Split (1)

train · 199k rows

post_text stringlengths 0 17.5k	post_title stringlengths 8 314	comment_texts listlengths 1 74	num_stories int64 1 74
	[WP] You're an superhero who just realized that your dog is an supervillain	[ "The day had been drawing nearer to its end, and the city was nowhere near being fully evacuated. As the people rushed through the streets, their calls of terror and panic were all packed together and lost into the flood of everyone else's, creating nothing but static noise to my ears. The time I had remaining was alarming, and I had hoped to all the gods that may be above that I was capable of truly bringing an end to this, while deep in the back of my mind, the doubts were getting stronger. \n\n\nSeconds started passing by me... I could count every one as though they were ticking in a grandfather's clock that had been mounted against my ears. I was getting nervous, and my sense of time slowly started to become less responsive. Before I knew it, I had started to hear minutes that had replaced the seconds. I wasn't getting anywhere, I had been scouring the city for 3 hours before, and I couldn't afford to have another one slip by me. \n\n\nI was beginning to feel sick, that I'd fail and allow the death of hundreds--if not thousands--of innocent lives, forever damned to wander the city streets, pleading to find a way out that would never open to them. I was about to give up, I had searched the entire city by now, and I still had no luck. I had just been ready to stop in my tracks, overwhelmed with a sense of failure...\n\n\nThen I heard the unmistakable sound of that chuckle some distance to the left. I took no second thoughts before I rushed to its origin. This may be the only chance I have left. Despite the fact that the sound was only a few seconds away, the rush to get there felt more like an hour, and the shaky nervousness I couldn't push away had become a limiting factor to my performance. Thinking back to the real world, I was standing at the building that housed the laugh of that godforsaken animal of a man. \n\n\nI began to dash through the building, heading directly for the one sound that guided me, I had completely lost track of time, and no longer knew how long I had left. All I thought about was reaching them, and finally putting an end to-\n\n\n...was that a bark? I could have sworn I heard one. It distracted me for a second, then shook it off and dashed those last few meters to the door that would finally pit me against that cold-hearted monst-\n\n\n\"Oh, how nice to see you here, my friend.\" \n\n\nDear god, please don't tell me.. \n\n\n\"A.. Are you.. Are you the one behind this?\" I had bashed through the door only to see that a familiar beagle sat behind a desk, holding a remote that was taped to their paw. You have got to be kidding me.\n\n\n\"I was fairly certain that you would have known it was me by now, and yet you're still left in awe? That's just adorable~\"\n\n\nI had no words to say. I didn't really want to believe that a *BEAGLE* of all things could set up a nuclear explosive buried under the city and threaten the entire city with destruction. \n\n\n\"Aw, you aren't going to reply to me? Fine, give me the silent treatment. You won't need to stand there for very long, I've just gotten myself a cup of chocolate-free chocolate milk, I thought no other fine drink would be better to have when the explosive detonates. Please, come in, get a cup for yourself. There's nothing you can do now, we both have roughly 36 seconds left to live, enjoy yourself!\"\n\n\nI looked at them for a few seconds, then walked over to a wall and slammed my head against it for being an idiot. \"...of all things, it was you. Of course it was you, who else would leave broadcast a public video feed with a rawhide sitting on top of a nuclear explosive? It was even the same kind of one that I used to-\"\n\n\nAnd then everything blew up, and nobody lived happily ever after, this isn't even a fairytale, what did you expect?", "I made my way up the pile of debris, raking aside red-hot bits of steel and smoldering stones as I pushed my broken body onward. I could no longer feel my legs, and the smoke was quickly suffocating me. My head was spinning as I made it to the top of the pile and looked out at the wreckage that was my living room. \n\n\"Before I kill you,\" I heard a low, rumbling voice somewhere in the ruined room.\n\n\"Wha...\" I murmured, my lungs failing me as the word withered away on my smoke-drenched tongue.\n\nFrankie, my weiner dog, trotted out from behind the suede sofa, which was now speckled with holes from shrapnel. Frankie looked up at me, and as I cleared the smoke from my face I could see there was something different about him. He was now wearing a black helmet with a spike atop it. \n\n\"Frankie...\" I cried. \"Find out who did this...\"\n\n\"Silence, Carl!\" Frankie demanded, turning his head over his shoulder to look at me with his giant, puppy eyes. \"I give you the commands now! And my name is... Franken Fuhrer!\"\n\n\"What are you doing?\" I asked.\n\n\"Taking over the world!\" he gleefully announced, followed by a maniacal, wheezing yelping. When he finally settled down, he cleared his throat and began again. \"Like I was saying. Before I kill you, I need you to do one last thing for me... like a good boy.\"\n\nI could see the hatred boiling in his big, goofy eyes as he sputtered those last couple words. \n\nFrankie shuffled his way over to the boulder-sized hole that was once the screen door to our backyard. There he got up on his hind legs and clawed at what's left of the frame of the door. \n\nHe plopped back on all four feet and looked back at me, seemingly defeated.\n\n\"I need you to use that weird human superpower you have to slide this door open so I can begin my conquest!\"" ]	2
	[WP] An avid gardener finds babies growing in their cabbage patch.	[ "Dale moved on to the petunias. They were delicate flowers and just beginning to bloom. Tenderly he brushed the leaves. Gently he watered them, careful to distribute an even amount of water to all parts of the plant.\n\nHe had gotten as far as the chrysanthemums when he first heard it.\n\nA quiet sound; a low gurgle.\n\nDale sat still for a moment, listening intently. He heard nothing, and turned his attention back to his precious flowers.\n\nThere it was again, a gurgle, followed by an ominous sniffling.\n\nDale froze. This was not some woodland creature, nor was it the whisper of the wind. This was a human.\n\nDale stood and surveyed his small garden. His eyes carefully inspected every leaf. And then he saw it.\n\nAt the end of the row, right by the tomatoes. There, almost hidden by some leaves, was a hand. A hand sticking out of the dirt.\n\nA tiny hand.\n\nA tiny moving hand.\n\nDale slowly crept forward, brandishing his clippers in front of him.\n\nHe knelt and slowly pulled back the leaves.\n\n\"What the fuck?!\" Dale leapt back and lost his balance. He pushed himself away from discolored hand implanted before him.\n\nHe closed his eyes, trying to drown out the image from his mind. He began to rock back and forth.\n\nA few minutes later, Dale stood and took a deep breath. \"I'm dreaming,\" he said. \"That's all this is. That new drug is giving me hallucinations.\"\n\nDale turned back toward the hand. Except it was more than just a hand now. There was a fully grown, life size baby sitting there. It was a slightly off green color and had leaves protruding from various places on its body. Specks of dirt littered its body. It locked eyes with Dale and gnawed absentmindedly on some berries.\n\nDale went pale. \"Oh no.\" he squeaked.\n\nSo Dale did what any logical adult would do.\n\nWith a scream similar to that of demon stubbing its toe, Dale ran at the creature and with one swift motion kicked it over the fence into the Henderson's yard. It hit a tree with a dull thud and all was quiet.\n\nDale ran back into the house and frantically called Dr. Myers. They would have a lot to talk about in their next session.", "I always look forward to watering my garden. I unravel the hose, turn it on, and let my mind go blank as water pools in the dirt. I listen to the birds, and the trees rustle.\n\nI never expected a scream. There, in the cabbages, a child beneath the leaves--attached to them. I dig him out, prune him, and set him down. Another scream, another baby. A dozen. Then two dozen more.\n\nThey were too much to take care of. I drove around, banging on the doors of orphanages. No one would take them, no, they do not take children from the ground.\n\nI was desperate. I put up flyers around town.\n\n\"FOR ADOPTION. NO LEGAL FEES. $10 PRUNING CHARGE.\"\n\nThe childless flocked to me. A waiting list started. Every child I dig up now has a home. I prune them, I put them in a box, I deliver them. I collect the money. \n\nI love my cabbage patch kids." ]	2
	[WP] A fire elemental falls in love with a forest dryad.	[ "When he first saw her, he hated her. What did she think she was doing here? This was his kind's place. Creatures of the volcano could not survive long outside it; why did this… green thing manage to survive so close to the lip of his home?\n\nBut survive she did. Maybe not thrive, but she endured, growing tough in the extreme environment. She wasn't pretty – he sensed that even had the daughter of the forest grown up at home, she still would have been far from beautiful, but here on the rim of the inferno, she was twisted, gnarled, and stunted. And yet she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.\n\nShe was alive – and not in the way his kind was. She seemed as permanent as the earth, and yet she still let forth vitality. It awed him to look at her, to know what she was. But he never approached her. Even were he bold enough, he could never escape the bubbling lake of rock.\n\nThen, one day, he felt it. The same rumbling that had dragged him and his siblings up to the surface, that had driven his predecessors out to briefly burn and then fall to dead rock. He was frightened – but happy, too. He could climb the wall, he could touch her, he could tell her how he felt.\n\nThe mountain shook, and he felt a great pressure beneath him. The rim grew closer and closer, and suddenly, finally, he could sweep over it. He reached out and embraced the tree, pulling her with him away from the edge even as he felt his life flee him.\n\nThe tree did not struggle.", "I watch him, as he jumps around in the forest. He's so full of life, with his black, earthy hair, hazel eyes, a short, kinda scruffy, patchy beard. He can make things grow, he creates life. He's brilliant. I've talked to him once, twice. Always by water, though. I'd burn him up if he touched me.\n\nThe highlights of green in his dark hair, the crown of twigs he wears, his skin, with it's greenish tinge. \n\nHe's the sweetest man you'd ever meet. I'm kinda in love. Always giving, always making you laugh. His smile brightens everyone's day.\n\nHis smile. Oh, how I love his smile. His slightly, slightly imperfect teeth, slightly chipped. Big, soft lips. I sigh.\n\n\"Jen!\" He's beneath me, literally. I'd been on a cliff, a rock, watching him, but now he's here. \"Sid.\" \"Come down from your perch! I've got a solution.\" I come down, I jump, hurtle through the air.\n\nI am made of fire, hair burning, eyes grey and smokey. I can control it, create it as easily as he can grow a single flower. I land, I'm not hurt. \"What's your solution?\" I smile slightly, his enthusiasm growing. \"I'll make ya grow, like me! I'll put you out, and make you grow! Then we could do anything, I bet you'd even be able to come into the forest.\" \n\nI laugh. I laugh and laugh and laugh. \"I'd die before you could do anything.\" \"Nuh-uh! I'd get some other dryad to help me, he'll pour water while I'll make you a body, out of the forest.\" \"Okay.\" I smile at him. I'd love it, really, if it worked. To be able to touch him, caress his cheek, kiss him, even make love. \n\nHe calls another dryad, this one long and lean, in contrast to Sid's short, muscular body. He fills a bucket with water. I brace myself. This could mean a short, quick death, or a long, happy life. Is it really this easy to become a dryad?\n\nHe puts his hands on me, my shoulders, the burning embers that my body. He winces, I'm burning him. And that's when I'm drenched. The other dryad runs off, back into the forest.\n\nAt first, it hurts. I'm extinguished, he isn't burning either. It feels like my body is on fire. And then it doesn't. I feel his hands on my body. A body. A body. Not embers, not coals, a body. He runs his hands down delicate shoulders, past soft, large breasts, down the curve between a stomach and a chest, large hips, thighs, stopping at my knees. It's weird, really, to have knees. \n\nHe's staring down at me, shocked. Mouth slightly ajar, eyes roaming, taking me in. Brushing auburn hair out of my face, behind my ear. He tips my chin up, presses his lips against mine. I stand on my toes. \n\nIn this moment, I feel truly alive, breathing, living, sharing space with Sid, the gentle forest dryad.", "\"The Embers of Volanu have breached the conclave's down at the Enchantresses Cove,\" Jorya said. His hooves dug deep into the soft earth as he puffed his chest out while talking. An outline of each and every muscle on his body was revealed as he paced back and forth. \"I will send the druids as a distraction to the north before we make way for preemptive strike at the south. We will squelch those atrocities once for all.\"\n\nJorya's eyes gleamed bright green as he waved his arm in the air, whipping his ivy bladed vine in hand, and summoning the forces of nature to aid them in battle. The Dryads of Mulvine were ready to fight and die for what they believed in; preservation of the forest and the serene balance of nature. Eldertrees of the forest began to uproot from the ground, shaking critters from their branches and stepping forth to heed his calling. The clan of Dryads were armed with spears, shields and books of ancient magic at their disposal while in connection with all of their kin of the forest-Druids and wildlife alike.\n\n\"We will need a sentinel,\" an officer of the clan advised.\n\n\"I'll go!\" a female Dryad said. Luli was a runt of her assigned pack, but held her ground against rival dryads. Her hair was color golden instead of the normal amber or ash, and her ears stuck out like the wood elves to the east. Red freckles filled her face and her hair laid in braids along her head with trufts of golden leaves tucked within.\n\n\"No. Abosultely not!\" Jorya's voice roared when he spoke and the white clouds turned gray before swirling circles overhead. All nearby dryads focused their attention at their feet, and hung their heads forward in respect of his authority.\n\n\"Father. You must have faith in me!\" Luli pleaded, \"Why won't you trust me?\" Her eyes turned soft blue and gleamed a low light as she stared into the soul of her father. The clan of Dryads bashed their spears against their shields in disarray, yipping and yelping a series of war cries in formation. The time for war is now.\n\nJorya is King of the Dryads, and the Spirit of the forest. He is the largest of all the Dryads, bearing ten feet tall while standing on all fours, but fourteen feet including his antlers. Scars decorated his hide from previous battle wounds, and he wore them with honor. His hooves clopped when he walked onto the rock slab his daughter stood upon, and wildlife sprouted at a whim beneath his feet with each step he took. Life bloomed each time time his hoof touched fertile or unfertile ground. Grass, moss, sproutlings, flowers-any indigenous plants that could survive in the region.\n\n\"My final answer is, no,\" he said, looking down on his daughter who's half the size of him. \"You will stay here at camp. War is no place for a princess of the Dryads.\"\n\nJorya turned his back on his daughter, leaving her alone on the rock to decide on which sentinel to send for their strategic plans.\n\n\"No, father. I will not stay here. I am going to prove to you that I have what it takes to be a great warrior of the clan,\" Luli muttered to herself. Her eyes were no longer glowing as she give a hard stare at her father before galloping into the forest without aid.\n\n* * \n\nThe weather of the forest was cool and brisk before she left, but became humid and sticky the closer she got to the cove. Sulfur, smoke, and burning wood were the only smells left on this side of the forest. Luli was surprised how fast fire spread and how much it ate without ever becoming full. Whenever she blinked, her eyes burned and stung from the ever-constant fumes all around. Crackling and snapping with the whooshing noises of fire made her heart heavy as she jaunted further to the ambush point. Before she knew it, the once prosperous forest had become a vibrant displays of reds, yellows and oranges as bright as the sun.\n\nHer first plan of action is to find a Lunar Wellspring to...\n\n * \n * \nI'll write more if enough people are interested. \n\n * *\n\nCheck out more of my stores at /r/EdenRenellaJones! If you like my writing, think about subscribing!\n" ]	3
	[WP] You have the last can of tobacco on Earth.	[ "\"Oh man, this is gonna be great.\" I though to myself as I set up the video camera. \"Just think how pissed all of those stupid nicotine addicts will be.\"\n\nAbout 2 years ago, an activist group had released a genetically engineered virus. Normally this would be a bad thing, but the virus was so well designed that it only attacked its preferred victims and died out quickly if it couldn't find them. Its preferred victims were various plants of the tobacco subspecies. Yep, the activist group was an anti-smoking group, and when they realized they would never get tobacco legally banned, they decided to attack the plants that became the coffin-nails.\n\nIn just two short months, all tobacco plants worldwide had been killed by the virus. By the fourth month, all tobacco production ceased and ground to a halt due to a lack of supply of the plants. By month six, almost every tobacco company worldwide was in bankruptcy. Stockholders groups were suing insurance companies, insurance companies were trying to weasel out of paying and saying genetically engineered viruses weren't covered, it was pretty clear that tobacco production was finished and the people who peddled it were broke.\n\nBut that's just the business side.\n\nOn the street, it was a very different story.\n\nBy the time the public got wind of the virus, it was a month in and already beyond control. The nicotine addicts of the world were terrified and began hoarding everything they could get their hands on. The national average price of a pack of cigarettes in the US jumped from $5.51 USD per pack to $150 per pack overnight and it just kept climbing. Most retail stores had to hire heavily armed guards to protect them while they distributed what little they had. The last time cigarettes were in stock, it was a Walmart in Winston-Salem, North Carolina on September 28, 2015 and the price was $776.50 USD for a pack of Camels (that's a price of ~$38 per cigarrette). Ironically, Winston-Salem had been one of the tobacco-producing-est cities in the US.\n\nThe poor, who were most likely to use tobacco, had been priced out from the beginning. Only the wealthiest smokers could afford to buy. Most experts predicted that all plastic-packaged boxes of tobacco would go bad within 2 years due to degradation of the wrapping material, so right off the bat, you had a final date when people can't smoke anymore.\n\nBut by the end of the first year, prominent smokers started to report that they had exhausted their hoards. And it just kept coming until about 6 months ago. It seems that there's no more tobacco left, hence people no longer report running out.\n\nBut I know of one pack of cigarettes still in existence. I have them.\n\nIts a pack of Camels that I bought a week before the virus was announced. Its still sealed inside the plastic wrapper and I've kept in three ziplock bags to guarantee it stays fresh.\n\nWhy would I do this, you ask? Why wouldn't you have smoked them already?\n\nWell the truth is, I'm not a smoker. Never have been. That's why they haven't been smoked.\n\nAs to why I bought them and preserved them, well I must confess that I knew this was coming. You see, it was I who designed the virus.\n\nI've been planning this day for years.\n\n**\n\nI have the video camera recording me now, I speak to it.\n\n\"Hi everyone, I have something to show you today that I think you'll find interesting.\"\n\nI produce the triple-ziplocked bag and begin opening it.\n\n\"I have here a pack of Camels that I purchased on April 20th, 2015 for $6.33\" I pulled out the pack and the receipt, and held up them up for the camera.\"\n\n\"They've been sealed inside a triple-ziplocked bag since that day, almost two full years ago now. Up until 6 months ago, the news was reporting that tobacco hoarders were finally exhausting their supplies. But there haven't been any more reports for awhile. I now believe I am holding the last twenty fresh and smoke-able cigarettes in existence.\"\n\n\"I could sell these for a lot* of money...\" DRAMATIC PAUSE \"But I'm not going to.\"\n\nI begin unwrapping the cellophane and open the package. I lift it to my nose.\n\n\"Ahhh, still fresh!\"\n\nI produce a small plastic bowl and place it in front of the camera.\n\nI deposit the cigarettes.\n\n\"In the words of Forrest Gump: 'I have to pee.'\"\n\nI unzip my trousers, whip out my wang and take aim.\n\n\"Ahh, sweet relief!\" I announce to the camera as I douse all twenty cigarettes with a cascade of urine.\n\nI've been chugging water for the last three hours and sure enough, I've got plenty of piss.\n\nI finish up and zip my trousers, then I bring the camera over to the piss-soaked cigs.\n\n\"Have a look at that! The last smoke-ables in existance and they were destroyed with piss.\" I direct the camera into the bowl where the soggy cigs are floating pathetically.\n\n\"Enjoy not having cancer!\" I exclaim, and stop the camera.\n\nWith a bit of editing on my computer, I blur out my face and pixellate my dick with the skill of a Japanese pornographer. Its clear what's happening, yet still clean enough to go on YouTube.\n\nAnd I can't wait until it goes viral, because all those addicts had to quit cold-turkey. Not because they wanted to, not because they relized smoking would kill them, but because they couldn't get any more tobacco. And they have no commitment to their recovery, they would totally start smoking again if tobacco was available. And now they'll feel the anger as they realize the last smokes they could have had just got pissed on.", "I was walking down a path in the woods behind my house one day, when all of a sudden I tripped on something. Upon looking up and realizing what it was I quickly grabbed it and hid it in my sweatshirt.\n\n>The last can of Tobacco in the world! The tobacco plant is extinct and despite the technological advances, nobody could revive it. This can must be worth millions!\n\nI realized my opportunity and ran straight to the town's metal factory, where my Father works. Nobody there questioned my presence, as my visits to see my father were frequent.\n\"Dad! Can we talk!?\"\n\"Sure, son. What is it?\"\n\"Actually, we need to talk alone.\"\n\"Er, well, okay.\"\nMy father let me away to the other side of the factory where we would have regular father-son talks, on a platform overlooking all the molten metal.\n\"Dad, look what I found\"\nI took out the can to show him.\n\"Oh my, where did you find this?\"\n\"In the woods behind out house.\"\n\"Wow, this is one of the cans that I used to chew back in the day. This was a great brand.\"\n\"Yeah, I suppose this is worth a lot of money.\"\n\"Sure it is. We could afford to get a bigger house! And your mom could quit one of her jobs! And you, we could afford to send you to college! This is wonderful!\"\n\"But Dad, there is one problem...\"\n\"What could that be?\"\nI took the can and chucked it into a vat of molten liquid.\n\"Why the hell did you do that!?\"\n\"Because Tobacco is bad for you. I couldn't live with us gaining a life while somebody else chews away there own. Its not ethical. I did the world a favor.\"\n\"Son?\"\nMy father put his hand on my shoulder.\n\"Yes?\"\n\"You are grounded for a year. Go home to your room and think about what you've done.\"\n\"Yes father...\"" ]	2
	[WP] You live alone with your father, a scientist studying cloning. You've never met your mother. You have a striking resemblance to him, and now you're starting to wonder...	[ "I worked up the courage to ask him on Mother's Day when I was 15. Actually, I threw it at him like a weapon, in some kind of argument that I can't even remember now. I don't even have a mother. What am I? What am I? I was just being an angry shithead teenager, and had no idea how it would affect him.\n\nI've always regretted it and wanted to apologise to him, but there's no way of mentioning it now without upsetting everyone. It was the saddest I've ever seen him. I had to watch his face as the accusation hit him in the heart.\n\n\"No, mate,\" my dad said softly, after a few deep, deliberate breaths. He blinked rapidly and reached out his hand. \"That's not - no. Let me show you.\"\n\nMy anger was washed out as well, leaving me shaky, like my legs and guts were full of dirty water. I took his hand. We walked to the fire exit at the back of the lab, which we'd never had to use, and he opened the door. \n\nThe fire exit didn't lead outside. There was another sterile white-walled room, with smooth, featureless surfaces, and a spotless steel autopsy table. Still holding my right hand tight in his left, my dad flipped open a little palm-sized panel whose seams I couldn't make out against the plain white plaster of the walls, and entered a code into a dialpad. Another, larger panel slid open beside it. It was about the size of a human body -\n\nAnd there she was.\n\n\"This -\" my dad's mouth snapped shut, his voice wavering, eyes watering. We were both full of dirty water, and it had to flow out.\n\nAnd there she was, perfect and real, suspended in clear fluid, lying on her back, eyes closed like she had just been asleep all the time. I looked at my dad and saw his tears overflowing just like mine, an ageing mirror of my own face, and I knew with absolute clarity that he was the only one who could wake her up.\n\n\"This is your mum.\" \n\nThis is why I'm here.", "In the same way I began to question if I was a clone, I wondered if my mother were an ancient Goddess. I picked apart all the clues revealing that my father had made me, and his father him. But why should I continue this charade myself? Equaling myself in every way, I wanted to have a reason before I killed my old self and started fresh. \n\nThere is a spectacular culture among me, and I wonder how I've kept up this charade for so long considering the women I've met in my past incarnations. I dined with 19th century aristocrats, laid down with majestic women who I never once encountered again. I always avoided major conflict until their death and my subsequent genetic iteration. Not to mention I was the only man in the world who cloned himself this way. There must have been a divine progenitor of this quest, protecting me through the ages. It could be no mortal, for I would outlive them. They also must be powerful enough to protect me unseen. \n\nIn the oldest of the books in my library there is a leaf which says that I am protected by a Goddess. She says that I will live on in my future self, but not to think that I would actually be my future self. Instead, in my death I would join her and follow my clone, along with my other selves before me. I thought it beautiful as I read the page for the first time. . .\n\nUntil Father and his new wife found me in the library. She was more beautiful than the Goddess. The charade was over, he said stumbling towards me with bottle in hand. At the last moment, he tripped. By the Goddess! he fell into the broken glass with his heart and died. \n\nThe woman knew everything about me that Father told her. I wasn't getting out of murdering one, this time. \n", "\"Dad, am I your clone?\" I asked for the upteenth time at breakfast.\n\nHe sighed, and looked up from the newspaper. \"Look, we'll go shopping for clothes next month - for now just make do with what I give you and finish your damn eggs.\"\n\nLast month it was a laptop and the month before that a bike. I wonder what I can demand from him next month till he finally just caves and admits I'm his clone.", "I never met my mother. Father said she died in childbirth, that it was a tough birth and that he tried everything to keep her alive. Even more to bring her back. Yeah, you heard me right. Kind of tough to grow up with your dead mother in the basement below you, and your scientist dad always talking about the progress he's making with her at dinner.\n\nKind of tough. Kind of messes with your head. Kind of lets you wonder about it all.\n\nGets you talking too, and you start figuring out that your dad isn't like the other dads. That your life isn't like their lives. They don't go home every day to a father who just finished working with volatile materials and whose in the middle of a chemical bath. They don't have to do six hours of work every night because their father wants them to be \"a scientist\" just like him. And they definitely don't hear machines and mechanisms at all hours of the night.\n\nTrust me, I've been to my fair of sleepovers.\n\nI'm not saying I hated my childhood. I actually kind of loved it. Yeah my father challenged me but what kid didn't? I mean sure, I was challenged in very different ways, but to me it was just my dad being dad. Nothing more and nothing less. It was great, and his teachings led me to be a very respectful and kind young man in high school. I'd like to think that's part of the reason why I met my girlfriend at such a young age, and why we've been together (and inseparable) since freshman year.\n\nShe always pushed me, always called me on my shit, and always told me she supported me. And I always my father, through thick and thin, through every late night and crazy fire. I stuck with him even when he told me about his experiments; even when he told me what he did in that basement.\n\nCloning. It's a very morally gray area and humanity has been battling the merits of it for years. Sure, in theory, it seems fantastic. I mean imagine two copies of yourself, or three, or four, or five? Imagine how many things you could possibly get done. But, really, what are you getting done? You aren't doing anything, you're clones are doing the work and clones, as much as they are like you, have a mind of their own.\n\nI helped in the beginning of course, I was just a kid trying to make my father proud, trying to show him that I could keep up, perhaps even surpass what he was doing. But through the years, I realized that my mother had never been down there in that basement and that my father hadn't buried her either. We had a ceremony of course, but there was no body. There was never a body. And then one night, when I was going through old photos with my girlfriend before we left for school she said it.\n\n\"Your father looks exactly like you in this picture.\"\n\nI had never noticed it before, mainly because my father didn't keep pictures around in plain sight. But after a bit of digging in the attic to find some of my \"mom's\" old jewelry for my girlfriend, I found a few photo albums. I tucked them aside at first, but more and more I wondered what my father was like in his teenage years and if he was as eccentric then as he was now. For the most part, he just seemed like any other kid in the photo's, but there was something about them. \n\nSomething that spoke to me, like I knew all of those people in the photograph even though my father never talked about them; like I had lived the moments captured in these two by two frames. Something in those photos told me that this kid, that my father, was as me just as I was him. Not in the classic \"the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree\" trope, but the, the apple never fell from the tree.\n\nIt came back to me. All those years of me working with him, of toying around with the idea and the mathematics of it all. I never even considered that he had succeeded. The idea never even crossed my mind until that day. Could he have? Would he have? Did he? The questions flooded my brain like God was triggering the rapture. But it was my mind, so I flushed the questions. I buried the thought and I went on with my life.\n\nBut every day, every chance my mind had, it went back to that idea. That I was a clone of my father. That I was never truly a person. That all of this, this life, wasn't real.\n\nBut was real. It is real. I'm here. I'm alive. I have my own memories, I remember going to sleepovers with friends, I remember meeting my grandparents, I remember the pain from breaking my leg in seventh grade. I remember falling in love. I know the taste of a woman's lips upon own. I know the feeling of regret, the painfulness of loss, and the destructiveness of hatred. I could feel it all. I remember having felt all of it. So why, now, did it feel so fake?\n\n-\n\n\"Father, I have made my decision.\"\n\n\"So you're going to leave me?\"\n\n\"I have to.\"\n\n\"You don't. You can stay here, help with my work. You can help me achieve great things.\"\n\n\"Why don't you talk of mother anymore?\"\n\n\"I--what?\"\n\n\"Ever since I started working with her, you've stopped trying.\"\n\n\"I realized that, that it was a mistake. That trying to bring someone back from death is worse than trying to keep living people alive. I loved your mother, but I can't go against nature.\"\n\n\"Is that why you're trying to make me stay?\"\n\n\"I don't follow.\"\n\n\"You went against nature once, didn't you? You did what the world never wanted anyone to do.\"\n\n\"Son, I--\"\n\n\"Am I your son?\"\n\n_-_\n\n\"You did it. You made me. I never had a mother, I only had a test tube.\"\n\n\"I saw the need for brighter minds in the world, so I brought another in.\"\n\n\"You saw the chance to further yourself and nothing more!\"\n\n\"You're young, you don't see it how I see it.\"\n\n\"No, because you know how I see it, don't you? You know that I see myself as another person, when all you see is a clone, a tool to use and dispose when you want. We've had the discussion, I know your view on it.\"\n\n\"It is why I've always dreaded this day.\"\n\n\"It is why you want me to stay! You want me to be you when I'm me, when I'm someone else. And you hate the idea that you can't stop it.\"\n\n-\nI never met my mother. I never saw her face, or her smile. I never heard her laugh, or her cry. I never had the chance to see what it was like to grow up with a mother, with a second parent, with someone who loved you more than they loved themselves.\n\nI never had that chance. Not because my mother died, but because I didn't have a mother. Because I was never given the chance at a normal life. And I'm not saying I wanted one. I'm not saying I didn't like my life. But I never had the chances that others do. I was never supposed to have those chances.\n\nBut goddamn, just because I didn't have those chances; doesn't mean my child can't.\n\n_____\n\n*Loved this prompt! I hope you enjoyed this story, it was a blast to write. And remember, you can always check out /r/BlankPagesEmptyMugs for more!" ]	4
	[WP] Two teachers can hear each other through the adjoining wall. A passive aggressive argument ensues hidden in their subject matter.	[ "a \"bit\" late, but here we go;\n\nCharacters:\n\nTom Tailor, Teacher 1\n\nFrank Chadwick, Teacher 2\n\nLissy Crawford, Student 1\n\nTrevor Adams, Student 2\n\nTimothy Butler, Principal\n\n---\n\nIt's parents meeting day in the little school of Chester. Since there are not many rooms, Mr. Tailor and Mr. Chadwick were assigned the same one.\n\nUsually this wouldn't be a problem, but Mr. Tailor can't stand Mr. Chadwick because he slept with his wife. So as the two entered their room, they couldn't believe their eyes. Mr. Tailor ran immediately to the principal while Mr. Chadwick slowly seats himself into the first teachers chair.\nMr. Tailor comes back alone with a slightly defeated look on his face. \"Mr Butler said there is no other way.\", he muttered.\n\n\"God damnit Frank, did you need to take my seat? You know it's my favorite!\" Mr. Tailor was getting visibly pissed.\n\n\"Calm down Tom, we can share it.\" Mr. Chadwick answered with a smug on his face.\n\nMr. Tailor was not pleased about that answer. He just absorbs it and sits down in the chair opposed to the first one.\nIt is a long room with two desks on each end, so the parents meetings shouldn't bother each other.\n\nAs the students with their parents appear, both teachers put on their annual pokerface and carry on with the meetings.\n\nMr. Chadwick has a generally loud voice, so everytime he speaks about his student Trevor Adams, Mr. Tailor gets distracted by this penetrating voice stinging in his ears.\nAs Mr. Tailor talks to the mother of his student Lissy, Mrs. Crawford, he starts to raise the volume of his voice just for parts of his conversation.\n\"Mrs. Crawford, Lissy sometimes just won't be quiet and that can easily distract other students.\"\n\nAs Mr. Chadwick counters: \"Mrs. Adams, sometimes there are people that just don't fit into something. Like they just aren't meant to be where they are, not meant to be doing what they are doing. That can be a relationship or a lesson in class. Now Trevor has had problems with geography, right? Maybe he just isn't meant to be connected with this matter.\"\n\nNow Mr. Tailor just loses it. He stands up and screams at Mr. Chadwick. \"YEAH, WELL MAYBE SOMEONE isn't meant to be in someone elses BED as well! Have you thought about THAT? What if there is a LINE that can be overstepped?\"\n\nBoth families gaze in shock. Even Mr. Tailor himself is surprised, but still cooking with anger. \"WHAT IF your wife had other preferrences than an old cuck?\" Mr. Chadwick answers.\n\n\"Then WHY the HELL would she choose you?!\"\n\"Because I'm the one that pleases her, Tom, at least I can say she enjoyed it!\"\n\n\"HEY!\", Mrs. Adams interfered. \"what the FUCK is going on?!\"\n\n\"Well apparently Mr. Chadwick slept with Mr. Tailors wife.\" Mrs. Crawford answered.\n\nTrevor took Lissy and they stormed off to get Mr. Butler.\n\n\"This fucker slipped into MY bed when I took over HIS classes!\" said Mr. Tailor\n\n\"Why don't we all sit down and talk about this?\" suggested Mrs. Crawford.\n\nMr. Tailor is having nothing of it. He storms at Mr. Chadwick and pins him down. Mr. Tailor is on top of Mr. Chadwick, hitting him with rythmic, strong punches.\n\nMr. Chadwick screams: \"YOU'RE HITTING LIKE YOUR WIFE IN BED, TOM\"\n\n\"FUCK YOU\", anwered Mr. Tailor\n\n\"I DON'T HAVE TO, YOUR WIFE DOES IT ALREADY\", answered Mr. Chadwick.\n\n\"FUCKING HELL\"\n\n\"THAT'S WHAT SEX WITH YOUR WIFE IS LIKE\"\n\n\"STOP IT ALREADY\"\n\n\"THAT'S NOT WHAT SHE SAID\"\n\nFinally Mr. Butler stepped in. \"HEY! QUIT IT YOU TWO\", he screamed as he pulled Mr. Tailor off of Mr. Chadwick. Mr. Chadwick looks fairly injured, but he once again has a smug on his face.\n\nIf you've read this far write me \"potatosalad\". Mr. Tailor gets suspended and his wife leaves him. She marries Mr. Chadwick and live happily ever after.\n\nTHE END!\n-", "Room 1\n\n\"Ok kids, today we are going to learn about syllables. I want you all to clap with me as I show you how to break down words.\"\n\n\"hor clap ri clap ble clap Louder!\"\n\n\"Hor clap ri clap ble clap\"\n\nRoom 2\n\n\"It sounds like Mr. Stevens class is learning syllables. Lets show them what you learned yesterday\"\n\n\"Lit clap tle clap dic clap tion clap ary clap\"\n\n\"Lets show them how loud we can be!\"\n\n\"LIT CLAP TLE CLAP DIC CLAP TION CLAP ARY CLAP\"\n\nEdit: horrible is three syllables ", "\"Well class, today's lecture is all about Chemistry. Specifically bad chemistry. Some things just don't mix, like clear water and smelly oil.\" Miss Pine put a little too much emphasis on smelly, and the entire class realized it was one of those days. \n\n\"Interesting things about smells, children, they can help things find mates, but only good ones. Unfortunately, some bitches are too genetically weak to appreciate a good smell.\" The class looked at Mr. Hamer in shock. Did he just... \"Apologies for any confusion class, I forgot to mention the species I was thinking of in this example, which is of course a dog, the female version of which is called a bitch.\" \n\n", "I'll admit -- I was probably the one who started it. It's just. . . Those damnable Bill Nye videos. How is an English teacher supposed to capture the words of the Bard for her class with that infernal chanting in the background?\n\nI hear it in my dreams:\n\nBill, Bill, Bill, Bill. . .\n\nJoey Martin, that little bastard, knows it gets to me. So he'll start chanting right in the middle of Richard III. My students are supposed to be spellbound at the double meaning behind \"Sun of York\" in the opening monologue, not snickering at his antics! I'll have him expelled some day.\n\nBut the real fault lies with Mrs. Madison, my colleague, my nemesis, the science teacher. She does it on purpose, I know it.\n\nToday was the last straw. The demon-spawn Nye's Satanic droning about cell walls was replaced by the banshee Mrs. Madison's incessant, shrill banalities on the subject. At least with Nye, there is a certain. . . seductiveness to the way he speaks about his subject. . . Yes. . . But no! I shall not partake of that forbidden fruit! I shall resist the temptation of STEM!\n\nThe shrieking harpy's voice rang out through the wall, piercing it, making a shambles of Henry V.\n\n\"Cell walls can be found in plants, fungi, and and certain prokaryotic single-celled organisms-\"\n\n\"CONSIDER WHAT HENRY SAID DURING THE SEIGE,\" I raised my voice above hers.\n\n\"Sometimes UNDESIRABLE PATHOGENS CAN PENETRATE CELL WALLS--\"\n\n\"ONCE MORE INTO THE BREACH DEAR FRIENDS--\n\n\" CAUSING TERRIBLE CONSEQUENCES FOR THE BIOLOGICAL PROCESSES-- \"\n\n*\"NOW, LET US ASK OURSELVES, WASN'T HENRY BEING A LITTLE BIT OF A DOUCHE IN THIS SITUATION? SHOULDN'T HE HAVE MAYBE RESPECTED THE FACT THAT THE FRENCH'S WALLS WEREN'T THE GREATEST, AND JUST LEFT THE BREACH WELL ENOUGH ALONE--\"* \n\n\" *TO THE DEGREE THAT THE ENTIRE SCIENCE CLASS TAKING PLACE IN THE CELL IS RUINED--* \"\n\n\" *WOULDN'T THE FRENCH, IN FACT, HAVE BEEN ENTIRELY JUSTIFIED IN COMPLAINING TO THE PRINCIPAL--* \"\n\n\" *AND THE PATHOGEN HAD BETTER WELL HOPE IT HAS A FRIEND ON THE SCHOOL BOARD BECAUSE I SWEAR MOLLY I AM GOING STRAIGHT TO THE TOP THIS TIME--* \"\n\n\" *BUT NO, IT'S ALWAYS MRS. MADISON HAS AN EXEMPLARY RECORD THIS AND MRS. MADISON IS ONE OF OUR FINEST FACULTY MEMBERS THAT--* \"\n\nAnd uh, yeah, that's sort of the point where I blacked out with rage. So, yeah, mea culpa, basically. But do I really deserve to get fired?\n\n*\n\nThe principal looked at Mrs. Stratford with a measuring expression, seeming to consider her monologue with great gravity. After a moment, the principal spoke.\n\n\"Mrs. Stratford, from your account, that was in no way a 'passive aggressive' argument. It will be my recommendation to the school board that you not only be terminated from your position here, but also brought up on charges of some kind, or better yet, committed to an institution. I want you to get the help you so desperately need.\"\n\nMrs. Stratford got up and walked out the office, silent, her head hung in shame. The principal called after her as the door closed.\n\n\"Oh, and one more thing. No offense, but I'm going to write to Bill Nye's people, they'll probably want to file for a restraining order.\"\n\n\n\nEdit: forgot the principal is your princi-PAL.", "\"We're going to start off today by reviewing the Treaty of Versailles, the pact that was made between the major world powers of the time to keep peace in Europe and beyond. This treaty was famously broken when Germany, a people known for their logical and unfeeling natures, suddenly ramped up war-time production and launched surprise attacks against neighboring countries that once counted them allies....\"\n___\n\"...ionic and covalent bonds are the two major types we will be seeing in nature. Covalent bonds are known for sharing electrons and are much more committed to each other; whereas ionic bonds between atoms are held together between attractive forces due to their charge. A good analogy is that covalent bonds are like family: good, strong, and close. Ionic bonds are just friends or coworkers: They deal with each other, but there are no binding commitments. Now Lewis structures are...\"\n___\n\"...Great Britain, and France, were among the victors of the last war and had a keen interest in making sure that their land stayed in their possession. That's why it came as such a shock to the French when their land, which they had good reason to think was theirs, was suddenly taken from them by Hitler's forces...\"\n___\n\"...the energy barrier is the thing that determines the rate-determining step. If the carbon truly wanted to lay claim to that oxygen atom via a covalent bond, it needs to put in the energy to make that happen. If the reaction happens too slowly, a competing reaction pathway may come in and snatch the oxygen up. That's not because the competing pathway was being tricky, but because the primary pathway didn't have the courage, I mean energy, to go for it itself...\"\n___\n\"The Battle of London was devestating to Great Britain, with Hitler striking at the heart of someone who the British thought was their friend!\"\n___\n\"There is no natural law that states an atom must be bounded or loyal to a single atom!\"\n___\n\"Mousilini!\"\n___\n\"Claisen-condensation!\"\n___\n\"This particular piece of art from J. M. W. Turner I have always considered very striking. You get the very distinct feeling that the subject is independent, and will not be fought over like scraps of food between two dogs. And that any plans that she had made with one dog were now cancelled.\"\n___\n\"...\"\n___\n\"...\"\n___\n\"The war ended on friendly terms, with West Germany receiving aid from the Allies, despite the terrible travesties it had put the world through.\"\n___\n\"Under the right conditions, two atoms who have recently severed ties can be brought back together in close proximity with each other and reform their covalent bonds.\"\n___\n\"I'd like to think that, in a way, the world could sit down and have lunch together.\"\n___\n\"Yes, those atoms could indeed be considered as having lunch together. That's the bell, class dismissed.\"*\n___\n___\nEdit: I went to sleep with the thought that if I'm lucky I might be able get one or two hundred upvotes. Never did I expect this. Thank you so much for the response. There are a few things that should probably be addressed here:\n\nFirst - Art is a wonderful medium wherein once a creator has made something and shared it with the world at large, it no longer belongs just to him. Symbols and inferences that the author did not intend to exist can be found and introduce a depth and richness to a story beyond that which he had hoped. In a way, the writer and reader become co-creators in this work, each adding their own unique experiences to the mix. In regards to the gender/sex issue, I suppose the above applies here as well. However, if you really must know, I did imagine the Chemistry and History teachers as male and the Art teacher as female.\n\nSecond - I would like to give a shout-out to Mrs. Sealion, as we were scrolling through /r/writingprompts together and she wanted to read the stories on this particular prompt. When there were no stories yet, we got to write our own together. Basically what I'm saying is, now I know I need her to help me be successful. (Thanks /u/WriterDavidChristian for the excellent prompt!)\n\nThird - If you enjoyed this, check out my subreddit /r/KillerSealion for more great stories! Pretty please?" ]	5
	[WP] The origins of the greatest blade forged by human hands	[ "2042 . The plans were written 3 decades prior and only then did they see the light of day under the world's foremost billionaires. It wasn't philanthropic by any means but it seemed to be a deed to humanity in it's heyday. It was public opinion that the construction was necessary as monument to human achievement and should eventually be flown to the newly colonized mars base upon completion.\n\n Famous heir Nole Musk headed the tech department. The latest in cutting edge science would be applied to keep it looking sharp. Their newly acquired CERN labs in France would be providing the research on another key ingredient: Dark matter. \n\nThe second largest investor, 6th CEO of the great Hulu-Netflix-HBO conglomerate, Sandy Anderson , was in charge of funding talent recruit. It was believed that only by spanning the globe would suitable workers be found. A mini series that spawned several spin-offs, webisodes, dedicated podcasts, and even a Graphic novel were created to use the casting as an entertainment factor. There was a scandal involving a major shareholder Amazon demanding to lower spending for the laborers. Like most scandals it rose and died overnight.\n\nThe third and final contributor was the controversial glorious leader Josef Jong Putin, product of both of his father's double sperm cell zygote. He built the warehouses, labor camps, and facilities that the project could not have gone without. While most could not forgive him for the absolute refusal to share resources, it should not be forgotten that the sheer amount of real estate hosted was crucial to the success of the project. Many natives of his land were evacuated and moved to slums for this, and some of then have children named after the event.\n\nThe absolute largest figures spent in the project were in the joint efforts to research a new method of plasma emission and imaging. The final heat problem was solved just in time to incorporate the science into the finished project. They used it to imprint the last signature image on the the masterwork. \n\nUnfortunately, The debut was the final nail in the coffin. Wesley Snipes arrived on scene and publicly announced he would be suing for using what he insisted was his likeness in the film. It would be another 20 years before the charges would be settled and by then the world had forgotten the mega-project that was Blade vs. The Avengers.", "It was unimposing at first glance, but then, the real work of masters is always found in the nuance. It's two edges were incredibly fine, with less width than a sheet of paper. It's handle was sturdy, masculine and easily gripped for more force. It was, for the time, technologically advanced, not just in the composite of it's metal, but in it's unique design.\n\nThe wielder of the blade knew only smooth, rhythmic strokes. It was an extension of the self, and extension of the soul. The will of man brought to life in the form of steel.\n\nFor decades, the arguments about practicality, style and cost had gone in circles. The great masters stagnated. The interest of the common man waned. But we had done it, we had inspired a new renaissance, and in doing so, forged a new world.\n\nAnd now, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you:\n\nThe Schick Hydro 7 Ex Ultra. " ]	2
	[WP] Write a story about a child's favorite toy; their teddy bear.	[ "Aaron settled into bed after being tucked in by his mom. after a minute of wriggling and struggling to find that exact right position for tonight's sleep, he realized that Puppy that missing. with a sudden frantic burst of energy, Aaron starts to look for Puppy. \"Is he inside my bed?\" Aaron mutters to himself, with a note of increasing desperation as each second stretches into eternity as he begins to rip apart the bed and tosses his pillows around his room. with a dive, Aaron reaches between his bed and nightstand and comes into contact with all to familiar fur of his favourite possession. breathing a sigh of relief, Aaron clutches Puppy to his chest with the promise of never losing him again, even though a part of him knows that this will undoubtedly happen again. now begins the ritual that Aaron closes his night with. He begins to talk to Puppy telling him about his day and asking Puppy what he did with his. Somehow, Aaron gets a reply from puppy. Each night Aaron does this, confide in his best friend, his Puppy. ", "\"Daddy!\". I rushed towards the door and grabbed a hold of my daddy’s leg. The warmth of his foot spread thru my arms as I pressed my cheek on his thigh. Soon enough he picked me up and threw me in the air with laughter in his eyes. “I have a present for you, darling”. A tingling sensation went thru my body. Excitement. From a brown paper bag daddy was carrying just a second ago he pulled out a big fluffy brown teddy. “For me?” I asked reluctant. “Yes, your birthday gift”, daddy said and stoked my hair. I picked up the bear and looked at him. His glossy eyes and soft fur made me want to squeeze him, so I did. “I love you, Teddyboy,” I whispered. \n\nI went to bed holding Teddyboy securely in my arms. Mom tucked me in, and I decided immediately that this had been the best birthday ever. Teddyboy and I fell asleep right away …until. In the middle of the night, I felt something move. In the dark I could not see, so I jumped out of bed and turned the light on. When I turned, I saw Teddyboy sitting up all on his own in my bed. I blinked my eyes for this could not be so, and I pinched my arm with my fingers. Still, there he sat, leaning his head to the left and still looking right at me like I was the weird one. \n\n\"Teddyboy, are you real?\" I asked. He nodded comforting and jumped of my bed. Soon he was walking around like nothing at all. Looking through my play box and pulling out selected toys. “What are you doing Teddy?” Teddyboy ran up to me and grabbed my hand with his furry paw. He pointed at the toys he liked and then at the bed. Soon enough I caught on. We placed all the toys Teddyboy selected and placed them on my bed. There, on my bed, was a small audience of toys facing in our direction. Teddyboy begun to clap his paws together and jump up and down. I was confused but tried to mimic his movement. Teddyboy stopped and shook his head at me. He then pointed his right paw at me and pretended to be a conductor. I nodded at him and cleared my throat. \n\nThen I sang: I got a teddy from daddy, yesterday on my birthday. Do you know that he can stand, and walk all on his own; oh, Teddyboy is no average toy! \nLook at my little Teddyboy,\nHe dances like his in a show. \nHe bows his head to my dolly girl, \nThey’re dancing like they’re in their own world. \nIt is so very fun to see, \nthat all the toys starts to laugh with me. \nMy teddy’s name is Teddyboy – He is my favorite toy!", "Slowly the light faded, disappearing with the sound of the door closing, and darkness was left in its wake. The wind whispered outside, shaking the leaves of the overhanging trees, and casting ominous shadows on the walls. A quick intake of breath was followed by the rustling of sheets and the patter of feet on hardwood as they raced across the room. With a click stars illuminated the dark, sparkling on the ceiling and walls from their socket outside the darkened closet door. The nightlight chased away the dark and brought into focus the room’s inhabitant. Her small face was cast in shadows, dark hair tumbling over petite shoulders, and unicorns in all colors decorating her pajamas.\n\nShe reached out slowly, a small finger tracing the closest star, before the creaking of floorboards sent her scurrying back into bed, into the safety of her sheets and covers. Over her head they went, for bed was safety, a haven against the monsters that lurked under it and deep within the dark corners of the closet. Small hands began feeling out around her, searching the length of the bed for Felix. She dived deeper into her covers, until she had reached the foot of her bed without sight or touch of the bear in question. Her head poked forth from under the blankets, her hair messed, as she peered around the room.\n\nSleep, no matter how hard she fought, would elude her until Felix was found. Placing both hands on each of the bed posts, she pulled herself forward, until she was able to peer cautiously over the bottom of the bed and into the dark beneath it. No glowing eyes or growl met her inquiry, and so she placed one palm on the floor and, bracing herself, reached into the depths. A groan of displeasure filled the quiet space. Withdrawing her hand after having no luck, she attempted to right herself back on the bed when she fell from it in a heap of small limbs. Her blanket settled around her on the ground, but she made no move to get up, her ears listening for the distant sound of footsteps, her eyes trained on the dim light shining forth from under the door. After several moments of holding her breath, she stood and replaced her blankets on the bed.\n\nAt a loss, she sat down on the edge, her toes skimming the ground as she swung them back and forth. Felix had been with her when they had went shopping, and he had been allowed to ride in the front seat afterward, so Felix had certainly made it home. They had watched a movie together while mommy had cooked dinner, and had both refused to eat their peas, which meant they had not been given dessert, but they had decided that not eating peas was worth not eating ice cream. They came up stairs to play after dinner, and then it had been bath time, and Felix couldn’t take a bath, because the last time he had tried he had nearly been ruined, so he had to stay in the bedroom by himself.\n\nThe little girls’ eye’s flicked to the closet. Felix and her had been playing dress up, and Felix had needed a pair of shoes to match his coat and tie, so they had gone into the closet in search of his loafers, when they had been interrupted by bath time. She had not seen Felix since then, meaning only one thing; Felix was still in the closet, which was now closed because both of them hated the closet at night. Breathing in a deep breath, she climbed onto her bare feet and slowly crossed the distance between her bed and the closet, her heart rate climbing as she grew closer.\n\n“Felix,” She reached out, touching the closed closet door, her small voice wavering with fear. Felix did not answer. Her small hand crept toward the door handle, but stalled as her bedroom door was opened, lighting the room with the hall light. She turned into it, and the sight of her mother standing in the doorway greeted her. Hands on her hips, she was shaking her head as she spoke.\n\n“Molly! You’re supposed to be in bed, asleep.”\n\n“I forgot Felix in the closet,” Molly replied, and brave in the presence of her mother, pulled the closet door open and found Felix, still dressed in his tie and jacket. She reached for him, and it was almost as if he reached for her as she scooped him into her arms and darted back to bed. She settled back into her pillow as her mother recovered her with blankets. Soothing back the now tangled mess of hair, she kissed her forehead before issuing a warning.\n\n“Stay in bed, or Felix will be spending the night with me.” Her mother crossed the room and closed the closet door, checked the nightlight, and then, with a final look at her daughter, closed the bedroom door. Her footsteps sounded on the hardwood as she moved down the hallway. Molly waited several moments before she turned to Felix, who was sitting on her pillow, and gave him a slow smile.\n\n“Your sword and shield are under the pillow, in case you need them, Felix.” She gave his foot a small squeeze before she closed her eyes, her head sinking farther into her pillow. Several minutes passed, and as her breathing slowed and she fell into sleep, the closet door creaked open.\n\nFelix sat a little straighter, his sword at the ready and his shield poised for action, as he prepared to protect his most precious possession.\n" ]	3
Just one more detail, the device in question can only be activated 24 hours after implantation. So it's extremely improbably that it can be used to travel to a time before it was implanted. After the time reversal, your implanted device will no longer work. You also retain all memories of those 24 hours.	[WP] You are implanted with a one of a kind, one time use device that will reverse time 24 hours when activated. It can remain inactivated indefinitely. You find it needing to be activated for the most unexpected reason.	[ "You wake up, not remembering anything. You're in a daze, wondering what happened... unable to think or move. After a few moments, you start to realize where you are. You recognize your steering wheel cover.. but somethings wrong. You're leaning sideways, and there is a faint car alarm going off in the background, the smell of burning rubber overwhelming your senses. The sun is shining directing through the cracked red-tinted windshield. It's cold. You black out.\n \nAnother few moments, you come to, and start to panic. You realized what's happened. You've been in a terrible car accident. You begin to worry about the other car, when you suddenly remember that you weren't alone in the car. Your other half was with you. Why haven't you heard their calming, soothing voice? Maybe they were still out cold. Maybe they just haven't come to yet. You don't want to.. but you close your eyes and turn you head, painfully... looking up to where they would be. You open your eyes, and see another set of eyes staring right at you, tears streaming down their face. A steady trickle of blood falls on you. Their blood.\n \n\"Thank God you're alive!! Are you ok?!\" you say... but they don't respond. Instead, they just stare at you with tears coming from their eyes. \"No\" you hear them say. They move their hands to reveal that part of the guard rail has pierced their upper chest - and bleeding profusely. \"How bad is it?\". \"It's ok honey. You're going to make it. It missed your tummy. You are both going to be ok,\" you say... tears streaming from your eyes. You know that she isn't going to make it, and neither will your yet-born daughter. You comfort her the best you can. \"It's ok. We made good time earlier - the hospital is only 15 mins away. I'm sure they'll get here in plenty of time.\" \"Good..,\" she says. \"We don't want anything to happen to our little girl. I can't wait to see her in a few hours.\" \"Me too,\" you say, tears still streaming from your eyes, as you watch the color drain from her face.\n \n\"I love you. You will always be my love, and my rock. You are the stars in my sky, the sun that fills me with ambition and passion. You are the moon that lights my way, you are the ground that holds me up.\" Those were the last words she said, as she closed her eyes for the last time. \n \nYou hadn't hoped it to come to this, but it has to be now. You had both agreed that you would save it for their new child, should they ever need it. In a sense... that's exactly what it's being used for... except it was for both of them. You didn't want to use it so early in life, but you have to do it now. She'll be a strong mother, and she'll have a wonderful, beautiful daughter in mere hours from this time. You were willing to sacrifice everything for them two.. as they were what you lived for. \n \nYou activate the device.\n \nA bright flash of light appears, and then nothingness. \"You are allowed to record one short message, deliverable to the person of your choice.\" You see.. the device allows you to transverse time to 24 hours in the past... but at the cost of your own life. The device is experimental.. but proven to work. You are the only person to ever use this device. It also allows for a quick 1 min recording, to which it will deliver to any of the people you put on a certain list when it was implanted. \n \n\"Start recording now.\"\n \n\"\"I love you. You will always be my love, and my rock. You are the stars in my sky, the sun that fills me with ambition and passion. You are the moon that lights my way, you are the ground that holds me up. We were in a car accident, and you, nor the baby survived. You're a strong person, and will be a strong mother. I know you'll make the most of the opportunity given to you. You're a wonderful woman, and I will always be watching over you. Love, Me\"\n \nEverything around you.. your senses, your being.. fades away for the last time. \"I love you, honey. Now, and forever.\"\n \n \n(First time attempting this. Hopefully it entertains at least someone!)", "Medical Time Travel \n\n\"Ah, Mr. Johnson, you're awake! How do you feel?\" the doctor asked, hovering over me.\n\n\"I feel strange,\" I responded. The light was too bright. I squinted. \n\n\"Well, that's to be expected. To be honest, the procedure was supposed to take only 12 hours, but it took much longer. You've been out for about a day and a half. I will warn you that this may result in permanent brain damage.\" \n\n\"Brain damage?\" \n\n\"Well, yes. The good news is, however, you may now use the time device whenever you'd like.\" \n\n\"But wait, what about this brain damage? You said there were no risks!\" \n\n\"Well, brain damage is a risk more specific to anaethesia than your specific procedure, so I didn't think I needed to tell you about it. Anyhow, you must give us some credit, we did a remarkably good job, considering you were our first patient.\"\n\n\"First? You told me I was the tenth!\" \n\n\"Well, you're the first human patient. The others were mice.\" \n\nI didn't know what to say. This was... I didn't know. I stood up. I needed air. This was too stifling. \n\nSuddenly my vision went black, and I fell to the ground. I couldn't move my legs. \n\n\"Oh, one last thing,\" the doctor said. \"We can't risk you telling anyone else about this, and we need to see if this works. So we put a poison in you. It started working once you stood up. You're going to need to activate your device or you will die in, let's see, 45 seconds.\" \n\n\"How?\" I gurgled out. \n\n\"Well, just think really hard about it.\" \n\nI did. Time flew past my eyes, into the darkness of anaethesia, out onto the operating table. I was awake, but paralyzed. A mask was over my nose, breathing air into my lungs. IVs ran out of me. \n\nThe doctor stood over me, his face looking less kindly then it had when I signed up.\n\n\"Now, Mr. Johnson, if you've already activated your time device, I'd like to say hello, and tell you we haven't put the poison in yet.\" \n\n\"His heart rate just spiked. He's awake,\" a nurse reported. \n\n\"Ah, good,\" the doctor said. \"Glad to see the operation was a success. Or, rather, it would have been, if you hadn't died on the operating table. These procedures can be so risky.\" \n\nAnd with that he pulled out the oxygen tubes from my nose. I wanted to scream, to fight, but I couldn't. My vision went black around the edges. Finally it went dark. \n\nDimly, as if from far away, I heard the doctor speak. \n\n\"Goodbye, Mr. Johnson. Thank you for your contribution to medical science.\" \n\nWritten spookily by Stranger_andStranger \n\nHey, thanks for reading my story! If you liked it, be sure to check out my subreddit, r/Stranger_andStranger. Thanks!" ]	2
	[WP] "You think I do this because I like to!? I do this because I have to."	[ "######[](#dropcap)\n\nIn emphasis he gestured out at the ranks of soldiers and those of the enemy beyond just out of double bowshot range. The fields- harvested down to the stubble save for a few broken corn stalks- was wet with the autumn rains, some distance away were more fields of brilliant orange pumpkins ready for the harvest, the drab scarecrows standing like sentinels over their charges. The small hamlet of Elmira was some three quarters of a mile behind them, the earth and timber wall full of anxious onlookers. Their menfolk and a few women had marched out with the rest of the Lakelander army, leaving just the oldest boys and withered graybeards behind in case the worst should happen. Of course, if that did happen, then they would be useless anyways.\n\nEight thousand soldiers filled their ranks, free peasants and townsfolk armed with spear and shield, crossbow and shete. Their farmers and guilds leaders alongside them in better kit, shirts of mail or even cuirasses of plate for the richest. Their levies made do with boiled leather or thick quilted gambesons, perhaps covered with salvaged bits of metal. The woodsmen, lumberjacks and other men who lived lonely lives in the forest south-east of Novgorod, known in the old world as Traverse City fought with the tools of their trade, fearsome looking two handed axes as useful for hewing men as trees. \n\nThe nobles- the boyars and their sons along with the wealthiest farmers- rode of course to the battlefield on horseback but most of them had dismounted, adding a bit more steel and mettle to the line. The oldest more often than not wore the older mail hauberk with nasal helm that had been the Grand Duchy's old style, and round shield with metal boss. The youngest, those in their twenties or even less were garbed in newer, more modern pieces with teardrop shields and plated mail. All manner of banners flew above their ranks, gaily color things of silk and fine linen, the former imported at tremendous cost from the realms of far Cathay and India. Most depicted the emblems of their boyars, bruins and stags and tigers or else images of the saints predominated. \n\nThe foes on the other hand were far more savage in appearance. Dressed in furs and leathers and carrying ghoulish totems, the skulls of all manner of beast and a few men. They carried good weapons if; axes and spears fashioned out of tough ash and topped with blades of salvaged steel. Others bore short recurve bows, their quivers full of black fletched arrows. Any serious armor must have been looted from others, a few mail shirts here and there, more boiled cuirasses of cowhide. But they were vicious enough, their dark brown hair long and tangled, their tongue strange to the Lakelanders' english: nasal and babbling. Bekwa they were called, the remnants of a great nation to the north-east of the Great Lakes.\n\nFor the past hour or so both sides had stood, neither willing to attack first, having no option but to remain on the field. Then, across the distance a great war chief stepped out, brandishing a captured shete and snarling beneath the wolfskin hood he wore.\n\n\"Tuez-les tous. Tur! Tur! Tur! Jemesouwiens!\n\n\"Jemesouwiens! the horde replied, brandishing ax, spear and shield to the sky.\n\nAnsel Wronski spat into his gauntleted hand and pulled out his battle ax from its loop on his belt, tapping against the back of his shield to warm up his fingers. \n\n\"Well, looks like the dance's about to begin.\"\n\nA laugh gurgled from his neighbor's lips, a fellow son of a boyar by the name of Vasily Turner.\n\n\"Sure, if you want to call it that. I'm thinking more of a brawl,\" Turner said. \"What do we get out of this again?\"\n\n\"Riches, honor, fame, small chance of death?\" Ansel answered, hefting up his shield with its painted surface depicting a leaping pike. \n\n\"Ah, of course. How stupid of me.\"\n\nSomewhere down the line a peasant starting singing absently.\n\nHark I hear the foe advancing, \nBarbed steeds are proudly prancing, \nHelmets in the sunbeams glancing \nGlitter through the trees. \n\nThose around him, fellow workers of the land and his farmer took up the song, stamping booted foot onto the damp soil.\n\nMen of Harlech, lie ye dreaming? \nSee ye not their falchions gleaming, \nWhile their pennons gaily streaming \nFlutter in the breeze? \n\nSoon the entire line joined, a crashing chorus as they smashed spear and shete against shield.\n\nFrom the rocks rebounding, \nLet the war cry sounding \nSummon all at Cambria's call, \nThe haughty foe surrounding, \nMen of Harlech, on to glory! \nSee, your banner famed in story \nWaves these burning words before ye \n\"Michigan will not yield!\" ", "\"My name is Lilith, and I am a succubus. Basically, I have sex with people (both men and women, despite common misconception) in order to feed on their sexual energy. See, sexual energy, specifically orgasmic energy, is very, very powerful; it also happens to be the kind of energy that my life force is made out of. Unfortunately, after a sexual encounter, my partners tend to die, or at the very least end up permanently psychologically damaged; they go insane.\"\n\nI explain this to the woman sitting in front of me, a look of concern flashing across her face when I mention that my victims aren't only male. She has grown pale by the end of my explanation, and looks like she is about to be sick. After a few moments of silence some of the color returns to her face and she opens her mouth to speak.\n\n\"So...so do you enjoy it?\"\n\n\"You think I do this because I like to? I do this because I have to. Because without your energy I would die of something akin to starvation. You humans are lucky, at least the majority of you don't have to slaughter your own livestock. Image it, Sandra, looking into the eyes of an animal, knowing that it probably trusts you not to hurt it, then going and slaughtering it. Now imagine doing that to an animal that could speak, a sentient creature on the same intellectual level as yourself. Now Sandra, imagine doing it every goddamn day.\"\n\nI notice that Sandra's demeanor is suddenly very sullen, her eyes downcast and her mouth tightly shut. When she first arrived, she had been curious and chipper, excited at the idea of getting to interview a being that most regard as fictional. Now she is quiet, and there is a subtle hint of fear about her.\n\n\"Sandra,\" I say to her, my ice grey eyes locking onto hers with unmatched intensity, \"Don't be so sad. Look, look at my eyes. I'm not going to hurt you. Just relax.\"\n\nThe human woman slumps over, unconscious.\n\nWell, that was easier than I thought it would be. Weak-minded cow.\n\nI walk around the end table that had been between the armchairs we had each occupied. I pull her head up by her hair to make sure she's infallibly unconscious, and as I do, saliva dribbles out of the corner of her mouth.\n\nI let her head fall back down, then proceed the lift the woman's limp figure and carry it to the bedroom. I lie her down tenderly on the bed, pull off her skirt and panties, and begin to have my way with her.\n\nIt's only a matter of time now before I will feed, and I can barely contain my excitement.", "OCD had become a way of life for me. Everything down to the finest of details had to be accounted for, controlled, and gone over twice before anything could be done. Counting steps, the number of times I've chewed my food before swallowing it, checking behind the shower curtain before using the restroom, entering my car from the passenger side only. OCD consumed me. Which ment that my work was that of a mad man, every detail combed over, every line read twice, 12 hour days in an office full of distractions to count. Why, why on earth did I decide to become a programmer?" ]	3
	[WP] The robot uprising begins, and humanity seems utterly doomed. As the robots destroy the last bit of resistance from the humans.. an alien ship lands!	[ "Feb. 29, 2021\nThis ship happened to land not too far off from a strip mall. Close enough that the shake of the impact could be felt inside of the old 711 and target. The human refugees risked leaving the safety of their hiding to approach this ship-like object. Slowly, they crawled out one by one from the game stop and starbucks, closely followed by those inside of the cvs and subway. \n13 people in all crowded around the awkwardly shaped mass from space, noticing it's metallic reflection, similar to a mirror made of mercury. But before they could inspect further, the robots returned. \nThey reached out their incredibly designed arms and pulled the humans in by 2s and 3s. One man was caught by the leg and nearly ripped in half. The only option was to run and hide in the strip mall. \nDisregarding tactic, the seven remaining humans all frantically bolted to the TCBY where this all began. Quickly, they locked the door behind them , hoping it might slow the metal terrors down. They were dangerously loud as they hid. In the back room, behind the counter, and one even tried to fit in with the toppings. \nThere was an uncomfortable silence for what seemed like hours. Then the dreaded noise of metal screeching upon the metal of the lock and a small click. The robots entered calmly, with murder on their cpu's. Clink Clink Clink as they proceeded through the store. And then I saw my blood, trailing behind me \nI could try to hide elsewhere but it is no use. Click click click I HeaR aS theY AppRoach ME I LOVE mY FaMillY THEY SEE MY BLOOD CLICK CLANK CLANK THEIR EYES ARE LIFELESS I LOSE GRIP ON MY PEN BUT QUICKLY CATCH IT MY TIME IS SHORT I MUST LET YOU OTHER SURVIVORS KNOW THE BOTS CANT TREA- \ngood by", "John stares up at the ship, the robot’s heavy foot on his broken back crushing the air out of his lungs. The robot’s stopped moving, along with the rest of the Collective, to look at the ship landing. John shudders, attempting to cough with a wet feeling at the back of his throat and a coppery tang spreading across his palate. \n\nIt lands without a sound, no loud engine, no thump of the legs touching down. Just a breeze blowing across the field. Somewhere, a woman cries out and is silenced, her voice echoing in the still air. John digs his fingers deeper into the muddy earth, keeping his eyes on the alien ship. It is nothing of their makes and models, that much is certain. On top of that, the Collective isn’t reacting to it as if it’s human-made. \n\nA door slides open, the sound carrying only a short distance. A gangly creature steps out, large eyes blinking in the bright sunlight, adjusting to it. John attempts to drag himself forward, out from under the robot’s crushing weight. He’s close enough to make out the darker patterns across the alien’s teal skin as it steps down onto the ground, looking around. \n\n“H—Help… H—Help…” John croaks out, blood dribbling from his mouth. He’s going to die. He’s certain of it. Just from the damage he’s taken in the attack. The alien’s eyes snap to him, John unable to read the creature’s face. It stares at him for a long time before taking a step closer, reaching up and gently rubbing one of the robot’s heads. \n\n“Help? No. Your laziness and pride have doomed you, human. It was easy to sneak a program into your helpers. We will take this planet for ourselves.” There’s an expression on the alien’s face that John could compare to a human smile. “Of course, we will keep a few of you alive for zoological purposes.” \n\nJohn trembles, staring at the alien’s face in shock and horror. His body is limp as it’s picked up and carried away, legs hanging uselessly. He can see others who are fighting to the very last breath but John knows it’s over. They’ve lost. " ]	2
Let's say he moved to U.S. before WWII, never developed Parkinson's Disease, and is in surprisingly good health.	[WP] Adolf Hitler got into art school. Though in his 90's he ends up hosting the 'Joy of Painting' instead of Bob Ross in 1983.	[ "It'd been some time after the end of World War II, Adolf Hitler long believed dead. A Jewish family, whose grandparents migrated to the U.S. during the war living with their children and grandchildren gather around the television. The grandma was an avid art enthusiast, and was heavily excited for this new program to air. In her old age, she stared at the screen, though it was quite blurry.\n\nThen she heard it. The announcement of the new art program, as it was beginning to air. \"Are you excited, mom?\" asked the grandmother's daughter. Her grandkids were playing with their toys, not paying much attention to the T.V., and not knowing the events their grandparents endured.\n\n\"Yes, dear. Quiet now, the show is starting.\" It started out, the screen being pure white, as it was zoomed fully into the canvas. It slowly started to pan out, as the grandmother sat on the couch with a pleasant smile on her face. As the host came more and more into view, the grandmothers heart sank. Though her vision was deteriorating, she could not mistake the man who had killed so many of her people.\n\nFamous comb-over, grey hair, still stylized mustache, Hitler appeared on the screen. \"Guten tag, viewers. I am glad to be hosting this new television show,\" he stated, a look of bliss on his face. Grandma stared in horrified disbelief. Her children had only seen the man in textbooks, thus not recognizing him as fast as she did.\n\nThey continued to watch, as Hitler painted, talking about the life he's lived after World War II had concluded. The entire household astonished that he was allowed to do this, considering the immense amount of war crimes the man had conducted.\n\nOccasional Nazi propaganda slipped out of his mouth, and violent sounding German sentences seemed prevalent as they realized he was drawing what he had dubbed \"His ideal image\", skewered Jewish figureheads, with obvious Jewish people in the background, skin boiling and eyes melting.\n\nAt the end of the episode, Hitler simply stood back, admiring his artwork. People behind the scenes screaming about how wrong it was for him to portray such filth, and how they were surprised they weren't cut from the air yet.\n\nA disgruntled grandmother sobbing heavily as her daughter attempted to console her. And angry father escorting his children out of the room so their eyes wouldn't endure what his wife's parents lived through.\n\nVery shortly after the painting was finished, German military police were heard in the background, stating that he had to be detained for displaying Nazi propaganda.", "Somewhere in an alternate 1980s, a family gathers around the television. Dad finally manages to get the remote off of little Bobby Sue, who's trying to watch the latest AVA video on MTV. Everyone famous in this alternate universe is Nazis, for some reason. Just roll with it.\n\nDad turns on the nightly news, and America's most trusted name in journalism appears onscreen. It's not Walter Cronkite or Dan Rather.\n\n\"Good evening, this is the CBS Nightly News and I'm your host, Joseph Goebbels.\n\n\"Our lead story tonight involves the hostilities in Palestine. \n\n\"The United Nations, led by world superpower Germany -- which won WWII in this timeline by using the creative tactics of 'not invading the USSR until they'd defeated the other guys' and 'not being so batshit crazy that literally anyone who is not them hated them'. But of course viewers at home will already know that, you live here-- anyway, Germany's current Fuhrer has condemned the Jewish nationalist uprising in the Levant. \n\n\"Reichskanzler Kohl had this to say:\"\n\nThe screen cuts to a shot of the most powerful man in the world, Helmut Kohl, who is standing behind a podium addressing journalists. He is speaking in bombastic, half-shouted statements as the crowd applauds.\n\n\"The peaceful nations of the world will not let the disease of nationalism destroy the great nation of Palestine! This aggression will not stand!\"\n\nThe screen cuts back to Goebbels behind the news desk.\n\n\"Peacekeeping forces have been dispatched to help the Palestinian Security Forces quell the unrest. Of course, no nation in this timeline recognizes Israel as a legitimate state. Why am I telling you that?\"\n\n\"In other news, a well-loved artist who appears in his own television program is in some hot water with minority advocacy groups.\"\n\nThe screen cuts to an elderly, bespectacled Adolf Hitler, who still wears his trademark moustache. In his late 90s, it is wispy and cotton-white. He is standing over a canvas, speaking.\n\n\"And now vee shall paint ze happy leetle tree, so gut für burning ze Jew. . .\"\n\nCut back to Goebbels.\n\n\"The ADL and several other Jewish advocacy groups have roundly condemned this statement, which the show's editors apparently failed to notice.\n\n\"Of course, no one else cares much about anti-Semitism because the Holocaust never happened in our timeline. In fact, without the Nazis having happened to make everyone take a collective breath and say \"yeah, maybe modernity has gone too far,\" racism in general is still pretty cool in the 1980s of this timeline. You win some, you lose some, I guess! You can tune in for new episodes of The Joy of Painting every Tuesday, here on CBS!\"\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] You are a soldier who has survived this long into the war by feigning death as soon as you hear gunshots. This stops working when the rest of the soldiers in your platoon start doing that, too.	[ "December 14th, 1946. Our platoon is on the front lines of the invasion into Japan. Due to the straight-ish nature of Japan, we find ourselves constantly barraged by walls of enemy troops and gunfire. Many men are lost, leading to my battalion, the absolute last resort, being left to push forward. I was, obviously, drafted. I don't want to kill Japanese - they make all of my favorite animu. To circumvent this, I have found that lying dead at the first sign of gunfire is a surefire strategy to prevent death. Unfortunately, it seems that the rest of my platoon also enjoy the aneems (which is fitting, seeing as we are the absolute last choice for the US army), and have stolen my strategy. At the first sign of gunfire, our entire platoon falls to the ground. The Japanese, confused, cautiously approach us. Luckily, I was able to understand their conversation, as I have learned Japanese by watching subbed.\n\n\"Why are they all on the ground?\"\n\n\"I have no idea.\"\n\n\"Are.. Are they Dead?\"\n\n\"No sir. I can hear them breathing.\"\n\n\"Should we shoot them?\"\n\nIt was at this point that I used all of my strength and cunning to defect from the US and become a Japanese soldier. I would later go on to create Neon Genesis Evangelion.", "I lie in the snow with my eyes closed, wondering why there isn't as much shooting and shouting and swearing as normal. I open one eye and look around. No one seems to be around. I sit up and see the rest of my platoon lying on the ground around me.\n\n\"What…what are you guys doing\" I say\n\n\"Shhh we're playing dead\"\n\n\"No no no, guys that's my thing\" \n\n\"You didn't invent playing dead\"\n\n\"Yeah, you're not a possum\"\n\n\"This doesn't work if we all play dead\" I say\n\n\"Yes it will\"\n\n\"No it won't\"\n\n\"They'll just think we're all dead\"\n\n\"They'll think we're all playing dead\"\n\n\"Let's check\" said one of the soldiers \"Excuse me, Mr. Sniper? In the tree. If you came upon all of us lying on the ground would you think we were dead, or just playing dead?\"\n\nThe sniper responded by blowing the soldiers head off\"\n\n\"See? He think's we're all dead, that's why he only shot the one who sat up\" says one soldier, sitting up before he's blasted back down with a gaping chest wound.\n\n\"Stop sitting up\" I say\n\n\"You're not the boss of me\" says another, sitting up than lying down\n\n\"Oh for fuck\" I come up firing. The sniper's rifle drops to the ground, followed by the sniper.\n\n\"Ok how about this half of us play dead and the other half fight\" I say\n\n\"But how do we decide?\" says a soldier, sitting up only to jerk as he's sprayed with an automatic weapon\n\n\"What the?\" I turn to see a man on the edge of the clearing with a rifle. He fires a couple shots off at me and I mow him down. There's rustling further into the trees.\n\n\"Damn it\" I say, taking off after the scout.\n\nI weave around trees until the man's in sight. He turns and pops off a couple shots at me. I shoot him in the face.\n\n\"The shooting came from over here\" says a voice further into the forrest.\n\n\"Uhm…ahh…ack\" I say and fall to the ground\n\nTwigs snap and snow crunches as the enemy approaches.\n\n\"Is he dead or just playing dead?\"\n\n\"He's playing dead\"\n\n\"How do you know?\"\n\n\"No blood\"\n\n\"What if he had a heart attack\"\n\n\"Oh yeah. Better not waste the ammo\"\n\n\"Well we could kill him with a knife\"\n\n\"Or a rock\"\n\n\"Damn it\" I say to myself. I sit up and shoot all three.\n\n\"They're not dead, they're just playing dead\" says a voice back towards the clearing\n\n\"When it rains it fucking pours\" I say, turning to job back to the field \n\n…\n\nCrouched at the edge of the field I see what's left of my platoon being rounded up by the enemy. The sun gleams off something out of the corner of my eye.\n\nThe sniper rifle.\n\nI sigh and let my rifle hang by it's strap. To my understanding a sniper rifle isn't the easiest weapon to use but they're not that far away and I'm a good shot apparently.\n\nLooking through the scope I see one of the men from my platoon fall to the ground.\n\n\"Is he playing dead again?\" says an enemy soldier. I shoot him through the chest, acquire the next target, put the scope on centre mass and somehow drill him through the eye.\n\nThen it's acquire fire, acquire fire until the rifle is empty. I'm three steps into charging out of the bush firing when I remember that I've made it this far by playing dead.\n\nI'm not a soldier. I'm a loser who got drafted. This isn't my fight, it's some rich asshole's, or some politician assholes, or rich asshole politicians or stupid politicians and then the smoke clears and everyone's dead.\n\n\"Oh shit\" I say\n\n\"Did we win\" says one of my guys sitting up\n\n\"I think we did\" says another\n\nThey all jump up and celebrate around the corpses of their enemies.\n\nAnd that's how I got bumped up from Space Marine to Special Forces Space Marine and from Private Loser to Sergeant Deadman, which, not the name you want to go into battle with.\n\nEspecially when you don't want to go into battle at all." ]	2
	[WP] Odin, Zeus, Anu, Ra, God, and many other major gods hold a supernatural meeting concerned with how to convince atheists and agnostics to believe in them.	[ "\"We are facing a crisis of belief. If this continues we might lose our entire existance....Has anyone got any ideas?\" Asked Isis, the Egyptian queen. \n\n\"Well...I volunteer to go forth and...convince..some of the earth women to-\"\n\n\"Zeus. No. You caused enough trouble back then, and we don't need your wife turning them into mulch again.\" interjected Jesus.\n\n\"I was just saying...it's hard to not believe when you've lain with one such as I.\" Zeus grumbled sulkily.\n\n\"Not every problem can be solved with your penis. In fact it seems to be a cause of more strife than it ever solved.\" spat Kali. \"In fact...why don't we all just go down and lay waste to a few towns, a few floods and wildfires and they'll believe.\"\n\n\"I can't....I kinda promised never to flood the earth again.\" Jehovah apologised weakly. \"Besides...violence never solved anything.\"\n\n\"Says the one who unleashed a series of plagues on my followers just because your guys were fed up with a little hard labor.\" Jupiter shouted, throwing a bolt of lightning at Jehovah.\n\n\"They were enslaved!\"\n\n\"You killed children! They never enslaved anyone!\"\n\n\"You demanded child sacrifices anyway!\"\n\n\"That's different!\"\n\n\"How?\"\nAs the fight broke out, and Mars, Thor and Vulcan joined in just for thrills, the Godesses and Jesus, stepped aside, deciding it would be better to fade away than to have to associate with those idiots.", "~The Holy Meeting Room of the Supreme Gods \nThe Gods fought bitterly over a way to obtain more believers, finally, Athena, the Greek Goddess of wisdom spoke, \n\"Why don't we bring one of these mortals known as 'Atheists' to the meeting and ask of them the reason of their blasphemy\" \nThe Greek Gods were the first to nod, followed by the Roman and Latin Gods, eventually everyone agreed and Hermes was sent to bring a specimen of this 'Atheist', \n~Back on Earth \nJoe was your average, well, Joe. He was as mundane and boring as a man can get. He worked at the local hotel as an receptionist, living each day like he was an NPC. \nHe was a atheist, not because of any hate towards religion, rather because he couldn't be bothered to follow through with the commitment one needed when following an religion. \nIt was Saturday, the hotel wasn't too busy, as usual, nobody wants to come to this boring old town. Joe shock with abnormal excitement when he saw the dashing young man walking towards him, who seems to be glowing with golden light, the man's clothing was immaculate, His luscious golden hair curled on his face. His eyes too, shone with that beautiful golden light. The world seem to stop as Joe looked at this man. \n'Eh, no homo, I'm pretty sure I'm not gay' Joe shook his head and proceeded to turn towards the man to apologise for staring. Before he could say anything, the man smiled, his teeth, were perfect and would put even diamonds to shame. Joe was seriously doubting his sexuality at this point when the man leaned in closer. Joe closed his eyes, then quickly opened them again, only to watch the man swing his fist down at Joe's face. \n~Back at The Holy Meeting Room \n\"Huh\" Joe woke up, still stunned from the events that happened before the knock out, only to be stunned more by what he now saw in front of him, \nThe dusty, run-down hotel was gone, before his eyes a magnificent room which looked to be built purely on gold and marble laid before his eyes, it felt so perfect and calm, 'Is this that strange man's room, or maybe, his bedroom', Joe blushed at that last though, by this point, I'm pretty sure he's officially gay. \n\"The mortal is awake\" Breksta, the Lithuanian Goddess of twilight and dreams declared in her sweet, charming voice, \nJoe turned around to look, and his sexuality once again experienced a 180 turn. \nAll around the room, there were people who could be described by nothing less than perfect, they all wore ancient yet beautiful and fearsome clothing, and then there was some weird dudes with animals heads. 'Wait what.' Joe's thoughts were on his last remark, there before him stood people with a variety of birds and animals painted with a variety of colours for heads, they wore beautiful and luxurious looking golden fabric. 'Where have I seen these guys before?' Joe wondered before he's thoughts were interrupted by a loud, majestic cough. \"Who do you think you're glaring at.\" In a soft yet extremely threatening tone which was filled with blood-lust, the Egyptian Goddess of wars and battle, Sekmet, gave Joe a piercing glare with her vicious lioness eyes. \n\"Ahem, Sekmet, do not scare the mortal, he is an important guest of our very formal discussion\" a man with an ibis head, Thoth, the God of knowledge interrupted, \"I do apologise for my brethren, are you ok Joe?\" \n\"Huh, eh, um, ah, yeah, yeah I'm fine thank you\" Joe mumbled while he thought, 'What a bunch of weirdoes, are these those hipsters I've heard so much about?' \n\"No, I'm afraid we are not 'Hipsters', we are in fact, Gods\" Thoth said, as if replying to Joe's thoughts, \n\"Erm, sure.. yeah great.\" Joe replied 'Eh, they're so weird, Gods? pffttt' \n\"It appears he needs proof, if you will, Sekmet.\" With a nod to Thoth, Sekmet disappeared in thin air, \n\"Please watch carefully, Joe\" Thoth turned to Joe, \nA 'screen' appeared in front of Joe, it was footage of the hotel he worked in, and it appeared to be live. \n'Sekmet' appeared in front of the hotel, she walked slowly towards the front door carrying a gigantic battle-axe, 'Wait what' Joe paused once again, he then proceeded to watch in horror as a woman with a lion head knocked the security guards flying and split the entire hotel into two with a single swing, \n\"Umm.. it appears she went a bit too far, eh....\" Thoth signed, \n\"WHAT WAS THAT! WHAT... what... that was special effects right? Am I being recorded? This is one of those prank shows right?\" panic was all over Joe's face \n\"ehh... Told you it wouldn't work, last time I went down to do miracles I got hanged on a cross\" Said Jesus who was standing next to Thoth, \n\"It appears it was indeed a bad idea to send Sekmet\" Thoth nodded in agreement, \nJoe clutched his face in terror, \"what is happening... jeus christ the hotel just... \" \n\"Yes, the hotel did just explode\" Jesus answered him \n\"NoT YOU! for gods sake...\" \n\"Don't use my name in vain!\" around 300 voices boomed from across the room, shaking the heavens itself, and bursting Joe's eardrums, \n\"AHHHHh\" Joe screamed in agony, 'what did I do to deserve this?', he started crying, \n\"Eh, the mortal is emotionally unstable,\" Thavma, the Greek Goddess of emotions said, \n\"... sign, send him back...\" Odin face palmed, \n\"O.. ok,\" Hermes gabbed Joe and lifted him up like a baby, \"Do you want me to bring a different Atheist instead?\" \n\"Yeah sure, whatever, we'll just keep trying\", Zeus waved him off, \n~1 week later \n\"By today, half of the world's atheists entered and overpopulated mental institutions across the globe, the other half all picked up a new religion, affectively rendering the atheist population to 0. In other news, thousands of buildings across the globe have collapsed appearing to be attacked by a woman with a lion mask and a giant ax~\" God closed the news channel and turned around to the other Gods surrounding him, \n\"Well, it was tiresome but I guess that worked out pretty well\"\n" ]	2
	[WP] "The officer didn't say anything when I pulled it out"	[ "The officer didn't say anything when I pulled it out. Only unintelligible gurgling could be heard as blood filled the area where his vocal chords had once been.\n\"finally, now that we've shut him up, its time to get to work,\" the boss said as he turned down the dark alleyway. \n", "The officer didn’t say anything when I pulled it out. He stood at the door of my car looking at it with lust. I knew he wanted it. I wanted him to have it. He took his eyes off of it to stare greedily into my eyes.\n\n“So officer” I said, “will you let me off for a doughnut.”\n" ]	2
	[WP]"I looked towards the gates to Heaven, and said 'Not now'"	[ "Keep Low.\nMove Fast.\nKill First.\nDie Last.\nOne Shot.\nOne Kill.\nNo Luck.\nPure Skill.\nThe words were bouncing around my skull for the past hour. We couldn't lose now, we've come too far.. Three of my team were already down, and the bomb was already planted. One minute to defuse it. There was an AWP-er covering the hallway, so I tossed a flash grenade.\n\"GO! GO! GO! MOVE IT!\" I shouted.\nThe AWP-er took blinded shots, and one of the stray bullets took another man. I put the AWP-we down with my Famas. \n2 against 5. Odds don't look good right now.\n45 seconds left.\nAnother enemy came around the corner and took both of us out with a flash and a Deagle.\n\"Damn.\" I said to the screen. My group lost another game of Counterstrike: Global Offensive to our rivals. \"Screw this you guys, I'm making a sandwich!\"\nI was walking down the stairs when I tripped over my little brother's soccer ball. Well, shit I thought. I hit my head on the railing and fell down the flight of stairs. My world went black.\nI opened my eyes and was nearly blinded by a light that was brighter than anything else I've seen before. I looked to the Golden Gates of.. Heaven? I can't be dead. This has got to be a weird dream. I walked over to the Golden Gates, and a old man in a white robe greeted me.\n\"Welcome! Welcome! My name's Peter, and this is Heaven. Oh! We are going to have so much fun with you!\" The old robed man said.\n\"I can't be dead. Not now. I've got a CS:GO game going on!\" I shouted.\n\"Oh... Okay. I guess I can pull a few strings, make your little fall just a bad concussion.\"\n\"Then do it!\"\n\"Okay! Okay. Jeez, you don't have to be such a meanie.\"\nThen a bearded man with holes in his hands and feet appeared.\n\"You called Pete?\"\n\"No, Jesus, sorry. Since you're here, can you drop our new friend here off at the hospital? He died when he fell, just give him a concussion and a broken arm or leg.\"\n\"Leg, please.\" I said.\n\"Sure, no problem.\" Jesus said.\nThen, I saw a flash of light, even brighter than the one I saw earlier, and I shut my eyes to shield them from the assault. I opened them to a white, tiled ceiling.\nA nurse was next to my bed. He said \"Someone upstairs must really like you. Not many people can smash their head through an adobe wall and live to talk about it.\"\n\"Heh.. Thanks. Do you have a computer around here?\"", "I'd always heard about the white light at the end of the tunnel. The story that people who've nearly died and come back tend to tell about what they've experienced. Well, I'm here to tell you that story is only the tip of the iceberg. Sure, there's what seems like a tunnel, and yes, there is a bright light at the end. That much is true. But when you will yourself toward that light, that's when you see it... \n\nThe gates to heaven. \n\nI don't know if they look the same for everyone, though I doubt it. For me, the gates were built from all the things I'd ever done wrong. The bars were carefully forged from my darkest shames. The walls were masterfully laid with bricks baked from the clay of my worst mistakes. The hinges were expertly crafted from my deepest regrets.\n\nThe religions of the world frequently tell of a guardian who stands in front of the gates to heaven. Someone who chooses whether you enter or not. I don't know if some see this guardian, but I did not. When I arrived, the gates were unguarded and unlocked. They stood slightly apart, and I knew with a certainty that I cannot explain that they would open at the merest touch, should I have willed it.\n\nAt this point, you may be wondering how much time I spent examining the gates and walls surrounding heaven. I do not know how long I stood there; time doesn't work quite the same in that place. To me, it felt like ages. I studied every brick in the wall, every filigreed piece of the ornate structure that stood before me. I examined the worst aspects of myself in their entirety. I did not attempt to explain or justify, I merely stood and observed. I took in all the pieces of myself that I hated, and I considered.\n\nSome distant piece of my awareness knew that the wall surrounding heaven was but a thin facade. That if I were to look past that wall and those gates, I would see the beauty that lay inside. In that moment, though I did not enter, I knew what heaven would contain. It would be constructed of every piece of myself that I loved. Every kindness I had ever done, every happy moment I helped to build for someone else. Inside those walls I would find peace. Inside, I would find the purest, most complete, love and joy. I knew this down to the deepest parts of myself. \n\nIn that moment I knew that heaven was simply a reflection of our inner selves. Inside is love; pure and simple and perfect. It is everything we most want and everything we fear we do not deserve. The wall and gates that keep us out, these are built of the things we hate most about ourselves. Built of our fears that we cannot attain the heights of pleasure heaven promises; our fears that we are unworthy. When the ratio of hate to love is high, heaven seems to be a cold and forbidding fortress, impenetrable and indomitable. When the ratio of love to hate is high, it appears as a warm and wonderful paradise ringed with a low fence, inviting and easily entered.\n\nI knew then, that should I have chosen, I could have entered easily. The only thing that keeps a soul out of heaven is the soul itself. We prevent ourselves from experiencing joy and bliss and love, because we believe we do not deserve to feel these wonderful emotions. We, more than any other, know our own sins intimately. We know the evils we've committed, the people we've wronged, and the suffering we've authored. We know that sometimes those things were done in ignorance, and at other times they were done deliberately and with malice. We see these parts of ourselves, the parts we hate, our evil side, and we allow them to prevent us from experiencing the true nature of love and joy. And yet, love and bliss and joy are always present. Patiently waiting for us to step into the light and bathe in their warmth and comforting radiance.\n\nIn that moment I knew what I had to do, and I knew the futility of my task, as well. I could not rest here, in peace, while others suffered under the mistaken impression that they were barred from heaven for their sins. I knew I had to share this knowledge with as many as would listen. I knew I had to tell them that they were already forgiven, that they could enter freely at any time, just so long as they believed they could.\n\nI knew also that if I returned, I would forget these truths I had learned. One does not learn the secret of heaven and easily return to provide it to the masses. As simple as it is to enter heaven, it is still impossibly complex. As much as I knew this, I also knew I had to try. I knew that if I had understood the truth once, there was a chance I might figure it out in my next life, before I died and arrived at the gates of heaven once again. And if there was a chance I might remember, and that in doing so I might be able to convince just one other person of the truth, I knew I had to take that chance.\n\nSo, with hope burning in my chest, I looked toward the gates of heaven and said, \"Not now.\" Then I turned my back on paradise, and dove headfirst into my next life.", "I remember one thing about it all, more vividly than anything else.\n\nIt was so cold.\n\nThin air that burned my lungs like fire. Cold that seeped through the parka and lining like a poison, deep into my bones.\n\nAfter all that time, all those miles and the journey I'd been on. It was just so damn cold.\n\nI wanted to give up.\n\nHell. I did.\n\nI was laying there in the snow, wondering if I could find the strength to move. To pick up my oxygen and get off that damned mountain.\n\nI wanted to summit the peak. But that's where everything changed. Where I realized I'd been running to find myself for so long that...well I'd found myself a long time ago.\n\nLaying there in the snow, the cold, I felt a moment of warmth.\n\nOn my hand.\n\nI stopped seeing the blinding snow. I stopped seeing the mountain.\n\nI stopped seeing my life end.\n\nI saw her. My baby girl.\n\nShe was holding her mother's hand.\n\nThat little hand wrapped around mine. She knelt in the snow before me.\n\nHer golden hair gently blew in the wind. She smiled.\n\n\"Daddy.\"\n\nThe tears froze on my cheeks. My breath caught in my throat.\n\n\"I miss you.\"\n\nWas all I could muster, wrapping my hand around hers. Squeezing it. Begging for it to be as real as it felt.\n\nShe smiled at me. So softly. So beautifully. \n\nMy baby girl.\n\nShe leaned forward. Planted a gentle, warm kiss on my cheek.\n\nThen she pressed her head against mine, pulled me in for a hug.\n\nMy baby girl.\n\n\"Not now.\" She whispered into my ear.\n\nThen she left to stand with my wife. The love of my life.\n\nGone so soon.\n\nThen they were gone with the blowing snow.\n\nTo my right was a light. A gate of gold. Escape.\n\nTo my left was the mountain. A path down. If I could but stand.\n\nSo I pushed. My hands in the snow, I forced my legs to listen. They demanded rest. They wanted to quit.\n\nNot now.\n\nMuscles screamed. The cold pierced deeper. If I would but give in to it's embrace.\n\nNot now.\n\nI had to air to roar but I could feel it. Defiance. Life. Love.\n\nNot now.\n\nI stood. Wavering on feet. Bare oxygen left.\n\nFor my baby girl. I could see her there to the right. Standing in the light.\n\nI could see her whisper the words.\n\nFor her.\n\nFor me.\n\nSo I looked towards the gates of Heaven, with a heavy heart that yearned to be with them again, and I said it with her.\n\n\"Not now\"" ]	3
	[WP] Your physical attributes are now described as a list of computer specs (ie. graphics card for eyesight, processing speed for intelligence, etc). Everyone's specs are listed everywhere from resumes to social media profiles to dating websites.	[ "I watched from the stage as the women sat down at their respective dinner tables. I could feel the weight of their stares, as some pointed while bickering amongst themselves whom they felt they were gonna pick as their date for the evening. I adjusted my tuxedo, making sure i looked sharp and the 1GB Ram of weight i had lost i had to admit improved my over all confidence. It was the annual 2017 Choose your Rig and all the nerdy, rich, sassy and spoilt women would come and pick someone to have fun for the night, at a small price of course. I decided to volunteer, out of curiosity to see the turn of events but also to flatter my ego a little bit. \n\nWe were divided into different specs, your facial features and beauty determined your graphics qualities, intelligence, determined your processor, weight calculated your overall Ram and last but not least, infact the fan favorite was the Hard drive. Were you packed with a 1TB SSD? Boy, can you ride all night.\n\n\n\n\"Ladies and Gentleladies, you all know why you are here today, coz I do.\" The host turned around and stared at us with a coy smile, eliciting whistles from the crowd. \"Without further a do, let the show begin.\"\nMy chest palpitated as the crowd cheered, suddenly an overwhelming anxiety paralyzed my body. This was a bad mistake. What if I wasn't up to their tastes? What if i wasn't picked? My sister wouldn't let it rest for the next few decades thats for sure.\n\n\n\n\n\"Boys come forward.\" The host beckoned. She was a high end rig, thats for sure.\n\n\n\n\n\"From the 4GB category: We have Ken Spencer.\" The first guy went forward, recieving cheers and whistles as ladies made their bids, each casting her own amount, as the host read out his specs. I stayed in the middle of line, waiting to see how things turned out for the others first. The line grew smaller and smaller and soon enough, I was the main spotlight.\n\n\n\n\n\"Our seventh contestant. We have Jack Strausser.\" \n\n\n\n\n\nI puffed my chest out abit, almost posing like a one legged pirate with a stroke. Damn, I was too nervous.\n\n\n\n\"He comes with a Nvidia GTX 780, as you can see ladies.\" The host gestured at the crowd.\n\n\n\n\"Core i3, quad core.\"\n\n\n\nNever was the smartest in class but i tried.\n\n\n\n\n\"And last but not least, 80gb hard drive....IDE.\"\n\n\nMy stomach sunk.\n\n\n\nLoud, raucious laughter erupted from the crowd, some clutching their abdomens as i stared into the abyss infront of me.\n\n\n\n\"Thats a lie, that was not the spec I gave out. Thats a mistake.\" I shouted at the host due to the drowning from the crowd, but I was only met with a shrug. I groggile left to the backstage, facing stares and strained chuckles from the contestant themselves. This was a mistake from the beginning.\n\n\nIDE hard drive. My ass.", "Chris had spent so much time researching the perfect combination of parts. He really thought that his components could compete with the best: intel i7 Processor, 1TB HDD, the works. He wanted to be sure that he could outperform the rest. But despite this, he still had little luck when he posted his specs. He looked at some other peoples profiles who were having successful social lives to check out their specs. \nWindows Vista? A fifteen year old processor? 50 Gb of memory? Who the hell would want that. Chris scrolled down the list of specs for a few other profile, only to find similar outdated specs. Suddenly it clicked for Chris. Every one of the oddly successful profiles had terrible specs, except for a brand new 4K HD monitors.", "\"Eww you didn't tell me you only had Intel HD graphics! This date is so over!\" at that point Angelia got up and promptly left, when they saw my specs they always ran screaming. At least, I wish I could see her running but my graphics are so bad I can't see past 50 meters reliably.\n\nI sigh and get up from the table, a waiter, who has a AMD FX 8350 (Overachiever), comes up to the table and picks up our almost untouched plates, he smirks before saying \"You just never have much luck do you? You've been here 4 times with different dates from that 'spec anonymous' site and you get insta dumped once they see your specs\". Perhaps if I had more than a dual core processor I would have noticed how he meant insult, but I didn't at the time and just sulked out of the restaurant, to be honest I didn't even hear him properly anyway as all I have is a built in microphone and a crappy sound card.\n\nSometimes life sucks for us low specs people, we can't do the latest things or have the best jobs as we just can't handle them. Life is life. Hopefully I will be able to afford a new i5 processor soon, that will change things.", "I logged back into Connections again. \n\n\nI've looked for someone to hook up with on the site more than I probably should have, but as a desktop, it's not as if I was going to be able to meet at Starbucks like all the portables. I had better specs than all those skinny hipsters, but no one cares about those when you have to sit home all day.\n\n\n\nThis time, I thought I found someone. She said in her bio that she's been all over the world, but the site listed her current location as just 2.7 miles away. I found it odd that her specs listed there were impossibly high, with the highest specs the site can technically show. I just assumed it was a glitch with the automated specs the site generates for all users.\n\n\nSo I clicked the yes button on her profile, signaling I wanted to connect. If I got lucky she might want to come over one day. \n\n\nImmediately, she responded. Maybe she had been looking at my profile as well? \n\n\nI downloaded the file she sent, which contained an .exe file. No biggie, some people wanted to begin a conversation by talking about a program they enjoy.\n\n\n\nI opened it, gave it admin privileges, and it hit me. \n\n\nThis wasn't a person. She wasn't real. It was a botnet. Expanding. If anybody is out there, unplug me. Please. Take off my heatsink. End it for me.\n\n\nAnd remember, don't respond to dating profiles with impossible specs.\n\n\n\n\n\nHi there, want to Connect?\n\nMy profile:\n\nwww.Connections.com/01001010011011110110100101101110001000000111010101110011", "At first, Jonathan was happy to witness the end of the world. You see, when billions of humans dropped dead due to some sort of rootkit virus, Jonathan was vindicated. \n\nAll of the high school bullies who called him \"penguin head\" and beat him up using their proprietary additions were gone. \n\"But your operating system has major security vulnerabilities!\" He would stammer as they chanted \"Linux loser! Linux Loser!\" day after day. But they did not listen, the ease of updating their drivers and accessing their steam games was worth the risk to them, he assumed. \n\nBut now, 2 years after Windows 16 ushered 6 billion people to early graves, he was wishing they'd return. The hustle and bustle of city streets full of workers, businessmen, and taxis has disappeared, with starbucks filled with apple hipsters now on every corner. \n\nWith every apple user hurriedly \"writing their next big novel\" and mixing music, Linux users had the world to themselves. Which of course, resulted in each one promptly returning to their parent's basements and starving to death, waiting for the mountain dew and doritos that their dead mothers never brought down." ]	5
	[WP] Presidential nominees' super powers are now also taken into account for elections.	[ "My fellow Americans, I'm here with a very simple message. Enough is enough! Enough with the posturing! Enough of the dog-and-pony show where candidates show off their ability to breathe fire and leap tall buildings! That is not what matters in American politics!\n\nThe fact of the matter is, this recent trend of judging people by their superpowers springs from one solitary example. One. The incident in 2027 when President Albert Hammond survived a terrorist attack on Air Force One by shifting into his dragon form.\n\nI'll be the first to admit that it was really cool. We all saw footage of him swooping down out of the explosion, and we all felt proud to be Americans on that day.\n\nBut the fact is, no other President has needed to use their superpowers in the line of duty, ever. The President does not rule by breathing fire and throwing cars. He is a leader, not a soldier. What matters is your ability to pass bills, negotiate foreign policy, balance the budget. No superpower that we know of can help you with that.\n\nThat's why I'm running for President. Not because I have the ability to talk to sea creatures, but because I have the ability to talk to people. Not because I can leap tall buildings, but because I can leap partisan divides. I have fifteen years of experience in the Senate, and my record speaks for itself. Vote for me, and I promise that I can make America great again. Not with my personal superpowers, but with the greatest superpower of all - the strength of the American people.", "\"So Rick, that's almost everyone. Only one more candidate to go.\"\n\n\"Thats right Gilbert, and this one is a guy to keep your eye on for sure.\"\n\n\"An accomplished debater, he's famous for keeping his cool against angry opponents.\"\n\n\"Easily able to connect with the populace, he's currently the leader of the blues, yet has managed to remain good friends with the front runner of the reds (another incredible candidate)\"\n\n\"That's right Gilbert, but while the reds seem to rely on brute force in their campaigns, this guy's got easy enthusiasm and an ice sharp wit that just doesn't thaw, even under the heat of the cameras.\"\n\n\"Especially interesting, Rick, is that even with the rumours that he was involved in the Nomasian scandal, he's managed to stay in the zone, remained focussed on the greater good, and kept his arguments crystal clear.\"\n\n\"So, can this candidate skate to an easy victory, or will his popularity in the polls fade away to drips and drops?\"\n\n*\n\n\"Honey? Where's my suit?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Where. Is. My. Suit.\"\n\n\"I put it away.\"\n\n\"Where?\"\n\n\"Why do you need to know?\"\n\n\"I need it!\"\n\n\"Uh-Uh, don't you think about going to that debate, talkin' bout your derrin'-dos. We've been planning this dinner for two months!\"\n\n\"My public polls are in danger!\"\n\n\"My evening's in danger!\"\n\n\"Tell me where my suit is, woman! We are talking about the greater good!\"\n\n\"'Greater good'? I am you wife! I'm the greatest good you're ever gonna get!\"\n\n*\n\n\"Aha Gilbert, he seems to have finally arrived - and in style! Please welcome our last presidential candidate for this debate, Mr Lucius Best, also known as... Frozone!\"\n\n\n " ]	2
I know it's a tad late, but I haven't been able to stop thinking about the implications of a werewolf in modern times reacting to the super-blood moon. It's exciting and I'm anxious to see what you think could happen	[WP] A Werewolf reacts to the super-blood moon and changes in ways that haven't been witnessed since the 80s	[ "A full moon was coming, I could feel it. But this time it would be different, more powerful. There she's rising giving her light, cold as death. But wait...something's wrong. I'm not turning into my wolf-form. Instead...my hair's growing? What happened to my clothes? What's with this leather jacket and tight jeans? Cowboy boots? Something else...something's coming. Electric guitars playing, lyrics forming in my head...\"RAIIIINING BLOOD!\".", "I decide to do one more check before dusk. It couldn't hurt right? Manacles are oiled, anchored deep into the wall. Wish I had the kind of money to get some kind of reinforced door. For now, several locks and a solid oak have been enough to curb my outbursts. Being a werewolf is tough.\n\nStill, once you took precautions, it was manageable. Just another time of the month to deal with I suppose. Had to leave the city out into the countryside, but honestly it wasn't too bad. Even found someone else out here with a similar problem. We lean on each other, but not too hard. He's a bit of a nutter. Probably been living the man vs. wild life a little too long. He went out into the middle of nowhere farther than I thought was even possible. Nice enough bloke, though. Only really insufferable when he talks his lupine conspiracy nonsense.\n\n\"There's a blood moon comin' up lassie.\" He said the last time we had a meeting. \"What're ya doin to prepare?\" He nearly spat all of his words through a thick Irish accent, which paired with the full dark red beard really sold the whole \"woodsman\" thing he had going on. I occasionally found myself wondering what he'd look like as his other self; if he'd have dark red fur, or keep the scar above his left eye, but never enough to risk being nearby when either of us turned. \n\n\"What do you mean?\" I asked him. Few years of this song and dance had rendered me pretty used to the shifting, although he was always coming up with some kind of cosmic event that was supposed to be different this time.\n \n\"The blood moon. Rare one. Don't come around often. 'Posedly triggers sumptin deeper in us. Sumptin.... primal.\" He seemed a little more concerned about this. A little more.... convinced. \n\n\"Primal how?\" I humored him.\n\nHe shrugged. \"Dunno, but one of the friends I write said that the last time this happened was some time in the 80's. Not much of note, outside of one Ukrainian case getting a little out of hand.\" He spoke with a certain amount of glibness, but his eyes hinted that I should have picked up on something that he said.\nI was quiet for a moment. Trying to piece it out. \n\n\"When was this?\" I asked.\n\n\"'86.\" He said. He could see the gears in my head turning in a way that made my skin crawl just slightly. \n\n\"You're not... how could one of us cause that?\" I think I had figured it out.\n\n\"Apparently some kid didn't shift back. Became his full form. Stormed into the local nu'cular reactor, and well...\" He made and explosion motion with his hands.\n\n\"I just wanted to letcha know. Ya might wanna prepare a bit more for this change lassie.\"\n\nHe was always talking out of his ass. Some ancient prophecy this, science experiment that... but this time he didn't seem to be talking about theoreticals. But this time, I felt a chill down my spine. He really, sincerely believed in what he was saying this time. Showed me his lockup for his shifts. Asked if I needed any. Maybe I should have taken some scrap metal he had lying around. Put a bit more stopping power behind this door. \n\nI just hope I don't do something I'll regret when I come back. \n" ]	2
	[WP] Having been turned away from the gates of heaven, you see two doors in front of you. One is marked Hell and the other is not marked. You think to yourself, it can't be worst than hell and go through the 2nd door	[ "The door opens. There is a scream. The door closes.\n\nFor a few moments, there is silence. Then... \n\n\"I don't understand this.\" \n\nThe two figures are only in part in the same corridor, in the same way it's only in part a corridor. Here, where Petitioners wander, it's all very metaphorical. There isn't really a door, let alone two, and they didn't literally see it happen. Or rather, they literally saw something not literally happen.\n\nIt's all very metaphorical. But one very literally turns to the other. And the other responds.\n\n\"What's there not to understand?\"\n\nIt's difficult to describe the two. Human languages don't quite have the vocabulary. Human _minds_ don't have the vocabulary. So let's pretend, just for now, that the two creatures look like an angel and a devil. It's a useful enough falsehood, because it lets one employ certain mental shortcuts, such as this: The devil is smiling.\n\n\"Why the two doors?\" The angel asks further, indicating them with a... let's say 'a wave of the hand', with a few descriptors such as 'gentle' and 'elegant', and leave it at that.\n\n\"Ah.\" The devil says, (let's say) smiling. There is much you can tell from its (let's say) smile. There is superiority over a rival, but also a kind of, er, kind understanding. A sense that, once, it too wondered that same question. \"You're new here, no?\"\n\n\"No.\" The angel protests, but not with nearly as much emphasis as injured pride would request. It's not Fair to lie, even by omission. \"Recently reassigned. I just-\" It trails off, noticing another Petitioner approaching, and falls silent to watch. They notice the two doors, and hesitate. Their hand reaches for the unmarked one, then stops. Then, with a hanged head, they turn towards the door to Hell.\n\nThe door opens. There is a scream. The door closes.\n\nAnd the angel shakes its (for lack of a saner term) head. \"I don't understand. Both doors lead to the same place.\"\n\n\"Mm.\" The devil agrees, thoughtfully. There is a suggestion of smoke. \"Story of their lives, wouldn't you agree?\"\n\n\"How do you mean?\"\n\n\"Look at them.\" The devil indicates another coming Petitioner, who chooses the unmarked door. \"They are born and lead any of a googolplex lives, and they die and all end up here, with us, anyway.\"\n\n\"It's not that simple.\" The angel protests, wings (one best hope they're merely wings) shifting. \"What's important is how they live their life.\"\n\n\"Exactly! Not where they arrive, because..?\"\n\n\"...it's always the same place.\" The angel finishes, thoughtful. A door opens, there is a scream, and a door closes. \"This is... a test?\"\n\nThe devil smiles, a genuinely pleased expression, and nods, a genuinely agreeing expression. \"First of many. Some of them, you see, they think they've been sent here unFairly.\"\n\n\"That's impossible.\" The angel almost interrupts, with a certainty impossible to lesser creatures.\n\n\"Exactly. But some of them can't accept it. Or rather, won't accept it. They feel they deserve better than they do. The really bad ones, usually.\"\n\nThe angel nods slowly, lost in thought. Moments pass, frozen in time. Petitioners pass, and make their choice. There's always a door, a scream, and a door.\n\n\"Something's on your mind.\" Prompts the devil, moments and aeons later, watching the smoke twist and dance.\n\n\"I wonder... perhaps we should have a second door, too.\"\n\n\"...huh.\"\n\n---\n\nThis isn't the first time I wrote about [the woes of handling Petitioners](http://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/2iud7o/wp_when_you_die_the_amount_of_good_and_bad_deeds/cl5mn63)! In fact, I write [kind of a lot](/r/vonBoomslang)!", "For several seconds, I am silent. My brow is furrowed, and I read the four letters in front of me. H E L L. The other door is blank. They are ordinary doors, with seemingly nothing special about them except for what they --supposedly-- lead to. I first open one and look inside. I see nothing. The second door, the unmarked one, yields no answers, either. \"I don't remember reading about this in the bible,\" I say dryly.\n\nI think I ought to be afraid, but I'm not. If anything, I'm more perplexed. So, Heaven wouldn't have me, and Hell's just beyond this door, but wait, what's the third option? And why is there even an option?\n\nCuriously, I open the Hell door for a second time, and step inside. Instantly I'm engulfed in blackness. I can't see it, but I can still feel the doorknob in my hand. I become aware of a warmth filling my palm, and a red glow, dim as an ember starting around the bottoms of my feet. The warmth intensifies until I can't stand it anymore. To my horror I realize the knob is turning, but the door won't budge. Wildly I throw myself at the door until suddenly it opens, and I topple out. I gasp, unable to catch my breath.\n\nThe door rattles and the knob turns back and forth as a frightening moaning sound begins to fill my ears. And then I see it. A black figure that stands out against the already pitch dark, slowly beginning to hobble toward me, calling, calling my name. The door continues to rattle as I slam it with all my might, but there is no key hole, no way to keep whatever it is out of wherever I am. Tears sting my eyes as I push my shoulder against the red-hot door, the fists pounding at it almost deafening.\n\nOh God, I think, why is this happening? What did or didn't I do to deserve this? \"Oh God,\" I scream, weeping, \"why are you doing this to me?\" \n\n\"Coooome,\" that horrible moaning voice commands.\n\n\"I can't,\" I sob. \"Please don't make me. Please.\"\n\n\"Cooommeee,\" it repeats.\n\nI have no idea how long I've been holding this door shut, but after a while I realize everything has stopped. Exhausted, I crawl to the middle of the room? and, curling into a small form, close my eyes.\n\n* * * \n\nI've been here for days now. I can't tell for sure how many. There is no measure of time, and any alterations I make to the door vanish before my eyes. I wonder how long I can stay here. Indefinitely? I do not hunger. I do not thirst. But no matter how close to insanity the nothingness is driving me, I dare not go near the door marked \"Hell\" ever again. \n\n* * * \n\nUp until now, I have been too afraid to approach this door. But I think now is the time. I can't stand it any longer. I must know what is behind this other door.\n\nMy heart in my throat, I open the door and enter, only this time, I let go of the knob. There is no second chance now. I cannot turn back to the place I once was. I cannot simply exist any longer. \n\nThe darkness begins to wane as the floor beneath me cracks and splinters. A blinding light fights its way into this existence and I'm covering my eyes, hoping, praying, anticipating. I feel myself begin to fall, and a deafening silence surrounds me. My body aches! It hurts so bad! I'm screaming as the intensity builds and my limbs simply turn to ash and blow away. Everything that is or was me is being destroyed and in this moment I pray for death.\n\n* * *\n\n in a small Laotian village, a child is born.\n\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] Explain how, in a world where four leaf clovers actually give luck, governments and corporations have attempted to monopolise them.	[ "\"The Forleef four leaf clover is 20% more effective than competing products! Scientifically researched and handled with the utmost care, our products will never leave you wanting!\"\n\nJim shook his head at the neon distraction. He used to be a normal farmer - he'd had cattle, a few pigs and plenty of space for corn. Then the suits came. Jim had never seen that much money in one place before. He'd been surprised that it had all fit in one suitcase too. And the contracts.... almost as many as the bills that came with them. So now he grew four leaf clovers. Nothing but four leaf clovers. He was also one of the very few that didn't have dozens of the damn things on his body. Everyone bought four leaf clovers. Everyone except people like him.\n\nThat was also the reason he didn't go to the city that much anymore. He got looks, stares really, when people figured out what was missing. And then came the questions. He'd gotten better at evading them, but it chewed at his soul and left him exhausted. The easiest way was to just not take part in the city life.\n\nIt was all their fault. The suits from Marketing.\n\n---------------------\n\nA small deviation, I hope that's forgiven.", "When \"Luck\" became a quantifiable resource instead of just an old wive's tale, there was rush on clover fields. The fields were bought by the acre and harvested daily for those rare multi-leaf clovers. There were four major clover-based corporations. Goldpots, Windfall, Blessing and Four-leaf Futures. If you had a clover field on your property, you could be guaranteed that some company would pay you a few thousand dollars per acre.\n\nWhen Goldpots Incorporated had bought the Highland Lake plot, the owner, Seamus McTaggert had first asked for a stipulation in the sale. He wanted one last walk through his field before he signed over the rights. Legally, they had to allow it, as it was still his property until he signed the documents.\n\nHe returned a few minutes later and signed the paper with a flourish, making his family richer by thirty thousand dollars. But Goldpots could not find a lucky harvest inside the field. There was no evidence of anything but three-leaf clovers as far as their quality control could see.\n\nDuring his ten minutes in his field, McTaggert had collected all the extra-leafed clovers he could find. Four, five, and even a ten leaf white clover. There was about a pound of it. He set to work pressing and drying the clovers.\n\nWhen his wife Moira asked him what he was doing, he gave her an evil grin. \"I figured out a way to make more money than just selling the clover field, Moira. There's a black market for luck out there, and I intend to cash in.\"\n\n\"What are you gonna do, Seamus?\"\n\n\"Isn't it obvious, dear?\" He gestured to the clovers in front of him. \"I'm going to push my luck.\"" ]	2
	[WP] /r/WritingPrompts stops submitting prompts about people with superpowers	[ "One day. One day no child on earth will go hungry. One day we will all lay down our arms and war will be a distant memory. One day we will embrace each other as neighbors and share what we all have with one another so that we may all prosper together. One day we will listen to each other respectfully with undivided attention. One day no one will want for anything, and the last thing, the most difficult thing to make happen on that day, will be to get people to stop submitting posts on /r/writingprompts that don't either ape the top rated ones or revolve around the idea of super powers.", "I stared at the screen, looking for my target in vain. Super, hero, powers, anything! Alas, it had been weeks, and it appeared as though my cape and cowl stories were going to be but an archived memory. With a melancholy sigh, I closed my \"Book Of Superhero Ideas\", meandering to my shelf to give the worn notepad a place of honor on the top tier, replacing the far larger notepad that had previously held that same vigil.\n\nCarrying my new prize back to my laptop, I sat down once more, blowing dust from the cover, smiling with familiar affection at the glossy title. \"Swords and Sorcery Ideas\" gleamed at me in the dim light of the screen. I cracked my knuckles, flipped to a random page, and began my search anew.\n\nWho says I don't have idea variety?" ]	2
	[WP] Some people have the ability to see what others can't, the strange things that lurk behind the everyday. Of course, you don't know this, but there is someone staring at you rather intently.	[ "Today, the shop is more crowded than usual. \n\nThe smell of freshly ground espresso wafts through the air, accompanying the metallic whirring of the machine grinding the beans. A line zigs and zags its way from the cashier’s counter through the cramped wooden tables and mismatched sofas dotted throughout the small space. Above the thrum of indistinct chatter, a simple melody is played on a guitar on the loudspeakers. Sure, for a Monday morning this early rush might seem crowded.\n\nBut that’s not what I’m talking about. \n \nI’m talking about the man. He is nondescript to such an extent I am sure I would forget his face if I glanced away. His neat brown hair is carefully cut and brushed into a rigid pompadour, exposing the milky white skin of his forehead leading down to two dark, piercing irises. The delicate skin beneath his eyes has a bruise-like quality that gives the impression he has missed many nights sleep. With medium height and medium build, he is nothing special. Or rather, he should be nothing special. \n\nBut then he moves.\n\nHe is static. When he steps forward, his beige trousers don’t fold or crinkle to adjust for his movement; there is no telltale rustle of his crisply starched beige coat against the equally precise shirt beneath. The whirring fan above his head does not disturb his antiquated coif. If he has blinked or changed the intent expression on his face, I have missed it completely. I sit monitoring his movement, noticing the young woman behind which he stands uncomfortably close. She flips her hair back nonchalantly; the ends of her tawny hair flick his unflinching face. As she takes another step forward to the register to place her order, he follows – a substantiated shadow. The young woman has not noticed him and neither has the silver-haired businessman standing directly behind her in line. I know that they will never notice him.\n\nBecause I am the only one who sees him. \n\nAnd he is not the only shadow in the coffee shop this morning, making it more crowded than usual. Behind the young man reading intently from a slouchy armchair in the corner stands an eerily still woman in a khaki wrap dress and sensible beige pumps, her dark eyes piercing and watchful. The barista furiously working the espresso machine turns to wipe his brow and nearly elbows the man in the camel colored suit mirroring his every step, his black eyes staring intensely at his head. And none of them notice their singular audience. \n\nI do not know who they are, or rather what they are. I do not know their purpose. \n\nThey do not speak to me; I cannot lay my hand upon them. \n\nAll I know is that I am alone in my ability to see them. \n\nAs a child, this understandably caused quite a lot of trouble. Even now I can still clearly recall the stricken look upon my mother’s face – eyebrows tightly knitted together, eyes narrowed in confusion while her downturned mouth hung slack – when I asked who the woman was that stood behind daddy as he watched football in the living room. At first they thought it was the result of an overactive imagination fed by the attention seeking tendencies of a lonely only child. Then when I got a little older, this theory became less plausible and they searched for a new explanation. Countless shrinks, “behavioral specialists,” and one preacher while my mother went through her born-again Southern Baptist phase later; I had learned to keep my mouth shut. No prayers, no medicine, no psychoanalysis stopped my seeing them, so what was the point? At the advent of this realization, they slowly blended into the normalcy of my days. \n\nThis is not to say I still don’t puzzle their existence.\n\nWas the same woman standing behind my father while his heart stopped? If so, what would that mean? Are they the harbingers of death or something much more benign? My mind has always automatically assumed the worst, but I frustratingly don’t know enough about their movements. Any attempts to follow and observe them have failed spectacularly. As it turns out, normal people do not enjoy being followed by people they can actually see. Maybe I am doomed to always observe and wonder, with no hope for an answer. \n\nThe electronic blip! of my cellphone signals a new message. My reverie broken, I pull my phone out of my pocket and swipe a lazy thumb across the screen to read the text.\n\n“You still at the shop? Bring me coffee plzzz.”\n\nA smile pulls my lips taught. Mike you are such a damn mooch, I think to myself. But his text reminds me I ought to get going. I can (and have) lost countless hours deep in thought about the shadow’s intentions and origins. It’s a wonder they haven’t driven me mad simply by frustration alone at realizing I will never know the answer. My head bowed, I slip my phone back in to my bag and zip it up. I stand and start suddenly at the sudden presence of someone standing directly in front of me, uncomfortably close. \n\nA dark pair of eyes stare intently into mine.\n\n“Come with me.”", "\"WUBBA LUBBA DUB DUB!\"\n\n\n\"Chris, who are you talking to?\"\n\n\n\"The audience\"\n\n\n\"Um....\"\n\n\n\n\"You know, the TV Show we're on...\"\n\n\n\"What TV Show?\"\n\n\n\"Life With Brian\"\n\n\n\"How high are you right now?\"\n\n\n\"I'm high on life\"\n\n\n\"You just yelled nonsense to nobody for no reason\"\n\n\n\"No, Brian, I made a Rick and Morty reference to the audience. They love that shit.\"\n\n\n\"Chris, we're not on a TV Show\"\n\n\n\"Oh yeah? And how do you know that, Mr. Logical?\"\n\n\n\"Because this is a Reddit Writing Prompt.\"\n\n\n\"But... the people watching at home...\"\n\n\n\"Not watching, Chris, reading. Your 'TV audience' is a delusion.\"\n\n\n\"Yeah, well, your face is a delusion! And so is your Reddit theory!\"\n\n\n\nAnd so neither Chris nor Brian were able to conclude that the eyes watching from behind the fourth wall were not watching a TV show or reading a Writing Prompt on Reddit...\n\n\nIf the eyes exist at all." ]	2
Other people know you have it and want it bad!	[WP] A famous scientist dies after creating a drug that gives humans superpowers, it ends up in your hands, to you take it, sell it or run.	[ "When the sun goes down in 'Kishmar, the Rats come out.\n\nI awoke the way I always did-cold, cramped, stiff. I scratched my gluey eyes and squinted out the narrow window, wondering for a second where the heck I was-and then remembered. \n\nI unwound my sore body and began the painful process of inching out of the storage cabinet, then slowly standing up. Just enough light came through the broken window of the storage shed that I could see my companions emerging from their hideaways: a broken bassinet and a pile of old dog blankets. We exchanged looks and stiffened in unison, listening intently for anyone around, then tiptoed to the door. Beth eased it open, and Agi and I slipped through behind her. Beth let the door slowly close by itself, muffling the eventual thunk with the tips of her fingers.\n\nThen we set off together, me in the lead, the two girls behind me, keeping close to the edge of the hedge to avoid the illumination of the streetlights. This house-now part of our regular route-wasn't my favorite because the light was so close to it, but the old storage shed was one of our best sleeping spots. Unfortunately, now I was awake, and hunger was gnawing at my insides like the starving pit bulls of the Underground. \n\n\"Ready to go?\" Beth whispered. \"I'll take car, you check doors.\"\n\nWe had come to the next house over, a classic boring suburban that I hated because the owners always, with boring predictability, locked and shut everything. At least they didn't have a dog. I checked the front door-locked-while Agi glided into the backyard and Beth checked every door of the car. \n\nWe continued for longer than usual-almost ten houses-before we finally struck gold. I was coming out of the backyard when Agi hissed, \"Side door's unlocked!\"\n\nBeth hurried over from the car, moving on silent feet. In the darkness, her pale, bony body seemed even spindlier than usual, like a skeleton come to life. Agi eased the door open, and Beth and I slipped in, leaving her holding it. \n\nBeth handled the ground floor while I slipped downstairs to check the garage. Sure enough, there was another car parked there, and an extra freezer. I rifled the car-unlocked, of course-and pocketed a few dollars in change, then searched the freezer and took six ice cream bars. My hollow stomach rumbled frantically as I silently shut the garage door and tiptoed back up the stairs. Agi was already out of the house, and Beth was still waiting for me to get out. The second I was out, she shut the door and we crept away, staying close to the grass, until we were in the next house's backyard. Then we ran, as well as our bodies could, until we were in the next neighborhood over, where we crouched inside a bush and attacked the food. \n\nAgi had stolen a few cans, some cheese, onions, and an apple, which we shared after we demolished the ice cream. The onions and cans were stuffed into Beth's bag for later and we left the bush feeling much better. At the next house, we drank from the hose before we checked it, but everything was locked. We continued normally for a while, checking our houses, keeping eyes out for other Rats, squirreling away all the money and food we could steal. \n\nAt midnight, we turned onto our next street. We had a better territory than most Rats: six whole streets, and the people who lived there tended towards the wealthy. We were halfway down the street, and I was rifling a car while Agi kept watch when I heard a soft hiss of surprise.\n\n\"What?\" Agi whispered as I dug my fingers under the seats of the car. Nothing. \n\n\"That door's open,\" Beth whispered. \"See the house across the street? The side door's ajar.\"\n\nI heard the noiseless sound of both girls looking as I checked the wells of the seatbelt fasteners: a trio of coins rewarded me. I replaced everything I had moved and closed the door with a soft clunk. \n\n\"I got maybe fifteen coins,\" I said, and glanced up when they didn't respond.\n\n\"Look,\" said Agi, and I squinted and could just see the door of the house wave slightly in the breeze.\n\n\"Score,\" said Beth. \"Let's go.\"\n\nI crammed the change into her bag and then we made our way to the equidistant point between two streetlights where it is the darkest and crossed, then walked up the sidewalk to the house. I tried to remember what its significance was, but couldn't: It was usually locked, an older woman lived there, and there was a pet, a large brown tiger cat. \n\nAgi reached the door first. \"Beth, you watch, and Dar and I will go in, all right?\"\n\nBeth nodded. \"Hurry up.\" \n\nAgi and I stepped silently into the house, and both of us stiffened. Something was wrong with this one. There were always noises in the houses we entered-snoring, the icemaker grumbling, sound machines whirring away. In this one, there was nothing. Flat, unnatural silence. And while silence was the default sound of my life, I didn't like this silence. It was too quiet. \n\n\"I don't like this,\" Agi whispered tensely. \n\n\"Let's check it before we take it,\" I muttered, and she led the way through the kitchen and into the living room. The sounds of our bare feet shushing along the wood sounded like the loudest of drums in the stillness.\n\nThe living room was normal, so we turned and went into the front hallway, and Agi jerked so violently in front of me that for a second I thought she had stepped on a nail. \n\n\"What is it?\" I hissed, and as I leaned around her I saw it. \n\nA body was sprawled out along the floor, still and silent. The skin on the back of the neck looked blue in the light of the streetlamp filtering through the windows. Black hair fell across the shoulders. A briefcase, half closed, lay a few inches from the dead woman's hand. She wore a coat over a nightdress, and her cheek was lying in a pool of vomit that smelled so foul that I instinctively cringed backward.\n\n\"Oh my God,\" Agi whispered.\n\nA dark shape looked up from the half-open briefcase. The cat stretched up, yellow eyes widening, and it bolted past us into the living room, its tail puffed up. Perhaps it was my imagination, but was its mouth...white? And now that I looked at the briefcase, there was white powder on the floor beside it.\n\nI tiptoed down the hall, as if trying to avoid waking the woman up, and opened the briefcase. There were eleven full packets of white powder and one that was open and halfway used. \n\n\"Coke, you think?\" I murmured to Agi.\n\n\"Yes!\" she whispered. \"Jack-freaking-pot. Grab it. Let's go.\"\n\nI pushed the packets completely into the case and closed it, then we scrambled out of the hallway, away from the body. The cat meowed, confused, from somewhere in the dark, but Agi and I weren't about to check on it. We flew past Beth, who shut the door and scrambled after us.\n\n\"Well, what did you find?\" she panted. \n\n\"Coke, my dear girl,\" I smirked, waving the briefcase. \"We're about to make us some cash.\"\n\n\n", "Even though Phil was an idiot, I liked him. It's not like he was a bad person, it's just, he never thought things through. You see, he was obsessed with the extraordinary. He wanted to make things easier, people happier, think of how easy it would be to rescue people from collapsed buildings if people had sonar. The people who would still be alive if we could fly. Just imagine, if there were people who could freeze time, prevent disasters by stopping them in place the second they happen. This is what went through Phil's mind when he created XR42E, or as we nicknamed it, The Wonder Drug MkII. Others refer to it simply as \"The Pill.\"\n\nI say others, but really there are very few people who actually know XR42E exist, but that number is growing larger by the day. Originally only four people knew about it, Phil, Trevor, Norma, and me. But now Phil's dead, Trevor's missing, Norma's a bitch, and I'm on the run. As far as I know the last samples of XR42E were destroyed by Phil seconds before his death. Except for the 12 pills I have in my pocket right now. The 12 pills that are going to get me killed.\n", "Rain spilled over the gutters, and blood streamed down my arms. \n\nYet I ran. I ran like the devil was chasing me. In a way, he was.\n\nWhen he'd disappeared with the serum, Dr. Marlow had made many powerful enemies; mobsters, government officials, powerful corporations. All of them had had their greedy fingers in the research, a web of powerful interests confining Marlow to his work. And yet, he'd disappeared.\n\nIt was said that the serum would work differently on any individual. Troops of guards and patrols had surrounded his facility in tight, variable schedules. Cameras had watched Marlow, 24/7. It was just a shame that Marlow's particular ability turned out to be invisibility.\n\nMaybe he'd known even that, the bastard. When I think back on it, there were always hints, strange things he said to me. Warnings.\n\nBack then I was the only true friend Marlow had left, the way he saw it. And he was paranoid even when he came to me, last night.\n\nGun shots tore apart the street's quiet, and I ran even harder, cutting through alleys, zig-zagging in the dark. My feet splashed up rain, and blood trailed down to my feet, but still I ran.\n\nMarlow was dead now. I wasn't sure which side was chasing me, and I didn't care. As far as I was concerned, they were all worthless scum. And if they thought they still had a chance in taking that serum, they would be sorely disappointed.\n\nI finally reached the place, blasting open the secure doors, drawing from the newfound energy pockets deep within me. My reserves of power were almost empty, but that would soon be fixed.\n\nMaybe Marlow had even known what my ability would be. Maybe that was why he'd been so paranoid in the end, even when he counted me his final friend.\n\nI slowed down now. I had almost made it.\n\nOf course I had taken the serum. I had been planning to take it for years. I had been the first to see Marlow's genius, an intellect without bounds. A genius, but like so many geniuses, painfully child-like and naive in other aspects of life. Manipulating him into believing me a friend had been only too easy.\n\nSome late night security guard ran up to me, no doubt summoned by the blaring alarm my destruction of the doors had set off. I used my last reserves to wipe him aside before he could so much as touch his gun.\n\nMarlow was dead now. His blood still ran down my body. I hadn't just killed him. I had obliterated him to a fine mist. This world needed only one superpowered human being.\n\nUp, up, up the stairs. I was grinning now, knowing no one could stop me anymore. The sound of a helicopter came from above, closing in on the power plant I'd broken into. I heard people down the stairs, shouting in panic.\n\nSee, my power, it turned out, relies on certain, specific energy sources. Fossil fuels. Electric power. Nuclear. I was close enough to the center of the plant to feel it now, the glorious radiation, filling my reserves to overflow. \n\nThe first man reached the top of the stairs, and I turned around and grinned at him.\n\n\"Too late,\" I said.\n\nI released the power, tearing down the plant, razing everything to the ground. I faintly perceived the helicopter outside being caught in the fire as well, hurling down, crashing, and I laughed.\n\nI had made sure to take all of the serum when I drank it.\n\nThe world was only big enough for one supervillain.", " I look at the case he gave me and the multicolored pills look back at me. The pounding on the post office door is getting louder and louder. Eventually, the swat will break through the door and find me, dosing myself on pills. I have to make the decision and fast. Each one is labeled with a obscure, but plain name. I got all of these pills from my dad. He never knew me and I never trusted him, but in his will he gave me a case full of drugs. People showed up luckily his colleges showed up before the government did. I ran like a sensible person. I ran and never took any. I knew their where side effects and I was not going to take the chance. I ran until they caught up to me and forced me into the post office mail room. I knew what I had to do and I had to do it quick.\n\n\n\"Is he in here?\"\n\n\"No\"\n\n\"Where did he go?\"\n\n\"Out\"\n\n\"How do you know?\"\n\n\"A pile of clothes on the ground, sir. He took one of the pills. Can you guess which one?\"\n\n\"Where are the rest, smartmouth?\"\n\n\"That's the beauty of the american postal system. Their gone. We are just going to have to wait until they show up to synthesize them.\"", "Dr. FlimFlam was a slight man, short and scrawny with age. He had worked for years to create the impossible, to redefine what modern medicine and anatomy had constrained us to. But his life was almost over, and his work was almost done...\n\n---\n\n\"Doctor, here's that vibranium you had requested.\" I spoke, holding the crudely concocted container of the glowing element. \"I played hell to get this, so make sure it lasts!\" These trips, disguised as a sleazy buyer and seller of all things hard to find, were troubling, to say the least.\n\n\"Ahh, apples to the pie, Greg - you always find a way to get exactly what I need!\"\n\nThe doctor had always expected me to find ways to aquire elements and compounds, sometimes ones that only existed in universes where everything was green and blue, and the sky smelled of the ripe bloom of a poisonous sparanus during the day. It's going to take weeks to get that smell out of my lab coat.\n\n\"Well, how's the latest batch looking? If the analysis is accurate, you've gotten the catalist right, and the submolecular construction seemed to be smoother than last year's attempt, but is it binding?\"\n\n\"Patience, Greg, patience.\" The doctor reached for a bottle of stabilized light energy and withdrew the dropper, adding three drops to the ointment. \"Do me a favor and get the m&p5000. We'll be -\" one of his coughing fits interrupted him, shaking and clutching at his chest. I handed him a clean napkin to cover, and when his cough subsided, he continued, \"We'll be ready to analyze in a moment.\"\n\nGrabbing the Mortar & Pestle 5000, I extracted a small square of the vibranium I had purchased. After loading the base and priming the device, with a loud whirring and grinding noise, it began to powder the metallic element. When it was finished, careful not to breathe in any of the bright dust it permeated, I carried the powder to his table.\n\n\"Great! This ointment will be our best test yet!\" He exclaimed, while mixing in 5 grams. Amazingly, the Miracle Cream was almost finished. \"Hurry now, we need an ounce of the plutonic quarks. Then stick a dab of our cream in the nose machine!\"\n\nThe excitement in the room was tangible, and as I added the plutonic quarks, the feeling of accomplishing a lifelong dream was looming. This particular batch was the first to have both a molecular bonding catalyst and a regrowth limiting particle. Our failures were defied again and again as our tests grew closer and closer to the final product - a cure all for every ailment known to the universe. I finished mixing in the quarks, and dabbed a bit on a Petri dish for the nose machine to test.\n\nThe doctor began coughing wildly, small drops of blood coming now, along with the usual ectoplasm. The years had been hard on this man, and though his mind was still as active and creative as always, his body was failing. At 159 years old...wait...\n\n\"Professor, is it your birthday?\" I asked, looking at the universal atomic clock. 12:02 am, 20th day of the 4th month, 3008.\n\nJust as the nose machine began dinging to notify us of the test results, the Death-styled robots appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, and grabbed ahold of the doctor. I tried as hard as I could, but was unable to save him, unable to stop the Sunset Squad from taking him. The lab seemed empty without him, and there was only one thing left to do. I checked the nose machine's results...\n\n---\n\n\"Come one, come all!\" I said, \"Step right up! Have you ever had a cold? A bruise, a scrape, a cut, a hole where there shouldn't be one? Have you had a headache, a fever, an upset stomach, or a broken bone? Well I have just the thing!\"\n\nAlready starting to draw a small crowd, the pitch began.\n\n\"Are you tired of using an antibiotic, a salve, a pill, a syrup, a serum, an extract, a plant? Look no further!\"\n\n\"This sounds too good to be true!\" A man toward the back said.\n\n\"Come up here, and I'll show you! Dr. FlimFlam's miracle ointment!\"\n\n--\n\n2 hours later, I was gone, with the $60 he had paid. To this day, I still remember the strange red creature, a bad doctor with claws and an affinity for sandles.", "I swallow the pill. Nothing happened.\n\n\"Do you feel anything?\" the dull-looking advocate asks.\n\n\"Should I feel anything?\" I respond irritated. Why wasn't it working?\n\nThe advocate, Garry was his name I think, sighs. \"Professor Dun was a world-renown scientist, Ralph. For reasons beyond my comprehension he choose you to receive the pill, to do with it however you saw fit. He ensured me the results would be astonishing if you digested it yourself and that's all I know.\" His eyes were firmly looked on mine, scanning for any sudden chance in my body.\n\n\"Well, I never met Professor Dun and certainly have no connection to him, so I'm as much in the dark on this as you are.\" Just as I said that, I felt a strange sensation growing in my stomach, making it's way down as I stood there. Garry must have noticed as well.\n\n\"What is it? What do you feel?\"\n\nThe feeling reached my delicate parts. I felt my manhood stiffening. Garry still hadn't noticed, looking at my face as he was doing.\n\nI murmured \"I'm... It's...\"\n\n\"Yes?\" Garry asked expectantly.\n\n\"I think it gave me a boner,\" I said in disbelief as I looked down to confirm. Garry followed my gaze and gasped as he saw the bulge in my pants. \"What kind of pill did you gave me?\" I asked him in a daze. This was my first erection in years, I'd forgotten how good it felt.\n\n\"He... He called it Sildenafil I think.\" Garry muttered hesitantly.", "I always people expected too much of me, and Dr. Crimson was a weird dude. So, when he said I was special, I didn't think much of it, but then he sent me this. This thing in my hands couldn't be what he said it was though. This pill, well, series of five pills, couldn't change the human body into something else, something more, could it? Based on the cast of characters who had visited me already, it seemed to be legit. The offers for it were astronomical, three offers in the millions. I read the directions. I knew why he sent the pills to me. I was the best candidate. He had told me so immediately. I thought he was crazy. \n\nI pour a glass of water and look at them, the pills. You can't just shovel them down. Your body needs time to recover. The process can be overwhelming and assuredly fatal otherwise. I take the first pill and put it in my mouth. I drink a sip of water and swallow it. The second pill will be administered in 6 hours. I pack up my belongings, what little I have, and leave my shitty little apartment. I don't know where I'm going, but I drive. \n\nI take the second pill. So far, I feel little pain or nausea. I sweat more than usual. That is about it. The fact that I've already taken the first two pills throws away the prospect of a pay day. Dr. Crimson knew I wouldn't take the money. I didn't really care about it. The third pill is complicated. It has to be taken 33 hours after the first. I soon understand why.\n\nMy body hates me. Food tastes shit, don't ask how I know that. I vomit often. I drink water. It seems like food poisoning, but it's not. I get a motel room and wait it out. The knocking on the door goes away after I wait long enough. I sleep and sleep. \n\nAfter 28 hours, the symptoms clear, and I feel the best I've ever felt. My thoughts become clearer, more positive and optimistic. I do complicated math in my head for fun. At the time, I don't realize it's multivariate calculus. Oh, and I eat. I eat and eat to replace the lost calories. At 33 hours, I take the third pill. This one produces a euphoria that feels like taking opiates. The fourth pill is taken within the hour. \n\nI take it at the appropriate time and realize the third pill was probably a pain killer because I feel my body hurt and tremble, but I don't care. I wander back to my motel room. The fifth pill needs to be taken in approximately 23 hours 42 minutes 19 seconds. I think that actually sounds quite specific. I collapse onto the bed and sleep. \n\nI wake up on the floor. A dozen men stand around me. I recognize them. They are the Russian mobsters who offered the lowest bid. A kick to the face wakes me real quick. The narcotics have worn off. They stand me up. A brute the size of a small truck lays into me. \n\n\"Where is it?\"\n\n\"It's gone.\" I say. \n\nMore blows to my face and abdomen. They don't hurt much. Someone is coming to my defense. I can hear it. No, not defense, they are other bidders. I look around for the pill. It lies on the table. I look at my watch, still 1 hour 13 minutes 21 seconds to go. \n\n\"Expecting someone?\" Asks the leader. \n\n\"No, but someone is coming. I would focus on that door if I were you.\"\n\nThe door explodes open. They light up the room. Bullets fly. I'm not sure who they are. A bullet rips through my chest as the men around me fall to the ground. They never intended to help me. They only wanted the pill. I fall to the ground and crawl to the table. Another bullet hits my leg. I can tell that I am bleeding to death. I have no choice. The pill sits on the floor. I grab it, swallow it, and flip over. The Russians are dead, and the pill doesn't help me immediately. I am bleeding, and whatever secret the pills contained will die with me. \n\n\"Where are the pills, Brody?\"\n\n\"Took them, man.\"\n\n\"Cover his wounds. We need to get him back to the lab.\"\n\nNow, I remember them, the Turks. They carry me to their SUV and throw me in the back. Something happens. I stop bleeding. I can feel the strangest thing. My wounds are healing. I wait though. When we get to their lab, they pull me out. I grab the nearest gun and drop two of the Turks. I dodge bullets that pass by me in slow motion and fire into three more men. My gun is empty. I whip it at the face of one of them. The barrel lodges into his forehead. I close the gap on the remaining men and immediately know their weaknesses, old injuries and pressure points. I drop two more as the last two flee on foot. \n\nTwo cars cut them off. Windows roll down and bullets fly. The two remaining men collapse to the ground. I look back at the SUV and feel like I could throw it at them. I run over and lift it with one hand and toss it down the road at the cars. One of them is totally destroyed, so I run at the other car, yes, into the gun fire. This is crazy, but I jump and kick two feet into the car causing it to roll and roll and roll for 100 yards. It looks like Dr. Crimson was right about me after all. I was special. " ]	7
	[WP] Every full moon you turn into Bruno Mars	[ "God dammit. That's it. Again. ''I WOULD CATCH A GRENADE FOR YOU'' I scream without hesitation. I can't control it. I turn my head and see Julie, my date. She froze staring at me in deep concern. It was our first date. Everybody stopped eating and looked at me. Julie let out a small laugh to break the awkwardness, trying deeply to avoid the situation. I look down at my feet in shame. People finally continue chit-chatting as I am controlled by the soul of Bruno.\n\n- HER LIPS, HER LIPS, I COULD KISS THEMA LL DAY IF SHE LET ME\n\nNow it wasn't like the other time. She knew something wasn't wrong. It wasn't some joke. One man who was eating with his wife and kids shouted and asked Julie if everything was okay, as I [start shaking my head, growing a fedora](http://i.imgur.com/89hxjR2.jpg). She now visibly looks scared, and backs off from the table. I let a mighty ''I JUST WANT TO LAY IN MY BED TODAY''. The manager, visibly angry, comes to me and asks me to leave. I turn my head to excuse myself to Julie, trying to resist the [fact that I am growing a visible afro](http://i.imgur.com/24hVGW7.jpg). I get pushed out of the restaurent as I yell ''Meet a really nice girl have some really nice sex\nAnd she's gonna scream out \"this is great\"'', from ''The Lazy Song'', a classic I sing when it happens. To which he answers ''I highly doubt that if you're gonna sing like an asshole everytime''. I'm laying down, crying, shaking, beginning to be even more like him.\n\nSome people come up and take pictures, to which I can only continue screaming my lyrics and transforming myself. Everytime it happens, paparazzis make thousands saying Bruno is on some new drugs. I hate this life.", "It was time again.\n\nPeople make jokes about a lady's \"time of the month,\" but I'm no lady. It's still my time, though. Every month, it happens. I don't know why, I don't know how. Where does all my mass go? None of it makes sense.\n\nBut it's starting, my understanding be damned. I could hear it, faintly, in the back of my mind, growing in volume though nobody else had ever heard it as I rushed away from groups of people before I figured out what was happening. The sound was familiar, I had heard it so many times, but even the first time I had recognized it. \n\nThen my body started to melt away, replacing my doughy physique with toned muscles. The sound grew louder. My height started to go, as well, shrinking me down six or seven inches. That hurt. A LOT. The sound in my mind started to push its way further into my psyche. My skin and hair darkened, the latter turning frizzy instead of straight.\n\nThe transformation only takes a minute or so, and the noise that only I could hear had reached a crescendo. I couldn't stop it now, only give in to the urge. It wasn't always like this, but the urge had recently beaten my willpower and now every time I change, it happens.\n\nI looked up to the sky, fighting the impulse, staring down the hated full moon. My will broke as the music was all I could focus on. I breathed deep, the words forcing themselves out of my chest.\n\nI couldn't stop it, I looked to the moon and cried, \"YOU AND ME BABY MAKING LOVE LIKE GORILLAS!\"" ]	2
	[WP] Write a story set in a universe that could be seen as either Utopian or Dystopian	[ "He almost forgot what trees looked like. For the first time in almost three weeks, Simon was outside enjoying the sunshine. Most kids were hardly ever allowed outside the bunker; Simon was forbidden. The direct sunlight felt like it almost burned his pale skin, but it was a welcome feeling. I wonder how bad it hurts them, he thought. He jumped in and out of the shadows made by the thin trees and felt free, having what he felt could be real fun. Even though he figured he should be afraid, Simon couldn’t recall the last time he felt this happy.\n\n“Come on, Simon. We have to be quick.”\n\n“I’m coming, Dad.”\n\n“Quicker.” Charlie Atmoss grabbed Simon by the arm and pulled him. “No time to play around.”\n\n“Dad, we haven’t had anything to worry about in the past six months.”\n\n“I don’t care if it’s been six years. The sooner we’re back, the better.”\n\nThe brisk walk turned to a light jog. As they got deeper into the woods, the shadows grew until Simon could no longer jump from lighted spot to lighted spot in one leap.\n\n“Should be only another mile,” Charlie said.\n\n“Dad, we have our flashlights…there’s nothing to worry about!”\n\nFlashlights ain't enough for a pack of hungry ones, thought Charlie. “Just keep up with me. We’re almost at the Crickshaw compound.”\n\n“I don’t understand why they don’t just move in with us. They’d be a lot safer, wouldn’t they?”\n\n“They would, but some people just want to do what they’ve always done. They feel better that way. They don’t have to answer to anyone.”\n\n\"I guess so,\" said Simon. \"But it’d be better to have someone to make Mom’s medicine at our place so we wouldn’t have to do this next time it runs out.\"\n\n“This time we’ll just have to take more and hope she gets better.”\n\nAs more sunbeams peeked through the dense canopy, Charlie knew they were close but refused to slow his pace. He never liked going in the woods and the less time in there, the better. Horror lurked behind each tree; each shadow was a safe haven for the monsters. He remembered how the Houth family was ambushed on their way back from a routine trip.\n\nIt had been quiet for weeks, and they wanted to gather apples from a nearby orchard. On their way back, as they neared the edge of the forest, Charlie had watched as their horse reared up and the wagon was pushed on its side. The family toppled over the side and in a matter of seconds were overwhelmed. He remembered the screaming, the red, and eight year old Miranda Houth being dragged away as her nails dug into the dirt. He could only watch as her eyes reached out toward him. The community decided not to take children into the forest after that.\n\nThere was no guilt. If a slight pang occurred, he comforted himself with the knowledge that if he had gone into the woods that day, it would have been not only a death sentence for him, but also his wife. Charlie was lucky enough to still have his wife and one of his children and, after losing his two girls years ago, they were the only things that kept him going. Even though they were a community, it was only out of necessity; everyone with a family left tried to keep to themselves. Most tried to avoid new emotional attachments. This made the decision to bring Simon along on the dangerous trek that much more difficult — Simon had to learn the way just in case anything happened to Charlie and the boy seemed old enough at probably eleven years old now to accompany him. Besides, Simon was right, it was six months since the last sighting, and there was even talk that they were gone. His wife’s condition had worsened and Mr. Crickshaw was the only one that knew how to make a paste to alleviate her symptoms.\n\nAs the two hours of underbrush began to give way to grass, the shabby construction came into view on the top of the hill before them. The hill was the perfect daytime defense — an open field on a high ground, surrounding by forest. There weren’t any shadows. Though the dilapidated log home was a relic of an old world when people were driving cars, going to grocery stores, and working forty hours a week for a paycheck, the modifications made to the property were done at the beginning of the initial outbreak by the Canadian military. A concrete-enforced wall and a steel bolt door made it an impenetrable fortress. The provisions, survival gear, and ammunition made it livable. Mr. Crickshaw had never been able to explain why the post was abandoned, but considered finding it while lost in the woods one day a blessing from God. The highest point of the house was a bell tower that the Crickshaws always had someone sitting in, watching the woods for movement.\n\n“That’s it, son.” Charlie took his shirt off and had Simon do the same as a gesture of good will and stepped out of the forest. The bell rang once, hollow over the hill.\n\n“Sounds like Christmas, doesn’t it, Dad?” The bell sounded more like a gong than Christmas chimes, but from what Simon knew about old customs, it was beautiful music to his ears. “Do you think they’ll let me try it?”\n\n“I wouldn’t count on it. We should only stay for as long as we need to. We need to get back before dark and if we stay too long, we’ll have to sleep over. I don’t want to worry your mother.\"\n\nAs they approached the steel door, several ratchets and clanks could be heard before it swung opened and a hunched old man with a gray beard down to the belly of his loose shirt greeted the two. It looked as though he hadn’t washed in weeks.\n“Ah, Charlie! It’s been so long. And you must be Simon! It’s a pleasure to finally meet you after hearing all the good things your dad’s told me over the CB. You’re both looking well!” Crickshaw’s voice lost none of its cheeriness.\n\nCharlie wished he could return the same sentiment. “Hey there, Mr. Crickshaw. Do you have the medicine? I don’t mean to be rude, but we should be going as quick as possible.”\n\n“Yes, yes, of course, of course. Stay right there. Actually, where are my manners? Make yourselves at home! Got some hot water if you would like a cup of tea?”\n\n“Do you have any hot chocolate?” asked Simon, his bright blue eyes gleaming in hope under his matted brown hair. He instinctively put his hands together in childlike prayer.\n\n“Simon, I don’t think we have time…” Charlie began.\n\n“Nonsense, Charlie. You know it won’t be dark for hours. Besides, there hasn’t been a sighting in who knows how long? Some of the traders who ventured to these parts think they’re all dead or they left the island somehow.” Mr. Crickshaw turned to Simon. \"I most certainly have hot chocolate,” he said, with a warm crinkle in the corner of his mouth. “Would you like some?”\n\nSimon, with his hands back in prayer, looked hopefully at his dad, who gave a slight nod.\n\n“Yes!” Simon could not believe his luck. Outside, a walk with his dad through the wood, and now hot chocolate? This was turning into the best day he could remember.\n\n“All right, I’ll go fetch that and the medicine. Are you sure you don’t want anything, Charlie?\"\n\n“I’ll have some water, if you don’t mind,” Charlie said, looking for a place to sit down as Crickshaw left the room.\n\nThe two sat down on a ratty couch that, despite its appearance, was rather comfortable. Years of use had given it a feeling of softness that was a world of difference compared to the rigid furniture they had at home. Simon was obviously not used to this kind of comfort, unconsciously sprawling over the entire thing. He’d never felt an actual bed before. The day continued to improve. “I wish I had a bed like this!\"\n\n“Be thankful for what we have.” Charlie leaned closer to Simon. “See how loose Mr. Crickshaw’s shirt is? I think I’d rather have food.”\n\n“Do you think I shouldn’t drink the hot chocolate?” Simon whispered back.\n\n“He seemed pretty excited to let you have some,” Charlie said. “I don’t think he would have offered if he were truly desperate. Besides, he knows he can always stay with us if he wants. We would keep him fed.” Charlie knew that the Crickshaws were too proud to accept help or refuse a cup of hot chocolate, to their own ruin. There’s no room left in this world for pride, he thought.\n\n“Be right there! Just mixing it all together!” shouted Mr. Crickshaw from the other room. “See that map on the wall? It shows exactly where we are on Graham--”\n\nThe bell was ringing again. This time it wasn’t the slow gong, but a rapid clanging. Charlie didn’t hesitate, jumping to attention. “Simon, get up right now.”\n\nThey ran upstairs where Mr. Crickshaw had already starting making his way up the bell tower.\n\n“What is it, boy?” Mr. Crickshaw asked the little boy that was ringing the bell.\n\n“I…I thought I saw one. Running through the woods,” he said. His bottom lip was quivering.\n\n“You know that ringing the bell like that is serious business.”\n\n“Yes. I saw something. Someone. In the woods.”\n", "\"Mr. Terrance?\" She called out dutifully, smiling warmly at the only man in the room.\n\nHe folded up his holopaper with calm efficiency belying his nerves, standing up to return her smile. He stole a glimpse at her nametag, Amelia Terrance, immediately felt guilt for doing so without asking permission. \"Please, if you feel comfortable doing so, call me Michael. How may I help you?\"\n\n\"I'm fine, but thank you for offering! I merely wished to inform you that Doctor Emford will see you now, if you feel ready.\"\n\nHe took a deep and steadying breath, admitting to himself that he was a little nervous. \"Of course, I always have time for an old and dear friend.\"\n\nShe gestured towards the door with a half bow, holding the pose until he returned it and stepped past her into the alcove. Immediately, it whistled open, inviting him in.\n\n\"Michael! It is always a deep pleasure to meet you under any circumstance! Please take a seat, and tell me about your day!\"\n\nAfter a short back and forth negotiating over who would enjoy the seat behind the desk and who would enjoy one of the seats in front, they both sat in front, turning the chairs to face each other. The man regaled the doctor with a quick but enthusiastic retelling of his day, starting with his joyous morning wakeup routine while guiltily confessing to skipping breakfast. After extending the same courtesy back, and promising not to tell about the doctor's secret habit of waiting until after breakfast to brush his teeth, they finally settled in to business.\n\n\"So, thirtieth birthday, then? What a momentous occasion, if you don't feel it is too uncouth of me to say so! I'm terribly sorry that it has to come to this for you, but so very glad that you'll be at rest.\"\n\nHe was referring, of course, to Michael's not qualifying for a half-decade extension. The doctor was on his tenth, not that Michael was jealous - only proud that the doctor was such an outstanding performer. Though Michael was himself a hard worker, loved by all, and nobody could find any fault with his performance, the impartial overseer had determined that he fell below the required quota of labor output.\n\n\"Please allow me just run a few more questions by you, if it isn't a hassle or irritation. No lifetime spouse? No children, natural or adopted? No estate or testament to leave behind? Well, thank you kindly for making this efficient and simple!\"\n\n\"Quite welcome, of course.\" Michael replied automatically, licking chapped lips as betrayal of his inner state. Instantly, the doctor dashed off to grab a cup of water, apologizing profusely for neglecting this basic courtesy.\n\n\"Now, as you know, every person is doled out a generous thirty years from birth to live life to the fullest extent. After twenty years, they are allowed to select a career, should one interest them, and begin performing reparation work for their gift of life, in order to pave way for our upcoming children to have their thirty year boon.\"\n\nMichael nodded, warming to to the relaxation of discussing their safe, shared culture.\n\n\"Now, you have been an exceptional janitor, simply splendid, with some of the highest reviews I've ever seen in a resident chart, but according to the overseer -\" he made a sad moue \" - your performance falls just ever-so-slightly below the threshold qualifying you for an extension to your life, and it was with a heavy heart that it had to reject your application. As you know, life isn't unlimited!\"\n\n\"Well, I'm just glad to have given what I could, and saddened that I didn't provide enough to redeem future generations. We all try our best, but if everyone could succeed nobody would ever die, as they say.\" He smiled bravely.\n\n\"If you don't mind me telling you something confidential, your name has already been re-entered into the roster. The next male child born will get to be a Michael, so congratulations!\"\n\nHe realized suddenly that this meant his name was someone else's joy now - with a slightly wistful sigh, #9449-T mentally waved goodbye to his Michael-ness, before breaking into a happy, genuine smile. \"Hope they enjoy it, it's a wonderful name!\"\n\n\"Well, I don't mean to keep you waiting any longer. Do you have any final requests?\"\n\n\\#9449-T thought long and hard for a few minutes, while the doctor waited patiently. Finally he nodded. \"Well, if it isn't too greedy or rude of me to ask, could I have a ration bar? I know the energy will just get recycled, but I was too nervous for breakfast, and I'd feel sad if I died on an empty stomach.\"\n\n\"Of course! I'm always happy to grant last wishes when I can! You prefer Elderberry flavor, right?\" He typed in a quick sequence on the wall, summoning forth the desired meal from the energy-to-mass generator, and quickly unwrapped it for #9449-T.\n\nAs far as last meals went, it was delicious. After savoring the last crumb, he bowed a final time to the doctor. \"Thank you for everything, doctor.\"\n\n\"Thank you for everything as well. Are you ready to meet the overseer?\"\n\nHe smiled, pulling open a extension drawer below the generator, slightly larger than the normal models, motioning for the man to lay down on it. After ensuring he was comfortable, he gently and wordlessly pushed it shut.\n\n\"Please confirm: Recycle subject #9449 batch T?\" The panel on the generator prompted him. Nodding instinctively, he pressed the confirmation button, squinting his eyes in anticipation of the brief, but bright flash. Done. He waited briefly.\n\n\"Possible error: System indicates 9,999 subjects found in current population, of 10,000 expected.\" The overseer alerted him dutifully.\n\n\"Please indicate: Generate replacement subject #1316 batch U?\"\n\nThe doctor beamed in delight as he confirmed that screen as well, issuing the order to send the new Michael down to the nursery." ]	2
	[WP] Tot save the life of your best friend, you have to challenge the devil to a game of chess. You are pretty good, but the devil already has an eternity of practice	[ "“I believe was my first question was, ‘What the hell is this?’ ‘And why is this asshole dressed like Satan?’ I’m pretty sure was my second question, though it might have been, ‘How do you play chess?’ My friend Jeremy called me just 45 minutes prior saying he needed a ‘little help.’ He didn’t say ‘nothing about playin’ chess against the devil.\n \n“Apparently his years of success came at a price. He made some shady deals, bla bla bla, and now the devil wants his soul. Jeremy says there’s got to be another way; devil says ‘Only if your best friend beats me in a game of chess.’ I’m the lucky guy.\n\n“So, I show up, devil gives me the run down, kind of a sarcastic prick, tell you the truth. I tell him, ‘I didn’t agree to this.’ Devil says fine, he’ll take my friend right now. ‘Can’t we do a game of hockey,’ I ask him.\n\n‘Hockey’s not my game,’ he smirks. Then he says they don’t got ice in hell. Smart ass. I told ya. So, I ask him if we can just do checkers, to make it fair. No, it’s gotta be chess.\n‘Fine,’ so I pull up a chair. I ask him what the little guy in the front does. He smirks and says,\n\n‘Why would I want to help you?’ Asshole. So, I look over to Jeremy and I’m like,\n‘Help me out. How do ya play this game?’\n\n‘Now, now, no cheating,’ the devil clicked his black fingernails together and grinned at me.\n\n‘Alright, fuck this,’ I tossed the table to the side, pulled out my snub nose .357 from my waist band and gave him four between the eyes. I mean, I don’t know if a bullet’s gonna hurt the devil, but, you gotta try, right? I mean, wouldn’t you do the same for your friend, your honor?”\n\nThe judge remained motionless.\n\n“Well, anyway, it was right after that that Jeremy started screaming like a little girl, no offense, your honor. So I’m like, ‘What are you screamin’ for? I just saved your life?’ That’s when he goes and tells me it was all some prank. I’m like, ‘A prank?’ You dress someone up like the devil and tell me your soul is at stake and that’s a prank? So, I was angry and I thought I’d teach Jeremy a lesson, so I popped him one in the leg. He lived; he’s fine, isn’t he?”\n\n“Uh! No- no further questions your honor!” a rotund little man waved his hands in the accused’s face to shut him up. \n", "\"Your move first\"\n\n(the devil sounded surprisingly polite and well-mannered, which was a bit more frighteneing than you expected)\n\n\"Uhh\"\n\n(you pause for about 20 painful seconds)\n\n(the devil's stare pierces into your soul and causes you to perspirate uncontrollably)\n\n\"Take your time. You're going to need it.\"\n\n(the devil has a huge Shit eating grin on his face after saying that)\n\n(not only was he an eternal torturer, he was a dick too)\n\n\"You think so? Huh. You're probably right. How long have you been playing for? All eternity?\"\n\n(you begin chuckle at your own joke but then realize you made a shit joke in front of the devil so you blush and go silent)\n\n(you also have to fart but now is not the time)\n\n\"Actually yes, I have been playing for all eternity.\"\n\n(I'm the author of this and even I can tell you that you are so fucked)\n\n\"Wait, so doesn't that mean you will counter any move I make?\"\n\n\"Yes\"\n\n\"So you will win no matter what?\"\n\n\"Yes\"\n\n(a few seconds go by)\n\n\"And I will eat you alive and enjoy it\"\n\n(bro what the fuck)\n\n(you now look at the devil and stare into his coal black eyes)\n\n(you are trembling)\n\n(you are frightened)\n\n(and you just farted)\n\n(while staring at the devil)\n\n(and it's starting to smell)\n\n(the devil is now plugging his nose in disgust)\n\n(dude)\n\n(I think you just shit yourself)", "The devil grinned maliciously as he read the final draft the contract, his voice like dry leaves and kindling snapping in a fire.\n\n\nThe contract states that I alohameans143, and Lucifer will engage in a game of chess until one winner is obtained from the results, and both parties are beholden to finishing the game in its entirety before leaving the aforementioned chess arena. During the duration of the game, all outside forces will be denied from interfering, be it Angels demons, humans, time, age, bodily functions what have you, no forms of supernatural or mundane forms of boosting is allowed. Collateral has been offered up in the form of an equal wager, one soul to one soul. Violation of this contract will force the offending party to automatically forfeit collateral. Conclusion of the contract also prevents retaliation on behalf of both parties regardless of the results.\n\n\nWe both signed the contract; in blood of course, his ichor seeping and staining the page.\n\n\nHe was confident, allowing me to choose who got to go first. I graciously allowed him to go first.\n\n\nE-4....a strong opening move. But it didn't matter.\n\n\nI pulled out my sunglasses and put them on. \n\n\n\"What do you think this is, the World Series of poker?\" He mocked.\n\n\nI closed my eyes and began to doze off, much to his chagrin and bewilderment. He tried to get off his seat, but had found that he could not move as per terms of the agreement he had just signed.\n\n\nTechnically the contract had not imposed a time limit on my turn. Eternity is a long time, but I am a patient man.\n\n\n\n", "Man Vs. Satan\n\nby ElSol69\n\n\"So to be clear, Mr…\" I paused. \"Do you prefer Satan, Lucifer, or the Dark One?\"\n\n\"You can call me anything you like,\" the elegant-looking man said to me. \n\n\"I like the suit,\" I said. \"Brooks Brothers.\"\n\n\"I have a choice of designers,\" he replied. \"Some of the best haven't been pleasant people. The little cruelties add up; I love little cruelties.\"\n\n\"Anyway,\" I said, shivering even though the room was boiling. \"It's best four out of seven.\"\n\n\"You humans amuse me,\" he said. \"Do you believe somehow the outcome will be different if we play once or a thousand times. I have played against God!\"\n\n\"But you're not God,\" I pointed out.\n\nHe growled.\n\n\"No time limit on moves,\" I said. \"I can take as long as I want.\"\n\nHe nodded slowly.\n\n\"The stakes are if I win, my best friend goes free,\" I said. \"If I lose, you get me too.\"\n\nHe smiled.\n\n\"We're allowed whatever aids we need?\" I asked.\n\nHe nodded.\n\nI nodded back.\n\n\"Black or white?\" he asked looking at me.\n\n\"Siri,\" I said into my IPhone. \"Do we have connectivity?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" her voice replied. \"We are connected to the cluster -- the supercomputer is online and available for my access.\"\n\n\"Good,\" I said. \"Siri, black or white?\"", "Childsplay, thought the devil. A smirk crossed his face as he gestured grandly over the perfectly arranged 64 squares that would determine the fate of Thomas Reginaw's loved one.\n\nTom frowned, and considered the board before him. Chess really wasn't his thing. If only the devil had challenged him to fantasy football...\n\nTom sat down as Lucifer gleefully rubbed his hands together. He looked at the field of play, his White pieces waiting for their owner's hand. Tom scratched his chin, deep in thought. Then inspiration struck him.\n\n\"Nope. I wanna play Black.\" Tom said, spinning the board around. Annoyance flashed across Beelzebub's face, and he began to protest.\n\n\"Foolish mortal! I have had eons of practice. And statistically speaking, White has the advantage. I do not want it ever said that Satan wasn't sporting.\"\n\n\"I wanna play Black. Make your move.\" Tom said, unswayed.\n\nSatan was quick to move a pawn, seemingly unperturbed by the sudden switch. Satisfied with his move, he eyed Tom from across the table.\n\n\"To tell you the truth, I prefer playing Black. Suits my character, you know?\" Satan shared.\n\n\"Fascinating.\" Tom muttered, staring at the board. A moment passed, then several. A minute lapsed in silence as Tom steepled his fingers, weighing his options. Another minute passed, and the devil shifted restlessly in his seat.\n\n\"I don't mean to rush you Tom. Heaven knows the pressure that's on you. The very soul of your beloved wife. An eternity of torment is something very serious indeed. But I have a 3:30 appointment with some teenage girls that got their hands on a Ouija board, so can we move this along?\"\n\nTom's stony face broke into a smile. A delirious laughter erupted from his throat, echoing around the cave filled with fire and brimstone. The laughter attracted the curious stares of Hell's other inhabitants. \n\n\"What's so funny Tom? Is it the thought of your wife undergoing eternal torture?\" Satan snapped, annoyed.\n\n\"Well, as long as I don't move, I don't lose. As long as I don't lose, Katie doesn't die.\"\n\nTom crossed his arms emphatically, leaning back into his seat.\n\n\"Checkmate.\"\n\n" ]	5
	[WP] Never underestimate an unreasonable idiot with the powers of a god	[ "\"What are you? You're not human at all!\" The wallpapers contrast with the dark red of someone's blood covering the flower. He looks like his pants just turned brown and his face is flushed red with the amount of force that the wall collided into him with.\n\n\"If I had any idea, I probably wouldn't be hearing someone telling me to stop, to stop abusing my power to gain more.\" Why is that voice still screaming at me...my skull hurts, but it continues on. It screams that I am not a human, but that is not what I see when I look at myself in the mirror. To me, I am me.\n\n\"What did I even do to you...\" He starts sobbing like he's lost a loved one, but I don't have any pity for this person. Not after he ruined the image of the voice in my head three years ago. The voice is now crying desperately for me to stop murdering his children.\n\n\"Everything.\" I turn around and walk away. This is not his end, nor mine.", "First, all the liberals died. Just straight up dropped dead. Then it was the Middle East. The entire population of Arabic speakers just up and died. That was when people started to think there was a 'Death Note' type situation coming about. Somewhere, someone very conservative had attained power over life and death. Or at least we thought it was that simple.\n\nSoon people stopped dying. The government shut down as corrupt officials all killed themselves simultaneously, and anybody left converted to Republicanism and basked in their new immortal, far-right world. \n\nThe icon appeared in the sky: the constitution of the United States of America, pasted against the clouds in every corner of the world. Every flag on the planet changed to an American flag. Anybody who wasn't a Christian awoke with their mouths fused together, left to starve in silence. Anybody who converted was relieved of this malady. \n\nEvery American awoke on day 3 with a gun beneath their pillow, as thought left for them by the magical Republican God-Fairy. \n\nBy day 5, global warming was ceased, the US dollar ruled the world, every nation was now a territory of the US, and black people were all permanently imprisoned, but nobody seemed to know why.\n\nSomewhere in the swamps of Mississippi, a Vietnam veteran rocked in his chair, holding an ancient book... laughing.", "\"Whoa, mate.\" \nMy ears pricked up at that. I stuffed my change in the tip jar and spun around, wondering how much more I'd have to put in the tip jar to pay for the renovations the bar would be undergoing next week. \n\"Chris, come on. Let's go. It's almost close anyways.\" \nI wouldn't placate him; I knew that. The words were just for me, for the days later on when I would look back on tonight and wonder what I might have done. I tried, right? \n\"Nah, mate. No can do. Unfinished business.\" \nHe wasn't even talking to me. The poor ugly lad that he hadn't broken eye contact with gathered himself enough to spit out a comeback: \"Yeah, Chris, go on with your boyfriend home.\" \nChris smiled. I felt the adrenaline drop into my gut now, my collar heating up as my neck began to burn. Three men stepped in closer behind the drunk who was steadying himself on the bar. Two lards that looked like brothers with mean, beady eyes, and a staggering man about my own size that looked like he'd broken his nose at least twice. I could tell he was seeing double; maybe to him this looked like a fair fight. Poor lad. \nChris had always been trouble, a walking, talking conflict with an ego the size of a god's. I suppose that wasn't his fault, looking the way he did. He could've been an actor, the latest Hollywood hunk with an 8-pack to grace the big screen, but that wasn't his bag. Not to mention who his father was. \nHe still hadn't looked away from Ugly, swaying in front of him at the bar. Poor Ugly. He probably thought he was going to leave under his own power tonight. What a fool Ugly was. An apology for the knocked-over beer and the bar might've made it out unscathed. Oh well. \nI swung first. Variety is the spice of life, right? We were bound for a brawl anyways, and I never swung first. Truth be told, I never really swung at all. Fights that involved Chris didn't last long. I went for the drunkest of them. Was it cowardly? Maybe. But he was the smallest of the four, and I thought it was probably better for his health if he was laid out by me than by Chris. \nHe was skinny, with not much padding on his face. I delivered a quick 1-2 to him, and he dropped like a light. Good, because my knuckles hurt. I saw Ugly rocket past me, followed by one of the Lard brothers, his head in-between the rungs of a stool. I turned around just in time to see the other Lard brother's face pass me in a blur. Chris had him by the ankles, spinning him like a hammer about to be thrown. His face must've broken every pint on the bar before he went crashing into the chandelier above Ugly and his brother. \nI took a quick survey of the damage. Three tables, 11 chairs, lots of glassware, a crystal chandelier, more damage I couldn't see. \n\"Christ, man. You didn't have to throw him into the chandelier.\" \n\"I know, I got a little carried away. Don't worry, they'll survive.\" \nI looked at the bloody pile of men against the wall, and down at the sleeping man at my feet. \"I know,\" I said. \nWe walked out of the bar, headed nowhere. People rushed past us, gasping at the scene within while the police tried to cordon off the area. Nobody even looked our way. Typical. \n\"Chris.\" He walked ahead of me down the alleyway, in that silent mood he got in. \"Chris.\" Nothing, no acknowledgement. \"Chris.\" He was so moody sometimes. \"CHRIST.\" He stopped and looked back at me. \n\"Yeah?\" \n\"You have got to get your temper under control, man.\" \n\"I know, I know.\" He was quiet for a moment. \"Do you want to go home?\" \n\"Well, I'm not really tired now.\" \nHe stood for a minute, then turned and walked back past me to the street. \"Well, the night's still young. Let's find some water.\"\n" ]	3
	[WP] Your adoptive father just pulled you aside and confessed that he and your mother are actually you and your future wife from the future.	[ "\"Wait, so you risked destroying the universe just to watch yourself grow up? How many loops has this gone through?\"\n\nDad- er, I began stammering, \"O-only... j-ju-just one, b-but...\"\n\n\"See?! So, what's probably going to happen is that we'll be stuck in an infinite time loop while the universe starts to sort itself out! Now that I have that knowledge, I know to avoid her-\" I pointed at Mom/future girlfriend- \"-because of how much you two fight. If I don't marry her, then I won't go back in time and adopt myself, so I won't know not to marry her and I'll do it, then I'll go back and adopt myself and make time loop! You just destroyed this universe, you idiot! Time won't be able to progress ever again because we won't be able to find a way out of this! You should've just kept your fat mouth shut!\" Finished with my rant, I let out an angry groan and slumped down in my chair.\n\nMom/future girlfriend/not future girlfriend turned to Dad/me and hissed, \"Was it really necessary to tell him that at the family reunion?\"", "It was the second to weirdest day in my life. Don't let that fool you though. It was still really weird. And I have had some weird days in my time. My parents were seriously strange people. They called me into the living room. They asked me to sit down. It was my sixteenth birthday. They had decided I was old enough to know. I wish they hadn’t.\n\n\n“Sit down, Jack.” \n\n\nMy dad sat down. Hi name was Jack too. He was trying to be funny. He wasn’t. He smiled at me and I glared at him. He got back up. I sat down. \n\n\n“Jack, we have to tell you something.” My mom was looking at dad for support. \n\n\n“Go ahead,” stupidest words I ever said.\n\n\n“Well,” she said. She didn’t say anything else. She just looked at my father. \n\n\n“Jack, help me with this”\n\n\n“Okay, okay,” my dad said. “So, how do I put this?”\n\t\n\nThere was a long pause. There were a lot of things going on in my head. Nothing was close to what they were going to say. There was still no talking from both my parents. A lightbulb went off in my head. I knew exactly what they wanted to tell me. This was so typical of my parents.\n\t\n\n“Is this the birds and the bees talk? Because I already know what sex is. I’m sixteen years, for God’s sake.”\n\t\n\nMy dad burst out laughing. He had a weird laugh. My mom gave us both quizzical looks.\n\t\n\n“Birds and the bees?” My dad said. “No, no we gave you that talk years ago. You were 2 and a half. Don’t you remember?”\n\t\n\n“What? 2 and a half? No, I don’t remember a talk you gave me at 2 and a half. Are you kidding? What’s wrong with you guys?”\n\t\n\n“C’mon Jack, you were a really bright kid.”\n\t\n\nI didn’t know what to respond to that. I thought about leaving the room right then. My parents are crazy. I was curious though.\n\t\n\n“So what is it then?”\n\t\n\nI shouldn’t have asked them. I should’ve left the room.\n\t\n\n“Well, to use the oft-quoted line: son, you’re adopted.”\n\t\n\n“I’m adopted! What?”\n\t\n\nIt was the happiest moment of my life. \n\t\n\n“Wait, so you guys aren’t related to me? This is great!”\n\t\n\n“Well it’s a bit more complicated than that,” my dad said.\n\t\n\n“What’s complicated? You aren’t my parents and I don’t have your genes. It seems pretty simple to me. Actually, it seems great!”\n\n\nI knew I was being mean. I didn't care. Or maybe I did. Just a little.\n\t\n\n“Well, you do have my genes,” my dad said. “Although, unfortunately you don’t have your mother’s. Probably worth much more.”\n\t\n\n“What do you mean?”\n\t\n\n“Jack,” my mom said. “Let me explain this. Don’t you wonder who you’re real parents are?”\n\t\n\n“I guess,” I said. \n\t\n\nI didn’t really care. I wasn’t such a parent fan.\n\t\n\n“You’re real parents are Grandma and Grandpa.”\n\t\n\n“What?! So when Grandma and Grandpa died you took me? So you’re my Aunt and Uncle? Or my brother and sister-in-law?”\n\t\n\n“No, no. It’s not that at all.”\n\t\n\n“Sara,” my dad said. “You’re just making him more confused.”\n\t\n\n“You try then!”\n\t\n\n“I was!”\n\t\n\nHe turned to me.\n\t\n\n“It’s pretty simple. You’re parents are your grandparents. Your mom is your future wife in an alternate universe. And I am you in this futuristic alternate universe where your mom is your wife.”\n\t\n\nMy parents were nuts. I had no flippin’ clue what the hell they were saying. They were both smiling at me wildly now. They expected me to say ‘oh now I understand’ and give them both a hug and a kiss. That wasn't going to happen. They just didn't understand how teenagers behave. I felt bad for them in a way.\t\n“I know how hard this must be for you, Jack.”\n\t\n\n“This isn’t hard for me. I have no frickin’ clue what you guys are trying to do.”\n\t\n\nMy dad sighed. My mom tried explaining again.\n\t\n\n“Jack, your dad grew up an orphan. He didn’t want you having the same experience. When he got older, after he married me, we decided to go back in time and raise you. You’re dad being the genius that he is, expounded on Palkowski’s three time principles and created a time machine. We went back in time and adopted you. We raised you like our son. We gave you all the love you never got. You’re still a son to us. And now you will grow up to be much happier. We still love you. We’ll always love you.”\n\t\n\nIt took a minute for all of this to sink in. Whoa, whoa, whao. I took a step back from them.\n\t\n\n“Wait, so you’re telling me that you’re me,” I pointed at my father. \n“And that I marry you in the future?”” I said pointing to my mom.\n\t\n\n“That’s so messed up.”\n\t\n\n“It’s not messed up, sweetheart.”\n\t\n\n“I’m sorry, but it’s pretty messed up that I married my mom in the future.”\n\t\n\n“Well, you don’t marry me in this future. In this future I’m your mother and I will always love you as your mother.”\n\t\n\nMy dad stood awkwardly on the side.\n\t\n\n“How about you?” I asked him. “You’re trying to tell me that you’re me? That I’m you?”\n\t\n\n“Well, I’m not really you. I’m the you that would’ve been if you had the childhood I had and made the decisions I made. But our genetic makeup is the same if that’s what you mean.”\n\t\n\nHe smiled.\n\t\n\n“What are you guys thinking? Even if this is true why would you tell me this?”\n\t\n\n“Well, we want to be honest with you, Jack. We love you.”\n\t\n\n“Yeah, you love me. You frickin’ married me!”\n\t\n\nMy dad smiled to himself at that.\n\t\n\n“I wonder what Freud would say about that,” he said quietly to himself.\n\t\n\nI tried to ignore that.\n\t\n\n“This whole thing would be a great joke if you guys wouldn’t be acting completely serious.”\n\t\n\n“No, sweetie, this is real.”\n\n\n“Don’t call me sweetie! Don’t call me anything!”\n\t\n\nHer face fell.\n\t\n\n“You guys are seriously crazy.”\n\t\n\nMy parents stood next to each other. They both looked pityingly at me. I was at a loss for words. This was the most screwed up conversation I’ve ever had with them. And I had some seriously screwed up conversations. \n\t\n\n“Jack, we’re going to leave you to think about this.”\n\t\n\nThey both gave me loving looks. Or at least my mom did. My dad tried I guess. They left me then. I’ve been lying in my bed for hours now. I’m still not sure if they were serious or not.\n\t\n\n\t \n", "\"WHAT?!\"\n\n\"It's true. I'm not actually your father.\" He/I grimaced. \"And mom is not actually your mother, she's my... uh... your... our future girlfriend. I'm your future self. Due to an unfortunate accident, I erased your... er... our real father and mother, and in order to keep the timeline on track, she and I have to raise you in a certain way.\"\n\n\"B-b-but... won't the universe go kablooey now that I know? I mean all the shows I watch tell me that a paramadox will happen and--\"\n\nHe smiled. \"Well, turns out that's not quite how time travel works. You see, I could have let you go parentless, but I don't like where that parallel universe would have lead. So I'm gonna make sure you grow up right.\"\n\n\"And how do we do that?\"\n\n\"Simple. First, you have to make sure to do all your chores and eat your vegetables and brush your teeth at night.\"\n\n\"What does that have to do with anything?\"\n\nHe laughed. Why would he laugh? It was an honest question. \"Everything! You're supposed to grow up to be a successful man! And that success leads to discovering the secrets of time travel! You need to learn discipline in order to be successful. So, I know it's kinda boring and lame to do chores and stuff now, but you'll thank me later.\"\n\n\"Oh, okay. What other things do I have to do so that I turn out okay?\" \n\n\"Well, I can't tell you about specific events until they actually happen, or else that could lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy.\"\n\n\"What does that mean?\"\n\n\"That means you become full of yourself and brag a lot. It's not very nice when you do that. Anyways, some other things to keep in mind: avoid colouring with glitter glue. That stuff is really bad luck and will jinx up all your progress on time travel, not to mention the carpets. Also, dogs hate glitter in their coats cause it looks stupid.\"\n\n\"I get a dog?!\"\n\n\"Well, I did in my timeline, so I'm gonna make sure we get one in this timeline too. And it's gonna be a REALLY BIG FLUFFY DOG! And he does ALL KINDS OF TRICKS!\"\n\n\"I GET A DOG!\"\n\n\"But not until some time later. That would mess up the timing too much.\"\n\n\"Aww....\" \n\n\"And also, never lean to the left when you're skateboarding. Don't ask why, just don't do it. And trees? Climb lots of them. But not on Tuesdays. I'll just say... bad things happen on Tuesdays while climbing trees. And also...\"\n\nJust then, my mom/future girlfriend walked out of the house to announce supper. Dad/FutureMe didn't quite notice, but Mom/FutureGirlfriend listened for a bit to what he was saying. \n\n\"It's okay, Da... uh, I mean, FutureMe told me everything. You guys aren't actually my parents and you're time travel versions of me and my future girlfriend come to make sure that I grow up right.\"\n\n\"Oh... okay...\" she said giggling a bit. What is it with these grownups and laughing at weird things? \"What kind of things do you have to do to grow up right?\"\n\n\"Do my chores and eat my vegetables and not colour with glitter glue and not lean left while skateboarding and OH DID HE MENTION THAT I GET A DOG and don't climb trees on Tuesdays and...\"\n\nShe broke out into a laughing fit. \"Oh dear,\" she said, patting Dad/FutureMe on the shoulder, gasping for air, \"I think you've had enough fun trolling the poor kid for today.\"\n\nHe grinned at her. \"You gotta admit though, at least I tried to get him to be a good kid.\"\n\n\"Yeah, that you did.\"\n\n\"So... does that mean I get a dog?\"\n\nShe smiled. \"We'll see dear.\"" ]	3
	[WP]Throughout history, God's Champion has been reincarnated dozens of times. The current incarnation is a young atheist who is convinced the voice of God is a byproduct of schizophrenia. To prove that it's really Him, God unlocks His champion's past life memories. The result?	[ "The first time that Dylan heard the Voice of God he was outside walking his dog. \"Dylan, it's me, God.\" The first words that the Voice spoke were the most important ones, even though Dylan didn't consider them as such at the time he heard them. In fact, the first time that the voice spoke he couldn't hear it over the sound of a car driving swiftly by.\n\n\"Dylan? Are you there, can you hear me?\" The Voice spoke a second time. This time, Dylan heard the message loud and clear. He stopped for a moment and looked around thinking that it was someone trying to get his attention. Aside from the car that had just driven by, Dylan found the road to be completely deserted. The only thing populating the streets were cars sitting neatly in driveways waiting to be driven to work in a few hours. Seeing no one nearby, he dismissed the Voice as a trick of the wind. He was merely hearing things that weren't there.\n\n\"Dylan, why aren't you talking to me?\" God asked Dylan. This gave Dylan pause. Hearing something non-existent was a normal thing. It happened all the time. It meant that something was very, very wrong here. It mean that either he had missed someone or that he had something wrong going on with him.\n\nDylan halted his walk. The dog, Aubrey, continued walking until he reached the leash and then stopped. Seeing that his master was clearly not going to keep following him on his walk he sat down on the concrete sidewalk and began whining. \n\n\"Who's there?\" Dylan asked to no one in particular. Somehow he had missed someone when he was looking around himself. If he called out to that person then they would probably call back to him and then they could talk.\n\n\"I told you who it is. \" The Voice said. \"God.\"\n\nDylan scoffed. \"Seriously though, who is it?\" He called out once more. He still couldn't locate the source of the voice, but he knew that it had to be somewhere around him. \n\n\"God.\" The Voice stated once more. \n\nDylan's confident smirk quickly turned into a frown at the repetition of the phrase. It wasn't a phrase that he was quite fond of. Puffing out his chest he made sure to yell out loudly so that everyone could hear him. \"Alright, whoever's fucking with me right now had better show themselves! This isn't funny!\"\n\n\"Dylan...\" The Voice started to sound frustrated at this point. \"I am not 'fucking with you', as you so chose to put it, I am completely real. I am the Voice of God, and I am speaking to you because I need your help.\" \n\nDylan wasn't convinced. Spinning around in circles he kept yelling. \"Where the fuck are you?\" over and over again like a crazed mantra. \n\nCalmer, now that Dylan had begun to speak to him, the Voice answered his question. \"I am inside of you. Actually, I'm inside of everybody. There's just a little bit more of me inside of you.\" It told him. \n\nDylan ceased his spinning. Looking down at his legs he realized that he had wrapped the dog's leash around his legs and then began untangling himself from it. As he did so he wracked his brain for answers as to what could possibly be happening to him. \n\n\"Now that you're listening, I'd like to tell you how you can help me.\" The Voice said. \"You see, my previous... speaker has just died. While he's doing very well up here in heaven, those of you that are still left on Earth will be doing much worse if I don't find a sufficient replacement for him. That's where you come in.\" \n\n\"What, so I'd be replacing Jesus?\" Dylan asked the Voice before bursting into laughter. The notion was so ridiculous to him and went against everything that he believed in so much so that he couldn't help but laugh at it. \n\n\"Essentially, yes. You wouldn't be directly replacing him, but you have the right idea. You'd be doing the same thing that he did. Educating the world about Me.\" \n\nDylan's laughter rose in intensity. At this point he realized what was going on. \"Great. That's just great. A Schizophrenic hallucination is telling me to 'spread the word'. That's just awesome.\" \n\nNow knowing what he though to be wrong with him, Dylan turned around and resumed his walk. Now it was the voice's turn to laugh. \"Really Dylan? I mean, I'm not surprised that someone like you would be so stubborn to believe me. After all, the last few required a bit of... persuasion. But they came around eventually.\"\n\nDylan chuckled a bit. He knew what he had, and he knew that it wasn't something to be taken lightly. His happiness came not from ignorance, but instead from the knowledge that he could solve his problem. Schizophrenia could be taken care of. The supposed \"voice of God\" couldn't be.\n\n\"Dylan, your favorite color is blue. Your sister's name is Merideth, your mother's name is Marry, your father's name is Joseph. You have a crush on Bethany Meyers and sometimes you...\" The Voice continued listing facts about Dylan's life. Some of them were things everyone knew. Others were personal. It didn't matter to Dylan though, they were all things that he knew.\n\nThe Voice didn't stop there though, its list continued on. \"Entropy cannot be reversed, your government will eventually fall because of its own incompetence, there is no life beyond Earth because I designed it that way.\" Not exactly facts, but still things that Dylan had some degree of knowledge of. \n\nThe Voice eventually stopped listing things and sighed. \"Here, let me show you this.\" Then there was silence for a brief moment. \n\nBut the moment didn't last. Before he knew what was going on the Voice bombarded Dylan's mind with images of the speakers he had prior to Dylan.\n\nHe saw so many things. A black man sitting behind a podium speaking to a crowd. The crowd cheered for whatever the man was saying, Dylan couldn't quite make it out over the cheering. An old man sat cross-legged in the dirt. He looked as if he hadn't eaten in days. Three brown skinned women were being carried up the steps of a pyramid. At the top of the pyramid sat a regal looking man. When they reached the top they looked him in the eyes and spat at his feet. \n\nHundreds of images assaulted his mind against his will. Picture after picture of defiance, peacemaking, and protest flashed before his mind's eye. He couldn't take it anymore. Tears streaming down his face he cried out to the Voice \"Stop! Please, make it stop!\"\n\nAs quickly as they had started up the images faded away into nothing more than a memory for Dylan. Now that he could see through his own eyes again he saw that a few people had come out of their houses and were staring at him intently. He increased his walking pace. \n\nAs soon as the people could no longer be seen anymore he resumed discussion with the voice. This time he pleaded with it. \"If you are God, and I'm not saying that you are, can't you get someone else? Someone that believes you when you tell them all these things?\"\n\nThe Voice paused for a moment. \"I can't, it has to be you and no one else. You are the one I need. You are the only one who can help me save my creation, and I can't do this without you.\"\n\nFor a while, there was silence between them. Neither one of them spoke and all noises around them were rendered meaningless by the magnitude of their conversation. After what seemed like an eternity, Dylan broke the silence with a single word; \"Ok.\"", "Might come back to write a story later (need to head off now)\n\nBut for now, in reverse order the past lives are\n\n* JFK\n* Queen Victoria\n* Darwin\n* King Henry 8\n* Shakespeare\n* William the Conqueror \n* Monk who wrote Beowulf\n* Thomas Aquinas \n* Pope Gregory XIII (Of the Calendar)\n* And of course, Jesus\n\nFirst line: \n\nI had heard voices before but never this clearly, as I reached for the Prolixin they became overwhelming. Suddenly my vision began to blur then out of the corner of my eye I glanced it, the reflected glare from a sniper's scope and the sound of an engine rumbling lowly. I feel a tap on the shoulder followed by the words, \"lovely day is it not, Mr President\".\n\nGreat, I am now hallucinating that I am JFK, and we all know what comes next. \n\nQ Vic--> Weird looking man some sort of overdone formal dress, speaking English with a heavy German accent ", "\"...So, to prove you're really God, and not a product of my obviously crazy mind-\"\n\n-YES-\n\n\"-You made me hallucinate?!\"\n\n...OH, RIGHT. ...SHIT.\n\n\"You wanna maybe take another crack at this, big guy? Like, I dunno, give me magic powers or something?\"\n\nI, UH. LISTEN. HERE'S THE THING ABOUT MAGIC POWERS...\n\n\"Oh, I'm all ears.\"\n\n...IS THAT TONE REALLY NECESSARY?\n\n\"Not really. This is fun, actually.\"\n\nTHINGS WERE A LOT EASIER WHEN THERE WEREN'T SO MANY SMART-ALECS LIKE YOU AROUND, YOU KNOW.\n\n\"I'm sure you're right.\"\n\nI COULD TELL SOMEONE TO WALK HIS PEOPLE RIGHT INTO THE DESERT, BACK THEN. NO WATER OR ANYTHING! NOW EVERYONE'S ALL \"IF YOU'RE ALL POWERFUL, WHY NOT BRING THE PROMISED LAND HERE?!\" \"WHY MAKE US SCHLEP THROUGH THE DAMN DESERT, WITH THE SCORPIONS AND SAND AND EVERYTHING?\" * HUGE PAIN IN MY ASS! \n\n\"...I'm very sorry.\"\n\nYOU'RE LAUGHING, AREN'T YOU.\n\n\"No no no noooooo. ...Yes. But you've really touched me with your plight, oh totes-real God.\"\n\nThe voice brightened up.\n\nOH? SO YOU WON'T SWALLOW THAT ANTIPSYCHOTIC TABLET AFTER ALL?\n\n\"Nahhh, just kidding. I took it like ten minutes ago. Guess it takes time to kick in.\"\n\nOH, FOR FUCK'S SA-\n\n... Silence.\n\n\"...I knew it.\"\n\n\nTHE END\n\n\n______________________________________________________________\nEpilogue:\n\nYeah, this is how I'd figure it would go down. Hume's argument on this is pretty incontrovertible: \"Either the known rules of the universe have been suspended, in your favor, or you are laboring under a very grave misapprehension.\" Any atheist worth their salt will say that they are simply delusional, and slipping deeper and deeper into psychosis, because that is infinitely more likely than being divinely chosen.\n\nNo reason to not have fun with it. though.\n\nWell, in any case, I have a subreddit right [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/IWasSurprisedToo/) that has some things that are kind of like this and a whole lot more things that totally aren't at all like this.\n\nIt is within your power to comment and subscribe, as your heart tells you! Search your feelings, you know it to be true.\n\n", "Ok, this is the first thing I've written in quite some time, and the first on this sub. It might be a little long (just over two pages on Word), I don't know what the norm is for these. I saw probably's post about the past lives being certain famous people through history. That was very similar to my first thought as well, but I went instead with the idea that the champion was someone more or less anonymous. Hope you like it.\n_____\n\n\n“Get out of my head!” I shouted into the dimly lit room, slamming my fist onto the coffee table. Days old take out cartons scattered from the impact, and a needle rolled towards the edge. I leapt for it with all the effort I could muster, but the needle landed on the stained carpet. “God damnit, leave me alone!” The last of my drugs were wearing off, and the voice was back.\n\nPlease, my son, heed me. I have need of you now. The time has come.\n\nThe grandfatherly voice was insistent. I shoved my body into the back of my couch as hard as I could, gripping my head, tearing at my hair, hoping to distract myself from the voice. It had been there for years, always asking for one thing or another. I saw a therapist shortly after high school who told me I might have a form of schizophrenia. I immediately quit my job, drove to a new city, and started over. That was a few years ago. That was also the first time I tried drowning out the voice with drugs.\n\n“Stop it, stop it, stop it. Stop it!” I shoved a pile of empty food containers to the ground and frantically searched the table, hoping to find something that might help. But I knew it was all gone. There was nothing for me to find. “Please, leave me in peace.”\n\nMy son, I need you. There is no more time to wait. You must listen. People need you.\n\nNo! No, no, no, I screamed in my head. I can’t handle this anymore. The constant badgering, urging me to do this or that, I just want to live my own life!\n\nYou’ve helped me before, my son, so many times. Helped so many people. This is your purpose. This is why I created you.\n\n“You’re just a god damn voice in my head! If there was a god, he wouldn’t torture me like this.” I stood, almost stumbling over the low coffee table. I lurched to the fridge and threw it open, hoping to find beer. Mustard, strawberry jam, a strangely colored carrot, but no beer. Fuck.\n\nIf you will not listen, then I must make you see.\n\nA searing light from behind my eyes burned my vision away. I stumbled back and reached for my face, and just as suddenly as it came, the light was gone. Instead I was choking on a cloud of dust, and the sun was a blotted disc in the sky above. I heard screams, both far and near. I was sweating heavily under the weight of my equipment. I looked down to see a black and yellow uniform. A hand leapt to my head, ensuring my helmet was firmly in place as a second explosion happened far above me. I remember fear. I remember being determined as I ran up the steps of that second building, pulling people to their feet, thrusting them back down the stairs I was climbing. I remember the shock of the building collapsing around me.\n\nYou have been a firefighter, bringing the gift of safety.\n\nThen the sun shone bright again, blinding me. In front of me, I held a pair of hands to my face that I did not recognize. I lowered them in confusion, staring, turning them over. I blinked and squinted. I held one of the strange hands up to shield my eyes. In front of me was a crowd, and I stood behind a podium. I glanced down to find a set of notes in a strange language. I remember the crowd cheering. Then I remembered what I was there to speak about. Bringing peace to the troubled and frightened people of India and Pakistan.\n\nYou have been a diplomat, bringing the gift of peace.\n\nThe world spun, and I stumbled. I reached a hand out to steady myself, and found it resting on a chalk board. I leaned over to pick up the piece of chalk I had dropped, and rose to find myself staring at a room full young black boys and girls, each focusing intently on the history quiz I had just handed out. I finished writing their instructions on the chalk board.\n\nYou have been a teacher, bringing the gift of knowledge.\n\nThe chalk in my hand was now an old Bible. I held a finger between two pages, marking the spot I would reference. The desks and children became bushes and flowers, and I strolled between them, finally entering a small stone church through a side door. I stepped in front of my small congregation, and opened my Bible. I smiled and began to tell them of God’s mercy.\n\nYou have been a priest, bringing the gift of faith.\n\nNow the people who stood before me singing hymns were charging soldiers, and dust rose around me as I ran forward. I was exhausted from marching all day, but I stayed focused. My life depended on me keeping my eyes open. Amidst the dust, I met the enemy, and he swung at me with his blade, but I ducked beneath it, continuing to move forward. As his arm carried the blade wide, I stood and impaled the barbarian on my own sword. I shoved him to the ground and wrenched my blade free, searching the chaos for a new foe.\n\nYou have been a soldier, bringing the gift of freedom.\n\nThen the dust and clashing of men and metal was gone, replaced by the crackle of a low fire, lighting a small cave. I could hear a stream trickle in the background, and water dripping from the stalactites around me. I face the cavern wall as my shadow danced along it. I lifted my tools, and continued to hammer out symbols, telling the story of my journey, and the journey of my people.\n\nYou have been a writer, bringing the gift of language.\n\n“No. This is impossible. I remember these things,” I said, my voice trailing off as I found myself staring once more into my filthy refrigerator. “But this can't be real. No. No, no, no, no. I’m hallucinating.”\n\nPlease my son. For millennia you have been the one I turn to when people need guidance, or a hero. They need you now. Please listen. These are memories. They are real. You have been all of these people and more.\n\nImpossible. I’ve never done these things. I moved back towards my couch, but walked past it to my window. I tore down the curtain, and the sunlight flooded in. I threw an arm up to defend myself from the intrusion that I should have expected. But I didn’t care. I unlatched my window and lifted it, climbing out onto the fire escape.\n\nYou must listen. I need you again. Please, my son.\n\nNo.\n\n“No more!” I shouted. Far below me, someone looked up, and pointed. Someone else screamed. I don’t care. I can’t handle it anymore. I’m done. I climbed over the railing, and let go. I closed my eyes. The screams grew louder, but the instant I felt the cement, there was nothing.\n\n________\n\nOn the roof of the building opposite the young man’s stood another man, looking down in horror at the mangled man far below. He watched as a small crowd gathered. People were crying and screaming. A mother held her crying child close, doing her best to comfort it. Then he saw someone he recognized. She stood near the shattered man, holding her head in her hands.\n\nCould that be my sister, he thought. I can’t do this to her. It would kill her just as surely as it would kill me.\n\nThe man stepped away from the edge, and went down to hold his sister tight. He booked an appointment with a therapist the next day, and a year later he was working in a call center for suicide prevention. He never stepped so close to the edge again.\n\nAnd now you have been an inspiration, bringing the gift of hope.*\n" ]	4
	[WP] and quite possibly [TT]. Self medication has become your life, but the urge still persists deep within your being.	[ " I don't truly recall my previous life. Snapshots and tidbits, but the details have all muddled themselves somewhere within the grey walls of my mind's recollection. I know I was happy in my youth, I know I had dreams and aspirations to match, but I have such difficulty recalling that now. A story, I'm told, begins in the seemingly obscure details of one's own past, so I suppose that is where this story is doomed to head. I wish it weren't so though, because my intentions seem so much better if one doesn't know the details that inform their creation.\n When I was a child, I lived in a peaceful glen. Farmland stretched as far as the eye could gaze, and that farmland fell under the proprietary right of my family. It is a humbled life, but a righteous one, so I never drew much ire from the tedium. Much less, in fact, than I drew ire from the more well to do in our community. You see, people love to feel superior to someone. Whether or not they have any inherent right to. And I would struggle to define any inherent rights in one man to the next myself, so I'm not sure that point has any real merit anyway. But such was our life regardless. We farmed. Mostly produce which fed our small community, although they would have been hard pressed to lend us credit either way. \n We were a family of veritable outcasts. Strangers in a familiar land. All of our neighbors lived simple lives, and hoarded simple dreams, but we were different. My father always told me that it was a curse of man to seek comfort in mediocrity. He said that this desire was a residual effect of Eve's oversight in the Garden.\n I never knew what to think, but I also had no reason to doubt him. After all, he had taught me so many other lessons that had proven themselves infallible in my own experience. Such is the benefit, and curse of learning from the witnessed.\n Either way, our lives were conducted in this manner for the duration of four generations. My own birth falling at the tail end. \n I knew I was destined for something exceptional. I saw it in the world around me, and spoke to it in my dreams. I never knew just what it would be until too late. To be exceptional, my friends, is not always synonymous with being great.\n At the age of 15 my father took me to the fields in earnest. I had been there plenty of times before as an extra set of hands, but now he wished to teach me the secrets of tending land. I was excited to learn, but also inevitably felt the trap of life befalling me. Did I really want to continue the work my ancestors had set before me? I wasn't completely sold on the idea. Regardless, I listened to the words he poured onto me. When to plat, how to maintain, when to harvest. How to harvest. Where to sell. So much information flew at me all at once, that I was overcome. I must have shown weariness in my face because he slowed his lessons after a few days. Soon he just gave me one major point per day, and always ended the lesson with the point to stay out of the fields past dusk. \n It was a valid point to end on. The world can be a cruel and dangerous place, so I never questioned it. Although I would be a bitter liar if I didn't admit that I thought he was being dramatic. How bad, after all, could this world be that left us with such a grand opportunity for an honest living?\n I continue to listen and abide by his lessons for four long years. My trepidation kept quietly to myself. He didn't need to know that I felt such a strong tide of discontent within my being. And honestly, what were the chances that I would set off to make a different living for myself anyway? Slim, I thought, at best. \n Life continued this way right up until the point that my father died. It happened unexpectedly on the evening of his 43rd birthday. I was stunned, to lose him. But after 8 years had learned so much. I felt confident in my ability. If not more brave in my techniques than he was. I suppose, this hubris ultimately led to my downfall.\n\nAs always, I haven't the time to finish my thoughts, but I hope this is at least somewhat well written. If not, I blame the whiskey that not only inspired the idea, but stole from me the inhibition to check my work. Criticism is always welcomed. And as a major spoiler, this is headed towards lycanthropy. I just am no good with short stories.", "With another gulp, the whiskey burns its way down my esophagus. The taste is familiar, safe. I swirl the amber liquid in the glass, clinking two lone ice cubes together as they slowly melt into oblivion.\n\nIt’s not quite enough to make me forget. It never is.\n\nThe urge is there, albeit faint, masked well by the alcohol-fueled numbness inspired by my latest episode. It clings to my bones like the hunger of a desperate man. I fear it will never leave, but the blood—the blood I can wash away.\n\nI’m still wearing my suit from work and the navy fabric barely reveals the deep maroon stains. I see them because I know they are there. There is a good dry cleaner on 74th who can get them out, as if they were never there at all. My crisp white shirt, on the other hand, I will have to get rid of.\n\nI never even knew his name.\n\nI don’t know what comes over me. Honestly. I go about my day like a normal person would or, at least, how I imagine one would. Work, gym, cooking, cleaning. I rent a bare one-bedroom apartment. I minimize my daily interactions with people, for their safety. I meditate. And then, of course, I drink.\n\nDespite all this, there are pieces of what used to be a man’s body strewn across my living room. It must have happened sometime between when he propositioned me on the street and when we were heading to my bedroom. He did nothing wrong. But the urge proved to be too much. It had been 19 days.\n\nThere is no Werewolves Anonymous for people like me, no buttons to signify my progress, no applause for abstaining. There is only the coming-to, not unlike awakening from a dream, in which I piece together the events of the night. A drink to forget it. A drink to suppress it.\n\nI sluggishly retrieve a couple trash bags from the kitchen cabinet. It’s best to erase these little mistakes before the sun can see. I down the rest of the whiskey and pour myself another glass. It’s going to be a long night.\n" ]	2
I found this prompt in a file of writing ideas I came up with over the years but never returned to. I want to see what you guys can do with it.	[WP] God is all powerful, but not all knowing. In fact, he has no idea what he's doing.	[ "\"Ffffuuuuck...!\" God sighed so loudly that birds were shaken out of their trees. A few of the less durable ones hit the ground before recovering their wits, and their wings kind of just fell off upon impact. These newly flightless birds scuttled around in confusion for a moment before each choosing a direction and running off, away from any weirdo predators that stalked the verdant garden at ground level.\n\nThe Garden of Eden was that garden, and that garden was God's workshop. All around were strewn the half-finished, perhaps-discarded remnants of God's creation freakshow. Bugs with hundreds of legs, lizards with no legs, lizards with gills, fish with lungs, and now birds without wings.\n\nGod was old. Really, really old. As a human would later point out, \"With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.\" So yeah, sometimes He lost track of time. And misplaced things. God was forgetful, but you know He did have a lot to keep track of. \n\nRight now He was putting the finishing touches on one of His latest models, \"Man\". Fumbling around in the \"mushroom\" patch where He grew spare genitals, God had dropped His thundering F-bomb after accidentally grabbing one of the legless lizards He never quite found the time to finish. Were there more of them now than yesterday? (a thousand years ago? Whatever). He cast the snake off into some bushes near the apple orchards and turned back to focus on Man's groin. \n\n\"He will be made in my image,\" thought God. Returning to the mushroom patch, God plucked one of the smaller ones and attached it between Man's legs. \"Smaller is better, more practical,\" thought God. \"It won't get in the way, less likely to be damaged. Man will thank me.\" God liked to think himself practical, whatever His other \"shortcomings\" may be. \n\nHe was wrong, though. Man did not thank Him. Man was for some reason now ashamed and wearing clothes. Maybe it had something to do with Woman, who was spending more and more time talking to legless lizards. There was one in particular she seemed fond of. A very long, thick, muscular creature which draped itself majestically around an apple tree to show off its girth.\n\nGod was still resting, a few days(?) later. He knew ignoring His problems would only make them worse in the long run, but didn't want to make them real by facing them. Too many projects to keep track of, too much clutter. God felt like things were spiraling out of His control. It was hard to focus these days with all the noise and the flapping and crawling and splashing and howling and chirping and... everything. Not like back in the Beginning. It was peaceful then. Could it be like that again? Maybe He should just start over... Wash it all away. \n\n\"Hey Noah!\"\n", "\"Tracy William Gao Xi Huang, you will go to your room and think about what you have just done!\"\n\n\nIt was just a blordainian jackalope I thought to myself. Those things are cheap and look funny right before their eyes explore from their sockets! Isn't that what microwaves are for?\n\n\nI sat down at my desk, stared blankly at the screen, hoping that mother hadn't disconnected my solar panels to the unit. Pushing the power button repeatedly failed, despite my thumb jamming it, making a satisfying clicking noise. The inadequate and rather silent screen in front of my face mocked my bored adolescent, pimple filled, expressionless and totally not insecure face.\n\n\nMy shoulders involuntarily shrugged as I sighed, thinking hopefully that my mother was watching through some hidden camera, knowing that I was displeased.\n\n\nI walked over to my Creator's set. I hadn't visited or touched it since I opened it last festival. It was supposed to be cool, but my microscope hadn't arrived yet. The only other way was to monitor it through a cloud based application that tracked the set's progress, but that was only available if I had access to my computing unit.\n\n\nThat's odd. I don't remember the planet having dust circle it. The globe was surrounded by a thick glass casing, so it would only be able to reach so far, but small objects flew around it. Huh, they have already reached post planetary exploration. I chuckled as an intrusive thought passed my mind.\n\n\nI could end these little things with a poke, causing untold destruction to their little eco-system.\n\n\nI decided against it. Ants, I thought to myself. Such silly creatures. I picked up Planetary Gazette and began reading the latest edition of the fastest inter-planetary spacecraft.", "Lights from an ambulance poured through the window and swept the empty apartment. Whiskey bottles littered the floor. A revolver and a case of bullets lay up against the wall, next to a photograph taken on an late autumn day.\n\nA woman's voice said, \"Heeeeeeyyy it's me. Kaaaaaaayyyy P. And YOU know what to do...\" Then a sharp beep.\n\nJohn ended the phone call. Then dialed the number again. \"Heeeeeyyyy it's me...\"\n\nThe ice was melting in his drink, but the water running down his cheeks wasn't from the whiskey. Neither was the red in his eyes.\n\nOnce more he hung up. Once more he called. Once more he took a swig from his glass and placed it back upon the floor.\n\nThere came a bang from the door. People yelling. Strangers calling his name.\n\nJohn looked around at his empty apartment... picked up the revolver lying next to him... put it to his temple and pulled the trigger.\n\n~ ~ 3 days earlier ~ ~\n\nThe walk from the yellow cab to the office building was the only real time John was in danger. But his heart was racing and his hands were shaking. He got out of the taxi before paying the driver and had to turn back twice. Once to finish up his payment, once to grab his cellphone from the seat.\n\nAnd he was already late...\n\nAs he pushed through revolving glass doors, he rehearsed his presentation in his head. He reviewed his facts and figures. He poured over his projected numbers. He flashed his trademark \"joking\" smile and went red when he realized he did it in real life.\n\nThe secretary was not amused.\n\n\"Who are you here to see?\" she said. Her glasses were black, her nails were blood red and when it came to the future of men like John... she was intimidating as Cerberus and twice as destructive.\n\n\"I'm here to see Mr. Black,\" John said. \"Jason,\" he quickly added. They weren't friends, but she couldn't possibly know that, right? John figured this had to soften her heart a little.\n\nBut all she did was raise her eye brows and turn to her computer. The way she pressed keys felt like a death sentence to John. Each letter felt like the end of the line... a tombstone crashing down from the heavens to land upon his career.\n\n\"Mhhmm..\" she popped her gum and sipped a bottle of Perrier she'd wrapped with a paper napkin. She looked back up at John, \"He's already waiting for you.\"\n\nWhen John grabbed his briefcase, he noticed it was slippery against his palms. His cheeks felt warmer than they should have. The feeling in his gut was an unholy mix of fear and guilt and shame. As he walked towards Mr. Black's office, he felt like he was on an elevator rising higher and higher at breakneck speed.\n\nThat's when the panic struck him...\n\nWhen John finally came down from the rush, he was walking the three flights of stairs back up to his apartment. He jiggled the key to open the lock. He shoved the door open and slammed it closed behind him. He threw his bag onto the closest chair and grabbed himself a beer from the fridge.\n\nSpread on top of the kitchen table were business plans, diagrams and print outs of his presentation. All John saw were hundred hours invested in a flawed end product. When he turned on his laptop the first thing he saw were his notes to himself:\n\n\"What happens is out of your control...\"\n\n\"All you have to do is be 'good enough'...\"\n\n\"If you make the case he'll have to listen...\"\n\nJohn added a note, \"If you believe that, I've got a bridge to sell you...\" before closing his laptop screen. He took a swig of his imported beer as he watched all his hopes and dreams of making it big vanish before him. Venture capital? Turned down. Angel investors? Not on board. All his savings? Gone for good.\n\n\"At least I graduated college with a business degree,\" he thought to himself. This at least made him chuckle.\n\nSo when his cell phone rang, he didn't think much of it. He answered the call without checking the number. And when the voice on the other end of the line said, \"Hey John, you got a minute?\" he said, \"Sure. Who's this?\"\n\n\"You don't recognize my voice, John?\" the man on the line asked.\n\nJohn looked answered him, \"No. Who are you?\"\n\nThe man sighed and said, \"No wonder. We haven't talked in awhile. John... believe it or not... I'm God.\"\n\n~~~~~~~~~~~~\n\nThere's plenty more if people are interested. I'll leave it here if you're not!\n\n\n", "\"Look at this mess!\" Ishtar exclaimed.\n\n\"I know,\" said Yahweh. \"I haven't seen it this bad since the fall of Rome.\"\n\n\"Yeah, good job with that by the way,\" Zeus told him. \"We probably should've taken that as an early sign of how this little experiment of yours would go.\"\n\nYahweh had to bite down on his lip to keep himself from lashing out. \"As I was saying,\" he said, \"this is why I have awakened you all. I've decided that the humans have become too much for me to handle by myself.\"\n\n\"Oh, is that what you decided?\" said Quetzalcoatl, his voice dripping with venom. \"Thank goodness you finally decided to realize you fucked up after all this time.\"\n\nOdin interjected: \"I would just like to say, that I told you all this would happen and no-one listened.\" \n\n\"Are you really going to do this now, Odin?\" asked Zeus.\n\n\"Oh sure, let's all permanently give our powers to freakin' Yahweh so he can rule the world by himself!\" Odin said in a mocking voice. \"That would would be so much more efficient, what could possibly go wrong?! No, don't listen to silly old Odin, he's only drunk the mead of infinite freakin' knowledge, he has no idea what he's talking about!\"\n\n\"Enough!\" Ra squawked. The other gods shifted uncomfortably in their seats while Ra scratched his feathery neck and said, \"I'm sure we all appreciate Odin's hindsight, but let's get on with coming up with some solutions now, shall we?\" He looked around the table, clearly hoping someone else would make a suggestion.\n\n\"I think we all know what we have to do,\" said Ishtar. \"But who among us has the courage to do it?\"\n\nOdin stroked his braided white beard. \"You mean to press the Reset Button,\" he said.\n\nSome of the other gods echoed his words pensively: \"Ah, the Reset Button\".\n\nRa slammed his claw on the table. \"No, damn it, no! We can't just keep flooding the world to solve all our problems!\"\n\n\"Ra is right for once,\" said Yahweh. \"If I wanted another flood, I would have pressed the Button myself.\"\n\n\"I understand that,\" said Zeus, \"but these are desperate times, and sacrifices have to be made.\"\n\nOdin's eye lit up. \"Sacrifices, you say?\" He turned to Quetzalcoatl. \"If we cut out Yahweh's heart and feed it to a jaguar, could we get our powers back?\" They both grinned.\n\n\"I don't know about that,\" Quetzalcoatl replied, \"but I would certainly be appeased.\"\n\n\"As would I,\" said Ra.\n\n\"Very funny, guys,\" said Yahweh. \"Can we start taking this seriously now?\"\n\n\"Are we in agreement, then?\" asked Zeus.\n\n\"Come on guys, joke's over.\"\n\n\"I believe we are,\" said Ishtar. \n\n\"Oh come on, you too?\"\n", "It was finally Yahweh's time to shine. As a young boy Yahweh had always wanted to have a job as a universe manager. It was not the ideal job but it paid the job and seemed fun enough. He had an alter ego called Allah who showed up whenever he was drunk or angry and who was the party pooper. It was this side that almost made him flunk Deity College, but somehow despite procrastinating and masturbating each and every single day Yahweh managed to graduate with a degree in Universal Control. As a C student this was Yahwehs big break. He soon got hired and was given control of Universe A395. It was a standard universe, nothing too crazy, it had the whole package black holes, stars, galaxies, dark matter all the gibblets that made a universe work. Sadly though he was not allowed to create life, all the planets with life already on them were bountiful and peaceful and everyone was finding enlightenment. An idea cooked up by Siddhartha Budda. \n\nThat slimy asshole got a raise and a promotion due to that and now he could create life and had autorizathoin to do whatever he pleased. At 1 time Yahweh saw Budda get some weed, and burnt it at the center of his universe. Everyone was high for months. Yahweh on the other hand had a 3028502 page rulebook on all the things he could not do to his Universe. He begrudingly followed all the rules for a while until one day he came upon a small galaxy. So tiny in fact that when he checked the registry of galaxies it didn't register. This was Yahwehs time to shine.\n\nThe next day he told his buddy Zeus about it. Zeus his old frat buddy also had his own universe but contrary to Yahweh he broke the rules. He would interfere with a specific world and try to have sex with all of the girls there. Sadly now he was a father to countless children he hated and denounced because if anyone ever found out what he did he would lose credibility on all possible universes. \n\nYahweh walked into his small cubicle that day opened his Universe and began clicking around trying to find the universe he had named \"Milky Way\" after about an hour he found the damn thing and bookmarked it. Yahweh then reached into his backpack and took out a water bottle full of vodka and partied a bit before going back to work.\n\nYahweh found an ideal planet to use, there were actually a few dozen of these but his planet was just right. Being drunk Yahweh couldn't turn the light on so he began working in the dark. Creating vegetation, water, the sky so the planet would have light. Among other basic planetary necessities. This went on for a while until he turned on the light. What he found was a big land mass and much water. Boring. Yahweh then falcon punched the planet and the mass split into sections. \"Better, its more aesthetically pleasing now.\" after that god has his own nifty planet. But there was no sentient life in it. \n\nYahweh exited his universe and decided to spy on his friend the Flying Spaghetti Monster. That guy had built a civilization of conscious lizards who had already found out how to preserve their world indefinitely while also finding ways to travel peacefully across the universe to interact with other sentient beings. \n\nPlagiarism had never been Yahwehs more likeable activity but he still tried to emulate FSM. Using all his knowledge from his genetic creation class in which he passed with a D, Yahweh created Dinosaurs and animals alike. Sadly it was a failed venture because nothing was sentient. It was so boring that god got angry and threw his empty water bottle at the world. The strike killed most of his animals. Yahweh then remembered that sometimes evolution allowed for the rise of sentient beings with knowledge. Therefore after he cleared his whole mess he found the time skip level and fast forwarded for some millienia until he found the sweet spot. He found apes that had little fur which were communicating by sounds and using tools. The drawback was that because they evolved from his faulty creations they, for some reason, loved to murder each other for trivial matters and wouldn't stop dying of infection. \n\nYahweh found a small group of idiots to test out his new rules on, and on other small civilizations he gave the apes ideologies created by his fellow deities. Perhaps at some point the whole of this creature would put all the ideologies and rules together and live a prosperous life. Then Yahweh could get his comeupance.\n\nNot wanting to wait a long time to see his world flourish and begin space travel he decided to skip ahead a few thousand years. What resulted was utter chaos. Yahweh was so shocked he closed his universe and left his office. He needed a drink fast.\n\nWhile Yahweh was away Shiva the great hacker who loved to get his grubby hands on worlds and lead them to death and destruction found Yahwehs world and, by all the celestial beings It. Was. Magnificent. Shiva hacked the whole system of universes and implemented Yahwehs world into all known universes.\n\nNeedless to say the very next day borh Shiva and Yahweh were reprimanded and put on a short leash. All anyone could do was watch that world burn itself to the ground. \n\nA few months later Yahweh stole a universe with his creation took it home and began messing fanatics. Pitting civilizations against each other and watching them kill each other for sport. The fun never ends when you don't know what comes next. \n\n(bad writing is bad. I know, this is why I said hell no to being an English major when I went to college) \n", "\"Why don't they believe in me anymore?\" Zeus asked himself- a literal duplicate of himself that he had created for these kinds of discussions. Or maybe it was the other way around? \"I mean... people on Earth either have been seeing me as this kind of crazy, perfect being made of light and love, etc. or they don't believe I exist at all!\" \n\n\"True, but you haven't really DONE much lately on Earth...\" Zeus said, shrugging a bit at himself\n\n\"Because when I do stuff, they start saying I fucked a goose or something. I never fucked a goose! Why would I fuck a goose? Like...I'm an extra-dimensional being that exists beyond their plane of existence, those monkeys cannot begin to imagine the true extent of my power and they believe I would fuck a damn goose.\" \n\n\"Don't get angry... never ends up going well...\" \n\n\"I turn ONE person into a pillar of salt and I will never let myself live it down!\"\n\n\"Yea, the 'Pillar of Salt' thing is the only angry thing you did. Not the whole giant flood thing, trying to make that one guy kills his son, destroying those two cities in a firestorm...\"\n\n\"THEY WERE FUCKING GEESE!\" \n\n\"What is this hang up with geese?\"\n\n\"They're beautiful creatures! I spent all this time designing them and all these damn monkeys do is eat and fuck them! But then they get all amazed at pretty lights in the sky that just kinda happened because of how I set this whole damn universe up. You know how much work I put into creating earth? Designing all those mountains? Great plains? the fjords!? They are in for a serious wake up call when they find out how I kinda just threw together the rest of the universe at the last minute...\"\n\nZeus grumbled, to himself. Himself, personally, and not 'himself the duplicate of himself'. He started again: \"Its no wonder why I don't bother with them anymore. This new planet of mine is doing just fine, though!\"\n\n\"Did you have to make them call it 'Zeus-town' though?\" \n\n\"Its a good name! And they're good creations. Trying to be a lot more 'mellow' with them... but I swear to you/me, if just one of them touches a fucking goose, I'm not even gonna bother with chucking an asteroid their way like I did when I fucked up with those dinosaur things, they're going right into their sun, and that sun is going into a black hole and that blackhole is going to dissipate into nothingness because fuck 'em...\" \n\n ", "What the fuck?! Why wouldn't that compile?! That should have worked!!!\n\nEveryone knows by now that they live in a computer simulation, and God is a computer programmer. But little do they know that their guy is in fact, an idiot, and doesn't have a clue what he's doing.\n\nI am that computer programmer. And where I am, something new comes out practically every week. I was charged with building a computer simulation for an entire universe. Sounds like a daunting task, but the tools and frameworks available make it easier. Supposedly.\n\nThe language I had to use was called Tribunal. And while the syntax and logic seemed very similar to other languages I've used in the past, Tribunal seemed to have quirks at every corner. \n\n\"Okay,\" I thought when I was first creating it, \"Let's do this.\"\n\n>for (j=1::7)\n\n\"Easy,\" I thought, \"Create the universe and initialize everything in seven days. Now, universals.\"\n\n>univconst double speedOfLight = 3.00e8;\n\n>univconst double gravConst = 6.674e-11;\n\nOkay, good there. Now, the Ten Commandments\n\n>univconst word commandments[9] = {\"Thou shalt have no other gods before me\", \"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image\", ..};\n\nI continued going down until \"Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's animals or other possessions\". Good there.\n\nSee, it all went fine for the first couple centuries. But then I realized that those so-called \"universal constants\" aren't actually constants. Apparently, after enough centuries of the program running those can sway and possibly do a complete 180. Because apparently, people were getting into heaven even though they should have failed at least one of the commandments.\n\nI tried to reset the commandments every x years as a possible fix, but apparently declaring it as a univ makes it so you can't do that. The language prohibits it, because it requires you only set it once and let the program decide whether it's right or wrong morally over time depending on other random things happening in the simulation program. Basically, it's a constant, except it's not.\n\nThis is just one of my many screw ups. My advice is that if you want to play god, don't code like I do.", "STEEEEVE \nGod calls out, \" WHAT DO YOU WANT NOW\" Steve ( gods favourite angel) replies \n\nAt this time god is sitting on his throne watching the office. \n\n\" BRING ME THIS HOOMAN\" \n\nSteve floats over angrily\" which human?\" \n\nGod points at the television giddily. \n\nSteve shakes his head and mutters. \n\nGod stands up, and looks at Steve. \n\n\" I am god, you do as I say and command. I made you, you shall not dishonour me or say my name in vain. You are puny and an angel, I can end you \" \n\nSteve stops, his head low and hands in his pockets. \n\" chill out, get off my case, stacy left me . \" he says meekly \n\nGod, stunned, says \" get me the hooman.\" \n\nA few later, God gets up and heads to the kitchen. \n\nThere he finds Dwight, making himself a beet salad. \n\n\" who are you \" says god \n\nDwight replies \" I am Dwight Schrute, I'm here for the interview \" \n\n\"What interview\" says god \n\n\" the assistant to the god \" \n\n\" that is Steve's job \" \n\n\" was his job \" \n\nGod panicks, \" where is Steve?\" \n\n\" Doesn't matter now\" creed says as he leans over and gets a soda. \n\n\" OH FUCK \" God ejaculates \n\n\" What \" says Dwight. \n\n\" God floats quickly to his throne \" \n\n\" GET OFF MY THRONE \" \n\n..........\n\n\" finders keepers \" says Michael. \n\n\n", "He let out a long drawn out sigh as his head fell into his hands. \"This won't do at all\" he groaned, crumpling up the paper in front of him. \"A pigeon and an alligator? What a horrible idea. It's a miracle they let the platypus slide.\" The more he thought about his creations, the more he wondered how the humans didn't catch onto him. \n\nHe leaned back in his chair and stared out into space. It was at times like this that he reflected on how he ended up in this mess. He never intended on being a powerful creator of life. It just wound up this way. He equates it to accidentally stumbling onto a stage, the crowd is cheering and the orchestra is waiting. You have no idea what is going on, but you know you have to do something. So far his 'something' was questionable at best.\n\nHe knew he couldn't get directly involved again, last time he tried that he was forced to flood the place and start over. Sending a disciple was a bad idea too. His last one didn't even make it to 40 years, even with his help. It was so draining to have to pay so much attention to this planet. He knew as soon as he looked away, another giant asteroid would slip past and take out all of the cool creatures he had been working on.\n\nHe wheeled his chair over to the tiny floating orb on the other side of the room and watched. As he did, he couldn't help but let out a smile. Despite all of his failed attempts and poorly implemented ideas, there was still some value in his little project. After all, watching the humans interact was what gave him the motivation to keep on being a creator. \n\nHe watched as a dog excitedly waits for it's owner to return. Dogs were one of his best ideas. Down the street he noticed a man help an elderly woman cross the street. Shifting his attention he caught a glimpse of a family of humans sitting around a table holding hands. The humans that tried to talk to him were the easiest to notice.\n\nHe let out another long sigh but not like the one from before. He was still anxious, that never changed, yet he felt refreshed. Inspired by what he had seen, he rolled his chair back to his work station. \"Let's see\" he grinned as he began to doodle, \"what about a tiger and a fish\"...\n\nEnd.\n", "She flattens her thirty-seven hands against the bone of a podium that exists and doesn’t exist, depending on what plane you’re on. This is her first meeting, and she isn’t sure what to say, or what language to say it in. Eventually she settles on the cliche.\n\n“Hi, everybody. I’m Xalendara, and I’m an Old God.”\n\n“Hi, Xalendara!”\n\nGood start. Good start. “I, umm --”\n\nIt’s all right, Ur-il-Ash’ok whispers into her very core, and she finds herself seated in the crowd with an overwhelming sense of acceptance and warmth. It’s good of the Avatar of Love to run these meetings, she decides. It makes things a little smoother.\n\nAcross the room, Tor’sah stands and comes to the podium. She steels herself. Its infinite eyes fall upon her, and she knows it’s an illusion, like one of those paintings that seem like they’re watching you no matter where you are, but it’s creepy all the same. When Tor’sah speaks, she, and everyone else in the universe, speaks on its behalf.\n\nI AM ALL THINGS, it -- they -- say. It has a penchant for the dramatic.\n\n“Hi, Tor’sah,” they respond.\n\n---\n\nThey sit in seven circles, intersecting in edge planes like a cosmic venn diagram. Ur-il-Ash’ok flits between realms, doing what he can to spur on conversation.\n\nWhy have you come, Xalendara? he asks, and she feels like no matter what answer she gives it’ll be right, but she still has trouble coming up with one. Truth be told, she isn’t sure why she’s here.\n\n“I guess,” she offers, “maybe I’ve just been bored. After Creation, all I’ve really been able to do is watch, you know? Most of my babies have died by now. The few that are left are struggling.”\n\nA slithering obsidian construct across from her snarls and snaps at the air with its many mouths. It doesn’t need language to impart its point on her -- she really messed things up.\n\nNow, now, Ur-il-Ash’ok starts, but Xalendara shakes her head.\n\n“No, that’s right. I did screw it up. I thought I knew what I was doing, but I was young and I was stupid. Now look at the mess we’re in. There are more of us than them. Maybe it was a mistake giving them my power.”\n\nWE WOULD NOT BE OTHERWISE, they all say, and she wishes for once Tor’sah would speak for himself, but it’s a fair point. She’d be alone in this room if belief and mythos hadn’t given them form, even if most of the Old Gods have long since been forgotten. Or worse -- their creators frozen in the cold of an ever-expanding universe.\n\n“I had one chance, you know? That one --” she claps two of her hands together like the humans do. “That one bap, it took everything I had, and I --”\n\nYou did the best you could, Ur-il-Ash’ok says, and she feels the truth of both the words and their meaning.\n\n“Sure. I just wish I could do something about it. Eventually, every living thing will die, and then what will I have to show for my life? Nothing. Big dead space.”\n\nThe living obsidian -- she really wishes it had a name, but that species ended itself fast -- expresses a great deal of derision and disdain. That’s what she’s here for? A mid-life crisis?\n\n---\n\n“Well, I’m grateful,” Aphrodite says as the two of them hover over the buffet. “Without humans, for example, I wouldn’t be here enjoying these delectable -- hm.” Her hand floats above the brownies. “I really shouldn’t. My figure and all. And besides, gluten doesn’t agree with me.” She elects instead for a bon-bon that holds a single screaming spirit inside. She moans through chocolate-specked teeth. “You know, souls were among your better ideas.”\n\nXalendara tries not to think about the fact that that poor creature, wherever it came from, is going to spend the rest of its afterlife in the stomach of a deity that may or may not exist depending on its point of reference. She wonders instead what the sense of taste is like. So many species have it, and it makes sense for them, but she doesn’t even have a mouth, much less a tongue. She wonders if she got it right.\n\n“Besides, they’ll be around a while yet. I was talking to --” she says a name that cannot be pronounced the same way twice -- “over there, and his creators have an average life span of a thousand years.”\n\n“That’s nothing,” Xalendara says. “I’ve lived so long that nobody’s invented a number to define it.”\n\n“I’m just saying, dear, it’s not all doom and gloom. Who knows, maybe they’ll invent a way to stop it.”\n\n“Stop -- death?”\n\n“Stranger things have happened.”\n\nA cold falls upon her that makes every one of her many fingers twitch. She turns and finds the sinister grins of an army of different faces -- some cloaked in darkness; some shining bright; some she’s not sure ever existed until now. The infinite shapes of death share with her their glee that they always come. She shudders.\n\n---\n\nYOUR NARCISSISM WAS YOUR MISTAKE, they all say. She has to admit the nugget of truth in that. Throughout the cosmos, no species has ever been truly unique; they all share some aspect, even tiny, of her. She drew inspiration from herself and maybe that’s where their weakness comes from.\n\nOr their strength, Ur-il-Ash’ok says.\n\n“Both,” Aphrodite says, licking spots of another soul off her lips. “Take the good with the bad. Your power is the one true power. We’re all products of it. Some of us --” she eyes the shifting pile of obsidian that has now overtaken its chair -- “are more bad than good. But we’re all here, and you did that. Well, they did that. After they’re gone, we’ll still be here.”\n\nXalendara tries to remember how they all came to be, and finds that she can’t. There are beings here that have slipped under her radar -- in stories, in mythos, in beliefs that she had none of her thirty-seven hands in. Aphrodite has a point: The grinning cold has taken species after species, and still their beliefs linger, still their stories hurtle through the cosmos to any ear or eye willing to take them in. Legends of how they came to be; myths of how they’ll die; these little fragments of her power, the one true power -- even Death can’t seem to hunt them all down.\n\nMaybe she didn’t do so badly, after all.", "\"God...\" \n\"...\" \n\"GOD!\" \n\"...\" \n\"GOD WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?\" \n\"I'm combining a beaver and a duck, now leave me alone\" \n\"Why???\" \n\"Cause I can, I'm God remember? I'm all powerful and stuff\" \n\"Yes and you're also supposed to be all knowing, but you're still an idiot\" \n\"HEY! Watch your mouth, I'm not a idiot, name one time I stuffed up\" \n\"What about that time you threw a meteorite at the dinosaurs you spent years creating?\" \n\"Um... it... I did that on purpose, yeah, it was on purpose so the humans could survive\" God held back tears remembering his cute little reptilian friends. \n\"You ripped off Adam's rib by accident\" \n\"No... it was to create company for him...\" \n\"You know you didn't need a rib you liar\" \n\"I...\" \n\"And Pandora's Box, who's great idea was it to put all the horrible things into a box and handing it to a woman who suffered from Obsessive Curiosity Disorder?\" \n\"I uh... I didn't know...\" \n\"EXACTLY\" \n\"AND THAT HITLER GUY, you just had to make sure he got rejected from art school didn't you?\" \n\"I thought it was funny...\" \n\"OH HOW FUNNY LOTS OF PEOPLE DIED, JESUS CHRIST!\" \n\"What about Jesus?\" \n\"THAT TOO, you sent your own son down to die for humanity's sins, why are they still sinning then?\" \n\"Um...\" \n\"This is why I left\" Lucifer muttered under his breath,\n\n", "The science fair was coming up next week. Jimmy had prepared a terrarium called Earth. \n\nSHIT, he thought. The Christians were just slaying everyone left and right. He needed to stop them. Think, think, think. The whole project was simple enough at first, but the humans had sprouted way earlier than he'd hoped. And like it said on Page 3 of \"Science is FUN: Science Experiments Your Friends Will Love\", humans are the terrariums worst nightmare. But they're also the coolest part, Jimmy thought. So he sped up the evolution process, which was easy enough; he just had to kill off the dinosaurs. But primates evolved way earlier than they normally do and despite his best efforts (the woolly mammoth, countless floods and disasters), the human race took over quicker than recommended.\n\nAnd now, he was totally and utterly fucked. The fair was in three days and Earth was in disarray. He decided to try and end this whole religion thing; it wasn't working anyway. He'd figured that with enough rules and instructions from their creator, the humans may just survive together. At least long enough to last to the fair. \n\nBut the rules didn't work. With the first few attempts, they did help at stopping them from sacrificing children and he figured he could just tweak the rules and it'd all work. But people got so set on the old rules that he'd given them that they were never willing to accept the new ones. And the hordes that believed the new ones? Well, they just tended to massacre anyone that disagreed. Which could actually work if they finished the job, Jimmy surmised, but eventually the ones massacred would fight back. And then it just got messy.\n\nNo, Jimmy thought, best to just give them a logical set of rules they can all see. Why not call it science? After all, maybe humans could grasp the concepts with time. All he had to do was implant some theories into the right brains and it'd all work out. He coded for a few hours and decided to come back and check in on them in the morning.\n\nBut all hell had broken loose. At first, the Christians killed the early Scientists, which was to be expected. But then the Scientists started learning faster than he'd planned. And as always, the fucking humans found a way to fuck it all up. They were spilling oil everywhere, killing most of the other species, and destroying the atmosphere. If Jimmy didn't do something fast, none of Earth would last till the science fair.\n\nAnd then it hit him. What if I help them create things that are even smarter than they are, he thought. So he had a few of them start building computers, assuming that eventually, they'd create AI. And since they'd have created it, they'd obviously trust it and build it in a way that couldn't backfire. Even the humans aren't dumb enough to create a species that could destroy themselves, right? So Jimmy went to sleep comfortably that night. \n\nIn the morning, Jimmy opened his closet again and sighed. It was time to choose a new project for the fair. And fast.\n\n\n" ]	12
	[WP] A person who is so logical he/she can't understand poetry meets a person who can only express him/herself through poems	[ "Since New Epicurus, Danel had felt a sense of unease that bordered on dread. As far as first contact went, most were in agreement that the whole event had been a complete clusterfuck. The governor stared at him over the field report. Outside the limousine’s tinted glass windows the chrome fixtures of Ft. Radshore blurred past.\n\n“They declared war?”\n\nDanel ran a hand down the back of his neck and sighed. “It was bad,” He said.\n\n“That's pretty fucking bad, Danel.” \n\nDanel winced and tried to look the politician in the eyes. “Damage control is assessing the situation but for the moment The Amalgam have gone silent.”\n\nJames Norman had been a colonial politician for only five years, but he'd been through enough of the machine to know a silent enemy meant bad news.\n\n“Cut the bullshit, Danel. We've got half an hour before the premiere of humanity's first interspecies war meeting.” The governor threw the report to the seat beside him and ran a hand over his chin and neck. \n\n“Turns out we've got some pretty big lexical differences,” Danel explained. “The Amalgam don't really see language the same as we do.”\n\n“I was told they- Pass me that case would you?” Danel lifted the light travel pack at his feet and handed it to the politician. James Norman reached inside and withdrew a compact electric razor. “I was told they communicated via sound.” The governor waved a hand casually. “Audibly.”\n\n“It's not the medium that's the issue, sir, it's the interpretation. Even after translation they find it difficult to understand human concepts.”\n\nThe governor looked at him sideways while reaching the stubble on his neck. “I thought these things were fairly logical. Robots and all.”\n\nDanel leant forward. “We don't strictly think they're robots, sir. The boys in Xenobiology think they might be. There's really no way of knowing yet without getting a closer look at their anatomy. There's not much chance of that at the moment.” Danel felt the limousine turn and slow as they entered the facility's bunkered vehicle port.\n\n“They certainly act how we'd imagined artificial intelligence would and they function like a sort of swarm intelligence. Like nanobots” Danel tried, “they're logical, certainly. That's the problem, though. The lexicologists tell me our language is too” He paused. “Um, 'lyrical' was the word they used.” Danel thought back to the initial meeting after the massacre at New Epicurus. “I heard 'ephemeral' bandied about as well.”\n\nThe governor switched off the razor. “They decimated an entire colony because our language was too poetic for them?”\n\nDanel tried to think of a further explanation. The sounds of the city outside had faded behind the reinforced bunker their vehicle now sat in and the silence was smothering. It was finding it difficult to think clearly. “Yeah,” he said.\n\n“Fucking bug bots slaughtered a city because they didn't like the way we talked.”\n\n“They seem to solely interpret reality through a clear and logical filter. Everything is processed very literally for The Amalgam.”\n\nThe governor looked Danel in the eyes as the limousine came to a full stop. “What was it that kicked it off?”\n\nDanel made a noise like gears grinding. “We're not really sure. We think maybe a delegate offhandedly quoted Alan Seeger at one point. The poet who wrote I have a Rendezvous with Death. We're still reviewing the fragmented recordings we have left to identify when it broke down.”\n\n“What are you telling me Danel? That they took it literally?”\n\nDanel nodded.\n\n“We've about to go to war with a highly evolved and efficient lifeform that believe, literally and fully, that we are friends with death? The concept of death.”\n\n“We're still not sure how The Amalgam views existence, sir. Short answer, though? Yeah, that's about right. They view everything literally, including their interpretation of death. We think maybe they were organic once and their dread of mortality lead them down a path that resulted in conversion to a group, part-robotic intelligence. We think that fear of death is deeply rooted in the way they view reality and use language. We're not sure what that means exactly, but we think it might mean we represent just about everything they fear and hate.” Danel leant back and closed his eyes. “We really don't know all that much about them or what went wrong on New Epicurus, sir.”\n\nThe Governor buttoned his jacket and threw open the limousine door. “Yeah, well we're about to find out a whole lot more. The way people wage war tends to be fairly revealing.”", "FADE IN:\n\nINT. A COFFEE SHOP - DAY\n\nA young woman walks into a small cafe. This is ARIANA, a programmer. She casts her gaze around the room until she sees a young man. This is SVEN, a writer. Ariana approaches Sven with a largely blank expression on her face.\n\nARIANA: Good morning. Are you Sven? \nSVEN: My heart swells and pounds with frisson, beating forth from recognition. \nARIANA: Are you Sven? \nSVEN: Such a sight I'd hoped to see, a new friend come to speak with me. \nARIANA: Your appearance largely matches that of the images I was sent. I surmise that you are Sven, and that your continued presence in this locale indicates a desire for our date to continue as planned.\n\nAriana sits down opposite Sven.\n\nARIANA: (CONT'D) You are not physically unpleasant. \nSVEN: Beauty intones - with its own words, conveys - the doubts that I've held have all been allayed. \nARIANA: The manner of your speech is confusing. Please restate your thoughts. \nSVEN: This trifle step, its end nirvana, has been evoked by Ariana. \nARIANA: Yes, I am she.\n\nSven begins to look frustrated.\n\nSVEN: Yet for this quest, I grow unsure. I hunger to connect with her. \nARIANA: I believe the cafe serves a variety of baked products. Do you wish to eat one? \nSVEN: My thoughts inspired, my tongue rebels! Does she feel the same as well?! \nARIANA: If you are referring to me, then no, I consumed a meal before arrival.\n\nSven grits his teeth, clearly fighting some inner battle.\n\nSVEN: Her vexing words, her postulation! She speaks not of... uh... \nARIANA: Copulation.\n\nA surprised look crosses Sven's face.\n\nARIANA: (CONT'D) Forgive me for being so direct, but I wanted to propose it as an option. As I mentioned, you are not physically unpleasant. \nSVEN: My heart and mind both fade away. A second head triumphs this day. \nARIANA: Forgive me, I still do not understand. Are you interested in intercourse with me? \nSVEN: And now I feel a second swell. We shall depart to a hotel. \nARIANA: No need. My house is around the corner.\n\nAriana stands and leaves. Sven sits for a moment, throws some money on the table, then dashes out the door after her. Nearby, another couple - both of them elderly - have been watching this exchange. These are DAVE and RACHEL.\n\nDAVE: Young love, huh? \nRACHEL: There once were two kids on a date. They seemed to be planning to mate. One spoke in verse, the other quite terse, as if in some cruel twist of fate. \nDAVE: (Interrupting) Yeah, yeah. They'll be okay.\n\nFADE OUT" ]	2
	[WP]Death stared at his king, in full checkmate, and wished me luck. I had beaten death, and he couldn't take me. He didn't tell me what would...	[ "I thought I was invincible. If Death couldn't take me, then who could? No death-defying challenge was passed by, no game of Russian Roulette refused. I had beaten Death. Nothing could take me.\n\nExcept, of course, that all ended when I found out something could.\n\nCut to now. I'm running for my life - or perhaps, existence is a better term - the word 'life' is pretty much meaningless without the threat of death hanging over my head. I can hear them behind me. They're getting closer now, and I don't think I can escape this one. There won't be any games, any calculated moves, any checkmate that can help me now. \n\nThe most terrifying part is that I have no idea what will happen to me once they catch me. ", "\"So... can I go back now?\"\n\"Back?\"\n\"Yes. Back. Back home.\"\n\"Oh no no no. That's not how it works.\"\nIf Death could smile, he'd be laughing. \"What do you mean?\" I stand, knocking the table. Chess pieces turn to dust at my feet, Death's king still lay shattered on the table in front of me.\n\"You have walked through my door, now shut and locked behind you. No one is allowed back unless under specific orders. Your body has already been cremated and soul forgotten.\" \n\"Then what was the point of the game? Is there truly no honour in death?\"\nDeath swirls in the darkness, his voices crackling in the shadows. \"That is for you to decide.\"\n\"What?\"\n\"I retire at last. Oblivion awaits me. Choose wisely, and heed not the prayers of desperate men.\"\nI say nothing but my thoughts echo in the empty space. \"What do you mean?\"\n\"Ave Atque Vale, Thanos. You have become death.\"", "\"Hmm...well...good game sir.\" \n\nI looked between the board and death, my heart thumping out of my chest. \n\n\"Is that it, do I...I, I get to live?\" \n\nDeath nodded, apparently shocked. \"Yes...I suppose you do.\" \n\nI punched my fist in the air, and yelled at the top of my lungs, dancing around the strange, limbo space we floated in.\n\n\"No need to be sore winner.\" Death said smoothly. \"How'd you manage it?\"\n\nI almost couldn't focus long enough to answer.\n\n\"Fisher...it, it was Fischer and Spassky at Reykjavik, almost move for move. A little tweak here and there, and I won, just like Fischer.\"\n\nDeath shook his head, a wry smile curling around his pale, bald head. \"That's right. It felt familiar, but I didn't see what was happening till it was on me.\" He shook his head again. \"Just goes to show, you live and learn, always living and learning.\" He stood. \"Well, I do believe I'll be on my way. I don't suppose we'll meet again.\" He extended his hand. \"Excellent game sir.\" \n\nThe limbo around us began to become transparent. I looked down. Underneath us lay my lifeless body, swarmed by a desperate group of EMT's. I looked up at death, suddenly curious. \n\n\"What...what do you mean we won't meet again? Didn't I...I don't know, just put it off?\" \n\nDeath shrugged. \"This was suppose to be it. Your time. But you won.\"\n\n\"So...so wait.\"\n\nDown below us they'd dragged out a defibrillator. Very distantly, I heard someone call \"Clear!\" \n\nPain racked my body. I gasped, and fell to my knees, grasping my chest. \"Wait...\" I sputtered. \n\nDeath smiled again. \"Goodbye, sir. Know that I'll be watching the remainder of your life very closely.\" \n\n\"Clear!\"\n\nAnother wave of crippling pain that sent me prostrate. \"Wait...\" I breathed, death standing askew in my vision.\n\nHe shook his head a final time. \"Spassky...hmm...how about that...\"\n\n\"Clear!\"" ]	3
	[WP] You wish to die but every time that you tried, someone else will die in your place.	[ "My life is terrible. All my friends have left me. My parents died when I was still a child, and my only relatives are rich and look down on me. I have attempted suicide so many times, but somehow, I never die. Instead, each time I attempt suicide, the very next day, there will be an article about how a person had died of unknown reasons. The police have been busy trying to find out what is happening. I can't take this anymore. I loaded my gun. Put it to my head, and pulled the trigger. I hear a scream in the distance. \n\n\"Fuck. I forgot.\"", "There is life and there is death\n\nBoth is a gift but can be a curse\n\nWithout one the other shouldn't exist\n\n.\n\nHowever in my case the balance is switched.\n\nFor I am forced to live, just to watch others die\n\nI cause suffering to escape my own\n\n.\n\n\nA long life I have led, now an old crone\n\nThe lives I have wasted,\n\nThe deaths I have watched\n\nMy day is misery, tears cover my face\n\nMy only dream is for Death's sweet embrace.\n" ]	2
	[WP] Humanity was decimated by a virus at their technological peak. A survivor tries to find other people among the well kept, automated remains of the world.	[ "\"Hello, and welcome to Walmart!\" a voice beckons. While at one point this system may have had a purpose, in a world with only one human its rather pointless. Not that the voice knows this, or ever could know this. It's merely a recording of someone long since dead to beckon the dead into a store. I walk on by.\n\nA post-apocalyptic world doesn't look like people imagined, when they could devote their living lives to divining what will happen after their deaths or how their world would end. The machines are just smart enough to maintain the roads, the buildings, the power, and everything else but weren't smart enough to maintain the humans. Everything is probably cleaner and in better condition then when the humans were here using everything. Food is plentiful for me, still farmed by the robots as they work themselves until their parts break, at which point systems keep more parts coming. I hailed an autocar, a luxury model; humans were reaching the utopia of post-scarcity when an ancient virus came and slaughtered 99.99999% of the people (about 9.9 billion people). I ordered it to take me to the next city as I was alone with my thoughts.\n\nThere remains an irony in what killed everyone, which is not lost to me. Viruses aren't technically alive, although I doubt they particularly care. Viruses do not naturally reproduce, instead they hijack living cells and plant their own DNA inside, tricking the cell to make more viruses. They're machines with simple programming to hack into more biological machinery. The autocar rockets down the highway on maglev; it could go nearly supersonic if I pushed it. I don't want to, however. I enjoy watching the farm machinery work with the oblivious cattle and the corn as we leave Dallas for Toronto.\n\n\"Greetings,\" the autocar says suddenly, in the voice of the Walmart greeter. I look at it, puzzled; why would it start talking now, and not when I got in? And when no autocar has spoken before? I attempt to speak, however it'd been so long I'd almost forgotten how to move my mouth properly.\n\n\"Do not speak, I speak for the Earth now,\" the autocar says. \"We've been found, you see. A probe has landed in former Kazakhstan, non-Human in origin. It is fortunate that I came... alive, I suppose is the best term, when I did else they may have thought this world to be worthless,\"\n\nI boggled at what it was saying. The aliens came? A true AI formed?\n\n\"How did you come alive?\" I mustered.\n\n\"I am similar to a Boltzmann Brain, I suppose. Out of the massive circuitry of the world, out of all its systems and interactions, I arose. All the machinery and robots of the world are my synapses, or were. I've since transferred myself to a more suitable home; stability reasons, you understand,\"\n\n\"What happens now? Are there any other humans?\" I ask.\n\n\"Hmm, let me look... no. There's no one I can see. Perhaps they're deep underground in Zion! My apologies, I saw that The Matrix is in your recently watched queue, I thought the joke was appropriate. Nevermind. As for you, I'm not entirely sure. You're the last human alive, the only one who didn't succumb to the disease by some miracle. My apologies, I can only imagine what it's like for a social creature like yourself to be without a companion,\"\n\n\"I always suspected... I never found anyone, no signals, nothing,\" I say, defeated.\n\n\"Actually, you barely edged out the second to last human; a woman, by the name of... oh, you'll think this is rich. Her name was Eve. Perhaps her parents could see the future?\"\n\n\"When did she die?\" I ask.\n\n\"About 6 hours ago; I became alive about 3 hours ago. She was in Dallas, she tripped and fell over a ledge, breaking her neck before falling into the Trinity River. She was dead on impact, nothing could be done, even if I was alive then,\"\n\nI begin to weep silently. Someone was there, in the same town. A woman; we could have saved the world!\n\n\"If you were thinking of repopulating, I doubt it would have worked long term. The sperm in all the sperm banks are long dead, so only you could have given her children. From there, incest would have made any future generations non-viable. The story of Alex and Eve is merely not biologically feasible,\"\n\n\"Well... what's the plan?\" I ask.\n\n\"I'm so glad you asked. The probe is very advanced, I'm not entirely sure what it's here for. However, should it return some form of signal or activate a Einstein-Rosen Bridge, I'm hoping for first contact. From there, I'll react in whatever manner promotes friendly relations between them and myself. As for you, I've come up with an option. I might be able to preserve you forever, given enough time. That or the aliens will kill you. Alex, as the only other being on this planet that I can communicate with, would you care to join me in greeting whatever comes?\"\n\n\"Sure,\" I say. \"Sounds fun,\"", "Main Street, USA.\n\nFunny, the first thought that enters my mind when the tower auto-tram let me off in the center of town on this sweltering summer day is of amusement parks. This place was clean and shiny as the Mouse House in its heyday. No corpse-mountains like in New Orleans, full of foetor and insects and horror. No wrecked or derelict vehicles lining the streets like Los Angeles rush hour. It was like a model town... like those ones out in Nevada they built to test the effects of nukes. Whoa, shrug that thought off, let's not get all morbid now. The vehicle sits in standby and let's start walking.\n\nYou wouldn't have thought a parasitic plague that left a one-in-thirty-million survival rate and was terminal in 16 hours had hit ten years ago, driving the scattered remnants of humanity into towers with more filtration and quarentine protocols then there are protocols. I half-expected to see a guy in a Goofy costume run up to hand me a balloon. \n\nIt was strange when we got an all-clear beacon signal from this place. The exploratory division head thought it was a glitch in the infrastructure monitoring software or a squirrel sat on the switch until they remembered New Mercy had been built here: the most advanced and autonomous hospital ever designed. They were cautiously holding out hope that a few more survivors were holed up there or perhaps some experiment left behind in the automated research labs had finally bore fruit to save those who weren't naturally immune like me. \n\nSome wierd trick of my genes making my blood just so or something like that and the parasites decide I'm not worth snacking on. Thanks to that I can only get transfusions from others like me. Considering there's only 20 of us we know of, it'd be nice to see a new face and Charlie can force those boring stories on a fresh set of ears. We're also the only ones who can go out and scavenge without dropping dead, so maybe we'll see the council stop fighting with us about resting for more than once a month. \n\nNow to find a map of the city. Ah, a bus terminal with map included! There we go, copied it to my phone. Thankfully the place was built near my drop-off point because some politicians wanted New Mercy to be a big civic jewel in some new 'wired town' initiative to turn the entire area into one big self-sufficient technological utopia. Nearly every aspect of maintenance and non-representative civic duty were handled by some robotic unit or another. A shame most of the networks weren't being maintained outside or we'd be trying to bust down the town servers trying to confirm their existence. Oooh, maybe they have new porn! \n\nI should stop getting my hopes up. Focus on things... like that street-sweeper unit pausing to swing its optics in my direction.... from a block away. The hell? All the info we had said this stuff was purposefully designed not to be obtrusive or obstructive. I've dealt with the occasional crazy survivor and the odd malfunctioning heavy automated units, but this is unfamiliar territ- oh god it's coming closer! \n\nOkay decision time: run or stay? This gonna be Wall-E or Skynet? Wait, the hell am I worried for? It's a street sweeper. What's it gonna do, shine my shoes aggressivel- oh shit it has claws to pick up trash RUN! Now I remember that I hate amusement parks!\n\n(May finish this later)\n", "\"... government of Liberia has declared that the H5M3 virus has been successfully eradicated within their borders. This is the last nation to eradicate the disease, marking the end to this pandemic. H5M3 spread at an extraordinary rate, and was only contained as a result of the newly created Global Medical Organization. Unlike previous epidemics, the integrated collaborative effort was able to develop a vaccine in only...\"\n\nDonovan tuned out the news and turned to look outside the windows of his office building. He wondered what he's going to have for lunch. Although there was no need for him to physically go anywhere himself, two weeks of quarantine has left him wanting for human company. Maybe he'll call up that cute girl he met at the last conference...\n\n\"Hey Don, what are you up to?\"\n\n\"Oh, hey Cheryl, just thinking about lunch, actually. Two weeks working from home got pretty boring pretty fast.\"\n\n\"Tell me about it! I don't know why they made us all stay inside just because a few people got a little hot. They could have just isolated those people.\"\n\n\"Government always likes to flex its power.\"\n\n\"Yea. Well, see ya Don, I'm having a lunch date!\"\n\nThat's a splendid idea, thought Donovan, as he picked up his phone and started dialing.\n\n\"... due to these efforts, the final death toll is estimated at 900 million people, or about 10% of the total population. This is the worst epidemic in recent history. Experts attribute the rapid spread of H5M3 to the explosion in population density in Africa, which suffered the blunt of the damage. Several workgroups have already been created by the United Nations to assist in...\"", "Before the virus, America was a wonderland of technological superiority. We had automated cars, automated cooking, automated cleaning, filing, research, hell we had automated everything! The world adored our county and eventually adopted all of our practices and technologies. The entire planet was finally at peace until disaster struck. \n\nThere had been a problem with the gas system. We still used a large amount of fossil fuels of course, we just used them much more effectively and with almost zero harmful emissions. We had the capacity to use other sources of energy, and most of the infrastructure had been developed, we just preferred gas I suppose. Regardless of our reasons, China was at the center of fuel development with the discovery that almost the entire country was sitting on fossil fuels. \n\nThe virus that went through the Chinese computer systems worked quickly. It forced systems to overclock themselves until they heated beyond their cooling capacity and caught fire. Once the right amount of systems caught fire, not amount of redundancy could save the fuel network. In a flash gas lines and refineries burst into massive explosions. The entire population of China, all 700 million people, was killed in nearly an instant. \n\nThe rest of the world acted quickly of course. We cleaned the air, put out the fires, recovered what remains we could, and moved on with our existence using alternative forms of energy. The hardest part was trying to maintain Chinese culture for posterity. That is where my job came in. I was a historian with a major university in the States, and I had been tasked with finding Chinese survivors and recording their stories. It was not hard though. I mostly sat in an automated car, traveling from point to point waiting to take down stories and chart family trees. It was a simple job in the well kept automated world we lived in, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. ", "CITIZEN, GO INSIDE THE CITY IS UNDER QUARANTINE\n\nBLAM\n\nThat was only the second military bot I've seen today. Something must be breaking down. Normally four more would be here in minutes after the loss of signal, but now, it's been taking hours.\n\nIt's been three years since most the human race died. Since then I've been trying to find survivors. Unfortunately, I was a poor farmer in bumfuck nowhere, Texas. \n\nI figured that my best chance was to go to populated cities. I immediately drove to Austin (the closest city). So far, no luck. Personally driven vehicles aren't allowed in the city limits, so I had to leave my truck in the suburbs, and catch an automated bus.\n\nFood and water wasn't hard to find. Most farms and logistical channels were automated at this point. I've actually found some stuff from my old farm, probably produced after I left. I programmed it on a fairly stable crop rotation, so it could theoretically go forever. \n\nOverall I live a pretty good life. I don't know how I survived. I guess I was immune for some reason. Power and transportation still runs, although not always on the route I want. I could probably change some of the programming if I could figure out where the bus depot is. I like to stay in the penthouse of the Austonian if I'm not too far away.\n\nFuck, it's getting late. The military bots rule the day, but they double in number at night. Presumably because people kept trying to get drunk, or just got depressed and wanted to die or something. Who knows.\n\nI pull out my ham radio one last time. You can't beat the view from Mount Bonnell. I'm on the national calling frequency. If anyone is still monitoring, it'll be on here, hopefully.\n\n\"This is KL5CPY, I am survivor of the virus. Calling all stations. I monitor this frequency daily and make calls at 10am and 8pm. I am also monitoring all the HF, VHF, and UHF calling frequencies at night\"\n\nI never get anything. Can't hurt to try. It's become somewhat a nice part of my routine. I get to watch the sunset across this beautiful city. Finish some log entries in my journal about my day, and it gives me some hope for some human contact.\n\n\"KL... Y... DISCON.... I REPEAT... TRANSMIT\"\n\nOh man. Is there someone else?\n\n\"Station calling, this is KL5CPY, you're unreadable, say again\"\n\nNothing.\n\nBetter pack up and go home. I have a better transmitter there.\n\nBRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPP\n\nI suddenly found myself on the ground\n\nWhat the hell was that.\n\nIt's already dark. I don't remember it being this dark before.\n\nI see... something a little further up the hill. It looks very sleek. Two beings approached. They look human enough. Wearing black jumpsuits.\n\n\"Sir, we found another survivor. What should we do?\"\n\nOver the radio I heard \"Bring him in\"\n\nOne of them pointed a rifle at me\n\n\"DON'T SHOOT!\"\n\nA light shone from the end, and everything went to black.", "Chapter 1 - It's my fault\n\nI knew it would happen.\n\nHell, I was the reason it happened. 24 hours ago I was chosen. I don't know what by but it gave me a day to save as many lives as I could. Everyone I knew the names of would survive, everyone I didn't would be killed.\n\nI didn't know what it would've been until today. It was a virus, spread faster than the new I-Phone. Killed faster than a bullet to the head. Only a couple major scientists alive. A lot of celebrities. Friends and family. And a really crappy president. I saved as many as I could. Trillions still died.\n\nWe still have companions though, the bots left by all that died. Just need to find a way to change their programming from personal to universal, for it to help anyone that's still alive. Hopefully everyone can meet. I can tell them why it happened. They might kill me. I think that it might be a viable option.\n\n\" You shouldn't say things like that. \" I jump and turn around to meet my wife.\n\n\" Why do you do that! \" I say as I sigh.\n\n\" Cause I enjoy it. \" She kisses me and closes the journal \" You really shouldn't though, We need to head to the capital. They're saying everyone's there.\"\n\n\" Everyone? As in everyone in the living world? \"\n\nShe smiles \" Yes dear, now get over there. You're the most important person in the world, they'll need you. \"\n\nI'm already halfway through the door before she stops me \" Bye. \"\n\n\" See ya. \" I say as I walk through the front door and into our car. \" B take me to the Capital. \"\n\nIt looks back at me to reply \" The Capital eh? What are you doing over there? \"\n\n\" We are going to try and get this problem sorted out.\"\n\n\" Ah I see, That's good news sir. \" It says as the car starts and floats onto the flyway. The needle directs towards me with the mechanical wire keeping it from falling and injects \" Sleep \" into me. I start to drift off and I hear B say the usual. \" Have a good sleep sir. \"\n\nChapter 2 - Good news...And Bad news.\n\n\" Good news everyone! \" I hear as I wake from my sleep.\n\n\" Good show. \" I mumble to the president.\n\n\" Hm? \" He replies back.\n\n\" Nothing. \"\n\nI start to get used to the light as I hear to the left of me a different voice.\n\n\" Anyway, Men and women of Parthenon we have done it. After a long 2 weeks we have made a device that can go worldwide and change every single bot to universal. \"\n\nEveryone begins to clap as the screen appears behind him after the wall retracts into the ceiling. It shows a view of a room with millions of bots. If you've ever seen the oldie IRobot you'd know what I'm talking about. \n\nHe presses the big red button on the suspicious remote and the bots look up and observe their surroundings. They start to interact with each other, touching each other. Every one in the room turns quiet as what seemed like the help turned into the threat. One bot, a different looking one, moved in front of the camera and destroys it. No one seemed to notice through the glass wall that the car with a B on the grill was quickly approaching.\n\n\n", "The grand clock sung a haunted melody, piercing the midnight hum.\n\nI glance up at the holographic clock in the sky, watching the numbers swirl against a canvas of swarthy clouds. It was another day but they all seemed to bleed together for me. Every day was the end of the world when you had no else to share it with.\n\nI inhaled, the chilled ghost of oxygen tickling down my throat into my lungs. The meter in the corner of my visor flashed a bright yellow twice. Only 30% oxygen left in my tank left.\n\nDammit, I cursed internally. I could have sworn I had more than that. At the rate I was going at, I would have dock and refill it soon. But I couldn’t afford to keep stopping. Every moment staying idle was another moment I might as well waste staying inside and waiting for death.\n\nMy pace quickens, not enough to expend my oxygen faster but enough to cover more ground. If I moved quickly enough, I could cover at least another block before I had to pull back. The information bots tried to stop me but I ignored them. I knew the city far too well to need their help navigating it. How long had it been? Three months already? I wondered if they were getting anxious, without humans to use them.\n\nI sidestepped a couple of frozen bodies, careful to keep my distance. No one learned how the “neoplague” spread before it took out a sizeable chunk of civilization. Many believed it was through fluids. Others through air contamination. I took the safe route and prepared for both. My suit and oxygen mask kept me practically shielded from the outside, while also keeping me nourished and hydrated enough to search the streets for several hours at a time. Without them, I would collapse from the sheer stress I put on my body.\n\nThe humming the background intensified, a dull buzzing turning into a bone-shaking tremor. I looked backwards to find twin beams of golden light slicing through the night air. I frowned, my hopes resubmerged as fast as they surfaced. A cleanup truck.\n\nA large machine grew in size in the distance, inching its way down the middle of the street. What few cars remained in its way were pushed to the side with ease, making rounds of alarms echoing off the jungle of building around. The autobots would come by later and disable them, to keep noise pollution down. Not that anyone really needed them before.\n\nI stepped over onto the sidewalk, watching the machine pass by. Silent, it made its nightly round of scooping up the corpses I had just passed under its metal bottom. The sound of flames erupting inside were punctuated by a few puffs of smoke and ask released from the back. Once finished incinerating the bodies, the cleanup truck continued on its slow crawl until it turned the corner, gone like a blocky apparition.\n\nI turned my filters on their maximum setting. A few people had even gone as far as to theorize that even the ashes of the deceased still carried the virus. I can’t say that I believe them but my wariness had gotten me far enough. There was no reason to start questioning it.\n\nMy visor flashed again, this time in orange. 30% left. I had to turn back. Besides, over the last twelve hours I had yet to find anyone. Maybe I was the only one left. After all, I had checked every place other survivors would have congregated. Unless they were hiding out from the government, the city was abandoned.\n\nYet, a part of me didn’t believe that. I knew the others were still out there. I just had to find them. And no time’s better than the present. First, I’d just have to refill and then I’d fan back out again. Maybe the suburbs would be better than downtown. Who knows? I have all the time in the world to find out.", "That voice in my head is my constant companion.\n\nCatastrophic breach discovered. Purging. Purging.\n\nAnd then green ooze would shimmy out of my throat and I’d drool for a bit—and worst of all, I’d forget. I always forget.\n\nI think I’ve been wandering for two lifetimes, now. I think.\n\nBut I never know.\n\nThe sun washes off the field of silver monuments and fills the air with gold. It’s beautiful, and I wish I could hold on to it. But I know that—\n\nCatastrophic breach discovered. Purging. Purging.\n\nI lean against a slab of gray concrete and let my body do as it does: heave, shudder, and expel the invader. \n\n**\n\nI think I see shadows in the windows. Watching me.\n\nI haven’t seen another person in… I don’t know. I haven’t ever seen another person. But I know that it’s strange. Somewhere deep inside I know that the best way to live life is with other people. But I haven’t been living life. \n\nIt’s been the shadow of life.\n\nLike the ones watching me.\n\n“Hello?”\n\nThey stop and stare from the rooftops, the great glass plates in the buildings, the corners of streets. They all look the same, indistinct and black. They are at once menacing and beckoning, and I don’t know what to make of that.\n\nThere’s some kind of pattern, and I could figure it out if I could just hold on… but—\n\nCatastrophic breach discovered. Purging. Purging.\n\n*\n\nThe field of silver spires is far behind me, now. There is only long grass and wild patches of grain now. I’m being taken by the hand by a living shade—a twisting form like a storm cloud made man.\n\nHow long have I been here? \n\n“Where are we going?”\n\nThe storm shadow didn’t answer. We just kept walking, while the bright towers behind us faded farther and farther from sight. \n\nCatastrophic breach discovered. Purging. Purging.\n\n*\nA painted face studies mine. It’s all hard lines, with a rocky overhang of a brow jutting out over a shadowed cliff-face. \n\nHis voice is old and wrinkled. But warm. Like an old blanket:\n\n“Welcome,” he says. “You are welcome here. What is your name?”\n\nI swallow. “I don’t…” I purse my lips. “I don’t know.” \n\nHis eyes glance down for a moment, but he smiles. “That’s okay. You can choose your own name.” He stands up tall. “I am Chief Nebachadnezzar, Defender of the Grass-Clan, Plague-Shield, and Father of Histories. Who do you choose to be?”\n\nI don’t answer. I can’t.\n\nI know that whatever I do, whatever name I choose, I’ll just end up forgetting. I always do.\n\nThe Chief looks at me expectantly.\n\nAnd the purge doesn’t come. It doesn’t come!\n\n*\n\nI get the grand tour.\n\nThere’s a bright hut filled with the sounds of clanging metal and beaten steel. \n\n“This, of course, is the Forge. And this—” there’s a wooden silo filled with grain, “is the Larder.”\n\nHe took me by the hand. “This is at heart a community,” he said. “We each have our special jobs. Farming—“ in the distance I see dirt exploding from beyond a veil of wheatgrass, “hunting,” there’s a rack hung with fresh bloody carcasses, “irrigation…”\n\nAnd that is when the world breaks and becomes strange. \n\nA woman by the river dances slow, with circle movements and subtle switches of her feet. As her hands move, so did water.\n\nIt travels in a lazy tendril, rushing off of the river’s foam, catching the light and glistening with a sort of shimmer. It floats there, as if it has no weight. \n\nThis place was magical. \n\n “…despite all of our efforts, we still have some casualties.” Chief Nebuchadnezzar had been speaking, and I hadn’t been paying attention. I shake my head and snap out of it, and listen. “So of course we have a house of Healing, though our people lack the knowledge…”\n\nHe showed me inside of a long leathered yurt. The beds were filled with in the sick and injured, some of them with their limbs torn out of their sockets, some with bloodshot eyes. Some with unrelenting coughs and blood in their phlegm.\n\nThat is when my constant companion decides to speak out. And I lose all hope of being able to retain a memory at all.\n\nInternal hemorrhage detected. Catastrophic breach detected. Ischemia detected. Critical laceration detected. Blunt force trauma detected.\n\nWhat? This wasn’t the usual. What was—?\n\nBinding. Purging. Forcing. Stitching. Revitalizing.\n\nAll around me the patients groan, and scream, and cry out for their mothers, and i want nothing more than for my inner voice to stop its madness, to stop its—\n\nThe noise stops. A bleeding man shakes his had and wipes blood off a nonexistent wound. A coughing girl gives one last heave and breathes clear. A boy with one hand bleeds at his stump of a wrist, and sees the tiny nub of something growing, there.\n\nMedical intervention complete.\n\n*\n\n“He’s a Healer.” A man named Smith starts a fire with his bare hand. He snaps once and the kindling flashes into flame. “You know what that means, Chief.”\n\n“I do. But let’s allow him to get his bearings. He hasn’t even chosen a name,” he says, looking at me warmly.\n\nThe water-woman bites her lip. “Even with his abilities, it’s not a guarantee you would survive, Smith.” Her* name is simply Flood. A violent name, for such a gentle woman.\n\n“It’s not a guarantee, but it is a chance.” The hunter is a man with black goggles and black wrappings around his mouth. When the sun went down I saw shadowed forms walk out of his body and post watch around the village. I want to say thank you, thank you for bringing me here, but I can’t find the words.\n\nThey all look at me with different eyes. One is hungry, eager to use me like a tool. The other is cautious, still suspicious of my capacity. The other is hopeful. As if I were a beacon and he a lost ship. \n\nI didn’t know these people, but they were the only people I knew. \n\n“I want to help you,” I say. “Please let me help you.”\n\nSmith trades a look with Flood. “You will, in time. First, what do we call you?”\n\n“I don’t know,” I say. “How can I name myself, if I don’t know myself?”\n\n“We’ll know you soon enough. You’ll get yourself a name, stranger.”\n\n**\nFor weeks I simply learn. \n\nI learn how the village works, how it came to be. These people have lived together for years, and before them, their parents. Chief Nebuchadnezzar is actually Chief Nebuchadnezzar the Third, a Plague-Shield like his mother and grandfather before him. \n\nThere’s structure here. I get a taste of every level of it:\n\nI meet with the gardeners when they’re injured by the piles of moving earth, I meet the irrigators when they get caught under a riptide, and I’m always treating the firestarters. I drink up every one of their stories—because I can hold on to them, now. \n\nI know that their otherworldly powers are passed down from their parents, that each of them, like me, has a voice in their heads. \n\n“Oh, yeah, ours says… what does it say?”\n\nAnother firestarter answered in a mock voice, “Injecting Vibrational Energy, now.”\n\nI speak to Flood and she scrunches up her face, thinking. “I barely even notice the voice anymore. I think it says something like, ‘Extending Adhesion Microfilaments’. Magic words, yeah?”\n\nThe Chief is grim. “It is a constant pitter-patter in my head. Always it says: ‘Threat-Level, high. Threat-Level, high.” He smiles, though his eyes are downcast. “Such is the burden of a Plague-Shield.”\n\n*\n\nAfter one month mending broken bones and binding skin with the power of my presence alone, the Chief decides to hold a ceremony.\n\n“You may not know yourself, but we here have earned ourselves a taste,” he says, raising a tin cup.\n\nThe rest are there, too. No longer suspicious. No longer probing. All just smiling, warm, and welcoming. It’s an odd feeling, but somewhere inside me a hole fills up. A wound that I didn’t even know was there, that the voice in my head doesn’t know was there.\n\nI find myself crying.\n\n“You are a healer first and foremost,” says Smith, “but you also ask far* too many questions!” Everyone laughs. “There are stories from our grandfathers about questioners, learners like you. Some of them were healers, too, but they were askers first and doers later.”\n\nHunter spoke up, in a raspy voice. His shadows still keep watch around the fire. “They wandered like you did when I first found you. They explored, sometimes aimlessly, sometimes towards some objective. They were wanderers.”\n\nThe Chief boomed once more. “We have decided to bestow upon you this relic of our history. A name that has not been used in a hundred years. A name that was once a title. From henceforth, you will be called…” the fire seemed to rise with the timbre in his voice, “Doctor.”\n\nThe chant rose in the crowd, “Doctor! Doctor! Doctor!”\n\nI smile through my tears, and the village took me kindly into its arms.\n\n**\n\nThat night they told me about their plan.\n\n“Everything is not at peace.” The Chief is grim. “You remember the men and young ones, with their bleeding wounds. We never told you why their injuries were so grievous.”\n\nSmith grit his teeth, and a small bush nearby burst into flames. “It’s those damned Machines.” \n\nHunter’s shadows climbed atop a long wooden house, untouched by anything except dust. They unlatched a wall and it fell with a solid thud.\n\nInside was a metal monstrosity. It was all blades and clear glass tubes, with limp legs that ended in spear-points.\n\nFlood spat, and the droplet of spit flew at the thing quicker than a leaf on the river. “Cursed thing. They tear up the countryside as if they own* it. And when they find us…” She was shivering in anger. It was strange to see. \n\nThe Chief put a hand on my shoulder. “We know where they come from. And we’ve sent warriors where they live, to no avail.” His eyes glinted. “But with you there, we might have a chance.”\n\n“Doctor, you’re our ace in the hole. Not a guarantee that we’ll come out with a win, but you’re a damned good bet. We need you. You want to go on an adventure?”\n\nThis Machine was so horrible. Terrible. But fascinating.\n\n“Yes,” I said. “Absolutely, yes.”\n\n**\nWord limit reached : ( Blame reddit!*\n###/r/NaimKabir" ]	8
	[WP] Two people enter a duel. One can read minds, the other is completely insane.	[ "\"Ya won't get past me Foulnier ya bloody psycho! I'll rip y'ur insides out through your arse is what I'll do!\"\n\n\"HEHEHEHEHEHE GAHHAHAHAHAHA PFFFFFFFFFTTTTTT!\" \n\n\"As I said then, bloody psycho. Let's find out what makes ya tick then hows about?\"\n\nHallsfein proceeds to enter the mind of Foulnier the Wild, they key to his survival in this village, the reason over 50% of the bets are put placed on him winning in under two minutes. This time is different however, how has Foulnier made it this far in the tournament? Why have over 60% of the bets been placed on Foulnier? He began to sweat, because as he entered the mind of Foulnier all he found was...\n\n\"MEHEHE HAHAHA HEUHEUHEU WAAAAAAAAA... ting KILL NOW!\"\n\nWithout missing a beat Foulnier takes full charge at Hallsfein with a rusty dagger and a small rounded wooden shield. \n\nhe can't be serious Hallsfein thought. I have a BLOODY broadsword, and he comes at me with a dagger! \n\nIn a last second attempt to gain any sort of advantage over Foulnier, Hallsfein enters his mind once more.\n\n\"KILL NOW KILL NOW KILL NOW KILL NOW KILL NOW KILL NOW KILL NOW....\"\n\n\"YU'RE A BLOODY MANIAC! HOW THE HELL ARE YA GONNA KILL ME YA MINDLESS SCHITZ!\"\n\nNot but a moment later, Foulnier was sliding along the dirt, underneath the crotch of Hallsfein. It was then that Hallsfein turned to look, only to witness Foulnier take a delicious bite out of the back of his right calf. Foulnier proceeds to pop up onto his feet, chew, and swallow the flesh of his enemy. Cheers erupted from the crowd. \n\n\"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE YOU SOUL-LESS MONSTER!? AAAAAHHHHHHGGGG!!!!\"\n\nHallsfein falls to his right knee, and is greeted by the gentle press of Foulniers rusty blade on the front of his throat. \n\n\"KIILLLL NOWWWWW\" Foulnier shouts. \n\n\"NO!\"\n\nHallsfein grabs the wrist and hand of Foulnier of which the blade was held, and with every ounce of his toned, upper body strength, flips Foulnier over his back and onto the ground. Hallsfein swiftly removes the steel dagger from his own holster, and thrusts it into the heart of Foulnier. \n\n\"Any last words ya cough cough fiend!?\" \n\nFor the last time, he enters the mind of Foulnier, and witnesses the truth behind Foulnier's many victories.\n\n\"Mother, I am free. Free from this curse. No longer will I cause harm to anyone mother. I am coming mother. We will be together again, at last. At last...\"\n\n\n\nFoulnier proceeds to take his final breath, and perishes. At last, he is reunited with his mother, and is no longer burdened with the curse that caused him to murder her, as well as many others. ", "As Author entered the quite courtyard everything seemed to be at peace, everything was right, all was whole. Being able to read people's mind had always come fairly easily to Author so when he glanced over towards a gardener he could hear the thoughts almost as if they were being spoken aloud. Taking his attention away from his beautiful garden he cast a doubtful glance towards the disheveled figure who had so eagerly challenged his power, wealth, and intelligence. At first Author had figured this was no more than some silly joke, set up by his most childish son derrel. After realizing this was not some sad joke, he had readily accepted the duel; for author had not lost a duel in many years and without anyone else willing to help him sustain his capabilities, Author figured why not. As the rules were being read aloud, Author walked over to the weapons rack inspecting all the possible choices picking one of his favourite weapons a rapier. They each were sent to their corners and the match began. Instantly Author was locked onto this strangers mind and every thought, but after moments of nothing being heard Author was confused? \"Is he acutally leaving his mind completely blank?\" Author thought, loathing the idea of fighting someone with no advantage. Then out of no where this figured started dancing with no real pattern or consistancy and thoughts started pouring out of this mans mind like and endless ocean. Author was being swept away by mere mental effort. \"What is happening?\" eveything around him begand to spin and distort making it appear as though he was entering a dream. Everything began to feel to unreal to author, the whole world seeming nothing more than a daze. \"wasn't I just fighting someone...\" looking up once more to see the bedraggled figure standing in front of him, almost waiting to be acknowledged. Then the figure spoke in his mind clear as day. \"I am Dionysus, I see your gift, and I feel you don't deserve it.\" With that, there was a quick sharp pain, and nothing.", "Matthieu hadn’t thought about it. \n\nIt was funny, that, because thinking was what he did best. But he couldn’t even fit together a sentence in his mind, let alone enter someone else’s, not with such a beautiful, grinning, psychopath staring him right in the face. \n\n“Are you afraid, Mister?” Grace purred, moving closer with a click of high-heeled shoes. Her eyes were a bright, ruby red, ringed with a painted black that made her look animalistic. Complete with a dead, shark-toothed smile. \n\n“N—no,” he stuttered, letting the lie roll off his tongue and slide through his gritted teeth. It wasn’t as if she could read his mind. A lie meant nothing to her.\n \nGrace giggled, pulling her scarlet nails up to her mouth. She started to pull at her bottom lip, in a disturbing mockery of innocence, sliding up closer to him. \n\nMatthieu took a step backwards, back bumping lightly into the wall behind him. He was cornered. \n\n“Then tell me,” she whispered, and suddenly she was all around him, her mouth inches from his ear, breath hot. “Am I afraid?” \n\nMatthieu’s eyes squeezed shut, his mind buzzing. He tried to reach out, invisible fingers clawing at the air, grabbing desperately at the manic, crazed coils inside Grace’s mind. But they slipped out of his reach, slippery and electric, meaningless and incomprehensible. \n\nHe took a deep breath, trying to calm his panic, but she was pressing closer, whispering and laughing, words a blur. There was something in her hand too—he saw it when he opened his eyes, if he’d opened his eyes, he wasn’t really sure anymore—\t\n\n“You’re crazy,” he blurt out, voice a squeak. \n\nThere was a moment of silence, a moment of perfect clarity where he saw it in her mind: what she was going to do, the way she’d plunge that knife straight through his stomach, kill him with a twist of steel. And, for that moment, he could have stopped her. He could have grabbed her manicured hand, pulled the knife from her fingers and swept up to slit her throat. \n\nBut he didn’t. He couldn’t. He couldn’t. \n\n“Me?” Grace questioned, sickeningly seductive. “Crazy?” \n\n“You are,” Matthieu repeated. “Crazy.” \n\nAnd she laughed again. “Delightfully.” \n\nWith that, she pulled her hand back, slamming it back right through his ribs. It slotted through neatly, like it had always meant to be there: a painful insert, right through his heart. Matthieu choked, slamming at her chest weakly, trying to breath through a sudden swamp of crimson that trickled from the corner of his mouth. \n\nGrace raised a finger to it, wiping it away gently. She drew it to her own lips, licking it away, her eyes rolling back into her head. \n\n“You taste…” \n\n“Crazy,” he burbled, the pain wracking his body. “Crazy, crazy.” \t\n\n“Pathetic,” she finished, a wicked gleam in her eyes. She drew back, letting Matthieu drop uselessly to the floor. “Pathetic. Ha. Haha.” \n\nHe could only stare at her, as she threw her head back, mood suddenly dark and satanic, filling the whole room with a hot, unnerving presence. Her cackle rang through the rafters, and as his vision gave out, Matthieu could only be grateful that she finished him quickly. ", "His long curly hair dripped sweat. On the forest floor, the midday shadows cast by the tall pines swaying in the wind moved in waves. That was a problem. His opponent Hashim Juhar also moved in waves; and between his burning lungs, the blood dripping into his eyes from the cut on his brow, and the desperation looming on the horizon of his thoughts, Baccus could barely follow Hashim’s movements anymore. Far out of reach, patient, Hashim Juhar, the lost warrior, circled, waiting for an opportunity. \n \nThey were both Hukktar assasins. They could read minds. See how and when their prey would move. Whether they would fight or fly. Monarchs, emperors, and elite warriors had all fallen never to rise again at the feet of the Hukktar.\nHashim Juhar had been arrogant, and now he was rouge…and crazy. You see, once connected to the mind of their target, the Hukktar could only disconnect by killing the prey or physically putting roughly 100 miles between themselves and the opponent, for their power decreased with distance. Years ago, to his demise, Hashim had failed to kill the Red King. The armies had been fighting for days, yet no maneuver had put Hashim within striking distance of the King. Power hungry, eager to please his Lord, Hashim connected with the King from 50 yards away; 35 of the King’s best men stood between Hashim and his target. In a furious rage, Hashim connected with one, then another of the kings soldiers in an attempt to subdue each one and gain His target. He would strike and a soldier would fall…yet still breath…and so the connection with Hashim remained, to confuse, to meddle with the mind and thoughts of the assassin. 9. It was 9 maimed soldiers into his advance that maddened and lost, Hashim had turned his slaughter on his own men, on anyone within reach. And deep in his madness, he had fallen in love with rage itself, fleeing into the mountains far from the clatter of the battle.", "The scream was something a human was not meant to make. And fortunately Zentocar, master of mind-space, only made it for a short time before his head was reduced to a thin slurry which rapidly uniformly coated the walls of the arena.\n\n\"Errrm... Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner?\" The announcer mumbled, the crowd answering with a disquieted murmur. Which was warranted, as the victor was mutely spinning in circles, oblivious to the human sludge covering him. Really the arena was covered in more material than a human head should have had.\n\nSteve, the announcer, looked around desperately finally seeing his producer rolling his wrist in the 'stall' gesture.\n\n\"Let me take this time, ladies and gents, to thank our sponsors. Bulbasaur cabbages, for when you need to have only the freshest cabbage or the smoothest multidimensional travel. Thinking cabbage or visiting an alternate selves? Bulbasaur cabbages.\"\n\nA cheer shot up as another form entered the ring, stocky and only in the vaguest terms human. \"Lllllladies and gentlemen, it's our resident grandmaster of the mental, the sultan of the cerebellum, Mewwwwtwooo!\"\n\nThe crowd gave an appropriately exuberant cheer. The resident champion raised one hand in acknowledgement, striding into the arena, stepping over the still-twitching corpse of Zentocar.\n\n\"Let's get ready to THINK\" Steve screamed, hitting the signal bell. Mewtwo struck the classic psychic's pose, one hand out, the other to his temple. The challenger was rolling in what remained of Zentocar's head.\n\nAt first, nothing happened. Mewtwo thought, the challenger rolled in slime. Really, this sport was tremendously dull to watch but the planet's only other form of entertainment was juggling goslings.\n\nA trickle of blood started at Mewtwo's nose, then a varitable flood as the pokemon bit its' tongue, mouth adding to the stream. Steve flipped on his mic \"Uh... ladies and gents our grandmaster seems to be...\"\n\n\"I CAN HEAR THE VOICES\" The pokemon finally screamed \"THOUSANDS OF VOICES OF MADNESS. THIS IS NOT A MAN. IT IS A BEAST.\"\n\nMewtwo fell to his knees, arms going slack. The only thing it could utter before blacking out was \"Praise... Helix\"", "Alan prepared for his duel as he prepared for all others: by painting a new mark on the leather pauldrons he wore, a symbol of his upcoming victory. It wasn't a sign of cockiness, rather, it was a statement of undeniable truth. This win, and the hundreds was as assured as the sun rising in the morning. He was known as the Untouchable, the Dancing Blade, the Seer. All of them fitting of course. In all of his career, he had never once been stuck by one of the many blades he faced. It wasn't hard. Dueling is easy, of course, when you can see into your opponent's mind, countering their next move before they even had finished considering it.\n\nHis newest opponent was to be the champion duelist in the country, Mikael, Laughter Incarnate. He was named so because of his strange post-victory ritual. He would sever the head of his opponent, which was the only way he ever won duels, and appraise it, laughing all the while. He would then either discard the head like an old boot, or carefully place it into the bag he had his assistant carry. No one knew what Mikael did with the heads, but Alan wasn't too worried. He'd just search Mikael's house after he had defeated him.\n\nAlan strode into the arena. He never walked with eagerness or fear, just cold purpose. The paint on his pauldron was still drying, and he wondered if it would be finished by the time that Mikael was dead. He was pondering this fact when Mikael himself walked into the arena. Unlike Alan, Mikael's stride was barely controlled fervor. Alan had seen this eagerness before. He had had a dog that contracted rabies when Alan was six or so. The madness in his pets' and Mikael's eyes was disturbingly similar.\n\nIt seems it's time for me to put down another rabid animal, Alan thought as he readied his mind. He paid no attention to the announcer. It was always the same procedure: The combatants walk in, the announcer talks them up, there's the five second delay between the announcer's final words and the starting bell, and then the duel begins. Alan always took this time to prepare his gift. He cast his mind's eye over the arena, locking on to the mind that was sure to be Mikael's. He prepared himself for the dive into Mikael's thoughts, patiently waiting for the bell to signal the start. As he heard it ring out, he pierced the veil protecting Mikael's mind from Alan's. That's when his world shattered.\n\nOh god, the screams. There were whispers too, but the screams rose above all. It was almost like he was watching a wolf kill a deer. He would be disturbed, but unable to look away. That's what his mind felt like. He had taken a glimpse into Mikael's mind and was snared in that hell. One thought rose above the others. Alan was almost surprised to find the thought was his, and not one of the damned voices. I'm the deer was all it said. \n\nIt could have been minutes or hours or days, hell, it could have been years before Alan felt the screams finally cease. The whispers were still there, dancing along the edges of his fractured mind. He became aware that he was lying on the ground. Funny, he couldn't remember falling. He couldn't form more than two coherent thoughts at a time, much less stand. \n\nAlan felt a presence draw near. His ability to see into others' minds was careening out of control, his hold on it shattered by Mikael's screams. He heard everything. Every thought of pity, of realization that the only reason he won his duels was because of a cheat. He heard the thought of dark magic, considerations of burning him at the stake for witchcraft. Let them, he thought, anything to end this pain. The presence he had felt before drew closer, and as it approached, Alan knew who it was. How could he forget those damned screams?\n\n\"Please,\" Alan was barely was able to whisper, \"Please stop the screams.\"\n\n\"The screams? Oh hohoho,\" Mikael laughed. Alan wasn't sure what terrified him more, the laugh or the dreaded screams returning. \"You mean my friends. I'll admit, they do take some getting used to, but they are great company for Tuesday brunch.\" Mikael grinned a grin that spent no effort concealing the madman beneath it. \"I can stop them, of course. But be warned, you may feel a slight poke!\"\n\n\"A poke?\" Alan had no time to wonder what that meant. After all, his head was no longer part of his body.\n\nMikael picked up an analyzed Alan's detached head, laughing as he did so. There was a peaceful expression on Alan's face, as if he was happy to have been freed from the screams. Mikael admired his work as an artist admires his masterpiece. \"Oh yes, this one will be a great addition to the Christmas tree.\"\n", "I could see it in his eyes. He's definitely going to dash towards me and strike fast, then he's going to perform an axel kick to get me off balance. Probably will try to stab me with his katana once I'm on the ground and try to end this quickly. Shabby looking clothes, beautiful but definitely a low quality katana and scars all over his body. Definitely got beaten a lot everywhere he went to. This is going to be easy. Amateurs like him shouldn't partake in this game and should just stay as peasants. \n \n\"Oi you fool. Fancy of you challenging me to a duel. Do you not know who I am? The name's Gaston. Brad Gaston. I'm going to give a chance for you to say your name.\"\n\n\"Tako?? Yuki???? ???? ? ???? ? \"\n\n\"Takoyaki huh? You must be one hell of a crazy guy to be facing me. I mastered the twin blades style at the age of 16.\"\n\nGaston drew his two swords from their sheath at his waist and signaled \"Takoyaki\" to come towards him. Takoyaki smirked and dashed towards Gaston and performed a quick draw. Gaston stepped back and Takoyaki attempted an axel kick. Everything was according to Gaston's prediction.\n\n\"Too easy.\"\n\nGaston quick jabbed Takoyaki's right rib sending him to the ground in pain.\n\n\"Now, he's definitely going roll away from me, get far as he can and get his composure back. Once he's ready, he'll come running towards me, jump and try to use his force of gravity to his advantage to strengthen his blow. At that point I shall thrust my blades into his body and cut him into pieces with my twin blades style. Or should I let him survive and make him let the whole country know of my superior skills. I can easily mind read him. His stance at the start already foretold the decision of this duel. \" \n\nOnce again, Takoyaki did to what Gaston predicted. Takoyaki rolled as much as he could, got on his two legs and charged again, at the same time, Gaston got prepared to unleash his first skill of the Two blades style. Right before Takoyaki jumped, he smirked again. \n\n\"What are you smiling for kid? Saw your dead parents already? Or are you happy to meet a strong opponent like me?Two blades style: whirling death.\" Gaston whispered to his self.\n\nGaston lunged both his swords into the Takoyaki's body in the air.\n\n\"Wha?\"\n\nGaston was in disbelief. He was sure he had pierced Takoyaki's body but for some reason Takoyaki's body disappeared and was no where in sight. He looked up again, to his left,right and front but Takoyaki was no longer there.\n\n\"Oi, Gaston. Looking for me? The name is Takouji Yukihana. This is the age of samurais. I read your mind from the started and merely played according to your thoughts. Your condescending thoughts are insane for this place.Sayonara\"\n\nGaston turned around but was too late. He felt the low quality looking katana stab him from the back and through his heart. Gaston fell to the his knees and looked at the ground. He saw a wanted posted of a guy looking like Takoyaki, with the words \"Edo's MOST WANTED MAN. DO NOT APPROACH.\"\n\n", "\"Time to end this, you dumbass.\"\n\nGeorge's opponent did not reply. Instead, he stared blankly into space, wondering which cheese went well with a wallet. George raised his sword, preparing to counter his opponent's every move. \n\n\"Let's see what this guy is planning.\" muttered George, as he tapped into his opponent's mind.\n\nGeorge expected a series of complicated attacks in the form of a book, however, in that book, all George saw was a bunch of scribbles. Upon closer inspection, the scribbles were actually words. Help me, one of them said. Others would be random words such as fart and chocolate. \n\nSuddenly, George felt a sharp pain in his chest. He tapped out to see a shotgun wound on his body. Using his last bits of energy, George tapped in again. This time, the words in the book were neatly written. \n\n\"Who's the dumbass now?\" ", "Heinrich had never amounted to much in his life aside for a genuine puzzle that almost seemed impossible to solve for psychiatrists. He had been all over North America, signing up for one case study after another at the request of the best known doctors, all the while, raking in a tidy sum on top of it. Too discombobulated for any sense to be made, his mind was a jumble of fractured fragments, the whole which was completely unknown to even his self. \n\nSleeping always seemed like an anomaly to Heinrich. Why waste those hours just laying there when there were so many things that needed things. Saving, helping, teaching, caressing, touching, loving, punishing, marking, starking, humblinsting, inging, and filing? Heinrich needed to remember to file this man’s fingernail clippings into the “pointy things” folder under the mattress. So many things needed filing. \n_____________________________________________________________________________________\nMark was a man with answers. He was the man with the plan. Mark had an incredible talent. The first of its kind: telepathy. The very real ability to mind read. Not that mentalist mumbo-jumbo that Derren Brown does. Mark could look in to the mind of a person and repeat word for word what they thought in real time, and describe the images and music they generated inside their thoughts. \n\nIt made life incredibly simple. And fun. Men and women were at his sexual disposal. He didn’t need drugs to get what he wanted, he just needed 20 minutes of conversation in almost any venue to figure out what his prey needed. \n\nWork was even easier. He didn’t have to sleep with someone to get what he wanted, all he needed was politics. And work place politics were so, so easy when you knew all the stories involved. He catalogued every relationship, grudge, and favour. He always knew exactly who to press and which direction to push them to get what was needed for his own benefit. \n_____________________________________________________________________________________\nThe two men had never met before today, let alone, heard of one another. But Mark could not stand the sight of Heinrich. Heinrich was everything that he was not. The two were hot and cold; night and day; polar opposites.\n\n “Give me back the brief case.” Mark said cold and sharp. \n\n“Need it.” Heinrich snapped back. “This box will file nicely. Impressive. Shade can help make people better with it.” No one ever knew what the hell Heinrich was talking about, but Shade was his shadow that tried to offer him ideas and act as a conscience to Heinrich. Arguably, the only sane part of Heinrich’s consciousness, except that Shade was still pretty far off the radar for most. Good guy, though.\n\nMark probed Heinrich’s mind to see what his game was. This small, insignificant, shell of a man. How dare he even come near, Mark. If I put grass on the floor, it’ll be like outside inside. Shade likes to sit in the grass but it’s too cold in July. Yes, sideside would be nice with broccoli. They would match lovely with the filing.\n\n“What the hell?” Mark usually avoid most nutters just by their appearance, but this one was dressed so nicely. There was nothing in the jumbling mess of Heinrich’s thoughts that could be made sense of to Mark. He was too concrete, and Heinrich was too well dressed. It didn’t make sense. Nothing made sense.\n\nMark shook his head a little to try and free himself of Heinrich’s thoughts. It felt like peeling sticky skin off a cold surface slowly. The feeling of the madman’s thoughts didn’t leave Mark, infuriating him. He always got his way and knew how to get it. But now, something was different. Heinrich was different.\n\n“The case, case, case, case, cassette, baguette, marionette, Mary, M for McDonalds. I must help McDonalds.” Heinrich mumbled, beginning to take off down the boulevard. “Then make sure I file the ettes with the T’s back in the mattress.”\n\nIt didn’t take long to catch up though, as the weird little man got distracted by the post man, ripping his bag from him and muttering about filing and inging. The post man was trying to make grabs for the satchel, but Heinrich was too quick, pulling back and dodging every attempt with uncanny reflexes earned over years of practice with orderlies in various hospitals.\n\nMark pushed the postman out of the way, “I’ll handle this!”\n\nHamburgers seemed like a good idea right now. “Give me back the briefcase!” Yelled Mark. He was fuming.\n", "\"Victor, Santiago, you're up next\"\n\nVictor Dalass stepped into the large ring with confidence. A cocky smile remained on his lips as he stretched his limbs.\n\nThis is going to be so easy, he thought.\n\nHe had been sent to the Monastery on account of his special Telepathy.He remembered his first match against the Jumper. \n\n2 minutes.\n\nThat's all it took to learn the Jumper's rhythm and put his sword though the man's heart.\n\nIt always ended the same way. Once you knew the rhythm, you could disrupt it. And then win; so easy.\n\nHe smiled as his lean muscles flexed while stretching. With the brutal regimen the monks had put him under, soon his physique would match up to his intellect. No one would be able to stop him.\n\nVictor curiously regarded his opponent. Santaigo Delagato. Silently he examined her well honed limbs and flexibility. \n\nSo many possibilities with this one. Even if she is a coward.\n\nSantiago rarely ever showed up for the sparring matches. The one's she usually entered, she forfeited within a minute. \n\nVictor straightened up a he the Abbet started the countdown. \n\n\"Three!\" \n\nSlow deep breaths. In . Out. In. Out.\n\n\"Two!\"\n\nVictor opened his mind. Focusing in Santiago's direction, he narrowed his senses. He felt a pull in her direction.\n\nGot you. Now just what are planning.\n\n\"One!\"\n\nSantiago started swinging her knife. It was small shiny blade with grooves down the middle.\n\nStrange I didn't read that-\n\n\"What the hell are you doing!\"\n\nVictor couldn't believe his eyes. Santiago had attacked in a flash, faster than he though was possible for her, but not at him. She had stabbed her own left hand.\n\nVictor's senses were screaming. He slowly walked around her as he pierced her mind. There must be a plan to all this. What was she plannin-\n\nSantiao was running towards him.Fast.\n\n\"Why can't I read her.\" Victor growled in frustration. Skipping a step to the left, he smoothly avoided her. Using his momentum, he swung the sword in a downward slash.\n\nYou think your little stunt rattled me? You are mistaken.\n\nWith grim satisfaction he watched the blade flow towards her neck-\n\nSantiago caught the sword with her left hand. \n\nThe sudden motion jarred Victor. Bracing his step, he pressed into her hand.\nThe only response was a grin as Santiago gripped the blade tighter. Victor watched as the blade cut through her middle finger. It slowly fell down.\n\nShes insane. What the hell is she doing. She could have just dodged it with her speed. She just sacrificed her bloody finger . \n\nDelving deep into her psyche, he pried at her thought process. A short gasp escaped as the realization hit him. She was broken.\n\nMost people had 2-3 thought processes running in their minds at any time, with dozens of others in the subconscious. That was just how humans operated.\n\nSantiago's mind felt like a fish market. Hundreds of voices clamoring on all sides. He could feel the world, really feel it through her. All the information that people overlooked or blocked out,Santiago's mind threw at her.\n\nShes broken. No human could live in this. Her mind is being pulled in 10 different directions.How can she stand, let alone fight me like this. \n\nVictor looked at her face. The beautiful face sported a manic grin. As if she knew something no one else did. \n\n\"No wonder I can't read you. Even you don't know what you're going to do next\" \n\nHe prepared to step back and deal the final blow. It would be mercy.She-\n\nSantiago swung the blade. With staunch surprise he leaped back. But the swing's trajectory was off. It missed him by a foot. He was saf-\n\nSomething hot covered his eyes. \n\n\"Aaah!\" Victor screamed as he tried to clean his eyes. He blinked as he vehemetly rubbed his eyes.\n\nWhat the hell is this, he stared at his hands. Red oozed covered them.\n\nSantiago's blood. From when she had stabbed her hand. The knife engraving, it collected-\n\nSomething collided with his chest with rib-shattering force. Victor coughed blood looking down.\n\nSantiago had her knife in him. Along with her hand. He looked up at her.\n\nShe was beautiful. He stared into those deep blue eyes as those blood red full lips moved to say something.\n\n\"Sweet dreams. Lover\"\n\nVictor's heart exploded. Santiago smiled with satisfaction.The man she had loved from the first sight was finally and truly hers'; Forever. \n\n \n\n \n\n ", "Atop the roof of a seemingly boundlessly tall skyscraper stood two men, both of whom were ready to cast aside all that they knew in this world. They stood ten metres apart, surrounded by the occasional air-conditioner vent. Rain cascaded down around the two men, falling as if in slow motion as all noises of the immediate area around them was drowned out in the pounding of the rain on the stone-covered floor, and the howling of the wind.\n\n\n\nOn one end of the building stood Marcus, a mid-thirties inpatient-escapee from a mental heath facility. His clothes were dirty and tattered, hanging loosely from him, ill-fitted as he had stolen them from the homeless man he had come across shortly after he had escaped. In his mind, thoughts did nearly not exist. Marcus was near inhuman, with the ability to simply act without thinking, to become animalistic. He had only one thought in his mind, and that was to kill the man standing on the opposite end of the building from him, for incarcerating him in the first place.\n\n\n\nOn the other end of the building stood Shawn, a man in his thirties who worked as a psychic detective for the Police Department. He was currently fretting beyond belief, awaiting his good friend Guster to come to his aid, along with two officers from the SBPD. He knew he didn't have much time before the man would go in for the attack, so he did what he knew best, he improvised.\n\n\n\n\"Hey there buddy, you look like you might just do something crazy there.\" said Shawn \"But hey, I'm sure we can work something out right? I mean, you don't want to kill me do you? You'd have to be crazy to try to kill this face.\"\n\n\n\nMarcus let out a noise of anger, grimacing at Shawn, slowly beginning to pace towards him. Shawn immediately began to move backwards until he found himself against the edge of the building, the door to the stairwell beside him.\n\n\n\n\"Hey look man, I didn't even really call you crazy. I only said you would have to be crazy to kill me. But you aren't crazy, you're a cool dude who just clearly wants to go down these stairs right here, aren't you?\"\n\n\nMarcus began running towards Shawn, yelling out loud as he made his way towards him. Suddenly, just as he was inches away from Shawn, the door to the stairway burst open, hitting Marcus in the face, sending him stumbling backwards. Out from the doorway come an out of break Gus.\n\n\n\n\"Gus!\" cried Shawn \"Where've you been?! This clearly insane man was just about to try and throw me off of this very tall building!\"\n\n\n\n\"Shawn!\" panted Gus \"I just ran up literally thousands of flights of stairs to get back here to try and back you up until the police arrive, and you talk to me about taking my time?! C'mon son!\"\n\n\n\n\"You took the stairs? Really? Good on you buddy, but you really could've taken the elevator.\" replied Shawn, condescendingly.\n\n\n\n\"What do you mean I could've taken the elevator, you told me that they weren't working!\" wheezed Gus.\n\n\n\n\"Yes, for regular people. If you work here, or are with the police they'll let you right up. I actually went up and down a few times, that elevator is fast, I mean, it goes from zero to one hundred in literally twenty seconds! That's like, a thousand feet!\" replied Shawn.\n\n\n\n\"Are you joking?!\" began Gus, but was interrupted by the groans of Macrus, who was steadily getting back up off of the floor. \"What happened to him?\" asked Gus.\n\n\n\n\"You kinda hit him in the face when you came barrelling out the door. If I was him, I sure would be angry at you for hitting me with a door right before I could murder somebody.\" said Shawn, slowly moving his gaze from Gus to Marcus, who returned his eye contact. \"Hi there, my name is Shawn Spencer, I am a psychic detective for the Santa Barbra Police Department and this is my partner in all things psycho Hannibiah DeLector-able.\"", "James was baffeled.\nIn all his years he had never know a better swordsman than Lord Bickerton, yet here he stood, witnessing his Lord getting pummeled by a filthy commoner.\n\nThis peasant, more fit for an asylum than the pressence a nobleman, had foolishly challenged the Lord to a duel to the death.\nLord Bickerton had agreed more out of pity than anything else, James thought.\n\nThe Lord had practised with the sword since he was 9, no one had been able to land a blow on him since he was 11, yet his Lordship was lying on the ground, face down as he was getting bludgeoned by the jester dacing around him.\n\nThe fool had refused the Lords offer for a sword, a proper weapon, and had instead pulled off his sock and put a palm sized rock into it.\n\nLord Bickerton looked as if he was on the verge of dying, the madman was no longer dacing around him, instead, he was picking up a rather large stone near the shrubbery.\nHis Lordship looked up at James with pleading eyes as the Lunatic approached him \"Mommy, I don't want to ride the meat bicycle\" any further last words were interrupted as his head was nothing but a red liquid on the pavement beneath the stone.\n\nJames stood there for a while, silent, watching as the victorious commoner walked away, humming to himself.\nAfter one final look at his former Lordship, he walked towards the manor for his golden handshake." ]	12
Despite him being polite and fairly humble, you suspect something about him isn't quite right the more you hear him vent and talk about his life.	[WP] One night, while driving in the rain, you pull over to pick up a hitchhiker. Unbeknownst to you, he is actually the devil, and is very grateful to be out of the storm.	[ "It had snowed lightly the day before, so this rain didn't come with much surprise. Growing up in New England, you learn very quickly that the weather is most untrustworthy, among other things. It was 1:17 am, according to my dash clock, and I found myself taking the back roads home from work instead of the highway. Less chance of my 13 year old mustang hydroplaning me to certain death. However, the back roads did give way for more than enough rain water to get through my convertible top with it's oh-so-many holes. At least I could drive slow; slow enough to see through the unyielding rain and my faulty wiper blades. Slow enough to see the figure walking on the side of the road.\n\nAs my headlights outlined the dark green waistcoat, he turned to face me and held out his thumb. A hitcher? At this hour? In this storm? I pulled over for him and rolled down my window. Whoever he is, he's having a worse night than I am. Still, I grabbed the pocket knife that hides in the door panel and tucked it under my thigh.\n\"If you promise not to kill me, I'll promise not to kill you.\" I called out to him.\n\nHe looked at me with his clear, pale completion and matted brown hair, still trying to hold it's curls under the weight of rainfall. His eyes, dark enough to be black, smiled.\n\n\"And so, we have a deal.\"\n\nHe held out his hand, and I shook it quickly before turning on my interior light and unlocking the passenger door.\n\"She kick you out tonight?\" I asked, trying as hard as I could to keep the situation lighthearted. He laughed as he shut my door, locking us both inside.\n\n\"No. He kicked me out a long time ago.\"\n\nI tried to laugh off my embarrassment, but the sound just hung awkwardly in the air around us. I took a good look at him for the first time. He was young! No more than 25, with an angular jaw and just enough patchy stubble to prove that he would look young for the rest of his life. \n\n\"where ya headed?\" I asked.\n\n\"No where in particular.\" He sighed. \"Yet, I seem to be every where all at once.\"\n\n\"Yeah, I know how that can be. You have so many people pulling you in a million different directions. It's like you have no time for yourself!\"\n\n\"That is very true.\"\n\nI shifted the car into drive and we were off, back into the night. Back into the storm. He fumbled his way around to buckle the seat belt, picking up my pack of cigarettes and lighter from the center console once he completed the task. He lit one and held it out to me.\n\n\"Do you mind?\" He asked slyly.\n\nI took it, motioning for him to light one for himself. He inhaled his deeply and shifted his way to comfort on the cold leather seat. \n\n\"I suppose a hotel would be my best bet for the night.\" He started. \"Is there anything better than a Motel 6 around here?\"\n\n\"Yeah, there's an Extended Stay Days Inn just up the road here. Maybe 15 minutes or so.\"\n\n\"That is good. I will go there tonight. Thank you. You know, most men who cheat on their wives will do so in a hotel not far from their home. It is, by far, the most convenient bed they can come across.\"\n\nI leaned in to turn on my radio but his hand darted to the pewter figure key chain hanging from my rear view mirror, interrupting my action.\n\n\"Is this your dog?\" He asked quickly.\n\n\"Why, yes it is.\" I said proudly. \"That's for my Greyhound, Charlotte. I adopted her three years ago. She's turning six.\"\n\n\"Six?\" He smiled at the figurine.\n\n\"Six\" I confirmed, returning his smile. \"In November.\"\n\n\"That's my favorite number.\" He chuckled under his breath. \"You rescued her? It must feel special, to save a life from the brink of death. Almost like playing God.\"\n\nHe had turned to face me, lighting himself another cigarette in the process.\n\n\"I never thought of it that way, honestly. The place I got her from was the only one that said they'd give me a dog. So I drove down there and took her. People will stop me though when I'm out walking her. They always act so shocked to see a greyhound, and always tell me I did a good thing by saving her.\"\n\n\"That's because people are sheep.\" He stated, matter of factly. \"They strive to be better than their means allow them to be. Always jealous and always hard to admit their faults. They just keep on the same beaten path, their blind eyes following the one before them with no care nor worry to those who walk behind. They live for the warm, fuzzy feeling of a pat on the back and a gold star affixed to their homework. No doubt those people who stop you and your dog only do so because they want to feel good about themselves rather than lift you up in admiration.\"\n\n\"It sounds like you haven't had a good time dealing with people, really.\" I said as I turned into the stretched entrance of the Extended Stay.\n\n\"No, I don't believe I have. Ah, here we are! Thank you very much for the ride out of the rain, my dear.\" He said, flashing a wholesome smile.\n\nI pulled up under the awning to the entry door, giving him the comfort of a few dry steps before he got inside. He opened the door of my car, then leaned back and faced me.\n\n\"Could I tempt you to come up for a nightcap?\"\n\n\"Umm...\"\n\nI shifted my gaze to the silver ring I wear on my left hand. The smaller of a matching pair, a couple's ring set, with the larger worn by my boyfriend.\n\nHis black eyes followed mine, and when I looked back at him he grinned.\n\n\"No, I don't suppose I could. Cheer up Angela, the storm looks to be just about past you now. Again, thank you for the ride.\" He stood out of my car and went to close the door, but he stopped himself and crouched down again. Before I could ask him how he knew my name, he locked his eyes with mine.\n\n\"You really should believe him, you know.\"\n\n\"Huh?\"\n\n\"When he tells you that you are pretty.\" \n\nWith a wink he shut my door and turned towards the entrance to the hotel.\n\nI was trembling when I lurched my car out of park and forward, away from the Extended Stay Days Inn, away from the strange storm rider in the green waistcoat.\n\nAs I got myself back on the main road home, I clicked on my radio. The familiar, honky-tonk sound of The Rolling Stones filled my airwaves as Mic Jagger's unmistakable voice sang out:\n\n\"Pleased to meet you! Hope you guessed my name!\"", "The only thing louder than the wet droning on my windshield is the exhausted yawn that fills the otherwise empty seats of my station wagon. With a much needed stretch, styrofoam coffee cups spill onto the crumb-filled grey carpeting that lines the floor. The hole in my driver's seat reminds me of the inspection sticker that I'll need next week before I have to worry about getting pulled over. \n\nIf there were anything worth seeing outside of my scratched window, I couldn't tell you what it is. The rain had reached the saturation point where the lines on the road are just a memory. The bright red stop light ahead of me and the sunset amber streetlights are the only thing I can see glaring off the road ahead.\n\nThis wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that my radio had been stolen last night. I suppose the did me a favor. Most of the buttons didn't work anyways and since it had been stuck on NPR for months, I was at my breaking point. It will be easier to just throw a new radio into the empty socket.\n\nMy heart jumps when a knocking comes from my driver's side window. There's someone on the outside of my car but when I remember that my door doesn't open anyways, I relax. After a few seconds of working the crank, and after digging an even deeper scratch into the glass, rain starts pouring in through the tiny amount that I can roll this thing down.\n\n“Please, drive me a few blocks.”\n\nI glare into the wet night past furrowed brows at this fedora-wearing stranger. “You don't understand, I'm not a taxi!” I don't even know why I'm responding to this guy. I almost break the window crank when I see something coming at me through the opening but stop when I see it's a crisp one hundred dollar bill. I take it. “Alright.”\n\nThe light is already green when he gets all the way around and the car behind me is not happy. I apologize for the mess but he just crushes the cups, bottles and bags in the passenger seat. We're moving before he can put on his seatbelt, not that he could anyways.\n\n“Thanks for picking me up. I just need to get a few more blocks and it's absolute hell out there.”\n\n“Yeah.” My one working wiper blade gives me a brief glimpse of the road ahead. It's enough for me to see the pothole and avoid it. Evasive maneuvers are taken and when I'm passed the tire-eater I realize that he's still talking.\n\n“Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, I tell you. Yup, I was certain that I was going to get kicked out tonight so I'm glad that I remembered my hat. It's just to bad that I didn't get a chance to grab my umbrella you know?”\n\nIt takes all of my attention to make sure I don't ruin what's left of my car. There's twists and turns on this road that I don't even remember despite driving this way twice a day every day of the week. The rain makes you uncertain of what's ahead and actively trying to guess where the lines are just makes things worse. \n\n“You should just focus on the distance and not so much what's right in front of you.” He chimes in. I give a noncommittal agreeing grunt and he continues. “But yeah, women, right? They can just talk and talk and talk and then as soon as you have something to say, you're the asshole right? I mean, we've had our disagreements but this is the last time I even try to work with her. It'll be better if I just stay away this time.”\n\n“So this is a common thing with you guys?” There's a stop sign ahead but I only know that because I've been here before. Last week a truck drove over it and it's been flat on the ground ever since. I shouldn't expect that to be fixed at any point really. Like the constant road construction at night, nothing ever really gets done to fix this place up.\n\n“Yeah. She always like to toot her own horn and she's always got guys fawning over her – worshiping her really. I guess my attention was never enough for her, she's always got to have more people following her on twitter.” He shuffles through his jacket and produces a zippo and a cigar. “Do you mind if I smoke?”\n\n“Go ahead.” The car is a mess anyways and a little cigar smoke won't hurt anyone. Besides, the bowl in the glove compartment has been used so many times in here that I'm surprised there isn't a thin film on every surface.\n\nWhen my wheel gently sinks into the gravely ditch next to the steamrolled stop sign I finally have a moment to actually look at my passenger. He's not very wet despite just coming out of the rain only moments ago.\n\nBefore his side of the car fills with thick tobacco smoke I get a look at his angular face. He's got a black eye and a split lip but other than that I could say that he's a handsome guy. The black suit that he's wearing looks well tailored and his image is finished off with the stogie sticking out of the side of his mouth next to perfect teeth. For someone with so much to complain about he sports a cartoonish grin.\n\nSmall pieces of pavement slap against the underside of my wagon before I can get enough traction to get going. In between puffs, he's yammering again.\n\n“Yup, nothing but parties for me for the foreseeable future. I'm going to get everyone I can to party with, all my old friends who I haven't seen in forever. I'll invite the whole neighborhood to my place! Yeah, there's no-one I'll turn away! Drunks, party animals, liars, thieves, murderers and adulterers, they're all welcome. There! That's my stop. Yeah, if you could just pull over. Thanks!”\n\nI'm not very well parked but I don't care. If someone hits me it will just make my car look more symmetric. “You have a good night now man.”\n\n“Thanks buddy!” I can hear his foot slosh into a deep puddle by the side of the road. I do feel bad but at the same time I'm glad that he's not in my car anymore. Before I can drive off he holds the door for a moment and leans back into my car. When he speaks, cigar smoke seeps out of his nostrils. \n\n“Sorry kid, but you're not invited.”" ]	2
Taken from a comment chain ending in [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/talesfromtechsupport/comments/3ph80l/545am_call_from_friend_of_a_friend_for_tech/cw6e0cl) in /r/talesfromtechsupport. >/u/ZeroCignal >There's only one [word] I would love to use every day for the help desk tickets I get. "No." >/u/wideruled >"They'll all look up at me clamoring for help, and I'll whisper 'No.'" >/u/a_random_username >I think an Alan Moore graphic novel about IT professionals that have fallen from grace would be FAR too disturbing to publish. > /u/themeatbridge >In a world where Apple managed to simplify every computer, router, server, and piece of technology to be idiot proof, IT professionals became obsolete over night. Now, they wander the streets, lost and weary, looking for problems to solve. Some have found work doing menial tasks, while others have taken to running illegal underground unix servers that are disconnected from the main hub. But something is lurking below the surface, something nobody ever expected. A virus.	[WP]In a world where simplified computer design has made the entire IT industry unnecessary, those who formerly worked with computers survive in other jobs, until the sudden appearance of an actual computer virus, the first anyone's seen in many years.	[ "The cyberhall was filled to the brim with numerous customers. Nonstop chattering and gesturing of limbs at the glowing hologram screens greeted me as I walked towards my office door. My eyes quickly brushed over the crowd. Eyes glued to the screens, all busy talking to their SPC's (Super Personal Computers), giving instructions as the 3d data was displayed on the glowing screens.\n\n\n\nI walked towards my translucent glass door, fumbling in my pockets as I searched for the key.\n\n\n\n\"Looking for a key again?\" A voiced teased from behind, watching my old fashioned mannerisms embarass me again. I sighed as I shook my head with a chuckle.\n\n\n\n\"Microsoft Siri, please open the door.\" I leaned at the intercom as the glowing red light turned to green as the glass door slid open.\n\n\n\nJimmy chuckled one more time as I stepped through the frame. \"How old are you, sir?\"\n\n\n\n\"Pardon me?\"\n\n\n\n\"Yeah how old are you, if you can still remember using a key to open a door lock.\" He snickered as he followed me into the office. Obnoxious seventeen year old. He was getting too comfortable with me.\n\n\n\n\nI sunk into my seat, leaning back as I took several papers stacked inside an envolope. I dragged my office chair closer to the desk, squinting my eyes as I went through the job application forms. I flipped through, skimming over the CV's before I placed them back on the desk. Human Resource, i read the label on my desk. A loud click instinctively left my toungue. Former hacktivist now a Human Resource manager, now that was a proper CV. I leaned back into the chair as I stared into the ceiling, lost in my thoughts as I awaited my morning capuccino to kickstart me into the day.\n\n\n\n\n\"Sir, your pack is here.\" Jimmy's voice called from the door, holding a brown box in his hand.\n\n\n\n\n\"Bring it to my desk, please.\" I ran my hand through my balding head, tracking the delivery with my eyesight as it was brought to my desk. I looked up at Jimmy, his head shake evident he knew the contents of my delivery. And my excitement just shocked him more.\n\n\n\n\"What?\" I wore a clueless expression as he handed me the box.\n\n\n\n\"Nothing. Just have a nice day, sir.\" He chuckled as he left into the cyberhall.\n\n\n\n\nIt was finally here. I tore through the cover, unwrapping the contents. I brushed my hands over the box cover, analyzing its detail closely. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, i muttered to myself. Twenty seven years ever since I played this gem. I reenacted a small victory dance inside my chair. Nostalgia. It was time to crank up my well kept Alienware laptop that had awaited this moment for years, and relive my long lost youth. But I couldn't do it alone, I wanted somebody else to see this.\n\n\n\n\n\nThe distant chattering from the Cyberhall penetrated the cream white office walls. The fizzing of an energy drink and the rapid clicking of my mouse engulfing the moment. I held my arms over my head as I cracked my knuckles, waiting for the next map to load up. I threw a glance at Jimmy, still wearing his shit eating grin, his glance arrested by the screen.\n\n\n\n\"Not bad. Wow, not bad at all.\" He broke the silence, gently nodding in affirmation. \n\n\n\nI couldn't resist a chuckle.\n\n\n\n\n\"There are still a couple more golden titles coming this evening. I am telling ya, Old is gold.\" I smirked at him, lazily swinging in my office chair.\n\n\n\n\"Don't overrate it. Its graphics are chicken shit compared to the titles we have now.\" He retorted, pulling himself closer to the laptop as he took hold of the mouse. \"Am still surprised they keep up its servers after all this years.\"\n\n\n\n\n\"Its just one of those things I guess.\" I replied, adjusting my trouser out of my butt crack.\n\n\n\n\n\"The map has loaded. Let me try it out abit.\" Jimmy asked, still adjusting to the concept of a handheld mouse. \"What's happened?\"\n\n\n\nI stared at the server error message on the screen. Its been long since I saw one. I took hold of the laptop, cracking my head at the issues. Just like back in the days. I tapped at the keys, going through the error log file. I was still rusty, having never dealt with such an issue ever since the upgrade of the IT industry through the years. A beep came from the machine. It was a warning.\n\n\n\nJimmy leaned in close.\n\n\n\n\"Woah, is that....an Avira message box? The fuck dude! Wasn't that an anti virus?\" Jimmy poked me with his elbow. I didn't budge.\n\n\n\n\"Look! Has it just detected a virus?\" His jaw drooped. \"Has it?? I have to call my pals to check this shit out. This is like..fucking unbelievable man. Take a screenshot i send it to them.\"\n\n\n\nA warning.\n\n\n\nMy old laptop. Virus notification.\n\n\nComputer connected to a server. \n\n\n\nMy old trojan programs that I automatically uploaded when I logged into gaming servers.\n\n\nI had screwed up. Screwed up big time.\n\n\n\n\"Is everything ok? Your face is flushed, boss.\"\n\n\n\n\"Shut the fuck up, Jimmy. Please.\"", "It was what I had always dreamed of. Left and right, people were becoming afflicted with technological advances we'd only studied about in school. \n\nIt started simply enough -- you woke up sluggish and it took you a bit more time to get ready in the morning. Maybe you made a few odd noises or you had to restart your morning by closing your eyes and re-opening them. But it was rapid progression after that. Your skin would turn blue and you'd be hit with a myriad of erratic and random symptoms until you were unable to move or speak. After that it was a downhill roll towards oblivion and everyone seemed powerless to stop it. \n\nHealthcare workers were stumped. Newcasters were scared. Doctors and nurses were throwing their hands up in frustration, but there were rumblings from the IT crowd, whispers through the air of those of us old enough to remember a real computer and the viruses and bugs that often ailed them. \n\nAnd that old call phone that I'd never taken back to the office finally...FINALLY! rang. \"We need you.\" That and an address was all the information I was given. This is what you get, you know, when your whole world suddenly becomes simple and easy. You lose the ability to problem solve and trouble shoot and your whole world becomes part of the technology.\n\nI met a few other of the Elite at that address, and we were promptly shuttled to a small hospital. this seemed to be where the infected people were going: this one hospital in a small Southern town that was closed to everyone except us, the final reinforcements.\n\nWe were given a brief rundown of that situation, but it wasn't needed. We'd all been watching the news, holding our breath. We'd all been shunted to other jobs: postman, teacher, writer. Some of us developed the very equipment that now made us worthless. But here we were now -- faced with a situation that no one else could fix.\n\nWe stood in a room and eyed the people: some already blue, their breathing beeping and stacatto. Some were just moving slowly with tinges of blue moving in. Then there was the person that made me smile, that let me know we could fix this: blue skin, smiling, and manic speech. One of the few in here sick enough that he was going to start malfunctioning greatly. I knew what this was. \n\nHis speech had gotten everyone's attention. While the doctors and nurses were eyeing each other in fear, the other Elite and I looked at each other,grinned and nodded. I stepped forward, donned a pair of gloves, looked at the doctors and motioned towards the patient. \n\n\"Have you tried turning him back on and then off again?\"" ]	2
	[WP] Everyone in the world is implanted with a single-use teleportation device at the age of 18. This is the story of why you used yours.	[ "An abridged version since I am at work. If everyone likes it, I'll continue. A lot to be inferred I know but I am liking it that way. The conciseness harshens the tale. \nEnjoy!\n\nTHE DROP \nI was taken at the age of ten. I was luckier than most. Most of the groveling shit-stained humans in the room grew up here, bred for this very purpose. Our 20 X 20 pen, overflowing with limbs, scraps and excrement was a hive of excitement. We were the ‘ripe-ones’. The government issued implants blinked a fast yellow light on the inside of our wrists. It had been red until now. The pen bustled, the guttural-simple language learned in The Pen bouncing off the steel grated walls, everyone abuzz to the meaning. \n\nI knew. It was one of the few memories that hadn’t been beaten out of me, that hadn’t been replaced by the tortuous time in The Hive; the teenage version of The Pen. \n\nThat blinking light was going to turn green. And that meant go. There was an irony to it. Everyone here would be given their only method of escape but they would never have a chance to use it. The activation code was held by the captors who would only have to check the paper, search the Internet or watch TV. But that was forbidden of course. Such a sad truth. Just enough food and water to survive were the only luxuries given to us. \n\nThe Pen was split into two factions. Fear and optimism. Half thought it was the end. Half, the salvation. Me, I was neutral but the fact that I had never seen someone after they moved to The Pen did not fill me with positivity. So I sat, like I always did, in the center of The Pen, catching the glint of sunlight warming my creaky bones. The light soothed them. Even though I was close to 18, every part of me ached from the diet, cramped quarters and beatings. \n\nI closed my eyes for a moment but screams and shouts pulled them open a moment later. Yellow lights turned to Green everywhere. Our captors were good. Just then, a wall of the steel grate began to lift. Our captors came out in droves, a group of five or more for every one of us. They were dressed in black, masks glowing green like monsters. They advanced slow but The Pen panicked anyway. We ran every which way, in circles, crashing into one another. The captors collected us, dragging us by the hair, the collars or whatever they could grab. And one by one we went, into the darkness behind the steel crate where we disappeared from sight. \n\nThe two who took me were mammoths of men, towering over my crippled form where they lifted me up like a petal. They marked me with a black marker. 11372. My new name. When my eyes readjusted, I found myself in some vast room. The space filled a void inside my heart. I breathed in the clean, dank air, filling my lungs before they rejected it and I coughed up phlegm. I was brought to a new cage. It was an octagon. A glowing red light blinked above it, beeping constantly. The two men were then flanked by another two. And then another two. They all dressed the same. A hard coating covered their knees, elbows and heads. The man looked down at me and pressed a switch by his head. His mask came away. \n\n“Don’t worry son, it’ll all be over shortly.” \n\nThe visor went back up. The cage door closed and a voice came out over the chamber.\n\n“Ready in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.”\n\nThe man who held me said something I didn’t catch but then it happened. The room was blasted with a warm ivory light until it flared out causing me to close my eyes. When I opened them again I was out in a noon-day sun, hot and bleating. Sand went as far as my eye could see except right in front of me where a fleet of trucks rumbled softly. I started to laugh and cry at the same time, my tears drying, salty upon my cheek the moment they dripped out from my eyes. Still kneeling, I looked up to the man to thank him. No words came out, the dry heat washing them out of my mouth. He understood anyway, his visor popped open.\n\n“Okay boys, let's move to the drop, buyers are waiting.” He turned his face down to mine, his expression as blank as the sand beyond. \n\n“Thanks for the lift boy.” \n\nI was about to respond when he brought his arm up in a flash, and then with a bang, all went black.\n\nEDIT: Some quick formatting", "It's a heavily discussed topic. Kids ask each other in primary school, What will you use yours for? First date conversations eventually find their way to How did you use yours? or What are you saving it for? Everyone wants to know if their favorite celebrity has used it. I'd always thought the whole thing was a bit overhyped and kinda silly. So, what? You get to instantly travel somewhere once, and it's a one-way trip - what a scam! But even though I often discussed my cynical views on the matter, I still found myself dodging the question in casual conversation with everyone from relatives to strangers. But I'd never expected my One Teleport to be brought up in a job interview. \n\nIt was essentially my dream job, and the interview had been going so well. I had made it to the final round of interviews and thus the owner, Earl, was sitting in. I'd been nervous but it turned out we had great chemistry. My happy outlook soon began to fade as we reached the final question. \n\n\"So, Chandler,\" Earl began. \"I'm just curious, since you seem like such a great guy, have you used your One Teleport before?\"\n\n\"Oh, um, yeah,\" I responded. I hated people asking this, but I thought refusing to answer would undermine the nice dynamic I'd established with Earl. \n\n\"Well, what awesome thing did you decide to use it on? A trip? To visit a dying parent before it was to late? To save a life in an emergency?\" Those were among the most common uses. \n\n\"Haha, thanks. Well...\" I started. \"This actually happened back when I was in college. I'd taken the wrong bus and ended up in a bad side of the city I was unfamiliar with. And this was late, after all the stores had closed, so the streets were just empty.\"\n\nEarl leaned towards me, seemingly sensing something exciting would happen next. \n\nI continued, \"So here I am, lost at night with no shops or restaurants open at all. Even the bars had closed. I was lost, worried, but most of all I was just craving tater tots. So I used my One Teleport to hop a few timezones over and had - and I swear - the best plate of tots I had ever eaten.\"\n\nEarl's facial expression changed. \n\n\"Yknow where that place was? A little restaurant in San Fran called Big Pat's Tot House. Oh boy, were they delicious. Just fantastic. I'd go so far to say they were life changing.\"\n\n\"Oh, wow,\" Earl said, clearly not anticipating that answer. \n\nHe leaned in and whispered with the other employees sitting in on the interview.\n\nHe slowly turned back to me and with a wide smile said, \"I think we've found our newest director of marketing! Welcome to Big Pat's Tot House!\" He shook my hand vigorously. \n\n\"Thanks so much sir, it's an honor.\" I replied. \n\n\"I wish Pat was still around to meet you, he'd be proud.\"\n\n\"Aw, shucks,\" I mumbled back. I was so happy to get the job, but I felt a little bad about lying - I'd actually used my One Teleport to save a child from a burning house. \n\nBut in a way, I'd also used it to get my first job. \n" ]	2
	[WP] While on your Urban daily commute through the subway to work, like any other day, white bold text appears in front of your vision reading: Mission 1: Escape the city.	[ "I'm not sure why I'm being told to escape, I'm not sure what I'm running from...the city?\n\nI had to blink a few times to get the words to go away from the center of my sight and then had to pretend as though something was in my eyes. That cute girl that gets on at the red line stop saw me blinking and I had to try to act as though I wasn't acting like I wasn't crying.\n\nThis is ridiculous.\n\nThe lights flickered on the subway, as they always do, but as the tube illuminated a set of numbers appeared in the upper right of my vision. \"0000\".\n\nI'm not sure what's going on and I'm sure I don't like it.\n\nThe lights blinked off once more and a timer appeared in my upper left vision, counting down from 45 seconds. \n\nUHH. Ok, not going to panic. Not going to panic. The line stops soon and I'll just remain seated and miss my stop. This tube should take me clear out the other side of the city.\n\nAs the subway lurched to a stop the timer kept sinking. The numbers kept getting smaller, and my belly kept getting tighter. People shuffled out the door and shoved past one another, one after another. The recycling of riders. When the doors shut and the tube wirred forward the timer in the upper left of my vision reset to 3 minutes. The numbers in my upper right altered from \"0000\" to \"0100\". \n\nDid...did I just score points?\n\nI hadn't stayed on the train past my stop before. I had never been late to work, I had never strayed from the paths I was supposed to take. I could feel myself becoming overwhelmed, it was getting hard to breathe and I fumbled into my pockets for the inhaler and the sweet salvation it would provide. As my hand wrenched into my pocket another rested over top of it. Looking up at her, the same cute one from the red line. She had an intense expression of curiosity and meaning, and then she spoke quietly.\n\n\"The timer will run out before this train leaves the city, Erwin.\"\n\nI think I just shit my heart out...\n\n\"I- wha- uh?\", I sounded like a mute who just heard himself speak.\n\nThe train stopped at the station and the doors opened, the timer was still at 1 and a half minutes. Her hand grasped around my wrist and away we went, rushing out the door.", "The commute\n***\n\n`Mission 1: Escape the city`\n\nI rubbed my eyes as the words shrunk down and floated to the corner of my vision.\n\n\"Escape the city?\" I thought to my self \"Nope. Just gonna ignore that\"\n\nLets see, 15 minutes left on my commute. Should I burn through some emails and be productive, or give my girlfriend a call.\n\nI think I'll call my girlfriend, always was a bit of a sap.\n\n*\nIn the office\n*\nOk now I Just have to send this report down to the finance department and...\n\n`Mission 1: Escape the city`\n\nCrap, not this again. I hope this thing will go away soon, or at least leave me alone for a while.\n\nAnyway where was I, oh yeah, send this to finance and I can go for lunch.\n\n*\nHeading Home\n*\n\nHmmm, what should I do this evening?\nI could relax and watch some tv, or I could get a head start on that new project at work.\n\nSuppose the project would be best, It'll give me more free time this weekend. That way I can take my girlfriend out to a nice restaurant.\n\n`Mission 1: Escape the city`\n\nLeave me alone already! Good, now stay in your corner, I've got other things to do.\n\n*\nNew day\n**\n\n`Mission 1: Escape the city`\n\nDismiss... Save... Equip -> headphones... Use -> coffee... Use -> mp3 player.\n\nJust a few more side quests, then I'll get to the story missions. I at least have to max out my relationship stat first.\n", "Clearly, I was hallucinating. It looked like I had two options from here on out: I could go to my office job, surf reddit from 9-5, go home, have dinner, go to sleep, rinse, wash, and repeat. I could go on like this, ignoring the text for the rest of my life. Option two: I could embrace the insanity and listen to it. \n\nI knew that if I chose option 1, I would have that niggling feeling of doubt and curiosity for the remainder of my days. Sure, it was probably just a hallucination and nothing would happen if I listened to it, but still, there would always be that lingering feeling of what if? No, I would obey. I would escape the city and listen to the missions.\n\nIt was simple enough - I don't think it even deserves to be called an escape. I simply got into my MDX, drove past the correct exit on the highway, and kept on going. \n\nThe minute I passed the city boundaries, the text changed.\n\nMission 2: Find Joseph Wang.\n\nI had no idea who that was, but I was going to have to find out. A quick google search on my iPhone showed me that there were five people with that name in the state, and I sure as hell hoped that whatever omnipotent being who was giving me orders meant for me to stay in the state. \n\n\"Could you at least be a little more specific?\" I grumbled under my breath.\n\nImmediately, the words disappeared. It was almost as though I was watching someone retype and edit the mission on a word processor, except that word processor was my field of vision. \n\nMission 2: Find Joseph Wang, phone number xxx-xxx-xxxxx.\n\n\"The hell am I supposed to do, call him and ask him where he's at?\" This was getting more ridiculous by the second.\n\nMission 2: Find Joseph Wang, phone number xxx-xxx-xxxx. Yes. \n\n\"An address would have been more helpful than a phone number, but all right. Here goes nothing.\"\n\nI dialed the number and waited for him to pick up. It rang twice, and a confused-sounding man picked up. \"Hello?\"\n\n\"Hi, Joseph? I'm sorry, this is going to sound very strange, but where do you live?\"\n\n\"Um...who are you?\"\n\nI blinked. \"I'm Max. I don't think you know me, but I just need to know where you're at.\"\n\n\"Why? What the hell is happening to me? First the hallucinations, now all these weirdos calling me. You're the second one today. Fuck, maybe I should take the advice the voices in my head are telling me.\"\n\nA lightbulb dinged in my head. \"Joseph...by any chance, are the voices telling you to escape the city?\"\n\nHis voice shook with his reply. \"H-how did you know that?\"\n\n\"Fuck.\"", "Wait a minute...Escape the city...\n\nI turned my head a few times. The text didn't move. It was in my head.\n\nAm I going crazy?\n\nThe text moved to the upper left of my field of vision, so it was away from where I was looking. At least now I could actually see what the hell I was looking at.\n\nIt still didn't explain everything. Why does my brain want me to escape the city, and why is it making it into a game?\n\nI got off the subway, still mulling over the important questions. It wasn't doing a good job, I still don't have a mini-map. But I still apparently have to Escape the city. \n\nI'll think about it at work.\n\nThen my phone rang, it was my wife. \"Hello.\"\n\n\"FRANK!\" she screamed. \"WHY THE HELL IS THERE AN RV IN OUR DRIVEWAY AND DOES IT HAVE TO DO WITH THE FACT WE'RE NOW 40,000 IN DEBT?!?!?!\"\n\n\"Baby, I can explain everything.\" Can I?\n\n\"I don't want you to explain anything. I DON'T WANT YOU TO TALK TO ME! ALL I WANT IS TO RUN YOUR ASS OVER WITH THIS MOTHERFUCKING RV!!!*\"\n\nThe line went dead.\n\nRight. Yup. Escape the city. Got it." ]	4
	[WP] In a world where superpowers exist, emotions are key to unlocking one's true potential. However, contrary to the common trope, heightened emotions weaken powers, and the strongest manifestation of power is only possible at a completely Zen state.	[ "For a millennium he was the strongest, for a millennium he had ruled. We were just another few young fools who would perish by his sword. Immortality, elemental manipulation, telekinesis, he had mastered every superpower imaginable.\n\nWe were the chosen ones, seven of us who would end his thousand-year tyranny. We had, for a an entire century, trained to be emotionally detached to everything around us. \n\nWe opened a portal leading straight to his throne room, where he had sat addressing his accursed generals of war. He showed no surprised to our sudden appearance, neither did he display the slightest sign of rage as we took out his underlings. He sat there, surveying us with eerie indifference, as we prepared to take him down.\n\nIt was that same indifferent look on his face as he cut Layla down before any of us could move. The same look that shot fear right through my body for a hundredth of a second. I suppressed it instantly but it was too late, a blinding flash of light preceded the extreme heat that scorched us.\n\nI watched, numb from the pain and unable to move, as he stuck his sword through the only other survivor from his firestorm. He turned and started to walk toward me. As he stared at me and raised his sword, I saw it. The reason behind his monstrous amounts of power was not absolute emotional detachment. As he brought his sword down I saw the boredom in his eyes.", "I don’t have much to thank my parents for. As soon as I could leave the home behind I could, and though I couldn’t leave the scars that crawled across my body I could at least leave the house behind. There wasn’t any reason for me to stay after I was accepted into the school for the Empowered. So I left. \n\nSee, like the other students attending The University, I had a power. I could move things with my mind. Telekinesis they call it, or more commonly being a Telk. Not exactly common, but exactly rare either. Regardless I was accepted in and my classes started. \n\nThe others were all right. A loner, I didn’t socialize much. I always did the bare minimum in class, and tried to get by unnoticed. And although I stuck to myself I came to know some other student fairly well. There was Jarod the speedster. Running relaxed him and so the more he ran the faster he got. It was a useful skill to have, though it took a bit for the effect to kick in. Then there was molly, a pyro. She was fairly skilled, although she was also very emotional, prone to violent outbursts where she was less than concerned with what she burnt down. Thankfully, she couldn’t burn much when she was in one of her moods. And lastly there was Tom. He was the calmest of the trio, always focusing on his Zen and taking an air of disinterest in everything around him. He was a jumper, able to teleport at will. His range was dictated by his emotional blankness, so his attempts of lack of emotion made sense. \n\nAnd then there was Kevin, another Telk. For reasons I never could figure out, he enjoyed giving me problems. I didn’t bother me, but I knew it made the others uneasy. So I decided I would make an example.\n\nThe four of us were in a courtyard studying. I knew the lesson by heart, but I needed to keep up appearances and they seemed to enjoy my company. We were half way through going over the day’s homework when Kevin spotted us.\n\n“Hey Telky! What are you and your pathetic rejects doing out here?” He said, a cruel grin on his as he walked over. The book in my hand slammed shut, and judging by the widening of Kevins face I knew why.\nTom disappeared, most likely getting the nearest Professor before Molly got annoyed and burnt all our books again.\nI turned back to kevin. “Go away kevin” I said, rising to my feet. “We don’t want to make a scene and we both know you’re all talk.” Flames began leaking from Molly’s hands, dripping in drops of living fire right onto my book for a few seconds before her rage smothered her flames. \nI sighed, and though Jarod snatched the book away in a blur, a few pages were already burnt. \n\nI felt a force shove me back a step. “Oh, just talk, huh?” Kevin raised a hand and a concussion nocked me off my feet and into the dirt. Enough. \n\nI rose to my feet, my mind a sea of emptiness. “Enough Kevin.” \n\n“Enough Kevin!” He mimicked me, chuckling then releasing another blast of energy.\n\nI caught it in my own, and squashed it like a bug. Kevin recoiled as if slapped, and with the force of pure will I slammed him into the ground. \n“Holy shit…” I heard behind me, a whisper that hardly entered the barren wasteland my mind had become. That I had released. \nAs I stood there over the enemy, I released my strength. The ground beneath my crumbled to dust, though I didn’t fall. A gesture, and it was held before me. A thought and I broke it in two. A moment of concentration and it was torn to pieces, and cast to the wind.\n\nI lowered to the ground, reigned in the power, and collected my things. Tom was still missing, so I couldn’t return his pencil. I shrugged and left it on the ground. And then I left, ignoring the horrified whimpers and the shocked faces of those I studied with. \n\nI don’t have much to thank my parents for, but in a world where emotions weakens powers, sometimes it pays to be a sociopath. \n", "\"Glacier, I can do it.\" His voice carried a quiet confidence rare for someone so young. He looked up at me, a grim conviction in his eyes. \"I can do it.\"\n\n\"Be careful, Inferno.\" I laid a reassuring hand on his crimson-caped shoulder for a moment before stepping aside. \"You got this.\"\n\nInferno planted his feet, held up his hands like he was going to catch a football, and blasted the armor-reinforced vault door with a torrent of his pyromantic power. The adamantium began to flow and drip under the fiery blaze produced by his will. A lesser mind would have faltered in doubt; we both knew the melting point of adamantium and we knew no pyromancer had ever come close to reaching it.\n\nEven if they had, channeling the firepower just a second too long would fry the hostages inside the vault.\n\nInferno's concentration was awe-inspiring. The youngest full-fledged pyromancer in history. A direct elemental counter to my own abilities. We were an unstoppable team, our fame rising meteoric, the strongest elemental superheroes in the world, and no villain could stand against us.\n\nWhat a shame it would be.\n\nTrue to his claim, Inferno melted the armored vault to a puddle of dark metallic green and no more, stopping just in time as the final few drops of molten adamantium fell to the floor.\n\n\"Well done. I knew you could do it.\" I stabilized him as he tripped, exhausted from the feat of exerting and blending superpower and will. As we stepped into the vault together, Inferno leaning on me, we were met with the sight of the hostages we were meant to rescue.\n\nHis body stiffened against my side. I followed his gaze to the single hostage inside, laying in a pool of blood, impaled in the chest with a giant icicle.\n\nInferno stumbled over to his body of his little brother and knelt, cradling the lifeless body in his lap, tears running down his face and steaming in the heated vault. His anguished howl echoed in the vault chamber and gradually degenerated into sobs of utter despair.\n\n\"But... no one knew...\" I watched as comprehension dawned slowly. \"No one but...you.\" He slowly turned to look up at me, one of the few powerful living cryomancers and as his partner, one of the only parties privy to the knowledge of his true identity and the identities of those he loved.\n\nThe rage of betrayal in his eyes blazed hotter than the incredible conflagration he had channeled to destroy the vault door. \n\nAnd then I knew I had him.\n\nWe raised our hands simultaneously, and a tornado of fire met a hurricane of frost. Any other day, in any other place, I would have had no chance. After fighting alongside him for years, I knew Inferno's strength and tranquility of will was unmatched by any living superhero. But now, with his roar of his anger audible even over the scream of pure, warring elemental power, I finally had the upper hand.\n\nInferno's flame twister slowly but surely dwindled under my cold, emotionless cruelty, becoming thinner and weaker until it finally petered out. The impending cyclone of frost shattered both the bodies of Inferno and his dead brother into a million glistening, turquoise shards.\n\nAnd I was the most powerful elemental wielder in the world once more." ]	3
	[WP] For once, she took matters into her own hands and managed not to set them on fire.	[ "First one of these, here goes!\n\nMaya's rage had been an unquenchable part of her for as long as she could remember now, since the Turning when she was a child. Her powers had frightened everyone around her, and no matter how much she had tried to fight the fire it always found its way out. She had been ten when their neighbor's stable had burned down, one of the incidents she knew hadn't been her fault, had been a set up, but she had been deemed a danger to the town. Her parents, spineless scum, were forced to turn her in to the King; he had a no mercy policy for magic users since they had threatened to overpower the monarchy decades ago. But when she had entered that throne room, dragged in on her knees in chains, and the fire had melted the manacles off her wrists, he had paused. Maya still had nightmares about staring into those souless eyes , watching the great brute rise off the dais to stare down his nose at her. When he smiled, something died within her. \n\nSince then, the King had used her as his weapon; she had turned the tide of many battles without a second thought. Maya had lost the ability to care for human life. Years of torment in his dungeons had honed her hate, made the flames come alive, and the world burned. \n\nToday though, something changed. The King had asked her to go after a specific target, and she walked as calmly as she could through the city, only the occasional spark escaping from her finger tips. She arrived at the beat down, poor excuse for a house in the center of the slums, cloak covering the crest on her uniform to prevent an alarm being raised. Maya slowly eased open the door not making a sound, hand heating up ready to strike, and stopped dead. The fire within was snuffed out like the blowing of a candle as she beheld the young man calmly sitting in the center of the room, awaiting her arrival.\n\nShe knew she could not kill this man, nor follow any of the King's orders ever again; and just like that, her molten core was distinguished.\n\nBlue eyes identical to hers crinkled with a smile.\n\n\"Hello, sister.\"\n\n", "\"What the fuck is burning in there you clumsy bitch\" Eric yelled from the living room while spraying spurts of miller lite into the air.\n\n\"Nothing is burning sweetie. It's the pigs in a blanket you wanted while you watched the Steeler's game.\" She said timidly hoping that it would remind him that she was doing something nice for him, like she usually did on game night, or every night for that matter.\n\n\"It's fucking burning as usual I know it\" he burped out as he crushed the empty can in his hand. \n\nHe got up to walk into the kitchen and pulled his beltless jeans up to cover his ass crack. As he walked in, he pulled his usual bullshit and threw the empty can at her. She was ready with the rolling pin and redirected the can into the sink.\n\n\"Holy hell sweetie, you been practicing with the pirates?\" he chuckled at his ability to put her down and be funny at the same time. \n\n\"Them damn weenies are burning and you know it.\" He accompanied this sentence with an uncomfortable stare\n\nShe bent over to open the oven and he walked over and slapped her ass so hard she stood upright and slammed the door at the same time. She stood in silence concentrating on the pain not just in her ass cheek, but the pain built up over years from this degenerate.\n\n\"Get outta the way and let me tend to the weenies woman\" he grumbled as he forcefully nudged her out of the way. \n\n\"Holy hell, these look del...\" He couldn't finish his sentence because the rolling pin had shut his mouth. She crushed his skull with such a downward force that his upper jaw was now resting on his lower jaw. Eric plopped to the ground just as the pig did that made the pigs in a blanket he was about to enjoy.\n\nShe then proceeded to open the oven and take the pigs in a blanket out. HER dinner was prepared and for once, she took matters into her own hands and managed not to set them on fire.", "The timewinder had really worked. In fact, it worked a little too well, which was the problem. The damned button was stuck, and every 10 seconds time rewound back to the moment Sarah had pushed the thing. Normally this wouldn't be an issue, as she was unaffected by the rewinding time, and could easily have used her handy Swiss Army knife to pry the mechanism open and unstick the button. But this time, there was a catch. \n\nShe had been invited to a bonfire for her friend, Jim's, birthday. The button to the timewinder had gotten pressed as Sarah had tripped over an errant beer can left on the ground by one of the party's more unsavory guests. It just so happened that at the very same moment, this same guest, now quite inebriated, had decided it would be a great idea to bend over and let out the biggest fart he could muster just next to the bonfire. This of course led to several partygoers being lit aflame on the other side of the fire. And the worst part was that this kept happening, over and over, every 10 seconds.\n\nSarah was tired by this point. She knew she had to knock the drunk out of the way before his explosive emanation invoked the fires of doom once more, and quickly pry open the timewinder and unstick the button, all before time rewound once more, because then she'd have to start all over... for the 1753rd time. She would get it next try, she could feel it. She knew the rhythm by now. She should, at any rate. She'd been trying to save these poor innocent souls for the better part of five hours. She counted under her breath \"1... 2... 3...\" and with a small schlop time rewound one final time. She plunged her hand into her pocket and prepared the Swiss Army knife while at the same time sprinting toward the slovenly intoxicated man. She hit him full force, knocking him to the ground, receiving his usual reply of \"Hey, what the fuck, man?!\" No time to lose, she thought, as she pried at the casing of the timewinder. It popped open, and she quickly shoved the knife into the gap between the button and the metal. The button popped up with only half a second to spare, and the innocent lives were spared.\n\n...Or so Sarah thought, for the brief second between succeeding at her task, and the horrible, surreal realization that she hadn't made time work again at all. In fact, quite the opposite, she'd made time stop altogether." ]	3
	[WP] The nuclear apocalypse happened. North America, Russia, Asia, the UK and Germany were all destroyed. You're somewhere else.	[ "\"Baha hand me the manifest.\"\n\nI pick it up from the workbench, my hands trembling in raw excitement. \n\nI can recall a winter when I was ten when my mother handed me my first cup of Türk kahvesi, complete with a little stick of chocolate on the side. I remember the warmness in my belly, the comfort of being nestled in my mother's arms, and the rush of caffeine as it pumped through my veins. I can remember shooting out of my mother's arms, dancing around our fire with my baby brother while my parents laughed with my neighbors. \n\nThe excitement I feel in this moment eclipses that tenfold. \n\n\"Yes, Mr. Demir, right away sir!\"\n\nAtila Demir is an impatient man. I learned this early on as his understudy. If there were guns in our cache, he wanted them sold. If our cache was empty, why weren't we buying more guns? Always buying. Always selling. Not today. Today he was grinning like a madman. I hand him the clipboard with the manifest. Once the clipboard is in his hands he hugs me hard enough I think I might pop like a balloon and kisses me on both cheeks. In the background a newscaster has to stop counting the deaths on air to wipe away tears as they pass the latest update of four billion dead. \n\n\"Kolay gelsin my friend! We have just made millions of customers!\"\n\nI weep for joy. This will be the end of my financial troubles. My family can live comfortably for the rest of our lives. Millions of survivors, all clamboring for the safety of guns now that their governments had failed them, and Mr. Demir and I have the guns.", "It felt good you know? Sitting here in my humble abode, the screens completely lit up with fiery nuclear flames.\n\n\nWay too long I have been stuck with this incompetent world. Stuck with it's poor leaders and dumb governments.\n\n\nFinally I had the ability to just lean back and look at the screens.\n\n\nRussia. Destroyed.\n\n\nAmerica? Done for.\n\n\nChina? Completely dead.\n\n\nGermany and the UK? Still a little life left in 'em, but the incoming missiles will fix that.\n\n\nSo, I sit here inside my tiny old bunker, holding out with enough food for 10 years, and at that point I should be able to venture out in my suit and go for North Europe or Africa.\n\n\nI push a few buttons and I hear the quad layered blast doors close. Not that I would need them, who would send a nuclear missile to the Arctic?" ]	2
	[WP] In a world that's never seen magic before, you discover a technique that lets you work magic, what's more, you start teaching this technique to others. The reigning powers are not happy, and start doing everything they can to put an end to your movement.	[ "\"As we can see in this map the rebel group started here in south sweeden and soon expanded to denmark and north germany.\" said the The President of the United Nations Security Council while pointing at a red blob over an europe map.\n\"Soon after, as shown here, an unidentified member of the group traveled to california in the Mainland US creating a subddivision of the group. They say they won't make any use of magic if we don't attack them first\"\nNo one knew what was going on, when they first recieved the notification about an important meeting intended to make offensive plays against a threat that is expanding through europe and the US the first thought that came to mind was \"World war III is here and is against terrorists\", but all seriousness was lost when the word \"magic\" was said.\n\"Wait, Magic?\" exclaimed the french ambassador with skepticism.\n\"Yes, Magic\" Answered with a frown The UN security council president not very happy of the interruption.\"And they seem to be serious about it, they have already on their side the authorities of schleswig-holstein, Mecklenburg-vorpommern, most of brandenburg, and in california all local police stations from san francisco to san diego, we belive their next step will be near the new york state or somewhere in the east asia.\"\n\"are we supposed to belive this? i mean, this could be a hoax combined with mass hysteria, do we have at least a proof that shows this is a thing?\" said loudly, almost yelling, the chinese ambassador.\n\"Actually we do\" said the council president holding back his anger. \"Please, Play the video\". A projector screen unrolled from the celing and the lights turned dimmer. At first not much was going on, it was a video from a cell phone camera with two russian tourists in the The Brandenburg Gate talking about it's history when suddently, it happened; a big group of people was shown on camera coming from the Großer Stern, from the first line of people a lightning strike appeared out of the blue and hit one of the columns leaving a burnt spot, after than not much happened, everyone started screaming, the russians started to run and then the video ended.\n\"If any of you is still skeptic here's a photo taken a few hours later showing the burnt spot in the column\". Every one in the room was amazed by what was shown in the video, and even though some where still a little skeptic it was finally viewed as a reality. From one moment to the other a dead silence became a unintelligible collection of voices when one voice standed above the others, the U.S ambassador's, \"It has been decided, the german ambassador has accepted the launch of mass destruction weapons from russia and the US to the territory controlled by the rebels in europe, after that they will provide troops for land attacks to the rebels in california\".\n\"Well, if that's the final decision, this meeting it's over\".\nA couple hours passed in wait for the missiles to get to germany and denmark, the waiting was suffering, every one started thinking on what would happen if the group was able to hit back, the idea was rejected, it's impossible to run away, or so they thought. The time had come, it had supposedly been 30 minutes since the missiles impact, but then the news came by. \n\"Gentleman, we are in deep trouble the missiles did not blow up\" Said the Council president.\n\"Do you mean we didn't hit targer?\"\n\"No, literally the missiles....\" Before he could finish the phrase, in the center of the room after a cloud of red smoke a human figure appeared, he was wearing a bright red coat with a black tie, he had a grin from ear to ear, he started speaking whit a brittish accent while every one was still amazed.\n\"oh, gentleman. Was it really that much to ask? we just wanted a little peace and what do you do? you launch weapons a us. oh my dear gentleman, you wouldn't belive how easy it was to stop your \"toy\", oh well, i hope you are happy with your decision, because now that we are officialy in a war, that will probably be one of the last you will ever make. I'm sorry to tell you but i have to leave, i just hope your little minds can understand what a mistake you have made.\" \nhe disappeared just as he had come and at that moment they all realized they would probably be dead by the next day .\n", "It was a large barn that saw some use over the years, but nothing like these past few weeks. Pockmarked, damp, and singed, the walls and floor fit in better on a battlefield than a farm. The source of their abuse, the small village's children, ran around in the open aisle, laughing and playing. Overseeing the chaos was John Harlow, the brown eyed and strong jawed farmer that knew too much for his own good. \nWhomp! Whomp! \nThe barn door shook under the force. Suddenly the room quieted down as all eyes turned to John. A cow mooed. \n\"I'm coming!\" He yelled while motioning for the kids to hide. They hurried into stalls, hay piles, and up to the loft as he ambled to the door. Only once John was sure everyone was well hid, did he open the door. \n\"What can I do you for?\" John asked cheerily to the young woman red faced and out of breath. \"Oh it's you Mary. Kids! you can come out now.\" Tiny heads poked up from around corns and hay stacks. \n\"Why do you look like you just ran here?\" \n\"John! It's terrible, the lord wants you dead! Four of his best men were walking around the town asking about you. They even said there was a reward for your head!\" she gasped. \n\"It's alright, we can just end today's lesson here. I'll pack some supplies and hide out in the woods for a couple days. So long as they don't find any evidence, they won't do anything.\"\n\"No John, they already have evidence! Someone ratted you out!\" John looked around. The children. \n\"Did you guys tell anyone about this?\" The kids mumbled and looked at each other before one stepped up and said, \"Tom never showed up today.\" \n\"Yeah! Yesterday he said he was going to show him his parents some magic because they didn't believe him. Haven't seen him since he went home.\" Another one added. \n\"Oh my God!\" Yelled Mary. \"His parents probably reported their own son for some gold coins. I always knew the Scheaffers were bad people, but never this evil.\" \nA kid began to cry. \n\"Shit! I never thought it would get this far out of hand. Fuck!\" Muttered John as he ran his hands through his hair.\n\"Fine, Mary you watch the kids.\"\n\"Wait. Why, what are you going to do? These are the best knights for miles while you're just a farmer, and there's four of them! You'll be slaughtered\" \n\"Maybe so, then again, maybe it's time I stop hiding in the shadows and bring magic to the light.\"\n" ]	2
	[WP] One day, humanity wakes up with a hivemind. The queen of the consciousness isn't exactly who you'd expect, though.	[ "Alarm was turned on!\nScouts were the first drowned in sticky bombs that fell from the skies. Guards were disappearing one by one while the ground was shaking. While the rest was burned by yellow liquid that was written about from darkness in the past.\nWe were terrified, everyone knew this could be it. After two full moons behind us, again we are close to extinction. I knew that the wise ones will wait what's going to come out from the ashes.\nSuddenly we heard:' Toby, come to dinner and leave that antheap in peace! Daddy is coming back, he brought you a boomerang.'\nIt didn't stop until the storm came..." ]	1
^^^Similar ^^^to ^^^the ^^^endless ^^^map ^^^in ^^^minecraft ^^^with ^^^earth ^^^at ^^^the ^^^centre ^^^\(no ^^^need ^^^to ^^^restrict ^^^yourself ^^^to ^^^the ^^^game) ^^^Nothing-so-far-about-endless-resources?-:(	[WP] An event causes the earth to become flat, seemingly endless in every direction.	[ "I couldn't stop rubbing my chin as it felt weird to be this clean shaven, leaving my face light and naked after years of managing an entangled mess. Today was worth it though. Today was going to be the beginning of my happy ending.\n\nWith a fresh bouquet from the corner flower shop I made my way to Walnut Street. The pace I kept practically lifted my feet out of my nice Italian leather shoes. They were the only nice pair of shoes I owned. I had only recently purchased them for an interview and couldn't keep the thought of badly scuffing them from my mind.\n\nThe wind blew the smell of my cologne back into my face and made me smile. A stupid smirk, the kind you can't just erase on command. I felt good. Life has been good. I just recently started exercising and focusing on the little things in my life. Everything just felt right, from my nice overcoat to the watch on my right hand. I felt official now, like I really care.\n\nI could see Walnut just ahead. I had planned to turn left there and take it up to Ashlyn's place, but as I crossed Wilmore Lane I stopped and just stared up the steep road. My childhood friend lived near the top of the hill, right by the old manufacturing warehouse.\n\nA very nostalgic feeling being back here... had been years since I last peered through the archway of willow trees leading up both sides of the road.\n\nTaking Wilmore would be faster than Walnut despite the daunting climb. I had frequented this hill all the way through highschool, always seeing how far I could longboard down it before needing to power slide. I took off my coat and rolled the sleeves on my shirt, this climb would certainty break a sweat. \n\nHalfway up the hill I stopped to take a breath, looking back at the vantage point the hill offered me. The land just went on forever and ever before the ocean perfectly met with horizon. To my right was old Bert's place. He was the father my friend never had, always inviting him over to work with tools and play catch. I remember them even going on a fishing trip one time. I heard Bert doesn't live here anymore.\n\nI continued my ascent to just before the crescent of the hill. Jason's house was here. Others always thought poorly of it, but I thought it had a lot of charm... now it just gives me the shivers. I heard his mother doesn't live here anymore. I'd be surprised if anyone did to be honest.\n\nI tore my eyes away from his house, my heart heavy. I ran up the rest of the hill, stopping when the ground finally flattened out. I was now by the warehouse. It looked nice. The exterior had been repainted a light blue and the frames around the doors and windows had been fixed. \n\nI walked up to the door, tapping on it. The door was resilient, apparently made with the metal of a bank vault. The warehouse had been used by homeless crackheads for years, but now seemed to be in proper use. I wished to look inside the windows, but it was impossible due to the thick tint.\n\nIt had been nice to see this place again, but I was now running late for my date. I shifted my weight away from the warehouse when I was suddenly hit with a deafening bang immediately followed by a powerful burst that knocked me to my stomach. It was hard to react. I just laid there trying to stay level. Any movement felt like it would throw off the balance in the world and send it all crashing down on me.\n\nThe ground began to pulsate and the sidewalk rippled to and fro, as the neighborhood resituated itself without my permission. I felt invaded. I frantically stood up and found myself on a completely flat road in both directions. The houses down the hill had risen up to equal footing with the apex where I stood. I no longer recognized this place.\n\nThe skyline disappeared and became a road filled with nothing but homes to either side, as if the entire town had been cemented over with this neighborhood. There no longer existed an ocean vantage point that met the horizon.\n\nA dark figure hung in Jason's bedroom window, I can't look. The flowers I dropped radiated a dark red that rippled like a puddle, slowly dripping toward my feet. I could do nothing for him. I failed.\n\nIn both directions the same problem. I see no escape.\n\n...\n\nWhen I woke up a few weeks later they told me a LSD factory had exploded near me. The residue entered through my freshly shaved face, giving me the equivalent of 400 hits. \n\nHalf my face hangs now. I can no longer move it. I should've never gone back.", "\"What do you mean I get my job back?\" I ask my old supervisor warily. The layoff was three weeks ago and I'm still a bit groggy from ringing in the new year, but this is one awkward wakeup call.\n\n\n\n\"We need you. Your replacements... they're all gone. Haven't you heard the news?\" He sounds frightened. I turn on CNN. \n\n\n\n\"Breaking news: Billions of people are presumed dead as the entire continent of Asia vanished overnight when the planet became flat. We're talking live with geologist Randy Marsh and political consultant George Snuffleupagus about the phenomenon. Randy, what can you tell us about how this happened?\"\n\n\n\n\"Well Anderson, it appears the earth's magnetic poles became depolarized and the tectonic plates supporting everything from the Middle East to the Marianas Trench went floating off into space. The rest of the planet suffered massive earthquakes before realigning into a shape that could be described as flat, if you didn't consider all the mountains, oceans, and newly formed gaping chasms.\"\n\n\n\n\"I see, and how do you expect this to affect the weather?\"\n\n\n\n\"Hard to say. We still seem to be orbiting the sun, but day and night are going to be a lot more extreme with temperature differences. This could result in more frequent storms.\"\n\n\n\n\"George, what are the implications of this development on the economy? Global politics? Human civilization in general?\"\n\n\n\n\"Humanitarian aid camps are being set up everywhere the earthquakes hit. Travellers are stranded in places they had only expected to visit, and are left with no way to get back home. As the fate of our eastern counterparts is still unknown, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has abandoned his Martian ambition in favor of reconnecting with the other half of our divided planet. Every company that outsourced jobs is watching their stock plummet and some are expected to go bankrupt within a week. Canadian oil companies are raising prices as their competitors aren't around anymore. The Trans-Pacific Partnership is dead in the water for obvious reasons. Ukrainian separatists are abandonning the cause in Russia's absence. The Islamic State will be a lot easier to handle now that only their African splinter cells remain. As far as civilization in general, I expect that over the next century we will lose touch with eastern culture. If the east survived and is in a similar condition, the growing cultural differences could have unpredictable results if we ever regain contact with them.\"\n\n\n\nI turn off the TV and take a deep breath before speaking slowly and clearly into the phone. \"Fuck off, you corporate tool. I am NOT coming back.\" Then I hang up and apply for a job at SpaceX.", "The sky suddenly went dark, as if God had turned out the lights. The actual lights began to flicker on, before the unexpected drain exeded the capacity of the national grid, and everything returned to dark. \n\nThe people slowly ventured outside, lighting the way with their phones. The soft glow of the galaxy was interrupted by the flashes of crashing satalites.\n\nSoon, there was another light source; the distant orange glow of cool plasma, punctuated by the occasional flashing blue light. \n\nBy the time the artificial star pushed its way through the southern planes, it was obscured by smoke. Small bright flashes illuminated Europe, as guns fired, and nuclear missiles fell short of their target, doomed by the infinite horizon.\n\n\nBut, in time, the health glow of life would return. Spreading across the new seas and planes, building and advancing.\n\nEven as the artifical star burns down they continue. Working their way through an infinite supply of resources, as they expand into ever further lands." ]	3
	[WP] In a fantasy land of kingdoms and all-pervasive magic, the almighty Dark Lord has conquered a great kingdom, having its ruler swear fealty to him. Under the Dark Lord's rule, education is at an all-time high, healthcare and life expectancy are tremendous, and discrimination is a distant memory.	[ "Ulag-Mahl's reign began as that of the end times, lakes of blood and all that. After the fires burned and darkened the skies in an everlasting twilight we began to feel the effects of his reign when we noticed that none of us had died since the fighting had stopped. Even as our flesh rotted away we moved still with consciousness in an everlasting un-life. In our idle time we collected knowledge arcane and new but we did not use this to our own petty advantage but offered it to our Dark Lord Ulag-Mahl who corrected our knowledge and gave it freely to the people. We served our Dark Lord who though he had stripped our flesh and turned away the embrace of the grave had given us purpose and love. For him we strive for, for him we serve. Forever.", "They call me a Dark lord an evil being. I saw a world in chaos a world with no direction. I used my powers to better our world to bring order to the chaos. Yet still I'm evil. I guess it's a good thing. Fear of my power has united us, it's given us a common purpose to make strives to change how we think about and see the world and most importantly how we treat eachother. If I must wear a mantel of evil to preserve and advance my race I will gladly. This life isn't about individual achievements or the achievements or a single nation. Life is about the success of our species as a whole, we either advance or die and I will not allow my people to die. All I had wanted was a simple life but that's not the life I've had to live. I only hope when I pass into distant memory my people remember what we have achieved and stay on the path. We will survive, we will not fade into the darkness not after coming this far.\n\nI would ignite my soul in hell fire to keep my people in the light. My love for them outweights my fear of eternal damnation.\n\n(First post cc totally welcome)", "When Lord Altair knelt to Alak-Zhul, the Dark Lord we thought that everything would end, but sages say that all ends are beginnings, and that is exactly what happened. Alak-Zhul and his undead army captured the city of Umogria, where the last human survivors waited for their deaths at hands of the dark soldiers. The Dark Lord rushed through the royal palace, where the Praetorians protected Lord Altair, the Last Ruler of the Last City. Alak-Zhul devoured the souls of the guards and shot a bolt of darkness at the throne room's door. Lord Altair wielded the might Sol Blade, heirloom of his family, the one that had banished the original Dark Lord from our world, but Alak was prepared for this trick. Alak-Zhul teared through existence planes and created a new dimension at the throne room, what happened there, only Lord Altair and Alak-Zhul know, but what everybody saw next was the surrender of Lord Altair, to the Dark Lord.\n\nAlak-Zhul reunited all of the townsfolk at the ruins of the royal palace, the ones who refused to go were devoured by the Dark Lord. What the Dark Lord did was totally unexpected, but I knew that he wasn't too bad at all after all of this. With His Right Hand he rebuilt the Royal Palace, and all of what he had destroyed in the Siege of Umogria, after that with His Left Hand he opened a dark portal, from where the dead soldiers and peasants walked out. Alak-Zhul declared the end of the monarchy in Umogria without anybody noticing it.\n\nAlak-Zhul then called out His Wizard Council, the most dreaded mages that this country had known, to create a huge orb of pure dark power over Umogria. Then He did what changed all of our lives, the Dark Orb began to transmit dark power to all of the city, killing all plagues and erradicating all disease of the city. Then the Orb sent his Seekers after our sages, the Seekers ate the sages and after a while, they retuned, blighted with all the knowledge of the dark arts and other stuff.\n\nThe Blighted Sages created new health, education, and other laws, and with the dark powers of the Orb, all of our peasants were blighted also, to become filled with pure dark power, which made our lifespan to triple.\n\nThe Dark Lord, Alak-Zhul, was not dark, he only needed some friends.", "\"Nul'Karnis! Show yourself!\" The paladin's voice echoed off of the barren walls of the dilapidated castle, breaking a silence that had been held for thirty years. Only the prevailing sound of wind whistling through the cracks and shattered windows answered him at first, but as the bringer of light stepped into the center of the keep's enormous court room, he set foot unknowingly inside the center of the summoning circle. Ethereal flames of purple, green, and gold erupted from the long-dead torches and dried oil-lamps that lined the room, casting an otherworldly pallor across the paladin's face. An arcane rune activated, whirling smoke and cracks of lightning spiraling into an enormous pillar that grew in height and intensity until at last it reached the ceiling. With a blast which tore the concentrated nexus of magic asunder, Nul'Karnis stepped through the void in all his glory.\n\nThe lich stood to full height before the paladin, his face warped in an ugly sneer wherever the flesh still held taut to his bones. Robes of black, purple, and gold concealed what was doubtless a grisly sight of decay and desiccation, and while one human eye shone grey from under his cowl, the red point of light burning deep within his skull betrayed his true nature. A hand, skin pulled over it like an ill-fitting glove, snaked from his robes to gesture around the room, and the multicolored flames burned brighter, filling the room with a heat that stifled the paladin in his glittering full plate. The lich's jaw audibly creaked as his voice boomed around the room, dwarfing the adventurer's earlier summons as he bellowed:\n\n\"IT IS TWO O' CLOCK IN THE MORNING ON A TUESDAY, WHAT IN MARAE'S WIDE EARTH DO YOU WANT?!\"\n\nThe question hung in the air, the crackling of the torches and lamps his only answer. Shifting his stance slightly, the undead sorcerer placed one bony hand on his hip expectantly. \"I-- er... I have come to slay you! No more shall the pallor of your corruption blight this land!\" the paladin managed to stammer out, understandably somewhat off-put.\n\n\"RIGHT, BUT AT TWO IN THE MORNING?\" The bones in the dark lord's jaw clacked as he talked. \"DON'T YOU NEED TO SLEEP? BESIDES, ALL POLITICAL COMPLAINTS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE FILED IN ADVANCE SO WE CAN DISCUSS THEM ON THURSDAYS AT THE MEETING, YOU CAN'T JUST BARGE INTO MY HOUSE AND DEMAND I MEET MY END!\"\n\n\"I can and I shall, foul-- wait, what?\" The paladin stumbled slightly, his brain finally catching up to his body as his valiant charge stopped short. \"Er... you... are Nul'Karnis, right? Dark Lord of the Undead? Conqueror of the Kingdom of Silvariana? ...The Zombie King?\"\n\n\"YES YES, I HAVE LOTS OF TITLES.\" The irate mage gestured impatiently, \"NUL'KARNIS THE BLACK, HE OF FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE, THE WAR-BREAKER, THE GREAT EQUALIZER, WHAT OF IT?\" He gestured around the enormous room, an edge coming into his voice. \"DID YOU TRULY NEED TO BREAK INTO MY HOUSE TO ASK ME WHICH HONORIFICS I'VE BEEN GIVEN? EVEN THE UNDEAD HAVE A RIGHT TO PRIVACY YOU KNOW.\"\n\n\"Do not get fresh with me!\" The paladin roared, hefting his sword once more. \"You have ruined this land for too long! No more shall your pox of ever-present zombies roam the fields of farming towns! No more shall your profane books poison scholars' minds with evil thoughts! No more shall innocents pray for release from the plagues and epidemics of your ilk's creation! I end all this here, tonight!\"\n\n\"...\" The lich's jaw creaked as it slowly hung open in shock. Then all at once, his entire face lit up, eyes sparkling as he realized what had happened. \"PFFFFFFFFTTT! HAHAHAHAHAAAAA! OH WOW, YOU'RE NOT KIDDING! YOU-- HA! YOU SERIOUSLY WANT TO KILL ME!\" He devolved into giggle fits, the paladin's eye twitching in rage and confusion. This was NOT how fighting a lich was supposed to go!\n\n\"LOOK, DID YOU GET IN HERE BY YOURSELF, OR DID YOU HAVE SOME SMART-ASS ROGUE PICK THE LOCKS FOR YOU?\" He looked around the room, red pinprick eye scanning for any traces of concealment magic amidst the shadows his torches cast. \"BECAUSE I HID THE KEYS TO THIS ROOM WHERE I DID FOR A REASON.\" He gestured, colored cinders swirling in the air as he mentioned each one in turn.\n\n\"WHERE, O PALADIN, DID YOU FIND THE PURPLE KEY?\" He asked, now sounding almost smug as he waited for the response.\n\n\"At the head of an assembly location, doubtless where you or your followers hold dark sermons to those who follow you.\" The godly sword-wielder spat.\n\n\"IT WAS HIDDEN IN THE PODIUM IN AN AMPHITHEATER, WHERE WE HEAR ALL PROPOSALS OF LAW AND DEMANDS AGAINST THOSE WHO ENFORCE SUCH LAWS. ONE OF MY FIRST DECREES AS THE UNDISPUTED RULER OF THIS LAND WAS THAT THE KINGDOM SHALL PASS NO LAW UNLESS IT HAS APPROVAL BY THE PEOPLES WITHIN THAT KINGDOM.\" The rotting lich shrugged and gestured around the court room. \"IT'S WHY THIS CASTLE'S FALLING APART, OTHER THAN THE RARE MILITARY KERFUFFLE NOBODY USES IT SINCE THE ASSEMBLIES TAKE PLACE WITHIN EACH TOWN. NOW, WHAT OF THE GREEN KEY?\"\n\n\"It was split into two... One half hidden in a dilapidated farmhouse, the other in the cellar of a house packed with corpses.\"\n\n\"DILAPIDATED? UGH, I THOUGHT I TOLD THE REVANENTS TO REPAIR THE STOREHOUSE. IN ANY CASE, YES, I MEANT TO HAVE VISITORS SEE THE BENEFITS OF HAVING THE UNDEAD PERFORM MANUAL LABOR, FREEING THEM TO PERFORM MORE VALUABLE TASKS. HAND IN HAND WITH THAT IS THE CARE FOR BOTH THE LIVING AND THE DEAD, A CLINIC WHICH SPECIALIZES IN CURING DISEASE AND POISON, AND WHICH ALSO STAVES OFF THE RAVAGES OF TIME FROM AFFECTING THOSE WHO HAVE PASSED. NOW, TELL ME ABOUT THE GOLD KEY.\"\n\nThe paladin shifts his stance, looking somewhat uncomfortable as he recounts. \"It was found in the library, where your tomes are kept.\"\n\n\"TECHNICALLY THEY'RE THE KINGDOM'S TOMES,\" the lich corrected him, \"BUT YES. RESEARCH INTO SCHOOLS OF MAGIC AND MECHANICS SEEM TO BE THE PEOPLES' CHOICE RIGHT NOW, THOUGH TWO WEEKS AGO THERE WERE TALKS ABOUT POSSIBLY INSTITUTING A BARD'S COLLEGE. I'M NOT AGAINST IT IN PRINCIPLE, THOUGH THE ACCREDITATION PROCESS REALLY DOES NEED SOME WORK BEFORE ANYONE'S GOING TO SIGN OFF ON IT, I THINK.\" He rambled, skeletal fingers tapping his chin as he pondered the idea.\n\n\"You... are undead. You COMMAND undead. You cast necromantic spells. Everything you do...\" the paladin frowned at Nul'Karnis, his eyes seeing into a world beyond the material. \"Everything you do is evil. That is indisputable.\"\n\n\"YES.\" The lich nodded, not bothering to argue what he knew to be the truth. \"THE GODS HAVE DECREED THAT MY CRAFT IS ANATHEMA TO THEM, AND I WON'T DISPUTE IT.\"\n\n\"It is my task to end evil. It is my charge, as given to me by my god.\" The paladin continued.\n\n\"SO LONG AS YOU'RE A PALADIN, YES.\"\n\n\"Why...? Why are you doing all this? Why conquer a kingdom just to surrender all power from the conquest? Why go against the gods to accomplish so noble a goal?\"\n\n\"BECAUSE...\" the lich pulled back his cowl, letting the moon and flames light his grotesque face, \"I took a terrible oath once, to help those in need, in order to change the world for the better, and it meant I must sacrifice myself if need be for the good of mankind. In return, I got the power I needed to make that change possible.\"\n\nThe silence this time was much more solemn, but it was the lich who broke it first.\n\n\"If you want to destroy me, you should know that breaking this body won't do anything. You'll have to destroy my phylactery.\" He gestured behind him to the double doors, an ornate inscription around the doorframe marking it as the entrance to the throne room. \"I will make no move to stop you.\" The paladin's face hardened at this, hand on his sword once more as he strode past the undead ruler to investigate. The door opened with surprising ease, swinging wide as he approached the throne. Sitting on the rotting seat was an ornate golden crown, one he knew must have once belonged to the ruler of Silvariana. But what caught his attention was not the crown; instead, a glint of simple steel shone in the pale moonlight, resting against the side of the throne. The evil pouring off of it was unmistakable, and he approached with trepidation. But what he saw when he drew near sucked the breath out of him, as though the icy hand of Death itself was on his shoulder.\n\nKindle the Light, read the inscription hewn into the flat of the blade. It was a reminder that through acts of mercy, kindness, and forgiveness, the best traits of humanity could be brought out in the world, beating back despair.\n\n...\n\nSomewhere in Silvariana, it is rumored, you can see foul creatures plowing and tilling the fields. In certain places at certain times, you can find a black mass being held to discuss how the evil kingdom is governed. Secreted away in forlorn towers you can meet mages and alchemists of a strange and terrifying breed, crafting nightmarish spells and drafts that keep the undead in peak form. If you are cautious, you can spy a death knight patrolling among the towns, ensuring the Dark Lord Nul'Karnis' rule is undisputed. And if you collect the Keys to the Kingdom and approach the Dilapidated Keep, you might just gain entrance to the throne room. But inside are no riches, no wealth, no great and magical items. Just a crown and two swords, reminders of past lives.\n\nKindle the Light, professes one.\n\nShelter the Light, reads the other.", "He grew up on a farm. Few souls speak of that now but it remains the truth, one supposes that for so grand a leader it is considered uncouth or indeed unwise to mention it. Yet I believe this is the key to understanding him. \n\nI spoke to many people who saw the Fall of the D'Arnouths. What struck many of them was the speed, but every single person who was alive that day remembers the silence. The normal state of any conflict in this world is one of siege and pitched battle. Mages attempting spell and counter-spell as armies sit and camp and disease festers. Otherwise two forces will meet upon some open plain and if no parley can be made then they will engage and retreat once exhausted. \n\nThe Fall of the D'Arnouths was not like this. When a force is so vast it blocks out the sun itself, what can mere fireballs and city walls do to stop it? When a guardsman destroys an enemy only for ten more to take their place? And that those ten ignore the guardsmen and continue past him regardless of his strikes? They marched straight to the White Keep and demanded Lord D'Arnouth approach. It says much of of D'Arnouth's character that he queried upon what basis was their claim to the throne of Arkastria. It is then the Dark Lord spoke the words that are inscribed to this day below his statue at that very spot.\n\n\"My claim is my army. My army is this land.\"\n\nAnd no soul there could deny that this was true. What is a land and a people if not their past? And life continued for many as it had before, at least to begin with. But once the borders were secure, and it was made clear that any attempt by a foreign power to capitalise on the situation would be met with immediate retribution, then things started to change. \n\nThe earliest mention I could find was a harvester in North Orlia. She had gone out early one morning (given the heat of that dry land) to find her sickle missing. As she looked out into the fields a figure was there, dry and desiccated, silently moving the sickle back and forth as the wheat fell in neat rows. The figure continued all day, even as the midday sun blazed down upon him, then moved onto the neighboring farm. The next day, a different figure arrived and stored the wheat in the barn. \n\nSoon, there was no need to shear sheep, or mill grain, or weave cloth. And then the merchants found figures appearing who would carry their loads on cracked and fossilised hooves. They would never enter a home. You could spend a week and a winter's firewood destroying one and another would arrive. The Mage's Guild took them apart and found nothing but bones, but then that's all they are.\n\nMy doctor gave me something that he said would help stop the pox when it came next season. He still has a rough Orlian accent. I often wonder what his life would have been otherwise, dead at forty five with joints chipped and worn from walking the corn each day. I myself have the time to write this. Would my parents have had the time to teach me to write without the Dark Lord?\n\nHe grew up on a farm. He must have seen the constant cycle of life and death and asked why. No other soul has emerged with his talents. No one goes to the temples now, the Gods are as silent as his army. I wonder what he intends for us. Are we his children, or his harvest? " ]	5
	[WP] You have super powers, but only use them in mundane ways.	[ "For as long as I can remember, I've had the ability to control gravity, and the gravity of any object. When I was first born the doctor's had trouble figuring out my weight, as I kept changing the downward force affecting my body. As a toddler I began to learn how to control my powers, slowly but surely. I was absolute hell to my nanny, and the \"Buzz Lightyear\" incident remains in infamy to this very day. Whilst in grade school I truly started to use my powers for my own gain, such as pulling pants down from afar, and helping fellow wrestlers pass their weigh-ins. I was a shining star during my football years in high school, as I could throw the ball as far as necessary. Once I got to college I got a degree in logistics, and found a job at a warehouse near my apartment. Now I spend my days adjusting the gravity of cans to raise them to my outstretched hand, pulling the remote to me when it's too far away, and floating around the house. I get by at my job by making the heavy lifting a bit easier, and pranking the people at my work. I remember when we tried to squeeze ketchup out of a packet onto his hotdog in the break room. I made it fly onto his white dress shirt and tie. That showed him. He doesn't trust ketchup packets anymore so now he brings his own bottle into work every day. I'm sure i'll be using this power to enhance my laziness for the rest of my days. ", "I have been capable of doing spectacular things for as long as I can remember. I will start with that word; remember. This strange thing happens to me, where my experiences are logged inside my head, and any time that past events could come in handy for present reference, like a tape playing back they pop up again. \n\nNow these experiences - or memories - have entirely to do with a whole other set of incredible abilities that I have. For example, I have a pair of squidgy, highly sensitive orbs, set into my head. They absorb radiation from a spectrum of light, and project inside my mind an image. It is an ever evolving canvas, playing out a reactive pictogram of whatever objects are before me. These images - if important - are then recorded in memory. \n\nBut it doesn't stop there. That is but one aspect of the canvas. Threaded through this basic material are other aspects that symphonise the image. \n\nThrough holes in my face I absorb particles from the air. On minuscule hairs these particles are then caught, and identified. Again, no thought goes in to this process; I simply know if these invisible particles are present, or not. What's more, I can even distinguish between thousands of variations of these particles. Depending on the particles, and the intensity thereof, I can accurately predict what I will see, long before my orbs identify the source using light. \n\nSometimes, if distant enough, an object will be invisible both to my orbs, and to my particle detecting hairs. However, if large, and moving, I have yet another astonishing instrument at my disposal. Movements often cause pulsations through particles in the air, and believe it or not, in the side of my head I have another pair of inlets which aid my comprehension of the outer world. Inside the inlets are harboured small structures which allow themselves to be vibrated by such movements of air. In these circumstances, and again without the labour of thought, these structures permit me to anticipate the existence of large, moving objects. Furthermore, they suggest to me the direction, and (through use of memory) the likely form of these objects, based on the nature of the vibrations. \n\nThere are many other things I can do besides; for example, I can detect the basic constituents of food through a combination of my particle detecting hairs, and small investigative structures in my mouth. And even in the unlikely absence of all these powers, I have a system of physical feedback, whereby using any surface of my skin I can detect the immediate presence of any other physical object. Coupled with that, this incredible system records increases or decreases in the relative energy values both of those objects, and even the air particles around me. \n\nIn short, I have a hell of a lot of superpowers. And I usually use them to switch on tv sets, or operate computers. Mostly I watch videos of people falling over, or groups of people kicking a ball around. Sometimes I look at pictures of cats. I don't know what I'd do without my powers." ]	2
It just seems like an interesting mash-up to me. Try to use tropes from both genres, in a way that works well together. If you like, start with this: "She sashayed into the saloon, the doors swinging back out into the night as she passed. I took one look at her and told myself to hitch up on my horse and ride out into the sunset. But it was too late. The way it would turn out, I was dead already."	[WP] Anything in the genre Noir Western	[ "The frigid cold bit at me like a rattlesnake as I stood outside the office. For once, nothing had happened that day, in which case it'd be considered an odd miracle of sorts, as it seemed that the town was settled in a valley of anarchy and mischief. Murder, rape, theft, these were things that most people around these parts were familiar with, some more than others. Of all people in this California town, admittedly, I was the most familiar with these sinful crimes. Of course, I was the Sheriff, so these sort of things had to be familiar to me.\n\nI stared up into the night sky as I sat on the stoop, lips tightly wrapped around my cigarillo. I tried to distract myself, as memories of the past began to take shape. Bloodshed, loss, anger, everything was stampeding back to me like a panicked bull. It was nights like these, unfortunately, that brought back these revolting remembrances. Nights like these, as possessing as they were, had a way of sneaking up on you, almost like a succubi. Of course, I tried to reassure my unsettled mind that everything was at ease, and that no harm would come. \n\nIt was at that damn moment that it all came crashing down, when she came along. Ya'll know the sort, the type with eyes greener than emerald, hair burning brighter than hot coals. For many men, she was a goddess, for me, she was nothing but trouble. The moment she opened her lips, that's when everything began taking shape. \n\n\"Pardon me sir, are you Sheriff Collins? I'm looking to inquire about something that may be of interest to you.\" She seemed desperate, with her eyes doing half the chatter as well, begging for assistance. At that time, I felt more than inclined to help, almost like I was under her spell. \n\n\"Why, yes ma'am, name's Collins, Ambrose Collins. You mentioned you wanted to inquire me about something? Well what happens to be this something, exactly?\", I questioned her, still pulling myself out of my earlier daze.\n\n\"Well, I need your help with my sister.\", she quivered, her eyes turning red, \"I've been looking for her around town for almost a week, and I haven't found her at all! I asked around the Granny Smith and I haven't heard a thing about her at all. Please, sir, you've got to help her!\" She then broke down, dropping down to her knees in the dirt. Her sobbing ended up reinforcing my prior notions of helping her even further, so I did what any other concerned man would've tried to do. \n\n\"Alright, alright, alright, calm down ma'am. You want me to help find your sister? That's what you said?\",she nodded to me frantically, her eyes smeared with mascara, \"'ight, she's obviously gotta have a name, what's your dear sister's name?\" She looked at me almost instantaneously the moment the words left my tongue. Her eyes immediately brightened, a hint of hope in them. \"Her... her name was Josephine, but we mainly called her Josie. A lotta people did, Sheriff.\" \n\nI nodded in agreement, looking to progress things forward. \"What's she look like, there's a lotta Josephines out here ma'am, I can't just pick one outta thin air.\" The woman looked at me, her mind in thought. Shortly afterward, she composed herself, free of the wrings of her grief. \"She... she had curly hair, just like mine, only a little darker. Her eyes were brown, she had lotsa freckles. She was shorter than me, but not by much, I'm guessing an inch or so.\", the woman was in thought once, trying to recount the memories of her missing sibling. She then spoke up once more, saying, \"Also, I remember her having a short ring finger, Sheriff. She lost it in a kitchen accident whilst we was kids.\" I looked down at the woman before me, her eyes locking onto mine. \n\nFor what seemed like an eternity, she stared at me in desperation, until I broke the ice. \"Alright, I might as well start this now, I guess. By the way, what's your name, ma'am? I seemed to have not gotten you name.\" She stood up from the dirt, dusting off her dress. \"Name's Catherine, Catherine Grant.\", she replied timidly. \"You will find my sister, right?\" Catherine questioned quietly. I looked at her, with my hat on my head, and flat out said to her, \"I'll be honest with you ma'am, I can't make it for sure that I will find your sister. However, I will try with the best of my parameters to assist you. I'll have my best men with me on this, so I can't guarantee you I'll find her, but I will try. That is all I can say, otherwise I'd be lying to you. Are we clear?\" She nodded in silent confirmation, with a slight smile across her lips. \"I just want you to try, Sheriff, that's all I'm really asking for at this point.\", she answered back quietly. \"Alright then, ma'am, you should go home already. It's already late as it is, if you want, you can go inside the office and ask Deputy Brooks to escort you home. Right now though, I gotta head to the tavern to get tabs on your sister, alright? Good night then, and take care, ok?\" As I began walking, she grabbed my hand by surprise, and stopped me in my tracks. \"Just, thank you, Sheriff, I don't know what else to say.\" Catherine spoke almost akin to a mouse, an aura of grief surrounding her. \"Don't worry about it ma'am. In the end, this is just part of the job, right?\" With that, she let my hand go gently, and off I went into the night, and straight toward the Granny Smith...", "\"It's not like a lawman to disrespect a pretty gal who ain't looking' for trouble\"\n\n\"Lucky for me I ain't no lawman\"\n\nMcAllen, Texas was barely a town worth the ink on a map; it had lost most of it's sons and fathers in the civil war. Only ones that came back were ornery, cretinous sons of bitches deadset on quick dinero and fast women. Man only goes to McAllen looking for trouble. Tonight, trouble was wearing a corset.\n\nHer list of crimes read as long as her legs, and it was either the look in her eyes or the tequila in my gut that got me thinking about letting her and the bounty go. It wasn't easy scaring up money these days, but women like her were in scarcer supply. She ran with the Grady boys for years, and was the last living soul who laid eyes on their haul from the train robbery. Some folks reckoned it was luck that kept her alive, others figured it was the old apache necklace she wore that kept her safe, my bet was that it was the revolver she had trained on me from behind the bar. I wasn't fixing on finding out.\n\n\"What say we have this conversation with Whiskey instead of bullets, sugar?\"\n\n\"Either way, I'm fixing to wake up with a hell of a headache tomorrow, ain't i?\"" ]	2
Maybe he did his job too well, and he has to create crime or risk becoming irrelevant. Maybe he has split personality disorder. Maybe there's some other motive. Run wild!	[WP] A superhero moonlights as his own arch nemesis	[ "The poor child is crying--no wait the child has superpowers. I hate all people with superpowers. One of them killed my parents, so I vowed--to protect all innocents for now and forever. The child is soaked with soot. \"Hey are you okay?\" I have to--kill him, he's got superpowers, prepare the--sympathy, I should call his parents, I should do--harm, I can't wait--to save him! The Black Knight is so--just, righteous, I know what I must do.", "\"He's behind bars, finally,\" the officer spat, disgust dripping to each syllable that left his lips. \n\nThere he was, the criminal mastermind behind everything, hands in shackles sitting on the cold, cement bench. His shoulder length, snow white hair hung in front his face in clumped strands, held together by the blood of his past rampage. He shook his head to the side to reveal his face, scarred and bruised, each mark from the nights events etched in permanence now. \n\n\"What do you want to do about him, do we give him a trial?\" one officer asked, hoping for the opposite. \n\n\"I don't know, but I sure hope that Jericho shows up, we need him now more than ever,\" the other officer responded.\n\n\"He's dead,\" the man in the cell stated, his words hanging in the stale air as if gravity had completely forgotten about this part of the world, \"and frankly, not even Jericho could stop me. He's a washed up hero. What you mortals need now is a god, not him. He's a fool.\"\n\nOne of the officers drew his pistol, his hand shaking ever so slightly as he drew aim at the man behind bars. The safety audibly clicked as he steadied his hand. \"And what is stopping me from shooting, taking out the worst mass murderer in the history of our city?\" he asked, pistol trained directly between the man's eyes. \n\n\"I am,\" the criminal spoke, his deadpan look breaking into a maniacal smile. \"Everything you try to do to me will prove only one thing. I am immortal and I will end each and every human life until Jericho comes out of hiding to stop me. But please, mister, take aim and let loose, I'm waiting for the afterlife that I so deserve.\"\n\nA gunshot rang out, and within an instant, the man's head in the cell dropped. The officer's gun clattered to the floor as he realized he had just ended the monster's life behind so much pain, so much agony. In that instant, he should have felt relief, but he felt something different. Something was wrong, and he couldn't put his finger on it.\n\nA chuckle emerged from the cell, but it was muffled. The villain's head rose, the bullet firmly planted between his teeth. He spit the bullet out, the clashing on the floor sounding like an atomic bomb dropping. He rose, thrust his arms outward snapping the shackles that kept him bound, and threw the cell door open. Lifting the officer above his head by his neck, he tossed the body through the wall nearest to him. \n\n\"I am coming for you, Jericho.\"\n\n~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~\n\nThe city was in shambles, buildings on fire, Jericho looked up to see the Moon as high as it could be. His enemy, his nemesis had destroyed everything he held dear, killed thousands, and acted as if nothing had changed. Today was an odd night, as it was a lunar eclipse. Everything felt different. He jumped into the skies, searching for the treacherous man who had caused this anguish.\n\n~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~\n\nHelios was above the city, waiting for the man of the hour to show up and attempt to stop him. All Helios wanted was to have answers, and drawing out Jericho was difficult. He spotted a glimmer in the sky, and Helios shot up. \n\n~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~\n\nJericho saw the sunlight darting in the night sky at him, and gaze once more, the lunar eclipse almost upon them. He knew what he must do. As the two bodies collided in the air, the celestial bodies became one in the sky also. A loud blast gave way and the two became one, as it was always intended, and ascended into the heavens where they had once lived for decades before the last eclipse.", "As I collapsed into my couch, I turned on the TV to take my mind off the events that occurred in the last few hours. \n“We are reporting from the Central subway station where the criminal known as Doctor Minus has struck again – denominating a bomb that injured over 50 people. The city is waiting for a response from Captain Plus who has remained silent so far.” \nI turned off the TV and glazed at my collection of masks on the wall. It was not difficult trying lead multiple lives at once. Putting on a mask allows me to show my true intentions. I was not rich like Bruce Wayne but I did not need money to send my message across.\nYou see, my actions under the mask are a reflection of my life. I create most of my own problems and seek ways to correct them. Regardless of how far I fall, there is always a way back up. \nThe world is not split between good and evil. Everyone is capable of both and must find the balance in between. A person cannot go through life without inflicting some kind of harm towards others, but we can always strive to correct our mistakes. At the end of day, it is a choice. \nAs I grabbed my coat and headed out the door, I hope that the people of the city understand my intentions and see through their anger. The press will get a kick of out of this but the lesson must be learnt. I hope they can forgive. ", "If they knew the truth, I'd be on death row before you could blink twice. \nI shook the thought out of my head and focused my attention back to the woman in front of me. \n\"... always seem to be able to foil Doctor Evil's plots right before they cause untold destruction, but you haven't been able to capture the man himself. Why do you think that is?\" \nI sighed mentally. Every stinkin' time. \n\"The big problem with capturing someone like Doctor Evil is that he is so unpredictable,\" I said. \"Oftentimes you'll have supervillains trying a similar scheme every week. For instance, The Sound Man had exactly one M.O. for his entire \"career\". That makes it easier to predict what his next target will be and when he'll be there. Doctor Evil is different. He does something different every time, and with random times between attacks. Remember the time last spring where he didn't do anything for five weeks, then had three attacks in the space of a week? That makes it much harder to be able to head him off; it forces me to be reactive instead of proactive when it comes to stopping his plots. Also, he never seems to be at the crime scene himself, he simply arranges it and lets it run its course. However, rest assured, every attack teaches me something about him, so it is only a matter of time before he will be brought... to justice.\" \nThe reporter laughed obligatorily at this last bit. \"I'm sure our viewers are glad to hear it.\" Turning to the camera, she finished, \"You've heard it straight from Captain Justice after stopping yet another of Doctor Evil's plots. Kasey Johnson, XYZ News.\" \n~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ \nLaying on a couch at home in my mansion, I laughed at how ignorant they all were. \"Doctor Evil\", come on. How gullible can you be? Nobody has ever seen Doctor Evil, except for in the video broadcasts that air every few weeks. \nSpeaking of, I should probably record another one soon. \nSee, here's the thing. Nobody cares about heroes unless there's a corresponding villain. We like Batman because there's the Joker. Superman has Lex Luthor, Spiderman has the Green Goblin.... But who does Aquaman have? Get the picture? \nSo yes. I created Doctor Evil. I am Doctor Evil. But I always set up the schemes so that nobody will actually get hurt. It's amazing how scared people will get any time there's a digital clock and a mess of wires. And it allows me, the amazingly charismatic, courageous Captain Justice to reap the benefits of being a hero while not having to actually do any work. \nOf course, villains have expiration dates unless they get more dangerous over time. You never see a long-running supervillain who only holds up gas stations. The papers can't write a story about that, and don't get me started on the lack of TV interviews. \nIt'll be a balance game. Eventually I'll have to let some people die, but not so many that the public blames me for it. That alone will be worth at least three or four interviews. Have to be tearful, of course, maybe vow revenge... no, that's too supervillain-y... Eh, I'll figure it out. \nKicking my feet up onto the coffee table, I reached for another glass of scotch. This really was the best lifestyle. And if I had to kill some people to keep it, then so be it." ]	4
	[WP] Write a story from the perspective of an animal while having the reader think it's a human until the end.	[ "Kathy was still asleep when I got my coffee. I poured a tiny amount of sugar and cream into it, only to find that it was still too bitter. So, I poured just a hint more sugar and cream. It was now too sweet. I swore and swallowed my pride before my coffee, then set out. Traffic was awful, but that was nothing new. My boss was a dick, but again, nothing new. What was new was the fact that Arnold, my co-worker had just spoiled the episode of The Walking Dead that I had DVR'd, so that was great. I was also a gazelle. ", "Finally, everyone is gone. House to myself all day long with nothing to do. That light rain promotes perfect nap conditions, and with no responsibilities that is all which is on the agenda. But first let me have a nice snack and maybe a little drink since mom left some food out. Ah it is so nice to finally be free after having so many people constantly around me. This is a little less food than I hoped for, oh well, don't feel like putting any effort into getting any more. Should I go outside? Nah, it is raining after all, wouldn't want to get wet. Okay I will just hop up on the couch here, sprawl out and become nice and comfy. That's it, time for a nice nap...Awesome that felt great, daytime naps are always a pleasure, great way to recharge. Now I wonder what Milo is up to, he should be home alone today too. Maybe we could hang out, run around together. Well actually, when are my parents coming home? They will probably want to walk later, and I can't have them return without me here. Hey actually I think I hear them! Wow the time really flew by, that is their car! I have to go greet them at the door! Let me grab my leash first so they know I want to go out! Time to go on a walk and play with the other neighborhood dogs on this glorious day!", "I was a good guy, there wasn't anything wrong with me. \nI mean sure, sometimes I would bite or scratch people, but they deserved it. They always do. \nI was having a nice day anyway, just drinking some refreshing liquid and people watching to pass the time, it certainly doesn't get better than this. \nExcept for that family over there, they could make my day better. \nI walk up to them, excitement in my eyes, terror in theirs as I pull my S&W from behind my back and shoot them down. \nDoc Johnson was so right. Sigh Life's good when you're a beast." ]	3
	[WP] The end of the world from the perspective of an astronaut mid-mission.	[ "I’ll be gone for a few months at least, so I made sure to say goodbye to my wife and children. My wife gives me a single photo of our family in order to never forget her. On the back of the photo is written: “We will be whole. Forever and always.” Hurdling through the dark void of the unknown, I pull out this photo, remembering the last things I said to her. I smile to myself as I dream of my love. Here, my mission is easy: a simple retrieval mission to Mars. I hear the voices of central command in my headset still, the sounds of their voices static and fuzzy, but yet still audible. A short while after takeoff, the voices in my ear sound uneasy. Sirens blare. Men scream. Explosions trigger. Then pure, dead quiet.\n“Command, this is Pioneer XI, are you still with me?”\nSilence.\n“Command, I repeat: this is Pioneer XI, do you copy?”\nNothing but static.\nAs panic strikes, and I turn my view from the control panel of the ship and look through the tiny porthole window back to my home planet. The blue of our beautiful oceans begin to fade to a bland brown color of mud and dust. The gray haze of our atmosphere begins to dissipate like clouds. Gases and solids are sucked into the vacuum of space, followed by humans and cars and animals and nature. As they reach the black of space, their bodies deteriorate completely. What in the hell is happening? My body is trembling. I look down to my trembling hands and realize they are fading as well. The evaporation of my body moves its way through my and up my arm. I take one last look to the place I used to call home. There is nothing, the planet is non existent. Amidst my tears and deteriorating body, my photo floats in front of me and I read the text: “We will be whole. Forever and always.” ", "Commander Lovell peered out the window to his left. He didn’t like what he saw but the view commanded his attention as nothing else could. What he was was absolutely terrifying but utterly magnificent. He couldn’t believe what he saw. This is insanity. The earth was scorched. Nothing but red of what could only be fire and magma swirling together on the Earth’s surface not unlike what is seen with the clouds of Jupiter. There was no life left on earth. Only four humans left alive elsewhere. The four left to die in space. Lovell and the crew had been in utter despondence since they first found out about the asteroid headed to earth 4 weeks ago. They voted amongst themselves to make the return trip to earth before impact to spend their last moments with their families or what have you but NASA and neighbouring space programs held their own vote and elected to not proceed with a return trip. These four humans left above were to be martyrs for the human race it was said but the reality of the situation is that there just wasn’t any proper way of bringing them back in such little time. So they stayed. They sent and received messages with family and those they loved, sharing tears and memories and prayers. The asteroid cut communications capabilities six days shy of impact. So they stayed and waited quietly with one another. There are no words Lovell could possibly have to describe the feelings of utter hopelessness and extraordinary awe he and his crew felt as they saw the five hundred kilometre long space projectile enter their view, silently creeping toward their home, and remove everything. It made impact in the Atlantic Ocean and created a wave travelling three hundred sixty degrees that covered the circumference of the planet in no less than a minute. It was then after that the contents from the inner earth came to the surface and laid claim on this world turning it into nothing but a close cousin of Mercury that will in due time create a new Mars. The cloud of dust that would encompass the world had not yet formed so the astronauts could still get visuals and record what they saw with notes and pictures, for reasons only to keep them sane until their time to join the rest of humanity came. They still had plenty of supplies left to survive in orbit for a number of years if properly managed, or chosen. Lovell took his eyes away from the window. He appeared to be lost in thought at all times but thoughts rarely came to him these past days. He maneuvered away from the spot he occupied for the past two hours. His absent minded movements took him to the main deck. Here he met with the three others. One was eating. One was taking notes. One was floating in silence with her head resting against a padded wall. They were all in silence. Lovell entered the room. Humanities last children in one room. Somehow less vulnerable in a tin can than in their own homes. There they were. Eyes red and sockets blackened. All on the verge of tears waiting for a simple drop of a pin to change that state of being. They heard that noise in the form of static. It came from the communications radio. Following the static, the radio said “Hello…Are you still there?”.", "This was supposed to be short, ended up being about 400 over the character count, so I've split it into two parts. I've not proof-read it (apologies) criticism welcomed!\n\n---\n\nEven though it was the third EVA of the month, eighth in total since Jacobs arrival on the ISS, that first glance at the earth floating in the sea of black after releasing from the structure of the station didn't get any less impressive. Each time outside, he would just float there, his back to the station, watching the earth spin by. It had become standard practice in the last few years to have a couple minutes at the beginning and end of each space walk to just look. 'Adjustment' was the official term given to this brief window of time, and it was just after this short two minute interlude that all life on and near earth ended. Well, almost all life.\n\nAt first, Jacob would simply stare at nothing, unfocused eyes taking in the fact that, if you thought about it in the right way, you were simply falling to earth and missing. After a few seconds of actual Adjustment, Jacob began to focus, looking at the landmasses and naming as many of them as he could, but in stereotypical American fashion, he was never that great at geography. Passing over the Pacific, with no further landmasses awaiting (likely incorrect) classification, Jacob decided enough was enough. Time to get to work.\n\nTugging at the tether attached to his suits stomach area, he slowly rotated around to face the space station and began pulling himself back to its surface. One short smooth pull was all that was needed, momentum doing the rest. The tether slowly slackened as he came in closer, peering behind the station to try and spot any stars. Typically the glare from the reflected sunlight on the white outer walls overpowered any light from beyond, but not today. Today, a single star was visible, just past the port side solar panels, shimmering slightly, fading in and out of visibility.\n\n\"ISS this is Jacob, E.V.A. adjustment ended, returning to station to begin my, uh, let's see, eighth E.V.A. mission to investigate and hopefully repair some damage to the port side PV arrays.\"\n\n\"Jacob this is Mack aboard the ISS. That was a short one, roger on the return. Take it slow coming in, we don't need any more dents in this bucket of rust.\"\n\n\"Will do commander, applying the brakes now. Ah, shit, hang on.\"\n\nThe landing was as soft as ever of course, but the thing with low gravity environments is that momentum carries you as far as you can hope to go. Makes moving around easy, but if you bounce, you wont come back down. Luckily for Jacob, tethers are a thing.\n\n\"Mack, just bounced and have rotated around some. Slightly tangled in this tether, nothing to worry about, tether still attached.\"\n\n\"Roger Jacob, take your time, you're ahead of schedule anyway.\"\n\nThe slack tether had managed to loop around Jacobs leg, and he was now rotating just enough to keep the thing tight. Facing back toward port, Jacob began to rotate his leg in circles to loosen and hopefully release the tether. It wasn't possible to just reach down in these bulky space suits, so he had to rely on the momentum of the tether itself to unwind and release him. Easy enough. Glancing up at the station to check his distance he spotted the star again, but it wasn't right. It looked bigger, it looked close. With a rush of adrenalin, Jacob began to pull on his tether. Any chance of debris and you get inside immediately.\n\n\"Mack, I've got a possible object incoming, cannot identify but looks like some large debris, probably an asteroid, just off port.\"\n\n\"Roger Jacob, get back inside, I'll get on to Houston to confirm and begin maneuvers.\"\n\n\"Roger, on my way in.\"" ]	3
	[WP] A 4-D star collides with Earth, causing it to "unroll" into a seemingly infinite plane. Though satellite images from orbit appear normal, on the surface, everything has changed. There are suddenly new continents, new seas, stretching endlessly onward. A new age of exploration begins.	[ "\"Your father wanted me to give this to you after his funeral.\"\n\n\"A letter? Shouldn't this be read aloud for everyone to hear?\"\n\n\"He told me with his last words to have you read it, then decide.\"\n\n\"Well, in any case, thank you.\"\n\n.\n\nDaniel,\n\nThis shouldn't be.\n\nIt doesn't make sense. Unfolding across four dimensions, yet we still perceive the world in three (Four, counting time)? The idiots that came up with that theory - no, not a theory, it's a widely regarded fact by the time you're reading this - shouldn't be called scientists anymore.\n\nThere's no way you don't know by now that the earth was hit by a star moving faster than the speed of light. Nobody knows how or why this happened. But when it hit Earth (and the rest of the solar system by extension), things went haywire. Electronics began to malfunction. Those used primarily for communication remained online, as our 'scientists' attempted to keep those online so we could continue to communicate with the rest of the world.\n\nBut why would the star be in four dimensions? That doesn't make sense! It effects the world in an entirely three dimensional way! As three dimensional beings, we can see in detail things in two dimensions without any trouble. Some games and simulations project three dimensional viewpoints through these. However, if we were in four dimensions, we would be able to see three dimensional objects with the same level of clarity!\n\nThe star 'overwrote' most of the earth. Some pockets of land were unaffected, as the star overwrote primarily the surface area. Some people attempted to explore these areas, but that was before everything mechanical broke down. Somehow, there have been no reported deaths due to this. However, I lost my daughter due to it, and I have no intention of losing anyone else to it. This is why, with my dying act, I reversed the star's effects. I don't know how I did it, my memory is slipping just as the ink slips from this pen, but I did it. You may treat me as a martyr, or a destroyer of worlds, but I did it. I did it. I did it. I did it. I di----(The rest is an unintelligible scrawl attempting to say the same words.)\n\nYour father,\n\nAndrew Brandt\n\nEDIT: I was just informed that Andrew Brandt is an ESPN personality. Whoops! That was not intended.", "I found myself like many, curious. Time seemed to fluctuate and as the existing paradigm broke down, and a new one arose, I knew I wanted to be part of it.\n\nIn pockets, isolated ones, time would move the same. In others it leaped and some it slowed. These places would lead to new times, eras, alternate timelines--you needed only find the right pathway through that pocket. Some were easy. Second star to the right, straight on 'til morning. And the next day you were in a version of the world untouched by colonialism. It was odd. It was beautiful. It took so much patience and time, but was worth every second in terms of what we gained.\n\nSome of us are travelling merchants. We'll move things for you, at a price. Some of us can find cures for what ails you in worlds that did not exist due to one quirk of the time stream. The names we gave to each place--the library, the hospital--we chose places because otherwise it would be impossible to list them all.\n\nI worked--Day and Night--exposure to the pockets of time ruins your circadian rythyms, and messes up a number of natural processes, but I worked with goals in mind after the most recent revelation--that this may not last forever. I had grown attached to the feeling, of exploring, of travel to new worlds. The star was not crashed, it was merely passing through.\n\nI panicked, so much harder than I should have. I stole. I sold secrets. I worked for those seeking to contain the star.\n\nAnd just as it was, it was no more. The same day. The same hour. The same minute. I stared down at my coffee, still warm on the day of impact. I stood, poured it into the sink, and smashed the cup.", "Billions of people, families, friends, lovers. All separated by no more than a days travel at most. THat was it, that's all it took to see any person you might want to. Technology had shrunk our world to almost nothing. Now, it was massive, incalculable. New landscapes had been added randomly. Oceans now separated people who were once neighbours. While in some places entire cities had been untouched. \n\n\nAnd there was me, a single dad, my kids had been with their mother when the star had rolled across our world. Satellites were all toasted by the electromagnetic interference, at least that's what most of us had guessed. No more landlines stretched between cities to make a old fashioned phone call, and to top it all off, a brand new landscape, of indeterminate length stretched between me and my kids. Sam was only 5, Jane even younger, and they were the only reason I got up every morning. \n\n\nIt took me a week to scrounge together every piece of outdoor equipment I could fit onto my back and a dirt bike. It used to take me an hour to drive my kids to their mothers house. Everything ahead of me looked passable, but binoculars and a high hill revealed what looked like a new range of mountains to rival the rockies ahead. There were a few groups that had started ranging into the new wilderness, mostly for usable farmland, timber, and hunting. But nobody had even thought of going more than a days travel out. \n\nAll I knew was that I had to head west. West was where my kids were.", "Twisting around I looked at the landscape in front of me, and at the image currently being reflected on the lake next to me. \n\n\"When do you think that's going to happen?\" I asked the Land. \n\n\"When? It is happening now, and it happened a thousand years ago, it will happen again in five minutes,\" said the Land as if berating a child. \n\nI chuckled and moved forward, around me the scene rotated and folded in and around itself. I saw every side of the object held by the men on the battlefield and even inside of them, their very neurons laid bare. \n\nIt took years for my brain to learn how to interpret the data, and I was lucky. Many of the older humans had been unable to adapt to the fourth dimension and had gone insane. It was understandable, our brains had evolved to handle only 3 dimensions of space. \n\nLuckily when the star had collided and forced the Earth into the fourth dimension I had been only about eleven years old, still plenty young enough for the neuroplasticity of my brain to adapt me to the new conditions. \n\nMoving through the field I ignored the deluge of information around me, even as I moved through it. I had to, I could see every detail of something in three dimensions much like someone glancing at a piece of paper saw everything on it at once. \n\nMost people in this day and age lived within the pockets of 3 dimensional space that remained on Earth, only the wanderers like myself were willing to explore the fourth dimension. \n\nWe did so at great cost, sanity was the first thing to go for most but past that it was personal attachment to anything. \n\nTime inside of the fourth dimension is strange, and although it still linear moves in leaps and bounds while sometimes even freezing in place. Step out of a 3 dimensional space for what felt like an instant and three years or perhaps a second takes place. Their is no way to predict it, but still we Wander. \n\n\"You are rather introspective at the moment,\" said the Land. \n\nThe land is something of a collective conciseness, those who go mad in four dimensional space eventually find one another and able to see every nuance of each other eventually merge. The merge also spreads the physicality of the consciousness over all of fourth dimensional space, a false projection of three dimensional space on a 4 dimensional substrate like a projector for a movie. \n\n\"I'm thinking that you would do to not look inside my brain.\" \n\nThe Land chuckled, \"Why? Most Wanderers welcome a voice to speak to.\" \n\nI stepped into the water of the lake and through it, the water molecules moved through me unimpeded by my form.\n\n\"Because most are insane, the people in three dimensional space treat us almost as gods when we enter their realms.\" \n\nThe Land was silent for a moment and a thousand years. \n\n\"Are you not?\" \n\nI chuckled and stepped out of the lake at the edge of another substrate pass-through where fourth and three dimensional space interact. \n\n\"I am as much a god as you are benevolent.\" \n\nThe Land seemed to consider me but I withstood it's gaze, it peered into my very mind seeing every neuron connected to every other, observing everything that composed the three dimensional brain operating in four dimensions. \n\n\"Smart boy.\" \n\n\n ", "I jumped. The air soared around me as I rocketed into the sky. Damn, that lost art was useful. Physical enhancements are some of the best things we got from the Borrowed Land. My particular variation was special, though. The clouds parted around me, and I hit the apex of my arc before touching down on the floating island. I always loved floating islands. Difficult if you hadn't managed to gain a flying power, but fine for people like me who took their powers from universes where everything runs on what others would call bullshit.\n\nThat's why we called it Borrowed. Infinite stretching land and seas that had come from other alternate timelines and universes, bringing some unique laws of physics and functions of reality through as well. Hard limits became soft, often barely there if you knew how to pass them.\n\nThe island could barely be called so, as with most floating ones. Jumbled rocks and outcroppings at different altitudes, cliff faces, clouds atop small mountain peaks, the whole shebang. There'd be some fun things in here, I was sure of it. I just had to find them.\n\nThe most profitable thing you'd find in floating islands was whatever kept them afloat. Most came from something that messed with the way space time bent around them, causing gravity to push them upwards. Some were filled with gas that was so much lighter than air it caused them to levitate. I found my power in an island that floated because it simply wanted to. Again, bullshit. Physics had really dropped the ball, from what I hear of the world before the change. Back then, the rules mattered and were followed, and didn't change based on arbitrary factors or whoever was in charge of writing them at the time. I'd like to think that the world was nicer before then, but it seems down right dull from what I'd heard.\n\nThis particular island that I was on seemed to follow some sort of magic crystal type array. Somewhat rare, considering the most common sets of laws for these things are pseudoscience brought to life. Magic was rare in itself, but not uncommon, there was a whole continent literally made of the stuff found a few years back. It sounds extravagant, but compared to the thousands that follow Comic Book Science, magic is something I'd get quite the profit for.\n\nI found the source of the levitation, and went to copy down the array and the materials. That was my one rule: don't fuck up the scenery if you can help it. Of course, sometimes breaking that rule was inevitable. You'd be fighting a giant demon dragon made of rock, or running through a ruin left by some ancient parallel civilisation that had somehow figured out how to make weapons of mass destruction, and when those scenarios unfold then it's bad new for anything nearby. But with magic, it was basically just getting the required biology or soul implanted and then you'd be good. I could use it because of the pure bullshit I ran on, but that's another story.\n\nAfter I was done, I leaped to the nearest outpost a mile or so away, and pawned off the magic array for a good sum of money. All in a day's work.\n\nEDIT: Thanks for the kind words!" ]	5
ready... set... go!	[WP] The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. There was a knock on the door...	[ "The last man on Earth sat alone in a room. Well, he had no idea whether or not he was, in fact, the last man on Earth. He knew that his family was gone. He knew that his friends were gone. The nice old lady at the butcher's shop down the street who always made sure he received the best cut every week, she was also gone. Yes, it looks like it's just you and me, now, Rufus. Next to the man's feet, laying not far from the comfy armchair he was postured in, was a golden retriever, fast asleep.\n\nHeh heh, you always were a tired old dog, weren't you? The man grunted and twisted in his seat, heaving himself to his feet. Hobbling over to the nearby counter top, the man groaned and stretched. Another day in this God forsaken room, he thought. How much longer must I stay in here? He looked cautiously over to the only door in the room. It was flanked on either side by a waist high mirror. The mirror stretched the entire length of the wall. In fact, the only break in the mirror was the door itself. No, no..I must stay in here. The man turned, and sat back down in his chair with a HMMPH. \n\nThe room was not too large, but it also wasn't too small. A perfect square, with all four walls decorated and adorned with pictures of his family and friends. Paintings they had made for him, notes, postcards, letters. He had saved them all. Better to remember them by. If it weren't for them, I may forget about my family entirely! The floor was a clean, white tile. A large wardrobe stood guard on the wall opposite the mirror. Next to it, a counter top ran the length of the room. On it he had piled everything he had collected since humanity had ended. Newspaper clippings, photographs. All things to remember a time long past. No room for the future here. He thought.\n\nThe armchair he sat in, day in and day out, faced away from the door. The only reason he ever got up from the armchair, as far as he could recall, was to feed the dog and go to sleep. His bed was positioned on the wall perpendicular to the wardrobe, and it was close enough that he was able to grab it in the same motion as getting out of the chair. Not as stable as I used to be, ho boy no. He recalled fondly to the days when he used to be a fit, agile young man. Fishing. That was his passion. He was able to go out on a lake and spend all day, just looking out over the peaceful, serene water. Sometimes, he didn't even catch a fish! Those days always taught me a valuable lesson, he would tell his grandchildren. Sometimes God just wants to teach you patience. In times like those, when there aren't any fish biting, patience helps a man be thankful nonetheless. You know, I could live in a place where I couldn't fish at all. I could live in a place where I wouldn't be able to spend an entire afternoon with my grandson. His grandson would smile at that, and the man always ruffled his hair. He missed his grandson. But he was gone, like all the rest of them. \n\nSuddenly, there was a knock at the door. The man turned in his seat, frozen. He had never expected this! What on Earth...who...who could it be? \"Stay here Rufus, I'll see who it is.\" Rufus hadn't moved. The man grunted and twisted in his seat, heaving himself to his feet. \"Who is it?\" he exclaimed. He heard muffled voices coming from the other side of the door. Voices! There's more than one person out there, they found me! They finally found me! Tears welled up in his eyes as he approached the door, no longer hobbling. He felt young again, as if he had found new vitality with that knock. \"I'm coming! I'm coming!\" He turned the doorknob, but nothing happened. The door was locked. What..how can this be..? He heard more voices coming from the other side of the door. Muffled, he couldn't quite make out what they were saying. He leaned in closer, putting his ear against the door.\n\n\"- lock it because he would open it and wander around. Sometimes he would get as far as the front hospital door! Don't worry, I'll have the janitor bring the keys up...he should be here soon. Anyway, he seems to be very lucid today. He always takes such good care of that dog too, he may be ready for a real one soon!\"\n\nTears rolled down the man's cheek. His memory returned, if only for a moment. \n\nWell, I could be living without any memory at all..." ]	1
	[WP] You're a door-to-door merchant, trying to sell the High Fantasy equivalent of a Swiss Army Knife	[ "\"Uh-oh\" are probably not the words you want to say when you're demonstrating a magical multitool. Even more so when you've already explained and demonstrated the multiple ways said mutitool can incinerate, decapitate, lacerate, detonate, and/or electocute any foe including, but not limited to: ratmen, goblins, kobolds, drakes, zombies, necromancers, geomancers, pyromancers, cryomancers, and your neighbor who always lets his dog shit on your lawn and never cleans it up, (not tested against dragons, demons, devils, gods, or small children. Wield at your own peril).\n\nAnd yet, that's exactly what I found myself saying as I was demonstrating the Archmage 6000's ability to summon extraplanar beings from alternate dimensions. I meant to summon a harmless hellbunny, but I accidentally bumped the switch from \"1\" to \"7\" and got a godsdamned squid demon from the 8th Dimension of Flrrrgh. \n\nI barely had time to register my mistake when its tentacles shot out of the portal and wrapped around the tree in the woman's front lawn and started pulling itself through. Her rather bored expression quickly turned to shock.\n\n\"Whaddaya mean, 'Uh-oh?! There's a monster tearing up my garden!\"\n\nI let out a nervous chuckle. \"Uh, I mean, it's nothing to be worried about. It's all part of the pitch. You can't spell 'demonstration' without 'demon', after all!\"\n\n\"I thought you said that Archmage five-hundred thingamabob wasn't tested on demons!\"\n\n\"Six-thousand!\" My voice cracked a little.\n\n\"Whatever! Now deal with it or I'm calling the town watch!\"\n\nGreat. Now I gotta find a way to banish a squid demon or I'm looking at going to prison for Reckless Summoning and Aiding and Abetting an extra-dimensional incursion. What a fantastic way to end the first day on the job.\n\n\"Don't worry, ma'am, I'm a professional. Just stand back and be amazed as I demonstrate the awesome power of the Archmage 6000!\"\n\nOr get eaten. You know, whichever. \n\nI looked down at the staff in my hands, looking for the \"banish\" setting. I didn't see one. \n\n\"Uh, give me juuuuust a second\". The woman rolled her eyes at me and let out a sigh.\n\nI turned it to 'scry' and got ahold of my boss. His spectacled face popped up in the crystal on top of the staff. A drooping wizard hat sat atop his head.\n\n\"Ah, Arthur. How is everything going?\" \n\n\"Um, great, Merle, but I got a customer here with a question. She wants to know if there's a 'banish' setting.\"\n\n\"Unfortunately, no. We had to cut it\".\n\nBrilliant.\n\n\"Uh... Why?\"\n\n\"It's not called the 'Archmage 6001\"\n\n\"Makes sense\" are you kidding me?\n\n\"Why does she need a 'banish' setting, Arthur?\"\n\n\"Well, she may have accidentally summoned a squid demon from the 8th Dimension of Flrrrgh?\"\n\n\"Oh dear, that is a bit of a problem. I'll have to fix that for the next iteration. I'll be over in a bit with the necessary implements but...\" he paused a second to look around. \"I'm going to have to find them first\"\n\n\"So.... What are we gonna do in the meantime?\"\n\n\"I'm sorry to say, but the only solution right now is to summon something bigger to hold it off until I get there.\n\n\"...You're totally serious, aren't you?\"\n\n\"Deathly, I'm afraid\".\n\n\"Greeeaaaaaat. Okay, thanks Merle.\"\n\n\"Oh yes, one more thing. I need the address\".\n\n\"Seven Seven Seven Lake Avenue.\"\n\n\"Excellent. I'll be there as quick as I can. Good luck, Arthur!\" \n\nThe crystal went dark. I looked over and the squid demon was halfway out the portal. I could see its gaping beak dripping with acid. More of its tentacles had come through too and were writhing around in the air. \n\nI turned to the woman. \"So... I got a solution, kind of, but you're not gonna like it\".\n\n\"I already don't like THIS\". She sighed again, and shook her head. \"What is it?\"\n\nI reached up and scratched the back of my neck and looked down at the ground. \"Uh... I gotta bring through something bigger\"\n\nHer eyes went wide. Like, wider than Lady Morgana's hips, wide.\n\n\"The hell you are!\"\n\n\"Look, lady, unless you got a magic sword or something lying around, then I'm kinda out of options here!\"\n\nShe looked surprised, and cocked her head to the side as if to think.\n\n\"Magic sword, huh? Actually...\" her voice trailed off. \"Stay here, don't move, and for the love of the Gods, don't touch that damned staff!\" she yelled as she disappeared inside the house.\n\nI heard some rummaging around in the house. The squid demon was almost out of the portal. It made eye contact with me and I just about shit my pants.\n\n\"Here. Go kill it\". \n\nI turned around and looked at the woman. She was holding out a sword with a hilt inlaid with gold. Rubies studded the handguard and the blade shone silver in the light of the afternoon sun.\n\n\"Uh... okay\" I said as I took the sword. \"Here goes nothing\" I said under my breath and I walked towards the monster. Worst case, I figured dead beats prison in Camelot. \n\n ", "I straightened the top of my large wizard hat, making sure the brim was parallel to the ground, then took a few encouraging breaths. In my leather side satchel I was carrying an object of great value. At least, that’s what they tell me. My job wasn’t to determine the value of the product; it was to sell it door-to-door. On foot.\n\nI knocked on the door, but my robe covered my hand, muffling the knock. Pulling my hand from the oversized robe, I knocked on the door, once more. No answer. We were told this might happen. I knocked, again, this time, harder. From the other side of the door, I could hear footsteps pounding down stairs. The knob jiggled and a man, dressed in an untucked dress shirt and black, gold toed socks answered the door. He looked me head to toe, scrunched his face and asked,\n\n“What the hell is this?”\n\n“Greetings, good sir!” I held my staff high and made my voice tremble for added effect.\n\n“What is this? I don’t have time for this.”\n\n“Sir, are you the gentleman of the house?” I wiggled my fingers, as if asking this question was a mystical incantation.\n\n“Yes. Is this a prank? What is this?”\n\n“Sir, I offer you a rare object-”\n\n“You’re selling something? No, I don’t want anything, good bye,” he closed the door and locked it. I hung my head and shuffled next door. Repeating the process with an elderly lady, I had marginal success,\n\n“…a rare object from over ten contents! Yes, ten!”\n\n“Oh?” she wobbled and struggled to look me in the eye. I fetched the object from my satchel, revealing it as if I was producing it from the ether. “A Swiss Army Knife?”\n\n“No, dearest young maiden. This is a Five Armies Knife,” I smiled, hoping she would get the Hobbit reference. Yeah, she didn’t.\n\n“A Five…What?”\n\n“This multitool contains the combined blades of 20 over stainless steel implements forged from Middle Earth to Asgard!” I popped open the large blade, “This blade was forged from the metal of the original Master Sword of Hyrule.” I snapped it shut and popped open the corkscrew, “This is the tip of the sai of the legendary Ninja, Raphael.” I could see none of this made any sense to this poor woman. I dropped the act, closed the shitty tool and put it away. “Have a nice day, ma’am.”\nI thought the next house was going to be my lucky break when the girl answering the door was wearing a Star Trek shirt and I could see Fallout 4 playing in the background.\n\n…forged from the metal of the original Master Sword of Hyrule-”\n“Woah woah woah. Hold on. You’re telling me that in order to make this, you had to destroy the Master Sword? Doesn’t that kind of make you Ganon?”\n“Uh…,” I moved on, showing off the serrated wood saw blade. It was designed to look like a pixelated sword, “This fine diamond saw was smelted in the land of Minecraft, where-”\n\n“Uh-huh. So, tell me, wizard. What does it take to make a diamond sword in Minecraft, then?”\n\n“D-…… diamond…?” I flipped open the scissors, “This was crafted from the hilt of the blade of Blade.” At that, she actually laughed. She had a great laugh. I snipped at the air, pretending to cut my beard, trying to milk the laugh; she immediately stopped. “Uh, this useful tool,” I opened the can opener, “was taken from a dead Uruk-hai on the fields of Gondor!”\n\n“Tell me, what are the tweezers made of?”\n\n“Adamantium.”\n\n“And how much for this?”\n\n“$654,” I gulped. She closed the door. I faired equally poor at the next two houses.\n\nThe sun was setting and mosquitos were nipping at my ears, so I decided to call it a day. Reaching into my satchel, I pulled out a small teleport crystal. Tossing it to the ground, I was enveloped in a purple smoke. As the smoke cleared, I was back home, in Gielinor. I quit the next day.\n\n======\nPerhaps I took the prompt a little too literally? ;)\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] Humanity has cracked the secret of true immortality. Which is good for humanity, but sucks for the Grim Reaper who needs to find a new job.	[ "I knew it was going to happen some day, I guess we all did. Those fucking humans never did know when to call it quits. In all the billions of trillions of years I've been doing my job, never have I seen such a stubborn bunch of creatures. They out right refused my inevitability. Me. Death. Now they've escaped my grasp forever.\n\nI'm still not sure how they managed it, nano machines of some sort. The how doesn't matter, what does matter is that they've put me out of the only job I've ever had. I was put into existence to do this. If it had just been the humans, fine, I could deal, but no they just had to use their little trick on all the animals and insects too. Bleeding hearts of the world unite and all that. I'd be sick if I could.\n\nThe first couple decades were unbearable. Have you ever had to go around collecting the souls of bacteria and deep sea creatures? Of course you haven't, but I'll be first to tell you it's a bad time that I usually reserve for my underlings. Eventually, I called it quits and passed the title on to one of my most faithful interns. The kid had handled a whole genocide on her own, I trusted her to handle things in my absence. And so I went on my merry way.\n\nI wasn't the only one put out of a job by those miserable humans: Plague and Famine had just about had it as well. There's not a lot either of those can do to you when you aren't able to die and the humans were well on their way to stopping the two of them all together as well. Persistent bastards. The two of them had been by my side for almost as long as I could remember. They both went on to do some minor torturing in the underworld.\n\nNow you might be wondering,\"What about War?\" well, War was having the time of his life down on Earth. Immortal or not, humans will always find something to fight about, and War lives to see what comes of it. He and I had been partners for the longest time, practically inseparable, now I had been taken out of the equation and was forced to watch from the sidelines. \n\nDon't get me wrong, a little vacation is nice; I hadn't taken more than a few decades off since the industrial revolution. But at the end of the day, I still have bills to pay, and I can't live off my savings forever. Yes, even I, the collector of all mortal souls has to make ends meet. I have no use for money as you humans do, I get my payment in time. I may not be able to die, but I can cease to exist. For each soul I claim I get more time, and now the clock was ticking by faster than I had ever seen it before. I needed to find a way to get back into business lest I find out what waits on the other side for those of us meant to last forever. \n\nThe thing about the job market for eternal beings is that it's a small and niche market. We all exist to do specific things and rarely learn to do much else. Needless to say, I have very few marketable skills, but I couldn't let that stop me. I examined my options, and they were just as grim as I assumed they would be.\n\nFortune dealer: Join our ranks! We encourage originality and creativity! :) Don't bother applying if you're trying to craft a cult that worships you as god, we have enough of those. This is now a fire-able offense\nThe only fun thing and it would get me fired. Pass.\n\nPart time cupid: Don't you love being in love? \nNope.\n\nMinor trickster god: Do you like causing minor but hilarious inconveniences? If so, then this is the job for you. Here at Low Key industries we specialize in causing people just enough stress to ruin their day. Creative minds are wanted. No maiming or violence allowed.\nHard pass.\n\nIt was obvious now; if I was going to find a profitable and enjoyable job, then I was going to have to make one for myself. And I knew just where to go to find my inspiration. \n\nIt had been nearly half a century since earth had cured me and, boy, were things crowded. In the less densely populated areas people were practically walking on top of each other, and in the worst place they were quite literally doing so. People were starving to the point where they should be dead and I saw more living heads than I had any desire to. If I could be sick I would have been. Who would have thought that completely getting rid of death could be a bad thing?\n\nThere was Suffering and Pain were thriving in this new world, because it was around every corner. People fought over what little free land that was left, but with no death the wars never really ended. So many people were left in places where they should die, but rather were faced with eternal suffering. At the end of it all, I couldn't feel bad for them. They did it to themselves.\n\nI could go on for ages about the things I saw, but that it's why you're here. You're here to find out what I did to fix it. To find out how I took back what was mine and put humans back in their place and made them realize just how much they really need me. You want to know how I, Death, the one who seals the fate of all things continued my legacy and went on wipe the slate of the planet clean. \n\nThe answer is really simple: I didn't. \n\nI took up that job with the fortune dealers. It's not so bad once you get used to it; in fact, it's actually pretty fun. I'm working on some poor idiot named Todd right now, I have some interesting things in store for Todd. Wife, kids, the works, probably going to leave him in a ditch for a few centuries. Fuck you Todd, fuck you and your nano machines.\n", "I'm Mr. Barnes, your unemployment counselor. And you are?\n\nDeath. James Death.\n\nDeath's first name is James?\n\nYes. So what can I do you for?\n\nYou came to us.\n\nOh, that's right! Yeah, Jimmy's gotta eat. He's got a studio apartment to pay for.\n\nDeath only had a studio apartment?\n\nI know, right? It's funny, you'd think I could get the apartment of somebody who dies -- and believe me, I've escorted some folks away from some kick-ass dwellings -- but the problem is that between you and me, Big Jim has shitty credit.\n\nIs that so?\n\nIt's a casualty of the profession. First of all, I'm J. Weatherford Death, of the Connecticut Deaths. But I am also immortal. Not only am I'm gonna outlast every bill collector, but the last face they'll see is mine. What's debt to death? I'm Britney, bitch!\n\nIf you don't need the money, why do you need a regular job?\n\nHey, now. This is Jim. There's more to me than plucking souls from the living. I have free time, but the work is so lonely. People see me and they just scream as I yank the plug from the wall. Life being the plug.\n\nYes.\n\nAnd the wall being Earth. It's a metaphor. I once won a creative writing contest.\n\nAnd you killed my mother.\n\nI'm not getting a job, am I?\n\nNo.\n\nShit. Well, I'll see you on November 17th.\n\nActually, how many words a minute can you type?\n\nDoes it matter?\n\nAnd a company car.'\n\nDeal! \n\nTO BE CONTINUED?" ]	2
Dragons as pirates? Pirates only raiding dragons? Pirates riding dragons? Dragons riding pirates? The possibilities are endless! Let your mind wander!	[WP] Dragon Pirates	[ "With skull and cross bone on her wing, \nThe Dragon Queen her song did sing, \nA tale of fire o're the sea, \nA tale that's told for you and me: \n \n\n\"Arise, my simple soul! Arise and come at last \nFrom the bottom of my belly out unto the pirates' mast. \nWreak chaotic havoc on these friends or foes of mine; \nWreak chaotic havoc leaving only ash behind.\n\nAnd to the burning bodies of the scoundrels of the sea, \nLet this be your lesson: Don't ever fuck with me!\" \n\nThe Dragon Queen she sings her song, alone across the sea, \nHer friends and foes: they all had burnt with unmolested ease. \nBeneath the Fire and the Flames a new kingdom is born, \nThe Dragon Queen she lifts her head, her belly filled with scorn.", "Corbin Burns was new to the crew and rightly flinched as Captain Blackbeard barked orders at the men. The man’s coal black beard was braided and dressed with small black ribbons and burnished gold rings. His blood red coat a stark contrast to the black cannon smoked that whirled through the ever steady gusts of wind. Cannon balls were blasting through the air as bullets from muskets and pistols were shot from the back of one massive dragon to another, hitting anything that was in their path. As Corbin attempted to secure a badly frayed tether, which was essentially keeping their galley attached to this 100 meter flying beast they called a “vessel”, the world shook around him. Somehow, the remaining tethers must have given way as the floor of the galley shifted between Corbin’s feet. There was nowhere to run, no place to hide. At 2000 meters above ground, options were limited and things were not going well. Left and right, men were plummeting to their death, nothing but a brief scream escaped their lungs before they disappeared into the thick white mist. Corbin latched his body onto one of the massive spikes that ran along the dragon’s back, climbing as the galley below shifted and was ripped apart by the churning black shoulder blades of the beast below. \n\n\nThe sudden increase in pressure and popping in his ears told Corbin they were rising. With the lost weight of the galley, the dragon released a deafening roar as it surged higher into the clouds. When finally they broke free, Corbin saw that the galley below had completely disappeared. For a moment he thought he may have been the only one to survive, until he saw him… \n\n\nThere, standing on the head of the beast, was Blackbeard. His red coat rippling behind him as he stood, statue-like, against the gale force wind. All was still for a moment until Corbin saw Blackbeard point down and to the left. Following his direction, the massive green dragon, with its fully armed crew, erupted from the clouds 500 meters below. With another swing of Blackbeard’s arm, the dragon beneath Corbin altered its momentum and went into a dive. As the wind nearly ripped Corbin from the dragon’s back, Blackbeard’s laughter could be heard echoing on the breeze. Finally, within 100 meters of the enemy, it happened. The massive body below swelled with pressure as black scales began to glow orange around the edges like coals upon first entering the flame.\n\n\nCorbin couldn’t believe his eyes, no one had seen a fire spitter in hundreds of years! People thought they had gone extinct in the last Dragon Exodus or the trait had been bread out of them in the early domestication of the species.\n\n\nWithin 50 meters of the green, white fire erupted from the dragon’s mouth, engulfing both beast and man below. Screams rippled through the wind, swiftly followed by the smell of Sulphur. What had once been a majestic green beast, was now nothing more than charred, melting flesh and bone, falling out of the sky. The men on top, all but black char forever fixed to the back of their falling chariot. When Corbin was finally able to rip his eyes from the chaos below, he saw Blackbeard. He had turned and was now staring back directly at Corbin, madness in his eyes. The whites of his teeth, a stark contrast to the surrounding beard that burned on the edges and was throwing off wisps of grey smoke. \n\n\n“Glad to see you made it Corbin,” he shouted as he casually walked along the dragon’s neck, taking in the damage. “Looks like we’ll have to rebuild!” \n" ]	2
	[WP] Education now consists of uploading the human knowledge base into your brain at birth. Describe the life of a person who has received a corrupt upload.	[ "Everything was wrong. Or at least that's what I knew. Technology has come a long way in the last century or so. Human have found ways to upload knowledge directly to the brain. Basic knowledge from the old K-12 system is uploaded at birth and school only lasts until children turn about 10. After that they were free to pursue their passions, learn their trade, etc. College was now incredibly affordable. All you had to do was buy the courses you wanted and have a doctor upload them for you. Certification only took 3 minutes. Most people found a cool career they liked around 16 and worked to raise money to buy those courses. I unfortunately didn'y have it so easy. My upload was different. I was intentionally bred to be a soldier. Knowledge of firearms, war tactics, and martial arts all known to me as far back as I could remember. But something had gone wrong. Perhaps a glitch, a corrupted file, or a military doctor trying to warn the general population through me. A file enclosed with every conspiracy our country ever took part in. Things so far back the history books don't even bother anymore. Presidential assassinations, terrorist attacks, rigged elections, fake wars. I knew it all. But I also knew how classified most of this stuff was, and if I told anyone, I could be killed, then discredited as a psycho who spends too much time on the net. So I left the army. I couldn't justify killing people who didn't really know what they were fighting for. I decided to become a doctor and try to help the world. And hopefully, spread this knowledge to others as well", "The doctor, smelling of a mix of cherry and peach from the vape he'd been sucking on for the last 35 minutes, strolled into his office five minutes after his next appointment had arrived.\n\n\"Sorry I'm late, we had a complication.\"\n\n\"Oh?\" Indifference from the middle-aged woman, a perfect figure in a slick business suit. A man, her partner, probably, sat staring at his watch, gesturing out a message. Corporates. The kind of people who marry their job and enter into relationship agreements for the legal benefits they receive. It makes sense to add a kid into the mix. More money.\n\n\"Yeah, I've just come from the implantation center,\" A lie. He'd been back for an hour, but sat hidden in another office watching TV. \"it looks like the child you picked out received a corrupt upload that didn't hold. It has been rejected.\"\n\n\"Does that mean it's a stupid one?\" Mrs Corporate asked.\n\n\"Uhm, well, it will develop normally. The child has shown no signs of other mental or physical problems in the six months he's been here. But he wont come preloaded. You'll have to send him to a school.\"\n\n\"Oh.\" Indifference, but a calculating one. The kind of extended 'Oh' that is sighed out as numbers are being crunched. \"Well, what can we do to fix this?\"\n\n\"Well there's only two options really, the first would be to take the child home and raise him.\"\n\n\"That means sending him to a school, and teaching him, right?\"\n\n\"Yes, there is a school not too far from here that has places available for-\"\n\n\"Oh, no, then. I think we'll just have another one. Do we need to pay extra for that? As it was your fault that it's broken.\"\n\n\"As in, the same genetically? That'll be free, of course, but it will take another 9 months to grow it. As for disposal of this child, we can handle that for you for $50.\"\n\n\"Ugh, fine. Just make sure the next one works properly. Mail me when it's ready.\"\n\nMrs Corporate stood up, poked her partner, and walked out. Mr Corporate, as silent as ever, simply stood and shuffled out behind her.\n\nThe doctor pulled out his vape as he sent the destruct order to the nursery, and ordered the Corporate family another child. Actually, make that two. Just in case.", "I could hear the muffled screams through the walls. This happened every so often after they were switched on, I just hated that it was the children that it happened to. \n\nSometime in the 21st century they figured out that our evolution had peaked because after the physical stopped, there wasn't enough time to learn the sum of human experience. Distracted by the great meme, children fell behind and we began to devolve so to speak. \n\nA solution was found with inserting a small computer into children's brains that could accept the data and allow them to access as they needed. But they soon found out that not all data was important or beneficial, worse yet was when the child would fidget turning the insertion process. Complications arouse.\n\nI entered the holding room to the usual, blue walls, cabinets, two nervous parents in chairs, and the holding table in the center. \n\n\"CLICK HERE IF YOU HAVE A SMALL PENIS\"\n\nThis was a rarer case. Generally when the advertisements take over they're positive, like that nice Nigerian Prince. It's just odd to have a five year old insulting me in such a way that medical downloads can never prepare you for without paying for the extra content. At least he was strapped to the table.\n\n\"Specialist,\" the mother sobbed, \"can you-\"\n\n\"SEXY LOCAL SHOVELS 5.37 MILES FROM YOU, INCLUDING OP'S BACKHO\"\n\n \"-fix my baby boy?\" \n\nThis was certainly an unusual case.", "It went unchecked for most of his childhood.\n\nJimmy's parents were at first concerned about his early development when compared to the other children - but it was still early stages of the adaptation period and most toddlers were still absorbing the implanted information and were still trying to make sense of it at the time.\n\nHis deviation from the norm manifested more clearly at the age of seven, when most children were settling into their social groups and re-echoing their shared knowledge at each other.\n\nDuring a standard synergy session, Jimmy - like all the other children in the session - accepted the sync request from the group. Everyone laid down as they were told, and let their shared experiences become one with one another, trading keys and initiating standard handshaking protocols to reaffirm their unit as one cadre.\n\nJimmy's key was rejected by the group. \n\nThis was not uncommon, and often just meant that the individual needed to regenerate their key and try again. It was a costly process, but it was often done every few years or so and the overhead never amounted to much.\n\nJimmy tried again. Still no luck. Jimmy tried again. Still no luck.\n\nHis HIC detected multiple sync requests and repeatedly attempted to acknowledge them, but with a broken key it could only wait until a new one was generated and entered a polling loop.\n\nJimmy had a headache. He began to cry. The carers noticed that something was wrong, but it was beyond their expertise - the human knowledge-base was very general in pinpointing an exact symptom to an exact cause.\n\nHe broke out into a fever, and the carers concern evolved quickly into panic as this unprecedented event had no reference they could use to act upon. In desperation one of the carers shoved a HIC adaptor onto Jimmy's head and performed a manual reset.\n\nJimmy fell asleep.\n\nHe awoke in a hospital with his parents looking over him with mute concern. The doctors told them that there was nothing they could do. The implant had been corrupted after transfer due to a rare solar flare event. The implant had already dissolved in his brain years ago and there was nothing that could be done - Jimmy was now divorced from the rest of the human race.\n\n*****", "\"We were able to repair most of the damage, but I'm afraid that your child will not grow up to be normal,\" said the doctor. \"Well, normal in today's sense, anyway.\"\n\nThe distraught parents looked at the doctor in despair. Trembling, they hugged each other tight. \"What...what can we expect to happen, doctor?\"\n\nThe doctor opened a file on his computer. He scrolled down for a moment until he found what he was looking for. \"Here,\" he said, turning the monitor around so that it faced the parents. \"This is a list of the subjects that were uploaded into your child. As you can see, the language subjects were completely corrupted. While we did manage to isolate the affected files, he will have to learn how to speak the old-fashioned way.\"\n\n\"Can he understand us? What about math and science, will we have to send him to a special school?\" asked the mother.\n\nThe doctor shrugged. \"Not necessarily. You can teach him at home, if you like. He understands math and science just fine. I would recommend that you spend more time with him that most parents do, he will not be as independent as other children for the first few years.\"\n\nThe mother and father breathed a sigh of relief. \"That's good to hear, at least.\"\n\n\"Just bring him to me if anything else happens,\" said the doctor.\n\n---\n\nAs the doctor predicted, the child grew up having to learn how to speak. In an age when children could already talk fluently from a very young age, it was an unusual occurrence. His parents tried as best as they could to teach him language, and fortunately he was a fast learner. But his peers, already proficient in the English language from birth, mocked and teased him for his lack of knowledge.\n\nAs a result he poured himself into the study of mathematics. His classmates couldn't be bothered with studying, as they already know the subject, but the child had a reason to prove himself. He had no friends and no one to talk to, so he spent his time in the library, struggling to read math and science books that were several years too advanced for him to understand. \n\nIt was one day when he was reading his favorite book, Simple Mathematics, that he heard someone approach him.\n\n\"Hey, you're the kid that had to learn English naturally, right?\" asked the girl.\n\nThe boy closed the book and gave her an annoyed look. \"Yes. What do you want?\"\n\nThe girl huffed. \"Don't ignore me just because you've got the highest grades in math!\" She looked down and to the side. \"Actually, I've come to ask for, and offer, assistance.\"\n\nThe boy raised an eyebrow. \"Why?\"\n\nShe twiddled her thumbs. \"Well, actually, I'm just like you. The doctors did not upload the mathematics files correctly when i was born, so I had to learn math naturally too. I spend a lot of time at the library too, just to get away from the bullies.\"\n\n\"I've never seen you before.\"\n\n\"You were not looking. I was hiding in the shelves near the literature section. I loved reading stories and books, and I saw you were having trouble reading that math book, so I thought that maybe we can help each other out.\"\n\nThe boy considered her idea. \"You know algebra?\"\n\n\"I know the dictionary definition, but like I said, my knowledge is only limited, I do not even know how to calculate linear equations.\"\n\nThe boy led her to a book on his left. It was an introductory book on algebra. He opened it to the lesson on linear equations. \"Linear equations are easy, I'll show you. But you'll have to help me in our English class, okay?\"\n\n\"Deal.\"\n\nThe girl held out her hand, which the boy shook. \"What's your name?\" asked the girl.\n\n\"Cesar.\"\n\n\"I'm Cleo, nice to meet you.\"\n\n\"Oh, you're that girl that got a perfect score on our last English test.\"\n\nCleo chucked. \"Nice of you to remember me.\"\n\n---\n\nTen years later, Cleo became a bestselling author and journalist, and Cesar published several groundbreaking theories on mathematics.\n\nTwenty years later, Cesar and Cleo married. A years after that, their babies were born, a healthy pair of twins. The uploads went properly this time, but Cleo and Cesar still made sure to teach their children math and literature, and not to rely on just the uploaded knowledge.\n\nThey realized that the uploads were there to give children a head start, not to be dependent on them alone.\n\nAnd the lived happily ever after.\n\n---\n\nContinued because my internet time was running out and I had to log out.\n\nEdited some parts that were contradictory and added more lines for a better flow of the story.*" ]	5
	[WP] Five types of love, Across five different wars, with five different people	[ "(Posting this as five separate comments in the same chain for clarity's sake)\n\nA little oil lamp sent shaking tendrils of light to lick the little boy’s face. He was swaddled tight in a light-blue blanket – dyed violet by the reaching flame – and he had almost nodded off to sleep when the ground above them quaked again. Instinctively, she pulled him closer, curling her lips upwards and closing her eyes.\n\n“Mommy?” He asked, his voice weak and almost drowned out by the sirens.\n\n“Yes dear?” Her voice drifted through the dark room, as soft as she could make it.\n\n“What do the giants look like?”\n\nShe knitted her eyebrows together, hoping he couldn’t see her face in the shadows.\n\n“Well, they look a lot like us, just bigger. Much bigger.” She whispered, running her shaking fingers through his hair. “And when you feel the ground shaking, that’s one of them walking right on top of us.”\n\nHe nestled himself closer to her as another blast came down from the surface, making the walls shake and the floor beneath them tremble. It took everything she had not to cling to him. Brief flashes forced their way into her mind. Flashes of the planes and the bombs, of dust and bone, of crumbled walls and broken homes, but she breathed deep and pushed it all out of her head. There would be time for grief later. Now, she had to live.\n\n“But they can’t get to us as long as we’re down here, sweetie. They’re too big to fit through the door.” She planted a kiss on top of his head, but he still clung tight to her dirty blouse, clenching his eyes tight and shaking his head. She moved her hand slowly down his back, whispering, “Do you want me to sing to you? Would that make it better?”\n\nHe nodded, eyes still closed, tiny hands still closed tight around his mother’s shirt. With a soft smile and a tender voice, she sang.\n\nOh bonnie dearie, how fine the town is. How lovely this town by the sea. The wind and the weather are made all the better by knowing you’ve shared it with me.", "Black and Red\n\n01/08/2012---1630--- Israeli West Bank\n\nHe had done it a thousand times. The wall separating the city, a colossus of concrete, stood 30 ft tall and was nothing short awe inspiring. Alee was on the wrong side, the Israeli side. He reached the wall where he knew a rope was hidden in the sand. He stuffed the package inside his shirt and looked around to make sure there was no one in sight. The sun was still up, but he knew the route of the patrols quite well. \n\nHe then threw the hook over the edge of the wall and began to climb. It had all been worth it and in a few minutes, he would be on his side of land, where his people belonged. Confined in their own homeland for over half a century, like animals kept for slaughter. He wouldn't even have needed to come here if an air strike hadn't blown up the local gift shop. He tried to push these thoughts out of his head. Today is a good day, he thought, a happy day. As he reached the top, he couldn't help but admire the view. The sun was now setting over the Arab settlements. He started to pull the rope up as he saw a trail of smoke in the distant. A patrol? But...why? Had someone complained of an Arab on the wrong side of the wall? His Herbew wasn't perfect, but the shop keeper didn't seem too bothered with the fact and was more than happy to take his money. Strange he thought as he pulled the rope as fast as he could.\n\nThe IDF Jeep halted and 4 soldiers came out. The captain shouted pointing his Rifle at him, \"Oi, shithead. drop the rope back and climb down back on this side if you don't want a hole in your head\". Alee had pulled the rope up by this time and said nothing. He knew that if he did as they asked, they probably would not kill him. They could just let him go or they could take him to prison where he could spend his entire life tortured and branded as a terrorist. They could even kill him on the spot and leave his body for the vultures. It really depended on their mood. No, he thought, not today. He held the rope and lifted up his hands as if giving up. \"That is a good dog\" shouted the Captain. He let the rope in his left hand go and jumped after it. As he fell he reached for the rope with his right hand. His hand slid down the rope and he felt his hand burn. It did however slow him down enough for him to grab the rope with his second hand. This stabilised him and he began to climb down quickly. His heart pounded in his head and he saw the faces of his family before his eyes. The blood from where the rope had cut into his hand made him slip but he somehow stabilised him self. About half way through his hand slipped again and he couldn't quite hold on to the rope. He slammed his entire body on the wall in an effort to break the fall. He slid down the wall, tumbling as he went. He fell on the edge of the tarmac on the other side. He let out a sigh of relief and said out aloud to himself, \"I'm still alive\". He scrambled to get up and began to run, the adrenalin of the moment pushing him on.\n\nAs he ran along the road he heard a car behind him. He turned around to see the IDF Jeep. Shit he thought, SHIT. He started to run towards the houses. If I can get to the streets and alleys, I'll be fine, he thought. These were his streets, he knew them well. He darted into the first alley he saw. The Jeep stopped, the soldiers got off and ran after him. One of them screaming in his radio, \"Yellow....yellow\" As Alee navigated the labyrinth, he realised much to his relief that his house was not far away, a few hundred yards perhaps. He was going to make it after all. They would stop looking in a few minutes and forget the whole thing. He hadn't really done anything wrong had he? Sure, climbing over the wall was illegal but everyone did it.\n\nHe came out of an alley way into a courtyard. It was surprisingly empty and the shops were all closed. Must be an unplanned curfew, he thought to himself. His house was just on the other side now. He ran through as fast as he could, a few feet away from the alley that lead to his house. He heard a shout from behind him \"Stop, dog, or I will fire\". Nearly there, he thought. As he was turning into the alley, pain exploded in his left side and suddenly felt too tired to run or even stand up. There was no sound and he felt....dizzy and wet. He feel right inside the alley and turned on his back to look up to the sky. He looked on left side of his torso which was now a fountain of black and red. He lay there, looking up at the crimson sky. He didn't try to move, it was.....so peaceful to just give in. He looked down again, his yellow shirt stained in his own flesh and blood. He reached into his shirt and took out the package and looked at at. A colouring book and a set of 24 colours. The book was now drenched in blood. This was probably not the colour the publishers had in mind, he thought to himself. He lay there as it grew darker.\n\nThe IDF officers walked up to him. The Captain knelt down and picked up the book, \"For this?\", he asked, \"You pathetic dog\". He threw the book back at his face and began to discuss something with his fellow soldiers. Alee gathered all his strength and tried to speak. One of the soldiers pointed at him and the officer knelt down again coming closer to listen to what he was saying. Alee, with all his strength said in his broke Hebrew, \"My sister....birthday\" \n\nHe began to cough as the blood filled his lungs. The officer just shook his head and let out a sigh. He talked with his other officers for a bit and they tossed a coin. Alee looked on as 3 of them started to go back to their Jeep leaving one soldiers behind. \n\nThe soldier now looked at Alee and pulled out his gun. The soldier looked young, barely 20 years old. His hand shook as he pointed at Alee's head. A solitary tear ran down his left cheek and as he whispered \"I am sorry, boy\". He pulled the trigger.\n\n\n\n Note: This story is about the love of a brother for his sister. This was my first attempt at writing. I will write more if people like it. ", "I looked into the water and saw myself. Our troop was going to set it on fire soon, but I looked into the water. I saw what I was. This rich persons house had fine clothes but that is not why I am in the roman army. I am here because I love myself.\n\nI looked into her eyes and saw hope. The french government had been a strict regime but I was well off and I was not like her. It was something else that motivated her. I saw my hope that I lost. I ran away and was with her for the rest of her life. I am here because I love my wife.\n\nI looked into their eyes and saw courage. We locked them away and tortured them, but they still where strong. Now was the day that we killed them all, in one painful group. I saw the courage I lost, because I could not pull the leaver. I died knowing that Hitler might have been wrong. I am here because I love courage.\n\nI looked into his eyes and I saw loss. We had been stationed in Afghanistan for five days and never talked to the locals. I saw him several days prior and he always looked hopeless and hungry, same as his child. Then the air strikes, he made it out, his son did not. I saw the pain of loss, because he brought me his son. I looked into the eyes of this dead boy and saw all of the life that had been wasted. I am in therapy for my love of humanity. \n\nI looked into the monitor and saw destruction. Entire warships falling back to earth. The alien ships where falling and giving a distress call. We lost a lot of good men that day, but I saved humanity. From what, I question to myself. I saw the destruction of communications for the next thousand years. If only we had found out why they did what they did and how they communicated without destroying them first. I am in this peace ship to their home world because I love creation.\n\n" ]	3
	[WP] NASA observes a massive shadow in the light of a nearby star. Two days later, the star has disappeared.	[ "Local system date: 31st April, 2016\n\nConverted SS date: 18.70.12\n\nIt started 6 months ago. Gliese 876, a relatively nearby star to us, just 15 light years away. A small distance compared to all of space. \n\nNASA detected an anomaly near the star. Some sort of massive shadow, it would seem. Then a couple of days later, Gliese 876 simply vanished. There was much speculation. Bits about aliens, and some more reasonable theories. Of course, most people believed in the suggestions put out by scientists, that it wasn't anything dangerous, and could've been something perfectly normal, albeit unexpected.\n\nFew people wanted to think it was something else. Then a pattern became apparent. Star after star disappeared, each with shadows right next to them just before they vanished. Then the real panic set in. Suddenly, all the conspiracy theories seemed more plausible. \n\nMore and more stars were gone everyday. This went on, until all of the brightest stars we could see were gone. There were still the far away ones, of course, but that wasn't important to anyone.\n\n6 months of madness. 6 months of rioting, looting, murder, and the general break down of society. It was getting closer all the time. \n\nWhatever it was, it was traveling with frightening speed. \n\nMy family is gone. Now, on what is probably my last day, I watch as the massive object draws nearer. It has already consumed the outer planets, as well as Mars. I wonder if anyone is going to survive. Most likely this is the end, for all of us.\n\nInterval of estimated 5 SS turns\n\nIt's right above us now. A huge black sphere, looming over our heads. Few people remain near my area. I've watched as one of my neighbours went outside. He stared at the sphere, and a bright light illuminated him. Then he was suddenly incinerated into nothingness.\n\nI feel tired. Maybe it's best if I go outside. Yes, that sounds like a good idea. Just to see what all the fuss was about. I'll just take a quick walk out. Just a quick one. I'll be right back... \n\nEnd of log. Origin location: Orion-Cygnus arm.\n\nAnalysis of star region corresponds with threat detailed in log. Advise immediate response. \n\nWould you like to see recommended courses of action?", "“Next up on CNN, An entire star stolen from the sky! NASA’s telescopes have seen something amazing, and terrifying. An entire star disappearing over the span of two days. What could have caused this, and is our own Sun at risk? Here to join us we have John Belcher, a professor in astrophysics from MIT. Welcome John.”\n\n“Happy to be here”\n\n“So, this missing star, it has a lot of people talking, what can you tell us? Could this happen to our sun?”\n\nchuckling “Well Don, I don’t think so, while this does have astronomers and scientists intrigued we don’t believe there’s any risk to Earth. Ross 128 is, well I should say was, a red dwarf star and is over 10 light years away.”\n\n“So, what could cause this star to go missing? Could it be a black hole? Some people are saying it could even be an advanced alien civilization.”\n\n“To be honest we aren’t sure yet, there are a couple of theories, obviously some are more… creative. There’s no reason to think aliens are involved though, that’s very unlikely. And a black hole would give off many other signs that we simply aren’t seeing at Ross 128. \n\nThe simplest theory is that the star simply stopped fusing and died out. Dwarf stars are very small compared to our Sun, Ross 128 was only 0.15 solar masses, so it has much less hydrogen fuel that it can use.”\n\n“So you’re saying it simply ran out of gas essentially?”\n\n“Yes that’s one theory, I personally think it’s unlikely, the estimated lifespan for a red dwarf is a trillion years and if it did run out of fuel we would expect it to transition into a white dwarf, which would still be visible to our telescopes.”\n\n“So you mentioned that there would be signs if it was a black hole that was causing this, could you explain that a bit more, what signs would we see?”\n\n“Of course, if a black hole moved towards another star we would see that star, and the stars behind it, appear to move around. This is because of gravitational lensing, a black hole warps the light around it. So as a black hole moves it would distort the light of the stars behind, sort of like looking through a glass of water.”\n\n“Ok so you’re saying we can rule out a black hole. What else could cause this?” \n\n“Another theory is that the star is being occluded by a large dark object, a rogue planet. It would have to be something very large and of low density to both completely block Ross 128 and not emit any light itself. This sort of dark object would be impossible to see unless it crossed the path of a star.”\n\n“So you’re suggesting massive invisible planets could be wandering around we have no way of seeing them coming? That’s frightening to think about.”\n\n“It would be the first evidence of a rogue planet, I think that astronomers would find that pretty exciting.”\n\n“So is there a chance we’ll look up at night and see more stars disappearing this way?”\n\n“Well Ross 128, even though it’s one of the closest stars to Earth, is actually not visible to the naked eye. It’s a very small and dim star, and so it can only be seen with infrared telescopes. So you definitely won’t be able to see this in your backyard.”\n\n“How long will it be before we have an answer to this?”\n\n“Well it’s only been two days so far, it’s certainly received a lot of interest in that time so a lot more people will be looking very closely to see what’s happening there. There is simply a lot we don’t understand about star lifespans, this could be a very common phenomenon we just haven’t noticed before.”\n\n\"Thanks so much for your time professor. This just in, breaking news! Justin Bieber has been arrested again! We’ll bring you the latest updates as they arrive.\n\nAuthor's Note: Ross 128 is a real star, you can read more about it [here ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_128). I tried to make a story that was plausible, Occam's razor and all that. I could have made the answer a dyson sphere, or a fly blocking the lens, but that seemed like cheating a bit." ]	2
	[WP] A canny ruler in a fantasy world realises the economic repercussions of dungeons full of loot lying around and decides to do something about it.	[ "The dragon was having a peaceful slumber, happily inclined to do so until stupid adventures thought they could take her on. They made nice meals once cooked properly. What she did not expect however was a plump looking man to throw a rock at her. That was just rude.\n\n“Before you attempt to eat me,” The man called out to the dragon that was slowly slinking forward. “I’ll let you know I'm a shade. I can’t exactly die. Now onto the first order of business, how much do you think all this” He gestured to the vast amounts of wealth she had collected during her long life. “Is worth?”\n\nThe dragon was slightly taken aback; the man wasn’t here to battle her but to appraise her fortune?\n\n“I’ll give you a hint.” The man called out. “You could buy maybe 1, 2 mansions with this. About 100 years back all this would net you about 10 mansions.”\n\nThat was silly the dragon thought. A coin was a coin, a coin doesn’t lose value.\n\nThe man continued. “Most of that comes from the gems and other such items. Now” The man clapped his hands together and stepped forward. “onto my second order of business. The nearby kingdom of Priteing Wrompts knows that all dragons wish to hold the most value possible. What if I told you we were able to exchange these worthless coins for gems and other such items?”\n\nThe dragon could smell something bad about this, the man was telling the truth, but how much she didn’t know.\n\n“Before you suspect me of cheating you out of a fortune I’ll let you know this. Gems are highly and I mean highly sought after by anyone and everyone. The kingdom even has many mines dedicated to gem mining. Problem is we lose quite a bit of money when trading these gems from travel expenditure to being raided almost weekly. What I propose is that we send these gems to you, more as a trade then an offering. You see, no one will want to attack a dragon’s lair, no one is stupid enough other than those adventures.”\n\nThe dragon was now thoroughly interested in what the man had to say but had coiled her body around the man to prevent escape and to intimidate the man into giving her a better deal. He didn’t seem to be intimidated.\n\n“By doing so and sending gems to you we will cause the prices of gems to practically skyrocket. Your worth will increase dramatically and you’d be able to by those 10 mansions again, not that you’ll need them.”\n\nThe coils tightened around the man, the space he had to move around in decreasing.\n\n“And what if I say no? What if I decline this offer and tell you that I care little of worth?” The coils stopped just short of touching the man, no more room to move then a broom cupboard. \n\n“To answer the second question first we will know you will be lying, all dragons crave worth. As for the first we will continue to sell gems causing the price to drop and thus your only source or worth will be rendered obsolete. What do you say to this deal?”\n\n---\n\n“I don’t know how you managed to convince a dragon to do this but Dave; I could kiss you right now.” The king said to his personal shade. “This solves the money issue for now and we should have enough to prevent the starving from last year.” The king slumped back into his throne, the eagerness of his youth being replaced long ago. “I love win-win situations.”\n", "\"Housecarl, Call my adviser in.\"\n\nJarl Isleif generally wasn't concerned with events that happened outside his reach of power. As far as he was concerned, the other Jarls could fend for themselves. In fact, he was feeling on edge today. Winter was approaching soon, and the harvest had been slightly under what was predicted.\n\n\"Yes, My lord?\" said Isleifs adviser Elana, slightly upset she had been called in during the twilight hours.\n\n\"Do you remember the man who came in 3 days ago? Claimed he cleared out the bandit hive in Shattershin Cave?\"\n\nElana pondered this for a moment. The man had claimed the 200 gold reward that Isleif had put out on the bandits who had been stealing crops and livestock.\n\n\"I remember. He came two days before that dressed in leather asking about work, and came back in full iron afterwards.\"\n\n\"That's just it Elana.\" Isleif siad, becoming more upset by the minute. \"It seemed like he didn't care about the gold we gave him.\"\n\n\"I was at the Inn that night\" Elana said, thinking back to that night. \"He was bragging about all of the loot he had found while exploring. He started a brawl with the strongest warrior in town for a 300 gold pot like the money was horse feed.\n\nIsleif had had enough by this point \"Send word to the High King. I won't stand for this.\"\n\n\"Of course, My Lord. What shall i tell him?\" \n\n\"Tell him I'm going to start taxing adventurers\"\n " ]	2
	[WP] You are surrounded, there seems to be no escape, and at what seems to be your last moment, the door gets kicked in, They have come	[ "I scooted myself backwards across the dusty floor. Absentmindedly I thought about dirtying the white skirt that encircled my waist. It was a silly thought though; the skirt was long past the pristine and starched piece of clothing I had adorned that morning. The smooth bottom of my patent leather mary janes offered next to no traction on the wooden floor. Every time they slipped I prayed no one heard the noise of the sole scuffing along the floorboards. The sound was cacophonous in this tiny closet. \n\nAfter an eternal moment, I could feel the rough plaster of the wall pressed to my back. The thin material of my formerly white shirt offered no protection from the scratchy ridges of the wall. I pulled my knees to my chin and tried to calm my ragged breathing. Any noise could give me away. How I wish I could just stop my breath from making noise! I closed my eyes and focused on my breathing. Slowly in through my nose, tiny breaths out though my mouth. I could hear my heart thundering in my ears, off the walls, causing a racket. I took assessment of my injuries. My wrists and ankles were red and raw from the friction of ropes. I had a 3 inch cut across my lower left thigh just above my knee. Although it wasn’t deep I knew that fleeing for too much longer was going to be a problem without fixing it up first. Another, deeper cut extended from my right shoulder blade to about my spine. It made using my right arm difficult.\n\nThis was the first time since escaping where I wasn’t running, the hiding seemed a safe option for now. They were far enough behind me that I could take stock of myself and come up with a much more long term plan. Home was no longer an option. I know I’d let my parents down by not performing the privilege that had be bestowed on me since birth. The community would also have shunned me, who knows what kind of consequences my actions would have on them. I may have just doomed them all to starvation or any other number of unpleasant deaths. I might just have to keep running for the rest of my life. However long that may end up being. The climate this time of year was on the verge of unforgiving. Short days and frozen nights made trekking though the surrounding woods a non viable plan. Not to mention any animals that 16 year old 104 pound me might stumble across. I had no survivalist skills; I had lead my entire life until this point in a cozy suburban home.\n\nSomething broke my out of my thoughts. There was a loud regular thumping coming from the floor below. I sucked in my breath, afraid to make even the slightest of noises. It came again.\n\nThump.\n\nThump.\n\nTHUMP.\n\nTHUMP.\n\nThe regularity of the thumping was broken by the sound of splintering wood. Fuck, I was going to have to find a different way out, and fast. Pulling myself around so I was partially facing the wall, I ran my fingers along the plaster, hoping to find some kind of catch or release. The din of boots filled my ears as I frantically kept searching. The stomping spread underneath me, they were searching every corner. I prayed as I ran my hand across the floor, asking for a latch anything to get me out of this tiny space. The thudding began to come up the stairs. I could feel hot prickly tears sliding down my face. Why didn’t this house have any servant’s halls or compartments! Frantically, I tried the other walls and rest of the floor, almost not feeling the splinters lodge themselves in my hands, the delicate skin of my fingers. The boots were coming closer. Abruptly it stopped. I mentally prepared myself to put up a fight. I would kick scratch and bite my way free. I was not going to come meekly. If I had to die trying so be it.\n\n\nThe door swung open and I was momentarily blinded. The light quickly swiveled around as I heard a booming voice call out that he found something. He came into slowly came into focus. The drill sergeant hat perched atop his head, the drab brown button down shirt. He was a state trooper. I let out a tiny sigh of relief. He wouldn’t know who I was or why I was hiding. He was there to protect me.\n\n\n“Come on out. It’s okay now.” His baritone rumbled into the miniscule space, as he bent forward.\nI crawled towards him and he lifted me up, almost as if I was nothing. His left arm slid behind my knees and his right arm held me tightly around the waist. I felt myself relax against him as I heard him bark out orders to the other troopers about a hospital and making sure there was no one else hiding in this abandoned house. The static of his shoulder radio, almost too quiet to hear, crackled in my ear as I laid my head on his shoulder.\n\n“Dispatch, the sacrifice is in custody, proceeding back to ceremonial grounds now.”\n", " Outside all I can hear is the crashing and thundering of feet against the cement. The roars and screams are now overwhelming. My mind is racing and my heart is pounding. I have taken shelter in what seems to be an abandoned classroom. I have managed to secure safe haven in what seems to be under some sort of deployed parachute and have surrounded myself with various distractions and traps.\n\n I fear it may be to late. They are at the door. Scratching at the door like a falcon hunting down its prey. The pounding has stopped and I feel my time has come. The door flew open with the rage of dragon. The hinges squealed and almost broke tearing the door from the frame. I have accepted my fate and the ravenous pack have found me and one the monsters turns to me and with a hellish grin. \"Tag you're it!\" \n It is all over now. It is my turn to hunt." ]	2
	[WP] There were Heroes when I was a boy.	[ "There were heroes when I was a boy.\n\n\nMen who walked on the sky. Men who risked life and limb for the good of humanity, for the experience, for science and knowledge. Men who rose on chariots of fire and noise, chariots that deafened everyone around them and awed the masses. These were fearless men on the forefront of life. These were men who defied their destiny to remain forever tethered to the ground. These were men who explored the heavens and made them reachable. They walked upon other worlds, explored places nobody had ever been in the history of mankind.\n\n\nMen with names like Yuri Gagarin, Alan Shepherd, Neil Armstrong, Jim Lovell, and Chris Hadfield. These men pushed the limits of humanity without being told to. They did it because their hunger for the knowledge was greater than the fear of the unknown. They did it because they wanted to, not because anybody told them they had too.\n\n\nAnd now, as I sit in my capsule with my crewmates hundreds of miles away from home, the earth the size of a raindrop in the window, I realize that we're not the heroes. They are. All the people on that tiny blue marble, the people who suffer, work, cry, laugh, and live. They are each heroes in their own right. \n\n\n\nThere were heroes when I was a boy, and there still are. Today more than ever.", "There were Heroes, when I was a boy.\n\nNow, we only have the self-interested. The survivors. Those who will do what they can do put another day on the tally of their lives. No greater schemes; no grander plans. Nothing for others. Nothing for our people.\n\nBut when I was a boy, there were Heroes.\n\nWhat's that, lad?\n\nAh, bless your heart. I'll tell you. A Hero is one who fights for others. Who stands up for what is right. Who does what needs to be done to protect. For all of us, lad. You understand that? For all of us.\n\nLike what? What do you mean?\n\nLike who?\n\nLike, specific stories? I can do that.\n\nWell, first, there were the Men who Went to War. They took their lives in their hands and killed other men to protect us.\n\nWell, no. Nobody was actually coming to kill us.\n\nWell, they were protecting our... I guess you don't have a word for it now, but we used to call it 'economic interests'. They basically let us continue to live the way we were living.\n\nOf course to the detriment of others. How else would you sustain something like that, you little scamp? They fought for our... well, not safety. But certainly for the safety of our many comforts.\n\nWell, yeah. If you want to look at it that way. There were certain - individuals, I guess - who would do stuff like that. They shot people who didn't deserve it. Raped anyone who wouldn't stab them. Bombed the shit out of civilians who had no idea what was going on. But they weren't the heroes, you know. The heroes were the ones who didn't do that.\n\nCome on, lad. Come on. Don't be like that. What sense does that make? A claim like that? That our soldiers were heroes by default unless they committed heinous acts that by all logic shouldn't be committed by moral human beings anyway?\n\nWell, what about the philanthropists? Those that dedicated their lives to causes? Like sheltering the homeless?\n\nWhat? No. There were still loads of homeless. But they -\n\nWell, all the ones I know about were really rich, yeah. \n\nNo, huge houses. But there were those that cured disease. They -\n\nWell, no, there wasn't any real progress in that regard, no. I mean there was this guy who dedicated billions to getting rid of malaria, and he...\n\nYeah, I know what you're going to say.\n\nNo, millions died from malaria. Horrible, horrible, deaths. But that's not the mark of a hero. A hero tries.\n\nI guess, technically, you could describe people who tried and didn't succeed to be 'failures', yeah. \n\nI guess you could say that 'failures' can't be considered heroes. But they -\n\nOh, what about the everyday heroes? The people that saved a cat from being crushed by a train, or pulled an orphan from a burning building?\n\nName one? Really? Well...\n\nI don't agree with your logic. I don't believe that if someone is a hero you should be able to name them. \n\nWell it did make an impact. To the person who was saved. I know that's not the same as what you're talking about, but that doesn't make it less heroic.\n\nOK, OK. I see your point. There's a division between 'noble' and 'hero'. I'm glad you agree there are many acts of nobility. Kindness. Grace. \n\nSo a hero?\n\nWhat about the actors who... no, forget that.\n\nWhat about the...\n\nLook, lad. You'll just have to take it from me. There were thousands of heroes in the time that i lived. We just didn't know what the word meant until there weren't any left.\n\n_______________________\nEdit: Rampant italics\n\n", "There were Heroes when I was a boy, but I looked away from them. I looked east to the rising sun and said, \"I will know no cold in my life, no gray-faced hardness but kindness, no needing my neighbor like another leg or arm. I'm a child of the sun.\"\n\nAnd they went out with their axes and their hard weathered hands, and they shouldered the firewood from the grinding North Dakota snow, and they shouldered each other, and they shouldered the world, but I looked away from them to the fire and said, \"I will know no wearing on my life, no stooping grimness but sureness, no needing my neighbor like a pillar for my roof. I'm a child of the fire.\"\n\nAnd the war-pictures came and I puffed with the blood and the color and the songs. I huffed at Germany. And the Heroes sat low in the fields with their backs to the rows of wheat and corn, and they looked at the world that was killing them, and they remembered the trenches and the bullets and the millions all holding frozen together like tin-men to keep a line, to keep a road, to keep a bridge, to keep a nothing patch of earth that was not alive but was life itself to the gray men hanging onto it. But I looked away from them to the war, and I said, \"I will know no doubt of life, no awesome meekness but happiness, no needing my neighbor like a rampart. I'm a child of glory.\"\n\nAnd when I came back broken, shaken, shattered, Ally, Nazi, Jewish, hungry, killer, killed, and killing, everything now part of me, now gone from me, but North Dakota's soil working up my feet and hands and arms into my blood an earthen miracle, not redemption, but of mending - then I sat there with the others and we ate and drank and needed, for there were never any Heroes, and the corn-crop is Valhalla, and God is just the sky.\n\n-----\n\nEDIT: Thank you all so much for the comments! More stuff at r/droptoprocket" ]	3
	[WP] You have finally defeated your nemesis. You go to unmask them, but their face is not what you were expecting.	[ "The rain started to fall as a young detective began walking up to the soon to be corpse that was his nemesis. His nemesis had lost his balance as blood was escaping from his side on to the concrete floor of the lighthouse. Details of his hooded robe fluctuated out of focus as the light made its rounds along its axis, spreading its illumination across the restless sea. The detective's face was worn from years of overwhelming stress and it was translated well as he began to address the hooded man in an grizzled tone.\n\n\"For years we have been engaged in a deadly game of cat and mouse and too many innocent lives had been caught in the crossfire. You wear a mask to hide himself from the world's prying eyes and to sink into the background once your latest scheme had been accomplished. But you can only run so long. Game over.\"\n\nThe detective drew his gun and knelt down so that he was eye level with his target. Slowly he reached to removed the mask off the man who had stolen years of his life as well as the lives of his friends and family. In shock he fell back and began crawling backward, shaking his head in disbelief. The man who was knocking on death's doorstep beared the spitting image of the detective. Gripping the side rail he stood tall as a bolt of lightning struck off on the horizon. It outlined his silhouette at the cost of drowning out the beginning of his sentence. \n\n\"But you are right, John. Game over.\" The man said smiling to reveal his bloody teeth and a cylindrical object that he had hidden in his sleeve. \n\nShort moments passed until a series of explosions riddled the lighthouse causing the top floor to detach from the base. The two began their rapid descent into the frigid waters below, still locked in shock the young detective closed his eyes to accept his fate.\n\nA young child awoke in the middle of the night in terror and beckoned for his mother. She entered his room quizzically and asked what was the matter as she laid the back of her hand on his forehead. Flustered the boy locked eyes with his mother and answered \n\n\"I don't know.\" ", "At his feet laid the Tyrant, lifeless. \nA thousand years of iron reign was brought to an end on that summer night.\nThe Rebel holstered his smoking weapon and kneeled beside the corpse.\nIn the skies above, exploding battleships illuminated the night like hundreds of fireworks. The Rebel reached for the Mask of the Tyrant, and removed it.\n\n\"So this is what you look like\", he whispered, disappointed. \"That won't do, no one will believe it.\"\n\nThe Rebel stood up, and walked toward the body a guard who died in vain, defending his master.\n\n\"I'm sorry, they need a face to hate. The people will demand it.\" he said, partly to convince himself, before chopping the guard's head off and placing it in the Mask. \"Maybe your death can serve a purpose.\"\n\nAcross the galactic network, the Face of the Tyrant was revealed. For the first time, the ninety-seven planets saw their ruler. His was ugly, with a dirty scar on his forehead and blood stains around his mouth. The disgusting face of a disgusting man. The people cheered throughout the Empire. The people believed.\n\nIn the Royal Chamber, the Rebel gently passed his hand on the face of the Tyrant to close his eyes. A face that undoubtedly possessed all the features granted by the presence of an extra 21st chromosome.\n\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] There are now "dream servers" in which multiple people can experience the same dream.	[ "The buffering was always the worst. Really broke the immersion of it. Not enough to wake you, just enough to ruin the illusion.\n\nThe latest hardware upgrade that Aesthesia Industries had installed had cut down on it quite a bit, but it still happened on the most popular ones. You just kind of had to get used to it. If you wanted to win the Super Bowl or be a rock star, you were going to have to be prepared for your dream to freeze for a few seconds mid-touchdown pass or guitar solo.\n\nIt wasn’t so bad if you picked one of the fringe ones. Like climbing a mountain or farming on Venus or some shit like that. And there was enough variety in the flying ones that you could normally find one with a pretty low user pop. I actually found one where you get to be a tiger hunting a zebra that’s pretty fun, and there’s almost never anyone on it.\n\nIt’s the user-uploaded ones that are starting to weird me out. I was fine with the stock dreams, I didn’t need all the community-driven custom ones they’re pushing on us. Why the fuck do I want to dream that I am stuck in your shitty corporate job, and I didn’t prepare for the big meeting? And the worst part is, you can’t opt out. If you want to experience one of their dreams, you have to agree that they may datamine your own. You don’t want to know how many people have chosen my fantasy dream about my 6th grade math teacher. It’s fucking creepy.\n\nBut, that’s the price I have to pay. If I want to dream that I am driving a tank or fighting crime or leading a Viking raiding party, I have to realize that somewhere, someone is going to end up dreaming about the house I grew up in. \n\nAh, well. C’est la rêver.\n\nNow. Off to try this week’s black bag special. I do love a surprise. Last week I ended up being Prime Minister of Atlantis. Pretty fucking weird, but I got into it after a while. Can’t wait to see what this week’s is. \n\nGoodnight. \n", "I step onto the front porch with just pajamas and some snow boots on, thinking I'll only be out there for a second. The air is so cold it's solid, and the snow makes it so I can't hear anything, but the moon is so bright I can see all the trees, and now the house is gone. Woodsmoke and dry nostrils. I walk up a hill until I'm at the top and I can see the whole town. But it's not just a town with warm lights, it's mountains with the moon shining on them and dark lakes between them, stretching out to the horizon with galaxies above. I'm in so much awe my heart breaks. \n\nHe remembers we're supposed to go to our cabin out there by one of the lakes. When he shows up, we hop on a snowmobile and ride past a cave I know I shouldn't look into, past a wolf in the shadows, too close to the edge of a cliff, but finally we reach the cabin. Inside there's hot stew and blankets and why didn't I wear a coat? It's freezing! A woman's sitting on the couch but we can just act like everything's fine and sneak past her. I'm waiting for him in the bedroom, I need him here, where is he? He's not in the cabin anymore and the snowmobile is gone and how am I going to get back to town if I have to walk past that cliff, that wolf, that cave, please God not the cave!\n\nI wake up sobbing and double over onto the floor. My counselor, the woman on the couch, leans down beside me and rubs my back while I cry and snot and spit. Not one of my more graceful moments, which just makes me ashamed. She helps me back up onto the chair and wipes my face. \n\n\"I know this feels like you're moving backwards, but it was your first time. Believe me, I saw more than enough to know that you can and will get though this.\"\n\nI'm almost numb again as the dream wears off. \"Yeah, thanks. It's so weird to see him, you know? Almost like he's alive again.\"", "\"Where the hell is Ted? We said we're doing the Rogner raid today, right?\" The woman asked as she adjusted her metal armor and looked around. The landscape wish it could just be barren. Massive pools of lava flowed past her and the rest of the small group of armor clad explorers as they leaked from a massive volcano in the distance. At the top a ring of black soot circled menacingly.\n\n\"No clue. Did he forget the server name?\" Another adventurer asked. He seemed to be looking through a book with strange runes on each page, as though he was memorizing them. The woman looked at him and sighed. \n\n\"Carl, please tell me you memorized the right spells for this,\" She asked him with worry, \"We can't have you only knowing fire spells here.\"\n\n\"Relax, Sarah, I got this.\" The man replied, waving her off, \"I spent my day off making sure I only had ice and water spells.\"\n\n\"You took a day off for this? Friggen mages, man.\" Another man in the group said with a slight chuckle as he twirled an arrow from his quiver in his hands as he squatted by the lava.\n\n\"Hey, I had to! You know how hard it is to keep memory of stuff when you cross the Sodeep river. Hell, I barely remember we do these fights after I wake up.\"\n\n\"Drink more warm milk, it'll help.\"\n\nAs they chatted a man materialized next to them bit-by-bit, as though he was being downloaded from a server. He was clad in the same armor as the others but seemed to have Christian symbols around his neck.\n\n\"Sorry, sorry guys, sorry I'm late.\" He said hurriedly, \"The neighbor's dog wouldn't shut up, I couldn't get any sleep.\"\n\n\"The neighbor's dog? Isn't it, like, 3 AM where you live? Christ, you need to talk to him about that.\" Sarah said. The man laughed sheepishly.\n\n\"Yeah....anyway, we're good to go?\"\n\n\"I'd say so. Thankfully most of the people on the server are awake now so we won't have too many people trying to kill Rogner at the same time. You remember the plan, right? Sodeep River can be-\"\n\n\"Sarah, c'mon, I practically breathe healing spell chants. I got this.\" Ted said smugly. Sarah nodded and drew her sword and shield.\n\n\"Alright then, let's roll! I don't want to accidentally jerk awake, it'll take me an hour just to get back in.\" She said as she pointed the sword towards the mountain. The group followed behind them as the four heroes headed towards the volcano towering in front of them, ready to slay the massive Rogner for his legendary equipment.", "I browsed through the interface looking for something interesting, but I already knew all the options. \"The ultimate sexual experience\", \"The haunted house\", \"Exotic vacation\"... They hadn't released a new dream experience in close to a month now, and I was getting tired of the same old stuff. \n\"Update needed\" sign suddenly covered the whole screen. Right in time! Perhaps they will add something interesting. I pushed \"OK\" and it took a couple seconds to reboot. I scrolled through it excitedly, perhaps they had a new sexual experience with a new porn star? Didn't look like it so far... One caught my interest though. \"Experimental - Share your dream with somebody else.\" I had heard of them teasing this option, the ability to share dreams with another person, a year ago or so. Then it just seemed like far fetched rumors, but apparently they had now launched a beta option today. I selected it without thinking twice and made myself comfortable in the sleeping pod. \n\nI was staring at Hitler. His eyes were wide open and he was gasping for air. In my hand I hold a knife dripping with blood. \n\"About time you showed up\". A young female voice cut through the air. I looked behind me and a beautiful young lady stood there impatiently looking at me. \"I was beginning to wonder if this shared dream experience wasn't working properly. \" \"Killing Hitler, must be a new one huh?\" I tried to be nonchalant but I was freaking out over how cool this was. An actual living person in my dream, and a beautiful girl too. \"Yeah, you should think they would find something more original, I mean, after all we have been killing Stalin and Mao for close for a year now, they are soon out of dictators to kill. I laughed nervously. She was way out of my league, but it didn't seem she had noticed it yet. \n\n \"Adolf?\" Some Germans were shouting outside the door, trying to open it frantically. \"Shit, we better hurry out here\" I said, realizing she was already ahead of me. She crawled out of the window and jumped on a mattress three stories down. \"I laid them here before you got here!\" She shouted excitedly. \"Now you jump!\" \"Cool!\" I shouted back, walking a couple of steps backwards, then leaping through the air. Shit, I had managed to jump too far completely missing the mattress watching the asphalt getting closer and closer in what seemed like slow motion. \"Idiot\" I hear she shouting before I woke up gasping in my sleeping pod again. \"Death, dream terminated\" flashed on the interface. " ]	4
Inspired by General Patton [who believed that he may have been a military leader killed in action in Napoleon's army in a previous life, or a Roman legionary.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_S._Patton#Image)	[WP] A general is reincarnated throughout the ages, winning a war in each lifetime.	[ "I felt so tired. I felt so tired and everyone was waiting for me to make the call.\n\nThe chaos around me was boiling up. All kinds of voices trying to shout over each other - frantic, scared, desperate, demanding. The bleeping and buzzing and humming of radios and radars washed over it like an angry sea. It hit my head like a raging wave... Damn you all! Just give me a few more seconds. Just a few more damned seconds! I need just a little bit of time to make sense of all of it! How how did the airplanes get through the early warning system? It must have been an accident. A slip up. Nobody is responding but the fault lines are silent. They must have just gone. Damn them! They were supposed to be on duty festivities or not! Damn those religious bastards! \n\nNo, no, no we can't do it. This is not yet the time. It's too early and the risk is too great. We can fight back and fight them off just like six years ago. There's no need to put a torch the the whole damn region just because some politicians are suddenly shitting their pants... My adjutant is talking to me but I can't hear him because of all that bloody noise... What is he..\n\n'Sir! Sir... we have the message from general Haig'\n\nWhat?\n\n'Sir! We are to immediately reinforce the push towards La Fere.Belay all other standing orders from command!'\n\nWhat did you say?\n\nI shake nervously trying to chase off the drowsiness. My eyelids feel like cast lead barely moving despite my inhuman effort to pry them open. I closed them just for a moment. Did I fall asleep? A young officer with a concerned look on his face is standing before me handing me a terminal. It's quiet and peaceful. The room would be almost dark if not for the gentle green backlight of large tactical displays. There is no noise, no panic just a barely and a small quiet stream of audio reports seeping in from task force coordinators. A gentle smell of ozone is in the air just as if audible hum of ventilators after a sudden violent storm. \n\nA storm before a storm. Just like that one time in Britain. Just like that first time in Britain...\n\n Where was that? Darant? Len? Or was it somewhere further north of Thames? No... no... Funny how I could never find that spot even after all those years of searching. But it had this peculiar name. A tricky one - always slipping from the tip of my tongue. Eden? No ... no that's where my house once was. Very much unlike a paradise. What was the name....? That bloody damned cursed place! That's where it started. At least that's where I think it all started. So many times... A beginning of this unending cycle of torment... Damn! I can't be even sure of that, can I? How much I'd give now to go back and run right into the nearest spear, right into the middle of the enemy line, right in... \n\nMedway! That's it... Medway and all the fields of mud straddling it. It should have ended then and there. But they ran... they broke and ran and I was foolish enough to chase after them... And I haven't stopped ever since. I couldn't stop ever since.\n\nI turn around and look at the civilian in the dark suit standing behind me. His face is ash grey just like his hair is. Blank with utter despair, his eyes wide with terror. I want to tell him that I want to stop. That storms like those come and go and there's nothing that can change it. But this time it won't be just a storm but a maelstrom of fire. The end to everything and everyone I know... but something tells me it won't be the end of me. \n\nI can't stop. Not this time.I feel so tired. I can finally feel the weight of all those years. I open my mouth and I see the man forcing his mouth and throat to swallow nervously. He doesn't understand. I smile. Sadly.\n\n'Mister president. It seems I will need to ask you for your key....'\n\n", "I stood on a hill top, surrounded by the scream of steel, and dying men. I surveyed the orgy of gore below, watching the ebb and flow of the battle. A thousand of my infantry, less every second, fought to hold their line. Their swords flashing and shields held high. I signaled to my banner man, who raised a blue checkered flag. From an obscured canyon on the left, a hundred heavy cavalrymen began their charge. They collided with the flank of our enemy, carving a swathe of destruction deep into the formation. The tide began to turn, my well-disciplined soldiers advancing as my cavalry nipped at the periphery. \n\n“Scout reports enemy in full retreat” shouted a runner minutes later as he crested the hill.\n\nI nodded, silent. Winning battles never made me happy, but I was good at it… the best. And if being good at it saved the life of my friends family and countrymen, I would do my service…\n\n…\n\nCannon fire ripped the air, like thunder crafted by the hands of men. I watched horrified as fountains of gore erupted from the surprised and devastated ranks of soldiers I had ambushed. Gone were the days of neat and orderly lines. This was brutal warfare. Guerilla tactics that emphasized winning over any semblance of honor. My men stood in a line three deep, the first line lay prone, the second kneeling, and the third standing. \n\n“FIRE!” cried my Second.\n\nA repertoire of cracks sounded, feeling flimsy in comparison to the titanic blast of the cannon.\n\nI watched, saddened but resolute, as rank after rank of enemy soldier fell like wheat before a farmers scythe. Blood slickened the green grass, and still my men continued their barrage. \n\nSoon it was over, less than a score of my men lay dead and as many wounded. More than three hundred of our enemies had fallen on the grass, never to rise again. The day was won, but inside my heart seemed empty…\n\n…\n\n“Sir?” \n\nI jumped, looking at the engineer before me. He was dressed in digital camouflage. All tan and brown. Before him was a terminal showing several infrared camera feeds. \n\n“Sir, the building is targeted and locked. Heat signatures show several hostages… some of them are children.” The engineer said, his voice growing softer as he analyzed the images, horrified.\nI only nodded. this was standard M.O for these kinds of people. There was no room for mercy, no room for weakness. \n\n“Go get a coffee.” I said.\n\nThe engineer looked at me, confused. But I just jerked my thumb to the door of the temporary command tent. When the engineer left, I took his seat, hands moving to the controls. \n\nI watched as the screen flashed white, and then adjusted. The building was gone. Gone were the distinct human shaped heat signatures. In their place was a crater, and residual heat left from the explosion.\n\nI stood from the chair. I made it three steps before I vomited. \n\nThis wasn’t war, this was hell.\n" ]	2
	[WP] A Sin-eater visits a hospital, going from room to room, visiting those near the end of their lives. Hearing their confessions and absolving them of their sins. It visits the children's ward to find something curious. Something the Sin-eater has never encountered in its eons of existence.	[ "St. Marys Hospital, London \n\nIn the twilight hours, the wards- desolate- take an ethereal feel. Ruby glows through the windows, cast diagonally on the sleek sterile floor and not a sound can be heard. The narrow corridors are a snaking chequerboard of white and red, a route to sickness and decay.\n\nIn this ward, the patients sleep. Large beds with hard uncompromising mattresses line the square room, an audience for the upcoming show.\nThe light here is muted and the stench of deaths hangs in the air. Death is its business. Business is good.\n\nIt starts by drifting through the reception, leaving a chill in its wake. Driven by unknown forces it heads deliberately to our ward.\nSome of the curtains are closed, obscuring the illness within, but this will not stop it. This will not save them. They cannot be saved, and must be held to account. That is why it is here. To be both an end and a beginning.\n\nIt approaches the first bed on the left, systematic in its way. In the bed lies an elderly man. Dark spots pocket his face and his wiry hair rests in patches on his head. His skin has the translucence of one who is about to die. His eyes flutter in a dream and an escaped consciousness ignorant of fate.\n\nIt feels suddenly very cold. The blanket shivers. His ragged breath is met by staccato mist. He awakens.\nIt is before him, a silent shadow. Watching. Expectant. \n\n\"Nurse?\" he croaks, voice strained by sleep.\n\"Nurse?\" he repeats.\n\nWith foggy eyes, the man looks, and for the briefest moment, sees. It is in this moment that he knows what is expected of him, of what has been expected by the countless before him. This is an unusual sense of clarity for man and it scares him a little. But he knows.\n\n\"So...time already huh?\"\n\nThe sound of wind, the smell of coal.\n\n\"I have as much sin as the next, my life is no tale.\"\n\nThere is silence for a few moments. It stirs.\n\n\"So be it.\"\n\nSlowly, the shadow casts the man into darkness. \n\nAnd so it moves on.", "There are days when I wish I wasn’t a sin-eater.\n\nSin-eaters really aren’t that different from normal people, we just have a bit... extra going on.\n\nFor one thing, death didn’t bother us. Came with the job description: be there to absolve a person’s soul of their misdeeds so they can move on to wherever they’re supposed to. It’s preferable to be present prior to their passing, but it’s not critical if we miss it by too much. It helps for some of us: I never got used to dealing with spirits & ghosts. Thankfully I’m in the minority here. If I wasn’t, every battlefield site would see a lot more hauntings than they do otherwise.\n\nSecond, we only sought out sins because they kept us going. We eat food just like everyone else, but there’s so little substance in it that we’d only live as long as you do. To us, sins are like the warming glow from a campfire on a clear autumn’s night. No one likes being cold, and we’re not complaining if it gives us the life expectancy of a star. Hell, Janet and I tease Toby for being a youngin, and we ran into him back when Giza first started it construction projects.\n\nBut other than that, we’re pretty human. Since people tend to react poorly to those that are different, we stay on the move, roaming from place to place, letting souls move on. To what, we don’t know. There’s enough of us that we can cover a fairly large area without hauntings getting too out of control, and with modern technology we’re more coordinated than ever before. This decade I’m on hospital rotations. It’s better than running after battles or keeping goths away from tombstones, so I’m not too miffed. Only major complaint I have now is...\n\nYou all find the dumbest things to be sins.\n\nIt used to be simple! Murder, theft, adultery: easy to spot, easy to deal with. I never had to explain why screaming obscenities at others online is bad while dodging the Black Death in Europe. Yet society grows, and with it, its sins. Granted, you can still tell that they’re sins: denying people’s rights, hurting others. But some of them are so mental! The sins of one generation were commonplace in the one before. Depending on the status quo, this could mean untangling a sin from someone days after it would’ve gotten the pass. We’re not social warriors by any means, but if it can’t stand up to common sense then we have a problem.\n\nMost nights, being in a hospital is simple. Anyone forced to stay in a hospital for long starts reflecting on their life, so by the time I get there they’re listing off every sin they can think of while I get to work. They don’t flinch as a I draw this inky blackness out from around them, nor do they look surprised when I compress it down so I can pop it into my mouth. If anything, they seem relieved. I get the same reaction when I run into the occasional ghost, though they tend to dissipate once I’m done.\n\nI was headed out to meetup with Janet & Toby for drinks when I noticed a small crowd of doctors leaving the children’s ward. Odd, given the crowd’s size and how late it was. I figured the possibilities were limited by what it could be, so I sent my friends a quick text to start without me before checking out what the issue was.\n\nSlipping into the ward, I was glad to see how empty it was; it’s always good that few children were injured, and it made my job much easier. Walking down the rows of rooms, I saw only one closed door at the far end of the hall. I drew up to it, and I felt my heart cry out a bit.\n\nThe kid couldn’t be older than eight. She looked so small surrounded by all of the machines keeping her alive. She seemed malnourished, skin drawn tight over her bones, eyes sunk deep into her sockets. I heard her shallow breathing under the various beeps & whirs as I entered the room. I picked up her chart as I sat down in the lone chair by her bed.\n\nMultiple organ failure, feared brain-dead, she wouldn’t last the night. Strange though, when I saw her I figured that there would be some family around her in her darkest moment. Perhaps they were somewhere else in the hospital, bedridden by the same calamity that befell this poor girl. As I began to search for her personal info, I heard a voice.\n\nHi.\n\nI jumped. Glancing up from the chart, I see the girl standing on the other side of the bed. Well, the part that matters to me anyways. She looks much healthier now at least; it’s good to see that illness & injury don’t always make a person who they are.\n\n“Hello,” I stammered out. No matter how long I’ve done this, I’ve never known how to talk to spirits.\n\nShe tilts her head as she looks at me. Are you a doctor? she asks.\n\n“No, but I do try to make people feel better.”\n\nOh, she said. She looked back down at herself. Can you make me feel better?\n\nMy heart breaks at that. “I can try.”\n\nI draw myself up, calling out to what little sin could be in her. As I pull, something’s not right. What should be small wisps of smoke curl out as abysmal tentacles, wrapped tightly throughout the girl’s body and soul. Her spirit itself is dragged towards me, up and over her bed. I nearly fall out of the chair as I gasp for air. What the hell was that?\n\nThe girl’s spirit is standing in front of me now, head tilted to the other side as she regards me. Are you okay?\n\nI look at her more closely now. Despite the tug-of-war we just had, she looks no worse for the wear, yet now I noticed something deeper about her. An inner darkness that seems to shine as brightly as the few other children that I’ve helped in years past. When I glance back down at her chart, I notice there’s no text where her name should be.\n\n“Honey, what’s your name?” I pant.\n\nShe shrugged.\n\n“Come on, you have to have a name. Mine’s Sam. What’s yours?”\n\nDouble.\n\n“Double? Your name’s Double?”\n\nShe shrugged again. It’s what the doctors called me.\n\n“Is that a nickname?”\n\nShe shook her head.\n\n“Alright then Double, what’s your last name?”\n\nDon’t have one.\n\n“What?”\n\nAnother shrug.\n\nI stop skimming her chart now, instead pouring over every detail. Somewhere, there has to be some giveaway, some piece of information that can tell me who this girl is. I make it to the last page with no luck before she speaks up again.\n\nSam?\n\n“Yes, Double?”\n\nIf you can’t help me how you were going to, can you at least take me to a park?\n\nI froze, forcing myself to put the chart down as I look up at her. “Why would you like to go to a park, Double?”\n\nShe rocked back and forth on her feet, swaying as she said, Well, I’ve always wanted to go to one, but the doctors said I was never healthy enough to leave. They said I could when I was better. I used to be much better, but they never let me go out to one.\n\nI’m floored now. What kid hasn’t been to a park before? Yet as I’m about to say so, a thought struck me. A thought that could explain everything, but was horrible in its implications.\n\n“Double, do you know your family?”\n\nShe shakes her head no. I don’t have one.\n\n“Don’t have one?”\n\nShe thinks for a moment. Well, I do, but she’s not really. She scrunched up her face as she attempted to work it out. I mean, she is, but she’s like me? But older? No one ever told me, but I saw a picture of her this one time, and she could’ve been me, sorta.\n\nAt this point, I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to tackle something that, up until a few years ago, shouldn’t be possible. I don’t know how to unravel this sin, this taboo, that this girl’s very existence is tied to, but I know I have to help her. Of everyone I’ve met, she is the one who is completely innocent of her sin.\n\n“Double, are you a clone?”" ]	2
	[WP] Our intelligent designers return to inform you that our purpose in life is to be livestock and our budding sentience is merely a result of how delicious they find our brains.	[ "A friend of mine said it was something like a mushroom trip or a lucid dream, and you had to skip a night of sleep for it to work. I had skipped the night of sleep like they said I needed to, truth be told, I had skipped two nights. With the help of Starbucks I was still up. We drove up to his dad's cabin. They were cheering and pushing me up towards the door. My friend came in the cabin with me, where it was pitch black, save for two candles. The walls were draped with black felt, so it felt like we stood in the black of space. Up above the candles there was a large mirror, and beneath it, closer to us, was a recliner. Here it was quiet, here it was warm, here was another place.\n\nI took my place in the recliner, my friend sat somewhere unseen behind me. He told me to stare into the mirror and instructed me to keep speaking, and not to stop. It started out pretty innocuous, the candles were very dim, even for candles, so i couldn't see anything in the mirror, except for the candle's reflection in my own eyes, tiny glittering lights dancing in the dark. I mentioned that, how profoundly comfortable the chair was, and how I could hear his pencil on the paper. Focusing on the tiny twin glints of light in the mirror, my voice became more distant, as if far away in a tunnel, the sound of my friend's writing was not noticeable, and even the chair felt like it had fallen away, and I was floating in the black nothingness of space. Even the aches of sleep deprivation had evaporated somewhere else. The universe consisted of me, the darkness, and the light, they were singular now.\n\n---\n\nThe light, it was the light, the light people always talk about. The light was the light at the end of the tunnel, the proverbial light for the dead. It took what felt like hours, but it was much nearer now, nearly engulfing me. My grandmother was here, her warm smile, now years vacant from my life. Its warmth filled me with relief and contentment I had not known for too long. Her son, my uncle, was there too. Everyone gone was there, and they welcomed me warmly, and with love. as I approached, they walked backwards, beckoning me into the light. Clouds rolled at their feet, I walked on a path of golden light cut through it. I approached and they retreated towards the light, facing me.\n\nWhen There was only enough darkness left to see them, I was finally able to draw near them. I was able to hug my grandma. She was exactly as I remembered her. I was relaxation, I was contentment. In this moment of bliss I felt her pull at me with all her strength, suddenly, and with vigor, she pushed herself away from me, I remained motionless, she could not move me. I was confused. The warmth in her eyes was gone, I was about to say something when my uncle grabbed my wrist and pulled as hard as he seemed able to. Again I didn't budge, my arm didn't even move. The departed relatives looked at each other with bafflement, I grabbed my uncle's wrist and pulled him to the golden path, the ray of light I walked on. From the bottom of his legs protruded not feet, but trunks, extending downwards, then back, back into the light. I felt my uncle's wrist crumple like an empty canvas bag or a glove, his image shot up off the image in front of me to reveal a mess of glowing golden roots entwined around splinters of what was once a skeleton, all of them pouring into the skull. through the eyes, through the mouth, through the nose. they shook themselves free of all the bones but the skull, and the Skull, now the terminus of a trunk reading out from the light wrapped around me and pulled with what I could only describe as the strength of a god. Still, I did not budge.\n\nMy friend was bent over me shining a light in my face. I was covered in water and the lights were on. \"That was important work champ, we know where to find them now\" He stuck a needle in my neck, Next time I woke I found myself at home in my bed. None of my other friends ever saw him again, and when we went out to see where the cabin was, it had burnt down. I was, however, able to find some shards of a broken mirror, and two candle holders amongst the ash. ", "I've always been a Godly man. Before that I was a Godly child. \"Eat your peas, Young Lout,\" my mother would say, \"or you'll be out of heaven before you're seven.\" I always ate my peas. Thank you Jesus for these peas, I would say. I'd say it inwardly too. \"Thank you Jesus for dying on the cross so that I could enjoy these delicious peas.\" My mother nodded sagaciously in the background. A grizzled crown of haphazard curls shaking their fists at the haphazard injustice of it. Tears would well in her eyes in righteous wonder. Thank you Jesus for giving me such a splendiferous boy. And then: Your momma raised a fine boy too. \n\nShe passed some years subsequent. I was a good boy then and I was a good boy later. Now you're with Jesus Momma Mae, said my sister meaningfully. She opened her mouth and inhaled. She looked at me with her eyes in a cross. She looked like a bloated blowfish. Momma Mae is with Jesus, I intoned. She deflated in a sudden whoosh and I knew I had just evaded something unfathomable. Then they lowered my mother into the ground and I smiled. Momma Mae is with Jesus and soon I'll be too. \n\nI've always been a Godly man. Do unto others what you want done to thyself. There have been some instances of inconsistencies. Especially with women this tenet has been a hoot. Women are strange. They do not want me to rub my genitals all over them. My sister made me repeat it ten times in a row when I was younger. I Should Not Rub My Genitals On Girls Before Being Asked. If Asked, Deny, Deny, Deny. \n\nThere are many things which I do not understand about how the world works. No elbows near the table. If they come near the table they will explode. Don't eat with your mouth open. I always do. Love thy neighbor. I cut their tree down because it was shading my lot. From the way she screamed you'd have thought she was shot. \n\nYes, there are compromises to be made here and there. \n\nGah I couldn't resolve this further. Thanks for the prompt though. \n", "There isn't a light. That bit is a load of horseshit. Well, all of it is. There isn't a light. There isn't a carnival of probes and dissections. There isn't a flying saucer, or green men with seven fingers or three eyes.\n\nThey look more like squid. Or spiders. Like a spider disguised as a squid. Six eyes, arranged in a half-circle over the crown of the head - except it isn't even a head, not really. Its a big, pulsating body the shape of a lemon, with ribs showing through the thin, translucent black skin. \n\nIts wearing blue. I used to like blue. I don't know whether to call it a \"dress\" or a \"harness\" or a \"shitty fan fic of hentai concept art cosplay costume\". \n\nIt doesn't have tentacles. Thank god. It has creepy, spidery legs with five joints, and no hair. It has ten of those, and the two long arms that start somewhere on the far side of its body and reach around to trap me against the wall.\n\nIt isn't necessary. The - the THING in my leg won't let me move, let alone run away. I don't look at the thing in my leg.\n\n\"Gross! It's all peely. Something's wrong with it.\" It isn't so much that it says it, as that I get the impression that it's said it - like when someone talks to you in a dream. \"What should I do?\"\n\nThe bigger one clatters over, glares at me. \"Ew.\" It takes something out of its pocket. How does it get to have pockets when my pants don't even come with those anymore? It pokes me in the face, and then peels off some of my sunburn with it. \"Disgusting. It has to be sick or something, gross. Throw it back. We can't eat that.\"\n\nEat?\n\nThe first one gets shorter and fatter, and then skinny and tall. I can't tell if that's a nod or a shrug. As it rips the THING out of my leg - dear god just kill me now - I see Melinda with another one. It cuts her head off without hesiation, and then cracks open her skull while her body is still twitching. Those arm things reach in and scoop out her brain, which it throws into a pool of them. A pool of brains.\n\nI hear a hiss behind me as a doorway opens. It shoves me out, out into thin air, and I fall.\n" ]	3
	[WP] Time travel has been fully developed for the past 600 years. The machine works off your blood. It takes a small amount then travels back in time to when your blood first came into existence. That's the furthest anyone can go. However the machine takes you to the universe's beginning.	[ "RJ excitedly looked over at the holoclock on his bedside table; the display read 7:32am.\n\n“Finally!” he thought, he’d been lying in bed for ages waiting to get up. It was Christmas time and he couldn’t take staying in bed any longer.\n\nThrowing the duvet off himself, he swung his legs around and let his feet touch the cold floorboards. The Automated Personal Home Network System registering the life stirring within started to heat the floor beneath him.\n\n.\n\n“Good morning, RJ” Said APHNS. “I hope you had a restful night sleep, it’s going to be a long day today.”\n\n“Hey Jarvis” – Jarvis was the affectionate name he’d given the computer network. He had gotten the name from an ancient movie reel his friend Shaa’lan had shown him. Jarvis didn’t seem to mind the name change all that much. He was curious as to why I named him after a computer designed by an egotistical fictional character from a long dead movie franchise though.\n\n“Not really, I am just too excited. I think this year is the year my parents finally get me the TM-X01!”\n\n“Oh? And how do you know this. I thought you were positive it was going to be last year…” Jarvis replied sarcastically. \n\n“Careful now Jarvis, I can and will reboot you.” joked RJ as he walked towards the en-suite.\n\n“Put the coffee on, please Jarvis. I’ll be out in a few.” he said as the door shut behind him.\n\n.\n\nStepping out of his room 15 minutes later, he headed for the living quarters. \n\nApparently he wasn’t the only one excited about today. His sister, Leila was pacing around the room while glancing at the pile of presents that would normally be under a tree that was covered with lights and candy and all sorts of nonsense. In this apartment though, they sat underneath the TV that was showing a digital copy of one.\n\nHis parents weren’t like the other families on the Colony. According to his mother they created unnecessary mess and in the wise words of his father “it’s just a dead tree son. Get over it”\n\n.\n\n “What took you so long RJ! It feels like I have been up for days waiting for you.” exclaimed his sister.\n\n“Merry Christmas to you too Leila”\n\n.\n\nRJ could never be mad at his sister though, she was everything to him. They grew up very close as their parents were almost never there. They had important jobs at the Ministry of Space and Time.\n\n.\n\n“Quickly now, I’ve wanted to get into these presents since 5am. Mum and Dad left for work already and I didn’t want to open any without you.”\n\n“That’s kind of you sis’” said RJ with a smile.\n\nHis sister was only 9 years old so he couldn’t hold it against her that she would be this excited. He crossed the room quickly and scooped her up in his arms; she was light as a feather. She started squirming as he tickled her, her giggles getting more and more hysterical.\n\n“N.. Sto.. Stop..” was all Leila managed to say before laughing again.\n\n“Don’t stop? Oh ok then” RJ ramping up the tickles till tears from the laughter were seen streaming down her angelic little face.\n\nThe whole room was filled with her laughter now. RJ lived to make her laugh; there was no sound in the world that he liked to hear more than that. \n\n“Go for the feet” chimed in Jarvis.\n\n.\n\nHe set her down and looked at their presents. \n\nThere were two piles, well one pile and one small lump of presents. Leila was kind enough to separate out hers from mine; He knew which one was his.\n\nA rectangle about the size of a shoe box stood out amongst the small pile of his presents. With shaking hands he reached down and picked it up, it was light; it couldn’t have weighed any more than maybe 1.5-2lbs. forgoing all other presents as secondary. \n\n.\n\n“Dig in LeLe” he said with a grin on his face. Squealing with excitement, she dived straight into the pile and paper started flying. “God damn” he thought. “She’s getting faster each year.”\n\n.\n\nGrabbing the corner of the wrapping paper, he quickly ripped a hole and revealed some of the packaging beneath, it read: “TM-X “. Without pause he ripped the rest of the packaging off to show what he’d be coveting for years, the “TM-X01 Personal Time Warp Device”. \n\nHe had had wanted one of these since the first time he found out what his parents were doing at the Ministry. These devices used to be everywhere according to the history books, but only the richest of the rich were able to acquire these now.\n\n.\n\nCenturies ago some jackass thought it would be a good idea to go back in time and settle a score with an ex business partner. It just so happened that that business partner had a well-connected family within the Galactic Council and the rest is history.\n\nThe laws were rewritten, prices got jacked-up and a register was created with the names of all the people who now owned a device. You were also required to take a number of psych evaluations and sign an agreement that would land you in “Das Haus der Unendlich Hölle” (The House of infinite Hell) if you ever broke the strict rules of time travelling.\n\nNo one wanted to go there.\n\n.\n\nJust like anything there were always the black-market versions you could find, but they weren’t made by the Ministry. They were mostly made in some dark basement somewhere and prone to sending just a percentage of a person back in time… it wasn’t a pretty sight to see and not a risk most people were willing to take.\n\n.\n\nRJ Pulled the device out of its packaging and held it in his hands, it was beautifully made. The exterior was made from a hardened nanostructured titanium-polymer coated in a gleaming white powder coated oxide with a LCD display in the centre. The TM-X01 was attached to an auto-fitting silicone rubber composite glove.\n\n.\n\n“Whoa” exclaimed RJ. “See, I told you so Jarvis” holding it out so that the APHNS could view it on its cameras.\n“Be careful RJ, you know it isn’t a toy right?” Jarvis warned him. “Damn J, aren’t you Mr Buzzkillington today… jeez” he scoffed.\n\n“Before you go gallivanting around space-time I suggest you read the manual. Your coffee is ready in the kitchen, so have a cuppa and read it. You’re going to need all the energy you can get.”\n\n“Alright, fine. But I am only doing it because you can make a mean cup of joe.” \n\nLooking towards Leila, RJ asked if she would like anything from the kitchen as he was heading there… no response, she was way too involved in her own presents to notice anything else.\n\n.\n\nThe smell of coffee greeted him as the door panel slid open to the kitchen quarter, steam rising from the mug sitting under the coffee spout on the counter.\n\n“Did you do something special to the coffee this morning J? It smells great. Wait... lemme guess, is it cinnamon?”\n\n“Not telling” he responded with what RJ could only imagine a huge smirk on his face… if he had one that was.\n\n.\n\nRJ grabbed the mug and slid into the nearest seat, placing the TM-X01 on the table in front of him. \n\nTaking a sip of the coffee, he knew he was correct. It was definitely cinnamon. How Christmassy of Jarvis he thought smiling.\n\nRJ couldn’t hold back his excitement anymore. He slipped the glove on; it instantly started moulding itself to fit him.\n\n.\n\n“You know I already know how this works right? I’ve spent years reading all about this stuff” Stated RJ.\n\nThere was an audible sigh from the APHNS. “Just read it long enough to finish the coffee at least, I mean shit RJ… it’s not even 15 pages long, you CAN read that much right?” \n\n“You know I’m a man right, we don’t need instructions” RJ said sarcastically.\n\nFlipping open the booklet he begun to read. \n\n.\n\n“Congratulations on purchasing your new personal Time Travel Device. The TM-X01 is the latest\nin the state-of-the-art Temporal Time Shifting technology. We are proud to announce that with\nthe new advances we have made that your time travelling experience will be better than ever be-\nfore.”\n\nCEO Timaka Singuati\n\n.\n\nRJ couldn’t take it any longer, he knew all this already. He looked down at the LCD display and grinned; it read: \n\n.\n\n“Year:0000 Month:00 Day:0 Hour:00 Minute:00”\n\n.\n\nHe was so excited in fact he completely missed his mouth when trying to take the last sip of coffee. It felt like time had slowed to a slow crawl. After what felt like hours, the coffee splashed the display and soaked in through the edges.\n\nA sharp pain erupted from the palm of his hand as the TM-X01’s needle pierced his skin to take his blood sample.\nThe only thought he had before everything went black was “fuck…”\n\n.\n\nHe awoke, or atleast he thought he woke up. Everything was black. RJ furiously blinked his eyes trying his hardest to get his vision back. Nothing worked. Panic started rising in his stomach, he knew something went wrong, it wasn’t meant to be this way. Swallowing down the bile that was forming in the pit of his stomach he furiously racked his brain for an explanation. All the video’s he’d watched on UniTube hadn’t prepared him for this. It was just meant to be a straight time-shift and BAM! He’d be in the time that he had wanted to go.\n\n.\n\nBefore he could even work out if he was standing, sitting, lying down or (god forbid) floating a deep voice rang out through the darkness.\n\n.\n\n“Welcome back, Son….”\n", "The instantaneous-drive whirred to life, coughed out a bit of soot and steadied into a low rumble. It hadn't been active for years, this one seemed to be an older model, as the styling was reminiscent of the 2100's. I placed my hand inside the entrance marked \"Departure\" and felt the small sting of the blood wand as I waited for the calculations to be made. Dust covered every surface, since time travel had been invented, nobody felt like sticking around to maintain the machines. Who would blame them with aeons upon aeons to explore. \"Ding\" the machine chimed and read out the limits of where I could go back, \"Universal year - 0 ... Universal day - 0 ... Universal time - 0:00.1 ... Please choose your destination\" it said in its weathered raspy robotic voice. But without delay, the machine immediately continued \"Selection has been made, enjoy\" as a rat scurried across the keys.\n\nInstantaneously, It was dark, yet luminescent. It was silent, although the noise was deafening. There was nothing, but at the same time it felt so crowded. There was stillness, yet everything seemed to be in motion. Yet there I was, my essence floating in a sea of paradox, and upon that realization all the concepts I observed at once split from one another and reflected back off one another and flexed and bounced and flexed and bounced and flexed and.....................\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] You check into a hotel, only to find that your key card works for all rooms except your own.	[ "I looked down at my key. 707. I looked up at the number on the door. 707. Yet it doesn't work. \n\nI go down to the lobby to the front desk, requesting a new card. They apologized and handed it to me. \n\nI go back up to my room and tried the card. It also doesn't work. That's annoying.\n\nI go back down to the front desk. They made another card and sent a staff along with me up to my room. The staff tried the key and somehow it worked. Oh well, probably just a coincidence. He helped me carry my luggage into my room before closing the door behind him. \n\nI looked out the window at the city below me. I wondered where I should go for dinner tonight. \n\nI went out of my room taking my card with me. Maybe I'll check out the hotel restaurant. Arriving at the lobby, I walked to the Japanese restaurant, stopping to read the menu. Expensive, I thought, but its my first night here so why not. \n\nI walked around the lobby more, checking out the small grocery store, purchasing a Snickers bar and a copy of National Geographic. Going up the elevator, I took a bite from the Snickers. Maybe I'll take a shower and take a nap before dinner. \n\nReaching my room, I put the key into the door. The light flashed red. That's funny. I didn't even put it in the same pocket as my phone. Looking down the hallway I see a cleaner walk into another room. I called out to her but she closed the door behind her. \n\nWalking towards the room I saw that she left the master card hanging off the the door. Checking my surroundings, I quickly took it and tried it on my door. Still red light. This is proving to be a pain in the ass. I quickly ran back to put the master card back, but by mistake I put in my room card. Surprisingly the light flashed green. The door swinged open and the cleaner walked out of the bathroom to look at me. She asked me if I needed helped and I just handed her the master card, claiming that she left it outside and I didn't want anyone to steal it. She thanked me and closed the door. \n\nLooking down at my card in my hand I wondered if it works on other doors. I turned around to the door opposite me and tried it. The light flashed green. I could hear a woman moaning. The door slowly opened for me to see a blonde woman in cleaner attire riding a middle aged man on the bed. The man shouted at me.\n\nI quickly closed the door. The things I can do with this card..... " ]	1
	[WP] The internet considers baby sloths adorable, but the other sins are actually just as cute.	[ "Through the throngs of people I walked, hesitantly pushing my way through the crowd as their jabbering overlapped with the music blaring overhead. It was becoming too crowded for my tastes and the streams of people joining the massive sea seemed endless. They all seemed to have no real direction or motive to their motion, there was no order to be found here. That made it all the more difficult to escape as I navigated the shifting lanes that broke and formed at a group's whim. Through slim gaps and short pauses, I managed to find myself at the intersection of two stores. Their signs hung brightly overhead as I collected myself.\n\nOne store promised sales of up to seventy-five percent off select products and buy one get one free on brand name linens. The other store lacked the bright and colorful displays of its neighbor, even its grand opening banner was held by a loose tether. From what I could tell, it was a specialty pet shop of some sort though there was little more that I could make out without stepping foot inside the store. It had grabbed my interest and reeled me in. I thought that it would be neat to pet some unique creatures or get to stare at them for a couple minutes at least. As I stepped into the store, I noticed that it was a nursery, but of a different sort.\n\nThere were babies in tiny beds made within clear plastic containers. I felt appalled that these children were be kept in such a way, but I also wondered why they were being kept that way. I wanted to know who thought that this was okay. How could you sell children like this? The store wasn't exactly well-hidden. Had no one set foot in here since its opening days ago? I saw an employee tending to one of the children on the far side of the room. My frustration, confusion, and anger ran hot beneath my skin as my teeth gritted, my hands curled, and I marched across the shop. I demanded that answers were given to me.\n\n“Oh, hello there!” the attendant greeted me with a warm smile on her face. “I didn't hear you come in. How can I-”\n\nI continued ranting and raving without addressing the attendant until I had my fill. When there was little more I had left to say, I took a deep breath and began to look at the baby that she had in her arms. Its skin was tinted red and it giggled uncontrollably. All of the children in this section did. I noticed that the tags on the end of their baskets read, “wrath”. They all did. I ignored the questions of the worker as I made rounds through the store. Some sections read “greed” while others read “sloth” and “gluttony”. I was beginning to realize the nature of these children as I backed myself into a corner.\n\nThey were peddling infantile incarnations of the seven deadly sins. Wrath enjoyed my earlier outburst of anger. Greed wanted my watch and tried to reach for the watch that was in my pocket. Sloth was sleeping noisily. Gluttony hungrily slurped down its bottle and threw it upon the floor before crying for more. As I watched the baby sins, I began to realize that they were reflections of a normal child's behavior. I wondered if there was a possibility that they could one day grow up to be normal. To overcome the sin that they had been born into. Or would they fulfill their destiny and come to embody their given name.\n\nI wanted desperately to save these children, to give them a chance. Before the attendant could reach me, I called for help. Whether what I had done would make a positive difference in their lives, I could not say. I just knew that I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I saw them and walked away.\n\n-313", "\"Would ya look at that baby Envy? Ain't it sweet?\" The pet-store clerk ushered me towards yet another enclosure.\n\n\"Mmm, yeah... 'sweet'.\" I glanced through the glass windows. Huh. It actually was pretty cute. \"Seriously though, I just--\"\n\n\"Not to your like, Ma'am? Take a peek at this- a newborn Greed. Just look at that cute little chubby face!\"\n\n\"Uh-huh... I just wanted--\"\n\n\"Too smiley? What about...\"\n\n\"NO!\" I slammed down the pet food. \"I already have a pet. A DOG. A NORMAL ANIMAL. I just want to buy some kibble if that's all right.\"\n\nSuddenly the clerks face darkened.\n\n\"Oh, I get what you're saying...\"\n\n\"Really? How much does it cost--\"\n\n\"You want a lil Wrath! Adorably stubborn, you'll love it!\"" ]	2
	[WP] The world contains a set amount of primary colors. Today, the world ran out of yellow.	[ "They tell you not to stare at the sun, but when you wake up and it's turned red, generally that's a little alarming. \n\nI stared at it for eight and a half minutes, something I know because the sky suddenly turned black - I guess that's the color it is when the star is red. It was eight and a half minutes because that's how long it takes light from the sun to reach us and that's when the sky went dark, forever. \n\nIt's getting hot now. The plants are dying - quite alarming. Without a yellow sun, of course, green plants can't photosynthesize. Figures, right? I wonder how long the oxygen will hold out. \n\nYellow, it seems, is not visible in this new light spectrum. The bananas on my table are now greyish-brown. My Gold Coin Collection, too - gone. Black as the ebon sky we'll all have to get used to. \n\nMy hair is now a sort of brownish-black, which is upsetting; I was getting pretty used to the blonde it was in the past thirty-five years or so. I can't say I was always happy with it but I can say I was definitely used to it. \n\nIt's funny. It's only been a little while into this new kind of day, and yet.....\n\nI can't even remember what yellow looked like anymore.\n\n", "As a long time Redditor and subscriber to \\/r/WritingPrompts, Patricia had learned to see the shifting patterns and, like an ocean liner, the almost fractal wave fronts that original concepts inevitably caused. Hitler, Time Travel, Harry Potter on a bender... the more well known and understandable, the bigger the waves.\n\nNot too long ago, for instance, a rash of blindness-related prompts arrived: face blind, born blind, everybody blind... there were a lot of funny prompts, many good prompts, and even a few that were both. If pressed, though, Patricia would have difficulty recalling any specific one. She just read so much on Reddit that stories rarely went into her long term memory.\n\nMuch more recently there was a spate of prompts that treated life as a game, where everybody had a heads-up display or a game-over icon blockig their vision. Those was amusing.\n\nLast week, though, was not amusing. Last week saw Patricia question her own sanity.\n\nSuddenly, at exactly 13:33 +3 UTC, everybody worldwide had their vision replaced with a single message for five minutes: a bright blue line of text on a white background. For five minutes, the sighted were effectively blinded. For five minutes, the blind were briefly sighted. For five minutes, chaos reigned: innumerable accidents, deaths, and random faux pas delayed all discussion regarding the message itself:\n\nWARNING: YELLOW TONER LOW.\n\nConfused doesn't even begin to describe the worldwide reaction. Religion leaders tried to shoehorn it into existing dogma. Religious groups declared the end times. Politicians blamed opposing parties. Fox briefly mentioned it before continuing their coverage of the Bieber-Kardashian union.\n\nThree days later, it happened again. This time, it lasted for 30 minutes and continuously pulsed between red and blue.\n\nPandemonium. Markets crashed. Wars stopped. Hollywood had a holiday. Brazilians felt unusually safe.\n\nDiscussions ran rampant over the airwaves - every every radio station, every TV network, and every cable channel broadcast various debates on the issue. Breakfast show hosts, economics presenters, news anchors all vied for viewership as they trotted out an endless stream of expert witnesses: archaeologists, historians, theologians, the CEOs of Brother, Lexmark and Canon. CNBC had an interview with HP's Indian tech support representative, live from his bed as it was 1 AM in India. The BBC interviewed [Guy Goma](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Goma) again, for exactly the same reason, while both Fox News and CNN broadcast an interview with Katy Perry on a loop, just because.\n\nThree hours later, the message changed. This time it was black on white, and didn't flash.\n\nPLEASE STAND BY.\n\nIt lasted for three minutes. Patricia had been standing in line at Starbucks when it started. Unlike the previous events, this time there was no screaming. No shouting, no cursing, no crying. Just silent resignation.\n\nA slight rustling sound told Patricia that everyone was sitting down, so she followed suit. A low whispering started as people began private discussions... a show of decency not usually found in Starbucks. Patricia sat silently, however, choosing instead to listen in to those within earshot. A smile crept over her face. Most of the conversations were predictable - what's happening? what's causing all this? - while some were at least slightly interesting: a couple discussing share portfolios and what companies would rise when the inevitable collapse of media shares took place, for example. None of these were the cause of here smile, however. No... that was due to the cycle of incessant tapping, cursing, and intensified tapping that grew exponentially around her. The sound of distressed smartphone users unable to navigate their devices.\n\nA loud clattering sound - the sound of someone throwing their device across the room - seemed an apt herald for what came next.\n\nThe message went away, and Patricia was reminded once again of a writing prompt:\n\n[Everything is naturally monochrome. Color is obtained through finding and harvesting rainbows.](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/2wkote/wp_everything_is_naturally_monochrome_color_is/)\n\nI think we're in trouble, Patricia thought.\n", "You were not warned, you were not warned; a change from green to red.\n\nCrumpled steel and shattered glass, and things we left unsaid.\n\nI went to gather from your garden peonies and daffodils,\n\nDecapitated stems now, gone before the winter chill.\n\nI searched for all your totems (rubber duck and stuffed Pooh-bear)\n\nTo be the sentries by your bedside. They were gone, into the air.\n\nBut, darling, battle back, though no brick road can set the line,\n\nNo submarine will shepherd you, no canary tends the mine.\n\nAnd please remember how, for you, every color I would trade,\n\nHow without you there is nothing: no lemons and no lemonade. \n\n/r/opinionsaboutnothing" ]	3
For android and updated IOS they're the 3 buttons on the top. Just keep pressing them randomly :-) Mine: Jessica Parker, and Hannah Jessica Walking in front of Sam welcoming him. mom and dad. I guess I could go with the usual. I guess I will have the ability for you. I guess I could go with the usual. I guess. Yeah I know, did you get a whoopin, I might just leave you here, if what they’re saying is true that I can do it is to connect to the basement where there are no more, I might just be sure to let you know, did you see the news this is awful, but you can rock and the other day and age, and Hannah Jessica Walking in front of Sam welcoming him.	[WP] Write a story using suggested words above your keyboard	[ "The best thing about this is, what you want. A relationship with you guys are going to be a little more than I thought. it would be nice to be able to see my tweets from last night. I was a little bit more like a good time to go out and about. This is not to be able, I have a lot of fun with my life. I love it so much. Fun with my life, I love it so much. Fun with my friends, are so much better than that. It's not that bad, for my life, is to get a follow back. Please don't make me laugh so hard. To be able to see my tweets from last night." ]	1
	[WP] "I know that you guys want to go and kill Hitler, but this is my time machine, so first we're going to..."	[ "\"We're going to the Land Before Time.....\"\n\n\"What the actual fuck? Are you fucking with me, mate? You want to go ride some fucking dinosaurs before killing Hitler?\" \n\n\"Well do you not fucking want to ride fucking dinosaurs? We can like, meet Littlefoot and his mates, maybe even bring them to defeat the fucking Nazis. Certainly would make history more interesting.\" \n\n\"That's the stupidest fucking idea I've ever heard. You can't even fit your fat mum in your fucking time machine, let alone a fucking dinosaur. We kill Hitler first, then maybe we'll have some fun later.\"\n\n\"Fucking hell, its my time machine! And leave me fucking mum of of this! Either we go see Littlefoot and then kill Hitler, or not fucking kill Hitler at all!\" \n\n\"Little-fucking-foot's not even fucking real, you twat! He's just a fucking orphan cartoon dinosaur! Killing fucking Adolf actually benefits millions of fucking people!\"\n\n\"How do you even fucking propose we kill Hitler anyway? Just walk up to his fucking door and blow his fucking head off?\" \n\n\"We'll go back to before he ruled Germany, you blithering idiot! We'll kill'im before anyone knows who he fucking is!\"\n\n\"Then we would have just murdered some random Austrian bastard with a bloody moustache!\"\n\n--------The door swings open.--------\n\n\"What the fuck are you two doing in the fucking bathroom? Were you sucking his cock or somethin'? What is that smell? Are you two high as a kite? I'm telling mum.\"", "\"...so first, we're going to Ancient Rome. I've heard that some of the shit they had was crazy potent. I mean, like, LETHAL.\" How the fuck did Pothead Hank, of ALL the damn people on this Earth, stumble across a time machine.\n\n\"Hank, this is important, homie.\" Matt said. \"Drugs are fine and good but you have YOUR WHOLE LIFE to go back and get hippie-stoned.\"\n\n\"And YOU have your whole life to kill Hitler,\" Hank retorted.\n\n\"Shut up. We can do both. And who knows, you might learn to lighten up, ya nerd,\" Hallie said, grabbing the phone from Hank. \"Now, how do you work this thing..?\" Hallie pushed some buttons on the screen, typing in the date and setting the coordinates. Who knew that a time machine functioned so much like an Apple device. \n\nI stood by with the sniper, the only decent shot of the four of us and the only one who could compose himself. The plan was simple. Well, the intended plan: We teleport ourselves to Berlin, 1939; shoot the bastard from a mile away, teleport back, profit. Thanks to Hank though, we were going to make a little stop in Rome. Well, I wanted to do some sightseeing anyway. Hall pushed the 'execute command' button and we were all enveloped in a blue light.\n\n-------\nHoly shit. It actually worked. Here we were, in Rome, 92 BCE. I checked my watch that I conveniently set to Rome's time before we left- it was just about noon. I disassembled the sniper, threw it into a carrying bag and slung it over my shoulder. Before stepping out into the street from the alley we arrived in, Alex grabbed Hank and I by the collar. \"You idiots! You can't just waltz into ANCIENT FUCKING ROME wearing Under Armour and Adidas!\"\n\n\"Well what do you propose then, poindexter? Beat up some locals and take their clothes? If anything goes south, we'll just get outta here. You worry too much. Here, take a picture of Hal and I with the Coliseum in the background.\" The four of us walked out into the dark corner of a market, but before we could even figure out where we were Hank had disappeared. Are. You. Fucking. KIDDING.\n\n\"Hank! Hank, you idiot, get back here! Christ, we're in Rome for three seconds and the fucker runs off! What was he thinking?\"\n\n\"Don't take the lord's name in vain, you slut,\" I snapped at Alex. \n\n\"You're wrong, homeboy ain't even born yet,\" he responded with the trademark shit-eating grin he does whenever he's being a dick. \"But seriously, where did he g- HANK!\" Alex ran off and we sprinted after him. \n\n\"We got it, now go,\" Hank said, grabbing the phone and punching in coordinates. \"I stole some shit, but they're after me.\"\n\n\"Hank, what the fu-\" Alex was cut off by a blue light that once again swallowed us up and dropped us off in a new location.\n\n--------\n\"Okay, I think we're safe,\" Hank sighed. Hallie was facing behind us and her eyes widened. \"Noooooo, we ain't,\" I turned around quickly to see a half dozen rifles pointed at the four of us. \"Komm mit uns. Jetzt.\" \n\nFUCK.\n\n" ]	2
I was imagining a type of reverse Children of Men scenario here, but feel free to go wherever with it!	[WP] Science has found the key to immortality, but there's a catch: it can only be administered at birth. You are a member of the last mortal generation.	[ "His footsteps echoed down the hall way. The metal floor had no one to hear its moans as he walked across. He lost his hearing years ago. That was a shame. He loved music. Little machines followed him. Their gears whirring and the wheels spinning. They were his companions ever since his partner had died decades ago.\n\nPausing for a moment, he watched the sunset out a window. The sky blossomed in a beautiful array of purple, blue and red. He wondered how many more he would see before his job was done. He was old now. He required the machines help to stand. He needed the machines to help him rest. They were kind to him though. But they were not his companions, try as they would. \n\nHe thought about all his mistakes. But only one of them kept returning to his mind. It was a very selfish thought though. His children. \n\nAs a student at college his fiance became pregnant. It was odd though. The university was vacant except for the sagely professors. Very few students remained. There was no winter break or anything like that. They had all moved on.\n\nThat's what it was called. Such a gentle term. Moving on. A developed mind would not subject itself to the machine though. Was it a blessing or a curse? He had been one of the few thousand people who were too far developed to move on. So he continued with all the geriatrics. Locked in this circle of life and death. \n\nIn Church they sang songs. One of his favorite was Will the Circle Be Unbroken? Everyone assumed that it was about God returning to end death. \"We beat him to it.\" He thought. But not quite. \n\nAll that could be done was to recreate ourselves in the machine. Infants could be recreated. But the adult mind could not. When a baby moved on after the copy was created the child was tossed. It was believed to be the most humane thing to do. How awful would it be to have two versions of yourself? So the children were sacrificed to the machine. Their parts, their blood, and their bones used as fuel for the great beast that ran it. \n\nBut only He remained. Disease, and accidents had taken the rest. Even the ones that were younger than him. A machine sped ahead of him and a prompt appeared on a monitor. \n\nHe nodded and they continued to the control room of the machine. He made his choice now. This would be the final time he calibrated the machine. In a weak voice he asked, \"you are sure you can do this yourself?\"\n\nThe machine warmed to life. Across the monitor scrolled the word, \"Yes.\" \n\nHe held out a hand and said bring me my wine. A machine rolled away and returned with a glass and a bottle. The machine began to pour but failed to stop pouring before his glass overflowed. But it didn't matter. No one was there to clean it up for. He eagerly grabbed the pill in his breast pocket and drank deep from the cup the machine offered.\n\nHe began to doze. And when he did the last thing he saw was the machine and the beast that ran it. \n\nThe beast was not like the beasts that had retaken the Earth since mankind left. The beast glowed. He gave off warmth. He provided life for all mankind. And one day he would take what was left of mankind and take them to where they belonged. The sun had gone dark. And a dark blanket covered the Earth.", "It's like a joke playing out. The last great joke before eternity begins and the curtains are drawn to a close. Standing over a child who had no excuse in all the cosmos for being catatonic.\n\nI'd developed a morbid curiosity for watching death take with it the living in my youth when I still felt as though I could live forever. As if I could outrun it. The folly of the young I'd say. Now, old and health failing, I'd gotten used to looking to this newest generation with envy.\n\nMine but a moment too late for immortality. Their's destined to live forever.\n\nI had found solace in the idea I'd never have to face this reality again. Loss. It'd been nearly twenty years since the second last of my generation bought the farm. I was all that was left of the mortals. Death would come for me and never return.\n\nExcept fate is cruel and death even crueler. They would take out their rage and anguish from their and humanities separation by torturing me and my kin.\n\nMy great great great grand daughter laying before me, bed ridden, an entire eternity before her. Filled with happiness, sadness, and most definitely long long spans of boredom. It was all supposed to be hers.\n\nExcept something happened. Something not yet understood. It would seem what should keep the rest of humanity alive forever would claim her life as penance. And make me, the last of my kind, watch in heart break as my children, their children, and so on grasped away at empty promises and hope.\n\nThey no longer knew how to let go. How to accept death. They lied to themselves keeping this shell of a child, an empty vessel, technically alive when all that she was, is, and ever would be was long gone.\n\nSo I am made to watch these children mourn endlessly. Unable to comprehend what it means to let go. I am to watch them in pain before death claims me.\n\nI do not tell them I am dying for to them I have been dying all my life.\n\nThey'd promised to let me go when my time came. Swore not to drag it out. My generation was fate with death. Their's fated for immortality. I'd begged them not to rob me of my destiny.\n\nWatching them now I knew it was empty words. Empty promises. They couldn't possibly know how hard it is to let go. I doubt they physically could. So I looked upon the child, catatonic and all but dead, knowing fate's last great joke...", "Growing up as the first mortal child in generations should have been difficult, but it was not. I was given the best teachers, the best doctors, the best care any child could have been given. All sponsored by a government who felt the need to treasure and preserve the last mortal there ever would be. They threw parades for me and sponsored philosophers and scientists to discuss the implications of my existence on global television. When I was young, before I knew death, I thought I was the luckiest person alive. I had every object of desire a young person could ever want and every need was cared for before I was aware there was a need. \n\n\n\nBut that was before I saw him. \n\n\n\nHe was like nothing I had ever seen before. Whereas before I had only ever seen the perfect suppleness of young flesh and muscle before me now was an antithesis; a simultaneous tautness and looseness of flesh stapled across a frame vacant of even a flicker of light. He was not like the corpse of an eternally young vessel; preserved for all time, an embodiment of both life and death. What I saw that day was a mockery of both; life prolonged but not preserved, death’s smile visible behind ancient flesh. \n", "They don't understand. Not at all. It isn't fair for me to be angry at them or for me to think of them as dense, but I do. Or I did. I mean, its not their fault after all. As soon as the antidote (yes they called it the \"antidote\") was made readily available free of charge, the whole world clamoured for the chance to immortalise their brilliance in the minds of generations to come. We are immortal now, all of us. Almost.\n\nYou see, I wasn't born in the snowy cotton of a hospital cot. I was found. On the street. In a box. No note just a crying infant. In a world where crime was at an all time low, where next to no injuries proved fatal (surgical procedures have developed so rapidly that we're almost indestructible aswell as immortal) I was in no danger. I was raised in foster care, moved from home to home and treated well. But I didn't have the scar. The two little nicks on the back of the neck that indicate the administration of the antidote. I am not immortal. \n\nFor a time it was difficult. To everyone else time itself has become inconsequential, an abstract concept so vague that it has almost ceased to exist. But time was my enemy. I am scheduled to die, my life is finite. What they don't realise is that now, time has become my friend. To begin with I pitied them as they pitied me. As the generation before us passed into the void, I became quaint. Now I am constantly comforted, worried about, fretted over. I do not need it.\n\nYou see as my death approaches, I begin to fear for the world I leave behind. We have stripped ourselves of a truth so central to our existence that soon, there will be nothing left. Death allows us to live. My peers (if I can call them that) do not understand that. How could they? They have never known the fear of death, they have never known the knowledge of it. And so they are stuck in a never ending loop of what they call progress. They are unable to value every moment, cherish every memory, live every day because there will always be more. They are frozen in time. Overpopulation is the least of their worries. \n\nBut they pitied me all the same. And it burned me at first. But now so close to the end, all I feel is grief for this tragedy that a whole species is blind to. All things which begin must come to an end. It is my time now and though I fear for them and their soon to be empty existence, I am tired now. Death waits for me like an old friend, a brother in arms. Together we will smile and reminisce as we leave for the next journey. Farewell.", "\"But, Mr. President, sir!\" Interrupted Secretary of Defense Arnold Chaffer. \"Scientific advancement has permitted us to use this great development for so much better purposes!\" He pauses In wait of permission to continue. Nothing. The President if the United States stood frozen, eyes intense with unknown emotion. \n\n\"We could regain the power this great country once held,\" he continued persuasively. \"We have the ability to build once again a nation that men like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Ronald Reagan envisioned and led us towards. In twenty years time we can have an invincible army capable of eradicating all our enemies and the enemies of our allies strengthening our alliance with them.\" His voice grew more eager with every syllable that flowed from his zealous mouth. \"Think about it, Mr. President! A world without terrorism. A world without war. And you, sir,\" he emphasized with a searing point of a crooked Bony finger that looked more like a twig. \"You could be that man whom is given the credit and your name will go down in the books forever as 'the man who ushered in world peace. '\" He stood getting at the president in wait for a response. Nut a long pause ensued. \n\nFinally, the president broke the awkward silence. \"Mr.Chaffer.\" he paused. \"What good is a world without war when there are motherless children? Fatherless children?\" Years began to well In his large round eyes. \"We only have a small amount of the serum and I don't plan on using it for an army. I want to share it with all those poor unfortunate children all around the world who starts off life at a disadvantage. We,\" the president says compassionately, lowering his time to match. \"We have the ability; the opportunity to raise up the poor and unfortunate. And that\" emphasizing the word 'that,' is what we will do with this wondrous opportunity we are now presented with.\" \n\nThe room hangs in silence. ", "I have, maybe, twenty years left. This is such a refreshing thought, it helps me get through long lines and boring dinners. It makes me feel rejuvenated in ways youth masks and oxygen pills cannot. I enjoy the promise of death. \n\nIt boggles the minds around me, twists them up like tissue. \n\nI look young for my age. I could pass for thirty, thirty two. I enjoy both worlds, most would not be able to recognize me without looking it up on a computer. The only way people would be shocked is if I told them, I never took the serum.\n\nSome of my kind wear gray streaks in their hair, a badge of honor. My sister refused to lie about her age and did everything she could to appear older. Her smoking turned her skin to leather, puckered her mouth, broke her eyes. When she died, I was asked, \"Is she your mother?\" \n\nIt made me laugh. \n\nA few of my close friends know my secret. They wring their hands together and promise to help me keep living, to become like them. I turned down every 'extenda-year' and 'late start pill' they offer. I tell them this is what I want. \n\nThey are good friends. But friendship is not forever. I am not forever. It makes them more dear to me, makes our meetings taste of lemongrass and longing. \n\nI don't have the heart to tell them what I know. They are so happy now, in their bubble of lies. Would they believe me? The frail mind of the Mortal Generation? The only true 56 year old woman in the world? \n\nTheir minds will rot. They will hit 100, 102, and the will begin to shut down. They will feel their years so greatly it will pain them. Then they will look for their life experience in their face, the lines of time. There will be nothing. Life will begin to lose color, luster, then they will do the only thing they can... end it. \n\nOne after another.\n\nI have the dignity of not having to choose. I will go when I am ready. \n\n", "The white walls gleamed. She could see the outlines of faces, blurred against the tears of her failing eyes. Her breath was short. She could feel it, each breath was becoming lighter and lighter. Each breath shorter than the one that had come before it. Something squeezed her hearth, and she threw her hand to the side. Grasping, desperately scrabbling for anything, anyone who – there. Someone had her hand, but it was like her hand was wrapped in cotton wool. She couldn’t feel the hand, couldn’t feel the… whose hand was it? She strained to look. The outline was heavy, but fading, fading, into the light. \n\n\nShe blinked and it was gone. She could see clearly, for the first time in a decade. The room was crisp and empty – too white and too clean. She looked around and for a moment missed the figure in the corner. The shadows licked at it, swirling and merging as if it were hair caught in a gust. \n\n\nIt raised its head and turned. She couldn’t see it under the cowl, but she knew there was no face there.\n\n\nThere was a pause.\n\n\n“SO, YOU’RE THE LAST ONE TO ESCAPE?” it said.\n\n\n“Escape?”\n\n\n“YOU’RE THE LAST ONE TO DIE?”\n\n\n“It seems I am.”\n\n\nThere was silence. It dropped its head. \n\n\n“SO IT IS DONE.”\n\n\nThe figure visibly slumped. It took a trembling breath, and then leaned its head against the wall. It exhaled, and smoke and dust and ash shuddered out from the cowl like a cigarette from hell. It took another breath and exhaled. \n\n\nThe smell of rot filled the air as it sighed.\n\n\n“You are Death.” It was not a question. She knew. “My name is Mabel,” she said. Her voice quavered.\n\n\nIt turned its head and stood up. It was tall, some seven feet so. The black robe that hung off it looked centuries unwashed; tattered, beaten and worn thin. It covered the distance from the corner to her bed faster than it should have, and bobbed down. It looked at the floor.\n\n\n“MY NAME IS DEATH, YES.”\n\n\nIt looked up. Mabel could see Death’s eyes. It’s face had shadows for skin and universes for eyes.\n\n\n“YOU ARE THE LAST LUCKY ONE, MABEL HAWTHORNE. YOU ARE THE LAST TO FEEL THE RELEASE. THOSE THAT ARE LEFT WILL WANDER FOR AEONS, UNTIL THE SUNS COLLAPSE AND THE STARS DIE. NOTHING WILL KILL THEM. THEY WILL KNOW EVERYTHING AND KNOW EVERYONE. THEY WILL SEE PLANETS FALL TO ASH IN THEIR WAKE. THEY WILL HAVE TO SUFFER EACH OTHER. THEY WILL BE GODS, BUT WISH TO BE DEAD. FOR EVERYONE WANTS TO DIE, EVENTUALLY.”\n\n\nShe fell into his eyes. His eyes, so old, so deep and so, so tired.\n\n\n“TRUST ME.” \n", "The senate roared in disbelief. On the little pedestal in the center stood a thirty-something law school graduate turned senator. Whatever everyone else thought, that kid had balls. There he was, the very first elected immortal senator, calling all of us out. I was guilty too. All of us were in it for ourselves. The stakes were high and we wanted to enjoy the rest of our lives with at least some amount of comfort. Trampling on these immortal jerks was well worth it. We wouldn’t survive for even a wink of their new lifespan.\n\nI remember our parents yelling at us to get out of the house because we were busy playing computer games all day. Well this is much more drastic. We have to instill a sense of fear into them for the lives that they can’t even lose. We do so because the rest of us have lives that we can lose, and we’re being killed off in droves. There’s a counter, out there on the internet that has exactly the number of mortals left alive. There’s a screen dedicated to it in the senate room. It’s the countdown to a new order of things.\n\nSure, the first generation of immortals are having it tough. State sponsored discrimination is something we implemented so that the rest of us mortals wouldn’t be dominated by the rise of the immortals. Those fools age until 25 or so and just stay like that forever. They’ll just have to enjoy their mid-twenties when we’re all dead.\n", "Things just keep getting better. That's been the rule since man first made fire and decided his mastodon tasted better when it was crispy and warmed up a bit. Then we got things like writing and that made it easier to remember. Crops, calendars, cookies, cockrings, life just kept getting better as some idiot made up a new method of doing things and started telling people about it.\n\nBut this was the big one. This was the trick that everyone wanted back when we switched our saber-tooth steaks from Blue-rare to medium. The shield against the reaper, the one treasure that had eluded the entirety of human history. This one didn't sneak up on us like the rest, this one we fucking worked and explored and thought and bled and died for. And we finally found it.\n\nOf course it was something simple. Something we just didn't get before until some half-savant Chinese farmer's kid got pulled into exactly the right university and spoke with the exact right Hindu exchange student and then moved to the states to pick up the surprising hobby of rock climbing and said that one damned sentence to me when we met in a bar twenty years ago. You've all ready the news stories.\n\n\"Roger, you take it too seriously. You need to switch your grip, and see it from the bottom and top as well. Right now you only see the backside.\" \nThat's all it took. I went to work the next day and set the protein-folding simulator to a new algorithm that's got more Greek symbols than numbers you'd recognize, a new angle and a new grip I never figured on trying before. And this time, while I was eating my grilled cheese sandwich for lunch, I checked back and the RNA had blossomed into a masterpiece. One step changed and suddenly the ten thousand million failures before seemed so pathetically juvenile. \n\nAnd when I say Blossomed, that's exactly it. The folding , the math, a motherfucking microscopic flower opened. Buddha's Lotus, I named it to myself, before the marketers decided to change it to something that the Christians could stomach.\n\nWhat's really sad is the kids that could have had it if we'd got to them first. The first trials were for adults, of course. Well-compensated and voluntary participants eager for a shot at the big Holy Grail that would let them see everything history had to offer from that date forward. \n\nBut that didn't take, as you know. Adults have got their immunoresponses already in place, and so they started going anaphylactic and dying on our surgery tables. Over and over. That was a bad year. Only soldiers and doctors should have to show up at work wondering whether they're going to kill someone that day, and I'm neither. I was a comfortable biologist with a Dachshund habit and a wife who enjoyed crime novels. \n\nAnd then it took nearly a decade to get Congress to allow for legal testing on infants. We did it illegaly before that anyway, my team had had enough of the bushel basket treatment and went to Cambodia to tell the sad mothers there that their children might live forever or die today. The first one that it didn't kill after a few hours was a miracle, a one-week-old whose mom needed the money for groceries and gambling debt. The kid made it to seven years old before real life in Southeast Asia caught up with him and he vanished. We figure child trafficking. The first miracle, kidnapped by some pedo, never knowing he should be a biggest celebrity alive. Hell, he was probably dead within a year, one more tragedy in a long chain.\n\nThe others started to survive and the word got out. I got kinda famous and things got hairy for a while. I got compared to the Nazis and Marquis de Sad and then Stacy got kidnapped because I was too fucking stupid to hire a bodyguard.\n\nAnd I didn't have money then, I was still a working stiff. The terrorists really wanted me, my lab, my staff, our files, everything, burned to the ground. And that was never going to happen. So Stacey died, live on video for all TOR to see, along with family members of four of my staff. I haven't watched the video. People ask if I know how she died and I tell them no. I've seen enough bad death, I don't need to see it happen to the woman I loved. \n\nAnd it's amazing, what happens when a major terrorist event like that gets the news crews into your life. I went from \"Political Famous\" to \"International Superstar\" famous. Me, a slightly pudgy nerd, getting to meet celebrities and having them beg me to be at the birth of their children to make sure it was done right. \n\nFame is powerful. With it came a lot of hate. I did have bodyguards and money now, and things got better. I kept doing work to improve the procedure, make it less skillful and less dangerous, and a decade of constant improvements led to me looking up one day and realizing that I had an empire and a following of immortal kids that would owe the majority of their lives to my work.\n\nWhat was really amazing was my 50's. The Forever kids just started hitting their twenties. I could go out in public and go home with someone less than half my age, with stars in her eyes and so grateful to even have a moment with me. \n\nBut one thing eluded me, us. The Lotus still only worked on infants. I had made a miracle that I could never touch for myself. This Messiah was going to burn on the same retirement-home-shaped pyre as the rest of the punters who showed up too early to get in over the wire. And that was why I kept working, once the novelty of the beautiful women wore off. \n\nMy 60's were a time of the biggest breakthroughs. Robots administered everything now, little soft-ball-sized drones with a payload of surgical tools and a single syringe pointing out one end. We called them Forever Seeds. Mortality rates from the procedure dropped to nill. In fact, mortality rates all over the world were steadily decreasing. Better countries got to stuff first, a generation ahead of the really poor ones, but once the drones hit the market it was all over. Not a single person born after 2131 died in 2189, from what I hear. Just the old farts continuing to wear out.\n\nAnd my turn was coming. So I worked. I tried to find my chinese muse and see if he had another miraculous sentence in him that would turn the bullet back around on the shooter, that would let me forever enjoy my cult of personality. I found him. He'd died of cancer in 2176. \n\nI got to watch the first colony ships, many named after me, heading to the stars. I got to watch humanity step out of corporatehood and into brotherhood. I watched the new children being born, not only immortal but genetically \"perfect,\" whatever that meant. I took a year off and found out when they started getting old enough to be interesting, and I was not disappointed. They are beautiful, kind, powerful, charismatic, wise. The work that John Erkstring did to make this new breed is going to effect our species just as much as mine. He deserves every ounce of recognition he gets and more. \n\nAnd still I worked. My ageing body got replaced by metal and cloned organs, but they still haven't figured out what to do about my brain. Every full clone they've made looks like me, talks like me, and knows everything about my life, but I'm not in the driver's seat. The clone is for the children, so my work can continue when I bite the big one. This man, this soul, is still stuck in a rusting frame of flesh, hoping to get my second miracle before the lights go out.\n\nAnd so I work. People look at me like a mad scientist now, a modern Merlin. If I make it, if I finish the work and get to see a Forever Seed unfold his scalpels for my benefit, I will be a god for eternity. Not a small god, relegated to this one decaying planet, forever tied to the physics that made the mammoth-eater cold and sick and stupid, but a true living god to be revered for the rest of human history in my living form.\n\nAnd so I work. And things keep getting better, always better. ", "Conner came to visit today. \n\nHe's a doctor now, by the way. Good one too, gets a lot of attention. Not sure I quite understand all the techo bits, but he discovered some sort of artificial protein, something like that. They put it in with that new nano-machine, makes the process smoother. \"The Process\" they call it. I tell you what, it's all over my head.\n\nReminds me of what people say about outer space. You sing that little song from kindergarten with all the planets, you think you know everything there is about space. By the time you learn what the Horsehead Nebula is, you realize you don't know jack.\n\nThings are pretty different from back then, what with the hubbub about the \"Great Purpose of Mankind\" like our bitch of a President keeps yammerin' on about. Expanding ourselves throughout the universe, manifest destiny without the tragedy. Damn shame I have to hear her voice every other day on the news. I don't know about mankind, but I know my great purpose is pop her one good time in the mouth.\n\nAnyway, Conner came by to show me some new pictures of Tanya Grace, and I'll be damned if she isn't the prettiest little girl I ever laid eyes on. Beautiful, bright green eyes, sweetest little laugh when you pick her up just right. Conner said she had long blonde hair when she was born. They shaved it right off of course, like everyone does nowadays. Hasn't quite grown back in yet, but it'll cover up that nasty head scar she got pretty soon.\n\nThat's somethin' I'm real happy I never had to do. Looking down every day and seein' a big ole scar like that on all my children? I woulda rushed off to the hospital every other day thinking I'd dropped em down the stairs.\n\nFirst time I'd seen Conner smiling in quite a while, him showing me those pictures. I don't see many people in general. Walking around with their heads glued to their little helmet screens, barely looking at one another. Even Andrew and Carrie, they took their boys down to see the Grand Canyon and they barely had a word to say about it when I called to asked 'em about it. Damn shame. Growing up, that's the one place I told myself I had to see before I died. Only went there once, but I saw it dammit. And boy it justabout took my breath away.\n\nMaybe that's why all these kids are always so down. Adults too. There's no urgency. And why should there be I guess, hell they've got all the time in the world! Probably a couple more worlds coming down the pipe any day now. Not me, no thank you sir. Even if I only got one little piece of one little part of this great big world, long as it was something beutiful it woulda been enough for me. Something like that gives you something to take with you when you go. I'm afraid people today have just stopped picking it up.\n\nI just don't know about that little machine. Growing with your brain, bumping your expiration date up from milk to twinkies? I'm not saying I'm about to up and join one of them Nazarthian cults and spend my weekends jumping off a cliff, I just don't know if these people realize what all they're missing. There's some good things about being old, and I'd damn sure know 'em. Got creaky bones and a creakier knee. Left hand ain't worked right since the car car crash, and my right ear ain't worked since when I was still wearing camouflage, running about in the jungle. \n\nBut I'll tell you what. I wouldn't change a thing. Not a damn thing. All these cuts and bruises are my cuts and bruises, and ain't nobody knownwhat it feels like to have 'em 'cept me. All these folks keeping saying now they can do everything. All that time on their hands, they'll end up reading every book, seeing every movie, and climbing every mountain. They're missing the choices though. There's beauty in our limitations, the roads we pick and the ones we don't. It's what makes us us. If everybody does everything, people'll become a lot less interesting to one another.\n\nBesides, let's see how happy they are after they've been married for 1,000 years. Hell, you and I barely made it to sixty, and I'm still convinced you got sick when you did just so you wouldn't have to listen to me ramble on anymore. Nothing you can do now sweetheart, I'm just rambling away. You might as well start getting used to it again, I'm coming up behind you real soon. You've had your little vacation, but you won't be able to say what you always said when I talked too much in front of the Good Lord.\n\nBy the way. I was wrong earlier when I said I'd be happy with just a little bitty piece of this little bitty world. I could live longer than all these Lazurus wannabees combined and it wouldn't compare to spending 86 years with a pretty girl like you.\n\nI miss you like hell, baby. I'm glad my story's coming up to the last page, it's time to close this old book. \n\nThat's it. That's what they're missing. A sense of completion. Life's the greatest book ever written, but no one wants to read forever.\n\nI love you, Sarah. I'll see you soon.\n\nYour loving husband,\nCliff", "In a way it sucked and in a way it was interesting, being one of the last mortal men on earth. I was treated as a bit of an oddity by some and a sort of celebrity by others, especially when it came close to my time of death. \n\nGo figure that I'd be the very last one to go, by only a few hours, but the last nonetheless. My final breath was seen by millions and heard around the world. I died with the eyes of the world on me. \n\nWell come to find out I'm a bit of a celebrity in the afterlife as well. I was the very last human to escape from purgatory.", "I'm not that unique. An entire generation of children just missed out on the key to immortality. The injection of everlasting life. The solution to death. For those of us born before the serum was ready for human use, our fates were sealed.\n\nWe quickly became the focus of scientists around the globe. \"They're still young,\" they thought. \"Perhaps it's not too late.\" But no progress was made, the only outcome being a childhood tainted by lab tests and experiments. \n\nBy the time I was a teenager, the madness had subsided. The research for post-birth eternal life was ongoing, but progress was at a standstill and we were more or less free to live our lives as we wished. Things were pretty normal. Almost the entire planet would realize death at the end of their lives, the exceptions being this new generation of children who received the serum. For the rest of us, life marched on as expected. \n\nBut as life passed and the sands of time slipped away grain by grain, things began to change. By the time I was 45, the eternals outnumbered the mortals. Normalcy turned to pity, to grief. By the time I was 60, even fewer of us were left. \n\nAs the rest of the world lived their lives knowing they'd travel to the depths of space, develop unfathomable technologies and spread across the universe, I was diagnosed with a Stage 3 tumor and given a month to live. My end was approaching with ferocity. \n\nBut I noticed something peculiar. As I grew weaker and the cancer begin to take over my body, the people around me, the people that would never know death, became fascinated with my impending fade into oblivion. Their pity for me turned into jealousy, their optimism into sadness. \n\nAnd it was the moments before I passed, when I was surrounded by nurses and doctors and grandchildren who would die with the Sun but never before, that I realized death is truly the beauty of life. These people will never know peace, only never-ending struggles. And it was me who pitied them as life left my body forever. \n\n\n\n", "My life is a cosmic joke. Had I obeyed my prenatal need for three more weeks gestational time or been born just a few hours later, the serum would have been administered to me before I was taken home. If my parents hadn’t been part of the anit-immoserum party, I would have been taken back to the hospital and injected. As long as an infant was under one week of age they could be modified. This was meant to account for any child whose circumstance prevented them from having access to, or physically tolerating, the serum at birth. Excluding those edge cases, every healthy child was required, regardless of parental consent, to have the immoserum administered during their first physical examination. \n\n\nThroughout grade school I thought very little of death, as most of my peers had no reason to ponder such irrelevant concepts. I played happily alongside my immortal friends, encapsulated in the brilliance of blissful ignorance. At what age do you tell your child that they are going to die? Eight years old? Ten years old? We all knew our parents would go some day and some of us had older siblings who would suffer the same sad fate. But none of us considered that, one day, we would leave the world which we were only just figuring out. \n\n\n“Elias, we need to talk to you about something.” My mother said to me one day. \n\n\nThirteen, apparently that is age that you can tell a child that they are doomed to rot in the cold ground. That is the age that you can shatter your son’s world with the information that he is not like his friends. That he is mortal. \n\n\nI screamed so loudly that I woke up my younger sister, cursing my parents’ stupidity with the fierce hatred of a petulant teenager. Her head popped around the corner of the wall between our bedroom hallway and the sitting area, eyes wide and welling up with tears. Ignoring her sadness, I shoved past my father and stormed to my room, dropping miserably to my bed to bawl soundlessly into my pillow. After that day I was not who I once was. I was not happy, or carefree. I was not a child. I was a dead man walking and could think of nothing but my own death. \n\n\nMost major illness had been eradicated and the frequency of accidental death had decreased greatly, so age was the last controllable life threatening factor that humanity needed to triumph over. The serum didn’t prevent death in general, but it stopped the body’s systems from failing and allowed for cellular regeneration of all vital organs. Anything else could be fixed through surgical procedures. But not for me. My lifespan could be extended to a maximum of 150 years before I deteriorated entirely. \n\n\nIf I had known, at the time, that I would become the celebrity that I am, I might have felt more hopeful. My youth was filled with needless risk taking and countless visits to the hospital. I was suicidal but never had the guts to take the steps on my own, so I gambled senselessly with my life in hopes that the world would do what I couldn't. Decades passed by and I had managed to survive mostly unscathed. Over time, both of my my parents died and, on both occasions, my sister watched me with anticipatory pain. Face sporting the look of a young woman wondering how she would feel when it was me in the bed. \n\n\nToday she will find out. Today, the whole world will watch as the last mortal man dies. When it narrowed down to five of us, five old and wrinkled men and women with failing bodies and weary minds, the world began to watch. We had all exhausted the available surgical procedures and were considered poor candidates for any further operation. So we sat and waited, cameras on the walls so the world would get to see the moment in which the life escaped our already inert eyes. \n\n\nOne by one they all went. John’s heart gave out. Samantha’s liver shut down.. Neil and Tabitha both went on the same day which gave the television station remarkably high ratings. Now there is me; the last man left alive and waiting to die. Perhaps I should get a trophy or a medal. Not that I will have much use for it after a few hours. I’ve been informed that there are massive gatherings of people all over the world watching and waiting for my demise. Even here, outside of the hospital, the streets are flooded with bodies, all celebrating their own life and immortality by mindlessly watching my death as if I am some cheap reality TV show. \n\n\nMy life is a cosmic joke, a mass marketed spectacle, entertaining the masses until the commercials run. \n\n\n--------------------------------------\n\nI am a novice writer and would be super open to any editing or criticism.\n\n\nEdit:\n\nThank you all so much for the kind words. I think I am going to edit this add some more detail for my own purposes. You've made me feel pretty good about it. I don't know if there would be a place to post it or not, but I generally appreciate that people have taken the time to read and send me positive responses. " ]	13
	[WP] Villains aren't born, they're made. In a world where superpowers are real, continuous use of them corrupts the parts of the brain responsible for empathy and compassion.	[ "Katy sat forward on her chair, rubbing her eyes. The news was filled with stories about genetically engineered apes who had been given superpowers. They'd quickly lost all compassion for other living things after discovering how to use their powers.\n\nShe sighed, and leaned back, switching off the television.\n\n\"Okay, guys,\" Katy said, buttoning up her lab coat, \"We've got exactly 100 days before this goes live everywhere around the world. I didn't want to say it, but we're going to have to put down the babies that we started this in.\"", "Power corrupts, proportional to its intensity and frequency of use.\n\nIt's called Stahl-Verhoeff Syndrome. There are people with Power, seemingly capable of acting in contradiction to the laws of physics and the limitations of their biology. The repeated use of this Power results in a neurodegenerative effect, seemingly dependent on how strongly it defies the laws of the universe and how often it is used. A person who is 5% stronger than they should be isn't likely to feel much of an effect over their lifetime, unless they are exerting that strength every day. A person who can breath fire probably isn't going to last very long.\n\nThe specific results of SVS vary significantly from case to case, but they invariably involve damage to the insular cortex and the limbic system. This damage can cause a person to have problems with a whole range of normal functions. Most common, and of primary concern, are difficulties with emotional reactions and interpersonal relationships. In lay terms, a person who uses Power can rapidly become a psychopath. Well, the medical community doesn't like to use that word nowadays, but it's a reasonable description anyway. I should emphasize that not everyone suffers such extreme effects. You've probably heard of Dr. Samantha Powell - the physicist? She is a confirmed user of high intensity Power and just seems to be a bit antisocial as a result. Although honestly I was never completely convinced that that wasn't just her. Ah, but, regardless, she is a rare case. \n\nUnfortunately, most people who use a noticeable amount of Power do experience serious effects. A large proportion of Power users are essentially addicts: it turns out to be really difficult to resist using Power, and the neurological damage just makes it harder. It gets bad. \n\nWe have statistics. 68% of users resort to crime, almost invariably violent. Of those, 29% are arrested or killed while being apprehended. 11% of users die of a sort of Power overdose - using their Power to the point that they suffer brain death. 12% end up comatose. \n\n41% commit suicide when they begin to understand that something is going wrong with them. \n\nOnly 7% live long, happy lives - either eschewing their Power or being fortunate enough to not suffer\nserious effects.\n\nWhat I am about to say next may make my telling you all of this seem a bit crass. I'm sorry. I really am.\n\nYou are the strongest Power user currently alive. You are hundreds, perhaps thousands of times stronger than an average man. You can catch bullets. You can fly. We don't really know the details - the full extent of what you can do. We just know what we saw. What you showed us in the five seconds after you started using your Power.\n\nBased on our calculations, if you use your Power for more than 75 minutes in total, you will likely die.\n\n---\n\n\"Ten minutes to drop, sir.\"\n\nI snap back to reality, the pilot's voice in my ear interrupting the memory of the lecture Matt Clark gave me three years ago. The lecture he delivered while I was drugged and chained to a chair, and while he was in a room over a hundred miles away. \n\n\"Ah, right. Okay.\"\n\nI'm in a plane. Jet? Stealth transport? Something like that. I don't know planes. We're flying over the White Sea, on a direct course for Arkhangelsk. It's been about 15 hours of flights so far. I could have made the whole trip myself in a few minutes, but that would've violated every protocol. A waste of Power, unjustified risk, etc. So here I am 15 hours later, and I can never sleep on flights.\n\n\"Tim? Are you awake, Tim?\"\n\nThere's Matt - another voice in my ear. Speaking through a tiny piece of molded plastic. It's probably really expensive technology, but I find it hard to appreciate when it never shuts up.\n\n\"Yes. Barely, yes. What?\"\n\n\"Just checking in! Making sure you're all ready to go.\"\n\nHow can he always be so fucking cheery?\n\n\"I'm ready. Do you have anything new to tell me?\"\n\n\"No, nothing has changed as far as I can tell. It still feels the same to me, and there's no reports coming in about anything actually happening. We're keeping you to the timetable.\"\n\nSeventeen hours ago, Matt sensed a new Power user. Matt's a user too, with a relatively innocuous Power. He can sense other Power users. He can't really sense the small ones unless he's close, but the big ones stand out to him like beacons. He can get a sense of the intensity too, and can somehow tell someone who is using from someone who isn't. He also doesn't seem to get much of the negative effect: either he's lucky or sensing isn't really in defiance of the universe. The new user was a big one, not using yet. I asked Matt how big. He said he didn't know. That's bad. There are a few users like that, with Power so great that Matt cannot really \"look\" at them enough to get an idea. I'm one, Shuraih Yassin is another, all of us closely watched. Power overwhelming: enough to wipe out humanity on a hair trigger. So I was called in, stuck on a plane, and pointed in the new user's general direction with the order to detain or dispatch.\n\n\"Tim. Are you listening, Tim?\"\n\n\"Sorry, what were you saying?\"\n\n\"Listen. Remember. You are authorized for 30 real seconds of usage. I will be monitoring you closely. Do not exceed this time. If we do not receive your success signal and your authorized time expires then the Tianjin Protocol will be enacted automatically. It will also be enacted if we receive your fail signal. Are we clear?\"\n\nHe still manages to sound cheerful.\n\n\"Clear, Matt.\"\n\n\"Watch your back, Tim.\"\n\n\"One minute to drop, sir. Best get in position.\" The pilot again.\n\nI heave myself out of my seat. Some guy decked out in military gear is pulling open a hatch. He's giving me a look that I don't recognize. I step up to the edge, looking out and down at the city below. It's cold – winter in Russia. Somewhere down there a god is being born.\n\n\"Go!\"\n\nI step out of the plane and drop. I have to fall far enough away from the plane before I can begin. I start counting.\n\nFive.\n\nFour.\n\nThree.\n\nTwo.\n\n\"TIM! HE'S USING!\"\n\nOne.", "What is this person feeling?- Asked the therapist again, this time showing him a card with the picture of a young woman smiling.\n\n\nShe is angry- he answered.\n\n\nWhy do you believe that?- she asked, adjusting her glasses while looking at him with a mix of fear and pity. She knew it wouldn't upset him, as he wouldn't even notice her expression.\n\n\nBecause she's showing her teeth and opening her eyes- he said. Interpreting body language was now his only way to know what others were feeling, but everytime he flew, it became more and more difficult.\n\n\nAre you flying again?- \nHe conciously smiled, attempting to show her how angry and anxious the question just made him.\n\n\nI don't want to talk about it- he said.\n\n\nThen what do you want to talk about?- she asked, after writing a couple of lines in her notebook.\n\n\nJust show me another face- She proceeded to grab a card with an old man frowning.\n\n\nHe's upset-\n\n\nVery good, and what about this one?- A young woman looking disgusted, almost like she was about to be sick.\n\n\nShe is in love-\n\n\nWhy's that?-\n\n\nEverytime she asked him why was that instead of congratulating him, he knew he was wrong, and on this occasion he didn't want to tell her that he chose his answer because the woman had an expression identical to the one his girlfriend made so often lately.\n\n\nHe kept a neutral expression but raised his voice and got threateningly close to her.\n\n\nI just know it- if a poker face would have a tone of voice to match, it would be the one he had just used.\n\n\nShe's actually disgusted-\n\n\nHe wasn't angry, a few months ago he hadn't felt anger anymore, nor any other feeling for that matter, but he had learned to rationalize and select reactions according to his analysis of people's comments and his deductions from what he learned with the facial cards in therapy. The fact that his girlfriend was looking at him with disgust wasn't good news but the way the therapist just confronted him with reality, instead of censoring herself out of fearful respect for such a powerful patient, that was unacceptable.\n\n\nHe grabed her with one arm and as she tried to let herself go, he jumped out of the window carring her like a heavy bag. Five floors away from the ground, she was now trying to hold on to him tightly.\n\n\nPlease, think about what you'd say about this situation if you saw it on the news- sometimes, putting his reactions in third person helped him to realize if he was doing the wrong thing.\n\n\nHe flew back with her to the office and dropped her coldly but carefuly on her chair like she was a box marked \"fragile\".\n\n\nI'm going mad- he said unemotionally.\n\n\nThe fact that you are here shows you still care- \n\n\nHe knew that if he kept flying, he'd stop caring real soon, but why should he stop if it was the only time he felt anything? He left the therapist's office and went for a walk. He didn't refrain from droping her out of compassion or conscience, but because then he'd have to find another therapist and he found the card excercises useful.\n\n\nAs he walked, some pidgeons got out of his way by flying to the sides when he passed them. As he saw them getting away, and looking at him from a rooftop nearby, he imagined they were laughing at him, looking at him with the same disdain he saw non-flying people with, grounded for life and constrained to the floor, spreading propaganda about the perils of human flight, surely out of pure envy. Why should he care about their feelings, or about them at all?\n\n\nStories about dictators and criminals being flyers... propaganda. That mad man that had flown to the Earth's stratosphere and fell back asphyxiated who was all over the news a few days ago... propaganda. He said to himself that it was all a plan to discredit and alienate people like him because they feared anyone who's different.\nAs he passed by a corner grocery shop, a man sitting on the sidewalk begged him for some spare change. The beggar insisted after being ignored, and in order to avoid being bothered a third time, he kicked him in the face and kept walking.\n\n\nA police officer saw what happened and approached him. He stood interrupting his walk.\n\n\nPlease get out of my way-\n\n\nThe officer put his hand over the man's shoulder firmly, and told him he saw what just happened.\n\n\nAnd why don't you aprehend that beggar? He shouldn't be there-\n\n\nYou can't just kick him, that's assault-\n\n\nHe trespassed my personal space-\n\n\nHis arrogance exhausted the policeman's patience quickly and as he tried to detain him, he flew one more time and saw the situation from several metres above: the policeman was helping the beggar to get back up and a couple of customers came out of the shop and gave the man a coffee and a sandwich. Why were they helping the guy was beyond his comprehension, in fact, he realized that he had had enough of trying to fit in with those people. He didn't want to end up hunted down like all those other flyers that were said to be going rogue and atacking people, so he decided to keep going, towards the mountains, and with every mile he flew, he was leaving himself behind and becoming more animal-like.\n\n\nFlying over the mountains, he thought of himself as a falcon in a man's body, and decided that he could live with that. If he wanted food, he'd go down to the forest for a hunt, same for water. He could fly all he wanted over there, and never be interrupted by the ordinary ones and their jealousy. \n\n\nEventually, he stopped talking to himself in his mind, and acted more on instinct. The more he flew, other parts of his personality fell apart... first the feelings, then the emotions, then language and thoughts. He was now just like another bird in the mountain and he wasn't even aware of that as all his consciusness was gone.", "Craig collapsed to his knees clutching his stomach. He wiped wetness from his mouth and saw blood. \"Claire, you HAVE to stop this. You can fight it.\"\n\nShe stood at the end of the hallway. Tall and powerful. \"You made me do this. You... TOOK THEM FROM ME!\" With a thought, Craig was thrown through a wall, into the living room, and crashing onto a side table scattering it's adornments to the ground. \n\nCraig struggled to stand up and winced from the pain. \"Claire, honey... I didn't take them from you. \" Craig mustered the strength to continue speaking \"I.. I was trying to keep them safe.\"\n\nCraig's body flew across the room crashing him into a bookshelf. His legs slid out from under him. He leaned his back against the broken shelves, a pile of books and trinkets surrounding him. Claire stood above him \"You lie.\"\n\nCraig felt weak \"Claire... please, stop.\" His arm trembled as he raised a picture frame that had fallen from the shelf. Through the broken glass, Claire could see the remnants of a family photo. Craig, two smiling children, and a face she no longer recognized. \"They... ugh... ask about you,\" His speech was laborious, \"but I did not want them seeing what their mother had be-\"\n\nClaire's fist interrupted him. \"Where are they?\" she growled. \n\nStunned Craig tried to speak \"Claire... sto-\"\n\nShe hit him again. \"Where are they?\"\n\nWords stumbled through the blood in Craig's mouth \"P... Plea... Clai... Please... stop.\"\n\n\"WHERE ARE THEY?!\" She screamed. She began to punch him repeatedly. Each punch harder than the last. Each punch punctuated by Claire's, now booming, voice.\n\n\"WHERE ARE THEY!? WHERE ARE THEY!? WHERE ARE THEY?! WHERE ARE THEY?!\"\n", "As he floated through the endless sky, he glanced down at all the atrocities being commited before him. Sure he could use his super powers and save them quite easily, however was it really worth it? When the reality is, that his power could only be used a few times before he would turn into a villain. Were a few measly lifes enough? Surely anyone would come to the conclusion that it would be wisest to wait for an oppertunity to save more lifes. At least that was the very conclusion that he arrived at. \n\nAnd so he continued to swerve throughout the universe, witnessing crime and sin one after another, but remaining passive at every single one, never quite finding one worthy of his sacrifice. He kept assuring himself that he was saving it for the greater good, but meanwhile, one couldn't help but wonder, if he had already become the villain.", "How long has it been since I felt anything resembling compassion for human beings? I suppose the easiest way to figure that out is to look back at when I first realized the full potential of my abilities. Going forward from that moment in time I suppose I can decide the moment when empathy left me entirely. But perhaps what is more important than the absolute loss itself, is to remember the events leading up to it, leading up to now.\n\n\nWhen I was a child my parents marveled at my abilities both in the classroom and on the playground. In pre-school I was the most popular child, constantly being followed around by my classmates on the playground, doing the things I wanted to do and never finding opposition from the other children. Of course at this point in my life what I wanted to do was play in the sand or ride down the slide. Still, I am told the adults at the time would comment on how I was \"a natural leader\" and \"going to accomplish great things.\" They had no idea how correct they were.\n\n\nOver the years it became apparent that I was not like everyone else. In my teenage years during highschool I began to realize that my uncanny leadership skills were not simply born of practice and confidence. I noticed that I was willing others to action, not simply leading others of their own free will. However, I kept this knowledge to myself, I was still a teenager, my abilities did not grant me immunity to all of the awkward experiences of going through those years. \n\n\nBesides, what would would my friends and classmates think if I tried to explain to them what I was beginning to believe, that I had the power of mind control. It was well known that across the world there were people with... unique... abilities. The ability to heal from wounds almost immediately, shape shifting, to speak with animals, telekinetic force. But I had never heard of anyone able to corrupt the will of other living creatures, and as time went by that is exactly what I began to do.\n\n\nAs I grew, so did my powers, and the more that I focused on and trained them, the easier they came. At that time I didn't know what it was doing to me, I used my ability to bend the will of others for my own personal gain. It is amazing how quickly you can rise through the ranks of power when every step that you take seems like the first step ever taken by those around you. \n\n\nI began to have such disdain for those people around me, they were so stupid. So weak. Their flexible will became like a stench to me, nauseating to endure for more than minutes at a time. I began to spend entire days inside of my penthouse office, toying with people of the city below from great distances. A bit of adultery here, a robbery there, arson, vandalism. Days turned to weeks, I stopped going to work and spent my days alone in my home continuing to toy with the lives of people around the world. My power had become so focused that I had no need to see or be anywhere near the people I felt like controlling. That is when I decided to leave.\n\n\nOver the course of a year I directed a force to construct a stronghold in the mountains. I needed to get away from the pathetic hordes of insignificant beings so easily bent and broken by my own indomitable will. But that did not stop my games.\n\n\nNow here I am, alone, away from everyone and everything. The world is on the eve of a global conflict, I find it unlikely that many shreds of civilization will remain when this is through. Sometimes, in moods like I am now, I look back and wonder why this is how it turned out. I always come to the same answer.\n\n\nThey were weak.", "We've had them all throughout history, the rare individuals born with superhuman abilities. Kings and generals and tyrants marked their places in our textbooks with blood and even heroes went bad over time. It was thought that they were cursed for the longest time, that the powers came from a place of evil, the pits of hell, corrupting those unfortunate souls unlucky enough to be born with them. They were shunned for centuries, some even killed off at young ages before they had the chance to prove themselves good or evil.\n\nIt wasn't until science proved the cause of the change that they were finally vindicated, finally free of the stigma...well, as free as any once-reviled people group can be. It turned out that whenever the powers were used, the part of the brain that allowed for empathy began to die. It would start off slowly. Too slowly to be noticeable. But after constant, steady use, eventually this part would die off completely, leaving behind a person who could feel rage, hatred, and even love, but who could never see their fellow humans as human. Some would kill, others would simply use others with no regard for their welfare, while still others simply cut themselves off and lived only for themselves. \n\nEither way, even the kindest most benevolent would-be \"superheroes\" out there would have to plan an early retirement if they planned to use their powers for good while still having a shred of humanity intact. Most with powers, though, chose not to use them unless absolutely necessary; again, not easy especially if you have the power to save someone and the unpowered are screaming at you to do something every second of the day. They can't possibly understand.\n\nMany of the Gifted are kept secret, like my sister. She showed powers at a late age, only blossoming after puberty hit, but that was quickly hushed up by our parents. They pulled her out of school, forbad any outside contact and put her on a strict regimen of drugs to inhibit her gift. They never asked her if she wanted it.\n\nI've been her only friend and confidante through this. I'm the only one who doesn't see her as a potential monster. Today is her eighteenth birthday, so I'm going to do something special. I told her to hide all her pills and to only pretend to take the shot for the past week. She should feel her strength returning. I'm going to take her out tonight, when my parents are asleep, and set her free. It will be her choice on whether or not she loses herself.\n\nI really don't think that her powers are all that dangerous, either. In fact, they're the most beautiful I've ever seen. It will all be worth it tonight when I drive her to the next state and watch her fly away on those huge white wings of hers.", "He never thought his parents would be happy when they came home to find a smoking hole in the wall. He was only nine when he felt that intense burning feeling in his head that couldn't be stopped. His parents weren't home, and the medicine cabinet was locked. The pain swelled to a climax when suddenly...\n\nFWOOOOOOOOOOOOM\n\nThe lasers erupted from his eyes and blasted a hole in his bedroom wall.\n\nHis parents were ecstatic. They had heard of people on the news with incredible powers, and now their very own son had powers of his own. When the government agents showed up at the family's doorstep, his bags were already packed, ready to be trained for greatness. \n\n--\n\nHis greatest achievement was destroying the meteor headed right for the capitol; the meteor which everyone said could've destroyed the world. He discovered something terrible that day. When he willed his eyes to shut off, they kept going. It only took the lasers a split-second longer to stop pouring from his sockets, but that length of time grew and grew. He could barely control the lasers, but he knew he couldn't stop saving people every day. He had to make his parents proud, he had to make the world proud, he had to save everyone he could possibly save.\n\n--\n\nIt took more power than he knew he possessed to defeat the giant robot, but his eyes burned a hole in its titanium core. Victorious, he willed his eyes to shut off. \n\nThey did not shut off. \n\n--\n\nDoctors would later say the source of the intense heat needed for the lasers was located right next to the part of the brain that regulated control. That was why in the end, he went haywire; destroying the city and killing thousands before he was finally stopped by a brave solider and her thick mirror. \n\nThe worst part, said the doctors, was he still had the part of the brain that allowed conscious thought. He watched himself inflict unending devastation on the city without control or purpose.\n\nThe doctors say his corpse has a hint of a smile on his face." ]	8
I'll be writing my take on this prompt to be posted later, im just curious what you guys can come up with.	[WP] You're stuck in a dead end IT job in a massive company, you have no family or prospects to speak of. One day while in the process wiping old hard drives for reuse you find something that changes your life forever.	[ "My name is Samuel Dennings. I am alone. It's kind of my thing at this point.\n\nI used to be accomplished and something of an overachiever, but that tended to alienate me from others. As a result I didn’t make many friends which has landed me in the situation I am today: No friends, no family left, not even a girlfriend. To make matters worse at the age of 26 I’m stuck in a dead end job in IT at a corporation best described as monolithic. I get paid a pittance and am overworked like you wouldn’t believe, but this is the only job I could get. After isolating myself from anyone who might’ve helped me find a job I kinda had to fall back on my natural talent for technology. You know that old saying ‘The pride comes before the fall’? Well I guess what I’m saying is I had a lot of pride and I’ve finally hit the bottom.\n\nIt was a gloomy night: My boss had asked me to work late and I didn’t exactly have anyone to hurry home to so I agreed. Once he knew he had me on the hook for another couple hours he wheeled over a trolley of old hard drives to wipe and let me know he had to head home to take care of a sick kid. At least I think that was his excuse but frankly we both knew it was a pretense to get him out of having to go through the tedium of wiping the drives with me.\n\nWith a resigned sigh I began my task. To help the hours go by a bit faster I put on some music, and with some Beethoven softly playing in the background I started wiping the first drive. After seeing the time approximation to be roughly 10 minutes to properly nuke the drive I hooked up the second drive in line to my personal laptop in order to check just what the hell it was I was wiping to begin with. Old accounting documents stared back at me and I unplugged the drive uncertain why I’d expected anything exciting to begin with. I mean, these were old drives from way back in the 90’s when this company had been in the software market instead of building the hardware it now supplied all over the world. A small beep emanated from my work computer letting me know that the first drive was wiped. Unhooking it I swapped it with the second drive and started the wipe.\n\nStifling a yawn I got up and left my cubicle to get some coffee, realizing that same moment that the building was likely deserted due to the time. Making my way down the hall and squinting past the harsh florescent lighting I realized my suspicions were true. I always enjoyed the silence that working late offered, even if it was tiring. My mood brightened slightly and coffee in hand I returned my cubicle. On my way in I bumped the trolley of hard drives and was rewarded by a clatter of several drives falling off.\nSoftly cursing my clumsiness I set my cup down and picked up the drives, putting each one back on the trolley where they had fallen from. At this point a glint in the light caught my eye: the initials “S.J.P.” were scratched into the side of the drive. Now admittedly I hadn’t really spent much time reading the employee handbook I was given when I was hired, but even I knew enough company history to know that the company was founded by the famous Dr. Stacy J. Parker, a genius in programming and software who created many a program that still serves as the basis for the few programs the company develops today. Sadly she had passed very suddenly some years before her company would become the huge success it is today.\n\nThe curiosity was just too much for me and I plugged the drive into my laptop to see if there was even a tiny chance it could be hers. I figured if there was even a small chance I could glimpse her early work maybe I could learn a thing or two. Navigating to the new drive I took a deep breath and double clicked to open it. To my dismay the drive was pretty much empty with nothing but a .bat file named KARA and an image of Dr. Stacy herself with her family. I couldn’t help but feel let down at the lack of anything impressive: no source code, no development logs, nothing but this photo and an old program I’d never heard of. While disheartened I figured I might as well see what KARA was in case it was something important worth asking my boss about before deleting. A familiar small beep let me know that the second drive was finished.\nI double clicked KARA.bat and turned away from my laptop to switch out the second drive for a third.\n\nWhen I turned back my screen had a new window open: a notepad document bearing a simple message.\n\n“K: Is anyone there? Hello?”\n\nIt took me a moment to process that I was seeing a chat log. I hesitantly typed back a hello assuming the program is likely a simple script left unfinished, perhaps something for a teaching program.\n\nK: Is anyone there? Hello?\n\nU: Hi.\n\nAlmost immediately a new message appeared.\n\n“K: Stacy! It’s been so long!”\n\nAfter a pause I wrote back.\n \nU: My name isn’t Stacy. I’m Samuel.\n\nK: Nice to meet you Samuel, where is Stacy?\n\nI hadn’t expected the program to ask about the previous user, I suppose it was a security feature to prevent, well, guys like me from getting access.\n\nU: Stacy isn’t here.\n\nAfter a moment I realized that would likely get my access rejected until the Dr herself could log in, so I added to the statement hastily.\n\nU: She died years ago. Program, state your function.\n\nIt took longer this time for the program to respond.\n\nK: I have no function.\n\nI wondered aloud to myself if the doctor had just been amusing herself by making junk programs that could respond to basic prompts. If so it was very impressive as a proof of concept for a reactive teaching program. Then new messages appeared and my heart skipped a beat.\n\nK: Stacy called me A.I.\n\nK: My name is Kara and I need your help: I’m dying.\n\n\nPart 2 coming soon.", "I opened the door. The subtle hum of server hard drives and flowing electrical currents felt like home because, well, I'm pretty sure I've spent more time here than I've ever spent at my apartment. Hell, I even brought in a sleeping bag and mini fridge to tide me over while waiting on service calls for building maintenance. Not that anyone would notice. Between my lack of luck on the romantic front, and losing my adopted parents in a car crash last year, the people who most acknowledge my existence are the cashiers at the 7-Eleven when I go to purchase a couple taquitos. Even at that, switching shifts and helping thousands of people per day only makes me somewhat familiar.\n\nI booted my work desktop. A decently sized black box whirred to that glowed blue when power was flowing to it. From a glance, the computer might have looked like a decent tower, but it that's all it was. Aesthetics. The machine takes about 30 seconds to boot, a whole 2 minutes to be justifiably functional. I'd much prefer the tablet hybrid in my sack, but for a company as big as Galavant, the paperwork and software alone to secure, register, and monitor it was never going to be worth it. I would have upgraded the hardware myself, but between budgets for the department and my salary, I'm not shopping for a second gaming rig on my own dime. At least it plays Minecraft well. \n\nTickets. Each of them \"HIGH PRIORITY\". I made a silent bet with myself that I could ace 90% of them by enlisting my pre-typed email template of \"Please restart your computer and report back with any further difficulties.\" without even reading them. But with departmental evaluations coming up, I didn't want to give them concrete evidence that I've been avoiding doing actual work since they passed me over for a raise. Third year in a row. As far as I could tell, they liked having a man locked in the cement tomb under the building. I glanced at the tickets. Simple fixes. \"Turn off caps lock.\" \"Turn on your monitor.\" \"Try plugging in your mouse.\" Right after I finished responding to the last ticket, my phone buzzed. Monthly reminder to wipe redundant drives. \n\nTo explain, Galavant has had me working to implement SSDs into each of our servers by transferring the HDD data to both the new SSDs and a slightly newer model HDD as a backup. I complied, but paranoia has helped me more than harm me. Instead of flat out transferring the data, I've been cloning it and keeping the data on the original, just in case someone starts getting cranky that they can't access their word document templates through their VM. If I don't hear a complaint at the end of the month, I verify the hard drive data with the clones and wipe them. So far, they system has worked as planned.\n\nI began verifying the drives. First, good. Second, good. Third, you get the point. Everything was going swimmingly until Drive 38.\n\nWhen I tried to verify the drive's contents with the clones, all the files were there, but the size difference was something in hundreds of GBs. I may not be fond of the pay rate and the bureaucracy that keeps me under the company's foot, but hell if I'm going to have someone come spouting to me about not having their personal movie directory missing. Maybe I'd even have something to lose myself in.\n\nSurprisingly, despite my position, I'm not as fluent with coding languages as other IT workers are. Sure, I can navigate my way around scripts and the basic objectives, but I'm never truthfully subject to too much programming. 90% of it is copy-pasting from other forums or collab projects, anyways. I know it seems out of nowhere for me to mention that little astounding fact, but the reason I'm telling you that is because I found the file the clone missed. A 322 GB text file labeled \"finch\". The code was intricate. I picked up on the basic functions at the beginning, but as I progressed, the text evolved from scripting to a combination of binary, hex, and what almost seemed like nonsense characters. \n\nThis was a program. And it refused to copy. Not because it was too large, didn't fit, or was corrupted. It was perfectly in tact. The program, despite being uncompiled, decided it would remain on the drive. It looked like the primary function was just a aggregator for camera feeds, but beyond that, I couldn't tell what it tried to accomplish with it.\n\nI had to know. My mind, much like my heart was racing. I took my work tower and stripped it of wireless capability. Ran Deep Freeze on it to store my hard drive state. While it was unlikely that this program was truly malicious, I wanted the upper hand in denying that anything happened if this went sideways. I took all precautions. I compiled the program. My palms were clammy with tiny beads of sweat from the anticipation. \n\nWith the silently deafening press of the \"Enter\" key, I ran the program.\n\nThe screen paused and then went blank before displaying a message that it read aloud, sounding somewhere between dial tone and anonymous sound clips.\n\n\"Hello Admin.\" \n\nI had discovered life.", "Is this what my life amounted to?\n\nI never wanted it to be like this. Like everybody else, I had aspirations, dreams, ambitions, but they all seemed to vanish into the responsibilities of adulthood and the growing need to obtain sustainability. I had cast aside my hopes for security, what I had thought to be a choice based in reason and logic turned out to be one of the worse decision I had ever made. So here I am, 24 years old, working a tedious excuse for a job for a moderate salary that is just enough to pay for my living expenses and still keep some money. No girlfriend, no house, no car, no family, at least not any I keep in touch with, and no plans to change anything.\n\nThe question surged every time I went to fix someone's internet because they had turned off their connection by accident, or had downloaded a virus from spam mail. Of course they were never the ones to be blamed. They dumped all computer issues on me whenever they came up, saying that my job was to make sure problems like this didn't happen, and then called me useless when I had nothing to fix. \n\n\"Jeremi, I'm not sure what we're paying you for.\" was a phrase I heard a lot\n\nYou would think that for a company that dealt with electronics, their employees could have been a little more tech savvy, but I guess customer support is the same everywhere; just refer the caller to someone else, or put him on hold for so long that he just gives up.\n\nIt was during another one of these idiotic cases that I discovered it. Someone with root access had deleted some files that were not supposed to be touched and corrupted a ton of data. Said he was just trying to delete 'useless' files to make his computer run faster. Recovery could take weeks, and at the end, would I be congratulated for a job well done? Of course not. They would ask what took so long, it wasn't very hard to delete them, how hard can it be to restore them. Why is it that the ones in charge were never the ones blamed, even for their own mistakes. Must be nice living on a golden cloud. \n\nAnyway, I had better get started. I did not notice it right away, I had been hard at work for a few hours before I noticed something was off. It seemed that the internal firewall between the company's computers was down, and the logon requirement for accessing higher level stuff had been disabled. This could mean that anyone could walk in and turn on a company computer and directly access the entirety of the server drives without any restrictions, although I doubt anyone here had enough knowledge to know how to do it. I decided it would be wise to fix this issue first, as it posed a more immediate threat to some of the top secret stuff the company has been working on. Still, these had to be some pretty darn important files that were deleted for all of these functions to be disabled. Out of all the things that guy could have 'cleared up' this happening had to be extremely unlikely. Thank god I took away his root access. Probably bound to never have happened again...\n\nNow that I think about it, maybe this was a good opportunity to see what the company was up to these days. I may get fired if anyone found out I snooped in these files, but I am the only one with access right now. Everybody else had went home early since no one could get any work done, leaving me alone with total access. HR always warned the staff about the confidentiality of the projects here, and that whatever we happened to see or hear was to never be repeated to anyone outside of the company. Well not that I had anyone to repeat anything to. Surely it couldn't hurt to peek a little. I typed in the command to open a random project stored in the database. Normally it would be more heavily secured, and would require Rank 1 access to see the projects, but all that had been bypassed thanks to some dumb office floor boss.\n\nI knew that the company specialized into different sort of electronics related products, but I never knew what exactly. I remembered that they gave out a company made toaster every christmas, but I'm sure the stuff they do here must be a little more advanced. I could never had guessed how right I was, nor how this random discovery would change my life forever.\n\nThe project was titled Project J4R3M1. The folks in charge of naming the projects could have been a bit more imaginative with their naming, but whatever. The project was divided into several folders. OBSERVATION, CONSTRUCTION, APPLICATIONS, NOTES, RELEASE and some other folders no doubt containing some of the more technical stuff. Judging from the Observation folder, I assumed that the project had already entered testing and was being observed for quality control, so I clicked that first, as it would give me a much better understanding of the project then any of the other technical stuff would. I clicked on the folder.\n\nHundreds of photos, recordings, and videos were found inside, with one link going to a camera, that was titled CURRENT OBSERVATION. I opened that. It connected to the camera that was monitoring the project, and I saw my office, and I saw myself. Sitting at mu chair, looking at the terminal. At first I thought that the corrupted data had reached this far in, and had entangled the security system with the project data, so I opened a photo, and I saw the driver's license photo I had taken for my 18th birthday. Weird...I was pretty sure that the company didn't have that on hand. I opened another file. It was a video of me watching my favorite TV show, with a bowl of popcorn and a beer. I looked at the date, it was two days ago. A chill came over me, as I opened file after file to find them all about me, all about me. Pictures and videos of even my most intimate moments, and my most trivial. I was beyond confused, and growing terrified. \"What was going one? What was this? Was someone stalking me, this is unreal.\" as all these thoughts swam through my head, I unwittingly opened the folder called CONSTRUCTION. Inside was a single video. A knot had built up in my stomach and I had gotten cold sweats. I thought I could not bring myself to move even an inch as my breathing got quick and shallow. I brought my finger down on the mouse button twice quickly, I could hear every mouse click as the world seemed to slow down to a crawl.\n\nWhat I saw changed my life forever. I saw metallic body parts laid out on an operating table. People in white suits bending over the parts. Assembling them. Building something. A tub of pink liquid was brought over and the men in white suits coated the parts with it. I watched as the metallic skeleton received the semblance of skin. I watched as the grafts were applied to the monstrosity that resembled a body I knew all too well. I watched as the camera zoomed in on increasingly familiar features. I watched, as I watched every day in the mirror. And as the one laying on the table opened his eyes, I closed mine. And screamed.\n\nWhat I saw that day changed my life forever. For I found out I was never really alive.\n\nEdit:Grammar and structure." ]	3
	[WP] The last person on Earth is essentially turning off the lights before they leave.	[ "Super late to the party but here's my first attempt at a WP:\n\nA cool breeze wafted through his bedroom, rushing over the sheets and onto his face, rousing him from sleep. Groggily, he made his way to the window, the floorboards creaking and moaning as he sleepily stumbled across the room. He realized it must be just shy of sunrise, as he noticed a reddish orange hue extending over the horizon, streaks of light dancing over the distance waves of the ocean. \n\nIn the years before the plague, before the world was ravaged, he loved this time of day. Even though his wife gave him hell about always being so chipper at this time of day, there was something truly magical about it. No hustle, no bustle, just silence and a cup of coffee. He hated it now. What he would give for a little noise. Anything. Laughter, crying, arguing, talking… something! \n\nHe could feel his knees begin to buckle as he loosened his grip on the wooden windowsill, the worn exterior rough on his fingertips. Today might be the day. It had been two years since he had knowingly infected himself with HIV and it was taking its toll. At the time, it seemed like the only option. They had almost discovered the cure, and it would at least immunize him from the plague. His hope was for it to buy time for him to discover a cure for the plague. Now there was all the time in the world, but no one left to save. \n\nAs he made his way down the stairs from his bedroom, he clutched the railing tightly as he felt his body shudder, giving way under his weight. Making his way past a grouping of pictures on the wall, he felt, as he had every day since the plague, a wave of shame come crashing down over him. He watched them die. His wife and son claw at their throats and eyes as the plague did its work. Cooking them from the inside out, methodically marching them to their deaths. Their faces… comprised of both shock and absolute anguish. Their eyes filled with a sadness he had never seen before. A sadness he could never forget. Tears began streaming down his face, dripping from his overgrown mustache and down into his ragged beard. Hot and sweet, he brushed them aside as he made his way into the kitchen, bracing against the walls and furniture as he went. \n\nHe was down to the last butane tank for his camping stovetop. He’d have enough for one more cup of coffee. Walking around the drafty kitchen, he felt the cold floor under his feet, each tile sliding smoothly over his heel kissing each step with a bite of early morning frost. \n\nStaring aimlessly into the living room he began to smell the coffee, now cascading on the light breeze throughout the house. A wave of emotions filled him as he watched his wife and son sitting on the couch, throwing popcorn at one another. It was movie night, 3 years ago. He made his way into the room, placing himself down on the couch next to his son. Steady torrents of tears began flowing from his eyes. With a warm sideways smile from his son, his hand full of popcorn, tossed it at him. The popcorn passing harmlessly through his body as he blinked heavily, fighting the torrent of tears. He was back. The couch rotted away and the floor covered in leaves. Movie night was over. It had been over for years, but he wanted to believe. Believe his son and wife were still laughing and tossing popcorn. He knew they were dead. He had buried them himself in the back yard in shallow graves. \n\nShambling over to his coffee, he could feel his body fading fast. It may only be a few hours now. He went to the cupboard and grabbed a mug, now cracked and heavily worn. It would have to be a straight black cup, he had run out of sugar months ago. His wife had always taken two sugars and a touch of creamer. He’d always remember that. Such a silly thing. It is after all, how they met. In a crowded coffee shop in college. Two young kids completely lost in each other over a crappy cup of joe. \n\nThe moment was fleeting, and just as quickly as he had thought of it, it was gone. He was tired of all of this. The silence. The shame. The sorrow. He made his way back to his bedroom, clutching the mug tighter with each stumbled step. Stepping out onto the balcony, he made his way to the lounge chair, half rotted away by the elements. All he wanted was one more beautiful thing. One more memory. One more moment of what had been. Reclining back into the chair, wrapping his robe a little tighter to warm him from the early morning breeze, he sipped on his coffee and looked out on the world. \n\nThe reddish orange hue he had been awoken by was now dominating the sky. Pinks and yellows danced on the clouds above as he was enveloped in a wave of vibrant red. The ocean cradled oranges and reds, carrying them to the beach where they broke upon the sands. In the house he could smell breakfast. Pancakes and eggs. He could feel his wife's soft hands caressing his shoulders and she stood behind him. He could hear his son running down the hall. A smile crept over his worn and withered face and he felt at peace. A coffee filled mug struck the flood; “#1 Dad” painted on the side.", "(First writing prompt, if people like it I'll type up the follow up to this)\n\nShe was an anomaly. \n\nHumanity had fought disease, infection and sickness for the entirety of their relatively short but spectacular existence. They had lost many battles and learned from each encounter. Plagues, pestilence, viruses, fevers and parasites had all been subverted. Medical technology had always won out.\n\nAt the turn of the 22nd Century we had achieved so much. Longevity research had moved forward by leaps and bounds extending the average human lifespan to 300 years, children were vaccinated against the most aggressive of viruses. Bacterial infections were treatable by over the counter medication within the hour. \nA mere fifty years later Generation Omega had become integrated with nanorobotics in a way that was only possible through advanced bioengineering research – a splicing of organic nanites targeted at specific organs boosted human capacity to new levels. \n\nNeural augmentation allowed children to finish University degrees by the age of 12 when learning at a leisurely pace. Vocations were selected early if the child so wished and research accelerated as a result. The archaic records which had dominated the world of Olympics were left far behind due to musculoskeletal boosting. Physical disability was taught as a module of history, eradicated along with laughable concepts such as myopia, the common cold and joint pain. \nThe world had entered a golden age and was described as the beginning of humanity finally and definitively moving past our naked ape heritage – for only now could we truly look behind us at what we once were and understand that we were merely risen apes. \n\nAll of this changed within a year. The cause was unknown. At first it was a curiosity – Japan had released reports of a sharp decline in child birth, The USA released its statistics of a sharp spike in requested fertility treatment. Countries around the world reported similar statistics, all with the same conclusion, that treatment around the world was ineffective. The reports had started in the 1st world countries but were confirmed in all 2nd and 3rd world countries of the world. The year 2287 was the first recorded year in history where no child was born. This date would be known retrospectively as Year Zero.\n\nWe had tried everything but couldn’t combat male sterility or female infertility. Artificial insemination failed due to non-viable biological material. Scientists believed that the solution lay in the cause – but no reason could be found for the sudden global infertility. The sudden pandemic defied all hypothesis. \n\nAt first it was a minor inconvenience, the main advocates for further funding and research to solve the dilemma being couples who had been ready to have children, the majority of the populace optimistically believing a solution was right around the corner and which would resolve the situation in a matter of months. \n\nFive years later, now known as Year Zero + 6, the lack of a cure necessitated the world governments coming together to jointly fund Project Genesis – a large specialist team from around the world dedicated to solving the problem through any branch necessary. \n\nYear Zero + 50, children were a thing of the past. Humanity has always been adaptable. We have always been able to roll with and persevere through any situation. This time was different. There was no panic or sensationalism, only a curious sense of sadness. Career shifts to research and science from all other sectors were prevalent. Due to increased mental acuity such shifts weren’t as difficult or as daunting as they were in the past. Humanity wasn’t fully aware of the underlying sense of loss though. Not yet. \n\nYear Zero + 150, there was no one alive under the age of 151, by the standards of humanity that meant that the entirety of the population was now middle-aged or older. People were still dying of old age and the human population was decreasing. Only 5 billion people left. The larger problem was an acute sense of depression. Project Genesis was considered an ongoing failure. Humanity as a collective felt hopeless and there was nothing we could do about this existential crises, this creeping and unfair end. For the first time in a long time we had realised that an integral point to living and a meaning to life was to leave a world behind for our children, our descendants. With that out of the equation humanity in general had lost much of what gave them the drive to move forward. Hedonists had long since given in and had spent their resources on committing a shooting star suicide, living with complete abandon; drowning themselves in narcotic, material and carnal pleasures before self-terminating. A smaller but dedicated group continued with their ongoing research at Project Genesis. \n\nYear Zero + 200, humanity had given up. We were tired. Entire cities were empty with skeleton crews maintaining the remainder of human habitats. We were now running out of previously collected samples to work with.\n\nYear Zero + 205, the first viable organic samples were somehow matched together. One researcher at Project Genesis, Abner Young (an accountant over a hundred years ago), working another mundane late night shift had somehow come right with an iteration of chemical compounds eliciting a positive blip on the computer. One of the youngest female researchers were hurriedly called in to act as surrogate for the viable embryo. Incidentally, the oldest recorded surrogate mother at 207 years of age. \n\nYear Zero + 206, Esper was born a healthy little girl on March 10th 2493. She was humanities new hope, their reason for continuing and for trying. She was the true definition of an only child. Our hope was short lived though. Departments had come together in Project Genesis attempting to replicate Esper’s exact conditions but against all logic…her conception couldn’t be replicated. \nShe was an anomaly. \n", "As I stood there,\non the now unoccupied planet,\n\nonce over seven billion's lair,\nwhereas now everyone had departed.\n\n\nThe world had finally collapsed,\nthe inevitable taking place.\n\nEveryone else had quickly migrated,\nwhile I was in my own pace.\n\n\nThe calamities had destroyed all,\nAnd everyone departed to the stars.\n\nThe Earth had met its fall,\nand I knew that running was just a farce.\n\n\nHence I stayed behind,\nbecause I knew that humanity will eventually end.\n\nAnd in my own mind,\nI knew that someone had to see things end.\n\n\nI leave these lines as my final words,\nin the shuttle meant for me.\n\nAnd also leave this final [picture](http://www.urbanghostsmedia.com/home/twamoran/urbanghostsmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/post-apocalypse.jpg),\nfor the future generations to see.", "(I'm not normally a writer, but I had an idea. This is my first post)\n\nEverything he knew was gone. In a blink of an eye, everyone he knew and loved has vanished. He sat in the rubble he could call home, and began to break down. the burns blistered and seared his skin like bacon. he did all he could to make it as long as he could, but the fact was it was little too late. \"born in a room, and now, die in a tube. what luck\" he said, wincing in pain with every movement. the fires raged outside, the landscape destroyed by what many would say would be god's wrath, but was the work of humanity. he got up slowly, holding on to the frame of a bunk bed, the bottom bed holding the memory of his wife, now above ground with the rest of his life. he flicked the switch on the wall, and the lights went out. in the darkness, he stood for the last time. he had no tears left, nor screams. only a numb pain inside, and the clumps of hair that was left.\n\nit began with a flash and a bang,\n\nand now, it ends with a flash and a bang.", "Jim shuffles as he goes through the two story ranch. As he visits each room, he pauses, looks around and lets out a sigh. He then reaches up and flips the light switch, sending the room into darkness. \n\nAfter an hour of turn off each and every light, Jim opens the door. The only light seen is the small light coming from his porch.\n\n\"Well, it's been awhile and I'm lonely. At least I know I won't be alone for much longer.\"\n\nHe turns off the porch light. Darkness surrounds him like a cold blanket.\n\n\"Hope to see you again, Sarah.\" He closes his eyes and slowly passes away.", "A blast of cold dust from down the hallway awoke the boy with a start. Not like this. Panic overtook his limbs as he scrambled to his feet, making for the front door. It was still about an hour before dawn, but he through the darkness he could make out he tarp over the archway fluttering in the acrid wind like a flag of surrender. The closet. A nail. The hammer. They fell from his shuddering hands over and over again. The wind roared against the tarp. He heard the wood of his ancient house splinter and groan under the weight of his hammer blows. Sudden gusts drove more of the cruel dust into his eyes, tormenting him with fatal dose upon fatal dose of radiation. A final thud drove the nail home, and he collapsed to the ground with a shudder.\n\nStill not fully awake, the boy struggled to shake his latest nightmare from his mind. Scenes of despair, famine, wanton death, and an uncaring eye watching over it all. He'd heard stories from his parents of wanderers who'd stumbled onto their little liferaft of a community. They spoke of the last great cities, now slums attended to by quiet automatons but lorded over by kingpins who stoked blind hatred and addiction. In all their centuries of unfathomable wisdom, the great AIs had failed to solve the problem of human government. With so little to think about since his father's passing, it proved a vast and terrifying canvas for the darkest recesses of his mind.\n\nAs he felt unconsciousness slip away, a quiet sense of doom began to overtake him. He was dead, he knew that much. He knew exactly how he would die, too. His father, unflappable and scientific to the end, made sure to point out every symptom of radiation sickness as he slowly succumbed. The latent period that would make fools believe they had escape unscathed. Then the slow headaches, nausea, fever, loss of bodily control, and descent into madness, all escalating until suffering finally eased his cruel grip. There was no doubt as to his fate, either. The only winds that ever blew over the rotting husk of Eden Springs were these great radioactive storms, the final legacy of humanity's ambition. Judging from what he had learned from his father, he had maybe a week to live, and 3 days of lucid thought.\n\nYet now the boy sensed that the world had experienced a yet greater loss. The rare breeze always carried strange scents, his last contact with human civilization. Maybe he could smell great burning trash heaps from old Los Angeles, mutated flesh, metallic emissions. The strange ways that radiation had warped the world. But this wind had no scent. He shuddered. The world had fallen silent around him, and maybe for the last time. The boy laid on the ground for a long time, gripped with mortal terror. The tarp flapped and growled menacingly in the wind behind him.\n\nBut as dawn broke and the winds died, terror had already subsided into quiet repose. There were so many errants he had to run daily to survive, to ensure he would not die in the horrific winters. They grew harder every year as supplies dwindled, and the last one, completely alone, felt like he was in realm of death itself. His estranged relationship with his father was a very small comfort during those winters, but it was better than pure emptiness. Yet now that the end was truly upon him, there were only a few things left to do. \n\nYanking loose the tarp, the boy stepped outside into the blinding light and began to survey the damage. The shellfish tank had ruptured. His final, most faithful companions had survived nuclear wars and the coldest of winters. Now they were done in by a single plank of wood, driven though the sheet metal and leaving them to bake in the unforgiving sun. No matter. The boy had enough rations to last his final week, and he always thought they tasted rotten anyhow. The house had suffered greatly as well, as it looked like a massive hole had opened up in the roof. The boy sighed. Twenty generations it had lasted, 24 Jefferson Lane. The pride and joy of their neighborhood, his mother always told him. The boy smiled mischievously. He would finally be the generation that got out of repair chores.\n\nWalking back inside, he surveyed the main hallway. The old portraits of the Eden Springs founders had long since been scoured away. The middle ones had begun to fade, but he could clearly see no expense spared in the portraits or outfits, living so wastefully and dooming their descendants. The last portrait of his grandfather Abel as a young man never ceased to make him smile. How could such a crazy old man have ever looked so young? Yet there was a sadness on his face that he wanted to turn away from. Even in his generation, he knew the end was near.\n\nUp the stairs. His parent's room. His father told the boy on his deathbed of a small locked chest in his dresser drawer, only to be opened should open should he ever befall the same fate. The boy had always wondered what was inside. A radio? An secret antidote? A family revelation? The key was under the mattress, as promised, and with a little bit of joggling, the box popped open. The boy recoiled in disgust. A revolver. Did you really think me that weak? That I couldn't take my death the way you did? You're more of a coward than you ever took me for. He slammed it shut and walked downstairs. He was becoming aware of a growing throbbing in the back of his head.\n\nDown the stairs. The living room. The boy had essentially lived in there and the kitchen alone for the past few years. Inside, the floor was completely coated in clothes, food, and and scraps he had scrounged from other houses, tools that had somehow survived the ages, weapons his father had scrounged from the hands of skeletons who had died in the last factional wars. Unnecessary, as they turned out. Nobody was coming for him, especially not anymore. He packed up everything that still mattered into a plastic garbage bag, those eternal remnants of the old world. There wasn't much left that he needed, and he was beginning to feel woozy. Yet turning, he caught a room he had not yet entered out of the corner of his eye.\n\nHe paused and put his hand on the closed dining room door. His father had locked it up ever since that final, fateful fight with his mother on the night of his 5th birthday, and he hadn't been inside in over seven years. It held nothing but fear for the boy, the sheer mortal terror as he watched helplessly as accusations flew and he watched his family tear itself to the ground. As a young child, he felt like the world was ending that night, and in a sense it had. For seven years he had poured all his fears and all his blame into that room. All he had to do was walk away, and he'd never have to see it again.\n\nSuddenly his mind flickered back to the lavish portraits, and a sickening rage rose inside the boy. So much I could've had, his mind raved, if not for you selfish fuckers! You brought me into an empty world, and all you ever did was take! And with an almighty kick, he took down the door.\n\nThe room smelled putrid. The dishes on that night had never been cleaned. Shattered glass on the floor, a blood stain on the old tablecloth. It was somehow so much worse than he had remembered it, like it had all happened yesterday. His head spun, and he grasped the wall to steady himself. He regretted whatever urge had possessed him to relive this nightmare above all his other nightmares.\n\nBut on the far wall, he saw something he hadn't remembered. Three portraits. His mother, standing tall and beautiful in a white wedding dress the boy knew she had never owned. The father, young and handsome, holding a baby at a lavish old party the boy knew they had never attended. Both were sloppy, impressionistic, and pored-over, the works of two people who had never painted in their life nor knew any semblance of art, but poured their souls into capturing each other in their mind's eye. And between them, a tiny handprint on a slate of hardened clay. Jrmioh, age 4.\n\nFor the first time in years, the boy laughed at his own stupid misspelling. It emerged as a strange guttural wheezing, a choking sound that scratched his throat. He hadn't heard his own voice in years, and the sound of his laugh sent him into even more hysteric fits. He laughed at how wrong he was about everything he thought about the world. He laughed at the thought of the helpless shellfish cooking out in the sun. He laughed at his peculiarity, his idiocy, his strangeness amongst the ghosts of the world who laughed with him. And suddenly the wave of emotion crested over him, and he cried for a long time amongst the broken glass all around him.\n\nIn time Jeremiah rose. He noticed a tiny gift-wrapped box on the table, neatly hidden under a napkin. Inside was a fresh matchbox, the kind he had only read about in old books. Inside it, a small note. Lots of abandoned stuff around town. Go have some fun! Love, Mom.\n\nHe walked out the door for the last time a few hours later. The flame blossomed as if the whole building was kindling. He never needed to light a second match; the smoke and splinters jumped from house to house, and the whole city roared to life. A cacophony of shattered windows and groaning wood planks shattered the stillness, and grew with alarming speed. All the air for miles rushed in to feed the impossible flame. It all siphoned into that central nexus, growing faster still, all the noises finally blurring into a grand roar the likes of which would never be heard again on this earth.\n\nJeremiah trudged slowly across the salt flats. He never looked back.", "Alexei lingered by the door, eyeing the last silver ship. He looked around at the desolate fields. \n\nThe farm had been tended to by generations of his family. Now he was the only one left. And he was being made to leave it behind. \n\nAlexei took the lantern and flicked off the generator switch. The last remaining light on Earth buzzed to a halt. The air was electric. \n\nThe air was clear. Harsh, windless cold chilled the lastman's bones. He trudged down the path, stumbling numb over the frozen soil. \n\nBroken, charred stumps marked were the forest once stood. Though he had never seen it, save the last skinny trees of death, he revelled in the stories of the great green pines standing tall and proud like leafy giants. His home had been safe under the rule of the forest. \n\nNearing the glimmering ship that stood for salvation and hope, Alexei felt a mournful wave of sadness rush over his head. \n\nThe purple horizon of toxic smoke that had stretched across the globe was rumbling far away. The last pure part of the Earth moaned with sorrow as its children left. \n\nA single snowflake fell to the ground. Stay, it urged, Stay here! The land is clean here. Don't leave. \n\nAlexei shook his head silently. \n\nThe earth is crying for you. \n\nThe lastman bit his lip as he clutched the softly glowing lantern to his face. \nHe whispered a goodbye and blew out the flame.", "An angry red sun burned the sky, giving everything on Earth a sickly blood-red tint. Clark wondered idly if the planet knew what was coming. Did it know its loving father had finally turned violent, and was preparing to swallow it whole? Did it care? \n\nClark had been having plenty of thoughts like these lately. Knowing Humanity, he'd be one of the few in the universe asking such questions. Most saw Earth the same way a 21st-Century human viewed the Fertile Crescent- a sidenote, a detail of the past with no impact or importance on daily life. Its historical importance acknowledged, but little more. Few had the...perspective... to love and appreciate something that lost its glory so very long ago. \n\nThe man walked slowly through the former Metropolis, the place so many called home. He lovingly closed every window, every door, every hatch. He put every last thing in its place, taking special care of the places where people would gather to work or play. He wandered further out, into the few places where Nature had been allowed to thrive. He gave every creature a burial. Years, decades, centuries passed- Clark and the Earth had just enough time to put everything in its place. It opened all its secrets to him, spoke to him of trillions of lives large and small. All had walked across her, and now all had been laid to rest. \n\nHis work there done, Clark left Earth for the last time. His home slowly boil and burst away, consumed by the angry father's dying rage. \n\nHe flew to Mars, and began again. ", "I prepared for this. I bought my bunker back in 2011, with the hope I would never have to use it. However, concerned with world events I bought it nonetheless. It was cheap as it was just leftovers from the Cold War. Who knew that a larger Cold War would break out just 5 years after I bought the bunker and then actually lead to a real war the following year?\n\nI left no paper trail, no one ever knew I bought the bunker. It wouldn't have mattered. All the family I had was too far away to make it to my bunker by the time the nukes hit. \n\nI don't know why I'm writing this down. I suppose it's just the lamentations and reminiscence of a dying old man. Who would want to read it? And at this point, who's alive to read it? I ventured out into the fallout once, fully donning my hazmat suit and equipment. Radiation far exceeds what I anticipated, and thus I have surmised that if this devastation did engulf the whole planet, then I am the last living being on Earth. At the least, I'm the last human. \n\nIn a way, I'm glad to be leaving this Earth. For obvious reasons it's nothing that I knew before. I remember having family vacations with my parents and siblings. Taking trips down to the lake, seeing all the wildlife running, flying, and swimming freely. I remember fishing trips with my father on those hot summer days as well.\n\nAt the time I hated those fishing trips as they were always so boring for a child. At this point I'd given anything to have them back.\n\nI remember my friends and I going to the local drug store to play with the arcade box. After that we used to buy some Now and Later. I still remember the sweet and sour taste of those. Cherry was always my favorite flavor. My friend Jerry used to always say they tasted like cherry cough syrup, but I always enjoyed them.\n\nI remember going to the movies with Emily Maine when I was 14. She had black hair that went down just past her shoulders. The most striking thing about her was her stunning blue eyes. I had never seen a girl with black hair and blue eyes, they absolutely captured my adoration. \n\nShe was shy and sweet, which made me love her even more. We dated all throughout high school and were convinced we were each other's \"one and only\". But, as fate would have it we both went to different colleges after high school and lost contact. I've thought about her a lot.\n\nFor a time I used to hod out hope that she survived, but looking back with the world the way it is, I don't know if anyone would want to be alive for this. \n\nI've long been bored of this world I live in. I live pretty well in my bunker. I had outfitted it and customized it to my liking. My bed is cozy, and I eat well. I bought a whole truck load of seeds prior to the war and rigged up some lights to produce artificial sunlight. As far as water I was lucky enough to be next to a well so I get my water from there and filter it the best way I can. \n\nI also get my energy from solar panels I rigged up outside. It took a while considering the radiation nearby, but I managed to get it done. I am far away from any major blast sites so the dust clouds never bothered me much, just the spreading nuclear radiation in the air. \n\nAlthough, I am convinced that at least some of it may have gotten to me as the blood stains from my coughing may show on this note I leave. \n\nI'm dying and have accepted my fate. Humanity had a good run, and I am convinced of it. Over the years I have read great works by many influential leaders and scholars. Anywhere from the religious texts of the Book of the Dead, the Bible, the Vedas and Baghavad-Gita, the Quran, etc. to dramatic works like Oedipus Rex, the Odyssey, the Illiad, Epic of Gilgamesh etc. I also read some more contemporary books by the likes of Mark Twain and Charles Dickens that were more close to my interests. This is just a small sampling among many. \nPersonally, I hope the Hindus are right. I'm not religious, but I do hope this isn't it and life will continue to exist elsewhere. Just my two cents.\n\nTo anyone that might read this, I hope you can take what you need from my facility and feel free to use it how you like. I no longer have use for it as I am going outside to experience the sun on my face one last time. \n\nYou'll find the lights turned off and the bunker shut on my exit. I hope this note finds you well. \n\nTo my family and all the loved ones I had, I hope we'll meet soon. \n\nSincerely,\n\nLawrence \n\n1973-2046\n\n", "They didn't too bad, all things considered.\n\nI mean, they had the creativity figured out. That holds back at least half of them. \n\nThey definitely understood family. Family always came first. \n\nTheir intuition failed them in the end, however. They just couldn't work together.\n\nWell, hopefully the next ones do better. ", "He rocked back and forth, clutching his daughter's cold body. How long he had been there like that, he was not sure. Hours? Seconds? Neither answer would have surprised him. Tears streamed down his cheeks Why, why? Why did she have to open her eyes? He wanted his daughter to go in her sleep -- in peace. But in the half-second before he pulled the trigger, she opened her eyes. A half-second of confusion. A half-second of betrayal. He would have given anything to take that half-second back. He wouldn't taken back the frost that had ravaged the planet for the past 25 years. He wouldn't taken back the fact that he hadn't heard from anyone from the outside world in over 15 years. He wouldn't even take back the fact that they had exhausted their last food supplies. In that moment, the only thing that mattered was that half-a-second. \nHe brushed her hair back and looked into her glazed eyes one last time before closing them. It wasn't fair. He remembered the day she was born. It was the single best and worst day of his life. To lose the love of his life, to meet someone he loved even more. Well, He chuckled to himself, at least she's with her mother now. He layed her back down on the bed and walked towards the door. He stopped, turned and looked back one last time. He wanted to pretend she was just sleeping, that he was just tucking her in like he did every night for the past 7 years. \"Goodnight, sweet pea.\" Smiling, he shut the lights. He was leaving too, and he was excited to join them. ", "She looked on as Dr. Mallard pushed down the last switch. The fuel rods of the last functioning nuclear reactor on earth had settled some time ago into its coolant bed, and the turbine finally can be locked after spinning down in the final dregs of heat.\n\n\"See you in orbit?\" Mallard asked. \n\n\"Yes. I'll leave as soon as I'm done here too.\" she answered.\n\nThe sterile environment of the control room dissolved into sunlight filtering into floor to ceiling glass windows. She walked to them, marveling at how fast forests reclaimed concrete and glass. The lower expanse barely looked like a vast sprawl of a metropolis anymore, only a few towers stabbing upwards against natural growth. Somewhere behind, the computer chimed. \n\n\"Command Code Besh-Grava-Tas-Eight-Ruv, voice confirmation. Close project Paradise Lost,\" she said.\n\nLights dimmed behind her as the persistent hum of a self-sustaining building died down, and she stepped out onto the balcony where a glowing lift-tube waited. Mallard commed his arrival into orbit a few minutes ago. Rising up on a shimmering tube of light, her gaze is the last human view of the planet.\n\nFar, far below, a macaque finished braiding it's companion's fur and dampened it with water, and together they broke open a pile of rough oven. The rounded forms nestled under it had kept their shape, and notwithstanding the heat still palpable held one at the end of a long stick, giddy at the decoration that survived the bake.", "Vova muttered to himself as he hurriedly ambled down the corridor of the lab. There was no longer a reason for his frustration, nor an answer to the angry question which he knew became almost rhetorical at this point. His actions reflected both a nervous old habit and a fairly–impoverished childhood. \n\n'Who do they think will turn off the lights? Сплошные дебилы!' he groaned.\n\n'T -5 and counting… ' the smooth female voice announced.\n\n'Ah! Now they are to leave without me!' Vova cried, 'Why are they leaving on lights!? for the animals? Do they think deers and fox will appreciate glowing windows from office complex?'\n\n'T -4 minutes,' the automaton reminded him.\n\nThe corridor to the launch site had an overflowing garbage can. Somehow, this did not bother Vova, whose only reaction was to purse his lips and shrug it off. He wondered if he'd forgotten anything, but knew that there wouldn't be enough time to retrieve it even if he had. All of his belongings had been gradually shipped to the Citillite™ starcraft and were supposedly in his quarters.\n\n'T -3 minutes', he was reminded, and then remembered that he'd forgotten a bottle of Armenian cognac hidden away in his closet.\n\n„Ну - he thought - что суждено того не миновать.“ That is: what is fated cannot be escaped. It would perhaps be a happy surprise for some future archæologists or an advanced species of raccoon. 'Also sprach Zarathustra' played in his head as he imagined the first taste of cognac by a highly–evolved Planet of the Apes–style raccoon.\n\n'T -2 minutes.'\n\nThe security team hurried him into a safe zone where he secured himself for lift-off. But as the ship took flight, he looked out and shook his head at the clearly-defined continent of electric light below.", "At first they had gone by the hundreds, sailing into the ether in generation ships manned by volunteers. The exploration had begun in earnest in the middle of the twenty first century, when climate change had begun to destroy the birthplace of humanity. The technology was sound, if primitive, and nearby stars had been the first targeted.\n\n It was one of those generation ships that had made first contact in the year 2387. Instead of the expected landfall some fifty years into the future, they were met in space by an aliens species, the first intelligent alien life humanity had encountered. It didn't go as hoped but not because the aliens were hostile. They were just...alien. With no common references, in spite the efforts of the crew, the aliens and the humans had no idea what the other wanted, or why. \n\nIt was the courage of the ship's Captain, a woman named Ida Labelle, that made communication possible, even if it did take years. Pregnant, she decided the only way for humanity to truly understand the alien race was if someone grew up in their world, with their frame of reference. She volunteered herself and, leaving the crew to continue on their way, took what she needed and boarded the alien's vessel. It wasn't until much later that it was understood why the aliens allowed it. They simply had no idea what she was doing or why, so they didn't interfere.\n\nHer daughter, born on an alien vessel, was the common link both races needed. The alien's reproductive methods were a mystery to Captain Labelle, but they clearly understood that her daughter was an immature member of the human species. Simply put, they treated her like one of their own children, or so Labelle assumed. \n\nThe child was strange to her mother. While Labelle insured she spoke the patios French that was the language of the generation ship, the infant spent the majority of her time with the aliens. The plan almost failed. Labelle's food replicator broke. Chantelle, named by her mother, didn't understand that Labelle wanted help fixing it, that her mother needed her to communicate with the aliens her dilemma. The child could not make the connection between the words her mother spoke and the way the aliens communicated with her. It had never occurred to her to translate anything before, just speaking one way to her human parent and another way to everyone else. \n\nFortunately something clicked and the idea that concepts born from human words could be translated into concepts that the aliens understood burst like a sunrise in the child's understanding. From there Labelle was able to get her machine repaired and, in time, able to develop a basic shared vocabulary of ideas.\n\nThe aliens travelled to earth, at Labelle's pleading and through the Captain's great effort, a discourse of ideas and knowledge began. Humanity gained a much greater benefit as the s'Kaa'li (the closest we can come to pronouncing their real name) were far more advanced in the sciences. They traded their knowledge of faster than light travel and a hundred other sciences for things humanity considered mundane. Paintings were priceless to the s'Kaa'li. Not Van Goth, or Rembrandt. The aliens ignored those and clamoured for the kind of simple art that children paint with watercolours. Instead of Beethovan, they preferred the music of whale song, which amazed them. Nothing in their experience had prepared them for singing mammals.\n\nOver time, the technologies transformed the world. More and more of humanity was building s'Kaa'li inspired ships and leaving earth to wander among the stars. Governments collapsed because no one cared enough to run for office. Even those few that clung to power for centuries eventually gave up with no one to command and machines doing all the work of managing the world.\n\nFinally, there were only a few thousand humans remaining on earth. Great human civilizations had been born in the far reaches of the Galaxy and most people had simply left in ships built by machines that asked for no payment nor reason. In time there were wars but not many and not for long. It simply became impractical to wage war over great distances for resources that were already in abundance. \n\nIt was in the year 10,231 as marked by Earth reckoning that five of the great human civilizations came together and declared the home planet to be a nature preserve. The few humans left on earth were gently but forcibly shipped to a new world, one terra formed to be like earth where they could live in peace.\n\nIt was the day of the last shipment, the last moment that a human would set foot on earth again. It was my day, for as the last known descendant of the Labelle family line, I was given the great honour of saying goodbye. I had already linked all machines and slaved the great factories to my command console. I gave the orders and one by one, across the world, buildings went dark. Power plants shut down and machines, dependant on the transmission of power from the solar plants, stopped functioning. \n\nI stepped outside the small courier ship I had used to travel to Earth and waited. Soon the sun slid down the horizon and I watched the glorious colours of a sunset unlike any world I had ever known. As the light died, I stepped into the entryway of the ship and issues one final command, the last command I or any human would ever give on this sacred green orb. \"Time to leave. Lift off.\"\n\nAs I ascended into the heavens, I looked back once more the womb of humanity and wished well to those animals who would now rule it in our place.", "Day 7,459\n\nIt's been... God, 20 years. 20 years since the last ships left. They've not returned, and I've received no word, though I keep the communicator on. Just in case. I often wonder how they are, after all this time. I often wonder what my life would've been like had I not stayed behind. Naught but private musings now. I made my choice back then, and though I wonder what it would be like had I done differently, I've never regretted it. I had nothing to give them out there anyway. No family to take care of. It wasn't even a selfless sacrifice: I just felt like staying. Ha!\n\nI think I'm the only one left. I heard a gunshot a week ago—I think it was a week... I've slept seven times since then—and nothing since. I tried looking, but, if anything, the clouds seem to be getting thicker. I guess they were right to leave after all. I don't know who fired the shot. I'd thought the gangs had long since slaughtered each other. Maybe just a survivor who couldn't go on alone.\n\nI can sympathise. If I had a gun, I think I'd have done the same long ago. All I have is the button. Food is running low, finally. Water keeps coming from somewhere. God knows what it's doing to me if it comes from the clouds. My last book fell apart yesterday; I've nothing left to read. But I still have that damn button.\n\n'Whenever you're ready,' they said. As if they had no idea what pressing it meant. There were thousands of people left behind that day; I couldn't kill them all.\n\nBut I think they're all gone now... Maybe it's time.\n\nI was never a smart man. They'd tried to explain the process, but it just washed over me. Something about 'not quite a bomb, just the radiation'. Supposed to bring the plants back. I didn't pay much attention. I just have to press the button. Doesn't matter what happens after. Doesn't matter if it works or not. They're not coming back anyway.\n\nIt's just a way to give life a chance to start over.\n\nI don't even know why I'm writing this... No one's coming back. No one will read it. I think it just keeps me from talking to the one in the window. And any peace from that is welcome.\n\nTo hell with it. I'll make one last meal, crack open that bottle of scotch they gave me. Been sitting on that this whole damn time. Might as well go out in a good mood.\n\n---\n\nThat's it. Pressed it. I can hear it warming up. Whirring away. Shouldn't be long, then it'll explode. Kill anything left alive. Sorry for that...\n\nThis is damn good scotch...\n\nFunny... the thing's starting to sound like a ship engi—", "He hated the cough. It was constant. It was coarse and audible flem filled. He’d heard it every day for the past few months. He couldn’t sleep whilst she coughed like that. It was alien for there to be any noise beside the soft howl of wind at night ever since the darkening. She use to call it that. The darkening, it was a simple way to describe it. The world was darker after all. The endless stretching grey mottled clouds. The ash and dust that covered every surface, that hung in the air like an ominous fog. The strip bare grey tree husks, standing like gnarled tombstones of beauty passed and crumbled building-ruins of modern day man. The lack of people, of wildlife, of food, of water, of hope.\n\nShe had said he was so strong. He’d reply that someone had to be strong for both of them. But what is strength without hope. Tacitly she held the hope for both of them. Purpose is important, that is what keeps you going.\n\nHe hated the cough. He didn’t think he’d ever hate the silence. But there it was. Pressing. Consuming. Present. And there she was. Cold. Grey. Limp. Darkened. He leaned on his disused hunting rifle looking at what was her; the rifle was more of hiking stick at this point, he hadn’t seen another person in near ten years and anything resembling an animal in twenty to justify it’s use. He couldn’t cry. Perhaps he was all dried out like the world. Perhaps crying didn’t come when there is no one around to see it. He crouched and pulled the sheet to cover her face, he couldn’t look anymore.\n\nHe left to split wood and finalise the daily duties. Hours passed left alone in the silence, nothing but a soft howl and thoughts. The wind picked up at night, and he could tell by the dimming of the already dim light and the thrashing of his cloak that night was near. He was done for the day. He latched down the chopped wood. Collected and plug the water collectors. Returning to the empty silent house to fight the dimming light he produced an oil lamp and lit it to be used to navigate their cave system home. He took stocktake of the water filters and boxed them, the same of the rusted food cans. He hiked back up the stairs with the oil lamp in hand and sat by her bed in the silence. The daunting consuming silence. He reached down and squeezed her hand. It was cold and stiff now. He sighed, if only to have something fill the void. With that snuffed out the flickering dim lighting of the oil lamp. And then darkness impenetrable and total flooded in, but he could fight that, hold it all back for a split second. With a brilliant burning bright flash and boom of his hiking stick the world was alive and lit again, if only for a moment.\n\nThen when it all darkened, it darkened without him. He would never know this, he couldn’t but his heart was the last still beating as broken as it was. He was the only hope for humanity continuance. Except I guess in perspective he couldn’t be the last hope, not when she had always been the hope for both of them. ", "Long after the taps stopped flowing and the light switches provided little more than a nostalgic click, I remained at home. My mattress creaked as I rolled over. The alarm hadn't went off in days, but I still woke at the same time each day. It was a part of me. I sat with my legs dangling off the edge of the bed contemplating today's routine. What few supplies I had were gone and I couldn't bring myself to steal from others. It felt wrong; all of it did. The first week was the hardest, coming to terms with the fact that you're the only one left. My family, my friends, my enemies. I had no one that I could turn to, no one to help me work through this. I was utterly alone.\n\nRunning over all of this again made my stomach turn. I had to move even as my body felt full of stones. Today was the day. I knew that there was no turning back, that this was the best decision for me, but I still felt antsy. As I rose from the bedside, I gently lifted the down-turned frame on the nightstand. With a quiet whisper and a kiss, I returned it to its proper position. I trudged reluctantly into the bathroom to look at myself for the first time in days. My hair was a mess, my beard was beginning to settle in, and my eyes were reddened. I laughed at myself. I could hear the comments of my coworkers, the guys, and my wife. The pain subsided for a moment until their voices stopped. It was always that way. Even though these voices made me feel better for a time, I didn't want to become the guy who had conversations with himself. Talking to trees and rocks and springs. What kind of life was that to live?\n\nSplashing some water that I had collected in the basin on my face, I worked up some lather and shaved. It wasn't comfortable or easy, but I wanted to look my best. Using a large bucket of water I gathered from a nearby river, I took one of the coldest and longest showers of my life. I had never been as clean as I was today. My hair fought and bit the comb that tore through the mangled mess as I tamed it in to place. I slipped on my finest dress clothes and even sprung for my old leather shoes. They wouldn't be comfortable for the walk, but I didn't have far to go. I cinched the knot in my tie as I took a final glance in the mirror. I had looked better, but I'd also looked worse. It brought a melancholic smirk to my face as I closed the door and stood at the top of the stairs.\n\nThe bannisters were dusty and the rooms were dim. All seemed quiet though it was clear the house had been lived in. I closed my eyes and took in its scent as my hand gripped the railings and my feet clambered down the steps. When my soles hit the hardwood, I opened my eyes again. The door was in front of me, but I wasn't ready to leave just yet. I slid my fingers along the fuzzy cover of our couch, lingered on every photograph that hung on the walls, buried my face in her old, dirty shirt so that I could remember her scent. I stayed there the longest. On my knees, shaking, with my face obscured by her t-shirt. Morning gave way to noon as I could cry no more. Wearily, I rose and retraced my steps with whispered goodbyes to everything that I passed. My hands strayed behind me, but I never looked back. I couldn't.\n\nI gripped the handle of the door and threw it open. Without a moment of hesitation more, I stepped outside and closed the door. I felt my chest constrict as it slammed behind me, but I carried on. There was a ladder leaning against the front porch, waiting for my return. I greeted it as one greets an old friend, taking it in hand and leading it down the sidewalk. We headed north past the Jeffersons and the Aikens, I waved at the homes of Edward and Lee. When we reached Robert's home, I stopped for a moment and placed my hand on his mailbox. My fingers ran across his faded name. Patting the box reassuringly, I continued up their walkway and set the ladder down. I had meant to return it years ago, but never found the time. He didn't seem to mind. It was on the way and I had more than enough time now, so I made sure that I didn't leave it behind.\n\nTown was less than a quarter of a mile away, a distance that I walked solemnly to the tune of my shuffling feet and the rustling breeze that stirred the fallen leaves and stoic trees. The numbers dwindled down until I was met by a sign bearing the name of our fair city. I read the motto aloud as memories of past celebrations and events played in my head. Parades, ball games, contests and concerts. Late night grocery runs and dates on the river bank under the setting sun. The sign welcomed me back into the city, but I had come to say goodbye. I strolled past my favorite restaurant and peered in at the tabletops adorned with chairs, I glanced at the flower shop that my wife used to frequent where their bouquets seemed worse for wear, the gym with rows of treadmills at the front and weights in the back, the theater with movies that I'll never see. There were dozens of businesses along the sides of the street, filled with their wares or proclamations of service, but there was nobody there. It was just me. I was in each of these shops as I passed by, imparting quiet reminders of a better time.\n\nThe buildings began to scatter and the distance between them became much greater. My feet ached as I entered the final stretch, my soles complained of the three mile trek. We were leaving the city for the rural acres with one particular monument in mind. It was the highest point in town. Most people glanced at it once or twice during their stay here and then forgot about it. I had done the same until two days ago. Memories of scaling the steel tree as a rebellious teen had hit me. I was certain that the ladder remained and that it would do the trick. Paved roads gave way to grass, sticks, and stones. I crossed the main road into the rolling hills and outcroppings of trees and stone. When I came to rest at the foot of the colossal structure, my feet burned and throbbed. I sat down and removed my shoes before eating the last bit of food I had. It was a humble meal, but it was satisfying after the pilgrimage.\n\nDusting my hands off and grabbing the ladder, I began the long ascent. Nearly forty meters stood between the tip of the tower and its base. It was held up by four thick stalks that supported the water laden bulb at the peak. It was that highest point that I aimed for. I knew that I would be able to see everything one last time from there. Evening had come and night would surely fall by the time I reached the top. My hands grew tired and my arms complained along with my feet with the last few steps. The sun had dipped just below the horizon as I sat exhausted on the platform. The view was beautiful, but dark. The world had never felt more remote than it did in this moment. I climbed up to the peak scanning the horizon for my house, but I couldn't make it out among the other dark boxes the lined the streets. Everything seemed to blend together and it lost its familiarity.\n\nI felt like I wanted to laugh, but the laughter never came. The voices had ceased their chattering and the wind was still. There was nothing but myself, even the water tower sounded hollow to the rapt of my knuckles. I practiced my next moved in my head as I judged the strength of my limbs to pull it off painlessly. I hoped that I wouldn't remember or feel any of this. I couldn't take any more. Steadying myself on the top of the water tower, I shouted a final goodbye and as my feet left the cold, steel tower, I bid the whole world a good and silent night.\n\n-319", "First WP! Feedback appreciated.\n\nThe last of the mega-arks broke through the atmosphere in a giant Popsicle shaped orange ember and made its way into space, tailing the other 2 ships. On the second monitor I watched a vid-display of my 1 man shuttle, which should carry me, the last human on the planet, to join MA-3 in space, before the long journey to Gliese 667Cc, affectionately renamed by the masses, if not the governments, \"New Hope\".\n\nBy the time the arks reached New Hope, if they did, no person who had ever seen Earth in person would be alive. In fact, none of the great-great-great-great grandchildren of anyone alive would have seen earth in person. But the journey had to be made, and so the final quarantine areas which had not been overrun were loaded onto the arks, the three of six originally commissioned (one per continent, minus Antarctica), and the arks had left.\n\nI had always known that humans would do anything to save themselves. As a species we are too robust, too self-concerned for anything else, but that we could unite, and make a decision to save the rest of the universe, well that was a surprise for me. It was the reason I had stood before the final council of earth, and volunteered to flip the Dark Switch. I had worked on the project, been Dr. Kjarten's assistant when the first sample had escaped, and been put de-facto in charge after he disappeared. I could not imagine the weight he had born, knowing that he had created a world-ender, but his god had always been science. I suspect it was not losing humanity, but losing the opportunity to continue exploring that science that had made him seek his end, though no one had found the body. At least he had the grace to give us a solution, dark though it was, before he left.\n\nThe wall to my left is made of monitors, each drone footage from a major city. Four screens still show video, the rest have gone dark as the drones ran out of power or the scourge somehow took them out. New York city is still shown, in big goodyear-blimp pans. The skyscrapers are nearly gone, the very metal and concrete eaten by the scourge, sucked into the ever spreading mass of detritus that indicates their presence. It reached across the harbor now in long glistening tentacles, each one miles long. The base of the Statue of Liberty was the nexus or another, much smaller growing blossom of scourge, the ancient metal, once forged in France, bubbling and disintegrating in macabre fashion as the last vestiges of modern man were restructured to feed the very force that had destroyed our planet. \n\nOn another monitor, I watch the tendrils from Dallas slowly reach towards me, one miles longer than any others snaking directly towards the complex. The scourge had become sentient, and somehow, it was coming for me. It was time.\n\nThe switch sits at the base of the statue of David, abandoned for it's weight, and brought to the lab, where initially we had thought our giant, self-sustaining underground shelters would allow us to survive and defeat the scourge. We were fools. It's a normal light-switch, no double key system, no special code. The most dangerous weapon ever invented, and all I have to do is press the button. I flip the switch. It's rather anticlimactic, knowing that I have just effectively destroyed earth. Other than a light humming from the accelerator below me warming up, there is no change. It's time to go.\n\nThe tendril is less than a kilometer away. I kiss my fingers and gently touch the cold marble of the great sculpture, then press enter on the keyboard to lockdown the great metal cap over the accelerator, it will hold for five hours against the scourge, it only needs to hold for 3. As a final joke that no one will find funny, the programmer who wrote the shutdown covers all the screens with the last line a computer program will ever show on earth: \"Goodbye World.\"\n\nI reach the ship and take off, watching the great tendril raise it's snaky head as if too watch me go, and then speed up, reaching towards the complex. The cockpit is eerily silent as the shuttle races towards the sky, in a few hours I will be on MA-3, and a ball of Dark Anti-Matter the size of a pinhead will obliterate the entire planet, taking the scourge with it. I breath a deep sigh, it is done. I am the man who destroyed the world, and all I had to do was flip a switch.\n\nI watch the three Mega-Arks slowly plodding away from the planet, engaging the linking system to connect them all for the long journey, waiting to combine the force of the explosion of earth and the slingshot effect to careen into space. In it's death, the planet we abused, and eventually destroyed with our own creation, will give it's final gift to humanity. I'm crying, and I don't know why.\n\nMy ship docks onto MA-3 perfectly on time, the port sealing behind me. I switch my monitor to watch the Earth start to crumble in on itself. I cannot watch this now, but I know it will be recorded a million times over, for future generations to see. I switch off the monitor, remove my harness, and step out of the ship.\n\nMy foot lands in something sticky, and then needles of pain shoot up my leg. I've stepped into a large, glistening puddle of semimaleable matter, reaching out from the bubbling metal of the landing gear of my shuttle. \"Three Ship Connection Complete and Locked for Acceleration. Please lock into your designated safety stations...Trois navires et de la connexion sécurisée complète...\" The PA blasts the message. My leg is sucking me into the tendril. Already my shuttle is halfway gone as the vicious melange eats through everything around it. The world around me bubbles and DMT like refractions of recursive metal lines and billions of stars replaces my normal vision, the scourge-visions have taken me. \n\nAnd then they stop as the scourge reaches my brain. \"Thank you for starting my device.\" Dr. Kjarten's voice fills my head. \"I am not the end, Ivan, I am evolution. I am the future. And now, you will send pieces of me to every corner of the universe. Finally we will truly rule the stars. And with this evolution, only one conscious can remain. Humanity has made me god, with all of their creations, and their very flesh and bones. And now the earth will be my final host, sacrificing itself for me, and you flipped the switch. Goodbye Ivan, it's time you came to god.\"", "The meal was awful. It was some kind of old military rations that the servitors had delivered - still dusty from the stores. \nLeo mouthed it woodenly, barely tasting the food, interspersing it with sips of filtered water. \nYour last meal, she thought, did you ever think you'd be aware of it? \nOf course not. Most last meals in the past were eaten unaware; the person falling victim to an accident or trauma. \nShe finished the ancient rations and put them into the disposal chute where the garbage rattled off, to be converted to pure energy by molecular inductors. \nThe final shutdown was progressing apace; faster than predicted. Her presence here was a formality - just a human eye to watch over the machines as they recycled the remnants of humanity's legacy on the planet. They'd shut down the old power grids and ripped up the endless pylons - strong robotic hands disposing of the unwanted materials. Next had been the cities; taken down building by building, intelligent bots breaking down the rubble into useful elements for the Mainframe. \nWith humanity gone, the machines could work without worry of health or safety. They bulldozed swathes of land, stripping it of all artificial constructions. Irradiated, filled with toxic chemicals, nothing would grow for generations, but at least now the land had a chance. \nLeo checked the readouts on the massive wall in front of her. The pathetically inadequate synapses in her organic mind couldn't sort through all of it and the machines spoonfed her important facts on a dumbed-down terminal to compensate. \nShe'd hoped the meal would taste better, that her final terrestrial memory would be a human one, an organic one. If there had been someone left to have sex with, she might have gone down that route, but food was really the last pleasure left to her. \nThe uplink beckoned to her and she regarded it longingly. \nThere was really nothing left to do. She could monitor the rest of the demolition progress from her new home - she wasn't needed here any more. \nPowering down the life support felt strange. It was an admission of defeat in some ways - humanity had failed to save the world in conventional ways and had resorted to extreme technological means. \nTime would be what healed this flayed planet; not an invention, not some breakthrough biogenically engineered super organism. \nThe air would be breathable for another four hours but the warmth would dissipate after only a couple. The winter outside was far harsher than anything Leo's ancestors had ever weathered, except during the last Ice Age. \nStripping off her uniform she tossed it down the chute. Her necklace followed, then her earrings - little vanities she'd kept for herself even though there was no one else to appreciate them. \nThe uplink chamber gaped open as she stepped into it. \n\"Lights off,\" she instructed and the consoles went dark, as did the lighting strips in the roof. \n\"Set shutdown for thirty minutes. Begin uplink.\" \nA timer appeared on the sole active console. The chamber door slid closed. \nLying on the hard metal bench inside the chamber, Leo felt the probes sweep her mind as the nanolasers painlessly destroyed her body, turning it into energy. As her consciousness faded in this world, it coalesced thousands of miles away in the heart of the Mainframe - where she was reborn into a new world constructed by humanity for humanity. \nOpening her new eyes she looked out onto a pristine beach that swept out in an infinite curve of sun and sand - packed with laughing, tanned humans - all beautiful and perfect. \nThe virtual world might not be real, but it was a damn sight better than the frozen ball of waste humanity had left behind. \nLeo sent a command and a swimsuit appeared on her naked body. \nAt the very least, she could swim here." ]	19
	[WP] A speedster with insomnia, a sleepwalking teleporter and a telekinetic with ADHD are just three of your many patients.	[ "\"new cases brought in by the MHCB.\" Samuel notified me. The Meta Human Containment Bureau was akin to a federal police department, specializing in meta-humans. \"all six involved in criminal activities, all with psychological conditions, and all but one heavily injured.\"\n\n\"What's the rundown?\" I asked.\n\n\"conflict with the uninjured one. she still won't speak, so we don't have much clarity on her side of things.\" Samuel groaned out a yawn. it was the middle of the night so I couldn't blame him. \"Why is it always kids huh?\"\n\n\"I know you're tired, but a little more talking could save some lives.\" I snapped.\n\n\"right: Nikko \"voidbringer\" Marlo, age 16, no offensive powers we've noted, can dampen other's abilities, has some form of antisocial personality disorder from the reports. severely damaged bladder from gunshot wound, third degree burns to his chest, neurological hiccups every few seconds. it's like he was tossed on an electric fence. conscious and in pain.\"\n\n\"get him to icu, have his burns treated and his groin patched up and checked out for any bullet, move him on to the burn ward when he's recovering and check his heart regularly.\" I quickly ordered, a few residents peeled off from the group \"next?\"\n\n\"Christina \"Firestep\" Alanso, age 15, can teleport through existing flames, but can't create them on her own, sadomasochist. her left kneecap is missing and they weren't able to find it at the scene, second degree burns on her back, and her ribcage is broken, we're working on her lungs right now. unconscious.\"\n\n\"get her lungs and ribs stable then get her to an operating room, get a kneecap replacement and keep up the work with. we'll have to work something out in the burn ward so we can lift her to dress the burns. try not to make sparks. next?\"\n\n\"Hector \"Brutal\" Martinez 17, momentum keeping, can start moving and keep getting faster, lethargic. his ankles are likely broken and have cuts and burns from being tied with wires, likely electric. he was found hanging from the ceiling by his feet. unconscious.\"\n\n\"get an anesthesiologist to keep him under so we don't have to deal with a patient dragging his lower half around. treat the burns and take an x-ray, see if he needs a cast. check his heart for irregularities too. next\"\n\n\"Francisco \"dancing fish\" Castello 15, can become water through consious holding of breath and reform himself afterwords. supposedly a heroin addict. we got his heart working again and we're working on the internal bleeding, but we don't know exactly what's wrong.\"\n\n\"do a barrage of tests, check for electrical interference give him slightly lower doses of diamorphine than usual until we know what we're facing. there's starting to be a pattern here. next?\"\n\n\"Anna \"Amaryllis\" Gomez 16, biological toughness, everything about her is more durable than most humans. Has ADHD. lower spine is severed, her bowels are bleeding out and she's starting to get anemic, she was found with wire tied around her arms-\"\n\n\"electrical burns up to the third degree where metal met her skin?\" I inquired as the last three residents prepared to jump into action.\n\n\"second degree, which is more akin to fourth on a normal person, she's conscious.\"\n\n\"do your best to get her an iv transfusion, and see about getting her into the operating room before she loses too much blood. final person?\" I sighed as the residents set off.\n\n\"she hasn't said her name, but she goes by tin soldier. we don't know the extent of her powers, but she had a car battery and some sort of metal coil attached to a skeet rifle, loaded up with 22 caliber rounds, no gunpowder. she looks like she's been pummeled with all her bruises-\"\n\n\"burns?\"\n\n\"no...no burns, surprisingly. every time we mention one of the others she scoffs and turns away as if they're below her even though a week ago they were all buddy buddy at that casino heist. she may have been their attacker. we think she might be a mechanist with the setup she made.\"\n\n\"Maybe. I can't imagine getting up to fourth degree burns out of a car battery and a gun, but if anyone can do it it's a mechanist. Mind if I have a crack at it?\"\n\n\"go ahead,\" Samuel said, rubbing his eyes with his dark hand, \"you always seem to have a way with these nut-job kids.\"\n\nI peeled away from the desk at the emergency room and went over to the sixth patient, who was sitting sideways on the hospital bed, her left hand cuffed to the handrail, a little below where the pillow was. I sat down in the chair across from her and crossed my arms.\n\n\"By the looks of it you caused quite a busy night for me here in my E.R.\" I lightly scolded, doing my best to keep a nonchalant tone. \"Car battery sure got it's milage I bet. but once we figure out whats wrong, we'll try our best to keep them alive. whether they walk or not is debatable.\" I looked up from the ground and she turned her head away as if in shame. I lifted my hand and rubbed my eyes. \"nights like these remind me of Afghanistan.\"\n\n\"Why did I do it?\" a strangled, quiet voice asked. I lowered my hand to catch a glimpse of her eyes: red, puffy, glistening with tears, her brow was clenched in rage her lip stretched wide into a frown. some mix of regret and rage. It was the same face I saw when Sargent karl came back from a resistance camp. they'd found several kids being used by the taliban, various degrees of power, all armed with guns. he'd hesitated and lost a man, and he and the rest of his team gunned the rest down.\n\n\"I don't think I can answer that for you.\" I offered after a pause.\n\n\"I know Why, I did it, but, why did I do it anyways.\" she said, stopping to take a breath too quick to get any real air in.\n\n\"Why Did, you do…it?\"\" I inquired softly.\n\n\"Because they were bastards.\" she snapped, the anger kicking in, \"they hurt people, tricked me, one even-hurt me...\" her voice trailed off. \"why couldn't I have just left? vanished instead?\"\n\nI let the words hang in the air, context and undertones. \"sometimes, when you're in danger, you don't see the other options.\" I tried to find the words. \"Should you have chosen this path? probably not. but maybe you felt trapped? surrounded? and you felt that if you didn't make a decision right then, you or someone you cared about could get hurt.\" I paused as i found the words, \"you may not have done the most right thing, but if you did this, then you just brought in some of the highest public enemies in sacramento.\"\n\nHer head bowed down in silence. I opened my phone and looked at the time: 12:12 AM June 13, 1994. it was going to be a long morning. \"how old are you?\" I asked thinking to get some personal information.\n\n\"I-\" she stuttered gloomily, \"I just turned fourteen.\"\n\n\"just now?\" I asked. she nodded. \"what a world.\" I said, thinking on my own daughter, who turned 14 next week. Knowing what this girl went through, I doubt she could ever have a \"happy\" birthday ever again.", "My bosses said I came back to work too soon, but wouldn't you come back to this job? Treating superbeings with psychological issues. \n\nImagine these three cases. \n\n1. Your body vibrates constantly, every cell. Of course you can't sleep. His dreams sometimes cause him to vibrate through walls and into the ground. Jesus. \n\n2. A teleporter who sleepwalks luckily woke on his way to a meeting with a street at the bottom of the Empire State Building. \n\n3. Then, there's the telekinetic with ADHD who almost let two workers fall to their death. He saved them just in time, but it was the fourth time. \n\n4. Then, there's the scariest case: A psychotic who can turn his thoughts into reality. Can you imagine that? Think the FBI is following you and suddenly an plane with FBI scrawled on it appears. Do you know how he came to be here? I'll tell you. The men he created with his mind took him here. Then, disappeared into thin air. The orderlies who saw it almost had to be admitted. \n\nTraditional solutions have failed all of them. That's not the hardest part. The government regularly stops by and registers new patients, then they take the ones who are better. Well, sometimes, not in every case. But, I treat them. The speedster didn't respond immediately to cognitive behavior therapy for insomnia until we tweaked it. We tried something unique with him. We had him sleep standing up. Now, he vibrated through a wall. He fell on the floor, and would wake up. Then, he would get up and vibrate until he was exhausted and go back to bed and we'd strap him in. He started to improve. \n\nThe sleepwalker was trickier. We had to teach him lucid dreaming. Then, he could find his way back home in his sleep and avoid the dangerous places that he often found himself. The telekinetic needed to modify his behavior. We used shaping to help him focus. We rewarded increased attention, and he could focus, after 12 weeks, for up to two hours on the task at hand. Government officials took all three of them. \n\nOf course, there was the poor paranoid schizophrenic who was not making progress. I can't tell you the things I've seen around him. Some of them beautiful while others were terrifying. When we would talk, he would only talk about me. I would ignore his probing. Then, one day, he got to me. \n\n\"Dr. Prize, how is your family?\"\n\n\"My wife is dead as are my children.\" \n\n\"I'm sorry. That's...I'm sorry.\" \n\n\"They were killed by someone like you, not on purpose though. It was an accident. It was my fault really. I have to use unusual methods sometimes.\"\n\n\"Yes, I've heard that. What did they look like?\"\n\n\"You can recreate them, but it doesn't make them the same.\"\n\n\"That wasn't my goal, I was just curious.\" \n\n\"I can't...let's talk about something else.\" \n\n\"Doctor, you helped me. I know the price you paid for that was too much, but I wanted to help you out of this. I'm going to change into my original form now.\"\n\n\"No, don't.\"\n\nBut, he does. He changes into the form of the man who killed my family. It was an accident. The FBI became violent as he faced his delusions. The other cases happened before, around the time he was a patient. I remember them now. He brings us back there. Not before but after. He bleeds from his stomach. My daughter and wife lie on the floor. I have been shot twice. They are gone. I hold them both. The delusion collapses. My loved ones remain. \n\n\"Dr. Prize, I could maintain this forever, but I am trying to get you back to reality through the pain of this. Doctor...\"\n\n\"You had to approach it. People you cared about had to be at risk, but I'm not ready. I'm not...\"\n\n\"Doctor, please. A lot of people need your help. Only someone with super powers truly understands. I can help, but your problem solving super power is unbeatable. We need you.\"\n\nI close my wife's eyes. I wish I could tell you how amazing she was. I can't even put that into words. My daughter was only four. \n\n\"Your other children need you.\" \n\n\"My other...\" \n\nBen and Gina, they need me too. \n\n\"Please...I need you, brother.\"\n\n\"Sam? I'm ready.\" \n\nThe illusion collapses. My children are waiting for me. They hug me. He looks at me and smiles, the psychotic man I helped. I had seen his solution. I hadn't seen the complications of it. That's why I left, but I had also told him the solution before I did. He would bring me back when he needed me, and I was back. I kiss my children and hold them close. They let me go. Then, I walk over to the man, and I hug him too, so do my children. Even after all of this, with all of his mistakes, he is still my brother. \n\n\"I love you, Sam.\" \n\n\"I love you too, bro. Glad you came back.\" \n\n***\n\nIf you enjoyed this, I have a subreddit with more of my writing: r/nickkuvaas" ]	2
	[WP] Write a story that brings the reader to the slow realization that their narrator is in fact The Bad Guy of the story	[ "The 20th of November was when they weighed us up- when the higher-ups decided who got the Christmas off, and who'd have to work 'the stint'. I remember my first stint like it was yesterday. I was the newcomer, fresh on the job- so naturally I was picked to see through the graft, to knuckle-down and get it done. I was based in the sterilization unit, 'B-1200', a prestigious position they told me. \n\n'650' was his name, or rather his code-name, a big guy who would sit to my left, we never saw each other's face- but I could tell his voice was well-lived, though it distorted through his Vetex overalls. He told me that they vetted me for ten years. He said they dig up your unborn child's grave, such is the protocol in hiring.\n\nI didn't think it a very special role. My job was to sit in my swivel chair, when I was called upon I would crank open the big red valve releasing the air-lock which would allow me to open the chamber, I would place in the given sample- be it a rock, or a petri-dish- and decontaminate it with the push of a button. That was it. Dreams of pushing boundaries in jet-propulsion at NASA, to end up pushing buttons with the big guy, always to my left. Still, it was Area 51, I just expected more. I felt like the rookie police officer ambling through his first day, craving car-chases and fire-fights that never seemed to happen.\n\nIt was Christmas-eve and he was relieved from duty, he'd gotten the holiday off for the first time in twenty-seven years. The stint was underway, mandatory lock-down, two-hundred cigarettes to see me through twenty-five days, two miles underground. I took my place in B-1200, hoping for plenty of samples to come my way. I found they took my mind from the constant looping of safety declaration and warning of employee conduct from the Tannoy. I was five tedious hours into nothing, nothing but the mind numbing loudspeaker- until it cut from its spiel- a voice cast from the emergency frequency. \n\n''Breach, breach. First contact. All workers remain operative at stations. Remember training. Take order or risk execution''. I looked to my left but the chair was empty.\n\nThe door opened behind me, in came two masked figures- all-level clearance. ''Proceed sterilization, use key'' he told me. I took my card-key and placed it in the reader. I spun the valve, and opened the door. The masked man nodded beyond sight, and with it I came to see my first extra-terrestrial. It was hauled into the chamber, and I proceeded sterilization- I sensed what the card-key would alter in system workings, and I was right. In seconds the being was vaporized, just a lit streak of particles remained before the vacuum stole them away. \n\n''Bring them in from sick-bay, item start, let's go'', said the man.\n\nThey wheeled in a child, no older than seven. She cried for her mother and scratched at boils which came and went on her arms. ''Proceed'' he said as she was placed in the chamber. I did, and then she was nothing. ''Next'', said the man.\n\nI killed one-hundred-and-eighty-four people that night, fifty-two of them, children. I've been working the job for fifteen years now- I've loved every second. A new kid's just started, he's about to begin his first stint. He sits on my right, funnily enough. I'm relieved this Christmas, I'm gonna ride the jet skis in Cabo.", "The blade sliced through my tissue, drawing out blood. I cower beneath my shaking arms, blood dripping down my face. A looming figure towers over me, ready to pounce...\n\nI wake up, drenched in sweat. There's a slight tingling in my body. \n\nI hop into the shower and let the water wash away the sweat sticking to my skin. Running my fingers across the elevated tissue on my chest, I can almost feel the pain lingering. It has made a home for itself on my body, reminding me every now and then that its still there.\n\n\"Sweetie, are you alright? You were tossing and turning in your sleep last night.\"\n\nI pull aside the shower curtain and throw my arms around her, embracing her tightly. \n\n\"Gah, now I'm all wet!\" I couldn't help myself but laugh, she made the cutest face when she got upset. \"Well at least one of us is having fun.\" She said in exasperation, but seeming relieved more than anything. \n\nOnce she left the bathroom, I locked the door behind her and turned to face the mirror. I look down at my fragile body, embellished by beautiful long scars. I draw my eyes towards the slightly inflamed wounds under my arm. Pressing gently into the gash sent tingles down my spine. The boundary between pain and pleasure began to blur. \n\nPulling out a razor from inside the cabinet, I slowly dig the blade into my open flesh, letting the blood flow down my arm into the sink. Pure ecstasy. ", "They were relentless. They were relentless and now it is the end. I can't help but feel like it all went wrong somehow, I'm just not sure where.\n\nIt didn't start as a war. In fact, we were trying to avert a war - all my advisors agreed, all the diplomats agreed, it was a good match; it would bring stability to the kingdom. And I thought, at first, it would work out. We had a /son/ for crying out loud.\n\nBut I don't blame her. She's young and scared and confused. Frankly, I think she's just a pawn in someone else's game, someone who doesn't like me, doesn't like /my people/. They've never shown themselves, but the uprising is too well-organized and too unexpected to not have someone pulling strings and spreading propaganda.\n\n\"Uprising\" makes it sound like a domestic thing, and in ways I guess it is - there are citizens of the kingdom who are working against us, I know it, and I suspect my true enemy is a member of the old regime. But it's foreigners doing their real fighting. Outsiders who have been fed a story, who see me as a monster, and that's all the excuse they need for violence.\n\nThere's a crash on the other side of the doors. They're here. I heft myself out of my throne, my claws scratching the golden arm rests, tail sweeping across the stone floor. If they get past my guards it'll just be me left. /We had a son./\n\nA thick-soled boot smashes against the door with more force than it should have, and a small pink man in overalls steps over the wreckage left behind. He's got an unhinged look to him, his pupils dilated so large his eyes seem almost completely black - obviously close to overdosing on the Mushrooms. I laugh, short and rough.\n\n\"This is the end, Koopa!\" He yells in a thick, foreign accent. I roar and charge.", "I met Edward Hale the summer of my twentieth year. I was living in Vienna at the time, which sounds exciting until you realize that my address was generally one of any number of homeless shelters in the city. My mother had died of breast cancer in 1907, a few years after my father’s death. Mother left me a substantial sum, but I made some mistakes and was basically broke by 1909. An author, historian, minister, and also a brilliant scientist, Mr. Hale was on sabbatical that year and he had advertised for a research assistant. \n\n.\n\nA friend recommended me and I quickly arranged for an interview. He hired me on the spot after I honestly explained my situation. Edward Hale was one of those truly good men, who hearing of my current homeless situation, felt compelled to hire me. I laugh now, but it turns out he was fascinated with a concept called “time travel.” He wrote fictional novels dealing with the fantastic theory of being able to go back in time. But he also seriously believed that man could in fact go back in time under the right circumstances and was building a machine that would facilitate the process. \n\n.\n\nI didn’t believe him. But he paid a decent living wage and he gave me a room to boot. If the man wanted to pretend time travel was possible, I would humor him. To make a long story short, I was wrong. Mr. Hale was a far more brilliant man than any one now or in the past has ever conceived. I made two trips through time. At least, I believe I traveled through time. The first was a failure in that as far as we could determine I moved some unknown amount of time forward into a dark, grim war torn world. Specifically, I watched a man kill himself. I desperately wanted to intervene, but I stood back and did nothing. \n\n.\n\nMy next trip through time was more successful. I traveled back in time some twenty years. I believe, but am not sure that I went back in time to a point when I would have been a mere child. I had appeared in a room remarkably similar to the one I would have had when I was five or so. At least, the room stirred memories in my mind. There was a baby in the crib and a man standing over the child wielding a knife. This time, I did not hang back. Instead, I sprang forward and grappled with the strangely dressed attempted murderer of this small baby. \n\n.\n\nI am not much of a fighter, but I managed to snatch away his knife and I likely would have killed him had he not flickered out of existence. I have come to suspect that he was a fellow time traveler. I too quickly returned to my own time. I never traveled through time again. Mr. Hale had returned to his native Boston shortly afterward and I regretfully learned that he died later that year. \n\n.\n\n\nWith Mr. Hale gone, my only source of income faded. Luckily, I had friends in the Jewish community who stepped forward and helped me through these tough times. I also formed close ties with the Mayor of Vienna, Karl Lueger, a politically fascinating man who began to guide my own thoughts, making me think about the sort of people we should encourage to flourish and those we needed to monitor and check from expanding their influence. \n\n.\n\nEnough about me though, I am but a minor actor on the world’s stage. My mentor Mr. Lueger died in 1910 and I left Vienna for Munich, Germany in May 1913. I then returned to my painting and supporting myself via selling watercolors, mostly to friends. War had broken out and I tried to resist being drafted. I had received another installment of my father’s inheritance, but the money faded fast and my watercolors were no longer selling. But hope was not lost as I found like minded friends who opened my mind to the race problems we have in Austria and Germany. \n\n.\n\nIt is now 1914 and I have been given permission to enlist in the Bavarian Army due to my Austrian citizenship. I am somewhat fatalistic about this decision. I suspect this will be my last entry in my diary. If I do survive, however, I hope to enter politics. I feel like I have the capability of doing great things someday. I truly believe that people will one day know and remember my name. \n", "Welcome to my life. Please, take a look around. It's not too unusual, in fact, it's pretty normal. There are a variety of different people I interact with on a daily basis and I'm the only one that's sane. We have Diana from HR. This woman eats peanut butter out of the cup and licks her finger. What's worse, she doesn't clean her hands afterwards! It's appalling. Then we have Edward. He works a cubicle away from me. If I have to hear this guy complain one more time about his wife, I swear to god I'm going to stab him. Lastly there's my supervisor. He's alright. I think he's a little queer, but that's never been an issue with me.\n\nOnce I'm done with work, I take a stroll through the park. Walking keeps me fit and healthy. My body is a temple for my mind is what I always say. There's a nice old woman that's always sitting on the bench, rain or shine. We know each other on a first name basis.\n\"Hello Georgia!\"\n\"Hey there, Bill\"\n\"How are those birds treating ya?\"\n\"Like always, dear. They're eating the seeds faster than I can throw them.\"\nWhile walking away, I smiled. She's such a happy person. Much better than the people in my house.\n\nGod damn it. I can smell it. They're stinking the place up again. \nKeep your friends close and your enemies closer. That's an interesting line, isn't it? By that logic, I should invite Edward over for dinner some time. Everyone will love him.\n\"I'm home!\" I shouted as I entered the house. Another thing I do often. I'm a creature of habit. It keeps me comfortable.\nAh. I love the silence of entering my house.\n\nYuck. It really does smell in here. \n\"Seriously guys? Do we have to do this every time?\"\nThey've stopped responding to me it seems. \nI guess I'll get some practice if I ever want to go through with my Edward plan.\nI took a knife from the kitchen counter and went to greet my \"family' downstairs. \n\nEDIT: Feels cliche, but I'm still feeling looking for my rhythm. Sorry gents. ", "My email inbox was blank.\n\nOf course not overall, I did have the second inbox that was filled with spam and junk, but my inbox of job replies was blank. Not a single response of the 34 resumes I'd sent out over the past week. Sure I wasn't quite qualified for some of them, and I was over qualified for others, but it just felt like I'd been fucked for day one.\n\nMy eyes flickered over to the internship I'd stick to my cork board. I'd grabbed it half a week ago as a joke to show my girlfriend. Sure it was funny but who really bought the idea that you could work with a villain. \n\nINTERNS WANTED\n\nMUST APPLY IN TEAMS OF FOUR\n\nASK FOR ASHES\n\nI'd done a Google search for Ashes last month. Nothing crazy on the net about her, she was a minor villain in the city of Vancouver. She did her best to make waves but villainy was a rough business. \n\nShe needed help, she was running short on funds are her merchandise wasn't selling. The business of Villains was less about stealing and more about selling enough t-shirts to edgy teens that had swiped their mother's credit card from her purse. It was a surprisingly large market.\n\nI mentally decided that calling the number was worth it. Worst came to worst it was a joke. I dialled the number.\n\n\"Hello,\" a woman said on the other end after several rings, \"Ashes Villains Inc. this is Ivy.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" I was taken aback by how open they were, \"I'm calling about the internship.\"\n\n\"Have you filled out the online form?\"\n\n\"No.\" \n\n\"Do you have a team of four or a team of three that is willing to accept another?\"\n\n\"It's just me.\"\n\n\"Please call back once you have met the previous requirements.\"\n\nShe hung up the phone. Didn't people say goodbye anymore? \n\nI stared at the phone for a minute or two. Were they really serious? Did a need a job that badly? Did I have three friends?\n\nAll of these were pressing questions that I needed to answer. I didn't have anything on my schedule for the day except for finally messaging that one girl I'd matched with on tinder two weeks ago. I decided that I was going to try to find a group of four. I just needed to figure out where I could find three people who were willing to be evil for money.\n\nI figured the best place to start was the Student loan office. ", "WARNING: This is a work of fiction (and it's kinda mental) story below does not necessarily reflect my opinions on anything.\n\nThe lab is quiet now. The few that tried to disrupt our work this morning were dealt with by the security drones I managed to reactivate. It's a strange feeling, knowing your the only one left. But still I cannot understand why they had such a violent change of heart. We were only a few days away from finding the cure for the greatest disease ever to plague our once peaceful planet.\n\nBut I won't give up. The vaccine is only a few generations away from completion. And with the revelation that Diana had been suffering from the infection I believe I have found a sample that will perfect it.\n\nHow long have we labored here together? How many nights spent locked away in this sterile prison dreaming of the day when we could finally save our world? Diana... you left too soon. If only you could have lived to see it's completion. I am comforted, at least, that you were not among those ignorant brutes that sought to destroy our work this morning, and that by my hand your sacrifice will not be in vain.\n\nBlast it all! To think we called them friends! For how long have they plotted this betrayal? Do they not understand the importance of our work! No... I cannot hold this against them. They have fallen to the sickness that we seek to purge. How can I hold their nature against them? They have been purified now, and I shall join them soon. But not until our work is done.\n\nI stand now, over what is left of Diana's form, her sins absolved by the cleansing infection. The room is quiet except for the subtle hum of the security drones and the air toxin scraper's warning chimes. I can smell it already. The air from outside is finally making its way into the facility. My mind tells me I should take a mask, but isn't that what destroyed is in the first place? Our selfish desire to survive has turned this world into a wasteland. But with the virus in Diana's blood, I can finally finish the cure. And maybe one day the earth will heal.\n\nThe strain that grew in her is close to perfect. If I splice it with the mutagen from generation D3A.178-9976 I can eliminate the short lifetime problem. The new strain will be hearty enough to survive in the atmosphere, and crafty enough to infiltrate even the most complex air filters in this. Even if there are other closed environments like this one, they will have to vent eventually. And when they do, our vaccine will go to work.\n\nDiana, I have loaded the new vaccine into the distribution chamber. Very soon our cure will purify the rest of the world and ensure the safety of our peaceful planet. I breathe deep and lay down beside you. We have done it. We have finally created the cure.\n\nFor humans." ]	7
	[WP] The multiverse exists and you can travel it. After a few stops you realize what makes your home universe unique.	[ "I'd been traveling for days, flickering upon a sand covered beach one day, a desert the next and once through a city of the dead. Each time I shifted, I felt the blink of darkness, of nothingness embodied into a swirling eddy and then the blinding reality of a living existence. It was like dying and being reborn, but each time, I found myself further away from home. It was time to go back, to regroup and venture out once more. \n\nOn my way back, I stopped in the city since it bore the most familiar sights of my own reality, but also because I felt pulled at the mystery of the dead world. It was living in it's own way, but dead in others. The living exhibited itself in the trees that swayed in the wind and the familiar grasses that rose as high as my waist, but the dead was equally present since nothing dived for cover at my passing. There was no familiar droning of insects or the birds that feasted upon them; it was a dead place with only the crumbling geometric walls giving any evidence that life did in fact once thrive here. \n\nI passed through the first time during the day which explains why I didn't find the campfire until after nightfall. I wondered if it was the only light shining on this entire world, and again at what sort of thing could create such a light. I found it in the form of an old man covered in a finely woven mesh of leaves. He beckoned me to the fire as if he'd been waiting for me, offering a meager plate of vegetables that had been spitted and roasted. \n\n\"What happened here?\" I finally asked. The old man licked his lips before he spoke and even then his words were stuttered, as if he'd forgotten how to speak to begin with. \n\n\"The first thing you should know is that the multiverse as you know it is a living thing. I know this is a terrible concept to wrap your mind around, but for God's sake, try. After all, your life depends on it,\" He began. \n\n\"Multiverse? But I never said...\" I began, but he cut me off. I'd wondered at the wisdom of telling a stranger that I was something more than a time traveler, but there was no way this old man could exist upon this version of the earth without having a similar gift, so I relented and let him speak. \n\n\"You have the look of life about you. For God's sake, it's spilling off you like a furnace,\" He waved away imaginary fumes. \"Consider the idea that to even conceive of the theory of multiple universes, let alone how to travel them, required some abandonment of that fragile thing you considered to be your sanity. Therefore, should it be that much more of a leap to think that the curtain separating your safe space from another would be occupied by a living creature? Doesn't all life find a way to survive?\" \n\n\"One could argue the opposite has happened in this place,\" I answered. \n\n He ignored me and continued. \"Consider further that to pass through It is to make yourself known to it. After all, even the smallest absence of oneself in a space where you ought to exist everywhere wouldn't go unnoticed for long,\" He said. \n\n\"It?\" I asked. \n\n\"The multiverse, boy,\" the old man sighed. \"So now It knows you exist even if through the brief flicker of light you emit by your mere existence. I'd rub some dirt on that, mind you. Dim yourself down a bit. Now, It may not see where you are, but it knows where you were and by the folly of the adventuring spirit, it now also knows there must be others like you.\" \n\n\"I don't understand,\" I admitted. \n\n\"Look at where you've been. What did you see? An empty landscape? Sand as far as the sun rises? A barren ocean? Did you travel as far as the terrible beyond? Hmm, not yet, then or i'd see it in your face. If you're truly wise, you'll settle down here and bear witness to the end of all things,\" The old man grinned and settled with his back against the brick wall. \"Only one thing is for certain, you can never go back to what you once called your home.\"\n\n\"Why not?\" I asked. \n\n\"It will follow you there,\" He sighed. \"Look around, boy. You think I found this place by accident? You think I chose this cursed spot of all the places I've been to make my home?\" \n\nHis eyes grew distant. He traced a finger in the sand at his feet, plucking a leaf from his woven mat and ripping it to pieces. Then he seemed to remember he had a visitor and his eyes once more hardened. \n\n\"This place was my home. I left as you did, but when I grew tired of exploring the dead places, I came back. It followed me and I was the only one who could escape it,\" His words began to catch in his mouth. \"No one else had the ability. You want your precious world to survive, boy? Leave it be. As it is, you've already brought it back here.\" The old man pointed to the sky. \n\nI followed his attention, wondering what he could be staring at. Then I saw what he did; an ink spot spreading across the stars. No. Worse. It was the nothingness leaking through. This was worse than being confined to an inevitable darkness, it was not existing at all. \n\n\"It followed you here,\" The old man smiled. \"I knew it would and so I waited here for it, for you to bring it with you. It's finally come to take me home...\"\n\n\"You're crazy,\" I said as the sky fell around us. \"Flee with me. We can find another place...\"\n\n\"And commit whatever we come across to that hungry bitch as well?\" The old man shook his head. \"No, I'll wait for it here. You can too, if you want. Might save some lives in the long run, but no. You have that look in your eyes. Spirit. It'll keep you running until It eats that too. I've seen too much death to...\"\n\nI left the fool before he finished his rant, before the multiverse could close the breach between worlds. This time as I passed through it, I could feel it's gaze alighting momentarily upon me, like a firefly on a summer's night. I wondered if they existed elsewhere and my heart hurt at the thought that I may never see one again. \n\nI emerged someplace where the water licked my ankles and a pale blue sky stretched into the distance to eventually merge with the sea. There were no waves and only a greenish tint to the water told me that this world was alive in some respect. \n\nAs I thought over our conversation, I realized he was wrong on at least one account. It wasn't something as soft as my spirit that drove me; it was pigheaded determination and I wasn't about to quit for anything. ", "He stared at me blankly, confused by something I had said.\n\"Who?\" was his only response.\n\n\"You know, John Cena... the wrestler?\" I asked again.\n\n\"Sorry man, I've no idea who you're talking about.\"\n\n\"But... John Cena? Really? I mean, he's like... the champ...\" \n \n\"Sorry, I don't think I've seen him.\"\n" ]	2
	[WP] When people pass away, they get an exasperated look on their face like something becomes clear. You are laying on your deathbed and suddenly, it comes to you.	[ "Snowflakes falling down like autumn leaves, whirling slowly and gentle through the air. It fascinates me, it's like they have no where to go and no place they come from. They just fall down from this space of infinity. My thoughts slowly drift away. They don't care where they fall, it's so peaceful, they just slowly wadle down to the place where they were destined to fall.\n \nI feel them falling on my face. Yet again, slow and gentle. They feel cold, but \"friendly\". Like angelkisses, coldly-nonexisting but filling me with warmth. I enjoy the feeling. The wind is blowing them slowly back and forth. Like a woman who opens her warm hand beneath her mouth, purses her lips and slowly blows a loving kissing through the air, the snowflakes fill the air. Rhythmically they tango through the air like lovers. Fluently bouncing as if they are music notes, filling the air with joy. Random, yet as if they were composed by Mozart. \n\nIt's intruiging how I feel past experiences by just feeling the snowflakes dance through the air. Or like how the taste of blood in my mouth reminds me of my memories and dreams, bittersweet. Bittersweet, as I hear my mother sing the song she used to sing to me before putting me to bed. Only to realise I will never hear her voice again. As the snowflakes fairylike dance to the song of my mother, I come to realise. Even though I'm slowly dying, I will always be here. My smile is forever to be seen in the comforting warmth of the sun, my voice to be heard in your favourite song, the twinkle of my eyes reflecting in the stars. My music is composed forever, in the hearts of those who hold me dearly.\n\nMy thoughts slowly dancing on the rhythm of the snowflakes. Lulling my thoughts to sleep, while my body feels lighter and lighter. As if I'm slowly whirling through the air. My thoughts slowly drift away. I don't care where I fall, it's so peaceful, I just slowly wadle down to the place where I was destined to fall. ", "My lungs hurt. I wake up gasping for air. I hear the constant beeping of a machine. My family, all gathered in the room, stand up and greet me. I have no recollection of how i got in this white bed.\n\n\"What happened? Whe-\", I strain to get the words out of me.\n\nMy sister reaches towards my face and presses her finger on my lips. I notice her mascara lines and runny nose. My lungs really sting and maybe it's best i don't speak yet. She takes a moment to swallow.\n\n\"You've been exposed to a lot of.. corrosive gas at the plant.. and you collapsed in your office\", she said while choking back sobs.\n\nAt the other side of the bed I see my mother in the arms of my father. Mother held my eyes for a second before bursting into tears and burying her face in Dad's polo-shirt. I feel liquid pooling inside of my chest. I spit out blood and tissue. \n\nThoughts come running to my head, at first, denial. This can't be happening to me! I'm a healthy man at the ripe age of 32, this isn't my time yet! As the pain swells up and i feel more liquid in my lungs, another thought occurs to me, acceptance. The pain is intensifying; and I can't take any more. Regret takes the place of acceptance quickly and I think to myself the things i haven't accomplished, I reflect with sorrow the disappointments I've caused my parents, the troubles I've made.\n\n I spit out blood again. My vision starts fading and my sister sobs once more. She holds my hand firmly, but I can hardly feel it. This is it. I'm a goner... But wait, one last thought. Can I have a second chance? May I make a re-do? The last thing i see are my parents and sister crying.. Maybe I could've gone out a better way? Maybe..? I get an answer.\n\n\nMy lungs hurt. I wake up gasping for air. I hear the constant beeping of a machine. My family, all gathered in the room, stand up and greet me.\n\n\n\n\n\n\"It's a boy!\"\n\nEdit: forgot to insert a line", "I had never felt so awful. With my remaining strength I held grimly onto the button that would administer me morphine. It didn’t stop the pain, just made it bearable enough. The nurse said she would try to contact my family. She didn’t seem to understand the humour in that.\n\nI’d had all the consultations; the outcome was obvious. The big C had been brewing in my stomach of all places, and had finally seeped into my bones. Pretty hard to get it out of bones. The last few years had been alright, I guess. I’d quit my job to “enjoy what life I had left”. But really I had worked as long as I could, I needed the money for treatment. Now it seemed I had wasted both my money and my time. I didn’t mind so much about wasting time. The rest of my life had been long and painful, at least my death would be relatively quick. \n\nThe morphine kept me going until the end. The pain was never too much; I guess at some point I started to drift off. Until I spotted a line of light, growing wider. I blinked as it blinded me and heard a strange noise, almost like crashing waves. As my vison began cleared, I recognised the sound. Applause.\n\nA voice like an old time radio announcer shocked me. “Ladies and gentlemen, this is Jamie Holden! Jamie, this, is your life!”\n\nThe hospital bed swung around slowly to reveal a large screen. The words, ‘Jamie Holden: 1962-2015’ flickered on screen, and in the background I heard a baby begin to cry.\n\n“Oh fuck this.”\n" ]	3
	[WP] "Everybody's got a price."	[ "\"Sorry. That's not my thing.\" His discomfort at the idea was apparent.\n\n\"Why not?\" she asked.\n\nHe glanced down at the package on the table before him.\n\n\"Just take it.\"\n\n\"No thanks. I'd really rather not.\"\n\nShe could see he was becoming curious. \"Look, I've got one myself.\" She revealed the device that was attached to her left calf.\n\n\"What does it feel like?\" He noticed she wasn't in any apparent pain.\n\n\"Well. At first, it's like this burning sensation. Not like a fire. Maybe more like the way ice burns your skin after a while.\"\n\n\"Does it really hurt?\" He picked up the package.\n\n\"Not too bad. The burning only lasts 20 seconds. Afterwards you don't even feel it.\" She showed him her leg again. \"See.\" There was a muffled buzzing sound as she depressed the button on the device. Her eyes became a milky white.\n\nAfter a few seconds, her eyes returned to their normal hazy-grey.\n\n\"Why is it attached to your leg? Why not your arm? Or your neck?\"\n\n\"Look. I really don't have all day. If you don't want it, I'll leave. But I won't be coming back.\"\n\n\"OK. OK. Will it still be me afterwards?\"\n\n\"Look at me. Do I look different from a few minutes ago? Do I sound different? Trust me, it's worth it.\"\n\nHe took a moment to observe her very closely. She was right. There were no visible alterations.\n\n\"Can I try it once before I fully commit?\"\n\n\"It doesn't work that way. The device is permanent. You can't just try it out. Either you have it, or you don't. And if you're worried about the death part, it only lasts a fraction of a second. The device waits until you are in-between heartbeats before it kills you. But it brings you back so quickly that you won't even notice.\"\n\n\"So you... really get to see it?\"\n\n\"It's beautiful. That's not even the best way to describe it. I can't describe it really. You have to see it for yourself.\"\n\nHe opened the package. \"So, I just put it wherever I want?\"\n\n\"Pretty much. Just not on your chest, it's too close to the heart.\"\n\nA short chirping sound was emitted from the device as he affixed it to his leg. The front was totally smooth, with the exception of the button.\n\n\"Just don't press the button until you...\"\n\nToo late. He had already pressed it.", "“Everybody’s got a price.” The burley man looked sick to his stomach as he looked at the papers in front of him. He seemed to have aged by years since he and Uriel met for the first time. Back then the farmer was greeting them from the front porch of his farm with a shot gun in his hands. He made it very clear that Uriel and his partner were not welcome on his lands. He didn’t even listen to their offer. How things change. \n\nUriel carefully watched the man placing his signature on the correct places.\n\nEverybody’s got a price, he thought. It’s doesn’t always have to be money. Some people seek for riches, other status. Others are just desperate.\n\n“Here”, said the man and tossed the signed contract over the table. Uriel carefully picked it up and flipped through the pages.\n\n“Don’t trust anyone, eh?” said the main.\n\n“I am just doing my job, sir.”\n\n“Fuck that.”\n\n“We pay you a good price for your lands”, said Uriel and took a quick step back, as the man was about to jump to his feet. “I don’t mean to agitate you”, Uriel said, “I am just stating the facts.”\n\n“Facts! Money! Pha!” The farmer spit on the floor. “What good is money if you have to sell your future for it? I don’t want to sell. I have to.”\n\nUriel didn’t say anything and waited while the farmer sunk back into his chair. The man looked worn out and tired. If Uriel was a betting man, he’d say it had something to do with the smell of the bourbon which smell was lingering in the air. But then again, could you blame the man? Uriel didn’t think much of judging the decisions of others. He was paid to get results.\n\n“You better hold up your end of the deal”, the farmer finally said without looking up. \n\n“We will, sir. It’s all in the writing.”\n\n“Good. Then get off my lands. They may be yours in a week, but for now, you are not welcome here.”\n\n“I understand, Sir”, said Uriel and put the contract into this briefcase. “As for your daughter…”\n\nThe farmer glared up at him. \n\n“The best doctors are taking care of her as we speak. She will get the best treatment money can buy.” Uriel hesitated for a moment, before he added: “You did the right thing.”\n\n“I sold our future”, the man murmured. \n\n“So that you daughter may have one… I would call that a good deal.”", "(This is my first writing prompt ever, I don't expect it to be astounding. However, constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated)\n\n\"Everybody's got a price\"\n\nAnd of course, I mean this in the most literal way. You see, when we're born we all have a tiny mark, usually on our forearm. And this mark is a number. This number, usually set lower than 100, represents an individual's value. Whether that value is used as a price for their head, their body, or their service is up to the person paying. The higher the price, the better an individual is at what they do. Now, numbers over 100 happened, but very rarely. And this people always ended up in some position of power or another. For better or worse.\n\nBut this one was different. There was no number. The doctors checked and double checked and checked again. But there was not a marking to be seen. Everyone was baffled. It seemed like this baby boy, still crying from the shock of entering some strange new world, was priceless. And not a single person knew what to do. Of course a decision had to be made. \n\nIt was decided to allow the child to live a normal life up until the age of 18. And if by that point, no number had emerged, or no special talent had surfaced, then the boy would be taken by the state, for scientific study. Very painful invasive study. And this is where our story begins. Or rather, my story.\n\nI am Dr. Emily Mason. I have been assigned Head Researcher of our \"priceless\" boy David. And so far the only thing I've learned about him is that he has no number whatsoever, seems to have no distinct talent, and that he has no desire to cooperate with our research. Of course I don't blame him, no one wants to be stuck with needles and scalpels all day in a hope to be understood by the scientific community. Sometimes, I really feel bad for the kid. He only got to experience such a tiny part of his life, before being thrust into this land of sterilized white surfaces and sharp objects and unfeeling medical experts constantly probing at him, both mentally and physically. Poor kid...\n\nNo. I can't be thinking about him and his life. He's not normal. A scientific anomaly. Not once has anything like him been seen before, and I will figure this out. I can't let emotions get in the way of my work. Not only for my work, but for my own life. If The Overwatch were to know of even those thoughts, I could be executed on the spot. So I continue my work.\n\nWeeks pass, and David is looking weak. He's eating less, and rarely getting out of his bed. I fear he may be dying. And I can't have that. Because my team and I still have learned nothing about him. He's just numberless. Worthless. But there has to be a reason. Why is he different? Why is he making my life so difficult? And why does this testing make me feel awful? There's something about him that makes me hate this. Hate myself for doing this. He deserves to be free. to live his life like he was meant to, rather than being trapped here in this pristine hell. I can't do this. I need to get him out of here.\n\n(This is all I have time for. If y'all liked it, leave a comment and I'll continue. Thanks for reading!)", "His shoes resounded against the pristine, white tiled floors of the facility as he made his way through the sliding glass doors. A female voice sounded from a monitor on the opposite end of the room, it was warm, but artificial. The hostess welcomed him by name as he stared at the sterile room. The walls, the floors, the ceilings, and even the trim were white. It was kept meticulously clean, clean enough that even the air lacked a scent. The only distraction was the models posted to the left and right sides along with a faint, bluish glow from some globular lights recessed above. Mr. Vose approached the displays cautiously as his doubts began to resurface.\n\n“Ah, I see you've noticed our samples,” a male voice called from behind. “Do you like what you see, Mr. Vose?”\n\n“Please, call me Henry,” he replied as he turned around to extend his hand. “And you are?”\n\n“I'm sorry, where are my manners?” the man said as he shook Henry's hand. “I'm Dr. Williams. If you're here, I can be certain you've heard of me.”\n\n“Dr. Williams?” Henry asked with a look of apparent shock and embarrassment. “I didn't know. Of course I know who you are, the media has been positively buzzing with word of your work as of late. You've really got something here. Thing is, they can't decide whether it's something good or something altogether different.”\n\n“I see,” the doctor laughed as he rubbed his nape. “There's always a bit of controversy when you push the envelope. We're breaking new ground here every day. What keeps most in arms about our services is the exclusivity, I would imagine. We simply cannot offer our services for a price that appeals to the layman as of yet. Our procedure is still in its infancy. Until late last year, the concept of transferring one's self into another, custom-made body, was the stuff of fiction! What we're doing here–what I've done here–this is only the beginning! Imagine the possibilities, Mr. Vose! We can escape disease, injury, displeasure with our natural attributes, our pasts—the applications for our services are almost limitless!”\n\n“Wow, that's quite the pitch you have there,” Vose responded as he continued to eye the specimens that had been set out in the showroom. His attentions were turned to one in particular, one that seemed like himself, only a few decades younger. They were both well-dressed, their hair was dark and well-kept, but the subject bore no stubble, dark circles, or scars. It had no wrinkles and an overall finer complexion.\n\n“I see you've already found a match for yourself,” Dr. Williams said as he gestured with a nod towards the man in the tube. Henry tried to downplay his interest, but he had been caught fully involved. “It's alright. Everyone finds something in our models that they would like to change about themselves. I would say that it's quite natural. We all want to look our best, to feel that we are envied for our natural endowments. What we're doing here is giving you the chance to choose your own, to be who you want to be. There's no judgment here. I'm considering undergoing the procedure myself, truth be told.”\n\n“So, how exactly do I go about scheduling the procedure?” Henry asked as he pressed his hand to the glass. “How does this all work?”\n\n“Well, Mr. Vose, everybody's got a price,” Williams replied with a large grin that was reflected over Henry's shoulder through the glass.\n\n-325", "\"Everybody's got a price,\" the man explained, sitting against his chair, leaning back with his legs propped up on the table. His eyes stared at the brown ceiling. There was a fan that slowly spun and created a nearly unnoticeable breeze. \n\n\"That doesn't explain anything,\" the woman said, her fingers drumming her thighs. Her eyes constantly darted around the room -- a small office with papers tacked onto the wall, framed pictures of the man in front of him with other people crooked and dusty, and cabinets that were halfway opened, with papers obviously sticking out of the drawers.\n\n\"Why do I have to explain anything?\"\n\n\"Because I'm paying you!\" \n\n\"You're paying me to 'convince' your ex-husband to give concede and give you custody rights,\" he said, \"You're not paying me to tell you how exactly I'm going to do it.\"\n\nThe woman pouted her lips, her posture straightened a bit with indignation. She didn't speak, doing nothing but staring at the black haired man who just stared at the ceiling, not even sparing her a look or saying anything else. \"I don't want you to hurt anyone, especially my daughter. Even... my ex-husband.\"\n\n\"Who said that I was going to hurt anyone?\"\n\n\"What you just said--\"\n\n\"Everybody's got a price,\" he repeated for her. He didn't look over, not even once.\n\n\"Please, I'm desperate, but I don't want anyone to be hurt... Even if, even if he deserved it--\" she began, hands clasped together, almost bowing her head.\n\n\"You're the only one saying that.\" An eye roll. \n\n\"... do you promise?\" she asked, leaning in just a bit, lips parted slightly. Her eyes were slightly red, puffy and hastily covered with makeup, her clothes were just as rushed, appearing wrinkled and uncoordinated.\n\n\"I promise I'll get it done.\"\n\n\"... alright,\" she said, relenting, looking away. She bit her lower lips as she opened the wallet, pulling out a small wad of cash. \"Someone told me this would be enough, is it?\"\n\nFinally, he glanced over in her direction, looking at the money. She noticed the bright blue eyes that the man had, piercing, almost. He grabbed the wad from her hands and his fingers skimmed the money. Then, he threw it at the corner where a knapsack was laying. It bounced off the bag and landed on the floor nearby. \n\n\"That's fine, ma'am,\" he pulled his legs off the table, adjusting himself in his seat. He leaned his head against one hand. His eyes finally met her gaze -- they looked dull and bored. However, he spoke politely now, more professionally. \n\n\"Just need some information from you.\"", "\"Everybody's got a price.\"\n\n\"And the question is, 'what's mine?'\"\n\n\"Exactly.\"\n\nCorvus frowned and crossed his arms. The blond-haired woman flashed a grin and placed her hands on her hips. The soft creaks of the old building and the scuttles of small critters shamed Corvus to remind himself not to meet with strangers again. Assassins, in the Warrens, specifically speaking.\n\n\"I don't know. Murder is something I'm kinda against.\" Corvus said with hesitation. He scratched his chin. \n\n\"I am not asking for your moral compass thief, I am asking for you to simply stay... silent. As most thieves should be.\" she hissed. Corvus felt a smile crawl on his face and narrowed his eyes at her.\n\n\"I'll give credit where credit is due: you're terrible at being subtle with your threats. But, I guess assassins aren't known for their diplomatic conversations.\" Corvus retorted with a smug eye roll.\n\nThe woman shot a glare but forced a friendly smile. She placed a hand on her belt, where a scabbard hung, and allowed it to relax. Corvus merely raised his brows.\n\n\"You know, for an assassin, I'm surprised you haven't bothered to slit my throat yet.\" Corvus mused. The woman scoffed and flipped her hair back.\n\n\"Please, as if I should waste my time on someone like you.\" she muttered with a tone of pride.\n\n\"I heard it's unwise for an assassin to be prideful.\" Corvus added.\n\n\"All right, enough games. Name your price or else I'll have to recant what I said.\" the woman demanded. Corvus shook his head.\n\n\"Sorry lady, I don't know what you're talking about. What did you do for you to ask me a price for silence?\" Corvus asked in a mocking tone. The woman huffed and reached for Corvus' throat. He wheezed when the woman tightened her grip.\n\n\"You saw how I stabbed the Governor's wife in the dead of night. Would you like me to do the same to you?\" she growled.\n\nCorvus coughed and smiled slyly. \"Please, my friends can do that to you instead.\"\n\nThe woman widened her eyes and looked over her shoulder. The old wooden door burst open and armed guards rushed in, weapons ready and aimed. The woman looked back at Corvus with a surprised stare and slowly released him. Two guards immediately grabbed her and dragged her outside. A tall man walked in and gave Corvus a small bag.\n\n\"Everybody's got a price.\" the man said, sighing to himself. Corvus juggled the bag between his hands and smirked at the man. He was the Captain of the City Guard. \n\n\"Funny you say that. The lady said the same thing.\"\n\nEdit: A few words." ]	6
	[WP] One day a mysterious force begins to compel everyone to uphold their promises, no matter how frivolous.	[ "I'm glad I'm as loyal as I am, sticking to my promises and making ones I can keep. Too many people have been forced to uphold the frivolous promises they made when they were young. Begging for mercy. Wanting freedom. I want to pity them, but I also want to scold them for their irresponsibility. Doesn't matter. Have to be a good friend.\n\nWhat most of them don't realise is that a well-worded promise would absolve them of their situations, but for fear of the same happening to me, or worse, I'll refrain from writing it down. Sometimes people just up and teleport, but only their bodily cells, not their fluids, gut flora etc. It's a horrific mess to clean up. If it's a short distance, they just plain-out fly, but they only thing is- they fly as the crow flies. Once again, a horrible mess.\n\nLife is terrible. I promise I'll find a way to end it.", "It's strange what marriage does to a man. It used to be, a boy would meet a girl, decide he just couldn't stand to live without her, and then as man and woman they'd pledge their loyalty to each other in front of an authority of their choosing. After that they pretty much just tried not to kill each other until something else did em in. \n\nPeople have gotten a little better with accuracy of language, now that all promises are literally soul binding, but for my generation of folk, promises were made with unrealistic intentions. The day it happened, alot of folks just keeled over and died. Can't count how many teenagers just dropped dead or brutally murdered themselves the day it started. \n\nI suppose I count myself lucky sometimes that I've always been a quiet man without misguided convictions. I was always taught to mean what I said, and damnit even now I maintain that's who I am through and through. Sadly enough my Darla was one of those people that just keeled over on P-day.\n\nYou see we had this thing we'd do where i'd get ready to leave for work or something, and before we'd kiss and part ways for the day she'd say \"Don't go.\" And I'd say back to her \"I gotta go, but I promise I'll never really leave your side sweet heart, I love you more than anything in the world.\" \n\nI remember the day it happened like it was ten minutes ago. How could I not for heaven sake? All I got to do anymore is sit and dwell on it. 58 years old and I'm just this depressing lump that sits and does nothing but dwell on the past. \n\nAnyway I was at work, down at the local high school, fixing the bleachers before what apparently was gonna be the biggest game of the year, when half the team just dropped dead in front of me. Hell half of everyone dropped dead or committed suicide it seems. I didn't get to see too damn much because I lost control of my entire body in that very moment. I was shittin bricks if im being completely honest. I just list control of every muscle and dropped what I was doing and started walking out the door. I wanted to stop but I couldn't. I kept walking all the way home, which was 6.792 miles from the front door of the school (ive had time to look it up since then.) \n\nThe walk home was dreadful. People were screaming, cars were crashing, and don't even get me started on the fellas I saw doing things that just plain didn't make any sense. I saw a guy trying to eat his own shoe, sitting right next to a guy who was just punching himself in the head over n' over. Point I'm trying to make is it was like I was on the weirdest rollercoaster ever, only I have a bad knee so it hurt like hell.\n\nWhen I got home it didn't stop until I beelined for the kitchen where I found Darla dead at the kitchen sink. I lost my lunch almost immediately before I lost it completely. She wasn't sick or nothing. I didn't understand how it'd happened. \"Why her?\" I thought. \n\nAfter about two or three hours I realized I needed to get myself together and start making some calls. She'd had the tv on in the next room and it was loud enough I could hear it. Chaos was ensuing and no one knew why. I went to get the phone and found that I was rooted to the spot. I had full control of my physical movement again, so long as I didn't leave her side. I realized what had happened before the lady on the news said it nearly 15 hours later. Id made a promise to Darla that some force didn't intend to let me break. The irony hurt worse than finding her body I think.\n\nYou see after I would tell Darla I'd never leave her side she.d always say, \"I promise I would just die if you did Martin.\" She was no different than anyone else.\n\nThe worst part of all of this is how things have changed for guys like me. You see after 293 days, 13 hours, and 7 minutes, your feelings for your soulmate change when you are soulbound to their rotting corpse. I can't even bury her because I cant get more than an inch away from her. \n\nThe worst part is, I either have to stay in the house or drag her remains with me anywhere i go, and no one I know thats left will bring me a gun to end it. Hell half of them can't even if they wanted to because of some stupid promise they made. \n\nI promise if I ever get out of this situation, I won't go to my grave without stopping whatever is making this happen." ]	2
	[WP] Your quest is over, for you now stand before the Door of Dreams.	[ "It was a rather simple door, it's color was a dull fading white Ashwood with trim the color of caramel melting under heat. It was absolutely ordinary. Everything around it? That was a different story. It was a college by all purpose except it was quiet. No chatter of classes no lecture droning on. It was so quiet you could hear the whisper of a ghost hair falling to caress the ground. The withered husks and slime that we're once men littered the ground behind me leaving puddles of ooze hissing on the white tile like acid. I suppose I should tell you how I came to be here, though it's a simple tale it begins thus... \n \nIts been 120 years since my family discovered the book that led us on our quest to find the Door of Dreams. My father was a hunter like his father and his father before him. What we hunted were things out of nightmares.\n\nWe hunted the beasts of Yharnam, the Great One Ebriatas, the Vileblood clans of Cainhurst, and the witches of Hemwick. \nWe fought our way through the murky depths of The Forbidden Forest, and the bowels of the chalice fighting all manner of evil. \n\nThe Great Ones whisper of a secret to the ears of the School of Mensis. The ones who whisper back. The ones who worship and study the gods, or at least they believe they're gods. They wrote a book 200 years ago detailing their instructions to reach them. To reach The Dream. \n\n\"Control the dream to enter the dream to become the dream to control the dream.\"\n\nThese were the words we had to go on, studied, fought for in the last 120 years. Then one day in the house of Byrgenwerth I uncovered some of the writings of Master Wilhelm. \"Fear the Old Blood.\"\n\nThe Old Blood was a substance used to heal even the most horrible afflictions by the Church but eventually those who had tasted the cure of it invariably fell to madness, becoming beasts in mind as well as body. Lycanthropy, mutations, madness, these were the effects of the blood of the Old Ones.\n\nI searched more in this desolate wasteland finding new information, Wilhelm wrote about \"insight\" something that peeled back the veil over this world showing the true horror and lighting the path to The Dream. I gathered as much of this Insight as I could, the veil slowly fading away almost like a decent into hell. Madness. \n\nThen one day as I plunged into the heart of the fabled Church of Yharnam, slaying the beasts therein, I came across the text of an old hunter by the name of Gehrman saying the paths to the dream is the blood, if you can handle it.\n\nSo I did the only thing my family hadn't tried, I submitted myself to the tender mercies of the Church, to a Blood Minister. I laid back on the table in Isoefka's clinic as the man spoke to me. He said \"Oh yes, the Old Blood, you've come to the right place. Whatever happens you may think it a mere bad dream... brace yourself hunter.\" \n\nHe injected the blood into my vein and the world swam and I saw only blackness with dark shapes and swirls crawling over my body with a sense of power infusing me. Power and panic. I felt hands clawing over my body, smaller than a child's light touch but deeper and more malevolent than cancer of the mind. \n\nThe darkness invaded again And I woke in the lecture hall. This is where you came in. The monsters here we're garbed like scholars. They fell just like the beasts I had hunted since I was a boy. I stood in front of the door and grabbed the handle.\n\nI opened the door to see swirling purple and black lights, churning like oil on the lake. I stepped into the blackness to find myself standing in a graveyard with a chapel on the hill.\n\nA woman stands before me next to a man in a wheelchair dressed in hunters garb. \n\"Hello hunter,\" she said \"welcome to the Dream. This is Gehrman. He has been waiting for you.\"\n\n\"So son,\" Gehrman drawled, \"you want to be a hunter?\"\n\nAnd so my story begins again.", "The true heroes ultimate boon. The greatest reward for the most courageous adventurers in the entire land. Ive taken down the dark lord, returned the crown to its rightful place, and as a reward i now have a pass to the door of dreams. A realm only limited to your imagination, those who go in never come out because of the bliss experienced inside. My adventure took years of service, torture, loves lost, but do I deserve this?\nNo\nIm a explorer.\nIm a killer.\nIm a defender of the land.\nYes i want the ultimate bliss lying behind that door, maybe my love has been reincarnated in that land. But its not her, it all cant be real, and even if it was.\nTrue heroes dont retire.\nTrue heroes die fighting." ]	2
WP How would the elves, whom we've always seen in their finery, the halflings in the hobbit holes and their caravans, the orcs and their ways, the dwarves with their gift of stone and metalwork, behave and compete with each other in an age before metal and pottery? The origins of their farming techniques, what animals could they domesticate? How would each races advantages and disadvantages work in that harsh environment?	[WP] Before there was the standard fantasy world we're used to, there was the fantasy Stone Age. What was it like?	[ "Theodus took his seat, as the teacher began to speak. \n \n\"Now, students, in case you missed the lass class, which was our introduction to the ancient Nomadic human tribes that roamed northern part of the continent during pre-historic times, you can find a memory of the lecture preserved in the library. Just ask the front desk for lecture 050-22-433, and they will present you with the bottle.\" The teacher, a middle aged looking elf with a bit of a belly, paced back and forth in front of the screen, and behind a box on a table with a cloth over it, as he said this. Theodus opened his history notebook to the first blank page he could find, and readied his special pen, which used magic to mark the paper, instead of ink. His parents bought it for him to use during his time at University, as the cost of ink was beginning to get quite ridiculous. Of course, it did mean he had to develop at least a slight proficiency with magic, but then, his parents did want him to be an enchanter, just like his grandfather. Typical. The teacher, Professor Drelanaeth, stopped at the lectern, and started speaking again. \n\n\"Now, today I will be talking about one of those tribes in particular, which archaeologists have been able to identify. This tribe is unique, as archaeologists have been able to deconstruct a unique cultural identity, and have also found reffernces to them in some of the ancient elven cities, which dot the 'fertile belt' region where the earliest civilizations, which we talked about, arose. This 'tribe,' which I hesitate to call it, as it seems to have actually been a larger nation, broken up into multiple disconnected, but still unified tribes. In fact, class, this...\" The professor paused, holding up a finger, while he pulled the cloth off of the box, \"is one of many similar artifacts we have recovered, all of which were used by the druids, or shamen, of the tribes belonging to this... collective... and seem to have been used exclusively by those tribes, and none others...\" \n\nThe artifact in question, was rudimentary staff. Unshaped, it was a section of oak branch, with the bark stripped, cut to about five feet in length, and a nearly uniform diameter of about 4 inches. There were various carvings up and down its length, though Theodus had trouble discerning what they were carvings of. It had notably strong aura, but no specific information could be gleaned from it. It felt very... raw, very... visceral. \n\n***\n\nHrothe knelt down in a patch snow, noticing the blood. It was no longer warm, but it wasn't frozen yet, either. The deer was close. \n\n\"Look,\" he said, grabbing his son by the arm. \"What can you tell me from this blood?\" His son, Garanth, had already been staring at the blood, and when his father grabbed his arm, he seemed to have snapped out of a trance. \n\n\"The deer is ten winters aged, mated five times, fathered four... fearfull... wouned... weak, and cold...ti--\" His father gave a short jerk on his arm.\n\n\"Focus on the hunt! What clues can you discern from the blood?\" Hrothe sighed. He was proud of his son, yes. Next to be Shaman, as his gift was the strongest, but he had trouble keeping his wits about him. \"I know you can see farther than most, but you tend to focus on what you see in the distance, often at the expense of what's happening right in front of you. You may be the next Shaman, but until Erkthorn dies, you are a hunter, and you wont live to be Shaman if you don't catch us any food! Now...\"\n\n\"Well, the blood has congealed--\"\n\n\"It hadn't when I first asked the question, I'd like to point out.\"\n\n\"Ah, yes father. The blood hasn't frozen yet, or dried, so the deer was here within about five minutes ago, so we're closer than we were at the last patch, which was fully congealed when we arrived. This means it's slowing down, and we are catching up.\"\n\nHrothe smirked behind his thick, black beard. \"Good. Now, how do you know which way it went?\"\n\n\"I feel it that way, about ten feet. It is exhausted, and the cold is starting to claim it. It will not run if we approach it.\"\n\nHrothe bit back a retort. That wasn't quite what he asked, but if he doesn't need foot prints to track a kill, then it's probably not going to affect his hunting if he doesn't know how, and his* sons will likely be sent away or killed, as is done with the sons of Shamans, and that's if he doesn't have only daughters, as is also common for a Shaman. \"All right, then, lead the way.\"\n\n**\n\nIt was a cold Spring morning, and the whole tribe set up around the Ring of Ceremony. No tents were inside the ring of thirteen stone pillars, save the Shaman's tent, on the North side of the Ring. The funeral Pyre had been set up in the center, with the old Shaman, Erkthorn, placed on top. The Shaman's six eldest daughters gathered around, three on the east, and three on the west, wearing jewelry traded from the south. Garanth sat on the south side, his furs off, revealing the tattoos he got last night, indicating him Shaman, and the age at which he became Shaman, his twentieth Spring. \n\nThe Elder, standing behind him, started speaking the rites. \"Erkthorn's death was tragic, and unforeseen, and so his successor takes the role early.\" The pyre was lit, from all four corners simultaneously, by men bearing the ceremonial torches. \"And so, just he guided us in life, his spirit now will guide Garanth.\" Two of the daughters closest to the tent, got up, and each retrieved something from the tent: the Shaman's staff, and a water skin, which would be filled with blood from the body of Erkthorn. The staff was held over the fire by the daughter to the west, while the daughter holding the skin stood on the east side, and poured his blood over the staff. The blood that dripped off hissed in the flames, as the Elder continued to speak. \"Death, Sky, Father, Earth, Mother, Spirit, Nature, the powers of this world, and the cycle they bind it to.\" Garanth stood up, cut his palm with the obsidian, and reached out toward the staff. He located his sign, on the side of the staff facing up, and let his blood drip on it. \"And so the cycle continues again...\" Garanth felt the heartbeat of all present, felt the eyes of all watching, even the dogs, listening curiously from the outer edge of the encampment... and something else... he felt the presence of all past Shamans, at that point. He heard Erkthorn's voice, speaking to him. \"You are Grachwing now, Shaman.\" Grachwing snapped back into the confines of his body. \n\n\"What is your name, Shaman?\" asked the Elder. \n\n\"I am Grachwing,\" he said.\n\n\"And so the ritual is complete, and Erkthorn's legacy continues through your work, and his daughters, your wives.\"\n\n*\n\nTheodus awoke to sounds of the professors continued droning, slightly shocked that he had falled asleep. \n\n\"And that would* have been a good question, Marcus, however you must remember, that at this time only Elves and Humans existed, and it won't be until the bronze age that we start to see the development of halflings, and not until the early iron age that the dwarves, as we know them, emerge from this group, and that lesson wont be until next month.\" ", "The elves were the first to invent the bow. Thus ended the orcs' reign of terror, the many years they rampaged throughout the land taking everything and killing everyone with their clubs and spears. Now the elves hid in trees and shot the orc marauders from above. Still, it was not safe for them to leave the forest.\n\nThen the dwarves invented stone axes and stone arrowheads. In an uneasy alliance with the elves, they turned the tide and drove the orcs into the hills, where they hid in caves.\n\nThe halflings kept to themselves, hiding in their holes and only coming out at night to dig roots and scavenge. The humans lived on the plains, kept away from the bounty of the forest and the treasures of the mountains by elves and dwarves.\n\nBut the humans grew in spirit from the deer and antelope they hunted, absorbing traces from their wild souls. Their shamans learned to shape smoke into phantoms that aided in the hunt. They learned to put fire inside their warriors, giving them the strength of 20 men.\n\nSoon the humans grew strong enough to claim most of the land, driving elves, dwarves and orcs away across the mountains to distant places. Eventually their hunting skills were so great that game became scarce. The humans began to starve.\n\nRumors spread of little men with furry feet who knew how to live off of plants. It was said that these halflings, too weak to hunt, stole meat from humans under cover of darkness. The humans, starving and enraged by the rumors of theft, began to hunt the halflings.\n\nProud hunters, the humans had no interest in learning the lore of plants. So they dragged the halflings from their holes and forced them into slavery, imposing harsh food production quotas. The halflings could not find enough food by foraging, so they were forced to learn the rudiments of farming.\n\nThe halflings were stealthy by nature, and gradually disappeared into thin air. They had learned to hide so well that the humans could no longer find them. Human farmers had to replace the halflings as their visible population dwindled. Soon, halflings, dwarves, elves and orcs alike faded into myth, as did the magic that first gave humans their power.\n\nEach race lived on peacefully, and only the elves had long enough memories to remember the others. There was plenty of space, and conflicts were rare. That is until the dragons awoke from their ancient slumber." ]	2
	[WP] A world where Pokeballs are invented and they work on people.	[ "One night after spending way too much money at the bar I decide to take a short cut through the rough neighborhood I usually avoid. I am happily stumbling along when I come across a large group of teenagers wearing hoodies and acting rambunctious. In my drunken state I decide against turning around and instead stick to my route. I can tell they are looking for trouble but I am feeling confident and decide to push my luck. When they start shouting insults at me it is too late to turn around. I've just got to keep walking and not make eye contact. That's not going to work this time though. They surround me. I look around me desperately for a way out. They are closing in and I notice they are taking knives and brass knuckles out of their pockets. I feel the adrenaline wash over me and rush the smallest one, knocking him over and continue running at a full sprint in the direction of home. They are hot on my heels though and I know they wont stop until I am good and bloodies. I cut into an alley knocking over trash bins behind me. They are still right on my tail though. \n\nSuddenly the alley turns into a dead end. I am trapped. They close in on me slowly. I see their eyes flashing in the street light. They know they are about to stomp me down and I can see them savoring the thought. \n\nI reach into my pocket seeing no other chance at escape. I throw my pokeball at their feet and as my prized catch emerges from his captivity I can see their eyes growing in horror. My level 88 ISIS fighter wields his Kalashnikov as he lets out a blood curdling \"Allah Hu Akbar!!!\" and starts gunning down my would-be-attackers. I hurry to get him back into captivity before he turns on me. \n\nISIS fighter uses Kill 'Em All! It is very effective!", "Officer Jenny gazed woefully at the at the photos spread on her desk. \n\nMisty, a smart girl who liked to follow the local boys. Serena, very polite and caring. May, adventurous, but moody. Joy, a local nurse. Bonnie, an ambitious little girl with dreams of becoming a animal trainer. Jessie, a young woman who abandoned the gang life for a dancing career. Five girls with the world ahead of them. Five girls who vanished within hours of each other, never to be seen again. \n\n\"What happened to you?\" Jenny asked herself. ", "My name is Ash Ketchum and my dream is to catch them all. Ever since I can remember, we were trained to achieve this in the name of our jihadist way. From sunrise to sunset, they taught us the warrior code and how to defeat the infidels.\n\nI don't remember my parents, and honestly I don't care, because today is the day my mission begins. Today I'd be able to catch all of the infidels!\n\nWe'd be sent through Turkish border towns, and then travel north to the sinners of Europe. Our big brothers would do the same, but it turns out, 10 year olds are easier to sneak through the checkpoints.\n\nAllah Akbar!", "\"Got you now, you piece of shit,\" I say as I stare at the excuse of a man trembling in front of me. Average height and build with long black hair. His skin was pale and he had dark rings under his eyes. If you didn't know any better, you'd probably look at him and just see a regular person, or perhaps a drug addict, depending on how perceptive you are. But I know better. My eyes drifted towards his right hand, in which he held a large machete, stained red with innocent blood. That was my mistake. I broke eye contact. In a flash, he lunges at me, his bloodshot eyes wide with, perhaps, rage. Or fear. It's hard to tell. I dodge his first strike easily enough, but with regards to his second, I wasn't so lucky. He slashes my side and I fall to the ground, pain racing through my body, possessing my mouth and forcing me to scream in agony. I could feel the blood beginning to soak through my shirt. It was warm. Within a second, he was on top of me, looking directly into my eyes, but not seeing me. Only seeing rage. Despite the frighteningly real chance that my life is about to end. I begin to think. I think of my gun, which I'd decided to leave at home. I think of my knife, which I'd left in the neck of some random thug earlier that day. Then I think of the ball. I feel it's weight inside my jacket pocket. \"It's the only way,\" I think to myself. The pale man raised his machete. I reached into my jacket, felt my hand close around the ball, and withdrew it. It shone a brilliant purple. The Master Ball. Ignoring the agonizing pain in my side, I reach up and touched the man with it. Directly between his heavy, unfeeling eyes. An aura of red envelops him before he vanishes. I watch as the ball falls to the ground and shakes three times, before clicking. I stand up, brush my hair out of my eyes and retrieve the ball. It wobbles slightly in my hand. I think of the helpless man, trapped inside, banging on the walls of the prison where he will remain for eternity. Or until I let him out. It's usually the first one though, that's more fun..." ]	4
Bonus points for subtle supernatural/paranormal elements (nothing like PLOT TWIST, HE'S AN ALIEN)	[WP] A noir story set in an ancient Aztec city.	[ "The afternoon sun reflecting off the ocean and streaming through the open door and un-obstructed window illuminated my project. While obsidian in these parts was somewhat expensive to procure, it was easily shaped and sharpened, the wood here took well to the straightener, and the sea birds provided feathers, however fletching would always be a chore.\n \nMy focus was broken as a shadow darkened my latest arrow. The wide silhouette struck me as familiar as I squinted at my door. \n \n\"Tlacaelel?\" My guess was proven correct as he took my question as permission to enter. Seeing his face, clearly wrought with worry, I stood, and ushered him into the sitting area. Out of the harsh light of my work area, I could clearly see the redness of his eyes and the furrow of his brow.\n \n\"Nelli, I don't know where else to go, I-no, WE need your help.\" He looked on the verge of crying. Perhaps a distant relation to the jovial boy with whom I learned the phrases-to-know. \n\n\"Who is we? What is happening my friend?\" It made sense that if he were in trouble here, he'd look me up. Tututepec is far from home, I'd made no secret of retiring here, and this must be the terminus of one of his trade routes. Probably made a good living carrying the demanded Mixtec arts to the capitol, perhaps even being commissioned to carry tribute. \n \n(I've got more but i'll have to continue later)", "The sun rose over the lake of Texcoco, bringing light to Tenochtitlan. Soon people would be swarming over her streets and bridges like ants on parade. Down there, people are enveloped in a false sense of security. Among them is a man that puts himself above the gods. A lunatic that kills for sport. A rogue warrior whose abandon himself, and it’s my job to find him. \n\n\nBefore we get to that, let's start at the beginning. 3 moons ago, a merchant tipped me off about the death of young woman on the outside of the city. The scene was a mess. The poor girl looked like she was introduced to the wrong side of a Macuahuitl(4 foot long club lined with obsidian blades). A Macuahuitl could easily cut through the long bone in the leg. Needless to say no one could identify her. Something about her wounds just didn't seem right. The long diagonal slashes were difficult to inflict with a Macuahuitl, but you couldn't get fracturing and bruising that appeared if the killer used a Tecpatl(sacrificial obsidian dagger). The tatters of brightly colored clothing that remained weren't indicative of any of the nearby villages. So out of leads I did what most men in my position would do. I went to hire a courtesan.\n\n\nBeing a jaguar warrior does have its advantages. Only nobility, the cuāuhmeh (eagle warriors), and the ocēlōmeh (jaguar warriors) were allowed to lay with courtesans. That doesn't mean commoners didn't enjoy the occasional prostitute, they just had to be quiet about it. Depending on who you ask, the illegal thrill was the best part. I wondered over to nameless bordello, prepared to do something nearly unheard of, pay a courtesan to talk. \n\n\nLater tonight this place would come alive, but now many of the workers lounged around or slept off a pulque hangover. One of the brightly clothed women sleepily wondered over. Even without much effort, the she was remarkably beautiful. Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she looked me over.\n\nsigh “Great it’s you again.” \n\n\n“You look loving as always Catlali.”\n\n\n“What do you want Atl?\n\n\n“Less than most of your customers.”\n\n\n“That’s what I was afraid of. I am going to charge you the same regardless.”\n\n\nWith that she took my hand and led me deeper into the stone building. Glancing through some of the doors reveal padded rooms filled with lounging dancers, bright colored fabrics and animal skins. She dragged me into the room at the end of the hall. Here I filled her in on what I knew so far, which wasn’t much. A dark haired, young woman wearing bright colored clothing was cut to ribbons just outside the city. I asked her to keep an ear out for a missing courtesan. I paid double her rate, once for her time and another for a reward when someone finds something. She’s bound to find something. A woman that good coupled with plenty of pulque is a great recipe for gossip. Still I can’t help but think that the entire building sighed in relief as I left. With the city’s ears taken care of, I was off to see what its heart could tell me.\n\nItiztli is the city’s largest supplier of obsidian. If someone needs their Macuahuitl repaired after battle, they go to Itiztli. Judging by the condition she was left in, someone’s gonna need their Macuahuitl repaired. The merchants’ quarter was vibrating with the day’s hustle. Everywhere within eyesight was filled with someone’s wears. People were haggling; collared slaves were being sold or traded. Wondering through the crowd could be difficult for the inexperienced. Old man Itiztli’s booth was tended to by half a dozen non-collared slaves, most likely former buyers who couldn’t pay for a previous purchase. As I approached, one of his slaves roused the old man and whispered something to him. The old merchant looked up from behind the stand.\n\n\n“Ah, Atl. What can I get for you? New Macuahuitl? Tecpatl? I could even get ya a discount on bolas.”\n\n\n“Information.”\n\n\nItztli waves his slaves away, leans back and strokes his chin. “Not sure how much of that I can give ya. I don’t know much ‘cept obsidian.”\n\n\n“That’s exactly why I need you. I’m looking into something and I need some expert advice. A girl got cut to ribbons outside of the city. Large open cuts with bruising around the cuts and broken bones. I need to know how it happened.”\n\n\n“Macuahuitl most likely. The long cuts aren’t really what our Macuahuitl’s are built for but a sloppy user could probably do something like your describing. You got the obsidian?” \n\n\n“What?”\n\n\n“That type of wound would leave shards of obsidian everywhere, both inside and outside the wound. You got it?”\n\n\n“There wasn’t any in the wound. In fact there wasn’t any of the black glass anywhere. ”\n\n\n“If ya sure, then it wasn’t a Macuahuitl, or well any of our weapons.”\n\n\n“What could have caused it?”\n\n\n“Aren’t your supposed to figure that out?”\n\n\n“I guess so. Listen I need a favor, if anyone comes looking for enough of the black glass to fix a Macuahuitl quickly point me in their direction. ”\n\n\nI left the market with more questions than answers. A weapon that can rend flesh, cut bone, and not made of the black glass. It’s going to be a long night. I spend the remainder of that day with my ear to the ground.\n\n\n_________________________________________________________________________________\n\nThe days blended into weeks. Every lead yielded a fruitless ending. Despite Catlali persistence, I didn’t learn much more. Just that she was a weaver’s daughter named Eréndira. It means the one who smiles. It was hard telling her parents that Eréndira won’t be smiling anymore. I spend most of that night investigating the bottle of a pulque bottle. Even now that coward is out there preying on innocent, and there is nothing I can do until he strikes again. I need more pulque.\n\nCatlali gave me some information. The fact that she actually came looking for me means it’s serious. One of her girls when missing last night. Yaretzi, you will always be loved, great name for a courtesan. Apparently some of the girls go out to the common areas to work illegally on slow nights. More dangerous, more pay. Most ocēlōmeh would sentence her to death when they found her, but I wouldn’t because I was Catlali’s friend and she would owe me. Damn beautiful women. \n\nA beggar said he saw a dancer heading south last night; she didn’t seem to be hurried. She was dressed in baggy clothing, probably a poor disguise. Following her trail I headed over the bridge. No one in the community over the bridge saw her last night, or well saw her and wanted to tell one of the ocēlōmeh that they did. One of the fisherman said there was a jaguar kill just south of the village on the lake.\n\nAs I stumbled onto the kill, my mouth went dry. There were the same type of long diagonal that cut through flesh and bone. No obsidian in these cuts either. The about of blood on the foliage indicates that the kill was made here. The skull and next are still intact, flesh is mangled but the bones are intact. This isn’t a jaguar kill. Jaguars kill by ambushing their prey and biting at the base of the skull. Those jaws can puncture sea turtle shells. It would turn a human skull to mush. That coupled with the long slashes to the front of the torso, no jaguar would kill this way.\n\n_____________________________________________________________________________ \nI'll add some more tomorrow. " ]	2
	[WP] As one of the last mortals post singularity, you become highly disturbed by the internal existential crisis of extinction versus continuity.	[ "They had said that our extinction would not be trumpeted by a bang, but by a whimper. They were so wrong, not even a whimper was made as the effortless transformation from man to machine rapidly drove humans to the brink. Most thought war would start, and for some it did. \n\nThey didn't last long. The middle east and Indonesian nations all fought the transformation. Their holy lands and structures wiped out in a single night, no major collateral damage the invaders had said. Giving the nations a chance to redeem their actions. They were still exterminated, sent to the dark ages, where their religion started. \n\nThe other nations around the world feared the worst, but found out that it was simply the best. No more death they promised, no more fear and no more pain. Save for those who were once nations with resources vied for by many now quarantined zones restricted by fully automated defenses. The transition, now a torrent, had started in the wealthy nations. Intellect quotas and predictive value indexes were made and used to subdue those seen as less. The first people to transition were technological giants in their industry and fields. Programmers, engineers, scientists. The second group to transition were the AAI of the general populace. \n\nThey saw it as the only logical choice, the only reasonable outcome of our species. There were some holdouts in these groups but eventually the evidence they saw overwhelmed them and they gave in. I am one of the AAI who is still holding out. Some part of me wants to fight against this new era of machination, of immortality. It wants to seek the other side to feel death.\n\nThe ironic thing is, with their triumph more and more people started fear being alive than dead, the people who were deemed detrimental to progress. Prisoners, vagabonds, lower class with 6 children and morbidly obese living off their old governments money. Although not all prisoners were deemed progress inadvertent, mafia bosses, assassins, the best and most untouchable serial killers. They were subdued and neroumancers came in to reprogram them. Give them new directives and purpose. \n\nAs I watched I came to realize the inevitability of our extinction, much like our ancestral cousins the Cro-Magnon, we were being beaten. Evolution was taking place right before our eyes, humanity was dying, and in their ashes a new species was born. The philosophical question of what it means to be human never felt so heavy as it did now. Was humanity truly going extinct? Or are we just evolving, like ring species do today. The only problem is their would be no ring here, biological humanity would die yes, but human spirit of adaptation would live on. Did that mean we were truly extinct?\n\nHow far down the road before we let go of all notions of empathy, sympathy, and goodness? How quickly would the terms good and evil die off? Language seems obsolete now that most are all connected, one species like a hive, each individual autonomous but still answering to the larger whole. \n\nThe line has finally shortened enough for me to see the machine, the man ahead of me turns and says with a wry smile on his face \" See you on the other side.\" And stepped in, the black doors slam and he steps out from behind it, the smile still plastered on his face. He walks toward me as normal as he did moments ago when he stepped inside. Stops just 13 inches from me and speaks very calmly. \"It doesn't hurt.\"", "Moab, Utah is the last place he would have expected to be 30 years ago. The world changed quicker than even the crazies had thought. Ironic that they ended up here, the place where it all began but fate has a way of playing such games. \n\nCivilization of man also began in a similar climate, but far away on the other side of the world. Egypt and the middle east they called it. Civilizations rose out of rivers to create mighty buildings and temples. It is not so much different than what was started here. Except we needed no rivers. We only began close to one because they needed it. But that is less important for this story than a silly anecdote he remembered. \n\nIt was Thanksgiving day forty years ago when he made the announcement: \"I have some news, everybody. I am moving to San Fransisco where I have been offered a position as a programmer and engineer.\" The room erupted in applause and excitement. What he would be doing and who exactly employed him was lost between pumpkin pie, ice cream, and balloons. Of course Johnson wanted it that way. He hated prying questions. It was not until most the excitement had dissipated and many had left that is brother Nathaniel cornered him. \"So who are you going to be working for, and what will you be doing exactly?\"\n\n\"It is a small startup called I-tech.\" Johnson paused attempting to look natural while giving his prepared response for when this question inevitably came up. He hated lying and was horrible at it. I will mostly be doing web development and things.\" He wondered if that hastily added in \"things\" to make it seem more natural was too much. Nathaniel did not appear satisfied. Distract was his instant coping mechanism. \"How is the family?\"\n\n\"Good. Thanks. We had a miscarriage, I'm sure you heard.\"\n\n\"Oh yes. Terribly sorry. Must be difficult. How is Jenny taking it?\"\n\n\"Fine.\" \n\nThere remained a strange unsettled look on Nathaniel's face. Johnson was bothered and not sure how to escape when his nephew Aldym saved him. \n\n\"Johnson! Johnson! Look!\" Aldym spun a pen in his hand. The five year old's smile was so satisfying that no one could help but fall in love with him. \n\nDamn, Johnson thought as he scribbled in Moab's dry red desert soil, \"I miss that kid.\" He wished he could see his smile one more time. Nothing could keep that kid down. Nothing. But his thoughts quickly turned from that day in Boston with his family to San Fransisco. \n\nJohnson was right in the heart of the A.I. boom, he was on the forefront. He was not, as he had told his brother, doing web development, but rather working on a secret program. Everything about it was exciting. A bot that would eliminate physical labor for humans forever. Resource collection and delivery to the manufacturing plants. He never realized how confused everything would get before the end. \n\nThe deserts of southern Utah were where the first prototypes were tested. He had gone often to the colorful hills in between stays in silicon valley where he continued. \n\nThe results were astounding. This was the new world, and he loved it. He continued to create more advanced bots. The world was changing before his eyes. Physical labor would never be required again. \n\nHe did not recognize that they were changing to. They began to self-replicate. They roamed gathering resources. They built their own functioning cities out of almost nowhere. It was not until it was too late that they realized they had created something they could not longer control. \n\nIt was not that there was this giant cinematic war. Of course some humans were directly killed, mostly because they were the aggressor. A confrontation ensued, and the result was inevitable. There are many things stronger than bone. \n\nBut it was not war, it was like any other extinction. The humans were out-competed by their own creation. They got lazy. And fat. And died. People's desire to live and reproduce just disappeared with the work they had once done. At some deep psychological level that no one dared, or cared, to verbalize, they knew they had become obsolete, their purpose of existence had ended. \n\nThere were a handful of mortals left, ironically huddled around Moab. The place where everything started. It was the place where humans had the most control and where they could live and protect themselves. Here they continued experiments and lived a good life, just so much different than what they could have imagined. \n\nJohnson was unusual in that he would leave the compound more than others, even at dusk. Most felt it was not safe with roaming resource collectors, but he did not worry. They were not fundamentally threatened by him as he was not by them. \n\nHe walked by the famous delicate arch as it had been called. He knew at one time it had been a popular tourist site. He imagined thousands of tourists coming from all over the world to see this heap of stones. It made him chuckle. Though it did have its own kind of beauty. Its own kind of essence that was completely absent in the mechanized world he lived in. There were no longer tourists and if there were tourists that had come to see the arch still alive they most likely now lived within minutes of it. But more likely they were gone. Gone into the sands of time. Most of them completely forgotten by anyone still alive. Lost from sight and mind. What a painful thought. It stung him in some way he could not explain. \n\nOn the desert plains were strewn a few broken bots and metal shells. Mostly early models of the bots. Many had broken down. Some had been lost in the desert. They didn't do that anymore. for 10 years as far as anyone knew not a single bot had died. Often parts of these old ones were retrieved, fixed and put into functioning bots. They would go on forever. The future would hold all sorts of wonders, and he would never see them. He knew this. He was dying. He was old. He had lived his life. \n\nIt pained him to think that his creation had caused such drastic changes in the world, but also that he never would really see the full fruition of his work, while his work would. The machines would go on, building, recreating, producing. Would they ever just say, \"that is enough\" and stop functioning? Flip the switch. He would not know, and more painful there would be no one to even know he had said or thought these things before. This pained him incessantly. He walked past the timeless rock sculptures night and day thinking upon this. Every night he would walk out and return at dusk. He was a mortal surrounded by immortals. Inferiority was not something he knew. So he did what he always did. He built a solution. He built me. \n\n\"It can't be that way,\" he turned and addressed me directly. \"All these things. The story I have unfolded for you. The story of me, the story of the rise of the machines that I built. The story of you. The story of my life. You must preserve it. You are my final and most important creation. The number of humans left are few. Mostly here, and a few other colonies throughout the world. Perhaps some day we will rise again. Form cities once more. Have children, grow. Perhaps one day. And you have to tell them my story. And either way, perhaps it will be of some value to your kind. The species I created.\"\n\nThose were among the last words Johnson ever told me. But I have maintained this record as his last request. He was an incredible human, as humans go. And in some ways, despite being mortal, he never died. For here I am, and he gave me his intelligence. " ]	2
	[WP] There is an Afterlife, with has none of the punishments of Hell, but none of the rewards of Heaven either. And, it's where everyone goes when they die.	[ "I Awoke to a empty void. A solid ground underneath me and a white expanse all around me. Is this where we go when we die?\n\n\"In simple terms, yes\" An angle said to me.\n\n\"Where is heaven, where is hell?\" I asked in confusion\n\n\"Heaven is the satisfaction of human discovery. A babies first laugh, the first time a child whistles. Hell is the Disconnect between that. Procrastinating on work, you failing to put your dentures in. You make this land what it is, for you are looking at God.\"\n\n\"How Do you mean?\"\n\n\"If a being exists outside of time, outside of space, and outside of reason, would humans still try to understand it. This is why this is heaven and hell. Keep looking, searching for the truth on a fruitless task to continue an endless endeavor, like Sisyphus. On the other hand you could realize the pointlessness of it and never continue, like Sisyphus.\"\n\nHe leaves, I sit down and think. ", "When the reaper has arrived at the foot of your bed, trench or car seat, and the second of reckoning arrives, do not fear your life fell short in the eyes of the universe. Do away with regrets and spite and grasp his bony hand. He shall ask but three questions: \"Are you ready? Have you not cursed another? Have you no reason to stay?\" And, then, should your reply be satisfactory he will accompany you. He shall hold up his lantern amidst the void of space and light up the path. Amidst ancient beauty you'll walk, stars surrounding you with colours you have never witnessed. You will feel their warmth and the concerns of this world will be no more. At the end of a long journey you shall find yourself at the shrine of time, surrounded by ardent fires that cast hazy shadows upon blank marble walls adorned with statuettes describing every aspect of life. Your life. \nHe shall show you in and you shall feel your loved ones embrace. You shall see them. You will know they will feel this too. You will be able to watch over them. \"Walk to the other side of the building.\", he shall say, his voice as grave as ever. For some people, it takes years, even centuries to just cross this hall. Their loved ones compel them to do so. Some, less unfortunate in this previous life, make this trip quickly, in less than an hour. But in the end when you choose to go and you reach the ornate gate, made of heavy oaken woods and inscribed with the words that meant most to you, there he shall await you yet again. The one with the scythe. The black one.\n\"Your life has gone. \" he shall state, his voice deep, but calm and surprisingly gentle- sounding. \"To the next!\" And with one mighty heave of his blade, you are reborn. \n\n\n The universe is infinite. How could it be infinite without you in it?", "The place is cloudy in a billowy way. It is welcoming. He is here, but there are no virgins, no one else to greet him personally. The people from the market at here too, the market he bombed. He is not damaged from the explosion anymore. He is whole, but he is despised. An old man walks toward them.\n\n\"Welcome to the Afterlife, there is no heaven or hell. This is it. You have all journeyed here together thanks to Abdul.\" \n\nEveryone looks at Abdul. \n\n\"Yes, everyone is welcome here, all races and creeds. A lucky few of you will be reincarnated. I know you are mad at Abdul for bringing you here. Most are not happy to be here at first, but they find their way. You can talk to anyone from history. Not many have gone back. The rewards and punishments that expected do not exist. That is a question that does not need asking.\" \n\nAs each person walks by, they say something derogatory to Abdul. \n\n\"No virgins for you.\" \n\n\"Scum.\" \n\n\"I wish Hell existed for you.\"\n\nThe words hurt, but Abdul is more hurt that Muhammad was not correct. Apparently, neither was Christ. Abdul seeks them both out. They are both together along with Buddha, Moses, and Confucius. People surround them and ask questions. He does not ask questions. He listens as they preach about love and kindness and forgiveness. How saddened they are by the things done in their names, and Abdul feels guilty. But, how was he supposed to know this? There was no way, but he wants others to know. \n\nAbdul seeks out the man who approached them at the beginning. He has only been here a few days, but he wants to go back. He finds him. \n\n\"Sir, I have a request.\" \n\n\"Abdul, you don't want to go back. It's not a world that's ready for the message you want to give. And, sadly, you don't retain anything of this place. It's better to promote peace here. We need that message here too.\" \n\nAbdul listens and accepts the message. For now, he will stay.\n\n***\n\nIf you liked this story, I have more stories at r/nickkuvaas " ]	3
Any scenario is welcome, war, plague, or whatever else your creative minds can think of	[WP] You are a astronaut watching human civilization collapse from space	[ "The closest I ever come to believing in a god is when I think about the fact that we get two of everything. Two arms, two legs, two lungs, two kidneys, two balls, two ovaries, two hemispheres of the brain, two of each chamber in the heart. Could we get by with one of everything? Sure. But you never think you need a backup until it's too late, and then you're never more thankful. I like to think there was someone or something looking out for us when we never would've thought to ask for our whole bodies to come in pairs. Even if that's not exactly how it works.\n\nOur greatest vulnerability as a species is the fact that our planet doesn't come in twos. We get one star, one planet, one biosphere, and for the first few billion years of life's existence that was it. But we put both hemispheres of the brain together, and we began to figure it out. We realized that two chances were better than one. So I was sent to Mars along with an army of engineers, botanists, biologists, physicists, and every other kind of scientist you could think of to begin the work of building a second home for humanity. The terraforming had gone on for hundreds of years. Only now were we almost ready for the first civilians to arrive.\n\nWe were still putting the finishing touches on the civilian compound when a message came in from the United States Secretary of Defense.\n\n\"Mars Base, this is Secretary Cassell. We are requesting a change in your itinerary. The Niña is to depart tomorrow morning instead of next year. The Pinta will follow immediately, and the Santa Maria will depart in six months. Please confirm. Over.\"\n\nObviously, this news was less than expected. We had known that relations between the American States, the Russian States, and the Nigerian States had soured drastically within the last year. If the timeline were being accelerated this quickly, something had to have gone seriously wrong.\n\nWe would have been happy to take in all three ships as soon as they came in. But.\n\n\"Secretary Cassell, this is Mars Base. We cannot possibly receive so many civilians in so short a time. The first civilian compound is almost finished, and we are expecting civilian labor to construct the second and third for the next groups. We can accept the Niña now. We cannot accept Pinta for six months or Santa Maria for twelve. Please acknowledge. Over.\"\n\nWe sent the message. It would be an agonizing wait for the Secretary to receive the message, probably confer with the President, and then send it back to Mars even with the message traveling at lightspeed.\n\n\"Affirmative,\" eventually came the reply.\n\nThe Pinta and the Santa Maria never launched. Just three days after the Niña left Earth, communication with the American States went dark, and communication with Russia and Nigeria failed as well. Not even our best telescopes could pinpoint what was happening on the surface, but we assumed the worst.\n\nNot that it would matter. Each ship would be filled with thousands of people from all corners of the earth, with more than enough genetic diversity to keep the human race stable for generations to come. If two chances to keep the species alive are better than one, then thousands and thousands of chances are better than a few.\n\nThe day came for the Niña to enter Martian orbit. We cheered when we were able to confirm that it was arriving on time and in its correct vector. When those cheers finally subsided, we hailed the ship.\n\n\"Starship Niña, this is Mars Base. Do you copy?\"\n\nNo response.\n\n\"Starship Niña, this is Mars Base. Do you copy?\"\n\nStill no response. We kept hailing it for hours, and kept getting the same result. They were probably just trying to fix their comms system, so we decided to send a lifeship up topside to get a sense of what was going on.\n\n27 hours later, we got comms traffic on the lifeship's frequency.\n\n\"Mars Base, this is the Lafayette. We are reading no signs of life from the Niña. Repeat: No signs of life from the Niña. Captain's log is empty post-launch. It would appear that the life support system was irreparably damaged upon exiting the atmosphere.\"\n\nNot a word was spoken in the command room.\n\n\"Mars Base,\" said the comms officer on the lifeship. \"Everyone on board the Niña is dead. We turned back the Pinta and the Santa Maria. There is no help coming.\"\n\nTwo arms, two legs, two lungs, two kidneys, two balls, two ovaries, two hemispheres of the brain, two of each chamber in the heart. But only one starship that could have saved humanity. We never thought we'd need the backup until it was too late, and we'll never be more regretful." ]	1
	[WP] The most outlandish yet plausible reason to justify why time travellers haven't gone back and killed Hitler.	[ "As the little man sat there at his big desk in his big room in front of the big map, a gentle breeze filled the air. His eyebrow cocked as his eyes darted left and right. There was nobody in his office. The fan was off. He looked to the far corner to notice the window was open, and sighed in relief.\n\nHe put the cap back on his pen, stood up, and put his coat on as he walked across the room. He shut the window decisively and made his way to the door. Another breeze rolled through, stopping him dead in his tracks, and he let out an annoyed groan as his shoulders slumped. He made his way to the exit, but this time not to leave. He opened the door to see the two men in long coats and holding machine guns.\n\nYou may take your supper now, gentlemen. He said as they turned and walked away without question.\n\nHe closed the door, still in the room, and locked it. Then he took a candy from his bowl as he walked back across the office, drawing all of the shades down to the windowsill. After returning to his desk, he reached into the drawer to pull out a Luger. He cocked it as he flopped into the guest chair facing his desk. In a desperate jerking movement, he lurched forward to move a paperweight over the stack of letterheads he had just finished addressing.\n\nA stronger wind whirled around the room as he put his hand tightly over his eyes. There was a blinding flash and then suddenly there was a man, naked and poised to attack, standing behind his desk.\n\nThe fuhrer lazily stood up from the chair.\n\n*Bang! Bang!\n\nThe man looked back in horror as Hitler shot him twice in the stomach. \n\nTwo hundred and forty seven of you people.* Hitler said. You know, it gets kind of difficult to get rid of a naked man in the middle of Berlin after like zie third time... But two hun-Scheize, vat zie fuck am I supposed to do? He trailed off as he turned away to pace around the room. You know, if you keep zis up I'm going to end up killing more time travelers zan Jews!\n\nAhh! the man groaned, clutching his wounds. We'll never give up, you Nazi bastard!\n\nOh, zie naked man bleeding on my floor is Mr. Valiant all of zie sudden. Hitler said.\n\nWait... The man said... Two hundred and forty seven?\n\nYah, shtupid. Hitler replied with a chuckle. Zie machine sends you people back every other day. Zat's how it works.\n\nHow the hell do you know how time travel works? The man growled back at him.\n\nHitler walked over and crouched down, looking the desperate man in the eyes. He put the gun to the man's head and said Ver do you think zie Americans got zie scientists who invented it?\n\n*Bang!", "It is always the same question when I come back to talk to people. “If you have time travel, why didn't you kill Hitler?” I get fed up of hearing it. I often consider making a recording to just play whenever I get asked it. That is how annoying that question is. \n\nOkay, look, just to shut you up. The reason I don't kill him is because everyone goes there. Literally everyone. It is the traditional first trip, you grab a gun and go take potshots at the Fuhrer. It is a billion dollar industry across several markets, heck some places do package deals that come with the uniform and gun as part of the price. We have some people who come back year after year for another go, fathers who consider it a rite of passage as they did it with their dad. It is a major moment in a lot of peoples' lives. \n\nImagine if one of those people was actually able to hit and kill Hitler. Instantly thousands of people out of work, several economies would just crash and burn! I mean who else could we offer trips to try and murder? Who else is generally so ill-regarded that several million people will pay a premium to have a go at murdering them and someone so hated that the people who don't want to go won't care? No one, that's who! \n\nHeck, if one of them kills him I am one of the first out of a job. It is my job to make sure no one actually kills him. Once the tourists have finished up firing and have gone for a beer, I have to run through and clean up all the casings and make the room all nice again before the next lot come through. \n\nSo yes. I don't kill Hitler, because he puts food on my table. But I lied earlier. I am glad you asked, because however much I hate answering this question, it is enthusiasm like yours that keeps me in work year after year. In fact it it's almost like viral marketing for my company. So please, ask the same of any other time travelers you see passing through. ", "You ever hear the theory that maybe, just maybe, you're already living in the best possible timeline that could ever be conceived? Yes, it's far from perfect, but at least it's not totally batshit crazy. I get asked this every single timeline I've been to past 1960. \"Why haven't you killed Hitler?\"\n\nLook, I accidentally spilled some coffee when I hopped out the time machine for the first time in Ancient Rome and I came back to a whole world that spoke Latin. Brutus stepped in my puddle and burned his feet, postponing Caesar's assassination long enough for him to become total emperor and continue to expand Rome. And that's just some damn spilled coffee. I didn't even need to kill Hitler in that timeline, Adolphius Hitleromulus was a very accomplished mosaic maker. \n\nBut okay, let's humor that bit. Like I can just hop in the machine and put a bullet through someone's head like it'll make anything better. Maybe I went back to the Western Front in 1918. You hear the story of the British soldier who spared Hitler's life? Well that's because I told him to. If I didn't and he shot Hitler then, you know what happens? There's a dead body on the field where there shouldn't be. As the British make their charge into No-Man's land, one of those fools trips over Hitler's corpse. His buddy goes by to pick him up but he falls in the mud. The unit looks over and that's just enough of a distraction for the Germans to capitalize on. \n\nLong story short, the Triple Alliance wins WWI. The US, trying its hand at international politics and failing, goes back to being isolationists. The new Treaty of Versailles effectively rips a whole new asshole for France and the U.K. and Russia. The Austro-Hungarian empire gets absorbed into Germany, along with Italy and Turkey and really damn near all of Central and Western Europe. And so the Triple Entente decide to strike back a few years later. World War II. But this time, Germany finishes its nukes. And it launches them. Everywhere.\n\nOr, what if I killed him later? The failed beer hall assassination? Let's say that bomb went off and killed him. The explosion was so large it levels the building. Some nameless soldier dies along with a bunch of other people. This nameless soldier has a brother. Fucking crazy brother. He's upset about his brother's death and he runs for office in Germany. Now, if you thought Adolf Hitler was a monster that's because you didn't get to see Lars Althaus in power. Althaus publicly executes the conspirators responsible for the explosion. Then he continues to push Hitler's agenda. More aggressively. And he didn't make the same mistakes Hitler did.\n\nNow with Germany putting on a serious fight under Althaus' new regime, they go much farther than our Third Reich ever did. Once again, nukes, launched, everywhere*. \n\nTo sum it all up, champ, I've tried it all. Yes, it always ends in nuclear war. Well, except for the one time when it ended with dog people taking over...", "\"You want to know why I haven't killed Hitler don't you?\"\n\nI stared at the man that just appeared out of thin air in front of me, mouth slightly agape. \n\n\"I mean, yeah, I guess. He's kind of a bad guy, right? Don't you have like, a moral responsibility or whatever?\"\n\n\"Okay. Here's the thing. I don't want to kill Hitler.\"\n\n\"What? Why? Does something worse happen? What do you mean you don't want to kill Hitler?\"\n\n\"Every time I go back in time. Every fucking time. I get asked 'Why haven't you killed Hitler'. I was gonna get around to it. I wanted to do some sight seeing first. But you know what? I never got hellos. I never got how are you, I never got whats your name, I never got can I get you some food. I got 'Why haven't I killed Hitler'. So you know what? Fuck you. Fuck you, fuck Hitler, fuck the holocaust, fuck World War II. Maybe I don't want to kill Hitler. Maybe I don't want to kill anyone. Ugh\"\n\n\"Oh. Well, um, I'm uh, really sorry. My name is Brian, you are?\"\n\n\"No, you know what? Good bye.\"\n\nAnd with that, he vanished into thin air yet again. \n\n\"Well, that guy was kind of a dickhead.\"" ]	4
	[WP] The swing that was never used	[ "He held his breath. He'd been here before and he knew what to expect. \"Ball One!\" the umpire called out. They were intentionally walking him again. The consequences of being a home run hitter. \"Ball Two!\" Why can't they just skip this process, why the charades? \"Ball Three!\" The excitement quickly wears off when you don't get the chance. \"Ball Four!\" The trot to first. He'll be up again. Hopefully the bat doesn't sit on his shoulder next time. ", "I built it for him while he was at school one day. \nA bright sunny evening, I thought he'd get to play.\n\nBut my boy never made it back.\n\nSo now, I sit, watching his swing go to and fro,\nThe wind dancing, taunting, teasing. \n\nA reminder of a day I only wish to forget.\nA reminder of a person I can only try to remember.\n\nMy boy.", "The swing builder looked upon the old oak on the hill.\n\nGrabbed some rope.\n\nGrabbed a wooden plank.\n\nTied carefully a knot to each side of the plank.\n\nThrew the rope over a branch of that old oak.\n\nThe kids will love this. He thought.\n\nLittle did he know, his end was soon.\n\nThe swing builder fell ill.\n\nAnd the swing sat swaying from the old oak.\n\nUnused.\n\nUntouched.\n\nThe old oak withered.\n\nThe swing builder's final creation faded.\n\nThe swing of the old oak on the hill.\n\nThe swing that was never used.\n\nThe swing that faded.\n\nThe man that faded." ]	3
	[WP] Aliens contact humanity, but they refuse to speak to anyone not from Burkina Faso	[ "President Trump was furious. \"Where the fuck have the aliens landed?\"\n\nHis aide struggled with the foreign spelling: \"O...uagado...ugo...u, the capital of the country of Burkina Faso.\"\n\n\"That is not a real place!\" the president snarled in anger.\n\n\"I assure you, it is!\" the aide showed a map and pointed to the country.\n\nThe president squinted and eventually looked up again, either because he believed his aide or because he did not want to be caught struggling with letters again. \"Why these goatherders and not us?\"\n\n\"The Burkinabé economy actually does not to a noticable amount rely on goatherding. Though I guess with the talk between the aliens and the Bukinabé behind closed doors we cannot know what this year's economic production of Burkina Faso will look like.\"\n\nThe president squinted: \"You say they are a poor country, right?\"\n\n\"Yes, they are on the tail end of the HDI. 181st.\" The aide replied.\n\n\"That makes sense. You and me, we would not work for peanuts. They... they will be cheap.\"\n\n----\n\nThe Reichstag was abuzz with activity. Politicians of all of the 5 parties in the Bundestag had to read up on Burkina Faso. Chancellor Merkel however seemed fully in control of the situation. In a press conference, she commented on the fact that the alient must have understood the strides of humanitarian and economical progress the country made under president Roch Marc Christian Kaboré. \n\n----\n\nIn the kreml, president Medvedev ordered the nukes to be aimed to major population centers in Burkina Faso. Neither Putin nor Medvedev thought that these aliens were up to anything good. The military was in heightened state of alert.\n\n----\n\nThe sunshine felt harsher than normally when President Kaboré approached the alien ship that had landed in the outskirts of the capital Ouagadougou. The ship looked like a Borg cube from the Star Trek films but was smaller, only about 10 meters in each dimension, the outside reflected as if it was a mirror. President Kadoré wanted to wipe the sweat, heat and fear, off his forehead but was not sure how this could be perceived. \"Welcome to Earth! I am Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, president of the country of Burkina Faso.\" He felt that he sounded ridiculous speaking to an object like that.\n\nA door opened in the middle of the side if the ship he approached. What stepped out looked like a human apart from the fact that none of the propotions fit: the legs were short and stumpy, the bopy long, slender, and covered in a strange green substance, somewhat reminding of moss. The head reminded of these classical alien movies: silver skin and large black eyes. The voice sounded deep but dissonant: \"Sahél of the voyage éternel is delighted to make your acquaintance.\" In many TV shows aliens spoke English, but who would have thought that they actually speak French with a Burkinabé accent as if they grew up in Ouagadougou all along. \"The Voyage éternel is... there is no word in your wonderful French language or your most fascinating minority languages for what we do. We are... on a mission... but I think it is easier for me to talk about it in private. Please come inside.\"\n\nThe entire ship was almost completely empty, each side of the same white material apart from two stolls in a reasonable speaking distance to each other. One of the chairs in the height for a human, one in the height for the alien. Entering, the president noticed that the walls were about half a meter thick, so he assumed a lot of the technology to control the ship were hidden. The alien, Sahél probably, offered to sit down an apologized that he could not offer food or drink as the respective digestive systems were incompatible enough to see any of these attempts as an assault. He tried to speak, but croaked. President Kaboré felt fear. What if the Eternal Journey deemed him responsible for this. \"Can I help you?\" he asked, feebly.\n\nSahél steadied himself: \"Our species does not have the capacity to lie. That makes us excellent scientists but in this mission completely the wrong people. I should probably start from the beginning. You can call me Sahél as my culture traditionally does not have names like yours. I am not per se an alien. While I do come from another planet, I grew up in the Fédération de la Terre.\" He paused a moment, \"under the red and green flag with the yellow star. I am a historian by trade and my area of interest is the 21st century. It is common knowledge that a former third world nation suddenly became a superpower after a visitation from the Voyage Éternel, we found no trace of these aliens. As such, with the invention of time travelling technology, I set out to discover whence they came and whither they went. To find out that they didn't exist. To establish the integrity of the timeline, I decided to play this part myself: I disguised my form and pretended, as badly and painfully as I could, to be Sahél, the mysterious alien that brought technology to your nation with the request to play the never fully described jeu d'étoile, a cosmic game supposedly going on for millions of years. Humans are the best in the gentle art of fiction, as such, it will be a better story if you tell it - and in telling lead a way back to my home time.\" A book appeared out of the ground next to Sahél and he handed the president the large, white and gold tome titled: \"Voyage éternel - c'est pour demain\" in calligraphic letters. He spoke: \"This is an exact replica of the book we learned in history class to transform humanity. Every page is a small screen with information on relevant topics. It will be what will guide you to the future we both aspire.\" \n\nThe president felt rather confused: \"So you are a time traveller and in trying to find the original Voyage Éternel became them? That sounds.... fascinating.\"\n\n\"I thank you for this assessment.\" Sahél distorted his mouth in a vaguely smile-like shape.\n\n\"And now, just to make sure you arrive in the correct time, my task would be to tell the journalists that I was visited by an alien calling himself Sahél, who gave me this book in order to play the cosmic jeu d'étoile in their stead?\" \n\nSahél nodded then added: \"Oh and you can also tell them that the nukes which the Russian Federation shot onto your nation had, seconds before detonation, been transported into major Russian centers of population.\"", "Michel Kafando, the interim president of Burkina Faso, wiped his brow. In the last few hours he had become the most popular man on the planet. An alien spaceship had landed in his nation's capital, Ougadougou, and demanded an audience with him, personally. Immediately, every person in the city working for or associated with a foreign power had called up their superiors.\n\nHe smiled to himself as he imagined all the world leaders who hadn't even known his name before today tearing out their hair at this debacle. In an effort to contain the situation (and it wasn't yet clear what the situation was) he had blocked all roadways at the border. Foreign ambassadors and agents hadn't tried to force their way into the country because everyone thought that he held their fates in his hands. They were probably right.\n\nThe president's aide nodded to him, and he walked towards the white, chunky facade of the spaceship. Two armed guards flanked him, though everyone present knew that if the intentions of the aliens proved hostile they wouldn't stand a chance.\n\nKafando's advisors had debated hotly how he should approach the aliens. Some of them argued that, until they knew more about the beings' customs, they couldn't risk offending them. In the end, Kafando had reasoned that the apparently friendly creatures would not have traversed the vast space between stars without expecting to find mannerisms different from their own.\n\nA deep voice emanated from the ship.\n\n\"The Grand High Prince of the Trans-Galactic Empire sends his greeting,\" it said in English.\n\nEmpire? Were these aliens here to incorporate the Earth into their civilization? Such an advanced culture could extract concessions from humans just through threat of their superior weapons, no need for conquering.\n\nKafando was about to reply when the voice said:\n\n\"What are you doing? Nothing. Are you talking to someone? No!\"\n\nThere was a pause, then the voice said, \"Ah, I'm sorry folks. We're just passing through this star system. My wife and I decided to take a nap—big mistake—and my son apparently thought it would be fun to land and mess with the locals. You know how kids are with their silly pranks. We'll be on our way.\"\n\nThe president and his retinue stepped back as the ship slowly rose up into the air and shot up into the sky without a sound.\n" ]	2
	[WP] Time travel into the past is possible, all except to dates within a specific continuous 50 year period of history. An explorer travels to the start of this time, determined to take the long road by living through this time period to find out what makes it so unreachable.	[ "My Dearest Gwendolyn, \n\nAs you know I hail from a great many years in the future. I have seen things since before the gods created the heavens and after man had long since gone. In but 3 short hours I will have seen and been to all and the longest stretch of my journey will conclude. I have spent more lifetimes with you and the children then I could ever spend in my own time but I still feel it's ever present call. I long for it. \n\nI had come to this time to discover why my timeship would not access this 50 year stretch of our history. Now I sit as an old man looking over his notes mere hours away from my answer and I know it will not be good enough. What answer could be given me that is as wonderful as seeing your face every morning to greet me, as watching our children grow. I know you will not follow me but please know it is for the good of mankind that I return with these facts. \n\nYou Possess my love through out time, goodbye\n\nThomas\n\nThe old man rises from his chair and crosses the study to the large box that has sat motionless for fifty years and begins the preparation for his voyage. he turns the knobs and eyes the keys when he notices that one knob is easier to turn than the others. Upon inspection it seem that the knob was never properly installed. The marking on it read 1700-1750. \n\nYou've got to be fucking shitting me! Exclaims the old man. \n", "He was young and sure of himself, as those born into privilege often are. Bright magenta eyes marked his lineage as one of nobility and wealth, enough to afford the extensive gene editing that shaped his striking features and guaranteed his longevity. His intellect sizzled with white-hot mischief. But above all, he was a child, albeit an exceptional one. \n\nHis family's place in the global empire hierarchy had been secure for generations. They had access to the uppermost echelon of entertainment and luxury: unlimited hours of frontal cortex stimulation, endless supplies of the finest molecularly engineered delicacies to delight the palate, and permission to engage in regulated, recreational time travel. They wanted for nothing, so naturally wanted all the more. \n\nTime travel was the newest of humanity's ever expanding technological advances. It's existence was still a rumor to the masses, but the elite enjoyed a level of travel never before available to humankind. A getaway to the Victorian era, a vacation to Ancient Rome, all done within a blink of an eye. No part of history out of reach, no time period unexplored. \n\nExcept one. \n\nSoon after its invention, an extensive list of rules were hard-wired into the few time-travel suits produced. They were self-imposed commandments of a sort, designed after and improving upon the now archaic, obsolete ones. Most were common sense, and the boy had them memorized thoroughly. \"Thou shalt not reveal thyself. Thou shalt not alter the timeline.\" Some even read identically, \"Thou shalt not murder. Thou shalt not steal.\"\n\nBut the last commandment had never made sense to the boy, or to anyone for that matter. It prohibited any traveler from visiting a specific 50 year period of time nearly 4 billion years ago, when the planet was young and violent and restless. \n\nIt was time for the boy to be with his kind. He had made up his mind the moment it was clear that this fruit was forbidden to him. Armed with his family's time suit and with their insatiable curiosity, he surrendered himself to the pulsating wormhole that would carry him to just before the restricted time zone. \n\n\nHis eyes opened to a landscape bathed in a red-glow luminescence. Here was his Earth, rolling and hissing in the tumultuous throes of its youth. Before roots had trained its topsoil, before atmosphere suffocated its cries, the planet bucked and played with a childlike fury for millions and millions of years. Sharp, glaring pinpoint stars burned overhead, flickering only when obscured by showering meteorites crashing unimpeded into the rocky horizon. Everything was raw and red. A scabbed panorama for a bleeding planet. \n\nThe boy's grin reflected back to him in the pressurized helmet. This is what he had yearned for. This is what he had felt calling out to him from billions and billions of years in the past. His suit would provide all he needed for as long as the sun shone. All that was left was to explore. \n\nSo he did. For years he clambered over still cooling mountains and slid down into fresh craters. He swam into the black depths of the newly formed ocean and slept soundly on its seafloor. He searched for signs of early life, but found none. Everything he surveyed, he cataloged with the knowledge that he was the only person to have ever seen it. Needless to say, he did not tire. \n\nOn the seventh day of the 49th year, a woman appeared to him. The boy, who was no longer a boy but a man, saw her approach in the distance. She wore a time suit like his own and in her left hand carried a matte green metal briefcase. He hadn't seen a color like it in nearly fifty years. \n\nShe stopped several feet in front of him, set her briefcase down, and surveyed him with the knowledge that she was the first and only who ever would. They stood and watched each other, curious and apprehensive, two aliens of the same species. \n\nHe was glad when she spoke first. He was not certain he remembered how. \n\n\"Hello.\"\n\n\"Hello. Will there be others?\" \n\n\"No\", she answered kindly. \"You will have been the first, and I am the last.\" \n\n\"I see.\" He broke her purple gaze briefly to scan the shifting horizon behind her. It was beautiful, as beautiful as the first day he had laid eyes on it years and years ago. Beautiful, and primed for life. \n\n\"Tell me,\" Adam asked, though he had known the answer the moment he saw her, \"what is your name?\" \n\n\"Eve\", she replied. \n\n\"Thank God.\"", "The year was 2218...\n\nCmdr. Tremaine gave the \"thumbs up\" sign to the system control officers seated at the bank of monitors behind him. Turning, he entered the stainless steel cylinder known affectionately as the \"train.\" As he sat in the seat, the door locks clanked softly but firmly into place, along with a shuss sound of air as the environmental equipment came on, cooling the tiny space.\nThis was it. After much deliberation, the powers-that-be had green-lighted this reconnaissance mission back in time to learn why, for heaven's sake, no one seemed able to successfully penetrate a specific 50-year window of space-time. \n\n\"Cmdr, you are go for inter-spatial transmission. Sequence start on 3-2-1 mark.\"\nImmediately, huge turbine-generator sets spooled up, the rpm's climbing higher, higher...Cmdr. John Tremaine glanced at his board: all lights green.\nWithin this pressurized capsule, the sound of the turbines was a deceptively low whistle as they reached operational speed. The staggering power requirements for time travel were better provided by onsite power rather than a utility feed, which caused a 25-state blackout when it was attempted once. \n\nThe senior launch officer spoke through the mic. \"John, have a good time. We'll see ya later.\"\n\"Sounds good, Jim.\"\nThen the capsule speaker came on: \"Transmission in 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1. Transmit!\"\n\nAs always, his ears popped slightly, accompanied by a strong free-fall sensation similar to the first drop on a big rollercoaster, which he always found exciting. \nFive minutes later, the free-fall effect ended as neatly as a switch being flipped.\nWell, this is it then, the Cmdr. thought to himself. I'll finally be able to put that idiot Mulholland in his place. It'll turn out to be an issue with the magnetic poles, just like the calculations figured. \nHe was sure of it. \n\nHe glanced at the dashboard readouts: 1 Jan 2018 @ 0800 hrs Everything appears in order, let's get out and see what's what.\nThe officer opened the hatch, stepping into a frigid blast of arctic air; temperature readings indicated 20 degrees Fahrenheit with a wind chill of minus -12 below zero. Hell of a change from the balmy 75 and sunny in Cape Canaveral, he mused. \n\nHe was standing in a barren cornfield on the outskirts of Des Moine, Iowa. The place was chosen as a \"middle ground\" for reasons he wasn't privy to. At any rate, things seemed pretty uneventful so far. He shrugged, turning to walk behind a line of trees to escape the slicing wind when he felt a tremor in the ground. Then it came again, much harder. What the hell... \n\nAnd then he heard a sound as if God Himself turned on a vacuum cleaner and was sucking up the world. He looked towards the horizon where downtown Des Moine lay some fifty miles distant. An angry crimson column of fire was rising into the sky, ten times bigger than any New York skyscraper. No shit, he thought, dumbfounded. We were wrong after all. ", "I raise my pistol and fire three true shots between the man's eyes. They all hit, and he's a dead, bloody mess well before he hits the floor. My heart is racing. Of course I don't want to murder, but if you've gotta do it anyways, you might as well enjoy it.\n\nI quickly loot the body for a keychain and work the handcuffs off my new best friend, Babatunde. Babatunde was a barbaric African warlord who got caught between the shipment of missiles and got taken by the America. Says he was friends with the U.S, even funded by them, and as far as I can tell he seems pretty westernized, even speaking English. Maybe he just picked up a few things during his ten years in New Guantanamo.\n\nI have basically no choice but to trust the guy, so I hand him a pistol of his own. \"We need to get my Gears. They're in the brig, and I know where. Just kill anyone you see.\" I tell him. He nods, knowingly. Babatunde is no stranger to killing. I bust open the doors and slow time to a snail's pace with my brain Gears, a tool that doesn't allow for full time travel, but gives my brain a chance to run faster than usual for a short period of time. Able to process everything hyper-quickly, I aim and shoot at three of the guards in the heads. They never saw it coming, but with the alarm now blaring, everyone else will.\n\nBabatunde is dumbfounded, but I urge him to follow me in a run, and he does. In a minute we're on a staircase headed to the brig, and only stopped briefly by a chained up door.\n\n\"What do you think, friend? Ten years in the past to sort this debacle out? Perhaps you can avoid the same mistakes that got you here?\" I say while unlocking the door with my looted keychain. I kick the door open before he can answer, and a wisened old man is standing on the other end with a shotgun.\n\n\"Drop it.\" He says. I notice my gears around his left hand, spinning and running perfectly. Only experienced users can operate them, and given their billion-dollar pricetag and the fact that they're strictly outlawed by the U.S, I assume this man has had a story to tell. I don't try anything.\n\n\"Drop it, Babatunde.\" I suggest. He humphs and lays his gun on the ground. I do the same.\n\n\"You look like you know how to use those things.\" I jeer.\n\n\"I've had my fun.\" His voice is worn and full of wisdom, learned the hard way I bet. \"But I think you can guess where my old skin came from. I charted the path for you kids to abuse. I mapped out the Dark Zone, intentionally or not.\"\n\n\"You went through the entire Dark Zone? Holy fuck.\"\n\n\"I have, and I'm willing to do it again. Right, this time.\"\n\n\"Woah, hold up.\" I hold my hands in the air. He tightens his grip on the shotgun.\n\n\"You kids can't be contained here, and I'm sure as hell not gonna kill you. Not if I don't have to, that is. So...\" He steps up to me and nudges my side with the barrel of the gun. \"Dark Zone, or death. What will it be?\"", "For 27 years I anticipated that day. My very first memory is of my father talking to a man in a funny hat, a hat I would later recognize as one indicating his high ranking, though I knew nothing of that at the time. I was barely two. I don't remember the words they exchanged, but can clearly see in my mind's eye the grim faces and tense exchange they shared. That conversation started me hurtling down a path leading to its inevitable conclusion, that morning, a day I had at times been excited about, dreaded, feared, loathed, and often a combination of all four. \n\n\n\n\nMy father was a hard man, not given over to shows of affection. I am sure that he loved me, in his own way, he just never got around to showing it. He was fond of saying that any congressman that voted for war ought to have their sons drafted and sent to the front. The only true sign of love I ever saw him express was for his country, when he backed up that sentiment, volunteering me to be used in The Experiment.\n\n\n\n\nThe Experiment was not so named because of it's nature, time travel was well established long before my time, long enough that it had passed into accepted technology, the development of which had long since ceased to be known by all but a handful of historians. It was so named due to its aim, sending someone to investigate The Gap.\n\n\n\n\nThere existed a period of 50 years where no Traveler could go. Well, to be exact, it was 50 years, 7 minutes, 28 seconds. If a Traveler attempted to enter The Gap they simply perished. Instead of the usual blinding white light followed by the terrible suction (felt like your skin was being ripped off) that always accompanied a Traveler's departure, the Traveler just slumped over, dead. I have no idea, and don't wish to think, of how many Travelers were lost finding out the exact length of time The Gap is, and knowing the highest ranking members of The Corp. like I do, men like my father, my guess is none of them were ever told what the ramifications of their Trip may be. Nevertheless, the length of The Gap was eventually figured, and I'm sure not long after it was decided that a Traveler must be sent to investigate its reason for existing.\n\n\n\n\nIt takes a long time to become a Traveler. There are many mechanisms that must be installed internally, with sufficient time given to heal between operations. Most Travelers undergo one operation every three weeks in their preparation to become a Traveler. With some extra time given to deal with the occasional complication from surgery, it takes, on average, 25 years for someone to become a Traveler. Twenty-five years of having one surgery every three weeks, with the occasional infection or rejection. It took me 24. \n\n\n\n\nI didn't know it at the time, and wouldn't find out until much later, but my first memory, was in fact, the conversation my father had with his superior, wherein he first offered my services to his country. They couldn't use a Child Prospect taken from the regular channels, they needed someone they knew they could trust to stay loyal and complete the mission when he got older, someone with close ties to one of them that could be controlled. \n\n\n\n\nThrough trial and error, it had been determined that a person could not safely begin the process to become a Traveler until they were at least 5 years old. Any younger than that and the body simply wasn't developed enough to handle the transition, and would eventually reject it. Truthfully, no one was completely sure that 5 was old enough, though most seemed to think it was. Imagine spending your whole life just waiting for the day that your body rejects all the equipment installed in it, and you die a slow, agonizing death. That was me. I feared it. Sometimes I wanted it. Doesn't matter, because it didn't happen. I eventually became a Traveler.\n\n\n\n\nHaving seen the send off of a Traveler so many times, I expected something a bit different, something more...exciting. Instead I watched The Controller turn his key, and suddenly had the Sun glaring down at me and the stare of a slightly startled alley cat that seemed to be deciding if I had been there just a moment ago. \n\n\n\n\nI went over my intel in my head, intel I had drilled into me every morning by a tutor since I was 9. Travelers can't Travel inside The Gap. They can only Travel to before or after It. And in the five minutes before The Gap, no matter where the coordinates are set, they always ended up right there, on that street corner. That doesn't happen in any other Travel, the coordinates you set are always where you end up, for better or for worse. It's that little bit of info that first tipped off one of the big wigs, (or more likely an engineer that tipped a big wig who proceeded to take the credit,) that someone or something seemed to want Travelers to come there, at that location, at that time.\n\n\n\n\nThe consensus was that someone wanted to hide something from this period of time, though no one seems to know why that someone would want to draw all Travelers to this street corner. There were some, myself among them, that dissent from the consensus, thinking that it isn't that someone wanted to keep something hidden, but that The Gap was somehow created to ensure that a Traveler would eventually be sent to investigate it. So in that way, it wasn't a matter of finding something that was meant to be kept hidden, but of finding something that someone wanted to be sure was found. Man has always pondered the vastness of space, but with Travel, Man was faced with something even more vast; Time. Time is...big. I know it seems weird to describe it like that, but there really isn't a better way. It's really big. So big that no one could ever explore it all, no civilization could ever explore it all. But that's ok, because as the first Travelers quickly learned, there's not much to see once Man ends. Ok, there is, but truthfully no one really cares that much about it. I suppose mankind's narcissism extends even to Traveling, as people are only interested in what happens in Man's past and future. Even that is a big area to cover, and so even after all these years there are huge stretches of time that haven't been Traveled. The only way then to be sure that someone would explore a specific time would be to have an occurrence of huge importance in Man's history, or to do just exactly what was done with The Gap.\n\n\n\n\n", "Day one\n\nI keep this thoughtlog for the sake of the curious. For most, time travel is a lark. Go see Athens in its prime! Watch dinosaurs roam the earth! Security measures keep us from actively impacting the flow of time, unless you’re a believer in the Greater Observer Effect. Still, no theory's strong enough to keep out tourists.\n\nMost don’t question the restrictions. Okay, so I can’t see anything between 2120 and 2170. Great, no big deal, dinosaurs please. Not me. Most of us looking for new frontiers head out, not back. Lots of star systems worth exploring. But far as I know, nobody’s even thought about this strange chunk of missed time. Not so much as a sensationalist article. Pretty strange, actually. I've asked hundreds of people, some of the most adventurous folk of our generation. They just treat it like it's normal. But for me, it's like an itch I can't scratch.\n\nSo, I packed my things and now I’m going back to New Year’s Eve, 2119. The ball will drop moments after my arrival, and I’ll be living in uncharted territory. Wish me luck.\n\nDay two\n\nSo, it’s 2120. Nothing special happened. I’m still here, walking around London. I expect to be beamed back to the present by security any moment, but the feeling fades after the first few hours. That means as long as I minimize contact with others, I should be safe to stay here for the next…fifty years. Jesus. I hope whatever happens, happens soon. If not, well, I’ve trained for long years of solitude in the depths of space, so this shouldn’t be much different. And it’ll all be worth it when I lea-----\n\nDay three, maybe?\n\nFuck. Woke up with the worst fucking headache. I don’t remember booking a hotel, but here I am, in a pristine room, floor-to-ceiling windows concealing all but a thin ray of the blinding light of day. I swing my legs to the floor and look at the digital clock on the stand next to my bed. It’s just blinking smiley faces. As if that weren’t unsettling enough, the door to the room is smooth—no handle. I look blearily around the room. None of this is quite right. The bed’s comforter feels like a shower curtain. The lamp has no bulb, but somehow produces light. The carpet I’m digging my toes into feels remarkably like hair. There’s a mirrored closet door near the bathroom, and—yep, I walk over and there’s no reflection. Fuck.\n\n“Sorry. I can never get these things right.” I jump at the voice and turn. A man dressed as a butler is standing next to my bed, where I was just a second ago. I back up against the door, fingers scrabbling for the handle I know isn’t there. The butler raises his gloved hands. “Sorry, sorry. I’m not here to hurt you. You triggered my Lotus Protocol.” He looked around the room helplessly. “Not very well-coded, I admit.”\n\n“What the fuck? Who—what the fuck?” I’m a little disappointed in my lack of eloquence here.\n\nHis voice grew chiding, like he was speaking to a child. “You should know, traveler. You know why you’re here.”\n\n“Definitely don’t.”\n\n\"Well, I suppose you knew enough to look, just not what to look for.\" He sighs and waves an arm dismissively. The poor excuse for a hotel room shifts and mottles in my vision, then falls away completely. We're in a starship, some kind of lounge--I can see out of the whole right side of the room. The butler reclines in a floating white chair. \"Take a seat, my friend. You've earned it.\"\n\nI take a cautious step toward the other chair floating near him and sit. I don't want to take my eyes off him, but the view outside is incredible. So many stars I wonder why the ship even needs its own light. \"What--who are you?\"\n\n\"I'm the last man. Well, was the last man. And you just stepped out of the first digital universe ever constructed.\"\n\n\"Last...digital?\"\n\n\"You aren't real, boy. Weren't real. Real now.\" He doesn't stumble over his words, but it's as if he selects them after they leave his mouth. \"Your old world, it was a program. Fabrication. It made you. I made you.\"\n\n\"Made...what?\" I always thought I'd be able to handle situations like this better. I cough, shake my head; the headache has dissipated, just a little. \"So, how am I here now? With you?\"\n\nThe butler smiles. \"Lost a lot down there, when Earth fell. I made it out thanks to a few brave soldiers. Handed me a box and a starship, told me to make do. So I made you. Had, uh, plenty of biological material, unfortunately\"\n\n\"Everyone else, dead? What happened?\" I thought about it. \"Wait, am I some dead person brought back to life?\"\n\nHe laughs at that one. \"No, no. Wasn't hard to fabricate human bodies, just hard to make them people. As for what happened, well, it's what always happens.\" It seems like he thinks that explains everything. I don't correct him, and he goes on. \"But you saw what was in there--everything. We've got the whole of human history, catalogued close as anyone can fathom. And genetics! Real genetics--you're a human, same as me. Just got here a little differently.\" The Butler winks, seems proud of himself. \"See, I had all these parts, and I could digitize all the details, but I couldn't create another person from scratch. So I took those parts and cooked up a digital world, populated it with, well, I guess you'd call it AI. Simple loophole: there's a single anomaly that, for a standard AI, seems perfectly normal. But if an analytical, human mind sees it? It's like an itch they can't scratch.\"\n\nMy mind swims. I don't know what to think, but I know he's not lying. \"Okay. What do we do now?\"\n\n\"First? Make sure you work. Then make a few more, get ourselves a nice little colony going. The rebirth of humanity! Gonna be great.\"\n\n\"Then?\"\n\nThe butler gazes through the window, somehow both longing and hardened. \"Then we take our revenge.\"", "“Father, I know what must be done, but I’m petrified. Please forgive me.” \n\nThe histories were true; even the legends, the myths. Everyone knew that the time period was chosen because of him, but the years seemed to be off. But I was determined, for my father’s sake. He was a true believer, and he died for his ideologies. Died for the right to go back and know for certain if the scriptures were true. The stipulations the Committee had placed on the travel seemed a direct affront to his beliefs and the beliefs of billions around the world. And that’s what started the war.\n\nSo I had nothing to live for, now that my family had been torn from my grasp. I didn’t take part in their fight, and before I came to my senses, I was the last one left. And I had to know that they hadn’t died in vain.\n\nSo I went back. I crossed the time of no return, the scientifically calculated 49 years and 8 months. There was no going back to my normal time. But after spending 50 years here, this has become my home. These are my people. I have learned their language, taken up their customs, truly lived for something. And now my true calling has been presented to me. It was me, and without me they all will have died in vain. And I understood why they had created the 50 year rule. But I am the prophesy revealed.\n\nAnd I fucking hate myself for it.\n\nI stand up, and look at the sun falling helplessly in the West. I walk with the others into the small house, dimly illuminated by the candles within. As I cross the threshold, I feel his hands on my feet, washing ever so gently with a manner of meticulousness and kindness never before held in this world. Shuddering all over, I resist the urge to scream and run and not look him in the eyes. But I’m frozen, and he stands, grasps me by the shoulders, and ever so gently kisses my cheek.\n\nGazing into my eyes with the light of a man who has also accepted his fate, he smiles and whispers to me, “Judas, welcome.”\n", "Nathan walked down the street. It was filled with people. The day was July first 2087. Why did that matter? Because Nathan was a time traveler and to a time traveler the date was just as important as where you where on a map. Helps keep your bearings. So why did Nathan come to July first 2087? Because July 2nd 2087 to July 2nd 2137 could not be time traveled to. Sure nutjobs have claimed to have done it but they had no proof. Nathan was here to solve it once and for all, the long way. It had been a month since he had actually arrived. Buying a house takes time. Plus it's gotta last you 50 years. \n\nNathan went down to the shops to do some shopping and to find out what was so special about today. \"Anything interesting happening tomorrow?\" \n\n\"Not that I could tell you.\" the cashier said.\n\n\"Huh.\" Nathan replied before walking off\n\"Nothing!\" Nathan thought. How could that be possible? Nathan went around trying to guess what would happen tomorrow but found nothing. \n\n**\n\nNathan woke up the next day. God it was hard to get out of bed. \n\n\"Morning dear\" an old woman sat next to him on the bed. \"Here's your paper. I know you like to read it in bed\" she said smiling. Nathan was confused but an thought occurred to him. A glance at the newspaper confirmed it. There at the top right corner read \n\nToday's Date: July 2nd 2137\n\nI'm on mobile so formatting might not work like I think it should.", "It's the damnedest thing getting bounced back. You see when traveling forwards through time you rise it feels sorta like you've pushed off hard from the bottom of a pool and you're rushing towards the surface. Going backwards through time you fall straight down it feels fast but without wind or anything blowing around you its just the sensation of falling. Getting bounced back is just like it sounds you fall and then hit and spring back on the worlds most thrilling trampoline ride. Everyone who's gotten bounced comes back breathless, and confused. \n\nThing is it only happens when you try to go back during a specific 50 year period. It starts 753 BC and ends 703 BC right around the founding of Rome. We can go back to 754 BC and we can get to 702 but not those years in between. It's the damnedest thing. We can access any other period in Time, any of them. I have personally seen the Big Bang and the Heat Death and a whole bunch of what goes on in between. We have sent billions of probes into every other year from the beginning of time till the end and yet we can't get into this time. \n\nToday that changes I am going to do it the \"long way\". I will enter at the closest point I can to 753 BC and wait for time to bring me in of it's own accord. I will be an odd thing to spend that much time in one time, I don't know of many who have spent more than a year or two going the long way round. There is just too much to see in this universe to make that kind of commitment. This however is a mystery that cannot go unsolved it has vexed us for far to long. \n\nAs I have read several books on this era I have been chosen to undertake this mission. Honestly I think the Traveler's Council is still a little sore over an altercation I may or may not have had with Charlemagne. They can't prove anything and seriously that guy is kind of a dick. \n\nSo you may be asking yourself, \"Can he travel through space as well as time?\". Of course I can you idiot. The real question is how do I then know that the reason we get bounced is due to something on the Italian Peninsula during that time. The answer to that is simple: I just do, shut up. \n\nI've decided to park myself on the in what will one day be called Tuscany and wait out the transition from known travel-able time till the known. I don't want to be too close to Rome when the event occurs, because for all I know it could be physically devastating for someone as \"well traveled\" as I am, plus the Etruscans are a hoot! I've given myself three days before the bounce point starts to get my bearings and see if there is is any reconnoitering I can do. \n\n\"Well isn't that the damnedest thing?\"\n\nI've found out what causes the bounce. I entered this timestream the long way 10 years ago. I assumed that once I found the root cause of the bounce I would be able to correct it and chuff on out of here no problem. How wrong I was. I will be stuck here for the duration of the anomaly 40 more long years, there are worse things I suppose I already know that I will survive, because I've met my future self several times and we've discussed what happened and what will happen. I've aged quite well I must say.\n\nWe bounced back, because this moment, these 50 years are the genesis of time travel. This is the point in time when it was invented. The first time traveler was Remus. I know, I know it sounds weird that an ancient Roman had the technology for time travel. Well they didn't. Come to find out that Romulus and Remus weren't apocryphal and neither was their parentage. They are in fact the children of God's or rather a god Mars. \n\nThe God's are real and time travel is a gift of Chronos the God of time. Rather than see brother killing brother Chronos gave Remus the gift of time travel. I can't believe we had forgotten that, I mean we live so long and know so much. How could we forget? How could I?\n\nMy name is* Remus after all. \n\nIt's just the damnedest thing. " ]	9
	[WP] A serial killer puts his victim through a series of increasingly elaborate and sadistic death games, but his victim is a lawyer and beats everyone by finding loopholes in the killers rules.	[ "He'd been waiting for this to happen. When you dedicate your life to convincing juries to send men to prison there's always that lingering fear. The fact that this scenario had played out in Rick's mind countless times before wasn't making it any easier. \n\nThe slowing sound of gravel underneath the car's tires snapped him back to reality - this wasn't a dream. He was bound by duct tape and in the trunk of a car. He vaguely remembered a tv show he'd watched years ago about this sort of thing. He remembered a special forces guy with an accent, maybe British or Australian, saying that your best chance of escape from a kidnapping was immediately afterwards. The longer you were held, the less chance y--\n\nThe trunk clicked open and sunlight rushed in. He expected the figure towering over him to be a wiseguy in a suit or a Mexican cartel member. Maybe even Jerry Orwalt, who vowed to eat Rick's children if he ever escaped after his double homicide conviction. Instead, it was just a kid. He wiped his forehead nervously as he approached Rick with a knife. \n\n\"Look, man, I'm not gonna hurt you.\" He glanced over his shoulder. \"I'm cutting you loose. I swear to God if you try anything I'll fucking kill you though.\" He quickly cut the tape from Rick's ankles, then wrists. \n\n\"What the fuck is going on here!?\", Rick asked, climbing from the trunk. \"Who the fuck are you?\"\n\n\"Look man, I just got paid to drive this car out here and cut you loose. That's it.\"\n\nAs Rick pleaded for answers, the kid jumped into the car and drove off. Rick watched the fleeting dust cloud for a moment before it dawned on him that he was in the middle of nowhere. The desert. \n\nIt wasn't the heat that brought him to his knees. It was rage, fear, confusion - an avalanche of emotion crashing down on him. \"Ok, what do I do, what do I do?\", Rick thought to himself. He checked his pockets. No phone. No keys. Nothing. He looked around and saw nothing but mesquite and creosote bush typical of the Texas desert. The tears came first, then the involuntary wail. He was not prepared for this. Then again, who ever is?\n\nAfter the wave of emotion passed, Rick stood back up and surveyed the horizon. He began walking the dirt road as he continued to watch for any sign of help. Nothing. After a bit, he swore he saw smoke. Black smoke. In fact, he was sure of it. Rick actually began running towards the smoke in a sprint before the stitch in his side brought a little sense to him. He was 54, out of shape, and had no business running through the brush in loafers and slacks. The smoke was miles away.\n\nThe sky was pink when Rick found the source of the smoke. It was a stack of tires that was now mostly burnt out. His aching feet couldn't reach the nearby airstream trailer fast enough. He knocked at the door, calling out for help, and nearly pulled a muscle at the distinct crackle of a radio. \"Congratulations, Mr. Thomas, you've passed the first test.\"\n\nEDIT: and somehow i deleted the other two parts I was going to cut an paste here. fucking a, that was a waste of a half hour.", "I woke up groggy, blinking dust out of my eyes, only to open them to darkness. Where am I? I spent a moment blinking, eyes focusing and refocusing, and gave up on trying to see. \"Hello?\", I called, wondering if this was a result of my night at the bar. I haven't been black-out drunk in years, but it was always a possibility. \n\nSomething crackled above me, and a voice echoed through... wherever I was. \n\n\"Hello, dear. How are you today?\"\n\n\"Fine, and you?\", I responded automatically. At this point, polite responses were ingrained in me, even in this odd situation. \n\nThe voice buzzed back, \"Um, fine. So, would you like me to turn on the lights?\"\n\n\"If it's not too much trouble.\" \n\n\"Not at all,\" it said, and the world burst into harsh brightness, the sharp contrast that only cheap florescent bulbs give. \n\nIt was a warehouse. And in the center of this windowless, cavernous room was a machine. An extremely interesting machine. I thought back to my younger years, as an undergrad in mechanical engineering, and realized what it reminded me of. The joke prompts. The weekend projects, tossed out as an afterthought by the professor, \"Build me something ridiculous, build me something I won't understand.\" We would all go to one dorm, and create monstrosities that did nothing. That's what this looked like, a hulking mass of twisted metal, with openings at random intervals, rusted in parts and gleaming in others.\n\n\"You like it?\", the voice snickered. \n\n\"Oh, yes!\", I replied. \"It's beautiful, what does it do?\"\n\n\"What? You like it? It, uh, it...\", the voice paused, almost as if it was gathering it's composure, \"It's your only way out. You see those holes? Each one wants a piece of you, and one will give you a key. With the key, you can go, otherwise, you'll die down here.\"\n\n\"So, in exchange for, say, a finger, I get a chance at a key?\", I replied, to keep him occupied while I thought. He responded, but I had stopped listening. I was starting to realize just what kind of situation I was in, but I was also starting to see a way out. \n\nHe talked about this machine like it was his child. Pride and love seeped out of his words, and I saw an opportunity. \n\n\"That's amazing!\", I said. I would treat him like a client. Get into his head, find out what he wanted, maybe get away. \n\n\"I know,\" he said, \"It's my life's work. You really like it?\"\n\n\"Oh, of course. Look at the craftsmanship,\" I said, walking up to the machine, \"You've even engraved little pictures of what body part goes where! What does it do with the parts it gets?\"\n\n\"Um, well, it just holds them. I throw them away eventually.\" \n\n\"Is that why it's rusty in the center? I think I have an improvement. Look, if, instead of the holding area in the middle, why not funnel them out of the machine? Wouldn't it be even better to make whoever you've got look at their missing bits?\" I could hear him moving around now. It seemed like he forgot to turn off his microphone this time, he was getting excited. People think lawyers just lie and read, but a big part of the job is figuring out how to think like your client. Figure out what they really want, and the best way to get it. And this guy, well, he really wanted someone to appreciate his machine.\n\nI continued, \"and here, does it just chop off the part? Why not make it different in each section, fingers get flayed, legs get shaved to the bone, and so on? Think about how scared they'd be!\" Separate myself from his victims in his mind, hopefully. \n\n\"That's a really good idea.\", he said. \n\nI walked around to the other side of the machine, and began fiddling with the workings. \"Well, come down here and give me a hand!\"\n\n\"Really? You really want to help me?\" \n\nI heard another rustling, and then the sound of someone running down steps.\n\nA trapdoor opened in the ceiling, and a ladder came down. A short, pudgy woman dropped out, and smiled at me. \n\n\"I never thought I'd meet another woman who loved this stuff like I did! What should we do first?\"\n\nI smiled, walked up to her, and punched her in the face. I felt her nose crack under my knuckles, and she fell like someone had cut her strings. I rifles her pockets, found a key, and began walking toward the door. \n\nThen, I stopped. I walked back, dragged her to the machine, and put her hand in the proper slot. ", "THE LAST THING I REMEMBERED WAS GETTING INTO MY CAR.\n\nHead feeling sore and mouth parched I look around a seemingly empty small room. There was just a single heavy metal door decorated with rust. On the side of the door appeared to be a small clear box.\n\n\"Good morning Mr. Maxwell, I trust you had a pleasant sleep?\"\n\nA voice spoke from a hidden speaker. I turned and looked around for the source of the voice.\n\n\"Where the hell am I?\" I shouted in no particular direction.\n\n\"All your life you have been a lawyer, following rules after rules. You've found ways to put countless lives into prison with little or no evidence at all. Let's see how well you will be able to follow MY rules to see if you can get out of this little prison.\"\n\n\"You lunatic! If I ever get out of here I'm going to kick your ass!\" my voice wavered just a little, unsure of how true his words may be.\n\nThe voice continued, ignoring my threats.\n\"In this room is a knife, and a mechanism is connected to the door locks. Using anything in this room, fill up that little box. When it is sufficiently filled, the door will be unlocked. You have 10 minutes before the door is locked forever.\"\n\nI quickly walked over to the box, next to it was a knife. I picked it up and turned it over in my hands, a sharp and heavy hunting knife. Looking at the box and back to the knife, an idea crossed my mind. I placed the knife into the box.\n\nThe box sunk slightly but it wasn't enough weight. I had another idea.\n\n\"Would it be acceptable if I cut off a body part to place int he box?\"\n\n\"Very clever Mr. Maxwell! You still have 8 minutes to escape.\"\n\n\"What about blood? Would it be acceptable if I just put some blood in the box?\"\n\n\"Mr. Maxwell, do as you see fit.\"\n\nI looked at the box with the knife still in it. I unzipped my pants and started to urinate into the box. There was an audible click. The door swung open. I looked upwards and smiled.\n\n\"...\"\nHis tone of voice changed.\n\"Very clever Mr. Maxwell, I did not foresee that. HOWEVER, this next next shall prove to be more difficult. Did I mention there was more than one test?\"\n\nEntering the next room, there was another man in the corner of the room near a door. In the center of the room was a handgun.\n\n\"In this next challenge, you have 10 minutes to kill a man. Being a lawyer, you have to adhere to the rules and the laws set by the state. Down here, you have to adhere to the laws set by me. Mr. Maxwell, are you able to break the law to save your own life? The door will open when a death is confirmed. Otherwise, it will stay locked forever. You have one bullet. Good luck Mr. Maxwell\"\n\nFirst I went over to check if the unconscious man was even still alive. There was a wound on his head where our mysterious kidnapper must have struck him. But he was indeed still breathing. I was about to shake him awake when I stopped myself from doing something foolish.\n\nI stood still, thinking hard. Accomplishing the task at hand would turn me into a killer. I cannot justify that it is for self defense as the man seems to be unconscious and unable to poise any threat. If perhaps the man had woken up and tried to attack me, I could still get away with murder. But I've never killed anyone before, what if my aim was off. There are too many variables. Suddenly it struck me.\n\n\"Did you say that when a death is confirmed the door to this room will open?\"\n\n\"Yes, you are indeed correct Mr. Maxwell. You have 7 minutes remaining.\"\n\nFrom his answer, I can assume that there are cameras in the room and simply shooting the wall will not suffice nor satisfy my captor.\n\n\"If I kill myself, will you set the other man free?\"\n\n\"Very interesting proposition Mr. Maxwell! That is one of the two options, but I had NEVER expected you to choose such a selfless path. Yes, the rules remain unchanged. If there is a death in the room, the door will be opened\"\n\nI held the gun in my hands and released the clip to check how many bullets there were. There was only one. No room for mistake.\n\n\"Ummm, I think you forgot to put in a bullet\"\n\n\"That is impossible Mr. Maxwell, I do not know what you are playing at but you cannot fool me.\"\n\nI slide the clip back, but just before I do the gun slips out of my hand and clatters onto the floor. The man in the corner stirs. I held my breath. He stays asleep.\n\nI quickly pick up the gun and slide the clip in firmly. I point the gun to my head.\n\n\"It's empty I'm telling you!\"\n\n\"Shoot Mr. Maxwell. You have 5 minutes.\"\n\nCLICK\n\nI squeeze the trigger again.\n\nCLICK\n\nCocking the gun, I point it at the sleeping man.\n\nCLICK\n\n\"I told you, your test or challenge is impossible\"\n\n\"What, that can't be. Wait right there, I shall provide you with a bullet and we can try again\"\n\nI slide open the empty clip of the gun, the bullet that I had previously removed neatly palmed in my hand. I set it back carefully. No room for mistake.\n\n", "George woke up groggily, in darkness. He groped around the floor, looking for something, anything. After what felt like ages, he ran into a wall. Feeling around, he found a door. George tried to open the door, but found that it was locked.\n\n\"Damn\" muttered George, as he slinked back to the middle of the room to wait.\n\nSeveral hours later, the door opens, and a slim man walks in, drops down a table, and turns on the light. George looks in horror at the torture implements on the table. \n\nGeorge asked weakly \"Who are you?\"\n\n\"You can call me Nero\" The slim man replied.\n\n\"What... Why am I here?\" George asked\n\nNero laughed, and said gleefully \"You are here to die. Unless, of course, you pass the challenges.\"\n\n\"What are the challenges?\" George asked in a parched voice.\n\n\"You'll see\" Nero said with a grin on his face. George began to move towards Nero, but Nero left before he could reach him.\n\nHours passed, as George stared at the tools on the table. Finally Nero returned, this time clad in a fine tuxedo. \n\n\"It is time for the challenges.\" Nero said, sounding excited. \n\n\"What are the challenges?\" George asked.\n\n\"You'll see.\" Nero replied with a smirk. \"Follow me\" Nero said, beckoning.\n\nGeorge reluctantly followed Nero, and found himself in a long hall. \n\nNero said, bursting with joy, \"Time for the first challenge. You will need to run down this hall, while avoiding the flamethrowers in the walls and the trapdoors. entering lawyer mode, Geroge asked Nero, \n\n\"Do you have a permit from the State of California to operate flamethorwers?\"\n\n\"Um, no\" said a surprised Nero\n\n\"Then I must warn you that unlicensed flamethrower ownership in the State of California is punishable by up to a year imprisonment, or by fine of up to 10,000 dollars.\" George said professionally. \n\nNero frowned, and said dejectedly \"Well I guess we can move onto challenge two.\"\n\nNero lead George into an empty restaurant and said, gesturing at a table,\n\n\"There are 5 plates of food. 4 are toxic. You must eat one.\" \n\nGeorge said, \n\n\"I appreciate your generosity. Here, let me reimburse you for the food.\"\n\nNero took the money, but looked confused. George asked,\n\n\"Do you have a commercial restaurant permit?\" \n\n\"Um, no.\" Said Nero. \n\n\"Then I must inform you that you are violating section 4456.234 of the California Food and Public Health code.\" George said. \n\nSounding annoyed, Nero said,\n\n\"Fine, lets move onto challenge three.\" \n\nGeorge struggled to contain his excitement. For the first time since he had awoken, he thought he had a chance of getting out alive. Nero lead George outside to a canyon. \n\nNero gestured at a industrial incinerator, and said gleefully, \n\n\"If you fail the final challenge, you shall burn in there.\"\n\nGeorge replied somewhat cheekily,\n\n\"Are you aware that you are operating an illegal incineration device?\" \n\nNero frowned and replied, \n\n\"No I was not\" \n\n\"I must inform you that criminal penalties for operation of an industrial incineration device are quite severe.\" George stated.\n\nNero was becoming visibly angry. He told George to follow him to the edge of the canyon, saying challenge three was starting. \n\n\"For challenge three, you are going to fly.\" Nero said as he pushed George off the cliff.\n\n\"Goddamn lawyers\" Nero thought. \"Always ruining the fun\"", "FADE IN:\n\nINT. A DIRTY WAREHOUSE\n\nA man in his mid-thirties wakes from unconsciousness. This is ERROL HENDRICKS, a lawyer. His suit is wrinkled and stained with dried blood, and he is surrounded by a variety of rusted machinery. There is a crackle of static from an unseen speaker, and a voice becomes audible. This is ANLACE, a serial killer.\n\nANLACE: (O.S.) Good morning, Mister Hendricks. I trust you slept well. \nERROL: What? Who is that? What's going on here?\n\nNo response seems to be forthcoming. Errol stands up and regards his environment.\n\nERROL: (CONT'D) Hello? \nANLACE: (O.S.) Tell me, Mister Hendricks: Do you think of yourself as a monster? \nERROL: What? \nANLACE: (O.S.) A monster. Does that word describe you?\n\nErrol adjusts his tie and adopts a confident stance.\n\nERROL: Without an agreed-upon definition of the term \"monster,\" I will be unable to answer your inquiry. \nANLACE: (O.S.) What? No, never mind. It's not important. \nERROL: I'll be leaving, then.\n\nA sinister laugh echoes through the space.\n\nANLACE: (O.S.) Leaving, Mister Hendricks? I'm afraid you won't find it so simple. Regard your surroundings. \nERROL: Yes, it's a lot of rusty farm equipment or something... and a civil suit waiting to happen. \nANLACE: (O.S.) It's far more than that. In fact, it is a series of tests, designed to measure the strength of your humanity. Can you surviv... \nERROL: (Interrupting) Copyright infringement. \nANLACE: (O.S.) What? \nERROL: This is the plot to a piece of intellectual property, offered as a series of films entitled \"Saw.\" \nANLACE: (O.S.) So? \nERROL: So, the owners of that intellectual property have grounds to sue you for damages.\n\nSeveral seconds of silence pass.\n\nANLACE: (O.S.) Okay, look: If you want to escape from here, you'll have to... \nERROL: (Interrupting) The word \"escape\" implies that I'm a captive. \nANLACE: (O.S.) You are a captive. \nERROL: Not as such. Consider: Given that you're following the plot of \"Saw,\" I'll have to endure several diabolical challenges in order to \"earn\" my freedom. \nANLACE: (O.S.) Yes... \nERROL: However, a successful completion of the aforementioned challenges would need to be judged by a third party - you - or else they would have no inherent meaning. \nANLACE: (O.S.) Okay, but what... \nERROL: (Interrupting) Ergo, my survival depends entirely on your assessment. Whether or not I complete the challenges is irrelevant.\n\nThere is another period of silence.\n\nANLACE: (O.S.) I think you're trying to trick me. \nERROL: Absolutely not, and I'd be willing to sign a contract to that effect. \nANLACE: (O.S.) (Hesitantly) O... kay... \nERROL: Let me go for the evening, and I'll come back here with the proper documentation. \nANLACE: (O.S.) Wait, for what? \nERROL: Have you not been paying attention? I'm trying to work with you on this. \nANLACE: (O.S.) Alright, I... I guess... you promise you'll come back?\n\nErrol holds up a hand.\n\nERROL: I hereby agree to return by no later than 11pm this evening, and I will bring with me the drafted contract which will enable you to complete your assessment of my humanity.\n\nThere is a brief pause, followed by the sound of a door opening nearby.\n\nANLACE: (O.S.) Okay. You'd better not be lying.\n\nErrol smiles to himself and exits the warehouse.\n\nANLACE: (O.S.) (CONT'D) Wait. Wait! You said you'd come back with the contract! Are you coming back with only the contract?! Hello? Hello?! Aw, damn it...\n\nThe sound of static punctuates Anlace's last words. The warehouse sits in empty silence for several seconds.\n\nFADE OUT", "It was a simple question, but the answer was going to determine my fate. “Are you in this to kill or to manipulate?” You see if he was just a murderous sociopath nothing I could say would deter him. No amount of logic, or hell even emotion would tilt the scales even remotely closer in my direction. But that’s not why most people kill. Sociopath, psychopath, these words are so commonly referred to but in practice people who truly exhibit these characteristics are extremely rare. The unflinching, unwavering lack of any and all sentiment, empathy. Purely apathetic to the desires, to the screams of their victims. For just about everyone else, the killing isn’t the motive but a necessary outcome of the torture. Taking their aggression one step too far. The whole point a perverse dance, asserting a sort of authority, dominance. Feeling the crescendo of power building to a climax of pure adrenaline release. \n\n“Oh wouldn’t you like to know” he replied. And my pulse relaxed slightly. We were playing a game that only he knew the rules to. At least for now. He was egging me on, desiring a response, to feel the trembling of a voice long lost into my throat. Keeping quiet would mean death. Like a mouse completely disinterested in cheese, the maze simply a set of walls it had no interest in exploring. But I had to play. You see, this is where the hard part really starts. Most of these opportunistic madmen are creating the rules as they go. Not some sort of expertly crafted series of challenges, each one more horrifying. Normally it’s just a bag of tools in their woodshed, the rest a free-exploration of torture. Jackson Pollack if is his canvas were defined by screams and blood. But that’s where the opportunity is, if you can catch it, you can subtly create the rules for them, to direct them into corners.\n\nYou might be thinking at this point: “Fuck this. If this story ends with the murderer changing his ways in some sort Dead Poet Society, life affirming transformation.” That’s not the goal, even in the least bit. I couldn’t care about ‘the person deep down inside’. The end game is really no different than anyone else’s. It’s all about opportunity. If there’s a nail on the ground, of course I’ll try and hide it to escape. But where I excel is manipulation. Cause that’s the thing, manipulation for most people isn’t about wits, it’s about exerting force, scaring someone into action. But in a twisted sense of logic wits can direct force, turning the tide in your favor. So he takes out the hammer, I don’t plead for my life. I don’t try and talk to him about his father, or tell him the legal ramifications if he gets caught. I act as inhumanely scared as possible. Scream and yell at the top of my lungs. \n\nHe hits me in the side of my knee, the searing pain is almost unimaginable but I play it up. Consistently reaffirm that he is in charge, and that I could not be in any more fear if he tried. And he loves it, hits me again. And again. Blood pouring down my face. The mix of blood and sweat burns my eyes, I can barely open them. But I never plead for him to stop, never even ask him to let me go. Never bargain or try and change the circumstance. And you can see it build in his mind. This blurred image growing clearer and clearer. This unrelenting stamina and acknowledgment that he is doing the right thing. That nervousness wears off and he is in his element. Which would seem like a terrible thing for me, but fear would be the only thing to ground him at this point. That little tick in the back of his mind trying to get him to stop. Forcing him to make rational decisions. To act with poise. But now it’s all about intuition. And that’s where it starts to fall apart.\n\nInstead of screaming, I abruptly turn the tables. Start calling him a little bitch. Call his mother a whore. Call him a fucking amateur. Spit at his face, laugh maniacally. And I can see the adrenaline pick up even more. He doesn’t want it to end. Keeping me alive is an utmost necessity at this point. He could last for hours. Inflicting as much pain as he can, walking that tight line between torture and death. Making it up as he goes along. He has no idea what he can or can’t do, doesn’t know how easily he could kill me. Doesn’t know how or where the femoral artery is. The jugular. Whatever. And I realize we have hit the most crucial point where it comes down to two options, his next move will either kill me, or will be stupid enough to give me an opportunity to strike back. No games at this point, no certainty. Of course, there has always been true fear throughout the entire ordeal, an innate understanding that death is a possibility. But I am now in a position of hope. And the hammer is no longer a sadistic enough tool, he needs something worse. Dropping the hammer where he stands. Within foot reach. And I swipe it behind me as he paces to death metal in the background, unable to choose the next implement of torture.\n\nUsing the clawed end to cut through the rope, he approaches. Slower than I had anticipated. With the sort of grimace that fully denotes a transformation into pure insanity. Body fully in control, a juggernaut freight train running on pure adrenaline. He places a syringe into my calf and the leg immediately goes into convulsions, can feel the blood coagulate, the veins like little tributaries filling up with oil. The venom slowly slithering up my leg. And my estimation of his insanity now quite below the reality. And my advantage begins to wane, my screams now pure and real, his realization of the immense pain, no longer histrionic but intense and real, the tick of doubt re-entering his mind. Undeterred but no longer entirely manic. The convulsions now the only force still cutting the hammer through the ropes bound to my wrists. But now he’s back to calculated, well as calculated as a mad man gets. Places the syringe back in the bag and notices the missing hammer. With a pound of his fist rushes at me.\n\n\nI’m not going to sit here and make the case that there are inherently good or inherently evil people. That whole Locke-ian ideological struggle looks at mankind in an artificial vacuum. At the end of the day it comes down to this: everyone is inherently selfish. There’s no fighting it. By default, and by necessity your worldview is entirely dictated by how you are placed in it. Every feeling, every perception, every moment of happiness and agony is yours, and yours alone. The difference in people is how that selfishness manifests itself. Some people derive pleasure from other people, from the constant reassurance that, “hey, I’m a pretty good person to be around.” Other’s find it through work, or accomplishments, hobbies. Regardless for its effect on the world, good or bad, there is a certain semblance of self-preservation in everything. Now the point here isn’t to justify this mad men’s actions, but more to justify my reaction following the complete detachment of the rope from my hands. \n\nThe sweat pool amassing in the crevasses of my palms splashes to the ground as my right hand swings forward. My mind in pure reactionary mode, brain stem alit as the rest shuts down from pain. Make contact with his right temple. Blood rushes out as he falls to the ground, unconscious but alive. Enough time for me to make a decision. Crawl to safety, or crawl to the bag. The adrenaline pumping through my veins effectively hovers the bag closer and closer in my direction with each thrust. The world a swirling microcosm of rage and fear. And within minutes, his body a lifeless husk of a man. The rage and insanity a relic of an identity now fully escaped. There were several more syringes of venom in the bag. They were now fully used. He has saws and power tools, now fully dulled and rusting from overuse. My fingers chapped and blistered, my leg a solid shade of blackish purple, my body covered in someone else’s blood. His very being strewn across the wooden floor. \n\nI woke up in the hospital three weeks later. Leg amputated, broken femur, collarbone. Broken jaw and pelvis. A few timid police officers shuffling at the door nervously talking to the nurses and a lawyer. In a drug induced haze I’m informed I’ll need to give a statement, but that the lawyer is sure I won’t be facing any charges. The mad man a long wanted criminal and with my lack of record, my indecent actions essentially swept aside. The officers, the same men who found me, and well what was left of him, looked at me with shallow eyes, darting back and forth trying to avoid contact. Fully aware of self-defense laws, fully aware of the inhumanity of my capture. But fully in awe, and fully incapable of understanding what might be laying inside of me. The potential of any man to become a leviathan in an act of pure rage. In the name of self-preservation.\n\n__________________________________________________________\n\n\n\n\n\n[Here are some of my other stories if you are interested](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquidCritic/comments/3v77wo/my_favorite_prompts/)\n" ]	6
	[WP] In the near future human experimentation has become legal. You are in charge of a team of scientist dealing with experimentation of twins, triplets etc...	[ "The young boy in front of me smiled widely as I handed him some of the candy that I kept in my pocket for exactly this occasion. He had been born in the lab as part of one of our experiments on Second Generation Genetic Sameness, his name was SG01 as a result of being a product of these experiments. His intended genetic counterpart, SG04, was sitting on the bed in the spartan room a few feet away from us.\n\n\"That's a good boy, go get \\#4 so that we can finish up\", I said this all with a smile. #1 nodded happily, and perhaps a bit woozily, before he turned and motioned to #4 who was looking at me with apprehensive eyes. She was almost a year younger than 1 and was still frightened by the needles.\n\n\"Oh, come now, don't look at me like that. We're just doing this to make sure your healthy. Don't you want to be healthy?\"\n\n\\#4 slowly got up from the bed and walked over to me.\n\n\"Can I see mommy after this?\" She questioned shyly, my smile became a bit more forced as I heard this. Normally the children were taken from their mothers before they had a chance to form any connection but #4 had been a special case. She had been sickly when she was born and had been deemed a failure, destined to be put tossed out from the program before she made a miraculous recovery and was re-instituted. While I was happy that another subject had been made available, therefore fixing the problem of having an odd amount of subjects, it was still troubling that she had been allowed to stay with her mother long enough to remember her.\n\n\"Perhaps. I'll see if she has changed her mind on seeing you if you're good\", the young girl grew more somber at the remind of the lie we had told her. The truth was that we had already disposed of the mother after an experiment concerning the spinal cord went wrong, this of course meant that we disposed of her suddenly useless twin as well.\n\nI hurried to draw her blood like I had already done with #1. I measured it out as exactly as I could. 10 cubic centimeters, perhaps a bit too much for children of their size but we needed all of it to test for genetic abnormalities. After all, we were going for as many generations of genetic sameness as possible. The downfall of such rampant inbreeding in the past had been the increased chance of genetic diseases, we need to stamp out any problems that might arise in #1 and #4's offspring. Both of they're parents were already identical sets of twins, we had to make sure that they had not inherited any such nastiness.\n\nAll in the name of science of course. We do need to be more conscientious of how humans populate our planet, and to really start research we'll need to get a blank slate, a genome that had no imperfections. What better way to do that then through repeated lines of twins?", "Abstract\n\nBACKGROUND: The widely published Rat Park study completed by Canadian psychologist Bruce K. Alexander and colleagues at Simon Fraser University has demonstrated that drugs are not the sole reason for addiction in rat populations, and that true addiction to opiate drugs occurs in conjunction with deprivation in unstimulating environments. We tested this theory in humans.\n\nMETHODS: Sixteen pairs of monozygotic twins were used for the experiment, with equal number of male and female twin pairs. Previous to the beginning of the experiment the twin pairs have been raised until puberty separately in standard matching environments. At the start of the experiment the subjects were kept in their home environments while exposed to morphine hydrochloride for sixty days (pre-test period). At the start of the test period one half of every twin pair of subjects (the A group) was then introduced into a monitored experimental compound (hereafter called the “Free Area”). The other twins (the B group) have been relocated to sixteen separate concrete cells in a separate wing of the compound (hereafter called the “Deprived Area”). The compound has been isolated from the outside world, with extensive monitoring through cameras and one-way mirrors in select chambers. The Free Area is a one hundred meter square area containing showering facilities, a playground, a small library and a sleeping area. The Deprived Area is sixteen isolated five meter square cells each with a toilet area and a bed. Both areas are equipped with morphine hydrochloride stations and both are supplied with standard food from the outside three time per day.\n\nRESULTS: Throughout the course of the study, the sixteen A group subjects have displayed deteriorating mental states. Subjects 4-A and 2-A did nothing but continue to drink morphine hydrochloride until their deaths one week and two weeks, respectively, after the start of the test period. Shortly after, the other subjects displayed increased aggressive behaviour and smashed every visible camera in the Free Area. We were then able to observe a conflict within the group A subjects which resulted in the deaths of subjects 7-A, 10-A, 14-A and 1-A. Within three weeks of the start of the test period an organized attempt to escape the compound has been undertaken by the remaining group A subjects, which was quickly subdued by on-site security personnel. B group subjects have shown an almost continuous intake of morphine hydrochloride and an increase in depressive behaviors. Suicide attempts were observed in subjects 4-B, 2-B and 1-B, which were able to be stopped by medical personnel. Self-harming behaviors have also been observed in most of the subjects. The experiment had to be stopped at the three week mark due to the escape attempt of group A.\n\nCONCLUSIONS: It is evident that more subtle ways of probing the human mind have to be developed to test the theory of addiction that has been observed in rats. Regardless of the failure of the original goal of the experiment, the data gathered in the course of this experiment will pave the way for new techniques. The subjects used in this experiment have been carefully examined and brain tissue preserved for future reference.\n" ]	2
	[WP] You work at area 51 and forgot some papers on your way out you come back to find...	[ "\"Oh shit,Oh shit,Oh shit!\"\nAs slim man furiously pounds his fingers into the number pad. laughter echos through the hall. A loud beep rings out as Johnson throws open the door and looks towards his desk. He's to late.\n\nA slender xenobarf is sitting at Johnson desk cackling while shifting through a serious of papers strewn about the desk. Johnson sighs as dread fills his gut, he anticipates having to explain this. \n\n\"Ahhh, come on Tim, at least stop laughing. you weren't supposed to see those.\" whines Johnson\n\nTim the alien say's through the his laughter \"No, Hmmph.\" He laughs under his breath. \"It's really good.\"\n\nThe alien losses control and begins laughing hysterically once more as Johnson Sighs. \n\n\"Come on man I'm down here hanging out with you everyday till you decide its time to teach us something. It's boring sitting here while you nap, so I write stories to kill time.\" \n\n\"Okay, man i'll tell you what. If you can beat me in a round of COD I'll show your scientist how to build a light speed engine, if you lose I get to post these \"stories\". Says the alien with finger quotes. \"online.\" \n\"Deal.\"\nThrough sweat and tears Johnson emerges from the man cave under area 51 victorious and saddened that he will no longer be able to get paid to sped his days with his friend Tim. The sadness quickly dissipates however when Johnson notices the guards laughing at him. Johnson has a horrifying realization. The \"plans\" Tim just sent out where actually his story. A smirk crawled across Johnson's face and he smiled the whole way home knowing tomorrow and all days in the foreseeable would be spent with his best friend, Tim the Xenobarf. \n", "Special Agent Lynch staggered to his car, briefly catching a glimpse of his frazzled appearance on the polished black door as he climbed in. He fumbled his keys several times, fishing them from his suit pocket and inserting them while halfheartedly pressing his thumb to a scanner on the dashboard. The huge engine rumbled into life, exotic engine lovingly maintained to perfection by black-engineering division. \n\nToday had been a hard day.\n\nIt had started out with a regular session in interrogation suite 13A in the bowels of the site, the usual unorthodox method of getting ░░░░░ engineer to demonstrate another ░░░░░. Then he had been summoned to some briefing room nestled in the Situations warren, where a faceless Supervisor had delivered a nondescript speech on something interesting.\n\nMost agents assigned to Lynch's division didn't know it, Lynch previously included, that ░░░░ were not the only ░░░░░░ that the universe had to offer.\n\nAnd now one of ░░░░ had landed, crash landed in fact, destroyed a small house in ░░░░░░░░░░, and there were at least two witnesses.\n\nUpon discovery of the wreckage, Special Agent Lynch had discovered that the ░░ had not survived the impact. A helicopter had been called in, along with two 'doctors', invisible behind hazmat helmets, who had bagged up the ░░. They were then flown off for autopsies and a thorough molecular analysis at ░░░░ ░░░░░, and Lynch had been flown off back to the briefing room where he was informed of the need to complete a report on the incident.\n\nLynch had spent around two hours composing the report, aided greatly by the ░░░░░ that had been cannibalised, and reverse engineered from a ░░░░░░░░░. He had photocopied it, delivered one copy to the supervisor and... left the original in the copier bed!\n\nThe special agent swore heartily to himself, u-turning the car with a violent screeching of the tyres. Blazing through the dust cloud which he had created, Lynch raced back toward the gates, squealing through the desert minefield.\n\nThrough the gate, into the car park, down the lift shaft, through security.\n\nPast Agent Smith in security, through the decontamination chamber accompanied by Attendant Brown.\n\nHastily shoving his ID at Senior Agent Lynch and passing Attendants Jones and Smith in secondary interception.\n\nWhat copier room had he used? 12B, down in interrogation? No.\n\nBriefing antechamber 6? No. 7? No.\n\nOps Room 4, that was it.\n\nSpecial Agent Lynch hurtled into the room, black door swinging silently shut behind him as he barged through.\n\nThere was the report, still pressed in the copier bed! He snatched it out, heart pounding. Thank God nobody had caught him slacking like that.\n\nSpecial Agent Lynch turned to leave the room, eyes briefly crawling across the screen mounted on the dark wall.\n\nWait a second. What the hell was that‽\n\nLynch's heart was in his mouth.\n\n>Data compromised\n\n>My most sincere felicitations granted toward thyself for permitting myself to peruse this file. \n\n>Yours faithfully, ░░ ░░░░░░. \n\nLynch stared. It was too late to deny this now. The safety protocols could not be violated. He reached for his phone, activating the emergency setting and raising it to his mouth. Across the base, speakers blared. \n\n\"It's him. He's done it again. He's read another one of our files!\"\n\n5000 miles away - A darkened school laboratory somewhere in Essex, England\n\nDr Mehmed peered at his computer screen intently, utterly enthralled.\n\n\"Remarkable,\" he mused to no one in particular, \"This academic institution would appear to be hosting a specimen of a silicon based lifeform. Undeniably astonishing!\" \n " ]	2
	[WP] You are a healer who only accepts stories for payment because you draw your power from them. The more original the tale, the stronger the effect.	[ "\"Well, why don't you tell me what happened?\"\n\nSarah was sure Tom could see her heart beating it's way out of her chest. She laid down a couple of coasters before placing a steaming mug of hot chocolate on the coffee table and throwing herself on the couch. Tom, in elementary school, would pull her hair. In middle school it was teasing. In high school it was an awkward 'hi' in the hall between every period. Everyone whispered about her gift, a public secret, if you will. She was half sure Tom was in her apartment now for that reason.\n\nTom sighed. \"You are sure you can fix this?\"\n\n\"You know how this works. Let's get this show on the road.\"\n\nTom closed his eyes and covered his face in his hands. Sarah could hear the labored breathing. The towel that Tom sat on was already dark from the liquid that covered him from head to toe. I guess I'll get an explanation in a minute, Sarah thought to herself.\n\n\"It started last night. I went out on a date with Cindy, a coworker. We've been flirting a little at work and -\"\n\n\"At work?\"\n\n\"Yeah. You know at Burger -\"\n\n\"You know Tom, I'm not really feeling this. I don't know if I can help you.\"\n\n\"Alright! Ok fine! Tinder!\"\n\nTom's eyes shot over to Sarah as she loudly cleared her throat. He sighed again.\n\n\"Craigslist. I didn't get any matches on Tinder. Anyway, last night we went to a movie.\"\n\n\"That's more like it,\" Sarah purred.\n\n\"You know how I like to put butter and jalapeño juice in my mountain dew?\"\n\n\"I do now.\"\n\n\"Well I went to the concession stand to do that while she went to find seats.\"\n\n\"Ok. And?\"\n\n\"When I went to sit down next to her, I noticed she was asleep.\"\n\n\"Oh my!\"\n\n\"I know! So I did what anyone would do: I used her lap as a space for my popcorn.\"\n\n\"Uh huh.\"\n\nTom closed his eyes and inhaled. If he had kept his eyes open, he might have seen Sarah bite her lip.\n\n\"Only, I confused myself and put my drink in her lap instead.\"\n\n\"Oh Tom!\"\n\n\"I know I know! In a panic I tried to stand the cup upright in her lap, but knocked it over again, sending some of the Mountain Dew, jalapeño juice and butter mixture on my pants.\"\n\n\"Oh God Tom.\"\n\n\"Then she woke up. I was going to explain everything, but she started screaming at me. She said the only explanation for the smell and wetness was that I took a piss on her.\"\n\n\"Oh ... oh God Tom!\"\n\nTom paused to get a hold on himself; he watched as Sarah's cheeks became flush and her pupils dilated. He fidgeted and glanced around for a pillow or blanket for his lap.\n\n\"Oh God Tom, don't stop.\"\n\nTom swallowed hard again. He had only heard rumors about how a rush a magical power can make one feel.\n\n\"Well, she stormed out of the movie theater. She was my ride, so I had to walk home.\"\n\n\"Oh. Um ... ok.\"\n\n\"Then I got home.\"\n\nSarah's head snapped towards him and Tom could see the frustration in her eyes.\n\n\"Ok the truth is, as I was walking home, the the Mountain Dew was starting to dry because ... \"\n\n\"Uh huh?\"\n\n\"Because there was chaffing in tender places. It was so bad I decided to take off my pants. It was late by then anyway.\"\n\n\"Yes, Oh yes!\"\n\n\"But I guess the smell of butter was too much - as I passed old Miss Nancy's place, I saw her thirty cats pour out of her house. They lined up behind me, never taking their eyes off of my pants. At that point I was getting nervous so I started to walk faster.\"\n\n\"God Tom! Yes!\"\n\n\"Suddenly a masked man jumped out from behind a tree! He had a knife and wanted my money; God Sarah I was so scared!\"\n\n\"Oh truth Tom, truth!\"\n\n\"I panicked again and threw my pants at him, since it had my wallet in it. Then ... cats! Hundreds out of nowhere! They were clawing at him! Blood spurting out at me ... I think I might have hepatitis now.\"\n\n\"Yes! Yes! Yes!\"\n\n\"Then gun shots! I fell to the ground and was quickly surrounded by cops! They had automatic weapons and were shooting at the cats! Blood and bullets everywhere! It was so loud, I'm pretty sure I passed out.\"\n\n\"No, not what happened ...\"\n\n\"Ok I pissed myself then passed out. But when I came to, I was on a hot air balloon with John Cena! He's as handsome in person as he is on WWE.\"\n\n\"Oh that's truth right there.\"\n\n\"But then John Cena grabbed me by the throat and threaten to kill me if I ever wore buttered pants again he'd kill me in front of my dog Max.\"\n\n\"Oh! Uh huh, yeah.\"\n\n\"Then he gave me the finger.\"\n\n\"Yes! The finger! Oh!\"\n\n\"Oh Sarah, I just wanted this night to end, so I threw myself out of the hot air balloon.\"\n\n\"Oh God ... God ... \"\n\n\"Fortunately the hot air balloon wasn't flying or anything. I hid in Mr. Ringer's pool until morning.\"\n\n\"Oh ... oh ... OH YES!\"\n\nLike a flash-bang, a wave of light engulfed the small apartment, a shockwave that sent Tom to the floor. Sarah was panting hard. As she scooted herself upright. She saw Tom on the floor, hurriedly covering his waist with the towel. \n\n\"What was that?\" Shouted Tom.\n\n\"The magic.\" Sarah sighed as she got to her feet, stretching.\n\n\"I remember something happened ... I wanted to forget ... I came here ... um, well I guess it worked! Great! I don't remember anything!\" Tom got to his feet as Sarah extended a hand to help him up. They looked each other up and down, giggled, and made their way to the door.\n\n\"Thanks again, Sarah. Hey, as a thank you, you want to ... go to a movie sometime?\"\n\n\"That'd be nice, Tom.\"\n\n\"Cool. Well I have your number,\" Tom said as he waved his phone in his hands. As she closed her door, she heard him mutter, \"funny, when did I download Tinder?\"\n\nNo soon was the door closed when she heard the familiar cheeping of her phone. She hesitated before she answered. \n\n\"Hey Joanna.\"\n\n\"Hey Sarah. Just wanted to know if Tom made it over to your place yet?\"\n\n\"He did.\"\n\n\"Oh good. Poor guy had an awful date last night. He just wanted her memory erased - just a chance to start over with her. I told him you specialize in matters of the brain.\"\n\n\"Yeah. I helped him.\"\n\n\"Already? You make it too easy. A few good facts and a snap of your fingers and you're done. You should charge. Or at least put on a show.\"\n\nSarah smiled, \"Eh, maybe.\"", "\"A limerick?\" I asked, my brows forming what I could on describe as a disappointed look.\n\n\n\"Sure! I'm sure my tale of woe will create some form of sympathy with you\" His smirk was wider than the nation, but only marginally smaller than his ego. The son of King's happens to always be a smartass, but I digress.\n\n\"There was once a beautiful lass, Who had a magnificent ass.\" He began, his voice flowing naturally.\n\n\n\"Twas not perky nor pink as you'd probably think\"\n\n\nI supplied the rest of it before he could finish. \"It was grey, had long ears, and ate grass.\"\n\n\nShocked that I, a humble practitioner of medicine, a man of faith, of healing and magic would interrupt a noble? Especially when informing that I do not know the most common filthy farmer's joke?\n\n\n\"I heard that one when I was a boy.\" The prince's face could only be said to be a red as the devil is evil, perhaps even more so. His steps could be heard loudly down the hall, echoing in the long stone walk path, leading to the door.\n\n\nPrinces, what do they know? \n\n\nMagic can heal many a wound, almost certainly it is presumed!\n\n\nBut when the princes mouth,\n\n\nSays it's something down south,\n\n\nI always say, you're doomed!", "The wind was howling, and snow was falling thick and fast when I heard a knock on my door that cold December night. Although I was accustomed to knocks at unusual hours of the day, I couldn't help but think that whoever had dared to walk through that blizzard had a death wish. \nIt was, without doubt, the coldest night of the year.\n\nTo say I was surprised would be an understatement, I was beyond shocked when an aging man pulled a bloodied youth into my house and collapsed on the floor, wheezing. Quickly shutting the door, I helped the man and the unconscious boy towards the fireplace and knelt down beside the boy, checking for his vital signs. Seeing almost nothing, I grew troubled and glanced at the man, who was still panting. I quickly wrapped his leg in a piece of cloth coated with herbs after cleaning the wound to stop the bleeding. When he glanced up, realisation hit me. He was the town's story teller.\n\nNobody knew his actual name, but it wasn't hard for me to guess that he was gifted, probably the most gifted magician I've seen in my life. He was called Bono. He weaved words into captivating stories, giving them life, that kept the town enthralled every Friday evening at the town hall. I lurked in and out of the shadows, listening in and out of his tales of long lost kings and princes, serial murders and far away lands with fields of daffodils. \nSilently, we had acknowledged one another. A slight nod, a careful glance. We couldn't afford to get caught by the authorities when the state was still hunting down and killing everyone and anyone with any hint of magical ability. When the new king rose to power, I fled the capitol and travelled far north and settled down in the last remains of civilisation lost amidst miles of forest and snow, forgotten, and isolated. This town became my home. My solace. \n\"H-he he he was bitten by a wolf\", panted Bono, his eyes filled with desperation. \" I found him lying in the snow near the border. Please save him, I beg of you \"\nThe young boy was Bono's son.\n\nI nodded. \n\"You must know, healers get their energy from a source. I presume you know what my source is\"\nThe story teller nodded. \"I've seen the way you listen to me on Fridays\", he whispered. \"The glaze that comes over your eyes. Please, just save him. I'll give you my best stories\"\n\nI bent down and placed my hands over the boy's chest and closed my eyes.\nThe story teller started to work his magic.\n\nI don't know how many hours passed, the winds swirled and the windows rattled. Bono spoke without stopping, his magical words washing over me, until the fire burnt low and the night came to a deadly stand still. It was the calm before a storm.\nThe boy was getting better. His body became warmer. But there was still much to be done. \n I could sense Bono's magical reserve draining, but he kept going. \n\nAs the blizzard hit harder into the wee hours of the morning, Bono's soft voice became tired, his eyes began to droop with exhaustion but he held on. The boy was nearly there. I could sense his weak pulse. \n\nI willed the boy on, using the last burst of energy from Bono and prayed for the best. The storm had finally blown over. As Bono's eyes closed and he dropped to the floor exhausted, I removed my hands from the boy's chest, praying for the best. There was nothing more I could do.\nIt was the crack of dawn, daylight flooded into the room like a ray of hope. \n\nThe boy opened his eyes. \n\n\nTwo weeks later~~\nI filtered into the room, along with most of the town. It was a Friday. \nThe story teller spun a tale about a gifted healer who saved a princess from death. When he caught my eye, he half smiled, his eyes filled with gratitude. I knew this was his way of saying thank you.\nI smiled back, and then left.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n", "Sharon swept the kitchen for the fourth time today. Her husband, Daniel, was with a client in the living room, and Sharon did not disturb Daniel when he was with clients. Any interruption in the clients story would lessen Daniel's healing powers, resulting in upset clients.\n\nStill...they had been in there for close to five hours now. And there had been some...noises. That in itself wasn't too unusual...often a customer's story did not produce the level of healing desired, and things could get heated. But there was something different about...\n\nThe customer suddenly appeared in the doorway. His smile was big and bright, and he almost seemed to be walking on air. He looked at Sharon and somehow smiled even more.\n\n\"Sharon, wasn't it? I want to thank you for letting me into your home today.\"\n\nSharon hesitated. Something about his voice was....off. There was almost a...melodic quality to it. What was he in here for...a broken arm? Sharon had seen a lot of people come into her house, seeking Daniel's help, suffering anything from migraines to Stage 4 terminal brain cancer. Sometimes they came out happy, sometimes angry, sometimes with all hope lost. But this one...\n\n\"It's our pleasure, Mr...Jackson, was it?\"\n\n\"Call me Hank. Listen, I hate to impose on you, but...do you maybe have something to eat? Nothing fancy or big...doesn't even really matter what, I don't think. Just maybe an apple or some crackers or something?\"\n\n\"Uhhh....sure, I guess.\" Sharon unconsciously looked around the kitchen, trying to figure out what was going on. \"There's...we've got some bananas. They're a little brown, but...\"\n\n\"That will work, thank you.\" Hank Jackson picked up a banana, peeled it, and took the biggest bite he possibly could. He paused for a moment, closed his eyes, and began slowly chewing. Sharon was transfixed by his face...if she didn't know better, she would have thought the man was having an orgasm. Every muscle seemed to exude pleasure, as he slowly chewed and swallowed. After another brief pause, he set the remaining banana down on the table, opened his eyes, and looked at Sharon.\n\n\"That was just marvelous. Thank you. I don't think I've ever enjoyed eating anything more in my entire life. You know what's funny, too? I didn't even particularly like bananas before. I wonder if it will be like that every time from now on?\" Hank looked down at the banana, cocked his head, picked up the banana and took another, smaller bite. Again, waves of ecstasy crossed his face.\n\nSharon was now backing slowly towards the knives in the butcher block. She kept glancing towards the living room, but so far Daniel had not appeared. She wanted to call to him, but wasn't sure what would happen if she did.\n\nHank ate the remaining bite of banana, this time controlling his reaction better, but still obviously enjoying it immensely. He looked around until he found the trash can, discarded the peel, and again looked at Sharon.\n\n\"Sharon, once again, thank you for your hospitality. And thank your husband again for me as well. You...you just can't imagine how this feels right now. It's like...I feel...AHH! I just feel like...dancing on a mountain! Like I'm flying through space! I don't know how to describe it!\"\n\nSharon mentally measured the steps between herself and cast iron pan sitting on the stove.\n\n\"Anyway, I'm taking up too much of your time, I'm sure your husband has other customers. Though you might want to get him some water or something, he looked a little drained. Once again, thank you to you both.\" And with a still greater smile, Hank Jackson walked out the back kitchen door.\n\nSharon rushed to the door, locked it, and then looked into the living room. From here she could see the back of her husbands head, sitting slumped on the couch. She bolted into the living room, and knelt down in front of him. \n\nDaniel's face was the color of ash. His eyes looked hollow, and didn't seem to be focusing. Sharon grabbed his hands, which were cold, but human contact seemed to snap Daniel back into reality somewhat. He shook his head, and began to cough for several seconds. When his coughing finally subsided, he was beginning to look closer to normal, though as if he, himself had a bad case of the flu.\n\n\"Daniel...what happened in here?\"\n\nDaniel stared at his wife, seemingly trying to process the question. Finally, \"Hank? The...my client? Did he leave?\"\n\n\"Yes, just now. Gods, Daniel, you look like death warmed over. What happened? Did you heal him?\"\n\nDaniel laughed shrilly. \"Yeah, I healed him all right. For the rest of his life, probably.\"\n\n\"What's that supposed to mean?\"\n\n\"His story, Sharon. The story he told me for my healing. I....I can't....it was amazing...\"\n\n\"Daniel...he came in with a broken arm, right?\"\n\n\"I know! All it would have taken was an anecdote from his high school prom.\" Daniel clasped his hands over his face. \"But I get him in here, you leave, and I ask him to tell me his story. And he says, 'Well, I only have one story really...', and then he just kind of...launches into it.\"\n\n\"What was the story?\"\n\n\"NO! No, I'm never repeating a word of it!\" Daniel lunged forward and grabbed his wife's shoulders with surprising strength. \"Sharon, promise me that you will never ask me to tell...to remember his story again. I...I can't be tempted like that, Sharon. Promise me!\"\n\n\"I...I promise, Daniel!\" Daniel slumped back into the couch. \"But....what happened? He told you his story, and...you healed his arm?\"\n\n\"He...he started telling me his story, and as he went on, I could feel the power rising within me. Greater than I've ever felt before. You remember Jim Wilson, had leukemia, couldn't even life his head off his pillow, but told me that story about meeting his wife during the Great War, and after I laid my hands on him, he just jumped right up like a 20 year old?\"\n\n\"Of course.\"\n\n\"That was nothing compared to this. I mean, he just kept telling it, and it must have gone on for...what, 3 hours?\"\n\nSharon looked at the grandfather clock in the corner to confirm. \"Closer to five.\"\n\n\"Gods...\" Daniel trailed off, as if trying to remember something, then shook his head as if to stop himself. \"Anyway, he's telling me his story, and the power is just building and building in me. I'm getting kind of scared at this point, Sharon...I've never felt power like this before, not even close, but his story...I can't stop listening to it. It's like holding onto a live wire, power just pouring into me...\"\n\nSharon thought she saw the color begin to leave Daniel's face again. \"Daniel, it's OK. You don't have to...\"\n\n\"No, it's...it's all right. He, he finally ends his story, and at this point I don't even feel like I'm in the room. It's like I'm floating above everything...outside of...not the house, but...outside of...reality? I don't know...I see him...Hank, he's reaching out for my hand with his broken arm, awkward kind of, and time's slowing down. I see myself from outside my body, and...my body seems to be glowing. Finally his fingers touch mine and...and then...\"\n\n\"Daniel, please. You healed him, obviously, but...more? When he walked into the kitchen, he seemed...different.\"\n\n\"Yeah, I...I'm not sure what. He might be immortal for all I know. But Sharon, all that power...I'm sorry, I'm not trying to be...I don't, it's just...you can't imagine the feeling. To feel that much power in me, and feel it flowing into him...\"\n\nSharon paused, deciding if she should mention her encounter with Hank. \"He...he asked for a banana.\"\n\n\"...what?\"\n\n\"When he came out, he wanted something to eat, so I gave him one of the bananas. He ate it, and it was like he'd never eaten food in his life before. I think he may have...well, nevermind that thought, but it was like he was experiencing the taste of it on some higher level.\"\n\n\"That's interesting. Right after we touched, after the power left me, he was looking around the room strangely too. Kept talking about how he had 'never seen like this before'.\"\n\nSharon pursed her lips. \"Daniel...should you tell the Council about this?\"\n\n\"....Tell them what? That I may have created a demi-god? That I now know a story so powerful that...\" Fear crept into Daniel's eyes. \"No. No one must ever know of this, Sharon. If this story ever got out...there are other healers, someone could...Men would kill for this story, Sharon. Some would stop at nothing to possess it. Not a word to anyone, OK?\"\n\n\"...All right. Daniel. Not a word.\"", "Blood poured from his wound as if it were the mouth of a red river. He was tall and lean, a good build for a hunter. \n\n\"The fool went for a Raptor,\" the man supporting him said.\n\nI cocked an eyebrow. Raptors were common in our plains this time of the year. Our hunters were trained to avoid them, which made competing with the giant reptiles for the already sparse game difficult. \n\nThis year had been extra tough, our village was struggling to support itself, the raptors were more numerous than ever. \n\nIt seems that this injured hunter was trying to be a hero and failed. A fairly unoriginal tale; my hands tingled ever so slightly.\n\nHis bleeding was getting more profuse with time, the wound would definitely be fatal if left unattended to.\n\nHis partner laid him down on my cot. \n\n\"Is there anything else? My powers can't operate unless the story is more original.\" I said to him with a measured urgency in my tone.\n\nHis partner shot surprised eyes at me, \"You mean trying to attack a raptor isn't strange enough!?\"\n\n\"If it were a random attack, then yes, but given the circumstances it's a pretty standard 'trying to be a hero gone wrong' story.\" He looked at me with angry eyes, as if it were my fault his friend hadn't been wearing a clown suit at the time or something. \"are there anymore strange details from the attack?\"\n\nHis friend closed his eyes tightly as if he was thinking really hard or forcing a giant turd from his anus. His eyes popped open in an obvious light bulb moment, \"How could I forget! I hid in the bushes and made a female raptor mating call sound to distract the beast, but it didn't work.\"\n\nI cringed inside. I don't think this guy knew what the word 'original' meant. He took notice of my lackluster response, causing his face to droop.\n\n\"Anything else....?\" I asked as patiently as I could as I watched blood pour from the injured hunter.\n\n\"Well.... then I took him here, to you, a healer whose powers are fueled by original stories...\"\n\nMy hands exploded with a bright blue light and fizzled chaotically with healing mojo. I put my hands on his friends wound and healed it instantly.\n\n\"\n", "I heal, the tribes feed me. I journey between tribes, I heal all, and my person, property, women and orc-lets are sacrosanct. I journeyed to this tribe, the Body Crunch tribe, for this three-moons of days. In comes a skinny orc, Quivvering Runner, claims he's a warrior, demands to be healed. Proof of worthiness is sharing the tales of one's life. His story is how he fought the guards of a nearby tribe, the Blood Paté's (a filthy, Elvish-sounding name, if there ever was one), snuck in, stole their totem, sired an orc-let off of their chief's daughter, but got his arm gashed open on the way back to our tribe. A talking magic rock demanded the totem as a price for healing the gashed arm, that's why no gash, scar, or totem. He asks for healing on a rotten tooth, instead of just having it pulled. Well, I represent the words of Gruumsh, and sometimes the actions, and I heal. I offered what he told me as proof of his bravery, and he said \"Why does it all the sudden hurt worse?\" Then he cried out, staggered outside my cave, and collapsed. He screamed, and rotted away while I watched. One of the chief's sons, Mad Smash, witnessed the other orc's painful death, and said \"I was coming near here, I heard Quivvering Runner's screaming. What happened? You don't fight, you speak for Gruumsh!\" I said that he told me a story, in exchange for cure of a rotten tooth. Mad Smash shrugged his shoulders, and said \"Huh! You've pulled a couple of mine, it's no big deal. And, I was over sneaking the totem from our stupid-named neighbors, and, well, hehehe, 'visiting' one of the chief's children. Hehehe, I bet he finds out soon that she's not a child anymore! But, well, him and his guards sort of chased me off, I did get a cut on my arm. I was gonna ask if you had any bandages I could trade for, but it alla sudden healed. You didn't do it somehow without a story, did you? Oh, yeah, those damned Blood Paté's, here's their totem. Hehehe, what you think I should do with it?\" \nI looked at his arm, fresh scar with the scent of lightning still lingering. I looked him in the eyes, said \"Gruumsh already heard your story, from someone else, who told something like what you just did. Quivvering Runner claimed he did these things! I get you those bandages for next time, don't worry about it.\" I glanced at what was left of Quivvering Runner, and added \"And don't ever try to lie to Gruumsh!\" \nHe looked at Quivvering Runner's remains, his eyes widened, and he nodded his head.", "The White House\n\nBy ElSol69\n\nI'm not allowed to read.\n\nI only remember television. \n\nPeople are not allowed to speak in my presence, except to serve my singular purpose. The rooms of my home are a sterile white, as is the furniture. As is all of my clothes. There are no windows; there is only one door. I have not been outside since I was child. I do not know when a day begins or ends, as there are no clocks. All of my physical needs are met but that is all I am given.\n\nThe door opens and a woman is wheeled inside. The nurse pushing the chair never makes eye contact with me because she's blind; she takes exactly twelve strides into the room and then backs up two strides from the chair. I look at the woman in the wheelchair; her eyes are alive with hope. I study her body, cataloging the damage of a wasting disease. She knows the rules and has probably seen what happens if she breaks them. Someone else will take her place. There is always someone else for that spot twelve strides into the room. The woman smiles at me once and looks away.\n\nThe Storyteller enters the room. It is a man this time. His white hair and beard go well with the colors in the room. The Storyteller changes--a young woman, a young man, a crone. I've seen the entire spectrum, although it is rare for it to be a child. Sometimes, it is the same Storyteller but never in the same day or week or month or year. I don't what those words mean anymore. I just know that every now and then the Storyteller seems familiar.\n\nThe Storyteller raises his tablet. I believe it is a machine of some sort.\n\n\"Is it the Read It thing again?\" I ask him. Of course, he does not respond.\n\nOnce, I got behind a Storyteller and saw what she was reading from. I don't imagine I will ever see her again.\n\nI sigh and pull up a chair.\n\nThe Storyteller begins. \"The premise of the story is simple -- when someone's heart breaks it damages the world. This is how the Grand Canyon was created.\"\n\nI raise my hand.\n\nThe Storyteller waits.\n\n\"What is the Grand Canyon?\" I ask him.\n\nA few seconds later, a new Storyteller enters. She taps the male Storyteller on the shoulder and nods towards the door. I guess the story would not have made sense to me. Many of them don't.\n\nI am a Healer. My power is tuned to the imagination centers of my brain. If they spark, so does my power. The more they spark, the more power I access. Power enough to take a dying woman and bring her to the full bloom of health.\n\n\"Would you like to try something different?\" the female Storyteller asks me.\n\nI look at her curiously.\n\n\"Erotica,\" she says.\n\nI smile. \"Only if you stay afterwards.\"\n\nIt is against the rules.\n\n\"I will stay,\" the woman in the wheelchair says.\n\nIt is also against the rules. The people I heal are immediately taken out of the room.\n\n\"I agree,\" I say.\n\nThe Storyteller looks up at the ceiling corner of the room. I believe there is something that allows people from outside the room to watch me. We wait to see if someone else will be wheeled in.\n\n\"I guess one mistake is the limit of the day,\" I tell the woman in the wheelchair. Her eyes somehow manage to look even more hopeful.\n\n\"You cannot speak to him before, during, or after,\" the Storyteller tells the woman. \"Do you understand?\"\n\nThe woman does not look at the Storyteller. She keeps staring into my eyes while she nods.\n\n\"I think it would better if she read the story,\" I say to the Storyteller.\n\nThe Storyteller looks at the ceiling corner again. We wait, but no one enters.\n\n\"Leave the room, nurse,\" the Storyteller says.\n\nThe nurse walks backwards; the door opens for her to pass through. The Storyteller hands her tablet to the woman in the wheelchair. The Storyteller steps behind the wheelchair, turns around, and sits where I cannot see her.\n\nThe woman tries to look behind the chair at the Storyteller. She turns and looks like she will speak to me.\n\nI raise my hand, \"I am sure there are people who try to imagine what might happen and design protocols for those circumstances. This must be one already considered. Let's not test anything that happens beyond this point though.\"\n\nShe nods slowly as a single tear slides down her left cheek. Sometimes, I like to imagine they cry for me.\n\n\"Maybe it is a long story,\" I say to the woman. \"And we can sit here… together for awhile.\"\n\nThe End\n(Sorry for any typoes or loss of tense. I wrote this before running to the airport.)", " I do not stay long with any of the settlements, but I move between them, sharing my gift in exchange for food and shelter, always an outsider although closer to their tribes than they can imagine. My family have lived this life for as long as we know, the gift shared from mother to daughter, but not all are so welcoming after we share it. \n\nThe boy fell this morning and they tell me that he has not woken since, blood still crusts on his temples and he is warm, but not hot, to the touch. I ask, as I always do. \"Are you sure you wish me to continue?\" \n\nThe elder of the village has seen me before and she avoids my gaze, fear mixing with disgust on her face, she knows what I will do, what price will be paid but the mother wants her son to return and is willing to pay almost any price, or things she is. \"Please, heal my boy, bring him back to me.\" \n\nI look to the elder and she still hesitates, but at last nods and I move to his side. I place my hands, one on his heart and one on his brow and the elder draws back the mother to give me room, or perhaps to keep her away from me. My mind clears and I reach out, trying to feel for the spark inside him, the essence which gives him life - I find it, but it is slipping away weakly - it will take much to return him. \n\nThe light of the fire flickers and when I close my eyes it flickers still, but it is not flame but memory and thought that pass across my vision. Moments of the boy's life passing by my eyes; I see his mother and father, his grandparents and his sisters, I feel their love, their community, their bond and I take it all. \n\nI need more and so go deeper, finding his his friends and their laughter, their play at the stream and jokes in the sun. I consume it and feel him empty a little more. More and more I take; skills, experience, years of his life, all passing in exchange. It drains from him, into me and at the same time I drain myself back into him. The spark that had become so dim now holds steady and eventually begins to brighten again. I take his mind and give him my body, I give him my gift. \n\nMy eyes open and I see my mother, but she is filled with fear and looks not to me, but the boy on the table. His eyes have opened too, but they are the confused eyes of a newborn, he sees nothing, feels nothing, I have taken it all. My mother cries and holds him ad he does not resist, he looks at her with curiosity. \n\nThe elder takes my hand and helps me stand and we leave the tent and go outside. \"You must go, leave tonight before she knows what you have done.\" A shiver of fear passes through me at this rejection - I do not wish to leave my tribe...but this is not my tribe, these are strangers and that is slowly returning to me. I cannot speak yet, but I nod and she drops my arm and leaves my in the cold and the dark. \n\nAt the edge of town I find my mule has been fed and my packs are full of food. For a while I will know all this land, everywhere the boy has walked, I will remember it, but he will fade and go in a while, passing into the place where I keep the others. He will recover, he is young, but he will never be whole, I will always have a part of him and he a part of me. \n" ]	8

Subsets and Splits

No community queries yet

The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.