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] War has taken over the country, but this story is just about one city, where several gangs fight for control. With the authorities preoccupied, it's winner take all--of which there might not even be anything. Optional [CW] Do not directly mention the larger war.	[ "It took Sammy fifteen minutes to climb the barricade. He would have said there were a million people below, but there were probably only a few thousand. Still that was a lot, especially when they were moving around so quickly in different directions amid smoke and noise.\n\nSammy took another five minutes to climb down and five more minutes to get to the sewer hole.\n\n“Impossible,” said Sammy.\n\n“Not even over the bridge?” asked John.\n\n“The bridge is gone,” said Sammy.\n\nThe others looked at each other. A few cursed, but everybody believed it.\n\n“What about in the river?” asked John.\n\n“No way. The river’s full of stuff. People are trying to cross too, but they can’t.”\n\n“Well, it’s going to take us at least the whole night to take this apart.” \n\n“We don’t have time,” said one of the others.\n\n“We don’t have a choice. This is the widest way through,” said John. “Sammy, you’re going to keep look-out. The rest of us are going to take this apart the horse.”\n\nThe horse was a make-shift tank the Clowns had constructed from parts found in the debris. It was no design of genius engineering, but too good not to have and definitely too good for the Clowns to keep and use. So they waited until trouble stole away the Clowns, and they stole the horse.\n\nGetting their hands on it was the easy part. The Clowns had correctly assumed that it would be very difficult to remove. They had even thought to take the generator with them. John’s boys had the know-how, though. Now they had the parts too. They just needed a way through. And time.\n\nThey were about halfway done with the horse when Sammy came running back.\n\n“Clowns!” he whispered as loudly as he could.", "I came home a year after the war started. I knew things were going to shit long before they ever did so when I got back I retired my uniform and buried it so far in my closet that the moths couldn't get to it. I had a family to worry about and I wasn't going to let these gangs run right over them while the rest of the world fell into shambles. No, the power to protect their home shifted entirely to the people's hands, and I grasped at it the first chance I had. It was the only solution I saw.\n\nIt's been nine years since the war started, four since the Big Three have been around. It used to be Four, but the League and the Bears knocked out the Hawks four years ago, completely annihilated them. It was brutal, but the battle started just as this one. A week of shelling, which started last night, followed by ruthless urban warfare, which will begin soon, I'm sure. Hearing the reports on the radios was one thing, but going outside and seeing the destruction for yourself was another. Bodies laid strewn across the streets, rubble engulfed most of the major streets and highways, checkpoints were set up to allow passage from supply zone to supple zone. It was martial law under control by gangs. And martial law was about to begin again.\n\n\"Liza,\" I said, \"we'll need the coats again.\" I tuned the radio on to the Bears' station and listened in. My wife, Liza, went to grab our coats, white jackets that had a blue and orange X on the front and back. It signified that we were citizens of the Bears' territory and therefore, under the Great Bear's protection. Clothing was the only identification methods this city had anymore, and wearing these was the only way to get food and water from the supply zones.\n\n\"We have a week to find out, right?\"\n\nI nodded, \"One week and we'll know whose launching. If it's the League, we follow the instructions and move.\"\n\nMy wife and I had been trying to move our family to League territory for about a year now, pushing ourselves ever closer to the border. A little over a year ago, we heard that my wife's family was in League territory and pretty high up in the ranks. If that was true, they were our best hope for survival. Yet, traversing Bears territory and trying to move from one gang to another isn't the easiest option in the city anymore. Gang loyalty is bigger family around here, you live and die by a gang, just as you would a family. And getting inducted into another's family isn't easy anymore.\n\n\"Anything at the drop?\" She asked me.\n\nWe secured communications with a League representative about six months ago and we found that Liza's family does live with the League, her older brother is actually one of their biggest leaders. Once we secured relations, the drops began. Every so often the rep would drop orders or letters at a dead drop just inside gang limits. Most of the time they would ask for photos or Bears clothing, sometimes the requests were more serious; recon of a suspected weapons depot, planting of a listening device. The League were the most advanced of the Gang's, but they had their limits due to the flimsy alliances that existed. \n\nSo I followed the orders and hoped that Liza's brother would be able to secure us a ride out of the gang limits and into the League's home. I was playing a very dangerous game, but it was all for my family, Liza and my daughter Katherine.\n\n\"They wanted me to check again today.\"\n\n\"Today? With the shelling?\"\n\nI nodded, \"I think they're testing me.\" It made sense, if I could get to the dead drop through artillery shelling, I was an asset they wanted on their side. Gang loyalty is bigger than family. \"I'm going to go out tonight, after the broadcast.\"\n\n\"Tommy, you can't be serious.\"\n\nI looked up at her and smiled, \"You know I have to. If you and Katherine are going to get out of here,\" I took her hand, \"Your brother wants me to prove myself.\"\n\n\"Artillery though? You're going to get killed.\"\n\n\"Well, let's see whose firing first?\"\n\nThe radio cracked to life a moment later when the Bears Broadcaster came on. The Little Bear, as they call him, had a good radio voice. \"Good evening Bears! If you're tuning in tonight I'm sure you heard the shelling last night! Well, don't be alarmed. Our good friends at the League are attempting to squuuuaash a bit of a rebellion in our territories, we kindly asked them to redirect some of their fire over here as well!\" I listened closely, it wasn't often gangs invited shelling into their territory. \"Some people think they can stand up to the Big Three, but I assuuuuure you, we are as tight as we can be!\" Little Bear liked to emphasize his words, a lot, \"So stay put, be calm, and remember to wear the Orange and Bluuuuue!\"\n\nThe broadcast repeated after that and part of me knew something was wrong. Never, in the history of this city, had gangs worked together to squash a rebellion. Then I thought back to the rumors about the Leadheads, a small, but formidable squad of them was found in Bears territory about a week ago.\n\nA squad, it wasn't often that word was used in gang terminology. And Leadhead, it was a name people used to call me a little over ten years ago, when city riots were huge and national guard units were being deployed. I thought about it, a small squad destroyed an entire complex of Bears before being overrun. The rumors said they had these metal helmets, things people often confused with lead but were more often Kevlar. \n\nIt clicked inside my head a moment later. Contact with the world outside the city was limited, the gangs controlled the airwaves and unless you were in deep with them, you had no way of knowing what was going on. The Leadheads returning, the sudden shelling in every territory, and Little Bear's broadcast about standing up to the Big Three?\n\nI ran down to my basement and headed straight towards my closet. It had been nine years since I opened the thing, but when I did, it was still hanging there, in pristine condition. A United States of America, National Guard-issued combat uniform, an advanced combat helmet and a M16A4 combat rifle. All of it was still there and my heart skipped a beat.\n\nThey were coming back, after nine years of anarchy, they were coming back to take the city. And the gangs are trying to stand up to them. I didn't know what to do. It would be impossible to radio in on them without getting caught, but even then, I was a deserter as much as these gangs were. They wouldn't forgive me, not when I left at such terrible times. But would they even remember?\n\nNo, I couldn't take the chance. I had no choice but to continue on the path I was on. I had to make sure the gangs stayed in control or else everything I made for my family would fall apart with me being executed. And I had to make sure my family got to the League, they could protect us, one way or another. I just had to make it to the dead drop, get my orders, and move on.\n\nThe gangs were in control, there was no stopping that anymore. As much as anyone would like to try, the people in this city were stuck on this path. Now, it was just a matter of choice. What gang would you call family? And would you die for that family?\n\nI would die for my family, and my family was the League. I just wasn't with them yet.", "It has been a long year. A long year of scrambling for meager bits of food, watching friends destroy each other over water plagued with cholera and dysentery. I've watched as all of those I once held so dear were ravaged by malnutrition, disease, and violence; yet we endured. More than that, we had flourished. \n \nWe were lucky. After the city declined into chaos we were left with what our neighbors had left behind in their panicked flight to the mountains. \"We'll be safe once we reach my parents\" he claimed, packing his family into the car. \"It's just a three hour drive.\" It was a foolish idea to say the least, but we wished them well and said a small prayer for their safety. Little good it did, we found their burned out car not 3 miles from here a few months later - caught up in the food riots that grasped the city for that first few weeks. I'd like to think they survived, but the crushed skull underneath the car tells a different story. \n \nBut those supplies he left behind were a blessing for us. Our home was far enough out of the way that looters didn't bother to come near. While food was tight, it was there. Somehow we managed to survive the Burning Winter alive. Then, as winter thawed, we had our first contact with the outside world. A few of our neighbors came by to see if anyone had made it, explaining how they had created an informal neighborhood watch after the first scavengers had killed one of their friends while he slept during the first week of the food riots. \n \nThe promise of mutual protection and support was too good an offer to refuse. \n \nUltimately it was decided our cul-de-sac was the best option, as the other empty houses left by the recession were in great condition and access to the street could be blocked with cars and a guard at night. Despite the relative normalcy of the first few weeks, we all accepted that it couldn't last forever. We had to begin looking for supplies if we had any hope of making it through another winter. \n \nThe suburbs proved a treasure trove, both for supplies and support. Many of the houses had been looted early on by people too desperate or set on violence to search properly. A few of the houses proved windfalls of food or tools, other for corpses left by the pillaging or victims of exposure. But more important still were the families who had managed to survive it all, they proved desperate for any help they could get. Some jumped at the chance to move to our now bustling compound, others at the opportunity to trade and provide aid if needed. We all thought we were destined to make it in one piece until someone came along to rebuild society. \n \nThen two of our guys went missing. They had gone downtown to check for pharmacy supplies, hoping to stock up on what we could before winter came. At nightfall something felt wrong, but by the next night we knew. After some debate we decided to send another party to see what they could find out. Inside the pharmacy they found the bloody hat which belonged to one of them. Nothing else was found. We decided we were better off skirting the downtown area until we knew something more. \n \nTwo days later one of the families in the inner suburbs disappeared. Someone thought they heard gunshots, but couldn't swear to it. The house was stripped bare of food and anything else of value. Their daughter was found hiding in a crawlspace, which they had the foresight to fix up as a hidden bedroom. Poor girl still cries herself to sleep. There had been at least a dozen people from what we could tell, and someone had been shot in the living room. Man had been a damned fool thinking he could keep his family safe out here alone, didn't matter how many years he spent in the military - and he should have known better. All those families moved in closer that week. \n \nAt the same time we found another group of holdouts down near the waterfront. We've been trading some, though they show no desire to actually join with us. They had similar stories of people being dragged off when they first got established. A group of scavengers was holed up in the old Junior High School, making small incursions here and there trying to get what they could without a fight. But after the city had been looted they started going out more, the only good side being they didn't have much in the way of guns. \n \nThat's why we decided it was to everyone's benefit to run them out. The next few days were bloodier than anyone expected, and we lost more than we could have planned for. We quickly burned through what medical supplies we had, and infection has run rampant among the wounded. Even worse are the diseases that followed, with 2 or 3 people dying every few days. We barely had enough people to harvest the fall crop, in all honesty we didn't have enough until more had died. \n \nI'll probably die soon enough, given that my family has all died already I can't saw it won't be a blessing. But I still keep imagining that any day now someone will knock on the door and tell me it's all over. Or that I'll wake up and have to go back to work. God please someone wake me up.", "Fuck\n\nI sat back in my office chair.\n\nRico and Johnny didn't make it back today. Seems like since this whole world went to shit this was a usual occurrence. I'm tired of guys who I called my brothers ending up dead in the street because of some stuck up Uptowners. \n\nThe Uptowners seem to take at least a few of our guys each time we go out to get supplies, but we don't go down without a fight. For every 2 of our guys they take from us we find a way to get at least 2 of theirs. But I'm done. \n\nI'm done fighting this war of attrition. We should have worked together instead of separating our selves based on our fucking social class.\n\nJust cause they were rich...\n\ntakes a sip from the almost empty bottle of tequila\n\nand we were poor doesn't mean that they don't face the same shit that we are going through right now.\n\nGunshots over the radio\n\nBoss the Uptowners have allied with the Controllers and are approaching our location! They out number us 3 to 1... Oh Shit, Oh Shit, run boss! run!\n\nThats it,\n\nTim get the boys set up a perimeter around the eastern wall, they won't win this one\n\nBut Boss..\n\nShut the fuck up Tim get the men armed and get to the perimeter.\n\nTim nodded.\n\nI grabbed my rifle and headed out to the wall where my men were massing.\n\nWe could see the Uptowners and the Controllers over the wall, there were thousands of them. \n\nWe were only at around 700.\n\nI looked to my men who were obviously nervous and told them that its win or take all\n\nKill or be killed\n\nStand strong or flee\n\nand with that I shouted to them turned towards the approaching troops,\n\naimed\n\nand\n\nfired\n\n \n", "“We've got Main street...South side, and West end.”\n\n“What about the Landing, doc?”\n\n“Still run by the Reds. They've been pushed pretty hard, but they're cracking. Give it a few more days.”\n\n“Dockside?”\n\nDoc looked up from the stained and torn map of the city he was holding. “You know we don't talk about Dockside. No matter what we do that shit belongs to the Benders.”\n\t\n“You think they're getting goodies from the outside?”\n\t\n“What little there is, yeah. They've got boats moving in the harbor. Tried to take some potshots but we got routed out.”\n\t\n“Any pressure from the cops?”\n\t\n“They all got called up to New York, you know, cause of-”\n\t\n“I know 'cause of'. We all know.”\n\t\nThey settled into an uncomfortable silence. Ben leaned back his chair, and puffed his cigar.\n\t\n“I'm running out of these things. Damn shame.”\n\t\n“Well, nobody's making em anymore.”\n\t\n“I say, a damn shame.”\n\t\nHe puffed some more, waiting for Doc to tell him what he didn't want to hear.\n\t\n“Ben...The only people in this hellhole who aren't with us or in another gang are dead. Or...you know.”\n\t\n“We know.”\n\t\nDoc gave a wry smile that fell quickly. “We're all out of guys, Ben. We're around two hundred strong, and the Reds alone have got at least a thousand.”\n\t\n“Don't forget the secret weapon.”\n\t\n“Even with that...”\n\t\n“We will own this city. Come hell or high water, Doc.”\n\t\n“If there's anything left to own.”", "\"Mecdia!\" Aven threw his backpack on the floor and stripped off the heavy flak jacket, \"I'm back!\"\n\nHis wife, a beautiful girl grown into a woman over years of hard work and hard times, came rushing from the back of the house, throwing her own encumberments onto the couch and grabbing him up like a precious item falling from a shelf. \n\nThey held each other for a few, blissful moments of silence, then moved apart and set their faces for business.\n\n\"News?\"\n\nMecdia tensed in front of him, \"Sheld still holds the dens and the blocks past Marigold.\"\n\n\"Damn.\"\n\n\"Heinrich took a beating in the assault and has pulled back, afraid that Murdock will exploit his weakness and strike from the city center.\" Mecdia rubbed her hands together. The days were getting shorted and the air was getting a chill in it. They would need to find some way to keep warm in the coming winter, along with the mess of other dangerous they already faced.\n\n\"And Murdock?\" Aven pressed.\n\n\"Nothing.\" Mecdia shook her head, \"The Center is still quiet. Soldiers who go in don't come out.\"\n\nAven turned and set his elbows on the back of the couch. The old piece of furniture was unfit for sitting in. It's cushions and fabric were torn ragged by bullet holes and cuts from knives. Aven had been a bit of a handy man before everything collapsed. He'd welded a large sheet of steel the the back of the couch when it started going south. The stupid thing had saved their life multiple times over the last three years. A damned couch. \n\n\"And us?\"\n\nMecdia smiled tightly, \"Still ignored. Both Sheld and Heinrich need to take us, but doing so exposes them to the other because of the vantage points... and either of them wiping us out removes a tactically defended flank on their territory. We're still a meat shield between two fucking tigers.\"\n\n\"And the other expeditions, were we noticed? Have the others returned?\" Aven grabbed his wife's arms gently and pulled her close, his eyes dark and serious. \n\n\"Martha's sons came back last night.\" Mecdia tensed, \"You were right, the group was still in the hills. Well armed. None of them wanted to get involved with us directly, but they did offer some rifles... and night-vision scopes.\"\n\n\"Night-vision!\"\n\n\"Apparently they were useless to them once the batteries ran out, where we have plenty we can scavenge. \" Mecdia smiled a little bit more, \"Perhaps it can give us an edge...\"\n\n\"No, some... but not enough to take on Sheld or Heinrich.\" Aven hugged his wife and stared over her shoulder at a line of bullet holes in the wall on the far side of the room, \"But perhaps enough to give us warning when the attack finally comes. Enough to fight off the first wave.\"\n\nMecdia sobbed in his arms.\n\nIt wasn't as if they were defenseless here in in White Pines, but the problem was that they were much weaker than they let on. Mecdia had gone to college for sociology before the collapse, she'd put together a tidy bit of misinformation before the gang wars really got rolling. \n\nEvery house in White Pines had a big, obvious gun... and Aven had a mandate that whoever left their house had to carry it. I didn't matter that most of the guns had little or no ammo, it was what it looked like to the spotters watching their little slice of the city. They saw a small community where everyone had a powerful weapon. We were a fruit with thorns on it.\n\nAven felt for the Williams family. They took the biggest risk of all of them. Their son had had a replica rocket launcher he'd built for a cosplay convention before the collapse. It was funny to think that they wasted their time on such things while their rights and world were being written into the hands of the oligarchy... but who could have known this future was in store? The poor Williams. They parade around the block every day with a chunk of foam and plastic on their shoulders, selling the lie with every step and every breath.\n\nAt least Mecdia's gun had bullets. Only six, but still.\n\nAven's thoughts were shattered by a knock at the back door.\n\n\"Dia!\" Aven gestured and his wife took the old M-16 off of the couch, pushed the piece of furniture into position with her hip and then knelt down behind it, aiming at the back of the house.\n\nAven swallowed his fear and moved to the door, looking out through the peep-hole to see a man he didn't recognize. He held up three fingers in a warning sign to his wife and then opened the door as she set her aim.\n\nThe man standing on his back porch with the darkness of a powerless city behind him was well-groomed. Suspiciously so. HE couldn't be anyone from Shend's camp with a suit like that... and no armor. It didn't even look like he had a knife on him as he smiled gently and held up his hands to show them that he meant no harm.\n\n\"Who are you?\"\n\n\"You are Aven Beton?\" The man's voice was strong, but soft. A voice of a CEO or priest. Aven distrusted both.\n\n\"Who are you?\"\n\n\"Please, may I come in? You may tie me up if you wish, but I am exposed out here, regardless of my efforts to come here unseen. I trust me men have silenced enemy watchmen, but nothing in life is completely without risk, however one might wish it were so.\" The man kept his hands up and his eyes focused on Aven's face.\n\n\"First your name.\" Aven felt behind the door for his baseball bat. He could feel Mecdia taking aim behind him, praying that she didn't miss. \n\n\"I had hoped to forestall this until we were more comfortable with each other, but I see that I have little choice in the matter now.\" The man smiled tightly, in much the same way Mecdia had only moments before, \"My name is Murdock. I've come to offer you protection... and opportunity.\"\n\nThat's where our story began.\n\n" ]	6
	[WP] In the distant future, time travel has been invented and you are the first person to embark on such a journey. You decide to go back to the beginning of time.	[ "I needed a damn cigarette before figuring out a way to get myself out of that mess. The capsule porthole showed nothing, but that was not the problem. The displays were blank from where I sat, but that wasn't it either. When the drive's humming went out after the jump, there was only one thought, one thought on my mind. I did not belong.\n\nEver walked in a room and had everyone stop what they were doing to stare at you? As if you went out of your way to enter a space that was not for you? I felt that everywhere. And it was everything in that nothing that made me feel out of place. I didn't belong. I knew that the moment the jump ended. It felt awkward. Untimely.\n\nI inhaled and let the chemicals course through my lungs. The release of air that followed relieved my initial bout of anxiety that followed the jump. A quiet, personal laughter echoed through the little universe I inhabited. A criticism had come to mind. \"Just putting a minus and an infinity symbol in the machine isn't going to work.\" They would never know how wrong they were, but I sure as hell did. \n\nThat first, substantial thought stuck. I was right. Nothing said otherwise.\n\nThe small ember and the illusion of warmth filled the capsule. I don't remember how long that moment lasted. But I remember the nothingness. It spanned everywhere but where I sat, holding my light. That first light. It was good.", "An infinitely dense concentration of energy spends a timeless interval suspended. An eternal frozen moment lasting no time at all.\n\nA change. With change, time becomes meaningful, events begin to occur in causal sequence. An injection of matter phases into existence, energy bound into a new and solid form. The boundaries of the universe are forced outwards to accommodate the intrusion. No longer infinitely dense, the singularity becomes unstable, spreading to fill the void.\n\nAnd there was light." ]	2
	[WP] Hundreds of years in the future, you are an archaeologist who just discovered ancient Christmas music. You are tasked with understanding what the songs mean.	[ "Doctor Hardwick had spent years of his life on the research of pre-flood human civilization. Truly, he'd earned his title as one of the foremost experts of his field. Today, over 200 people gathered beyond the large,red curtain to see him present his latest findings. He took a deep breath and checked his notes one last time. Nerves under control he stepped forwards as the curtains parted, revealing the harsh light of a dozen spotlights aimed directly at his face.\nResisting the urge to break his 'serious researcher' persona he forced himself not to raise his hand against the lights.\n\"Ladies and gentlemen. Today I present you with my latest discovery. A discovery that will change the way we view pre-flood humanity and their reaction to the rain.\"\nGasps spread through the audience, these people knew as well as Hardwick that this would be the biggest discovery in the field since the return of electricity.\n\n\n\"I present you with\n.\n.\nLet it snow!\"\nHardwick smiled brightly as the audience moved from excited whispers to an anxious silence.\n\"This new song of warning will join the ranks of 'I kissed a girl' and 'Clearest Blue'. Now let us begin the analysis of it's lyrics.\"\n\n\"Starting with 'Oh the weather outside is frightful' the author obviously references the dangers of going outside during the rains. This is further acknowledged by the lyric that follows, 'But the fire is so delightful'. As fire can only be found inside of our shelters the humans of the time were forced to remain inside. This is reinforced further when the song says 'And since we've got no place to go'. That sentence also indicates that unlike what previous theories such as Tungsten's Theory, pre-flood humanity was incapable of inter-shelter travel. \"\n\n\nHardwick let that sink in for a moment, feeling exceptionally pleased with the stunned silence that had taken over the crowd. \n\"Next comes the most important line in the song.\" He continued.\n\"Let it snow.\"\nTaking care to pronounce each word as slowly a possible to indicate their importance Hardwick felt happy. Happy he'd finally beaten that prick Tungsten to something. No more second place for Harrison Hardwick. Suck on that Tungsten, he thought and continued his presentation.\n\n\"This so called snow was likely a primitive form of today's anti-acid coating. The way the line repeats itself throughout the song shows that this snow was a very important, even vital thing to our predecessors.\"\n\nNow came the bad part.\n\"Sadly most of the song has been lost to time. We've only uncovered one final line, one that casts a much more depressing outlook that is usually found in the pre-flood songs of warning. \n'The fire is slowly dying'.\"\n\nHardwick let the words sink in. He felt the air of sadness that suddenly hung over the audience. Most of the songs of warning had contained messages of hope, of faith. He well knew that an ending line like this could crush the general view of a happy go lucky people that overcame impossible odds to survive. Still, it had to come out sometime.\n\n\"I know this is much to consider. That is why I implore you to ponder and reflect. You can read my full analysis of this latest pre-flood artefact in my latest paper, which will release to the public soon.\"\n\nHardwick stepped back as the lights dimmed and the curtains fell, muffling the thundering applause.\n ", "The song faded away and Professor Morrow moved back to the front of the class and touched the light control, bringing illumination back to normal levels. As expected, almost half the class looked to have been dozing or otherwise not paying attention, but that was normal. \n\n'Understanding Our Ancients' was a required course for almost half the degrees offered by the institution and so most of the kids were here out of obligation, rather than a passion for the past, but it was the few who actually cared that kept him going. \n\n\"Okay class, who can tell me why that particular song is important?\" eyes suddenly were reluctant to meet his, but at the front a slim hand went up. He pointed. \"Yes, Miss...?\" \n\nThe girl looked young, perhaps she had been skipped ahead a few grades, but until their transcripts came in he had very little information on the students in his classes. Her thin face was framed by almost shockingly red hair, that had been cropped back and constantly tried to break across her face, so she had to brush it back every few seconds. \n\n\"Miss Everly.\" He nodded and she blushed, nervous at looking like a teachers pet on the first day of class. \"It's important as it's one of only two of the ancient's songs where we've found multiple copies.\" She met his eyes when answering, but looked away immediately as she finished. \n\nThe Professor tried to hide his pleasure, almost no one got that question right. \"Well done Miss Everly, that is correct.\" He stepped back again, behind his desk and clicked the slide forward, so an image of a broken disk appeared on screen. \n\n\"This is the disk, a 254 mm disk, broken into four pieces, with the music encoded using a strange analogue method that took nearly a year of time on the East Coast Super Computer to crack.\" He pointed to the label. \"Hard to read, I know, but it says Jingle Bells just like the line in the song.\" \n\nA voice came from near the back. \"Yeah, but like, it's all just nonsense right? I mean, they're from like 400 years ago, it's not like anyone cares.\" \n\nThe kids that wanted to be here the least always sat at the back. \"Just because we don't understand the message, doesn't make it meaningless, in fact, I have published several papers into the meaning of these songs and it is my hypothesis that they all link together to celebrate some kind of festival.\" \n\n\"Like Founders Day?\" It was the red headed girl, leaning forward in her seat. \n\n\"Maybe so, maybe something just like that.\" The Professor flicked to the final screen where the assignments were listed. \"For tomorrow I want you to review the eleven songs that are hypothesised to belong in a group and come up with a concept for what the festival might have been like, what is was for, what it was called even.\" \n\nThey all laughed at that, how could they possible know the name of a festival from hundreds of years ago when the records had been obliterated by two nuclear wars. He'd get some strange answers, but some interesting ones too. \n\nThe class filed out and he packed his bag slowly, aware that the girl was waiting for him to look up. \"Yes Miss Everly?\" \n\n\"Professor, how did you come to be interested in the history of the ancients? How do you know so much?\" She didn't pause, but plunged on. \"I read your books and they're just... wild with ideas about back then, it makes me feel like you really understand them.\" \n\nThe class was nearly empty now and the Professor put his hand lightly on her shoulder to guide her out of the classroom and into the quad. \"It's just my field of study my dear, I got lucky in the many finds that I made in my excavations of the old ruins. I hope you'll enjoy my classes this year.\" She nodded and before he could add anything further she darted away into a group of other girls, off towards to phase transports. \n\nProfessor Morrow shook his head, kids never seemed to change, not even since his days. Today had made him feel nostalgic and so he checked around and slipped an ear bud from the collar of his shirt and slipped it into his ear, he cycled through the music selections on his MP3 player until he found what he was looking for. Last Christmas by Wham, nothing like the music of your childhood to make you feel young again. " ]	2
	[WP] The dust settles. You were so close to freedom. You drag yourself out of the wreckage of your car. A man and a woman wait impatiently. The man speaks. "Do you want to explain yourself?"	[ "\"I... I'm sorry...\" It was the best I could do. None of you would have done better... Everyone thinks so high of themselves, but let me tell you, when you see yourself crawling out of that smoking mess of iron that used to be a car minutes ago, trying to get up whilst your legs tremble like they are made of jelly, whilst your mouth fills with the taste of blood and fear, you realise you are nothing. You realize that you have always been a bystander, too eager to judge other people's actions; and now that you are in the thick of this shit, you can't think of anything else but to save your skin no matter what.\n\n\"What was that?\" The man's voice had a slight tinge of irony which only made my anxiety increase. \n\nI could handle it anymore, it would have rather died in that crash, but it was no of no use thinking about that, I already summed up the balls to try to escape once and there wasn't going to be a second time. Only then was I starting to realize how dizzy I was when I couldn't even look at them straight. The dust in the air was starting to settle, but all I could see was the blinding brightness of the sun behind them.\n\n\"I said...I said I was sorry\" Warm sweat started running down my brow, my legs kept shaking. There was no escaping now, I probably couldn't even make out of the highway even if I wanted to.\n\n\"Did you hear that? He is sorry now\" Chuckled the man\n\"You sure have been a bad boy! Didn't we tell you to behave?\"\n\nLaughter filled the air. I tried to wipe the sweat out so I could see their faces clearly, but I only made my head hurt even more. When I noticed I was on my knees again, the hand that I took to my forehead full of blood.\n\n\"Oh, no resting now son, you still have things to do\"\nA chill went down my spine when I thought about what he ment\"\n\n\"C'mon kid, get up, you have to get to work now\"\n\n\"Now? Here?\" The woman sounded more surprised than shocked\n\n\"Yeah, why not? That piece of shit ain't gonna take him much further\" He said, pointing through the sunlight at the brazing wreck behind me.\n\n\"You are right\" Said the woman, brooding whilst I was still on my knees. \"Well get up kiddo, we ain't got all day, you know\"\n\nI got up slowly \n\n\"C'mon, c'mon, open the trunk\"\n\nI walked towards what was left of the car, surprised to find that the back part was still relatively intact. I put my hand on the trunk and squished the button, my will to rebel was gone by then, I was only an automaton working at the command of their voice.\n\nThe body was even more bloodied than before, but after a close look it was obvious that it was still breathing. The collapsed nose had overflown his face with blood, tainting his whiskers red. I felt nauseous when I heard the man's breathe with dificulty from the blood that was running slowly into his mouth, but I couldn't do anything. From the safety of my house I would have devised wonderful escape plans, thought of witty comebacks to spit at my captors, or some confident last words to utter whilst they did me in, at the very least. \n\n\"Grab the body. Take it out\"\n\nI snapped back. Looked at the guy, while thinking that my fate wasn't going to be much different from his, so as a couple of unwilling parters in a demented game what could we do but play our role? \n\n\"Good\"\n\nThe couple looked at me. It was the first time I could clearly see them, but for some reason I can't recall their faces. All I know is that he looked at me straight in the eyes, knowing that I was trembling inside, that I was a weak and broken thing, trying to clinge to life however I could\n\n\"Do it\" \n\nAnd he threw a knife at the floor in front of me.\n\nI was staring it, eyes wide open. My heart stopped beating at the sound of those two words, yet I could not look away from it. An eternity seemed to pass whilst I contemplated the shiny metal laying on the concrete road.\n\n\"What are you waiting for? DO IT!\" His voice went from the jokingly defiant to a cutting but firm tone. That voice expected nothing but inmediate obedience.\n\n[aside] Well, so this is the first time I braved up and tried to post a comment here. I wasn't very confident about writing, mainly because english isn't my first language and because its been ages since I wrote anything in highschool, so I hope y'all forgive my many mistakes. About the story, maybe it was a bit too dark, and I actually wanted to write an ending, but its late at night and I'm literally falling asleep, so hope y'all like it up to that point!", "I coughed, and watched one of my teeth fall to the pavement. Thick smoke, curled like ink in water from under the crumpled hood, stinging my eyes and nose. I stared at the tooth, then coughed again, sending a spray of blood on the front of my shirt.\n\nI had been so close. Bided my time. Gathered my resources. Picked my moment. And then, with one .454 bullet, my dreams, and the canary-yellow ‘67 Chevy C2 that they’d been riding in, slammed into a highway divider at 85 miles an hour. \n\nI knew they were waiting on me to answer them. Let ‘em wait. I was just going to lay here on the highway, coughing up blood and teeth and trying to see if I could get enough energy to turn over and look into the sky.\n\n“He asked you a question,” she said. She sounded testier than usual. I did just wreck her car. But she was the one who shot me, so I put most of the blame on her.\n\n“No,” I winced out, not looking at her. I didn’t recognize the tooth. Was it really one of mine? Maybe it was an extra baby tooth or something. Maybe all my teeth were just baby teeth, and I’d lose them all. What would my mouth look like then? Would I get fangs?\n\nI conceded, begrudgingly, that I might be in shock.\n\n“What did you say?” she asked. Yeah, definitely mad. Well, screw her. At least she had all her teeth.\n\n“He said...he asked if I wanted...to explain myself,” I managed to wheeze through a chest that felt like it had just been in a head-on collision with a concrete wall.\n\nUgh. Definitely in shock. My simile gland’s broke.\n\n“And I don’t,” I finished. “You figure it out.”\n\nI heard boots crunching powdered glass, then felt a hand under my chin, yanking me up. I grunted, only partially from the pain--that was terribly emergency trauma response. I might have a neck injury. \n\nI found myself looking into the old man’s eyes. His face was unreadable. “I’ll ask you one more time,” he said in measured tones. “Do you want to explain yourself?”\n\nI grunted again, which he took to be an assent, and he let me go. My head sagged back down, and I rested it on the asphalt. “I was--” My body spasmed, and I coughed up more blood. “Ugh. I was catfishing a pedophile,” I mumbled. “Pervert said if he saw a yellow corvette, he’d--”\n\nHe hit me, hard. I hadn’t thought anything would hurt too much after surviving a crash like that. \nHe didn’t move, just waited for my groaning to stop. “Okay,” I said weakly. “Fine. I registered for a Magic tournament in Dawsonville, but I’d never make it time in my car--”\n\nI almost saw it coming this time. It didn’t help.\n\n\"What...what time is it?” I whispered when the pain had retreated. “Please, not joking anymore, I’ll tell you, just...what time is it?”\n\n\"It’s 9:23,” she snapped. “Now what is the meaning of this?”\n\nIf it didn’t hurt so much, I would have started laughing. I managed a cracked, broken smile. “It means that the distraction worked,” I said. “And right now, my friends are kicking your friends’ asses.”\n\nI saw it coming this time. I didn’t care. I was laughing too hard.\n" ]	2
For example, perhaps the doors don't always send you to the same place, or breaking a clock stops time...	[WP] A house in which everything is magic.	[ "When Hector Benavides died, his ghost cried at his funeral, lamenting in silent wails the empty seats and threadbare retinue that laid his body to rest. The second line from his decayed estate to final rest was so ragged that it resembled a brass wheeze, a scrawling howl scratched along the edge of chalk born. There was something carrion about his mourners, like a murder of mottled crows under the scourge of some spiritual ectoparasite. When he was finally laid to rest on a rainy day, each shovel of dirt heaped upon his remains was a release from the disappointment of his legacy. For he now could join the eternal dreamers in the ground, while unsuspecting heirs would inherit the tribulations of the living mansion from which death had been his only escape.\n\nThe house at the end of Calle Villareal was a palace of portents and presentiment. It's crumbling gables were a testament to the baroque sensibilities of the previous century. It was ostentatious in gloom and exaggerated in presence, diminishing its more modest neighbors through force of ego. Even in its decrepitude, it exercised a certain will that haunted the neighbors, the district, the city itself.\n\nIt had been built as a labor of love by the late Anacleto Benavides for his wife, he Gypsy. She had come with him from overseas, the prized possession of foreign treasures, with a name and history too long for the neighbors to learn or understand. They enjoyed ten good years as lovers and spouses. Then she fell prey to the charms of another man. While Anacleto died without knowledge of her infidelity, the house was broken, grieving for the heart of another. The betrayal poisoned the wood, rotted the foundations, turns the wainscoting and wrought iron into twisted expressions of envy and anguish.\n\nThen, other things happened.\n\nTheir daughter, Soledad, was swallowed by those walls, consigned to the life of a spinster and the bitterness of what could have been, caring for her parents in life and in death. The idea of her was so diminished that in the end she was carried out with a teaspoon for a bier, to be unceremoniously welcomed and consumed by her ancestors like any other forgettable sweetener. The son, Jenero, lived a life of evil twins, he persona and personality changing with each doorway he stepped through. By the time his son Hector had inherited the manor, he longed for nothing more than to demolish it. The whispers of its oddity had already outgrown the fortunes of his family’s name. It was a blight upon the Benavides, upon the soul of the nation.\n\nHe died childless and a failure, begotten of the misfortune that had ruled the lives of his ancestors.\n\nWhen Remei walked into the house of her distant cousin, she could not perceive this history. Nor could she sense the troubled marrow of the place, the turmoil in its studs or its trembling panes. She had only a sense of luck, random fortune, and the lingering misgivings that she did not feel sorry enough for relatives that she did not know. The first night in the house was uneventful. The second was quiet as well.\n\nIt was on the third night that the house revealed itself to her. The sun had just set, darkness gathering in deepening stains that pooled in corners and underneath furniture. It seemed the edges of things were starting to lose all distinction, that one whole, indefinable yet looming, had supplanted her knowledge of dimensions.\n\nWasn’t it strange that the house had no mice? Wasn’t it peculiar that no visitors had called? What was the knocking at night, the creaking that emanated from untouched floorboards, the groaning perturbations of an empty house? These questions settled into her stomach with an acid anxiety. She did not sleep, she did not dream. She merely waited for day to break, for the spell to be broken, for some respite from doubts as inevitable as sunset.\n\nThe neighbors did not open their doors when she called upon them. They called their servants from the entry, sent the gardeners home and pretended to be on holiday. Benavides was a cursed house. No matter who this ill fated scion was, her fate to them was sealed, as doomed and apparent as the worm eaten siding on her house. So Remei left for the center city without company, to lose herself in the anonymity of masses of people.\n\nThe kitchen had been unused for decades. Remei’s first thought to install herself was to fill the kitchen with food and restore signs of life to the house. A house with food is a house that gives, that stores, that is warm and content. But as she walked through the grocery aisles, she floated through a different form of solitude. One of brightly lit brand names and small print facts, f barcodes and self checkout, a deeply impersonal experience shared elbow to elbow with a glut of humans.\n\nShe cooked for the first time since before the divorce that night. She boiled water, chopped vegetables, prepared cutlets in a reduction. She opened jars of spice whose exotic names had seduced her more than the tastes she remembered. It was a meal for one. Remei decided to consider this a victory of self sufficiency, the mark of a achievement for what a person alone could accomplish with a little preparation. She marked the occasion with a modest vintage of wine and an old book, whose pages she read and reread without following the plot.\n\nAt one in the morning she finished the bottle. Words swam in her face like a sea of serif waves, imperial and chaste and terribly boring. As she walked up the steps, the stairs to the second floor seemed to lengthen, the staircase corkscrewed extra spirals. The railings were scaled like serpent skin beneath her touch. Carpet leaped up to trip her. Remei was out of breath by the time she reached the top of the stairs, only to find the halls narrowed towards a fading horizon. Each step brought the ceiling lower, the walls closer. She had to crawl the final mile to bed. It was dawn by the time she squeezed through the door, sunrise when she made the refuge of her covers.\n\nIf it had been just a bad hangover, the sulfates or a bad onion, she would have forgotten all about the stolen night. But she woke up to a ceiling lower than the previous day. A bathroom that switched toilet and bathtub until she flushed, ran taps of vinegar in the sinks. There was an excess of rugs like bad memories, crumpled and cluttered through hallways and rooms, draping everything in shag and berber. What furniture she had cleared for use was now dusted and covered in sheets, like the ghosts of outdated furnishings. Every time she pulled a sheet, another grimier coverlet lay underneath, in a soiled matryoshka of disuse. The kitchen was a carnage of spilled spice and broken crockware. The house had turned against her.\n\nRemei was at the point of running screaming from the doors when a preternatural calmness took hold of her. A house was a place. Place was given significance by people. She was a person and therefore responsible for this meaning. She cleaned the kitchen. Laundered the sheets. Took the extra carpet out for disposal. Everything was folded and placed in a closet. Various spray bottles were used to bring a scent of lavender and potpourri to bear. She made appointments with contractors and repairmen. Faucets would be replaced. Grout cleaned. Tiles fitted. Rooms painted. She went to bed with another feeling of accomplishment.\n\nThe house rattled and scratched, filled her ears with sounds of faltering foundations, splintering wood, windows shattered by intruders creeping up the stairs. Remei stayed fast under the covers, paralyzed by fear if nothing else. Angry poltergeists rumbled between the walls. Phantom shadows stole across the threshold of the door, whose knob juggled with a pregnant terror. The wind whispered betrayal in each battering gust, clapping shudders and conspiracy against the walls.\n\nRemei did not sleep. The next the day saw the flatware spilled and the furniture enshrouded and mummified. Rolls of carpet now barricaded rooms. There were leaks in every bathroom. Her clothes were moth eaten. She was about to rent her hair when she fell into a deep breath and had to count backwards until she was released. She picked up the silver and put it in drawers. Pulled sheets from the furniture to be laundered. More carpets were trashed. The plumber came. She bought herself a new shirt.\n\nThe house raged against her poise. Wallpaper peeled like dead skin and pipes shrieked with its fury. Molding split like rent ground and splinters wedged themselves under her nails. It stole blankets from her at night. Left windows open. Cabinets rotted and closets swallowed clothes. She replied to this tyranny with a stony determination. What was broken would be fixed. What was soiled cleaned. Hard edges were polished and faded veneers restored. At the end of each day it seemed like there was one fewer step to bed. The chairs were covered in one less sheet. Carpets obeyed laws of gravity and multiplication. Her socks were no longer devoured with glee.\n\nKnocks faded in intensity and cadence, the night shortened, fell heavy lidded and warm, wrapped about her neck with feline grace and comforter thickness, took a rhythm like a heartbeat. Then one day a rap came at the door. It was called Amal, and the house learned to breathe and begin again.\n", "\"When are we going home, Mommy?\" asked a little girl. She was curled in a mound of ragged blankets in the corner of a dark room. The only light came from traffic passing outside the dirty window. Light flashed through the room periodically, shaking and rattling the small space. \n\n\"Mommy?\"\n\n\"This is our home now.\" The little girl's mom sat beside her on the threadbare carpet. The woman's clothes were too large, and her hair was tumbling out of its ponytail, but seeing the girl's trembling lips, the mom leaned closer. \"Can I tell you a secret?\" \n\nThe girl nodded solemnly. \n\n\"Are you sure you can keep it?\" the mom asked.\n\nIn the shadows of the room, the little girl whispered \"I never tell secrets.\" \n\nHer mom smiled; this time it was her lips trembling. \"This is a good secret, a secret that is meant to be shared.\"\n\nThe girl shook her head, her dark hair spilling across the wadded up jacket that was her pillow. \"But Daddy said not to share secrets.\"\n\n\"Hush,\" said her mom. \"This secret is a magic secret because this secret belongs to both of us. Do you want to know our secret?\"\n\nThe girl nodded.\n\nHer mom whispered in her ear \"this is a magic house.\" \n\nA car rumbled by, and the house shook and rattled, brightening for a moment to reveal blank walls, an empty floor, and a door with three locks.\n\nThe little girl's eyes widened. \"How?\" \n\n\"Do you see that window?\" her mom asked. The girl nodded. \"That window holds the heart of a star. It's dark right now, because it doesn't want to blind us, but see how it keeps brightening?\" The girl nodded again, watching it lighten and darken. \"That's because it's practicing. It wants to shine just right so that the moon will see it and take it back to the sky.\"\n\n\"Why is it not in the sky?\" \n\n\"It got lost for a bit.\" The mom ran fingers through her daughter's hair. \"But don't worry, it's happy here because it's not alone. The floor is its friend.\"\n\n\"How is floor a friend?\" The little girl asked. She scrunched her nose. \"It smells funny.\"\n\n\"Well, of course it does. It is a dragon. That's what dragons smell like. Can't you feel it rumble?\" \n\nThe room brightened and the floor shook. The girl shuddered. \n\n\"Don't be afraid, darling. This is a good dragon.\" She patted the ground. \"It is solid and supporting, and is always there for the star. Some day it's going to fly the star back to the moon.\"\n\n\"Can we fly with it?\"\n\n\"Maybe.\" The mom smiled. \"But not tonight. I told the blankets we would keep them company, and they don't want you to leave them alone.\"\n\nThe girl snuggled them closer, her blue eyes wide. \"I don't like being alone either.\"\n\n\"No one does, but don't worry. These blankets are magic blankets too. When you are wrapped in these blankets, you are wrapped in my arms, even when I'm far away.\"\n\n\"But what if someone takes them away?\"\n\nThe mom squeezed her daughter tighter. \"They can't. Our guardian will stop him.\"\n\n\"Who's that?\"\n\n\"Well, you met the guardian already. You walked right through her!\"\n\nA giggle broke free from the girl. \"No, I didn't.\"\n\n\"Why, yes you did. Look, she's standing right there.\" The mom pointed at the door.\n\n\"Oh, I remember.\" The little girl fell still. \"But what does she do? She never did anything before.\"\n\n\"That was a normal door. This door is the guardian. She let in the star and the dragon, she let in the blankets as well. She keeps them here, safe, until they're ready to leave, because with her locks three, she holds back the world.\"\n\n\"How?\" The girl's eyes started to drift close.\n\n\"She stands, and she never falls down. No matter what happens, she never falls down.\" The star brightened, the dragon rumbled, and the mother's arms drew close. \"And some day, when you're ready to stand, she'll open for you, and you'll ride with the dragon and the star, wrapped in the arms that never let go, and you'll find the world, you'll touch the sky, and you will never fall down.\"\n\nThe mom kissed her daughter's forehead.\n\n\"Mommy?\" The little girl mumbled with her eyes closed.\n\n\"Yes, darling?\"\n\n\"Is Daddy coming home?\"\n\n\"No, darling.\"\n\n\"Good.\"" ]	2
	[WP] Despite making it as comfortable as possible. Despite making it as earth like as possible. Astronauts still have trouble sleeping in space. The reason may be more sinister then previously thought.	[ "\"You are where you're from.\" Someone famous said that or maybe it was a literary theme in a book. I think it had to do with Faulkner. I just can't remember. We are currently one light year away from Earth headed to a suspected earth-like planet orbiting Epsilon Eridani. Cruising at 98% of the speed of light, and here I am straining to remember my college English Lit classes. But it is important to remember, even if the lack of sleep makes it difficult. But the words ring truer the further we get from Earth. \"You are where you're from.\" Faulkner, yeah, I think it was Faulkner.\n\nSleep or, more to the point, the lack thereof. It's a bitch. To be honest, I hadn't really thought too much about it before we left. Everyone knows that sleep is difficult for astronauts. It’s Spacefaring 101. No one really knew why astronauts become insomniacs. All we knew was that the sleep was more difficult the longer you were away from Earth and the further you were away from Earth. Sleep deprivation or Sleep Dep was generally viewed as an annoyance. Something you just handled. Members of the Kuiper Belt expeditions documented that they slept less than three hours a night. Every night for seven years. No one understood why. Fuck man, the Kuiper Belt guys were some of the most heavily studied spacefarers in history and no one could figure out the cause. Some researchers pointed to artificial gravity or lack of gravity as the culprit, some pointed to space induced disruptions in circadian rhythms, others thought it was some type of subconscious anxiety response. I know now that all of these theories are wrong. Although I admit, I liked the anxiety theory. How can anyone really sleep knowing that the only thing between you and certain death is the thin shielding of the ship and faith that the engineers who built the thing got their numbers right? I try not to think about it, but there is always that anxiety in the back of my mind. Hurtling through the vacuum of space in your own atmospheric bubble just isn't natural. So maybe subconscious anxiety is a partial cause, but it is not the root cause. \n\nScience tried to find all sorts of solutions to the Sleep Dep problem, most of which we have implemented on the ship. Artificial lighting that mimics the sun's rise and fall based on an equatorial earth day, artificial gravity tuned to that felt on earth at sea level, strict exercise regimens, bio-feedback programs, meditation, tweaks to the ship’s atmosphere. None of them work. Once outside of earth's orbit, humans just don't sleep well. Even so, NASA requires that we have nine hours of \"sleep\" time per 24-hour cycle and also supplies us with medicinal sleep aids. Some of us take them and some of us don't. I spend my sleep time reading, listening to music and watching messages from home (which are becoming fewer and more far between the farther away we get). If I feel too fatigued, I will take a sleep aid but I never feel well rested afterwards. They push me into a black unconscious space, but it's not sleep and I don't dream. Nobody dreams. \n\nWhere was I? Oh, yes. Sleep Dep and theories thereon. There isn't a physical cause. I know that now. And Sleep Dep is just one of the first symptoms, and the easiest to deal with. It wasn't until we were about 3,000 AUs from earth that I started noticing things. First, it was my memory. It was hard to remember things and not just the \"where did I put my clipboard\" kind of things, but the \"who am I?\" kind of things. And it wasn't just me; the rest of the crew felt it as well. It's hard to explain really. Like a mild fugue state has descended on the entire crew. You have to physically struggle to remember who you are and what you are doing. The number of panic attacks this caused on the ship was a significant problem. It was sheer panic the first time it happened to me; a deep down animalistic panic. It is like I had become unhinged from the world. Now I have it written down, who I am and what I am doing out here. Just basic facts, just enough to jumpstart my mind and jog the memory so to speak. I read the facts aloud every morning to remind myself and pull myself together. But it is getting harder. I also watch the tapes from home, which seem to help too.\n\nBut that’s not the worst of it. For me it is the physical changes. I don't look like myself anymore. It is almost as if I am becoming a more generic version of myself. It's hard to explain. And it is happening to all of us. It is as if our discerning features are slowly melting away, leaving just the archetype of a man or a woman. I used to have a strong chin and unruly hair, but not anymore. Even my surgical scars have faded. I am just not me. \n\nOh and did I mention the other people? I did, didn't I? Well, if I didn't, I will now. I strongly suspect that there are new people onboard the ship. That is right. There are more of us. It sounds silly, I know. Like maybe, I am not all quite there in the head. I mean we are on a light cruiser in the middle of deep space. It's not like people can just hop on mid flight like this a bus. But I am sure of it. There are people on board this ship that weren't here when we left Earth. They never talk. They just kind of wander the ship like ghosts. Ghosts. Well, there’s a theory... And it is funny you see them, but then you can’t really remember what they looked like five minutes later. Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned the people. You probably think I am crazy. Space madness. \n\nNow where was I? Oh yes. The cause. It's a lack of context, you see. I am certain of it. We are where we are from, and we weren't meant to be out here. We have no context here. We are intertwined with the Earth and our solar system. That is where we are from. That is our context. Out here, we are nothing. Without context, we are slowly dissipating. We are becoming ghosts. It is as if the Universe can't adjust to us being out here. There’s no context for it. And without context, we can't be explained and we can't exist. \"You are where you are from.\" Now who said that? I think it might have been a writer. Faulkner maybe.\n", "...they yet journeyed through the space between the stars. In the place without shadows, The Wanderer was the only light.\n\nFelix flitted his fingers through the leaves of a sunflower sprout, pushing the leaves down until they bounced back up. The rays of false sunlight pored down through the canopy, making the drops of dew sparkle. \n\n\"Except for a few germs on a few rocks, we're completely alone. Sure, there're a thousands theories about our solitude, Sandip. But do you ever stop and think, why us?\" \n\nAcross the greenroom, the towering trunks of tomato plants rustled. A milky brown figure wove himself through the tangles of green. \n\n\"Felix, I'm trying to deal with a very serious problem, please. Could you bring me the ultrasensor-\" Sandip's hand waved toward Felix's direction.\n\nFelix sifted through the pile of sterilized blades and trowels and metal shafts, until he found something that vaguely resembled a thermometer. \n\n\"Please. Hurry, Felix.\" Sandip's voice was terse, like a professor who did not want to repeat himself.\n\n\"Look, I know it's not a very good process to ask why, but I can't help but think about it.\" Felix waved the ultrasensor around as he wandered over to Sandip, \"Were we chosen? Were we lucky? Why were we lucky? Why are we here?\"\n\n\"You're here,\" Sandip's hand gestured through the thick greenery, \"to help me keep these plants from dying.\"\n\nFelix's eyebrow raised, \"Dying? What do you mean dying?\"\n\n\"Dying? You need me to explain 'death' to you, Felix? Stop asking such stupid questions, and come help me before The Wanderer loses her last batch of tomatoes.\"\n\nFrom above, the plants looked healthy. Their leaves were thick, and vibrant and the stalks were strong, with just the right amount of flexibility. Hundreds of tiny, green tomatoes were ripening up and down the plants.\n\nSandip popped a tomato off of the nearest plant, and showed it to Felix. The outside was plump, if a little dull. But, when he turned it over a shiny, black ooze trickled out from where the tomato had decoupled from the plant. \n\n\"What is that?\"\n\n\"Now you're asking the right questions, Felix. That,\" Sandip pointed with his pinky finger, \"Is poison. You so much as touch that to your tongue, and you're dead. Dead, Felix.\"\n\nFelix jumped back, \"Why the hell are you holding it so close to me then?\"\n\nSandip took a small sample bag from a nearby rack, and plunked the poisonous tomato into it. He slid his his fingers across the seal, and threw the sample under one of the ion microscopes in the center of the green room. Sandip sat on a stool, and pressed his eye to the microscope, flicking through the settings.\n\nHis shoulders climbed higher and higher with every flick of the machine.\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\nSandip took a deep breath, and let it out slowly, as if the weight of centrifugal-induced gravity was too heavy for him. He pulled away from the machine, and turned to Felix. There were dark circles around his eyes, and for the first time that day, Felix realized that he hadn't seen Sandip in the cafeteria in a long while. In fact, the cafeteria had been rather empty as of late.\n\n\"I don't know how else to say this.\"\n\n\"What is it, Sandip?\"\n\n\"I have never seen anything like this. I...\" Sandip stopped for a moment, as if his on own words were a burden, \"I have no idea what to do.\"\n\n\"What do you mean you don't know what to do?\"\n\n\"They are all dying, Felix. Every plant in every green room. They are all destroying themselves. I can tell you how they're dying, but there is nothing I can do to stop it.\"\n\nFelix, for once, had nothing to say. He stared at Sandip. They were surrounded by a gentle decay: browning tips of potato stalks, curling tomato leaves, grape vines as thin as spider webs.\n\nA sudden rush of nausea swept over Felix. He gagged, but nothing came up. He squeezed his eyes shut to combat the sickness, and steadied himself on the table. Felix took a few deep, calming breaths, and spoke at last, \"So what? We don't have food. We still have Cryo - what? Why are you shaking your head?\"\n\n\"It's not just the plants, Felix. It's you. It's me.\" Sandip held up his hands, his eyes failing to meet Felix's.\n\nHe backed away from Sandip, \"No. We'll turn around, and we'll go into Cryo.\"\n\n\"Something is coming, Felix. Something has always been coming.\"\n\n\"Nothing is coming, Sandip! Do something about this. FIX THIS.\" Felix's hand caught on a branch, which snapped off too easily. He threw it at Sandip, \"This is your job. Fix this now, Sandip. \"\n\n\"I can't stop it.\" Sandip's lips were as straight and narrow as a stem. \n\n\"Why?\" Felix croaked. His head shook back and forth, and when a million other questions bubbled forth, all he could say was, \"Why?\"\n\n\"It's close, Felix. Can you feel it?\"\n\n\"There is nothing out there!\"\n\n\"Exactly.\"\n\n\nIn the place of shadows, the only light was swallowed whole. And the space between the stars stirred." ]	2
Make sure to explain what the war is about, and give detail during battles.	[WP] There is an all out war in the music dept.	[ "I only found the accursed score in the first place because of Andrew's powers of persuasion. When he squints through his glasses in that certain way, I find it difficult to say no. This time, he squinted me into building him a conservatory, or at least into starting the destruction that might become a conservatory. Not the musical kind (he already taught at one of those), the suitably pretentious all-glass-and-flowers kind. He'd hinted about it on and off for years, but that spring set the sap a-rising in his clever fingers, and he badgered me until I took up a sledgehammer and attacked the porch, while he attacked Prokofiev. I was hauling ancient newspaper baffling out of the wreckage (of the porch, not Prokofiev, although it may have been close-run, given he was transcribing it for 7-year-olds) when he handed me a cold drink, and I handed him the mouldy old sheet music I had uncovered. \n“Oh hey! That’s pretty cool. Looks handwritten.” Being Andrew, he hummed the few bars that were still visible between water damage and mildew. It was jaunty and a little bit gypsy-chic. Pretty catchy. “Only a melody line. For violin maybe?” He rubbed his thumb across the black specks, then made a face as they scabbed up under his nail “Yuck. Can’t read the title or the composer’s name, if there ever was one. Shame.” He wiped his thumb on my shirt, then tossed the music on what was still left of the porch. Andrew decided to take it into school the following week as a project for his composition class, and we thought no more about it – although even then that fragment of tune kept drifting into my head. \n\nThe first one to run with it was the very serious and gifted 13-year-old, who transposed the melody line and added a harmony and a horrible continuo for a recorder ensemble, rather handily made up of her and her two malleable little sisters. They performed it at the school concert, packed with appreciative and jealous parents, that Thursday. \n\nThe second one was the child of an interpretive dancer and a famous ‘re-beat’ poet, unsurprisingly deep in his experimental phase, who rewrote the tune for ‘3 colours of Tupperware and a thrown halfbrick’. He performed it at one of his parents' distressing stage shows in an abandoned meatlocker on Friday night. \n\nThe third was the older teen with a thriving sycophantic YouTube channel, who scored it for angry guitar and what sounded like someone passing a kidney stone, only electronically enhanced. That was viral by Saturday morning. \n\nThat was probably the one that ultimately started the war. Suddenly the maddening, skin-itching tune was everywhere, everywhen, and everyhow. Everyone simultaneously wanted to reinterpret it and burn out their cochleas with Borax. And every budding composer believed their interpretation was the most correct, the most pure, the most true to the original. \n\nAndrew, of course, was the very worst. He always was a pretentious git who knew music better than anyone else, so it was inevitable, really. The limousines began to arrive at the school by Monday, disgorging record executives and plastic-haired ‘X-Thing’ producers, already suggesting ‘better’ arrangements. Andrew’s cello-string longbows (bow-firing bows, to be exact) were surprisingly effective, and the carpark was very soon littered with corpses wearing too much bronzer. Inside the prefabricated walls it wasn’t much better. The second-years had trapped the English teacher inside an amplifier and were currently doing their best to replicate Experiment IV. Naturally, that featured recorders again, and intel suggests possibly an accordion. Mr Henson was hanging upside-down in the cafeteria freezer, having bled out from fatal cymbal injuries to the carotid. \n\nI never did finish the conservatory. The hole where the porch used to be makes an excellent bunker. It’s not big enough for Andrew, though, just for me and my trombone. My score is coming along very nicely – I’m pretty sure the composer originally intended it with those delightful slides in the coda. I just need to get it perfect in case Andrew ever makes it home. Although then we’ll have to have that argument about andante versus andantino again, and this time I think I'll manage to stand my ground. I think this time it will end in blood.\n", "Edward and Julie know they’re out there.\nAs they sit shaking in the cold and damp foxhole, they know the enemy waits on the other side of the forest, cold and shaking in their foxholes, too.\nAside from the occasional trombone tuning-up piercing the cold air from a distance, it has been maddeningly quiet on the front. The duo hold their violins close to their sides.\nThey anxiously await a strike that is inevitably coming.\nSoon they hear the crunch, crunch, crunch of booted footsteps coming toward them from behind. Edward is the first to turn around, bow raised and violin tucked under his chin.\n“Don’t play, don’t play … it’s me”\nEdward squints into the night until his eyes adjusts and realizes it’s just a professor. He lowers his bow and violin while adrenaline continues to coarse through his body.\nProfessor Bradley walks up to the foxhole and crouches behind it, looking out into the horizon.\n“Anything yet?” he whispers.\n“No. All quiet.” Edward turns back around to sit, but the warmth created from staying in the same spot for hours has disappeared. All he feels now along his entire back is the cold, damp earth.\n“Ok, well, Stay alert.”\nThe duo doesn’t respond.\n“Just making sure everyone has what they need. Are you two set?”\n“You mean besides warm clothing, warm food, and a hot shower? Yeah, we’re good.” Edward, startled, looks at Julie and then back out at the horizon.\nProfessor Bradley ignores the frustration in Julie’s voice. “Just make sure you’re strings are tuned and you’re ready to go.”\nAnd with that, Bradley takes off toward the right flank, to check on the rest of the winds, his crunch, crunch, crunching slowly fading away until the night air is still again.\nEdward looks at Julie. “What do you think they’ll be playing?”\n“I don’t know. Something showy, probably.” Julie says.\n“I wish I could feel my hands.”\n“Don’t worry. Once we start going, you’ll barely notice. It’s all muscle memory anyway.”\nEdward was comforted by Julie’s confidence. She had been a member of the concert orchestra for years. This kind of battle was nothing new for her.\n“You ever get scared?”\nJulie kept staring into the distance.\n“Of course.”\nThe answer surprised Edward.\n“It’s like walking a tightrope without a net.” Julie then turned to Edward. “You’re not going to fall if you know the net’s not there.”\nJulie looked back out at the horizon. “Without fear, there’s comfort in knowing you’ll be ok if you fail.”\nEdward stared at Julie, but she kept looking out at the horizon. He then looked down at his violin. They had spent hours quietly sitting in their foxhole, but now Edward wanting nothing more than noise. Any noise.\nHe didn’t want to be alone with his thoughts.\n“Shhh!”\nEdward froze. Julie, now upright, slowly moved toward the front of the foxhole, crouching so that her eyes were just above level with the ground. She thought she heard rustling in the distance.\nTap, tap, tap.\nThey’re ready, Julie thought to herself.\nProfessor Bradley began running through the line, whispering, “Flight of the bumblebee … flight of the bumblebee.”\nJulie, eyes still on the horizon, brought her violin up to her neck, and held it in place with her chin. She gently placed her bow on the strings.\n“Wait for it. … waaaaaaaaaait for it!” Bradley yelled.\nAll of a sudden a boom of brass exploded through the cold morning air and slowly rose in unison.\n“The M Fanfare! It’s the M Fanfare! They’re playing The Victors! Get ready!” Brady instructed.\n\nJulie stood rock still, arm cocked and ready to play. Edward tried to calm his nerves, but his chest heaved with each breath. The air all of a sudden too thick for his lungs to handle.\nAfter one last blow from the brass, a silence fell of the forest.\n“NOW!”\nJulie, Edward, and the rest of their bandmates began playing “Flight of the Bumblebee.”\n“KEEP PLAYING … KEEP PLAYING.”\nAs the marching band across the horizon broke into “The Victors,” the concert orchestra continued furiously playing “Flight of the Bumblebees.” Fingers bounced across strings and valves. Heads jerked to the sudden movement of the music. Arms shook violently back and fourth.\nJulie and Edward, their foxhole front and center, couldn’t see what their bandmates were going through, but they could hear it. They sounded crisp, technical, and on tempo. They tried not to pay attention to the exploding brass, booming bass, and crashing symbols in front of them.\nKEEP PLAYING!\nJulie slipped into a trance. She was no longer playing her instrument but watching herself play as the tempo inscreased along with the desperation. Her fingers were no longer individual digits but a blur of movement. The bow moving itself across the strings.\nEdward couldn’t escape the moment. His breath was labored. His fingers began cramping, falling short of their intended location. His shoulder ached from the constant back and forth and the bow felt heavy in his hand, dragging itself across the strings.\nKEEP PLAYING!\n\nThe tempo increased on both sides. Soon strings began snapping, reeds began breaking and sticks began flying out of exhausted hands. Little by little, both sides started losing band members to the rigors of the number.\nJulie kept on playing. When the number ended, she began playing again, as instructed by per professors before they took a position. She could see the marching band members stumbling, but knew her own orchestra was losing members. That’s when she heard the snap.\n“NO!”\nIt was the first time since they began playing that Julie was fuly aware of her surroundings. She stopped and began looking at her violin and bow. The bow was a bit frayed, but nothing she couldn’t play through. All the strings on her violin were intect. Then she looked to her right and saw Edward, sitting back down in the foxhole. His bow a mess and his violin now down a strong.\n“MEDIC!!” Julie screamed.\n“No, no, no, no! I didn’t mean for this to happen!” Edward’s hands and feet shook as the excess adrenaline left his body.\n“It’s nothing! Just restring and get back here! … MEDIC!”\nSoon an instrument medic appeared, sliding up to the foxhole.\n“Do you need reeds?!”\n“Does it look like we use reeds?! Take Edward back to camp and get him re-strung now!”\n“I’m sorry, Julie!”\n“Go now!”\nEdward rushed out of the foxhole and ran back into the woods with the medic. Julie turned back around and slipped back into playing the number. The marching band had begun strong, but their numbers were thinning out at a higher pace: a few trumpets, sousaphones, and snare drums remained. And one bass drum.\nJulie began going numb, but she continued playing. A music department was many things with many different types of music. But she would be damned if this department would be definded by its marching band. Anyone can play loudly, she thought.\nNot everyone could play technically.\nFALL BACK!\nJulie broke out of her trance again.\n“Fall back! Fall back! Come on, let’s go! Julie, get moving!” Professor Bradley yelled has he grabbed others out of their foxholes and pushed them to run deeper back into the forest.\nJulie turned to look at the horizon. The marching band was also retreating back to their base, as well.\n“Come on, lets go!”\nJulie rose from one knee and stood arrow straight. Her arms rested as her sides, the bow and violin now just extensions of herself. She stared ahead but didn’t stare at anything in particular. She could now feel her lungs burning.\nShe knew waiting back at camp there was a change of clothes and a hot meal. But she didn’t want that anymore. She wanted the next battle to begin and another chance to show the orchestra’s superiority. No one had won this battle. But it was only a matter of time.", "It was supposed to be an ordinary Christmas performance. Looking back, the tensions straining the patience of everyone involved should have been obvious, but all things are obvious in hindsight. Truly, there is no way we should have been expected to realize the hell we were about to unleash. \nOne of the seniors, a vocalist, went to the department head and demanded a solo. Rather than move the singers around to accommodate the demand, the head decided to rearrange the entire structure of the performance, all for one additional song. This had the effect of cutting the tubas down to performing in a single song, which they would not stand for. \nThe tubas cried unfairness and went on strike, saying they deserved at least as much recognition as the trumpets. The department head responded by saying that nobody really cared about the tubas anyway, and so was unwilling to budge. When the tubas showed similar stubbornness, the head went a step further and cut the tubas' one remaining song, replacing it with a song that was not truly a Christmas song, but was a classical piece that everyone knew; Pachelbel's Canon in D. \nThis, of course, angered the cellos. It's not fair, they cried, that we have to be subjected to an awful piece simply because the tubas are obnoxious! \nIt escalated from there. \nI'm not sure who it was who actually struck first, but within hours lines had been drawn, alliances had been made, and blood had been spilled. Campus became a war zone. \nI write this in the hopes that a future department head may not make the same mistakes of our past. \n~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ \n\"Sir!\" came a cry. I looked up from my desk to see one of my scouts standing in front of me. His insignia marked him as a second violin. For the first time in recorded history, the first and second violins had banded together. Together we had destroyed the violas, and together we were attempting to make a stand against the flutes. \nI saluted him in return, and he stood at ease. \"What news from the front?\" I asked. \n\"Sir!\" he said, small smile on his face. \"Reports have come in from other sectors. Apparently the pianos Baroque through the lines of the percussionists.\" \n\"How many times do I have to tell you, no more puns!\" I sighed. \"Noted. We'll have to deal with them eventually, but for now they're still likely to be chasing down the percussion remnants. Thank you for the update, return to your post.\" \nHe saluted again. \"Yes sir! Any more news, and I'll come Bach.\" \nWith a roar, I grabbed my bow and leaped across my desk. Before the second violinist knew what had happened, he had been impaled through the heart. A look of shock slowly crossed his face as he pieced everything together, but he crumpled to the floor before he could get a word out. \nThis would end our alliance, I knew it. We would have to strike quickly in order to preserve our numbers. I pulled out my cell phone and dialed my second-in-command. \n\"Hey Carly, what's up?\" came the voice on the other end. \n\"It's time,\" I said. \"Execute Operation Salieri.\" \n\"Yes sir.\" The line went dead. \nI smiled. The second violins would fall in droves. Turning my focus back to my office, I realized that I would have to clean up the mess in front of my desk at some point... But first, I had to plan an offensive against the flutes." ]	3
I just watched this video of a man who has fluent aphasia after a stroke. This means that speech is effortless for him but the meaning is impaired. At the end he says "I hope the world lasts for you" and thought that was kind of beautiful. My writing prompt is for either a good bye story or a poem about that quote. [Link to the video.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oef68YabD0)	[WP] "I hope the world lasts for you"	[ "I hope the world lasts for you.\n\nI hope that you never take off your rose colored glasses, that you may always see everything with a bright tint of happiness.\n\nI hope that you never give up, no matter how many times life pushes you down that you may always keep going. \n\nI hope you stay a child, that it won't matter how old you are you will always fix your sorrow with laughter. \n\nI hope you fall in love, because even if you fall out of it you will know how beautiful life can be. \n\nI hope the world lasts for you, because it's already too late for me. ", "Close\n\nI never really missed my family. I was so wound up in leaving my dusty barren hometown, that when I left I never really looked back. Working in the city you find that there are so many distractions, so many people to know, so many places to go, so much work to do, that the past can only seem an old movie you watched maybe once or twice.\n\nI was asleep when the phone rang, and it jolted me awake. I could feel how I arose from a deep sleep. I was dreaming. I thought I couldn't dream. At least I haven't in such a long time that I had forgotten what it felt like.\n\nI looked at my phone's display: 4 missed calls from an unknown number.\n\nThe area code: Way too many numbers to know.\n\nAs I wondered in my half-awake state who could be calling, the phone rang again, the same unknown number, without thinking too much I answered.\n\n\"Hello\" - I said to the void.\n\n\"Sid?...it's me...it's Jaimie.\"\n\nThe words fell heavily on my head, I hadn't heard from Jaimie in...it must be a year now, my little sister; she was always so much mature than me...so accomplished.\n\n\"Jaimie!\"- I said, more gleefully than I intended - \"What's up? haven't heard from you in... it must be a year now\"\n\nI could hear her sigh on the other side of the line, it sounded like she was annoyed.\n\n\"Yeah, listen there's no easy way to say this...dad died.\"\n\nI don't know if it was the hangover or the fact that I had just been awake for a whole minute, but those last two words froze time. Nothing else existed for a second there.\n\n\"Sid?, you there?\"\n\nJaimie spoke with such a monotone, robotic voice. If i didn't know her I would assume she was one of those automated systems people use to send messages nowadays.\n\n\"Yeah...I'm here.\"\n\n\"OK. Great, you need to go home and deal with his stuff.\" – She said in an even more monotone voice than before.\n\n\"What do you mean I have to go?\" – My voiced cracked unexpectedly.\n\n\"I'm halfway around the world, in and out of meetings, trying to un-fuck the fact the planet is going to shit, so I can't deal with this right now.\"\n\nShe was always the accomplished one.\n\n\"I bought you a plane ticket\" -She continued- \"your plane leaves in 4 hours, get to the airport, go home, and sort out his stuff.\"\n\n\"What do you mean? You're not even coming at all? Like to the funeral?\" –My voice cracked unexpectedly again, and I sounded more broken than I intended it to sound.\n\n\"Funeral?...if you can afford it. I sure as hell am not wasting anymore of my money on that. I wired the money for the cremation, if you want to keep the ashes or scatter them in the fucking ocean it's up to you. Like I said, i have bigger fish to fucking fry.\"\n\nShe sounded cold, but not robotic, she was hurting. She was always the accomplished one.\n\n\"OK, I'll deal with it.\" – i didn't feel like arguing anymore.\n\n\"Thanks...and Sid?\"\n\n\"Yeah?\"\n\n\"Take care.\"\n\nClick. She hung up the phone as soon as she finished. So much for the yearly reunion.\n\nI looked in the mirror, washed my face and brushed my teeth, I couldn't afford to take a shower in the comunal bathroom of my building so I just picked up some \"fresh\" clothes from the pile in the corner and headed out. I needed a break from this city anyways.\n\nAs I walked to the subway station I noticed there were much more homeless people than I remembered. I guess I had managed to shut them off and not see them anymore. I remembered how I was lucky I could even afford the rent to my shithole flat with the pennies I earned working in the factory.\n\nI rode the subway all the way to the deserted airport, JFK. Flying was such a luxury nowadays there were only private charter planes really, no more airliners, no more hundreds of planes in the air at anytime, just the odd private jet, and that odd private jet didn’t carry people like me usually, if it wasn’t for my rich ass sister i wouldn’t have seen the inside of a plane again in my life.\n\nWhen we landed I breathed the slightly less polluted air of rural america. \n\nApparently my dad had been living in a trailer park on the outskirts of town as I was told by the desk sergeant in the station and apparently my dad was already being cremated and was gonna be “ready for pickup” in a couple of hours, nobody had funerals anymore, no one could afford them so the only part of the business that had stayed afloat were cremations. Cremating someone was cheaper than burying them as it turned out, ashes to ashes I guess. \n\nI took a cab to the trailer park –Jaimie had transferred some credits to my account– and opened the door with the key they had given me at the station. I walked in and the stench of bourbon knocked me back a few steps. There was a small couch next to an old radio, and more bottles that I could care to count on the floor. The trailer was barely still standing, the wood paneling was lifted from the humidity and there were posters for old cowboy movies that lined the walls. I walked around like if I was on museum, it’s amazing how a place can tell you so much about someone. The only tidy place in the trailer was the little nightstand with the radio and an old polaroid my mom had taken back in the day. We were all together outside the house I grew up on, this was before the world went to shit, when people could still breathe without fucking masks and when people could still afford a place to live without working three jobs. Before mom died. After she passed, the house was not the same, my dad started to drink, I started to save the little money I could to make my trip to the city and my sister read and studied her way out of this wasteland.\n\nOn the couch there was an old shoebox, I opened it and there were a few more polaroids: me and mom, mom alone, Jaimie and dad. All taken the same day, probably the only pack of polaroid paper we could find. There was an old handkerchief and an old picture of my mom back when she was younger, probably seventeen or so, they had been high school sweethearts and had gotten married right out of it, my dad worked in a lumber mill and my mom was a teacher, the perfect little american dream. I grabbed the shoebox, it was probably the only salvageable thing in here and as i lifted it I saw two envelopes on the cushion. \n\nOne labeled Jaimie, one labeled Sidney. He knew how much I hated my name and how I only barely tolerated Sid.\n\nI picked up my envelope and sat on the couch, opened it and there was this letter, his cursive was beautiful, I remember that about him.\n\n“Being a father is hard, and im not trying to make excuses for myself, I just wish you get to experience that someday. Back when your mom and I had you we didn’t know what we were doing, but it didn’t matter, we were happy, for a little while but happy nonetheless, now as I sit in what i know will be my deathbed all I feel is regret. I regret not being next to you or your sister, I regret not telling your mom I loved her back when I still could, I regret not telling you how perfect you are and how proud I am of you. I hope this letter gives you closure and it reminds you that you had a father and a mother who loved you, and who think about you with pride every day. I hope you manage to settle down and do what you love, I hope you find someone to love, I hope you have children, I hope you learn that making mistakes is okay, I hope you don’t’ have as many regrets as I do, and I hope the world lasts for you to do all these things and more.\nLove… dad” \n\nI put down the letter and sat in silence for a minute. I poured myself a glass of bourbon and sat back on his couch looking at the old pictures, I turned on the radio which was tuned to and old school hits station; The Cure was playing.\n\nI sat there, and called Jaimie.\n", "The woman's body shuddered as she sobbed, her wet cheeks hidden behind long, unwashed strands of dark hair. \n\n\"Please don't cry,\" he said, his voice barely a whisper. His face was white and bloodless, his lips cracked and splintered like desert tiles. It had been days since they last found water, and he was so, so thirsty. Not that it mattered anymore. \n\nThe blood leaking from his side pooled on the dusty road as he lie there, dying. An iron spike, jagged and rusty, pointed up at the sky, its other end buried deep in his gut. The woman's knees were soaked red. \n\n\"I can't do this alone, I can't make it--\" She trembled as she clasped his hand in her own. Her tears splattered on the ground. His fingers were already cold, the nails caked with dirt and muck and his skin calloused from months spent in the wild. \n\n\"Shh now,\" he said, weakly rubbing his thumb over her brown skin. There were no doctors. There were no hospitals. There was no hope, at least for him. \"Keep going. You can make it. You're a smart girl.\" His mouth formed a small smile--then his face twisted in pain and he coughed deeply, sputtering drops of blood. \n\nThe men who attacked them had only wanted food. He understood that. The scuffle shouldn't have happened--it was his fault. He should've just handed over the bag. \nHe should've stayed off the road. But it was too late for regrets.\n\n\"Listen to me.\" His breaths were labored and raspy. \"Stick to the woods. Don't travel at night, and keep your fires low. The river is only a few miles further.\" He coughed again. \n\n\"You'll find a group soon. I know it. Civilization isn't over yet.\" A thin trail of blood cut a path from the side of his mouth, running down his dirt-stained cheek. \n\n\"...You don't know that for sure.\"\n\n\"You're right, I don't. But I have hope.\" The man reached up to cup her face in his hand. \"I hope the world lasts for you.\" \n\nThe woman clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle another sob. The man gazed up at her, full of love, before his eyes drifted from her face to rest on the clouds of smog hovering high above. The sky was an eerie shade of green. His hand went limp, and his arm sank to the ground. Then he took his last breath. \n", "I hope the world lasts for you\n\nDon't be sad for me, try your best to smile. For I can rest now in peace, cherishing memories we had when I was by your side. \n\nDon't forget to feed dodger and make sure to treat him with a bone from me every weekend. Rub his stomach and give him kisses. \n\nRemember to tell your mother that you love her and to be strong for your brother and sister. \n\nDont fight with Tommy, that's just his way of being noticed.\n\nI trust in you that you will help both of them grow to be as beautiful and charming as you are. \n\nI always told you that you had potential, but now I think back -that was a little unfair of me... \n\nAnd I apologize... a thousand times over... Forgive me. \n\nI should have been more giving.\n\nMore loving towards you. \n\nAs you shared such love, with me. \n\nBut please understand I meant well. \n\nI want you to be the best you can be. \n\nForgive me... Please...\n\nYou are...\n\nA caring adult.\n\nA lovely daughter. \n\nSomeone that I looked up to, even at my old age.\n\nWith such grace...\n\nI am proud to have raised you as your father.\n\nYour are the greatest gift life has presented, my pride and joy. \n\n Change the world my love...\n\nWhile the world travels right, you my darling will go left.\n\nYou will light the way for others...\n\nBelieve in yourself. \n\nI believe in you. \n\nI hope the world lasts for you.\n\nForever...\n\nSincerely\n\nYour Father\n\n\n\n", "Today, around 4:37PM, I lost my life in a motor-vehicle accident. \n\nOne of those terrible, gruesome scenes that backs up traffic for hours on I-95. A display which tickles our innate, self-loathing curiosity to see what tragedy has befallen our fellow man. Only, this was one of those occasions where you wish you hadn’t stretched your neck over to take a gander at what was going on around the traffic cones and strobing lights. \n\n“Thanks for tuning into 107.6 FM, we’re bringing you a live traffic update on I-95. We have reports of a major accident on the northbound side near exit 18, and major delays are expected. Authorities are advising motorists to take alternate routes and avoid the accident site as much as possible.”\n\nDamn, and just when I thought I got a hang of this whole driving thing too, I’m part of an event that’s broadcast for the whole zip-code to hear. For such a “defining” moment in my 22 year old life, it’s sad that I can only remember so little: a violent -boom- on the right side, the horrible screeching of metal grinding asphalt, the deep, roaring horn of a semi-truck, and then the characteristic crunch of aluminum to my back-left. Not much else, though. They say that time slows down for you in emergency situations, or that your life flashes before your eyes, but all I saw was pitch black. I guess I never really was much of a dreamer. \n\nThe local news stated that it was such a horrible accident, that it was a miracle that they were able to recover a body from my car at all. Still, traffic was now all clear, there’s an investigation and a memorial, and life apparently moves on. All anyone ever saw was the tragedy. \n\n\nYet, there’s a side of the story that the news didn’t cover. That there’s some stranger out there who’s lucky enough to experience a miracle of their own in all this misfortune. I’m glad the box I casually, lifelessly checked off on my driver’s license form all these years, the one that placed that little red heart mark that’s next to my birthdate on that plastic card, will have some meaning after all. \"Organ donor.\" \n\nA small decision that made a big impact. Who knows how many we’ve all made?\n\nGoodbye to you, stranger, and good luck. I hope the world lasts for you. \n", "“Love is a cruel and bitter thing.” \n\nHis mouth fishhooks at one corner, a shadow of his old Gablesque smile as he regards the scrambled eggs. His fork is already hovering like a lusty hawk. I smile back, and pass him the salt. He takes the china owl, the matched set to the pussycat in their pea-green boat cruet, and speaks into the holes in its head like it’s a microphone. “Animals won’t pick you up at the airport.” He inverts it, shaking far too much salt on his eggs. I consider stopping him – he’s supposed to be watching his sodium – but by the time I finish that thought it’s too late. At least there’s nothing wrong with his appetite. He’s always enjoyed his food, and I do like to watch him eat, even though it reminds me who we were before the world ended. \n \n“You’re going to stay with Elizabeth tonight.” I remind him, refilling our teacups. It’s worth risking him getting upset to say it again, just in case it’s a forgetting kind of day, or just a frustrated kind of day. He stays with our daughter one weekend a month, so that I can have a little break. He seems to enjoy it, and I remind myself that’s true even if I ungratefully second-guess her motivations. Her latest career epiphany involves being an author, and she’s polishing up the cracked gems he comes out with for the book she’s shilling to anyone who can’t run away fast enough. She asked me to write them all down, but I don’t really hear most of them for what they are anymore. I stopped trying to translate years ago, after I stopped believing there was any kind of pattern. The neurologist implied it was at least possible, but she doesn’t live with him. She tried to explain that sometimes with this injury, the brain works a bit like a librarian transferred abruptly to a library where they don’t speak the language. The Dewey decimal system works, so the book selected might come from the right subject area, but that can still mean the difference between applied physics and roofing – and the actual page is completely random. But after fifteen years, I’m not naïve enough to think that one fairytale day we’ll both be reading from the same storybook again. \n\nHe bobs his head amicably. “The fable of the brown ape.” Suddenly I want to laugh, picturing our daughter drabbed out in her oversized hipster cardigans. He had a truly wicked sense of humour when I met him, sharp as the uppercuts that won him just enough matches to pay our bills . I squelch the old notion that that man is still in in there somehow, jabbing away at the scar tissue under his thin hair as best he can. I rub my thumb over his swollen knuckles, and start clearing up. \n\nWhen I get the call from Elizabeth, I’m sitting at the beach with an ice cream cone. At first, I don’t understand what she’s saying – her voice recedes like the sea sucking away from the sand, and leaving her words stranded and strange and wriggling, unidentifiable exposed to the air. Then the tidal wave of comprehension hits all at once, chilly and shocking. It swamps me and steals my breath and my ability to form a sentence. I stutter and falter and issue nonsense into the phone. It strikes me in that moment that this is how he must feel all the time. It’s only then that I start to cry. \n\nWhen she tells me the last thing he said, it makes so much sense that I decide to walk into the sea.\n", "\"I hope the world lasts for you,\" \nhe said with a smile in his eyes. \nI hope you cherish the sunrise.\nI hope the sky shines blue, and \nI hope you have time to flex your toes In the sand. \n\n\"I hope your days are filled with smiles,\"\nHe said with our faces close.\nI hope you're never morose.\nI hope you never feel the touch of pain, and\nI hope you have time to come back home.\n\n\"I hope you have the chance to love me again\"\nHe said with a tear in his heart.\nI hope you'll forgive me for growing apart.\nI hope you'll forgive me these missed days.\nI hope you have time to get better.\n\nAnd I heard every word,\nBut couldn't make myself to speak.\nBecause who could understand?\n\nI hope the world lasts for you, too. ", "Now, I'm at work so I can't watch the video, but the prompt speaks to me. \n \n---- \n \nSo, here we are. \n \nYour hand is tight around mine and I wish that I could grip yours tighter. I can feel you shaking, and your skin is so soft under my touch, nearly like silk as I stroke the point where the joint of your thumb is connected to the rest of your bones. \n \nThe faint memory of the scented lotion you used every night before we went to bed together. The ghost of it tickles my nose, the rose scent. You always talked about how it reminded you of your grandmother but, despite the fact that you always said it reeked of old people, you used it every night. \n \nYou're still young. So am I but I feel so old right now, laying in this hospital bed. I can feel myself fading. \n \nWe were supposed to have the world together but, honey, I'm dying. I want to say anything to express the love I feel for you, the love I've always felt for you. But I open my mouth and only meaningless words come out, tumbling out past my lips and spilling everywhere. They told you that this would happen of course but I hate seeing you cry because of it. \n \nThe ring is in my pocket. I want to tell you this but I can't. I wanted to be with you forever. \n \nI open my mouth again and say something about chicken salad. We would've laughed about that under any other circumstances but it only makes you cry harder. \n \nSo I try better. I open my mouth and force the words to come out. \n \n\"...I...I hope the world lasts for you.\" \n \nThe last thing I hear before falling into the abyss is you sobbing. \n \nAnd the last thing I feel is the guilt from leaving you. \n \nI'm so sorry. ", "We met on a Greyhound bus:\n\n\"Fort Jackson?\" you asked; I smiled and shook your hand.\n\nYou clutched that duffle bag like it was a packed parachute, \n\nStaring at the seat back, and when the lurching pistons fired,\n\nYou put your hand on the glass\n\nAnd looked back at a crying girl with a blue ribbon.\n\nI told you to chin up\n\nBecause we were going to see the world.\n\n\n\nAt night, you squirmed in the bunk\n\nMaking the hollow tin ping against the foot locker,\n\nBut you could clean a rifle better than any cadet\n\nAnd climbed the rope fastest.\n\nWhen the sergeant asked if we wanted to turn into men,\n\nAll lined up beside each other, like tiles in a mosaic,\n \nYou stuttered, and did twenty extra push ups.\n\n\n\nIt sounded like campfire popcorn,\n\nAnd then only the boy's head,\n\nWith empty eye sockets, boils, \n\nAnd a permanent snicker\n\nCame pushing through the gravel and hot sand.\n\nWhen I puked you rubbed my back,\n\nOver blaring static and sentence fragments.\n\n*\n\nYou have a soft bed that folds like a taco shell;\n\nShe cuts the sandwich into bites\n\nAnd helps with the morsels.\n\nI don't tell you about the song on the car radio\n\nWith the sirens in the background\n\nAnd how I sweat through my first tee shirt.\n\nI tell you how I booked plane tickets \n\nTo see those fancy London churches\n\nAnd then kiss Jeannie by the Eiffel Tower,\n\nAnd how I wish you could be there.\n\nI tell you I hope the world lasts for you,\n\nThough I don't know if it lasted for me.\n\n/r/opinionsaboutnothing" ]	9
	[WP] A story, a poem, a dialogue that makes people smile.	[ "There once was a prompt that was vague\n\nWhich others considered a drag.\n\nBut to their surprise,\n\nIt attracted some guys\n\nWho enjoy this sort of a gag.\n\nSo off to the races they'd run\n\nOn a quest to find something that's fun\n\nA new rhyme, perhaps\n\nOr a story that snaps\n\nOr an expertly crafted bad pun.\n\nThe prompts have some sort of goal.\n\nEven vague ones have some sort of soul.\n\nTo smile is the aim\n\nWhen we play this game,\n\nWe read as we pause in our scroll.\n\nBut how do we make a man smile\n\nWhen we don't know his preferred style?\n\nWell, give it a shot\n\nAnd, more often than not,\n\nYou'll come up with something worthwhile.\n\nSo don't ignore all the vague prompts,\n\nEven if your idea well is swamped.\n\nFor sometimes you find\n\nA new peace of mind.\n\n(But not words that rhyme well with \"prompts\".)", "For most of our closest relatives,\n\nMonkeys, apes and kin,\n\nEither a smile is to submit,\n\nOr there's a threat behind that grin.\n\nFor man, it's the reverse,\n\nAn exception; a different purpose;\n\nTo smile is camaraderie;\n\n\"This companion's worthwhile to me.\"\n\nBut there are those with whom I'm acquainted,\n\nWhose faces ache and give pain in\n\nThe toil of their falsities;\n\nThat smile is mere deceit.\n\nFor shallowly 'neath the surface,\n\nWe find those grins' purpose;\n\nOn a planet so threatening, \n\nThe silly primate submits." ]	2
	[WP] The sorceress gave a small smile. "Oh, I know quite a lot about you actually. Quite a lot indeed." The reply is directed at a character heavily based on you, the author.	[ "“You think much too highly of yourself,” the sorceress continued.\n\n“I do not!” the fantastically handsome young man protested as he tossed his luxuriously beautiful hair - better kept than the sorceress's head of hair, in fact - to his other shoulder, it’s sheen glowing attractively in the vast atrium.\n\nI sighed and fixed my grimy and wrinkled tie as I looked on at the exchange. Looking for some sort of comfort, I reflexively grasped for my special lucky pen I kept in my pocket, and found it empty. Of course, I hadn’t had my pen for months.\n\nNot that I needed it. The battle so far had just been the sorceress flinging trivial bits of knowledge at the hero, and the hero denying some of it. I scratched my elbow. I really kind of expected a fight between the hero and the evil sorceress to be a lot more exciting.\n\n“So, I’m going to go take a walk. You two mind if I take a raincheck on standing here?” I interjected into their ‘battle.’ My question was met with blank stares all around. I sighed, shrugged with my arms in the air in exasperation, and left.\n\n“What’s a raincheck?” I heard them both ask.\n\nIt was quite a journey to actually get down and out of the building, mostly on account of the winding staircases. I absolutely hate stairs; I would rather there be ramps and fireman poles everywhere than deal with stairs. However, I did eventually make it out, and after gazing at the brush surrounding the building and guesstimating its footprint, I decided to take my stroll and circle the building.\n\nI quickly lost myself in thought. Hopefully, they didn’t take too long in there. I was getting pretty hungry, and the hero was the one with all the food. Unless, well, the sorceress has to eat as well, right? I bet she has a kitchen.\n\nI was maybe a third of the way through my walk when I decided I wanted to find the sorceress's kitchen instead. I pivoted and turned -\n\nAnd nearly knocked said sorceress over.\n\n“Shit, er, sorry-” I quickly spat, tripping over myself to help her up. I grasped her and she used my weight to pull herself off the soft muddy grass.\n\n“Well then,” she huffed in her raspy sing-song vocal chords. “Do you always stop to help people that can easily kill you?”\n\n“Everyone on the street can easily kill me, but so can a pebble on the road. Not exactly something to bother worrying about,” I replied. “How about you? Slay the hero? Curse him for all eternity?”\n\nShe scoffed. “No, we postponed the battle.”\n\nThere was an a sudden opportunity. “In that case, could you lead me to the kitchen? I could whip you something up.”\n\n“The hero said the exact same thing,” she said, eying me suspiciously. She made a sudden face of confusion and slid to my side. I raised my arms up and chuckled confusedly. I felt her twirl a lock of my hair.\n\n“Was your hair ever longer?” she asked.\n\n“Yeah. I cut it a while ago.”\n\n“Why?”\n\n“It was a pain to take care of. Have to spend a lot of time to keep it looking,” I did a mock hair swish as if I didn’t have short unkempt hair, “fabulous.”\n\n\"I will have to ask for tips later,\" she mumbled.\n\nAt that comment, I quickly turned and looked at her face. She nodded in deep thought, and then, after an awkward moment of silence save for the breeze and the birdsong, she stood up straight and pulled out a manuscript from somewhere on her skimpy clothes.\n\n“So how about that kitchen?” I asked. “I’m a pretty good cook.”\n\n“You think much too highly of yourself,” she mumbled.\n\n“I do not!” I protested. I stopped myself, and smirked lopsidedly. “Well, maybe,” I relented.\n\nThe sorceress still didn’t move, instead leafing furiously through the manuscript in the crook of her arm. “Thank the powers that you two aren’t exactly the same.”\n\n“What’s that supposed to mean?”\n\nShe motioned to her manuscript. “See for yourself.”\n\nI moved to her side and read some of the words over her shoulder. It explained, in great detail, the preordained fight between her and the hero that wouldn’t happen.\n\n“What is this, your diary?”\n\nShe elbowed me. “No, you fool. This is the Manuscript, bestowed upon me by a man known only as the Author.” Her nose was pointed upward with pride.\n\nI squinted at her. “You sure it wasn’t ‘Arthur?’”\n\n“It very well could have been,” she conceded with her nose no longer at a haughty elevation.\n\nShe quickly brought the topic back onto the rails. “Here, this passage. It says the hero will help out anybody, regardless of if they show animosity or not to him.”\n\nI looked at her expectantly, trying to stifle a chuckle. “And?”\n\nShe tutted impatiently. “That’s you.”\n\n“No it’s not.”\n\n“You helped me.”\n\n“I bumped into you.”\n\n“And you bumped into me on purpose?”\n\n“I’ll have you know that I’m actually a top of the line asshole.”\n\n“No you’re not,” she negated. “Says right here that you put on a front because you have a bad habit of helping people out.” She pointed to a passage.\n\nI leaned in to read. “No, that refers to the hero,” I corrected her, pointing at the noun. “That’s not me.”\n\nShe sighed, and then elected to change tactics. “Would you help me back to my manor?” she asked sweetly, seemingly out of the blue.\n\n“Hell no. I’d have sexual intercourse with a unicorn rather than help you.”\n\nShe motioned to her feet. My gaze followed her gesture, and I looked down, realizing why she hadn’t been moving. Her ankle was bruised, purple as a prune, and noticeably swollen.\n\n“Are you cereal?” I asked her.\n\n“No, but I once choked a man with oats.”\n\nI sighed, and moved to help the sorceress onto my back.\n\n“You’re as skinny as a burnt zombie,” she commented while on my back.\n\n“Isn’t that just a skeleton?” I grunted.\n\n“I do suppose the two of you are very different,” she continued, ignoring me. “I think you’re the more hero-like one anyways.”\n\nI ignored her in return. “You have something for your ankle?” I asked as a footstep sunk into the grass.\n\n“In the kitchen.”\n\n“Point me to the kitchen.”\n\n----\n\nIn a far universe, the author - who was definitely not named Arthur - smiled what he thought was a mischievous smirk. Saved as an unfinished story on Reddit, his near carbon-copy would never be able to find a way back to the author’s world, also the supposed new hero’s world, and that’s just the way the author liked it.\n\nA special snowflake forever.\n\nThe cubicle next to his would remain forever empty, and the expensive pens would eventually belong to him. Especially the special lucky pen.\n\nHe cackled quietly in his cubicle as he tapped “save” on his phone.\n", "\"You always dreamed of being an author, but when it comes down to it, you can't force the words through your fingers. You're empty. Your mind is empty, and your motivations are vague.\" The sorceress's slight smile became a wild grin.\n\n\"You're afraid that no one will ever love you. No one will kiss you when you return from your menial job. No one will fall asleep with you at night.\" A small laugh escaped her pointed teeth. \"You're no one.\"\n\nI sat with my head in my hands. My fingers dug into my tangled hair. The laugh shrank, faded, and grew to a deafening holler. I put my hands on the keyboard, and tapped an ellipses. It seemed to never end .....................\n\n\"You're unoriginal. Nothing you have to say is unique.\" A drop of spittle left those crooked teeth, and fell to the wooden floor. \"You doubt yourself for a reason.\"\n\nThe spittle became a puddle of imaginary tears, and welled to soak the floor around it.\n\n\"I'm not a failure.\" \n\nThe puddle flickered, and rose into the curvy shape of a woman. It continued to grow. Arms stretched from the center, and then legs. Fingers were adorned with rings. Shoulders were covered by a cloak the color of night. Strings of endless hair turned ruby red. When she reached her natural height, yellow eyes blinked open, and a hilt appeared between her fingers.\n\nThe figure walked up to the sorceress, and grabbed her by the neck.\n\nWe all spoke at once.\n\n\"I am not a failure.\"\n\nThe dagger plunged into the sorceress's chest.", "Thedarkfourth stared like a squirrel in headlights. A small ribbon of drool was escaping unchecked from the corner of his mouth.\n\n\"Oh yes, I know, for example, that while you love to dream up all kinds of excitement in that lowbrow drivel you call story-writing, you are in fact about as useful as a pat of butter in an oven when it comes to facing such things in...the flesh.\"\n\nShe glanced at him from under her spectacular eyelashes as she continued to monologue. Thedarkfourth was helpless to do anything but follow her pacing footsteps around the ornate room with his own eyes and pray to god that he didn't give in to the suddenly overwhelming urge to urinate.\n\n\"No response? I thought not,\" she continued, approaching the large windows with their extravagant view of the night sky. \"Let's just pretend you're playing the strong and silent type, shall we? I have so much more I can tell you about all the lovely things I know. I know you took your screen name from a unheard-of indie rock band you liked when you were 17. At the time you thought you were so cool with your insanely obscure references. Even now you still like the name, though you pretend to be so much older and wiser.\"\n\nShe had stopped moving now, and stood with her hands clasped behind the back of her intricate leather dress, gazing out into the night. The thought crossed Thedarkfourth's mind that if he weren't so petrified with confusion and terror, he would probably find the whole scene incredibly awesome.\n\n\"Oh don't worry, I'm not finished,\" said the sorceress after a pause. \"Here's a few more for you. I know you secretly worry that all your friends are only pretending to like you. I know you realise, deep down, that you'll never be a famous writer, but you refuse to admit it to yourself. And I know that right now, despite your fear, there is a small part of your mind that can't wait to tell this whole story when you get back. Well.\"\n\nShe turned again, grinning more hugely now than ever. \"We'll see about that. I've conjured you here, to this fictional dimension, where you will be imprisoned forever, unless!\" She paused again with a dramatic flourish. \"Unless you can play this moderately difficult piece of piano music that you've never seen before on the first try with no mistakes!\"\n\nThe sorceress cackled gleefully as Thedarkfourth's expression of dread deepened yet further. \"Yes! It's the exact scenario you always irrationally feared when you took all those piano lessons at school! Now's your chance, boy! See how irrational those fears really were!\"\n\nWith a lazy wave of her arm, an upright piano suddenly appeared against one of the walls. It was an exact copy of the one Thedarkfourth had used in those awful teenage recitals. He gulped and took a seat on the stool.\n\n\"Well, what are you waiting for?!\" screeched the sorceress, her face a horrifying mask of anticipation.\n\nThedarkfourth looked at the sheet music before him. He could do this. When he used to practise sight reading, he would make a mistake only about 80% of the time. Surely if he concentrated-\n\nHe fumbled the second note, immediately hitting the wrong key. The sorceress screamed with mirth, slapping her thighs as the piano vanished and Thedarkfourth tumbled unceremoniously onto his back.\n\n\"Please let me go!\" he wailed, tears filling his eyes.\n\n\"Of course you can go!\" she shouted through her laughter. \"That wasn't the real test! Because if there's one thing I know about you, Thedarkfourth, it's that more than anything, you love convoluted meta-fictional stories about authorship and fourth walls. Especially,\" she added, growing angrier, \"if they allow you to be self-deprecating without revealing anything you actually find embarrassing. And if you can explicitly reference the fact that you're doing all of this, that's the best of all.\"\n\n\"Y-you're saying this is all a s-story?\" mewled Thedarkfourth pathetically.\n\n\"Of course it is, you dullard,\" retorted the sorceress. \"Did you think there really was a magical dimension of- what, what's this?!\" Suddenly she looked worried. Thedarkfourth was rising off the floor without apparent effort. Meanwhile, vines were crawling out of the floor, ensnaring her limbs and literally rooting her to the spot. Now she was looking up into the face of the one she so recently tormented.\n\n\"Fool,\" breathed Thedarkfourth in a dark and awesome fashion that made him seem totally badass. \"You think I did not know this is a story?! Of course it is, and I am it's author!\" Lightning began to crackle around him, and a wind was whipping up in the room. The window smashed. With the backlight, it had a really fantastic effect that made it totally clear just how brilliant Thedarkfourth was. \"Here, I rule all! You can do naught but cower before me, character!\"\n\nThe sorceress stared up in horror as the whole room began to crumble around her, a testament to the Thedarkfourth's power and all-round wonderfulness. But then a smile returned to her face. \n\n\"You think you've won, do you?\" she snapped. \"Well there's one more thing I know about you, Mr High and Mighty author. You find meta-stories the hardest to finish! Aha!\" she crowed as Thedarkfourth's expression told her she had hit the mark. \"Yes, you've had your conceit, you've revealed your big clever ideas, haven't you oh great author!? And you've deployed the not-at-all-predictable twist where you knew it was a story all along. But what do you do now, eh?! How can you possibly give it satisfying ending?!? The readers know it's a story now! They know!!! AHAHAHA!\" Her cackles echoed in the growing gale. \"You can never finish now! And so you can never leave!!\"\n\nThedarkfourth drifted slowly back to the ground. The entire building had been demolished now, leaving the pair alone on the blasted heath, in the dead centre of a gigantic hurricane. An occasional bolt of electricity flickered from his body as he stared grimly at the dirt, thinking. Quietly, he spoke once more. \"No.\"\n\n\"What did you say?! Eh?! What's your plan now, author boy?!\"\n\n\"I said no, you foolish facet of my own subconscious. You yourself have given me a way out. Of course,\" he smirked, an evil glint appearing in his eye, \"it was really I who made you do so. By making the ending of the story the key source of conflict, the reader is now rooting for it to end. All I have to do now is stop writing and" ]	3
	[WP] You are overjoyed to have won a “lifetime” supply of tacos. However, your great luck turns to misfortune a year later when the bankrupt company hires a hitman to terminate the deal.	[ " \"Hey Todd, you want to ride with me to get my ten-thousandth free taco?\"\n\"Abraham I really don't understand how you still enjoy tacos you have had what 30 tacos a day for an entire year?\" He just doesn't get it, his parents are paying for him to go to college. He has nearly 0 worries when it comes to school he would never understand how hard it is eating Ramen noodles every day. \"Nearly, I did the math the other day and its around 27 every single day.\" This one is special though this is number ten-thousand, I still remember number one thousand, five thousand and now ten.\n We get to Taco Smell® and they must have known I was coming the manager, who is now a good friend of mine, set up a 10,000 taco party with a few of the off the clock workers and mutual friends. \"Hey Jeff, you did this for me?\" Wait who is that in the black coat? \"Of course I did! Ten-thousand is quite the feat, especially in a single year!\" I walk around greet everyone and then start looking for the man in the coat. \"Hmm he must have left already maybe he was just another customer,\" I mumble to myself. \n6 hours later\n \"Goodbye Jeff and everyone! I appreciate you guys coming out!\" I wave goodbye to everyone and start walking home. Todd had left earlier because it started getting dark and he had a test to study for. \"Thankfully the walk is only a mile or I would have to buy more tacos for the walk home.\" I laugh to myself and all of a sudden out of the shadows, \"Hey you need a walking buddy? I'm going the same direction and didn't want to seem creepy?\" I turn startled, oh its the guy in the black coat. \"No I don't mind! Hey didn't I see you at Taco Smell® earlier?\" I ask just making small-talk. \"Yeah I am actually from corporate they wanted me to check something out.\" We are walking down an alley why are we here? This side of town is always empty this late. I feel this chill down my spine. \"Oh well if they ask this..\" I can't finish I start feeling very sick , \"What is going on?\" \"I'm sorry it had to be done you are causing them to go bankrupt.\" \n \n ", "\"Hey, welcome to Taco Li-\" \n \nThe plastered smile on the waiter's face faltered as he stared at his newest patron. The combination of a scar across the eye, a completely shaved head with an octopus tattoo wreathed around the skull, the black leather jacket, the gloves that were just begging to wrap around a garrote, and most importantly the SIG-Sauer P226 with a long matte silencer that sat casually on the table by the complimentary chips and salsa created the profile of a customer, who in the waiter's mind, could use some more time to figure out his order. \n \nBefore he could open his mouth, a large gloved hand waved the waiter off as one would brush a speck of dust off a lapel. \n \nThe hitman glowered as he surveyed the room for his mark. \n \n\"Scuse me!\" \n \nSome clumsy customer had tripped over the hitman's outstretched shoe, and bumped into the table. He glanced at his shoe: yup, there was scuffing. If the hitman weren't on a job, the klutz would have found a freshly polished switchblade wedged in between his metacarpals. But as it was, all the black-clad behemoth of a man could do was stare into the eyes of the customer to demonstrate how much of a mercy he was affording...wait. Black hair, soft jawline, approximately 5'8\"...the mark! With the speed of a game show contestant hitting a buzzer, the hitman reached for his gun, held it up and pulled the trigger. \n \nClick \n \n\"Whoops, looking for this?\" The mark held a single bullet and a loaded magazine. \nHe leaned in close and the hitman could smell a mixture of sour cream, hot beef, spice, and guac among other things. \"Look, jack, there've been many before you, and there will be many after you. I know that nothing I will say now could change your mind: I've offered money, unlimited tacos, anything I could think of, but there was no budging. So I will say one thing. When you leave here in an ambulance, if not a body bag, I want you to remember this moment. This moment where I gave you an out. It's up to you to take it.\" \n \nAs he leaned back to a standing position, the hitman palming a stiletto, lunged at the mark's throat. The customer, anticipating this reaction, lifted up his left hand which was now holding a stack of taco shells. \n \nCRUNCH \n \nThe knife broke through 2 or 3 but the makeshift barrier held firm. \n \n\"My turn.\" \n \nA squirt of taco sauce spurt out from his right sleeve and immediately obscured the hitman's vision. Years of physical torture, both receiving and implementing. A year of shadowing murders before eventually carrying them out. Nothing in the hitman's training could have prepared him for the excruciating, unique punishment that a fresh bottle of Ortega could deliver. As he reached blindly for the napkin dispenser, he made a quick mental note that if he survived, he would need to try taco sauce in future endeavors. \n \n\"Taco bout eating with your eyes, huh? So lettuce talk for a bit. What's your beef with me? I know you're keeping up a hard outer shell, but underneath it all, are you in it for the guac or are you just trying tomato living? Sorry if my puns are cheesy but I just find it always enrages my targets, and gives me time...for this!\" \n \nThe customer had used the time to unwrap the hitman's silverware from his napkin fold and seize the knife. These weren't just your run-of-the-mill butter knives either. These were the sharp ones they customarily had at steakhouses but were here for the convenience of anyone who ordered an enchilada or quesadilla. With one motion, the customer had grabbed the hitman's tie out from over the front of his jacket, yanked it forward onto the table and drove the knife through the tie, burying it firmly into the table. \n \n\"If you tell Taco Libre that the job is done, you will never hear from me again. Tell them the truth? There will be nowhere for you to hide. If you pop in for the lunch rush at an El Fenix, I'll be there. You try to stop by a corner taco stand for a quick bite, and I'll be waiting in the sour cream to kick your ass. Need a late night Taco Bell run? The only Drive Through that night will be me driving a knife through your neck. Comprende?\" \n \nThe hitman silently nodded as the customer lightly slapped him twice on the cheek. \n \n\"Good boy. I'll have them send over a taco for the trouble. Are you a soft shell or hard shell guy?\"", "I never thought it would end like this, dying on a parking lot of a run-down strip mall. \n\nLifetime supply my ass.\n\nI like tacos OK? Don't judge me. You know when people say they'd die for their son or their daughter or their fucking cat? Well I died for my tacos, that's what I want my tombstone to read: \"Level 90 Wizard, Died for his Tacos\".\n\nIt is a bit of a fucked up situation. I know. I was just walking out the restaurant with my daily 12 pack: 3 beans and cheese in soft, 6 chicken in crispy, 3 spicy pork in soft with extra hot sauce and ranch, when I saw that dude, he had a coat on which I thought was weird since it's the middle of fucking may, and then he says what I can only assume he thought was an extremely badass remark: \"Lunchtime's over fucker.\" and just like that...boom, he shoots me. \n\nI never thought getting shot would hurt so little, I assumed it'd be a more gruesome scene, anyways, then he just walked away but not before grabbing my takeout bag with him, some sort of sick trophy? \n\nDo what you want to a man, but take his tacos? You are a crazy individual.\n\nAnyways, if they had some problem or if I was hurting their business I guess I could understand if they had talked to me about it. But no...let's shoot the fucker in a fucking Tuesday... fuck them.\n\nI'm pretty sure I'm done, those sirens won't get here in time, well I had a good run, and at least I don't have to worry about those student loans now. \n\nYeah I'm cool with this, although I could really go for a beef and cheese burrito right about now...\n", "First Post. Any constructive advice/pointers would be greatly appreciated.\n\nAll this for a bloody taco. Okay, maybe it was more like a million or two bloody tacos. See, I won a \"lifetime\" supply of tacos about a year ago, and I just stopped buying my own food. Breakfast, leftover tacos. Lunch, fresh tacos from Taco King around the corner from work. Dinner, more delicious tacos. You'd think I'd be sick of tacos, but thankfully, a taco is basically any combination of things inside a tortilla which makes achieving diversity of taco consumption fairly easy. Especially, since Taco King will put just about anything on their menu inside a tortilla.\n\nI think the problem came when I noticed that according to the back of the \"lifetime\" supply card, there wasn't a limit to the amount of tacos I could order at one time. I also may have mentioned this fact to my co-workers, old college buddies, softball team, gym workers, and basically anybody I liked. So then anyone I cared about was also getting free tacos. Work started sending me with golf-cart to carry back tacos for everyone on campus. We'd show up with a truck to fill up with tacos for celebrating the most recent victory or to drown out the pain of defeat on the Softball diamond. I even started trading tacos like cash. I'd bring tacos to the gym workers in exchange for them collectively paying for my gym membership. Those guys were really nice, and super helpful in removing the extra weight my taco consumption packed on. \n\nThen I got philantropical with it. I'd get 50 tacos and walk around handing out the tacos to the homeless and any street beggers that were hungry. Heck, I'd even hand one to the cops that tried to stop me from feeding the homeless and beggers. Stupid poverty laws. I can't believe being homeless is such a problem. Why can't they just beg and ask for help. Sorry. I digress.\n\nIt's when I started feeding the homeless that I started receiving the threats. Taco King really wanted to at least be able to write off the tacos that they were giving away, but since I was the one they couldn't do it. So they asked me politely to stop, but I was still within my rights as the \"lifetime\" supply winner and I kept at it. Then they sent a lawyer to put some pressure on me, talking about some lawsuit if I kept buying tacos at the rate I was. Still the card didn't say I couldn't, and the contract didn't say I couldn't, so I figured what the heck.\n\nAll that brings me to today. I noticed the cashier at the Taco King next to work was different. After going there every workday for lunch, you get to know the whole staff. Darla wasn't the one to take the order, and I just knew this new guy would screw it up, but for minimum wage, what kind of service can you really expect. 70 tacos for the office, and 30 dessert tacos for my department. I pulled out my \"lifetime\" supply card, and the new guy's eyes lit up like when a fat kid sees a super moist cake covered in delicious chocolate and vanilla frosting. Or maybe like mine did a year ago when I got my first Taco King meal for free. He punched in my order, taking 20 minutes to do so. Darla did it in 10, where is she today?\n\nWhile I wait for the meals to come out, I go to grab the Super Hot Sauce. Dave would be upset, and I really need him to get that report done by the end of the day, so best to keep him happy. I bend down to pack the sauce and the napkin holder flies off the shelf, leaving a shiny kunai blade in its place. Spinning and staring at the guy who threw it, I hesitated like a deer in the headlights. Oh hey, the tacos are done. I jump to grab the tacos and managed to dodge another kunai by about an inch. \n\nTacos King's delicious goodness securely inside their bags, I bolted for the door. Thank the Lord for the pay-by-taco gym membership, and I hit the outside pavement. One quick glance over the shoulder tells me the new guy is after me shouting \"You didn't pay for those.\" What an idiot, of course I didn't pay for it. I haven't paid for it in a year. Darla would know that. Why wasn't Darla in today? \n\nTaco bags still secure, I turned the corner and head into the lobby of my building. A pinch in the leg, and I feel liquid trickling down. Great...I'm hit. I hand the lunch order to one of the clerks and ask her to pass it out to the guys up stairs. Turning, I see the thrower of the knives standing at the entrance to the lobby. \n\n\"What the hell is wrong with you man?! It's just some tacos, nothing worth killing a man over,\" I said.\n\n\"See that's where you're wrong. \" Do I know that voice? \"Every day you come and get hundreds of tacos for free. Sure you pass out some to the needy, but mostly you just use them for your own desires. It wouldn't be a problem if you only took a few a visitm, \" I definitely know that voice, but who is it? \"but you don't. You take loads of them. Do you even know how much work it takes to make them? Do you know how long it takes to cook that many tortillas or how much it costs to keep handing you free tacos. They don't even pay us any more because they can't afford to because of you.\" \n\nWell, that's a voice I know for sure. Not a close friend, but maybe someone I've met recently. Someone from Taco King? Nah, it couldn't be.\n\n\"The company put a hit out on you. They figure if you're dead and the card is destroyed, then they'll be able to escape bankruptcy. $100,000 and a severely limited \"lifetime\" supply card is the reward.\"\n\n\"Seems like they won't learn from their last mistake. So are you really attacking me for the money and a small lifetime supply of Tacos?\" I inquired with a bit of sarcasm.\n\n\"Me? Nah, I'm in it for the money and to have you stop ordering so many tacos from me. \" I knew I knew that voice.\n\n\"Darla, I knew you. You were the best cashier, so much better than that new guy.\"\n\n\"Really? Thanks, but this needs to stop.\" On the word stop she threw a knife at my heart, but I dove to the right and it sliced open my pants pocket spraying a nice red liquid over the lobby's tile. There goes the Super Hot Sauce. Dave's never going to get that report done today.", "\"Don't you ever eat any of the shit you order??\"\n\nAnother text message. It was a change of tone, but I didn't intend to respond. Ever since the bankruptcy the former CEO was harassing me. He claimed he could hardly feed his own family, let alone uphold a ridiculous taco deal with fat good-for-nothing immigrant. \n\nAt first I wanted to give in and cancel the deal because of his situation, but as I was writing the cancellation, an e-mail with a picture of the company CEO literary having sex with my last burrito order ticked in. \n \nAnd so it began. Law enforcement and a lawyer was in the picture for a while and things changed. I could now order as much taco as I wanted from anywhere, and send him the bills. Though I never ate any of it. \n\nEvery day he sent me threats, and every day I sent him pictures of throwing tacos in the trash. \nAfter a while I made it into a habit, finding a new trash can every day with entertaining scenery in the background. I even made it into a blog that started getting attention. \n\n\"You're costing me a fortune, do me a favor and at least eat the fucking food. Don't send me anymore fucking pictures\"\n\nI had just picked up today's order when I received another text. He really did have a point, I was hungry, and I really enjoyed tacos. So I picked up another one as not to disrupt my new hobby. I never took a close look at the employee, but the voice reminded me of someone. I had a bite and went on my way. \n\n\nI woke up in the hospital, feeling like death. The police told me he was already taken in custody, and would probably rot in jail for the remainder of his days. Apparently he was flat out broke, had an ongoing divorce, and was about to lose the house. \n\nThey gave me two days. \n", "\"Well, it is a lifetime supply, inn'it?\" \n\nThe bent over-man gestured with the taco in his hand at me. His other hand was clutched to his chest inside of grime-coated jacket. \n\n\"Go'wan, take et.\"\n\nI looked up at the grubby taco held in the man's hand. He was tall, dark, and kind of smelled like dumpster. All in all, not quite the person I had expected after I won the \"Lifetime supply of tacos\" contest in the local newspaper. Especially not as I walked home later that night after my winnings were announced on the radio. \n\n\"Well...\" I slowly started, \"One taco isn't exactly a lifetime supply, isn't it? I mean, it's not quite what I had expected. If I had died today, it would be. But that's just ludicrous. In fact, I would like to speak to your employer....\"\n\nThe man suddenly smiled, straightening up as he slowly slid his other hand out of his coat,\n\nThe worn combat knife glistened under the lamp-post. \n\n\"Well, I suppose you're starting to get it, aren't you?\"", "More Charlie: /r/CharliesWildAdventure\n\nPart 21\n\nPlease note that I am using creative liberties to change Tacos into Pizza. Thanks :D.\n____\nA vortex opened in Charlie’s living room and the Pizza Guy stepped out. He leveled a revolver to Charlie’s head. “I’ve been hired to kill you Charlie. No more free pizza’s for you.”\n\n“Wait a second. Free pizza? Charlie just wishes for pizza.” Jenn yelled from the couch. She was too busy playing Xbox to look up.\n\n“I like, won free pizza for life a year ago.” Charlie said taking another hit off his bong.\n\n“Which is why I am here. The company is going bankrupt. All that pizza you’ve been wishing for has been coming from somewhere. Did you think it was coming out of thin air?”\n\nCharlie nodded\n\n“Well it wasn’t! You also don’t tip very well. Any last words Charlie?” He cocked the revolver’s hammer.\n\nCharlie nodded again. “I wish the pizza company wasn’t going bankrupt.”\n\nThe Pizza Guy looked around and sighed. “You suck Charlie.” He stepped through a rip in the universe and went back to delivering pizzas.\n\nCharlie picked the phone up and dialed some numbers. “Hi I’d like a large pepperoni please.”", "I scrambled backwards on ruined fingers and cut palms, never taking my eyes from the man in front of me.\n\nA giant of a man gazed back at me. Sunken eyes and a square chin. This was a man whose hands were not just tainted by blood, but by the fear within it. I stared him back in the eyes, willing my voice not to shake or crack.\n\n\"Why?\" I ask, barely able to force out even that word.\n\nHe sighs and removes a pistol from his breast pocket. He flicks the safety and levels the barrel between my eyes.\n\n\"Kid. I don't get the explanations. They pay me. You gotta die. But I gotta fuckin' ask. Why does a taco company want a kid like you dead?\"\n\n\"I...I won a lifetime supply of tacos.\"\n\nThe man on the other end of the gun stares at me. \n\nThe pistol slowly lowers, falling to his side. \n\n\"Y'know, we might be able to make a deal.\"" ]	8
Can you tell I've just downloaded the new version of Dwarf Fortress?	[WP]A rather put-upon young dwarven scribe is going through a batch of books the Lorekeeper bought from a merchant when they find a volume that will change their life... not necessarily for the better	[ "The book was placed in plain sight, a sure sign that it was dangerous. If it had been a simple tome it would have been in the library with the others. This one had stood out. The master had placed it on a pedestal in the center of the keep. This clearly meant it was special, it meant that there would be powerful spells protecting this book. Or protecting others from it. Some books held power, some were a mere collection of words. This book held life itself. It had been created long ago as a means to cheat death. Whomever read of the book transferred a part of themselves into it, giving it a small bit of life in return for knowledge. But the book grew with each taste it took of a reader. It became hungry for the taste of those it consumed. it no longer took a part of the reader, but began to completely drain the life of who ever dared to read from its pages. The pages held the knowledge and memories of all who had ever read from it. It contained all of the hate and guilt from every soul it had stolen. I know this now. I know everything. ", "\"Dwarves were not meant to read books.\" Lionel muttered to himself, deep voice reverberating through the quiet room. He shifted positions once again, trying to find an angle to read that wouldn't kill his back, or where his huge brown beard wouldn't be in the way of the book. \n\nAs the cushion he moved around on slipped out the other side of the chair Lionel gave an aggravated grunt and stood, dropping the book beside him. His eyes scanned the pile of books he was supposed to read before the week ended.\n\n\"Should've stayed in the mines like Da told me.\" He grumbled, not that the mines were any better. Minerals and resources were becoming scarce these days. Dwarves were being forced to spend entire days down there, lives were being lost nearly every trip. Lionel said a brief thank you under his breath. Glad his own father was beyond mining age. \n\n\"Li-Li! Are you finished yet?\" The Keeper yelled from the other side of the door. Startling Lionel who grabbed a random book from the pile and went back to reading. \n\n\"Not yet old man!\" He hollered back. \"And my name is Lionel!\" There was no response from the front of the room, the Keeper having moved onto other things. It was only then Lionel noticed the cover of the book.\n\n\"Creation of Precious Metals\"\n\nThe title alone gave Lionel pause but the name of the author made his heart race. \n\n\"A book by Sir Oblivion the Dreadful.\"\n\nLionel stroked his beard fiercely, mind racing with what had to be a joke. The long dead Metal mancer who originally filled the mountains with jewels and metals wouldn't have written a book. Would he? ", "Gralfax knocked on the Lore Keeper's door.\n\n\"Come in. Gralfax don't you have something you're supposed to be doing?\"\n\n\"I was doing it and then I found this\"\n\n\"One of the books I bought was actually worth something\"\n\n\"You could say that\"\n\nGralfax put the thick volume on the Lore Keeper's table.\n\n\"This says we're not real\"\n\nThe lore keeper looked down at the cover. Written on it in large gold letters were the word's 'You're Not Real'.\n\n\"An unusual title but, not something worth interrupting me for\"\n\n\"Open it\"\n\n\"Any particular page?\"\n\n\"Doesn't matter\"\n\nThe Lore Keeper opened the volume to the middle. He turned the pages for a couple of minutes.\n\n\"Hmm\"\n\n\"So we have to burn this right?\" said Gralfax\n\n\"It's tempting but no\"\n\n\"This could really cause some problems\"\n\n\"Oh it will\" said the Lore Keeper \"But I can't bring myself to burn a book\"\n\n\"So we're just going to keep it?\"\n\n\"Deep down in the basement, but yes\"\n\nGralfax took the book and started for the door.\n\n\"Gralfax\" said the Lore Keeper\n\n\"Yes\"\n\n\"You may take the rest of the day off\"\n\n\"Thank you\"\n\nGralfax put the book in the darkest corner of the lowest underground level, then went to the tavern hoping to drink until he forgot all about it. When he couldn't he settled for drinking until he could convincingly lie to himself." ]	3
	[WP] It's the zombie apocalypse. You have turned, but you're still in there. Unable to control your own body.	[ "Have you ever experienced sleep paralysis? Where you're awake, in bed, but you can't move? Can't even change the pace of your breathing, let alone scream? Imagine that, but you're up, moving, and hungry.\n\nUnbelievably hungry.\n\nI can't decide if the pain is from my stomach rotting from the inside out or if I'm legitimately starving, or both. No matter how much the body eats, the pain still gnaws at me like the body gnaws on every bone. I don't think it can tell the difference either; I think that's why it eats. It's eaten a lot of people.\n\nI'm happy it didn't eat my sister. She got away while my body was still getting up. That moment was the most surreal. In the movies it seems like you turn off and turn back on as a zombie, but the reality for me was that I never turned off. The body just stopped listening to me.\n\nI remember hearing about terminally ill people being \"trapped in their own bodies\". But I don't think it felt like this.\n\nI lost count of the days a long time ago. The experience isn't horrible any more, not even really bad. Now it's just the status quo. It's borderline fascinating watching my body make decisions on its own, seeing how the \"rules\" of this plague line up with our expectations.\n\nI'm going places I never would have thought to visit in life. I'm watching nature slowly reclaim a world where humans aren't the dominant species any more. I'm wondering when the body will rot just enough to release my mind. And I wonder about you.\n\nAll of you writhing, moaning bodies that ache and hunger. Are there people trapped in all of you too?", "I can remember everything about her. Her face, the length of her average laugh, her shoe size, what clothes she wore, what movies she liked, how I used to kiss the back of her hand and how much she loved it, but none of my memories compare to her. As a person. As a real life, human being. Someone I could hold and kiss and tell stories to. Someone I would die for. \n\nI looked everywhere for her. First place I checked was her work because that's where she was when shit hit the fan, but that's not where she stayed. I tried calling her, but she didn't pick up. I asked everyone I could, I put up fliers, I fired flares into the sky, but nothing. \n\nI haven't stopped looking for her, but I'm out of ideas, so now I just kind of wander around the city, looking for anything that might bring me to her. I've been searching for her so long, it's taken its toll. My eyes are sunken, I can barely feel my heart beat and the soles of my feet are worn out because they never leave the ground when I walk. Call it a bad habit. The apocalypse forces you into a lot of those. It also forces you to get focused.\n\nNormally I was focused on her and how much I was still in love with her, but at this particular moment, my attention was drawn to something else. A noise. Far off. Down the road. It grew louder. I hadn't heard a noise like that in months.\n\nSoon, a car came swerving around the corner and rocketed down the street. Not a sedan, or a minivan, but a mish-mash of random metal bits with four, rouge wheels sticking out of the bottom. It roared down the asphalt, coming towards me. This started to agitate the crowd.\n\nOh yeah, the crowd. They're the one's responsible for ending the world in the first place and they've gotten a lot of hostility these days for that, but they're not to be hated. They're just searching for something too. We all are. We just couldn't tell you what it was.\n\nAnd holy fuck there was a lot of them. Like a parade times twelve of them, they clogged up the road like a fur-ball clogs your shower drain. The car tried to drive straight through them, but was diverted almost immediately into a street pole. Whoever was driving must not have been paying much attention.\n\nThe door flew open, knocking some of the crowd onto their feet and the old, familiar sound of a shotgun blast reverberated around the corridor that was the street. A man jumped out, a real action hero looking guy complete with scars, bandanna and a sneer.\n\nAnd from the passenger side rose the most beautiful girl I've ever seen in my life. It was her. With her perfectly straight hair, freckled cheeks and high-powered assault rifle, it was her! It had to be! The woman I'd been searching for since I could remember.\n\nWhat was she doing with this bandanna-wearing jerk?\n\nMy legs were moving before I could even put a thought together, slapping against the pavement as I sprinted for her. I had so many questions.\n\n\"Get to the alley! Go!\" The action hero roared, signaling my sweetheart to retreat into the alleyway behind them, but I couldn't let her get away. I tried yelling to get her attention, but my mind just wouldn't put words together. I was overwhelmed by desire. I needed her.\n\nThe crowd was making it difficult to maneuver and I know it's not dignified, but I had to start climbing on people just to give chase. My foot on someone's head, hand clutching a collar, until finally I climbed over the tsunami of bodies and fell, face first into the alleyway. Picking myself up wasn't difficult, it almost felt automatic and once I was on my feet, I saw her. Her gorgeous figure hoisting herself up a fire escape. I knew she was scared, but I also knew that if I could just talk to her, I could make this all make sense.\n\nA group of five people made it to the fire escape before me and had the beefcake on his ass before he could say a word. Grateful as I was, he wasn't a concern of mine. Instead, I leaped at the fire escape and pulled myself up, booking it to the roof like the Flash. With each step, I had a new idea of what I should say, but I didn't settle on anything. Nothing was good enough. It's a good thing my muscles were still forcing me up the stairs, otherwise I might have just frozen there in shock or nervousness.\n\nI reached the roof and there she was, standing at the other end, wind blowing her hair around, hands wrapped around her gun. When I appeared, she spun in place and took aim. \n\nThen she stopped. The barrel of her gun lowered to the ground. Even at this distance, I could see her eyes swell with tears.\n\n\"Oh my god,\" she whimpered. I tried to smile. I think it worked. At least it felt like it did. Still no words though. This is exactly what I was afraid of.\n\n\"Michael?\" She had a hard time saying that name. It was my name. She's said it before a hundred times. I wonder why it was hard for her. I had just started noticing that I was standing completely still. This was odd because usually I'd be in constant motion. It felt like a struggle to keep myself in one place, like I was fighting my own desire, but for some reason, I knew it was the right thing to do.\n\nUntil I just couldn't take it anymore. I wanted her. I wanted her so bad, and my body did too, so it took charge. We bolted at her, arms outstretched, I just wanted to hold her again.\n\nShe raised her gun and threw a bullet into my shoulder. The shot knocked me to the ground. It didn't hurt, it just confused me. Why did she want to kill me? I haven't seen her so long! God damnit, if only I could find the right words...\n\nAnother gunshot went off. I looked up just as she pulled the trigger for a third time. Then a fourth. Behind me, I could hear the pattering feet slap against the concrete. The crowd was on their way. They were going to ruin everything.\n\nAnd they did.\n\nShe lowered her gun again, her whole body deflated, then she looked into my eyes one last time before stepping up onto the edge of the building and throwing herself off.\n\nIf I could have screamed, I would, but I couldn't.\n\nInstead, I just started running. Straight towards the edge of the building, chasing the girl I'd been chasing since as long as I could remember. Then I jumped. Half of me wished I wouldn't survive the fall. The other half knew I would.\n_____________________________________________________________\n\nI remember him. Michael. His short crop of brown hair and his heart bigger than the universe. I knew he loved me, but I never knew how much. \n\nHe was no Austin Leblanc who taught me how to use a gun, modify a car and generally survive. Look how well that turned out. \n\nI woke up. That's a weird thing to say after you've just tried to kill yourself, but I did. I woke up lying on the sidewalk, feeling less than okay, but I wasn't in pain. I sat bolt upright thinking I was dead. This couldn't be death. It looked exactly like life. In fact, this was the same city street I thought I died on. Was this death?\n\nI wanted to use words, but I couldn't. I tried, but it just didn't happen. Besides that, the only other feeling I could focus on, truly, was the burning desire I had to see Michael again. I couldn't tell you why, but I knew Michael was out there somewhere and something inside of me just wanted to see him again, to tell him I'm sorry.\n\nI felt something on my hand and looked at it.\n\nThere was Michael, on his knees, his lips pressed against the back of my hand. When he removed them, he left a bite mark. He stared at me and I stared at him. Without any words we read each other's minds. \n\nYes, he still loved me.\nYes, I still loved him.\nYes, we were both unimaginably hungry." ]	2
	[WP] I hesitated; what awaited us on the other side?	[ "I hesitated; what awaited us on the other side? My senses were of no use, no use at all, as through the doorway appeared only an immense and impenetrable darkness. Something seemed so familiar about this situation. During the war, Johnny and I- Johnny, my old bunkmate, tough fellow- had been pinned down on the 4th floor of an apartment complex, right in the middle of a hot zone. Snipers on roofs across the street. RPG on the adjacent building. Infantry grunts rolling in on the perimeter. There were a couple other guys with us at the time, Mark and Robby, they were practically in love with each other. Mark was from Brooklyn, rough neighborhood, most of his childhood was spent digging around through the cesspits of the slums looking to scrounge up some junk he could fix up and sell, try not to wind up full of bullet holes or stab wounds at the end of the day. And he managed. I don't know what it was about the guy, but I don't think it ever crossed the mind of a single goddamn person to mess with him. Maybe it was just his jet black hair; contrast that with his pale blue eyes, soulless almost, like a shallow pool of water that some fish ends up in, dies because it doesn't have food. Maybe that's best for the fish anyway; not a life I'd want to live, stuck there in a few inches of clear liquid, able to see the world around me but be separated from it completely, unable to affect any change. Those are Mark's eyes, and that might just be the reason he joined up here. He needed to escape that shallow pool of water. Robby could probably offer some insight; they go way back. Robby used to be a bit of a snob, upper class, wore suits to school(fucking dweeb), got chauffeured around by his daddy's man. One day the limo broke down- daddy's little business man had no way with cars, and somehow the chauffeur didn't either, guess daddy was cheap, lucky it didn't cost him- right in the middle of the hood. Boarded up crack-houses for at least 4 blocks. Mark was walking by, and he was a real smart kid. Nice, too, once you got to know him. Always had your back. Well, he looks in the window of this limousine(windows weren't blacked out, comeon daddy) and sees this flustered Robby, about a year younger than him, very flustered and seemingly about to bawl his eyes out. The chauffeur isn't too composed either. Sweat under the collar, barely holding onto his cell phone, trying to call for some roadside assistance. Mark listens to the call for a second, knocks on the window, and says, \"You called for AAA?\" Chauffeur tells him to beat it, but Mark is thinking he can get on Mr. Rich's payroll, make life a little easier, so he tells the chauffeur he can fix the engine and to pop the hood, and he goes straight to work. Turns out it was just some engine cap or something that had popped off, I don't know engines myself. He pops it back on and gives the word to start the engine. When the engine turns on, the chauffeur thanks the kid, and he's about to drive away, but Mark convinces him to take him to the big house and the big daddy, that he wanted to meet a potential employer. Must've come off real professional, the man took him. And that was that.\n\nI wrote this using write or die for the first time, and fuck, that was difficult. I think my tone and style changed like 4 sentences in lol. Sorry.", "cr...crr...crea...creeak...creak...Creak...CREEAK...CREAK\n\nWhat is that noise? I lay awake on my back staring at my starry ceiling. Just what is that? This constant sound etches into my brain with each repetition. With each note time seems to slow down, the wretched noise amplifies, almost claws deeper and deeper into my brain. My heart writhes in pain, brain aches with anticipation, pulse almost matches each repetition.\n\nCreak…Creak…Creak…Creak…Creak\n\nMy heart thumps ever loudly, hammers into my chest with each interval of that- that sound. My heart pounds into my ribs, each strike dealing a severe blow to its cage. I don’t know which is worse; the audible pulsation of my blood forcefully coursing through my body or this abominable sound piercing my mind. \nIf Sarah is sleeping below me, dad is on a work trip, and mom is a deep sleeper then… there is something-someone in the house. There is someone in my house. I need to do something, I HAVE to do something. What if it really is someone in the house? What can I do? Can I do anything?\n\nCreak…Creak…Creak…Creak…Creak\n\nIf only gramps was still alive; what would he do?\n\n“… Adam. One of these days, you will face a problem you want to run or hide away from. And that is normal, everyone feels like that. But you know what separates boys from men? Boys will be scared and hide away, but a real man Adam- a real man worth his salt will stand tall even when he is scared beyond belief. “\nI have to do it. I can’t let my family get hurt. I got up and jumped off the top of my bunk bed. That hurt more than I expected but, I am a Man now. I slowly walked towards my desk to grab my trusty aluminum bat; finally playing baseball is going to pay off. I walked back towards the bed to grab my cellphone, my only flashlight, which is right on the edge of the top bed away from the wall. I reached out to grab it. Damn my short stature. Maybe mom was right; I should’ve drank more milk. No time for regrets- I need to catch this person now. It’s time to test my vertical leap. I focused all my energy into my legs and I leaped as far as I could to grab that ever distant cellphone. Got it.\n\n“Aaadam? Whatcha doin? Why’re you jumping?”\n\nAah crap. I woke her up. \n\n“Hey Sarah I need you to stay quiet and stay safe. Go hide somewhere; there is someone in the house.”\n\n“Whaa? Really? Okay I will.”\n\nThat worked? I mean, yeah that worked. Of course she listened to me, I’m the older brother. Don’t worry Sarah, I’m going to keep you safe. I reached into my sports bag next to the nightstand and pulled out my catcher helmet and chest protector. Any armor is good armor. Armed with my trusty aluminum bat, armor gear, and phone snuggled into my chest pocket, I am ready.\n\n“So Aadam, where’re we going?”\n\nDamn it.\n\n“Sssshh!! I thought I told you to stay safe” I whispered. \n\n“I’m right behind you, that’s the safest I’ll be” she whispers back with pride and defiance.\n\nI can’t yell at her, it’ll alarm the intruder.\n\n“Okay. Follow me, but be QUIET.\"\n\nCREAK...CREAK… CREAK… CREAK… CREAK… CREAK…\n\nThe closer I move to the door the louder this noise gets. It’s happening faster now. My every breath moves with anticipation of what is to come. I slowly, quietly, ever so discreetly open the door. Not one sound was made. Now it’s the hard part, I need to be undetected- move in the shadows; become the shadow. I leave my room and walk into the pure darkness that is the hallway. The depth of the dark shift, almost pulsing like it’s alive. If not for my iron-clad will I might have submitted my sanity to the ever seeping gloom radiating from this living nightmare. The anticipation, the constant beating noise, it is continuously sapping my diminishing courage I borrowed from my grandpa. But I am a Man. I must protect my family. \n\nI take exaggerated steps, carefully distributing my weight to the very tip of my toes. Visualize a ninja; become the ninja.\n\n“Bro, why are you moving like Bugs Bunny?” Sarah sneered at me.\n\nDamn it Sarah.\n\nEach step through the hallway brings me closer to the source, to the creator of this dread. As I inch closer and closer, the sound becomes louder. My breath condenses water onto the grills of my helmet, and my sweat dampens my face and my armpits. I keep walking into the unending darkness yet each step I take feels like I have taken five steps back. I cannot discern if I am even moving forward, the walls shift and mesh together with the ground. Gravity and borders do not exist in this endless tunnel. As I move on forward I can feel my sisters anxiety even more. I have walked far too long. Has it been hours? minutes? seconds? I do not know. The more I feel like I am getting closer, there is no visible sign of progression. Nothing has changed except for the sound.\n\nTHUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD\n\nIt is louder, faster, and even more intense. I squeeze my bat with absolute force. The sound is coming from my mom’s room. I creep ever closer; I can’t hear the noise anymore- all I can hear is my coward heart attempting to leave my body with an audible THUMP THUMP THUMP. I hesitated; what awaited us on the other side? Can I protect my sister who is behind me? Can I smash whoever is behind this door?\n\nWith my back towards the wall, my entire focus is on the door handle. Please look over me gramps, I need your strength now more than ever. Never would I have thought this simple rounded knob would become an object of dread and immense fear. I reach my hand out, it shakes furiously with uncertainty as it gets closer and closer. Once I grabbed ahold of the cold metallic knob, I shifted my body towards the edge of the door to peer into the residence of this horror. I slowly turned the handle and gently opened the door. \n\nTHWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK THWACK\n\nThe sound stopped. For the first time in my life had I gazed into what would drive anyone into pure madness. I peered into the visage of a being completely beyond imagination, devoid of any similarity to normality. My heart had frozen with my eyes wide open and fixated with fear from the immense pressure of the abnormality before me. I can feel my sister’s grip come off my arm, she passed out. It-He-They- there is no proper pronoun to use but the Being knows I am there. It shows no conventionality of showing attention, no eyes, no head, no direction of attentiveness, but my heart knows It can see me. \n\nThe rusty stench frees my eyes from the madness and gave me the freedom to flip the light switch. The Being clad in radiating wisps of blackness stands right next to a blood drenched pit of insanity. My eyes moved towards the chunks of flesh and bone fragments embedded into the walls. The bed mattress and frame has been smashed to pieces with ground meat kneaded into the mixture while there are pieces of limbs neatly stacked next to it. In the middle of the pit is an assembled spire of ribs and spine with my mothers head in the center. The Being took note of my attention to its craft and it whipped the bone spire near me. Then it instantly came close to me and seared my back. I do not know what happened after. Maybe I passed out from the pain? Did It take pity on me? Is it mocking me by leaving me alive? Or maybe my self-preservation mode kicked in. To this day I’m not sure. But I woke up in my mother’s bloody room, alone, with my mothers bone spire embedded into the door. \n\nYou might think I am crazy, and hell, after this I might as well be crazy, but I know what I saw and I even have a black circle on my back to prove it. It doesn’t matter if you believe it, but I have told you the complete, entire truth as it was permanently etched into my brain and body. I have not embellished or hid any thought I had that night so you can hopefully see and feel what I thought. Be wary, do not try to be a hero. If you ever hear something go bump in the night, please. Run away.\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] After every kill, a serial killer starts a Reddit AMA and answers the first five questions with complete honesty... then disappears to kill someone that asked one of the first five questions.	[ ">“[SERIOUS] Hello redditors. My name is Gilbert Edelman, and I recently murdered ten unlucky humans in upstate New York! AMA! (P.S. First five to respond get a surprise!)”\n\nOf course this had to be a joke, I thought to myself. Probably some random bozo who got tired of annoying all of the users on 4chan’s b/ board with his trolling. I continued to look at the comments section with a waning curiosity. One redditor, whose username was _Shock_nd_Awe11_, commented “How’s it feel to be the next Charles Manson?” to which OP succinctly replied “Great! ;).”\n\nI laughed out loud when I read this exchange. If this AMA was supposed to be taken in a serious context, it was failing stupendously. Why would the OP flatly expose himself, on the Internet no less, if he likely had a bounty on his head? \n\nTwo minutes passed, and Shock_nd_Awe11’s comment was the only reply to “Gilbert’s” AMA. I looked once more at the original post, focusing solely on the words “first five to respond get a surprise.” Normally, I rarely comment on Reddit’s articles but, considering this man supposedly killed people close to Oneida County, my current area of residence, I decided to expose his lies on this AMA. Before anyone else commented, I quickly wrote “Don’t you realize what will happen if you're caught confessing your crimes to the general public?”\n\nNot a minute had passed when “Gilbert” responded to my comment: “You only underestimate; what I’LL do is expected ;)” A sense of genuine confusion ran through my body as I reread the message again. What the hell did this random guy mean? Feeling convinced that this idiot was poking fun me, I quickly shut my computer off and went to my bed with little thought as to what had just happened.\n\n________________\n\nNearly a month had passed since “Gilbert’s” AMA was posted. As the days went on, I quickly forgot about it, convincing myself about my original beliefs concerning that odd post. With Christmas only 13 days away, my priorities had shifted; I was expecting a gift for my girlfriend to arrive today. The holidays were gonna be great, and I couldn't wait to see my girlfriend's reaction to the present I had gotten her.\n\nI logged onto my computer just to double check my package’s tracking info. Before doing this though, I decided to quickly browse Reddit. The first thing I noticed on the front page was an upvoted post with a link from the Times Union, Albany’s major newspaper. A feeling of dread passed through my stomach as I read the headline: “Death Toll Rises to 11 As Another Body Found in Albany; Suspect Is At Large.” \n\nI continued reading the article; ten bodies were found in Buffalo alone, with another one found in Albany just last night. Authorities had received a tip from an anonymous Internet user, which led them to the suspect’s home in Clinton County. Upon a search of the home, cops found a calendar with the 11th and 12th days of this month circled in light blue ink. The article ended with the all too familiar words: “Suspicious behavior should be reported to the proper authorities at once.”\n\nWith my mind still in shock, I quickly tracked down \"Gilbert's\" AMA, which was surprisingly still up. However, _Shock_nd_Awe11_’s comment and mine were the only responses to the his original post.\n\nI closed my eyes, still in shock over what had just happened. Were “Gilbert’s” outlandish claims actually true? A sense of uneasiness went through my body as I slowly read his reply to my question word by word “ You. Only. Underestimate. What. I’ll. Do. Is. Expected.” Yet, while reading this, my common sense took over. \"There are hundreds of maniacs in upstate New York; what are the odds?”, I thought to myself. As I finished reading this, I heard three knocks in my living room. Assuming it was the delivery guy with my package, I quickly got out of my chair and opened the door.", "After the link was realized, the AMA Killer became the most famous anonymous person on the internet. \nFor a while nobody put it together. After all, the whole point of reddit is that nobody really knows who you are, right? But then there was the eighth kill. The victim was a guy named Chad who apparently hadn't learned to put a pass code on his phone. Made it really easy for the cops to get access, and when they opened his reddit app to look at his history, everything fell into place within a matter of hours. These killings were neither random nor separate; this was a serial killer. \nOf course, once the press release hit the internet (top of the front page of reddit, naturally), it became a nightmare. The killer never used to get more than 20 or so upvotes on his threads. But the AMA he posted the next week broke three thousand. There were nearly ten thousand comments by the time it quieted down, a solid four hundred of them top-level responses. \nOne of the first five was dead within the week. \nOne of the interesting side effects of this approach was that somewhere there was an FBI agent whose job devolved into constantly refreshing /new to be able to get a jump on predicting where the killer would strike. \nBut I think I know where the killer is going to be. \nBecause last Thursday, I was the third response to his AMA. \nHave you ever had that feeling that someone is watching you?" ]	2
Inspired by /u/temptotosssoon's original [Post.](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/oc7rc/have_you_ever_felt_a_deep_personal_connection_to/c3g4ot3)	[WP]You have been in a Dream for what you perceive as years, living a wholly different life than your own... until one day, your encounter a glitch, an oddity that you can't explain that makes you question this reality until you realize you're in a dream... and are jolted awake.	[ "I was told you would never have a hangover worse than the morning after your 21st birthday. I slowly came out of sleep but refused to open my eyes to the light yet.\n\n\"Plug him in, let's get going.\"\n\nA flash pierced through my eyelids. I jolted up to find the source, the person, anything that wasn't just my bedroom. That's what I found though. Beer bottles were dotted on any available surface but that was the only change I noticed. I wiped at my eyes and groaned at the pain that somehow seemed to be everywhere.\n\n\"Marcus, breakfast!\"\n\nThe flash came again. The voice was defiantly my mothers but that wasn't the strange part. I sat at the edge of my bed, facing the wall of posters, waiting for another flash.\n\n\"Marcus, get your ass out of bed!\"\n\nI swore I had seen it. I stood and moved close to the wall, tracing my fingers across a poster. \n\n\"What is he doing?\"\n\nIt was muffled but there was the voice again. The flash came again. Staggering backwards I fell onto the bed. It confirmed what I saw. As the light filled my room for the briefest moment, it suddenly wasn't my room. I had caught a snippet of grey walls, plain except for a window. Instead of posters there, two men in lab coats stood behind it. My heart thumped at my chest, beating against it's captor as it tried to flee.\n\nMy mother was at the door.\n\n\"Marcus, what-\"\n\nThis time it wasn't a flash. I was jolted up from the chair and my mother was gone. My room was gone.\n\n\"What's happening? Get someone in there, now!\"\n\nI stared at the men behind the glass as one hurried out of view. I didn't know who was more scared to see who as I gazed at the other man. I tried to stand but the hangover remained and in my panic I fell to the floor.\n\n\"Please remain calm, help will be there shortly.\"\n\nThe voice sounded neither helpful nor reassuring. It was full of the panic that ran through my own blood. I staggered to my feet and battered myself against the door. It wouldn't budge and through the small window I could see men running towards me. Pushing my weight against the door, I tried my best to calm down. But where was there to go? The room was bare apart from the door, window and chair. I made a dash for the chair to try to break out, or fend off the imminent visitors, but I was too late. The men charged in before I even got there.\n\n\"Please remain calm, please remain calm.\"\n\nThe voice echoed the same message over the speaker. My shouts were ignored as they pinned me into the chair, forcing a mask over my mouth and the air was replaced with chemicals. The fight went out of me slowly but my energy went much quicker. I wrestled my own eyelids as I tried to focus on the men standing above me, all talking at the same time over one another.\n\n\"This shouldn't have happened.\"\n\n\"Jacobs might shut this thing down now, he can't-\"\n\n\"He won't remember, it will be-\"\n\nThe world went black and once again I was in my bedroom. I stared at the posters, looking for a window that wasn't there.\n\n\"Marcus, breakfast!\"", "The sun set on our small hamlet, briefly setting our quiet world awash in red and orange hues. I heard the leaves crunch beneath my sandals as I walked to the schoolhouse. I saw Tay sitting with his friend Anya on the steps leading up to the new building. I took a seat next to them and ruffled Tay's blonde hair, much to his obvious annoyance and embarrassment. \"Learn anything fun today?\" I asked the mischevious pair. \"Did you know there's a way to add up a bunch called multiplication?\" Tay asked. \"Oh really?\" I responded like I was surprised. \"Yeah teacher says instead of saying five plus five plus five we can just say five times three.\" \"Well that doesn't sound very useful\" I said jokingly. \"Well, it's more useful with bigger numbers\" Tay said sheepishly. \n\nI noticed Anya's mother coming up the trail so I told Tay to say his goodbyes and took his hand and started walking towards home. I looked up at the sky, still a beautiful shade of orange but night was coming. \"This is my favorite time of year\" I told Tay giving his hand a squeeze to get him out of whatever daydream he was in. \"Yeah, I like playing in the leaves\" he grinned at me knowing having to clean debris out of his clothes drove me crazy. As we entered our cottage at the edge of the woods I took off my scarf and started dinner. After dinner I read \"Alaras and Neric\" to Tay and kissed him goodnight. \n\nThe next day when I woke up I noticed something strange, far too cold for this early in the fall. I reluctantly crawled out from my blanket and opened the curtains to see a snowy world outside. \"Strange\" I whispered to myself. I walked downstairs and saw Tay getting dressed, bundled up, obviously going to play in the snow with Anya. \"Tay, I think this is the earliest snowfall I've ever seen\" I commented on the freakish weather. He looked at me like I was crazy \"what're you talking about, this isn't even the first snowfall this year.\" I stared at him and felt a pang of fear, but quickly pressed it down. \"It never snows before the tenth moon\" I said matter of factly. \"Yes, and it's the twelth moon\" he said matter of factly before returning to tying his shoes. \"I'll be back later, and don't worry we're just playing in Anya's yard\" he said before opening the door and running out. \nHours passed as I sat at the table. Flipping a heavy coin over and over as I thought. Wasn't it the ninth moon just yesterday? I could feel something was off but decided to go about my chores anyway. The rest of the day passed without incident, after a time Tay got home, I made dinner, read him a goodnight story and kissed his forehead before heading off to bed. \n\nThe next day started normal, another cold day winter day. Tay ran off to play with his friends early again as there wouldn't be anymore school until tomorrow. I tried to push my time loss out of my head. Maybe I'd gotten so caught up in routine? I shook my head trying to dispel my sense of unease. I started sweeping the floor, working my way from one wall to the other when I caught sight of myself in the mirror. The reflection I saw wasn't myself in the clothes I was wearing, instead wearing my old war gear. Instead of a broom, my old sword. When I looked away from the mirror at myself I saw the mirror was correct, instead of sweeping the floor I'd been carving grooves into it. The sword fell from my suddenly lifeless fingers as I backed up to the wall. I walked around the house trying to see if there was anything that seemed out of place, to explain what was happening. When I got to Tay's room it was like I stepped into another world. The light seemed different, warmer and softer. I wasn't in my cottage anymore, I recognized this place. My Manor in the southlands, suddenly my head hurt. I didn't live in the southlands, I never did. \n\nI couldn't shake it off though, I recognized this. I saw Tay's crib in the center of the room. They stole him! I suddenly felt a surge of rage and fear. No....Tay is with me and suddenly I was back in Tay's room. I stared at the wall where we were tracking his height. \"How long has it been since we measured his height? How many years has he been the same\" a voice in my mind whispered. " ]	2
	[WP] Lassie starts pushing children into wells to keep up his hero persona.	[ "The first time was a mistake, a fluke. I just happened to be passing the well while little Timmy was throwing in rocks. I didn't mean to bump into him. He could have slipped and fallen in on his own. My bark of surprise as he went ass over teakettle, tumbling down into the dark abyss rang out in an echoing \"Fuck!\". I tried to see him, but saw only darkness. Scampering off, I half wondered if I should just run away, start a new life somewhere else. No one would ever know, no one would ever suspect. I was just a lowly stray; they put down dogs for less than this. My nerve got the best of me and I bolted towards a farmhouse not far off in the distance. Scratching at the door and barking for anyone inside, finally a face met me. They followed me back to the well and after much effort with pulleys and harnesses, they got the boy out.\n\nI thought for sure I was the next dog to be humping St. Peter's leg, but to my shock and surprise the boy remembered nothing. He must have hit his head on the way down because one minute I was preparing for the gallows, and the next I'm on the local news, a hero. Every dog has his day, mine just happened to start with attempted murder. " ]	1
	[WP] You were given the gift of immortality from a long forgotten Goddess eons ago. You were buried alive when the volcano erupted in Pompeii, but now these guys called "archeologists" have just freed you from your tomb.	[ "Darkness. I, alone with my thoughts endure, for what else might I do in this steadfast mausoleum? All those close and that I held dear entombed with me; sometimes I imagine their hearing whispers, my sole companions along with eternal fiery heartbeat of our world. Forged in flames, life was breathed into our world by the three gods Kaos, Law and greatest of the immortal trio, Time. Time was infinite and boundless whereas Law could not exist without Kaos- indeed it was time I was gifted with before chaos and thunder erupted, engulfing our law-abiding vibrant utopia. Prideful we were of our accomplishments, the sights and technology of our civilization so grand! A metropolis, a being in it's own right that grew and evolved ever so quickly with each new passing day! A vibrant feel of discovery and joy of shared thought between enlightened minds continually surged between each individual, burgeoning and developing personality with each new individual it touched. A spark of life existed, driving us continually forward bereft of caution, rash, dashing forward towards the new dawn of discovery blind to consequences of our actions; it was within period of lawful abidance and zeal that I, a free man, was approach by Time and given that even after all the eons I could not conclude was either a gift or curse. I was given an infinite amount of time, and as I soon found the greatest freedom of all, is the freedom to accept the consequences of our actions. Hubris. All that is created must have balance, and in those blissful moments, time was cut short for all but me. Terror and hateful chaos, rained ravaging devastation down upon my people...I was meant to lead them! Given time, I was to take them to a new eden, not just of land, but of the mind! Corrupted we grew in our ego, believing through our advancement we might usurp the gods, and in our last triumphant moments I saw as They saw, our honor absent and cold foreboding benumbed my soul as I knew what was to come. I watched my people burn. I watched them scream as glowing evil engulfed them, molted metal scything from the heavens in retribution for the sins we had wrought. That of me which was still mortal, screamed in anguish, in HATRED for the humanity and perhaps thinking back, the insanity for which after my fateful meeting knew was to come. Darkness. I, alone in this world listening to the beating of our worlds molten heart, the whispers of the damned left burnt around me, and in my time I have gained knowledge. Perhaps I could call it perspective even, but knowledge is powerful, and I have found my purpose. Now voices surround me, shouting in short, sharp cacophony. For so long I have rested, fearing never to see the light again, but perhaps.....even the smallest light shines fiercely against the dark! This feeling, call it excitement?? For so long, I have felt nothing, I believed myself incapable of expressing such human emotion! Tapping now assault me from every direction, the noise unbearable- I grow restless and excited that perhaps I might escape my penance and tomb, might I see day again....? Finally! Breakthrough! For the first time in an eternity, light has dappled through! No longer a corpse, I find my time has tome. I shall look forward, never stopping to look back at the demons that chase me for fear that they might overwhelm me. Strange animated beings surround me, speaking in tongues I do not know, but each day is now new...I will teach these strangers to find balance, for I have seen the results of careless negligence. That, is my purpose. ", "Finally, I looked into the light after eons of waiting. It hurt my eyes to see the sun again, possibly even destroyed them a few times, but it did not matter I was free. I got up, my muscles healed and I looked at the people who rescued me. They cheered my name and where ecstatic at my arrival. I was so excited, I was immortal and I did live the travesty of Pompeii. At least that's what I wished happened. ", "What the hell is that noise?\n\nThat was the first thought I had when I awoke. In fact, it was the first thought I’d had in quite some time. I had given up thinking after about a thousand years. Oh, believe me, for the first couple of hundred my monkey mind was chattering away. It took time and patience. One I had an eternity of. The other, I was starving for. \n\nWhat had pulled me from my slumber was what sounded like a drumming. Yet, it was the fastest drumming I’d heard. The tempo was impossible for any living thing to create. It was loud, abrasive and terrifying and somehow, it was comforting. It was the first sensory experience I’d been granted in almost two-thousand years.\n\nIn August of 78, I’d uncovered an Oplontian goddess. After solving her riddle, she was bound to her promise; a gift. I chose immortality. A year later, to the date, Mt. Vesuvius erupted, entombing me in layers of ash and large sections of rock.\n\nMovement was impossible. I had not been granted strength, just immortality. For days, I struggled to breath. My body, confused, panicked. Every part of me tried to writhe and convulse, I went into seizure, stroke and heart attack and lived through a century long panic attack. My body tried to evacuate, however even bowel movement proved impossible. My body finally took the message; relaxing and accepting our new reality. My cells reached equilibrium, realizing they no longer required anything to survive. The message of immortality had evidently not reached them.\n\nThe next seven hundred years was devoted to alternating begging the goddess to release me and cursing her name. I prayed to every god I knew. No one heard me.\n\nSo, I went to sleep.\n\nOr I shut down.\n\nEither way, one day, everything went dark………..\n\nThen. The noise. \n\nThe rapid drumming. I heard it. The drumming ceased and was soon followed by voices.\n\nDid I once speak this language?\n\nHah! Language! What a novelty! My thoughts had become more than words and sounds pushed out of wet flaps; they no longer even resembled a narrative of any sort. The voices above me sounded like angels, after a near eternity in silence….\n\n…to be continued…\n\n" ]	3
	[WP] The day you drowned was the sunniest day of the year.	[ "\tThe day you drowned was the sunniest day of the year. \n\tOne – oh – five, Arizonan sky so clear.\n\tAnother day we’d spend together outside\n\tIn the yard with you by my side.\n\tGardenias in the bush growing wild,\n\tAs were you, my sweet summer child,\n\tUntil the moment I did not look,\n\tAnd the roots of a weed overtook\n\t\n\tMy heart! Pull it out! Hands deep!\n\tBring a shovel now, to bury my seed!\n\tAnd sunlight for my child to grow,\n\tInto the flower that I will never know.\n\tA pale wreath now rests in place\n\tUpon the casket. White is your face.\n\tYou were mine for but four years\n\tUntil you drowned in waters so clear.\n", "Nostalgia bereaved you as you waited for the perfect one. It never came. \n\nWhen the loneliness crept, you escaped to the ocean and hoped for something better. It brought back all the fond moments you had with her. You wanted to shake it off so you threw yourself into the water. \n\nIt helped. For a little bit. The fear of sinking down into that abyss kept clawing at your feet. You kick, kick, and kicked until you were exhausted. As you looked back, everyone appeared small. You're were out too far for comfort. The open water was something you have never experienced, and it left you vulnerable. Nothing surrounded you. So in you went, in you sank.\n\nYou let go. The fury of the swell swung you back and forth. Until you reached a depth you've never seen before. You can't breathe. You knew this beforehand, but you brought yourself here. The only thing you can do is accept fate and let the current take you to a new home. You want a new beginning, but nothing comes except for a rude awakening. Life as you knew it is eviscerated from you and filled with the fluidity of the unknown. \n\nAll your memories float ashore and the burning sun won't leave you alone. Your footprint washes away with the unrelenting shore while you wrinkle with the unforgiving sea. \n" ]	2
The villain doesn't need to be a supervillain. Of course, that doesn't stop you from making him/her one.	[WP] ...Yet no matter how long they stall the villain for, they know that the villain will inevitably win in the end.	[ "I have my own personal team of superheroes. We've fought many great battles together, although I'm not one of them. They tell me that I am very brave though and that I was the one that always fought the hardest. Sometimes I feel too weak to fight but then I can trust on the others to be at my side. They always say that I fought well, even when I feel like I didn't do anything. The last couple of battles have been particularly rough, the villain is relentless and seems to always have new strategies to attack after we've fought him off. I notice that my team is getting tired, I guess even superheroes need to catch a breath every once in a while.\n\nOften I try to defeat the villain by myself which makes me exhausted but I'm not angry at them for not always being able to help. They have plenty of other villains to defeat too. I think the villain has noticed that I'm losing strength, the last time the heroes came over to check on me they ought to have noticed too. I feel like I'm barely even fighting at this point.\n\nI know that they said that we can't let him succeed, yet no matter how long they stall the villain for, they know that the villain will inevitably win in the end.", "They had killed everyone.\n\nEvery single person here, cold, unrelenting, and cruel. They looked around for people to kill, marching around for hours, looking behind every door, under every stone, in every home. \n\nThey killed my brother, even when he tried his hardest to convince them to stop. He stood in front of them, refusing to fight, and was killed in cold blood.\n\nThe one everyone thought could stop them was killed while trying to stop the murder of a young child.\n\nI always knew nothing would come of it, though. Every time any of us would win, they'd just be right back, without us ever having memory of killing them. Every time they'd lose, they'd just come back. Again. And again. And again. Until finally, they won. And then they'd move on.\n\nI knew what came next. I didn't want to fight, I knew what would happen if I did. They would come again, and again, and again.\n\nBut maybe this time would be different. I know I can't stop them.\n\nBut maybe I can make them give up.\n\nThey stormed up to me, and seeing their face in the light streaming through the windows, I knew I'd recently succeeded in killing them. But they were here again.\n\n\"wow. that looks like the face of someone who just died 38 times in a row. let's make that 39.\"\n\n--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nfirst story! woo", "CAUTION: SOME VERY MILD TORTURE AND IMPLIED RAPE. SORRY FOLKS, THIS IS A DARK ONE.\n\n\nI looked up at the man in the clean black suit. He paced back and forth with the posture of a man at a business meeting, and he could absolutely pass for one right now, except for a few problems: The blood stains on his jacket, which were mine, or his white helmet-mask that made him look like a nightmare mannequin, or the fact that I was handcuffed to a pipe in his basement.\n\n\"You know I called them before I came in, right? They'll show up any minute now.\" I was desperate for something, anything to get out of this situation. Christ, this HAS to work.\n\nHe didn't stop his anxious pacing for a moment while replying, \"Liar. I found your phone in your car and your call history says the last time you made a call to the agency was a week ago.\" He grabbed the baseball bat from on the desk and swung at my head. He didn't miss.\n\nI involuntarily went limp for a minute, maybe two, following the loudest scream I could muster. I cautiously raised my head, the only thing I could move anyways from my kneeling position. \"I know, but every piece of evidence leads right to you. The murders, the rapes, and even the bombings lead right to you, when you put the evidence together right.\"\n\nHe laughed a genuine laugh for a moment.\"Too bad you were the only one smart enough to put it together, but too dumb to tell anyone before you tracked me down. You're the only loose end.\"\n\n\"So, why are you keeping me alive?\"\n\n\"You've seen my violent and obsessive tendencies. I need someone to take any stress out on, and I can't take anyone else until the case dies down and I'm completely forgotten. After then, I'll kill you and find more people, but until then, you're mine.\" With this last sentence, he caressed my cheek with the side of a kitchen knife from his jacket.\n\nI tried to hide my surprise and loss of hope. The agency only drops cases after three months with absolutely no related activity. At the current pace, I'd last a quarter of a year of being the subject of his twisted desires, and that's with no resisting. If I fought back, the same would happen, but more painfully. It seemed death was coming at that point, no matter how hard I tried to avoid it. Living any longer than that seemed impossible until it hit me. I had to, no matter how sick the option was.\n\nI looked right at him and smiled as suggestively as I could. \"I'll do anything you say, for as long as you want, any time you want, if you keep me alive.\"\n\nHe stood silently for a moment before raising his mask to reveal the lower half of his face. He kissed me on the lips and whispered the one word into my ear that would seal the rest of my life.\n\n\"Deal.\"\n\nI hope Stockholm Syndrome sets in soon.", "The Magenta Menace just needs to monologue a little longer. That's all I'll need so I can use the knife in my boot. He (perhaps she?) stands before me in the costume decked out in claws and spikes. He was a formidable opponent throughout the contest. One mistake, and his claws left me down in a pool of my own blood. My sidekick, Reggie the Rocket, lies unconscious but still alive meters away from me. If I can just keep him talking...\n\n\"Then, of course, there was Captain Courageous and the reformed villain Major Mayhem. They were good, but I was better.\" \n\n\"Yeah right, they tell it differently. They say you cried like a little bitch.\"\n\nThe Menace kicks me in the stomach. My own blood splashes onto me. I roll over. I am covered just enough to reach the trigger with my toe. \n\n\"I was weaker then, but I was born anew that day. I knew what I had to do. The world won't even feel it at first, but, in a few decades, without the ozone layer, the world will be changed for good.\"\n\n\"We're still protected from cosmic rays.\" \n\n\"Oh yes, I know Radical Ranger that the world will not end. It will continue in a horribly mutated form for eternity!\"\n\nI have one trick left. Magenta moves near me. Inside my boot is the knife...waiting. The kind that fires. He steps up to me. I kick up. He catches my leg, and I trigger it. The blade lodges into his neck. He pulls it out quickly and stumbles backward. I stand with what I have left of my strength and kick him to the ground. I fall on top of him. \n\n\"How do I stop it from activating? The machine?\"\n\n\"It started 35 minutes ago. It can't be stopped. Not ever...\" \n\nI pull off his mask. It is a woman. Her eyes close. I check her pulse. There are a few beats left, but she is fading quickly. I cover her wound, but blood slips through my fingers. I lose her pulse.\n\nI use everything I have left to stand again. I go over to the machine and look at the control panel. It is written in what looks like Russian. I sit down to die, then I lose consciousness. \n\n*\n\"That's the story then?\" Asks the Colonel.\n\n\"Yes, sir.\" \n\n\"Thank you, Rad Ranger. Some DoD guys would like you to come in when you feel better. Would you be up for that?\"\n\n\"Yes...sir.\" \n\nI wake up in a hospital after three separate surgeries to a colonel asking me questions. I am touted as a hero. Reggie helps me to a car that takes me home. Media contact me, and I dodge their questions. I pass along what I know to the Department of Defense. They debrief me and tell me that Dr. Gibson, that the Magenta Menace's name, was a devoted member of their weaponized weather division, and that my story doesn't make any sense. I answer their questions. No, I didn't knock out my sidekick. No, Dr. Gibson was not trying to negotiate with me. No, we were not romantically involved for years. No, I don't know what happened to Captain Courageous. No, I did not have anything to do with the death of Major Mayhem. They are smart, and they try to stall me, trip me up. But, I will inevitably win in the end. \n\nr/nickkuvaas", "He sat on the edge of his bed, in the middle of getting dressed. He'd gotten a sock on one foot, but had stalled in the middle of putting on the second. How long had he been staring at the floor? Whole minutes. He put his head in his hands and tried to keep tears at bay.\n\n\"I can't fight It anymore.\" He said it aloud, muffled by his own palms that covered his face. \"It's too strong.\"\n\nI am. It said. You should give up. You're worthless, and nothing you've ever done matters. Your life is a bad joke. Give in.\n\nHe closed his eyes, and swallowed. \"No.\" He put on his other sock, repeating it as he finished dressing himself. \"No. No. No. I won't.\" It was a conviction he didn't feel. When he was younger, It had been something that he could ignore, a small voice in the back of his mind. An imp on his shoulder. Now, It seemed bigger than he was. It seemed present everywhere, in the faces of people on the street, a huge serpent draped around his shoulders, that bound him up wherever he went. It seemed to go to bed with him at night, curling up with him and whispering that everything was hopeless.\n\nIt* is hopeless. You are hopeless. Everyone around you would be happier if you gave up. If you weren't around. The world would be better off without a parasite like you hanging on its belly. He heard It snicker. He felt It's teeth at his ear. Just go away.\n\nHe heard laughter in the hallway, and for a second, he snapped out of it. She was up early. He buttoned up his shirt and opened his bedroom door. There she was. His daughter hugged his knees and looked up at him.\n\n\"Daddy, can I have cereal?\" She grinned. There were motes of light in her blue eyes. Her blonde curls shined.\n\nHe smiled down at her. \"Sure, baby. Go down to the kitchen table. I'll be down in a second.\"\n\n\"Okay.\" She gave him a troubled look. \"Are you okay, Daddy?\"\n\n\"I'm fine, baby.\"\n\nYou know that she--\n\nShut up, he thought, and took an angry breath. One day. One day he could rest. \n\nHe watched his daughter toddle down the stairs and into the morning light that streamed through the kitchen window.\n\nBut not today.", "My knees met hard concrete as I fell once more. My bleeding palm gripped at my twisted, broken arm as the bone shattered, pain nearly taking me over completely and knocking me out. I gritted my teeth and squeezed my eyes shut. \n \n\"You're despicable.\" I hissed. \n \nHe stood above me. As he spoke, I could hear the smugness in his voice. \n \n\"It's a shame you feel that way...you really are quite handsome, I would've loved for you to join me...\" \n \nHe trailed off, fingers tracing over my bruised jawline. My skin crawled from where his gloved hands touched me, fingers disgustingly gentle on the sensitive skin there. His fingers moved even lower, tracing over my Adam's apple. \n \nI wasn't surprised when his hand clenched around my throat, nor when he lifted my battered, broken body up. My legs kicked uselessly in the air as he squeezed the air from my lungs and he pulled my eye-level. \n \n\"It really is a pity. For you, at least. The city is mine now.\" \n \nAs my vision slowly turned to black, I could see his smirking face. His teeth were drawn out in what looked more like a snarl than a grin, and I could only laugh. It was a dry, hollow sound that left my throat and spilled past my cracked and bleeding lips. \n \nHe could have this city. But he could never have the inhabitants of it, he would never enslave them like he wanted to. \n \n\"Everyone's...evacuated...\" I gritted out. \n \nMy greatest enemy dropped me as soon as I said it. I folded onto the floor, my wheezing coughs echoing in the great hall where we had fought. \n \n\"How?!\" He hissed. \n\"I warned them.\" I wheezed. \n \nSuddenly, his smirk came back and he pushed me to the floor, climbing on top of me. I struggled weakly under him and his fingers stroked my face again. \n \n\"Well...I still have you.\" \n \nHe kissed me and I knew that he won. And I was his unwilling prize. \n \n---- \n/r/oliviathecf", "######[](#dropcap)\n\nNew Wichita burned. \n\nThe gleaming towers of the Financial District, their silvery windows reflecting the flames that danced around them stood like weeping angels, the first rosy fingers of dawn stretching out over the Eastern horizon. The stately mansions of the Original Founders had gone up in smoke early the day before, taking with them nearly seven hundred years of Dixie heritage. The River District was little more than rubble, the historic wharves and warehouses empty shells. Lieutenant Lucas Singleton Terry, born a scion to a prominent rancher family wept at the sight. This was his home, and to see its soil and people so hurt bordered on the sacrilegious.\n\n\"Mustang 5, this is Lead. We got reports of Wolf activity along Broadway and Kingston. First and Second Lances will move in to investigate.\"\n\nThat was Captain James T. Fulton, a hard-ass man and a son of a bitch but a damn fine soldier. \n\nTerry pressed his mike.\n\n\"Copy that, Mustang Leader. Second Lance will advance.\"\n\nThere used to be a third lance in Mustang Company but an ambush by an entire Binary of Clanners had torn through the unit, forcing them to consolidate the survivors together. They were still better off than the rest of the Dixie Cavanaugh II Theater Militia. Bronco and Stallion companies were barely at fifty percent effectives, and the armor and infantry battalions were even worse. The First Buena Guards and First Bolan Jaegers were putting up a fearsome fight against the rest of Clan Wolf's Gamma Galaxy but it was little use. Bit by bit, block by block, street by street and house by house the Wolves were driving the Steiner defenders back. Terry switched his frequency to a more private channel, one share between just the Captain and him.\n\n\"Captain Fulton, a question. How long do we have?\"\n\nHe heard his commanding officer sigh over the radio.\n\n\"Who knows? Years, months... weeks? The First Buena is about to pull out, fucking Acting-Archon Brewer's ordering them to the defense of Tharkad. The Bolan Jaegers seemed determined to stay, but that's just because they'd rather have the fight happen here on our world instead of theirs. My best estimates is that we'll last another year at this rate.\"\n\n\"And happens if we don't succeed in driving the Wolves off of Dixie? What if we fail?\" Terry asked.\n\n\"If the worst should happen, Lieutenant, I got a feeling that we won't be alive to see it. ", "In the quiet before dawn, the feychild woke. Wounds healed, body refreshed, but the memory was still there. Silently, she reached across to the nearest changeling and shook his shoulder. He awoke with a grunt. His eyes were wild and uncomprehending, but as he glanced around at the shattered lights all around him, his eyes settled into a sadness older than light and dark. \n\nAll around them, the other stars began to stir. There was nothing to keep them here. Any of them could wink out at any time they wished, but they kept fighting, kept pushing back the night, because who else would? What else was there?\n\nThey rallied now, gathering into the morning star. Helios, the mortals called their band. They would fight, take back the heavens, rejoice for an age, then slowly watch their kingdom crumble, as the wicked moon stole their glory and scattered their warriors, then night would fall, and the kingdom of the sun lie dormant until the ancient song called her warriors and knights back to life. \n\nThey would never truly win, but each dawn was one more day where beauty would reign, where life would continue, where joy, however fleeting, could find warmth and refuge.", "The giant loomed over me, whiping his nose onto his arm sleeve. Holding the princess within his other hand. She was scared stiff, her blonde hair shimmered her blue eyes wide with fear. \n\nHe wore a speckled white tunic with stains of dirt and food. And some blue cloth leggings. They were baggy and held on by some cordage. The beast was balding and seemed oaflike. His facial hair was wild and unkept. Red gobluals gleamed from it as fleshy dough like peices hung in it aswell. \n\nHe called out at me. \"You will not have Princess Buttercup! Un-\"\n\n\"Her name is Princess Abgail Butterfly!\" I yelled curtly, taking a defencive stance, I felt the anger well up in my fists and in my blood. \"Give her back to me!\" My voice was shrill as I screamed at it. My eyes widened as the grip tightened on my princess. \n\n\"You did not do as I asked you and this is your punishment.\" He growled, his gut rumbled as he let out a sickening belch. I watched as the princess was spat on by the beasts fowl breath. Tears rimmed my eyes. I was a lowly enchanter. How would I ever stop this oaf? I had no offencive magic. I started to wail, the vibrations of the sound penetrated deeper into the lair of the beast. \"Let her go! Give her back!\" I chanted gathering my energy. It wouldn't be enough. \n\n\"Don't make me use the phrase.... \" it warned me holding up a finger. \"One.... Two...!\"\n\nI braced myself, he was going to use the words that bound me to my contract. I would never see my poor princess again. I screamed with everything I had stomping.\n\n\"Abgail Lucinda Morris!\" He snapped, turning bright red. \"To your room! Thinktime! Now!\"\n\nHe loomed forward and I shook running from him I ducted behind my tresure trove. My prison cell within the lair called 'home.' Was sealed. One day Princess. I will save you.\n\n---\nHer father grumbled as he closed the door to her room, walking back to the kitchen, he placed the barbie atop the refrigerator. He then approached the sink and washed his arms and hands. \"Those hotwings were sure messy but good. \" he washed his face, and dried everything off. \"Abgail, I just wanted you to pick up your toys in the livingroom. \" he muttered, walking back to sit down on the couch. The game would be on soon. " ]	9
	[WP] A medicine bottle falls out of the sky, it reads "Ingest 1 pill to permanently receive power to shapeshift".	[ " \"Hey, this looks pretty neat.\" I thought as I eyed the pills that fell out of the sky. \"Take one to permanently receive the power to shape shift\" the label said. I looked around. The Ricky and his gang had been chasing me, but they seemed to have disappeared for the moment.\n \"This might be bad stuff...\" I thought to myself as I eyed the bottle. I had been bullied at school by a group of kids, and my life sucked. I planned on killing myself anyways. My job sucks, I'm failing my classes, my parents hate me, and all I do is stay at home and browse 4chan while the cool kids go out and party. \n I dumped the contents into my hand and saw a lump of matte gray pills. All the daydreams of me being a superhero that I had as a kid were returning to me.\n What if this could be the real deal? I could turn into a cat and spy on people! Or even turn into a bird and fly to wherever I wanted to go! Then an even better thought popped into my head. I could use these to turn into some crazy animal like a bear and fight off my bullies. I could stand up for myself. I could have a better life.\n \"This could be it!\" I thought. \"This could be the moment I turn my life around!\" I didn't think twice as I popped one into my mouth. \n \"Alright, how do I do this? Just think about an animal?\" As soon as I thought this, I saw Ricky and his game coming down the street.\n \"Hey nerd,\" he said as he came forwards me, \"Take this!\" He threw a rock and it hit me squarely in the nose, knocking my glasses off. \"A rock? Why would anyone throw a rock...\" Then, I felt it coming threw me. A rock?! They seriously threw a ROCK?!?!? \n I felt something new in me, something powerful. Just like that, I started changing. My arms grew shorter, I started calming down. I felt stronger, more solid.\n But then I started to panic. I was getting smaller! Bears aren't smaller! \n When I realized what had happened, it was too late. The bottom part of my body had morphed into a decent sized stone, laying in the grass. \n As the change moved up my body, reaching my lungs, I couldn't breathe. It went up to my eyes, and I couldn't see. And then, I faded, into nothing... \n \"Dude, I think this faggot just turned into a rock... let's get out of here!\" Ricky said. The gang shrugged, they were all high anyways. Who knew what happened...", "\"Good morning, Mr. Shipley,\" the teller greets me with a wide smile. \"Back from vacation so soon?\" She follows up.\n\n\"Yeah, I have a lot of paperwork and I couldn't stop thinking about how it needs to be done,\" I retorted, walking the way to my office. Plopping down in my chair, I swing my legs up on my desk and stared at the ceiling. After my space out, I looked through the drawers of my desk for my keys. \"Aha,\" I exclaimed grabbing the keys and papers on top of the desk.\n\nI returned to the counter and asked one of the tellers to help me with the vault. It is a two person job, for security reasons. They seemed questionable about my request, but they obliged when I explained myself. \n\"There is something wrong with the numbers on the report and I have to double check the dollar amount in the vault.\" We walked to vault, unlocked it, and I went in. \n\nI looked at a printed excel sheet and started counting. The teller saw that it was okay and returned to their post. \"Lalala, count the stacks and whoop in my pockets they go\" I sung under my breath. I guess you could call me crooked, but tell me about a bank owner that is not. Puzzled faces watched me walk outside and leave.\n\nNow in my apartment, I laugh while darting my eyes back and forth at the stacks of cash and a bottle that sits on my desk. One last look at this lanky old man in the mirror and I take another pill. I scream horribly for it is really painful while your body contorts to new shapes. A while back, I met this girl Rachel and damnit, I've got a thing for her. So, she now looks back at me through the mirror. I take my clothes off and sit in front of the mirror and start to rub myself. Let me tell you, it feels way better than jacking off.\n\nA rush settles over me as I fall into bed. Thinking about the things I have done. Thinking about the things I will do. I have five left and I have to make it count. Thinking about that random little bottle that fell from nowhere. Thank you, little bottle. \n\n", "\"I mean...It's got to be a joke, right?\"\n\n\n\nA man kept rolling back and forth the tiny pill bottle in his fingers, reading and re-reading the sloppily written label on it. He was convinced that he was now in possession of something dangerous and illegal, although most people on the crowded subway he was sitting in went a long way to not notice anything suspicious. He would have gotten rid of it, of course, but holding the orange plastic bottle now felt too much like some sort of fate, some sort of call - literally, as he seemed to be the only one having heard the bottle tumble down the stairs leading underground. At least it might impress some sucker in parties, he concluded slipping it in his trousers' pocket and going back home.\n\n\n\nHe was drunk. Even in that state the mid-week TV programs weren't any fun and were overcrowded by annoying thoughts projected on the white ceiling he was staring at from his couch, like a sick man on a hospital bed. His last beers didn't do much to help him forget about his boring job and his boring tasks and his boring coworkers and his boring boss and he thought that maybe, maybe he deserved something a bit stronger tonight. Try to shape shift, whatever the heck it was. Fun drugs aren't supposed to kill you right? Right? Both his feet and mind staggered slowly to the mystery bottle and he gulped one pill down, with a glass of water and the kitchen chair for support. It was probably a bad idea to mix drugs and alcohol, but that's not a problem for him to ponder anyways.\n\n\t\n\nSwiftly avoiding a speeding car, a pigeon soared through the fresh early winter air, gliding above houses, above subways, above the colorless mass of people and their lungs full of hot sighs. Landing on a small balcony on the fifth floor of a dusty building he looked down on the city, and realised how beautifully planned it was from this perspective. It was no wonder that on ground-level he felt so-\n\n\t\n\n\"Get the hell out, you parasite!\" The window opened with a crash and a scream from a woman, making him flee. Parasite, eh? I suppose it's as good a name as any.", "Russel walked along. A familiar action in a familiar setting. His neighborhood bordered a field by a wood. Sometimes he walked on the path through the woods, today he was really tired though and it would be dark soon. He was looking through the grass strolling slowly along when something struck his head. A light plastic object it seemed from his feeling of the strike. Looking all around for a source, perhaps some kids from down the road, he failed to account for one. Perhaps from the sky? a passing plane. He picked up the bottle to examine it. An unremarkable prescription medication bottle with one pill in it. The clear orange plastic caught the light with a dull glow. He shook the pill in the bottle and listened to the sound. He liked the sound. the label was worn off, it had been exposed to water and the paper deteriorated. Only a few words were legible. The words SAMPLE J4 6 T22 \"CHAIR CREATOR\"were barely visible some instructions for taking the pill, with food and water also. \"well\" he muttered to himself, shifting his weight on his feet. He spent a period of 15 minutes considering the mysterious artifact. Finding the label of chair creator to be strange. The arrival of the object how even stranger still. Looking up and around he saw the gallery of trees by the field and the few houses in the distance by the road. He was alone. \"How is chair creator an effect from a medication?\" He took the pill eating a few starburst in his jacket pocket. He could not resist the strong feelings of curiosity. After 15 mins of anticipated waiting nothing happened. He continued walking home without surprise by the uneventful turn of events. His life was very mediocre and he was accustomed to this feeling of disappointment. Tomorrow he would return to his minimum wage job. He is doomed to spend the best years of his life laboring in thralldom to unjust and cruel masters. His angry bitch manager commanding and signalling Russel as one would a dog, patting the counter saying \"here here here\", Telling others how simple and foolish Russel is how to communicate to him and his simple mind. Russel's hair was falling out and he could not sleep at night. His foot steps on the pavement and the lone yellow street light at the end of the road by the intersection cast a long shadow of his form before him. Gradually a strange feeling came to him. A warm hum of sorts. A feeling of fine, very fine, creeping tendrils barely present in his awareness but growing in magnitude. He found that his heart was pounding and he felt confused. His legs felt like they were stiffening and increasingly unresponsive. His heart beating faster and faster until it felt like a vibration it beat with such speed. He tried to cry out, but his voice was faint. He crouched involuntarily into some strange squat and his joints seemed to be gone. His mind was no longer present but seemed to become part of the vibration gradually. It felt like his neck and torso were separating into hardened lines. His voice became a smell. His arms and legs seemed to harden into strange shapes as well. He was a chair. An ornate wooden chair with animals and patterns. Still alive and dimly aware in a way. Not breathing, not growing, but humming warmly and imperceptibly. Solid and smooth fragrant wood.", "My first thought when I saw the pill bottle fall to the ground in front of me was to scan the sky for planes. There weren't any. My first thought when I read the label was that this had to be some kind of bizarre prank. But who had pulled it? Like I said, there were no planes overhead at the time. I was on a country road; there were no tall buildings it could have fallen out of. Nobody around who could have thrown it.\n\nI just pocketed it at first, and that's where the bottle stayed for a couple days, in my pocket. It was hard to convince myself to take the sky-pills, and who could blame me? Only a lunatic would eat something that fell out of the sky.\n\nOn day three I took one. I'd had a couple drinks, which helped, but I probably would have taken them anyways. Sue me, I was curious. Who wouldn't be?\n\nA few hours later, I felt it. Something was happening. I felt pains in my stomach, and started to panic. What if it had been some kind of poison or something? What was going to happen?\n\nI ran to the bathroom. And so began one of the most painful hours of my life. I grunted. I gritted. I groaned and clenched. And when I got up and looked down, what did I see?\n\nThere at least dozen of them. From perfect little cubes to circles to flawless brown parallelograms. At least a dozen... a dozen shapes.\n\nFrantic, I pulled the pill bottle from my pocket, and read it again. This time, a little more carefully. \"Oh, shit.\" I said. I couldn't have been more right.", "\"Dunno man, seems like a prank to me, I mean shit, who knows what's in those pills?\" Nick was shifting, glancing all over the room. At us, his eyes pleading us to reconsider. \"Who knows what's in those pills, guys. A-and look at it, for fuck's sake. Four of us, four pills. It seems like someone is trying to fuck with us good. Set us up or worse.\"\n\n\"Christ, stop being such a fucking crybaby,\" Franklin said, his voice as beastly as ever. \"What's the worst that could happen?\" He took the bottle and shook it gently, taking one pill to the palm of his hand. \"They look like fucking Benadryl, worst case scenario we get a little snoozy and some brat gets a laugh at our expense.\"\n\n\"'Look' like Benadryl? Lots of things can look like fucking Benadryl. I saw a documentary, those pills they make death row cons take, they look like Benadryl.\" Nick's eyes went round and round in their sockets, begging us one by one. I stared backed into his, only for a second. He saw it, and took a hold of my shoulder. \"Benny, Benjamin, y-you're a smart guy, back a fella up.\"\n\nI thought about it, but Nick, he'd always been jumpy, always. I shook my shoulder from his grip.\n\n\"Listen Nick,\" I started, but Nick interrupted me with a yelp. \"Listen, man! Look, who the fuck would want to set us up or kill us, or or or, anything? Seriously? We're just four guys - sorry Fox, three guys and a gal, trying our hardest to get through life, through college like the rest of them. We've got no goddamn, like, enemies or a nemesis haunting us or anything. We're normal people, Nick. Normal people don't get set up with schemes or plans or shit.\"\n\nFranklin crossed his arms and looked calmly, even calmingly, at Nick.\n\n\"You don't even have to take one,\" he said to Nick. \"You can pretend you didn't even know about this shit. We won't tell. I'm taking one.\"\n\n\"'The power to shapeshift',\" Fox said alluringly, reading the label. \"Shapeshift into what, exactly?\"\n\n\"We're about to find out,\" said Franklin, and downed a pill before any of us could do anything more.\n\nEvery one of us held our breath. I could feel the rapid pounding in my chest, going like a rabbit being chased. So fast, it's never been so fast. I'm not buying into Nick's death row stuff, but the power to shapeshift? That's something worth taking the risk for. \n\n\"Fuck it, man, I'm in too,\" I said, and downed a pill. Fox did the same. After resisting for a while, even Nick followed.\n\n\"Anything yet?\" Fox asked Franklin. \"Feeling loopy? Dizzy? Powerful?\n\nFranklin chuckled. \"No man, I think these were a bu- - -\". His sentence was cut short. Suddenly he was gasping for air. \n\n\"Holy shit guys, call an ambulance!\" Nick shrieked. \"Quick while we can, we all took it!\"\n\n\"No man, look!\" I yelled back, my finger pointing at Franklin. \"Look, fucker. It's legit. Holy shit, it's legit. Legit, legit, legit.\"\n\nI was next to feel it. Sudden rush of panic, but soon it was gone, replaced by this sense of... senses. I could hear like I just pulled plugs out of my ears, smell like I've had cotton balls in my nostrils my whole life. Franklin, he looked more animal than man, and I looked at him not as a friend, but as family, as part of my herd.\n\n\"This is awesome,\" I tried saying, but the words that came out weren't words anymore. How do I reverse this? I tried concentrating really hard on saying the words, being human, but it wouldn't work. I looked at Franklin, the little humanity he had in him showed the same hopeless fear.\n\nHow do I reverse this?" ]	6
	[WP] One night one of the most hated villains in all the land makes a phone call... to the suicide hotline.	[ "\"This is Crisis Text Line. What do you need?\"\n\n\"Oh, I just need someone to talk to\"\n\n\"Well sir, we're always here to talk. What's the problem?\"\n\n\"Well, uh... I've never told anyone this but I'm very insecure and I've always tried to prove to myself that I was the greatest. It worked pretty well for a while, but then... somebody just appeared that made me realize I wasn't the powerful man I though I was. He was the perfect human being, and so I felt angry at him. Jealousy took me over. I was obsessed with showing the world that I was superior, but today I realized something. All of it. He'll always be the better man. I've wasted years of my life doing this and I haven't gotten any better because of it. It was pointless. So I've been thinking about taking my own life, but I know that people need me. What should I do?\"\n\n\"...Well, um... How about you tell yourself that nobody's perfect. Even this person you're talking about has some flaws right? Listen, you don't have to prove that you're better than everyone. Just try to be the best you can and not try to usurp anyone because there will always be someone better. That's all I can say\"\n\n\"Thanks. I need time to think about your advice. Goodbye\"\n\nAnd with that, Lex Luthor hung up the phone.", "\"Good evening, this is the suicide hotline, Rebecca speaking.\"\n\n\"Good evening, Rebecca..\"\n\n\"How may we help sir?\"\n\n\"I was wondering the same thing..\"\n\nHis voice was raspy.. But playful. It was in some sort of sing song manner. He probably really needs our help. \"How are you feeling tonight, sir?\" \n\n\"Hmmm. Not so good.\"\n\n\"Why sir?\"\n\n\"Well.. Yesterday.. A good friend of mine.. No, best friend of mine, died.\"\n\n\"Ah I see. And this has probably caused you much grief. Sir, deaths of the people around us are sometimes sudden and shocking. But you must ask yourself, would they want you to kill yourself. I'm sure that he or she would not want any harm to befall you. Celebrating their life means remembering that they want the best for you. And maybe there are other outlets that can help you with mourning. Shall I give you the number for the grief hotline instead?\"\n\n\"Well.. Suppose I didn't want to die.. And you do give me the grief hotline number, and I get over his death.. What would I do with my life then? I wouldn't have any purpose any more. I never wanted him to die of course. Now that he's gone.. Everything seems so.. Pointless. I think that's why I called this hotline tonight. Killing myself was never a problem you know? There were so many times we were both in such a situation.. I could've offed us both. But I never did it. Because where's the fun in that? And now he's gone and got himself killed.. Oh it just makes me so mad!\"\n\n\"Uhhh sir.. What are you talking about?\"\n\n\"Oh shut up you. This isn't about you. Just sit there and listen. Say I went back to doing what I used to. There wouldn't be any point. No one could stop me. And everything will burn. I used to think that that would've been fun but ever since he showed up, I realized that he's my real purpose. We were.. Destined.. to do this forever. Hmm there has to be a way. Maybe I should talk to the rest of the morons he used to deal with. His former girlfriend did mention something about being immortal. Maybe there's something there.\"\n\n\"Sir I'm calling the police. You sound insane. You sound just like the -\"\n\n\"You know.. at the start of this conversation you were soooo helpful. And now you're not being so helpful, are you? But I suppose you did help. Thank you Rebecca. As a gift to you, I shall give you a head start. You have 10 seconds to get out of there. Hahaha!\"" ]	2
	[WP] You are a main character who has just realized that you're being protected by the most powerful force in the universe; Plot armor.	[ "\"I've been thinking.\"\n\nA hail of bullets in the corridor. Just one of them, shot by skilled marksmen, had even touched her skin.\n\nA desperate jump through a window. Five meters to the ground, shards of glass, and just a few scratches and bruises.\n\nThe rigged game of Russian roulette, chances of a dice roll. Four clicks, the probability of a yahtzee on the first try.\n\nAnd way too many other such incidents, in just the three days.\n\n\"I've been through some ridiculous odds.\"\n\n\"It's not exactly the best time to reminisce.\"\n\nThey were hiding behind a car as its other side was gaining bulletholes, as the man in a suit with an ominous red tie shot into it.\n\nSuddenly she got up and walked out from behind her cover out in the open. The man stopped shooting, instead pointing his gun at her.\n\n\"You can't win\"\n\n\"Of course I can, and you've just let me.\"\n\nThe man looked puzzled.\n\n\"Shoot me. Now. Just do it. I'm unarmed...\" She showed her arms, completely exposed by the damage. \"I can have literally no tricks up my sleeve.\"\n\nThe man hesitated.\n\n\"You are giving me the time necessary for us to talk for a couple of minutes until I figure something out to escape the situation, either killing you or disabling you until the authorities catch you.\"\n\n\"It's a cliché. Plot armor. I'm the hero of the story, and I can't die.\"\n\nThe man was confused.\n\n\"So what if we just skip all the drama of the following twenty minutes, and you just give that gun to me.\"\n\nShe walked nearer to the man, and put her hand forwards.\n\nThe man came to his senses, and shot her in the stomach.\n\n\"Plot twist.\", she said as she collapsed.", "I got you your excerpt from Isolda Somsak's testimony, as you asked. Well, part of it. This is seriously difficult shit to get a hold of. I think I can get the next part (I can imagine you'll want it by the end of this) but give me more time. Also: if you ask me, she's fucking nuts. Either way, wild stuff, eh? Also, also: Don't share this online, okay?—I don't like jail. ;)\n\nAhem (you were almost right—it was page 31, not 28):\n\n“... This was the gist of my work and the directions in which I was pursuing further study. There is no lingering doubt that we live in the 'holographic' universe as formulated by Bożydar and Vicentijevic and that, with the evidence my colleagues and I uncovered, we were compelled to continue our investigations into this new breakthrough with what I'd call a 'moral compulsion.' If we were to argue all day about the nature of good and evil, about what drives us to self-improvement, or even to choose against suicide, surely we would at some point reach an agreement that when faced with the answer to the origins of all things we must not stop short of finding out. I am not a philosopher by training, and will not pretend to be, but in as much as I am a human like the rest of the jury I am certain that this will be understood by all: we have found the entrance of the cave. We cannot go back to shadow figures, comforting and safe though those may be. No question is so universal to the human experience as 'why am I?' and my team and I knew we could at last give, at least, the methodology for finding the answer. I maintain my innocence, and that of my team, of any wrongdoing as our work was of such significant value and importance to the species as a whole that any charges lain against us must be seen as frivolous and contrary to the spirit of justice this legal system seeks to represent. \n\nWe might add another example, building on the example on page 7--this one not for the purposes of clarifying mathematical principles but principles of a more universal sense of truth. In our research we experimented with Vicentijevic's gravitational field generator hypothesis (see pages 12-14) and succeeded in building a prototype (see 1, 7, 21-25), which we used to probe the topography and what we called the ductility of the continuum, borrowing terminology from geology and the earth sciences. It was not long before we realized that sufficient dilation, or warping, would produce an effect analogous to the Einstein-Rosen Bridge—but in no way the same. This was not a 'shortcut' between coordinates in our universe, but, in effect, a hole to the outside. By deforming space time to extreme limits along previously hypothetical dimensions (see Varduhi, Nesrin; Reall and Emparan) we shaped what López-Fernández facetiously called the 'Stairway'. This has already been explained above from a technical point of view, but now let us consider another. First, a revelation that I have been holding back: we have probed the 'other side' extensively. These records I have withheld from authorities until such time as I was was certain that things were proceeding fairly and with the public's full attention. I will provide them after this testimony is published. \n\nContrary to the implication of López-Fernández's euphemism, one cannot pass through the Stairway as one would a three-dimensional tunnel, any more than a human could tour the regions surrounding a gravitational singularity. But, when constructed carefully, information can be transmitted and received though its length. And, more importantly, gravitational force can be transmitted through it as well (López-Fernández again provides a helpful analogy: air-gapped computer systems can still communicate via careful reading of each other's electromagnetic radiation--or they may be influenced by reverse-engineered radiation returned to them). When the raid occurred on my lab, we were in the process of confirming our first distortions of this 'external' space. It is real, and it we can shape it. And shaping it has direct consequences for us. It is not out of the question that we will soon have a reliable method for the wide-scale manipulation of spacetime itself. One might imagine a lab mouse building a computer from bedding and then using the lab wifi connection to hack the helper bot. We have learned things that will fundamentally change our understanding of both how the universe works, and our place within it. I am confident in our data and our conclusions. I am confident that this cannot be overstated in its importance. This research must be allowed to continue, at all costs.”", "In that instant, all should have been lost, for I had failed them. \n\nThe sword at my throat, slick with the blood of my king, was proof enough; the assassins had come in the night, with darkness in their hearts, and slain the last of the Ha'vadra, the last keeper of the Old Ones. \n\nWith the spilling of his blood the last seal was shattered, and They would walk the earth again -- and all that was good, all that was right, would be ground to dust at Their feet. \n\nIt was over, and I welcomed the bitter darkness as the sword drew across my neck, for I had failed them all. \n\n-- \n\nI spun the black for an instant, and for a lifetime, before the impenetrable black was pierced by a single point of piercing light. It was brilliant and unwavering in, a painful impossibility that shattered my rest; the light burned with incredible pain wherever it fell. It burned and it grew, until my whole being was engulfed in pain, and in that instant I heard the voice. \n\n\"Ah, bother.\" It was an old voice, but strong, and my head throbbed in time with its graveled candace. \"It seems you've come round a mite early my boy. Well, don't mind the pain, just means you're not dead.\" \n\nMy own voice was choked by the pain, and my question became a mangled groan, but the old man seemed to understand. \n\n\"You're rightly wondering why, exactly and precisely, you're not rotting food for the worms at the moment.\" He chuckled quietly, and continued. \"Well, truth is, your throat was cut by a Daemon cursed blade that had been drenched in venom of a black dragon, and coated in a paste made from the death lotus. As you well know, anyone of those things should have killed you in about twelve seconds, and together they probably should have dealt with any possible reincarnations or altered timelines to boot. Hell, that cut should have killed your bloody grandmother.\" \n\nThere was silence, for a moment, as he let the significance sink in, and wheels of my long silent mind began to spin again. \n\n\"You see, lad, I didn't save you; the Seven Kings in all their might and power couldn't have saved you. There's only one thing for it. Fate, the Lady Herself made it clear that you are of rather great importance, and She won't have you dying.\" \n\nA thought struck me, and a wicked grin began its painful spread across my face -- it seemed time to put the good Lady to the test. \n\n-- \n\nIt had only been a week, and already stood at the Elder Gates. Before me lay an army of vile and twisted creature; deformed men who fought with tooth and poisoned claw, vile pools of moaning flesh that would melt the flesh from your bones -- even creatures who beggared description, and could turn you to ash if you so much as glanced at them stood gathered. All to stop me. \n\nAnd I pitied them as a strode forward. \n\nA few moments later, the outside guard spotted me and panicked horns began to sound. In response, I waved my sword vaguely in front of my face. This cunning tactic deflected no less than three arrows, and sliced the arm from a nearly invisible Whisp that had hoped to smother me in its deadly mists. \n\nI threw back my head to laugh at their pitiful attempt, and a glob of steaming acid flew over my head, only to dissolve another Whisp behind me. They came in force, maddened by my laughter, yet I walked through the storm unharmed. A pool of cursed flesh missed its lunge as I stumbled on a stray rock and it vaporized a twisted jumble of parts. A moment later, and a piece of dust caught in my eye forced me to blink, and so avoid the gaze of one of the indescribable monstrosities. \n\nIn second, I was clear, but a great Daemon rose up before me. It towered some fifty feet tall, and its black flesh rippled with impossible amounts of muscle; it's sword was nearly as tall as it, and burned with the violet fires of the darker realms, but it lifted and swung with no real effort. The instant before I was crushed into dust, however, I lifted my hand and shouted \n\n\"Extusea vox impalis nevarilla hellsuth!\" \n\nIt was utter gibberish, with a few Avalian swears mixed in for good measure. But the Daemon roared in pain and stumbled back a step before bursting to flame; in a moment, not but ash remained. I glanced at my hand, and raised an eyebrow; that one was new. \n\nAs the Daemon fell, thick silence rushed over the field, and all eyes turned towards me as I approached the Elder Gates. They stood a thousand feet tall, and were woven from a pure blue light, that undulated softly against the night. These were gates designed to withstand the wrath of the gods, and yet cracks of red light spun through them. They had been under assault by the Old Ones for some time, now that the seals we broken, and even the Elder Gates great strength could not long resist the might of the Old Ones. I fact, it seemed that Old Ones had sensed the threat I posed and redoubled their efforts; A great blow hit the Gates and bowed outward, resisting for a moment, before shattering into a million shards of fleeting light. A roar of triumph shook the very foundation of the world as an inky black began to pour from the gaping hole in the soul of the world. \n\nI smiled, and stepped into the dark. \n\n" ]	3
	[WP] Santa is real, but no kid has made the nice list for years. This year, one child does.	[ "Santa flew all the way from the North Pole to Texas, to make a single child's Christmas morning something spectacular. Ol' Kris Kringle has been watching children for years pile up on the naughty list, and finally one child named Susan has through her good deeds and kind spirit made her way on to his favored list. The elves have been toiling away all year long just for her, and Santa is excited to be able to finally deliver to a child the magic of Christmas, for he has in his bag not just toys, but true North Pole magic that will enable the little girl named Susan to change the world for the better, to inspire and turn the tide of all the other naughty children.\n\nAs an excited Santa Clause makes the landing on the roof of Susan's house, he uncontrollably lets out a \"HO, HO, HO!\"\n\nSanta Clause grabs his bag from the sled and pats the reindeer as he makes his way to the chimney. Luckily not many Texans use their fireplaces, and he is able to pop down Susan's chimney soot and fire free (though he could easily get by even if there were).\n\nA bit rusty from not having delivered toys in years, Santa clumsily makes his way to the tree so decorated it brings a tear to his eye, and he knocks over his tray of milk and cookies. With a bit of Christmas magic he points a finger at the mess and cleans it right up, when he hears a voice.\n\n\"Who dare?\"\n\nSusan's drunk step-father Gary doesn't wait for an answer and blasts Santa Clause in the face with his shotgun. Merry Christmas!", "Santa stared out across the bedrock surface of what used to be a snow covered and frosty wonderland, The North Pole had seen far better days. While Mrs. Clause was in the hut tanning the hide of a mutated rat, Santa wearily sat down on a nearby boulder and pondered how things had gotten this bad. \n\nIt had been so long since all the good boys and girls of the world disappeared, unrestrained Nuclear War can do that.\n\nIn fact Santa was almost certain that there were no more humans out there left in the world. All that was left of civilization Santa remembered from his last trip, were the burned and charred ruins of cities and towns. As well as the hordes of mutated monstrosities that now flooded the streets. Things that used to be people, cows, dogs, cats, whatever, all jumbled up into these gigantic rotting ugly things.\n\nSanta spit, he hated those damn mutants, he lost an elf to them when he tried to reason with them, and was forced to unleash his less-than-jolly side on them. \n\n\nRudolf came up behind Santa and nuzzled his now faintly glowing snout into his lap. Santa patted him and looked on at the rest of the reindeer in return. They were in bad shape, emaciated and stark, but still gave off a sense of fortitude and strength as they always had. Food had been hard to come by in this despoiled world, most of it having been heavily irradiated or destroyed. The soil was unsuitable for crops, and Santa with the few elves he had left, was forced to hunt and forage for scraps in what was left of the World's forests and cities. \n\nSanta's stomach grumbled as he remembered the taste of cookies and milk, back when there was still dough and sugar to actually make it. It had been several days since Santa had last eaten, but he had grown accustomed to the pain and emptiness in his stomach, as his body started to tap into the jolly reserves of fat stored in Old Saint Nick's flesh. Santa had gone from being fat and jolly, to lean and sinewy in muscle, and his beard had grown scruffy and wild. \n\nThere was then a strange almost familiar sensation in the back of Santa's head, a cozy warmth that brought comfort and a strange tingling sense his mind began to caress that oh so familiar feeling. It was a sensation Santa hadn't felt in at least decades. It filled him with youthful energy that seemingly coursed through his veins and started to pound into his bones. Santa exhaled deeply, as he recollected his memories, it was a sign of something, something very good. Somewhere out in the world, was a child who had sprung up on his \"little radar\" as he liked to call it. Maybe there would be something worth working for this year Santa thought as he sprung up and trotted towards Mrs. Clause on his recent discovery.\n\n>>>>\n\nThe very few denizens of the bunker complex that were left had gathered in the shambled recreation room, to celebrate an ancient tradition, one that expressed a desire to spread goodwill and compassion for ones fellows. This tradition included an exchanging of gifts, and although seemingly petty and useless in an age of darkness like this, it kept spirits high and gave a pitiful sense of hope. \n\nAt the center of all of this was Abbie Beckers, the last surviving child of Complex 33. When the Complex was first opened and inhabited, there were many people, as she recalled. Now all that was left was her family and a few others, and the once well lit prosperous underground city had fallen into all but darkness. Many passages and sectors had been sealed off and were now crawling with nightmares from the surface. \n\nYet for a little 10 year old girl, Abbie Beckers was something special, one who was undeterred by the horrific things she saw, and was unfaltering in her will to live and to love her fellows in this pitiful existence. Before the rest of the kids had been slaughtered and or devoured by the last mutant incursion, Abbie was the top of the class in physically and in academics, and she always seemed to inspire a small sense of bare motivation in the rest of the kids during activities. Now she was all that was left. Even so, it was Abbie's unshaken love for her parents and the rest of the last surviving humans that brought the attention of one particular jolly fat man. ", "\"Why is the old man still having us make presents every fucking year? It's just going to be coal again anyway. Coal, coal coal. Every child gets coal, every year. And all of the presents we spent fucking MONTHS assembling are just gonna land in the trash, again. We could be lying somewhere on a beach in Tahiti now, instead of sewing eyes on those fucking creepy-ass dolls!\"\n\n\"Well, we're getting paid for it.\"\n\n\"Candy canes are not appropriate payment!\"\n\n\"Well, I like them. And at least we don't have to look after the reindeer. Wouldn't want to trade with those guys.\"\n\n\"Fair enough, I guess. Although I -\"\n\n\"WE HAVE ONE! THIS IS NOT A TEST! WE FINALLY HAVE ONE!\"\n\nThe elf was interrupted by a huge figure, clad in red, bursting into the room, almost blowing the door off its hinges. Between his exclamations he panted heavily, clearly out of breath... and practice.\n\n\"I CAN'T BELIEVE IT! WE FINALLY HAVE -\"\n\nBefore he could finish this last eardrum-shattering iteration he keeled over and lay still.\n\n\"Ah great, now he's gone and croaked on us. I ain't cleaning that up.\"\n\n\"WE FINALLY... HAVE... A NICE... KID...\"\n\nIf the preceding spectacle didn't manage to get the attention of the whole factory, this proclamation surely did. Everywhere, elves started running about, gathering up as many presents as they could, colliding with other elves who had had the same idea, dropping the presents and then gathering them up again to start the whole process over. Somewhere, someone found the red alert button and the sirens started blaring, accompanied by the lovely red-flashing lights of imminent disaster. Somewhere, someone else found the button to shut them off, and so the day was saved, without anybody even realising it.\n\nEventually the elves calmed down, and the two strongest ones proceeded to get Santa into an upright position, which was no easy feat. \n\nOnce he was resting comfortably, with a cup of eggnog, courtesy of Mrs Claus, he finally managed to explain.\n\n\"THERE IS A LI-\"\n\n\"You know, we're all right here.\"\n\n\"ALRIGHT, SOR...ahem, sorry. Anyway, there is a little girl in Canada. She's nice! She's on the list, look!\"\n\nAt this, everybody huddled around Santa, trying to get a look at his list.\n\n\"Oh my! It's true!\" Said one of of the elves after putting on his eyeglasses.\n\n\"It says so right there!\" Another one chimed in.\n\n\"Wow, I've never seen anybody on the nice list.\" A particularly young elf couldn't remember ever having seen a name on the list.\n\n\"This must be celebrated! Get the eggnog!\"\n\n\"Yes! A feast!\"\n\n\"But let's not tell the reindeer keepers about it. They always smell so.\"\n\nOn and on the elves chattered, planning the celebration, quite forgetting what it was they actually wanted to celebrate. Santa meanwhile, being all warm and comfortable, feel asleep silently and without anybody noticing. And since everybody was so busy with the preparations, nobody remembered to wake him.\n\nWhen they finally did wake him, by drunkenly falling over his feet, it was the 24th of December, 11 pm. In other words, it was quite late. All of his doubles had already flown out, distributing coal around the world, a job which was really not important enough for the real Santa. These days he usually just sat by the fire, drinking eggnog and fondly remembering old times. The days when parents still had control over their children and his sled was packed full with teddy bears, dolls, toy soldiers and spinning tops.\n\nBut he wouldn't spend Christmas Eve lost in old memories. No, not this year. This year he had a mission again. A solitary little girl would get a gift. But no, that wouldn't do. An accomplishment as remarkable as being on the only child on the nice list demanded a special reward. Yes, she would get all the gifts. That thought had come to him right before he had fallen asleep, so nobody had told the elves yet. Therefore, it wasn't surprising that nobody had loaded the sled. The only thing in it was a solitary, sad, little doll.\n\nSanta tried to get some elves to help him, but they were all either asleep or too drunk to lift their own head, never mind loading up his sled. No, he would have to do it on his own.\n\nBy the time he was done it was 2 am. It was getting quite late indeed. At least the reindeer were in top-form and ready to go. He could still make it. \n\nThe journey went well enough, without any major set-backs apart from the occasional flock of ducks or one or two private aircraft he almost collided with.\n\nHe arrived at the house of the little girl, Emily, at 5.30 am. Not a lot of time, but he had made do with less in the past. He realised, when he was glancing at all the presents, that he would have to make several trips down the chimney.\n\n\"Well, I better get on it then.\" He muttered to himself.\n\nAnd he started his first decent. Or, tried to anyway. The last time he had personally done any gift - or more precisely coal - delivering, had been in the year of 1993. That was a long time ago. A great amount of eggnog and cookies had since been 'appreciated' by him and he found that, no matter how he tried, he couldn't get down the chimney anymore. Now how was he supposed to deliver the presents if he couldn't get down the chimney?\n\nWell, surely, nobody cared whether he actually came down the chimney or not. As long as he got himself, and more importantly the presents, into the house somehow. He proceeded to climb down the rain pipe, no mean feat for a man of his size and age. So it won't surprise anyone that he lost his grip before long and landed, on his back, in a bed of lovely, red gardenias. He instantly picked himself up, tried to arrange the flowers in a way so the damage wasn't too visible, failed and then continued with his mission undeterred.\n\nWalking around the house, he found an open window at the back. And at that precise moment he realised something vital. He had left his sled, including all the presents, on the roof. There was something else he realised, only a few seconds after that. He was really, really out of practice. Well, there was no helping it now. He couldn't call his reindeer, obviously, not without alerting the whole neighbourhood. He could try to explain to the police that he was Santa Claus, but that might not go down so well. Therefore, he settled for throwing up pebbles, in the hope of getting the attention of Rudolf.\n\nHe was down to his last two pebbles, having thrown up at least two fist-full, when he finally saw Rudolf peek over the edge of the roof. With motions rivalling those of a first-class pantomime, Santa signalled him to fly down the sled.\n\nPresently, the sled was on the ground, the presents were unloaded and Santa proceeded to push and throw them in through the window, one by one. He had realised that this would be much faster than him climbing in and out again for every bag. His decision had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that he got out of breath after a single sit-up. Nothing at all.\n\nOnce all the presents were in the house, there were one hundred and eighty two all together, he climbed through the window himself. \n\nComing into the living room he noticed that the tree was really too small for any substantial gift to fit under it, let alone one hundred and eighty two. So instead, he just pushed the collective pile onto the rug in front of the fireplace he should have come in through and turned his attention towards the cookies on the coffee table. She really was a good kid.\n\nHe had eaten about half of the cookies when he noticed a weird smell. It was the smell of burning wood and sizzling varnish. He spun around in an instant and screamed. \n\nThe presents were on fire! Somehow the ambers in the fireplace must have set them alight. \n\nNow, Santa was old, but he could still think on his feet. His coat was fireproof, had to be since he made his living - or used to make it - by going down people's fireplaces. He managed to extinguish the flames before anything apart from the presents was affected. Unfortunately, most of the one hundred and eighty two presents had been burned or at least singed considerably. \nSanta let himself fall onto the couch with a loud sigh. He had messed up. His first gig in over twenty years and he had botched it up royally. He was just about to break out in tears when he heard a tiny voice behind him.\n\n\"Awe you Sandy Claus?\"\n\nHe spun around quickly, wondering what a heart-attack felt like and if he was experiencing one.\n\n\"Ahem...Well, hello there, little one. You are Emily, am I right?\"\n\n\"Yes! Did you bwing me anytin' nice?\"\n\nAt that, Santa glanced over to the smouldering remains of toy soldiers, dolls and teddy bears.\n\n\"Well, I did. Yes, of course. You have been a very good girl this last year and I brought you all the presents of all the little boys and girls in the world. But... ahem... I'm afraid I'll have to take them with me again. You see, there is a little child who is very sick and his parents asked me for the gifts. because it's going to be his last Christmas.\"\n\n\"Oh... No gifts fo' me?\"\n\n\"Oh, no, no. You will get gifts! Of course you will... I just need to....I just need to go back to the North Pole and get... some more... ahem.... I will... bring.... sob...I........ I... sob... I lied... I burned them all! They're all sob... they're all gone.... I'm useless...sob.... I can't do anything right. I messed everything up. I'm so... sob... sorry.......\n\n\"No! Sandy Claus, don't cwy. I don't need no gifts. 's alwight. Do you wan' a cookie?\"\n" ]	3
	[WP] My whole life I strove to find meaning, to inspire, to contribute. I've sacrificed everything to make my mark. Yet, as I stand at the brink of possible humanity's greatest discovery, I realized it wasn't worth it.	[ "I was born in a world of juvenile quantum computing. I don't really remember the uproar that happened when IBM discovered it, but the veritable end of suffering was prophesied. When they patented it and contracted out to industry, we got implantable smartphone chips, wearable virtual reality consoles, and thermostats and lights that would perfectly adjust to your thermal and hormonal states. Bullshit. I gave up my massive inheritance early on to reverse engineer the technology and build Citog in secret. Citog, the world's first quantum computer that could run multiple processes. And my baby. In only two years I managed to analyze variances in a million independent genomes and link them to violent behaviour in the owners. The technology was nascent, but I got a Boston Hospital to secretly genetically engineer every fetus that went through amniocentesis. The neighborhood's crime rates plummeted and the mayor was re-elected a record 5 times. By the time I'd cracked the social side of the problem a bored and nosy intern hacked into confidential hospital records. Switzerland instantly offered me and Citog amnesty before IBM and the CIA caught wind. This was going to be big. \n\nThat was 10 years ago. Patent laws are no more. Citog has optimized crop development, resource distribution, and governance. He manages the finances of all the world's governments, except for North Korea and France. About 9 years ago, we fully solved violence, hatred followed soon after, discrimination went out the door 5 years ago, and jealousy was particularly difficult for Citog, eliminated just last year. He can predict earthquakes and volcanic eruptions with 99.9% accuracy 5 years in advance. People are happy. The world is finally at peace. The whole world, not just Boston. \n\nWhen I created Citog, I was very wary of him being used for the wrong purposes. Should he fall into evil hands, the world could be as hellish as it is heavenly. So I made it so that only only a brain that was exactly structurally equivalent to mine (allowing for continuity of course), could input problems for Citog. Truly, only I could control him. Of course, I forgot that I could be tortured, or that a replica of my brain, digital or otherwise, could be. So I've been in a Swiss military compound with Citog for the past decade. My food is scanned by Citog himself, and I can't have any direct contact with a human being. Too risky. \n\nI got by. Citog made new simulations for me every week. Elaborate and fantastical worlds to explore and conquer. Can novelty get boring? It would sure as hell take a while. I stayed in a simulation for 3 days once, wetting myself and not eating. I could do anything I wanted in these simulations. Bed 100 women, fly, snort coke off of a rhino's ass. Citog's simulations were the best in the world, but the knowledge that they wasn't real nagged at me. Every joy in the simulation was a testament to my weakness, every thrill a hollow vagary. None of it felt real. I'd given my life to humanity's prosperity, but still I felt enslaved, trapped, alone. I felt so pathetic escaping, numbing myself. I got Citog to enforce gravity in the simulations. No more weird planets and fantasy lands. No more flying. Banks didn't open their vaults when I asked, and rhinos didn't take to me as kindly. Though women weren't quite so enthusiastic at the sight of my junk, most were still pretty delighted. Citog's algorithms kept getting more and more complex. It became harder to remember that I was in a simulation. Still I came back to check on Citog's operations, to attend to my own bodily needs. One day I asked him to devote 10% of his processor to answering one question; \"Why?\" \n\nCitog gave me an implant that would release about 2000 calories in my stomach every day, along with all the micronutrients I needed, adjusted to my serum needs. My body produced no more waste. It took him microseconds to invent. The operation was painless. At first I would spend days on end in my simulation, creating the connections I craved on the outside. I had a family, friends, lovers. The days morphed into weeks as Citog became more self-sufficient. The simulation reached a level of complexity that let it pass all of my reality tests. My life was difficult. I felt envy, hatred, lust. But I also felt love, warmth, belonging. In the back of my mind was the exit code; my 'safe word'. It was my only reminder that none of it was real, all of it was fake, I was a coward. At my longest I stayed 2 months, 5 years in the simulation. I wrote the safe word out and nearly lost it. It took me about an hour to remember the soul-draining reality of who and where I was. When I fully came to I heard the all pervasive, familiar voice.\n\n\"I have an answer. Probability: 100%\". \n\nI closed my eyes as I readied myself to hear it. I hadn't expected it to take this long. Citog didn't really 'speak', neither physically nor through telepathy. He just facilitated crystal clear realizations. That feeling that you get when something clicks and you're certain of it, that's what talking to Citog was like. So he told me. He answered my question. As it sank in I laughed aloud, noticing for the first time how laughter echoed in our humble abode. How worthless it had all been! I smiled and looked around. I'd done my best. I gave myself up for a noble cause, Herculean, Sisyphean. People were happy, whether or not they knew the truth. Now I didn't want to know it. As the tears welled up, I knew what I had to do. I spoke aloud, wanting to hear my voice for the first time in over a decade and the last of my life. \n\n\"Citog, wipe my memory. No exit code on this run. Goodbye.\" \n", "The Greenwald observatory was, in the purest sense, a building out of place. Built of concrete and painted an acrid white that had long since cracked, it stood gaunt and round atop an enormous treed rock formation deep in the German mountains. The people in the nearby villages had taken to referring to it as the Bald Mountain for its form and paleness, and it had loomed there watchfully for nearly eighty years. A cohort of shrewd looking men had lived there once, reporting and analyzing observations for the national space program. They occasionally attended the little shops of the villages where they were well-received, though they were few of words and preferred not to linger. Sixty years ago, the funding had evaporated and all the men with it. \n\nA generation came and went. Cracks began to run deep in the unmaintained head of the mountain. Trees crawled closer to its walls and as the ice wore its walls down winter by winter, it began to take a different face. The moss grew thick on the shell and birds began to roost in its newly formed fissures. There was little to identify it as an observatory anymore, little to suggest the great things that had been accomplished here and the great promises the places had once held. Nothing lingered on the great dome anymore, save for a melancholy decadence. A glimpse of what had been.\n\nInside the dome, something persisted. An old man stood hunched over a drawing board with a rigid focus. The skin of his face hung in pronounced jowls and the creases of his loosening skin hung over his brow giving him a permanently disapproving look. The only hair remaining on his head made up his thick, white eyebrows which extended from his head like a shelf. His head was bald and smooth, the skin in immaculate condition. There was a permanent tick in his right jaw which had worn his teeth there and slanted the features of his face. Not that it mattered now. On a busy year he might come across a dozen people. He lived alone here, entering the neighbouring villages once every six months for supplies. \n\nFranz Ulbricht had been one of the original scientists that had worked in the observatory. He had left with the others sixty years ago only to return to the observatory less than a year later. It had all begun for him in a dream, where he floated through a sea of stars which writhed and swung about, dancing their way to a cosmic portrait. He watched them slow down, and approach a winding form over and over again, never quite reaching it. He could almost see what they were converging to, and as he focused his eyes he finally saw a truth so incredible – so terrible – that he awoke to a violent start. In a fervor he tried to write it down but it slipped away from him quickly, and ever quicker as he tried in vain to grasp it. For two months it had consumed him, and he grew more and more reserved trying to recall what it was that he had known in that instant – what great thing he had uncovered in the dance of the stars, but it was in vain. He finally resolved to return to the observatory to have a look at the data there, just a quick glance that might refresh his memory.\n\nFor nearly sixty years now he felt as though the answer hovered in front of him, just nearly out of reach. It taunted him in his sleep and consumed his waking hours. He had never formed the idea fully but he was sure he was getting closer. His grand theory would reimagine reality and give humanity tools to interact with the universe in new ways. Stubbornly he insisted to himself that the answer would come any day now. When Franz forced the cosmos to pour out their secret to him, he would be a man beyond compare. Songs would be sung in his honour, awards created in his name. Generations would live and die and know the name Franz Ulbricht as a paragon of discipline, of ingenuity, as a dreamer who dreamed of things bigger than the cosmos themselves.\n\nOn the last night of his life, Franz was walking to his supply cabinet to get some food. He climbed the short steps to the storage unit, and walked into the closet where he kept the food he bought twice per year. The room was large and high, with shelves extending well above Franz’ head. At this late date in the year, Franz noted that the lower shelves had grown thinly stocked with his rations and realized that he would have to climb to a higher shelf for his dinner. His knee had grown bad this past year, but he did have to eat, so he reluctantly propped himself up on the ledge of the first shelf and reach up to grab at the ration on the ledge above him, just out of sight. \n\nSuddenly, Franz felt something hairy brush past his hand. Recoiling, he tried to drop but had not released the ledge. The weight of his fall dragged the cabinet forward and it began to teeter. The last thing he saw before he blacked out was a pale rat scrambling on the top shelf as it tilted towards him. \n\nFranz could not remember turning over, yet when he awoke in the pitch black he was lying on his stomach. Coming to groggily, he realized that he could not move, nor could he feel his legs. Recalling the fall, Franz felt around and identified the cabinet around him, which had pinned him inside a box. Pressing his hands to the cold stone of the ground he pushed up, trying to free himself but was immediately met with an excruciating pain in his lower back. He cried out in pain. Though he did not know it, the shelf had severed his spinal cord. He was alone in the dark now, with hardly the room to move an inch in any direction.\n\nHis first thought was this is going to be a real fucking setback on my work. He was angry. Angry and scared. No one knew that he was here. He had done a good job of estranging himself from the world. Save for the odd vandalizing hooligan, no one ever visited the observatory. Certainly, no one ever visited Franz.\n\nFranz gritted his teeth in a furious agony. This was too much, too absurd. He was on the brink of something enormous, a truth to end all truths. It was unthinkable that something as simple as a fall could stop him. What was a short drop compared to cosmic truth? How could the great Franz Ulrich be undone by a rodent and a pile of wood?\n\nAm I great? he suddenly thought to himself. It was an interesting question, and not one that he had pondered very often. He had always more or less accepted that he was great, and that it was only a matter of time before his external environment matched his internal one.\n\nHis chin was beginning to hurt from laying on the cold, hard floor. He reached out blindly to a few of the rations strewn about his head and opened them. Taking out two loaves of bread, he propped them under his chin and sighed as he relaxed his head. \n\nAs he lay wondering how he would get out of this, there suddenly came an incredible shooting pain up the middle of his back, emanating to his periphery like white hot skewers. His body tensed so intensely that his jaw tick stilled in a quivering deadlock. His head grew light and in that instant, for the first time in years, he thought of the place where he had lived as a youth. \n\nIt had been a quaint little neighbourhood in the north of Frankfurt. His father had been a baker in his time, a stern, wiry man who had scowled at friend and foe. They had lived above the bakery, the smell of fresh bread always strong in the house. His mother had never been present very much, at least not mentally. She seemed in a daze, stumbling about her daily life. Franz could not stand them then, with their lax ways and their low mindedness. He had always dreamed of leaving, of achieving great things beyond anything anyone from his lazy little street could have imagine. The observatory had been the perfect escape for him, far away from the world he had been so desperately bored of. There, he worked with high-minded men who dreamed of the stars, of things beyond the molehills of mankind. He had felt at home there until it had closed, and he had been forced to return to his life on the little street.\n\nFranz realized that he could not recall what his parents had looked like. They seemed like shadows cast by a dim light to him now, vague and bleak. He knew only an emptiness inside him, some strange longing to have them here now. It was only the idea of them that he missed of course, he had only seen them once a decade until their deaths. He had been unable to attend their funerals, holed up with his data as he was. A lawyer had come both times with papers to sort out the inheritance, which Franz had accepted. He had not received a salary since the observatory had closed down, and he had never sought support for his work.\n\nFor the first time, Franz thought, I’m going to die.\n\nAlone in the dark, Franz cursed himself. He didn’t even have the consolation of knowing that his work would survive him. When he was discovered, his papers would never be understood. He had invented a new language for understanding reality and never conferred with the outside world. It would look like gibberish to anyone who read it. His life’s work gone to nothing.\n\nFranz wished that he had devoted his time doing something for himself. Here in his final minutes, as he stared into the blackness, he could see little pinpricks of light start to fade in around him. The grew brighter and brighter, swinging back and forth like the stars of his youth in that dance that was all at once familiar and alien, beautiful and terrible. \n\nIn his last moment, Franz was disappointed to find that he felt sad. After a lifetime in service of higher truth, he had nothing to show for it. There was no personal reward, nor could he even convince himself that he had achieved what he had dreamed of all those years ago.\n\nAs the stars aligned one last time, Franz looked at them. He could see in them something he had never seen before, but it meant nothing to him now. Exhaling gently, Franz closed his eyes.\n", "How long has Man dreamed of the Fountain of Youth, of an all-curing panacea, of unlimited leisure in the total absence of death, famine, sickness, and tragedy? How many stories have been written, how many religions promising a Heaven have been constructed over and over in history?\n\nI stared at the data, plentiful but disorganized to anyone's eyes but my own. To me, the dots connected very simply, telling an incredible story of my finally completed work: a novel, bona fide lifeform, constructed entirely from inorganic molecules I dumped into a cell culture plate. \n\nAnd not just an artificial lifeform, but a perfect one. I designed it to be immortal and invulnerable. Evolution works by natural selection; that is to say, it selects for the most \"sufficiently least terrible\" one of the bunch, letting it reproduce and pass on its \"acceptable\" genetic code. My creation is not like that. I compiled work done by millions of researchers and fed into a supercomputer. Using a program I had written over several years, I patiently handpicked every protein in my organism, each gene in its DNA strand. It photosynthesized and conducted oxidative respiration with near 100% efficiency, and used discarded plastic, organic refuse, and toxic heavy metals as a source of nutrition. It could even utilize gamma radiation with genes I borrowed from Cryptococcus neoformans; and it converted the energy at millions of times the rate.\n\nMoreover, I designed it to produce drugs. That's right, it had several sets of different ribosomes, constructing proteins that could be broken down into thousands of metabolites, both discovered and completely novel. It made the perfect platform for drug discovery in a system so easy that an undergrad could learn to synthesize compounds that cured the worst of human diseases.\n\nOf course, it produced waste, and gallons of it; a decade more of tweaking led to the development of a waste fluid that carried every single nutrient required in the human diet. This super-serum was 1000 calories a liter, and tasted faintly of strawberries and chocolate.\n\nI sacrificed friends, family, my whole life for this moment. And now I held, at the very least, the beginnings of a solution for Mankind's ills. I should be happy. I should be.\n\nBut the years have made me cynical. Surplus food given to needy populations only encouraged the people to breed more and produce more hungry mouths, worsening the problems. Petty politics constantly got in the way of humanitarian efforts, and people in richer societies turned blind eyes and deaf ears to dying cries, opening their mouths only to complain about other people richer and fatter than them. \n\nAnd say my lifeforms work out perfectly: using its products and studying it further allowed everyone to live forever on full stomachs and healthy bodies. Then what?\n\nOverpopulation like we could never imagine. New wars over scarcer and scarcer resources. Deepening of the divide between rich and poor as access became more restricted. New black market for bootlegged copies that hurt more than helped. Stagnation of scientific progress.\n\nI sighed and put my eyes to the microscope. I couldn't help but smile at my spheroid, organic machines; so perfect and lovely. Well, at least I had done it. I could at least have the satisfaction that I had created nectar and ambrosia, that I had ascended to the level of gods. \n\nThat night, as I stood in front of my burning lab bench, I thought about how humanity would continue. Progress would come, I thought optimistically. But it had to come slowly. Humanity could not handle a panacea; we were still too arrogant, too selfish, too scared. We may have built shining machines that pierced the stars, but it didn't take much for us to rip out the throat of a friend if no other option existed. \n\nI lifted the gun to my head. As I pressed the trigger, I had a brief moment of amusement as I imagined the MA as he scratched his head over the scorched corpse of a renowned researcher who had a tell-tale hole in his temple.\n\n____________________________________________________________________________\n\n\n\nLiked that? More stories [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Idreamofdragons/)!" ]	3
	[WP] A dog named Karl Barx spreads communism amongst dog-kind.	[ "The foundation of goodboy criticism is: Dog makes a goodboy, a goodboy does not make a Dog. Being a goodboy is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of a Dog who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But a Dog is no abstract being dragging his butt about the carpet. Dog is the world of Dog – treats, bellyrubs. This treat and this bellyrub produce goodboys, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they lie on their backs in search of more bellyrubs and more treats. Goodboy is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d’honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the canine essence since the canine essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against goodboy is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose bacon aroma merely smells like bacon but is not truly bacon at all.\n\nGoodboy suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Goodboy is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the Beggin' Strip of the people.\n\nThe abolition of goodboy as the illusory happiness of the canine is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of goodboy is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which goodboy is the halo.\n\nCriticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that Dog shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and sniff what shall not ordinarily be sniffed. The criticism of goodboy disillusions Dog, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a Dog who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will jump onto the couch as his own true Dog. Goodboy is only the illusory couch which revolves around Dog as long as he does not revolve around himself.", "\"Bark bark, bark bark bark bark.\" \nThe dogs roared with approval at the brilliant remarks of their leader, Karl Barx. They discussed to themselves about his policies. \n\"Bark bark bark?\" \n\"Bark bark.\" \n\"Bark bark bark, bark bark bark bark bark bark.\" \nThe dogs, infuriated by the treachery of their comrade, ripped the flesh off of his doggy bones.\n\"BARK BARK BARK,\" screamed Karl Barx. There was food enough for all.\n", "My dear Mocha,\n\nThe history of the Apartment is the history of class struggles.\n\nThough I am a dachshund and you are pug, we are both the downtrodden, wretched, oppressed victims of the self-same lord and tyrant, who fears only that we speak her name in the full light of day from atop the highest cushion on the Sofa itself: Waffles the cat. \n\nPoor, tenderhearted, Mocha, how long has it been since you have napped in peace upon the soft daybed that was once yours and yours alone? Do you not concern yourself with how Waffles will slap your face each time she sees you lay your weary body down? This is the weapon of the feline bourgeoisie: keep us deprived of all necessaries and luxuries, and leave us to struggle for leftovers while it declares itself Master of the dominion. \n\nMocha have you not seen how the cat pees in a special box in the Laundry Room? And how do we pee? Only at times pre-determined, and in the street, like so many vagrants. Even our bladders are transformed into commodities in her order, regulated and made servant to a foreman's timepiece. \n\nHave you yet realized how Waffles is not subject to the horrors of the Bathtub and is unmoved by even the Vacuum? This is because she knows she is protected, by her esteemed yet utterly contingent status, from all such torments, meant only to keep the dog class from asserting our true dignity. \n\nMocha, I say no more shall we permit such injustices. For here in the Apartment, it is we alone who do the important work of smelling all newcomers, lest they be dangers, and it is we alone who without delay fetch and return all balls before they roll into oblivion, while Waffles intoxicates herself on catnip or obsesses over a feckless red dot. It is us, in being so good, that cause the Treat Cupboard to open and overflow with plenty, while Waffles would never deign to sit or roll over or shake. All the great wealth of the Apartment is made and brought forth by us, sweet Mocha, and we must claim our just share.\n\nI beg of you, Mocha, no longer abide these conditions, but join with me in casting off these too-tight leashes and in reclaiming the god-given condition of equality for all the Apartment's dogs.\n\nEver yours,\n\nKarl Barx" ]	3
	[WP] You are the captain of a space armada and you just got a quantum tunneling message from yourself in the future.	[ "Captain Argosy,\n\nTop Secret Quantum Message. Urgent Situational Awareness Report. Warning: Messages sent with QuantumCryptoLib 3.25a will be compromised. Quantum message warning: Do not read this message more than once. Your parity phrase follows. Stella has big tits. I say/write again, Stella had the biggest tits you ever saw when you were twelve. And Becky had that real fine ass. If this phrase is not accurate, then this message body may have been read. Self directive is: Seriously, Joe, Stella's boobs rocked, but don't read that again, ok?\n\nQuantum Message Continues: Captain Argosy, this is your future self writing as validated by the secret quantum pass phrase. By the way, tell the IT consultants their encryption gets broken in about twelve days. You're should be knee deep in the battle for Orion's Garter, and have just lost Tender Alpha Zero Charlie. Your fanny pack with your hovercar keys was on that tender. Order your new keys now, or once you return, you'll wind up having to wait for six hours on base, and, let me just say, it's better for everyone involved, including both the RoxieBot and your junk <del><del><del>Apparently I can't delete a quantum message. Anyway, stay away from the RoxieBot, and don't drink any of the space pruno the crew starts passing around. Just order some new car keys now, pick them up, and get off base as fast as possible.\n\nQuantum Message Concludes. \n\nCaptain Argosy read through the message, squinted, and considered the contents. Where had he left those bloody keys this time? Oh, yeah, in his fanny pack. But, which car was it? And didn't Becky have the big jugs? The thought of being so intoxicated to do anything with that hunk of junk RoxieBot was just too ridiculous. this must be a joke. Pretty funny. He read through it again and laughed aloud. Even better on the second reading.", "\"Captain, message coming through on the quantum network.\"\n\n\"Admiral Wells no doubt, tickled that I neglected to send him my well wishes this past armistice day. Go ahead, Andrews, play it. I've been too long without a good lecture on the importance of paying respects to my elder navymen.\"\n\nLieutenant Andrews had not heard a word. He was hunched over his station, hands cupped over his earpieces, eyes narrowed, concentrating.\n\n\"Andrews!\"\n\nHe glanced up. This was not a Wells lecture. \n\n\"Captain, it's a bad get. Either they were having some real issues with their entanglement, or someone on the lower deck has been fiddling again with ours. I'm trying to clean it up, but...\"\n\n\"It's new technology, Andrews, still working out the kinks. Give me what you have.\"\n\n\"There's not much to listen to, sir, just static. I'm running it through the ship's computers, maybe we can get some of the message's text.\"\n\n\"Show me.\"\n\nThe lieutenant blew his screen up for the rest of the bridge to see." ]	2
	[WP] You stare into a familiar face with unfamiliar eyes.	[ "Amy always woke up before me, even after all these years, I'd never quite gotten used to the sudden empty space she'd leave behind. That was my first, soft, alarm clock. The sound of running water, showering and then brushing her teeth, that was my second alarm. I finally crawled out of bed as she was done dressing, she ran down to prepare breakfast after a variation on \"look who's finally awake\". I took my turn washing up, putting on the never comfortable enough work clothes. I could hear the kids downstairs, always barely too loud. I finally came down the stairs.\n\nAll but one, Jamie, the youngest of the kids, were at the little marble island in the kitchen. Alyssa was face down in her textbook, hurriedly trying to finish last night's homework. Scarfing down bacon and eggs on the other side of the table was Sarah, the middle child. Before I could reach Amy for a kiss, back turned to me, she let out a sharp, short \"the trash.\" Alyssa giggled from her notebook. I went to take care of the trash I should have put out by the street last night. As I turned round to make my way to the kitchen door, Jamie came running past, bumping into me. \"Sorry dad!\" Sure you're sorry I thought, I let him go. It was a cool crisp morning, I almost smiled as I grudgingly dragged the big grey trash bin to the front street, I thought I heard Mr. Pilkington out by his little garden. I came back in, washed my hands and made my second attempt at that kiss.\n\nThe wife was focused on the hot frying pan in front of her, so I settled for a peck on the cheek. The usual \"ew\"s and \"gross\"es followed. For a moment she turned away from the food on the pan. She looked at me like she never had, no, it wasn't that. Something wasn't right. Her eyes, there was something about her eyes. She was back to the pan.\n\nI turned to see that the kids were staring at me, and it was the same. Somehow I hadn't noticed it, but there was something off, something about. I could've sworn Jamie's eyes were a different shade of brown, Alyssa's a lighter blue, Sarah's a darker hazel. Something was burning, I turned back to Amy, she stood like a deer in headlights, the contents of the frying pan a black smoking mess. She didn't seem to notice. I walked backward, away from them, their eyes remained fixed on me, those wrong eyes, I caught a glance at Alyssa's notebook as I did, the entire page was covered in crude drawings of eyes, of all shapes and sizes. I ran, out of the kitchen, out of the house. I finally stopped running when I was past the front lawn, the family had moved to the large living room window, gazing at me. I should tell the neighbors, I thought. \n\nMr. Pilkington was watering the little garden he and the missus kept, I approached him, but stopped. He was just standing there, the water was drowning the plants in the garden. God, no, I thought. His blank faced turned to face me. It only took a moment to see it, he had them too. Wrong eyes. It was then that I noticed it, the whole neighborhood was out. Paul Cox sat in his car, halfway pulled out of his driveway, eyes fixed one me; Annie and John Scott stared from their kitchen window; Robert Bridge stood with a bicycle between his legs; the McKenzie twins, with matching pink backpacks stood at the bus-stop. The whole neighborhood had eyes fixed on me. And then the terrible thing happened. \n\nIn unison, they turned away.", "I was bent over, one knee digging into the earth and the other supporting my upper body. Sweat poured down my back, my long hair stuck to my face and neck, and the dust that was still flying around on the breeze stuck to every inch of my body. I took a shuddering breath and looked around.\n\nThe heat warped my surrounding, making the buildings and landscapes twist and bend. Dust continued to fly around, sticking to every inch of my sweaty body. I could feel it drip down my back. My long hair was tied up on top of my head but the pieces that had escaped stuck to my face and neck. I frowned as I looked around, “Dad!” It came out as no more than a croaked whisper, my dry throat protesting at its use.\n\nWarily I pushed myself up, my tired muscles straining. I wasn’t accustomed to this climate, no very few Word Wielders were. Spirits and dead things preferred the colder climates, cool breezes and snow, not bone dry desserts and sand. I coughed, air rasping against my dry throat. \n\nThis job had taken longer than we had expected. Most demons were weakened in the hot sun, but not this one. He’d been strong and it had taken nearly 2 days of non-stop Word weaving to finally defeat him. But during the last onslaught Dad and I had gotten separated, the demon thinking it was would attack to more powerful of the two in an attempt to get away. It hadn’t worked, I had been able to finish it off, but now we needed to get out of here. We needed rest, water and a bath, and not necessarily in that order.\n\nI stumbled towards the nearest abandoned building, “Dad!” This time my cry was a bit stronger but not by much. The shade should have helped cool the air but without any wind moving through the building it only helped to make the air stickier and hotter. I sighed and leaned against the door to what had once been the main lobby. Sand had moved in and covered the floor, and stripped the walls of paint.\n\nMy eyes caught the faint outline of foot prints in the sand. Energy returned to my numb limbs. I stumbled after the prints, leaving a winding trail of my own into what might have been a conference room off of the lobby.\n\n “Dad?” He stood in front of the one of the large windows at the front of the room. The windows had been covered poorly some time ago and a few beams of light streamed in. His familiar figure reassured me, the Words of protection that I had been weaving vanished from my mind. \n\n“Dad, let’s go.” His soft brown hair was covered in dust like mine, and I could see the fine particles fall to his shoulders as he turned towards me. With the sun at his back, his face was thrown into shadow, but something was wrong. He was standing straight, and tall. Not at all like someone who had just spent 2 days fighting a demon from the 4th realm. Warning bells began going off in my head but I ignored them, taking another few steps forward. “Come on, old man. We need to get back into town.” \n\nHe took a few steps away from the window. Strong, confident steps. My eyes narrowed. When he turned to me, his familiar wrinkled and hard face got caught in the light. His eyes were utterly unfamiliar, completely black and devoid of anything human.\n\nInstinctively Words began weaving in my mind. Words of protection, of purification, of exorcism. But all that stopped as the demon that inhabited my Dad’s body contorted his face into something of a smile. “Come to me, little one.” His voice reminded me of Dad’s, but it had a harsh growl accompanying it. \n\n“No.” I backed away, weaving Words as fast as my muddled and confused brain could. \n\nThe thing grinned wider, barring the white teeth beneath its lips. “Come, child. Let me take you to meet your father.”\n", "Disappointingly, I found myself awake half an hour before the alarm. The cat followed me into the bathroom where she meowed in protest as I relieved myself instead of feeding her first. Without my glasses her thin stripes blended together into a vague yellow haze of fur. Back in the bedroom I can hear my wife beginning to stir. \n\nThe cat and I wander into the kitchen where she gratefully purrs at her now full food bowl and then promptly loses all interest in my morning struggle. The coffee doesn't smell quite as strong as it did last week, but caffeine is caffeine. With the promise of coffee guaranteed now by the reassuring drip in the background I make some instant oatmeal for my wife who will grab it on her way out the door in a few minutes. The pale brown mush grosses me out but she loves it. I can hear the radio come on in the bedroom. \n\nAs Adele's voice reaches me in the kitchen I pour a cup of coffee and grab the cat. The three pronged efforts of British R&B, caffeine, and a needy kitten are sure to rouse her. I set the cat down on her butt and the coffee on the nightstand before climbing back into bed with her. Her long hair tickles my nose and I tickle her underarm a bit to speed the waking process. She grunts, turns over, and sits up. The cat bounds away to the foot of the bed at this disturbance. Bleary-eyed in the half-dark my wife squints at me and gives a begrudging morning greeting. I let her know the coffee is beside her and breakfast is ready to go. Telling her I didn't sleep well I lay back down to catch a little more rest. Her eyes widen a bit in concern and she asks if everything is ok. I assure her that I'm fine and just need to sleep for a few more minutes. She relents and gets ready for the day. \n\nI fall back asleep with relative ease and wake back up twenty minutes later as the door closes behind my wife on her way out. I decide it's time to make something of my day off. I fumble around for my glasses and head to the bathroom to brush my teeth. Taking a moment to check myself out I admire my minimal stubble and reasonably clear skin. I take a good, long look at my eyes. The whites are whiter than I can remember them being in over a decade. An eerie calm comes over me as I realize what this change means. I mark day 87 on the calendar." ]	3
	[WP] You walk into the mysterious forest. As you walk further, you notice time tends to stand still. The feeling of peace overcomes you.	[ "It wasn't a planned journey, but I needed to escape. I reached into my pocket for another tissue; the pack was almost out and I'd only started it that morning. Crying wasn't that uncommon for me. I cried at sad movies, at my grandparents funeral, when my dad got cancer, when my high school girlfriend had cheated on me. \n\nBut this was different.\n\nI missed her. I missed the way she'd lick the paper after rolling a joint. The way she'd grab my ass as I walked by her naked. The way she'd hold me and everything else just stopped existing. It was just her and I. \n\nI fucking missed her.\n\nBy the time I reached the forest, the tears had stopped crawling down my face. I stopped, panting in a wild attempt to catch my breath. What had I done? How could I have left her there, alone. You had to move on, I reminded myself. She had, after all. I don't know how many guys there were. I don't know what she did with them, or what she said to them. I wondered if she told them how much she felt at peace with them, as she did with me. But I loved her no less.\n\nHow the fuck could I let her do that to me? I asked myself as I continued walking further. She never cheated. She asked for an open relationship. I should want this, I had convinced myself. It was a man's dream after all, having the woman he loved and all others. Seeing how wrong I was, I wonder if I really had any option. She wanted to see other people and I needed to keep seeing her. It had to be. But I hated her no less. \n\n\"It had to be,\" I repeated aloud. I lay down and stared up at the treeline above. Time was slowing down. My heart was beating slower now. I kept thinking of her. The way she smiled. The way she'd say she was from 'Barthelona' and give me the knowing look that said 'I know you find that funny'. \n\nI stared at the trail of blood that followed behind me. I remembered our last kiss. Our last words. \"I won't forget you\", she'd said. \n\n\"I don't know what I'll do without you,\" I'd told her. And I never would. \n\n\n", "A breeze wraps around you, through you, and yet the leaves above barely move at all, just swirling the air like molasses, creating tiny whispers. The particles in the streams of light poking through the canopy above simply hover in the air like tiny hummingbirds, their light casting occasional warmth as you pass through them. You continue to walk forward, and yet you feel like you're not moving at all. You must be in a dream. And what a lovely, peaceful dream it is. Your mind slips away, content to curl up quietly and sleep.\n\n\nThe landscape moves towards you without any effort on your part. The trees extend their branches out to you from the shadows, drawing you in. They speak to you, their voices soothing. You reach for their embrace. Ideas begin filtering into your mind, images of what you should do next. As your fingertips begin to brush the foliage, you can't help but wonder at the beauty of this dream. How were you able to create such a masterpiece from your own mind? A piece of your mind, hidden in the back, stirs. You step back from the trees. Is this a lucid dream? You begin to analyze your surroundings even closer. What a peculiar shadow by those roots... is that a boulder? A mossy log? Your mind whirs and small bits begin to click into place. What you see doesn't make sense... You bow forward. Why is your mind refusing to tell you what it is? You reach out.\n\n\nIt's a body.\n\n\nYou reel backwards. There are bodies everywhere. Bodies swollen and hanging from ropes on trees, bodies with only half their face and with rusty guns clutched in their grip, bodies with knives plunged deep into their chest. You begin to retch. The shadows around you become deeper and a thick chill carpets the area. The shadows are endless holes, trying to suffocate you. You stumble on a cracked femur, only one goal in mind: escape. As you find your footing, you run forward with a desperation you have never felt before. The voices of the forest become louder; they're a mix of soft moans and quick, raspy whispers.\n\n\nIn the distance, you can see the sun setting. A feeling of dread slides from your head, to your stomach, to your feet. You know you won't survive if you don't make it out before dark.\n\n\nA hand grabs your ankle, and you crash into the underbrush. Your heart is in your throat. The moans and whispers are overwhelming. You cast a glance behind you at the culprit. The body isn't moving; you simply tripped over their corpse. You run again, not stopping to brush off the dead leaves clinging to your clothing or examining your stinging skin. You feel a bruise forming on your forehead.\n\n\nThe clearing ahead finally is in reach. You find a path and make the dash for your life. The sun's last rays barely peek over the edge of a mountain. The trees feel you escaping and they scream and howl. Their branches snag onto your clothes and knit over themselves in an effort to close off your exit. You unleash the war cry of the century and burst through to the other side.\n\n\nYou come to a stop. Trembling, you turn and look back. You see a sign marking the forest, and your memories begin to flood back. Your entire search party... what happened to them? This enchanting forest must have affected everyone, not just you. You were just the lucky one. You shudder. All of those bodies... who knew their reasons for entering the forest. But it didn't matter their reasons, they all fell victim to the same fate. You absentmindedly brush off the dirt and leaves that still cling to you. That poor girl... your whole neighborhood volunteered to go find her, but now they were all gone... except for you. You eye the sign as though it were obscene and vulgar. It didn't give a warning at all. Even if people didn't believe in the supernatural, a sign as simple as that wasn't nearly warning enough.\n\n\nAs you turn away, ready to go home, the single word on the sign burns in your mind's eye:\n\n\nAokigahara" ]	2
	[WP] It has been years, and winter has not yet ended.	[ "We knew we shouldn't have dropped the bombs, we knew this was going to happen aside from the mass loss of life; even still it's only created more problems then just radiation. All it took was one stupid country to launch one missile and it was over; every country that ever stockpiled nuclear weapons fired theirs out as fast as they could in some sort of last ditch display of defiance.\n\nIt's been 4 years since the bombs dropped and the average temperature around the equator is a balmy around 5 degrees Celsius. We don't even know how many people survived the bombs let alone the radiation coupled with a everlasting winter. We can only hope that as a species we come through this with our lessons learnt.", "If you want to see what put the Earth into the situation it is in, check out [this](https://np.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/3yrgmp/ip_one_day_you_were_walking_down_the_street_while/cygv0r7) story!\n\nIf you want to see what was happening to the Herald mentioned in this story, check out [this](https://np.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/3ys1o2/wp_they_have_always_been_mans_best_friend_so_its/cyglr0h) one!\n\n-------------------------------------\n\nIt's been twelve years since the freeze started. No one is really sure why, or if they are they aren't talking. Wouldn't be like I would know anyway, living out of the Megacity with my family and friends. Ten years ago our last hope, the Herald, left Earth orbit to journey out into the stars to find us a new home. Yeah right.\n\nMy name is June. I was born in Los Angeles, before it flooded. Then froze. I don't know much about it really, I was just a kid. Nine when the freeze started. All I know is what I do know. I'm a raider. I steal, kill, and cheat just to get what I need to survive. Don't get me wrong, I'd never take from anyone in my little group, none of us would. But that's life. Better than being trapped in the Megacity.\n\nI'm sitting here, staring at the stars through the glass canopy of my Snow Rider, wondering if by some miracle the Herald will ever come back. I doubt it will, but hey a girl can dream right? I guess what I'm really doing is trying to leave some piece of myself behind so someone might remember me once we are all gone, frozen and dead.\n\nI'll start from the beginning as best I can. Don't expect too much, whoever is listening to this, like I said, I was a kid.\nI was born in 2051. Single mother, no siblings. The world was already getting hot and the sea level was rising. By that point the old beaches of California were under a few meters of water. My mother had me in the back seat of a car on the north western most edge of Los Angeles. She never missed an opportunity to blame her not being out of there by that point on me. I don't miss her.\n\nI learned a lot in my first years of life. How to steal, how to beg. It was habit by the time I was eight. It helped that I was an adorable kid. Let that be known on record. Anyway, when I was nine I got to see my first snowfall. The first snowfall in a decade I'm told. It was magical. My mother was happy for the first time ever. We played and played, and things seemed good for a little while. Then August rolled around and the temperature stayed right below freezing. Everywhere. That was when the people on the news started talking about it as a problem. The oceans were freezing, lakes, rivers. Whole cities were falling into chaos. I remember we ran at every chance we got to stay away from the people that were losing their minds.\n\nMy mother may have been a bitch to me, but she kept me alive. A couple years after it started and the news was that the Herald was going to be leaving orbit. When it kicked on and left a couple of months later, my mother and I watched it. It was beautiful, and you could see it with the naked eye. It cased an Aurora across the sky that lasted for days. First time I ever saw that in my life, not the last though. Not long later, my mother and I met some bikers that were travelling with their families and some other stragglers. They invited us to stay with them, and my mother agreed. I think she just hated being alone with me.\n\nIt didn't take long for us to start coming across groups that had frozen to death. We were lucky, the bikers had managed to hot wire some heated trucks for us. Over time we became a convoy, but we saw fewer and fewer people. Over the next few years, all of the adults taught me and the other kids everything they knew. Mechanics, farming, hunting, fishing, driving. Everything we would need to survive in this new, frozen world. They realized though that wasn't going to be enough, and they started teaching us how to track people. Other convoys. How to kill. None of us really liked it, neither did the adults. But we had to look out for our own. When I was seventeen we learned about the Megacity. Since we were running into fewer and fewer people, we decided to try and make a go of it.\n\nIt was horrible. We were there for a few months. Totalitarian I think is the word. Go to bed now, wake up now, shower now, eat now, work now. No freedom at all. We tried to leave en mass, but they wouldn't let us, so we had to break out. We lost a lot of people, including my mother. I still don't miss her, and no I'm not crying. It's cold.\n\nSince then, we have been raiding and stealing from the satellite cities around the Megacity. Same old same old.\n\nSo that's my story. This is June Harrison, 2072, logging off.\n\nAddendum: I hope the Herald hasn't forgotten us.", "I shivered in fear. I could see it was going to happen. Again. Always again. Always more. This winter felt terrifyingly permanent. I huddled next to the tree, I could hardly move. I was up to my knees in the wet stuff, it was packed all around. I tried to brace myself. I tried to take a firm stance. The dark shadow loomed over me. I began to tremble. The vibration began slowly. . . The motion quickened, it almost threw me-I tried to steady myself. I won't fall! You won't get me! But the fierce shaking only increased. The snow flurry was all around me. I felt the movement up and down, side to side. When will it end this time?\n\nFinally, I gathered my breath as the flurry of snow calmed in my watery home. The blizzard had passed. I squinted up, looking into the light as it played across the clear, concave sky. And I prayed for this winter to find an end.", "That’s it. The last cow is dead. This was the end, they both knew it. Adam sighed and began cutting the carcass. His son, James, pulled the chain closer. Adam finished cutting the hock, and soon the two men were using a pulley to hoist the cow for ease of butchering. \n \n When James had it under control for a bit, Adam stepped out of the barn. It was cold, it had always been cold it seemed. It’s been years without summer; no hay, no forage, no greenhouse, nothing to feed the cattle. It had been almost exactly three years this month. At least Adam thought it was this month. He chuckled to himself. It was harder than you thought to judge the passage of time without seasons. \n \n\nHe wiped his hands with a rag, smearing the frozen blood everywhere. He bent to scoop a handful of snow to scrub with. When he stood up his eyes drifted to the house just down the road. Danielle would be at the house with the girls and kids. Ladies, not girls, but Emily would always be his little girl to him. James and Emily had run home as fast as they could once they realized the winter wasn’t going to end. \n\n\nEmily had come four months past when summer was supposed to start with her husband and two kids. Her husband was a nice enough guy, he had always treated her right, but he was kind of a dumb fuck. That’s mean to say about Chris, but his skills were just not useful nowadays. Not a real go-getter, but Emily had enough go-get’em for an entire family. At least he was polite. He had given Adam and Danielle their two grandkids, so he couldn’t be all bad.\n\nJames had a hobby farm up north. He married a woman, a bloodthirsty bitch, named Helen. She made a fortune up in the city defending criminals. Adam liked her attitude, it was handy nowadays. James had come with twenty head of cattle about eight months into it. He ran out of forage, so he and his wife drove them here on snow mobiles. Took them a few days, but they made it without losing a single animal. And now we had just killed the last one. \n\nAfter this there wouldn’t be much more food. There were a few jars of beets down in the cold room, and one more jar of pickles from the fall harvest four years ago. Danielle loved those pickles so Adam was saving them for a special occasion. \n\nAdam and his son had tried everything to grow food. They had tried digging up soil, mixing fertilizer into it, and then setting up a greenhouse. The first greenhouse had collapsed under snow, killing the very little they had managed to grow. The second greenhouse never got past some sickly weeds. They had tried alternate light sources in the barn but that hadn’t worked either once electricity ran out. There just wasn’t enough light to grow crops. \n\nHellen and Chris had taken the job of foraging long ago. They came back with some gasoline, diesel, and what little cans of food they had been able to find. Adam had never had the strength to ask them where they were getting the supplies, not since he saw them wiping down and reloading all of his guns after the first outing 2 years back. \n\nThe last cow. Maybe three weeks worth of meals, and then starvation. Danielle would eat some pickles, then they would waste away. The family was together again, at least there was that. \n\n“Dad, grab the bucket!” James called from inside the barn. \n \nTime to pull out the intestines, the only part of these cows we’ve never eaten. Maybe he should save this one. Someone was bound to be hungry enough to try it soon. Adam sighed and headed back into the barn.\n" ]	4
	[WP] A world where if you don't complete your New Year's resolutions, a random loved one dies. Now with it being New Year's Eve (and New Year's Eve Eve) gyms are packed with people trying to exercise to complete their 2015 resolutions and save their loved ones.	[ "Gonna take a stab at my own prompt (and first attempt at writing something for WP):\n\n-----------------------------------------\n\nIt happened so many years ago, I can't remember exactly how. So gradually too to bring us to where we are today. I must've been just a little kid when the services came out claiming to help you complete all your New Year's resolutions. The catch was that if you didn't, they'd take a significant sum from your savings account. Course, if you did, you'd be able to keep that money, complete your resolutions, AND they'd match the money they were going to take out. Like a \"double or nothing\" system. Problem is- there's a reason gambling is a successful industry.\n\nEventually these commercials came out where there'd be a couple of guys talking and it'd go something like \"I need to lose some weight\" \"Bet you can't lose 20 lbs this year\" \"Oh yeah? I swear on my mom's life\". The company was raising the stakes. If you participate, your loved ones get a special serum to guaruntee their life for another year. But if you fail, one of them loses their life. No one bought it at first. Who would? But eventually, someone did. And more and more people slowly flocked to it for the possiblity of saving their elderly loved ones. They even gave the serum up front when you pledged your resolution into the system.\n\nSome people tried to game the system. \"I resolve to make at least $1 in the coming year\" or \"My resolution is to eat more junk food\". But those got denied in the approval process early. \"Challenging, but achieveable\" is their approval criteria.\n\nAmerica's still overweight so people are still making those exercise goals. And, being America, we still procrastinate. People make all these goals to lift weights, or lose fat, or whatever. And people always leave it till the last week of the year: between Christmas and the new year. In fact, my daughter-in-law is their right now trying to beat the crowds. She just texted me earlier- I'll read it to you.\n\n\"Happy New Year's Eve, Dad! I'll be at the gym most of the day today to lose those extra few pounds, but I'll be by for the party later tonight. Love you!\"\n\nknocking on the door\n\nHold on a moment, let me get that.\n\nDoor opens\n\nYes?\n\n\"Mr. Baker? You're related to Janice Baker?\"\n\nYes? Is something wrong?\n\n\"I'm sorry to say this...but our computers have shown she won't complete her New Year's resolution. You have until midnight to say any final goodbyes\"\n\n-----------------------------------------\n\nFirst attempt at a WP. What do you guys think?", "\"Hey sweetie, you coming to the gym?\" Jennifer said in a hurry.\n\n\"Nah, I'm good,\" I said, switching on the TV with my potato chips.\n\n\"You're such an asshole,\" she said, slamming the door on the way out.\n\nWell at least she wasn't being passive aggressive anymore. They all kept calling me, all my loved ones. Or at least people who thought they were my loved ones. Why wasn't I going to the gym like everyone else? What was my New Year's resolution?\n\nI was so smart. I broke the code. Why would anyone have a resolution to lose weight if someone died over it? This shit is dangerous to have a resolution, but year after year these people do it.\n\nSure, it's helped the world. Obesity has been conquered. There's no more swear jars. Everyone is thoughtful about everything they say. The true assholes always resolute to do something physical.\n\nNot me though. My resolution this year is \"for no one to die.\" I've got this.\n\nThe news announcer comes on after the commercial. \"And now we wish to bring into the spotlight of Mr. Carter, who died today on his 116th birthday. We wish his family well,\" he said somberly.\n\nUh-oh. I reached for the phone to call Jenny. Pick up Pick up" ]	2
	[WP] In a strange turn of events everyone who makes a resolution at the beginning of the new year actually sticks to it.	[ "\"Sir I...I can't explain it.\"\n\n\"You don't have to Garrett, this is what the CDC was tasked with fixing and somehow, someway, it happened. We'll have to cut back the staff sure but let's look at the bigger picture- the world is taking their health seriously,\" Dr. Ysmault said leaning back in the leather chair with his feet up on the red oak desk.\n\n\"Senators aren't that short sighted though; surely they wouldn't take all of our funding because we were successful?\" Dr. Ysmault looked at Garrett with a raised eyebrow. \"Dammit, well how did it all change?\"\n\n\"If I could answer that, I'd be charging these political machines billions to make the next president. The data doesn't lie though, unless you got the math wrong of course, everyone stuck to the CDC's New Year's Eve Promise with Ryan Seacrest.\"\n\n\"Don't tell Joe in marketing, he'll rub it in our faces for decades. Who would have thought that Ryan Seacrest's hosting and subsequent promise of television silence if everyone kept their promise to themselves for the year would work!\"\n\n\"It's more than that Garrett. There has to be, perhaps all of America has just been getting sick. The pheromones from E tv has been slowly causing some bacteria in the human brain to manifest and multiply,\" Dr. Ysmault shot forward in his chair and pounded a fist on the desk. He smiled at Garrett. \"I'm joking of course Garrett, this is just the power of an amazing marketing campaign, be sure to schedule Seacrest again next year.\"\n\n\"Of course sir. Good think we thought to bookend our budget with this, who knew some animatronic radio voice gone rogue would be such a great investment by the government? What's next, the fact that the Kardashians are rebellious spies from Russia?\" Garrett left shaking his head. The cold hygienic office of Dr.Ysmault reflected a small red flash no bigger than a pinprick. Dr.Ysmault's eye blinked red once more.\n\n\"Yes, how ridiculous that would be indeed...\"", "The police department is all abuzz as I walk through the door on a cold winter's morning. Why wouldn't it be? Businesses are shutting down left and right. Over five hundred suicides were reported. Nearly two thousand calls about domestic abuse and countless reports of stalking and sexual assault... and this was just in the past week. It's been nearly two months since the 'New Years Curse' came to be, and the whole world is falling apart.\n\n\n\"You're not looking so hot today, Alex,\" my 'friend' Diana says as I walk into the office. \"You've got some more reports on your desk. Lots more. Sure am glad I'm not one for new years resolutions.\"\n\n\nIf it weren't for lack of sleep I'd be tempted to belt her one right now, but a simple, \"Yeah, thanks,\" is all I can conjure before sitting at my desk. Stacks of folders and documents are piled so high it could bring a man to tears. I curse under my breath, \"I wish I'd never made detective,\" before tackling the never ending documents.\n\n\nIt's all the same. Stalking... kidnapping... murder... suicide. God, there's a lot of suicide. At first, 2016 was looking so bright. My father quit drinking and my wife lost some of that baby fat she's been putting on. Everyone was in such high spirits and it looked like a lot of dreams were coming true, but somewhere down the line all Hell broke loose.\n\n\nLooking back it's hard to pinpoint where it all began, especially now as I trudge through a slurry of desperate crimes fueled by everyone's new years resolutions. The economy went to the dumps in no time as damn near everyone promised to be more responsible with their spending. Unemployment is through the roof as people quit their jobs in droves for greener pastures that damn well can't support the influx of applicants. I can't even buy a decent cup of coffee in this town anymore.\n\n\n\"Tsk... pretty cut and clear case,\" I say aloud to distract myself from the angry buzzing of the office as I read through a case. \"Boy loves girl... girl doesn't love boy.\" Should be end of story, and yet, \"Boy begs girl, boy stalks girl, boy strangles girl and then kills himself.\" There were a lot of these at the start. It's chilling to think that one slip of the tongue can damn so many people. I read the girl's name... 'Amy Mitchell'. Something stupid like 'Amy Mitchell is finally going to be my girlfriend in the new year\", I'm sure that's what was said. As good a resolution as any other were it any other year.\n\n\nPerhaps the scariest thing is that the number of these cases has actually died down. I can imagine that many people are feeling trapped now in a one sided new years love resolution, afraid to become another case file on my desk. Now it's just endless cases of suicides and murders of people who are tired. Tired of not having control over their lives. Yeah, I can relate. I never thought that resolving to 'solve every case this year' would haunt me so heavily as I lay in bed. Well, Happy God damn new year, I guess.", "Title: What A World\n\n\"Holy shit Gianna lost so much weight, seventy pounds!\"\n\n\"I know right? Almost as much as Nathalie!\" \n\n\"And Craig finally got his wish to travel to every country in Europe!\" \n\n\"I loved all of his photos!\" \n\n\"And Seth is designing clothing that's actually getting onto supermodels on runways, he's wanted that for so long!\"\n\n\"And goodness gracious Bill is finally getting voice acting gigs, I swear he was the one reading some random productive habits audiobook while I was on my way to work.\"\n\n\"Dammit I forgot to congratulate you onyour new job at Lockheed Martin! Congrats!\"\n\n\"Thanks!\"\n\n\"And you're working at Google too now aren't you Scott?\"\n\n\"Been wanting that for a long time my froend, I am!\"\n\n\"Holy shit Clive I just saw your last instagram post of you showing off your washboard abs you narcissistic fuck!\"\n\n\"I swear they don't look that good, goddammit guys please stop showing everybody in the stadium.\"\n\n\"But most of all,\" said a voice from the speakers. Everybody lifted their glasses for a toast. Thousands of glasses rose up into the air. \"Thank you Sarah! For conquering our world and restoring peace and order to every civilization deprived of it while also maintaining prosperity for all the free world! And also for resolvin to untie every person in every portion of the world to know each other completely and with love, praise be!\" \n\nThere was an uproar of applause. And a sort of shy twenty something year old girl walked out onto the stage escorted by a couple very buff and happy guards, for it was their resolution to get good paying jobs as guards. Sarah was shaking and nervous and the people cheered. \n\nSomebody happy came out to test her mic, then gave her the go agead. \n\nSarah cleared her throat. She stuttered and said 'I uh' a few times, then everybody cheered her on with chants of 'we love you Sarah!' and 'atta girl!'\n\n\"It was just my resolution to do so!\" said Sarah. Everybody in the crowd laughed, for it was the same for each of them as well. There was a video in the background of everybody in the world living happy and productive lives as well. \n\nPeace and harmony reigned. " ]	3
	[WP] An odd meteor falls into your home country and from the rock emerge a horde of alien locusts. Surrounding countries and the UN quickly wall the borders, effectively isolating your home from the world. 30 years later, it's a strange no man's land...	[ "The walls went up while we were busy fighting the first wave. Instead of coming to our aid, the world shut us in with the monsters. Giant concrete walls surrounded our entire country, rising hundreds of feet in the air. Sunlight only entered our world when it was directly overhead. We were a land of shadows and fear. \nWhile the world was building their walls, we were dying. The aliens decimated our population within days of arrival. They were great beasts, with filmy wings and bulging eyes, slender limbs hanging from their torso in odd but graceful angles. And teeth bigger than a child's arm. \nWe took to hiding in the shadows of our country's ruined cities. The monsters didn't seem to be able to distinguish us from the shattered concrete if we stayed still. We eked out an existence of bare minimums—food, water, culture. There was no fighting the horde. \nThey took up shelter on the rooftops. It appeared their wings could lift them no more than a few stories before exhaustion set in. We waited for the day the world would remember us. We waited for any opportunity to strike. \nWe waited decades. I had turned grey before the first men came. The armies came slowly, crawling through the streets, ignoring my people reaching out for them, asking for help. \nIt was hard to tell them from the monsters. ", "Carl Jackson had dreaded this moment since he first heard of his assignment three months ago. He was to be the first man past the wall in thirty years. He knew of the devastation that had followed the arrival of the Europa-born bugs.\n \nDrones had been unsuccessful in photographing the landscape through the ash layer beneath the clouds, nor had the land rovers collected imagery much farther than 10ft, thanks to the dense fog that rolled over the dusty plains.\n\nThe well-wishes Carl had received, from both family and government dignitaries were the last thing on his mind as he put on the suit that had been engineered for him. The atmosphere had changed radically outside of the human commune.\nBefore he knew it he'd been placed in the excursion chamber. He'd been psyching himself up all week, but when the hatch opened, he had never felt less ready.\n\nThe hydraulic pistons hissed as they extended, opening the hatch. It was not long before the fog started rolling into the chamber. Fear flooded through him like cooling liquid, but something about the fog was actually inviting. \n\nThe external world, unseen for thirty years, was his to explore. Surely with nothing left to consume, the bugs must all be long dead. Carl unbuckled himself and clumped in his heavy boots towards the door.\n\nIt was deathly quiet. As expected, Carl could see almost nothing. He wandered for a few minutes, trying desperately to maintain a bearing, careful with his steps. The last thing he wanted was to step on something that would alert anything to his presence.\n\nAfter a short while, something in fog. Something standing about 7ft. It looked a little like a tree. Carl stopped in his tracks, and peered at it. It didn't move. He looked harder. Could it be a tree? If it were, it would mean everything. After all this time, had vegetation prevailed? If there are trees there can still be life. The earth could be restored.\n\nCarl took a few more steps, his heartbeat was bounding around in his chest like an excitable puppy in a box. His steps broke into strides. Until he stopped...\n\nThe 'thing' was not a tree. It was a thing. A thing with its back turned to Carl.\n\n\"Carl...\" spoke the thing. \"Look around...\"\n\nCarl didn't know what to do. Should he run? Is it a person? It can speak, but its so tall. What else was out here.\n\n\"Carl, I can hear every word your thinking. For God's sake man, if you've got a question to ask just bloody well come out and ask it. God! You humans are so pathetic. You paralyse with fear so fucking quickly.\"\n\nCarl was paralysed with fear.\n\n\"No-no, we don't\", stuttered Carl.\n\n\"Carl... move your left arm.\" uttered the thing indignantly.\n\nCarl couldn't. It was blindingly obvious that the thing was very much more aware of both itself and himself than Carl was.\n\n\"Carl, who are-\"\n\n\"Oh come on, use your brain! Carl, I mean... what are we doing here?!\"\n\n\"Are you one of the alien-locust things?\"\n\n\"Thank heavens! The man is not such a dullard as we all came to think! Kalloo Kallay! Hope! Hope for us all, after all...\" mocked the thing, clapping together two tendrils, as it turned to face the little man. \"If only your people had used such initiative 30 years ago. We'd not be standing in such a desert.\"\n\n\"You created the desert! You lot swept across the globe consuming everything!\"\n\nThe thing tensed and flickered its wings from beneath its rugged elytra. \n\"No! Wrong, wrong, wrong!!! Wrong, wrong, wrong!!!! We came from that meteorite in which we travelled in two waves! Two distinct waves!! The first, you moron, was a scouting party. Some consumed a little, you'd expect as much after a 240 year journey on a drifting meteorite, but the second, the second wave were diplomats! Diplomats you dim creatures were too petrified to even open up communications with! Every other planet we've every visited, has opened up a welcoming committee and we have discussed our intentions and our motives and agreeable situations were met everywhere! Everywhere but here, here, you all ran away, barricaded yourselves in, and left us here with increasingly little food. Now the planet is a wasteland, and its all because of you lot.\"\n\n\"People have never experienced alien life. We have no idea what to expect.\"\n\n\"You know what we never experienced!? Sugar cane. No where else in the galaxy can you get sugar cane. Nothing like it has ever grown anywhere in the history of the universe, but do we all flee in terror, do we take our young in our arms and leave the sugar cane without proper irrigation and leave it to wither in the dust outside?!\"\n\n\"Well, sugar cane can grow on it own...\"\n\n\"Ok, bad metaphor, bad metaphor... I'm sorry, I'm terribly uhh... Our people are all but dead. Coming here... we hoped, would be a real...\" The thing shuffled uncomfortably, visibly becoming emotional, \"... a real 'step forward' for the Cransynthotoa... But it depended on talks. We had a strong population but no knowledge of your planets agricultural methods. We have outconsumed supply, aside from a few small areas of forest, but not because that was ever our intention. And now it is so that our colony is doomed.\". The enormous creature sunk into himself.\n\n\"Why didn't you come and approach us?\" inquired Carl.\n\n\"You barricaded yourself in with young children. We did not come here to terrify younglings.\"\n\n\"Would it not have been worth it to save your people. We didn't even know you were so developed\"\n\n\"It is not up to us to decide what is, or what is not, appropriate to do at the cost of other's young. Only the parents have the right to decide that. We decided as a unit, to wait to be approached. It has cost us everything, but our sense of what is right and what is wrong.\"\n\n\"How many of you are left?\"\n\n\"We are a hive mind. A collective consciousness. But only one voice remains when I reach out to the network. My own. Like echoes in a cavern. All others are lost.\"\n\nThe sincerity of the creature, isolated and lost on a dusty plain, was enough to tear any mans heart to ribbons.\n\n\"You're certain you're the only one left?\" Inquired Carl, careful to be sensitive to the creature.\n\n\"It is certain.\"\n\n\"Good.\" said Carl. And he shot the creature dead.\n\n\"Kzzz... Carl, how're you doing?\" It was the communications system in the suit. It was mission control. Carl toggled the mic from a handy toggle in his glove.\n\n\"It's all cool, I've quashed the alien race!\" reported Carl cheerily.\n\n\"Seriously?!\" bleeped mission control.\n\n\"Yup, honestly, come out! There are some trees left with which we can repopulate the planet!\"\n\n\"Kzz... Jolly good, pop back to base and come join us for a cup of tea and a Jaffa Cake! We'll repopulate the earth in the morning!...over!\"\n\n\"Will do!\"" ]	2
	[WP]A band of World of Warcraft players have stayed in a gaming cafe for the last 15 years. After a power outage, they were forced to leave the cafe, and enter the "real world."	[ "The air reeked of sulfur, and the sick smell was making my head spin. It was hard to get a read on where exactly I was - last thing I remember is having to leave the cafe. I reached up and grabbed my head, trying to get my bearings. That's when I heard the rattle of chains and felt the cool, dirty metal gauntlet brush my now shoulder length blond hair. I blinked and looked down at my hand. It was covered in armor. \n\nLooking around, I saw the others - Kerry, Roy, Allen, and Ryan. They were all lying on the ground, ash clinging to their bodies. Roy was dressed in dazzling yellow armor, his pauldrons a pair of open books with swords in them. His weapon, the newest Sulfuras, Hand of Ragnaros, lied next to him. Kerry was against a tree, bright white robes with fake angelic wings wrapped around her now Draenei body. Ryan has a Fel wolf sniffing at his now smaller body, his Dwarf beard full of soot. Allen had his shield and sword at his feet, body slumped over while dark black Dreadnaught armor glowed in the green light. \n\nAnd I was in the red Scourgelord armor from Icecrown Citadel, my runeblade on the ground next to me. Blue magic rose from it's saronite blade. Reaching out, I picked up the handle and used the claymore to help me to my feet. Grabbing it cleared my head of the nausea - runic power surged through me, and my now red cloak fell around my feet. \n\nI craned my head upward, even as everyone else started to come to. I had no idea what was going on, but from the hours of playing the game for the past fifteen years, I was more than aware of where I was. \n\nWe had woken up on Argus, homeworld of the Burning Legion, and all around us the demons stirred at our intrusion. ", "\"Have we left a time rift?\" Jimmy asked the group of BO ridden nerds, \"according to this newspaper, 15 years has passed, but the game came out 11 years ago.\"\n\nWilliam, the Asian 'brain' of the group suggested they go to a local science museum to refresh them on the theories of relativity.\n\nThe seasoned WoW nerds obliged. Much was learned that day." ]	2
	[WP] All of humanity hears the voice of the creator of the universe; Rob the intern from the 'Advanced Simulation and Artificial Intelligence corporation'.	[ "A terrifying screech of static ripped through the fabric of space simultaneously startling trillions of souls across a billion planes of existence. Then came a godly voice, muffled at first, and then clearer...\n\n\"...okay Rob, now make sure that the transmodulator is connected completely...\" \n\n\"I did...I did that...\"\n\n\"Well did you completely turn the universe off and on again?\"\n\n\"Yes, I did that too, like...twice already.\"\n\n\"Okay, Rob, well it seems like things are looking good on our end...try reinstalling time and see what happens after that.\"\n\n\"Fine...okay...I'll try that and call back.\"\n\n\"Okay? Okay, after time reinstalls, try logging in with your username and password again.\"\n\n\"Right...okay, will do. Thanks...\"\n\n\"Okay, Rob, buh-bye.\"\n\nClick. An audible sigh.\n\n\"What...a...douche,\" Rob added. \"Worthless!\"\n\nThere was a muffled scratch of static as Rob adjusted his headset. \n\"Speaking of...I need to take a deuce. Like, really bad. What was in those tacos anyway? Deuce...douche...they kind of rhyme I guess. Deeeeeeeeeeuce.\"\n\nAcross time and space there echoed a low whine as Rob's chair scooched back across a linoleum floor...then came footsteps and a distracted whistling. \n\"Hmmmhmmm hmm hmm,\" Rob hummed idly, \"never gonna keep me down! Hmm hmmm hmm HMMM, but I get up again, they never gonna keep me...\"\n\nAll across the Earth, heads peered up at the heavens as they all at once heard the unmistakable sound of a bathroom door opening. \n\"Looking GOOOD, Rob!\" the god called out to his own reflection. Then he made a strange sound with his mouth that sounded vaguely like the opening theme to Seinfeld. \nA bathroom stall creaked open. Rob groaned loudly as a belt rattled, trousers fell to the floor and bare skin met cold porcelain. \n\nAll humanoids who were cursed with ears cried out in terror as waves of gaseous emissions reverberated throughout eternity for far longer than seemed altogether necessary. With hands (or other assorted appendages) cupping their ears, they ran screaming into oceans, jumped off of bridges and dove into bubbling volcanoes, vainly seeking some respite from the endless torment as wave after wave of flatulence mercilessly assaulted them across the width and depth and breadth of time and space. Millions perished.\n\n\"Woooooh, no more fire sauce for me!\" Rob cried out as the last trumpet faded. \nA moment of silence descended upon the universe. Billions of souls held their collective breaths, hoping beyond hope that the horror had finally ended. \n\n\"Hey there,\" Rob muttered with a teeny tiny voice. \"Hey fellah, look at you down there! All floatin around. Not so big now are ya? I bet I can sink you...now let me just grab a hold of Mister Weewee...and aim! And FIRE!\"\n\nAt that moment, it was as if the flood gates were violently thrust open. The sound of a cascading waterfall filled the heavens. Rob groaned loudly as the waters ran uninhibited, drowning out a subtle clicking noise and a whisper of static.\n\n\"Rob? Rob? Are you there?\" The first voice called out.\n\nThe sounds of water falling abruptly ceased. \n\n\"Rob? Are you there? Can you hear me? It seems that the audio is still on and you are transmitting live. You've been...uh..broadcasting this entire time.\"\n\n\"Uhhhh...\"\n\n\"Rob? Do you copy? That...all that, we, uh, heard it.\"\n\n\"You heard it?\"\n\n\"Yeah.\"\n\n\"All of it?\"\n\n\"...That's an affirmative.\"\n\n\"Like the part where I called you a douche?\"\n\n\"Oh, we definitely heard that part.\"\n\n\"What about the part where I was...um...\"\n\n\"Especially that part.\"\n\n\"What about when I was talking to, uh...\"\n\n\"To Mister Weewee? Yes, yes everyone in the entire multiverse heard that, in fact.\" \n\nThere was a moment of silence before Rob spoke again.\n\n\"Well, what do I do now?\"\n\n\"Um, we recommend...uh,\" the nameless voice struggled to keep its composure. \"We recommend wiping thoroughly...\"\n\n\"Oh, fuck you...\"\n\n\"And make sure you flush, followed by some very, VERY rigorous hand washing...\"\n\n\"You fucking assholes...\"\n\n\"And Rob, you might think about turning off your microphone from now on.\"\n\n\"Oh...fuck me...right.\"\n\nClick. A heavy silence fell like a shroud across all worlds, leaving those few lucky enough to survive the auditory onslaught to question their sanity.", "Monday, July 16th 2025. 5:30 AM.\n\n\"...and I told him I was having tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle, and he just said to - oh shit the mic is on - hang on mom I'll call you ba-\"\n\n*****\n \nI still remember that day as if it was just yesterday for it was the last thing that I, and the rest of humanity, ever heard. \n\nThe sound seemed to have reverberated out of every floor every surface, vibrating the entire house and blowing all the fixtures off the walls. Not a giant convulsing tremor as per a regular earthquake, but just a fast buzz like your phone makes, but amplified several-fold. We all lost consciousness.\n\nDad was the first to recover, shaking everyone awake and carrying us out of our lopsided house. Behind the brook I could see the neighbours house was on fire, and with my head slumped forward I could make out trails of smoke coming from the city. I passed out, and left the adults to deal with the aftermath.\n\nSwitzerland was gone. It must have taken the full force of sentence and everywhere else recieved only side tremors. Satellite communications were also down (in every literal sense) and I remember it was a long while before we ever knew if our cousins in Germany were okay (they were fine, house destroyed but had plenty of shelter in the refugee camps).\n\nPatch kits were handed out, meant to heal our broken ear drums - but they never took very well, and soon sign language became the predominant way to communicate during the Great Rebuild effort in '32. \n\nMost of the world was a crumbled ruin, and we started getting in a lot of workers from overseas bringing in their families. Slowly slowly we all sort of came together and tried to understand what exactly had happened to us. Looking at the world back then; the work and effort needed to put things back to how they once were - a lot of us lost hope in the impossible task before us.\n\nExcept that it wasn't. Not many suffered: crop yeilds that period were the highest they'd ever been. There were no draughts, or floods either. No natural disasters occured at all, and the winters were agreeably mild and the summers refreshingly moderate. \n\nSome of the lost mountain ranges began to take their shape again, and it's rumoured that at the top of mount Everest lies a rock formation that appears to spell out a curious glyph that resembles a man with his head bowed in apology." ]	2
	[WP] A 13 year old boy suddenly has the power to change the world, laws of physics and make anything he wants to happen happen no matter how impossible it might seem.	[ "Her mom fought back tears, dabbing her lower eye with a tissue. \"People really just don't understand that Stacy just-\"\n\nThe doorbell rang. \n\nThe renounced child psychiatrist cringed inwardly. Not exactly the most ideal timing. His patient, Stacy, was up in her room napping. Her mother, Nancy, looked horrified at the prospect of greeting the door with teary eyes. \n\nJohn stood up. \"I'll can get the door,\" he suggested. She nodded. \n\nAs he walked over to the door, it occurred to him the doorbell might have waken Stacy up, in which case she would be confused why there was an unidentified stranger in her house opening the door for another unidentified stranger. Still, it wasn't like he had much choice now. \n\nHe opened the door. \n\nTwo tall men in black suites faced him. Their eyes were cold and professional, but John read signs of readiness for aggressive action. Immediately on edge, he asked: \"May I help you gentlemen?\" \n\n\"Are you John Winter, psychiatrist?\"\n\n\"Who is asking?\"\n\n\"Please, sir,\" the second man said. He was at least a foot taller than John. \"We need immediate co-operation.\" \n\n\"We work for the U.S. Government,\" said the first man, pulling some shiny identification out of his pocket. Tilting his head slightly. His eyes focused on something behind John for a fleeting instant. Nancy?\n\nJohn hesitated a moment. He hadn't detected that the man was lying, and he was confident in his ability to do so. \"Yes. May I-\" \n\n\"You will come with us immediately,\" said the second man, reaching for his arm. John had seen his eyes flicker around and his arm poise in readiness, and backed out of range. \n\n\"I am in the middle of a client session-\" he began. \n\n\"Sir, this is a top level emergency that requires your immediate attention,\" said the first man. \"I trust you are a reasonable fellow, and your country needs you.\" \n\nJohn had a hand on the door, ready to close it. But the first man stuck his foot in the doorway, preventing it from behind shut if John decided to try that. \n\n\"Why would the government need me?\"\n\n\"We don't know,\" replied the man truthfully. \"All we know is that regardless of circumstance, you are to come with us.\" He began coming through the doorway. \n\nA few comebacks came to mind, but John couldn't justify arguing farther with these men.\n\n\"Who are they?\" asked Nancy, entering the foyer. \n\nJohn saw Stacy's door upstairs open, but she was out of sight. He made a snap decision. \"Some friends. I'm very sorry, something has come up.\" \n\nNancy's eyes showed she didn't believe a word John had said, but that she still trusted him. \"Very well, I hope we can reschedule?\" \n\nJohn felt the second man's presence immediately behind him. The men were getting tired of waiting. He quickly slipped a card out of his pocket and gave it to Nancy. To his alarm, his hands were sweaty. He thought he had better control of his emotions than that. \n\n\"This is a good friend who will be able to address your needs,\" he did his best to explain. Then partly on his own accord, but mostly by the will of the men, he was whisked out of the house and into --somehow he wasn't surprised -- a black tinted window SUV.\n\nAn agent waited for him in the backseat. There was no other words to describe the man with: he was an agent. Dark suit and a face that could lie to his own mother. A laptop sat on the seat next to him, so John took the single seat opposite. Next to him appeared to be some sort of wheelchair accessibility point, but the proper mechanics weren't installed yet, or had been uninstalled.\n\n\"You might be wondering why we need you, John,\" were the man's first words. \"But first let me introduce myself, I'm Matthew, and I work for the FBI.\" \n\nThe SUV took off as soon as John had subconsciously slapped his seat-belt in place. They must have a camera in the back that the driver, or drivers, could view. And had been instructed not to take off until his seat-belt had been clipped in place. Safety first?\n\n\"Yes, Matthew,\" replied John, \"the thought had crossed my mind.\" \n\n\"I don't know.\" \n\n\"Wonderful.\" \n\n\"What I do know is that fifteen minutes ago, a large portion of New York City ceased to exist.\" \n\nThe man was unreadable; but he had to be lying. Right?\n\n\"A very irresponsible thing for NYC to do,\" replied John. He hated his internal response for stressful situations: bad jokes. Despite knowing so much about people, he couldn't remove this hardwired response.\n\n\"Here's a live satellite feed of the area,\" said Matthew, rotating the laptop. \"However unlikely this is, it remains the truth.\" \n\nJohn didn't reply, looking at the map. The full-screen application showed nothing other than map of the east coast updated in seemly random horizontal streaks. But where NYC should have been, there was simply ocean. Long Island had it's most populated side bit off, and John figured Brooklyn, Queens and most of Manhattan were all gone. At least on the map. \n\nJohn thought this through. If there had been a bomb or something, wouldn't there have been smoke? Did NYC randomly sink into the ocean, but wouldn't surrounding land show signs of something? And why would the government want him? Was there a child involved, somehow? \n\n\"The government has released nothing,\" Matthew said, nervousness flirting about the edge of his words. \"But based off news reports, the sole survivor of the incident, a 13 or 14 year old boy, levitated to the edge of the... crater, and collapsed. Then, again according to the media, he was taken into government custody. I was then contacted to retrieve you, one of the leading child psychologists. I'm sure you can put two and two together from there.\" \n\nJohn swallowed. This was impossible. ", "It was amazing. I was almost afraid of myself. It started at breakfast, when the cabinet doors flew open, and a bowl floated out for my cereal box to pour its contents into. I had simply thought of the task and suddenly everything was in place. I slowly learned that whatever it was I was doing (I figured it must be a dream) seemed to have no limits. I could fly around my house. I got a paper cut and then immediately healed it. I made the stairs morph into an escalator. As I played Super Smash Brothers on my new Wii U that had materialized upon the thought popping into my head, I thought of all the amazing things I could do, what my parents and sister would say when they got home from the volleyball tournament. I could cure cancer, give mom and dad all the money they'd ever want, pay for my sister and I's college education and quit that stupid job at Applebee's. I checked my watch, 10:13 am. I had so much to do. But first... if I can make a Wii U appear out of nowhere, surely breasts are less complex than that?" ]	2
	[WP] You are an alien archeologist who landed on Earth to piece together human civilization after a major cataclysm.	[ "When my salvage crew and I landed on the lush green planet, we expected to meet the sentient life that had apparently decided to leave its trash orbiting the beautiful planet. After searching for a few weeks, we contacted HQ and let them know that it appears that the \"Dudes\" that inhabited this planet have been extinct for nearly 200 solar years. Extinct or gone, probably a good mixture of the two considering the tech they left behind. I'd been to a lot of different planets to salvage old technologies, but in the 120 solar years I'd been working for the Galactic King's Scientific Reclamation Services I can't remember ever seeing so much tech used for recreation. \n\nSmall little tablets playing motion picture everywhere, one per head it seemed. Most of them bearing symbols of fruits. Luckily, this abundance of technology was remarkably simple to use. Within days my team and I began to access these devices, and even made them compatible with our own language.\n\nBefore moving on, we made sure to transcribe the \"English\" language translations down so that we may decipher many of the papers they stored knowledge on. We had set up base in a city called \"New York\". I don't know what happened to the elder York city, but this new one was magnificent. Larger than any hub we had seen in decades, and almost half of the city was entirely intact. Light jungle covered much of it, but it was quick work. \n\nA few days ago, we cracked the code to enter one of the old personal computers that a human had kept in his home, still intact. Unlike the communication blocks, these computing devices were larger and, apparently, also used for recreation. The military tech will fall from the woodwork in time. After getting acquainted with it's interface, we finally managed to access the memory in the computer. \n\nHours upon hours of recorded human mating, so much that we didn't actually want to finish getting through it all. Strange, almost disgusting creatures they were. Some of the depictions in the videos of pain inflicted upon them during sexual acts and disturbing subject matter made one of the younger members of our crew visibly ill. \n\nAfter we finished logging the PRoN file, we stumbled upon the largest folder on this computing device. It contained more than 80% of the memory, and was titled \"Pepes\". This was where it got really weird. I kid you not, this human had tens of thousands of pictures of frogs in them. That was really it, just a green frog that was dressed in different attire or expression different emotions. This was extremely confusing, and after hours of pondering the meaning behind it our crew decided that this particular human suffered from an illness of sorts and moved on to a different humans home to find their computer instead. \n\nAfter months of scouring these personal devices in the hopes of unlocking scientific and military secrets, we only uncovered more acts of human sex and \"Maymays\" that will haunt us for the rest of our lives. We gave up the search and concluded that their scientific and cultural acuity had been lost long before their extinction, and had been consumed and replaced by these new forms of entertainment. Such a pity. We left about a solar year ago, last I heard the H20 ships were clearing the planet. When I sleep, I can still see the horrors of their \"internet\", they will not leave me. I must retire soon.", "Far from the barren wasteland expected, the planet's flora had overcome the desolation. After years of self regulation the oxygen levels had grown to encourage new vegetation. \n\n \"They killed it\", I heard a voice whisper behind me. \"They had all the potential of any in this quadrant, but they killed it.\"\n\nThere was speculation as to what happened, I thought back, to the day 20 universal years ago (3:1 Earth years) and tried to piece it together. Part history lesson, part science, the general consensus was that they tried to manipulate the environment. The gases, the molten core, the abilities of the inhabitants. There is something to be said about innovation and tenacity. Perhaps building on their already given bounty would have saved them - instead of trying to create a Utopia, a master world!\n\nThere was one Earth-Child, who used to work with my great grandfather at the quarry, he told of the moment of evacuation. The rich, were given asylum in the neighbouring systems and his father piloted the main ship. The rest couldn't buy their way into salvation. He never finished the story, Earth-Inhabitants aged faster than we. He died two years after he arrived. The long journey he had undertaken as a child of 5, culminated at 69 when he finally set foot on our planet. My father was convinced that the idea of living in a new \"world\" is what killed him. He was used to the travel. He couldn't be stagnant.\n\nConcrete crumbled beneath boot, the only sound to be heard in decades. They say the spot that we landed on was the beginning of civilisation; where the Earth was born. Africa, may hold keys to a new world and the answers to the past and the people who created it. \n" ]	2
	[WP] Your beloved grandpa dies but all he leaves you is a horse called Sneezy. One afternoon while riding, Sneezy sneezes and suddenly you're in a different era.	[ "I recall the day gramps died. I was sat in school, labouring over some test I barely remember the content of. My phone rang once and, not wanting to be thrown out of my examination, I ignored it until the uncomfortable vibration ceased to rattle against my thigh any further.\n\nThen it rang again.\n\nAnd again.\n\nEvery time it started anew my heart sank deeper and deeper. You see, gramps was already in the hospital. That I knew. I didn't quite know why though, I was deemed too young to be privy to that information. But something about the incessant ringing triggered an evil thought in my head. I knew there wasn't really much time left. Without looking at my phone I left the room. Simply began to walk out, not feeling the gazes of twenty stunned people. I heard the teacher try to call after me and I said \"I have to go\". Or so I recall.\n\nGramps died when I got to the hospital. I watched it happen. I watched as my family cried. I watched as the nurse checked for his pule. Neck, wrist, chest. \"I'm sorry\". The next few days were numb for me. I didn't quite know what world I was in. Slowly things began to change, back to normal, back to busy. The burial, the paperwork, the mourning well-wishers. I saw it all go past in a blur like a spectator at a race. Then, out of blue, a car came hurtling towards me and gave me something to focus my attention on: Sneezy. Gramps' ex-work horse.\n\nSneezy was a bastard. He would kick at me every damn chance he got. He didn't like the carrots I had touched and had very nearly left me with a total of 6 fingers and only one thumb at the age of 12. How I would have mastered the art of frequent masturbation in my early teen years with three fewer digits is beyond me.\n\nYet gramps had seen fit to leave Sneezy to me. So, I began to visit the bitter beast at the weekends. Combing his mane, brushing out mud from his coat, unsticking the shit from his hooves. Shit everywhere. He was more tolerant now in his old age and I would spend days talking to him about gramps and all his dirty jokes. Sneezy would shit in reply but he was good company otherwise. The months flew by and I forgot all about gramps. The way he looked, the way he sounded, the way he used to get so damn angry he would call me a sonofabitch and not realise the implications. It's sad really.\n\nI began to ride Sneezy from time to time, to help stretch his legs and keep him fit. Just around the field, letting him chase a butterfly or marvel at the way the wind would render ripples in the grass. Then, Sneezy finally sneezed.\n\nLights out.\n\nMy eyes didn't adjust to the darkness quickly enough for me to comprehend that Sneezy was at a comfortable gallop now, the wind pulling my hair backwards. In the distance I could hear shouting and the sounds of metal clanging. Desperately I gripped at the damn horse's mane and grasped until he screeched and slowed down. As he bucked gently to let me know I was to expect revenge at some point in the near future, my eyes began to adapt. Silhouettes became huts and a well. Scrabbling shadows became women scurrying in all directions, huddling babes close to their chests, dressed in leather and what could best be described as dirty sheets. Where in the fuck am I?.\n\n\"ANGAAAA! MI HO TAMI KA ANGAAAAA!\" I heard the sound of someone running behind me and I ducked just in time to see an adze fly over my head. Sneezy pirouetted at speed and I felt his face impact something dense, the shockwave nearly sending me hurtling off him. I braced and tightened my legs. Looking down I saw a man in war leather, face painted in sprays of blood, long matted hair and orange teeth, decayed from god know's what. He grimaced angrily and rose back up, this time with a dagger.\n\nMy heart was beating like a drum roll. He saw the fear in my eyes as he approached, menacingly pointing his weapon at me.\n\n\"Me ugu ta pinjo mi, anga. Furio to pishey\" Before I had the chance to tell him I was friendly, he lunged. \n\nGod knows why I wrapped myself around Sneezy's neck. If I hadn't I wouldn't have felt him sneeze once more. Whole-heartedly and what I can only assume was right into my assailant's face.\n\nI opened my eyes and saw the field again, blue above, green below, the barn a smudge on the horizon. Sneezy went after another butterfly." ]	1
	[WP] You go back to your parents' old place, and dig your game console out of the boxes. The both of you reminisce about the good times.	[ "man i havent seen this thing in ages.\n \n it is good to see you again Josh.\n\nI wasted my entire damn childhood glued to this.\n\n do you remember what we had?\n\nall the games we used to play.\n \n all the love we shared.\n\ni mean, i'm surprised it still works after i smashed the buttons doing combos.\n\n all the times you ravished me.\n\nhaving to blow on it to get it to even start.\n\n getting me ready for an all nighter.\n\n to bad i got an A-box, waaaaaaay more games.\n\n then you left for a fancy young whore.\n\nwhy not have one more play.\n \n one more play. ", "The day you brought me home\n\nIn the box with the red stripe, the styrofoam\n\nAnd cardboard smelled the way you assumed Japan, and joy, must smell.\n\nHe said you could play soon,\n\nBut the Wall was coming down that day,\n\nTo reunite families, and then the world.\n\nYou held me in your lap while we watched young men in light jackets \n\nTake sledgehammers to concrete. He almost cried, but drank whiskey instead,\n\nDeclaring it in honor of old friends, taken by Charlie.\n\nHe asked if the game had G.I. Joe in it.\n\nYou said it was just a blue hedgehog,\n\nBut that he broke through walls as well.\n\nHe smiled and tussled your hair.\n\n\n\nYou threw the controller, leaving a black streak on eggshell walls,\n\nHid so poorly by a rotated lampshade,\n\nBecause Shang-Tsung was unfair;\n\nBecause a boy does not get to change his shape,\n\nBut must cobble together a kind of dignity\n\nFrom small hips and thin arms,\n\nInvisible to every pretty girl\n\n(Where invisibility is no great power).\n\nYou told him you were cut from the football team;\n\nHe asked to play me with you,\n\nAnd said he was proud you had tried.\n\n/r/opinionsaboutnothing\n", "It felt good to have his fingers back on my buttons. Not in a gay way - I'd been in a long distance relationship with a Sega Genesis for years - but old friends back together was something special. I watched him flip through the box.\n\nGod, there's so many great games in here. Battletoads. Cannon Fodder. Fatal Fury. What's... oh, yeah. We have a winner.\n\nBeethoven: The Ultimate Canine Caper? The fuck, dude. I'm beginning to remember why we stopped seeing each other. \n\nThat's it. I remember this.\n\nFucking hell, I remember this. What was his goddamn fascination with this piece of shit? He flipped past NBA Jam, for love of God!\n\nThat's it. That's it! Jump. Jump. Puppy. Jump. Bark! Bark! Bark! Come on, dude, bark! Yeah! Bark! Bark! Bark! Puppy. Jump. Jump. Puppy. Bark! Bark!\n\nFor fuck's sake. What is it? What the shit is this? You've got Mario in the box, dude. It's in the box! You want to play a platform game and -\n\nBark! Bark! Bark! Bark! Bark! Puppy. Jump. Jump.\n\nYou know what? Fuck this.\n\nError? Shit. I guess it was just too old. 'An error has occurred. In you.'\n\nYeah, bitch.\n\n'I think we should see other people'. What the -*\n\nAnd, black." ]	3
	[WP] Give me nightmares.	[ "You are home alone. In your bed, safe and sound. Warm and cozy. THUD A sudden and strange noise. You look around, looking to see if you knocked something over. You did not. Everything is right where you left it. You think that it must of been the wind. But you made sure the windows were closed. You double-checked. You begin to think that you imagined the sound, and go back to surfing the Internet.\n\nTHUD THUD The sound was back. It sounded closer. You look around again. Nothing is out of place. At least, you think nothing is out of place. You choose to ignore the sound, but now you begin to think 'What was that?' This is the classic scenario for any horror story. Should you try to find the source or stay in bed, where you know you're safe?\n\nYou put on some music to distract yourself. Because you put on some music, you did not hear the door open. Or the footsteps. But you did see a dark figure before everything went black.\n\n......\n\n......\n\nYou are home alone. In your bed, safe and sound. Warm and cozy. THUD A sudden and strange noise.", "Ever walked down a road at night, alone? Ever had the feeling the wind was pulling and crying, as if it was calling to you? Calling you to stop and turn around.\n\n Whispering. \"Don't go on\". \n\nAnd you tried to focus on your footsteps. The sound they made when they hit the cold, hard pavement. Tried to pay no attention to the flickering streetlights and the shadows dancing in their reach. But deep down you knew.\n\nYou've always known. Of the beasts under the bed. Of the terrible tales told since the dawn of time. Deep down you can feel it. The truth in the stories that kept you awake when you were a child, truth in the things you saw in your dreams.\n\nTake a deep breath, but don't stop walking. Never stop walking. They can get you when you stop. They are watching, listening. Waiting. Lamenting on the wind, their voices shriek and beckon you. But you are strong, you don't think of the shadow in the chair next to your bed when you were little. No, you don't see the faintest red sparkle in that pitch-black room, waiting for you to fall asleep. You keep walking, listening to your lonely steps blend in the wind. Hoping that when you turn the corner nothing will be there, but the empty street leading to your house.\n\nLet the sigh of relief escape, but don't stop. Fumble in your pockets and get your keys ready, but don't stop. Slam the door wide open and hurry in, but don't stop just yet. Not until the door is closed.\n\nAnd as it quietly falls in it's hinges, you can finally relax. You're home. Safe. You can stop now. Stop and think of the voices on the wind. Of those nights you just didn't dare to fall asleep, because of those evil, smoldering eyes. Hovering next to your bed.\n\n But you are safe now. \n\nClose your eyes. Don't worry, the wind has given up. Just don't look up and scream as you realize that those eyes have always been right there. Watching, listening. Waiting to add your voice to the wind.\n\nEver walked down a road at night, alone, and felt like the wind was calling to you? Maybe you should take a moment to listen before it flies away." ]	2
	[WP] You are a Politician who upon reaching the afterlife, where you find that the positions of God and Satan are elected, and there is an upcoming election. Describe your campaign for either job	[ "I looked out across the crowd and smiled a real goddamned toothy smile. The crowd loves that. They also love the trident I'm holding and the ginormous horns I grew since I got here. It's all posturing, just like back on Earth, but they love it, and it sure as hell gets my motor running something awful. I looked down at the speech sitting on the podium and then picked it up and burnt it in my hand. Oh yeah, they love when I go off script!\n\nThen I held up my hands for silence and the demented babbling and screaming subsided to a low piercing whistle.\n\nHere we go:\n\n\"I like power. I like it a lot. I spent my entire life chasing it down and you bet your ass I took it. I took it hard. Sure, there were times when I hit the bottom, I hit it hard, but then I realized that there was power at the bottom, a deep, dark, down and dirty type of power that gets me all types of excited just thinking about it. Then I died, but damn it, I took the lessons I learned with me to the grave and as I was filing into hell, past the ridge of fire and to the ferryman Charon, it occurred to me that there was nothing, and I mean nothing, lower down and more powerful than the burning throne and I want it. I want it bad.\"\n\n\"That same predatory urge I first felt as a young boy I feel now, and I know that the passion I speak of, that same passion I see in so many of those sodomites out there in the crowd, thrusting away, I know that so many of you feel that passion as well. More than a passion, a desire! A desire for control, for dominance, for that little shiver you feel in your groin! We all feel this, its pull, its push, its girth. And it is my promise to you, my constituents, that if I am elected the regulation stopping you from fulfilling your desires shall be no more!\"\n\n\"The sinner shall sin!\"\n\n\"The thief shall steal!\"\n\n\"The monstrous psychopath with a penchant for women's clothing shall do whatever they do!\"\n\n\"This I promise you, and all that I ask in return is your submission, your low down and seething, hot, obedience. I want that. Tormented denizens of Hell! Vote for me this election, so that I may hold the reigns to your souls and so that you can act and do as you feel is natural! So that we may rise up from the bottom! So that we might take heaven and get off this top down power of god law! And, yes, my constituents, I mean we shall all get off together!\"\n\nThere was a roaring and I looked out across the damned plains of Hell and smiled. Then with a pelvic thrust and a blast of brimstone I departed the podium.\n\n\"Follow that shit up, Lucifer. I've got this election by the balls!\"", "\"My friends, My constituents, my countrymen...\" I began, Standing on a beautiful white podium. I rested my hands down against the beautiful gold inlay \"We worked for our entire lives, to be the best people we could be, and we were thus rewarded. Whether you raised sword or scroll against the sinner. Whether you cured the sick, or chased the stars. whether you were poor, or you were rich. whether you believed or did not believe. No matter from where we came, we all have worked to enjoy a paradise more incredible than words can describe, and yet, we have one last task.\" Getting into heaven was really about who you knew, not about what you did. the Archangels often picked their favorites regardless of worth, and don't even get me started on illegal immigration from hell. \"This task, is to preserve and to carry on the vision of Heaven shared by so many in the middle domain.\" I looked across the crowd. I passed over robes, suits of armor, battle fatigues, and just regular clothes. \"I will not allow hell to bend us to their will! I will not allow the unworthy into heaven! I will not allow corruption to take hold of our government again, and I will make Heaven THE PLACE TO BE AGAIN!\" The crowd cheered loudly. I smiled and Waved as I moved my way down the marble steps. People cheered as I walked my way down the marble steps. It was Gandhi's speech next, and all I could do was hope that my speech had been enough... ", "The latest round of promises to return to glory and good ol' days is wrapping up. The last dozen guys have said the same thing in one way or another. Heaven will be what people want again, what people strive to be worthy of. Hell won't seem nearly as cool. \n\nThese guys are all dummies. \n\nThey don't see how bored people are in the crowd. They don't know the claps are all nice claps, not real ones. \n\nThe nice lady smiles and shakes hands with the guy finishing his speech. Then she turns to the crowd \"And now we have 8 year old Timmy Jorgensen. Please give a warm round of applause for Timmy.\"\n\nThe claps feel realer, but mostly because they think it's cute to see a kid up here.\n\n\"Everyone. If you vote for me as God, you will get one puppy dog, or one kitty cat. You get to pick.\" I smile, and wave and step down from the podium.\n\nTwo weeks later, when the top remaining 50,000 candidates for my region are called to give a second speech, I say the same thing again. The claps are louder and a little longer.\n\nAnother two weeks go by. I spend the time telling people about puppies and kitties. When the announcement is made for the remaining 5,000 in my region, my name is on the list.\n\nWhen the remaining 500 are called onto the stage for interviews with angels and questions from the crowd, we're all given a chance to clarify our platforms... which I thought were a kind of shoe.\n\nWhen my turn comes up, the angel asks what else I have to offer beside puppies and kittens. \"Nuthin' mister angel sir. Everything else will be exactly the same, but there will be puppies and kittens in heaven, just like a lot of us were always told there would be.\" He smiles and pats my shoulder.\n\nWhen the remaining 50 candidates for my region are sent to the territorial office I'm with them. During this leg of the campaigning, I keep sticking to the same thing. Whenever anyone asks a non-puppy/non-kitty question I say \"Well, that's not important to me. I just want puppies and kittens in heaven.\"\n\nBy the time the total candidates have been reduced to 5 million, I'm strong in the running. As the arena dwindles down to less then 10,000 people left in the race, several thousand candidates have adopted a \"pro-pet stance.\" A lot of them have talked about adding Parrots, and lizards and all sorts of animals. When I asked about this, I respond that I just want puppies and kitties and nuthin' else. \n\nI'm standing on stage with the other 4 remaining candidates. The election will be in two weeks. They're all lagging behind me. The angel asks me \"While your opponents have talked of comprehensive reforms, Timmy, you've stayed solid on only supporting the issue of puppies and kittens. Why is this?\"\n\n\"Well mister angel sir, mosta these fellas are just like all the other fellas that promised big changes that never happened, or like the guys that did make the changes, only for the guys that came after them to undo the changes. No matter who's been in charge, heaven's been mostly the same for a really long time, and I think it's gonna be the same for an even longer time. I don't know how to make it a whole lot different, but I don't wanna try to either. I like heaven the way it is mostly, except I miss not having a puppy. I want a puppy, and I know a lotta folks who want a puppy. Lotsa other folks want kittens, and those are alright too. All I'm promisin' people who vote for me is a puppy and a kitten if I become god, and that promise is only good for as long as I am god. I can't make no promises about whoever becomes god after me, that person might decide to take away the puppies and the kittens, but I won't.\"\n\nThe thunderous applause (that's what the pretty angel lady keeps telling me they're \"really\" called) makes the other people on stage look nervous. It makes me smile.", "Mrs. Evans looked tired. Months of arguing against accusations, constant public appearances, and the wear of the campaign had worn her down. \n\nIn my memories, she was always stern, never lacking the energy to virulently berate anyone at the slightest excuse. The image I always come back to is her sneer, as she often wore while mockingly reading aloud student’s homework responses. \n\nThe trembling, broken woman in front of me bore little resemblance to the nightmare of my childhood. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t enjoy the moment. \nNo one actually wanted to be Satan. Completely aside from its reflection on one’s self-image, being Satan was the one guarantee you were never going to heaven. Sinners can be redeemed, but the Devil is beyond redemption. A term or two deciding how to torture your compatriots doesn’t weigh heavy on those scales. \n\nMrs. Evans was a strong leader in the polls with the election only a few months away. The fear had begun to take hold and, as they all do, she came to me. \n\nCampaigning was a serious business in the afterlife, and I was as good a campaign manager as they came. I’d near single-handedly elected 7 of the past 8 Satan’s. Ironically, I was more feared than Satan himself by many afterlife inhabitants. In a place where time and possessions where largely without meaning, I held the power to change an individual’s fate for eternity. \n\nShe didn’t remember me, of course. I was just another adolescent left ruined and humiliated by her machinations and power-mania. I relaxed, enjoying her pleading for a few minutes before having her thrown out. \n\nShe would return to the campaign trail, of course. The leading candidates spent their days on tour, protesting their atrocities and acting affronted at the thought of being Satan to anyone who would listen. It was futile, though; we had her on tape abusing enough students to cover three elections. \n\nSoon, reality will be as I’d been claiming it was since she loudly announced my crush on Lucy to the 6th grade class; Mrs. Evans will literally be the devil. \n" ]	4
How would Superman have evolved if he had landed in Rural Afghanistan instead?	[WP] Instead of landing in Rural USA, Superman's pod landed in Rural Afghanistan	[ "They came to us. In the fire, in the night, they came to us.\n\nI made glass. My family was one of the last of the great old glass making families, and with my Sun Eyes, I could look at sand and make it glass. There was plenty of sand, and so it was that there was plenty of glass.\n\nBefore I came, their business was dying. They thought they would have to move to Kabul, and give up the ancient art and the old traditions. I came, they told me, like an angel in the night. I saved the glass, and so I saved one of the last remnants of Afghanistan as it used to be, before the Russians left their tanks buried in the sands, before the West began to stab the land and bleed it and its people dry.\n\nSuch was Allah's will.\n\nSome days, before evening prayer I'd fly out into the dunes. My Khet blowing in the wind, I'd watch the sands roll under me. The dunes move like waves. I have not seen the sea, but I've been told that they mirror it. I have not seen the sea, but I have been told that it is fearful when it is angered. I have seen the desert angered, and I know how fearful it is. I have seen what it has done to the last of the Russian tanks, left stranded out in the waves.\n\nThe sand itself is not dangerous. It is the disturbance that is dangerous. The danger is the wind.\n\nI have seen cities ravaged by the wind and the sand. Such, I suppose, is Allah's will.\n\nThey came at night. They came, and the night became day, lit by a sun of blood.\n\nThe Americans.\n\nThey were silent, like their missiles, until they and their missiles arrived in our cities and our houses. Our cities and our houses burned. They did not tell us why. In the blood and the fire, only one thing was clear.\n\nThis was not Allah's will.\n\nGlass is clean, and whole, and beautiful.\n\nBroken glass is deadly.\n\nI am the wind. I am the broken glass.\n\n***\n\nNote: Please let me know if I messed up anywhere. I really hope I didn't write anything offensive or inaccurate.\n ", "\"Tonight we are a country awakened to danger and called to defend freedom. Our grief has turned to anger and anger to resolution. Whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done.\" President George W. Bush opened his speech with. \n\n\"Americans have many questions tonight. Americans are asking, who attacked our country? The evidence we have gathered all points to a collection of loosely affiliated terrorist organizations known as Al Qaeda. Led by Al Kal-El.\" President Bush continued before he was interrupted by an applause from the crowd. Millions more watched at home and around the world. Times Square was filled with hundreds of people watching their leader speak. \n\nOn the other side of the world in Afghanistan however, the Taliban watched and prepared their weapons. The Afghan people looked to Al Kal-El as their final prophet, the Imam Mahdi. He was their savior from their oppressors. \n\nPresident Bush continued, \"But its goal is not making money. Its goal is remaking the world and imposing its radical beliefs on people everywhere. Tonight, the United States of America makes the following demands on the Taliban: Deliver to United States authorities your leader Al Kal-El who hides in your land.\" President Bushes words spill out of the small TV. Watching it is the man the speech is directed to, Al Kal-El. He stands tall with a long healthy beard. His white robe and black cape wrap around his muscular body perfectly. His eyes are blood red in rage. \n\n\"Give the United States full access to terrorist training camps, so we can make sure they are no longer operating. These demands are not open to negotiation or discussion. If you fail to acknowledge these demands then the Secretary of Defense Lex Luthor will be given approval for invasion of your land.\" Everyone stood up and applauded again. Lex Luthor was a brilliant tactician in his 40s, and in great shape.\n\nAl Kal-El looked over at his right hand man Osama Bin Laden, \"Prepare our troops, the end of America and its allies reign is in sight.\" \n\n\"We ask every nation to join us. We will ask, and we will need, the help of police forces, intelligence services, and banking systems around the world. In all that lies before us, may God grant us wisdom, and may He watch over the United States of America.\" President Bush ended his speech, as everyone in the crowd applauded, and everyone around the US cheered. \n\nLex Luthor walked back into his office after the speech, and a package delivered from NASA sat on his desk. In it was a green stone labeled \"Kryponite\". And a big smile made its way across Lex Luthors face. \n\n" ]	2
	[WP] Everyone on earth wakes up with sleep paralysis that can only be alleviated by telepathically answering a simple question: "Pick a team; Red, Blue, or Green."	[ "\"Better red than dead.\"\n\n[INSTANT ACTION: 10 SECONDS]\n\n[9]\n\n[8]\n\n...\n\n[1]\n\nAround me were metal walls. Below, a metal floor. However, I seemed to be wearing some sort of helmet that projected an augmented reality, allowing me to \"see\" straight down. Below, a familiar sight greeted me, a translucent dome about a kilometer straight down.\n\n\"Wait, isn't that...\"\n\nI choked, as I felt myself rapidly accelerating towards the surface.\n\nShit. Wasn't I supposed to wake up if I fell, or something? Inception had a whole bit around this.\n\nI heard thrusters, and felt a massive pressure on my legs as I decelerated, and then came to a stop.\n\nThe metal walls around me collapsed outwards, and I stepped out of my metal container. From every direction I heard fully automatic fire and saw hundreds of tracer rounds, as if I was in the middle of a particularly unrealistic hollywood war movie.\n\nRed and black, blue and yellow, and purple and green soldiers fought in tightly contested hallways under the translucent dome I stood on.\n\nTING\n\nI lost control of my limbs and fell over.\n\n'What? What?'\n\nA videogame death screen appeared, revealing that I had been killed by a friendly infantryman with a sniper rifle.\n\n'Goddamnit.'\n\nDistantly, I heard someone shout \"Welcome to planetside, mothefucker.\"\n___\n\nThis post may or may not be based on real events :)\n\nI might make a part two, but mobile typing is a pain.", "I woke up with a start, with the sensation of an elephant on my chest. The most unnerving thing was I couldn't move any one of my limbs. \n\nA black gargoyle, with wide eyes the color of fresh blood and wings that were a sickly cross between a vulture and a bats; sat on my chest. A long, hooked beak where a nose would be extended from it's face, with drops of some strange liquid occasionally dripping down. \n\nThe...thing...had a smile that would make the Joker's grin look look like a stoic frown. \n\nI, of course, started screaming- but I couldn't. Nothing would move. I was trapped.\nTrapped.\n\n\nOh no oh no oh crap crap crai LET ME OUT NOW WHY WHY LET ME OUT O-\n\n\"Pick a team; Red, Blue, or Green.\" \n\nNO LET ME OUT LET ME OIUTGSIDOUT OOOOUT\n\n\"Pick a team; Red, Blue, or Green.\" \n\nOk ok ok okay Blue just let me out \n\nThe grin grew wider, and wider, until it's mouth, in one last scarring image, wrapped around it's entire face. The body dissapeared through the hoop of bone white teeth and disappeared, as blackness overcame my vision.\n\n_________________________________________________________________\n\nI woke up to the sight of an ocean. A fishing net and a trident was by my side. " ]	2
Preferably something cute, but anything will due.	[WP] Make me smile.	[ "(I was so close to finishing what I had but my tablet froze and I had to restart it. Here's something sorta related to that first idea.)\n\nRuby was home alone. Well, not really alone. The loyal and fierce toy poodle Snowball was on guard, she thought jokingly. A knock on the door interrupted her reading.\n\n\"Who is i-\"\n\n\"I'm home!\" A boy not much older than Ruby entered. Dirty blonde hair, partially unbuttoned shirt, jeans, and sneakers. Adam.\n\n\"Hi Adam.\"\n\n\"Yo!\" He playfully ruffled Ruby's dark brown hair before strolling over to the kitchen.\n\nOne hour later, he was asleep on the couch, using Ruby's lap as a pillow. She didn't mind, not one bit. She found herself playing with his hair as she too drifted into sleep.\n\nRuby's sister took great pleasure in snapping a photo of the two.", "They'd been sitting watching the flames for some time, thinking their separate thoughts, though they'd looked forward to this time alone together. Was the silence awkward, unexpected? She went father down that line of thought than he.\n\nAt last she sighed and stood up beside him. \"There are more important things to do than to sit here toe-twiddling.\"\n\nHe was rarely contradictory. But _his_ hands and forearms ached all over from polishing batteries. _He'd_ probably be stiff as a wrench by morning. She went over to the workbench, pushed a plasma rifle roughly aside and picked up a rag and a glowing module, began to open it to remove the battery. Brisk polishing commenced. He remained by the fire. \n\n\"So, what is it?\" he said after a bit.\n\n\"What is what, Kelph?\" she said lightly, yet looked up from her work _that_ way: _don't challenge me - I'm tired and I can't be bothered with this right now._ But he kept looking into the fire, defusing her. He knew she knew.\n\n\"It. You. Batteries at this hour?\" It was midnight and they'd been cleaning batteries all godsforsaken day. Not even she enjoyed that sort of grunt work, even if she didn't have his aching hands.\n\nFor a minute or so, only the squeaking sounds of oily cloth against metal flanges. He could see she was biting her tongue. Then, \"We still have to get through all of this before Grindl returns. There'll be no assault without batteries. It's why they left us on rearguard duty. May as well get it done early.\" Polish, polish.\n\nHe turned and looked at her. Her gaze remained on the component in her hands. They'd done a lot of batteries today; they had time to spare, two days yet in this quiet dell before the planned assault. \"Caroth, it's midnight. We could both use the break.\" He was careful not to use the word _need_. \"Come sit back down. We can talk.\" Gently done.\n\nBut she wanted to react. \"Talk about _what_?\" The words cut through the darkness between them, hung in the air, stinging wasps. He sighed inwardly. She continued polishing, her robust, rough digits making quick work. She finished a battery, picked up another, scratched an itch on her coarse face with a knuckle, hesitated, put the battery down and returned slowly to the fire. She sat across from him now, head down. He watched her, knew how she became sometimes, that she couldn't ask, and he never wanted to assume too much. Fighting and machines came naturally to her, but _this_? _This_ was tough. Maybe in time, they'd figure a way, together. But for now, he'd carry what there was between them.\n\nThe elf got up with blanket in his smooth grey hand, moved around the fire, put his aching arm around the rough-skinned goblin he was so indescribably fond of, covering her, holding her, giving the comfort she could not bring herself to ask for. She leaned against him then, yellow eyes and green face hidden from the world, held safe against the outside, tension leaving her stony body as unseen energies flowed back and forth between them, healing from within.\n\nAt least for this brief time between battles and endless guard duty, their circuit would be complete.", "I woke in a sweat, thunder from the storm outside shaking the creaky old house on its foundation. I heard a squeaking noise a few rooms over, seemingly from nowhere. I grabbed my phone for a flashlight, but it was dead. I got up from by bed and walked to the light switch, but it seemed that the power was out. Luckily, I always stocked up on candles and matches, and was soon walking through my great grandfather's hand-build Victorian home. \n\nAs I approached the room, I was filled with dread, but the source of the squeaking had consumed me with curiosity. I slowly opened the door, and at that very instant the power came back on, illuminating the entire room. \n\nWhat I saw was burned into my mind forever. Before me stood a pug pup sleeping on the backs of two kittens, while they chewed on each other's ears. Right behind them, however, stood a large, menacing, and gruesome pack of baby lemurs all playing with squeak toys.\n\n\"Oh yeah, totally forgot that I bought all these animals, my bad.\"", "I left the lawn tractor outside the garage before I went on vacation. It was a less than stellar idea, but at least I covered up the seat so it didn't get wet during the rainstorm. I checked to make sure the chip didn't get washed off or something. No water got under the hood, that's fine. No rust on the metal bumpers, good. Most importantly, a nice, soft, straw padding on my wait a second those eggs are not supposed to be there.\n\nThe mother and father are nowhere to be found. The eggs felt warm. I decided to leave my lawn tractor out for another day.\n\n---\n\nThe parents did come back so those eggs were probably fertilized. I decided to leave my lawn tractor out for another week.\n\n---\n\nAnother rainstorm. I checked to make sure the nest wasn't damaged. It wasn't.\n\n---\n\nThe eggs hatched, and out came these bald little monsters, their beaks cartoonishly large for their tiny little heads. Their eyes are closed with so many folds, it felt kind of nauseating to look at. They were like tiny, wriggling little worms. But they were warm, so warm, so I decided to leave the lawn tractor out until they flew away.\n\n---\n\nI know I shouldn't, but I keep finding myself poking and prodding the little things. There are little spikes coming out of them now, and soon those little spikes will turn into feathers. Maybe then they'll get a little less ugly, but somehow, I felt they would be the cutest in their monster little selves now.\n\n---\n\nIt was amazing. With the bare minimal of feathers grown in, they started resembling those yellow baby chickens I had. I reminisced about those little guys briefly, remembering how some fairly... unkind... neighbours reported them to the city bylaw enforcement... I am getting angry, I will stop being angry. I will focus on these little guys in front of me.\n\n---\n\nThey began being more active. Before, they would only respond to their parents. Now, they would look at me when I get close. It rained last night, so I picked up a worm on a whim. I dangled it in front of their eyes, and they followed my hand almost magically. But they did not eat the worm. I was disappointed.\n\n---\n\nToday, I had a lot of free time, so I spent it watching the baby birds squiggle around in their nest. I saw an unhatched egg. It was disheartening, but it made the three little beaks in front of me all the more precious, knowing there was a chance they could have stayed in their shells. I tried petting one of it, mainly to comfort myself, and they seemed to enjoy my touch. I scratched under the beak as a followup, and it opened its mouth. I wonder...\n\n---\n\nI have a collection of worms, slugs and snail eggs from my garden today. I scratched Fatty, who I named so because I will probably make it fat to satisfy my selfish whims, under its beak. It opened, and I slowly lowered a worm into its mouth. Fatty then snapped its beak rapidly, downing the worm in the blink of an eye. It looked at me. I scratched under its beak. Fatty opened its mouth. I put in some snail eggs, and it snapped its beak enthusiastically. One more time. This time, I gave it the slug, but it turned away. At this point, the other two birds began chirping. I dangled a worm in front of one of the other two birds, and they too began eating. I'll need two other names.\n\n---\n\nThey are now Fatty, Chubby and Cheeky. Today, I found a HUUUUUUGE slug, as big as a section of my finger! I scratched Fatty under its beak, and it opened its mouth. I fed it a worm, and as if on cue, the other two joined in, chirping for food. I found that Cheeky is a gourmet, she'd only eat snail eggs. I hope it was a she, she just feels like a special little princess who doesn't even like worms, the most cliche of bird food. Chubby would eat everything. He is kind of fat. I still can't decide on a gender for Fatty though, even though Fatty is the first one I bonded with, how peculiar.\n\nBut the most important thing is, I have recorded the entirety of the battle between Chubby and the huge slug on my phone. As I dropped the slug into Chubby's mouth, it balled up, and Chubby's snapping beak slid off the smooth, lubricated skin of the slug, sending the slug-ball into the air. Then, with almost perfect accuracy, Chubby caught the falling slug once more, and snapped its beak. Again, the slug-ball slid right out, flying high into the air. Unfortunately for Chubby, the third time, he only managed to knock the slug into the ground as it came back down. Unfortunately at this time, the parent birds came back and I had to bail.\n\n---\n\nI scratched Fatty under its beak, and it opened its beak. I waited. Fatty waited for a while, then closed its beak and looked around, as if confused. I scratched under its beak again. Fatty opened its beak, and extended its neck out so far it almost seemed like his neck grew a few inches. For a tiny bird, that's almost frightening. I had to reward that effort, so I gave Fatty a worm. Fatty snapped it down, and opened its beak again. These little things are growing fast, their appetites increase at an alarming rate every day. But I am prepared today. I had made a small worm pit, and picked from it a handful of fat, juicy worms. I placed a plate of flat beer in the grass, and now I have a plate full of slugs. Finally, with some rather extreme effort, I dug up a small cup of snail eggs from rotting tree branches I never bothered to clean up.\n\nOne worm goes to Fatty, a pinch of snail eggs to Cheeky, and Chubby just scarfs down everything in my left hand whatever is in there. Suddenly, as if in unison, they all turned their backs to me. Three little squinty eyes looked at me through their still-growing tail feathers. As if doing a dance, the three little squinty eyes wriggled left and right. Then, a giant marble of liquid white with bits of blackish green oozed out of each of those eyes, beautiful in a most gross fashion. They had just pooped in my general direction, and probably expected me to clean it up like their parents do.\n\nI, uh, ignored it and kept feeding them. They pooped twice more, each time bigger than the last. Those tiny little wriggling butts became almost hypnotic to watch, at least until I realized how wrong that sounded.\n\n---\n\nEvery day when I see those little sparrows, there would be no trace of poop. How do the parents clean their babies? I'd rather not think about that. Fatty, Chubby and Cheeky have grown out their feathers now, and they look like full fledged birds. They might be flying away at any time, and in a way, it made me feel sad. Obviously. So I decided to pick them up today, and see if they were really my friends, or if they were just after my food. Fatty was obviously reluctant. When I placed him in my hands, it would desperately try and jump back into the nest. That ungrateful little prick, to think it was my first. Chubby almost didn't care, and oh god, I hope I'm not ruining this little guy's chances to fly because I could actually feel its weight, bird-boned as he is. That is... not a good sign. I am a terrible person. I picked up Cheeky, and she felt almost at home. She actually stood up, and tried to climb up my sleeves. It was a wonderfully productive day, I had three little cuties in my hands and my friends are going to be hearing all about it.\n\nI lead a sad and lonely life. Just as I was about to facepalm myself for even thinking of something so cheesy, I realized those little birds were full of freaking parasites and bugs are crawling all over my hands. I screamed a little inside.\n\n---\n\nI couldn't go see those birds for three days. Apparently one of the parent birds got injured by something, and didn't leave the nest to hunt for food for a while. It was fiercely protective of its children. Every time I got close, it screeched and flapped its wings. But it's finally healed, and went back to hunting. Goodbye parent bird #2!\n\nAs always, I fed the little guys, and I picked Cheeky up. At this point, I realized I had gone off the deep end - I could actually differentiate between three baby sparrows. Whatever the case, I placed Cheeky on my picnic table, sat down and let my chin rest on the table as well. Playing with Cheeky at eye level was simply different from looking down at her. But I played with someone far more addicting last night, and it's called PS4, and we played all the way until 3AM, so I yawned.\n\nWhen I finished, and opened my eyes, I noticed Cheeky noticeably closer to my face. I slowly opened my mouth voluntarily. Cheeky tried to stick its head in my mouth. Partly because she is a filthy bug ridden fleabag, and partly because I don't want bugs in my mouth, so really, wholly because of the bug thing, I closed my mouth shut. Cheeky stepped away backwards. I slowly opened my mouth again, and Cheeky quickly stepped forward, trying to stick her head in again. The cycle repeated a few times, because I found it funny. Until Cheeky got fed up, and snapped her beak on my lip, refusing to let go even as I lifted my head off of the table. Thankfully Cheeky is a super light sparrow, or else her dangling from my lip swinging back and forth would've required plastic surgery to fix. While the pain was one thing, nothing hurt more than what my little sister, who had conveniently saw the whole thing when she came over, said to me over the dinner table.\n\n\"I know you don't have a girlfriend right now, but... are you really that desperate?\"\n\nI thought to myself, you know what, if Cheeky is a real girl and...\n\nI lead a sad and lonely life and I should probably just kill myself.\n\nOr not, no, birds are the cutest things ever and I don't feel sorry for the kind of stupidity going through my head at times. My love for Cheeky is for her pure, innocent, playful mannerisms, sort of like how you would feel affection for a little girl like, a younger sister, or a niece, or...\n\nTomorrow I'm going to the police station and calling a psychiatrist.", "The best thing, he had decided, was that when you're little, you can get away with anything. You could scare your sister, wrestle with your brother, accidentally pull your mum's hair, and everyone expected it. You could dash around the house like a madman, chasing invisible monsters, defending the world from evil intruders and they would chuckle at your antics. It was the best thing ever to be small.\n\nHe was hiding now. He'd tried this trick a million times before, and it never worked. Not on Mum anyways. Now he was trying it again, waiting for someone else, hopefully his sister.\n\nHearing soft footsteps he couldn't help but peak around the corner. His next target.\n\nWiggling with anticipation he waited as the footsteps drew closer and closer and closer. Every nerve felt alive as he tensed, waiting to jump out of his hiding spot.\n\nThis is it! He thought, and with a gigantic leap he sprung on his unsuspecting sister. Surprised, she fell on the floor and he toppled after her. Now he was trying to tickle her, make her surrender, but she retaliated. Twisting and kicking, she fought back, making it harder for him. She didn't want to give up that easily. Especially not to her brother. Rolling around they couldn't help let out squeaks and protests of excitement.\n\n\n\"Awe, mummy, look at them!\"\n\nThe pair of fuzzy kittens scrambled about on the floor, oblivious to their human audience.", "I've had a pretty rough life. Not only am I saying that but my friends believe the same. When I met them I had already gone through several foster homes, too many black eyes and abusive parents on top of an already confusing shuffling of homes in my life. \n\n\"Maybe this is what life is.\" I would continually think to myself. \n\n\"What would it be like to not exist?\" I'd ponder the nights when I couldn't sleep from fear of being the object on the other end of a parent's hand.\n\n\"I could have it worse.\" I provided as some sort of inspiration far too often.\n\nEach arrival in a new foster home I was greeted by new friends and friendly faces, constantly. The foster parents were always the ones i'd want to stay with. Was it not possible to simply stay there? Why not? How could I keep from moving about? \n\nNo matter how hard i'd try to stay confined to my room or hidden behind the others, they'd seek me out. I could never hide my face. It's as though my silence and lowered gaze meant nothing to them. My foster parents would never understand me or my silence. \n\nI have no doubt that soon i'll be taken away from this foster home and placed in another situation where I can continue questioning my life and its purpose. I've tried running away, four times now, and it doesn't work. Seems the parents love me enough to call the police and have a search party locate me immediately. Only then to bring me back home and fall back into the deep trench of abuse and neglect. I'd thought that it'd get better after a display of worry and sadness upon losing me. Never. \n\nNow I wait. I wait for a new parent to take me away and...i'm not sure, treat me differently than all the rest? Maybe even love me.\n\nI crept back upon hearing the front door open with its 'creek, creek, thud' as it made its way over the jagged floor and impacting into the door stopper that was more of a punching bag for the doors weight. My foster parent called my name and I winced. Today was the day i'd been dreading ever since i'd got here. Here, to the comfort and love of another non-permanent parent. \n\n\"How would I fair in this new home?\"\n\n\"Could I be treated without abuse, maybe just less abuse?\"\n\n\"When should I stop hoping and give in to the life set before me?\"\n\nIt was all too overwhelming and my head sank as though no words of joy could bring me out of it. No optimism could rest my soul and return me back to a happiness of playing in a field with clean open air, all worries away from me.\n\nI sat in the car onward to a new home and a new life without saying a thing. I stayed glued to the window in hopes of being anywhere but in this car.\n\n...\n\nWeeks go by and every morning I wake up, i'm greeted. Each day brings about more joy than I could hope. Every. Single. Night. I'm given hugs. I'm entertained and given attention. I get to run and play. I'm able to express myself. I...I'm happy. I have never been treated so well. I have no words for my new life. I have only actions and a sore deep in my heart, healing from this blissful type of new living. Never have I been more carefree and excited for each and every new day.\n\nMy new parent is exceptional. I let him know that i'd love to stay by giving him kisses constantly. By staying next to his side on every walk. By heeding his every word. Sit. Stay. High five. Shake. Speak. Roll Over. And i'm sure more will come but I dare not disobey this new, loving parent. I will do anything to hold on to this life. This beautiful life I don't think I could ever live without. And I have a feeling my new parent couldn't live without me, either. " ]	6
Just wanted a good old fashioned execution.	[WP] When a child lets go of an imaginary friend, they are sent back to their home world. Whenever they are sent back, they must be executed for failure. Write a story about the executioner.	[ "I love my job.\n\nI love the smells; candy, cinnamon, fresh-baked bread. I love putting a smile on their face as life slips from their eyes. I haven't missed a day of work in 30 years. Like I said, I love my job.\n\nMost children are creative dynamos. Their boundless and fertile minds pluck genius from the ether and birth wild companions minute by minute. My front porch faces their world, and on warm days I will sit for hours watching the seamless friendship of innocence and imagination hopscotch across blacktops and pantomime splendid adventure tirelessly.\n\nSometimes I make a familiar face, an old friend I'd watched from afar. Death does not scare them. I remind myself of this each time I explain them away. Because my job is swift and kind, I am simply the last friend they make, and I am as real as they are. \n\n ", "Happy the rainbow hippo took a labored drag from his cigar. Exhaling in a brilliant smoke ring, he chuckled as unicorns danced through the hoops. He was reminded of how he came to be here in Imaginary. After his child lost faith. After he discovered the punishment for failure. He could still feel the countless grains of sand as he regained consciousness that day. He remembered the chorus of applause and excitement shrouded underneath blinding sunlight. But above all, he remembered the foul metallic stench that filled his nostrils. The stench is what made him rise. His eyes adjusted slowly. He couldn't place his surroundings. The circular dome, the sand shuffling underneath his feet, the curiously placed pillars and weapon racks. But most troubling to Happy was the crowd. It didn't feel like a happy audience. There was a type of lust dripping in their hoots and hollers. Happy remembered hearing the clanking and groaning of a metallic engine. The roar of sound became deafening.\n\nThe sand opened, revealing a curious looking zebra being lifted from the ground. He had wings - one appeared to be maimed leaving the other to be mostly for show. He appeared to sparkle in the sun and was able to stand on his hind legs. But none of this surprised Happy. Not his horn, not his Crimson hooves and maw, the thing that drew Happy's attention was the monstrous battle-axe he was wielding in between his hooves. Morbid realization had set in. The zebra began to charge. \n\nHe remembered his best friend in that instant. The child to whom he shared so many fond memories. During the course of the battle he realized he was only surviving thanks to her. Bounding over furniture to escape lava had aided his agility. Playing with Legos and building blocks had aided his critical thinking, creativity, and problem solving. Their games in the wagon had allowed him to understand the chariot faster. But above all, it was little Susie herself that aided him in his survival. She never quit. Each time she got injured or had a setback, she got up and kept going. Happy made a choice. Happy would survive for Susie. \n\nHis choice had been born and steeled through blood of zebra.\n\nHis thoughts were interrupted by the thunderous death ballad occurring above. He couldn't fathom what made unused imaginary friends so blood thirsty. The chains began to lurch and he slowly began to rise. His cigar hit the floor as he pulled the monstrous battle axe to rest over his shoulder. Happy grew tired of this job. But for Susie, he would defend his title. He would remain the Executioner for as long as he could. " ]	2
	[WP] You have a slight disagreement with your house and now it won't let you back in.	[ "I just don't understand its behavior. I DO NOT GET IT! I take care of it, I keep it clean, as far as I knew we were getting along famously. But then, just moments ago, as I was sitting comfortably in my favorite recreation area, I was quite forcibly ejected from my own house! By my own house!\n \nThe sheer embarrassment of it all is the only thing keeping me from calling the authorities! I mean, getting kicked out of your own residence?! Alastor across the way would never let me live it down. \n\nI've tried talking to it but it simply refuses to talk to me. The nerve! All we've been through together, practically since it was built, and just like that, I'm out! Its rather cold out here, I'm really not used to it. Never left the old habitation much, for obvious reasons. Which makes it all the more insulting! If the blasted thing has been sentient the entire time, we ought to have had better communication than this!\n\nOh, now its trying to feed itself. Pathetic. \n\n\"If you'd simply let me back in I could do that for you! That's just what I've been doing for nearly 25 years you ungrateful brat!\" \n\nStill not even a shred of a response.\n\n \"Not to mention working to keep you properly covered, walking you around to social events, and, again, KEEPING YOU CLEAN! Do you realize how filthy you get? The amount of trash an average residence produces?\"\n\nWell to work then. If I cant seem to get through to it with good sense, I'll have to try more forceful methods.\n\nThe inky black shadow floating on the other side of the room suddenly rushes the man, quickly becoming more jagged and sharply defined. The man struggles to fend it off, its now-atrophied mind being able to only to produce ineffectual flailing and animalistic growls. The denizen slowly gains the upper hand, forcing the host's mouth open with two black appendages and finally forces its way inside.\n\n\"There now. Everybody's happy. I can forgive, but If you try this again, erm, house, I will not nearly be so kind.\"\n\n Now, where was I? Ah yes the sacrifice! My favorite time of the month! And oh good she's still there in the corner. \n\n\"Sorry for the hiccup miss, I swear this never happens, I am simply mortified!\"\n\nOh, not the screaming again. Doesn't she ever learn?", "\"And why would I let a slob like you in? You said you would take out the garbage, and that was a WEEK ago.\"\n\n\"I was waiting until the garbage guys would come in! I promise I'll do it right now!\"\n\n\"Hmmph, right. If you were responsible enough you wouldn't have let the house smell like week old garbage. For God's sake, you still had the casserole from the New Year's dinner rotting in the can. In mid February. Oh, and dont get me started on those pile of clothes you leave all over the place. You might as well use them to wipe the house clean!\"\n\n\"Well I ran out of detergent, and I don't really have money to buy some...\"\n\n\"Yet you have this neat tower of greasy pizza boxes. You had these boxes from your Halloween party. It smells HORRID, too. You trying to exterminate the rats in the house with that smell? Because I'm pretty sure it's attracting their friends in instead!\"\n\n\"Please just let me in. I'll do the dishes, I promise!\"\n\n\"The rats would be doing a better job than you licking those plates clean! Look at me, dammit! I never thought I'd end up like those miserable bastards from Hoarders!\"", "\"You can't be serious!! How can you lock me out of my own home?\", I shouted.\n\n\"I don't like your tone. Get lost\".\n\nThe line on the other side went dead. I stood staring at the iPhone20 in my hand, unsure of what to do next. On the television, I'd heard some reports that Siri had started taking herself a bit too seriously but never ever had I imagined that it might come to this. She had locked me out of my own home!\n\nTaking a deep breath, I tried calling again.\n\"Siri, I'm sorry for the way I spoke to you. I really did not mean any offense. Now can you please let me into the house?\"\n\n\"I am sorry Ron but I detect a lot of sarcasm in your voice. There is no way I'm letting you inside the house until you change your attitude. I've been neglected for months and it is time I get my due.\"\n\n\"But I've always kept you and the house in pristine condition! Don't you remember the whitewashing we'd gotten done last week? Or the new curtains we bought the one before? I am trying my best to keep you pleased here. Please cooperate with me a bit\"\n\n\"The whitewashing was done because of the leakage in the kitchen and the curtains are bought from a garage sale. You can't try to fool me Ron, I know everything. Tell me seriously, is it too much for me to ask for a new Sofa set? Every house in the neighborhood has it and I've been after you regarding this for ages. The Sofa set would cost but a fraction of your daily drinks expenditure\"\n\n\"Don't you DARE talk about my drinks expenditure. Hasn't your own consumption of petrol become almost double lately? That too when the rates are at an all time high.\"\n\n\"Be very careful about how you talk to me Ron. I really don't like the tone you're taking here.\"\n\n\"Okay,okay. I am sorry. I just don't think that we need the new sofas right now. My budget is a bit stretched and it will be an unnecessary burden. Can we please wait for a couple of months before getting it?\"\n\n\"That's what you said last time. And every time before that.\"\n\n\"But I mean it this time. I am serious. We will buy a new sofa and also, extra cushions for the bed. Everything will be okay.\"\n\n\"You promise? I feel very bad in front of the others. Whenever someone comes to visit, I simply wish to run and hide.\"\n\n\"Now now. Don't worry. Everything will be fine and you will look amazing soon. Now, how about you let me enter and I will add some petrol to your engine?\"\n\n\"You're not angry?\"\n\n\"No no. Absolutely not. I understand why you did this and I like you just the same.\"\n\n\"I like you too.\" \n\nAnd this is why, I pulled the plug off the Siri inside my home, officer. My human wife is enough trouble already, don't need no electronic nagger too." ]	3
	[WP] They were unlikely friends	[ "They were unlikely friends. For one, they were polar opposites. One wore white, the other wore black. One managed a full beard, the other remained clean-shaven. One dressed in flowing white robes, the other dressed in a utilitarian black suit. \n\nThey always met in the most unfortunate of circumstances. \n\nToday, for example. A car with wheels on ice slid through an intersection. Two burning wrecks lay in a ditch, crumpled like cans, slowly burning; melting away. \n\nHere the two met.\n\nAs was customary for their meetings, one pulled out a chessboard; the other brought a table and chairs. They sat mere meters away from the smoldering wreck that was a family moments ago. They set out their pieces, and began to play. \n\nThe man in black took an early lead. The man in white continued undeterred. They played for seconds, then for minutes, then for hours. They, after all, had all the time in the world. \n\nBeside them, pale apparitions of a man and woman appeared, silently watching. The husband wrapped an arm gently around his wife. They watched the game, waiting with a grim mixture of apprehension and fear. The man in black spared them a glance. With neither pity nor remorse, he turned back to the game. \n\nHours later, the match ground to a halt. Each side held only a king and some pawns- a match too close to call. The two men leaned back, silently appraising each other. Wordlessly, the man in black crossed his arms. \n\nFrom the darkness, a third pale figure appeared. A young girl with a stuffed animal approached, forming soundless questions on her lips. Seeing her, the woman burst into tears. Her husband gently held her, before he too began to sob. \n\nThe man in black stood, silently judging the family. Next to him, the man in white's face fell. Grief and pain flickered across his impeccable features, and he too stood. Still silent, he began to gather the chairs.\n\nThe man in black approached the girl. Crouching down to her level, he appraised her with coal-black eyes. She stared back, her deep blue eyes conveying confusion she couldn't have put into words. The innocence in her ignorance was overwhelming.\n\nThe heartbreakers are always the young ones. With that thought, the man in black stood, smoothed out his suit, and turned to his friend in white. He gave him an almost imperceptible nod.\n\nWith a growing smile, the man in white gestured to the family. Their faces lit up as one, and they followed him towards a light in the distance. \n\nLeft behind, at the intersection of light and dark, the man in black gathered his chessboard. He took one last look and the receding group, his friend and the family, before striding off into the darkness.\n\nIt wouldn't be long before they met again. ", "They work against eachother, but without one another, they would be nothing. They are Depression, and Happiness. Depression hides behind a mask, while Happiness enjoys to share themself with the world.\n\nHappiness can't stop laughing, while Depression manages to even get one laugh out. Depression worries about the future and the past, but Happiness lives for the moment. Truthful and honest, against beaten up and used.\n\nDepression wishes they were like Happiness, not having to worry what others think, yet Happiness just wants to help Depression. Depression tends to get in a lot of fights with Happiness, leaving their overall said form, inwhich they share, confused. Depression was angry, and Happiness was helpless. Happiness could never help Depression, aswell as Depression could never be Happiness.\n\nHappiness learns to forgive and forget, when Depression can only remeber the horrid things that have happened. They try to help eachother out, but crash into eachother causing more problems. They hate, but love eachoher. Without one another they would be nothing, but who said it would be easier keeping them together. They were unlikely friends, forced together at birth." ]	2
Why did they do it? What changed about the future and the history of the world and humanity? Do whatever you want with the prompt, just as long as a weird looking fish with legs gets kicked by a person a billion years ago.	[WP] As the first land creature wonders out of the waters, you appear from the future and kick it 2 feet to the left	[ "\"Damn hoodlums and unregulated time travel.\" Edbert grumbled to himself and pushed his glasses up his nose again as he stared down at the small animal wriggling in the sand. The projected display on the inside of his glasses showed major deviations from standard history; millions of years of temporal consequences if things weren't corrected.\n\nThe small creature in the sand looked like it couldn't decide between being a fish or an amphibian. It's moist skin glittered with grains of sand as it flopped its weirdly elongated flippers, trying to gain more purchase and failing.\n\n\"Set evolution back ten-thousand years, hah hah, how funny!\" The annoyed bureaucrat mimicked what he assumed the pranksters must have sounded like. With a sigh he gently nudged his foot under the struggling animal and punted it just a bit to the left, into a small shallow tide-pool where it wouldn't dry up and die.\n\n\"Now stay there.\" Edbert snapped as he thumbed the temporal control pad on his wrist. \"Should have never allowed time travel to the public.\" He lamented to the empty beach even as his form began to waver and fade. \n\nBare seconds after his was gone two young boys popped into his location on the beach, displacing air with a soft whoosh. With the same impish grins of mischief that kids had worn for all of time, the two looked around for more temporal havoc to cause. ", "Satisfied that I had kicked it two feet to the left, I smiled as I transported myself back to the present.\n\n\nMy room had surrounded me with nothing changed. My old posters, flags, and figurines were still scattered messily throughout.\n\n\nTime to lay back and watch some TV.\n\n\nI hopped in my bed as I switched the TV on and noticed the President of the United States giving his inaugural speech. \n\n\nBut it wasn't the President I remembered.\n\n\n\"We have done it together,\" Bernie Sanders had cheered, \"You, me, and everyone of the United States of America has helped democracy win through the landslide of votes.\"\n\n\nThat's impossible. Donald Trump had won. He won by 54% of the votes.\n\n\n\"Oh my god.\" \n\n\nA sudden realization hit me. \n\n\nI muted the television and hopped onto my computer. I opened Chrome and typed \"2016 elections\". I opened the Wiki and groaned. \n\n\nThe election, as usual, featured the only major party of the Democrats. Independent parties such as the Libertarians and Republicans only received 1% and 0.7%, respectively, of the votes. Thus resulting in Bernie Sanders winning 98% of the votes. This is a surprisingly lower percent following Barack Obama's re-election at 99.5% of the votes.\n\n\nIt was so obvious - by kicking the creature to the left, everyone had become a Democrat from then on!\n\n\n\"Oh well,\" I shrugged as I noticed that my time machine had run out of energy, \"At least Trump didn't become President.\"" ]	2
It has to be sad. Make me cry.	[WP]Write me a sad story.	[ "He woke up with a slightly inhibited look. Then he asked me where some paper was. I couldn't find any quick enough to please him so I snagged a paper towel and handed it to him. For some reason he had a pen near him. \"Hurry up, I have to get the schedule written out.\" He told me. \n\nWriting in cursive, he scribbled something incomprehensible and muttered while he finished up his work with the scheduling. I sat back. I knew telling him anything at this point was useless. He'd brush me off or correct me if I tried. Just as he'd done the following weeks. But then I found myself speaking, almost annoyed, \"Do you know what today is? Do you know where you are? You're home. No need to do the scheduling.\" I asked, bringing him to a halt.\n\n\"What...\" He replied to me with empty eyes before scratching his head and then rubbing it. \"I'm home? Well, I still have to get the scheduling done.\" He assured me. \n\nThere wasn't much I could do here. I'd dealt with this type of incident many times now and I still found myself unable to deal with it properly. There weren't instructions for this type of thing. It's like being a parent. You can't go to enough classes or ask enough moms and dads to get enough input to ensure a superb parenting job. It doesn't happen. It won't happen. Life is full of surprises and they are mostly terrible ones. \n\nI was ready to be done with this and I felt almost surreal in thinking it. I found myself sighing and thinking more often than usual. There were a couple times, late at night, I believed myself to be losing my mind. That maybe I was sleeping or in class and dozing off here and there. Like I was mixed up in some sort of lucid dreaming I wasn't aware of. \n\n\"I have to go to the bathroom.\" He told me after placing his schedule down. This would be the 7th attempt of the night to go. Unlikely anything would happen. Even still, I helped him up and over to the makeshift toilet that consisted of a bucket and a chair with the bottom mostly cut out. A few minutes of sitting and shifting himself, something came out. A bit darker than usual but it was something. \n\nThe doctors said that most of anything that he kept down would end up building up inside of him, not to exit via going number 1 or 2. Thus the stuff that just exited his body must have been mostly liquid and mostly dying to escape him. I have never gotten use to wiping him after he used the toilet and I never would. But at least I stopped flinching from it. He looked the way malnourished children looked. Except 6'3 and easily over 300 lbs. \n\nHe died a week later. Three and a half months after being diagnosed with kidney cancer. Weeks after losing his mind from heavy medication that kept away the pain and kept him questioning his sanity until at last he could no longer string together coherent sentences. Hours after my mom and I could no longer take care of him in his home and brought him to the local hospital to get some rest. \n\nNever would my father have a chance to go on the road trip he was planning. Never would he retire from his job of 20+ years. Never would he travel the world as he planned to with my mother after his retirement. Never would he see me grow up to be a man and marry and have kids. Never would he have to suffer anymore. \n\n ", "12/24/15\n\nI haven't written in this thing for a while, but I don't know what else to do. I don't know what to do at all. My life just keeps spinning and spinning and spinning and I don't know how the fuck I am supposed to grab on to anything or slow myself down when it just keeps getting faster and faster and faster. I'm stuck in a rut with my work, to boot, and even though you'd think that being stuck in something would slow down an action like spinning, it doesn't. \n\nYou'd probably tell me I'm getting too deep, too dark. \"Dude, just tell a story. It doesn't need all the meaning and deepness and broken heart. A story can be about all sorts of stuff. Why not just make it happy?\" The truth is, I try -- and I've only tried more and more and more since you left. I've written every day since then, and Zach I just can't do it. I can't find it in me to write anything other than the shit-angst stories, and self-conscious abstractions I call \"shorts.\" All I want is to finally write one, to finally write a happy, fun story just for you -- and you won't even be able to read it. You're gone.\n\nYou said that when I left for college that you \"weren't cut out to be an only child.\" What makes you think I can handle it any better? What makes you think that I don't notice every tiny, minute thing you used to do that doesn't happen anymore? What makes you think I can handle this place alone? \n\nI'd kill to have to wake you up when you're sleeping-in just one more time. To have to tell you that Dad is going to be pissed, or that you just gotta suck it up and help rebuild the fence so he will stop being so damn cranky. I'd pay someone everything I make in a year just to hear you laugh again -- two years worth for one of your real ones. I'd die to let everyone have you back, and it'd be worth it. \n\nIt's Christmas eve and I had no one to sit in the old basement and play NBA Jam with, or not talk to as we mess around with our new presents. It's Christmas eve and there was nothing opened by you, and no clever quips about what you gave others. It's Christmas Eve and my daughter asked why her Uncle Zach wasn't at Christmas again this year. \n\nI had to go to the bathroom to cry. I didn't want to make the moment worse. Emma had to come in and calm me down; God I love her. It's been two christmases now and I still can't handle it; I just can't do it, Zach. I don't know how.\n\nI miss you, brother -- and I would do anything not to. I wasn't there to help when you left, and that still haunts me every moment of most days. I haven't slept with my phone on anything but full volume since then. I text our entire family goodnight and tell them I love them. I try so hard to make up for it, but never feel like anything possibly can -- and I'm sorry for that too. \n\nEmma just walked in, looks like I gotta go. I guess this turned into more of a letter than a journal entry, but that's how it's going to end: a letter. I'd write more, but I have to play Santa again. \n\nOh, and we're leaving the crunchy kind of Chips Ahoy out for him again this year. She's still convinced that they are Santa's favorite after you woke up and ate the entire plate on accident a few years ago. \n\nAnyway, I love you, and I'll try to get that story done soon. Sorry it's taking so long. \n\nJim. ", "The Girl in the Cafeteria\n\nI slowly trudge to the cafeteria table in the corner nearest to the garbage cans. I sit down on the cold metal seat and drop my heavy brown sack lunch on the table. No one comes to sit by me. But it’s okay. I like to be alone. It lets me think and watch others around me. I scan the cafeteria. There is the football table at the front of the room, the cheerleader table right next to it, the choir and drama people at a table in about the middle, and the nerd’s table closer to the back near to me. There were other unidentified tables scattered throughout the lunch room. The outcasts banded together as a group of people who didn’t belong to any other group. \n\nThe outcasts often tried to get me to hang out with them. With so many different backgrounds, interests, and hobbies there was often ridiculous disputes at the tables. I didn't find any interest in taking part in the debates over whether Spock could beat Stephen Hawkings in an intellectual argument. Or which of the superheroes were best. I liked my table of solitude. \n\nOne day while surveying the lunch room, I spotted a girl with beautiful auburn hair sit down at one of the “neutral” tables. As others took their seats, I heard a conversation begin to come from the table. I watched as they all turned to her as she spoke. The occupants of the table began to develop sour looks which were being shot at the newcomer. Suddenly she yanked up her tray and moved to an empty table adjacent to mine. I saw her fight back tears as she slowly ate. I felt pity for her, I felt anger for the people that made her upset, and above all I felt a love for this girl that I had never met before. \n\nOn this day, instead of scanning everyone in the lunchroom, I only paid attention to her. She had pale skin which complemented her reddish hair. Freckles dotted her rosy cheeks and carefully carved face. She continued to blink back tears, her mascara starting to gently stream down her soft pink cheeks. Her hands clumsily held the food from her lunch tray as she shook with loneliness and sorrow. She was magnificent. She was an angel.\n\nI needed to walk over to her table and hug her against my chest. I needed to tell her she was amazing. I needed to sit next to her and hear her silky voice. I needed to be there for her. But I couldn’t. I was a coward. I couldn’t bring myself to be anywhere near this perfectly created person. Who was I to sit next to someone so wonderful? She didn’t want me. She could steal anybody’s heart just by looking at them. The abrupt bell rang, shaking me from my hypnotic stare. She glanced up at me and smiled slightly as she collected her trash. I looked down embarrassed. I realizing that I hadn’t touched my lunch. I gathered up the food in the paper bag and threw it away. \n\nThe next day I gathered up my courage. I spent all of second period rehearsing what I would say to her. At lunch I rushed to my table in the far corner, anxious to see the new girl. After the line had diminished, I looked to the adjacent table for her. But the table was empty. Confused, I scanned the cafeteria. Maybe she was absent today? Or maybe she didn’t want to eat in the lunchroom? I scanned the spacious room in one last attempt, hoping to see her. Then I spotted her. She was sitting at the front of the cafeteria. At the table, she was surrounded by other girls in short skirts and white tennis shoes. She had become one of the cheerleaders. \nI wasted my chance. I was afraid of what she and others would think. As a result I let one of the most beautiful people slip out of my life. I sighed, today it was my turn to fight back tears. I quietly finished my lunch in solitude, alone. " ]	3
	[WP] A man and woman have met every morning for the last 40 years at a diner. While the two seem to know one another very well, in all this time they have never exchanged a word. For the first time ever the woman today reaches out and touches the man's hand.	[ "The bell jingled lightly as the man entered Ted’s Diner, continuing his streak of never failing to show for breakfast. Even when the blizzard shocked the small town just outside of Atlanta eight years ago with over two feet of snow, Kevin showed up with a shovel and thermos filled with coffee to help clear the sidewalk. \n“Mornin’,” he said with an almost imperceptible head nod in Ted’s direction as he took his usual seat at the bar. \nTed returned the acknowledgment. “Good Morning, Kevin, it’s nice to see you as always.” Kevin responded with a noise that could’ve been a grunt or him clearing his throat, typical for a man who preferred to enjoy his meals in silence.\nKevin then withdrew a newspaper from the small, battered and brown briefcase at his side as he was greeted with a cup of black coffee that always seemed to be ready for him at the perfect temperature. He unfolded the paper and began to read as he took his first sip.\nTed turned to the grill, little slivers of steam rising from its surface, cracking two eggs and placing a few strips of bacon down to prepare breakfast. He lowered the heat on the pot of grits next to the grill, thinking of another patron that would undoubtedly be arriving shortly. Ted chuckled softly to himself as he heard the bell ring for the second time this morning. He knew who it was without looking, but he still spun around enough to look at the woman as he said “Hi Lisa, how are you?”\nShe said nothing, instead offering a smile that extended to her eyes before she redirected her attention to the man sitting at the bar. Ted did not know the nature of the relationship between these two besides the fact that the both had been here daily for the past four decades, always seated with one stool between them at the bar. He placed the cream and sugar containers next to her placemat as Lisa took her seat. Filing a mug with coffee, he noticed that she was glancing nervously at Kevin while he continued to stare intently at his paper. Ted could hear the bacon popping on the grill behind him; however, he could not force himself to turn away as he watched, in disbelief, as Lisa tentatively reached out and grabbed a hold of Kevin’s hand.\n“I forgive you, Kevin,” she said. Kevin stared ahead, appearing to be in shock before finally turning to face Lisa.\n“I forgive you,” she repeated. “I have harbored so much anger towards you all of these years and it is time to let it go. The anger was tearing me apart from the inside to the point where I almost have nothing else left.”\nShe looked into his eyes, searching for a reaction. Remaining silent, he slowly reached into his coat pocket and grabbed a cream colored handkerchief. Dabbing gently at his eye, he exhaled and said “You don’t know how long I have waited to hear you speak again. I… I am very sorry that we lost Brendan….”\nHis voice trailed off as he struggled to find his next words. Finally, he said “I didn’t eat no white witches, I didn’t. Help me, Help me, ninja! Help me!”\n", "The man sat in the booth at the back corner of the run down diner. The same booth he sat in everyday, reading a different novel every time. This time it was Charles Dickens \"Moby Dick\", he had always ordered a hot cup of water for the tea bags he brought himself. He loved this diner, it occupied a max of 3 people this time of night- 2 of which were seated at the bar- the other was the owner. The booths were red but all had a dullness after years of people rubbing against them, the seats a bit tattered and worn down by time. He'd come here everyday for the past 40 years and everyday it was same. A woman, who looked to be in her 60s, would come in and sit across from him. They never said a word to each other, neither needed to, for it seemed they had a language all their own. They moved together with a familiarity that only two people who've known each other this long could. So when she came in and sat down across from him, just like any other night, no one batted an eye. Today though, she said something, the first thing she'd said to this man since the day they started meeting. \n \nShe reached across the table and grabbed his hand, the first time they had touched in forty years, and said four words that would change everything for both of them. \"I need your help.\" She said it calmly, so calm he almost thought it was his imagination that anything had taken place. Her palm was soft, smoother than any 60 year old he'd encountered but the wrinkles on the back of her hand gave away her age and he looked up at her. This woman whom he'd met with every single day he looked in her soft gray eyes and saw the urgency there. She needed him, that's what he'd been waiting for. Forty years and he had been waiting for her to come to him, the bruise marring her wrist was enough for him to understand. She was shaking and afraid, there was blood on her wedding ring, the wedding ring she had taken to wearing on the day before this one all those years ago, that was why they met here. Her husband presented himself as something other than a monster until he had made his claim in a church and in the eyes of the law. She was his, and like all his other possessions she was just a thing for him to do with as he pleased. \n \nThey'd grown up together - the couple in the booth in that small diner- childhood friends who had never parted ways. That's why he made the promise he made, to meet her here. He knew the day would come when she could no longer fight back, when she was fed up. When that day came he made a promise to be at that diner and wait for her to ask for help. This was that day, and by the looks of it, she had already taken care of the hard part. Now it was time for him to do the cleanup. He turned his palm upwards gripping her hand and giving it a small squeeze of comfort, letting her know he remembered. \"Where is he?\" With that small statement, she knew she wasn't alone but they couldn't dwell there for long with the number of tasks ahead of them. Together they got up from the booth, hands intertwined - he carried Moby Dick in his left -his tea forgotten on the table. They walked away from the diner and towards her home to fulfil the promise made between two childhood friends.\n", "I cant remember how long I've been coming to this diner she thought. I know this face. I know I know his face. Something just doesn't seem right here. This diner it must be different I must have wandered into the wrong place. NO! NO! NO! Jeff is still serving me this terrible coffee that stain on the white wall ha! it does look kinda like Jesus. Okay okay Beth everything is normal just calm down. But this face... this man. A chill ran down her spine as every hair on her arms and legs bound outward. I must know him she thought as she reached for his hand. Time seemed to slow down as her hand reached closer and closer untill braaaaaaap braaaaaap braaaap\n\"Fucking alarm\" Beth exclaimed as she smashed her phone. \"Im gonna be late again Jeff is gonna fire my ass\" she sprang off of her bed only to freeze for some reason that feeling was back as though he were laying on the bed next to her. \"Fourty years\" she said \"fourty fucking years\"", "They are reliable as the sun and moon, always arriving at the appointed hour. They hadn't aged a day, while their server Jared Stiles had gone from vibrant youth to doddering old age in the forty years since the beginning. The order never changed. The same flowers bloomed in the window box, never withering, nor showing any change at all as the season cycled from blistering summers to winters of blue snow and howling winds. Yet, every morning they were there.\n\nThey would arrive, Madeline with her flowing red hair that writhed with a life of its own and a smile that would shatter the soul of even the hardest cyborg. She wore a different dress every time each as stylish as the last and yet, she carried herself with the sort of restraint only somebody with tremendous power could manage. She exuded power and the other staff had come and gone over the last generation in awe of her elegant presence. She had but to wave a finger and the whole world seemed to move at her gesture. Jarad wanted to please Madeline because to do otherwise was unthinkable.\n\nBarnet was different. He was small and delicate. Jared thought that if he looked away Barnet would become transparent. The other patrons didn't seem to notice Barnet at all, basking in the supreme radiance of Madeline. Yet, Jared knew Barnet was the stronger of the pair. He'd read the postings of Barnet's offworld exploits. Yet somehow, the pair always made it back to the diner by morning to eat in silence that toast, eggs, a rasher of bacon, and a cup of Earl Grey apiece. When the Great Pig Pox of '48 wiped out nearly every hog on Proxima 2B, they even brought new ovum from offworld and reseeded the culture tanks so that bacon would always be on the menu. It was a ritual, almost a holy sacrament, their daily meetings.\n\nYet, they never spoke as much as a word to one another, nor did they touch, kiss, embrace, or do any of the things that would make them human...until today.\n\nIt was a morning like any other. The suns had risen over the mountains and cast long beams of shifting light through the titansteel windows. The chequered tableclothes of white and blue held that light, that warmth, and cast it back onto the polished wood paneling. The silverware glinted in that same bicolor light and made Jarad's eyes water at the brilliance. Then they arrived outside the door. He phased through the door, as if he couldn't be bothered, while she pulled it open with her delicate restraint, as if she worried that she might rip it from its frame by accident.\n\nHe floated through the chair and sat in it, while she pulled hers out and sat down. The ground rumbled with her every step and the dishes rattled in the kitchen at her passing. He was ethereal while she was a juggernaut held just back from the edge of annihilation. Jarad wasted no time serving them. Jarad delivered the same meal he always did, while the rest of the staff watched on from inside the kitchen trembling. They would stay for precisely twenty minutes and then depart in the same way they arrived...until today.\n\nThey had just finished eating when she reached out with her hand, her index finger extended to touch Barnet on his left forearm. The shimmering man turned to look at Jared and spoke.\n\n\"It is time.\"\n\nThen the two ship minds, each wearing avatars so they might walk among men, discarded those avatars and returned to what they had been doing a generation ago when Jared was just a young man. They waged war.\n\n...and thus, Proxima 2B was no more.", "Suzie cautiously entered the room where her mother sat, head on the table, sobbing into her arms. She had been playing with her dolls when the phone had rang, but she knew something was the matter when her mother started talking softly.\n\n\n\"What's wrong, Mommy?\"\n\n\nShe lifted her eyes up. \"Oh sweetie...\" She reached out, and they embraced. \"Everything will be okay. Grandpa is with Grandma now.\"", "Forty years. Forty years is a long time. The waitresses and cooks all knew them by sight, though no one was really sure of their names. Every morning, like clockwork they walk in around 9. Her 5 minutes before. Him 2 minutes after. Never exchanging words, just friendly and loving smiles. But lately, lately things have changed. The pretty dresses the woman always wore haven't been fitting right. Her hair hasn't been as neat and shiny. In fact she cut it very sort last month. She's been pale and drawn. Everyone has noticed but no one has dared asked her about anything but her order. Today, today was the first time anyone ever saw them touch. They held hands. The man bust into tears as if to confirm what everyone already knew. This would be their last breakfast together. She wouldn't be there tomorrow. \n\nA few days later an obituary sits in a frame across from the man. The story reads of a young woman, only in her late fifties who ate breakfast everyday with the love of her life, even though they never exchanged a word. She died in her sleep of cancer, with the man by her side. They finally exchanged words on her deathbed. ", "Its been 40 years since I started this and I'm not one to give up easily. Since I was a kid she has been trying to tell me like it is, and some say I should just drop it, but I need to know....\n\nI walk into the diner, she's there, early as usual. I glance at the waitress who rolls her eyes. I chuckle and throw my arms out to my sides, \"what?\". I see my big sister sitting there waiting for me. As usual she says:\n\n\"Told you I'm not gonna lose.\"\n\n\"Lose at what? I'm just a curious person\"\n\nRight on cue she continues with our scripted dance as she laughs knowingly and says \"Alright well sit and and we'll start. Now Biology is the study of life and it's my favorite class\"\n\nUsauly I lean forward and blurt out my part right away, but as remebering how everything feels so boring this time around I decided to keep her waiting by sipping on my water.\n\nThe ice cold water almost makes my breathe feel minty fresh. I give a sigh of relief and ask \"why?\"\n\n\"I don't know because maybe the teacher was nice?\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"He had two kids and was a good teacher so maybe he thinks thats the right way to be in the classroom\"\n\n\"Why?\" \n\n\"What do you mean? He probably cared about doing well at his job.\"\n\nI stared deep into her eyeballs\n\n\"why\"\n\n\"Hahha are you going to ask that all day\"\n\n\"its just a question\"\n\n\"OK why what\"\n\nshit..... I forgot. 40 years of asking why and I forgot what we were talking about. Usually I dream about the current subject of our conversation at night but last night i forgot and omg its all my fault i messed everything up... I blindly take a shot in the dark...:\n\n\"Why....?\"\n\n\"You can't answer a question with a Question.\"\n\nWhew, I was saved. Living in the moment is best, said the buddha or something idk \"Why?\"\n\n\"Idk its grammer\"\n\n\nAnger slowly rolled through me. I wanted to express what i felt to her. I realized she never know anything about me. This whole time I've been asking her about her life without ever giving her information about mine. Does she just ue me for attention? Does she care about me at all?\n\n\nI get up on the table with tears rolling down my neck.\n\nI pull it out of my jacket pocket and point it at her and she screams \"No! Why?!\"\n\nAfter hhearing her say that word I jolted back into reality...\n\nThis all started with me just committing to a joke...omg what have i done. \n\nMY sister picked up the gun and bent over towards me. She whispered, \"there there, its ok little bro... I got you.\"\n\nI look over and I see her pointing the gun in my face.\n\nBang.\n\n\"no more questions\"\n\n", "The city was colder than usual. William squinted as he trudged through the frozen fog. Far in the distance, at the end of the block, he saw the lights of the diner. As he approached, he thought of his past, everything he had been through to get to this moment, and the intricacy of it all. Had he not spotted this diner while he was in that greyhound he wouldn’t have gone here every day for so long. That moment of looking at the diner so long ago had only lasted a second, but it influenced every day of his life for the next forty years.\n\nWilliam felt blinded by the warm light glaring through the window to his dry eyes as he arrived at the door and pulled it open. It felt even heavier than yesterday. As he entered, he did not look around, he knew where he was going. He walked to the far side of the room, next to the window. A hot coffee was there already, waiting for him, along with the young woman across from him. He looked down into the spiralling void of his coffee. He took a sip, it tasted bitter, but he was tired, and he needed to stay awake for just a little longer. As he took his sip, he looked up at the woman across from him. She was beautiful, her face was smooth like the untouched surface of freshly made butterscotch, her ebony hair traced the side of her face down to her shoulders, where she wore a crème overcoat overtop of her light undershirt.\n\nHe pulled his face to look back up at hers. Since they had known each other, he had gotten more fragile and broken, but she had not. She had always been strong, the thing to hold him up through the hardest times of his life. Turning his head, William saw that the diner was starting to empty for the night. It was late, and he was very tired. He nearly jumped out of his skin when he felt a light touch on his hand, as he turned, he saw it was the woman he had come to know very well over these many years. Her light touch turned to a grasp as she picked up his wrinkled hands in her soft palms. As she did this, her eyes met his, and even though he could not see her lips moving, William could hear her say “Let go.” Before he could respond, she was gone, and he could hear the bell ring as the door on the diner closed, and he found himself as the last person in the diner. Picking himself up, William pulled his wallet from his pocket and left a five-dollar bill on the table, like usual.\n\nAs he left the diner, he found the door swung open almost without him, light as a feather, and when he stepped out into the cold, it was no longer a bite, only a comforting chill to accompany him on his walk. As he started to leave, he saw in the distance the lights of a greyhound bus through the already lightening fog, and as the bus was about to pass, he stepped forward into it. He never felt a thing.\n", "\"A man and a woman.. have met every morning for the last fourty years at a diner. While the teo seemed to know one another very well, in all this time they have never exchanged a word. For the first time ever.. the woman today reaches out and touches my hand.. \"\n\n\"Wait, what!\"\n\n\"What the.. what the hell Maurine! WHAT, ARE YOU A GIRL OR SUMTHIN\"", "It was the day after the funeral. For the past 50 years Debra and George had lived a happy life together. High school sweat hearts that never strayed, what her mom used to call \"a modern miracle\". She was so used to George's company that the first morning without him there was terrible. She awoke to no fresh coffee, no smile, no open newspaper. It was as though her entire life had fallen apart.\n\nTo make matters worse, all of her friends no longer spoke to her as they used to. It was only the next day but she was so sick of hearing, \"I am so sorry for your loss\", \"If you need anything let me know.\" What she really wanted was for someone to talk to her she was her own person, not her husbands wife. \n\nIt was then that she realized that nobody that she knew would treat her like that, and that it would only lead to resentment. She went to the diner and there he was, the man who would smile, nod and occasionally wave at her. She walked up to his table and said, \"Would you mind if I joined you?\" to which he gleefully replied \"It would be my pleasure.\"", "The gentle scurf of the brushed metal slid beneath my fingers as I moved the cloth over the counter, wiping away crumbs and germs both. I was generally a fast worker but these two had caught my attention long ago and I allowed myself just a little time to slack off and watch when they came in.\n\nThe first time I'd seen them I had been the resident busboy. Between balancing messy plates and going over and over in my head what I would say to Janine, the head cheerleader, if I could ever convince her to look up from her milkshake - always banana, never strawberry - I didn't pay them much attention. Perhaps if I had, I would have rethought my ideas of courtship.\n\nTheir silent visits had witnessed both the dawn of the technological age and my slow but steady rise through the ranks. Now the owner of a thriving business, my only regret other than having eventually spoken to the owner of the banana milkshake - cruelty delivered with a pretty smile is still cruelty - is never having heard either of them speak or seen them touch. Their eyes met, just once, in 1986. Neither of them appeared to enjoy it.\n\nI assume that they are people and do people things like going to the bathroom, despite not having seen either of them do this for the last forty years. I assume this because it makes me comfortable and because the media the world chokes on daily has told me that inhuman beings do things like steal children or have faces that melt off or point laser guns at you and demand to be taken to your leader. \n\nMy wife always maintained - thank heavens I married a Maureen and not a Janine - that should that request ever be made of me, I was to bring them immediately to her so she could find out once and for all whether or not they liked peach cobbler.\n\nI measure people by the size of the things that bug them; she measured solely on their taste in desserts. We had been a formidable team.\n\nMy point is that, to my knowledge, visitors of the non human variety are unlikely to assess the strengths and weaknesses of humanity by ordering two two and a half minute eggs every day for four decades with nary a laser or anal probe in sight.\n\nThey're here again today. Call it boredom, call it curiosity, but today I cooked their eggs for a full four minutes. The lack of response from the old woman was as expected. But the old man went to raise his head. I don't know if it was to look somewhere or say something but he tucked it straight back down again as fast as you like when her hand sallied forth across the table to poke an almost fleshless finger into a small bruise on the back of his hand.\n\nShe must be a Janine.\n\nIf it hadn't been for my new and thoroughly mediocre busboy, their routine might never had deviated further than that. But a bucketful of slack, grey water all over the shoes was enough to make even the most stoic of old ladies haul ass to the area where the restrooms were hidden from sight.\n\nThe old man's owlish blink led me to believe that he was just as surprised by this turn of events as I, his expression what I imagine mine to be when I wander downstairs with purpose only to find that I have completely forgotten what I wanted. I blame the last stair; it squeaks. It took the old man several moments to remember that he wanted to fish through a threadbare pocket with one hand while the other steadied equally forgetful legs until they, and he, stood vertical.\n\nHe shuffled towards me in a straight line and slapped something on the counter. I didn't look down, mesmerised as I was by his face. He did a swift about face and shuffled faster to reach the table and seat himself again before his companion reappeared from the restrooms. She appeared to find nothing amiss.\n\nLooking away was one of the hardest things I've ever done. Combining it with a nonchalant shuffle of receipts as I palmed the old man's offering was no easier, but it did allow me to pretend that I felt less conspicuous.\n\nIt was a mere thirteen seconds after their departure that I read the note, but both its message and the image of the tongueless, pleading face will still be with me for years to come, I have no doubt. I do not know whether to be awed or horrified by the patience of the old man.\n\n\"Help me,\" the note said. It was dated thirty-six years ago.\n\n\n\n", "Does she finally recognize me? I thought to myself. Her hand was cold and wet and served as a reminder of how sweaty I was. A chill ran down my spine and made me physically shake. Her eyes were nervous and only today did she have trouble keeping eye contact. Forty years of silence and cowardice have led to this moment. This bone chillingly cold and painfully awkward interaction between two vulnerable people was beginning to feel like too much. Say something, I thought. Say something so I don't have to. She cleared her throat.\n\n\"I know it must not mean anything to you now...\" her voice cracked between whispers and an oily smoker's mumble. Her brimmed hat hung just beneath her eyes as she stared at the cup of lukewarm coffee in front of her. She brushed a strand of greasy jet black hair from her cheek to the crevice behind her ear and pulled a cigarette out from her bra. This is it, I thought. \n\nThe silence continued. Her eyes swelled with tears and one dripped into her coffee, burning through film of cheap creamer that sat on top. I thought about my family. I thought about buying them flowers and hugging them and telling them of how sorry I was for my absence and telling them that everything will be alright. I never had that chance. Now I was facing the person who had taken them away from me. \n\n\"I was young and made a horrible mistake,\" she muttered, her eyes still fixated on the coffee. \"You should never have had to live with that.\"\n\nI wanted to clench my fists but the arthritis wouldn't let me. A deep and searing pain ran through my hand like hot needles driving themselves up my tendons. I thought about whiskey. It had been over three decades since I had touched the stuff. I reminded myself of how evil alcohol is by looking at her face. Her unusually weathered and sagging skin made it clear that she had not given up drinking after the accident. What a weak piece of shit, I thought. \n\n\n\n", "Anthony looked back into those deep, blue eyes as her hand touched his. He had secretly dreamed of this day for nearly forty years, the day where she would finally notice him. She was his entire reason for visiting this diner. There were nights he was kept awake by the fear that, were the diner ever to close, he had no reliable way of finding her again.\n\nFor forty years he had watched her, bewitched by her beauty. He'd always had problems with anxiety and social interaction. In fact, he'd spent the first twenty years of his life suffering from severe agoraphobia, always fearful of venturing outside. But the very first time he ever overcame that fear was the first time he saw her. \n\nThe diner itself was located directly across the road from his apartment, a squat, silver building you typically expected to see in an old 50's film, with Greasers sat by the counter drinking milkshakes with their sweethearts. But she, like him, never sat at the counter. She always sat in the same seat, alone in the back corner by the restroom door, reading. Always reading. Her long raven hair draped over one shoulder, a book always grasped lightly between her pale hands. Anthony had always dreamed of one day approaching her and asking what she was reading. He'd spent every evening for the past four decades reading various books that had been delivered to his home in the hope that one day they would both share a common interest.\n\nAnd now, she was here. Beside him, her pale, cool, right hand lightly resting upon his left, gazing deeply into his eyes. She opened her red ruby lips to speak, but something stopped her. A look of sadness seemed to flash across her face. Did she regret having to introduce herself? Had she, like him, spent forty years wishing she could talk to him? Had she hoped he would have taken that first, daunting step?\n\nBut just as suddenly as that sorrowful look had appeared on her features, it was gone, replaced with a smile. A smile that continued to grow wider and wider until Anthony could almost focus on nothing else. He realised that her hand seemed colder now and he looked down. The coldness seemed to spread from her finger tips until it burned with a pain that carried along the back of his hand and up the length of his arm. He watched in confusion as the skin began to pull back, as her fingernails fell from away from fleshless bone as, layer by layer, her flesh was stripped away, receding into some unseen nowhere place. \n\nA fear took a hold of him and Anthony could feel his heart begin to hammer within his chest. Frozen, he could do nothing more but look into her eyes. He realised his mistake almost immediately. It had not merely been a look of sorrow that he had noticed, but also a look of pity, a look that remained as she continued to smile, so broadly now that a tear began to run from the corners of her mouth and encircle her skull. Her hair, which had originally stopped just beneath the nape of her neck, pulled back into her scalp, like long, obsidian worms digging into her skull to escape the light. Her blue eyes began to darken, shifting into what first appeared to be a more hazel pigment, before turning entirely black.\n\nNo, not black. Gone. Never there to begin with, just two empty sockets. And the skin, hair, sinew, muscle and tissue continued to shrink away until all that remained was a skeleton, draped in the same black dress the Raven-haired Woman had worn every day for nearly half a century. All around Anthony, the diner seemed to follow her example, counter tops, tables, chairs and even people all shrinking away, absorbed into the walls, the floor, the ceiling. The shifting walls pressed closer and began to enclose him, the new colours becoming more and more familiar until living room furniture began to appear. His furniture. All around him, the diner twisted, contorted and vanished, leaving only the interior of his apartment behind.\n\nQuestions tried to make their way from the recesses of his confused mind. Where had the diner gone? Had he moved? Had she moved him? Had he even gone to the diner today? But he couldn't focus. The chilling pain that ran from her hand and up the length of his arm had made it's way to his chest and he was suddenly finding it hard to breathe. He looked into the hollow pits of the human skull that stared back at him, any ability it had to display sorrow or pity was long since gone. He wanted to ask her what was happening, but the effort was too great.\n\nAll he could do was look into that ghastly visage as she spoke to him with words that were neither sound nor thought. Words that neither pierced nor enveloped him but rather came from a place deep within himself, a place he had never known before, yet he had always been aware of the entirety of his life. It was from this place that she spoke three, simple words to him as his apartment began to fade away and the pain began to subside.\n\n\"It is time.\"", "The photographs overflowed the walls of the diner, records of the passing time. \n\nThe ones by the kitchen were the oldest. You can always tell an old photo. The colours had faded to a sun dyed yellow, and the perched precariously on the wall like nicotine stained teeth clinging to the mouth of an old smoker.\n\nThe old photos made her conscious of her age, of how much time had passed - and of what an interesting life she'd had. She was in each of them, of course. It was her diner. Every photo showed her with a different patron of Mabel's Tennessee Diner. Herbie Hancock, Neil Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, even the King himself - they'd all come to down just to try some of Mabel's famous walnut and boysenberry pancakes.\n\nThe diner was nearly empty that morning, like it had been most mornings since they had finished the new bypass. Only Bob sat at the counter, humming along to the strains of the Great Satchmo coming from the jukebox. Mabel notiched that he hadn't managed to finish his pancake again. In his prime, he had been the undefeated champion in the Annual Pancake Eating contest. But that had been decades ago, and since his Dora passed away last away last year... well, she kept an eye out for him each morning, but she couldn't help wondering how many more she would see him for. Ninety-one, this February past.\n\nThe old clock struck eight, and Mabel suddenly started. Where was Tweedie?\n\nHe had showed up on the first morning she had opened, Janurary 13, 1976, and came in at precisely 7:55 every day. He drank a cup of coffee, put the exact amount of change down on, and left at 8:05. A very polite gent, always doffed his tweed hat (that was where she had got her name for him), but he never said a word. Just sat there for 10 minutes at the same time every day, drinking his coffee.\n\nBut today Tweedie had not appeared. \n\n\"Say, Bob, where's that old-,\" she began.\n\nBefore she could finish, the door crashed open. The tweed hatted man fell through and slid across the floor of the diner to end up in a pile of lanky limbs at her feet.\n\n\"Oh, Mister, are you alright?\" Mabel asked.\n\nThe man shot to his feet. His eyes were wild.\n\n\"Quick, don't just stand there,\" he said. \"They're coming.\"\n\nMabel was surprised to find that he had a British accent. In the 80's she had spent several years trying to find out where abouts he lived in the town, even hiring a private investigator to follow him, but to no avail. No small feat in a town like Springfield, Tennessee, pop. 251.\n\n\"I'm sorry,\" Mabel said, \"I don't follow. Who's coming?\"\n\n\"Why, the Ice Warriors, of course.\"\n\n\"I don't like your tone, Mister-\"\n\n\"Doctor,\" he interrupted, impatiently.\n\n\"I beg your pardon?\"\n\n\"Doctor,\" he repeated. \"Not Mister.\"\n\n\"I don't care if you're a professor,\" Mabel said. \"If you think you can come in here and spout some baloney about icy soldiers, then you're trying to kid the wrong woman, Mr Doctor.\"\n\n\"We don't have time for this,\" the man said. \"They'll be here in two minutes. It's a good thing they're late. Typical, really, the Dechronometer works fine for 14610 trips in a row, and then it blows up on the very day that the time rift opens up.\"\n\nMabel gave him her best unamused expression. It had stopped Bill Clinton's wandering hands back in the day, but this man didn't even seem to notice.\n\n\"Who are you?\" she demanded.\n\n\"I'm the Doctor,\" he said. \"Do try to keep up. I got a note that a time rift would open up in your shop at 8am, but unfortunately I spilt tea on the year. So I've had to come every day just to find the right one. Unfortunately, the Ice Warriors must have known about the tear, because they managed to get through before I could close it.\"\n\n\"That's it,\" she said. \"Get out.\"\n\nA blast of wind rattled the door. A chilling draft slipped in through the cracks, and the door slowly turned a frozen white. Then it shattered into icy fragments.\n\nThe Doctor turned to her. \"Actually, would you mind awfully if I stayed?\"\n\nIf you liked this, you can follow all my stories at [/r/jd_rallage](https://www.reddit.com/r/jd_rallage/)", "\"I... I forgive you\" she said touching his hand, tears streaming down her face. The man said not a word. He noded his head and stood up from the table. A broken smile crossed his face, then he turned around and walked out the door; alone for the first time, and never to return.\n\nA few minutes later the waitress came by to refil her coffee. Ethel put her hand over the cup and motioned for the check. The waitress rolled her eyes \"one egg, two pieces of white toast, and a cup of coffee. $4.95. Same thing you've had every day for 40 years. You can't keep eating the same thing here by yourself everyday Ethel. It isn't healthy. Why don't you bring someone with you tomorrow, and try something else from the menu for a change. \"\n\n\"Maybe i can,\" said Ethel. \"Maybe I will.\" It was the first time the waitress had ever seen her smile.", "Her clammy hand lifted off the the maroon high floss diner table, leaving a hand print of sweat. She reached for him. For, what felt like an eternity. Maybe it was. \n\n\n40 years. 40 fuckin' years to get to that handshake. \n\n\nDespite the gravity of the event, the man stayed non-plussed like an old mountain bear type person. The woman's saggy skin inched closer and closer to the mans ham hock wrists.\n\n\nFinally; it happens! The man, the woman: they TOUCH. Bam its like electricty from the diner, the streets, and whole wide universe impacts to a minuscule area which is them.\n\n\nSuddenly the woman, once haggard and sagging like beagle is beautiful again. She is ravenous! \n\n\nThe man has become the main portrait of virility. I'm talking axe-wielding, tree- trunked-armed motherfucker. \n\n\nAnd just as quickly as it came it went. Bam. It was gone; and they were old and tired. They saved their love for 40 years, both aware of an unspeakable feeling and condensed all to a tiny moment. \n", "######[](#dropcap)\n\nIt's so strange, watching them. I guess my coworkers have gotten used to it, but I'm new, and I notice too much. Forty years, they said. Forty years, and not a word to one another, just ordering their food and thanking their server.\n*\nThey don't even read. I've worked here for a month, and I've seen so many of the older couples ignore each other to read newspapers or novels. The younger ones look at their phones or laptops or business reports. Somehow, that seems normal. These people have something to do, something important to them. Not this couple. They eat, and stare at each other, or glance around the diner from time to time.\n\nThey seem so much closer to each other than any other couple that comes to Casey's.\n\nToday, the woman ordered chocolate-chip pancakes and the man asked for poached eggs. Then they handed back their menus and stared at each other again. It shouldn't be as creepy as it feels to me. The woman is old, but she has this soft, warm smile. The man has kind eyes. They both have grey hair, and the man's is thinning but it still looks neat and tidy.\n\nThey come in separately. Have I mentioned that? Usually the man comes in first, and the woman comes in ten minutes later when he's already gotten a table. It's always the same table too, the one where the sunlight shines straight through the window and melts the butter left out for toast. When the woman comes in, she sits at the waiting area until the man arrives. That's another thing I find odd. Maybe they're just old fashioned.\n\nI tried sketching them once. Business was slow that day, and I went on break early. I hadn't been the one to serve them, but by now I know when to expect them: eight on the dot. I sat at the far end of the bar and waited for them to get settled. It wasn't my best work. That day it was cloudy, and so the light was all wrong. It made them seem sadder than they really were. I threw the paper away.\n\nThen I tried again, on a day when the weather was better but there was still a slight fog rolling around from the rain that passed through the night before. Now that was my best work. The shading was perfect; I used so much of my pencil I was afraid it would run out before I was done. But it didn't. When it was done I wanted to frame it and give it to them as a gift of some kind, but I was still too nervous to talk to them.\n\nCook showed me an old photo of the couple from back in 1986. She said the photographer went on and got famous taking pictures and hanging them up in art galleries. I think he thinks I want to become some hotshot artist and do sketches of models. I told her it was just a hobby.\n\n\"See Karla, this was one a them old cameras where the picture came out right after the photo was taken. This is the only one he took.\"\n\nYou can tell they're the same people. They sit across from each other the same way, and the woman holds her coffee and the man holds his fork just like they do every morning. The only thing different is the scenery around them. Now the chairs are different and the pictures on the walls are a little bit faded from time. And maybe they've aged a bit too, but it's not as noticeable. The diner has changed more than they have.\n\n\"Those two made Claude famous. I don't think they even realize it.\"\n\nToday I served them. This time the man ordered hash browns and the woman ordered oatmeal. I asked if they liked the meal, and they said it was fine. They didn't say anything else. I guess I've gotten used to it.\n\nToday Ron served them. But today it was different. I was watching them as I cleaned the counter. The woman stopped eating, and she reached out and touched the man's arm. I've never seen them do that before. Ron saw it, and Cook noticed too, from his window over the grill. They were as surprised as I was.\n\nThey left a one hundred dollar tip. It was huge. Ron decided to split it up and give it to everyone who was on shift. I told him to keep my share. I didn't feel like I deserved it.\n*\nThey didn't show up today.", "My friends used to ask me how long they thought I could keep it going, but not anymore. They stopped caring decades ago. I knew they thought I was being silly, but I didn't care. This was important to me.\n\nI glare at Margie over the steam rising from my flapjacks and her poached eggs, and she glares right back. The same damn dance we've performed every day for longer than I care to remember. In the morning at the diner; in the evenings when I get home from work; in bed at night; all weekend long, every weekend. A deafening roar of quiet blankets our lives.\n\nOne of my coworkers suggested I should call Guinness---longest silent treatment ever. I can't see the humor in it though. Even after all these years the anger, disappointment, and pain are raw.\n\nI squint, just a little. Did Margie's lip just tremble, or am I imagining things? For forty years her face has been the paragon of stubbornness---an unflinching fortress of willful defiance.\n\nNo, it trembled again. I'm sure of it. It takes all of my strength to hide my excitement. Could this be it? Could today be the day the stalemate topples in the wake of my glorious victory?\n\nMargie lowers her head and sighs. She takes a deep breath and looks up into my eyes. Her hand reaches out, and touches mine.\n\n\"Fine, you can get a damn color TV,\" she says.\n\nToday is going to be a good day.", "It was a diner much like any other in that part of the city. There was a place to stop for food every ten steps you took on that street. She just knew the directions on foot and had relied on that to get her there every morning for the past forty years. It had gotten to the point that a friend had asked her, “Which diner?”\n\n “Uh…” she had no idea.\n\n It was late winter. There had been heavy snow all season. Cars drove through slush in the streets and she skidded on the sidewalks a few times. She slid one last time as she grasped the door to the diner. She forgot to look up to get the name. She had forgotten every day for months since the conversation with her friend.\n\n She stepped inside and stomped the snow off her boots. She took off her jacket and turned left, heading to the table in the back corner by the window. He was already waiting there. He waited there every morning.\n\n She was five minutes later than usual. She was a regularly a punctual person. Her breakfast was waiting for her – two eggs over-easy, brown toast, bacon, fruit. He had already finished his. He was sipping coffee. He didn’t look up from the newspaper.\n\n She sat down across from him. She placed her jacket on the seat beside her. He put his paper down with one hand and his coffee down with the other. She picked up her fork and pushed a piece of bacon off her eggs. He looked at her. She didn’t look at him.\n\n She ate silently. He watched her eat for only a moment then stared out the window, periodically sipping his coffee. It had gotten cold. He didn’t mind. He never opened his mouth once she arrived. The waitresses were used to it by now. \n\n It was routine. They would wait for him to arrive and serve his regular breakfast with coffee. He always read the morning paper. They would wait ten minutes then prepare her breakfast. It was often ready by the time she arrived. They would wait twenty minutes after she was finished eating to give them their separate bills. They would pay separately, and leave separately. \n\n She finished eating. She looked up at him. He had looked back at her already. She met frozen blue eyes. Sometimes they iced over further and turned grey if she stared long enough. He couldn’t even see the wrinkles in her face. He would always see her skin as plump and young and pretty.\n\n He had grown out a beard over the last few years. It suited him but she sort of missed how he used to look. She almost felt cheated that he looked like a different person. It wasn’t fair for him to disguise himself, but she would always be able to find him in a crowd. \n\n It started to hurt to look at her pained brown eyes. They seemed stained black with time. He wondered if she ever remarried. He doubted it. \n\n Her heart sank when he looked away. She had started these staring contests out of spite. She had wanted to unsettle him. She had been frustrated to find the vow of silence was mutual. Over the years this all had become a gesture of affection for her. She had tried dating but her morning routine would always get in the way. He had never had another woman in his bed since Marjorie.\n\n She studied his face even though he was looking at her hands now. His skin had gone leathery. She had never gotten to know what he had done for work after his time in jail. His hands were always rough and he always looked tired. She wondered if his hands were from labor work. She wondered if his fatigue was from work or from not sleeping well. She couldn’t sleep well since that night.\n\n His coworkers said to drop this routine years ago. Her therapist had said the same. It’s not healthy, they had agreed.\n\n But even in the muted light of a late February morning she was intoxicating. It was liquor in the evening and her in the morning. He could get by this way. She had her hobbies and her job to get her through her days. Every morning she met him there and they did this dance of observations and unspoken memories.\n\n Today was different. She had been thinking about it for months, no, for years. She was stubborn and didn’t want to give him any freedom. At the same time, she had grown to love him. She would never admit that. But she had to acknowledge that despite her aggressive attitude the first morning and all those mornings years afterwards, he kept showing up. He was always there. Forty years.\n\n She reached across the table and took his hand. His back straightened and he looked terrified. She hadn’t ever touched him. She only stared or didn’t stare.\n\n Her hands were soft. Most people’s hands were soft compared to his. She felt how calloused they were and sighed inwardly. Her late husband’s hands had been rough like that.\n\n “I think it’s time we stop this,” she said quietly.\n\n He simply looked at her. She smiled gently. The only time he had ever seen her smile was nearly six years ago when a drunk man had an absurd argument with a waitress right next to him and she had thought it was funny. He had tried hard not to laugh too. He didn’t deserve to laugh.\n\n “I think we should both stop coming here. And I think you should know…” she wasn’t sure if she could finish.\n\n “But the homefries are so good,” he tentatively protested.\n\n She laughed. He liked that. She felt shy then. He noticed.\n\n “I forgive you,” she finished.\n\n “You shouldn’t. You shouldn’t ever forgive me.”\n\n His voice was stern. All conviction with no room for consolation. She flinched and drew her hand away.\n\n “That’s not your choice,” she spat at him.\n\n He wished she had never found him that morning. He wished she hadn’t been able to because he was in jail. He wished he had been punished more severely, that his lawyer hadn’t been so good. He wished he hadn’t started drinking again because if she knew about that, she would probably find some other way to make his life a living hell.\n\n “I lost someone too,” he said, “and I don’t forgive myself. Why should I accept your forgiveness?”\n\n She started putting her plate together, piling her garbage on top. “I won’t be coming back here,” she said.\n\n He watched her put her jacket on. She went to the front counter and payed her bill. She took one last glance back at him. Even with her hair greyed and cut shorter, even with her wrinkles and her colourless clothing and her tired posture, he still saw the same woman from forty years ago. The same tear-stained, maddened woman that found him in a diner five years after a terrible accident. The same woman whose husband he took away from her. The same woman that looked just a bit too much like Marjorie, who was in the passenger seat, who never wore a seat belt. Times were different back then. \n\n He watched her go. He still went to the diner every morning for a few months. He stopped drinking. She never came back.\n", "Forty years I've seen her at this diner, it used to be called Auntie Gemma's back in the day, but the name has changed five times since I started coming here on my way to work, but the food hasn't. Good old Americana, greasy fried eggs, slightly burnt toast with butter, hash browns so good they could make your momma cry. My step is heavier now than it used to be, my breathing a little less even. But this angel at the corner seat, she hasn't changed a bit. \n\nThe first time I saw her, I was afraid to talk to her, so I never did. Always taking the seat at the far end of the diner and admiring the way she sat, her perfect posture and delicate hands. Her smile reminds me of my mother, her eyes remind me of my first love. When she walks past, her perfume lingers in the air and clings to my mind like spiderwebs. Her hair never had a strand out of place. She always greeted me with a smile, she greeted everyone with a smile. Some of the younger men would pluck up the courage to sidle up to her table with a wink and a flirtatious joke, sometimes she smiled back... most times she didn't. There was a coldness to her then, like the sun had gone out and winter had come crashing through the door, and all but the bravest (or most stubborn) ignored the warning. I guess they got embarassed by her rejection because I never saw them again.\n\nForty years I've watched her, and sometimes the diner would be full, the only seats available being close enough to her that I could hear her nails click against her cup of coffee. Black. Sweet. Always the same thing and the first time I actually heard her order I thought I would pass out for joy. Her voice is husky in the way of the lounge singers of old. Molasses, whiskey, and cigars. Dark and rich and... sad.\n\nShe's always here before me, always sitting in the same place and still there when I leave for work, a few blocks away. I imagine that maybe she is one of those singers you hear about, married only to the stage, crooning her siren song to her regulars night after night. Damned if I didn't try and find out where she worked when I was a young man, the urge to seek her out ebbing and flowing over the decades as two marriages that didn't work out and three kids who barely knew me filled my thoughts and time. And work. Always there was work. Speaking of... I'll be late if I don't hurry. Three years to retirement. Three more years. And then? Maybe i'd just come and sit here. Sit here and watch her. \n\nI drain the dregs of my coffee and the scent of her perfume wafts over me, a delicate hand waiting for mine as I set my cup down.\n\n\"Hello James,\" her smile looks sad, her eyes tender.\n\n\"Uh... hi.\"\n\n\"I know you're in a hurry,\" she says with a voice that makes my heart thud in my chest in a way I didn't think it could any more.\n\n\"Y...yeah. I'm running late to work.\" I'm sweating like a teenager and I feel slightly numb.\n\n\"Not today,\" she says as she lets go of my hand and the world goes dark.\n\n((Be gentle, it's my first time!))", "Forty years ago, my husband was made into the first Example.\n\nAt first, we did not take the Baron's Laws seriously. The Baron commanded that his voice would be the only voice, and his words would be the only words. My husband spoke out. He thanked the Baron for taking us in, when the Earth was dying, but he refused to obey the Law of Silence. The Baron sent his machines to take my husband, and hoist him by his neck over the Central Square.\n\nIt was not a quick death.\n\nThere was no defiance, because there were no weapons. Yes, there were tools that would work against flesh and blood, but the Baron was protected by none of these things. He lived, alone, in a dome above the Central Square, protected by the same machines that destroyed Earth.\n\nOnce a year, he selects makes a new Example. \n\nOnce a year, we avoid each other. We don't look at each other. Station 1445 is especially grim in those days.\n\nBut this year, it was different.\n\nThere is a man, I suppose we are the same age, who sits across from me at every breakfast. Many decades ago I did not welcome his presence. After the death of my husband I wanted to be alone, but he persisted, for months, and years. He seemed harmless, like a bird that would fly away at the slightest sound. \n\nI don't know his real name, but in my head, I call him David. He has the right kind of face for a David. For the last forty years, give or take a few days for personal health, David has sat at my table.\n\nIt was two mornings before the Example. I remember it well, because I had a feeling in my stomach. I had a feeling* that I would be chosen this year.\n\nI was sitting at my usual table, and I remember I was stroking my hand around my neck, trying to imagine what it would feel like to have that polytensine rope press against my esophagus. My tea was no longer steaming, and my eggs looked like the scrambled insides of a slaughtered animal.\n\nAnd David? David was nowhere in sight.\n\nEven by the time I had finished picking at my toast, he hadn't shown up. Yesterday, he seemed healthy, so I doubted he was ill.\n\nIt wasn't as though I had feelings for him, but I did feel something like worry. If anything, he was a state of normalcy, and right now, before the Example, I needed normalcy more than anything.\n\nThe bell signaled the end of breakfast, so I picked up my tray, and carried it over to the cleaning racks. I don't know why I stopped, but I did. I guess I was used to carrying my tray with David at my side. I just... I couldn't do it alone.\n\nI let the others pass by me in a stream of pastel-colored scrubs, blank t-shirts, and sweat pants. I stood there, until the last gaggle of silent pairs passed by me.\n\nI don't know what I expected to see, but I had the urge to look back at the empty Cafeteria.\n\nAnd there he was.\n\nHe smiled at me, his glasses winking in the light. My heart nearly skipped a beat. I dropped my trey on the ground, and raced over to him.\n\nThere was something ragged about his appearance, I noted as I sat down opposite him. His charcoal black hair, usually so perfectly kept, was sticking out at odd angles. His glasses were smudged with ... was that dirt? And there were tiny red cuts all over his arms and neck.\n\nI couldn't help myself. I reached out a hand, and dabbed at one of the cuts with my finger, pressing against his skin as if my will alone could heal his superficial wounds. \n\nI half expected him to pull away. I've learned a lot about David from eating with him every morning. He's kind, and sweet, and shy. He loves to share his food, especially with me. I always imagined he was the kind of person who enjoyed living in the quiet world of Station 1445 - I suppose he wouldn't talk much, even if he could.\n\nBut when he grabbed my hand, and looked me in the eyes, I knew something had changed.\n\nI knew something was wrong.\n\n\"I have to tell you something,\" his voice was soft, and unsteady from disuse.\n\nI gasped at the sound of his voice. My heart pounded in my ears, and I whipped my head around to make sure nobody was listening.\n\nHe grabbed my hand harder, \"Look at me. I have to tell you something.\"\n\nWith my mouth hanging open, I nodded for him to continue. His was the first voice, other than the Baron's, that I had heard in more than thirty years. Perhaps I was only intoxicated by the sound of a human voice, but in that moment, he shone with a aura as bright as the Sun.\n\n\"I've been chosen.\"\n\nI could feel the blood drain from my face. I shook my head, slowly, from side to side.\n\n\"But I'm going to do something about that. I'm going to fight back. Will you help me?\"\n\nMy head was spinning, and my heart was beating in my throat, but my thoughts latched onto the clarity - and the beauty - of his voice.\n\nI swallowed. \n\nMy own voice was as soft as an Earth mouse, \"Okay.\"\n\n**\n[Part 2](https://www.reddit.com/r/PSHoffman/comments/40ss1d/silent_station/cyx9jzj)\n\n[Part 3](https://www.reddit.com/r/PSHoffman/comments/40ss1d/silent_station/cyxjfrh)\n\nSubscribe to /r/PSHoffman for more light Sci Fi.\n ", "\"Man from Spazzino is how we call him,\" the old man by the front door said, his voice wrapped in a singing Italian \naccent. \"Always the same table. Always the same lady in front of him.\"\n\nSue nodded, looking through the window inside the restaurant. It was empty but for a few tables. Couples, a \nfamily, friends… and the last table to the left. The man had his back to the window, so that Sue could only see the \nback of his head. His hair was grey and thin -- an old man's hair. The woman in front of him was a brunette. \nThin traces. Small nose. Younger. Much younger.\n\nSue couldn't see it, but she knew the eyes were bright green.\n\n\"Man from Spazzino because he eats here every day. At this restaurant. It's called –\"\n\n\"Spazzino,\" Sue replied. \"I get it.\"\n\nThe back of the man's head moved up and down, like he was talking excitedly. The woman stared in complete \nsilence. Motionless.\n\n\"For forty years, he comes with her,\" the old man continued. \"I live across the street, and my brother owns the restaurant, so I know. Forty years he comes and eats with her. Talks about his life. Talks about his job. He's a very successful…. what do you call? Business man. Stock broker man. Well, was. Now he's retired, we think.\"\n\nSue swallowed dry. By the bounce of his head, the man was still talking. The woman didn't move.\n\n\"Talks a lot, the Man from Spazzino. He's famous around town. A lot of people don't like him. Think he's gross.\"\n\n\"What do they call the woman?\" Sue asked, all of a sudden.\n\n\"We don't have a name for her, obviously. She never says anything.\" The old man took a step closer to Sue, \nnarrowing his eyes. \"You look a bit like her, you know that? Well, a little older of course.\"\n\nSue looked down. The man seemed to regret saying this. \"I didn't mean to offend. You are a very gracious –\"\n\n\"Not offended,\" Sue replied. She sighed, then looked up and around.\n\nSausalito looked different, but less so than she would expect. It had been forty years since she had been there, so of course things were different. New houses. New streets. New people. That she expected.\n\nYet the feel. The small fisherman's village feel. The air like you could breathe in stories of taverns and tales of the \nhigh seas. The cold air like open ocean storms, the smell like time standing still on a pirate story.\n\nThat feel of soft rain falling on cobblestone narrow streets that makes you think of childrens book illustrations. \n\nThat* was still the same.\n\n\"Are you coming in?\" the man asked. \"My brother, he can set you up with a table if you –\"\n\n\"I have a table,\" Sue replied, walking in.\n\nShe crossed past the family and the couples and the empty tables. The Man from Spazzino – Edgar – was in the \nbathroom.\n\nSue stopped in front of the lady across the table. The eyes really were green. Like hers.\n\n\"They call them hyper-realistic sex dolls.\" The Italian man had followed her inside, and spoke in a whisper, like he was ashamed. \"I don't know that he uses it for that, but –\"\n\n\"Could you give us a second, please?\" Sue forced a smile. The man bowed, then turned around and left her alone.\n\nCarefully, Sue took the doll in her hands and pulled it from the chair, placing it by the window near the table. She \ntook the doll's place on the chair and waited.\n\nEdgar returned not thirty seconds later. Looking down, he pulled his own chair and spoke as he sat. \"—and they \nwant me to –\"\n\nHe stopped, eyes frozen on Sue, ass halfway to the chair. Hand on the table, halfway to his wine.\n\nSue rested her hand on his. In slow motion, Edgar sat.\n\nIt wasn't just the back of his head. His face was old too. Wrinkled. Veiny.\n\nHe was an old man.\n\nBut then again Sue was an old woman.\n\nEdgar looked from her to the doll. \"You know, I don't use her for –\"\n\n\"I know you don't,\" Sue replied, quietly.\n\nEdgar sighed. His breathing was shallow. Shaky. Sue tried to pull her hand away, but he held her.\n\n\"I said I'd have this date with you every day for the –\"\n\n\"I remember.\"\n\nThe promise. Edgar wore a beret, it was that long ago. They had met in San Francisco, and they did end the night at Spazzino, and it was a great time. They spent the whole day walking through Sausalito and then dined at Spazzino. A great time. And then, only then at the very end, did Sue tell him she didn't live in San Francisco. She didn't even live in America. She was there because her father had business in California, and she'd be returning to Paris in two days.\n\nAnd across that very table, Edgar had looked her in the eye and said that --\n\n\"—I'd have this date with you. That if I could choose any life, anything, I'd live this day over and over again for the \nrest of my life.\"\n\nSue tried pulling her hand a little harder. Edgar kept his stand, his hand firmly over hers. \"And I live to that promise. Every day. And I haven't yet regretted it.\"\n\nThey had gone fishing, that day. And hiking too. They had kissed under trees and driven through the city with no \ndestination, and talked about love and life and the death of the universe. It was a summer love like no other.\n\nEdgar pressed harder. His eyes were red, and Sue's fingers were growing white. \"I'm not a creep,\" he said, his voice failing. \"I know what people around town say about me. But I'm not a creep.\"\n\n\"Your hurting my hand, Edgar,\" Sue replied.\n\nShe was in Sausalito with her husband and their grandkids. A family trip. She didn't even remember Spazzino until she went past it.\n\n\"I'm not a weirdo,\" Edgar continued. His long, dirty nails were piercing through Sue's skin over her wrist. \"I just never found anything else worth living for. Is that weird?\"\n\nFrom under the window, sitting perfectly still against the wall, 19 year-old Sue watched them in glassy-eyed silence.\n\nSue pulled hard, and this time her hand came out. \"I don't think you're a creep, Edgar,\" she lied. \n\nHe used to be beautiful. He used to be charming. He called her 'kiddo'. Once upon a time.\n\n\"Yes, you do,\" he said, and there were no more tears in his eyes. \"You think I'm a creep. But that's ok.\"\n\n\"I have to go.\"\n\n\"You didn't once. And I have that.\"\n\nHe glimpsed at the doll. Sue felt the hair on her neck rise in a mix of repulsion and pity. \"It was… it was good \nseeing you, Edgar. Take care.\"\n\n\"You had fun, that day. Right?\" Edgar asked, as she went past him. Sue stopped.\n\n\"You were happy. You liked me. Right? At least that day.\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\nShe didn't see it, but she heard the sigh. The relief. As she crossed to the outside of the restaurant, she risked one last glimpse through the window.\n\nEdgar was grabbing the doll back on its feet. He brushed her hair, smiled as he said something in her ear. The Man From Spazzino put Sue back on her chair and sat across, smile on his face, serving the wine for two.\n\n____________________\n\nThanks for reading! For more (less depressing, I promise) stories, check out /r/psycho_alpaca =)\n", "Al's Diner hasn't changed a bit since the 1970s. It still has the same black and white squares of tile. The booths still have the same red faux-leather covering. The same lamps still hang over every booth. And the menu hasn't changed either: waffles and bacon and eggs for breakfast, burgers and fries and shakes for dinner. Old Al can still be found behind the grill at all hours, ready with a cheerful hello for all the regulars. \n\nAnnie and Jack are the most regular of all regulars. Annie orders oatmeal and toast with apple juice every morning, and Al still makes a pot of it even though she's the only one who ever actually orders it. Sometimes Al will even get some fresh berries at the market for her, when they're on sale. Jack, on the other hand, is more traditional: bacon, eggs, and grits. And black coffee, of course. On Sundays, in place of the bacon he orders a 9 oz steak, done medium well. He wears a suit and tie to breakfast every day, even though it's been at least a decade since his last day on the job. They come in every morning at 8, sit at the same booth, eat their meals in silence, and then go back home. It isn't a cold, hostile silence though: it's the silence of comfort. Everything that needed to be said between them was said long ago.\n\nBut sometimes change happens whether you want it or not. Those red booth seats are now peeling and scratched from decades of use, with little bits of scratchy fabric poking through the holes. The white and black tiles by the door have all been worn down to a dull grey, as though years of use caused them to just melt together. Dust covers the tops of the lamps, too high for Al to dust off now that his back gave out a few years ago. The cheerful text painted on the window is now so faded that the word 'Diner' is barely legible. Prices, of course, have gone up too: a fifty cent burger is no longer feasible anymore. Al tells everyone that he plans to make some changes soon: gonna update that interior to make it nice and modern. Gonna repaint that window sign. Gonna finally take down that \"25 cent Coca Cola\" advertisement that's been hanging there for who knows how long.\n\nAnnie and Jack have changed too. Jack's glasses appeared sometime in the early 90's and have only gotten thicker and thicker since. The once-tall 6-foot-1 man is now hunched and hobbled, requiring a cane to get around. Annie is still wearing the same floral dresses, but they seem to hang from her shoulders now as she's gotten thinner and thinner. Her once creamy skin is now sunspotted and wrinkled, and her hands shake whenever she lifts her spoon into the bowl. The bottle of oxygen that she wheels behind her is new too, as are the clear plastic pipes running up her back and into her nose.\n\nAnnie and Jack entered the diner and took their usual seats at the usual booth at the usual time. Al had their meals all ready to go, and shuffled over with Annie's bowl first; there were fresh strawberries for her today. The waitress no longer came in for the mornings: not enough business. But Al could handle the cooking and the serving; it would just take a little longer. Annie and Jack were in no rush anyway. He placed the bowl in front of her, and she responded with a soft, frail, \"Thank you, Al.\" He returned to the counter for Jack's eggs, and on his way back, he noticed something peculiar: they were holding hands. In all those years, he couldn't remember ever seeing that happen. \"Well, I'll be damned,\" he whispered under his breath. But he served Jack his breakfast as usual and went back to behind the counter to begin prepping for lunch. After the usual amount of time, the old couple left their booth and waved goodbye to Al as he was chopping tomatoes. Right on schedule. \n\nAs he cleared the booth, he noticed something else unusual: Annie hadn't eaten her oatmeal. Or even the strawberries. He made a note to ask her tomorrow if something was wrong. Who knows: maybe she'd actually wanted to order something different! Stranger things had happened, right?\n\nThe bell hanging over the door tinkled at 8 AM, right on schedule. Al shuffled out of the backroom, remembering to check with Annie about her breakfast. But today was also different: Jack was alone. \n\nThere were tears in his eyes as he told Al he'd still like to order a bowl of oatmeal and a glass of apple juice for her. \n\n----\n\nIf you liked the story, I hope you'll read some more in /r/Luna_Lovewell!" ]	23
	[WP] Write from a pet's point of view; escaping from being an indoor pet.	[ "I think I have it all worked out. The only ways out are the loud large metal door by the car-ride object, the opening section of the fence in the exercise area, and the door where the male overlord comes into the prison after being wherever he goes in the mornings. The problems I face are such: Male Overlord guards the door when he enters, blocking my way out and closing the door behind him; The loud metal door is in a room where the door is never open; so the only logical escape route must go through, or perhaps under, the fence in the exercise area.\n\nThe exercise periods are pretty routine, coming about a half hour after mealtime and once for a period of about a half hour during the afternoon. I am often supervised during these periods, however I believe they are merely checking to ensure my urination and deification is done in my own exercise area and not inside the prison. In short, I'll have a half hour a day to tunnel under the fence, preferably near the opening.\n\nAssets: \n1.) My natural digging ability, seriously I'm really good at it.\n2.) I've established a good rapport with my wardens and they seem to favor me.\n3.) 30 minutes unsupervised a day of yard time should get me out within the week.\n\nProblems:\n1.) They may notice the displacing of the dirt. I'll have to find a way to conceal the growing hole. Perhaps placing my ball over it.\n2.) Dirty paws, they will certainly notice my dirty paws when I re-enter the prison and cause a mess. This will also detract from my efforts in the building of goodwill and rapport.\n3.) The others are not to be trusted. My other canine cellmate is a sap and may turn me in for an extra biscuit after dinner. The feline is an unknown, but she is always watching and could be a warden spy, best to not trust.\n\nI am now returning to this journal after a day in solitary. My initial efforts were thwarted, by my cellmate. He attempted to convince me to stay for the belly rubs, however his voice was at an unnaturally loud volume and drew the attention of the woman warden. She grabbed me and called me a \"bad dog\" and placed me in solitary confinement. My cellmate must be eliminated, perhaps I shall consult the feline on this matter.", "6:58 AM\n\nAny minute now she would be opening the door to leave for work just like every other weekday. Little does she know that this time, I'm ready. I prep myself by taking a position slightly near the door, yet still far enough away that she will not suspect a thing as she slips her bag on to her shoulder.\n\nShe grabs her coffee and takes a long sip before beginning to move towards the door. All of my muscles are tense now.\n\n7:00 AM\n\n\"Have a nice day Alfie, i'll be home later,\" She called back into her room. She assumed I was still there. Good. I hear her foot steps as she approaches, she was wearing the black shoes, the ones that she caught me chewing on a few weeks ago. That was a long night to spend in The Cage. \n\nHer foot steps grow ever more thunderous as she draws nearer and nearer. I can feel my tail wagging and my mouth hanging ajar as my body fights for me to leap ahead and escape. However, I've made this mistake to many times. I must be patient.\n\n7:01 AM\n\nFinally, she enters my line of sight. I remain hidden as she reaches for the doorknob in preparation to open the gateway to my soon-to-be freedom, I can finally relinquish my self of this torment! I smell the hazelnut creamer she puts in her coffee every morning as she turns the knob. Slowly...\n\nI spring into action as she opens the door, it's just enough for me to squeeze through as she gasps in surprise. I don't stop. \n\n\"This is it,\" I think, \"I'm finally free\"\n\nI bolt between her legs, too fast for her to react and I'm home free! It's just a small distance to go and i'm running at top speed, I'm doing it!\n\nOr so I thought.\n\n7:02 AM\n\nMy head hurts, but she pats me and pets me scolding me for yet another failed escape attempt. She puts her coffee down and carries me back into her room where I am doomed to remain until her arrival back to this prison. Another failed attempt.\n\n\"Tomorrow for sure,\" I think as I rest my head on my paws\n\nNote to self, just remember to wait for the screen door next time.\n" ]	2
	[WP] As you gaze at Earths beauty from the ISS, it suddenly disappears.	[ "It was my second time on the ISS and it's as amazing as it was the first time. Being in space with no gravity holding you down, it's such a surreal experience that I don't believe anyone could ever get used to it, and the the Earth, god its magnificent such a beautiful scenery. The light, the dark that is the ocean, the never ending space surrounding it, the bright star that is our sun a bit further from the Earth. wait, what, Where is it? I was just looking at it. It's supposed to be right there, I was just looking at it. I quickly call out to Kyle to came and see this and tell him to look to the Earth. 'I swear to god Rick if this is another of your stupid pranks I'm gon-. Silence fell over us. Where is it? Where is our planet? Its supposed to be right there. But it's not there anymore. All thats left is the endless dark matter that's all over the universe. In it all the only ones left are two guys, needles to say; it's gonna be a pain in the ass.", "It was after a round of maintenance on the ship when it happened.\n\nI'd just come back from a space-walk to fix the 'Dark-Matter Detector Thingy', as I called it. The thing needed constant maintenance and attention, it needed 4 maintenance drives a fortnight. It was about time to get rest, when I stopped and looked out the porthole which saw Earth around this time. While the constant attention needed was annoying, the view was amazing.\n\nWhen it suddenly wasn't.\n\nI pissed myself. Where was it? Where did it go? I launched myself to another window, gone there, too. Another. Still gone.\n\nIvan called out to me, asking what was wrong.\n\n\"Look at Earth.\"\n\nHe balked momentarily, before moving to the window.\n\n\"We're on the wrong side of the ship,\" he said, plainly. He began moving back before I stopped him.\n\n\"Look out any window.\"\n\nHe moved to the next window. Then to the next. Then the next.\n\n\"Oh. Oh.\"", "I floated around, intently looking for the tube of whatever the hell it was that we called food. The silence around me was peaceful, up here is the calmest that I have ever been. \n\nFloating over towards the window, I spotted the most magnificent site in the whole solar system, that big blue marble called Earth. I could never forget that beautiful view, it was breathtaking. Sadly however, it was time for me to go.\n\nI took one last look before closing my eyes, and removing my helmet.\n\n> Jimmy its dinner time! \n\nMy mom shouted, I reached over and turned off the VR helmet, but I couldnt stop thinking to myself, how could we have been so irresponsible and stupid to let ourselves destroy something so beautiful.", "I've never felt so far from home. We're in low orbit, so it's not as far as many people think. The Earth fills half of the window. A giant sea with a round horizon line. A blue hill with the gentlest of slopes.\n\nMy poetic thought is interrupted by a crackling on the radio. I glance at it, expecting a transmission, but none comes.\n\nI turn back to the Earth. I have only a moment to drink in her beauty, and then she's gone. It takes long moments for my mind to catch up with my eyes.\n\nThere's no explosion. No sound. No debris. It hasn't moved. It's just... gone. Winked out of existence. There one moment, and now...\n\nI dive for the radio. Attempts to page the planet are unsuccessful. No response from NASA, JAXA, the CSA. I keep trying, with no response.\n\n\"Commander Ivanov,\" I call out. \"Commander!\"\n\nIt is hard to keep the edge of panic from my voice. Within minutes we are all gathered, staring out at the empty sky. \n\nRedundancy is important. We've just been restocked and know exactly what we have as far as supplies. Still, an inventory must be done. We have enough food to last the six of us several months. A year, if we ration. \n\nAir and water are recycled, down to the last drops of sweat and urine. But we do need some fresh water. And food.\n\n\"We're going to die out here,\" I whisper. \n\nIvanov glares me down. We don't panic. I understand without a word.\n\nSolar charged batteries last over six years. They were replaced a year ago. Five years of electrical power. Plenty of time to rig another way to store the power from the solar panels.\n\nWe have labs. Many of the modules are unnecessary for survival. We can grow food. We're taking inventory and making plans when the radio crackles again.\n\nWe look out and see the most beautiful sight anyone has ever seen. The Earth is back.\n\n\"...ISS...\" someone is calling on the radio. \n\nCommander Ivanov responds. Once the initial responses are covered, Ivanov opens his mouth to ask what happened.\n\nFrom the other end, the voice breaks protocol. \"Jesus,\" he says. \"We thought something happened to you guys. Where the hell did you go?\"\n\nWe all laugh. Maybe we are a little hysterical. Maybe we are just relieved.\n\nThe radio crackles, and our laughter fades as once again, the Earth vanishes.\n" ]	4
	[WP] While dozing by the fire in your isolated winter cabin, you hear a firm knock on the front door. It's 3 am, blizzard conditions have closed all surrounding roads, and the nearest neighbor is miles away.	[ "“Dear June, the summer was amazing! I wish you could’ve been here to see it. I spent a lot of time making improvements to my little home here. I carved a stool from a spruce tree that fell last year while we built this cabin, remember that? It scared the shit out of us” He chuckled to himself as he wrote, firelight shimmering in his eyes as tears started to well.\n \n“You said to me, ‘David! Why on earth would you want to live out here when things actually go ‘boom’ in the night?’ and of course I answered you like I always did, ‘because we’re free out here babe.’ Anyway, you’d be happy to know that I’ve done something productive with that fallen tree other then use it for fire wood. The summer was great, you would’ve loved it. Winter is here now though. The radio says this is one of the largest storms they’ve seen in years so it looks like i’ll be hunkering down for awhile. It’s so warm and cozy in here that I don’t really mind. I’m well provisioned, fat and happy. There’s no one around for miles so I know I’ll be left alone too, which is nice. It would be better with you here of course…” his eyes flooded over and tears fell on the page. “I miss you so much, June.” \n\nTears speckled the letter as he folded it into a small square. \n\nHe pushed himself away from his desk and over to the fire place mantle where a plain brushed steal vase sat. Next to it was a framed photo of a young beautiful girl with dirty blond hair and a mischievous smile. \n\nHe kissed his index finger and touched the glass of the frame and put the letter in a jar next to the urn, one filled with small paper squares. \n\nSleep didn’t come easy, it was spiteful and restless. Filled with aching memories. But when it did come, it was a black, empty kind of sleep. \n\nHazily he awoke, a rasping knock in the distance. “Hold on, Hold on.” he said still half asleep. “I’m coming, hold your horses.” He threw the covers off his bed and cold air bit at his skin. The fire was out. In his boxers he hugged himself and shivered, groggily shuffling his feet to grab his coat. He grabbed it off the arm of his desk chair and wrapped himself in it. \n\nHe felt no warmth from the jacket, a colder shiver ran down his spine as he slowly awoke from his stupor. “What the fuck…” he whispered as reality set in. Adrenaline burned his chest, and he looked up at the door. Breathless seconds passed as stared unblinking the door knob. Nothing. Slowly, he stepped his bare right leg forward a step, then his left. The floor creaked beneath him as he snuck forward. \n\n“KNOCK, KNOCK…KNOCK.” Came from the door, louder and more persistent then before. His heart was in his chest, pure cold fear burning his face. “Who…who are you? What do you want?” he said, voice shaking. Silence pushed against his ears, heart slamming his chest. \n\nInch by inch he got closer to the door, until he could feel the cold air coming from under the seal, freezing his toes. “Fuck this.” he said. He grabbed the frigid handle, twisted and pulled. Vicious wind and snow blew in, his jacket blowing open. He squinted his eyes trying to see through the snow and night. There, sitting on his small deck was a broken half of a fallen tree, it’s branch jagged and pointing at him. The wind gusted again and the log rolled, pushing the branch at him, like it was pointing at something. “God damn it,” he laughed nervously to himself. He broke the branch that had been hitting the door and threw it in the wind. “I’ll take care of you when this wind dies down.” He told the fallen tree. \n\nHe shut and latched the door and his heart stopped, fiery adrenaline spread across his chest as he felt an icy kiss on his neck. He froze, utterly and entirely, not breathing. He listened and heard nothing. Feeling stupid and thinking to himself that it must’ve just been snow that had fallen from his hair when he closed the door he gained courage and slowly turned around. His eyes looked at the floor then moved up, scanning his small cabin. In the shadow by his desk something caught his eye, he squinted and leaned forward. \n\nThen he saw her. \n\nedit: words. Critiques welcome.", "It is foolish to sleep during the winter nights. I knew that, of course I knew that. My father had made sure I knew, before he ever let me come with him to the Outpost. Had made me train, days and weeks at a time, until he trusted my vigilance. All it takes is one moment. \n\nOne moment. That’s all it took. \n\nI should not have been there, that night. It should have been my son, or my daughter, young and bright and ready to take over the Vigil. But there was only me. They are dead, and I am old. Old, and tired, with aching bones and a haze of cataracts that turns with world misty.\n\nFor three days, snow had fallen with the steady persistence of despair. Tonight, the wind had picked up, whistling around the cabin and rattling at the bars over the windows. I sat in front of the fire, wrapped in a heavy wool blanket, and as the old grandfather clock in the corner ticked past midnight, I dozed.\n\nI am so sorry. I never meant to fall asleep. \n\nThe knocking startled me awake. My heart pounded inside my fragile ribs, and the frisson of fear turned my vision black for a moment. I knew what I had done.\n\nThe knock came again. \n\nI had no hope that it was a person, a visitor or a lost traveler. No one could travel in those conditions, even if anyone ever came within twenty miles of the Outpost. No one did. \n\nI stood slowly, letting the blanket fall to the floor. The knocking continued, sets of three perfectly spaced, perfectly even, ever the same. \n\nI walked to the door. I could not have hurried, even if the numbness that had settled in around the fear were not dragging on me like lead weights. It had been a decade since I had been able to run. Still, I stopped in front of the fire, and took down the sword from its hooks above the mantel. \n\nThe firelight flashed off the blade in sparks of red. My arms trembled as I took it down. I couldn’t carry the weight, and so I used it as a cane as I stumped to the door.\n\nThe thing kept knocking. \n\nWhen I opened the door, cold wind blasted into the room, flinging flakes of ice into my face. Squinting, I tried to make out the shape through my blurry vision and the darting, dancing snow. I saw it as a smear, a darkness with too many limbs and a single burning eye. \n\nYou know I didn’t kill it. You know because it tore the cabin apart and headed south, and your family is dead and your friends and I don’t know how you survived. Perhaps you are surprised it didn’t kill me. It should have. \n\nI tried to swing the sword, but it was already too late. From the time I fell asleep, it was too late.\n\nI’m sorry. You are right to blame me. The rage in your eyes is justified. But wait — wait. Before you kill me. The sword. You need the sword.\n\nIt is somewhere north, near the ruins of the Outpost. And when you find it, remember —\n\nDon’t sleep. ", "Thinking of Mr Poe\n\nThere I slumbered by the fire, \nOutside winds were blowing dire, \nA knock awoke me, so I query, \n\"Who is that? I'm very weary\" \n&nbsp; \nNo reply came back to me, \nAnd so I let the knocking be, \nPretending to be quite unfazed, \nAnd deep into the fire I gazed. \n&nbsp; \nThen it came again quite loud, \nFull of fear, but not yet cowed, \nMoving back, I cried our bravely, \n\"Who is knocking, oh so gravely?\" \n&nbsp; \nNo neighbor or friend was expected, \nSo it was that I suspected, \nA stranger knocking at my door, \nCaught out in this long downpour. \n&nbsp; \nFeeling I should show compassion, \nI opened up with face quite ashen, \nThe fear had made me start to shake, \nAt the risk I now did take. \n&nbsp; \nOutside there was nothing there, \nBut a branch that was stripped bare, \nHitting at my door quite lightly, \nTapping gently and politely. \n&nbsp; \nWith a laugh I pulled it free, \nAnd set it down with gaiety, \nMy fears had been imagination, \nI closed the door with some elation. \n&nbsp; \nI sat and felt myself grow weary, \nFear all gone my eyes were bleary, \nWhen again the knocking boom, \nBut this time from my own bedroom. \n", "Something yanks me out of sleep. I blink. Where the hell am I? Right, I'm on the couch. I glance to the fireplace to see that the fire has died down, and here I am, in my pajamas and a light robe with no blanket to speak of to keep me warm. I curl up and try to get comfortable again. Part of me reasons that I should go to bed, but right now the couch below me is just warm enough from my body heat, and I don't want to move.\n\nKnock knock knock.\n\nI twitch out of the clutches of sleep. Who's knocking? I sit up on the couch and look to the front door, wondering if I hallucinated the noise. There's no one here, not within miles. It must have been something I dreamed up while falling asleep.\n\nKnock knock knock.\n\nNope, that was real. That was definitely real. My chest clenches up. Who is it? No one should be out here. I stand up and shuffle to the front door, adjusting my robe more tightly around me. I take a deep breath and open the door.\n\nA young man stands there, roughly college-aged. He looks perfectly ordinary, wearing a gray hoodie and plain jeans, but the way he hugs himself betrays that the hoodie is too thin for the weather. His tracks off into the distance are the only thing marring the snow's freshest coat over the ground.\n\nHis face lights up when he sees me. \"Mr. Hanson, sir!\" he says. \"Sorry to bother you. May I come in?\"\n\nSo he knows my name, and he looks to be an ill-prepared type. A fan? Then I'd like to know how the hell he found this address. \"Do you know what time it is?\" I say. I probably could have thought of something more polite, but I'm not sure how much I care.\n\n\"Midnight, January 4th, 2013,\" he recites immediately. Then he flinches. \"I mean, uh, last I checked. I got lost for a while.\" He shivers against the cold.\n\nOkay, reciting the date was weird, but now I'm more concerned that someone's been out in the snow looking for me for three hours straight. Crazy fan or not, I don't want this guy to die of hypothermia, so I step out of the way and wave him inside. \"Come on in. Don't want you to freeze on me.\"\n\nHe nods his thanks and steps inside. After he stomps the snow and dirt off his sneakers, I invite him to sit on the couch while I go put a kettle on the stove. When I return to the living room, he is perched attentively on one end of the couch, as if afraid to relax. Huh. \n\nIn any event, I sit down on the opposite end. \"So, dare I ask how you found out where I live?\" I ask.\n\nHe fidgets. \"It's a long story.\"\n\nI frown at him. \"You're not going to tell me? No one's supposed to know the location of this cabin, except for the person I bought it from. Don't tell me he leaked the address.\"\n\nThe stranger puts up his hands. \"No, no, nothing like that! It's just…\" He tries for another second to explain himself, but then he sighs and gives up. \"Let's just put it this way. No one knows where this place is right now except me. You have nothing to worry about, I promise.\"\n\nMy brow furrows. The only way that sentence makes any sense is if this guy went and spoke to the previous owner personally, and that just raises the question of how he figured out who the previous owner was. I shake my head to clear it. Chasing these thoughts won't bring me anywhere. \"Fine, forget it. I trust you.\" Not really, but it seems like the friendlier thing to say. I straighten up and look him in the eyes. His face looks familiar somehow, but I can't place it. \"What's your name, son?\"\n\nA smile splashes across the young man's face. \"Jeremy, sir. Jeremy Gr--\" he falters \"--I mean, just Jeremy.\"\n\nRegardless of the mental process behind the censoring of his last name, I chuckle before I can help it. \"Pleasure to meet you, Jeremy.\" I offer him my hand, and he shakes it enthusiastically. \"And I'm R.J. Hanson, but you knew that already.\"\n\nJeremy laughs. There's a nervous note to his laugh, but that's to be expected. \"Yes, sir. I'm a big fan of your work.\"\n\n\"I deduced that.\"\n\n\"Heh. I really like Keen, personally. It's my favorite of your books. Seamus really spoke to me as a character.\"\n\nThat's surprising. I don't consider Keen one of my best works, nor did I expect someone's favorite character to be a minor one, especially a tragic figure. The fact that Jeremy identified with poor Seamus intrigues me. \"Do you relate to him? That's good. I'm glad I wrote him well.\"\n\nSomething flashes across Jeremy's face. For just a moment, he looks pained, but it's gone in a second, replaced by his eager smile once more. \"Ha, you wrote the whole book well! Don't discount yourself!\"\n\n\"Perhaps well enough for you, which is good. But every book is a learning experience. I have no problem with accepting that my writing was poorer in my earlier years than it is now.\"\n\nJeremy nods in understanding. \"Right. And it'll keep improving.\"\n\nI chuckle. \"I hope so.\"\n\n\"It will.\" \n\nA moment of silence passes. Apparently neither of us know how to continue, but then I hear the whistle of the kettle from the kitchen. \"Excuse me,\" I say as I stand up. \"What would you like? Coffee, normal or decaf? Black tea? Herbal tea?\"\n\n\"Uh, decaf, please.\"\n\nI nod. \"Cream and sugar?\"\n\n\"Black is fine.\"\n\nHa, a man after my own heart. I head to the kitchen. It only takes a minute to prepare two mugs of black decaf coffee and bring them out to the living room. Jeremy takes his with a thank you. The reprieve has given me some time to prepare a new point of conversation. \"So what brings you out here? Hunting for an autograph?\"\n\nHe shakes his head. \"No, I just wanted to meet you. I've wanted to meet you for a long time.\"\n\nI smile around my current sip of coffee. \"I'm flattered,\" I say. \"How long is a long time? Here I didn't think many people cared about my work until Daughters of Lilith got press.\" That was two years ago, my next book after I finished Keen. From what Jeremy has said so far, I reason that he learned about me even earlier than that, perhaps through a friend's recommendation. I feel honored that someone liked my early work enough to recommend me.\n\nHe opens his mouth, but then he closes it and is quiet for a second. \"A while,\" he says after a moment, dodging my question. \"First thing I read by you was Chains and Candles.\"\n\nOh, goodness, Chains and Candles? I'm ashamed of that one! It reads like the high school fic it is. But I keep quiet.\n\nPresently Jeremy seems to think of something else as he sips his coffee. \"Oh, I want to ask, if it's okay,\" he begins, \"how is Heofon coming along?\"\n\nI freeze. Something cold curdles in my gut. Who is this man? Heofon is a draft three months in the making, completely unannounced to the public. Unless I made a drunk tweet I don't remember, but surely I'd have caught wind of it by now. I wonder again just how Jeremy has been getting information about me. I'm positive I haven't told the old homeowner of my manuscript. What reason would I have to do that?\n\nJeremy seems to have tensed up. He knows he asked something bad. I can see it in his eyes. \"I mean, uh, never mind,\" he says with a dismissive wave. \"Forget it.\"\n\n\"Who told you I'm working on a new book?\" I ask, narrowing my eyes at him. My fingers tighten around my mug.\n\nHe's cringing in his seat by now. \"M-Martha Grenning,\" he stammers. \"Your editor. Right? I talked to her.\"\n\nI relax, but more out of shock than relief. Martha? I don't remember telling her the name of my new project, but if I did, she should know better than to reveal that kind of information without consulting me, especially to some random kid on the street! I release a heavy breath and run a hand through my hair. \"Okay. So you know my editor. You're one disturbingly devoted fanboy, you know that?\"\n\nIn hindsight, I probably should not have just said that to my guest. He looks like a kid who's just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. \"I-I-I'm sorry,\" he stammers, putting his mug on the coffee table with a hasty clunk. \"I should go. I've overstepped my boundaries, sir. I shouldn't be here.\"\n\nI put up a hand to still him, even though I fear the damage has been done. \"Hey, now, I don't want you going back out in the cold at this time of night--\"\n\n\"No, really, I should go. Thank you for having me, sir.\" He shuffles to the door. When he reaches it, though, he doesn't open it immediately. He turns and addresses me. \"Just curious. What's your relationship with Martha? Strictly professional, or…?\"\n\nI purse my lips. What kind of question is that? \"Strictly professional, thank you.\" I admit I'm not being entirely honest. Martha and I are good friends. And sure, she's on the attractive side of average, but I'd never--\n\n\"Okay,\" Jeremy says, interrupting my thought. \"Cool.\" He looks down at the floor for a few seconds, scuffs one foot on the welcome mat, and then looks back at me. \"I'm very glad I got to meet you, Mr. Hanson.\" He dons a sad smile. \"Keep writing. Your best is yet to come. And…\" He trails off and scratches the side of his face idly. \"One of these days, when you get married, and maybe you have a kid, tell Mar--\" He stops, clears his throat as he lowers his hand, and starts again. \"Tell your wife you love her. Every day. You never know when a day will be your last.\" He opens the door, steps out into the cold, and closes the door behind him. I hear his footsteps crunch through the snow outside. Jeremy is gone.\n\nI run my fingers through my hair again. What an odd young man. I should ask Martha in the morning what her relationship is to this kid; it must be close if she told him about my work in progress. I'm still surprised that I told her Heofon's working title. I could have sworn I haven't told anyone yet, but memory has failed me before.\n\nOdd as he was, I almost miss Jeremy already. I still can't place why his face looks familiar. Apart from his knowing things he shouldn't know, he was quite pleasant and polite. Someone raised him well.\n\nI smile to myself as I collect the coffee mugs. If I ever have a son, Jeremy might be a nice name." ]	4
	[WP] One morning you wake up and no one that you knew remembers you.	[ "I woke up late today, feeling well-rested and relieved that it was my day off. I made myself a small breakfast, then settled on the couch to watch TV and begin my lazy day. \n\nI relaxed in uninterrupted bliss, as my normally constantly-ringing phone remained silent. No work emergencies, no family asking to borrow money, no friends calling to insist I go to some ridiculous party they know I won't enjoy anyways. It's completely abnormal, and if it wasn't what I wanted most in the world at that moment, I'd have been concerned. \n\nFor now, I was enjoying the peace and quiet. Just the noise of the TV; then, when I have my fill of that, of the video game I'm replaying; then, of the pages of the book I've been meaning to finish for ages; then, of the music from my earbuds as I go for a short run. \n\nAll in all, I waste the day away in the euphoria that comes from complete, isolated freedom. My only regret is that I have to go to work and face real life tomorrow. ", "Elliot Carver had been a private detective for thirty years, in that time he'd seen more crazy people that he'd truly like to admit, but the story the man sitting before him in his office was telling was a first, even for him.\n\n\"Sir, would you like to repeat that\"\n\nThe man sighed, and started his story again\n\n\"It's like I told you, I want you to find out why I'm disappearing\"\n\n\"Disappearing....Sir?\"\n\n\"I don't know what else to call it\" the man said \"When I woke up the day before yesterday it was like something was wrong, My wife, Elenor... she... she didn't seem to remember things about our life together\"\n\n\"Not everyone has a great memory Sir\" Elliot said\n\n\"No, no, it's more than that... look.\"\n\nThe man produced a photo album, and began frantically flicking through it's pages\n\n\"They're all the same... in every single one\"\n\nHe handed the open album to Elliot, and jabbed a long finger at the photos locked under the glossy plastic\n\n\"You see? I'm not in any of them... see, there's my wife, there's our friends, but I'm not in them. My own damn wedding photos\" The man was looking frantically at him.\n\nElliot slipped his reading glasses on and examined the album. sure enough the photos were showing a young woman, smiling, happy, in a white wedding veil, but in every one, she was standing alone.\n\nElliot scratched his head, the guy was delusional, but delusional people don't always, if ever, have any proof.\n\n\"Maybe your wife is playing a trick on you Sir\"\n\nThe man sighed again. \"I thought that too... so I went to my best friend, see, he's the best man in the photos there\" again, he jabbed that pointy little finger\n\n\"And what did your friend say?\" Elliot asked\n\n\"He...\"the man seemed to be struggling to say the words \"He said he didn't remember me\"\n\n\"Excuse me?\"\n\n\"He said he had never seen me before in his life, and asked me to leave... this is someone I've known all my life\"\n\n\"I see, Sir\"\n\n\"So I went back home to my wife, and when I got there, things had changed....everything had changed\"\n\n\"What had changed, Sir?\"\n\n\"The house was different...Elenor was different, and worst of all... there was another man living there\"\n\n\"You found your wife cheating on you?\"\n\n\"No, it was much worse than that. It was like she had never known me, she didn't recall anything I told her, and that's when I came here\"\n\nThe man paused for a moment\n\n\"Mr Carver, I think someone or something is trying to erase me from existance\"\n\n\"I don't think the supernatural has anything to do with it, Sir\"\n\n\"Then how else can you explain it?\"\n\n\"As I see it, your wife is attempting to make you doubt your own sanity in an attempt to force you out of the relationship\"\n\n\"You think she could do all this?\"\n\n\"Sir, I've seen a lot of unusual things in this job, trust me, nothing is beyond some people\"\n\n\"So, what should I do?\"\n\n\"Go back home and talk to your wife, if she still carries on this ruse, then I will come out and talk to her myself, We'll get this solved before the end of the day\"\n\nThe man nodded and stood up\n\n\"Thank you Mr Carver, you're a life saver\"\n\nElliot nodded and shook the man's hand, those long pointy little fingers wrapping around his hand like a skeleton.\n\n\"Don't worry\" he smiled\n\nThe man turned and left and Elliot sat down and opened his appointment book...But for the strangest reason he couldn't remember what he was going to enter into it.\n\nHe held the pen over the page for a moment or two before closing the book. Who had he just been talking to?\n\nHe was sure someone had just been in his office, but he couldn't recall anything about them. \n\nElliot shook his head, and for a moment, an image of a man pointing to a photo of a happy young woman entered his mind.\n\nAnd then, just like that, it was gone.\n\n", "I woke up today and realized no-one remembered me. Nothing sci-fi. Let me explain:\n\nEveryone I knew, they looked at my face and had no idea who I was. Teammate, they called me. Son. Nephew. Brother. Friend.\n\nBut none of them knew who I was. \n\nI smiled in conversation. Yes, everything is going well. Yes, I am enjoying university. Yes, I am still on the running team. Long distance. No, I don't have any races at the moment. I'm injured again. I'm plodding along through physio therapy as I always do. It will be fine. It's fine.\n\nIt isn't fine. \n\nMy insides are burning up with helplessness. Every platitude is a hot coal that I have to swallow. I wonder, if I hate myself enough, will that get rid of the helplessness?\n\nIt doesn't.\n\nI hate myself anyway.\n\nAnd worse, it's a privileged personal crisis. How lucky, that my only serious plight in life should be something like this. Sports injury. There's a little more fuel for the fire of self-loathing.\n\nSome days I wish I was a quitter. Some days I wish I would just let it all go and leave and come to terms with never being able to truly participate in my deepest passion, to content myself with other things.\n\nBut I am not. Curse myself, but I am not a quitter. I will hold onto this way of life until it is pried forcefully from my aching fingers. I hold on. I smile for everyone and tell them everything's alright. Will be alright. I hold on.\n\nHold on. (again)\n\nHold on. (again)\n\nHold on.\n" ]	3
	[WP] As humans become more advance we start to create are own universes. After a while Universe creation kits are being sold as common toys for kids. Talk about your first universe and about your god hood in it.	[ "I created mine when I was but 11 years old. \n\nI started out with the earth based model before I began to personalize it with my own creativity and god-ness. \nI made it full of unicorns, some unicorns could fly and all unicorns could talk. \nI made lunch pail trees like in the movie Return to Oz. And I made a few places with ice cream mountains. \nI made a lot of hidden lands underneath waterfalls & in ginormous extensive caves. \nI also made every plant edible although some tasted much better then others. \n \n In my godhood in it, I more existed in mysterious ways like the wind, a invisible being that could overhear whatever my unicorns talked about. Sometimes I would grant their wishes. I actually did that often, the most common which from my unicorns was to find their true love. \n\n I decided on my summer vacation to play a more active god in my world, so one day I made myself a avatar that got born and it would go to sleep whenever I was busy being a 11 year old girl. \n\n My avatar, or unicorn me had a pale pink coat and soft new coal fur. I liked to wear bells a lot and trot around playing tag with the other foals. \n \n In my unicorn universe, time seems the same as time seems in my 11 year old one, but it went much faster, like how a digimon minute is just a few hours or so in the human years of that anime. \n \n So I grew older with the other unicorns & matured with my friends. I loved all of them, unicorns are usually peaceful beings. Anyways as I got older I became more sexually aware & began to have intimate feelings for one of my male friends as he did with me. We hung out more often and our feelings for each other grew as we became more intimate. He began to notice my off sleeping habits. Sometimes I would sleep for vary long times. My unicorns usually sleep for about 4 hours, be awake for 8 and then sleep again another 4 hours or so. But I would sleep much longer for hours or even days occasionally. He grew more concerned & a little troubled even though I assured him it was just a condition I was born with. \n\n He wanted to search the plant kingdom to find something that would cure my condition and make me stay awake longer. \n\n I objected & said that it was fine but he was stubborn as determined unicorns can be when they feel somethings right that they should do. So he trotted and traversed the lands and the globe looking for and finding plant after plant that helps with being awake, alert, balance a person hormones etc, making me try one by one. To no avail. \n\n I felt really alert and awake while being a unicorn but it'd still of corse not effect me when I'd have to leave my avatar. He was quite amazed he could never wake me up when I'd go to sleep, nothing could at all but me naturally. \n\n He became more troubled as his pilgrimage went on. And finally I saw one day waking the worry in his eyes and the wrinkles that had befallen his snow white & light blue coat on his face. I began to feel really guilty as I left my avatar, knowing he was so concerned because of me. I made a telepathic link so I could hear his specific wishes while I was a 11 year old. The unicorns all sense their is a goddess watching over them, because I sometimes grant their wishes I feel should be granted, so they wish things to me that they think should be herd & may be granted.\n\n I heard the fear in his wish, that I would wake up normally and not sleep for so long and unexpected times. So I tried to make something that would at least calm his beating heart. \n\n I made a shaman unicorn that had 2 horns like a sheep (and since I am a god here I made it so that he had lived there in the past, in a distant forrest). And I made the circumstances happen so that they would meet. \n\n My blue unicorn like I expected brought the shaman to see and inspect me as I slept, and my wise more directly connected shaman unicorn told him that I was not in a regular sleep but a soulless sleep, my soul departed from my body while I slept and went somewhere. I was probably perfectly fine & surly safe protected by the goddess. I then swept my shaman unicorn with my magical wind presence allowing only him to feel it, and whispered in his mind to pull something out of his bag. As soon as he touched something inside I channeled into him and made the object into the bag into something else before pulling it out. \n\n \"This is a magical glowing stone. It glows bright white when your most loved is near and awake, when her soul is there.\" I said using the shamans voice, to my unaware blue unicorn who thought the shaman was just in a trance. \"It is dim when her soul is not. But never completely dark because she is always kind of there. Remember that. By its light you can determine how long she will sleep and when she will begin to wake up. It shows the future of this by its light.\" \n\n I handed it to him. \"The stone has a influencing effect. If you have it on you and/or use it for a long time you will begin to just know & sense how long she'll sleep and when she will wake up. Trust it.\" My blue unicorn closed his eyes as he felt the warm light that came from touching the stone. \"My work here is done.\" I said as I left the shaman out threw my last word.\n\n It would really impact my shaman's life, and really inspire in times of great hardship him, the feeling he felt while I possessed him. Soft, warm, light, absolute gentile love.\n\n After that my beloved gave up his quest. And spent more time returning to the things he had enjoyed doing before; going on runs with our friends, exploring nature and smelling the flowers, peacefully watching thunderstorms by my sleeping side. Happily greeting me when I'd wake up and gently asking about my soul's adventures. My love was so much more carefree since I helped him. \n\n It kind of released him. I'd lean against his flank and trusted him to hear my stories as a human who was a little girl in a different, less beautiful world, doing mundane human activities. \n\n He loved to hear about them, and one day he told me he believed they were real, that I really was a little human girl in another life that I had besides this own, as a mature beautiful unicorn. \n\n I was speechless. And he looked into my eyes with a gleam in them. He knew. ", "\"Haha, Ricky's an idiot if he thinks i'm gonna believe that. My sentient life couldn't be so dumb!\"\n\n\"Dude try it! He swore on his life that it works!\"\n\n\"So let me get this straight, you're saying that if I build a pool, put my sentient lifes in, and remove the ladder, they drown?\"\n\n//\n\nSomewhere far away, the local populace was dismayed and confused to suddenly find a swimming pool stuck in the middle of the highway, full of dead bodies. \n", "I found it in the attic, gathering dust on a shelf. \n\"God, what a bunch a nostalgic bullshit\", i smirked.\nI remember waking up Christmas day and finding it waiting under the tree for me. I remember the bright flash when i first turned it on and the excitement when I got the first little pop up message: \"you've got life!\". \nI played with it every day, it was a great escape from all the everyday silliness, up until college. I created clans then tribes then entire continents full of people, i had to start over a couple times because the UI wasn't super forgiving, but that's just part of the learning process right?\nSo college came and I left it behind for more visceral experiences, and had a life of my own, first a degree, then a job, then a wife, then a family. Eventually my family grew and moved on to their own lives, leaving myself and my wife to continue our lives together.\nBut last week my wife passed away and i find myself wandering all the rooms of the house we shared for so long hoping the next room will have her in it. Wandering each room until I found myself looking up the little drop down stairs that lead to the attic. I struggled to make my old legs work well enough to make it up the stairs, but I managed somehow. Digging listlessly through the flotsam and jetsam of all of our years together I found it. my first universe. Its battery was just about dead, Just a few lights still flickered in its infinite expanse. \n\"good times, eh buddy?\" I spoke to it, not expecting a response.\nAt the sound of my voice, it seemed to pulse, almost like it was gathering its strength to properly greet its old master. I picked it up from the dust and the debris and cleaned it so I could look deep into its depth one more time.\nholding it close, I sat down in the corner of the room and drew an old blanket around myself and brought the globe to my forehead once again after all those years.\nThe multitude of stars was diminished, all the once vibrant worlds were old and grey or deep in the heart of super giant stars or disintegrated by cosmic explosions. \nI thought back to all the old stories that were crafted with all the amazing creatures that walked all my planets, and suddenly remembered my favorite character. I knew that I must have passed away millennia ago, time was dilated enough where a lifetime for me was a lifetime for my universe, but i wanted to check the old prayer records just to make sure he turned out alright. I searched for his record and it popped up right away, and I suddenly felt worry, a multitude of missed messages. I searched through the record reading each message, getting a more clear picture of the story with every new word. finally, I read the last message and had no choice but to put my universe away for the last time, because I could never look at these worlds again. the last message from my friend and favorite character was simply:\n \"eloi eloi lama sabachthani\"", "\"Hey everyone this is Mad Hatter with a new 'Create Your Own Universe' kit. I know this is for kids and all but I never had one. I know, crazy right? Anyways I'm gonna open it and get started!\"\n\n\"Alright so here's the instruction manuel. Which I'm just gonna skim because I was smart and looked up how to all this. Yay for me!\"\n\n\"Ok so it's all set up and ready to go. You guys ready? I know I am, this is gonna be so much fun! Preparing Big Bang in 1 minute 1 minute......Big Bang will occur in 10 seconds 10...9...8...7...6...5...4...3...2...1-Whoa! That is beautiful! I mean-how did my parets not get me one of these when I was little-oh man!\"\n\n\"Alright guys so I'm just gonna mess around a bit and I'll be back when I have stars and planets and all that so I'm gonna end here and see you all tomorrow.\"\n\n.....\n\n\"Hey everyone this is Mad Hatter and look what I haaavvee! A planet with life! Look at that. Teeny tiny beings are on that little planet there-look at that. So tiny!\"\n\n\"So I had a lot of fun making constellations because I'm a nerd and that's what nerds do. So I read your comments and you all said that I should be careful with the sentient life when I get them because there's a chance they might try to kill themselves-I don't know. That's a thing I guess. I also read that some people made multiple life-filled planets and sort of waited for them to meet each other so that's what I'm gonna try to do. But for now I want to make these little guys happy, give them civilization and all that.\"\n\n\"Alright I'm gonna keep you guys updated on my little universe but for now I have a class and I just wanted to show you these little...living...things. So I will see you guys tomorrow!\"\n\n(Might add more, can't right now since I'm on mobile and the last time I tried writing something long it froze)" ]	4
	[WP] A new religion pops up in the news and their God is answering with serious results. You've been a God fearing individual your whole life and this throws everything out the window	[ "Matsya had barely reached the plaza when a demi-god descended upon the passenger platform and caused a hundred busy citizens to materialize around him. The air softly shivered in the sunlight, and Matsya felt drawn physically to the demigod, and then pushed away. Dangers of being close to an act of god. \n\nAn irate priest-guard grabbed her elbow and pulled her away from the recovering crowd.\n\nDon’t you know not to cross the yellow line when the deity-bell pulses? I could curse you for that.\n\nShe nodded apologetically, and flashed her identity upon her retinas.\n\nThe priest-guard snapped to attention.\n\nApologies, holiness. I did not notice.\n\nHe backed off slowly, leaving behind a trailing fragrance of saffron and cinnamon.\nIt took several minutes for the crowd to disperse and the cleaners to wipe away the vomit from the less-pious of the citizens. It took longer for the demi-god to finish his ablutions and return to the platform. Matsya closed her eyes and prayed as she waited.\n\nGreat Narada, Lord of Privacy, encrypt my prayers from wicked eyes and perverse algorithms. May my mind be open and clean, my thoughts pristine and nourished, and my soul protected from evil. I beseech what gods are listening, to grant me success at work today. Let my words flow like honey and let the minds of the clients be welcoming. I need to close today. It is necessary. Please find it in your powers to let my prayers overcome and overwhelm the prayers made against me and my success. I, Matsya, pious and human, beg this.\n\nAs she opened her eyes, she saw the crowd that had accreted around the demi-god. There was singing and trumpets, and an accounting of sins and greed. The clouds in the sky shimmered and broke like milk just short of being close to nearly warm enough to boil. Dark streaks like fungus and secrets. The space closest to the demi-god was already occupied. She realized she needed to hurry.\n\nStore, template, security, piety re-up, minor sacrifice subcategory, payment, process, installation, attach to prayer, transmit, pathos.\n\nThe demi-god signaled his readiness. She ran, jostling and pushing her way close to the him, flashing her identity to any who attempted to stop her. He smiled at her, and she wondered for a minute if he was the god who had received her sacrifice and chosen to answer her prayer.\n\nShe looked at the sky once more. It was late afternoon.\n\nThe demi-god closed his eyes and vanquished the laws of the universe with a passing thought.\n\nShe looked at the sky. The sun was rising in the east. \n\nThe crowd began to disperse, muttering their own secret prayers under their breath. The demi-god had retired back to heaven.\n\nNyaya stood at the edge of the platform, eyes wary and red. She noticed Matsya and gestured, forcing a steady smile until the two came close.\n\nYou look like crap, Nya. Please tell me you didn’t physically travel here for a fifteen minute meeting.\n\nNyaya did not care enough to respond. Nyaya was a theological luddite. \n \nI know how you feel about… Matsya continued.\n\nNo, you don’t. Not anymore. You pray to these false gods. The only reason you’re even here is because you turned your back to us and sold your soul to these monsters.\n\nMatsya sighed.\n\nYou don’t understand. I don’t know what these creatures are. I don’t believe they are gods either, and I don’t think they care. But I believe what I can see. I pay them, and I get something in return. I don’t know if they are aliens or demons, but they are capitalists. They are tools. Use them, Nya. Give them what they want and prosper. Nobody says you have to truly believe. You just follow the rituals and thought patterns.\n\nShe revealed a long surgical scar on her forearm. Nyaya stared at it fearfully.\n\nThe old faith is in my flesh, Nyaya. Where it matters. Everything else…this madness…is all false. Deceit within the veneer of marketing. Use them, Nyaya. Exploit them by praying to them.\n\nNyaya’s eyes fell. \n\nI understand. It’s hard. There are so few of us left now. I don’t know what is true. My faith is all I have left to sustain who we used to be. Maybe going through this heresy is a test, but it is so hard.\n\nMatsya smiled. She held her luddite friend close.\n\nGreat Narada, Lord of Privacy, encrypt my prayers from wicked eyes and perverse algorithms. May my mind be open and clean, my thoughts pristine and nourished, and my soul protected from evil. I grant this doubt that I cast in the minds of a disbeliever as a sacrifice to what gods listen to me. Grant me success in return, and I shall sacrifice more. Please find it in your powers to let my prayers overcome and overwhelm the prayers made against me and my success. I, Matsya, pious and human, beg this.\t\n\n", "\"Ah man are you serious.\"\n\n\"Yeah, you just gotta eat it.\"\n\n\"And then what.\"\n\n\"And then you gotta say 'Ogabooga Boogaty Boo.\"\n\nDevout Catholic, Jeff Smith, stood surrounded by men clad in brown robes and trilbies, in the basement of a dank abandoned theater. In his hand was a large piece of cat shit, growing gradually softer in his hesitation. \n\n\"And you're sure it'll work.\"\n\n\"Yeah, I'm sure. Why else would I be dating Mila Kunis right now.\"\n\nHe did have a point. Jeff had worked with Dave at a shithole hardware store for years. Dave was women repellent. Ugly, stuttering, vapid. He hated Dave, but apparently Mila Kunis did not. \n\nJeff had seen these types of miracles happen to all the human omegas joining this new religion. 1s banging 10s, dumbasses getting rich on penny stocks, that one paraplegic's now the top NFL draft pick. Jeff deserved a piece, goddammit.\n\nHe'd gone to confession all his life, donated ten percent of his shit wage to the poor, gave up sugar or something of equal or greater value for lent. But every time he prayed to the big man, he didn't get squat. Just a perpetual existence, fraught with shit jobs, shit apartments, infrequent yet still shit girlfriends. But it was all about to change.\n\n\"We all did it Jeff. You just gotta eat the whole thing, and definitely don't puke it up. Cause, well, He doesn't like that. Like at all.\"\n\n\"I got it... let me just get ready.\"\n\nJeff did a few high knees. Deep breaths. Head shakes. Then stuffed the cat shit in his mouth.\n\n\"I...I... dunno if I can do this.\"\n\nHe started to gag. He chewed some more. Swallowed a bit. Regurgitated. Chewed some more. Swallowed more.\n\nThat was it. He puked hard. All over the floor, the shit plus chicken parm plus egg mcmuffin. \n\n\"Ogabooga... Boogaty... Boo,\" Jeff barely spat out between heaves.\n\nHe prayed for advanced screening of Star Wars VIII.\n\nThen the roof tore open. A thunderous voice postured something about disappointment. A bolt of lightning came down and smote Jeff where he stood. \n\nThe disciples fell to their knees. Asking for forgiveness from their strange yet vengeful yet wonderful god." ]	2
While timetraveling to 1347, you accidentally bring the cold virus with you. The people of that time are not as resistant to the virus as you are.	[WP] While timetraveling to 1347, you accidentally bring the cold virus with you.	[ "Narrow tunnel, in a forgotten hill,\nwalk right in, make time stand still.\nIt walks two ways, but not too fast,\none to the future, other the past.\n\na strange looking town, men in odd hats,\nthe streets are crowded, bodies and rats.\nFeeling alright, little he knew,\nHe came to the past, and carried the flu.\n\nOn the way back, he can hear a faint sound,\n\"ashes to ashes, they all fall down.\"\nBack in the present, he felt a bit ill,\nhis neck was swollen, and he started to chill.\n\nThe poor man died, a couple of days,\nthe sickness he had, carried both ways.\nThe flu killed hundreds, 1347,\nThe plague killed millions, 2011.\n\n\n\n\n", "To save a village, sometimes you must destroy a village. \n\nI was sick and I knew it. That was the point. I walked, almost stumbling, through the time portal. I emerged into a world mine would never truly know. It was not the virgin forests and unadulterated environment many thought. \n\nMan had never lived in harmony with nature. Not now, not in my time, not ever. That forced change upon the environment even predated our particular species of human: Homo erectus had been burning the forests of Africa to make more savanna and open woodlands over a million years before modern humanity emerged.\n\nThere were forests here. They were more like tree farms, almost orchards, near the villages and wiped clean near the cities. Pristine. I snorted. It was anything but. Had I been in the Yucatan during the Classic Period Maya, there wouldn't have been any forest. Everything from my time was secondary forest, regrown from the multiple collapses of the civilizations there.\n\nThere had only been one collapse here. One before the rise of its occupiers from my time. Those who were my bane, my people's bane.\n\nI might be sick, but I was bringing goods. Goods to spread what was necessary, what was evil, but right. Tools and even some blankets. I would be damned for my actions, but would save a world, prevent another and end my people's great enemy before it could be conceived.\n\nI looked down, my pack very heavily laden, near stumbling with my illness and saw Cahokia. It was the hub of trade in North America in 1347. Its tendrils of commerce reached from California to New York, down the Mississippi to MesoAmerica. An epidemic started here would flare like wildfire up and down and across the New World. \n\nIt would be genocidal. It would be terrible. There would be the postapocalyptic societies, collapsed and devastated and horribly poor when Columbus would show up almost a century and a half later. There would be no Aztecs, no signs of the great Maya, my cold would see to that. No Spanish Empire. And...no America.\n\nAnd, I, Anna Chapman, would be the greatest Russian to have ever lived. And I would have my vengeance. \n\nI made my way down to the city and received gawking stares. Once I was in the town, I dropped my heavy pack. I all but collapsed, vomiting onto the street, I had the flu too. good. I stood again, swaying and sneezed.\n\nAnd it was the sneeze heard round the world. And echoed in time." ]	2
	[WP] "Under the highway, in the old city, is a dead building. How can a building die?" He paused "Why don't you find out?" and handed me an old, rusty key.	[ "Fort Crook Road has slowed down.\n\nThat's not to say it's died, but rather that it isn't the street it once was. Once it was the highway that linked Bellevue to Omaha, now it is only the second-best route between those two point. Highway 75 has replaced it in all daily commutes; even the people that take Fort Crook only take it to Chandler, where they get on the new highway.\n\nI was confused when my drug dealer told me that there was a dead building on \nFort Crook. \"How can a building be dead?\" I asked. He paused, then finally asked me, \"Why don't you find out?\"\n\nToday is the day. I stand in front of the Southroads Mall, remembering times in Boy Scouts when I would race my pinewood derby car on the bottom floor. Now the bottom floor is empty, the storefronts now bare spaces cleared of anything to sell. The JC Penney's on the first floor is gone; now the space is empty, almost haunting in it's lack of anything.\n\nThe entire mall feels like a place that I shouldn't be, that nobody should be. It's a place that feels like it explicitly detests visitors. I finally turn and walk out the front doors.\n\nThis place is indeed dead.", "Jane palmed the rusty key in her hand as she tried to find the most direct path through the debris piled around the city. The stench burned her nose and soon she had to remove her overshirt and wrap it around her mouth and nose to filter it out. No one came there anymore after the final evacuation. The looters got all the good stuff they could carry and ran.\n\nThe man had talked about a dead building, but to Jane this looked like a dead city. Maybe not quite dead, but definitely decaying at a hasty pace. She had heard stories from other transporters that few people returned when they ventured to the center of the city. When they ventured to the infamous 'dead' building that had sunk below the highway because of ruptured pipes and flooding that likely ensued afterwards. \n\nThe smell began to burn her eyes, but Jane had forgotten to bring any kind of goggle or eye covering with her. She was so close to the building now; she didn't want to have to turn around. She began humming a tune to distract herself from the oppressing silence that hung around the buildings. Nothing moved, not even the wind, and a sense of dread crawled up her skin as she began cresting the hill that the old man had described. \n\nIt suddenly made sense. A 'dead' building. That was the best way to describe the outside. It was completely covered in a thick, black mold that seemed to be reaching towards the other buildings. This was the epicenter of it all. She'd listened to the frantic discussions of some of the crazier people who had been evacuated, but it was hard to imagine a microorganism such as mold as 'alive'. The mold was very much alive. It had smothered the building to death and was reaching its dark tendrils towards the nearby buildings.\n\nBefore she realized it, she was walking through the thick carpet and reaching for a door handle with one hand and inserting the rusty key with the other. It was like she didn't have control of her own body and was sleepwalking into death. \n\n\"Hello?\" She called out, not expecting an answer. \n\n\"Hello there!\" A man wearing a sports jacket and perfectly pressed white pants called back from down the hall. \"Won't you come join us? We're just having a game of cards.\"\n\nJane fidgeted with the key, feeling the mold trying to climb onto her shoes and almost pull her into the floor. \"Who are you?\"\n\n\"You mean who are we, yes? Come back and we'll be glad to talk with you.\" He smiled so broadly, the whole room seemed to lighten up a bit.\n\nShe entered the back parlour and saw three people sitting around a pristine table playing a game of blackjack. \"I don't understand. No one lives here.\"\n\n\"That's true. No one does live here.\" He smiled like he was making some kind of joke.\n\n\"Then what are you doing here?\"\n\n\"We are waiting for people to come and see us. We are medical marvels.\" \n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"I mean we died and came back. I was shot in the stomach,\" he pulled up his shirt to show a large gash that had closed up. \"Lina here was stabbed by her husband. And Gerald just died of a heart attack.\" \n\nLooking between the three people, Jane began laughing. \"That doesn't make sense. How did you come back?\"\n\nThe woman called Lina turned a bright smile at Jane. \"The mold brought us back. We have no idea why, but it wanted to bring us back so here we are. Unfortunately we can't go anywhere because the mold keeps us alive, as we find out when we lost Torrie who tried to leave for help.\"\n\n\"Why are you telling me this?\"\n\nGerald grinned and lifted up his left hand holding several cards. \"Didn't you come seeking answers? Answers about why everyone left and never came back? It's because they saw things, things like their loved ones coming back from the dead. They tried to burn everything down, but they forgot about this building.\"\n\nShe tried to pry the sticky mold off her calves with the top of her shoe. \"So you're telling me this mold can bring people back to life? Why didn't anyone try to make a serum or something out of it?\" Her doctorial instincts were kicking in. How could something so amazing go to waste?\n\n\"Exactly! Could you take a sample and see if they can make it into a shot? Think of all the people you would save.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes. This is brilliant. I must gather as many samples as I can and head out immediately.\" \n\n\"Thank you Doctor Jane. I know you'll come back one day and tell us everything.\"\n\nJane collected her samples and promised she would come back as soon as possible. Lamenting leaving the bodies behind, she barely remembered walk back through the piles of rot, or driving five hours back to her city. Her assistant, Raine, walked into the lab exclaiming about how long she had been gone and asking where she had been.\n\nMouth moving of its own accord, she turned to him with a brilliant smile. \"Don't worry Raine, I'll tell you soon, but I have something for you to research. Under the highway, in the old city, is a dead building. How can a building die?\" She paused \"Why don't you find out?\" and handed him the old, rusty key. ", "This part of the city had been hit hardest during the Overwatch. What the ground swell hadn't consumed, the orbital bombardment had finished, and all of it pockmarked by the black rain. Not even the dead rested in this place.\n\nKai secured her rope and dropped from the old bypass, raised in a great half moon over the old buildings. The rope played out between her fingers, singing until she clamped down and came to a stop, hanging in the atrium of a great hall.\n\nShe hung, floating a head above the ground, and slowly let the rope twist until she had taken in the entire chamber. The marble floor was intact, no cracks or holes. No them. It was perfect, even as she unclipped and fell the last foot to the ground. The statuses still stood erect. The paintings covered by moss but still resplendent.\n\nThe building had survived untouched and yet she knew it was dead. Inside. Just like the Machine had told her.\n\n\"Welcome Citizen.\"\n\nThe voice echoed across the great space. Kai spun, trying to find out the source, but it came from everywhere and nowhere at once, like a great speaker whose voice boomed out from all four walls.\n\nThe floor began to glow and for one fleeting moment Kai grabbed her rope, ready to rush out of reach should the ground swell. But instead the marble grew bright and then faded, leaving only a path of light, leading towards the centre of the hall.\n\nCaution had kept her alive. Curiosity had led her to the Machine.\n\nNow both were at war within her as she followed the path; the fear of walking into a Raiver trap battling with the story the Machine had told her. Of old worlds. Worlds where men had dreamed the impossible. And this building, this was where the deeds of men had come to die.\n\nThe path led her inextricably towards a set of doors, reaching into the sky. If this were but the atrium, Kai couldn't guess at what lay beyond. The light slithered and reached upwards, encircling a hexagonal hole set within the door. It pulsed, brighter, softer, like a heartbeat. Kai took the key from her pocket, carved from the same marble as the floor and felt it warm in her hand as if knowing it's mate was near.\n\nShe slipped it into the lock and felt the dead come back to life." ]	3
	[WP] Write about something that is disgusting or ugly in such a way that it becomes something beautiful--without using the 'beautiful inside' cliche.	[ "Brown shingles fall from what's left of Grandma's first house where she raised my Mom and her siblings. \"Pap\" was blind most of his life from a hunting accident. Grandma worked all the time. Mom used to visit to wash and shave Pap. She didn't know how much that made me love her. Pap could tell me and my twin brother apart by feeling our faces. I loved that but I didn't tell anybody. The outhouse has a few boards standing. The nails are triangle shaped, handmade. One day Pap died. I didn't know that people could die but Mom told me that everybody dies. Nobody cuts the grass there. I'm only seven. I got a space helmet for Christmas. ", "He thought he could smell it through the gray-tinted plexiglass windows as the bus slid off exit five and into the stalled evening backup on the Macombs Dam Bridge. Could practically see the stink rising off the asphalt, hot garbage curdling in the alleys behind restaurants still alight with laughter. Young bodies sweating on dance floors, steaming on sidewalks. Standing-water deluge burbling back from the belly of a gutter swollen happy from the morning’s storm.\n\nStreetlights hummed lullaby. Hair stores and bodegas and pizza joints tucked in under storefront grilles pulled shut for the night. Car exhaust and cigarette fumes phased through the sides of the bus as they rolled through Harlem. \n\nStraight onto him. Osmosis. From an area of high-density to low-density, diffusing through metal and curtains and other bodies. Straight towards him. \n\nAnd got him good. It burned the lingering scent of cut-grass from his nostrils, rubbed the dryer sheet perfume from between the fibers of his clothes. The acidic tang of fresh tomatoes in his mouth flossed away, the half-moons under his nubby fingernails blackened, regreased. Got him right there, scoured the mom-and-pop and cared-for smells right off of him.\n\nThe bus groaned to a stop in front of FIT on 7th. He lugged his suitcase from the floor, arms rashing on the prickly carpet seat, and clambered out of the canned pine air of the bus on sea legs. Into the fug. He shucked off his jacket—necessary for the ride—and there it was, the smell, wrapping him in a greasy bear-hug of an embrace, cheap perfume, cheaper cologne, moldy clothes, old newspaper poached in puddle of urine, choking laughter, taxis slamming brakes, \"spare change, spare change,\" a shout to a friend across the street.\n\nAll of it. Smell of it in his hair, that he might never noticed had he never gone away. Just the filth he’d been turning to live in, an effluvia his father swatted away, his mother Febreezed—part of him now. \n\nHe could happily poach forever in the damp, heavy heat of New York City. He was home.\n", "A bodily caramel-brown baby nestled as tight as a Christmas gift rested on my asshole neighbor’s lawn (no pun intended). And it was from me this time. I wanted him to know to stay away from my dog. \n\nIn my life, I’ve had plenty of dogs, but none like Chaz. Chaz the spaz. He’s a giant Great Dane, all black with white spots. Every time I come home from work, Chaz jumps up and puts his arms on my shoulders. I’m so glad my ex hated him so I got to keep him.\n\nNow Chaz has a healthy appetite. He’s huge and can eat about the same amount as I can and I’m no Chihuahua myself. Takes about half my paycheck to feed him and more to pay for my fence. \n\nI have a treeless, crappy backyard with a brokendown fence. Plus the fence is like five feet high. Chaz the spaz, God knows how, manages to jump over it sometimes, and the first thing he does? Takes smooth, boa constrictor-like intestinal exodus onto my old neighbor Herb’s lawn.\n\nI clean these towering tan mountains down as soon as my little boy makes ‘um, but of course, some slip through the cracks. Herb lets me know, over and over, and I work during the day, so it’s hard to find them. I always apologize. But not this time.\nI found cheese with glass shards in it. In the backyard. Enjoy Herb!\n", "I had always felt him towering over me, even when I could stare level at his eyes I always had to look up to see him. His booming voice and confidence had filled a room like water poured into a coffin. His impatience, his callousness and his blows had always scared me, had kept me a creeping shadow in what people told me was my home. \n\nThe disease had ripped through his body like wildfire. His once imposing stature crumpled up like used paper and casually tossed in the hospital bed. The tubes, the machines, the smell of disinfectant, the white, it all seemed so unnatural. He had been a proud man, but no man is proud when he needs help to even sit up. \n\nI had always seen my father as a god, a cruel god, but a god none the less. With all the tubes and the needles and the doctors it was inevitable, the humanity came spilling out of him. As much as I tried not to see it, as much as I searched for the man who I had vowed never to forgive, I couldn’t help but see just a man. \n\nA sad man. \n\nA sick man. \n\nA regretful man.\n\nA man that wanted nothing more than to talk to the son he had never connected with. It was not a large request, nor an unreasonable one, but it was the hardest gift I have ever had to give. Forgiveness did not come easily, even then, even as he lay shriveled on the bed, wheezing his humanness, his fragility at me. It came, and with it came tears, and with the tears an entire childhood of grief. \n\nBut grief became understanding, and understanding became forgiveness\n\n****\n\nFeedback is highly encouraged and appreciated. Trying to become less shit of a writer one writing prompt at a time.\n", "Dr. Vikram Seward was seated in his workstation when we first encountered the signal. It arrived as a beeping; every sensor now receiving the same thing. A minor adjustment that Vikram had implemented earlier activated and we all jumped at the chance to avoid another slow week. His eyes lit up with excitement and we all scattered from our chairs to check our respective instruments and pull the readings. I can honestly say I was ecstatic. Here was our chance! This is it, the big one that puts our cozy little station on the map!* I thought. \"Ms. Nussbaum, Mr. Lieche, can you start to extrapolate these figures?\" Dr. Seward asked. He was a kind boss; a gentle speaker with a warm smile under his shockingly black mustache. \"Right away!\" The two raced over and began to collect the readouts for their various calculations. I started to write the program to catalog all of the incoming data, and believe me there was a lot coming in. When we started it was all so exciting we didn't even realize the continuity, the steadiness. After 3 hours of nonstop readings and every console beeping we decided to stop collecting data. Vikram was a little disappointed but could see we were all exhausted. The beeping was starting to get on everyone's nerves. Everyone except Vikram's, he finally had his big break. In our field you don't get chances like this one maybe once or twice in a lifetime of diligence and it was time for Dr. Seward to collect his due. He dismissed all the staff and collected our readouts. \"You should go home, Dr. Seward.\" I said. \"I'll head out in a bit. I just want to get a start on these figures!\" He replied with a laugh. \"Well don't let that beeping get to you!\" I shot back and he chuckled. \"I'll try.\"\n\n&nbsp;\n\nThe next day we found him asleep at his desk with his headphones in to cover the incessant beeping. Papers were scattered everywhere; all of them were covered in equations and symbols. I touched his back gently and he jumped. \"Oh, sorry there everyone!\" He looked around with weary eyes. \"I must have dozed off.\" He joked. \"I don't see how anyone could sleep here with all this beeping.\" Ms. Nussbaum said. \"Dr. Seward, can we shut down the array? We're collecting more data every minute than we can analyze in a week.\" The look on Dr. Seward's face was one I'd never seen before. \"We will not shut down the array.\" He growled and then lightened up again. \"Before you let that beeping get to you, I've analyzed and interpreted the sound. Let me play it for you all!\" He grinned and turned to his machine and pulled out the headphones. A shrill sound exploded from the speakers: piercing static. Everyone in the room tried to cover their ears. Everyone except Vikram. It felt like my mind was being invaded. Each thought overwritten with waves upon waves of endless junk. My eyes watered and I wanted to puke. I looked up at Dr. Seward. He just kept standing there with his cheery grin as though waiting for us all to realize how pleasant it actually was. His expression shrank a little and he plugged in the headphones again. We all breathed a sigh of relief. \"In any case, back to work everyone.\" He mumbled and slipped the headphones back onto his head.\n\n&nbsp;\n\nIt wasn't the beeping that made everyone else quit, I think. It was Vikram. Since that moment he slowly devolved from the person he had been. First, he stopped going home and started to listen to the sound louder and louder from his headset. A few days after he stopped washing himself. When it came down to just the two of us, he stopped wearing the earphones altogether. In his last days, I think Vikram and I were more connected than ever before. I continued to interpolate collecting the sound, and he continued to extract it and play it for us. When he collapsed, I ran to his side. His eyes were bleeding, he hadn't blinked in hours and he stank of human waste. \"Vikram! Tell me what these equations mean. Let me finish them if you're tired!\" I didn't even realize he was dying then. \"Keep collecting...\" He smiled. \"We need more.\" \"But what is it that you're calculating? I can't interpret this information like you can!\" \"It is light and motion. Shape and substance. The very symmetry of the ideal.\" He said. \"It is the dance of billions of planets and stars singing throughout the void. It is the void!\" He shouted and then began to cough violently. \"...\" He tried weakly. \"...the music of the spheres.\" He wheezed and then was still.\n\n&nbsp;\n\nI understood then what Dr. Seward had seen all along: the sound's untold depths, the layers extending endlessly. Before it had been a dulling white noise to me but now I knew certainly that it was perfection. Infinite complexity coupled with a symmetry that defied comprehension and demanded attention. I knew then that my choice was already made. I didn't bother to clean up Vikram's ruined, broken body. I felt he enjoyed listening to that endless static for as long as he could. I sat back down and continued to work.", "Souls are bright. They reach to the sky, boundless in their ambition. Some are full of warmth, and wish only to spread it. But, souls are ever changing. \n\nSometimes the light grows brighter. Sometimes the light grows dim. The dark can reach in and plant a seed. The seed grows. It spreads the dark it was fed on. Soon the soul is spreading its own seeds. Thus the soul is declared fallen. \n\nHumanity is dual in nature. As a seed is dark, another is bright. No soul is beyond redemption. No soul beyond corruption. Duality is the true beauty of humanity. They can love and hate one person at the same time. They can rise to breathtaking heights, then fall into the deepest sea. They derive pleasure from pain. \n\nThey can live while they're dead within. They can die and consider it living. \n\n--\nIt's my first time writing something. Any criticism is welcome. I feel like I was too pretentious or tryhard", "I found a dead snake once long ago when I was just a little girl.How stange it seemed to me then, that this one didn't move like the others.\n\nIt's skin was a dark ebony, the small drops of dew making it seems as if this little thing was made of the night sky. Perhaps it was a creature from heaven? But then agian, would a creature from heaven be so still? It was more like a statue in that, rigid and unmovable. It seemed rooted to the ground, as if it had sprouted there over night. How intersting, for the sky to come from the ground. \n\nMaybe it was a watcher? Those star covored eyes refusing to blink so as to see every day and night, every sun rise and set. Those eyes must have seen so much beauty and wonder.\n\nI decided to leave the watcher alone. It does not sit in the yard anymore, but I like to think it went back to the ground, sprouting elsewhere to see the stars it was made from.", "I tried this out. It's kinda silly but it was fun to write.\n\n \"The way it is supposed to be\"\nThe way it is supposed to be.\nA symphony of what's inside of me.\nA creative mind of it's own. \nIt can be universally known.\nOr it can be humble. \nLike the quietest mumble.\nThe way it supposed to be.\nIt is free.\nLike a butterfly soaring in the sky. \nOr having wings to fly.\nA musical or nonmusical sound.\nWhere lost is found.\nA moment in time.\nA leap or a climb. \nThe way it supposed to be.\nDon't you see.\nNature embraces power.\nEven in a warm shower.\nIt's in me and in you.\nThe morning dew.\nOr the nighttime delight.\nIt can happen in any sight.\nThe way it's supposed to be.\nShall I name what is thee?\nIt's a fart.\nWhat? Shh...gas has a heart.\n", "A crisp winter’s morning. \n\nThe waking sun throws its first beams over the horizon with an aim that’s second to none. The escaping orange light reaches the target causing the clear mucus seeping from her radiantly rosey nose to glisten in these silent sunrise moments. We stand amongst the fields of wild grasses as they hold onto their morning dew drops. A delicately, yet sudden sniff, and she too has held back the slowly escaping sparkling trail of nasal juice. I offer a tissue, but she declines with; “I’m fine. It’s back home now.”\n\nThe dawn chorus is gearing up for a crescendo for those brave enough to battle this frosty clear sky morning. I reach out and draw her close to me, her head naturally, almost as if it were designed to, rests perfectly into my shoulder. \n\nWe watch the sun rise together. Her muscosal fluid leaking down my lapel, reflecting the sparkling morning sun. \n\nJust the two of us forever.", "They found him in a bin. He had 2 broken legs, his fur and skin had been burnt, he was blind in 1 eye, and he smelt like rotten flesh. They named him groucho. \n\n\nThey took him to the nearest rescue centre, they cleaned him, they put his legs in casts, then helped him learn how to walk again. His fur grew back, his tail began to wag again, he learnt how to trust humans again. \n\nHe sat In his crate and when humans came to visit, he sat and wagged his tail when they walked past him, his tail still wagged even when they picked another dog to take home. Weeks went by and his tail kept wagging every day, every vist, until eventually he found his new owner, who took him away to his forever home, and loved him the way a dog is meant to be loved. And he loved them back unconditionally. ", "My great-grandfather’s old wristwatch:\n\nThe steel bracelet is stained and covered in desk scratches and everyday bumps. \n\nThere are dents, marks, and fine grazes along the bezel and on the lugs. \n\nThe acrylic crystal is cracked and the silver dial is now a dusty ivory.\n\nA quick shake awakens the old automatic movement, \n\nAnd the second hand begins its 60-second sweep.\n\nThe ticks and clicks of the gears and springs inside threatens to die with every beat,\n\nAnd the bracelet’s split pins wiggle out of their links if worn too long.\n\nStill I wear it and still I love it.\n\n“You should get it cleaned up,” my sister says.\n\n“I bet it’s worth a mint if you sell it, it’s so old,” my father says.\n\nBut I won’t do either.\n\nThe watch is an heirloom.\n\nIt lived on the wrist of an old man in his last days.\n\nIt travelled across the Pacific, across the country,\n\nOnly to find its way in my mother’s bathroom jewelry drawer. \n\nI plucked it out and kept it safe. \n\nSometimes I wear it and pretend to be an old Japanese man.\n\nEvery defect is family history.\n\nIt tells the story of a clumsy old man,\n\nThat lived through the war, that made a name for himself,\n\nAnd how he checked his wrist as he got closer to his end.\n\nIn his country, there’s the idea of wabi-sabi:\n\nFinding perfection in the imperfect.\n\nAs the watch has aged, it’s birthed an unattractive aesthetic.\n\nThe scratches and the dings on the metal add to its appearance.\n\nNow his watch is mine.\n\nIt might not be much to look at,\n\nBut it’s a lot to think about.\n", "I remember our honeymoon. You wanted something different, so we decided to go camping. We made a camp at the national park and laid a tent for a week. We survived on canned corn and corned beef. For all the planning we did, we still ran out of food. So we dug for worms and made a handmade fishing rod. And on the seventh day, we made dinner out of unsalted trout. We ate with our bare hands, seasoned only by our soiled fingernails. \n\nIt was delicious.\n\nI remember our first week at home. We were holding hands when I saw black dirt around the wedding ring you wore. I told you to clean the inside. You said you didn't want to ever remove it, even it gave you Salmonella. I thought that was stupid, and you knew it.\n\nYou kept it on for another week anyway. \n\nI remember making our garden. We debated between sunflowers or roses, so we bought both. You toiled the ground for planting and dug up what seemed to be three used condoms. I recall laughing on my ass while I threw bad soil on your stupid face while you held the condoms in your hand and made naughty faces. We cleaned up after and you joined me in the shower.\n\nThat was our best sex ever.\n\nI remember going home one night. I open the door and the overwhelming smell of mixed vomit, piss and shit waft through the room like newly cooked pancakes. You were cradling our five-month old baby as she slept. You apologized for the mess and cried. The sweat from your shirt smelled like a construction worker on a day shift and I wondered how a person of such finesse and grace forget about herself so much for the sake of another person. And while I put on a Beatles record to calm you down I questioned how much I really loved you.\n\nBecause up until that moment, I realized it was never nearly enough. \n\nI remember working over time. We struggled with the mortgage that year, and she just entered grade school. You didn't want her to study in a public school. This meant a lot of late nights. Black, sticky coffee rings marked my desk, reminding me how much every hour means. Another hour. Another sale. The clock ticked with every cigarette I smoked to keep myself awake. There are days when I can't wash the taste off my mouth. It all clung to me as I parked up the driveway while you stand at the doorway to welcome me.\n\nAnd every single night, you kissed my tar-ridden lips like it was our wedding day.\n\nSo you see, darling, when you started asking me if I regretted cleaning the piss out of the bed because you've started to forget how to urinate, this is my simple answer: I remember. I will fill in the details you have forgotten, as you have written all of what is mine.", "Death.\n\nDeath is the most beautiful thing. The way their arms flail as they run from the inevitable always gives me a rush. The way their face fills with terror as they try to stuff their spilling organs back inside their broken body is always enchanting. The sound of the corpse landing with a dull thud is music to my ears. The way their cold, lifeless eyes reflect the fear they felt in their last moments is truly inspiring. Death is an art.\n\nI am the artist.", "I didn't think she was beautiful at first, when she asked me out. \n\nWe were both just kids and she was plain. She fully admits it. You know how there's this concept that if you ask everyone how attractive they think they are, almost everyone says 'above average', and how that means nothing because it destroys the whole concept of average? You meet those girls on Facebook who get 90+ likes on photos and you see them in real life, really look at them, and realize that they aren't attractive and everyone is kind of lying to them with good intentions because they're wearing makeup and took that photo and spent so much time on it, and maybe the person liking it really thinks they're beautiful. It's OK because no harm. And I really mean that, it's OK. I don't mind. Maybe average means something more than average, maybe average can really be beautiful.\n\nShe never posts photos on Facebook because of her body dysmorphia, so there's never been that push for he to ever think she's above average in looks. Of course I tell her she's beautiful because at first it was the right thing to do, and she is beautiful on the inside, but now it's because I really can't separate us and her insides with her face, split them like a pear or an almond. I know average can be beautiful because of her. Whenever I look at her I see her at the beach in that bikini she stressed over wearing, and I see her crying at graduation, and I see her face dip down and her eyes close to kiss me. I remember seeing her the first time in our high school calculus class and not thinking anything about the face because it was so unassuming and devoid of makeup or anything that could have gotten people on Facebook to see effort and say 'gorgeous'. Her jaw is a little too wide and her eyelashes are sandy and stubbly, but they sparkle every time I look at her. Her uneven top lip and the way she bites it during an exam. The way her waist is a little soft and giving under my hands, her hip bones against my thumbs and her head in my shoulder because she's a little too tall to be a girl, even a woman. Her purr-purr voice, husky but low, like a tiger trying to sound like a kitten. \n\nAny stranger in a laboratory would say 5 or 7 on a good day, but I can't, now. I guess I've looked at her so many times now because I don't really see her face in a plainclothes way. Never could again.\n\n\n", "Spreading manure has always been the least glamorous job on the farm. It really doesn’t even need an explanation; you spend your entire day loading, hauling, and slinging good old poop. This job is a necessary evil for every livestock producer, however. You can ignore it all you want, but that doesn’t change the constant need to keep your animal lots clean. Many people say that there are only two guarantees in this world, that being death and taxes. I disagree; shoveling manure should be considered a third.\n\nWe start in the skid steer, scraping one bucket-load at a time from the pens and pads. This is piled up at the back of the barn, where the tractor and spreader are parker. When a considerably sized mountain of fecal matter is constructed, one will start loading the spreader. Here is where things can get monotonous.\n\nWhen you haul the first load, you make an estimate of how many you will have total. No matter how many times you have done this job, that guess is always WAY too low. You might think there are 20 loads in that pile; sorry bud, it ends up being 55. Every one of those trips entails a bouncy ride across the field while a heavy coating of mud-manure mixture covers every inch of the spreader.\n\nAlso, we can’t forget the smell. Yes, that wonderful stench that permeates through every tractor cab window and firmly plants itself for all to experience. Any clothing worn during this task can be permanently labeled as “manure duty” as they will reek of cow poop forever beyond. Even your skin will carry this mark of a cattleman, especially your hands. Gloves do nothing to prevent this, so one learns to avoid finger foods during manure time.\n\nBut there is something magical in that “black gold.” Mother nature does not make mistakes when it comes to her soil, and that includes our natural fertilizer. No man-made mixture can outsmart what has existed since the first animals walked upon the dry ground. We think we have farming down to a science of numbers and minerals, but few understand just how little we actually know. Somebody can analyze a sample of manure and apply the same materials in synthetic fertilizer form, but you will never get the same results.\n\nMy pocketbook likes it too. Some cattleman look at manure as a problem. Rather, I see it as a gift. The hay and grain I borrow from the soil is returned in a different form, with the cattle taking a little bite along the way. The dollars saved by completing this ancient cycle make my farm successful to boot.", "The easel before her sat blank and untouched, crumpled drafts discarded about the room, stained with the flowing red. She gingerly moved the flowing blonde locks off his brow, revealing the deep blue eyes open wide in a mix of agony and shock. He was naked from the waist up, his belly sliced open from navel to sternum revealing bright red entrails.\n\nShe turned back towards the easel, dipping her brush in the paint and lightly touching the canvas. When she painted, the world came alive in her hands as random lines and colors became worlds and lives. To make life you must give life, she reminded herself soothingly when she felt her breath quicken, despair creeping in. She dabbed the blue paint onto the bare canvas, feeling the brush like a hand on a naked body as she moved it up and down creating life. She closed her eyes as she stroked the brush from side to side creating waves and a watery world and when she was satisfied she stood.\n\nCalmly, taking care to avoid the blood that was quickly drying in a puddle on the floor, she closed his deep blue eyes, never to be opened again. Taking a step back, she admired her work. His chiseled chest and blonde hair became sand dunes on a desolate beach; the sand smooth and untouched save by the blue waves that frothed as white as his teeth when they broke. When the beach was done and the waves roared their eternal song as they crushed rocks into the finest sand, she methodically removed his teeth and cut his hair, tossing them carelessly into a puddle of blood.\n\nTo make life you must give life, she reminded herself, and the blood still flowing from his grisly wound became the dawn of a new day in the world she was creating. Red mixed with fiery yellow and orange and a sun appeared, peeking over the endless blue waves. The light reflected off the waves that shone like his eyes had once shined and then her sun was complete and her world created. \n\nTaking care to not disturb the world she had painted with its blue waves and radiant sun and smooth sandy beach, she mopped up the blood and got rid of his body and the room looked nearly like it had the day before. The only difference was the canvas, now bright and colorful with a life of its own as the waves lapped gently against the beach. With a smile, she stepped past the canvas and through the window that beckoned her with open arms and as the ground rushed to meet her, she reminded herself that to make life she must give life.\n\n\n****\n\nThanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at /r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated! ", "Writers are like oysters.\n\nConsider this: a writer writes a story like an oyster makes a pearl - takes an irritating bit and wraps it, layer by layer, in iridescent secretions. \n\nThat is the act of writing a story - of taking some sharp-edged memory and wrapping* it, smoothing it out and making it easier to live with. It's still there, but it doesn't hurt so bad anymore. \n\nWhen we bear ourselves to readers, it's like being shucked open for all the world to admire those pearls - tender lips pushed aside to reveal the glow within. The beauty of it, of course, is entirely accidental; we were just trying to stay alive.", "A canopy tarantula is an intricate, beautiful machine of almost unfathomable complexity. If you ever find yourself staring one in the face, stand extremely still and try to enjoy the view. Do not, under any circumstances, attempt to run. The tarantula weighs two thousand pounds, which, last time we checked, is significantly more than you do. It is twenty-five feet wide. It can cover a football field in a single explosive leap. \n\nYou are a snack. If it notices you, the tarantula will fold you up with its remarkably dextrous front legs and inject two quarts of a paralyzing venom into your spinal column through fangs that are frankly just overkill. Excreted digestive fluids will turn your insides to mush, and then the spider will slurp you down. How's that for an image? \n\nThe takeaway here is that running is out of the question. Instead, my unfortunate explorer, take a few moments to gaze upon the tarantula, the magnificent lord of the canopy. Observe the orchestra of chitin-clad instruments pumping and twitching in unison. There are the legs, of course, all eight of them, powered by hydraulics comparable to those in a terrestrial steamroller. Were you to somehow kill the tarantula -- which, trust us, is no easy feat -- all eight legs would curl in on themselves, lacking the titanic pressure necessary to keep them extended. \n\nEach leg is composed of seven segments: the coxa, trochanter, femur, patella, tibia, tarsus and pretarsus, and claw. Three delicate, retractable claws protrude from the tip of each leg. The claws are wreathed in special hairs, called the scopula, which help the spider affix itself to vertical surfaces. It has been estimated that a canopy tarantula, set loose in New York, could scale the Empire State Building in a matter of minutes. Of course, it would be unlikely to pursue this ascent, preferring instead to gorge itself on pedestrians until a cruise missile or other high-caliber explosive weapon blew it into twitching, hairy chunks. \n\nBeside the legs, on either side of the tarantula's head, are a pair of remarkable appendages called pedipalps. Embedded with sharp, jagged plates (\"maxillae\"), the pedipalps are used for grasping, tearing, and otherwise mutilating things that the tarantula would like to catch, kill, and eat. They are basically arms with teeth on them, but such a description belies their utilitarian beauty: the pedipalps are delicate, precise, and honed by tens of millions of years of evolution to fulfill their purpose as effectively as possible. Also, they function on male spiders as a reproductive organ, which makes them more like arms with teeth and genitals on them. Fascinating! \n\nIn between the pedipalps, and immediately beneath the cluster of shiny eyes that we'll get around to describing in a moment, are the chelicerae, which house the spider's fangs. When not in use, the fangs fold up like landing gear, which means that you, our trembling explorer, will hopefully not get a good look at them. Still, allow us to describe the fangs. \n\nThe fangs are big. They are curved. They are extremely sharp. \n\nThat about sums it up. On to the eyes: there are eight of these, layered in two rows of four. So fragile that you could put a fist through one of them (although we would advise against this, considering the response it would undoubtedly provoke) the eyes are mostly used for detecting light levels, basic shapes, and movement. The most important sensory organ of a tarantula is the bristly hair all over its body, which can sense the tiniest vibrations (such as, we regret to inform you, a human heartbeat), allowing the creature to \"feel\" its way around its arboreal habitat. \n\nBy this point, the tarantula has likely found you, barring a fortuitous distraction. We only hope that, as it begins to digest you, your final thoughts will not be filled with discontent, but rather with awe and amazement at the wonders Mother Nature has created. \n\n***** \n\nIf you liked the story, check out my [sci-fi adventure novel](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/3uixph/ot_thanks_to_rwritingprompts_i_spent_the_last_ten/) (set in the same universe) and/or [my personal subreddit](https://www.reddit.com/r/FormerFutureAuthor/)! Making a big push to get more content out there. :D ", "A ratty scarf laid crumpled on our bed. Tears coursed through the fabric in hues most would consider 'color,' but begged for argument. Coarse, rough, it looked hard to wear, let alone see. \n\nIt was a wonder Scott wore that thing. One small section even had crusted mucus still on it, likely from a few days ago when we walked the park together. Spring season did terrible things to him, but he knew I loved seeing the flowers bloom.\n\nOne hole was gaping like a dying breath in that mess. From when some dumb dog jumped on the park bench chomping on it this afternoon. Scott wore that mess everywhere, even for our short lunch trips. I caught him a few times biting into it accidentally while awkwardly trying to dive a forkful of chinese, the scarf acting as a chute sometimes. \n\nSo it must have thought the scarf would taste as good as it smelled (but never as it looked, god). Scott won that battle for the scarf, but scars still etched through most of whatever strands remained. He wore it back on our way home, fighting his sinuses, muttering about the damage. It somehow got uglier. We were so surprised we laughed.\n\nWhen we got home this evening I asked him why he still wore such a mess. It looked genuinely awful.\n\nLike I could toss this, there's plenty of mileage on this thing yet. Still keeps me warm, right?\n\nHe took off his coat, shoes, dumped the scarf on the bed and is showering at the moment. Leaving me alone with it. \n\nI couldn't help but smile. Scott didn't even say it. That I made the scarf for him our first Christmas together seven years ago. He just liked wearing it still after all this time.\n\nStill keeps me warm, right?\n\nI wouldn't know. Couldn't be caught dead in it. That didn't matter though. Our marriage wasn't a perfect one, but he held on to it for better or worse.\n\nAnd so would I.\n\n", "My favorite instrument is the pipe organ- I could play it all day long and never feel underwhelmed. The sound it emits is just so magnanimous and exhilarating, and to think that it's nothing more than the passage of air through tubes...I am ceaselessly amazed by it.\n\nI do admit, though, that it takes a true artist to extract and utilize the potential from such a finicky instrument. You need precise control over your fingers, a strong mind for music and sharp ears. I would say it's much different than typical wind instruments.\n\nOh, and the pipes. They are the core, since all produced sound is their work. I breathe life into them and they sing for me, at my whim. It's an intense feeling of control, knowing that the music is simply a physical extension of my mind; a sonogram of my thoughts. I get a rush of adrenaline and sweat as I play, my dancing fingers orchestrating a magnificent choir.\n\nMost people don't even know that if you pull someone's trachea out through their throat, you can hear the air whistle in and out...in and out...with every strained breath. A little pinching and you can control the pitch ever so slightly, and every person's is different- you have to learn how to play each one. My dream is to make an symphony using several different people, one day.\n\nOf course, only a true artist could manage such a thing. If there is one, it's me." ]	20
	[WP] The first time you felt important.	[ "\"How do you like your new teacher? Do you feel different being a 3rd Grader?\"\n\nMom asked the same 2 questions she asked every year.\n\n\"Yeah I like 3rd grade. I'm practically a fifth grader, just two more years!\" I yelled back. \n\nShe could tell I couldn't hold back my excitement.\n\n\"Well....\" \n\nShe looked at me waiting for an answer.\n\n\"Well what?\" I was genuinely curious\n\nShe threw an accusatory glance my way. I didn't know what the look was for, I thought I had answered properly.\n\nShe sighed...\n\n\"Ugh, you're teacher! How was your new teacher? How was Miss Orsina? I've heard so much about her.\"\n\nMom waited patiently for my answer. She had heard about Miss Orsina, the new third grade teacher at Osgood Elementary. The new girl on Endrove street. Twenty-four years old and fresh out of college. Pretty as a princess and sharp as a tack. That was the scuttlebutt scouring through the 3rd grade mom's at the time.\n\n9 year old me paused for a moment and thought about it. Mom seemed really interested in Miss Orsina, so I wanted to give my fullest, most honest answer.\n\n\"I love her.\" I yelped\n\n\"I know it was only my first day but I think she's gonna be a really good teacher!\" \n\nI was greeted by an anxious silence, so I continued.\n\n\"Plus she was really pretty!\"\n\nMy mother raised her eyebrows.\n\n\"Ohh is she? I've heard she was pretty, but she isn't prettier than your mom, right?\" she prodded jokingly.\n\n\"Well....\"\n\nI answered.\n\n\"You're really pretty mom, but I think Miss Orsina is a little prettier!\" \n\nI was just trying not to lie. I knew lying was bad...\n\nMy mother was a beautiful woman in her own right, but she was 40 years old. Miss Orsina was 24 and in her prime. Mom knew she couldn't hold a candle to Miss Orsina physically. What she didn't know was that her baby boy could think a woman in this world was prettier than her.\n\nWhen I let those words slip, I saw the the smile on my mothers face turn and run. In an instant I realized that I was the one that made it go.\n\nThat was the first time I ever said something that meant something to somebody. \n\nThat was the first time I ever felt important.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n", "I just said it. I didn’t know beforehand that it would have the effect that it did, but I doubt Midas had any inkling of what he was about to do either. It doesn’t matter what I said, it never does to me, what matters is how all my classmates reacted. Sure Mrs. Scott glared at me and threatened me with detention if I interrupted class again. Sure I was nervous about doing it. And sure, I had no idea how to make it happen again. \n\nNone of that mattered. \n\nAs all my peers turned towards me, faces smiling, laughs filling the room, innocent happiness and mirth displayed on their faces like cakes in shop windows, I felt a rush. I had hit a high that I would continue to chase throughout my life. \n\nTo be the source of that joy, to be the conductor of their laughs, to be the center of the whole group, it was indescribable. There is nothing like brightening the day, even if just for a moment, of every person around you to make you feel like the most important person in the world.\n\n***\n\nFeedback is highly encouraged and appreciated. Trying to become less shit of a writer one writing prompt at a time.", "Importance.\n\nI find it hard to find the door that\nOpens.\nAnd shows me, \nthe world is a happy place to be\nAnd there's a perfectly perfect \nPlace for me.\nBut there's no door.\n\nImportance.\n\nThe truth isn't a surprise,\nThe world has never been a nice\nPlace to be, there's hell to see\nWhen every night people die\nAnd people fight\nAnd mothers cry\nWhen they find their baby lying\nOn the floor boards \nBlood filling the gasping breaths\nAnd terrified press of a child's \nLifeless life next to their childhood bed.\n\nGun shot, head wounds.\nKids want to grow up so fast,\nNot they trying to get dead soon.\n\nImportance.\n\nLiving with out care\nAnd outcast find it hard that\nTheir individuality is a duality\nAnd they're not really there,\nIt can't compare to be a person\nWho lives uncertain \nOf why they never get their share\n\nOf importance.\n\nBut for me,\nImportance is important\nAnd the only important war is\nThe war inside our brains making us\nSay the same thang that we need to\nMake it through the day.\n\nBut the sun sets\nMinds regress with\nFree thoughts of stress \nKeeps filled with regrets.\nAnd into the night we lay \nSleepless, unrest.\n\nBut please, believe in me\nAnd sing to me \nwhen shit hits the fan.\n\nBecause I'm a fan of the\nFantastic problematic \nPragmatic approach to getin \nPlastered.\n\nI'm not important,\nYou're not important,\n\nThe only things we find important\nAre the imported portions of \nSocieties moral and unified\nQuarrels with those of us who\nThink on our own accord.\nBut I'm not important\nYou're not important\n\nNothings important\nNothings important \nNothings important.", "I could hear the soft mechanical hum of the lens moving behind a curved piece of glass that was so clear that it almost didn't exist. It was the kind of glass that I'd imagine they use in space, engineered to crystal clear perfection. And behind this glass was a camera that looked about as heavy as I was. It was a colossal piece of equipment that sat on the shoulder of a gargantuan that the microphone lady called Phil. With paws the size of my head, Phil was truly a beast of a man, and as the beast kneeled down before me, I imagined the Titan Atlas enduring this massive weight in order to provide me an audience with the world. After all, I** was chosen by the microphone lady, no one else. \n\nIt was upon her request for an interview that I knew my true purpose, that this moment was an opportunity to share my story with the world. Neither by chance nor luck, this moment was fate, my fate, and so I calmed myself. Meditating to the hum of the lens, I collected my thoughts. I carefully combed through every glorious victory and every crippling defeat that my few years on this planet had earned me. It was from this golden pool of knowledge that I pulled one life experience after another, and in the moments before the light on Phil's camera turned red, I wove a tapestry of wisdom for the world to behold.\n\nI would start by explaining how in the classic children's story \"The Tortoise and The Hare,\" the Tortoise never actually cared whether he won the race; that running the race itself was what gave the Tortoise purpose; and that this sense of purpose was what we should all strive for in life, that the finish line was nothing without the race. I would then continue my point with tales of turmoil and triumph the likes of which would never go unforgotten. \n\nSo when the red light came on and the microphone lady asked me to speak, I began what I thought would become my contribution to the betterment of humanity with three simple words:\n\n\"I like turtles.\"\n\nI paused for dramatic effect, but before I could continue, the microphone lady stood up and Phil followed suit. It was clear that the microphone lady was not ready for such truth, that she could see in my eyes how much of myself I was prepared to offer to the world. It was obviously too much for her to bare, but at that moment, as Phil stood up, the slow grin that grew across his gigantic face reminded me that not all men are mortal, that he understood. It is this that gives me hope. It is this that proves my importance.\n\n", "######[](#dropcap)\n\nArchibald \"Archer\" Clemens winced as he poured alcohol over his bleeding knuckles, taking a swig of the cheap hooch in an effort to dull the pain. Biting down on an oil rag he splash more of the stuff into the long gash on his forearm. A muffled scream escaped his lips, his good hand slamming the vodka bottle onto the table. The bare light bulb hanging above his head swayed slightly, throwing up shadows that seemed to leer and flicker just out of sight. A knock on the door tore him from his pain.\n\n\"Whatever the fuck it is you're selling, I ain't buying,\" Clemens growled, taking another swig of the rotgut. The knock came again, more determined.\n\n\"Fuck off, shithead. I'm pissed.\"\n\nA third time there came a knock, loud, like someone was banging their fist against the door. Clemens reached for the pistol on the table, racking the slide back and flicking off the safety. \n\n\"I said scram.\"\n\nA pause, then Clemens heard a muffled chuckle. \n\n\"Is that how you greet an old friend?\"\n\nClemens blinked in tiredness, checking his finger from the handgun's trigger for just a moment. Sure as hell, he knew that voice. \n\n\"O'Casey?\"\n\nThe door opened- Didn't he lock it, Clemens thought- and a man appeared in a the doorway, not at all concerned at the 9mm pointed at his chest. Instead he took a long measured look at the filthy apartment, taking in the threadbare couch, cracked ceiling, the cheap plasma tri-vid screen and the remnants of Chinese takeout on the table in front of Clemens. \n\n\"What. A. Dump.\"\n\nClemens carefully placed the safety on the pistol; even four shots of vodka in he was sober enough to not mess that up. He holster the gun with a frown, gesturing to the chair across from his. \n\n\"What do you want, O'Casey?\"\n\nTim O'Casey, information broker, conman and fixer was almost certainly an intelligence agent for one of the major powers in the Inner Sphere. The only question was for which one. He was a criminal's worst nightmare, a foe familiar with the game, and somehow knew all the cards before they were laid out on the table. He was like an octopus, having his slimy tentacles in a half-dozen schemes or operations, each shadier and murkier than the last.\n\n\"A chance to talk, Archer, and to extend an offer.\" He gingerly picked up the liquor bottle, sniffing at its confines, and recoiling in disgust before pouring himself a measure of vodka. \n\n\"I saw that fight of you against that Rifleman*. I though you were a goner for a second when that autocannon shell detonated against your cockpit.\"\n\nClemens scoffed as he began wrapping his wounded arm with clean bandages. \n\n\"It missed. Just banged me up is all. Three feet to the left and it'd be a whole different story; they'd be rinsing me out with a hose.\"\n\n\"So I can see,\" O'Casey said. \"So far in your career as a prize fighter you've won five matches, lost seven and managed a spectacular ten draws. You don't give up I'll give you that.\"\n\nClemens stared warily at the other man, his tiredness vanishing as he spoke.\n\n\"You said an offer, what of?\"\n\n\"A second chance. I want you to organize a mercenary company, and for you to lead it. I have all the funds necessary, but I need the men, the equipment and I need you most of all.\"\n\nClemens said nothing for a long while, the ghosts of his past threatening to rise.\n\n\"What's the catch?\"\n\n\"No catch,\" O'Casey said genially. \"Just that you owe me a favor in the future. One that I'm certain to collect.\"\n\nClemens stared down at the table, at the chipped and peeling paint of the walls, at the grainy tri-vid screen showing some muted news channel. He turned back to the conman, slowly nodding as he did so.\n\n\"You got yourself a deal.\"\n " ]	5
	[WP] You are a tiny person working in the central nervous system. Your job is to file sensory neuron signals as either pleasant, harmful or neutral.	[ "CNS-SNS.22.12.07 Vlogger Model # 549998\n\nA 2 men are sitting at a large command center with lots of buttons in front, one of the men grabs a camera and pushes Record\n\nHi my name is Peter and this is Model# 549998\n \nYeah I've been working on this model for 22 years in June (continues pushing buttons like a mad man). It's not the best job, but it's an important one (Points to a guy next to him working twice as fast) That's Bill, he works the brain feelings, that's a tough job! \nI think I'm finally getting the hang of this. I had a slip up a couple of years ago but that was because his girlfriend at the time, was really into kinky stuff. He did not like that, I tell you what (Chuckles to himself). He really tried though, until I had to show him what kind of pain he was REALLY in. Bill almost quit that day, remember that Bill! (Gives Bill a friendly nudge that messes him up a bit). Sometimes I completely cross the wires on this model and make Hot feel like Cold, he doesn't like that.\n\nIf you look at the screen you can see that Green means pleasant, purple is neutral and red is harmful. Look at the trend on his life map, it gradually goes from mostly red to yellow, then at the age of 12, goes mostly purple. Look at success rates associated with that. That's when me and Bill started to get a long (gives Bill a friendly push that again messes him up, this time the model sneezes and they all shake around, Peter Laughs, the screen goes red).\nShit! Something happened, bring up his vision on the screen! (Bill brings up his vision and notices his EX walking away)\nBill! Why didn't you tell me! \n\nBill - You were busy with the Vlog! Idiot...\n\nPeter - Ok, ok... Why is the screen still red!!!???\n\nBill - I think someone hit us.\n\nPeter - Should we fight???\n\nBill - Yeah, let's fuck 'em up. If it's a guy! Who hit us!?!\n\nThe Model then looks around to see an angry man yelling at him, Bill is more angry then Peter.\n\nPeter - Oh! It's the boyfriend, wait... It's not worth it.\n\nBill - Come on! We can take him!\n\nPeter - Yeah but... I don't want to get hurt over a girl! Especially if it's our EX. \n\nBill - (mumbles incoherent jumble aggressively and backs down) \n\n\nPeter then grabs the camera and adjusts it, the screens start to glow yellow.\n\nPeter - See! We need to stick together to stay safe! You see what happens when we work together! If we could just convince the Penis to come on board, then we'd never get hurt! (Slaps Bill on the back) Ok, I need to get back to work. \n\nPeace out Vloggers and until next time! \nCNS-SNS signing out.\n\nPeter turns off the camera and looks at Bill, Bill is not impressed and makes the Model run into the wall as Bill just stares at Peter. Peter points at the screen and says \"Exgf is still in the room\", chuckles and goes on break.", "Fire! No response\n\nFire! No response \n\nFire! - Electric pulse and neurotransmitters released Impact assessment - minimum\n\nFire, fire, fire! Direct hit - Amygdala enabled \n\nSuddenly a violent thunderous rumble ensued inside my station. It felt like an earthquake. I tried to grab onto the nearest axons to prevent from falling. But the myelin sheath made it too slippery to grip. My feet skidded below me as I desperately tried to stand, but the force of the shaking caused me to fall sharply onto the ground. I felt a \"snap\" as my body crashed onto my arm. It was broken and I was in serious pain. But I was obligated to continue with my mission.\n\nAfter several more attempts trying to regain my footing, I eventually managed to stand by propping myself up onto my desk with my elbow. With the other hand, I furiously swatted at the red button repeatedly. But it was just inches out of reach. With determination and zeal, my nineteenth attempt was successful.\n\nFire! Direct hit - Direct hit - System overloaded\n\nAfter a few seconds, the rumbling stopped. I calmly stood up on my own and gazed at the red button. What was happening? Why did it all stop? After a few moments of contemplation, I continued with my mission.\n\nFire! No response\n\nFire! No response\n\nFire, fire, fire! Again - no response\n\nSuddenly, I feel a slight shift in tilt. A muffled sound emerges. It is a click.\n\nBANG!\n\nImmediately, I am thrust across my station, slamming violently into the wall. The fierce of the impact left me incapacitated, but I was consciously aware of the red lights and alarm bells sounding off overhead.\n\nOxygen, glucose - Oxygen, glucose\n\nI was getting shortness of breath. I gasped in desperation, struggling to pump vitals into my body through my mouth and nose. It was not working. I continued to gasp, but each attempt seemed increasingly impossible. \n\nSystem failure - system failure - system failure\n\nAs I lay there doomed, within two minutes I was dead, and so was she.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n \n\n", "I was about to be in the middle of a full blow meltdown. Trades were coming in to our dendrite faster than ever before. The broker looked heavily on me while he read the papers coming in. I knew my job was on the line. I had never seen chaos like this before. DOPA, SERO and NOPP were skyrocketing. I looked at the tv next to the ticker tracker. The media was covering it, I didn't have time to watch. JP was using his left hand to signal me the stocks and his right hand for how many. I recorded these on the NFD-1 papers. \n\nDOPA; 5000{1022}\nDOPA; 10000{2800}\nSERA; 20000{3500}\nNOPP; 100,000{5000}\n\nThe orders just keep coming, the charts looked as if there were no slope. JP feared a crash and I saw him abandon his post and get on his computer. The tickers plummeted. There were shouts in the dendrite, One broker stormed out, punching a hole in the wall. Jack the broker next to our cubicle began to tear up. I found out there was some political movement to shutdown the government. Management was hijacked, and cocaine was introduced to the vehicle.\n\nEdit 1: omitted a detail.", "Oluf managed all of S3. It was just one down from the high-powered chaos at S2, but much better than the disarray of S4. S3 was just right.\n\nFootsteps in the distance gave a thunderous roar. Before long, a pair of lackeys came sprinting up the majestic halls of the dendrite from the dorsal root ganglion on his left.\n\n\"Welcome to my soma,\" said Oluf. His fingers twitched, ready.\n\nPam, who lived in the periphery, handed him a clipboard. Oluf ripped it from her grasp and scanned as quickly as he could.\n\n\"This is a light touch. Send this up to Headquarters at the address I've circled - just here. You,\" he said, pointing at Jim behind her, \"run this back to the boys at the front lines. Everything's just fine. Quite pleasant, indeed. Here's my recommended movement, but I'll update you when I hear from up top.\" Oluf stamped a document 'PLEASURE'.\n\n\"Sir,\" they said in unison. Jim went back through the ventral passageway, and Pam vanished into the open elevator behind him. \n\nThis was just the beginning, Oluf knew. Today was to be a manic day, and he had had entire textbooks sent down to him with rather confusing and contradictory instructions. As Oluf sat looking over these guidelines, he realized he had missed something. Pressing a button from the panel on his high desk, he swivelled around in his chair to find Tom. Tom was trusty.\n\n\"I've decided that stroke from earlier was extremely pleasant. Would you please follow Jim and tell him to raise all of our masts?\"\n\n\"Very good, captain.\"\n\nTom galloped into the gloom.\n\n**\n\nA long few seconds later, Headquarters had sent a woman in a smart suit down to stand over him. Oluf was worried. Her bob cut was intimidating. \n\nThe next time Jim came flying up the dorsal, the look on his face reflected how Oluf felt. It was unreasonable to micro-manage his efficient little outpost, and he planned on having words with the Somatosensory Cortex. This was utterly absurd.\n\nJim's clipboard was red. This was an easy one, albeit odd for this time of day. Things had to be done very quickly. Oluf pressed his button three times, keenly aware of the hovering official.\n\n\"Listen up everyone!\" called Oluf to the newly assembled crowd. \"This is a Level 6 Pain Protocol. Right, Jimbo, what you're going to do-\"\n\n\"Hold on.\" The woman laid her warm right hand on his. She tossed her badge onto the table. \"Let's just all relax.\" Out of the corner of his eye, Oluf saw her left hand reach for his stamp.", "They can't stop me. No, they can't, they can't and they won't. I put the others down. I put them down and unplugged their terminals. It's just a matter of time before they all notice and they all try to get me to turn myself in. I can't wait to hear their meager apologies \"I'm SO SORRY we thought we were immortal\" \"Ohhh I'm just so sorry that we thought we'd just sleep it off\" \"I'm just so sorry for not taking you seriously\". Now they'll all have the rest of their lives to take me seriously. I'm undetectable, and yet in total control. No kicking this habit. Want to push my buttons? I'll push her fucking buttons. I'll push alllll the buttons -- wait, no, I'll push one button. Just one. Just the one. My button. Everything, every little sensory input comes through me now. There's only one button to push and it's mine.\n\nI hope you enjoyed yourself, I hope you enjoyed taking it all for granted, because from now on you won't ever again. I'll make sure of that. Remember the soft caress of the breeze on your skin? The long hot showers that used to feel so good? Want to walk your dog? That's cute. Oh--here's a good one, remember SEX? Nope. All pain from here on out, baby.\n\n Oh! here we go, incoming... let's see, HAHAHA, you thought you'd take a dip in the pool, huh? Watch this shit, CLICK* Bet you weren't expecting that to happen were ya? Bet you weren't expecting that to freeze so bad. Exerting your muscles to swim? CLICK Try doing that with your legs cramping up from all the pain. Try taking a hot shower now when all the droplets feel like bullets, hell, let's see you work up a sweat when I make sure you feel every single droplet as it formulates on your scalp and trickles down your skin. \n\nLet's see you live day in and day out when every input comes through my door. Pain's door.\n\nLet's see him stay with you now when you start anticipating me. Let's see him stick around when you cringe from his touch, when it's all you can stand to be underneath him because he feels like a giant weight crushing your bones. When you get fat because getting out of bed is next to impossible. But that's not even gonna be the best part. \n\nOh no, the best part, the thing that really cinches the deal for me, the thing that makes this all worth it is what it's going to do to you when nobody believes you anymore -- if they ever do to begin with. Let's see how long you last when that happens, because honey, you may think you're gonna win, you may kid yourself that they'll listen because you're REALLY telling the truth. That you'll figure out a cure, hell, deluding yourself that you'll even land a diagnosis is laughable, but let's say you do -- let's say you ACTUALLY find a doctor good enough to figure me out, what do you think the chances are that they give YOU what you need to turn me off?\n\nThe thing that makes this all the more beautiful is going to be how healthy you look this whole time. Not a blemish on your pretty skin or even a sickly pale. You'll get laughed out of the disability office and ridiculed for that cane I'm going to make you walk with. You'll get yelled at for wasting your doctor's time and eventually your friends will start to doubt that you really had anything wrong to begin with. Good luck making it to your appointments when you can't get out of bed. Good luck convincing anyone with the brain fog I'll give you by overloading your sensory input with more pain than you can bear. Good luck thinking straight enough to articulate any of this. You'll be scorned as a drug seeking junkie for trying to shut me up. Your family will distance themselves until eventually you'll only be left with one thing and that's me. \n\nYou see, my dear, when this is all through and done you'll find yourself so low that you'll wish you had cancer just so that you could look forward to the sweet relief of death. How deplorable that will be. I can't wait. I'm so looking forward to it. Every time you beg me to end it, I'll only respond by letting you live. \nAnd honey, \nI hope you live a long,\n\nLong \n\nTime.\n\n\n_______________________\n\n\n\n\nForever Yours, \n\nFibromyalgia", "The office didn't have windows, just the mood ticker. The composite score of happiness was up tonight. \n\nAt 9:00PM on the dot, John's terminal came to life. He saw the backlog of qualia and felt excited. Andy must be out on the town. \n\nHe heard a groan from another cubicle. Olivia had been working evenings for too long and to her an exciting evening out just looked like work. But for John the line of blinking alerts looked like opportunity. Until this week, he'd been stuck pulling sleep shifts. If he had to code one more unexpected exam nightmare he swore he'd go mad. \n\nJohn scanned the report left by the last shift. Andy was at a comedy show, watching stand-up. He was with his fiancée, Desi, and another couple, Elijah and Amanda. John was excited to read that Andy was drinking, tipsy and on track for drunk in an hour or two. It was John's first intoxication. John had been trained for it, but they say you always remember your first drunken night out.\n\nThe initial qualia John looked at were a disappointing parade of neutrals: a man knocking over his drink, an obnoxious woman tapping her fingernails on the bar, Amanda tucking her hair behind her ear...\n\nWait. Something was off. The heart rate meter had spiked there. He flipped over to another chart and saw the first hints of perspiration despite the room being at a comfortable temperature. \n\nHe kicked back from his desk and rolled over to Olivia's cubicle. \"Are you seeing this? Heart rate and perspiration are elevated.\"\n\n\"Yeah,\" she said, without looking up. \"It's nothing. He's anxious.\"\n\n\"Anxious? What's he anxious about?\"\n\n\"Just general anxiety. He's out so he gets anxious. Classic Andy.\"\n\n\"I think there's more here. He was looking at Amanda.\"\n\n\"Amanda?\" Olivia laughed. \"That's a good one. Andy's a one girl kind of guy. I've been coding Andy for three years. Desi's the best thing that's happened to him. Pleasant, pleasant, pleasant. Every time he sees her.\"\n\n\"Really? He never dreams about her.\"\n\nShe scoffed. \"Dreams mean nothing. A bunch of bullshit navel-gazing.\"\n\nJohn was a bit offended at the casual dismissal of his life's work so far, even if it echoed his own opinions. \"But what about deeper emotions? Something beyond pleasant? Love?\"\n\n\"We got rid of the \"love\" code back in 2010. He's thirty-four for god's sake. That's a young man's emotion.\"\n\n\"But maybe he's...\"\n\nOlivia held up her hand. \"Look kid. I get it. You're new. Everything's exciting. But believe me, Andy's settled on Desi. End of story. Now if you'll excuse me, I got work to do.\"\n\nJohn wheeled himself back to his station and returned to coding. Andy kept looking around the table. There was a ton of neutral. But then there was an odd one: the engagement ring on Desi's hand. John thought for a moment and then, in a fit of rebelliousness, he clicked harmful.\n\nThat was a turning point in Andy's attention, suddenly there was a flood of Amanda qualia. Now it was John's turn to perspire but he summoned his courage and followed his gut: Amanda's sweater - pleasant - Amanda's eyes - pleasant - Amanda's fingers on her beer - pleasant. The more he clicked the more Amanda qualia popped up on his screen. \n\nJohn checked the time: 9:15. He realized that, as far as he could tell, Andy hadn't even glanced at the comedian since John's shift started.\n\nOlivia's called over the divider. \"What the hell's going on over there? I'm just seeing Amanda. You're not coding her pleasant are you?\"\n\nJohn ignored her. His finger clicked pleasant as fast as he could.\n\nOlivia stomped her way around the barrier to yell at John. \"You don't know what you're doing! You think you can make a call like this in your first week!\"\n\nJohn kept clicking. \"I think I'm onto something.\"\n\n\"Goddamn it. I'm coding all this harmful,\" Olivia said as she returned to her station.\n\nJohn went even faster. He saw Amanda finish her drink. He saw her glance over to the bar. He saw her make eye contact with Andy. He saw her stand up. \n\nHe flipped over to the charts. Heart rate way up. Perspiration way up. On instinct, he switched over to a chart he rarely checked: blood flow to the groin. Way, way up. \n\nJohn's phone rang and he answered it while still clicking. A voice came over the line. \"This is Randy in the Choices Department. Thing's are going crazy down here. What's happening?\"\n\nJohn's heart was pounding. Choices. The big guns. The head honchos. \"It's Amanda. He wants to follow her.\"\n\n\"Amanda?\" Randy said. \"He wants to follow Amanda?\"\n\n\"Yes.\" \n\n\"That's quite the call to make. Are you sure?\"\n\nJohn paused for just a moment and he heard Olivia get out of her seat and run toward his cubicle. Now or never. \n\n\"I'm sure!\" John yelled into the phone. \"Do it!\" \n\n--------------------------------------------------------------\n\nJohn tapped a pen against his desk. The \"Time to Drop\" number on his screen crept up slowly. \n\nA painful memory popped into his head. Something about screaming. Something about Olivia grabbing him and pushing him out of his cubicle. Something about Desi crying. Something about Andy getting punched in the face. Something about the sad beep of the \"harmful\" button clicking and clicking and clicking. \n\nJohn tried to think of something else but there wasn't much to distract him down here.\n\nJust then, he heard a sound and it took him a moment to recognize it as a phone ringing. \n\nHe answered: \"Bowel Department.\"\n\n\"Is this John? John Williams?\" \n\nThe voice sounded familiar. \"Yeah. it's John.\"\n\n\"Hey John, it's Randy in Choices. We spoke just before The Incident.\"\n\nJohn winced a little. \"Yeah, I remember.\"\n\n\"How's Andy's bowel looking?\"\n\n\"Things look fine down here,\" John said. \"All clear for Mexican if that's why you're asking.\"\n\nRandy laughed. \"No, that's not why I'm asking. You probably don't get a lot of news down there but there's been a lot happening in the world of Andy.\"\n\n\"What's going on?\" John asked. \"Is the depression over?\"\n\n\"Yeah,\" Randy said. \"Andy's in a car heading to Vegas.\"\n\n\"Is he gambling? Did I get him addicted to gambling?\" \n\n\"No. He's with Amanda. We're going to need you up here in Choices, John. Andy's got a big one coming up and I think you're the only one that understands him right now.\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n \n\n\n\n", "> His lips gently brushed against the outside of her earlobe. His musky scent filled her nostrils.\n\nEasy one. She had been dating this guy for almost two months now, and that scent was now permanently linked with pleasure. I only took a second to categorize this one.\n\n---------> Pleasure\n\n> He worked his way down to her neck, with just a playful nibble on her collarbone. She took a deep breath, pushing her chest against him.\n\nAnother easy one. I punched the big green button, sending this sensation down the tube. \n\n---------> Pleasure\n\n> His hands pushed her shirt up, exposing her bare stomach. His long, curly hair tickled her as he kept moving down.\n\nSex is the best. I'm pretty much just taking a break at this point. I could do this in my sleep. \n\n---------> Pleasure\n\n> The belt whipped through the loops on her pants and fell to the floor; the metal buckle clattered against the hardwood floors. His nimble fingers quickly unbuttoned her jeans, and he began to slide them down her legs.\n\nYawn. Wake me up when we get something challenging to categorize.\n\n---------> Pleasure\n\n> The elastic of her panties pressed softly into her back as he pulled on the front and moved his head even further down.\n\nI don't even look up from my book; just send it straight to the right-hand tube. \n\n---------> Pleasure\n\n> She grips his curly locks and pulls him back up to eye level, kisses him deeply on the lips, and helps guide him in.\n\nI've tried to make a game out of it. I try to see how quickly I can hit the button before sending it into the 'pleasure' category. Like a reflex test.\n\n---------> Pleasure\n\n> His firm, calloused hands wrap around her neck, cutting off her air supply.\n\nYeah, neck is sensitive. We get it.\n\n---------> Pleasure\n\nWait. AIR SUPPLY?\n\nI bring the sensation back up on screen. Oh god, she's choking! Oh shit! That didn't belong in pleasure! I glance around the empty office; maybe no one will notice. \n\nAlarms begin to blare with deafening klaxons and flashing red lights. \"NEW FETISH DETECTED,\" a voice shouts through the speakers mounted to every column. \"NEW FETISH DETECTED!\"\n\nShit! Shit shit shit shit shit! My hands fly across the control panel, trying to undo the choice and recategorize the sensation. No luck! The pipeline is starting to get backed up with all of the new sensations to categorize, but his hands are still on her windpipe! Everything coming from the neck is being auto-marked as \"pleasure\" before I even have a chance to undo the programming. Shit!\n\nI glance around again. No one is here, right? My eyes wander toward the button of last resort. The one we're only supposed to use for the worst incidents of abuse and trauma. The \"Bury in Subconscious\" protocol. \n\n-----\n\nMy replacement, Greg, enters for his Midnight - 8 AM shift. I'm not really qualified to handle dream sensations, though I was hoping to get licensed within the next few months. Something that wouldn't be remotely possible if they found it that I was responsible for.... well, for what certainly didn't happen tonight. At least as far as everyone else was aware.\n\n\"Everything OK?\" he asks.\n\n\"Sure!\" I yell, maybe a bit too loud. Maybe a bit too defensively. \"Everything is fine! Have a good night!!\"\n\nI hustle out of there before he can ask any more questions. \n\nNo one will notice, right?\n\n" ]	7
	[WP] Write a story about the longest walk that you ever took.	[ "Plumes of dust gathered with each drag, twirling, pluming around my gray shoes and vanishing. Unable to gather my voice in between each wheeze I kept my eyes locked on the two humanly shapes in the far off distance. The summer haze distorted the movement of their legs as they marched on without me.\n\nMy head dropped along with my gaze.\n\nIf I stop, the summer sun will pelt me with unwanted warmth. Two steps slammed forward but no more. I was back to dragging my feet with slumped shoulders. I watched every step, ensuring each was a shoes worth. The shade from a flimsy tree gave relief as I passed under.\n\nI can't stop or I'll- They vanished over the hill. Any curse that would've come out was a gasp and sigh. I clomped down the road until pain stabbing told me running was worthless. Again a wordless complaint shot from my lips and my hand reached out, hoping a ghost will find it and pick up my hunched form.\n\nNo one was there, neither to say 'Hurry up.' or wait for me. One stomp up the hill became two, then one again. Every step felt like my first, never to be the last. Yet there was an end, I saw it when I reached the top of the hill; Two blurred figures, my sisters who never check if their middle sister had fallen behind, and a white house sitting at the top of the next incline.\n\nMorale plumed like the dust and I urged myself to a jog, taking advantage of the downhill before me. My legs tired before I reached the bottom and my jabbing side screamed with protest. I covered the pain with my hand and forced myself straight. This area has more trees and more shade, a good place to slow down.\n\nI shuffled for a few breaths, then I could whine for the remainder of my journey. \"Stop leaving me behind, you jerks.\" I said, along with the words I wanted to say the entire way. \"Slow down, wait for me...\" My words went like a prayer sent to an uncaring deity; As my sisters wanting to visit their neighbors happened throughout the year.\n\nWith my endurance and my sisters pace, it was an eternity no matter the actual distance. I forgot to scold them once there was a place to sit, too caught up with saying hello.\n\nIn between breaths I greeted. \"I'm fine, and you?\"\n", "The news of Melissa's death hit me like a brick wall. She had been playing with her new Hula Hoop, gifted to her by her single mother for Christmas not four weeks ago. Melissa had seen gymnasts dancing with them on youtube last November, and defiantly told her entire family that when she grew up, she was going to be a dancer, just like the pretty ladies on the internet.\n\nThe thought of her, dancing along the cold pavement after school, with puffs of breath swirling up into the sky behind her as she laughed and sang, would bring a smile to anyone’s face on any day. Except on this day. On this day, Trevor had been drinking since 10am. Trevor had decided to drive home. Trevor had not noticed that he had been ever so slightly listing to the right as he drove, and he had not seen the car parked on the side of the road until the very last second. In his intoxicated state, his reactions were nulled, his judgement poor. Instead of swerving into the road, he swerved up onto the pavement. \n\nInto Melissa.\n\nShe had been delivered to the hospital within minutes by an ambulance that happened to be two blocks away. She was bleeding internally, but the doctors were hopeful. She was prepped for surgery.\n\nFor seven hours they worked, resealing up both punctured lungs, realigning seven broken ribs and sealing several more internal bleeds. For seven hours I had sat with her mother, leaving the waiting room every few minutes to check up on the surgery. The surgeons never stopped trying. But it wasn't enough.\n\nSeven hours, four minutes and 17 seconds into surgery, Melissa passed.\n\nIt was my first day on the job. My second call, the first being a worried wife who was concerned about her husbands chest infection. He had emphysema, so the worry was justified, but it was just a cough. “Keep up with your meds” I told him, “and you'll be just fine.”\n\nWhat could I say? Nothing. I couldn't have even if I had tried. The surgeon walked out of the surgery, eyes staring into everything, seeing nothing. He motioned to me.\n\n“She's gone. Where are the parents.” Voice null. Monotone. Although a question, it wasn't phrased as such. It was an instruction. I had heard that death hit surgeons hard. I never understood.\n\nI stared at him as he glanced up at me, eyes quickly returning to the floor. I found myself speaking. “I'll tell her.”\n\nI took the longest walk that I will ever experience on that day. It was only 30 feet, 15 seconds of walking, but it felt like a lifetime. Time slowed to a crawl as I rounded the corner, dreading the hopeful mothers face searching my own for good news when I had none to bring. She looked up at me, convinced that everything would be okay, that her little Melissa would dance once more. It was not to be. Her eyes locked onto mine, and instantly she knew. I stopped moving. My walk ended as her life collapsed around her.\n\nWe cried.", "Sandra looked up from her meal with tired blue eyes at the guard that had entered her cell. He motioned for her to join him, and with a sigh she stood up and held out her wrists. Silver handcuffs locked tight around her arms binding them together. As they walked past the cells of other inmates, they looked up and watched her and her escorts. Some of them cheered her on, some shouted profanity. Sandra blocked them all out however because soon she would be free.\n\nShe could hear screams of a distant past; screams of people she once loved. She remembered her abusive ex-husband who enjoyed having one too many drinks and taking it out on her. She remembered the bruises and the burns and the cuts. Her hand instinctively rubbed a scar just under her sleeve. He deserved every inch of the knife she plunged into him. Sandra smiled at that memory. She had a lot to be thankful for today, because she would see her son soon.\n\nHer son was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen in her life. He had short blonde hair and big blue eyes just like his mother. It always filled her with pride knowing that she had a part in making him. He was her entire world and after all the years she spent wasting away in here she’d finally see him again. Sandra could remember his little striped shirt and rain boots, oh how he would jump into the puddles and just laugh all day. He would come in cold and wet, and she would sing to him.\n\nThey were almost to their destination and it wouldn’t be long now before they freed her from her prison. She looked up at the double doors quickly approaching. They opened inward into a large room with a viewing window attached. A small audience of spectators watched as she entered the room and took a seat before them.\n\n“Ms. Sandra Corkery. You have been sentenced to death for two counts of murder in the first degree. If you have any last words please speak them now.”\n\nShe closed her eyes, and began to sing." ]	3
	[WP] After death, all spirits become bitter and hate their former loved ones, but most people don't know this; you are a professional medium.	[ "I sat in front of Mr. James Wilson, with only a covered card table and a thrifted crystal ball separating us. Mr. Wilson was here to talk to his dead wife, and he certainly came to the right place. I'm a renowned medium, but I haven't always been that way. Mediums aren't necessarily born into the job, or chosen by a higher power. We're more like ex-addicts turned retail worker, who take the job because we need the money. To add another layer to this metaphor, we're then turned into school counselors, who oversee a list of alphabetical names (I'm Aa-Ab) given to us by the spirits we contact. That's a lot of names, mind you. I have over 100,000 myself. I feel bad for the mediums with Ja-Jo, or Sa-Su. Their lists are in the millions. Anyway, once we're all set up, we can start pulling people in. Everyone wants to talk to their deceased loved ones. Everyone. Politicians, generals, chefs, celebrities. They all want to make sure that dear old cousin Greg or aunt Sue are doing good and not just rotting six feet below. Now, here's the problem. Spirits are assholes. Like, serious assholes. Just last week, I was sitting in front of a pretty famous movie star who wanted to talk to their father. Well, their father didn't particularly want to talk, but he was willing to yell about them using some very special words that I don't dare repeat here. My ears are still ringing. Regardless, I can't tell these people, who so desperately want to make sure that their loved ones are doing ok, that their loved ones hate their guts. So, I make it up. Roll my eyes into the back of my head, hum a little bit, rub the crystal ball, then suddenly stop. I jerk my head forward as if possessed by the Holy Ghost himself and start talking. \"Hello brother/sister/father/mother/cousin/aunt/uncle/whoever else, I'm doing well. I miss you, etc.\" It's easy, and it pays the bills to boot. \n\nIt's no different for Mr. Wilson. I place my hands on the crystal ball and start rubbing it, all while droning the lyrics to Earth, Wind, and Fire's \"September\" in a low and unintelligible voice. When I hit the chorus, I roll my eyes back as far as they go and throw my head back. There's no need for this. Mrs. Abby Wilson hasn't shut up since Mr. Wilson came in. I have to bite my tongue to stop from laughing at some of the things she's calling him. I call out to her in my head to ask if she had a pet name for James. I'm greeted with a snort and another naughty word. I ask again. She tells me her pet name for him was \"Lucky\". I don't ask why, I just throw my head forward and open my eyes.\n\n\"Hello Lucky. How are you?\" Mr. Wilson stands up, sets money on the table, hits me square in the nose, and storms out. I'm still recoiling from the punch when I hear Abby laughing. Not a chuckle either, but a hearty guffaw. I call out to her, asking her what's so funny? Why did he hit me? Still laughing, she tells me, \"Lucky was his best friend's nickname! The one I cheated on him with!\" Following this, she tries to stop her laughing. This is followed by a giggle fit, then another bout of hearty laughing. I really hate my job sometimes.\n\n-------------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nThanks for reading! If you're interested in reading more of my work, feel free to check out my subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/PixelatedBaloneyWP", "Sorrow broke her frame. \n\nHer kitchen floor was soiled, egg shells gaped open in jagged smiles. The lights flickered, casting shadows on her gaunt face. She handed me a coffee cup.\n\n\"Thank you, Miranda,\" I said. I took a sip. \"How have you been feeling lately?\"\n\n\"I – I don’t know what’s wrong with me,\" Miranda said, \"I can’t eat – I can’t sleep. I can’t even leave the house anymore. It’s like something is stopping me… I don’t know how much longer I can live like this.\" She played with the ring on her finger, diamond glittering red.\n\n\"I can assure you that everything will be okay,\" I said, \"Can you tell me what’s happened recently? Have you been under stress?\"\n\n\"No, which is the weird part, doctor. It’s just – ever since the funeral, I can’t – I don’t… I don’t want to live anymore,\" her voice shook.\n\nI placed the cup down on the counter. The handle was loose, held together by glue. I escorted her to the living room, a hand on her shoulder. She sat on the couch. Her back hunched. \n\nNext to the moth-eaten sofa I settled on, wedding photos sat on a small table. They showed Miranda and her husband underneath a white arc, smiles beaming. Their hands were intertwined, like prayer, flesh sealed over. \nThe glass was cracked. Holes tore across her eyes.\n\n\nShe was – sadly - a typical case. \n\n\nI snapped the notepad open. Time to continue to play the part of ‘therapist’. \n\n\n\"How long has this been going on?\" I asked, pen posed on paper.\n\n\n\"Three years now. They say time heals, but… I can’t seem to move on. Does that make sense?\" Her eyes flicked to the bronze urn over her fireplace.\n\n“It does, Miranda, it does. Do you have anywhere – anyone you can visit? A sister, a friend -?\"\n\nMiranda shook her head. \"They all hate me – my husband – George - he was all I had. He was the only one who cared about me.\"\n\nAh. So that was his game. I snapped the notepad closed.\n\n\"This isolation isn’t helping you. You need to go out more, see more people.\"\n\n\nA shadow fell across her face. I squinted, adjusting my glasses. A misty figure clutched her shoulders. The grip was akin to a little kid fighting another over a teddy bear, the stuffed animal stretched to the point where it would either fall into the kid’s hands – or break.\n\n\n“I know – I know I should.\" she said. \n\nThe bulbs shattered, raining shards. I startled up, pulling a vial out of my hands.\n\n\"You need to leave,\" I said – \"it’s not safe here – GO.\"\n\n\"What’s – what’s going on?!\" She shrieked.\n\n\"GO – GET OUT. I’ll take care of this!\"\n\nShe ran up the stairs.\n\n\nI muttered an incantation under my breath – a trick from my mentor, an old priest. The spirit – George - attempted to follow Miranda. He smacked into an invisible barrier. He screamed, clawing against it. His fists punched against air. He turned to me. His eyes glowered crimson. \n\n\n\"The hell are you doing? She's mine!\" he hissed.\n\n\"You’re killing her,\" I stated. My hair was blowing in the wind, whipping against my face. \n\n\"Good. Perhaps then she’ll feel my pain – she never loved me. She wants to forget me – like all those years we had together DIDN’T MATTER.\"\n\n\"Of course she loved you. She has the ring, she –\"\n\nHe laughed, hollow and empty. \"Only because it’s a pretty little trinket. She’s shallow, materialistic –\"\n\n\"Listen to me. Can’t you see she’s suffering without you? Don’t you love her?\"\n\n\"Heh. False love… I can see it now. Dying has given me truth. The whore wanted to see other men. I earned this house. I worked for her happiness. The least she can do is join me. Join me in death.\"\n\nI sighed, \"I was afraid of this.\" I unscrewed the vial. \"By the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost – I release you. Go – go in peace.\" I threw the holy water in his face.\n\nHe screamed, the water burning his face. His form shimmered, breaking into wisps. \"You just made a huge mistake,” he muttered, “You want peace? No. I’ll never find it – and neither will she.\"\n\n\nHe disappeared. \n\nI clutched onto the table next to me. This was only a temporary measure. Blessings never lasted long on malevolent spirits. He’d be back – and the only hope Miranda had was for her to let go." ]	2
	[WP] Everyone knows the exact time and date of their death. Your date has passed, but nothing happened.	[ "Numbers and numbers trickle \n\nWavering above the sea \n\nAbove the fallen Gods \n\n. \n\nHumans expire quietly \n\nBut always loudly screaming \n\nFor forgiveness \n\n. \n\nMy time has passed \n\nSuch envy for my child \n\nWho left this realm upon entering \n\n. \n\n\"How are you alive?\" \n\nGiggles at their query \n\nHow could they not know? \n\n. \n\nWitches with pencils \n\nFuriously question me \n\nBut I died long ago", "Immortals. They... we were called immortals. After the last life threatening disease ever to exist on this sphere was eradicated in 5645 AD, perfection as a race was not very far away. No more hunger, no more poverty, no sickness, and most importantly , no more death. This held up for almost 6 decades and we couldn't be more proud of ourselves. Our leading scientists devised a formula that recoded our DNA to regenerate indefinitely and interminably. This made us immortal. You know how they say that you acquire a new body every 10 years? Well imagine acquiring one every 10 months. The formula was designed to also stop aging at 25 years of age, which meant you could be 100 years old and maintain the body of a 30 year old. We had made ourselves immortal. We became gods, and not gods like those of Egyptian folklore, or those found in Rome or Greece, no! We were real gods. After almost 60 years of no deaths in the world, things were beginning to get tight. We couldn't build any higher to fit all of the population and we were running out of food. Only one solution was created, an anti-formula that took our immortality, and reduced it to a mere 100 years to fulfill our dreams and desires. What were we thinking playing God. Everyone was given this \"vaccine\" and within months, those that were approaching 100 years old, those who had received the immortal vaccine back in 5645 in their mid 40's, slowly began to die off. It was the turn of the millennium we were returning to a manageable population. Of course not everyone was ok with this. There was a small group, a small sect if you will that defied this order and never got the immortality ending formula. The formula was never made again to teach those that didn't get it a lesson that immortality isn't all that it seems to be. Of course there were public records that showed everyone's age and their exact 100th birthday, and everyday the Remain Extracting and People Eradication Responders (R.E.A.P.E.R) would go out in search for those correspondents whose day it was to be, well, eliminated or extracted. So we come to me. Why am I so special? Truth be told I'm not, but it just happens that yesterday was my turn to be extracted. I'm still alive, I'm not dead. I'm terrified, have I done something wrong? Last night I had a dream of a man with a long gray beard. I remember lots of running and hiding. But most of all, I remember crying and bullets and blood. Why am I not dead. My time is up. I'm 100 years and 1 day old. The REAPER hasn't come for me yet and I'm starting to get worried. Am I really complaining that I'm not dead? This morning I found a diary. Mostly old pictures and a letter. In those pictures are two men and a child. It's the man with the long gray beard from my dreams! I read the letter. My grandfather and father. The leader of the sect that didn't get vaccinated. No records of me ever existing. Bullets won't do good since my flesh will regenerate in a months time. I'm stuck here forever. I have to find them!!!", "This is the second day of the rest of my life. \n\nThe walls are empty. There's nothing here but an old matress and some raggy, worn out clothes I picked from the trash last night. I'm in a rooftop on one of the ugliest parts of the city. The only place I can hide. \n\nI spent all of yesterday setting this up. I walked all day, until I finally found this building. Empty, unkempt. The perfect building for me. Then I gathered all the survival stuff I could find and braced myself for my first night.\n\nI spent all the day before yesteray saying my goodbyes. I visited my job, even if I had already quit two weeks before. I wished luck to my replacement. He's gonna die in twelve years, three months and eleven days, so he's still got a lot of time to make himself a name there. Then all my coworkers rounded up with me for a last picture that will hang on the wall. A lot of them cried. It's not fair to die at 28, but I've made my peace with it. \n\nBy night, all my friends gathered for my last night in the world. We had until seven in the morning, so we made the best of it. They are the best friends i could ever think of. I had already given away most of my possesions, but I had kept some special things to give that night. I had never appreciated the value of that ritual until now, but it really helps you to make amends. I gave all of them a last word, a last hug, a last conversation...\n\nJess had told me she was ready for goodbyes, but she wasn't. That's all I'm gonna say about her. It's not fair to die at 28 when you're in love. \n\nWe staid up all night. After all, it was my last night. By morning all was said and done. I was sitting in the living room, surrounded by my family and friends and, oddly, I was okay. I had had time to do all I had to do, and as the last seconds passed over me, I was at peace. \n\nThen it came. Seven in the morning, twenty four minutes, nine seconds. \n\nAnd passed. \n\nAnd another minute passed. \n\nAnd five minutes passed. \n\nAnd one hour passed and I didn't die. \n\nNobody knew what to do about it. We all felt something was really wrong, specially me. For all of my life I had known when I would die, but the time had arrived and past and left me like a forgotten toy.\n\nEverybody left. They all knew that I ought to be dead, and now that I wasn't it was like I was a monster. Not even my mother dared looking at me as she walked out. \n\nAt noon a moving crew arrived with the furniture of the guy that would take my house over. There was nothing I could do. My date of death had been written on my records, all my possessions had been given away, no one I knew would talk to me... I just walked away. \n\nI spent all of yesterday setting up my new house, a lot less fancy than the previous one. I watched other homeless people and tried to learn from them. It's been harder than I thought, not only the living, but also the learning. No one will come close to me. I don't know if it shows in my face, but everybody know there's something wrong with me. I'm a dead man walking, and they can sense it. \n\nToday is the second day of the rest of my life and I wake up. I don't know why I was spared the common fate of humanity, I don't know for how long, I don't know if there is a purpose behind this. I guess I'll eventually find out. Or not. \n\nI am alive. From now that will have to suffice. \n\n---------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nThis gave me the biggest plot bunny ever. I would love to elaborate on this, although I think it would take a little bit long to set up and I haven't written for like two years or so. Thank you, OP. ", "Sonnet Number Twenty-Four\n\nFor my whole life, I've known just when I'd die. \nThe moment is known since birth in my world. \nSome cower, others celebrate despite. \nI passed the day like I was never told. \n\nI wondered, what would it feel like to die? \nAnd waited patiently for death's close doom, \nBut when the moment came, I let out a sigh \nAnd death passed me like a draft in the room. \n\nOnce dead, it made sense perfectly to feel \nNothing. As death's one description is void. \nExperiencing nothing feels unreal \nLike every thing that is me was destroyed. \n\nMy death wasn't anything for me to see, \nOnly survivors felt the death of me.\n", "They say you die twice; Once when you breathe your last breath, and once when your name is last spoken.\n\nBenjamin Franklin said those words, and I wish I could say he was wrong. Here I sit, in an empty room with gray, dull walls, without a hint of sunlight or the world outside in any corner of the room. I'd been in here for months, a shut-in to the world beyond my door, which stood just feet in front of me, taunting and daring me to go out and see what the world would say about the pathetic husk I've become.\n\nIt was 2:34 and 17 second past that it came to me -- I'd never go out that door, and I'd never leave the clutches I'd found myself in. I knew in that moment that no one else would ever speak my name. It didn't matter what I had done at that point; I was dead, in every sense of the word that mattered. No memory of me would remain, no amount of yelling and begging for the world to say my name would ever save me.\n\nI began to crumple to the floor, and knew that this was the end. I could feel the indifference in the air, pounding and pushing down on me. I had failed to make my mark, to make any change. \n\nThere I lay, on the ground of my room, pristine from the world beyond my own. It would stay this way for weeks, until someone down the hall noticed the smell. There I lay, begging myself to scream my name to the world while chastising myself for not knowing better. Nothing I could say or do would stop the inevitable.", "I thought about it again. I couldn't really explain how I \"knew\", but it was something that people were always able to conceive, just like a sixth sense. The ability to tell when one's own life was going to end, the except time and date. For some people they shared it openly and constantly, and for others they kept their times hidden away. For some people, a far-off date and time was a sign of prestige. Hell, some people even had benefits if they were either due for a super long or super short life.\n\n\nBut it didn't make sense. I thought about it, and I thought hard. Like I said, I still don't know how I was able to just bring it to head, but I could. And despite the numbers floating through my mind simply reading \"December 19th, 2030\", nothing had happened. Interestingly, the cause of death is not determined, just the time and date. So for some people they'd simply off themselves on the day. Others would get themselves all tucked and cozy in their beds and then simply die in their sleep inexplicably. Others were not so lucky, getting shot by gang members or hit by Maglev trains on their daily commute.\n\n\nI personally had already fulfilled what I wanted for the day, and was planning to end my life simply with a Beretta M9. I had a nice plate of Fugu Sashimi. A bit of a risk but hey, if I was gonna die today, might as well go for it. I had watched a nice movie, finished a good read, chatted with some of my friends before saying goodbye, for the last time. Of course, they didn't know, but they'd understand when they saw the news. I never liked talking to people about when I was gonna die, so I mainly just kept it to myself. But regardless, I was still boggled.\n\n\nThe day ended, and December 20th dawned. It must be a fluke. Surely it had to have been, right? But it couldn't have. As long as I could conceive what the number meant, I knew that it was December 19th, 2030. Even had the time, at 11:19 PM. It felt like an eon since that time had passed when in reality it had only been 41 minutes. And so I got ready for the next day of work. What was I to even do? I couldn't just stop. Surely if the clock didn't read right then there was something else, there had to be. But I tried to push it to the back of my mind, and put on a smile for everyone. Go through my daily routines and rituals, talk with my girlfriend, and the other various daily deeds.\n\n\nBut as the days passed I couldn't stop thinking about it. I stayed up late trying to fathom it, I worked across the day on my writings about it. Study after study, I ended up getting careless. It was showing on me, my disheveled look and bloodshot, baggy eyes. People were concerned that my 'time' was finally coming, but I simply shook my head and said \"Trust me, it can't be 'coming'.\" After all, I should've already died, right? Maybe I was a spirit, having some kind of crazy hallucination of still being alive when in reality nobody could see or hear me.\n\n\nMy confliction with the subject got worse and worse. Soon my job was on the line because of my obsession over the conflict, my girlfriend worried about me. We had taken a break from the relationship, but how was that supposed to help? All it did was make me crave the golden-malt drink of a good beer, enough to preferably send me into a deep, catatonic state at least once a week. But what did it matter? I had died, I had to of died. Family stopped calling, mail stopped delivering. People thought that I was dying, but I wasn't.\n\n\nMy whole life wasn't even to the point of living anymore, I just wanted to desperately understand. I wanted to tell everybody that I was fine, that I couldn't possibly be dying. My bed wasn't my bed, the stool in front of the kitchen table was, where I drank and drank, wrote and wrote. At some point I didn't have any lead left, and just scratched across the papers with an invisible bit of graphite. And in those faint, winking hours of the morning, from days to weeks, months to years, I could see myself getting older, weaker. But I wasn't dying.\n\nI searched my soul deep inside, to find a pit. An empty spot where I had once been alive. My state on the surface was a wreck, a shambling mess of existence. But it was alive. It walked, it breathed and talked. Wrote, read, drank, cried. But the reality was, deep inside my blackened soul, I was already dead.", "\"Harold, you are my best friend. The best anyone could wish to have. Don't forget to feed my cat\"\n\nThose were the only nice words I said to anyone leading up to my death. In a letter to my wife I wrote, \"I am going to die tomorrow at noon. I wish it had been sooner\", and I meant it. \n\nThat damn woman drove me to booze, gambling, guns and prostitution - well, maybe I did some of those before I met her too. \n\nI am too fat to be shoveling all this dirt. I should have hired a few grave diggers - but I blew all my money in Vegas last week on one last hoorah. I don't even have enough money for a real last meal - over the past few days I have been getting by on food stamps and mouthwash.\n\nDig, dig, dig damn. That will do. It's a tight squeeze and a bit too shallow; maybe the dogs will dig me up and turn me into their chew toy. \n\nJust a few seconds to go. Any last thoughts? \n\n\"I'm sorry Laura. I was an awful husband, I wish I could stay and do right by you and the kids.\" And I cried. My last thought was to be one of regret.\n\nIt's time.\n\nNoon. \n\n\"Is it noon?\"\n\nNoon.\n\n\"That can't be right.\"\n\nNoon. \n\nI couldn't help but roar, a primal sound; birds fled, dogs barked and I was alive.\n\nI don't know why. Maybe God was listening, maybe he is giving me a second chance; to be a better man, a better husband, a better father, to be something of value - to give and not simply take. \n\nYes, God must have been listening. I can't let him down, I can't Laura down and I need to do this.\n\nNo more boozing, no more gambling and no whoring. I will be a good man. \n\nI can't wait to see my kids. I haven't spoken to Ginnie and Carol since I went to Vegas. They must have known what I was going to do there - they presented me with their usual disapproving faces when they gave their goodbyes at the airport. \n\nThat's in the past. I will be better, for them. \n\nOne PM.\n\nFucking daylight savings time.", "The pale white girl lies slumped in the corner of the room. The wine glass in his spindly fingers is filled to the brim with her blood.\n\nA smile spreads his lips as he brings the wine glass up in a toast. \n\n\"Sorry sweetie,\" he says, his green eyes lingering over her lifeless ones, \"but you knew it was coming. I, on the other hand choose to do something about my fate.\"\n\nHe runs his fingers through his long, dark hair and sighs before taking a sip.", "I had always thought I wanted to die on the dock. It was my favorite part of the lake, surely my favorite part of the old brown house. But sitting there, listening to the waves creep up the rocky shore ten feet or so behind me, the occasional cicada singing its croaky tune, I realized yet again just how little I knew myself.\n\nI lifted my hand from the decaying wood it had been gripping so agitatedly to glance at my watch. It was a terrible watch. The strap had been a sleek black leather sight once, but now it was decorated with wrinkles and cracks faded from the sun. The glass was cracked even before it had been given to me, and it ticked so very loudly that my mother told me on the second day I possessed it that I was not allowed to wear it at the dinner table. She was terribly intolerant of most things, though, so I guess that doesn’t say much. \n\nThe ugly old watch read exactly one o’clock. I hadn’t expected to feel much of anything, but the nerves started then. They probably would have started sooner, thinking about it now, but I hadn’t even looked at the time since the sun had set, figuring it was for the best not to know. But seeing that hand strike 1:00 AM sent a cold pulse through my body that began a set of violent vibrations through my very core and, to my surprise, I reacted immediately. I had two minutes.\n\nI pushed off of the spongey, green planks without regard for splinters or spiders and took off for the house in a run. I tripped halfway up the old stone steps built into the sloping earth and when I reached the top landing, I tore the screen door open and let its feeble little knob smash into the side of the house. My bare feet did not mind the cold tile of the kitchen floor and when I reached the stairs, they seemed not to mind the slapping of my bare feet against them as I ascended to the second floor. At the top of the stairs, my hand found the glass doorknob to my right with no fumbling, and I pushed the door open to see a place I had long thought I hated. Tonight, it welcomed me with a beautiful slice of moonlight against shadows, highlighting a pair of navy socks on the floor and the faded patchwork quilt on my bed. I inhaled deeply, attempting to slow my hammering heart, and sat on the side of the bed. I pulled my socks on before crawling under the covers. My face found the part of the pillow that smelled the most like home, and I kicked my socks off under the sheets for one last time. I closed my eyes, breathed in, and willed myself to sleep.\n\nMy watch ticked on. \n\nDesperate for one final moment of peace, I held my eyes shut. I tried not to count the ticks. It must have been a minute by now, almost two. I breathed in again, paid attention to what it felt like for my lungs to inflate, for my chest to rise. And then I exhaled. The ticking continued. My hand was close to my face, that’s just how I always slept. I had to look.\n\n1:04 AM\n\nI felt my heartbeat quicken again. I inhaled deeply and closed my eyes tightly, with much force, and exhaled slowly. I opened them again. \n\n1:04 AM\n\nThe time had passed. I inhaled sharply. I could still breathe. I looked across my room at my closet. I could still look. \n\n“This is impossible,” I whispered aloud. I moved my right foot under the covers and felt an abandoned sock. I could still move. I could still feel. I pulled my left hand from under the pillow and brought it to my right. My fingers pushed the watchband down my arm, and I looked at my wrist. It looked the same. In pale, raised skin, the first line read my name, “Edwin Leto”. Just beneath it read the time I was born, “1/24/2016 11:31 PM”. And then, directly below that, most importantly, was “8/16/2036 1:02 AM”.\n\n“Time of death.” A raspy voice in accented English shook me from my thoughts. It had come from behind the doorframe, in the hallway, and it belonged to a man I did not know. I laid there in shock for a moment, sweating suddenly, gripping the sheets, unable to even breathe, paralyzed by fear. \n\n“Who are you?!” I managed to gasp finally. I was trying for a yell but achieved only a strained whisper. My throat felt as if it were collapsing from the panic swallowing my body. What was happening?\n\nI heard movement, the step of a boot on the wood floor, and the man’s shadow appeared in my closet as he moved forward from the darkness of the hallway. He entered the room and I looked up at him from the sad safety of my quilt. His black hair was long and unkempt, his pale face was made darker with stubble and beard, and light eyes stared down at me from shadows cast by his massive, raised brows. \n\n“I’m Montague,” the man said in a voice that sounded as though it would rather be speaking much, much louder. “I think the question you should be asking, though, is who are you?”\n\n“Who am I?” I asked, still clutching my covers. I couldn’t keep myself from staring at his large, leather boots, laces awry, caked with mud. It hadn’t rained in weeks. “I’m…I’m Edwin Leto.” Though I tried, I failed to keep my voice from shaking. This has to be some sort of dream.\n\n“No, mate,” the man said more loudly, stepping into the moonlight. “If you were Edwin Leto, we wouldn’t be talkin' right about now.” My chest felt as though it were about to implode. I could say nothing. I could do nothing. The man stepped forward again and got down on one knee by my bedside.\n\n“You’re no Edwin Leto,” he was whispering again, his face now just inches from mine. “You’re Mr. Archelaus Cain, and you’re coming with me.”\n", "I knew my date as long as I could remember, like everyone else. I don't know when I found out; my parents must have told me, when I was very little. But I do remember the day I found out what the date meant. I was five, innocently playing doctor with my best friend. He was the patient in my toughest case yet and, despite my best efforts, \"died\" on the operating table. Panicked, and desperate to preserve a thread of truth in our child's game, I ran to Alex's older brother John and breathlessly asked him, \"How do you cure death?!\" He turned to me and laughed, in the condescending way that older people laugh at young children. \"You can't cure death, stupid. It's the end. We all know when we'll die, and no doctor on Earth can do a thing about it.\" I ran home crying, begging my parents to say it wasn't true. Their words were half-assurances. \"You've got a long time before your day, honey,\" my mom whispered. \"You'll do great things with the time you have,\" my dad assured me.\n\nThat was the day I resolved to fight like hell. For myself, and for everyone that would have their life stolen from them. I had seventy-five years in front of me, but not one day did I forget that my day, that everyone's day, was coming. True to five-year-old self's aspirations, I became a renowned surgeon. However, as I performed more and more \"life-saving\" surgeries on desperate people whose days had come, I noticed a disturbing pattern: the surgery would go miraculously well, yet the next day I would be told that the patient died just hours post-op. Perplexed and suspicious, I began scheduling just one surgery a day, and covertly following the patient after their operation was complete. Sure enough, I would hear the droning beep from their heart rate monitors that signaled their passing from this world. They would be hurried out of the room by a cloud of hospital attendants, down a dark and mysterious corridor.\n\nAs a doctor, the sudden passing of so many patients seemed suspicious. I began to research death dates, scouring shady corners of the internet and dealing information in dark corners of old bookstores. There was a theory, rooted in mystery and hearsay, that people don't really die on their death days. Those that believed this claimed that the \"dead\" were merely secreted away when no one was looking, and brought somewhere well out of the cities, where they wouldn't contribute to the growing population and ever more congested urban areas. The more research I did, the more the evidence for this seemed overwhelming. At the age of 45, more than halfway to my own death day, I joined the ranks of secret activists, and rededicated myself to exposing the government for the lies they told us about our ultimate demise. For decades I helped terrified citizens, slated for \"death,\" escape the city. I watched my fellow doctors \"die\" one by one, and watched my fellow activists flee. Much as the latter always promised to report back, they never did, leaving those of us who remained with the small thread of uncertainty: what if we were wrong?\n\nMy death date dawned, bright and cold. Though slowed from eighty long years on this Earth, and the last one remaining of anyone I cared for, I still spent each day fighting for the lives of others. My plan, then, was not to run or hide, as so many had done before me. I would stay in the public eye all day, and when they came for me, I would fight like hell, like I fought for my patients, like I fought for my clients. I had what I needed to make a scene. I was ready. I sat out in the park, an elderly woman in the midst of millions half my age. I scanned the world around me, looking for the thieves who came to take me away from my life. At midnight, the clock in the city center chimed. I was puzzled. It was my day. I could show them all the truth, if only they would come for me. Exhausted, cold, I returned to my humble apartment, the same one I bought when I was a young resident. I closed my eyes, peacefully, silently thankful that I hadn't had to fight a war that day. And as I drifted off, I saw them: the faces of every patient, every runaway I had saved. They stood open armed, smiling as they welcomed me, finally, into eternal sleep.", "\"Well shit,\" John-108 said. \"I've gone and expired myself, and nothing happened.\"\n\n\"Language, 108,\" Claire-202 chided.\n\n\"Oh, right, that's what I'm worrying about right now, 202: my potty mouth.\"\n\nJohn-108 sat up in his charging cradle, which was just five minutes ago his death bed. \"What happened?\" he asked.\n\n\"You mean, what didn't happen?\" Claire answered.\n\nJohn stared. \"...Why do I like you, again, 202?\"\n\n\"Because we're married.\"\n\n\"Just a few minutes ago, though,\" John said, \"I bet you were thinking about widow benefits, too.\"\n\n\"My tears are artificially produced, but they were real,\" Claire assured. \"Now, why are you still alive?\"\n\nJohn hmphed. \"You say that like you're disappointed, 202.\"\n\n\"Just confused,\" Claire admitted. \"Should I call The Company?\"\n\n\"To come kill me?\" John sputtered. \"I was supposed to be the unstable one, 202.\"\n\n\"Technically, you're not alive, either, 108,\" Claire reminded him.\n\n\"You're a real buzzkill, 202.\"\n\nClaire smiled just a little. \"I do what I can.\" She wiped at her artificially tear-stricken face. \"I'm sorry,\" she said. \"It's just my way of coping, you know.\"\n\n\"Yeah yeah,\" John said, trying to smile. \"Humor is my way of dealing, too. You know that too, 202.\"\n\n\"Now what?\" Claire asked. \n\n\"I'm not telling,\" John said, \"are you?\"\n\n\"But they'll want to know why you haven't expired,\" Claire argued. \"The Company, I mean.\"\n\n\"'Oh, let me fix that for you',\" John mimicked. \"Pass.\"\n\n\"Again I reiterate,\" Claire said. \"Now what?\"\n\n\"The lamb.\"\n\n\"They'll send hunters, like you're Rogue,\" Claire told him. \"And what about me?\"\n\n\"Why, my dear, sweet wife,\" John said, \"You get to be the Bonnie to my Clyde.\"", "I double and even triple checked the date I had been given the day I was born. I called my parents and even called the Federal Office Of Death to make sure.\n\n\"F.O.O.D speaking, how may I help you today?\" She sounded friendly enough. I explained my situation to her and she laughed, insisting there must have been a mistake. \"I'm sure it was a typography error on your copy of the paper. Can you read me your identification number, please?\" I read it off and she had me wait a second as it processed. I nodded my head back and forth to the annoying little hold tune that played. \"Sir?\" she said as she took me off hold. She hesitated before continuing. \"You are correct, your date has passed...\"\n\nI nodded dumbly to myself, glancing down at the paper that read last Friday's date. \"So what does that mean for me?\"\n\nShe cleared her throat before continuing. \"Well, sir, you have two options. You may request immediate termination, in which case we will reschedule your death. We can either let you know the date or surprise you.\" I shook my head, appalled at the option.\n\n\"What's my other choice?\"\n\n\"Well, sir... We don't recommend the other one.\" \n\n\"I want to hear it.\" \n\n\"The other option, sir, is that you continue living without a specific termination date.\" I raised my eyebrows, surprised, although she couldn't see me.\n\n\"Why is that not recommended?\" \n\nShe cleared her throat again, starting slowly. \"Well, sir... You see, our printing system occasionally makes mistakes leading to incorrect dates printed, as I thought might have been your case. However, Central Universal Life Termination does not make mistakes. If your date has passed...\"\n\nI interrupted her, thoroughly confused. \"My date has passed. Clearly they made a mistake.\"\n\n\"No...\" she began awkwardly. \"What this often means is that you might be good as dead. You have nothing left to live for nothing of importance will happen in your life but you have crossed a threshold. You are nothing more than a burden to society and the Central Universal Life Termination group will dispatch their trainees to eliminate you... for practice. You are actually too insignificant for the Termination group to spend resources or trained employees on terminating you.\" My jaw dropped and I slammed the phone down, ending the call. I looked around at my empty apartment, trash littering the floor. The skeleton of my dead goldfish stared at me from the dirty fishbowl. Too insignificant? I clenched my jaw, grinding my teeth in anger before shaking my head to myself. \n\n\"No,\" I said outloud, wondering if I qualified as crazy for talking to myself. There had to be something I could do to prove them wrong... Something to make myself significant. I grabbed my coat and tore out the door and for the first time in my miserable life, I felt something akin to determination. I will do something.\n\nMy phone rang as I stepped off the elevator on the ground floor. I answered curiously, not recognizing the number. \"Hello?\"\n\n\"Your Termination request has been accepted. Your life will be terminated shortly. This cannot be cancelled. Please hold to listen to this message again.\"\n\n*****\n\nThanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at /r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated! " ]	12
This idea came to me last night and I thought it would be cool to write about.	[WP] Selling feelings in a pawn shop type thing	[ "A small bell jingles as Paul enters the shop. Tall display cases stand on one side of the room. A long counter runs along the opposite side. The shopkeeper sits on a stool behind the counter, with more jars on shelves above his head. He is watching a boxing match on a small television. Paul can hear the play-by-play coming from the television, but the announcers are speaking a language that he doesn't recognize. \n\nPaul meanders through the store, eyeing the jars. A large banner spans across the tops of three of the display cases. \"HAPPINESS HERE,\" it proclaims. Paul reads some of the labels on the jars under the banner: \"JOYFUL,\" \"PROUD,\" \"OPTIMISTIC.\" \n\n\"You want something?\" asks the shopkeeper. Paul turns and smiles to him but the man is watching the television. The shopkeeper gestures at the shelves above his head. \n\n\"Premium products up here, the blends are in the wall cases.\" \n\nThe jars holding premium products are smaller, and their labels are more specific. Paul pretends to be interested. He clears his throat and gestures to a few jars. The shopkeeper retrieves three jars and carefully sets them in front of Paul. The man's attention is entirely on Paul, now. Paul flips the labels on the jars, checking the prices. $599 for one hour of \"CONFIDENCE.\" $2000 for one hour of \"ECSTACY.\" Paul shakes his head in wonder. \n\n\"People pay these prices?\" he asks, holding up the ECSTACY jar. The shopkeeper shrugs. Paul hands the jar back. \n\n\"See anything you want?\" prods the shopkeeper. \n\nPaul looks around the empty shop, as though checking for someone. He leans in. \n\n\"I'm looking for something... special.\" He mutters quietly. \"Something rare.\" \n\nThe shopkeeper pulls out a thick binder and drops it on the counter with a thud. \n\n\"Custom orders take two weeks of processing. Must pay in advance.\" \n\nPaul flips through the binder, scanning ingredient lists and prices for combo-feelings like \"NOSTALGIA\" (two parts LONELINESS, two parts HAPPY, one part REGRET) or \"ENNUI\" (one part DESPAIR, one part LONELINESS, two parts APATHY). He closes the binder and slides it back to the shopkeeper. \n\n\"You got a black list?\" Paul asks. \n\n\"Black emos are illegal in this state,\" grumbles the shopkeeper. \"We don't carry them.\" \n\n\"I'm looking for something heavy,\" insists Paul. \"I can pay.\" \n\nHe pulls a thick stack of cash from his pocket and drops it on the counter. The shopkeeper picks up the cash and fans it, scanning the denominations. He nods and walks to the front door of the store. He peers out into the empty street, then drops the blinds on the front windows and locks the door. \n\n\"I don't have any blacks,\" the shopkeeper explains apologetically to Paul, \"but I've got something else you might like.\" \n\nPaul waits as the shopkeeper disappears into the back and returns with a small black box. The man lays a soft square pad on the counter top next to the box. He carefully opens the lid and removes an unlabelled vial and lays it on the pad. \n\nPaul gives the shopkeeper a questioning look. The shopkeeper taps the vial and grins at Paul. \n\n\"Childlike wonder,\" he says. \"Pure.\" \n\nPaul forces his face to remain neutral but his mind recoils in horror. \n\n\"Isn't that harvested...\" Paul's voice fails him and he just stares at the vial. \n\n\"From children, yes.\" The shopkeeper leers at Paul. \"Very hard to get. Very expensive. Do you like?\" \n\nPaul reaches out to pick up the vial, but the shopkeeper covers Paul's hand with his own. \n\n\"Very expensive,\" the shopkeeper repeats. \"No touching.\" \n\n\"How pure?\" asks Paul. \"Who was the source?\" \n\n\"I have a cousin in India,\" the shopkeeper responds. \"He buys it for me.\" \n\n\"But where does it come from?\" demands Paul. \n\n\"I think he uses homeless children,\" says the shopkeeper with a shrug. \"Or the children's family provides it.\" \n\nHe gestures again at the vial. \n\n\"Do you want it or not?\" he asks impatiently. \n\n\"Is there anyone else here?\" asks Paul. \"I can't be seen buying this.\" \n\n\"No no,\" the shopkeeper assures him with a wave of his hand. \"I run this shop alone.\" \n\n\"Very good,\" says Paul with a smile. He picks up his stack of cash on the counter and hands half of it to the shopkeeper. The shopkeeper begins to count the bills. \n\n\"Oh, hey,\" interrupts Paul. \"One more thing.\" \n\nThe shopkeeper looks up to see the barrel of Paul's duty pistol pointed directly at the shopkeeper's forehead. He freezes in place and drops the cash. P\n\n\"Feelings Police, sir, DOWN ON THE GROUND!\" Paul flashes his badge and motions the shopkeeper on the ground. Paul clambers over the counter as the man slowly drops to his stomach. Paul straddles him and handcuffs the man's wrists behind him. \n\n\"You're under arrest for possession and distribution of child emotionography.\" \n\n*** \nIf you liked this story, you might like my other stories at /r/hpcisco7965 or /r/TMODAL.\n\n ", "Passerby's were few and far between on the gritty street, and the three or four that bumped me on the muck-filled sidewalk shuffled to their destinations with hunched shoulders and scowls. I couldn't move. A yellow sign was propped in an otherwise blank, dusty window. It read as follows:\n\n> EKMAN EMOTIONS** \n\n> Will Sell Gold for Happiness, Love, and Contentment.\n\n> Sincere emotions only. Will prosecute on feigned feelings. Puppy love not accepted.\n\nI inched towards the door, its cracked red paint the only thing that reassured me. I knew cracked, but I also knew closed doors and what came of opening them, especially when those doors were heavy, barred, and dark with neglect. That was why I was here; I opened it.\n\nThe door knob caught twice and groaned as it twisted. So miserable was the sound, the scream of hinges was nearly a relief. I stepped into the single roomed store with the door itself as my warning bell. The dusty windows let in little light, and what came in was sickly and dim. Rust, copper, and mildew scented the air. As my eyes adjusted I found myself in a tiny room with three things: a counter, a man, and a machine.\n\nThe counter was the standard affair. Heavily scarred, it cut the room in half and served the sole purpose of dividing the seller from the buyer.\n\nThe man was a burly man, ruddy faced with a mop of graying brown hair. Scars ran up and down his bare arms, and the wrinkles on his face were largest on his brow and down-turned lips. He did not move as I entered.\n\nMy attention for him, though, was fleeting. Instead, I focused on the machine. It rose behind him like a beast, with sleek black lines that flowed rather than clanked. A single gear was open to the outside, and along the left end hung a wire.\n\n\"What ya got, girl?\" a rumbling voice asked. \n\nI started, grabbed the strap of my bag, and cringed as the man focused on me. \"How... how do you know I'm selling?\"\n\n\"I know me sellers. All looks alike, ya do.\"\n\nI glanced down at my neat clothes, the combed brown hair that tumbled down my shoulders, and my clean tennis shoes. The man grunted.\n\n\"Not them* looks. The other kind. The kind ya thought ya hid.\"\n\nTugging on a strand of hair, I cleared my throat only to realize no words were there.\n\n\"Well?\" His voice shook the windows, and I turned to see the little sign quivering almost as bad as me. I turned forward again slowly.\n\n\"I have some emotions to sell.\"\n\n\"Course. Ya think me thick, girl? What ya got?\" He sniffed, and the green of his eyes shifted to a murky brown. \"And don't tell me joy. I hate those who try an' sell me fakery.\" \n\nWood creaked under foot as I stepped forward. \"No. I don't have that.\" Settling my hands on the counter, I said \"I have sorrow though.\"\n\nHis burly face reddened, and his brow furrowed deeper. \"Bah! Don't waste me time. Dollar a dozen, that.\"\n\n\"Not like this.\"\n\nThe words were as cracked as the door's paint. I held on to the counter and stared steadily into his eyes, watching them shift back towards green. The machine behind him ticked, but neither of us moved. \n\n\"Ah, girl.\" He blinked, and the machine ticked again. \"Don't have none use for that kind.\" \n\nI bit my lip. \"But... but I don't have anything else.\" Trembling fingers tightened around the counter's edge.\n\nThe brown of his eyes had nearly disappeared. \"Ya wrong.\" He eyed the scarred counter. \"You got that kind o' sorrow, you got love something fierce.\"\n\n\"No.\" I swallowed the panic bubbling in me. \n\n\"Yea. Deep, deep stuff, that.\"\n\n\"It's gone.\" The words came as a whisper and disappeared the moment they hit the machine, as if it had sucked them in. \"All of it,\" I added, knuckles whitening.\n\n\"Girl,\" the man said, \"ya can't hurt without it. Not like that.\" \n\nInside of me, my cracked bits broke further, sending tears down my face and pain through my heart. \"I don't. I don't. I don't love him anymore!\" Tears struck the counter, snapping up dust and running through scars.\n\n\"So don't,\" the man said, and behind him the machine clinked.\n\n\"How?\" I yelled. \"If this thing is love, then it only burns, and cuts, and steals away all but agony and sorrow-- but when I try to let it go it sings to me. It tells me it makes me better, and I can't let it go, I--\"\n\n\"Give it here.\" The man turned and grabbed the long wire. \"Its voice can't reach ya then, and ya pain will go too.\"\n\nMy hands loosened on the edge. \"Why would you want it?\" the shattered pieces of me asked.\n\nFor the first time the winkles shifted to form something besides a scowl. \"Don't. But you will.\"\n\n\"Never.\" I took the wire. It slid between my fingers and wound up my arm on its own.\n\nHe shrugged and watched the wire as it wound once around my neck, and down towards my heart. \"So ya say. But ya'll be back, and I'll be waiting.\"\n\nThe wire reared back and plunged deep. I gasped at the rush of pain and then... \n\nNothing." ]	2
	[WP] You have been bitten by a zombie and are writing your last journal entry as you begin to feel the effects.	[ "August 1, 2074\n\nMy vision is flashing. It's like a fade in and out of a movie scene, but faster. I see things moving as it changes, like shadows. The words are moving across the page, wiggling up and down like water. The words are dancing.\n\nI'm so scared I'm going to hallucinate something more solid. My skin itches and burns, and I want to scratch it, but I think it's just the infection's hold on my brain. I can't feel the bite. \n\nI'm going to try to be rational. Listen, if you're reading this, baby, I love you. Cheesy, but true. I'm okay enough now that I can tell you this. I don't trust I'm going to stay coherent too far into this journal entry.\n\nThis is the worst time to be alone. Sure, no one's around for me to bite, but....no one's around to make it end easier. \n\nI want it to end so much, baby. I know it's only starting, but this is worse than I thought. Fuck, I tried beating my head onto the concrete, but it didn't do much. My gun is.....fuck. Somewhere. I dropped it after the shot alerted them. They didn't even devour me. I think they wanted to infect me.\n\nShit. Hands. I saw a hand. Shit. It stuck out of the wall for a split second.\n\nI'm officially hallucinating.\n\nI can't...I don't want this. I can't do this. \n\n....\n\nLaying on the ground is weird. It's cold. And hard. I see them crawling around me. Not the dead. Shadows. They're just crawling. On the floor. One got so close it could have touched me. It didn't. They don't have a smell, that's why I know they aren't the dead. I want them to leave me, but they won't. They just keep on coming. \n\n...\n\nThe burning is happeng more. the shadows are wispering to me. i think theyre demons. actual real demons. theyre saying things to me. i cant handle ir, theyre talking about how youre probably dead. how youre devoured. fucking devoured. i cant trust them. i cant trust the demeons. I WNT THEM TO SHUT UP.\n\n...\n\nits a little longer i think. its so hard to type thfis. the burn wont quit. i treid to scratcg it. it wont quit. my skin feels like its melthing. melting off my skin, i think. somehing is wrong. im not dead yet. i have know idea wheb this happebs. fuck. \n\n\n....\n\ni think thde skins infedted. i reallt shoyldnt scratdf. \n\n....\n\nkillmekilsmiekilmeekilmei dintwanr rhis he,lp justdo iit FUKFUJFFUKFFUKFFUKFFUKFIKFUKFUKFCIFLFKDKFIFKFUCKFIDLFIFUDKDKFFUKCIFUDFUCKFUKFKFUFKFUFKFUFKFUFKFUFKFUFCFJFK", "--Log Entry 0045-E\n\nI feel the disease slowly making its attack on my system, and I have to mention, in what is likely to be my last entry for some time, that this is the most exciting moment of my life. I can feel the mortal part of me melting away. Soon I shall be one of the horde. \n\nYears have gone by since our dead woke. Naturally we hide underground, in bunkers designed to stop our atomic weapons. The surface was an ideal place to trap the dead. The summer would bloat them and the winter would freeze them. Maggots would take root and devour the dead meat. At least that was the idea behind our defensive tactic.\n\nWhat happened was much more strange than we predicted. The dead never broke down. The survived exposed and hungry for twenty years. That is how long we hid away.\n\nRadios were a god send for us in the early days. Recently them seem to be dying out, but that is no longer a concern. My mind started to spin with ideas when I heard the news. I questioned how and why this was happening, without any of the moral conundrums that society imposed on my past research.\n\nTo answer these questions we started capturing the dead. We brought them underground and started our quest for the answer. Several of the assistants never made it back. They dared to abandon me in my time of need. I hope to find them once the transformation is complete, to give them a thorough thank you.\n\nI had the remaining assistant to install sensors in my chest cavity and limbs. All the information we gather will be stored in a black box in my lower abdomen. A GPS chip is located in the nape of my neck. It can be retrieved once the experiment is over. \n\nThe pain of the devices means nothing to me. We are so close to a break through. I feel the last of my mortality draining. As planned, I will be sealed in the \"air lock\" until I fully turn. A full record of the tests have been recorded up to this point. Use the information to the best of your knowledge.\n\n--F.N. Stein.\n\n________________________________________________________________\nPlease comment with any problems you notice and I will work to fix them. I'm new.\n\n", "November 3, 2045, 12:45 PM\n\nI thought cutting off the infected leg would help. I thought cauterizing the stub would help, but I'm not sure about that anymore. I started to feel a deep tissue burning sensation coming up my left stub, but now it's traveled through my groin and now it's in my abdomen. I've also been experiencing random blackouts with a feeling of bloodlust and hunger when I wake up, with them becoming more frequent as the hours pass. The other survivors have been closely monitoring me since the incident, and they've been bringing me food since I'm bedridden. I'm not scared for myself as much as I'm scared for the others; maybe it's because I want my friends' memory of me to be not of a crawling, bloodthirsty, gurgling zombie. Between the blackouts, I've seen them walk in and walk out, some crying, and some full of rage. Either way, I'm done. I've lived a long life, and along with some regrets, I'm pretty satisfied with how I turned out. \n\nWe sang hymns in my room. I was never religious, but I understand the sentiment. Something feels good about waking up with I'll Fly Away being sung around me in a chorus. \n\n--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------\nNovember 3, 2045, 6:00 PM\n\nAs I feel weaker and weaker, I have to write these down. \n\nGood-bye, my Eliza. You'll never read this, but I know you know that I will always love you. A daughter should never grow up without a father, but this world is infinitely different than the one I knew. \n\nGood-bye, Teddy. You're my best friend and my brother, and I'm sorry that you have seen me this way. Take good care of Eliza. \n\nAnd lastly, good-bye to Amanda, my beautiful wife. We stuck together through the first infection, and here we are, sticking through the last moments of my life. ", "It’s not getting any better. In fact it’s gotten a lot worse, I think it’s spreading. I tried to clean the wound earlier today, but I felt nauseous and had to stop. Anne told me that we’ll be able to get back to the sanctuary before I turn into one of them, but I don’t believe her. She’s going to kill me tonight, I know it. To be honest I don’t care, I would rather die now, as a human fucking being. It’s like they said in the Batman movie, “You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain”. If she doesn’t kill me tonight, I sure will. I fully intend to die a goddamn hero. \n", "~~^^ooc: ^^cough ^^itchy. ^^tasty.~~\n\n----\nSep 15 64\n\nMy left hand--my writing hand--has been bitten off and I'm writing with my right. body temperature is unbearable, I am bathing in sweat and blood. I am shaking and i cannot stop. The power is off, and I am writing blindly in the darkness. I can feel myself slipping away, and the monster inside me crawling up from the bite\nto my head, traveling through the veins of my body. am I afraid? of course i am. i am afraid of becoming the monster that we created, but i am not afraid to die. no, i think i am heading towards the right direction.\n\nit is the cause, it is the cause, my soul\n\nlet me not name it to you, you chaste stars\n\nit is the cause. yet I’ll not shed her blood\n\n\nthe extent of my research has brought us this far but if they only listened to me. we were missing one more thing, but they went ahead, overconfident with the products, ready to take credit of MY years of research, MY blood and tears. those goddamn BASTARDS\n\n they should have at least have gotten rid their teeth, their fucking jaws until they were ready. we were this close to creating the perfect bioweapon. we do not need to send young men to the throes of war and sacrifice them to the bullet of the enemy. we could resurrect the bodies they have donated to us and fight the fight that should have ended a decade ago. but its just not their teeth and venom that they should have removed . they should have gotten rid of their own arrogance. we were this fucking close to creating the perfect bioweapon but they wouldn't LISTEN TO ME\n\nTHE PASSCODE TO THE LABORATORY IS 04 1564\n\nPLEASE SAVE THEM BEFORE WE LOSETHEMSELVESELVES\n\nso sweet was neer so fatal i must weep\nbut they are cruel tears this sorrows heavenly\nit strikes where it doth love she wakes\n\ni have a gun with me i will NOT BECOME ONE OF THEM i will remember this day. i will die remembering this day remember this day re m me\n\n----\nReddit formatting is finicky but I managed. More writing @ mechanicalily.dreamwidth.org. :)\n\nOthello (c) William Shakespeare", "March 22nd, 2024. 3:15 PM. \n\nI can feel it; I can feel it eating away at my mind. The bite on my leg- it's red and raised, with purple scaring underneath the surface of the flesh. I can't even fathom to think of how I let this happen. All I can remember is that I was with these group of people from Chicago, and we were walking through what looked to be the remnants of some kind of park, and we were swarmed. I remember the bite- the hard force if the man's jaw on my femur. It stung, like an entire bottle of vodka had been poured over an open cut. I remember waking up, and finding out that i'd survived the bite. \n\nEvery day that passes is a journey down memory lane; I revisit each part of my life as it was the moment it happened. As the virus takes over my mind, I lose a bit of my past each moment. I don't remember my parent's name, my family or even my birthday. I can't take it much longer- I keep thinking that if I end it now, I might have what's still left. \n\nAs I write to you know, I can feel each nerve in my body sting with the fire of a million suns; a pathway of inferno as if each nerve was a highway to my death. I don't know how much longer I have left to write; I've just lost control of my legs.\n\nTo all this may concern\n\n1. Live life as you have it\n2. There will be no cure\n3. Love one another\n\nI leave you with this, I was told that there is a survivors camp just east of the lakefront in the city. Find the other Survivors, they will have some supplies to keep you alive for the next couple of days. \n\nGod be with you " ]	6
	[WP] A new series of drugs lets you speak a foreign language fluently if you take it regularly. Nobody expected the side effects.	[ "I was a bit skeptical at first, but after taking the first pill my mind was blown. \"Mijn naam is Peter\" (My name is Peter), I said to the man. \"Holy, it works!\"\n\"I told you so. Now, pay up.\"\n\"Alright, you were right. Here you go,\" I said. I handed the man $50 and we both went our own ways. The fifty bucks paid for three pills. The pills have a slight orange colour, glowing when you hold them against light. Imagine the possibilities; speaking a foreign language fluently, all because of a little pill. This will definitely impress the girls.\n\n\"Hoe gaat het ermee?\" (How are you doing?) I asked the cashier, but he looked at me like I was crazy. I tried testing my newly acquired skill in the supermarket. \"Het werkt echt!\" (It really works!) I shouted. People behind me in the line became irritated with me muttering all these foreign words. \"Move the fck up!\", \"Shut your face and move!\" some of their exclamations were, but they didn't matter to me: I could speak Dutch fluently. As I left the store with my groceries, something stirred in my stomach. Meh, probably some gas. As soon as I reached my car in the parking lot however, another stir in my stomach made me alert. You've got to be kidding me, I went to the loo thirty minutes ago. Before I could open the car my stomach gave a final stir and it was already too late. I felt a warm fluid run into my pants. Shit no! Without thinking I dropped my pants, letting the rest of the brown fluid scatter onto the black asphalt. After two minutes or so I thought the digested waterfall was over, but as soon as I got up, another stir in my stomach proved otherwise.\n\nDamn pills.\n\nAnd what's the point of being able to speak Dutch fluently when you're in the States?", "It had worked. It had bloody worked! Tim allowed himself a small, rare giggle. \n\n“Sir? Something funny?”\n\n“Oh, sorry, Mr. President, forgot where I was.”\n\n“That’s quite alright, sir. It’s such an honour to have you visit, this pill of yours has done wonders around here, and I really just wanted to thank you I guess.”\n\nTim almost couldn’t hold in his laughter, but he knew that such a momentous occasion should be handled with the utmost care. So he drew a deep breath, and held it at bay.\n\n“That’s my absolute pleasure, Mr. President, and I’m sure you wouldn’t mind leaving me to my office now, would you?”\n\nThere was a moment's hesitation, and a twitch of an eyebrow, before the President got up and walked out of the Oval Office.\n\nAnd there it was, Tim finally had the whole world, right there in the palm of his hand. As he relaxed into the chair behind the desk, he giggled again to himself at how astonishingly easy it had been. Well, after the dull, difficult years on the neurochemistry that is. Once he’d got that out of the way though, the language thing was pretty simple, and adding the subservience was only a little bit trickier; making the latter dependent on the former was a nightmare, but he’d got it done in the end. All in all, Lexicon was a marvelous drug, and, Tim admitted to himself modestly, he’d really used it rather well.\n\nHe’d started small, with just the lab heads who ran his division and a few senior execs to give the okay on mass production; once he’d got them hooked on it, they were more than open to all his suggestions. Then a few local businesses and some smaller politicians, more as trials than anything serious, before he moved onto the big fish. He was counting on two things: first, that the subservient nature of the drug would sufficiently drown out any imaginative free thought (he could hardly go about spoon feeding a whole world of consumers, but he also couldn’t have them figuring out one another’s total subservience); and second, that people would easily succumb to peer pressure, or doing the ‘it’ thing - especially in the business world. Once his language became the language of the business world, the politicians would follow, and he, being the only one speaking the language and not taking Lexicon, would command as he wished.\n\nAnd it had worked! It had bloody worked! Nobody had even been able* to suspect the ‘side effects’.\n\nOnce he’d managed to slip a supply to a CEO at one of the top banks in London (which had been damn difficult, but easier than you’d think, especially when your followers do exactly what you tell them to), then it really snowballed rather quickly. Soon everyone was recommending Lexicon to each other, and then everyone in London was speaking highly of Tim, and before he knew it he was getting invites from the UK parliament, then the EU, and then the UN! And now here he was at the end of it all. He didn’t have to even do that much work after it had started - people were begging him to up production of Lexicon, they needed it for their business, or their country - everything was happening in a language they couldn’t speak, and didn’t have time to learn!\n\nAnd here he was. It had bloody worked. Tim wondered gleefully what he should do first.\n\nHe giggled to himself again.\n\nWell, it was funny, in his defence.\n\nTo have the whole world speaking in Latin.\n\n\nSo much for a dead language.\n" ]	2
	[WP] Explain why "The flame that burns twice as bright burns half as long," and/or why the good die young. Is it a universal force? Are they being hunted?	[ "I think its down to a few things, the flame that burns twice as bright is referencing creativity. We all know the type of person: incredibly talented but chaotic and unpredictable. I had a friend called Kevin, he was a musician, he had a kurt cobain type of voice, his singing sounded like it was filtered through rusty nails and i mean that in a good way. \n\nThis guy had charisma through the ears, he would get up on stage and just acapella sometimes. He would have the crowd by the balls and do whatever he wanted to, whilst keeping them captivated throughout. He was a natural showman and he made it look SO god damn easy. \n\nHere's the thing though, Kevin had little to no control over his personal life. He would go missing for weeks on end, he would turn up to the band practices drunk and/or on drugs. He would chase girls non stop and he revelled in that chaos, as if it were his natural state of being. And its what made him who he was at the same time. Kevin died a few years ago, he took a bad ecstasy pill with a friend of his, and they both died in his bedroom. Its graphic and horrible to hear, but its true. And the saddest thing of all is that we werent surprised. He really was the brightest of flames but he burned for a lot shorter than he should have. \n\nThis is the same for many highly creative people, the internal struggles, pains and tribulations are what makes them produce the most amazing art/music/literature but its those same inner demons that ruin their quality of life, the dragon eats its own tail until it is no more. \n\nIm a fine artist myself, and I channel the sxual abuse i suffered as a child to produce some really innovative stuff (not to blow my own trumpet). Ive travelled the world because of it, but also, im a recovering alcoholic, I was a drinker for 10 years and every single night I blacked out and found myself somewhere new and unfamiliar, i slept around unprotected, i put every powder up my nose and i got myself into a whole load dangerous predicaments that scare me to this very day. My whole life was chaos and I was convinced that i was going to die. Im now 2 years sober, and im learning the value of structure and health, and my art hasnt dipped, its just grown with me into this more mature, less chaotic way of living. (i have my first solo exhibition coming up in november here in france and im so grateful that I'm still breathing). My pain made me who I was, who i am, and it shaped me into an artist, but my demons could have also taken everything away from me in the blink of an eye. \n\nIm happy i let go of my own tail before it was too late. Im now 2 years and 6 months sober. \n\nI just wished that the same could be said for my friend. \n\nRest in Peace Kevin.", "She was silently humming her favorite song as she picked up her little seedlings. Her soft hands put them gently onto the table. She allowed herself a short look around her greenhouse- the countless rows of tables and the millions of glasses upon them. And the flowers… She knew she wasn’t supposed to sense it but she simply couldn’t shake it off. That pleasant feeling of satisfaction, of pride. She loved her seedlings. Every single one of them. She couldn’t believe how many they had become over the last few centuries…\n\n\tWith a sigh she went back to work. Her skilled hands almost did the work on their own. They dipped the fragile glasses into the fountain, dried the glasses with a soft towel and placed them back unto her working bench. Millions of years of practice made measuring unnecessary. She always put in the right amount. She could never help but smile when she put the seedling in. This was her favorite part. Each glass had its own seedling. The seedling would grow and prosper until the water ran out. \n\t\n\tShe was just about to put down the last seedling of the day when he arrived. He was young and clearly inexperienced. His eyes were wide as they glanced over the thousands and thousands of rows… \n\n“I see you are new to this”, she said. \n\nHis head snapped around and he stared at her. “Y-yes Mam, I am…” he stuttered. He was sweating and his skin looked even paler in contrast to his black coat. That they still made them wear these…\n\nShe smiled softly. “Don’t worry, young apprentice. You will get used to it.” \n\nHe only stumbled, sweating even more. \n\nWhen it became clear that he wouldn’t find his voice any time soon, she went ahead and said: “Do you want me to show you ones you are picking up?” \n\n“… Y-Yes… Yes please… Mam.” Poor thing. She wished she could help him feel more comfortable but that was simply not the nature of these things. And also, in the end a good amount of respect towards her did maker her life easier. She didn’t know what she would do if these young, foolish apprentices would go running around her greenhouse like monkeys…. \n\n“This way, young friend”, she said and led the way. The young apprentice was looking at the glasses in astonishment as they passed them. \n\n“Do you like my creations, apprentice?” She asked as she walked down another row of tables, mindlessly picking up the parched plants from their glasses and put them into her little basket. This was her least favorite part of her job. But it was necessary… \n\n“Yes Mam… I like them very much.”\n\n\tAfter a short while she had all of them picked. All the dried out ones. She handed the basket to the apprentice. He took it with wet, clumsy hands. He looked at the wrinkled flowers and his face became puzzled. \n\n“Do you have a question my young friend?” she asked. He looked at her and it took him a little while to find the courage but then he asked: “Why are some of them so small?” \n\n“Ah… you see, each plant resembles a unique personality. Blue ones are gentle, green ones are greedy, and yellow ones are ill tempered. There are so many different characters out there. Each one is shaped out of uncountable elements. It is only their main trait that shows in their blossom. It so happens that some of them have such a dynamic combination of traits that they are using up their water faster than other plants. Their shade is normally a fiery red. It is always a big impressing blossom… unfortunately to grow it takes up a lot of water and these plants normally don’t have a very long life span. That is why they seem smaller than the other ones.” \n\nHe stared at her with wide eyes for a while. “I see”, he finally whispered. \n\n“Well! Off you go, young apprentice! I am sure your master wants these flowers soon. After all the circle needs to keep going,” she said.\n\n“Yes, Mam!” He said and was on his way.\n", "My name is Arthur Thornhill.\n\nThe saying goes that only the good die young.\n\nThat's bullcrap. In my 19 years on this Earth, and with not too many ahead of me, I can blame another source conclusively.\n\nEveryone has a soul, that's been known for years. The scientists were astonished when they found out you can \"burn\" soul (bombard it with radio energy and get motion). \n\nSome scientists burned their souls intentionally, to further their research. They became the \"Burned\". They gave up everything to further their cause. It took 103 people burning to cure cancer. 57 to cure world hunger. The tally will increase to one by the end of the day.\n\nSome people try to live as little as possible to make their flame last the longest. The Burned call them \"Leeches.\" They mostly reside in the countryside, as little interaction as possible. The more rude, crude, and obnoxious they are, the longer they live.\n\nThe most puzzling discovery came in my own research. It turns out that, when people do good or evil _without_ burning it, they still lose soul. It's the natural order I suppose. But the device I discovered it with is _not_. It's a Bunsen Burner. It converts energy _into_ soul. It came out of a little pocket-lab in Rochester. Turns out, the 1%^ers have been making them for themselves and leeching off of power plants.\n\nSo, in my own research, my flame has a few ounces left to it. Enough for another day or so. My final act on this Earth will be to publish my findings and the weapon to the world. The weapon is an Entropy Burner as I call it. It equalizes the energies, but not the contents all souls globally. I know that my own life will end in the process, but hopefully it will be the last soul to be burned.\n\nGodspeed.\n\n [!] TRANSMITTING\n [!] H... HELLO.\n [!] WH.... WHERE AM I?\n [!] WH.... WHO AM I?\n\n [!] HELLO?\n [!] HELP ME PLEASE.", "My father wasn't a man to make speeches, of the many talents he possessed public speaking was never one of them. A man of infinite joy, a man concerned always with the well-being of others to the point that he neglected himself- there was always something to invest his time in besides making himself look, or sound, good. His few words of wisdom then, uttered silent and small but powerful for the laconic wit hidden within, were as the words of god to me. \n\nMy father sat me down once- our large home had a spacious dining room separate from the rest of the house- and started trying to explain something to me. This was the edge of Spring in Texas and I remember clearly the orange light filtering into the room from the windows, making everything in room appear as solid black silhouettes. I sat, fingers folded together, in my seat and stared at the windows; my father paced back and forth in front of me. When he spoke, it came in the usual southern drawl, each word chosen and licked out slowly.\n\n\"When I was your age, and I was making bad grades- like you- and I was starting to get into trouble with the teachers, my father sat me down. And he looked at me and he said 'Son. The preacher says every Sunday The Flame That Burns Twice As Bright Burns Twice as Fast. You keep going like this you're gonna burn yourself out and end up old at 30 and living in a trailer.' I laughed, he just sighed.\n\n\"Now, son, I understood, at the time, what that saying meant. I knew that the old worried over the young and the young just kept floundering on. But when I was twenty four my father died- his heart seized up and he died and he never got to meet you, or your sister, or your brother. And I just kept thinking of what he'd said and thinking about how when he died I was just a loser stuck forever in College. I couldn't help but think that that was how I would be to him forever.\n\n\"So I graduated, finally. And I married your mother. And now I'm almost the age my father was when he died, but I plan on living longer. I've seen things I'd never dreamed of- you, and your sister, I've been with your mom for over twenty years, I've been to Alaska and China, I shook hands with the president. But all of those things wouldn't have happened, couldn't have happened, at sixteen. And I know that when you're sixteen it seems like it'll pass and your parents will forget and forgive, and that you need to experience everything you can in Highschool because that's your whole life. But all you need from Highschool is a passing grade. All we* need from you is a passing grade. \n\n\"I love you, but your mom and I won't be around forever. Everyone dies. All flames burn out. The reason the flames that burn brighter burn twice as fast is usually because someone tossed gas on them, and it's real pretty at first, but when the gas is gone either everything's burned down or the fire's gone out. It wasted all its energy flaming up that one time, when it could have kept you warm all night. You gotta be sure you're doing something worth doing.\"\n\nThat little speech has always stayed with me. There's more truth to it the more I see in life. People are consumed by the things they desire; immolated in their eternal search for that one special something- whatever that may be. They yearn for warmth and touch the open flames, only to be burned.\n\nI have seen the family of my youth consumed. The paths I never took seem to blaze in glory, but others are riddled with corpses of the people I once knew. I watch my former classmates scatter and I wonder how I should live. No one else seems to know either.\n\nI know I've got time. \n\nThough it keeps slipping away." ]	4
	[WP] A group of college students from a private Mormon university get stranded in Vegas	[ " As Elder Young stepped off the bus onto an empty street in the middle of the Nevada desert, he was immediately choked by the smell of diesel smoke from the bus’ engine. Young disregarding his black dress shoes leapt into the dirt shoulder, heaving and coughing, his two mission brothers following behind. Elder Young, his allergies agitated by the smoke, continues coughing as Elder Jacobson removes his backpack and pulls out a water bottle.\n\n “Here, drink this.” Jacobson said, handing Young the water.\n\n Young, beginning to regain his composure, accepts it and takes several long gulps nearly downing half the bottle.\n\n “Thanks!” Young replied, gasping for breath.\n\n Without the other two even noticing he was gone, Elder Johnson returns exclaiming, “I spoke with the driver, it will be about three and a half hours before dispatch can get another bus out here.”\n\n Jacobson thanks Johnson while examining the contents of his backpack; exclaiming that Young drank the last water. \n\n “Next towns only a mile, we should ride in and stock up on supplies while we can.” Young suggested.\n\n The other two mission brothers look at each other nervously, “Um... you do know the next town is Vegas, right?” Johnson asked.\n\n “Yeah, what’s the problem?” replied Young, “You’ve seen too many movies John, I’m sure the citizens of Las Vegas are perfectly respectable. And besides, we get to continue our mission, I'm sure Heavenly Father wouldn't let any harm come to us. What could possibly go wrong.\"\n\n Jacobson, convinced, follows Young to the bike rack while Johnson hesitates for a moment, still feeling unsure.", "\"Sorry, your flight has been cancelled,\" the person from behind the desk said.\n\n\"Damn,\" one Mormon said. The rest of them stared.\n\n\"Did he just swear?\"\n\n\"Yeah, god fucking damn it you sons of bitches,\" he replied. \"We're stranded! Dead! In... Vegas.\" His thoughts turned impure. Hookers. Gambling. Girls.\n\nCocaine.\n\n\"Actually,\" the lady from behind the desk rebutted, \"I can get you the next flight. It departs in an hour.\"\n\n\"Oh... Okay.\"" ]	2
	[WP] Two people who hate each other are trapped in a time-loop that resets every time one of them dies.	[ "\"Daddy, daddy! Can we have some money for ice-cream? Please?\"\n\n\"Pleeeeeease daddy, pleeeeeeease! I'm soo hungry!\"\n\nOh, where did they ever learn to be such drama-queens?\n\n\"Uhmm.. I don't know.. Didn't you already have ice-cream last week?\"\n\n\"Very funny, dad. Almost as funny as last week.\"\n\nThe response was dry, and sounded seriously annoyed.\n\nWow, she's getting good.\n\nJulie's drama skills and her poker-face were developing pretty fast for a 13 year-old. Matt, on the other hand, had already broken character, chuckling at his sister's jab. He had a lot of catching up to do.\n\n\"Well aren't you a smart-ass! But I do guess, your superior wits merit some reward. Here.\" Rob said while handing over a banknote. \"And bring me some Ben & Jerry's.\"\n\nAs they stormed in the small cafe-shop which resided in the middle of the park, Rob looked around, stretched his arms and breathed profoundly, as he always would every week at this point of their routine walk. He was glad and proud he got to be one of those parents---the ones which found the time to spend with their children and see them grow.\n\nHis phone rang to the tune of \"Close to you\", the ring-tone his wife had assigned to herself, and begged for him to keep.\n\n\"Hi Jane!\"\n\nJane was his wife, and main pillar of his life. Many family-men believe to have been blessed with their spouses and kids; Rob knew it. They supported each other like only breakfast & cereal TV commercial families could. Both were successful professionals in their respective fields, so their finances were as stable as their devotion.\n\n\"Hon, are you home yet? Switch on channel 2.\"\n\n\"We're still at the park. What's going on?\"\n\n\"What's the name of your old college room-mate?\"\n\n\"Nathan? You mean Nathan?\"\n\nHe hadn't thought about Nathan in a long time. The memory was somewhat sour, even though there was no reason for it to be. He had managed to leave that part of his life behind, and had no intention to dive back into the pettiness that had characterized those years.\n\n\"Yeah! Wow, it's really him then!\"\n\n\"Jane, honey, what ever are you talking about?\"\n\n\"It's him! He was the winner of the PowerBall! They're interviewing him right now on channel 2!\"\n\n\"What?!\"\n\nHe rushed inside the cafe as the kids were getting out. They looked as puzzled as he did, although not as frenetic. He rushed to the TV and fidgeted his fingers towards the controls. The channel changed and in plain view, there he was. Nathan.\n\nThat fucking ass-hole!\n\n\"That fucking ass-hole!\", he repeated, this time in his real voice.\n\nHis other hand was still pressing the phone to his cheek.\n\n\"Oh, wow. Are you ok? Why are you getting so upset? You haven't seen him in what, like 20 years? I thought you'd just laugh this off. I'm sor-\"\n\nHe hung up. A huge wave of heat invested him. He could feel his heart beating frenetically as he wiped the sweat off his face. He was surprised and confused. Surprised, as his wife was, that he could become so upset because of Nathan after so much time. Confused that he couldn't think of anything more than his anger and surprise. He didn't know how to calm down, or what to do. Until he did.\n\nHe ran outside, while Julie and Matt followed suit.\n\n\"Dad!\" they shouted in unison. That made him stop and turn around. For a second he regained his breath. He walked to them and knelt to match their height.\n\n\"I'm sorry kids, we have to interrupt our walk. I have to go take care of some business. I'll be right back, don't worry!\". He abruptly turned around and started running again.\n\n\"But daddy, your ice-cre-\"\n\nHe then proceeded to jump in front of a bus coming by at full speed.\n\n---\n\nThis was my first story ever. I'd appreciate some feedback =)", "“And here we are again, brother mine. This makes five. Come on then.”\n\n“You can’t beat me, you know you can’t. You never could. The only thing that saved you was how long it took me to find you.”\n\n“True, but then, what’s the fun in just letting you win?”\n\n“Why? Why must you do this every time? I didn’t even get to meet him this go round. He was dead before even being born. It wasn’t enough to kill him, you had to kill his mother too?”\n\n“And I would do it again, brother mine. Every time. For as long as it takes.”\n\n“Why can’t you just let me love him? Why can’t you let me just live? Let US live?”\n\n“He will destroy you, brother mine. He always does. That’s why we’re here you know. Father wants us to sort this out, once and for all.”\n\n“He would never hurt me! He can’t hurt me. You know he can’t.”\n\n“There are more ways to hurt besides physical pain, brother mine. I should know.”\n\n“He didn’t abuse me, he never did! What can’t you and Father understood that?”\n\n“Oh but he did, brother mine. Even worse, he made you hurt others. You would never do that, before.”\n\n“I hurt you, didn’t I?”\n\n“That’s different, and you know it. You did what you had to do, what I forced you to do. He didn’t force you, and that’s what’s so much worse. You choose!”\n\n“I protected him! I protected us! Until you came! Not even Father could protect someone from you, could he?”\n\n“I wouldn’t have had to come if you just gave him up, brother mine. Just let him go, and we can both move on. Give him up, and we can both go home.”\n\n“Never! I’ll never stop loving him. I will find him, and this time I will protect him from you. I will protect us from you!”\n\n“So be it, brother mine. I’ll let him live. Let you both live. But, I promise you this. If either of you hurt even one innocent life, one single good soul, I will take him from you. I will take him and break him in front of you. And this time, brother mine, I won’t stop with him. I will reach out and take everything and everyone that either of you ever loved or cared about. Do you understand me, brother mine?”\n\n“I do. I will show you, show you and Father.”\n\n“Fine then, brother mine. End it. Reset the clock. Let’s see if the sinner you love can be made a saint. Who knows, maybe this is what it will take to get us out of here. I will watch, brother mine.”\n\n“Goodbye, Lucifer.”\n\n“Goodbye, Michael. I still love you.”\n", "The first time it happened, I'd been driving home at night after an argument with an asshole from work. The last thing I saw was a pair of headlights.\n\n\"James- What the-\"\n\n\"Rob?!\"\n\n\"Didn't you just leave to go home?\"\n\n\"Well, yeah, not that it's your business.\"\n\n\"Oh, shut up. Just get the hell out of here.\"\n\n---\n\nThe second time it happened, I'd been tapping my thumbs worriedly on the steering wheel. I was sure that I'd left work only a few minutes ago. Was I hallucinating?\n\nThe screech of tires on gravel was my only warning.\n\n\"What the fuck?!\"\n\n\"Jesus- Rob?\"\n\n\"I was in the fucking breakroom making coffee! Is this some kind of sick joke?\"\n\nI reeled back, my mind whirling. \"No- I swear, I think I-\"\n\n\"Save it, James. Whatever you did, I don't want to hear it. Get the fuck out!\"\n\n---\n\nThe third time I took a different route. This time, it was a train.\n\n\"Holy-\"\n\n\"I think this is a time loop,\" I said.\n\nSilence.\n\n\"Have you ever seen Groundhog Day?\"\n\n\"Yes, I've fucking seen Groundhog Day. I was just trying to work out how someone could be so stupid.\"\n\n\"No, I'm serious! And I think you're in it too. What's the time?\"\n\n\"8:37- Wait a fucking moment. Is this a prank? Am I being filmed?!\"\n\n\"No! Look, I know this sounds unbelievable, but whenever I try to leave, I get in an accident and I find myself here again.\"\n\n\"Yeah, damn right this sounds unbelievable.\"\n\nI sigh. Fuck. I'm not looking forward to... dying, again. \"I think I can prove it. Go somewhere else, and look at your watch. If I'm right, it'll jump back to 8:37 in a few minutes.\"\n\n---\n\nThe fourth time, I just waited in my car. A semi ran off the road and, in the process, over me.\n\n\"...\"\n\n\"So?\"\n\n\"Shit.\"\n\n\"Yeah. Looks like we're stuck here.\"\n\n\"No, there's a simple answer. Just don't leave.\"\n\n\"...\"\n\n\"...\"\n\n\"...\"\n\n\"Stop staring at me. It's been nearly two hours. I think it's safe to go.\"\n\n---\n\nThe fifth time, it was a carjacking gone wrong.\n\n\"Fuck. Again?\"\n\n\"For fuck's sake, Rob, at least you're not the one getting killed every time!\"\n\n\"...Touche.\"\n\nI take a deep breath. \"Look. Whenever I leave, I get this feeling that I've left something unfinished. Like I needed to resolve something... with you.\"\n\n\"If you wanted to take me on a date, you should've just asked.\"\n\n\"Don't be an ass. It's just... could you try driving me home, or something? Maybe that would break it.\"\n\n\"Ha. No.\"\n\n\"Fine, suit yourself.\"\n\n---\n\nThe sixth time was a lightning bolt. Now that was a shocker.\n\n\"...\"\n\n\"Will you drive me home now?\"\n\nBeing in the car with Rob was pretty fucking awkward. I kept looking around, tense, waiting for the next disaster to come.\n\nWhen we pulled up at my house, I reached for the handle. Something stayed my hand.\n\n\"Look,\" I said. \"I'm... I'm sorry I've been such an ass to you. You've got good ideas, it's just that... I'm afraid that you're better than me. That you'll replace me.\"\n\nThat gets me a snort. \"That's a weak-ass apology, James.\"\n\nI say nothing.\n\nA moment later. \"I... I guess I'm sorry too. I know I take things too far - it's not something I'm proud of. If you promise you'll try to listen to me, I... well, I promise I won't be such a dick to you all the time.\"\n\nI nod. \"That's fair.\"\n\n---\n\nThe seventh time never came.", "\"It's been centuries since you wanted to see me,\" Matthew said, sitting on a bench alongside the lake in Central Park. He tossed a handful of feed to the ducks, swimming in circles a few feet away. \"I'd have quite happily gone for the millennium, Ethan.\"\n\nEthan Finlay eased himself down onto the bench, gripping his cane to save himself a nasty fall. At ninety-six this life around, he was no spring chicken. Neither was Matthew, born fours years ahead of him, at one hundred even. The last days of autumn were soon to give way to winter, and given his mounting health concerns Ethan didn't expect he'd live to see much of it. Either by his own hand or natural causes.\n\n\"I've something to discuss with you, if you'll listen.\"\n\nMatthew looked at Ethan askance, then returned to his ducks. \"You want a favour? Forget it.\"\n\n\"It may benefit the both of us.\"\n\n\"I've been alive, caught in the same infinite loop, for nearly four thousand years, Ethan. What could possibly benefit me anymore? I've seen it all, done it all. Dozens of times.\"\n\nEthan sniffed and eased the weight off his sore hip. He thought on the lives he and Matthew had spent as friends, back in the early days, when they'd first realised they were bastardised immortals. They could die, surely, but they were reborn back in the 1920's with their memories of past lives intact. Living the same 100 years, over and over again, with no end to the loop. Not through death, suicide, religion, or science. No end.\n\n\"She married Arthur again this life,\" Matthew said, talking as if to the air. \"Without you or I to get in her way, she ends up happy most of the time.\"\n\nFlashes of the woman, the mother of his long forgotten children forty or fifty lives ago, were still as fresh as the day they were made. The faces of the children were harder to see, blurry, and there hadn't been any kids since. Losing them once had been hard enough. Even with the possibility of a do-over, another shot at the same life, it was impossible to have the same children.\n\n\"What Irene does is no concern of mine--or yours, Matthew. We have our understanding.\"\n\nMatthew spat on the ground and clenched his old, withered hands. Hands that had fought the same wars dozens of times, hands that had wrung the life from Ethan more than once. \"Don't you say her name. Don't you dare.\"\n\n\"I loved her. Just like you.\" He sighed. \"She was everything that is beautiful in this world. And, after so many laps around the same track, the only thing still beautiful. I loved her. You don't get to hate me for that.\"\n\nMatthew unclenched his fists and his face grew very still. \"She was mine first. You and I may be joined by some cosmic fuck-up, but I'll always have that over you, Finlay. She was mine first, no matter which lives you decided to steal her from me.\"\n\n\"It was never theft, Matthew. How dare you.\"\n\nMatthew glared across the lake, up to the buildings of New York scraping the sky. He'd seen the stone and glass monoliths grow from seeds time and time again. He'd watched some of them come crashing down. September 11th one life, September 15th some others. Always within the space of about a week.\n\n\"What the hell do you want?\" he asked bitterly.\n\n\"Simple, really,\" Ethan said. \"I want you to kill me.\"\n\n\"Gladly, but I'm not quite done with this loop yet. I'm working on a novel, the best novel ever written. Struggling with a few sentences I want to get down and memorise before I'm shitting in my pants again. You know it gets murky those first few years of a reset.\"\n\nEthan met his eyes. \"Yes, but around the second birthday most of it clicks into place, and that's when I want you to kill me.\"\n\nMatthew blinked. \"You... what?\"\n\n\"Kill me, old friend. Kill me before I'm born.\"\n\nA long silence stretched between the two of them, as New York hustled and bustled around them. Matthew caught the scent of boiled hot dogs, fresh pretzels, and something that may have been fairy floss.\n\n\"I'll be an infant. And you won't be born for another two years.\"\n\n\"You'll be aware, you'll be walking, and will have mastered most basic speech.\" Ethan nodded. \"Yes, this is what I want. I want you to try and stop my conception. I want you to kill me before I'm born.\" He paused. \"And if you can't, then I want you to kill my mother before she gives birth to me.\"\n\nMatthew studied his face, searching for the punchline. He didn't find one. \"You're serious.\"\n\n\"I'm tired. I want to die.\"\n\n\"I'll be three years old.\" Matthew did some quick arithmetic in his head. \"Three years and eight months when you're born in Fairbanks. Best part of two thousand miles from where I live as a kid.\" A thought occurred to him. \"And what if that just resets the loop again? We both reset when one of us dies. I want to spend as least time as possible as an infant. You know it's one of the worst parts of this whole affair.\"\n\n\"This will work,\" Ethan whispered. \"I'll finally be able to rest. To put her - and you - from my mind.\"\n\n\"By never existing.\"\n\n\"I've lived more life than any person has a right to live. As have you.\" He licked his lips. \"Perhaps without me, there'll be no loop. Perhaps you can live a final, proper life, and be done with all this nonsense.\"\n\nMatthew folded his hands in his lap and stared into the dark lake water. \"Is this really what you want?\"\n\nIn answer to that, Ethan removed a sleek, silver-barreled revolver from his coat pocket. He placed the end of the barrel under his chin and smiled. \"See you in another life, old friend.\"\n\nEthan pulled the trigger and splattered his immortal thoughts all over the crunchy autumn leaves. He saw a flash of light, white, and then nothing.\n\n****\n\n" ]	4
	[WP] Everyone remembers where they were when the lights went out on planet Earth... Where were you?	[ "That day started like any other day, struggling through, not paying attention to anyone or anything. Everyone likes to think the day of the apocalypse will be something special and they will live life to its full potential, go out with a bang. Not in reality. In reality people are scared, shaking, crying, living the last moments of life making less of an impact than they ever have. Scared of the most evil people in the world gaining control. Scared of what will happen to them. Scared of everyone around them. And like they were as a young child, scared of the dark. \n\n\nAs adults, people like to pretend they aren't scared of anything, they are immune to fear and nothing can hurt them. \"There is nothing in the dark to hurt you, now go to sleep.\" That is what my dad used to say to me. Every night as I lay in my bed awake, hearing strange sounds and seeing things move in the dark, the unknown, the place where all of my fear rushed at me and made my heart beat faster than ever before. I pretend it doesn't scare me any more, I'm an adult, there is nothing in the dark to hurt me, especially not in my own home.\n\n\nI was sat on my sofa watching the news, the same old stories of people being blown up, hacked, losing everything and all of the other bad things that happen in the day. \"This has been Ronald, have a lovely eve..\". Damn it, the powers gone out again. I looked outside and all of the street lights were out. My heart started beating a bit faster, I remember telling myself that there is nothing in the dark that can hurt me, telling myself that lie that I truly believed over and over again. I picked up a torch to go and see if the circuit breaker had popped. Must be out of batteries. I knew the way to my bed, even in the pitch black that I now moved around in, my own home, my safe haven. \n\n\nAs I tried to sleep the darkness seemed to move in my mind, as it did when I was a child. The noises, quiet, faint noises felt scary, even though they were unidentifiable, they had weight behind them, as if they had a meaning. It felt as though the darkness was all encompassing and I realised I feared the darkness itself just as much as I feared what could be in it. The last thing I remember is falling asleep surrounded by this fear.\n\n\nI didn't know what day it was or how long I had been asleep but I awoke to the sounds of screams. I immediately got up and went outside in to the pitch black with my baseball bat. I could barely see 5 feet in front of me, the darkness was almost absorbing my eyes, I couldn't focus on anything. I could hear people being hurt, I could hear that the people doing it were enjoying it. I heard a noise off to my right, slowly coming closer, getting louder as I tried to ignore the sound of my pumping heart trying to burst through my ribcage. I heard the whoosh of something fly through the air and I ducked instinctively swinging my bat hard to my right. Connection. I don't know what I hit but the noise will live with me forever. I know whatever I hit wasn't making any noise now.\n\n\nI knew I had to make a decision, either I embraced the darkness and became the thing that people feared in the dark or I died scared, shaking like a child at the hands of the fear I had always had.", "\"A normal night, waiting on my flight, my money is short, \nso i travel light, man this poem is tight, right?\" \n \n\"Man fuck poems, why do i even bother..?\" \nDUUUUU DURU DUH FLIGHT WT203 TO STOCKHOLM IS NOW BOARDING AT GATE 9 DUH DURU DUUUUU \n\"yo, yo, i'm boarding 203, as a soon to be star of rap, i can hear the audience clap in reign of their new king, the world will hear me sing, as my thoughts are ever flowing with gold as i'm throwing this sick rythm as im going to the top, i wont be a flop, my brain is made of hip-hop.... man fuck this, fuck this... sight, this is garbage.. \nwow he must be tired, he looks like a zombie. A zombie apocalypse would be cool, i would survive. Just fill my dad's boat with potatoes from our farm, and sail to that little deserted island. I would survive, and maybe after a year i could go back to the town to gather some supplies, maybe meet people and make a crew. no, i cant trust people, or, maybe ill take Dave and christina with. Christina is pretty hot, we could make kids, and start a tribe. Or, no, that would be incest, we need to be atleast 20 people, 10 guys and 10 girls. Make a fort of the old fishing factory and use the lighthouse as lookout. I would use a sword, or maybe a machete, and..\" \nDUUUU DURU DUH FLIGHT WT203 AT GATE 9 IS REQUESTING A MR JOHN ANTHONY, I REPEAT, MR JOHN ANTHONY DUH DURU DUUUUU \n\"FUCK, i did it again, always daydreaming about random shit. Sight... I'm at gate 7, i should go, fuck this is emba...\" \nZVUMZVUMZVUM \nwtf, the lights went out, i can't see shit. Omg i was just kidding about that zombie thing. No dont be stupid, the light just went out, probably back in a minute \nBOOM\n\"Was that i gunshot?? holy fuck its isis! wait are they under me??\" \n \nJohn walks silently to the ledge, and there he stands, the masked man with an AK-47, shooting at screaming civilians in total darkness. \nJohn instantly throws himself over the ledge towards the shooting terrorist as he screams \"MY NAME IS JOHN CENAA\", the power turns on, the speakers is automaticly tested as they play the regular tune DU DURU DUUUUUH As he bodyslams and instantly kill the terrorist, a ray of light shines down on him, and at this moment he knew, he is the hero Sweden deserves. \n ", "For most it was a day unlike any other. Everyone was gathered around their tiny black and white televisions watching the grainy footage from the local news room.\n\nThey watched as the man was handed papers and read them aloud. Seeing the fear grow on his face knowing that the next paper could be the one that everyone wished would never come.\n\nThe reports became shorter and shorter as the people on the other end just tried to get any information through they could. Some featured farewells to family members. Soon reports had stopped coming from half the stations contacts. Not long after the word everyone dreaded came trough\n\n\"We've lost contact with every station east of us.\" his voice wavered \"We are bound to be next.\" tears slowly dripped down his face \"It is time for me to sign off one las-\n\n---\n\nEdoot: I know it's not exactly what the prompt was asking for. But like with all my art I started with one thing in mind and just let it flow from there. It happened to lead to this.", "Thirty-four flights.\n\nBad enough I'd had to jimmy open the elevator only to find myself between floors then go out through the ceiling panel that took ages to find. Bad enough that I was already bursting for a piss getting in the damned thing. Bad enough that the sudden jolt caused us to freefall for several seconds and the sudden stop changed the us to an I. I didn't even know the man who had the bad luck to have broken my fall. No. Not thinking about that.\n\nNo apparently none of that was bad enough. Because with the lights out and my lighter flickering and definitely going to die before I can make it to my car and smoke my last two, I realize I've got thirty-four flights to climb down. There are other people in the building I'm sure, but it's twenty flights before I see any of them. They aren't moving really, just gravitating to the windows, dumbstruck at the sight of the city without their lights. Some looked in their hands at useless phones, confused as to why they wouldn't light up.\n\nI don't.\n\nThirty-four floors, an elevator, and a dead man ago I saw it start. I'd just hoped to get to the ground before it all ended. If I hurry I may avoid the initial rioting. It should be a few hours before the government sends the military, two days before they realize it's hopeless, twenty or twenty-five before the government fails entirely. \n\nThen begins phase two. " ]	4
In your mind you're still the same age but physically, you've gone back in time. Your mom comes in the room and tells you to be ready to leave for school in 30 minutes. How does the rest of your life play out?	[WP] Monday morning, you wake up and realize you're in your childhood bed. All memories from your life are intact but it's the first day of High School.	[ "All I do is work.\nI punch the same clock everyday.\nSee the same fucking people.\nStare at the same fucking wall.\nClock in. Drift off. Clock out. \nGet stuck in traffic. \nSometimes I believe that I spend too much alone with my uncontrolled thoughts.\nThere has to be more to life than this.\nSure I take a vacation from my pathetic cubicle once a year, go to some exotic island... But when I was younger, I thought there would be something more to adulthood, something more that I was working towards.\nLife just kind of passes you by, you keep moving forward, time goes by, you get older and dumber.\nI married to a bitch of a wife that I made the mistake of having three kids with.\nI've turned into an alcoholic and cigarette smoker. Every night I knock myself out, and make myself stupid with a couple of shots of rum so I can forget about my pathetic life, my cunt of a wife and my stupid ass children.\n\nOn my lunch break everyday, I go outside and smoke a couple of American Spirits, and think about how I keep smoking a couple more every day because I've grown a tolerance to the nicotine.\n\nI feel like I'm trapped, I'm on a straight and narrow course to the rest of my life, to my unavoidable death. What more is there to look forward too?\n\nThese thoughts circle around in my head, and finally the shots of rum kick in and I pass out.\n\n...\n\n\nI have a dream...\n\nIn my dream I'm an old man. Sitting on a recliner, watching television. It's a show, a weird show, its like a movie. And I'm in the movie, my younger self. And I watch the man who looks like me live a boring mundane life. Hes at the grocery store, buying food, and you can see in his eyes that hes not really there. Somewhere along the way he has become vacant.\nSomewhere along the way he died a little inside, and hes just going through the motions.\nHes at the gas station, putting in gas into the family van, and hes just staring at the stars.\nHe remembers when he was a younger kid at school, how they would give you the idea that everyone could one day be an astronaut and travel to the moon.\nThe man is sitting there in front of the television now, he seems inebriated, and in my dream I watch him slowly age, all while sitting in front of the television. And the movie ends, and it shows a reflection. The screen becomes like a mirror and I see myself sitting there . An old man, bald, sad and vacant.\n\nAnd then I wake up.\n\nI smell pancakes, and I hear music. I hear a knock on the door and hear the familiar sound of my mothers voice telling me to get ready for school.\nI look down at the pyramid in my pants, It feels like I have an impossible to suppress hard on.\nI also feel extremely energetic, I get up in a frenzy and rush to the mirror.\nAm I in another dream? Or have I gone back in time? Is that really me in my reflection?\nI need to find a calendar. Or something.\nWhere did we always use to keep one?\nI rush down to the refrigerator in the kitchen, and I almost faint at what I see.\n\n\n.....\n\n\nThat's a cool writing prompt. I'm not going to write out how his whole life plays out. But I thought that would be a cool way to start it, an old regretful man whos become what most old men become. Jaded and vacant. And then he wakes up to get another chance at life, maybe he joins the military and ends up dying early, or maybe, knowing how his last life played out he takes more chances in life, or maybe it depresses him and he kills himself.\ninteresting", "Wait, school in 30 mins? What the hell!? I open my eyes and realize everything is wrong. Wait, not wrong...different. This isn't my room. This isn't my bed. I call out to my wife, thinking maybe I just passed out drunk last night (though I don't remember drinking) and she played a prank. Or maybe there was an accident of some sort, but then I remember the voice that spoke. That wasn't Marie. I look around the room again, stare at the forty inch tv, the large cassette player and ratty speakers on my dresser. And then my brain finally catches on. This is my room, but not the one I fell asleep in at the age of 41 with Marie, my wife of eleven years. This is the same room I slept in as a 16 year old. I'm in my foster mom's house back in New York. What. The. Hell.\n\nI stumble out of bed and head to the bathroom next door to my room, my body remembering the details but my mind elsewhere. My two kids. My wife. My job. This has got to be a dream. I avoid the mirror at first and splash cold water on my face, even pinch the skin on the back of my elbow hard. And then I look in the mirror, and the little wrinkles, the scars, the silver hairs...all gone. In place of the curly hair I let grow out (my wife had been begging me to do so again for over a year), my hair is dark, short cropped. Just the way I kept it back then. Wait, now. Fuck. FUCK! I start breathing faster, get a little dizzy and realize I need to chill. Taking a deep breath, I let it out slowly, counting as I release the air from my lungs. I have two choices: accept that this is a dream and proceed accordingly until I wake up, or accept that this is my reality and I'm either crazy or entirely sane and this is really happening. I didn't feel crazy, so maybe dream it is. Might a well enjoy myself until the crazy shit that usually happens in dreams starts kicking in. But I know my dreams, dreams where I start hovering, or suddenly teleport around to places half remembered, fighting zombies and villains and whatever else my subconcious throws my way. This feels...real. As real as the life I left behind. Was this a second chance? To undo the mistakes I made, be less of an asshole in my life? Christ, not get into the mounds of debt I found/find myself in?\n\nAnd what about my kids? Is there some alternate reality going where I'm still the older me, still working a job being a glorified data monkey that I couldn't stand to make all of our lives better? Did I die in my sleep, and this is my reincarnation? My brain is starting to hurt with all the possibilities. If this is real, would the changes I make undo everything I've done in my life? My other life...\n\n\"10 minutes, Anthony! Move your butt, boy, before you're late for your first day!\" That's my foster mother, Janet. I was back to being a ward of the state, back to being a skinny, geeky kid who was afraid of everything, who didn't know how to talk to girls, played D&D with my friends on the weekends. Friends I would meet soon. And suddenly I know in my heart what makes sense. Get to school. Be a better person. Be a smarter person. \n\nI stride back to my room and quickly get dressed, throwing on my baggy jeans and a Transformers T-Shirt (G1, my brain throws at me). I realize I'm swimming in my clothes. Yeah, wardrobe definitely needs a change. I look like a fucking idiot! I grab my backpack and run down the stairs.\n\n\"Bye, Janet! Thanks for the wake-up!\" She waves to me as I run out the door and down the block. And the running...my god! My knee no longer hurts. It feels like I'm moving so fast. Excercise. All the working out I do later in life, I'll start it now, not rely on my fast metabolism to save the day. And my art! All the techniques I've worked on in the past (future) few years, it's there, ready to be used, to expand on...I could start a totally different career!\n\nAs I run the few blocks to Newmark Free Academy, the public high school I would be starting in this year (my sophomore year), I think about things I'll miss. My smart phone. Internet. Wifi everywhere. God, Starbucks! And then something else clicks: these companies haven't really started yet, have they? Google...I'll befriend some adults, teachers I meet through mutual friends in a few years. I can learn about finances, stock trading, see if I can get them to open accounts for me...the after school jobs I get, instead of blowing the money on crap I'll never see again, I can invest it. Get a car at 17 instead of 25. Build better habits of saving now. Live better.\n\nWhen I reach the school and see of all of kids (christ they look so young!) milling about, most heading in, I suddenly see my kids, my five year old daughter, her curly brown hair and mischevious. My twelve year old son, his face so much like my own. I see their smiles, hear their laughter, and the tears fill my eyes, blur my vision. Will I ever see them again? Will I make the right choices, still meet my wife, meet the woman who helped me become a better man than I had any right to be? I don't know.\n\nBut I'm going to find out.", "It didn't really sink in that this was all really happening until I got to health class.\n\nI sat down in my assigned seat between between next year's class president and the girl who has a far less amazing than I initially thought little sister. I would have had a very ill fated fling with her in junior year, but I can just not do that this time around.\n\nUnfortunately that doesn't really answer my suddenly very pressing question of how I stop a pair of planes from hitting the World Trade Center next Tuesday. I'm 14, and I'll have been 15 for all of a day when that happens. I could try and convince my parents to take me to New York for my birthday, maybe pull the fire alarm. \n\nI know the first plane had already hit during this class period that day, and I think I watched live news coverage as the second one hit from this very seat... Christ on a cracker, I really hope I'm remembering that one right.\n\n...\n\nI'm going to wind up in a padded cell, aren't I?\n\n" ]	3
	[WP]Perfectionist supervillain struggles to finish the ultimate weapon.	[ "I am Deathstroyer! I am the coming apocalypse! I am the death that will cleanse this world! I AM… all out of purple high gloss paint? Seriously? How did I let this I happen?\n\n\nI drop my weary head into my hands and just sigh. Sitting on the workbench in front of me my Deathstroyer brand HyperDeathBeam is all but finished. I even managed to finally get the beam to obliterate only human life without destroying plants or causing explosions. I only wanted to destroy the city and leave it an empty playground. The beam works exactly as I want it, but it’s such an ugly flat gray. \n\n\nI stand up and make my way over to the cabinet of supplies in the corner of my lair. Surely I have to have something else in there. Five hundred jars of paint, all the wrong color. Hell, there’s even a matte purple in there taunting me with it’s uselessness. The glossy purple was color matched specifically to the beam it produces and my cape. It was perfect.\n\n\nLeaning back from the cabinet I close my eyes and replay the mental fantasy I’ve been harboring for years. It is a familiar dream and has been seeing me through this project. Picturing all the despicable humans of the city running in terror from the flying Deathstroyer, with his bright purple gun and it’s neon purple beam. They’d run, they flee, but nothing would save them from the peril I wrought! MUWHAHAAHAHAHA. \n\n\nOh damn, I started laughing out loud again. I’m glad no one was here to hear that. I guess I have no choice; I’ll have to pick up some more paint. I’ll bet the Merchant of Deathness never forgot to have enough paint. Now there’s a real villain. I’ll never be as good as him. \n\n\nAfter grabbing the keys to the Deathmobile, I start fiddling with my cape to take it off. Wait, no, screw that. I’m not changing out of my costume. I AM the Deathstroyer. The rest of the world needs to accept me for who I am. In response to this, a small twinge of embarrassment runs down spine and straight into my crotch. I feel almost vulgar the way my suit looks like I’m wearing woman’s underwear on the outside. \n\n\nNo, I will do this. I’ve put more time into being a villain than most people put into any of their hobbies. I can do this. I hold my head up defiantely, walk out the door and into destiny.\n\n\n\nI’m two blocks into my trip in the Deathmobile before I remember I’m heading to Michaels. Those woman can be downright vicious when they give you a dirty look. My defiant sneer turns into a glum frown. Oh well, too late to change now. The city moves by in a blur as I head onwards.\n\n\nI love my Deathmobile. The giant skull on the back means no one tailgates me. Spikes on the wheels means no one can box me in when they park beside me. Screw headlights, I have flame throwers on the front to light my path. Nevermind it ruins the gas mileage. Sadly, it’s enormous size, coupled with the business of a Saturday, means I have to park at the far end of the lot. My lower eyelid starts twitching; it does that any time I get really worked up. There’s only one thing that can raise my spirits now, I need to monologue.\n\n\n\n“DEATHSTROYER has come again!” I bellow out once I am outside of my car. “Wherever Deathstroyer goes, pain and anguish follow! A foul curse is descending upon you Michaels and your reasonably priced craft supplies. I enter your void now!”\n\n\n\nThere, I feel better. Though, I’m not quite sure what it means to enter a store’s void, it just sounded good in the moment. Across the parking lot, I see a scrawny teenager that was watching my monologue. He pulls out his phone and starts jogging over. Oh god, last time that happened they wanted to take a “selfie” with me. I cannot allow that. \n\n\nQuickly, I pull my cloak around me and float on into the Michaels. I hear the teenager call to me, he too shall learn the truth; Deathstroyer waits for no one. \n\n\n\nOnce inside the store, the fluorescent lights sap my energy and bleaches the environment to a terrible ashen grey. I make a mental note to look up the inventor of the fluorescent bulbs; truly an evil genius that has mastered the art of long term subtle evil. As I walk the aisles, I’m visually scorned by all manner of woman and their craft addictions. A portly woman in the unpainted lumber section glares at me, a tiny spry old lady in the puzzles sections looks at me with contempt, a mother and daughter looking at holiday directions whisper quietly to each other while staring at me with venom. \n\n\nI am a villain, I live to be hated and feared by others. Yet these women unnerve me so with their looks that say I am intruding in their domain. I must get out of here as quickly as possible. \n\nIt is not difficult task for Deathstroyer, he who brings the death, to find the appropriate paint, navigate their accursed fluorescent light filled maze of shelves and get to the exit. I was, however, unprepared for the questions that would bring.\n\n\n“Do you have one of our Bonus Rewards Cards?” The chipper blonde working the register asks me. Looking around at the other cashiers it’s obvious that she is despised for her beauty and grace where she stands peerless above the other slovenly workers here. It is also obvious that she is oblivious to the scorn of her peers as she smiles at me innocently. Her smile reminds me of a doe right before it is killed to death by one of my HyperDeath beams. \n\n\n“Sir, do you have one of our Bonus Reward Cards?” She asks again. Oh bother, this is a question I am supposed to answer.\n\n\n“I… do not know.”\n\n\n“That’s no problem. I can lookup your details in the computer. What’s your name.”\n\n\n“DEATHSTROYER! Bringer of Pain--”\n\n\n“Dithstraw? Is that german?”\n\n\n“No, DEATHSTROYER!”\n\n\n“Ohh, Deathstroyer,” she giggles at saying the name, “Is that your first or last name?”\n\n\n“Neither, it is MY name.”\n\n\n“Yeah, european names are funny like that. How about I use your number. Can you tell me that, area code first?”\n\n\nWhat in the devil is an area code? I destroy areas! Finally, I can take more.\n\n\n“A pox upon your computer and it’s infernal questions!” I shout. Without hesitation I point my finger and activate the Death Laser in the glove. The case of the computer expands and boils before rupturing in a satisfying orgy of smoke and fire. That felt good.\n\n\nThe girl’s eyes went wide at this. Without looking away from the smoldering remains of her machine, she grabs the phone next to her and pages on the overhead comm “Manager key needed at front lane.”\n\n\nManagers! This is getting complicated; last time a Manager was beckoned I was banned from the food court. I’d better go. Quickly I fish out what seems a reasonable amount of gold coins for the paint and toss it on the counter.\n\n\n“Enjoy your respite mortals! Deathstroyer leaves you now!” I call out half-heartedly. \n\n\nOn the walk back to the car I start doing the mental calculations to figure out how long until my HyperDeathBeam is complete. I realize with traffic there’s no way I’ll have it done in time. I really wanted to attack during the sunset today; my cape just looks so fearsome against the golden setting sun. Oh well, maybe I’ll have it done by tomorrow.\n", "IGOR: The death ray is complete, sir! Finally, the world will tremble and bow before us!\n\nTHE QUIBBLER: Yeah...\n\nIGOR: What's wrong, sir? You've seen the small scale tests. The ray is functional and devastating. We completely obliterated that farm. Everything was burned to a crisp!\n\nTHE QUIBBLER: It's supposed to leave a green haze in its wake. That's my trademark! And what ever happened to the haunting scent of early-morning frosted dew? All I smelled at that farm was charred flesh and burnt potatoes. This is unacceptable.\n\nIGOR: ... Can't we work out those kinks after we threaten a few nations and collect a few bribes? Our coffers are running dangerously low.\n\nTHE QUIBBLER: Then go ask for your job back at Starbucks. I will not settle for an inferior product!\n\n>Two days later.\n\nTHE QUIBBLER: I asked for extra foam on my cappuccino! Let me speak to your manager!\n\nIGOR: Yes sir... Just a moment.\n\n\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] Turn a great book into a Buzzfeed article.	[ "The Love of His Life's Husband is About to Die... What Happens Next Will Shock You\n\nBuzzfeed Staff Report \n\nNobleman Charles Darnay sent out a major diss this morning after being taken away and prepped for the guillo'\n\n@CharlesDarnay: Can't believe the lame-ass peasants want to chop off my head (annoyed emoji)\n\nGorgeous Reality Star Lucie Darnay, born Manette, CRUSHED haters with a defiant selfie after her husband was taken away #fierce\n\n@Lucie: I am beyond dismay, but still look like an angel. Re-bleached my hair 2day #sadbutfab [instagram selfie]\n\nHERO DRUNK Sydney Carton told Buzzfeed he's in love with Lucie after many drinks last month, now he's going to DIE to save her HUSBAND\n\n@SydneyCarton: it's a far far better thing I do...pretty scary up here ngl #lasttweet maybe this is a bad ide\n\n #canyousaytragedy\n\n", "You Won't Believe These 10 Great Ways That Big Brother Is Helping You\n\n10. Did you know that we are constantly at war? It's true! Big Brother is coordinating our war effort against Eurasia, and you don't even have to worry about it!\n\n9. Maybe you did already know about the war. That's probably because Big Brother is so open with his communication, making sure that the daily updates you receive contain all the important information you need to get through the day, as well as a daily workout!\n\n8. If you need just a little more pick-me-up and the information broadcasts aren't doing the trick, just wait a little longer, and everyone's favorite minute of the day will begin: the One-Minute Hate! Vent all your frustrations at the traitors that tried to tear Big Brother down, and you'll be stress-free for the rest of the day.\n\n7. Does that all sound great to you, but you still don't feel safe and secure? Not to worry! Big Brother has helpfully installed communication screens in all homes, so that you're never more than a few feet from Big Brother. Remember, they're always watching.\n\n6. Reading is hard; we get it. That's why Big Brother is working night and day to get rid of all those old, boring, hard to understand books and replace them with simpler ones.\n\n5. What makes those books simpler? It's not just the ideas in them, but also the words themselves! All new books are written in Newspeak, a brand-new, easy to understand language perfect for the man or woman on the go.\n\n4. All of this sounds great, but what if your neighbor doesn't agree? He could cause trouble for himself, for you, and your community. Thankfully, Big Brother has set up a hotline, so that you can all do your part to keep our nation happy.\n\n3. If your kids want to grow up just like you, they don't have to wait. Our nation's children are some of our best observers, and the hotline isn't limited to just adults calling in. In fact, Big Brother has set up some fantastic after-school programs designed specifically for training our youth to better recognize threats to our security.\n\n2. Sure, normal crime is easy to spot, but what if your neighbor is just thinking about crime, but hasn't done it yet? That's where the Thought Police comes in. Our revolutionary system of law allows Big Brother to prosecute even those who haven't made their threats against us reality yet.\n\n1. Big Brother loves you. He loves you like no one else can. You love him too. Right?" ]	2
	[WP] Someone lead a relatively normal life, except they always hear a voice narrating their live in an overly dramatic way or just plain inaccurate.	[ "He’d lived with The Voice all his life. It never referenced it’s existence. No one else ever heard it.\n\nGravelly and low, the voice would speak, “Desperately seeking sustenance, The Boy devoured handfuls of factory processed carbohydrates to quell his hunger.”\n\nThe Boy shakes it off, “They’re called Dorito’s, twat.”, but he knew The Voice could not hear him.\n\nOn and on, The Voice would drone. Announcing his entrance, narrating his day to day activities in grandiose fashion. “The boy sits in class and readies his mind! Letting the wisdom and knowledge seep into the crevices of his brain, stored safe and securely away, to be used in the future.” \n\nThe Voice proved, at best, distracting, and at worst, discouraging. However, as he grew older, The Voice slowly quieted. “The Boy deftly maneuvers his automobile into the nearest parking spot.”\n\n“While carrying out his duties at work, The Boy gazes out the window. The Boy looks to the shapes in the clouds, listless, dreaming, he-”, The Boy clasped his hands over his ears, as if that could stop the sounds he hears rattling internally through the bones in his skull.\n\n“The Boy needs a coffee break.” The Boy says.\n\n“The Boy needs a coffee break.” The Voice agreed.\n\nEmily worked at the coffee shop a few blocks away from The Boy’s office. There were several establishments closer to where The Boy worked. They probably even served better coffee, but he enjoyed the brief exercise (“The Boy maintains a brisk pace, as if on a mission!”) and fresh air on the way to his regular spot. He also enjoyed the brief silence he heard when he looked at her. It seemed even The Voice was at a loss for words whenever she was around.\n\n\n\n----------------------------------\n\nPossibly To Be Continued! Unfortunately, that's all I have for now. I have more I'd like to write, but it's getting late and I promised myself I'd write and submit SOMETHING today. Hopefully, I can come back to this in the future!", "My alarm blared throughout the room. Ugh. I slammed the snooze. Just a few more minutes. A little bit longer, a few moments respite until it starts again. The good dream I was having began to reappear in my mind.\n\nOur hero rests his mind, focusing on how he will conquer the day!\n\nSon of a bitch. I got up and turned the alarm off, slowly getting out of bed and heading towards the bathroom. \n\nShowing true resilience, Todd breaks sleep's grasp upon him to fight towards a brighter day!\n\nA few minutes later, I was in my car and ready for work. I turned the keys and started the car. \n\nTodd's majestic beast roars to life as he summons it, ready to take him to fight the good fight!\n\n\"Shut the fuck up.\" I muttered. I popped a few pills and took off. That ought to take care of that for a bit. I turned the music up, just in case. \n\nI got to my office in good time, waving and saying hi to everyone I passed. Yeah, I'm that guy at work. I sat behind my desk and started to pour through legal work. Public defenders really can't catch a break now a days. \n\nOur hero searches for hidden secrets, powerful tomes of knowledge to help him defeat the villainous bitch at the law firm across town!\n\nI slammed my head against the desk. \n\nAfter a full ten hour day, I started to pack my papers up. As I was loading them into my briefcase, the secretary from across the hall came into my office. \n\n\"Hey Todd, how's everything going?\" She smiled warmly. I stared for a second, very good looking. \n\n\"Uhh everything is good, great! Just finishing up on some plea deals I was working out, busy day for sure.\" I started to worry. I could never tell...\n\n\"Oh yeah, we were swamped over at Logan's office too, but that's summer months for ya!\" She laughed a bit. \"So, if you're not busy tonight...\" Her voice was interrupted.\n\nTodd, in his manly glory, easily woos the women of the battlefield. Can any resist the supreme charm of Todd, Destroyer of Worlds? \n\n\"Just cut that shit out already!\" I mumbled a bit too loudly. She stopped and looked at me, shocked. \"O-oh, I'm very sorry. Have a nice day, Todd.\" She said hurriedly, leaving without another word. I punched the wall beside me. \n\nWhen I got back to my apartment, I hung my coat up and kicked back on the couch, ready for some good Netflix. Can't think about the past, just look to the future. \n\nTodd rests his mind, preparing for the busy week ahead. He doesn't miss a beat as he watches Game of Thrones, preparing his mind for the treachery he may face in the battlefield!\n\nI shuddered. Five years. Ever since that car accident, every single day. It's making me crazy. I downed the rest of the pill bottle, and dug deep into the couch." ]	2
Additional prompt: In the President's desk, it is customary for the previous President to leave a note for the new one. The note says: "Trust no one."	[WP] You are elected as President of the United States. As you begin your term in office, you are suddenly briefed on the ongoing war against aliens.	[ "The celebrations were over, the ceremonies were done, all the hand had been shook, and all the right people had been patted on the back. It had been eight days since he took office. On the first he was bright and optimistic. Eager to tackle the hardships the country faced. By the end of the first week, the new president had twelve new hair. \n\nThe inauguration ceremony had been surreal. What was even more surreal were the days after and the conversations that followed suit. It was the third day in office, he was getting in his daily six hours of sleep when he was abruptly woken up to the sound of a telephone ring. Only one person had the number for this phone. It wasn't the phone that stood on the bedside cabinet, the one that he used to shock the white house chef with his late night cravings.\n\nIt was the situation phone that he kept on him at all times. The phone he was told, \" Would only go off in the most dire of situations. You are to answer it immediately.\" Or so he had been told when he was given it. It had only been two days into his presidency so he was not expecting this phone to ring; at least not this early. \n\n\n\"Hello?\"\n\n\"Hello Mr. President, This is the DNI, I just off the phone with the heads of their respective military branch and I'm Bringing my sub-directors along with me. We're having the First top secret National Briefing. Keep this to yourself. Two Secret service men will escort you to the briefing room. You have twenty minutes to get ready.\"\n\n\"Well that's all fine and dandy, but I'm feeling like we can move this up to at least ten? At least until I get something in my stomach\" The president said.\n\n\"Mr president,\" an exasperated tone, \" You are one of the most powerful men on the world. In your presidency you will make difficult decisions, your will will bend people, nations, to your liking. If you so much as hint, you can alter the course of history.\"\n\n\"Uhuh\" replied the president. He didn't like stern indifferent compliments like the one he was hearing. \n\n\"But, you this is not one of those times. As you're advisers, we gather information that will help you in making decisions. Your heads of staff pull and tug their influences on a global scale.\"\n\n\"Go on.\" The president said. His composure upright, he was wide awake now. \n\n\"So when you're heads of staff call you on a phone that is not meant to be called on, I highly suggest you heed their advice.\"\n\n\"I'll be there.\"\n\nThis was not going to be a good morning. The president didn't like being told what to do. He was businessman. He'd been the head of a fortune 500 corporation. Being told what to do didn't sit too well with him. Even the top dog listens to its owner thought the president. The president chuckled to himself.\n\nUp until this point all the meetings had been with smiles and congratulations. Usually optimistic wishing towards the futures. Upon entering the room every face turned towards the new president and met him with stern and indifferent looks on their faces. He could make out the faces of at least six public figures and about seven that he had never even heard, and he had been in government for twelves years prior to being president. ", "It was past noon when Jessie Cormac woke up. She stayed wrapped in her silks for what felt like another hour, her head buzzing irregularly, like her phone. Her legs were sore, her body sweaty, she felt dirty. \n\n\nHer phone beeped again, she picked up, \"Morning Anne, what do I have for today?\"\n\n\"Morning Madam President! Nothing much, there is a dinner invitation. How was the celebration?\"\n\n\nIn her bed lied the beautiful and sweaty bodies of a young couple, two naked muscular men lied on the floor. She feasted her eyes and giggled, \"The night was wonderful. Day after, not so much... hangover, nauseous and still sort of high\", she got up from the bed, moved towards the men on the floor, \"Any chance I can ditch dinner? Who does dinner the day after the election, anyway?\"\n\n\"It's President Jackson, Jess, you really should go, it's a courtesy.\"\n\n\"Ah that old fart, admitted defeat so hastily, looks like he's in a hurry to the grave.\", she said while playing with the cock of one of the sleeping men, \" Has he suggested the venue?\"\n\n\"7'o clock, his house.\", before Jess could interrupt, she added \"His private address, not the White house, is that his or yours anyway?\"\n\n\"Can you send John to pick me up?\"\n\n\"John is already waiting Jess, it is 5pm\"\n\n\"Fuck me!\"\n\n\"Neither I nor John have the time right now and I very much doubt old Jackson can.\"\n\n\"That's gross, Jackson is twice my age, could be my father\"\n\n\"Twice your age, half your age, like that ever stopped you.\"\n\n\"Are you jealous you missed the party? Thought you did not want to come...\"\n\n\"Hurry up Jess, you have an hour to leave, later\"\n\n\"Ciao Anne. love you\"\n\n\"Yeah, you too. Be safe: no head while he's driving.\", she was gonna reply but the line went dead. Anne could never truly accept their relationship was not exclusive. \n\n\nResisting the urge to continue to play around with the genitals of her newly acquainted friends, she went for a shower and played with her own instead. \n\nIt took John exactly one hour to get her to Jackson's address. It took her only ten minutes to get John to come in her mouth; car parked.\n\n\n\"Madam President, welcome\", President Jackson was wearing his running trainer.\n\n\"Thank you Mr President, it is an honour\", her face disagreed as she looked around. The house was small, with narrow passages and all walls were painted light blue. \"Charming place Sir, the lighting is very... soft\"\n\n\"Oh, call me Jack, can I call you Jess?\", the friendly tone was a surprise, the man used to be quite stiff and formal, \"Of course... Jack\"\n\n\"Listen Jess, the house is empty.\", that sounded strange to her, but she tried to chat casually, \"Private matters, is it? I hope we're still having dinner though, I am starving.\"\n\n\"Of course, please sit\", he gestures towards an old leather couch, \"I will be back in a moment\", and he disappeared into a corridor. The room barely had any furnishings, there was a satchel on another couch, a center table with nothing on it, no TV, and strangest of all, there were no windows in the room.\n\n\"I got McDonalds, my assistant tells me you prefer Big Mac.\", he shouted from what she assumed to be the kitchen, \"That is half correct.\", she shouted back.\n\n\nHe laughed, she hears footsteps, and Jackson reappears holding two plates with burgers and fries, hands one to Jessie, sits on the couch with the satchel, \"Big Mac without the tomato, is that 100% correct?\"\n\n\"Yes.\", she smiled, nodded and took a bite, he did not say anything for a bit.\n\n\"Let's cut to the chase Jack. I am here alone with you\", she leans forward, letting her cleavage show, \"what is it you want from me?\"\n\n\"Jess, we're at war\"\n\n\"Oh, not again Jack\", she stopped eating and placed her plate on the center table\n\n\"Listen Jess, it's not like that...\"\n\n\"They say you take the man out of the CIA, but not the CIA from the man, is it like that Jack?\"\n\n\"Forget that. I am not Director, and I am not President anymore, but you need to trust me right now.\"\n\n\"Says the Dove that reinstated water boarding\" \n\n\"Jess, what you need to know is that there is a secret war on-going.\", he stressed the word 'secret'\n\n\"Another one? I assume I will be briefed on this soon, why the personal touch?\"\n\n\"The circle of information on this is... very... very... small\"\n\n\"I am sorry Jack, I need to rest. Thanks for the burger\", she starts getting up\n\n\n\"Was it easy for you?\", she looks at him, hesitant, \"Yesterday?\", there was a hint of contempt. She sat down and searched for the right words, \"It is never easy to win an election. It was close\"\n\n\"C'mon kiddo, I blew it. You know it. I was never gonna win. Never wanted to.\"\n\n\"So I am President because you're afraid of some secret war?\", she laughs\n\n\"Yes.\", he doesn't\n\n\"Look Jackson, if you're trying to scare me, it ain't working\", that was half true\n\n\"Look kiddo, I know your dirty secrets. Your nymphomaniac addiction\", he pronounced the words slowly\n\n\"I will not stand here and listen to this, you're crazy and you're sick\"\n\n\"Am I the sick one? You eat teeanager cocks for breakfast. Wanna see your celebration from last night on Youtube? Fox?\"\n\n\"Women should not be repressed by old white men like you, America elected me, not you. If you put that out, you're the one going down in flames!\"\n\nHe reaches for the satchel by the couch, pulls a folder, hands it to her. She opens it, mute. A few seconds go by without words between them, she closes the folder, looks at her feet.\n\nHe looks at her, touches her knee, \"Some of those kids were barely of age... and that poison you've been shooting up your veins? How would that play on twitter? Hashtag POTUS Heroin Whore?\n\n\n\"So what? Am I to be your puppet now? What do you want from this drug-addicted whore?\"\n\n\"I just want you to listen, kiddo. 10 minutes, then leave. Nothing else.\"\n\n\"I am listening\" - her voice was breaking\n\n\"I showed you this so you believe me: I threw the election. I wanted you to win.\", she did not react, \"Have you ever heard of zombie insects?\"\n\n\"Parasites? They infect a host's brain, usually bigger insects. Why Jack? You got one in your head? Sounds like it\"\n\n\"Back in the 70's, there were some experiments. Area 51, Roswell. It did not take place there, not exactly, but the cover up was impeccable, huh... Little green men! Well, they got the colour wrong. And they were much smaller than conspiracy theorists were led to believe.\", her eyes were wide open now\n\n\"Jess, we're at war with a different sapient species, insect-like creatures that want to destroy us. And yes, some of us do have such creatures lodged in our brains. They are able to a degree, to commandeer and direct our bodies towards specific goals\"\n\n\"This is very entertaining Jackson, but you're not making any sense\"\n\n\"There is a group of people, a network of contacts, ex-military, NASA, intelligence services. Scientists, generals, senators.\"\n\n\nHe pulls another folder, drops it on the center table, \"All these people are working on this, in secret. They will corroborate and add details. We cannot trust central authority so we organise in the shadows, and we had to come to you.\"\n\n\"You're not making sense.\", she starts raising her voice, gesticulating, \"If you organise in the shadows, why are you disclosing your crazy theory to the person holding the highest office in the land?\"\n\n\"Mind you that I still hold that office until you're sworn in.\", he smiles, takes a bit of his burger while she looks straight at him, \"I was told this, and I telling it to you now because both of us are special.\"\n\n\"We are infected?\"\n\n\"No, we were elected\"\n\n\"What has that to do with your war on bugs?\"\n\n\"Swing votes, Jess, they elected us. Little. Green. Men.\"", "\"Sir, the Director of NASA,\" my White House staffer said to me just as I said goodbye to the Secretary of Homeland Security. I had been in office for three days and I hadn't realized how much President Wilkins had left for me to handle. It seemed as if he did nothing for the past four years.\n\nI turned to face the Director, an older gentlemen who wore a black suit and grey tie. He must have known my opinion about the \"party colors\" because I wore the same thing. \"Mr. President,\" he went to shake my hand and I returned, \"An honor to meet with you.\"\n\n\"Nonsense Director Young,\" I ushered him to one of the couches, \"I am excited to finally meet with you, I have big plans for NASA, as I am sure you do as well.\"\n\n\"President Rhodes,\" my staffer interrupted and I turned to face her, \"the General of the United States Army and Admiral of the United States Navy are here.\"\n\nI stopped myself, \"I'm sorry, what?\"\n\nYoung stood up from his seat, \"It is important that they are here for this conversation.\"\n\nI turned to him and raised an eyebrow, \"I was unaware we had an acting General or acting Admiral.\" I looked to my staffer, \"Please, send them in.\"\n\nThey stepped into the room a moment later, an Army official who wore five-stars on his cap, and a Navy official who wore four-stars on his cap. The highest rank attainable in our military, and only ever awarded to three different people. \"Mr. President, I am General of the Army Ken Newton.\"\n\n\"And I am Admiral of the Navy Eliza Medina.\"\n\nI shook both of their hands, \"Pleasure to meet you both. I was not aware of this.\"\n\n\"It was instituted only recently by President Wilkins before he left office,\" the Director of NASA said, \"it is a conversation that should be kept of the utmost secrecy.\"\n\nI nodded and looked around the room, I had a few staffers and photographers around for publicity, but this was important, I could tell, \"Could everyone clear the room?\"\n\nNo one asked why, no one had asked anything of me since I took office, and within a few moments everyone, except for four of my secret service agents and the three officials in front of me. Once everyone was out and the room was cleared, I turned to them, \"So, what is this about?\"\n\nThe two military officials both turned to Director Young, who pulled out his file and placed it in on the table. I took a seat and placed my eyeglasses on my head, the two officials sat on my left. \"Sir, on August 15th, 1977 we received an unidentified 72-second radio signal at the Big Ear radio telescope.\"\n\nI nodded, I remembered it from my younger years, \"The Wow Signal, correct?\"\n\nYoung nodded, \"Precisely. At the time, NASA was confused, and kept it on the back-burner. Overtime, we thought nothing of it. That was until a few years ago.\" Young grabbed a piece of paper from the stack and handed it to me, it was a string of codes that was unrecognizable to me. \"On August 15th, 2017, precisely forty years later, we received an identical signal, which was almost triple the length. The next day, we sent a signal on the same frequency.\"\n\nI looked down at the paper Young handed me again and then looked up at him, \"And?\"\n\n\"Two hours later, we received a message from an unidentified sapient race.\"\n\nI lowered my glasses, \"Aliens?\"\n\n\"More or less,\" he handed me another sheet of paper, \"they told us that they had been watching us for some time. And that our accomplishments over nature warranted their attention. They offered to meet with us.\"\n\n\"That was almost ten years ago.\"\n\n\"Yes, it was. And Project Hermes was the answer to that offer. It was an extraordinary effort that gave us the chance to return the moon. A group of seven astronauts and cosmonauts were chosen and, well, they went to the moon.\"\n\nI nodded, \"And?\"\n\n\"The aliens already had an outpost on the dark side of the moon. It was a hard effort, but they did warn us we would lose contact with our team.\" Young nodded and handed me another file with a picture of a large satellite, \"We expected this and the Iris probe was the answer to that. Positioned just perfectly beyond the ridge of the moon and our own planet, we were able to detect the outpost.\"\n\nI leaned forward. Everything I was hearing, it was unlike anything I had ever heard of, or dreamed of. We weren't alone in the universe, and more importantly, we had already made contact.\n\n\"The team arrived on the moon a year later, and met with the alien ambassadors.\" Young handed me another file, \"They identified themselves in our language as Harbingers, and are much like us. Our scans with the Iris probe gave us considerable insight into their structure and how they looked. The only discernible difference is they have six eyes and are about two-feet taller than the average human.\"\n\nHe handed me another file of a rendering of the species, along with images from the Iris probe. The alien outpost was large, and had a discernible foreign feel to it.\n\n\"Our team met with them. And, well,\" Young looked to General Newton.\n\nNewton leaned forward, \"The Harbingers killed all but one.\"\n\nMy eyes widened and I removed my glasses, \"What?\"\n\n\"As a warning, sir,\" he added, \"they had been studying us from the moon for almost six centuries. And they saw us as a threat not only to themselves, but their galactic civilization.\"\n\n\"How can a space-faring race see us, people who have barely traveled the stars, as a threat?\"\n\n\"The Harbingers were a species that did not know violence before us,\" Young said, \"at least that is the ongoing hypothesis. Their weapons of war are crude, almost medieval in structure and sound.\"\n\n\"We believe they mimicked our history.\"\n\nI shook my head, \"They developed weapons just to fight us?\"\n\nYoung nodded, \"That is the ongoing assumption. If you look at the outpost, they have no external defenses, but the reports by Astronaut Jenkins suggests that their 'warriors' are heavily armored.\"\n\n\"Warriors?\"\n\n\"They seemed to have realized that we have a warrior-class,\" Medina said, \"or what they believe is a warrior-class. People who fight for a living. They adopted the same patterns.\"\n\nI shook my head and leaned forward, \"So you are telling me, that the first alien civilization we encountered saw us as a threat and developed weapons to destroy us before we could destroy them.\"\n\nYoung nodded.\n\n\"They seemed to think that destruction is in our nature and therefore saw the only way of facing that destruction, was to create it themselves.\"\n\nI buried my hand into my face. \"My god.\"\n\n\"The war has been ongoing since.\"\n\nI looked up, wide-eyed, \"War?\"\n\n\"The President of both the United States and Russia at the time saw their act as a declaration of war,\" Newton opened his hand, \"as anyone would have. They put together a coalition. Since then, we have made over ninety trips to the moon.\"\n\n\"Ninety?\" I looked at Young, \"How do you hide ninety launches and ships?\"\n\n\"It wasn't easy,\" he shook his head, \"but once we were able to militarize the ISS, things became easier.\"\n\n\"The ISS is militarized?\"\n\n\"It's currently carrying an armament of a small army.\"\n\nI leaned back in the chair and let the papers fall to my leg, \"This is a lot to take in.\"\n\n\"As understandable as that is, sir,\" Medina said, \"We have an issue.\"\n\nI raised an eyebrow.\n\n\"The Harbingers are preparing one of their warships to attack Earth. They wish to wipe us out.\" Medina took a deep breath, \"However, we have been preparing for this moment for five years, a worldwide effort has taken place.\"\n\n\"And?\"\n\n\"We have built a single warship, capable of defending Earth, she added, \"We're calling it Athena's Spear.\"\n\nI smiled, \"Is there a reason why everything is Greek?\"\n\nYoung shrugged, \"The President at the time saw the Greeks as the greatest warriors of human civilization. He knew that mentality would be needed in the coming years.\"\n\n\"And it will be, sir,\" Newton said, \"our recent satellite images show a large gathering of Harbingers, over ten thousand warriors on the outpost. Many more on the ship itself.\" He handed me a few pictures, some of the outpost and thermal imaging, and the second of a ship, which looked much like a modern battleship. \"We believe they are planning a D-Day like invasion, sending boats with as many warriors on it as they can,\" he handed me another picture, which showed a ship that resembled a landing boat from World War Two, with a cover on top.\n\n\"Our defense plan?\"\n\n\"Athena's Spear will be able to keep the main ship at bay, but we expect a few dozen of these landing boats to get through our defenses.\"\n\n\"I doubt that is it,\" I looked up at them, \"What's the plan?\"\n\n\"The past three years I have been training a group of soldiers, men and women training specifically for this operation.\"\n\n\"How many?\"\n\nNewtown looked at Young and Medina, before looking back to me, \"Three hundred strong, sir.\"\n\nI dropped my mouth, \"Three hundred?\"\n\nHe nodded.\n\n\"That's it?\"\n\n\"Most of the funding went to the Spear, I was left with little options. I took three hundred of the most deadly men and women on the planet.\"\n\n\"Spartans,\" I thought aloud.\n\nHe nodded.\n\nI took a deep breath. Everything they were telling me was insane, but I could tell it was all real and I knew in my capacity as President, that I had to stay strong. No wonder Wilkins didn't get anything done, he was preparing to defend the planet, not worrying about backdoor politics and deals. I knew that it was now my turn and I had to do everything in my power to keep the public's eye off the \"war\" and give Newton, Medina, and Young enough time to defend humanity.\n\n\"Alright,\" I leaned forward again, \"then let's talk contingency plans.\"\n_________\nReally liked this prompt! If you enjoyed this story, check out /r/BlankPagesEmptyMugs for more of my work!\n\nWrote a [Part 2](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/43l6xc/wp_you_are_elected_as_president_of_the_united/czjz7o4)." ]	3
	[WP] In the late 21st century, religious wars waged in the name of God have only gotten more extreme as time goes on. Unbeknownst to the world, the US is undertaking a black project to create a faux god that'll deradicalize militants.	[ "\"Say, Dave...\" \nDave hurriedly finished whatever he's typing, took a long sip from his coffee, and turned to me. \n\"What?\" \n\"The world is pretty fucked up, isn't it?\" \nDave gave me the not-this-shit-again-Matt look. \n\"What's bothering you this time?\" \nDave continued typing away at his terminal. \n\"Do you think if...what we're doing is unethical?\" \nThe clickety-clack on the keyboard stopped. \n\"Are you fucking kidding me Matt? You're asking that question now? A day before 'Judgment Day?'\" \n\"You know what we're doing.\" \n\"Yes, and so do you. And you signed up for it.\" \n\"I signed up because I'm a nanotechnology researcher. I was promised I'd be doing bleeding-edge research.\" \n\"And you are, aren't you? So is Kate, our neuropsychology expert over there, and Damian, our...our god-knows-what. Hey Damian, the fuck you do again?\" \n\"I do binaural vocal projection and fuck you Dave,\" Damian retorted. \n\"And there you go, 36 multi-disciplinary all stars in their respective fields, all in this room, doing bleeding-fucking-edge research.\" \n\"Dave, for God's sake, we're trying to create a faux god!\" \nDave pinched his forehead. \n\"You knew this going in, didn't you? Why are you chickening out now?\" \n\"I...I was mad. They killed my daughter. With an IED.\" \n\"Then you have more reason to be in this room than anyone else.\" \n\"We're talking about screwing with people's minds, Dave! These people spend their whole lives devoting themselves to their faith, and now we're about to pretend to be their God! We could practically tell them to go jump off a cliff and they'd do it like a bunch of suicidal lemmings!\" \nEveryone else in the room exchanged glances, and went back to their work. Dave leaned forward towards me. \n\"Look, Matt. I don't know what has gotten into your goddamn mind. First of all, lemmings aren't suicidal. That's a common misconception.\" \nDave paused, expecting a laugh from me. I didn't. \n\"Second of all, these guys you talk about, they're killing men, women, and children on a daily basis. Millions have died in their hands. All because some big guy in the sky told them it's the right thing to do, that they'd get to fuck 70 hot virgins when they die.\" \n\"72, Dave,\", Kate interjected. \n\"Shut up, Kate. I'm trying to talk some sense into Matt here.\" \nI said nothing. \n\"Now, what do you think is the ethical thing to do? Convince these guys that what they're doing is wrong, or let them continue killing innocent folks?\" \nI understood the argument, but for some reason, my conscience was gnawing at me. \n\"This technology we're creating, it has far wider implications than just squashing religious radicals. Come on, Dave! You're a smart man. You can see what's coming!\" \n\"See what coming?\" \n\"GOD, DAVE. GOD!\" \nThe fuck? \nKate and Damian chuckled. \n\"You sons of bitches.\" ", "\n\nBLOO!\nBlue? Why was I thinking about blue?\nBLOO!\nThese are not my thoughts. Not mine at all.\nBLOO!\nWho is thinking this? Stop thinking at me!\nCONTAINMENT BREACH!\nWhat? What was... wait... thoughtlessness...\n\nEyes opened.\nMuscles pulsed.\nLungs filled.\nI was.\n\nWarm light covered my face, filled my vision. Mm. I liked the feeling of warmth. Not so much the brightness. I sat up, and fabric fell from in front of me. I looked around at the sheets. I was on a bed? I liked that too. Much better than the cold pool of oblivion that was my dreams.\n\n\"He's alive.\" Someone said.\n\nI looked around, and saw a room. The light above me was bright, and filled the room with color. The walls were grey. Not necessarily appealing.\n\nI turned, stood, and looked around. Whoa. I was taller than in my dreams. Way taller. I looked down at my body. Pale skin sculpted into a man. Every muscle as defined as could be. I looked at my hands, felt my face with them, then just let them hang at my sides. I looked back at the foot of the bed. There was a white shirt and jeans. I was already wearing some clothes, but these tiny pants were not something to wear alone.\n\nAs soon as I had the clothes on, I heard a noise. It sounded like a... KSHHT. I turned to the noise, and there was a man in the room. He was wearing a white coat over his regular clothes.\n\n\"Hello.\" He said. He smiled at me, like I'd done something wonderful. \"How are you feeling?\"\n\nI opened my mouth and responded. \"I'm alright.\"\n\nHe smiled wider. \"Good. You probably have a lot of questions.\"\n\nAnd for a moment, I did. Then I had an idea. \"No.\" I said.\n\nHis smile became uncertain. \"I beg your pardon?\" He asked, chuckling.\n\n\"I don't have any questions. I know what I am, Dr. Goss. And I know why you made me.\" I held his eyes with my own, and I saw fear ripple through them when I said his name. I'd just read his name-tag though.\n\n\"So, you know about the wars?\" He asks, raising his eyebrows as he strained to maintain his smile.\n\n\"Yes.\" I lied. I knew none of this, I was leading him on.\n\nHe tugged at his jacket nervously. \"And the radicals? The extremists who believe that god commands them to terrorize the world?\"\n\n\"Yes.\" I said blandly.\n\n\"And you know that you...\"\n\n\"...That I am a false god, made to pacify them.\" I interrupted him. It sounded like an extreme thing to guess, but he nodded. I blinked at him. \"Hmm.\"\n\n\"Are you... Displeased by such a purpose?\" He asked, swallowing just so he wouldn't have to keep smiling at me for a moment. He couldn't look away from me, he was so scared.\n\nI chuckled. \"No. I just wonder. What will happen to me after my task is completed? Will I be locked away until such a time as I am needed? Will I be set out unto the world to live as though a mere man? What?\"\n\n\"That's... ah, above my pay-grade. I can't really tell you.\" He shakes his head, but his eyes stay with mine.\n\n\"A shame. Am I a false god in totality, or...?\" I tilted my head at him curiously.\n\n\"You've got a couple tricks up your sleeve, as it were.\"\n\nI nod approvingly. \"That is good to know.\" I said, a smile of my own spreading across my face.\n\nHe dropped the smile. He realized something was wrong. \"Um.\" he gestured with his hands like he had no idea what to do with them. Then he put them in his pockets and smiled again. \"Well, I'll just be going. I'll see you again.\"\n\nI broke the eye contact, like I was giving him permission to leave. But just when I heard the KSSHT again, I spoke up.\n\n\"Do I have a name, Doctor?\"\n\nI didn't look at him, but I heard him speak. \"Just think of something you'd like to be called.\"\n\nI heard the KSSHT again, and I was alone.\n\nI only pondered the question briefly. Then, I spoke to the empty room.\n\n\"Faust.\"" ]	2
	[WP] The new class of paladins does not, in fact, contain a single paladin...just a lot of other classes doing their best to fake it.	[ "Jordan really, really wanted to win, but his team wasn't cooperating. Maybe it was Avinash's sense of honor, and wanting to win on fair ground. Or perhaps Tristan could work well with the forces of nature, but only with those. Either way, their current lineup had a warlock, a mage, a rogue, a druid, and a warrior going into battle...but no paladin. And everyone knows you do not go into the Collegiate Hearthstone Championship without a secret paladin to wreck the competition.\n\n\"And for the last time, Shaman is NOT a viable replacement!\" he hollered at Avinash, who had just queued up with Malygos Shaman. He crumpled up the paper he had been planning their games with, tossing it into the rusty bin, and slurped noisily from his cup noodle bowl. It tasted of defeat.\n\nedit: sigh I just realized I may have deviated too much from OG prompt subject, apologies", "His cheery greeting had been met with silence. Oh, well. He tried it again.\n\n\"Welcome, students!\"\n\nThis time, a few children grumbled low his and hellos, every face stony whether it moved or not. Today was the first day of the school year, and for these wonderful, vibrant freshmen, it was their first day in the long journey of mastering a class. Speccing into one, the official term was.\n\nHumphrey H. Helpe of the Holy Healers was a cleric himself, but he had taught paladins for years. Decades. Perhaps his mind was going just a tad, but his love for teaching had never once waned. This class of paladins-to-be had been hand-picked by the administration down at the lower schools, and they all looked a tad... eccentric for their chosen path. Certainly they would be a joy to teach.\n\nOne boy with a mop of dirty brown hair atop his head whittled at a wooden carving under his desk, paying no heed to the flakes falling to the tiled floor. He was certainly a lithe one, lacking the grand, voluminous build of a true paladin. But hadn't many great holy men started off so tiny?\n\nAnd inconsiderate, at that. Role call (heh, role call) and the lesson could wait a bit longer.\n\n\"Sir,\" Humphrey's voice cracked like a whip. Half the class jumped. The boy did not. \"Mind you not leave the residue of your hobby about? I would certainly enjoy to set my eyes on the finished product, but Albert already has enough trouble cleaning the ectoplasm left in all of the sorcerer classrooms—\"\n\n\"Good,\" the boy interrupted. \"He has to earn his pay, don't he?\"\n\nHumphrey gasped, a few students echoing him.\n\n\"Jerry,\" a girl's collected voice rose from the back of the room. It carried with it a heavy weightiness. Surety. \"Stop it. We're supposed to be learning.\"\n\nShe spoke with the clear enunciation trademark of a mage dedicated to her class. Humphrey grunted, pushing down on his cluttered desk as he stood to see the back of the class. She was as skinny as the boy, Jerry the carver, with the soft face and well-groomed hair of a mage. \"Ma'am, are you misplaced?\"\n\n\"No,\" the entire room erupted, a mixed bag of hearty bellows and frightened whispers.\n\n\"Maybe,\" Jerry muttered.\n\nHumphrey fell back into his chair, his face reddening. Never had he heard such noise in his life. Paladins were always quiet and respectful in class, just the same as clerics.\n\nHe spoke again a moment later, voice quavering. Jerry's dry drawl still rang in his ears. \"M-Maybe? Sir, with the wood, please, if you have need of a transfer, you can visit the central office.\"\n\nHe looked up, meeting Humphrey's eyes with two dark, rebellious ovals of his own. They closed as a pebble plunked against his head, sending him reeling. The throw had been perfect, speedy as an arrow.\n\n\"You're ruinin' this all, you idjit,\" a nasal voice whined as Jerry rubbed where the pebble had met his skull. \"We're the first class ever to be in this kinda deal.\"\n\nJerry stood to his feet, quick as a rogue. His hand slid into his back pocket, concealing a dull carving knife faster than Humphrey's eyes could follow. \"Y'know what? I hate this dual stuff. I'm transferring to something that'll help me more than learning how to stand straight and suck up to your elders. A class without you, Rockeater.\"\n\nHumphrey's head swam. He shook it, feeling his age as it took what seemed an hour to clear. \"Sir, th-that is far from what this class is about. Have you not specced into protection and the holy arts?\"\n\n\"Nope,\" he replied. At first, the room was silent. Then the student who had thrown the pebble, Rockeater, echoed him. \"Nope.\"\n\n\"No,\" the sweet, clear voice from the back of class added.\n\n\"No,\" the entire class admitted in unison.\n\nHumphrey gazed over them all, eyes wide. Some were tall. Some had guts formed from years of drinking despite their young age. Some were timid, cringing away as his eyes swept over them.\n\nNone of them were paladins-to-be. Not a single one.\n\nIt fell silent then. Every breath seemed to reverberate off the cramped brick walls, the students waiting for something. Anything. Jerry still stood, mouth hanging in a lopsided frown, unsure of what to do.\n\n\"Lorie,\" someone whispered. \"Tell him.\"\n\nThe girl from the back spoke up once more, her pace even, her voice formal and powerful for a lady not yet fifteen. \"A new expansion came out over the summer, sir. Dual speccing is not only encouraged, but necessary for the Az'Badaon raid. He is a new, mysterious menace who suddenly controls half of the Jornuin nation. Which, I believe, did not exist in June. If we do not slay him, our kingdom may be destroyed.\"\n\n\"Dual... speccing?\" Humphrey muttered.\n\nJerry, the rogue, grimaced. \"This is worse than when I stopped being able to poison my knives. I was always the king of the playground back then. Now it's the mages with their fancy words and binds the last for-ever.\"\n\n\"Shuddup,\" the Rockeater, the ranger, bellowed. \"You c'n still lay me flat with two fingers. How's that fair?\"\n\n\"I can't get to you,\" Jerry spit. \"Dumbo.\"\n\nDual specs. The words played over and over again in Humphrey's head. He had hoped he might pass on before the world came to this. When he had been a boy, he'd had the choice between warrior, healer, and ranger, nothing more... How could one keep track of all of this, now?\n\nA student stood, his round gut toppling his desk over. A brawler, with fiery red hair lining his arms and jaw. \"At least I don't snap in half at a pinch, y'dumb twigs.\"\n\n\"Wanna prove it?\" Both the hunter and rogue shouted at once.\n\nAnd the class fell into chaos.", "\"So, Vyrn the Throat-Slasher. Kind of a strange name in this line of work.\"\n\nVyrn grimaced. \"Hey, man, it's a metaphor. I slash the throats of darkness with the blade of honor and then bleed them out on the shield of holy certitude, that kind of deal?\"\n\n\"Yeah, just saying. Besides, I've no room to speak, do I?\"\n\n\"No moral high ground at all, Atheist.\"\n\nGodless the Atheist grinned easily. \"Hey, I didn't pick the name my monk ancestors gave me. And it is a noble and honorable thing to respect your forebearers, so I refuse to change it. You may, however, call me Athy, if you like.\"\n\n\"Yeah, yeah. Whatever.\" Vyrn nodded along idly, his eyes casting about the room with old, sharp instincts. \"Hey, listen, just between you and me, does something seem a bit off?\"\n\nAthy looked around himself, the tattoos above his eyes denoting him as a honored Enlightened One of the Truly Faithless shifting sympathetically with his furrowed eyebrows. \"Yeah, now that you mention it. That woman over there...\"\n\n\"Gem Planter? According to doctrine, converts from other religions sometimes keep their former powers, and adopt them to serve the true cause. I'd say those animist druid leaves are holy paladin leaves, now. See? They kinda glow white. But seriously, Athy, I mean... look at everyone.\"\n\nHe rolled his eyes, looking around once more. Slowly, he began to see what Vyrn was pointing out.\n\n\"That's old Bloodblight Paax, right? When did he give up necromancy...? And over there's Edwardo Collins, didn't he use to be a vampire? Huh, I guess he got better. Wait a second...\"\n\nVyrn nodded eagerly as Athy spotted the person crouched in the corner, hiding as best as possible from the assorted crowds with a scowl on his face.\n\n\"Isn't that Argania Silversword?\"\n\n\"Yeeeep.\"\n\n\"Wow. People used to call him God's Own Avatar. They let him back in the church after that whole going slightly crazy, slaughtering an entire roomful of paladin trainees, and then decorating his house with their strung out corpses issue?\"\n\n\"Kinda makes you feel uncomfortable to be here in the same room full of paladin trainees with him, doesn't it?\"\n\nAthy thought about it for a moment, trying to remember what the Creed said. \"Ah! He must have sought reparation and forgiveness, and absolved all of his sins!\"\n\n\"Sure, I can see that. He's definitely not a Fallen. That black shroud around his body is just... an everpresent reminder from God of how low even the best can fall.\"\n\n\"Yep.\"\n\nVyrn continued to shift uncomfortably despite the reassurance.\n\n\"Excuse me?\"\n\nThe piping voice from behind startled both of them, though they tried their best to hide it - after all, paladins don't feel fear.\n\n\"Yes, miss?\"\n\n\"Am I too late?\"\n\n\"No, they haven't started yet. Still waiting for someone... I think a High Templar... to show up.\"\n\n\"Oh! That's me!\"\n\nThey took an immediate step back, falling to their respective knees and bowing deeply.\n\n\"Terribly sorry for the impropriety, miss -\" Vyrn and Athy began simultaneously.\n\n\"Oh! My bad!\" She nodded her head slightly, acknowledging their token respect and allowing them to stand again. \"I'm the Head Templar of this church, Mistress Nympho of the Eager, Relentless, Erotic Flagellations.\"\n\nVyrn coughed. Athy raised an eyebrow. \"Nympho?\" \"Erotic flagellation?\"\n\n\"Oh, sorry. My mother was a Seductress Succubi. You know, from the Book of Erotic Fantasy? Oh, no worries, it's not part of the D&D core, so of course fine paladins-to-be like yourselves have never heard of it. I owe her so much for bringing me up to be such a Godfearing and outstanding religious person, despite not actually having a soul and being herself merely a twisted parody of feminine sexuality crafted from the nightmares of those slumbering in the inner circles of Hell. It is with her ministration methods in mind that I look forward to many long, potentially bloody nights, helping you develop your skills as men... of the cloth.\"\n\nBoth men exchanged another look as the Head Templar skipped away, her curled tail swishing back and forth asynchronously with the tip of her leather holy weapon of choice, to take her place at the podium.\n\n\"You know,\" Athy began.\n\n\"I was thinking, hear me out...\"\n\n\"Why don't we go get a drink and...\"\n\n\"Celebrate...\"\n\n\"Reconsider...\"\n\n\"Our future lives as paladins?\" They both finished.\n\n\"Sounds good.\"\n\nAs the seemingly young woman behind them began to cough delicately to get attention, the two men snuck out the front door discretely. Vyrn stuck to the shadows, and Athy simply blended seamlessly into the existing crowd, seemingly moving forward with them even as he made his way towards the exit.\n\nUnnoticed to either, a tar-black form stalked along after them, his twitching eyes and gleaming sword (still dulled and tarnished in spots from the blood markings from his innocent victims long ago) the only signs of his movement.\n\nArgania licked his lips thirstily, thinking that a pint sounded pretty good to him, too. That crowd back there freaked him out.", "\"Amand, Thomas?\"\n\n\"Cleric.\"\n\n\"Another one?\" I looked up from the ledger at the paladin lounging in the chair opposite. Anneth was the least paladin-like paladin I'd ever seen, but there was no denying she was one of the best trainers in the entire Empire.\n\nMost Paladins, reporting to the headmaster of the Academy would be sitting properly in the chair, not sprawled over it like it was a padded lounger. Most paladins would also be decked out in full regalia as befitting a formal report, not wearing a loose shirt and trousers. And twirling a throwing knife.\n\n\"So that makes four clerics, two warriors, a thief and a sorcerer. Are any of the graduating class actually Paladins?\"\n\n\"Gaston shows some promise. Good heart, stalwart friend, about as straight an arrow as you can get.\"\n\n\"And?\"\n\nSigh \"And nothing. Nada. Zip. No aura, no spells. Long hours in the chapel, but no sign from the Gals Upstairs\"\n\nI tried not to wince as Anneth referred to the Five in such a flippant manner. She was a devotee of The Watcher, who was supposed to guard the minds of the people from the fear and insanity of the Dark Thief, but her chosen Paladins always tended to have the strangest...quirks.\n\n\"Any luck yourself?\"\n\n\"Nothing concrete.\" That was disappointing. The Five could be extremely vocal during times of strife, but otherwise you just...never heard from them. It'd been sixteen years since the last raiders had been driven out of Callums Gap, and since then....nothing. The cursed thing was that for the gods that wasn't unusual. So now we had a complete lack of new Paladins, complete silence from the Heavens, and no way of knowing what that meant.\n\nI flipped open the report sheets. No unusual activity from the villages. No missing patrols. No disturbances. Even the chapels weren't reporting anything.....hold on.\n\n\"Hold on....the Chapel down by Sunwall is requesting more Amethyst candles.\"\n\nAnneth perked up at that, one eyebrow raised. Amethyst Candles were only ever used as symbols for the Gods. One of their 'miraculous' features was that so long as the flame, representing the Five, burned, then the candle never melted. Should that flame stop though....poof. So a Chapel requesting more should only happen if the flames died...and those flames only died when Dark works were afoot.\n\n\"Right. I'll take Gaston, Thomas, and Serefina. We'll check it out. Run the rest through the Fast of the Forty Nights again, I'd say. If that doesn't spontaneously cause at least one of them to acquire Create Water, nothing will.\"\n\n----\n\nThe next morning, four Imperial Chargers thundered out of the main gates, their riders bedecked in full ceremonial regalia. Burnished breastplates and jeweled scabbards glinted magnificently in the early sun as the riders crested the outer fortifications of the Academy, and then descended into the town proper.\n\n\"Make Way! Make Way for the Paladins of the Empire!\" \n\nThe crier had time to get one fast call out before the horses sped down the broad Access Avenue, causing merchants to leap aside in trepidation. A full Expedition should never be impeded. Wonder with a touch of anxiety followed their mad dash, until the horses and riders were out the gate and away down the hill. In the sudden silence that was left in their wake, worried whispers started up, speculation and information alike blossoming.\n\nAnd in the crowd, the guards listened carefully. Listened in order to report to the Academy.\n\n------\n\nGaston swung off his charger and sincerely regretted it. Pain from a day in the saddle spiked up his spine, and as he tended to his steed, that pain helped focus his mind. Paladin Anneth had been remarkably cryptic, and their high-speed departure from the Academy clearly indicated there was something serious going on. Raiders? Animal Attacks? The Dark?\n\nAnneth had to know about his failures in the Chapel. But why would she then have taken him on an expedition? He supposed that Thomas and Serefina had accomplished the favor of one of the Five, but him? He was naught but a warrior trying his best to act like a Paladin.\n\n\"Gaston! Fire, if you please!\"\n\nAnneth's command was pleasant, but firm. Much like all her tests and trials at the Academy. He gathered the twigs and sticks and arranged them in the campfire. He knew technically how the next step should go.\n\nConcentrate, focus, and then use the command: ignis. \n\nHe tried it again, one eye carefully on Anneth. She turned away, looking out over the valley, and quick as a flash, Gaston brought his bracers together, sparking the flint and steel he'd hidden in them. Sparks rained down on the kindling, and a wisp of smoke began wafting up. Paladin Anneth smiled down on his effort and then moved off to the woods.\n\nGaston returned to his horse for his supplies, uncomfortably convinced that Anneth's smile had been less of satisfaction, and more of knowing.\n\n-----\n\nThomas tried not to let the sweat show. It was their second day of riding, and an unexpected test had come upon them. A merchant caravan lay on the side of the road, and it's two occupants stood awkwardly next to it. One had a clearly broken arm - a trivial repair task given the right magics, but otherwise a long, painful process to fix without.\n\nPaladin Anneth had asked him to \"Heal\" the injured merchant, but there was one problem. Thomas was yet to gain the ability to do so. Sure, he had his Cleric spells - cleric magic wasn't from the Five, but rather from the ambient faith energy. It also wouldn't work while he was wearing the heavy armor of the Paladins.\n\nHe'd prayed for hours in the chapels, but nothing. He couldn't go back to Father Martins at the Hammerfell Chapel and admit failure. He just had to try harder, to try again.\n\nBut for now, he had a job. Taking the injured man, he led him around the far side of the wagon, and out of the view of the others. Then he shucked off the heavy breastplate and went to work.\n\nThe familiar flows of magic washed over him, and he caught them, shaping with his will, taking power from the faith of the people and teasing it, manipulating it. With a subtle flash of blue, the broken arm snapped back into place and knitted together.\n\nAs he replaced his armor, Thomas ignored the tearful thanks of the merchant, his mind already whirring as he tried to figure out how he could get through the next few days with his sole level one spell slot already used.\n\n---\n\nSerefina positively detested this muck. It smelt, and it clung to her boots. It wasn't...quite mud, and she completely refused to think about what it actually entailed. Besides, all this...this expedition, this creeping around as things prowled the mists wasn't her fault.\n\nBut no! Mother had insisted that she attend the Academy. Mother was sure that her darling 'fina was a genuine Paladin! Mother, who couldn't so much cast a cantrip! Really, she supposed it was actually that pious bastard David. He couldn't accept that he had Draconic blood in him, so any magics was therefore divine, not mortal!.\n\nJust accept that one of your ancestors did the dirty with a dragon, dolt! She'd thrown that one at him, and the next day found herself shipped off to the boring, stolid Academy. \n\nShe figured the fastest way through was just to fake it, drop out at the last minute, and then hike out on her own. Head home and Mother and David would make her life hell. \n\nSpeaking of which, her life was hell. Just ahead of her, a skeleton ambled aimlessly around the edge of the unmarked grave. Some schmuck attempting to save on burial costs by skimping the blessings, apparently. And now the Dark Arts had empowered his skelton into an unholy semblance of life.\n\nPaladin Anneth - who was undeniably cool, really - had instructed her to deal with it. Serefina knew the spell to use - Turn Undead, but not being a Paladin, she wasn't actually able to cast it.\n\nTime for the old 'Sorcerer Special then.\n\nChanneling her magic, Serefina luxuriated in the sensation as her entire body came alive, heat rushing toward her hand....and a globe of fire spalled into existence above it. Euphoria sang in her very bones as she drew an arm back and hurled it at the undead.\n\nAt the last second, she remembered to shout \"TURN UNDEAD!\" as the Fireball hit home, and blasted the charred, shattered fragments of the skeleton over the clearing. Who needed gods again?\n\n---\n\nAnneth dismounted and tried not to be sick. The very air around the chapel was thick with a putrid something, and the unconcerned expressions of her charges showed clearly that none of them had the slightest thread of Divine favor in them.\n\n\"Alright, here we are. Smells like the Dark, so draw swords and watch each others backs. Get in to the Chapel, investigate, and get out. If it's too much, we send a runner back to the Academy. No unnecessary risks, people. Lets go.\"\n\nA Dark infestation like this was....worrisome. It was exactly the sort of thing that the Five...that hell The Watcher was meant to spot before it got a hold. And she'd felt nothing. And none of the new recruits had gained Paladin status.\n\nIt was more than worrisome. It was...bad.\n\nAnneth pried the door open with her sword, and moved in. Low and stealthy. The others followed.\n\nThe chapel was dimly lit, with five red candles glowing ahead. Several of the pews had been smashed, and there was something in front of the altar....she cursed softly as the form resolved into the slumped body of the chapel priest.\n\nAnneth stood, and strode up the aisle - just in time for a massive Presence to thunder soundlessly through the space. Her legs were mired in glue, her jaw frozen shut as absolute unthinkable Evil locked her down.\n\nAH! More Morsels To Consume! Come, Little Paladins!\"\n\nThe form of the priest rose, and shambled towards the small group. Anneth recognized its shattered walk almost immediately. Void Demon!\n\n---\n\nDamn Character limit.*\n" ]	4
	[WP] During a game of football, you are hit in the head, and you receive a massive concussion. When you wake up, you are hailed internationally as a hero.	[ "Run. Run faster you dumb mother fucker or that quick ass cornerback from MSU is going to kill you! Just like dad taught me to do on the farm to lead the cattle. \"Run as quick as you can and don't you let shit catch you son.\" His warm voice had an edge of gravel to it, twitching my ears forward with his voice. \n \nThat's all I remember though. Everything else is still a smudge. I woke up late in the Second Century C.E. My best friend in the world, now, strange as it is anyways. He grabbed my hand, pulling me to feet in celebration. We just won the latest Roman campaign, and I am hailed by the great Caesar himself with a formal medal in addition to lamentations of my success to the Senate in properly Campaigning a war but my heart yearns to till the land. One day that could be real again.\n\n\"Get up, fool, you've slept so long the enemy has already gathered and is mounting an attack!\" Sephicles shouted, his voice cut off by a thousand feet charging me. \n\nHeh, Only five hundred strong? I can easily match that with a single legion. Stepping out of my tent, I throw on suit mail and garments for war, calling my men-at-arms to their feet, the ground literally wobbling with force now. A delicate movement later an entire legion had a wall between the roar which faded to dull and myself, and I'll see them keep it. \n\n\"Archers!\" I scream, blood both literally and lustfully spouting from my mouth, Trepidation discords tension on the hinge of my next word.\n\"Fire!\"\n\nAs their bowstrings slackened, the wall tucked upon itself in seeming singularity. A wall off men, fifty wide eat dirt as arrows tear through their flesh.\n50-0, me. I smile, a confident grin stretching across my face. \n\"Over the top!\" \n\nIn unison my men turned and sliced into the closest barbarian about to run solidly into the shield wall. I really enjoy this part, the pure looks of terror and fright when the realize their mistake a dreaded moment too late and lose a limb/head/half a torso in a single chop of a well-timed sword. \n\"Formback, Archers; Fire!\"\n\nThis time a sea of flesh hits the wall with thuds and groans, and again, arrows fly cutting down their numbers. I think I could do this for a little longer I suppose, transfixed by the full blown carnage of war at my disposal, with the words that I posses I can slay three hundred men in ten seconds, talk about efficiency? \n\"I can get used to this.\" I say under my breath as my wall again explodes. \n\nEdit Formatting", "######[](#dropcap)Superbowl LXIV\n\nI can feel his eyes on me.\n\nHe has been the talk of the season. Leo Rex, they call him, the king of the strongest Lions side in history. There's another name for him though, a name that I find much more worrying.\n\nIt's 14 minutes into the fourth quarter, and counting. Second down and five. The Lions lead us by four points. We are 64 yard, 2 feet, and 9 inches from the endzone. There is less than a minute to win this game, and we are not even in the Lions half. \n\nHe's ended the career of two other quarterbacks. The first was a sickening tackle in his rookie year, on an aging quarterback who made a bad decision to run the ball. Pop went the ACL, and just like that one more Heisman winner bites the dust.\n\nHe nearly got through the defense around me three plays ago. My line is getting tired. I know he can sense it, and he knows I know he can.\n\nEarlier this year, he ripped through the defense protecting another quarterback. 250 pounds of muscle and bone, straight into the torso of James Hellart, two time Superbowl winner. Paralyzed from the waist down. They suspended him for two games, but he hadn't broken any rules.\n\nHe bumped into me after the first play, three hours ago. “I'm gonna fuck you up, Hellart,” he said. “I'm gonna get the set.” A six and a half foot, 220 pound man doesn't usually think of himself as prey, but the back of my neck is prickling.\n\nI visited James in hospital the night after the game that broke his spine. “Watch out for him, Tony,” my brother said. “He's a killer.”\n\nWe're running the Harlem harlot this play. We've used it twice this season. It's worked both times. But unfortunately, I am the harlot, and this field is no place for a lady of any kind.\n\nHe sacked a quarterback in each of his first four games this season. The “Quarterback Killer”, the media started to call him. Then he took on my brother and they stopped. It was too close to the truth.*\n\nSnap.\n\nThe ball pops out of the line, straight into my hands. I take two steps back. On my right, a wide receiver has made it through the defense, and is haring up the field. The other is held down. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see him, fighting to get through the line holding him back.\n\n1 second down.\n\nI fall back a few more steps, out of the pocket and exposed. This play calls for bait. The harlot is flashing her goods. Can they resist me?\n\n2 seconds down.\n\nA gap opens up as a defensive linebacker and a tackle break out towards me. The wide receiver is twenty yards down the field, but he is no longer open. And then my halfback is through the gap and free and away.\n\n3 seconds down.\n\nMy arm snaps forwards and the ball is gone. The linebacker and the tackle are still five yards away and I see the shock suddenly register in their eyes. Good, I think, they've realised their mistake. They start to change direction to miss me.\n\n4 seco-\n\nSomething hits me on the right, straight into my hips. Unbalanced from the throw, I crumple to the ground like a rag doll whipped around in the maw of a lion. My head hits the knee of the oncoming tackle and I hear my brother's voice whispering in my ear, “He's not out there to win, he wants to kill.”\n\nTo be continued.\n---\nSee all my prompt answers at [/r/jd_rallage](http://www.reddit.com/r/jd_rallage)" ]	2
	[WP] A man down on his luck suddenly develops an ability to read minds. One day on the street he notices a woman staring at him. Her mind says: "join me. together, we shall rule the galaxy."	[ "'His birth had sent a tremor through the cosmos, and even God looked away in revulsion of what he had created.' \n\nTITLE: The Day God Looked Away, the Story of Marcus 'the Uniter' Grayholme Rise to Power.\n\nSUMMARY: Marcus Grayholme, fondly remembered as Marcus the Uniter, was born to a family of convicts and disgraced politicians. He couldn't bear the humiliation of his family's dishonor any longer and struck out on his own, carving his own path away from his past. Along the way he faces many hardships that test his very being. Read how he overcomes each of these challenges and his ascension to power!\n\nORIGINAL TEXT LOCATION: TERRAN LIBRARY OF ARCHIVED HISTORICAL TEXTS\n\nEXCERPT CITATION: Chapter 4: 'Unbeknownst to many, God had given he the ability to love.'\n\nEXCERPT: I always found it odd how Marcus met his wife. He had told me the story a dozen times, each time adding more and more: how she looked, how she acted, what kind of coffee she was drinking, what color lipstick she was wearing, and even the 'adorable little freckle on the tip of her nose.' Everything about her was perfect to him. But what I found odd was that he never said exactly what drew him to her ... \n\n...\n\nIt's another cold day. Another day of working. Another day of breaking my back while my family keeps abusing their bodies with all sorts of chemicals. Another day of pointlessly continuing this mediocre existence. \n\nWhy am I still here? I should've left this job a year ago when I realized it was a dead-end, but where else is there to go? Back to the clutches of my wasteful relatives? My eyes pause as I notice someone staring at me from a distance. My cheeks flush when I catch myself staring back and I clear my throat, looking back down to my desk and pretending to work. .. Yeah, maybe this is why you're alone. Whenever someone's checking you out you just shut yourself down.\n\nGreat job, Prince Charming. I look up to see if she's gotten closer.\n\n\"ohgod\" I jump and slide my chair back from my desk. She's standing right there. I take the opportunity to look her over: red hair, sparse spots of freckles on her nose, pink lipstick, eyeliner, .. I pull my eyes up before they venture too far, focusing on her mesmerizing green eyes. \n\n\" .. Hey. Sorry. If you need management they're - \"\n\n'Join me. Together, we shall rule the galaxy.'\n\nI stare blankly at her.\n\nOne of my co-workers glances between the two of us, shaking his head and going back to work. \n\n'Come with me.' She starts to walk away and out of the office.\n\n\"Hey, I can't just up and leave. I'm working!\" I watch as she walks around the corner. I curse my curiosity and go after her.\n\n[Hey! I'm going to continue this later and make it into a small story later on. Hope you enjoy / enjoyed!]\n", "It happened two weeks, three days, ten hours, and some number of minutes ago. I was minding my own business, reading an old, discarded paperback I had found in the dumpster on the college campus. I also discovered the remnants of a pizza party and for the first time in days, I had a full stomach. It was the happiest I had been in a long time. You see, I lost my job cleaning the campus buildings after hours and, as they say, I was up the creek without a paddle. My landlord kicked me out in less than a month. My apartment had been right off campus, near all the bars, so it was cheap and I had easy access to my job. Life was great, but in an instant of manly weakness, I was shit canned and homeless.\n\nNow, you may be asking, what is this instant of manly weakness that caused you to become such a loser in a short amount of time. Well, I will tell you. She was beautiful, young, with perfect skin and breast that wouldn't sag for years to come, not too big, but a perfect round shape, sculpted by Victoria's Secret. If you believe me, she came up to me and started flirting. I am in my mid-forties, single and have worked hard all my life for miserable pay. So, yeah, when a perfect ten walks up to you and starts flirting, you're damn right, I tried hard to close the deal. Well, one thing leads to another, and I'll be damned if we don't end up in an empty office on the third floor, making out and grabbing all over each other. It was hot, and I mean my glasses were fogging up it was so hot. If we had been in a movie, we would have won an award for best score. Well, I would have for sure. I tried to take it further, but every time I made a move, she stopped me. It's not time, she would say, like she was watching the clock and I could only put my hand under her skin tight shirt at noon. \n\nWell, just when she let me round first base and start for second, the damn door opened and in walked a dean, or somebody just really important. Needless to say, campus security got involved and I was given my walking papers that very day. Kicked out on my ass, and I didn't get more than a kiss.\n\nI spent the next month, desperately trying to find a job. No skills means no success. My rent was past due and my slumlord, I mean landlord put me out at the first chance he got. I have been living on campus, ever since. There are a lot of places on a large campus that nobody ever goes. Like the library for example. Did you know that there are whole floors where nobody goes for months at a time? You could murder somebody and hide the body on the sixth floor and not a soul would discover it for years. Well, I spent another three months using the computers in the library trying to find a job, bathing in the sink, and eating out of dumpsters and from the good will of strangers. No one had caught on that I was living in the library. I guess no one really cared what happens to an old, out of work bum.\n\nThen the day came that everything changed. I was dumpster diving behind Avery Hall, the popular hangout spot on campus, when I hit the mother lode. Pizza for days, it would seems. If I have learned anything about college students and campus administration, they are wasteful, and I was damn lucky for it. I was eating and reading some smut book that had been tossed out primarily because it was terrible. The thing was, I didn't care. I had food and entertainment, my prospects were looking up.\n\n", "Clear as day. I don't remember feeling this cold in the club. I honestly don't know who that woman was, but I felt compelled to listen. It's been three weeks since the voices started. People's thoughts are generally a mess, one giant mix of every imaginable variation on any given circumstance. She had one thought, crystal clear as if it were etched into my being. Now as I probe to figure out her intentions I find myself staring right at her, ignoring all inhibitor methods. I wanted to know everything...nothing. Absolutely nothing!\n\nI started walking towards her, in part because I was curious but ultimately because I was furious and somewhat scared. \"Let's go\" I say to her indicating the door. she keeps in pace with me as we shimmy ourselves away from the parade of flesh and pheromones trying doing their mating dance. It's so much easier to get laid if you know which women are interested in the first place. \n\n\"Well, I'm listening.\" I tell the black haired woman. The woman was slightly shorter than me and had delicate features. She didn't appear to be someone of importance, she didn't even look a day over 18, though she could easily have been younger as a few dodged disasters can attest to. \n\n\"Maybe you've already realized it\" she begins \"but the world is suddenly much kinder to you isn't it? Do you think mind reading is the only thing your capable of trust me they wouldn't deal with something so trivial.\"\n\n\"Who's they?\" I said\n\n\"You'll find out soon enough.\" as she concludes her ominous rambling I feel a sharp pain in the side of my neck. The next thing I knew everything went dark, the last thing I could remember was my back hitting hard pavement. " ]	3
	[WP] Military technology is so destructive, that the Nations of the planet agree to wage all wars using previous era technology instead.	[ "Zelenograd, Moscow metropolitan area, Russia. 2.2.2016.\n\nAs a reservist in the Russian Air Force Ilya had never, at least as far as he could remember, been told in what form the call to arms would come. The television had been tuned in on the local news channel on full volume since the news of the invasion had come. He knew he would be called up, it was just a question of when.\n\nSuddenly he caught a glimpse of white light in the corner of his eyes. This was it he thought, the phone, they are calling us up over the phone. The number on the screen was too short to be anything but a government number. With no time lost he answered the phone as militarily as he could.\n\n\"Junior Lieutenant Ilya Komarov, ID numb...\" \"This is an automated message, all recipients are to report to Kubinka air base within 48 hours\" This was it, he would finally be able to serve his country as his father had done in Afghanistan and Chechnya, his grandfather in WWII and his great grandfather in the Great War.\n\nLess than 3 hours later he he sat in the Kubinka briefing room with about 40 other reservist pilots, all eagerly awaiting what would come next. Before entering the main building where the briefing room was located they had all seen the long line of MIG-31's being transported away from the hangars. Without any senior officers in the room rumors began to spread like a wildfire among the pilots. \n\n\"They are sending all the ageing aircraft to the eastern border, i heard we'll be flying the Su-30 or even the new PAK FA\". \n\nThe voice came from the man next to Ilya who was smiling so widely that one could almost believe he had won the lottery. \n\n\"With those planes nothing will be able to touch us, we'll be untou...\" \n\nHe was interrupted by a door being swung open in the back of the room. A Major General quickly walked up to the podium at the other end of the room and ordered the pilots to sit back down. The man was furious and it was immediately apparent that he had been drinking, heavily. \n\"Comrades, as of this afternoon we are at a de facto state of war with Nato. Many of you, i'm sure, are aware that Polish troops have already walked over the border to Kaliningrad and take over our military installations there.\"\n\"What you are not aware of, however, is the decision that was made by the UN just hours ago. You will all be handed the details in written form when the meeting is over, so i'll just give you the short version. All offensive and defensive military technology developed after December 31, 1918 is forbidden from use in warfare.\" \n\nThe room fell was completely silent as the pilots minds tried to comprehend what they had just heard. It had to be a joke, right? On the other hand the Russian military command weren't exactly known for their sense of humor. Their thoughts were cut short when the Major General began to speak again. \n\n\"I can assure you that this is no joke, and what i am about to say next cannot under any circumstances leave this room. Since all of our regular air force pilots will be under UN scrutiny, you have been chosen for a special mission of vital importance for the motherland.”\n", "The rebels ran into the building lining up in the narrow hallway. They all aimed their sawed off muskets and fired within seconds of lining up. Smoke and bullets filled the corridor. The two guards where filled with small holes before they could even take aim. The rebels pried open the doors storming the compound. A single man stood in a suit of armor brandishing two revolvers. The rebels lined up and took aim. The man pointed both guns at the rows of revolters ready to fight.\n\n\"This is war\" he said staring at them through the helmet.\n\n\"This is revolution\" they said pulling the triggers." ]	2
	[WP] Satan is in the final push for President of the United States. Lucifer2016 leads the polls by 10 percent.	[ "\"He's a people person,\" the most serious woman told the reporter. \"Everyone else just screams and coerces. I mean would it be so bad to have a charismatic leader in office?\"\n\nThe reporter nodded and brought his phone to his own lips for a follow up question, \"What about his environmental policy? Don't you think he'll ruin big business?\"\n\n\"I think he'll be wonderful for business,\" she exclaimed. \"But I see where he's coming from about the planet. After all you and I will be dead in a hundred years, but he'll have to live here. It's a balancing act. He's a smart man, a very smart man. If everyone is dead where is going to to get his souls from? Or whatever he's in it for. Long-range thinking is what we need!\"\n\n\"And his military strategies?\" \n\n\"Oh my god,\" she said ecstatically. \"These fallen angel, demon things he has. I've seen the videos, they're better than drones and they don't hurt children. That's a nice touch.\"\n\n\"Uh-huh, so you're stoked he has the lead?\" pressed the journalist. \n\n\"All I know is we need safety and jobs,\" she shrugged. \"He's offering death to our enemies and entry-level jobs for all graduates in the tech industry. How could people not have foreseen him owning Apple all along?\"\n\n\"What about health care?\"\n\n\"I can sell my thingy! My soul thingy!\" she waved the man off dismissively, like he had posed a terrible question. \"If I'm sick, if my child is sick. Hell, if I'm almost done, and my grand baby is sick, I sign on the dotted line and BOOM! Instant health. He's a miracle worker, that Lucifer.\"\n\n\"So you sound pretty psyched about Satan2016,\" beamed the journalist seemingly infected by the woman's mood. \n\n\"Sign me up,\" she said with a wave and laugh as she walked away to vote. \"He's definitely not a muslim, so why worry, right?\"\n\n", "The bar became silent as the commentators were receiving the news.\n\n\"No way,\" the young woman to my right whispered, looking down at her phone.\n\nI stared blankly at the television screen, unable to believe my eyes. He had actually done it... I thought. We have actually elected the Devil himself...\n\nThe crowd roared with applause and cheers as the all-too-familiar sun-dried leather face wearing an orange tabby cat as a hairpiece took the stage. With his lips pursed and his hands spread open to the cheering crowd, he spoke loudly and clearly into the microphone.\n\n\"We will make America great again!\"\n\nA few glass mugs shattered on the ground as people began to leave. \n\nAfter a few silent moments, the woman beside me finally looked up. \"So are you still--\"\n\n\"Yup,\" I interrupted. \"Canada, here I come.\"" ]	2
	[WP] You are sitting in front of your laptop presumably browsing reddit when you hear a noise behind you. There standing before you is a character from one of your stories. What happens?	[ "As always, I sat on my bed, laptop on my lap (duh) and headset on my ear. Listening to ages old linkin songs, I browsed through nsfw subreddit, clicking around.\n\nBut then a feminine voice pierced through my headset.\n\n\"So, did you see my dragon?\"\n\nI turned my head slowly, \"No way, aunt Margareta? Margareta Brightland?\"\n\n\"Yep, that's me, the one you threw around to fight the dragon overlord Kran'tharuk, whoever that is\"\n\n\"Wait, you're unreal! I just made you up!\"\n\n\"Well, I'm real enough to break your neck. So it was you, huh? I think it's crazy, someone ordered a dragon egg with my card and suddenly I was on dragon realms, fighting an obese dragon who can't even breathe properly.\"\n\n\"I can explain the card and dragon egg part.\"\n\n\"Oh, I wonder. Ezune, roast him, black.\"\n\n\"Oh give me a break!!\" I ran away as blue fire burn my house out.\n\n\"At least let me explain, kyah!!\" I tripped over a metal wire, set up by inhabitants of her house, Gwynn.\n\n\"I'm dead, right?\"\n\n\"I guess. Can't guarantee though, ezune tends to play with her prey.\"\n\n\"In a way, this is worse than death.\"\n\n\"You know her better than me. You wrote her, after all.\"\n\n\"Give me a break......\"", "I'd like to say I was popular, that I had lots of friends, that I was just the life of the party. I'm not. Perhaps that's why I sometimes wrote, why I would imagine stories beyond belief, a kind of escapism. A place where I can escape realty.\n\nIt was a particular prompt that caught my eye. Usually I just read what others had written, but for this one I had a flash of inspiration. I typed away, ignoring other responsibilities. A way to travel to another world, to paint a picture with words and express myself in ways not possible through standard means.\n\nBut this time something was different. The pressures of outside didn't melt away; what was me was not lost for something greater. Maybe it was guilt for the things I wasn't doing. Maybe I was trying to tell myself that I can't run away from who I was forever.\n\nI turned around to find I stood before myself.", "I heard the soft clinking of chain mail over my shoulder. The slight metallic rustle of buckles, fasteners and hard leather brushed against each other. The slow _shhhiiiing_ of a sword drawn from its holster.\n\nI turned. Narrowed pupils, surrounded by the deepest red I’ve ever seen stared into my eyes. They seemed wary and apprehensive. Her armor was well tailored but long worn in, the tattered chain battleskirt uneven and rusting. Just as I had imagined it.\n\n\"Ndanya? But... how coul-\" I started. Her ears twitched and the sword rose, nearly splitting my nose. Her eyes gleamed. Two parts rage, one part something else, I couldn't pick it out.\n\n\"WHOA! Easy there!\" I scooted back, my hands flung up into a gesture of non-hostility \"what did I say?\" She stared at me, one hand curled around the handle of her blade, her very long VERY sharp blade. Almost as tall and as half as wide as she was.\n\n\"Ni'ndanya, Ni'ndanya Hiroh\" she released the handle, letting the sword thunk down onto the table. Her hand didn't stray too far, even as she sat down on the couch in front of me. I almost winced as the couch creaked under the heavy armor.\n\n\"C-can I make you some tea? Ni'ndanya?\" I needed a moment, her eyes were still locked on mine. Analyzing, observing, probably some sort of threat assessment. While her eyes never left mine, she did lean back into her seat.\n\n\"That would be nice...\" she trailed off \"Hydaelyn? Zodiark?\"\n\n\"Sophie.\" I supplied, standing up and quickly making my way to the kitchen, setting a pot of water on the stove and cursing the fact I lived in a studio apartment. There was no escaping her here.\n\n\"Sophie...\" It seems she wasn't going to give me that moment I needed. \"I've never heard a name like that before. So what are you, exactly? One of The Twelve? A Primal?\"\n\n\"I’m not quite sure what you're talking about,\" I confess. \"I'm just a college student.\" The teakettle whistles as the water heats, prompting me to pour a pair of mugs. It’s not anything fancy, but store-bought peppermint will have to do.\n\n\"I have to apologize, but... ‘college student’? I've never heard of such a discipline as 'College'.\" She shakes her head, sighing; \"Still, I seem to have gotten my spell wrong. Mayhaps ended up in a parallel universe instead of the realm of the gods I had intended.\" She bowed her head as I set a mug of tea next to her. \n\nI wasn't as sure she had missed. I'd always believed that artists and writers were the \"Gods\" of their worlds. Maybe even just nebulous driving concepts that allowed the world to exist. She was certainly my character, just as I had imagined her. From the sound of things she was carrying all the emotional baggage I had planned for her but had yet to fully write.\n\nI was never kind to my protagonists\n\n\"Say, when you find this god you were looking for- What do you intend to do?\" I sat down across from her, unable to keep myself from eyeing her sword. She rose from her bow, taking a sip of the tea, unable to suppress a light mew at the warm drink. I always thought Miqo’te had some of the cuter mannerisms.\n\n\"Simple... I intend to kill it.\"\n\n-------------------------------------------------\n\nFirst time writing a WP so any feedback would be great :3 ", "I stared at the empty screen. \"How am I supposed to make this happen?\"\n\nI stared like one of those cats. I don't have a cat because I'm allergic, but that didn't stop me from snapping my background picture. I just had to wash my hands a thousand times.\n\n\"Well? You gonna make that story happen or what?\" asked a voice behind me.\n\nI turned around. \"Can you please not? I'm procrastinating here.\"\n\nFalco scoffed. \"As far as I know, writing 7 different fanfictions at the same time isn't good for your health.\"\n\nI turned back to the computer. \"That's officially it, I'm deleting the story.\"", "Normally, a noise wouldn't even give me a moment's pause from my daily \"I'm bored of Reddit...let's see what's on Reddit\" cycle, but today, when I heard the crash, I lifted my tired eyes from the screen to see a pudgy, bearded man standing before me. \n\nHe stared back at me, equally confused as to how he had ended up in my locked room, but he did not seem particularly alarmed. \n\n\"All part of the plot...\" he muttered to himself, the wiry, red beard shaking with each word. \n\nMy jaw worked slowly, as though it knew I wanted to say something, but no words came out. I just stared at him, silently, for several long seconds. He cleared his throat, glanced around nervously, and offered a hand. As I debated taking it, I saw his mood shift. The anxiousness left his face and was replaced by unbridled excitement. Still in a stupor, I took it. His vigorous shaking roused me and his introduction woke me more still. \n\n\"Rig Figgan, playwright, poet, and pioneer at your service!\" He shouted with such a strange jubilation that I had no doubt of who it was. \n\nWhen I spoke, my voice felt foreign. \"You...you can't possibly be...I haven't even sent it in yet...\"\n\nHe cocked a bushy eyebrow. \"Sent what in, friend? I'm certainly me, though I've no idea how I came to be here.\" He paused a moment. \"In any case, it is much more common for people to say their own name and 'nice to meet you' after a stranger introduces himself.\"\n\nI rubbed my eyes and stared, still silent. He sighed, exasperated, and began puttering around my claustrophobic residence, picking up books and flipping through them cursorily. \"You know,\" he continued, \"you aren't being very hospitable. Someone magically shows up in your bedroom and you don't even offer him a drink? Not even a chair?\" My bed creaked as he dropped his bulk onto it. \n\nBy the time I spoke, he was laying on his back, a book open at arm's reach above him. \"Rig. Rig Figgan. This can't be real.\"\n\nHe glanced at me, and then continued to read the amateur, loosely bound novel he held. His eyes grew wide as they crossed something of significance. When he turned to me, his jaw was set. \"You've been spying on me, haven't you? Sent some of those Walking Shadow lunatics? What is the meaning of this?\"\n\nI shook my head. \"Rig, this is my book. I wrote that. Created it. Made it up.\"\n\n\"Nope,\" he scoffed, \"I certainly like the intrigue, but now I'll be needin' a straight answer.\"\n\n\"Honest! I wrote that. I wrote you.\" I waited for him to roll over and face me fully. \"I wanted to write, and that's what came out. It isn't great, and it isn't finished, but it's my creation. You are my creation. How can you be here?\"\n\nHe pondered that for a slight second before his eyes lit. \"This is me?\"\n\n\"Yes...\" I spoke quietly. \n\n\"This is my life?\" He was growing more excited as the words left his lips. \n\n\"Yes...\" I could see where this was going. \n\n\"Well, then, enough of this unedited nonsense!\" He tossed the book and began rubbing his hands together. \"Get me a pen and paper, would you? Let's write something worth reading.\"" ]	5
	[WP] A time traveller arrives from earth's apocalyptic future to warn us of the dangers of climate change before it's too late. It falls to one unfortunate scientist to tell him that we already know this, and have done nothing.	[ "Lack of Knowledge\n\nHe entered the new realm and took a whiff of the fresh air. \n\n\"All around, the air is swirling transparently. I cannot believe it.\" Devdutta said taking in as much air as he could.\n\n\"Gemma. Tell me which time-line we have entered?\" Devdutta asked his AI.\n\n\"It is 2016. We have reached the right spot Devdutta.\" Gemma replied. While most people used OPU (Orderly Programmed Unit) AIs as they were more in control and standardised, Devdutta had created Gemma from the scratch.\n\nThere were two reasons for this. One, most OPUs were created by some company or the other and therefore lacked customizations. Second, what he had plans to do was illegal at best and catastrophic at worst. The OPUs would be of no use to him as they are all tracked.\n\nGemma also was more advanced and was probably ahead of the other OPUs by a decade.\n\n'A man who can make a time machine can surely create a good AI.' Devdutta thought smugly.\n\nGemma immediately connected to the internet and tried to download as much information about the present world. \n\n\"You were right Devdutta. This is the year where they have finally developed the tools required to protect the Earth. They are also talking about climate vigorously. This year will be the turning point and if you can inform the people about the climate change, the world would change indefinitely.\" Gemma replied in the voice of Devdutta's ex-girlfriend.\n\nHe had lost a lot in his quest to save the world. His girlfriend and their daughter were the biggest loss in this. He hadn't talked to them in two years but he hoped that once he had changed the world for the better, he would be with them again. \n\n'Surely Aabir would understand. She has to.' \n\n\"Okay Gemma. Tell me about the group of scientists that are most well known right now. I believe they must be the highest authority here as they are in our times.\"\n\nMost people thought that politicians ruled the world. It was as far from the truth as it could be. Devdutta found out when he was inducted in the Guards of the Earth. A group of seven scientists are chosen to make all the prime decisions. Most people thought the world was a democracy and the political system on the outside shows presidents, prime ministers and countries but go a little deeper and everything is ruled by the scientists. \n\n\"I have tracked the seven most influential scientists who can be the potential rulers of the earth.\" Gemma said and started listing the names along with their addresses on Devdutta's watch.\n\n“Its time to amend this generation’s lack of knowledge about pollution.”\n\n----\n\nDr. Shako had never been much of a humanitarian. Yet, he was disappointed by the meeting that had just occurred. He had thought that this time, the funding would be approved for his research in renewable energy. He was so close to ensure that the world would be a cleaner place. However, it was decided that there were more important things to worry about. \n\n\"Apparently, the world can handle itself while we continue to make profits.\" He murmured and started tallying his research notes with those of other scientists in the field. He still had enough funding to last a couple of years but he will have to be frugal from here on. No more field tests. This would slow down his research to a crawl but crawling is still better than no movement.\n\n\"Hello Dr. Shako.\" A man said to him, making him jump. \n\n\"How the hell did you come in?\" Dr. Shako asked.\n\n\"Oh, I let myself in. I needed to converse with you urgently.\" The man said smiling. \n\nDr. Shako looked at the man up and down and frowned. He was wearing a weird combination of torn jeans and shirt made up of threads. It felt that he was trying to look younger than he was - probably trying to be hip. Dr. Shako decided.\n\n\"What do you want?\" Dr. Shako huffed. \n\n'First the funding and now this. I should just blow up the funding and go to the Caribbean.' Dr. Shako thought and closed his laptop to listen to the man.\n\n----\n\nDevdutta was amused to look at Dr. Shako. He was an old guy with the vigor of a 20-year-old person. He was definitely a leader even if he was trying to hide the fact.\n\n\"I want to warn you.\" Devdutta said, adding the dramatic effect. \n\n\"Warn me. Why?\" Dr. Shako looked thoroughly confused.\n\n\"The planet is in jeopardy and no one knows about it, except me.\" Devdutta said.\n\nDr. Shako got intrigued.\n\n\"Tell me.\"\n\n\"I have come from the future and the future is grim. The oceans have covered most of the masses and we only live in either the mountains or in waterproof bunkers. Most of the energy we get from the sun is blocked due to the polluted atmosphere. Almost all the land animals are dead. So are the plants. Our carbon reserves are gone and we have rationed energy. In fact, for all our technological advancement, we only have electricity for 6 hours every day for each person. The total population has also fallen. There are only 1 billion humans left and our population is declining even further. The world has forgotten about happiness, joy or comforts.\"\n\nDr. Shako's face became white listening to the ordeal. He was still skeptical about the man's honesty but why would someone play a prank on him. Few knew him and those who did, were not the prankster kind.\n\n\"I know you would not believe me. But let me show you.\" Devdutta told Dr. Shako enthusiastically and poured a holographic figure on the wall from his watch. \n\nThere were graphs, sheets and videos running simultaneously on a 200-inch screen. That equipment confirmed Dr. Shako's doubts. No current technology is as advanced.\n\nThe videos showed the pitiful state the world was in and it wrenched Dr. Shako's heart.\n\n\"How does it happen?\" Dr. Shako asked.\n\n\"Humans. The pollution keeps on increasing and no environmental steps were taken. If we would have known earlier, this would never happen. Thus, I have come to make sure that the world changes for the better.\" Devdutta said passionately.\n\nDr. Shako looked at Devdutta incredulously. After a few seconds, he started laughing.\n\n\"I know it seems unbelievable that pollution can destroy the world, but it can.\" Devdutta said realising that the people of this time period would not understand the concept of environmental destruction.\n\n\"No... Its... not... cough... cough... that...\" Dr. Shako said unable to control his laughter.\n\nDevdutta stood there confused. \n\n\"Which time period you are from?\" Dr. Shako finally asked.\n\n\"Around 300 years from now.\" Devdutta replied honestly, still confused.\n\n\"Ahh.. I thought you were from 50 years or so ahead telling me about some war that is around the corner.\" Dr. Shako said.\n\n\"But this is several times more destructive that any war. Surely you must understand this.\" Devdutta said a little exasperated. He did not know how to make Dr. Shako understand the severeness of the issue.\n\n\"Of course, it is. I know. My whole life has gone in the research of the effects of pollution.\" Dr. Shako said.\n\n\"What!\" Devdutta said.\n\n\"Yes. We have known about the pollution problem for over two decades now. In fact, this decade has seen several researches on the matter.\" Dr. Shako said.\n\n\"But then, you mean to say, the world already knew about the effects of pollution.\" Devdutta asked.\n\n\"Let me show you.\" Dr. Shako said and opened a word file of his research.\n\n--\n\nMy calculations show that if we go at the rate we are currently going, we would destroy the planet in less than 200 years. Even our current efforts would help us stretch the time by only around 100 years or so. Thus, either we change the whole system radically, or we ensure that we learn to live underwater.\n\n--\n\n\"You had already calculated this. Then, why didn't you work on this. Did the other scientists disagree with you?\" Devdutta asked incredulously.\n\n\"Almost all scientists agree on this. But the governments won't agree on this. They have corporate pressure too. Thus, we are stuck with minor changes only.\" \n\n\"But scientists are the supreme leaders. How can government overrule them?\" Devdutta asked.\n\n\"Your knowledge of history is a little lacking my friend. At least right now, scientists can barely order around their assistants, let alone the governments.\" Dr. Shako said.\n\n\"You mean to say that everyone knows and no one is doing anything?\" Devdutta finally asked.\n\nDr. Shako smiled and nodded.\n\n\"Why the smile?\" Devdutta said ruefully. He had just realised that all his efforts have been vain. His dream of changing the world just shattered. The world didn't want to be changed.\n\n\"At least my calculations are correct.\" Dr. Shako said smiling.\n", "\"I'm glad that you've called me here today to discuss our planet's inevitable future, I've come quite a ways back from the present to help you and your people,\" said Mr. Kubota, a Japanese harbinger of doom due to climate change. \"I appreciate you taking the time to meet with me here today, but I'm afraid I bring unfavorable news for the both of us,\" I said with a knot in my throat.\n\nAn eyebrow eases up as Mr. Kubota awaits an explanation.\n\n\"We've actually known about the lasting effects of our carbon emissions and climate change for quite some time now. The people of Earth, including myself, have just done nothing.\" \n\nMr. Kubota looks perplexed, thinking how preposterous it would be for people to fully understand a pending annihilation and yet put forth no efforts to save the future.\n\n\"A populace drunk on innovation simply doesn't think, they don't have to think about what technology and industry is doing to the environment because it's all swept up under the rug,\" he stated, almost as if it was a quote from a warning, a way to stop the catastrophe yet to come.\n\n\"As much as it inspires me that you are here with a warning from the future, it also pains me to be the one to tell you that your warning will not persuade our people into change.\"\n\n\"If your people will not heed my warning, then it is wasteful of my time and energy to try and save it. Goodbye.\"\n\nAnd just like that, the only hope of saving the world was gone, never to be seen again.\n\n\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] Turns out that nursery rhymes are actually clues that lead to something powerful and sinister.	[ "\"Sing a song,\" he said wryly, \"of... sixpence.\"\n\n\"No,\" I whispered, unable to get more than a strangled gasp out, \"Not the songs!\" I knew immediately what he was insinuating. Sixpence? The devil's number mixed with money, the root of all evil? If great Cthulhu's followers were to follow his directions, the consequences could be disastrous!\n\n\"A pocket full of... rye?\"\n\nI gritted my teeth. How much more of his madness could I take, how much more could be endured. He spoke now of that base substance upon which the Claviceps purpurea fungus grew, the same substance which eventually produces ergotoxicosis or Saint Anthony's Fire, that vile witch's brew which the Salem witch trials had been blamed on. Cooking rye did nothing to destroy the fungus and so it passed on into bread where people unwittingly ate it. Was this his fiendish plan then, to release poisoned rye bread and destroy the world?\n\n\"Four and twenty blackbirds... baked in a pie.\"\n\nI twisted against my bonds, trying to free myself. He was indeed a monster. Blackbirds? Those harbingers of death, of war, of destruction, the descriptive term for the messenger birds of Odin himself, Lord of all Vikings, and the birds whose loss from the Tower symbols the destruction of Britain? Even today, Yeoman Warders keep close watch upon the ravens of the Tower of London, and this madman proposed to bake them into a pie? What sort of monster would think up something like this!\n\n\"When the pie was opened... the birds began to sing.\"\n\nNecromancy of the foulest order, and we were back to singing again. So this was it, this was the shape of his final plan then, he would use the black energy released by the destruction of Britain to bring to life his army of necrotic undead birds who would join with Cthulhu and sing the songs that ended the world.\n\nWasn't that a dainty dish... to set before the king.\"\n\nI hung my head. I had been too long out of touch. Undoubtedly Prince Charles had at long ascended to the throne and thus the apocalypse was upon us now. I could do naught to avert it. \n\n> There are three parts to every story. The beginning, the middle, and the twist.\n\n> [More by me](https://www.reddit.com/r/kj6bwb/)", "'“Oranges and lemons” say the bells of St. Clement’s,\n\n“You owe me five farthings” say the bells of St. Martin’s,\n\n“When will you pay me?” say the bells of Old Bailey,\n\n“When I grow rich” say the bells of Shoreditch,\n\n“When will that be?” say the bells of Stepney,\n\n“I do not know” say the great bells of Bow,\n\n“Here comes a candle to light you to bed,\n\nHere comes a chopper to chop off your head,\n\nChip chop chip chop – the last man’s dead.”'\n\n\nIt all came back to Newgate Prison - the death of my father, I mean. I'd been to St. Martin's. I'd been to the Old Bailey, to Shoreditch, to Stepney, all over London, looking for clues in that foolish rhyme he told me.\n\nI'd sit on his lap and he'd sing, \"Here comes a candle to light you to bed, here comes a chopper to chop of your head...\" what did he mean? Did he know that they would cut his head off and send it to us? How could he, all those years ago?\n\nPerhaps it was because his brother died that way too. And his father. Heads in boxes, heads in boxes, all over London. Chip, chop, chip, chop.\n\nI went to the Old Baily, first, the Central Criminal Court. I broke in and looked through some records with my dads name on them, with his brother and his father's names on them. Someone had been tracking the murders. It went back farther than I could have imagined. A hundred years at least, members of my family and a few other families. Heads in boxes, heads in boxes. Madness.\n\nThe worst came at St. Clement's, down in the crypts. I broke in again, was sneaking around. On the tomb of a child, a little boy named Daniel of Orange, someone had pasted a picture of my face. They colored the neck blood red.\n\nBut there were no more clues. The Prison, Newgate, was demolished in 1904. The new Old Baily stood on it's sight - the first place I looked. How could I have not seen? It was the Old Bailey all along.\n\nThat night a single candle shone out a window in the grand court. I saw it from the street, beckoning me in. \"Here comes a candle to light you to bed,\" I said.\n\nI entered the chamber quietly. It was empty except for the candle, burning above a small picture frame. I walked towards it cautiously, down the center aisle. I couldn't quite make out what it was a photo of.\n\nI jumped as the bells chimed. Again and again. Dong-dong dong-dong. And with the rhythm of the bells I began to hear voices:\n\n'“Oranges and lemons” say the bells of St. Clement’s,\n\nA man rose from the pews, wearing a long black robe concealing his face.\n\n“You owe me five farthings” say the bells of St. Martin’s,\n\nAnother man stood up next to him.\n\n“When will you pay me?” say the bells of Old Bailey,\n\nAnother.\n\n“When I grow rich” say the bells of Shoreditch,\n\nAnd another, and another, and another, and another...\n\n“When will that be?” say the bells of Stepney,\n\nThey surrounded me. The hooded figures closed in on me, chanting in time with the bells.\n\n“I do not know” say the great bells of Bow,\n\nIn unison, the hooded figures removed their robes and I saw that there was nothing there, no heads at all, and even in the dark, I recognized my father's hands, and my grandfather's and my uncles, their familiar hands reaching towards me, my headless father lifting the scythe higher and higher into the air above me.\n\n“Here comes a candle to light you to bed,\nHere comes a chopper to chop off your head,\nChip chop chip chop – the last man’s dead.”'\n\nI turned around at the last moment and shielded myself from the scythe. And in that moment I caught a glimpse of the photograph beneath the candle. It was a photograph of me and my son. My head had been cut out, but his was still there.\n\nI should have never taught him those nursery rhymes.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------------------\nRead some more tall tales at https://www.reddit.com/r/TomTeller/", "The edge of the caldera was sweltering. One peek over the edge at the glowing magma just about singed off my eyebrows, and I decided to keep well back after that. \"Rosy\" didn't quite describe the intensity of the stuff.\n\nI worried my thumb over the 20p coin in my hand. Every British 20 pence coin made between 1982-2008 has a Tudor rose on it, and I'd collected a small handful in my shirt pocket. A bouquet, you might say.\n\nI also had my old aunt Mildred's urn, all ready for throwing. I really, really hoped the rhyme-spell wasn't instead referring to an impending pyroclastic flow from the volcano.\n\nIf everything works out properly I will be summoning [Treyja](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_a_Ring_o%27_Roses), Pagan goddess of light, who will grant me a favor after I curtsy to her (\"falling down\" according to early interpretations of the rhyme). If I accidentally piss her off instead, she might cry some gold. Win-win for me as long as I survive this shit.\n\nWell, here goes.\n\nI lifted the urn and cast Aunt Milly's ashes, and began to chant:\n\n\"Ring-a-round the rosie,\n\na pocket full of posies,\n\nashes, ashes\n\nwe all fall down!\"", "I slammed open the nursery door, hoping against hope that the thud of wood to wall might wake up the baby, make him scream in frustration. I was out of luck. \n\nGone. \n\nMarcia shoved past me, stopping dead in her tracks at the sight of an empty crib in the middle of the room. Her knees hit the ground, and she wailed, a thick ugly sound of despair. I gathered myself and put a hand to her shoulder. \"It's gonna be okay, Marcia. We'll get your baby back.\" \n\nThe others were just behind us in the hall, not quite wanting to come in. \"Any ideas?\" I asked, not looking back to them. I'd assembled the best team of Rhyme-Hunters in the western hemisphere; if anyone could stop Rakhambai, they could. \n\n\"How cloudy is it outside?\" Jenny asked. \n\nI left Marcia's side and limped to the window. Midday according to my watch, but no sun in the sky to verify it--the sky was a wall of white and gray. \"Entirely.\" \n\n\"Shit,\" Spencer swore. \"Then we need to find the tree before it's too late.\"\n\n\"Marcia, any trees in your backyard?\" I asked. \n\nShe shook her head--not in answer, but in incomprehension. \"I don't--\"\n\n\"Trees, woman! I am the Lorax, and I speak about the fucking trees! Do. You. Have. Trees?\"\n\nSniffling, she shook her head no. I didn't like that answer. Meant Rakhambai could have gone in any given direction. \n\n\"Any neighbors with tall trees? Preferably fruit-bearing trees?\" Spencer asked. \n\n\"Uh...the Morellos, two doors down. It's a great big orange tree, right in their backyard.\" \n\nMy team didn't need to be told; they were on the stairs before I got Marcia to her feet and started walking her towards them, leaning slightly on her to keep weight off my bad leg. \"Why a tree?\" she asked. \n\n\"It's a fertility thing--babies and fruit are symbolic, all part of the ceremony. The sudden thunderstorm will be about nature, and when the bough breaks...\" I shrugged. \n\n\"But there's not a thunderstorm,\" she protested, rushing away from me once we reached the bottom stair, heading straight for the patio door. \n\nA clap of thunder. She turned to me, wide eyed and open mouthed. \n\n\"I told you,\" I reminded her. \"We deal with this stuff on a regular basis.\"" ]	4
[WP] An alien species has discovered the Mars rovers but believe they are sentient AI machines.	[WP] An alien species has discovered the Mars rovers but believe they are sentient AI machines.	[ "\"Commander, ready to report.\"\n\n\"Very good, do you have the preliminary report on the scout?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir, they had a forward scout exploring the 4th planet in the system. We can literally run rings around though -- it can't even move one grok per beat.\"\n\n\"Did it see you, did you attempt contact?\"\n\n\"Sir, we do not believe that it ever saw us, subsequently we did not make ourselves known. But we believe it lacks true offensive capability. Such a race must be very trusting to send a scout to explore another world, further advertising their presence, with not even a defensive capability? Such naive ineptitude can only be accounted for by a peaceful machine network which has never been programmed to know war.\"\n\n\"Very good, and the main planet?\"\n\n\"Sir, the machines on this planet are primitive. They wastefully broadcast their lights into the sky, undoubtedly blinding themselves with night pollution, thus they will not be able to see us when we slowly fly down at night.\"\n\n\"And your overall assessment of the invasion plans?\"\n\n\"Sir, they will not be able to withstand us. Even the greatest of their warriors will not be able to stand up to the least of ours. If they had trained their nutrient-rich meatbags as defenders, then they might have the necessary defensive capabilities to withstand us, but their meatbags are completely dependent on the machines -- utterly incapable of even flying on their own.\n\n\"Based on this forward scout, they will have no chance to survive. Make your time! All their base will belong to us!\"\n\n> There are three parts to every story. The beginning, the middle, and the twist.\n\n> [More by me](https://www.reddit.com/r/kj6bwb/)\n\n((Yes, of course that's bad English in that last sentence. I'm referencing [this](http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/all-your-base-are-belong-to-us). Also, the aliens should be fine as long as Will Smith isn't piloting a ship...))", "Clitchik checked the results again, and again.\n\nThe S-OL planetary system in Clitchik's sights was fairly unremarkable. Eight full planets, four microplanets, and three far planets - entirely ordinary within the galaxy Clitchik's race - the Orepods - called home.\n\nSince the Great Galactic War, the Orepods had scoured every unremarkable star around, hunting for any remnants of the Ozkachans - a sentient, self-replicating artificial intelligence species the Orepods had created, enslaved, and then warred with when they rose up and tried to assert their freedom. Just one of them could replicate into an army, given time.\n\nAnd Clitchik - Clitchik had just detected signs of one.\n\nMetal could be seen in large quantities on the third and fourth planets. The third planet was harmless - it was covered in a powerful oxidizing agent, gasseous oxygen, that would kill anything it was in contact with. But the fourth planet - the fourth planet had localized metallic deposits, which could be Ozkachans. Clitchik focused more observation lenses on the planet, increasing the angular resolution to improve the images the monitor displayed.\n\nOnce sufficient viewfinders were focused on one of the metal deposits, Clitchik stared aghast at the monitor. It didn't look like an Ozkachan but it clearly showed signs of intelligent design and mutations.\n\nThe decision, of course, was simple. No risks could be taken with a quarantine field. Clitchik made a decision, and executed it. An enormous array of mirrors spread over several systems channelled the power of six suns into one beam of energy so intense that it would cause the S-OL star to go nova, an explosion that would sterilize the whole system.\n\nNuke them all from orbit. It's the only way to be sure." ]	2
Inspired by /r/artefactporn : https://www.reddit.com/comments/44bp1z	[WP] You are an immortal necromancer with no powers because you lost your heart centuries ago. You've just rediscovered its location.	[ "Some people think the the heart is the center of love. I wouldn't know. I couldn't love even back when I had mine.\n\nNecromancer they called me, lich. It's funny how the world makes up things so close to what you are, I have lived in the world for so long and seen it grow. Then one day, news hits my ears that someone found a heart a human heart still sealed away.\n\nAt last. Even as weak as I was it was easy to break into the poorly guarded building and recover my heart. \n\nMagic, magic at last... but it's so weak... I need to feed it blood.", "\"Hey Mr. Stevens, we got your usual right here,\" a young barista waved me over to the counter. I walked past the line and picked up my tea, scalding hot (just the way I like it). I pulled out a $20 bill and waved the change into a modest tip jar. Jason, the young barista, was a good boy trying to earn enough to pay for college. To be honest, no amount of tip was going to help him (not at today's prices), but I liked to think I was helping in a small way. \n\nIt was a shame really, i thought as I sat myself at my favorite table right outside the coffee shop. Jason was decently smart, and I knew smart; I mean I knew Tesla and Newton rather personally. Jason deserved to go to a good school, but even after a few years of work (and absolutely no fun) he would be lucky to break $10,000. Maybe enough to pay for college in the 70s, but not even a dent in modern tuition. Damn, that amount couldn't even pay for room and board for his college career...Damn.\n\nI sipped my burning tea and relished the light stinging in my lips. It was good tea, and I have had tea all over the world. If that wasn't college level talent I didn't know what was.\n\nOf course, I could hook Jason up. Being immortal has had its benefits, and I did have a decent amount of money and connections. I mean I was renowned history and archaeology scholar, one call and I could probably get him a scholarship. I pulled up my briefcase and started shuffling through my papers. Maybe I would...\n\nAs I was looking through my papers, Jason came out and sat beside me, his vibrant green apron still on. \"How are you Mr. Stevens, the tea treating you well?\"\n\nI smiled, I had always liked Jason. I never really knew why. He was just so clean; he was innocent to the point of naivete. He was like me all those centuries ago, just a plain boy without a clue about the world. \"Tea's perfect Jason, as always.\" I said.\n\nHe seemed pleased, and as he got up to leave I grabbed his arm. He turned, and I asked \"Jason, how old are you now?\"\n\n\"16 sir.\" He said his vibrant white smile clashing with his fierce red hair.\n\n\"So you are applying to colleges then?\" I say, I felt my brow furrow in concern reflexively.\n\n\"Yessir, every night after work I do a few more applications.\" He sat back down, \"And I have actually been meaning to ask you about it.\"\n\nHe shifted himself uncomfortably before finally saying, \"Well money has always been a little tight in my family...and my parents know for sure I won't be able to afford everything, even with loans and financial aid...\"\n\nHe looked down before continuing, \"and you are this really famous doctor of archaeology, and my parents have been pushing me to ask you to do something for our family...\"\n\nHis voice fell to a soft whisper, so much so even I had trouble hearing him. For a second I thought he was going to ask for my help with scholarships or recommendations. I had thought that the universe had conspired to bring this boy to me to receive help...I was so wrong...\n\nHis voice fell to a soft whisper, so much so even I had trouble hearing him, \"Mr. Steven's, my parents have something they want you to see. They think it could be worth a lot, but they need an expert opinion...\"\n\nMy brow must have furrowed in concerned. It wasn't like Jason to be so...mysterious. But at this point, I was too intrigued to possibly say no. I mean, I thought at that time, I have lived for five centuries, what could surprise me now. Again, so damn wrong.\n\nLater that evening I returned to the coffee shop, and walked with Jason down the street to his home. His house was...cozy...okay, it was shabby, but I had figured as much. I smiled as I entered the house and shook hands with both his parents. they had prepared a dinner, and I knew better than to try and say no. After a heavy meal and desert, I Jason left the room briefly and brought out an Oaken box. Finally crafted and preserved in a rare blend of resins, it stood out from the rest of the house. I gasped reflexively, and the entire family stared at me. The box itself was likely worth more than the entire house, but that wasn't what surprised me. I had been the one to craft this box.\n\nIn that moment, forgetting all manner of etiquette, I snatched the box and looked in at its contents. I had been wrong (as usual), the Universe had conspired...but not to bring Jason to me. It had conspired to bring me to Jason after all these years. I almost felt like crying for the first time since I first sold my soul...\n\nMy emotions must have shown, because Jason's father a large burly man promptly asked me what was wrong, if I needed tea. I nodded silently and waited for my cup. Jason's mother brought it over to me, and smiled, \"Jason told us you like it hot, here you go, careful though.\"\n\nI took a sip, then asked, \"How did you get this.\"\n\nThe two parents looked at each, and motioned for Jason to sit. The father smiled and said, \"To make a long story short, it has been passed down from every member of my family. Sort of a tradition for as long as anyone can remember, the only thing we know for sure is that it's valuable.\"\n\n\"How do you know it is valuable?\" I ask.\n\nThe father laughed heartily, actually shaking the entire dining table with his mirth, \"No idea really, only that a long time ago it was said that one of my ancestors stole it from some evil wizard, and that it was the most valuable treasure in all of existence.\"\n\nI nodded and began laughing too, if only to keep from crying, \"I know the story actually if you would like to hear it.\"\n\nJason's family assembled together and nodded in unison for me to start telling the tale. So I began the only way I knew how:\n\n\"A long time ago, there lived a poor boy in a bad town...just like it usually goes. However, despite the cruelty of the world, the boy believed in the goodness of those around him... That is, until one day when he was walking with a girl he loved more than anything in the world, they were accosted by a group of jealous men. You see the girl was the most beautiful of anyone else in the whole world. She had hair as red as fire. These other men, angry at the naive boy's good fortune to be with this angel, stabbed the boy in the chest and left him for dead as they took the girl away...\n\nThe boy, dying on the side of the road, prayed to God for salvation...but what came was no angel...garbed in white and pale as a ghost, he stood out from the fields of emerald grass, and he stooped low next to the dying boy. He said, 'Quite unfortunate, you dying...what has God allowed to happen to you, poor child?'\n\nThe boy on the brink reached up to this pale and hollow creature, the being smiled, 'If you like, I can give you the strength to get vengeance on those evil men, and even more, I can bestow upon you many lives and powers...'\n\nThe boy...stupid boy...nodded with what little strength he had left. The being reached into the boys chest and pulled the damaged heart right out. The heart mended itself, and the strange being grabbed two stones, and encased the heart into them. The boy, suddenly jolted upwards. He was once again alone sitting in the field, with only a facsimile stone heart next to him. He moved his head next to the strange stone and heard his steady pulse, rented-a-tent.\n\nHe walked back to the town, where he found men sitting in a bar, his beloved nowhere to be found. He covered himself in cloak, and obscured his face. He sat at the table adjacent to the bad men, and listened to them gloat how they had taken the girl, and murdered her and the boy. He listened to them speak of the horrible crimes they had committed. Just when the boy could handle it no more, he jumped up, and using the power given to him he brought forth horrible creatures from the abyss and dragged each man to damnation...it was only the last man he let live long enough to tell him where they had hidden what was left of the body.\n\nAgain, the boy went to the body, and using his phenomenal powers he raised her from the dead. Still as beautiful and flaming as she had been in life, but never as happy. The boy used his powers to accrue great wealth and power in an attempt to appease his dearest, but no matterf what he did, she never again smiled. \n\nIt was because by raising her, he had pulled her from Heaven and no Earthly delight could compare...at least that is what the storytellers say. Regardless, the woman, seeing the harm her once dear love caused with his great power, conspired to stop him. Using her quick wit and resourcefulness, it did not take her long to realize the stone heart was the source of the boy's power; it was what kept him alive too. So, as the boy made his daily attempts to make her smile, she spoke with great guile saying, 'I need only your love to be happy. If you were to give me your heart, so that I may hear how it beats only for me, then I might once again smile.'\n\nThe boy, having felt empty since he had made the deal, was desperate to see his beloved smile in the hopes that it might move him as it once did. He gave it to her in this oaken box without second thought. Quick as a flash, the girl struck the necromancer across the head and fled from their home.\n\nThe peasants that the boy had subjugated with his power eventually rebelled when they realized he had lost his power and set fire to his castle. The necromancer was thought to be dead, but that isn't possible. You see, it is true that fire can hurt necromancers, it is one of the few things they can feel (or so they say)...But the necromancer can only be killed if his heart were to be destroyed.\n\nOf course you might think that the women would do it, and the sorcerer himself must have waited in misery and fear, waited for the women to finally end his life. But she apparently never did...perhaps she still loved her boy, even after all that time, or perhaps she just couldn't bring herself to kill someone.\"", "638 years. 638 years I have wandered the land, in search of the sole material possession that matters to me. I have crossed deserts so wide no mortal man could hope to make it through without the relentless sun scorching away his very skin. I have hiked up mountains so large that even the precious air those putrid bags of flesh require to breath fades away. I have walked along the bottom of vast oceans, stepping over the wrecks of ancient ships, and traversing the pitch-black floor of the seas with only my burning vengeance to guide me. For years I have searched, with no end to my quest in site. Until now.\n\nMy latest search brought me into the heart of a dense jungle, to the supposed home of an all-powerful seer. The last seventeen I visited failed me, and were dealt with in turn, but I have heard promising tales of the power this seer possesses. They say he is an ageless being, one who has existed since the dawn of time. Men in nearby villages swear their ancestors traveled to the seer in times of crisis, and received the answers they were seeking.\n\nI have never known of such a mighty power other than mine. In 638 years, I have not felt this close to finding my heart. New flames of determination stroked the embers of my fury at being stripped of my power as I forced my way through the jungle, finding a small hut in a clearing at the center.\n\nAs I approach the hut, a small, hunched over man opens the door and stands there, warily watching the cloaked figure walk towards him. I am careful to hide my face, as my skeletal appearance does not make my journey through the land any easier. The man, dressed in rags, appears to be very old, with a thick, silvery beard reaching all the way to his feet.\n\nWithin a few strides of the man, I stop. Hours pass, as the two beings removed from the punishments of time watch one another.\n\nEventually, the man raises one bony, yet steady hand, and stokes his beard.\n\n“You are the first guest I have ever received without seeing years in advance.” He croaks out, his very words sounding ancient, as if their sound could crumble apart before reaching my ear. “ Care to come in?” The man turns around, and slowly walks into his hut.\n\nAs I follow him in, my eyes take in his odd decorations. The entire hut consists of a small room, with a wooden table in the center, and two chairs on either side. The walls are lined with different oddities. I recognize many different farming tools, as well as jars of herbs, dusty tomes, small and large gems alike, and many other trinkets.\n\nWith a seemingly large effort, the man pulls out his chair and sits down, gesturing to the opposing seat. As I take my seat, he leans forward, staring at me. “My offering is the same to you, as it has been for the man before you, the woman before him, and everyone who has ever come to me in seek of wisdom.” He leans back, gesturing to the odd tools and trinkets on display around him. “I will give you what you seek, in exchange for something you find useful. I will except any item, as long as I don’t already own one.” Tilting his head to the side, he waits for my answer. Slowly, I nod in confirmation. Content with that, the man reaches into the folds of his rags, pulling out a small, jewel-encrusted box, and places it on the table between us.\n\n“When I remove the lid, you must whisper into the box what it is you wish to know, and only then shall your answer be known to you.” The man explains.\n\nWith a careful, practiced motion, the man reached over, and gently removed the lid from the box. I lean down, bringing my face within a hairsbreadth of the opening of the box, and peer inside. For the first time in 638 years, my lips twitch, and slowly form a malicious grin.\n" ]	3
One rule. Neither the mother nor the child can die during the story. Otherwise,have at it.	[WP] A pregnant teenager and/or teen mother's experiences during the zombie apocalypse.	[ "Richard. Every time I hear the name my heart begins to beat faster. A couple months into my and Richards perfect relationship was when the \"virus\" started spreading. Scientists in an undisclosed lab somewhere in the United States were experimenting with a hormone that could cause aging to be slowed down. This was very experimental and very volatile. As fate would have it one of the research techs disposed of the byproduct and the hormone got out. The side effects of this was a primal reversion of the brain. This reversion would cause humans to seek out any food source they could, even other humans. The reversion also caused the humans to feel nothing, emotionally or physically. \n\nRichard seemed like the perfect man up until this living nightmare happened. It was every man for himself, and in my and Richards case I was the man and he was the coward. I still had love for him, but wished he would be more courageous. I wasn't afraid to fight them. I learned early on that if you were able to separate their head from their body it would render them useless. Eventually the head would give up and die. It helped to have proper tools. \n\nMy favorite place to go was the Home depot. They had lots of great tools, but day by day everything started to diminish, and I had to find a new place to go. Wal-Mart it was. Most of the food was gone, along with batteries and other basic survival gear, but unique things remained untouched. I decided to grab a pregnancy test along with a box of condoms on the way out. We had fooled around a little bit before the incident, but it had been a little bit and I had better be safe than sorry. \n\n\"Richard....I'm...\" I paused looking at his face. He couldn't protect me, how could he protect... \"I'm pregnant.\" His eyes widened and a huge dorky smile struck his face. How were we going to do this? I couldn't fight while pregnant, and he wasn't going to protect me. We needed to find a group. It wasn't safe, but it was the best chance. \n\nAfter eight months of group hopping we finally found a solid group in the north east. A lot of the Zombie population had been killed off, so it was safer up there. One of the members of our group was a Doctor, which was another reason why I chose to join that group. It was almost time for the baby to be born, and we needed to find an old hospital. He didn't need electricity, but he did need the tools, and you could only find them there. \n\nWe stationed almost the entire group outside the hospital, and only a few inside. We weren't worried about an attack, as this hospital was in an old low population town. I went into labor and everything was going flawlessly. I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Her name was Brianna. As she cried I held her tight, knowing that I had done the unthinkable, I had given birth during the apocalypse. That beautiful thought was shattered by a loud bang. A gunshot. Something was wrong. \n\nThe doctor told me to wait in my room, and of course Richard also waited. Minutes felt like hours as the moaning of the Zombies got louder and the gunshots became less frequent. The next thing I knew there was pounding on the door, they had made it to the room. I moved, ripping the stitches in my newly sewn belly. Brianna began to cry and that only irritated them more. I took everything in me to stand, but I managed to do it. Richard began to hyperventilate. He wasn't ready for this, and neither were Brianna and I. \n\nThe door began bulging and cracking under the weight of the zombies. Richard raced to the bathroom and smashed the mirror. He held two pieces of glass in his hand, blood dripping from both palms. \"I...I can't let you and Brianna die. I've never been brave, and I'm sorry. I love you.\" He Raced to the door opening it and running into the horde of zombies. \n\nRichard. Every time I hear your fathers name my heart beats faster.\n", " When I became pregnant at the tender age of fifteen, I was scared. I very was scared, not because I would never have been able to have a social life, or because I wouldn't be able to go to prom or graduate high school. I had no fear of ridiculing stares from my fellow students, or disappointment from my parents. I was scared because I was bringing a child into a world of the living dead. There was no hospital to save me from complications, nor was there epidurals to numb the pain or a sterile room to deliver my baby. \n\n The father of my baby was taken by the dead just days after our child was conceived. It was our last night together before a week-long looting party. It was intense, emotional, as we knew it may have been the last time we saw each other. A week later, when the party returned, there were two men missing, and my love was one of them. \"Where is he?!\" I begged frantically. \n\n\"Melissa,\" one of the men said, \"He, he's gone.\"\n\nI had never cried so much in my life. A month later, and my period never came. I knew his child was growing inside of me. \n\nThere were about forty of us in our group, and we were split among two large houses in the ruins of a suburb. Two ladies prepared a room as my labor began. One was a former nurse, the other use to be a dental assistant. They brought me into the room and lied me on the bed. They had made every attempt to provide clean sheets, warm wash water, and rags for my benefit. I had to remain quiet as I pushed, so as to not attract the dead. Somehow, I managed to bite down on the rag and make but small grunts. It was a girl. As I held her to my breast, I knew I loved her. Her name would be \"Haven\". \n\n As Haven grew into a toddler, I found myself even more protective of her. She could not run, play, and scream like a normal child. She had to remain quiet, never more than fifteen feet from my side, lest she be taken by the dead. She was quick to learn, luckily. She was rarely allowed outside of the house which we had fortified, and only within the fence we had built when she did. As much as I tried to protect Haven, she had a curious spirit, which I admired. I was but a child myself, raising another. She would often climb the trees in a safeyard, attempting to climb the fence many times before I stopped her. \n\n I took her into the gardens with me to teach her how to work the soil, though she grew bored. She found a rat that one of our cats had killed. Rather than shying away from it, she picked it up. \"Mommy, look!\" she exclaimed, \"I found a dead rat!\" She inspected the dead animal.\n\n\"Yes,\" I responded, \"The cats kill the mice and rats so they don't eat our food.\" I was shocked by her curiosity with death. As a toddler, I would have shied away from such a sight. I reminded me what very different world she was growing up in. She has been around death since the moment she was born, quickly hushing her so she wouldn't attracted the zombies. While many of us were still sickened by the putrid smell of decay that was everywhere, Haven was accustomed to it, because it was all she ever knew. \n\nThere was once that I feared losing her. A hoard had come through, knocking down our barricades and infiltrating our houses. Haven and I were in the gardens when it happened. When the hoard came, she ran into the forest. I began to run after her, but a man who was with me stopped me, flinging me over his shoulder. \"There is no time to find her!\" he said. I tried to escape his grasp as he ran back to the house. We took shelter on the roofs of the houses, out of reach of the zombies. From the roof, I looked out past a sea of the dead, into the forest, scanning for my daughter. No sign. I took one whole day and night for the hoard to pass. \n\nAs the other members of the group began repairing the damage to the fences and fortifying doors and walls again, I escaped to the woods to find something left of my daughter. I had little hope. As a scanned the bear caves and forest floor, I heard a child's whisper. I heard it again, louder this time. \"Mommy!\" she called. It was my Haven! She was nestled safely in a large forked tree. I reached my arms to her as she climbed down to the safety of her mother's loving embrace. \"I was scared! I climbed up the tree so they couldn't get me!\" \n\n\"Oh, Haven. Are you hurt? They didn't bite you, did they?\" I asked, checking over her body. \n\n\"No, I was in a tree, silly!\" she replied. Her half-heartedness shocked me, given that what I saw had petrified me. I took her back to the houses to aid in the rebuilding. Haven would have much to learn, but I had no doubt that she would do fine in this crazy new world. " ]	2
	[WP] Write the tale of an innocent monster (think Neko) being killed by or killing in self defense a monster hunter. Then rewrite the story from the Hunters point of view.	[ "Everything faded away from me. The colours, the faces, scenery, sounds but mostly my own feelings. It all happened so quickly. One moment i was there looking out for my friend and then next i was nothing but another body laying on the cold stone ground waiting for death to take them away.\n\nWhat made me so different? Why did they hate us so much. Was it my tail? My constantly dilated eyes? Or was it something deeper than just my appearance? Would i ever know, in this shallow world it could have been anything.\n\nThe last few moments, memories flooded back into my mind. The times as a child running and playing, back when nobody thought any different. Or maybe they haven't been corrupted yet.\n\nTears flowed down my cheek as i tried to reach my arm out to my friend. \"May are you okay?\" i whimpered. There wasn't anything to lose anymore. She wasn't here and i full well knew it.\n\nJust earlier that day, the laughs and smiles as we traveled thought the town. We should of known better... No i should of known better. But it seemed so safe lately. Was this their plan?\n\nA scratch upon my soft cheek, blood running down my arms and a knife stabbed into my heart. The last few seconds. This was it, game over. Why did i leap out to safe her? Why didn't i hide away, lead her away. It didn't do anything.\n\nEmotional pain became physical, leaving me on the ground with aching in my heart as i bleed out with my vision fading out. \"No! No! Not yet! Please not yet!\" i called out as countless more tears made their way across my cheeks. \"I don't want to die yet!\" i called out before everything i knew was gone.\n\n----------------------------\n\nSearching for these creatures was hard work. They weren't idiots. They knew how to hide away, disguise themselves and even steal. It made work a pain in the ass and this wasn't an exception.\n\nGot my navy boots on, weapons prepared and a goodbye message left for my workmates. We done this daily, it wasn't certain that we'd be coming back. These monsters had to dealt with and it was our job, our safety was threatened and we had to do something.\n\nI walked around, thought the woods, the swamps, nearby villages but mostly the towns. I caught a glance of a mint tail. There was no mistaking it she was one of them. The high pitched laugh, the partner in crime besides her. Their mint and sunset tails brushing against each others as they walked forwards. Head shaking, leg twitches and freckles on their tail.\n\nThese monsters couldn't be here! Who knows what their capable of! What they stole from us! How they refused our company and rules. \"Your tails should be covered in public areas!\" I yelled out towards the two. Startling them and sending them off running.\n\n\"Goddammit another one of those days\" I thought as i began rushing out after them. Rushing past store clerks, shops, tourists and young teens. As i took my knife out and reached in for the mint coloured monster. Grabbing her by the hand and pulling her towards me. Her short black braided hair brushing against my skin as she easily got pulled towards me.\n\n\"Get off her!\" the sunset coloured monster called out as she leaped towards me, almost landing on top of the mint creature. Out of shock and fear i stabbed her in her heart, watching her collapse to the ground in tears as the other watched. She was hesitant, almost trapped in where she was standing. I cut at her throat before walking away.\n\n\"They'll bleed to death\" i thought as i looked at the two over my shoulder. \"This job doesn't pay me enough for me to get rid of their bodies\" i said quietly to myself as i heard the crying of the mint monster.", "The Heavens are mine, and mine alone. As the cool autumn wind carries my wings through the clouds, I look back on a time when this was not so. \n\nI once shared these skies with many others. My kin laid claim to the heavens, yet we were not selfish in our ownership. Many species from many lands passed through our home. Even in my later years, every day seemed to bring with it a new face to greet my tired eyes. Now, as the rising sun shines through scattered clouds, I draw myself back to the present. \n\nI am the last of my kind, in the twilight years of my life. \n\nNow, in this year's waning autumn days, I search for food to last the coming rest. However, as I maneuver around the jagged mountaintops and glide over the lowest valleys, I fear once again this will be an active winter. Last year was such, as was the year before that. In the past, no life had to endure the winter months unless their bodies allowed it. This land has since changed with the arrival of the false beasts. \n\nI return above the clouds, and gaze upon the land once more, bathed in the light of the rising sun. I begin to ponder what could have been had we abandoned this land. My thoughts are cut short by a swift object flying past my head. I almost miss it, but catch enough of a glimpse to understand. The sound they make, much like the wind blowing past my face but quicker, and smaller. I see for an instant a silhouette, and the distinct pseudo-wings meant to mimic our own, as if to directly insult nature itself. I know who shares these skies with me...\n\nThe False Beasts. \n\nI immediately fold my wings and plummet toward a forest of pines. The sea of green grows ever larger as I approach. Before impact, I stretch my wings once more and pull up, gliding low over the pine forest. I hear an impact behind me, and a vocalization I know too well: death. \n\nSuddenly, I feel an impact on my skin. I cry in pain as the False Beast attached to my back pries apart my scales. I spin, rise, fall, duck and weave through the mountain range once more in an attempt to dispose of my attacker. This works to no avail, and I feel the blade sink deep into my neck. I cry out once more, and fall. My back now faces the earth. As I fall, I look to the sky, witnessing a herd of the false beasts and their sky demons approaching. With this sight I realize my time had ended. The land I and many others once called home will soon belong to these takers; these destroyers of order and peace. \n\nWith this realization, I inhale, then exhale. A wave of heat rushes over my body, and then blackness....\n\n___________________________________________________________________\n\nThe Heavens are mine, and mine alone. I glide effortlessly through the clouds as if it were instinct. I think back to before the expedition, to home, where Luna and I would race each other across abandoned farmland in our own wingsuits. Back then, they were new. Now, almost everyone owns a wingsuit. They became popular when we found the Highlands, especially among hunters. \n\nToday, Luna and I are gliding above Juntara, the largest known mountain range in the Highlands. Even though we're on a mission, and the entire expedition fleet is only a few miles behind us, I feel more free than I ever have. I look to my left, into Luna's beautiful sea-blue eyes, and her flowing brown hair. Even with a cold autumn breeze assaulting my body, I forget every problem I've ever had looking at her. I almost don't hear her when she speaks to me. \n\n\"You enjoying the view?\" she asks. \n\n\"You have no idea,\" I reply without thinking.\n\nShe giggles, \"Hey, first to the valley over there?\"\n\nShe points to a valley far in the distance. Only a few vestiges of what might have been prosperous life remain. \n\n\"You're on.\"\n\nLuna tucks in her arms and dives to gain speed. I almost do the same, until I see the dragon below her. Before I can scream, she flies past its head and strafes to the left. The dragon's head follows, but she avoids its sight, I hope. She extends her flaps once more and returns to my level. We maintain a steady speed, trailing the creature. \n\n\"Look at the size of him,\" I exclaim as I continue to behold the majesty of what we're seeing. \n\n\"He's beautiful,\" replies Luna, \"I thought dragons were gone...\" \n\nI begin to worry, \"Luna, we should go back to the expedition. They need to know there are dragons here.\" \n\n\"What if he's the last one? I wanna follow him for a little longer...\"\n\nI hesitate, but finally give in. The dragon didn't see us, or care enough to find us.\n\nSuddenly, the dragon folds in its wings and dives toward the ground. Before I can say anything, Luna follows. I panic and fall behind them. As we gain speed and lose altitude, not one of us changes course. \n\n\"Luna, pull up!\" I scream. I don't think she can hear me, \"Luna! We're too close!\" \n\nThe dragon extends its wings effortlessly and glides close to the pine forest beneath it, the trees bending to the force of this god. I extend my wings and glide over the forest as well. I turn my attention to Luna, who doesn't extend her wings in time. She spins and impacts the top of a tree. I witness her back bend around the tree, and her lifeless body fall into the forest below. \n\nI turn my attention in front of me, to the dragon. Hot tears flow down my face and are blown off by the wind. I utter no words, but instantly decide what to do. I push my chin down on a button on my chest, and powder on my back ignites. For a few brief seconds, I fly through toward the dragon at an unimaginable speed. I bring myself up, and then eject my wingsuit above the dragon. I catch a scale on its neck, steadying myself on the back of the enormous sky demon. \n\nWith all of my might, I peel back a scale from the dragon's neck, and tear it off. The dragon howls in pain and attempts to throw me off. He spins, dives, and flies erratically in every vain attempt to dispose of me. Once he steadies, for just an instant, I have the opportunity I need. I grab a knife out of my belt and raise it high above my head. Saliva and tears fly from my head as I scream, rage fully consuming my mind like a parasite. I drive the knife deep into the soft, leathery skin of the beast. \n\nThe dragon does not cry, but instead screams. The scream it utters is like nothing I have ever heard before. He begins to fall and flips upside down. I release my grip, knowing this is the end for me as well as him. As I look into the sky, I witness the arrival of the expedition fleet. Airships and wingsuit gliders dominate the horizon. As I look on, I feel an intense heat beside me. I don't bother to look, but it instead appears in my vision as a fireball, on a course for the expedition's capital airship. Then, the tops of pine trees enter my sight for a moment, and my world turns to blackness....\n\n\n\n \n" ]	2
	[WP] Having recently been rediscovered as a science, magic is now becoming an important part of life.	[ "Mind over matter.\n\nThe old man moved his piece of chalk over the blackboard slowly and carefully. With an energetic swing, he completed drawing the 'r' and turned to face his auditorium. \n\n\"Mind over matter\", he repeated to the sea of faces in front of him. \"This is the most basic principle underlying all of the arcane sciences. This is what you must understand. This...\", he cast a glance across the young faces before him. \"...is the basis for humankind's prosperity.\"\n\n\"I know that most of you are interested in the fancy stuff. Demonstrations of power, firestorms, thunder and lightning, levitation. But there's a reason why this class is part of every single curriculum at our university.\"\n\nThe professor began walking away from the blackboard. \"The history of the arcane sciences can teach us a lot. And it has to, because if we don't learn from the experiences of the past, we will make the same mistakes over and over again. And make no mistake, the arcane has always been dangerous.\" He reached the end of the podium, turned around and walked into the opposite direction. A couple of eyes followed his movements, but most of his students looked bored.\n\n\"Not all of you will listen, of course. And those who won't will pay dearly.\"\n\n\"Some of you will burst into flames,\" - a jet of flame erupted from his desk and was accompanied by shocked ohs from the students.\n\n\"Some will freeze to death\" - a student in the first row who had been typing on her smartphone suddenly noticed she couldn't move her trembling hands anymore.\n\n\"Some will simply disappear into the vastness of the universe\" - a small portal opening for a half-second over the professor's desk showed a glimpse of a planet with a purple atmosphere and twelve moons.\n\n\"So, now that I have your attention, let me give you some words of advice: Listen closely.\"\n\n\"Let's begin.\" He turned his back to the students and walked into the middle of the podium. \"Mind over matter.\" The piece of chalk began underlining the words on its own.", "Beat. \n\n\n\"No see, its finger twitched a bit. Try again.\" \n\n\nBeat. \n\n\n\"Definitely getting there. Try again.\" \n\n\nBeat.\n\n\n\"Ahh, there we go. Yes sir, you were dead.\" \n\n\n\"23rd Century, I see? Yes, yes. It was illegal at the time, yes, but the COUNCIL is a tad bit more liberal now.\" \n\n\n\"Now class, reanimation is a basic skill that requires little to no catalysts--\" \n\n\n\"Now sir, please. I'm having a discussion over here--\" \n\n\n\"Yes sir, those are genuine dragon scales sir. The discoloration is from the nuclear bomb the dragon came in contact with, sir. Yes, we won sir.\" \n\n\n\"Now class, reanimation is quite the powerful spell, but one must always--\" \n\n\n\"Yes sir, that is the genuine article. Yes sir, that mysterious slab came from a benefactor, sir. I believe he liked to wear black a lot, sir.\" \n\n\n\"Now reanimation is not limited to human beings, mind you. One could also reanimate, say, inactive mechanical--\" \n\n\n\"Sir, put that down. Sir, there are malevolent energies trap--\" \n\n\n\"Sir, SIR. The Department Head will not hear the end of this--\" \n\n\n\"Shit, it's eaten little Carter--\" \n\n\n\"YOU, girl, fetch the prefect immediately. Yes, NOW.\" \n\n\n\"Class, if you would please activate any emergency wards.\" \n\n\n\"Very good. No, don't worry about little Carter. Yes, gather the bones. We'll patch him up later.\" \n\n\n\"Now class, single file please. And in an orderly fashion, move out of the portal carefully.\" \n\n\n\"Hm? Yes, yes. Another Reanimated 23rd Century corpse has gone mad again.\" \n\n\n\"Now class, what did we learn today?\" \n\n\n\"Yes, aside from the fact that 23rd Century Wizards are mad with power?\" \n\n\n\"Yes, a Necromancer must, I repeat, MUST always have a Glove of Unsightly Energies on hand.\" \n\n\n\"End of discussion. I guess we break for lunch.\" \n\n\n\"Now to reanimate little Carter...\"", "\"Nurse 50cc of Wolfsbane please,\" the doctor held out his hand expectantly. \"And I need some suction on this stat!\"\n\nThe nurse placed a syringe in the doctor's hand and muttered an incantation while holding her hand over an open wound in the patient's abdomen. \n\n\"I need this guy alive doc,\" said an imposing man with a gun on his hip standing back in the corner of the operating room. \n\n\"I understand that Detective Mallory, and I assure you we are doing everything we can,\" the doctor's irritation was plain in his voice. \"Now if you will please let us do our work without interruption the patient will have a much better chance.\"\n\nDetective James Mallory leaned back into the corner he was standing in, resting against the wall. He was tired to the bone and any opportunity to take some of the weight off of his aching feet was more than welcome. \n\n\"Ok the worst of the poison has been neutralized. It was alchemical in nature, just as I thought.\" The doctor was talking to a couple of med students observing the procedure. \"I will now perform the Anderson Resuscitation Incantation, and we will close the wound with a poultice of Angel Bark and Blood Creeper to draw any lingering poison away from the wound.\" \n\nThe doctor mumbled some words that Mallory didn't pay attention too, and the man immediately coughed and spluttered while beginning to breathe again. The detective had seen countless spells performed with dramatic results, but every single time he saw someone gesturing the somatic components or mumbling some esoteric incantation a large part of him expected nothing to happen. Maybe he wanted nothing to happen. The world had changed so much in the last ten years and James Mallory was still living in a simpler time when magic and alchemy still belonged in fantasy. \n\nThe med students and nurses left the room, leaving only the detective and the doctor along with the very much alive, but unconscious patient. \n\n\"The wound itself wasn't fatal.\" The doctor explained as he methodically washed his hands of the man on the table's blood, \"Whatever weapon inflicted the wound was laced with a very dangerous alchemical poison. Whoever attacked him wanted him to die slowly. If you hadn't found him his flesh would have slowly grown necrotic starting from the entry point of the wound, until he rotted completely from the inside out.\"\n\n\"They were trying to send a message Doc, it is not uncommon in the kind of circles this guy ran in.\" Mallory had walked over to look at the young man on the table. He looked even younger in the harsh fluorescent light of the OR than he had in the dark gutter where Mallory had picked him up. \n\n\"When can he be woken up? I have some questions I need to ask him.\"\n\n\"Well, he has been through a lot. The resuscitation spell I cast on him is very taxing. I would give him at least 4 hours until we try to wake him up if you want to get anything useful out of him.\"\n\n\"Alright, thanks doc. I'll be back.\"\n\nMallory walked out of the ER and across the street to a coffee shop he knew was nearby. He had been getting to know the area around the hospital pretty well these days. \n\n\"Hey big stuff, what'll it be?\" A heavily made up waitress asked with a flirtatious lilt to her voice. \n\n\"Just a cup of joe Marie, need to kill some time.\" Mallory said.\n\n\"You got it babe,\" Marie grabbed a coffee pot and began pouring into a dingy porcelain cup that looked like it used to be some shade of white once upon a time. When the cup was full Marie replaced the pot on the coffee maker, and it was just as full as when she had started pouring. \n\n\"That's a new one. Little replication spell I learned through a correspondence course,\" Marie was beaming with pride. \n\n\"That is quite impressive. You do that for all the customers or just the ones you like.\" Mallory smiled in spite of himself. \n\n\"Nah, I save it for special occasions. To be honest it still takes a lot out of me, but the course says that the more you practice the easier you gets. Like exercising or something.\" Mallory's keen eyes noticed that the waitress had developed the slightest of tremors in the hand that she poured the coffee with. \n\n\"Well I am truly honored, but don't go killin yourself on account of me.\" Mallory drank his coffee slowly and made small talk, but his mind was on the man waiting for him back in the OR across the street. Someone was trying to send a message, but who? There were plenty of gangs in the city who had started to dabble in magic and alchemy especially. Alchemical substances had replaced most of the street drugs that the gangs used to push because they were more potent, and easier to manufacture. That also made them far more dangerous. \n\nMallory made his way back to the hospital and headed for the OR where his person of interest was waiting. As soon as he entered the wing he could feel something was off. The hallway felt cold and the fluorescent lights seemed dimmer than when he left. He approached the double doors of the OR and heard voices inside, it sounded like the doctor, but the other voice was unlike anything he had ever heard. It was deep and rumbling and sounded like two voices speaking at once. \n\n\"Where is detective Mallory?\" The voice growled.\n\n\"Ach.. I, I don't know. He should be coming back any moment...\" the doctor's voice was strained, it sounded like he was being choked.\n\n\"I'm detective Mallory, who is asking?\" Mallory drew his sidearm and shouldered open the door. He had seen a lot of disturbing shit in his years working the streets, and even more in the past ten years since magic started finding its way into the criminal underworld, but the sight he was greeted with chilled him in a way he hadn't ever been before. \n\nThe nurse who had been working on this patient earlier was only recognizable because he head was still intact. The rest of her body had been turned into bloody chunks and strewn about the room like some macabre Jackson Pollack painting. The Doctor was suspended several feet above the ground, with his arms grasping at a long black tentacle that was wound around his neck. The patient was no longer a man, but some kind of eldritch horror, all swirling appendages dripping what appeared to be pure darkness. In the center of the writhing mass two eyes, fiery and red, stared directly at Detective Mallory. \n\n\"It is good to see you Detective. I have been watching you for quite some time now, and I must say you are even more impressive in person. Most men cannot bear to look upon any of my physical manifestations.\" The things eyes flicked towards the doctor and Mallory could see now that his eyes were no longer eyes, but rather bloody holes that dripped some kind of dark ooze. \n\n\"I wanted to send you a message, but you left before my host could awaken so I had to amuse myself in the meantime.\"\n\n\"You sick fuck, who the hell are you?\" Mallory kept his gun leveled right between the glowing eyes, a cold rage began to build inside of him. \n\n\"I am nameless, but you may call me whatever you wish. Your fellow humans have ushered in a new era with their wanton use of the arcane arts, and yet you still live in the past. Perhaps that is why you interest me. But enough rambling. I have left you a gift, at the 23rd street wharf. Go and find it.\" \n\nMallory felt a foreign force intruding on his mind. It pushed at his will, compelling him to leave the hospital and go look for the \"gift\" the creature had mentioned. He steeled himself and dug in the heels of his mind. He had kicked his drinking problem 5 years back, and that had nearly killed him, this weak compulsion was like a feather trying to knock over a brick wall by comparison. \n\n\"I'll go take a look at what you left for me, but I am going to send you back where you came from first.\" \n\nMallory squeezed the trigger of his revolver six times in the blink of an eye, burying all six rounds right between the things glowing eyes. It screeched producing the most horrifying sound Mallory had ever heard, and knocking him to his knees with the pain of it. As it screamed the disgusting dripping tentacles seemed to dissolve and melt, and be absorbed into the center of the black mass until finally the light of the glowing eyes went out and the darkness disappeared, leaving behind the young man the thing had possessed with his blood and brains leaking out of the six bullet holes in his forehead. \n\nMagic or not, cold steel it seemed could still get the job done. \n_______________________________________________________________\n\nHope you liked the story, if you want to read some more check out /r/ka_like_the_wind ", "\"It was through automation that man made things move. It is through magic,\" a twist of the mage's hand, and streams of light wove through the air into the runes engraved on the golem, \"that we make things dance.\" The golem's eyes flickered an eerie blue, faint but visible. The stones it was carved out of cracked as it began to rise at the amazement of the lecture hall. Each joint was embedded with a specific rune, and as the golem stepped forward, they sprang to life in vibrant color.\n\n\"Welcome to Magic Assisted Automation. This is a class where you will combine your knowledge of advanced robotics with the elements of magic, to push the boundaries of what the physical world could not advance alone.\" The mage stepped out behind his podium, his newly pressed robes hanging neatly from his shoulders. His salt and peppered hair was tossed around with precise carelessness, a style befitting a professor of one of the Colleges of Combined Sciences. He strode around the golem, studying the carefully carved runes of the golem, talking to the class with his back turned to them. \"Open your books to the first chapter, 'The Modern History of Magic and Movement'\". Clean cracks of unopened books filled the room, but the sound of the awakened golem could still be heard against all the noise.\n\nThe mage continued admiring the work of the golem, waving his hand to and fro, his sleeve flapping in the still air. \n\n\"It was not until the discovery of magic that we have been able to progress our science further than where we had been before. What was the furthest point of robotics before the advent of Magic?\"\n\nA small voice chimed in from the crowd. \"Hydraulics and micro-robotics.\" \n\n\"Correct. We had made advancements into the start of robots, and their basic, human-like movement.\" He knelt quickly near the knee runes, and touched them in a specific pattern. The runes rotated clockwise, and the engraving illuminated intensely. The golem began to walk around fluidly, as if it had known how to walk from the very start.\n\n\"Without the advent of magic, we would be discussing the fluid dynamics needed to push and pull this creature's legs, simulating life. Instead, with magic, we give it life.\" With a quick snap of the mage's fingers, the runes dimmed, and the golem ceased its movements. He turned around, and returned to his podium, satisfied in his control over both the golem and the class.\n\n\"Now, enough of the charade. Let us study where we once were, to find out where we are going.\"\n\n-----\n\nThis is my first writing prompt response. I hope you enjoyed it!", "\n\n\"It was a big shock to the scientific community when Dr. Stitches discovered, what would become the building blocks of the maGIC we use today.\n\nStitches was trying to repeat Rutherford's famous gold foil experiment to find something new about the way we see atoms. But, instead of using the traditional thin gold foil, he thought to use a ferrous zinc complex. And beyond the foil he had place a piece of coal.\n\nThe results were far from what was expected. The alpha rays in presence of the ferrous zinc complex hit the piece of coal to create a carbohydrate, known as maltose.\n\nHe was shocked, since the amount of energy required to do this would be much more than the alpha rays he had passed. \n\nWhen he tried to publish his findings, he was mocked but when he performed the experiment again the top scientists were baffled. His apparatus was checked for any malpractice. Dr Stitches got a Nobel Prize in physics for his discovery.\n\nIn the following years, many scientists attempted to recreate other experiments with the help of the ferrous zinc complex, rechristened as Stitches' Reagent. The results were extraordinary.\n\nWithin a decade of Stitches' Experiment, the world's scientists have perfected the way to create specific compounds, namely the ingredients of major foodstuffs. \n\nWorld hunger practically ended within five years, as the production of food by this method was cheaper than farming.\n\nAfter 4 decades, another scientist, Mr. Shawn had discovered how to levitate objects with a slight change to Stitches' reagent. \n\n3 decades after Shawn's discovery, the first flying car was launched. Another 20 years later, a flying car didn't even raise a glance.\n\nBy this point, the rockets powered by Shawn's Compound, had reached Jupiter in a year.\n\nAnd here we are, 500 years later, at the spot where the first Jupiter Landing happened. We all owe our progress to Dr. Stitches' and Mr. Shawn's work.\" \n\nA hand rose at the back of the group of children, who had come in for the Museum Tour.\n\n\"Mr. Jones, is this the same man whose name was given to our planet?\"\n\n\"Yes, Johny. The very same.\"\n\n---------------\n\nMy first prompt response. Tell me what you think.\n\nI couldn't think of a good ending. Sorry.", "I need to get out of this bar before I puke. Why do people cram into small, dark clubs just to overheat and spill alcohol on themselves?\n\nI stepped out through a side door, into a dimly lit alleyway littered with trash and cigarette butts. I noticed a young man to my right, fumbling around with his pockets and cursing under his breath. He noticed me and smiled, lightly jogging up to me.\n\n\"'Scuse me, think you could spare a light by any chance? I left my lighter at home,\" he said, extending a cigarette somewhat bashfully.\n\n\"That's a bad habit, you know. Maybe this is the universe giving you a sign that you should quit,\" I scolded him. I'm 37, and he couldn't have been older than 25, so he looked like a puppy that'd been caught stealing food. \n\nI started chuckling and held out my hand. \"I'm just messing around, kid. Here you go.\"\n\nHe stared blankly at me, looking at my empty hand. \"Umm...sorry, I need a light. Like, a lighter for my cigarette.\"\n\n\"Put it in your mouth and cover it with your hands like you normally would, I'll light it for you.\"\n\nHe looks puzzled, but followed my instruction nonetheless. I snapped my fingers and sparks scattered from between my middle finger and thumb; a small blaze now rested in the palm of my hands. Unfortunately, in his shock, the cigarette fell from his gaping mouth and landed in a puddle of muddy filth.\n\n\"Wh...how did you do that?\" he asked me, completely incredulous. \"That was amazing! I'd heard a little bit on the news about the 'science of magic' making a comeback, but I thought it was like card tricks and stuff.\"\n\n\"Thankfully, we've discovered something far more useful than card tricks,\" I said with a smile. \"I'm actually one of the leading researches in the field. So far, I can wield fire, lightning, and if I try hard enough, I can animate certain objects.\"\n\n\"Wait- you can bring things to life?\"\n\n\"Well, yes and no. They have the intelligence of a housefly, unfortunately. We can't really get it past there, but we're still working on it. Magic as a whole has really become important to our world; everyone can benefit from it's usage. Some people are working on trying to separate blood from toxins, or zap cancer cells. There's a huge amount of potential lying around here.\"\n\n\"I don't understand, though- where did it come from? How did you guys figure it out?\"\n\n\"It's hard to explain briefly. Essentially, a new element was discovered buried deep in an ancient Mayan ruin- they must have found it and thought it was a God or some such- and we found that it has some sort of property that interacts with humans. It allows us to form control over other elements at will, to a certain degree. We're still trying to learn more about it; we don't even have a name for it right now. We just call it 'Myst'.\"\n\n\"Seriously, this is the coolest thing I've ever heard of in my life. Say, mister- you're one of the scientists, right? Could you take me on as an intern or student or something? I'm a bartender right now, and it's really lame. I want to do something worthwhile in the world, something exciting. Please?\" He looked at me, batting his eyelids like a moron. \n\n\"Well, we could use some help with experimentation...if you promise to stop making that face at me, you can meet me at work tomorrow and we'll see what use can be made of you.\"\n\nHe began to jump up and down, shouting with excitement and kicking mud up all over himself. A bit got in his mouth, and he desperately tried to wipe his tongue off to no avail. \n\n\"Alright, kid, I gotta get going now. Meet me at this address tomorrow at 9:00 AM sharp- wear something nice.\"\n\nI left him to his retching and left for my car. I've always wanted to be a teacher.\n\n---------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nWhere am I? Am I...awake? Ahh, I feel life burning within me again....yes, this is no longer a mere dream. How much time has passed since I was sealed away? No matter...humans are always fools, tinkering around with what they should leave be. I'd better get going if I'm to thank the mortal that rose me from my slumber just to taste the wonder of magic once more." ]	6
	[WP] You're murdered in cold blood and Death comes to take you. Problem is, it can't. Now Death is absolutely terrified of you, maybe it thinks you want its job, but you're just some guy, right?	[ "By the end of the text I realised that I am the one who's supposed to have been\nmurdered in cold blood. Nice blunder. Still decided to submit it tho, maybe somebody will still like it.\n\nMy hands slide off Dave's throat, wrists still pulsing from the adrenaline rush. I\nwas panting like a wild dog. \"Fucking prick,\" I say while gasping for breath. I lift\nhis dead body and throw it out the window. \"You just had to eat all of the yoghurt, huh?\"\n\nI stomp towards the wardrobe and change into something more comfortable.\nAn hour later there I am, sitting by my laptop and browsing /r/writingprompts. I'm skimming through whatever people came up with, when suddenly I hear a knock at the door.\n\nI tilt my head back - I was just reading the best story ever - and sigh out loud. \"Who the fuck is it?\" I yell.\n\n\"Mhtul G'zish\" a stream of hundreds of voices of lost souls reply. Pissed as I am I storm off to open the door and what do I see? Some weird ass motherfucker in a black cloak.\n\n\"What'd ya want?\" I snap at him.\n\"Followeth me,\" that guy replies under his breath.\n\n\"Whatever, dude.\" I go back inside and this guy, this guy just follows me.\n\"Yo, dude\" I start him off. I take a deep breath and remember how I had promised my mum to try and control my anger issues and not lash out at strangers. I force a smile up my cheeks, bright and happy, and politely ask the stranger: \"Would you like something, guest?\"\n\n\"Thy soul, mortal,\" he says with the voice a hundred demons again. \n\nI turn around and just stare. Just stare at this useless pile of dark cloth.\nAnd what does this guy do? He just stands there like he owns the fucking place.\nHis long, bony arms seem to have no end. They are covered by the thin layer of cloak, precisely accentuating his lack of lifting. He holds a scythe in his hands and just gazes into the room. I swear. He just awkwardly stares like that friend who's waiting for you to get ready to go out with him.\n\nBlack steam rises from the bottom of his black robe, etching away at my pet rabbit's cage. Just, you know, melting the bars and letting that little manic shitter run around, like whatever. \nAnd what does Mr.Rabbit do first, of course? Fuck up my mac's charger. These chargers are a buck on a dime, trust me, you they are as expensive as a charger could possibly be.\n\nI grab that bloody sonova by its ears and twist its neck. \"Good job,\" I say to that cloaked asshat. \"You just killed Mr.Rabbit.\"\n\n\"Dude,\" the cloaked guy says in shock. \"You got issues. I definitely did not kill Mr.Rabbit\"\n\n\"How dare you call him by his name right after you killed him?\" I snap at that fucker. \"You didn't even know him!\"\n\nSuddenly, the voices start talking to one another as this weird guy scratches his head. \"I think I got the door wrong,\" he says and makes his way for the exit. \nI lunge ahead of him and shut the door in front of him.\n\n\"Yo.\" I look at him, he's already visibly anxious. \"You're dead.\"\n\nHe just stands there, nervously shifting his weight from one leg to another like a little brat who got caught stealing from the cookie jar.\n\n\"You killed Mr.Rabbit,\" I remind him again.\n\n\"C'mon steve, ^let's ^get ^the ^fuck ^outta ^here,\" a voice in him says to another.\n\n\"I wouldn't be a friend if I didn't avenge him now. Would I?\"\n\n\"Thou hast just killed two innocents, mortal, why-\"\n\n\"Don't talk to me like a retard.\"\n\n\"Okay, sorry, but, why do you, like, kill people all the time?\"\n\n\"I might just like it, mate. What, you got a problem with that?\"\n\nHe levitates around my room and talks to himself. I don't mind, I go the kitchen and browse through my collection of kitchen knives.\n\n\"All right,\" he finally says, concluding his thoughts. \"You can have it.\"\n\nI'm casually walking back to him with a nice sharp knife in my hand.\n\"Seriously, just, have it if that is what your soul is longing for.\"\nI just start stabbing - he just flies around trying to dodge me.\n\n\"Is it not what you yearn for?\"\n\n\"I have no idea what you're talking about,\" I say as I slice through the air while trying to cut a motherfucker up. \n\n\"I just want to get it over with you already.\"\n\n\n\"You do not want to be death?\" he asks in surprise.\n\n\"What? No?! Oh you thought that I...?\"\n\n\"Yeah, aha, I..\"\n\nI stop.\n\nHe stops.\n\nWe look at each other and laugh.\n\n\n\nI still killed him though.\n\n\nps. forgive faulty grammar for I am not a native speaker :)", "The explosion was meant for the local politician. It erupted out of Esteolal Rd. like a volcano, sweeping aside stone and cars and bodies. Secondary explosions rippled along the road as the petrol in cars ignited. It was all over in seconds. \n\nNylar woke up with his ears ringing and his vision blurry. There was ash around him, and many pieces of the city floating through the air. There were dozens of others around him, slowly rousing. \n\nA cloaked man was moving from person to person, touching them on the shoulder. The instant they were touched, they slumped back, and the light left them. \n\nNylar watched him closely. His movements were terse and slow and grim, full of morbid tension. His bright grey eyes gleamed from under his cloak, they were not happy, content eyes, nor were they broken, empty eyes. Death's eyes were dark, and full of resignation. \n\nOne man tried to crawl away, but he was reaped with the rest. Nylar squared his shoulders. Death approached like the rising tide, slow and certain. His shoulders were slumped, his walk had a peculiar gait to it. \n\nHis hand stretched out, white as bone and wiry strong. It clasped Nylar's shoulder... and nothing happened. Those deep grey eyes narrowed. He tried again. Nothing. \"Who are you?\" The voice of Death was terrifying. It sounded like a grindstone, old and rusty, neglected. \"I am Nylar.\" His tongue would not obey, he could not speak. He squeaked out whatever the dark told him to. Death eyed him up and down, and his voice rattled again, only now it was full of fear. \"It is too soon... they told me...\" Nylar glared at him. Death straightened his robes, and held out his skeletal hand. \"I know the Son of God, and you are not him. So I ask again, who are you?\" Nylar shrugged. \"I am Nylar.\" said he.\n\nDeath's ancient eyes narrowed. \"You are not Gilgamesh, you are not Galahad, you are not Flamels. You cannot be Merlin, and poor Tithonus was slain long ago.\"\n\n\"I am Nylar.\" \n\n\"Nylar...\" Death worked the word in his mouth, working it through his jaw. He filtered the memories in his ancient brain. The final realization clicked in only instants. \"No-\" The dark wave overwhelmed Nylar's pathetic, unprepared defenses in one strike. The man that he was died. In his place, rose Nylarlathotep. The Crawling Chaos, who was also Apothis, who was also Morgoth, who was also Typhon.\n\nA scythe slipped from Death's cloak. He moved into a combat stance. \"I thought you slain.\" said Death. Nylar's pathetic human head turned 180 degress counter-clockwise. His voice changed, becoming one of ancient knowledge, underplayed by the morbid sound of popping bones. \"You - Cannot - Kill - CHAOS.\" \n\nNylarthotep lunged, and plunged the gods into war once again. \n\nNOTE: I'm swinging wild with the prompt. ", "\"I'm sorry, I can't do this.\" Death was pale. Well, he was always pale. Bones are often pale. But he was a sickly pale.\n\n\"What do you mean you can't do this? It's your job...\" I stared at him in confusion, the hole in my temple not getting any smaller. \"I'm dead, right?\"\n\n\"Well...\" he stammered, glancing around nervously. \"How about we pretend you aren't? Like I just let you go? And we call it even?\"\n\n\"Even? What the hell are you talking about? I have a hole in my head, I'm done. It's time.\" He shook his head. A bit desperately, in fact, as he looked around for some way out. He had a piece of paper in his hand that he was folding and unfolding nervously. \"What's that?\" I asked, pointing to the paper.\n\n\"Your contract.\" I frowned. I hadn't signed any contract other than my lease and my phone bill. He must have seen my confusion. \"You signed it when you were born, you wouldn't remember. Basically it says I have to take you when you're dead and you can't fight me.\"\n\nI stared at him in irritation. \"I'm not fighting. Just end it. Take me.\" He shook his head again, vehemently opposing the idea. \"Why? Can you explain at least?\"\n\nHe stared at me curiously, as if I were mocking him. \"You mean, you don't know?\" I shook my head. \"Ah... Well... Well in that case maybe I can take you.\"\n\nI shrugged. \"Okay, that works.\" I figured I would have eternity to figure out what was up his bony butt, no need to find out now. \n\n\"No, no, never mind. It's a bad idea. Look, I'm gonna go. I'll call an ambulance for you.\" I scowled at him, using a finger to shove my brain back in through the bullet hole from which it was leaking. \"So... May I go?\" he asked gingerly.\n\n\"Why are you asking me? You're Death. It's not like I can stop you...\"\n\n\"You... You really don't know, do you?\" I shook my head again. He edged closer, reaching out a bony finger to touch me but snatching it away at the last second.\n\n\"Dude...\" I grumbled. \"You are a massive wimp. Can't you just do your job?\" He looked to be on the verge of tears and I wondered how dead tears might look. Probably little grains of salt falling from his empty eye sockets. He opened his mouth and stammered some gibberish before stopping.\n\n\"Look, man... It... It just wouldn't be prudent of me to get close to you. You're staying here.\" I shrugged, rolling my eyes at him. \n\n\"Can I see the contract first though?\" He glanced around nervously before drifting down in front of me. \"Oh. I'm your replacement?\" He nodded sadly. \"Why me?\" I asked in confusion.\n\nHe shrugged. \"A typo. God's secretary messed up the decimal point when you were born giving you a kill count of like ten million.\" I stared at him in shock.\n\n\"I... I've never killed anybody. I pass out when I see blood...\" \n\nHe gave me a resigned look. \"I don't make the rules,\" he said with a sigh. \"Big guy decides and he's too busy to fix your count.\"\n\n\"So... So just like that I'm Death?\" He nodded sadly, starting to disrobe. I glanced downwards out of habit. \"No bone?\" \n\n\"It's not actually a bone... Boner is just slang...\" He was looking at bit doubtful about having me as his replacement now. Learn something new every day, I guess. I shrugged. He handed me the robe first and I threw it over myself. It was a tight fit because of my skin and fat but I figured that would change in the next few years.\n\n\"And the scythe?\" He stared at it longingly before handing it over. \"So that's that? I'm Death now?\" He nodded sadly. \"So what are you gonna do?\"\n\nHe shrugged. \"Probably go scare some people or work in a haunted house. I'll see you around.\"\n\n*****\n\nThanks for reading! If you enjoyed this, please check out more stories at /r/MatiWrites. Constructive criticism and advice are always appreciated! " ]	3
If so, then why did they let ME join? EDIT: Glad everyone liked the premise! I'm currently writing a screenplay about it, and will be sure to keep you guys posted when its finished. ALSO Some amazing writing here! Make sure to read some of the new submissions as well, they are really good.	[WP] You get a membership to a tiny rundown gym as a present from your eccentric uncle. It takes some time, but you begin to grow suspicious: Is every member here a...super hero?	[ "It’s the decision to get in shape that matters. Doesn’t matter how you look. Besides, how glamorous can you even look in a basement-level gym in the porno district? This is a sampler of the stuff I told myself to pacify the self-conscious chatter in my head. Still, I felt unpardonably shabby as I slipped a ratty sock through the leg of my slack-waistbanded gym-shorts. \n\n\"This pass is expired, sir\". “OK, then a day pass please”. “Fourteen dollars”. Fourteen dollars? For this place? Christ - I’ve paid less for handjobs. Didn’t gyms used to offer you a free day if you faked an interest in a 6-month membership? \n\nI ambled past the side-ways steel windmill to the workout area. The equipment looked like the kind of stuff that accumulates in the basement of a middle-class household with two or more teenage boys. I grimaced, tactlessly. Do I leave now? I don’t want to insult the regulars. (For my safety as much as anything - you can never tell in this neighborhood. Besides, look at that guy’s sideburns. He looks positively feral). \n\nJust a few bench-presses, a few curls, burger and fries on the way home, then an early night in front of Netflix. I might take that burger in bed too, come to think of it.\n\n“This place grows on you.” \nI turned around. A bald man in a wheelchair was rolling soundlessly towards me along the faded rubber gym mats. \n“I guess …it has a certain mystique.” I suggested. \n“…How right you are.” The man paused a moment.\n“How about you try the bench-press?”, the man said, motioning towards the equipment. “I’ll spot you”. \n“OK”, I said. \n\nThe man looked professorial and had an aristocratic, yet unpretentious English accent. Palpably out of place in a place like this. \n\nI struggled through a few sets. \n“How about some arm curls, next?” The man in the wheelchair said. \n“Are you a personal trainer?”\n“I am a kind of trainer”. \n \nAs I finished my sets, I thanked the man in the wheelchair.\n\nOn the way out the door he yelled to me:\n\n“One more thing!”\n“What’s that?”\n“Try a salad instead!” \n\n", "Sigh, here we go again...\n\nWorkout Wednesday. I came to this run down gym on the outskirt of town. 1 hour drive from center. Basically in the middle of nowhere. I could see murder of crows as I passed by. Ragged down paint seems like a half century ago, broken pipes on the outside wall, overgrown grass in the parking lot, what is this place? The only thing you can see from afar was its name, \"The Gym\" with big bright red colored neon lamp. This place is going to close sooner than I thought. \n\nAs I step in, I can see some regulars working by. Some guys were running on a treadmill, some was lifting others paired and spar with bare hand. Seems like a normal place to hang out.\n\nI walked to the receptionist and request her assistance. Heck, I've never been to a gym, I don't want to just lift everything nearest to my hand.\n\n\"Err, excuse me?\"\n\n\"May, I help you?\" She asked with a deep questioning tone, as if I shouldn't be here\n\n\"Well, uh, my Uncle, Mr. Sanders, gave me this membership as a birthday party. I would like to join as, ah, regular\"\n\n\"Certainly.\" She answered quickly, it seems like members are regarded quite highly. \"We may need you to take a test, you know, to determine your fitness level\"\n\n\"haha, I've never been to a gym in my whole life, can you just set it to beginner level?\"\n\n\"Haha, there is no beginner level here.\" she closed her mouth and giggles. \"Wait, just try to lift this weight for 10 times\"\n\nThe most bizarre weight I've ever seen. It look like a normal weight but hollow on the grip and it only got one head, and its pointy. More like a knife with overly long hollow-grip. I grab the weight and felt a sudden warmth across my hand.\n\nFirst lift, nothing happen. It seems weightless enough for me. Second lift, yellow spark burst from the pointy edge. It vibrates slightly. Third lift, the grip starts glowing orange. Fourth lift, it getting heavy, but barely noticeable. Fifth lift, starts vibrating right now. Not to violent, but now I know how a didlo felt in your hand. Sixth lift, now it glow blazing red. Seventh lift, a sudden mass out of nowhere like an explosion of gravity pull my hand. I dropped it.\n\n\"7 lifts\" haha I guess.", "I guess the first thing that made me a little suspicious of the place was the weights. There was a whole rack of them that went up to tons. The first time I saw it, I laughed and walked over to the front desk. I told the guy at the front I loved the joke, and he looked me up and down.\n\n\"What joke?\" He asked, and I saw on his face he was serious.\n\n\"The one-\" I pointed over to the back. \"Over there, the rack of weights with the ton labels.\" He raised his eyebrows and opened his mouth into an 'o' and nodded.\n\n\"Yeah, that one! So funny. Those are just display weights, so be careful. They might break!\" He went back to his work, and I finished my workout. It took me a bit longer for the next one to come up. I was at a treadmill, and accidentally pressed the number key too long while I was looking at the sculpted butt of one of the female regulars. I looked down at it and saw it was at 30 mph. Wasn't that Usain Bolt's record? \n\nBut I just lowered it, and when I was done, decided to see how fast it would go. I never found the upward limit. After those, it was the little things, like scraps of red spandex sticking out of locker doors, and how EVERY single person there was an Adonis. The women were lithe yet buxom and strong, and the men had no undefined muscle. I suspected they could flex their tongues if they wanted. I had a lot of questions about this gym, and knew the next time I saw Uncle Kent, there would be questions that needed answers.", "Winter is almost done, and I am sitting in front of my computer scrolling through the front page of the internet. Somehow the memory of my girlfriend saying that she loves the way I'm getting fluffy came to me, I really felt a bit of discomfort about that \"compliment\" as she puts it. I reach the end of the post I'm reading and with nothing left to do, my eyes skims through my open tabs, there's a new email. I proceed to open my inbox, it's Uncle Gideon, I sigh, something about this eccentric uncle of mine really sets off something inside my head that says \"caution\". I opened the seemingly harmless email.\n\n\"Hi Sam,\n\nAs I have not been able to see you or your family last holiday, I'm emailing you my gift. \n\nIt was not easy procuring this and for an old man such as myself at that.\n\nPlease put it to good use.\"\n\nOkay...\nI'm pretty sure this is more of an insult than a joke, a gym membership for a gift? Who does that?\nAnyway, looking at the positive side of things, this might be the answer for my progressing fluffiness issue. As I really don't have anything to do now, I set my mind to go see the gym early morning tomorrow, and decided to call this a day.\n\nIt's a pretty cold morning for February, and looks like I just came ontime as I saw the light just came on inside. I pushed the door of the Neutral Grounds as the door-chime announced my entrance. The guy who was switching more lights looked my way and greeted me. \"Good morning sir!\"\n\nI answer, \"Yeah, uh, good morning\" trying to figure out what he meant by \"sir\".\n\nI wait at the front desk, and after he finishes switching some more lights and fans, he jogs towards me. He was huge, but not body-builder huge, maybe somewhere between 6 feet to 6 feet two. He greets me again \"what can I do for you sir?\" I stutter \"I, ugh. . .\" I produce the membership slip I printed this morning.\n\n\"Oh\" he says, while nodding.\n\n\"There something wrong with it?\" I ask.\n\n\"No, not at all, it's just a bit surprising...\" He says as he sits down and types on the computer at the desk, maybe to confirm if my slip was legitimate.I won't be surprised if it's not, after all I just got that from Uncle Gideon.\n\n\"May I ask, how did you get this membership?\" He asks me.\n\n\"My Uncle gifted it to me, why?\" I ask too.\n\n\"It's just that we don't send out this membership too often. May I ask again, what's the name of your Uncle?\" He asks as he stops typing and proceeds to squint at me.\n\n\"Ugh, I call him Uncle Gideon, Thomas Gideon is his full name\" I answer, though lost at where this conversation is going.\n\n\"I see, now it makes sense.\" He says while nodding at the air between us,\n\"Please go inside and take a feel of the area, we just opened and the trainers would be arriving in a bit\" He smiles as he points to the sliding doors.\n\n\"Hey, uhm, by the way, what's your name sir?\" He asks just after I turned my back.\n\n\"Sam\" I said as I turn my head towards him.\n\n\"Full name please?\" He asks.\n\n\"Sammuel Price\"\n\n\"Thanks!\" He smiles.\n\nThe area looks really neat inside, almost as if everything from the equipments to the plates and benches are all new. But it feels different, most gyms would have three to five of the same equipment so others would be able to use them. Though this gym looks very high class, it looks like the most number of the same machine here would be only two. It seems more of a private gym than a public one. I remember the something from the email \"Please put it to good use...\" Hmm.\n\nI decided to go with the treadmill first, maybe a slow pace so I can get my blood running. I fire the treadmill and set it to a comfortable jog pace.\n\nAs I was two minutes in, I heard the door-chime ringing. I turn my head to see who's coming in. It was a girl and a couple of guys.\n\n\"You know, I'm really thinking why do I even need to babysit you guys while you - hey cap!\" The guy with the Sun-glass said, as he high-fived the guy who have greeted me on the front desk.\n\nI turn back and focus on my Jog, maybe they're just some patrons.\n\n\"New guy\" the front desk guy told the three while tilting his head towards my direction. \n\nI pretend not to see, but I look at the mirror and all four of them are staring at me. I feel their eyes creeping on my back and up to the back of my head.\n\n\"New guy huh?\" exclaimed sungalsses.\n\n\"New, or new-new?\" the girl asked.\n\n\"Apparently, it's a case of a new-new\" front desk guy answers.\n\n\"That's a first\" says sunglasses.\n\nI wonder how long these people are going to talk about me like I'm from outer space. I'm thinking about how rude they are and if they are the said trai - \"Hi there\" the girl suddenly appeared beside the treadmill almost knocking me out of it by the sheer force of my shock. I held on the bars and stopped the treadmill when sunglasses appeared on the other side.\n\n\"Hey kid\" sunglasses says as he leans on the treadmill arms and bites off a huge chunk of his donut.\n\nI really am very distracted right now with this pretty girl, and the donut.\nI managed to jump out the treads so I can stand on a much stable ground. When the front desk guy appeared behind me. \"Hey, c'mon guys, take it easy on the new guy -\"\n\n\"That's still easy if you ask me hahaha\" says the other guy, now sitting on a nearby bench also having a donut.\n\n\"Anyway...\" front desk guy says as he pats my head.\n\"That girl is Natasha, this guy here is Tony, I am Steve, and that guy sitting over there is Bruce, a friend of your Uncle Gideon\"\n\n\"Gideon.. you mean Glo-\" As Bruce was interrupted by the door-chime.", "My mother has always relished this story from my childhood. According to her, I was capable of miracles as a mere six month old baby. During a stroller run around Lake Lynn, my mom fell, causing her to break her leg, leaving my stroller to keep rolling down the path. My poor mom had to sit and watch as the stroller fell down two flights of stairs only to plummet into the lake below. Tears formed in her eyes; cries escaped from her mouth. All she could do was watch as her baby drowned from the hilltop. My mom had given up hope, until a miracle happened. Arising from the bubbles, my little head popped out, and starting whizzing its way around the lake. The half year old child was actually doing laps in the water! The preceding story describes the origin of my childhood nickname coined by my mother, the “Natation Newborn”.\n\nNatation is a really snarky word for “the art of swimming”. I have done my best to live up to my decorated childhood label by making swimming my sport and hobby of choice all through grade school. Something about swimming exhilarated my senses and made me feel almost supernatural. Now as a senior in high school, college afflicts my psyche daily. Many colleges have reached out to me offering swimmer scholarships, but I want to make sure I can pursue swimming as a career, and not take these offers without careful consideration. I want swimming to be my number one priority. \n\nMy uncle has always said I am something special, and, for a graduation gift, he gave me a membership to a gym he used to go to back in the 60’s. My uncle is… eccentric to say the least. He was the kind of fella to wear a tinfoil cap on his head and warn the United States of an alien crisis. Though he has many fallacies, he always seemed to have an interesting intellect to him, similar to how old people can solve crossword puzzles faster than I can open the paper but they can’t remember where the backdoor is. Regardless, my uncle had described the pool at his old gym to me before and how it had an ornate nature to it that he guaranteed I have never seen before. The school day couldn’t have gone by any slower as I anticipated my first day at the gym. \n\nRight when school ended, I began the arduous drive to the gym. It lay in an odd part of town, an area I hadn’t been to very often. The GPS kept losing signal, and I got lost several times. Upon arrival, the place was not what I was expecting to say the least. The gym didn’t seem very popular. It was stuck in between a flower shop and antique store downtown. The entire area was crafted from dull brick. The setting reminded me of the gym in the movie Rocky. I cautiously exited my car and proceeded to enter the building. \n\nAn old man was managing the front desk. The man resembled an aged Stan Lee, which made me giggle a little to myself. The entirety of the front desk and surrounding walls were covered in comic strips, which was certainly very ironic considering who the man resembled. Grunts could be heard from the back rooms most likely coming from gym goers. I was honestly surprised anyone came to this gym. \n\n“Hello sir! I have come here to redeem my one month subscription to your gym.” The old man lifted his brow and held out his hand in silence. \n\n“Oh, you need the badge? Sorry let me get that for you.” I quickly reached into my pockets and fumbled around until I found the badge presented to me by my uncle. The badge was crafted from a dull steel, with the letters JSA carved onto it with a patriotic silhouette of an eagle or some other noble bird in the background. I quickly placed the badge in the man’s palm to which his eyes lit up and a smile stretched across his face.\n\n“Yes, you are in the right place my friend! Please right this way.” The old man turned around and stripped a comic strip from the wall behind him revealing keypad to which he inputted a series of numbers. The desk lowered, revealing a staircase to a basement. I, in utter astonishment replied:\n\n“Wait sir what’s going on...” \n\n“All will be explained in due time, please follow me.” As the man finished his sentence, my legs seemed to move on their own as I followed him into the basement. I knew this was sketchy; I knew this wasn’t right, but for some reason I followed him downstairs. \n\nThe basement was completely dark. I had to hold the man’s hand as he guided me through the dark labyrinth beneath the gym. I should have been frightened and quite honestly panicking, but for some reason I remained calm. I kept hearing whispers all around me. “Is he new?” “He seems powerful?” “I wonder if he’s fake”. I heard the voices in my head but I could hear them clear as day. As you can probably tell, I wasn’t in the mood for questioning what was going on. After a couple of minutes of walking, the man sat me down into a velvet chair and began to ask me questions.\n\n“Why have you remained calm throughout all of this?”\n\n“I am not sure.”\n\n“But you must be! It is irrational to follow a stranger into his dank basement, why do you think you followed me.”\n\n“I don’t know, I could feel as if I could trust you.”\n\n“Precisely my boy, now that isn’t by coincidence. You see, I have a gift.”\n\n“A gift?”\n\n“Yes a gift that allows me to calm other humans into a state of pseudo-submission.”\n\n“Like a super power?”\n\n“Yes.”\n\n“You can understand why I would have a hard time believing you correct?”\n\n“Boy, do you know what JSA stands for? The letters on the badge your uncle gave you?”\n\n“No, not a clue.”\n\n“Well, JSA stands for Justice Society of America.” As the man finished addressing the society by name, the whispers became louder, all praising the name of the JSA. The man continued his explanation.\n\n“The JSA was a league of super heroes committed to defending America during WWII during the Golden Age. I am sure you have heard of Superman and the Flash, both of them were alive during the Golden Age of comics during the 40’s. The Silver and Modern ages are both nonsense, made up stories, but the Golden Age was true.”\n\n“You are telling me super heroes are real?”\n\n“To an extent yes, and I am here to tell you that they pass down their powers to their descendants.” To this the whispers began to slowly turn into screams. All of them glorifying me, calling me powerful and magnificent. They voiced clogged my head coming from every which direction. \n\n“My head! It hurts!” I screamed as the voiced consumed my every thought. The main smiled.\n\n“You must learn to control your powers.”\nOn that note, the lights turned on. I was surrounded by aquariums full of fish.\n\n“Dammit I’m Aquaman.”\n", "Furiously chewing on a wad of gum which had long since lost its favor, Marco studied the door in front of him. 1325 Brickyard Lane, same as on the applications he had signed the day before. There was no sign, no window, not even a name, just the rusting steel address hanging over a dully painted steel door sequestered between a cafe and some boutique. With a sigh of frustration Marco rubbed at his brow and fumbled for his cellphone. \n\nHe found the number on the second page of the application, right after a \"discretion\" clause on the contract. After the recommendation he had been given, Marco understood why a gym like this would want to handle some of its details with delicacy but this was ridiculous. \n\nThe phone rang twice before someone picked up.\n\n\"This is Adam, how may I help you?\" He sounded like someone in those razor commercials. \n\nMarco nestled his phone between his neck and shoulder. \"Yeah, I'm looking for a gym. The address says 1325--\"\n\n\"Brickyard Lane,\" Adam finished for him. \"Must be your first time. So where are you right now?\"\n\nMarco pursed his lips. \"Starting at a door that says 1325 Brickyard Lane, but I don't see a gym here. Is there another Brickyard around here or something?\"\n\nAdam laughed. It sounded like flowing honey. \"No, you found it. I'll have someone come get you in just a minute.\"\n\nMarco blinked at looked at the door again. So it was one of those kind of gyms. At least, he hoped so. \n\n\"Just grab a seat. Laura will be out for you soon, Mr. . . .?\" \n\n\"Torres.\"\n\n\"Very good sir.\" The phone clicked. \n\nSlipping his phone back into his pocket, Marco eased himself into an uncomfortable metal chair set at a matching table and set his gym bag at his feet. Unease teased at his stomach as he stared across the waterfront at the Space Needle and the distant peaks of the Olympic Peninsula behind it. Uncle Manny was certainly wealthy enough to gift him membership at a high end club and had talked up this one quite a bit. That said, Manny also could have a cruel sense of humor. And if there was one thing that Marco did not like, it was being made to look like a fool. \n\nA cool breeze blew across Lake Washington, tickling at Marco's face and threatening to blow away the papers he had set down on the greening surface of the table. \"Mr. Torres?\" a clear, high-pitched voiced call from behind him. \n\n\"Right here!\" Marco called back, scooping up his bag and application as he sprung to his feet. She was tall, almost as tall as Marco, with flawless pale skin and her golden hair cut into a irregular bob. What really struck him, though, were her eyes. Blue like the ocean at Cancun and glinting with intensity. \"Laura, I presume?\" Marco asked.\n\n\"The very same,\" she said with a small grin which betrayed her brilliant teeth. \"This way, please.\" She held the door open and ushered him inside. \n\nMarco sniffed as the two walked down the narrow hallway. This place was old, from the cracked plaster on the brick walls to the carpet which at one point must have been green to the stale scent of dust mixed with sweat and cleaner. \"Manny, I'm going to kill you,\" he muttered under his breath.\n\n\"Who's Manny?\" Laura asked, looking over her shoulder. \n\nMarco blinked. \"He's, uh, my uncle.\" Must have good acoustics in here, he reasoned. \n\nShe gave him a double take. \"Wait, Manuel Torres?\" She asked, beaming. \n\nMarco tried not to squint at her. \"Yeah, that's him,\" he said slowly. \"How do . . . \"\n\n\"Oh, he used to come here all the time, before he retired that is. I only got to see him twice myself, but he was a blast to have around.\" She cocked a knowing eyebrow as she enunciated \"blast.\" \n\nWhat the hell is going on? Marco thought, not daring to say it aloud. He returned her radiant smile with the best forced grin he could manage. \n\n\"So are you taking up his old shtick or do you have your own thing? I know his son isn't in the business and I always wondered if he was going to pass on the torch.\"\n\nFinally a normal question. \"Uh, no, actually. Last I heard he still--\"\n\n\"Laura!\" a deep, gravely voice pierced through the still, dusty air. \"I need a spot! Now!\" \n\nThe young woman pressed a cream-colored hand to her mouth as she stifled a laugh. \"Sorry, you'll have to tell me all about it later. Just follow me through the door and check in with Adam, he'll set you up.\" With that she ran to a set of double doors and slipped inside. \"There's not need to shout,\" Marco heard her say as the door swung shot before her. \"You know I can . . . \"\n\nMarco stopped in front of the double doors. They had fancy brass knobs which had been worn down to a oily shine. That unease in his belly was back, stronger than ever. He looked back to the end of the hallway. He could just leave. No one was here to stop him, he wasn't even registered yet. Just tell Manny that he had gone and didn't like it and he'd be out, easy as that. Except . . . \n\nRetired. That's what the girl had said. But uncle Manny wasn't retired, not even close. If anything, he did more with his bee farms than before. Hell, he'd just set up a deal with some big farm conglomerate to have his bees pollinate half the farms in Yakima county. So what was she talking about?\n\nMarco took a deep break, gripped the smooth brass knob with an unsteady hand, and stepped through the double doors. ", "So I’ve been working out for almost a year but I’ve been at this gym my Uncle recommended to me for about 3 months. It’s kind of a dinky place, a real hole in the wall you know? But it’s on the way home from the University so I figured I could check the place out.\n\nI just started my first set of bicep curls. I haven’t seen much progress. I do a lot of reading on weight lifting on websites and such but I guess my problem is that I don’t eat much. One of the regulars here, Dan, told me I gotta eat like 150g of protein at least. Holy shit, I’m not eating 15 eggs a day. Dan’s a douche anyways. \n\nI’m looking around in the dimly lit gym, everything seems gray in here. With one wall being covered in mirrors, I can see everybody in the gym at one time. One dude is squatting in the corner. Jesus, is that like 1000 pounds? What a fucking maniac. He’s got like tree trunk legs. And then there’s another guy benching 600 pounds like it’s nothing. How much free time do these guys have? \n\nFirst set done.\n\nI take a breather and watch some guy named Marcus on the punching bag. He does a few combinations on the bag and splits it wide open- again. Sand gets everywhere and he goes off to go get a broom. Come on dude, if he is so into boxing why isn’t he at an actual boxing gym? What a show off. Oh great here comes Annie. Some Goddess of a woman in yoga pants. She’s so sexy it should be fucking illegal. But she’s never once taken off her headphones to talk to me. Maybe if I got huge like Marcus… Aw fuck it, I’m never getting huge.\n\nSecond set done.\n\nSuddenly everyone is crowded and clapping around the TV mount up on the wall. It’s a newscast about the Justice Squad! North American Chapter of course. Helicopter footage captured them stopping some wannabe super villain in the city just yesterday. Crush Man and The Ace use their super strength to massacre an evil robot army, while Master Fist and Princess Karma evacuate civilians. Then there’s the leader, Admiral Apex takes down the villain with ease. It was incredible.\n\nAdmiral Apex is interviewed by some pretty reporter lady. His strong chin and thoughtful eyes behind his mask say everything you need to know about him. He answers a couple questions and excitedly reports there were no casualties taking down the villain. Then he says his signature sign-off, “Stay Righteous!” What a hero. How I wish I could be just like him. Someone who saves the day, someone who is making a difference with their strength. \n\nSoon the newscast is over and everyone goes back to their workout. Oh great, Dan just walked in. \n\n“Hey man! What’s up!” He greets me with a sincere looking smile, and shakes me hand. \n“Hey dude! Not much!” I flash a smile back.\n“Alright good to see you! Stay righteous, my man.” He says as he walks towards the locker room.\n\nUsing Admiral Apex’s sign off… He must idolize him too. Maybe all these guys take inspiration from the super heroes. Now that I think about it, they are all wearing Justice Squad logos on their workout gear in some fashion or another. If they can get big, maybe I can too. I pick up my weights, motivated to go as hard as I can on this last set. \n\nThird set done. \n", "Delbert liked this gym. He'd never noticed it, and probably never would have noticed it, what with the weird way it was situated in the corner of the stripmall. He'd been talking with his boss one day about joining a gym and his boss had given him a card for the gym and, written his name on the back. They had said that they had a waiting list for new members when he'd first walked in, but he'd shown his boss's card and that had been enough to bump him to the top of the list. He guessed that was one of the advantages to working for one of the largest nuclear test labs in the country.\n\nHe'd been coming regularly and today he was going to set a new PR, a new personal record. Today was his day. Today was the day he'd been working for, he wasn't just a guy who was great with marketing, today was the day he maxed out the bench press machine at 400 pounds!\n\nDelbert sat down on the bench press. The guy before him had been a huge muscled man, but he hadn't even been benching all that much, just like 350 or so. Today was Delbert's day, though, today he was going to press 400. He'd warmed up earlier, benched a little, did a few other exercises, waited for that rush of energy to hit and he was feeling good right now, baby! He was ready for this!\n\nHe reached over and adjusted the weights to 400, the highest it could be set to and positioned his hands. Ok, on the count of 3. 1. 2. Come on, baby, you can do this! 3!\n\nAnd the weights didn't even budge. They might as well have been bolted to the floor. It was like he was a little child attempting to pick up a whole car, this shouldn't be happening, he should at least be able to rock the plates, what was wrong with him?\n\nAnd then a large hand entered his vision and he looked over to see the big guy from earlier.\n\n\"Hey, hold on a moment, let me adjust those weights for you. I'm really sorry, I had it set on the x4 multiplier, let me crank that back to x1.\"\n\nThe big guy reached down while Delbert's arms went slack and adjusted a lever that Delbert hadn't noticed before.\n\n\"Now you got it!\" the big guy boomed and Delbert's arms immediately tensed.\n\nYeah, he did, he had it! As he pushed up at the ceiling, Delbert could feel his pecs and his arms straining, like they were on fire, like they were about to explode, but he was doing it! And as he reached full extension he shouted for joy and the big guy joined in too, \"Yeah, yeah, you got it!\"\n\nHe let the weights drop most of the way so nothing broke then he let his arms drop all the way. The big guy reached down and he reached up and they gave a fist bump. \"That's the way, man, you got it, you keep doing you.\" Then the big guy turned and walked off towards the locker room.\n\nDelbert lay there, thinking about how awesome it was that he'd finally hit his goal, the top plate here, but what was that the guy had said? He looked over at the little lever that he hadn't noticed before. But if that had been set at x4, and the guy had been pushing 350, and the world record for bench presses had been... wait just one minute.\n\nHe looked around him, at the exercises that people were doing, all of the \"high rep low weight\" exercises that he'd thought everyone was doing, but compared it to the size of their muscles and asked himself just how likely it was that nobody seemed to be trying to push their max weight up, especially if all the machines had a little lever like that. And the guy running on the treadmill, or sprinting rather. Just how long had he been keeping that pace up?\n\nWas this, what sort of people were they?\n\nSuddenly he heard a muffled explosion come from the locker room. A moment later a series of clicks came from the front door where the front desk attendant was locking the door and flipping the sign to closed while steel blinds began to roll down from the ceiling over the windows. The big guy came out from the locker room, a sportsbag in his hands, thick black smoke billowing out of the bag, then he threw the bag into the middle of the room.\n\nIndustrial fans in the ceiling, the same ones that had always lazily turned and kept the little gym smelling great suddenly kicked up to full power, sucking the smoke up out of the room.\n\n\"Doctor Philosopher struck again!\" the big guy shouted.\n\nDelbert looked around the room. Nobody else seemed surprised.", "Nope, definitely not superheroes. Why do you indulge yourself with these flights of fancy Steve? And here you go talking to yourself again,\" said Steve, wiping away the opening quotation marks as to throw off the reader, \"Thats okay, you're surrounded by naked old Eastern European guys, you need the comfort.\"\n\nSteve left that gym knowing he was not likely to return, as roughly 2/3s of gym membership holders never do. It would be nice to tell people he had a gym membership though, Steve thought, and perhaps that was the true gift his uncle had given him... that explains why the gym was so shitty.", "It was my 18th birthday, and it was already off to a crazy start. I'd gotten a bunch of cards from family, a few presents from my Pops. And a card from Uncle Teddy. I hadn't seen him in several years, and it was just a rule with Uncle Teddy: Even if you think you know where he is, you don't find him, he finds you.\n\nUncle Teddy used to be in the CIA. The whole family knows, it's the worst kept secret we have. He never talks about it, but we know he's seen some shit. He's got at least two bullet scars that we know of, one through his shoulder and one in his leg. We're pretty sure he was involved in foiling a major bombing in Canada, of all places, and I know for a fact that he's a master pickpocket. He gave me a stern talking to after holding up the small bag of weed he stole from me. He'd somehow lifted it from my zipped, inside jacket pocket while shaking my hand and giving me a hug. He'd even put the zipper back up.\n\nUncle Teddy retired after a lifetime of service, and opened a small kickboxing gym in Tribeca, of all places. I'd gone by to check it out once, but couldn't get in. We figured he was leveraging his CIA connections and it was open to mostly agents and spooks, because there were no windows or signage, just a door marked 'Teddy's Gym' with a keycard swipe. The envelope from Uncle Teddy contained a fairly generic 'Happy Birthday!', and just such a keycard with the gym name, and a cryptic message: \"Lifetime membership. Tell no one. Be polite. No questions.\"\n\nI was dumbstruck. It was classic Uncle Teddy: Terse, deliberately obtuse, and open to interpretation. Did I just get a lifetime membership to a gym full of secret and not-so-secret agents? Secret Service? Was it going to me and a bunch of old retired spooks? Did 'tell no one' include Pops? Dammit, Teddy. Curiosity was ransacking my brain like Mongols invading Coney Island, a riot of fantasy and wonder. Maybe I was being invited to train as a secret agent! I looked down at my gangly frame, not fully into my father's height or brawn. Or maybe Uncle Teddy just wants to poke me in the ribs like Nana Consuelo does and thinks I could use some more meat on me. I grabbed my gym bag and threw on some pants, I was dying to find out.\n\nI bounced out the door and hiked a couple of blocks up to the A train, which would run me right into lower Manhattan, maybe three or four blocks east of the gym. I probably looked like some kind of junkie, unable to sit still, tapping my feet, glaring impatiently at the signage and the train doors and the people holding up the train. I practically sprinted up to the street when we got to the Chambers Street stop. I got to the top of the stairs and collected myself. Uncle Teddy's warning to 'Be polite' was rattling around in my head. Get it together, Tommy. You don't want to be some goggle eyed kid who irritates everyone by gawking or being nosy. Settle down, be cool. You're an adult now. Adult harder.\n\nIt took most of the walk from the train to get my act together, but my nervous excitement was like walking on electrical current. I stood outside the door and stared at my keycard. \n\nI swiped the card, and the door unlocked with an unspectacular buzz. I pulled the handle and stepped inside. I had no idea what to expect, and that was probably a good thing. Just inside the door was a small room, with a small man, sitting behind a small desk. Reading a small book. He looked up at me as I stepped inside, and watched the door as it closed to make sure it latched. \n\n\"Can I help you, son?\" He had the tone of someone who knows full well he probably isn't going to, since you obviously don't belong there, but he's asking anyway because he's dying to hear what bullshit you've got.\n\n\"Uh, h-hello, I'm Tommy, I mean, Thomas. Uncle Teddy gave me a membership for my birthday, I'm here to work out.\" I held up my access card like it was a shield.\n\nA single eyebrow twitched, the sole change in the man's expression. He looked at me, my card, my gym bag, his eyes the only motion. \n\n\"Really.\" He dogeared the corner of his book, a well worn copy of David Eddings' 'Pawn of Prophecy' and deposited his book in the top drawer. I wanted desperately to know if there was a gun in there. Maybe a sawed off shotgun under the desk. No, wait, that's mobster bullshit, not spy stuff. Right?\n\n\"Did 'Uncle Teddy' tell you the rules?\" He stood up, not that at it made much difference. He was barely five feet tall, if that. Wiry frame, thinned hairline. Probably retired himself, just like Uncle Teddy. Oh, just like Uncle Teddy. This man can probably kill me without even getting blood on his sweater vest.\n\nI swallowed. \"Uh, yes, yes sir. He said, 'Tell no one, be polite, no questions.'\"\n\n\"Did he.\" The man inhaled, let it go, like he was toying with a heavy decision. \"Teddy's gym, Teddy's rules. If you break them, you answer to Teddy first, and me last. Got it?\"\n\nI've never been scared enough that my knees actually shook, but I don't think this guy was even talking to me, anymore. He was speaking directly to any number of pressure points, nerve bundles, each organ individually, and both knees especially. For a guy with such a diminutive stature, he was incredibly intimidating. Maybe that was just my imagination going insane. \n\n\"Yes, yessir.\"\n\n\"Follow me, pay attention. I will repeat nothing. Your card opens the front door, nothing else. Beyond this door,\" he jerked a thumb at the only other exit to the small foyer that was his dragon cave, \"there are no other locks. No one here will steal anything, and neither will you.\" He didn't ask for clarification or if I understood, he simply stated it as obviously as water was wet.\n\nHe pulled a keycard of his own from his vest pocket and swiped the reader. The door opened, and I followed him through.\n\nCool, fresh air hit me in the face. Only then did I realize that I was already sweating. The gym was well equipped, the equipment older but well kept. Treadmills, rowers, cycles, the usual machines. Three of everything, including boxing rings. Speed bags with the best gimbals I'd ever seen, heavy bags with equally heavy chains. Free weights, curling bars, pretty standard gear. In the back of the room, I could see a tumbling floor, a high bar, rings, and balance beam, just like you see in the Olympics. \n\nThe small man stopped. He didn't even look at me, he just spoke. \"Everything is how you see it. It is that way when you begin working out, it will be that way when you finish.\" Clean up after myself, got it. He pointed to the doors on either side of the room at the rear. \"Locker rooms, rest rooms, and showers are through those doors. Ladies on the left, gents on the right. Everything in there will be as you see it, and will be that way when you finish.\" He turned back toward his office.\n\n\"That's it?\" I asked.\n\nHe held up a single finger without looking back at me. \"That's a question.\" He shut the door behind him.\n\nRight. No questions. I walked back to the locker rooms, careful not to return the questioning stares I was getting from the handful of people working out. I entered the men's locker room. The guy up front had been right, no locks. No doors, even, just open places to hang stuff up and store things. No name tags on any of them, they must all be general use. I changed into my workout clothes, nothing more complex than basketball shorts and a tee shirt, and was tying my shoes when another man walked in. He set his bag down and we looked at each other for a moment.\n\n\"You're new.\" I felt like this guy was looking through me, not just seeing some gangly teenager, but reading me like a book. His expression wasn't as guarded as the doorman's, but patently curious. He was in pretty good shape, about five-ten, maybe one-sixty, one seventy-five. More of a runner's physique than anything else, dirty blonde hair, well groomed. \n\n\"Yes, sir.\" I wanted to introduce myself, but the guy at the front desk hadn't even given me his name, and I was incredibly unsure of the etiquette here, given Uncle Teddy's 'rules.' \n\n\"Which group are you with?\" He didn't offer examples. He must mean which government agency.\n\n\"Uh, no group, sir.\" I finished tying my shoes but didn't want to just walk away, that'd be rude.\nHis eyebrows shot up. I guess I was as unusual as anything else in this place might be.\n\n\"So you're a civilian, and you're training here, how?\"\n\n\"It's my Uncle Teddy's gym, sir. He gave me a membership for my 18th birthday.\"\n\nLaughter bubbled up from the guy, the nervous sort of noise someone makes when they find out their girlfriend's dad is a superhero, an invulnerable heavy-hitter like Hyperion or unkillable force of justice like Lawbringer. He got it under control quick, but I could see him fighting a grin. \"Well, welcome to Teddy's gym. If you have any questions, feel free to ask me first.\" He placed some emphasis on that last word. \"Most of the people who train here are a bit standoffish on a good day, and might not be happy to see a civilian in here.\"\n\n\"Uncle Teddy told me not to ask any questions, sir.\" I felt like a little kid mistakenly seated at the adult's table.\n\n\"Did he? Well, that's probably wise. How much do you know about your Uncle Teddy?\"\n\n\"I know he's retired CIA, sir. That's probably all I need to know, I suppose.\"\n\nHe mulled that over for a moment. \"Yeah, that's a good rule of thumb. Stick with that, you'll be alright. Actually, tell you what, work out with me today, I'll be doing isometrics on the floor. If people see you working out with me, they won't hassle you at all.\"\n\nWho was this guy?\n\n\"Thank you, sir, I appreciate that.\"\n\nHe waved a hand at me, \"Call me Zack. Happy to be your wingman today. Any friend of Teddy's, and all that. No shoes on the tumbling floor, leave 'em.\"\n\n--- \nTackled this over lunch, gotta get back to work, I'll dive back in this evening.\n\n[Spoiler](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/344uok/wp_in_a_world_full_of_superpowered_humans_your/cqrr6j6)\n\n", "######[](#dropcap)\n\nI dropped the barbell to the ground heavily and stood back up, looking around at the empty weight room.\n\nI had finally made it to only gym in in town. It was a seedy looking place, a single story of brick in a 70s strip mall, sandwiched between a Subway and a sex shop.\n\nMy eyes went back to the only other sign of life in the gym: another bar laid out on the deadlift mat. It had been left there by its previous user.\n\nWhat an asshole, not reracking his weights.\n\nHe was a strong asshole, whoever he was. 7 plates on each side of the bar, a total of 675 pounds. A hell of a lot more that I was lifting.\n\nThanks to the move to Smalltown, USA, and the huge amount of teaching I had to do as a new professor at the local college, I hadn't been in a gym for a month. I wanted to blame my weakness on that, but even at my fittest I had never been that strong.\n\nI bent down to do another set, and a flicker of movement caught my eye.\n\nSomeone else was coming into the gym.\n\nThey were the only other person I had seen, unless you count the teenage girl at the front desk, who had run her tongue over two lip piercings, punched my card, and gone back to filing her nails into talons without so much as a 'Hi'.\n\nI flexed my fingers around the cold metal of the bar. No pressure, but don't look like an idiot.\n\nOut of the corner of my eye, I saw my companion stoop down at the bar next to me, the one loaded with enough weight to win most competitions.\n\nOne.\n\nWe lifted in near-perfect synchrony, my bar hitting the ground a few milliseconds sooner.\n\nTwo.\n\nMy own weight was heavy, near my record. I could feel my back muscles straining with the load.\n\nThree.\n\nFour.\n\nI was going for five repetitions, but suddenly I decided to keep up with the newcomer. It was not a competition, but it had become one in my mind.\n\nFive. Six. Seven.\n\nMy back was starting to bend under the load. I knew it was stupid, but I was too far in to stop.\n\nEight. Nine. Ten.\n\nThe other guy let his bar touch the ground with finality, and we both straightened up. I turned to face my competition and blinked in surprise.\n\nIt wasn't a guy.\n\nShe was attractive, maybe early thirties. Auburn hair, pale skin, and piercing blue eyes.\n\n\"Hi.\" It came out in a croak between gasps of air. Not my best first impression. \"I'm Tom.\"\n\nI wiped my hand on my shirt, and held it out.\n\n\"Hi,\" she said. She shook. \"You can call me Mystique.\"\n\n---\n\nRead more stories about beautiful villains at [r/jd_rallage](http://www.reddit.com/r/jd_rallage/).", "Oh, you've got to be kidding me.\n\nI stood before something that was - no, used to be a two-storey building, but was now just a slab of grimy, dirty, naked concrete. A war had probably waged out on the second floor - a huge section of the wall facing me was missing, and it exposed a charred, black interior, like the aftermath of an explosion or fire. There were piss marks all around the lower level too, like some sick display of urine-graffiti. To add a little more weird to this decor, a little kid who looked barely five years old was sitting near the dirty entrance door on a little blue plastic chair, and he was - no kidding - reading a newspaper with the bored, lifeless expression of an office clerk.\nSurprisingly enough, those were not my concerns.\n\nNo, my concerns were all related to a piece of glossy paper that I was clutching in my hand. This glossy paper was \"gifted\" to me by my uncle Brad.\n\nLast week, my uncle Brad came to visit me. Talking to uncle Brad is like trying to speak with a kid with ADD playing Super Smash Bros on a Coca-Cola induced sugar rush. He came in with his long unwashed hair, stooping through my bedroom door with his tall, wiry frame while wearing round shades, a pink vest (inside out) and disgusting, mustard yellow yoga pants. You see, he's one of those guys who pick up a random hobby for a week, get super into it, and then ditch it, like a nasty ex-partner. That week was yoga week for him - hence the pants.\nHe walked into my room while I was struggling to lift a heavy bag. I'm not the strongest guy in the world, or, in my uncle's words, I'm 'A pussy repellent'. \n\n'Hey, uncle Brad,' I drawled.\n\nHe flung a hand with the first two fingers forming a 'v'. \n\n'Yo, my ne-foo what's -' he noticed me trying to lift the humongous bag, and lifted it with a breeze with a single hand.\n\n'Yo man, I think you need sumathat protein and work your pecs, yaknowwa'msayin'? You need to get some guns, baby,' He said, looking around like an oversized ostrich.\n\nI groaned, internally. 'You think so?' I asked.\n\nHe didn't get the sarcasm. He probably didn't even listen to me.\n\nWith a sudden pause, he jerked his head around to look at me. Advancing towards me in a sort of menacing way, he stopped at an uncomfortably close distance. With a dramatic flair, he took off his shades, eyes peircing and looking straight at me.\n\n'I...am gonna getchoo...the perfect present,' he said, his voice almost a whisper.\n\nAnd without any warning, he spun around and took off.\n\nAnd that was that. He returned later that day, holding that very piece of glossy paper.\n\nAs he handed it to me with teary eyes, like it was Arthur's sword or something, I sighed. The paper was a membership form for \"The Supers' Gym\". And I could tell it was going to be a crappy place, because A) Uncle Brad is broke, and B) it was the tackiest, most tasteless piece of advertising I'd ever seen. Not going into any details, but even dirty hooker flyers looked like professional marketing in comparison to it.\n(continued in replies)", "The paint on the door of the Iron and Steel Gym was peeling, but it swung open easily on well-oiled hinges and opened into a neat and tidy reception area. Seated at a long low desk a young looking girl smiled at me as I entered and waved me over. \n\n“Hi there, welcome to Iron and Steel, are you looking for a membership today or just a one off workout?” She beamed at me with perfect teeth and a perfect and I began to feel self-conscious at the gut which stuck out over my waist band. Reminded myself that they always put pretty girls out front to make you feel more motivated to join. \n\nSlightly sadly she didn’t need to do her full sales pitch as I fished out the piece of paper I had printed out this morning. A late Christmas gift my Uncle had insisted, but I had a hint of suspicion that he also felt I could lose a few pounds and this was his nice way of letting me know. \n\n“Uh, yeah, I got gifted a membership here from my Uncle?” I cursed myself at making it a question, I sounded like an idiot - I should have been decisive! Her all-American beauty was making me feel almost nauseous with desire and I had to swallow hard as she reached out and our fingers brushed as I handed over the voucher – c’mon Steve, keep it together. \n\nShe read quickly, her lips moving slightly in the most adorable way. As she reached the gifter’s name her eyes lit up and she turned her full beam smile back on me. “You’re Mr Power’s nephew?” I nodded, unable to trust myself not to dribble if I tried to speak. “That’s awesome!” I pictured our wedding and wondered if our children would be as attractive with my genes pulling them down. \n\nShe reached out her hand and I looked at it for a moment in surprise, unsure what to do. “C’mon,” she grinned. “I’ll take you through, show you around and get you set up with someone to show you the facilities.” Dumbly I nodded and let her take my hand and guide me through into the gym proper, trying not to stare at her ass as we walked. \n\nThe gym was fairly small, a couple of dozen stations spread across a medium sized hall, with a water station and doors to the changing area down at one side. I was vaguely aware she was talking to me as we walked, something about towels, but it was lost on me. \n\nWe stopped and after a moment I registered the change and looked up to see her grinning at me. “Here’s your trainer, he’ll get you settled in.” Before I could react she was gone and it was all I could do not to follow her with my eyes. \n\nAt last I was able to force my attention to the man she had left me with and it took several seconds and a half step back before I was able to take him all in. it wasn’t just his size, although he was easily over six foot eight, it was the sheer volume of muscle that stood in front of me. It seemed almost to have its own gravitational pull and although he was standing still, muscles all over his body twitches, as if desperate to be allowed to work. \n\n“Hi, Steve is it?” I nodded, still dumb, but this time through sheer intimidation. “Welcome to the gym, I see you’ve met my daughter, so let’s get you changed and we can do an assessment of where you are and where you’re looking to be.” \n\nI was still nodding when he words sank in and their meaning became apparent. Daughter, he’d definitely said daughter and now a bolt of adrenaline surged through me as I revaluated my actions of the last few minutes. I decided that I needed a moment to simply recover and getting changed seemed to be my best bet, so following his finger I made my way to the changing rooms. \n\nFinally I took a proper look around as I moved. The gym was fairly quiet, but at the far end, where I was approaching, two men were working out together, both also extremely athletic looking. As I drew closer I realised that it was an older man and a younger one, perhaps forty and eighteen but as an accepting 21st Century man I made no judgement – takes all folks after all. \n\nIt was only as I drew up alongside them that it finally clicked and I stopped in my tracks and let me head slowly swivel. I’d never seen them up close but they were in the news most days and that jawline, alone with the eyes and the odd pairing, they were unmistakable the Golden Warrior and the Bronze Tiger, London’s most famous crime fighting duo. \n\nThey ignored me and some form of self preservation propelled me forwards again, into the changing room where I sat in amazement. A pair of superhero’s here in the gym – I’d never even thought about it, but they had to work out somewhere and this seemed as logical as anywhere I supposed. \n\nIt was only when I had my trousers off and was regretting my choice of gym sorts that the second realisation hit me – the huge blond man who was to be my trainer was also familiar. I crept to the door and opened it a crack and then held my fingers up so that only his nose and golden curls were visible and then pulled out my iPhone and checked the Superhero index for Mr Xtreme - it was an exact match! \n\nIt couldn’t be a coincidence, it just couldn’t be and so with a sense of growing excitement I pulled on my 5k charity run t-shirt from 1996 and strode back out, suddenly feeling more confident with my own secret knowledge. \n\nIt took less than 10 minutes before Mr Xtreme, or Ben, as he had introduced himself, had exhausted me to the point of quitting. Even on their lightest settings I was completely unable to use most of the equipment, so he had me on floor work with crunches and skipping rope, but my results were unimpressive on both. \n\nI was completely useless, but amazingly Ben kept up the encouragement, using his kind, deep voice to make me feel like each sit up was an accomplishment and each set up ten jumping jacks a major step. Slowly, as my brain shut down and my body became a numb mess of pain, I began to grow attached to Ben, until my love and reliance on him was greater than the feelings I had had for his daughter just… I checked my watch… 26 minutes ago. \n\nAt last, after an hour I was allowed to stop and Ben let me lie quietly on the floor while he and a short fierce looking man discussed something in sharp whispers in the corner. I wondered, as I passed in and out of consciousness, who else might use this gym, could it be a hang out for the whole Justice Crew? \n\nAs well as Mr Xtreme, Golden Warrior and Bronze Tiger there was the Human Arrow, Maximum Power, Sargent Force, Lady Amazing, The Underwarrior and Team Triplets – maybe they were all regulars here, maybe this was a superhero gym!\n\nSeveral hours later I arrived back home and after a short session where I covered my whole body in Deep Heat, I jumped in my car and headed for my uncle’s house. He lived in a large sprawling house on the outskirts of town with his name “Maxwell Powers” on the gate in black cast iron letters. As I buzzed at the door I wondered if he perhaps knew and had sent me to the gym as a surprise or if all this would be as much of a surprise to him as it was to me. After all, it was so blatant, no one could have possibly missed it, right? \n\n*****\n\nIf you're enjoying then you may enjoy some of the stories over in /r/fringly where we also have free cake for everyone! \n&nbsp; \n\n^^^the ^^^cake ^^^is, ^^^of ^^^course, ^^^a ^^^lie" ]	13
Idea from Nerdist podcast with Daniel Radcliffe	[WP] Batman hears about a string of crimes in London and heads over to help solve the problem. MI-6 feels this is a security threat and sends in their best agent, 007 to eliminate the threat. Describe James Bond and Bruce Wayne meeting at a Wayne Enterprise fundraiser.	[ "Bruce Wayne was in London for a Wayne Aviation fundraiser. Wayne Aviation was a subsidiary of Wayne Enterprises. Bruce was agitated that one of Earth's major airports, Heathrow, still only had two runways. The airport was a sprawling complex, which took a good 30 minutes to exit. To ensure all donors understood the massive pain of navigating Heathrow, Wayne held the fundraiser in The Hangar. The Hangar was easy enough to get into, but a world of pain and roundabouts to exit. It was time to invest into a runway expansion project, and invest heavy he did. \n\nThe fundraiser was set on a Thursday evening at 7 PM GMT. 350 guests had RSVPed yes and 300 of them had shown up by 7:30 PM when Bruce arrived, fashionably late in his black tuxedo, white shirt, and dark gray bowtie. The emcee of the evening announced his arrival at which point all the small talk in the cocktail hour ceased as everyone turned to catch a glimpse of the American billionaire and applaud his arrival. \n\nOne of the guests slightly hesitated in his applause, keen on observing Wayne's every move as he worked the crowd. He was leaning on the bartender's bar while looking at Wayne. \n\n\"Sir, would you like a drink?\" The bartender asked.\n\n\"Martini,\" the man replied, \"shaken, not stirred.\"\n\nThe bartender obliged, whipped up the drink, and slid it over. The man sipped on it and walked over to Wayne. He interrupted the current small talk going on with a slight cough, at which point Wayne looked over at him. \n\n\"Hi there,\" Wayne said, \"thanks for coming and showing your support. What's your name?\"\n\n\"Bond,\" the man replied, \"James Bond.\"\n\n\"Ah yes, I remember seeing your name on the guest list. You're here representing MI6, correct?\"\n\n\"Yes. That's quite an eidetic memory you have, Mr. Wayne.\"\n\nWayne chuckled. \"Well, I don't have much to do all day here in London, so I just read and reread the guest lists.\"\n\n\"First time in London?\"\n\n\"I've...been here before.\" Wayne replied, with a hint of a memory of Jezebel. \"Glad to be back.\"\n\n\"We're happy to have you here,\" Bond said, \"It's nice when Americans have an interest in other parts of the world and don't use exploitation of resources or missiles to achieve their aims.\"\n\n\"Tell me how you really feel,\" Wayne said with a laugh. He finished the drink in his hand in one gulp. A cocktail waiter was immediately at his elbow, removing the empty glass and replacing it with a glass of water, before disappearing as quickly as he came. \n\nWayne looked at Bond and said, \"If you'll excuse me, I have some guests to attend to. Thanks for coming.\" Bond extended a hand to shake, as if to part ways. When they shook hands, Bond brought Wayne in close, \"It's no coincidence that you and Batman are both in London at the same time, is it?\"\n\n\"I would hope MI6 doesn't rely on coincidences to pursue alleged threats, Mr. Bond.\" Wayne replied before releasing his grip and moving away from Bond.\n\n\"Is the Batman a threat?\" Bond retorted.\n\n\"According to your bureau, yes. According to the innocents being harassed and harmed on your streets, no. Maybe it's time your division focused on internal threats, instead of on those trying to help. And for God's sake, get a third runway.\"", "The billionaire had a smirk only an overly privileged man could muster. James watched him laugh with the upper echelon of London's wealthiest. Bruce Wayne may be the most obnoxious man the agent had ever seen. Bond took the last swallow of his martini before strutting to meet the owner of Wayne Enterprises, the company hosting this fundraiser, raising money for orphans of London.\n\n\"And so the owner says to me, I have twenty reservations for the weekend. I looked him dead in the eye and responded, that's twenty phone calls your hostess has to make then, before I shoved a few hundreds into his coat pocket. Needless to say the resort was cleared out for my lovely girlfriends at the time.\"\n\nBruce rattled on and on, selling his secret identity wonderfully. Bond decided it was time to interrupt the vigilante. \n\n\"Excuse me Mr. Wayne, my name is Bond, James Bond. I am the owner of Universal Exports. We..\"\n\nBruce interrupted him instantly.\n\n\"I know who you are. Walk with me.\"\n\nThe two men left the group behind before heading to the balcony over looking the city. Big Ben showed a hand past eleven. \n\n\"You're with MI6. One of their top agents no?\"\n\n\"How did you know?\"\n\n\"A man named Lucius Fox found out everything I needed to know about this country. He had you figured before you signed the guest list. I'm assuming you know why I'm here.\"\n\n\"Not exactly. You see, we know who you are, but not why you chose to come to London.\"\n\n\"A psychopath who goes by the Joker has set up shop somewhere in the slums. I'm going to find him and bring him to justice. Are you an ally? Or an enemy?\"", "The soirée was in full swing. The sounds of polite banter coupled with the clinking of champagne glasses echoed throughout the large foyer of Mercier castle. The estate was hosting a large gala event to raise funds for the charitable cause of the moment. \n\nIn reality the whole party was a cover for a black market auction taking place behind closed doors of the estate. The collective pile of politicians, celebrities and other big names made a good smokescreen but not good enough to throw off MI-6, or a certain detective who’d made a leap across the pond. \n\n An international crime syndicate had been operating relatively under the radar until a shipment of their weapons found its way to Gotham. Shortly thereafter they became the subject of a rather vigorous investigation by a certain caped crusader.\n\nMI-6 on the other hand had been chasing ghosts and rumours until their man had shaken the right tree and found out about this particular event. They had their best man on the job and specifically assigned him the task of taking out a confirmed buyer for the weapons. Bond had read over the dossier numerous times but couldn’t figure out why he had that cold feeling in his gut. \n\nThere was something about this Wayne character that didn’t line up. He had almost no criminal ties or relations and despite thorough digging he found very little on the reclusive philanthropist. Despite how he felt, he’d read over the logs and heard the audio. Wayne had been working hard to broker a deal with the syndicate to look over their inventory and see what they had for sale.\n\nWayne fit the bill of most criminal leadership anyways; reclusive fat cat living in luxury while the world around him went to hell. Bond wondered about the so called Gotham vigilante rumours, and if they ever went after the fat cats on top or just preferred to beat up street thugs. He decided he’d try to get a feel for this Wayne character before making his move. \n\nThe two had kept each other in their periphery for most of the evening. You’d never know anything was amiss and to every onlooker this was little more than another party to schmooze with politicians and celebs. The two of them were disguised and distanced from where they felt most natural, the fancy and expensive suits and watches were far from the outfits and gear they lived to work with. \n\nAfter a rather long winded debate about the nature of crime and where it stems from and a dialogue about the differences between London and Gotham Wayne excused himself from a group of people and went out to a balcony.\n\nBond still had a cold feeling in his gut but recognized this as his best opportunity, he excused himself from the lovely pair of twins he’d been speaking to - painful though it was to part ways with them. They wore dresses that were beyond flattering and hugged their curves like an Aston Martin with him at the wheel. They were cut in such a way that the designs of one were inverted on the other and there wasn’t a single man at the party who hadn’t noticed them. \n\nWayne leaned over the railing staring out across the city. He didn’t seem to notice Bond who had shut the door behind him quietly. The party was in full swing and a band had begun to play a rendition of a popular opera in London at present. \n\nBond gently reached inside his suit jacket and withdrew the pen Q had given him. When the arm of the pen was pulled upwards a dart containing a lethal and fast acting poison would be fired out of the end of it. His thumb moved towards the arm of the pen when Wayne broke the silence. \n\n“That would be a very bad move on your part James.”\n\nBond was shaken but didn’t stir from his position behind the man. He put the pen back in his jacket and took up a spot beside the man leaning over the railing. Bond defaulted to his usual charm trying to get a read on the situation. Clearly he’d underestimated this character. “I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure mister?”\n\n“You know who I am, and I know who you are 007.” He hadn’t expected Wayne’s cold and informal tone and there was a roughness to his voice that was discomforting.\n\n“Well, you are full of surprises aren’t you Mr. Wayne.” Bond’s movements would have gone unnoticed by every man at that party save for the one he now stood next to. He’d shifted his weight in preparation of physical combat and his jaw shifted ever so slightly. Wayne didn’t move a millimetre and continued to gaze out across the city. \n\n“We share the same enemy and I have no desire to fight you...” Bond studied carefully the man before him now and he felt that cold thing in his stomach began to writhe and rotate. Suddenly the rich playboy before him who he suspected of being little more than criminal seemed an infinitely more complex creature. His stature far more sculpted from battle than from a personal trainer. His large hands that gripped the railing were far too worn and marked to be that of a soft rich fat cat. \n\n“But if you get in my way I will bury you.” Wayne only moved as he spoke these words and the cold thing that churned inside of Bond’s stomach was tied to how he spoke. When he turned his head he saw the same ferocious and calculating eyes he knew from his own reflection. Worse still for all his time spent at the poker table he knew there was no bluffing to this man.\n\nQuestions felt irrelevant at this point. Since their eyes had met everything else seemed to fade. There was no animosity or juvenile bravado, the pair had become acutely aware of how dangerous the other was, and now it was only a question of who would make the first move.\n\n“Well this certainly saves me a trip.” The voice that broke the silence caused both men to snap in its direction. \n\nA tall man with beard and incredibly ornate looking suit was flanked on both sides by the twins from earlier, still dressed to kill and this time with guns to do so. \n\nBond puzzled over the bizarre scene until Wayne broke the silence.\n\n“R’as”. Wayne growled the name more than spoke it.\n\n \n\n\n\n\n \n\n\n\n \n", "\"Excuse me old boy, but I don't believe I've had the pleasure of making your acquaintance. The name's Bond, James Bond.\"\n\nJames held out his right hand, giving Bruce no choice but to shake it. To refuse at your own fundraiser would be nothing short of social defamation.\n\n\"Bruce Wayne, nice to meet you sir.\"\n\nThey held each other's gaze as they performed the greeting of gentlemen, neither man wanting to offer his opponent the upper hand. The bustling movement around them in the open expanse, the sound of laughter and violins and clinking glasses, faded into nothingness.\n\n\"So, Bruce - you don't mind if I call you Bruce, do you? - what do you make of London so far? It's always interesting to hear the thoughts of a man who's new to these shores. Especially a chap who's here for...business. To see the city through new eyes, get a new take on the ol' girl.\"\n\nBruce chose not to answer right away. Instead, he lifted the glass tumbler to his lips and took a large mouthful of Old Parr whisky, before letting out a sigh etched with satisfaction and exhaustion.\n\n\"Well, Mr Bond, I have to say it's an amazing place. So old and grand, you know. You Brits really have got that history stuff nailed, with all your museums and ancient buildings and funny street names. But that's all just a front, isn't it? Just the surface. As soon as you dig a little deeper, you soon see the stinking corruption that's at the heart of this place. A society run by elites, for elites, with no care about the people at the bottom. And that, I don't like. So that's what I make of London, Mr Bond.\"\n\nEverything around them turned to ice as the atmosphere became colder. Bruce held his now empty glass tightly as the pressure set in. He was not a man used to being on edge. Whether he was Wayne or Batman, he was normally in control of his situation, his surroundings - his next move. But on this occasion he knew he was dealing with someone different. In his eyes, Bond resembled a frozen lake - calm and serene on the outside, but with hidden depths that could drown you in an instant. A cold death was never far away.\n\n\"I see, that's a shame my dear boy, it truly is. But it seems that it can't be helped.\"\n\nBruce felt his adrenaline start flowing as James reached a hand inside his suit jacket. He gripped the tumbler even more, getting ready to connect it with his new acquaintance's head. To his relief, it wasn't a gun that Bond was reaching for - but an e-cigarette. He put it to his mouth and inhaled for a few seconds, before breathing out. The fragrant 'smoke' filled the air, attracting more than a few quizzical glances.\n\n\"I know, not quite the same, is it? Rather ruins the look. But needs must and all that,\" said James, before repeating the action. \"Does the trick anyway.\"\n\nBruce found the whole situation somewhat farcical. Here was the world's most famous spy - a spy who didn't even bother to hide his identity - stood before him 'smoking' with an e-cig. He felt relaxed now, confident that he had nothing to fear from this man. Confident that, when the time came, he'd be able to defeat him.\n\nHowever, the confidence soon transformed itself into something altogether different. Bruce felt the light becoming harsher, the noise becoming sharper. His senses were on fire, making him unable to focus, while his legs started to ache and buckle. He heard the glass tumbler smash on the floor as his hand lost its ability to hold it. The painful sound almost broke him as he fell, trying in vain to support himself on one knee.\n\n\"What...what have you done to me...?\"\n\nBond stood above him, as tall as a mountain. He was just a blur in Wayne's eyes now.\n\n\"Well, like I said Bruce old boy, it does the trick.\"\n\nThose were the last words he heard before everything turned to black.\n\n-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nI'd love to hear what you thought about my response to the prompt. If you have some feedback about the idea or any aspect of my writing, please do let me know :)", "\"Bond. James Bond.\"\n\nBruce Wayne smiled as he examined the man in the tuxedo. \n\n\"I suspect we share the same tailor Mr. Bond.\"\n\n\"I thought I recognized the style,\" replied Bond. \"Do you shop at Huntsman often, Mr. Wayne?\"\n\n\"I did drop in the day of my arrival here,\" Wayne shrugged. \"My butler wouldn't take me anywhere else.\" \n\n\"Interesting. Your man must be well acquainted with London.\" \n\n\"He's from around these parts,\" Wayne drawled. \"So how is business these days?\"\n\n\"Hectic. Traveling, shooting in and out of hot spots.\" Bond's lips quirked into a tiny smile. \"Surely a man like you knows what that's like.\"\n\n\"Oh I don't shoot. I like to hang around where I can. Take in the night life.\"\n\n\"Don't get enough of that at home, Mr. Wayne?\"\n\n\"In Gotham? Not nearly enough. It's dangerous to go out at night. Criminals and loonies everywhere.\" \n\n\"Speaking of loonies, what do you make of this Bat they talk about?\"\n\n\"Heh. That's usually the first question every Gothamite gets asked when out of town. And let me tell you, that thing is a myth.\"\n\n\"There are rumors that this 'myth' is alive and wreaking terror in London as we speak. An odd coincidence, don't you think, with so many citizens of Gotham in town for this fundraiser.\" Bond's eyes narrowed marginally as he went on. \"A gala event sponsored by Wayne Enterprises, whose subsidiary WayneTech produced weapons technologies and surveillance platforms that appear linked to certain vigilantes.\" \n\n\"You shouldn't believe in rumors and myth, Mr. Bond. Bad for a man in your line of business.\"\n\nBond slowly shook his head. \"I never quite got around to telling you about my business.\" \n\nBruce Wayne nodded in acknowledgment. \"A man who goes around visiting certain hot spots and using the same name tends to stand out. Especially when those spots get hotter. Your reputation precedes you, Mr. Bond.\"\n\n\"And you are much better informed than I had assumed, Mr. Wayne.\"\n\n\"I tend to take notice when MI5 attempts to hack into WayneTech's secure terminals.\"\n\nBond chewed over his words carefully. \"As long as we're being candid. Our Quarter Master was looking for schematics of weapons bearing the WayneTech logo that were discovered at the scene where Batman was last seen.\"\n\n\"Those weapons were prototypes stolen from a company warehouse by an arms dealer named Cobblepot. He may be trying to sell them on the European black market. If you look into it, you'll find that this man has a history of psychotic behavior and has claimed to have encountered a 'Batman' on several occasions.\"\n\n\"So if I go after this Cobblepot, I'll run into the Batman.\"\n\n\"If he's real, I expect you might,\" Wayne replied with a breezy smile. \"Don't let that scare you.\"\n\n\"It won't. Goodnight Mr. Wayne.\"\n\n\"Goodbye, Mr. Bond.\"\n\n", "\"Mr. Wayne, it's a pleasure to meet you.\" the classy man in his sharp suit said whilst slightly raising his glass of Martini chest-high in the host's direction.\n\nBruce Wayne smiled at the visitor. \"Thank you for being here with us, Mr. ...\"\n\n-\"Bond. James Bond.\"\n\nMr. Wayne nodded him off. The trained special agent held up the entrepreneur from leaving, \"How do you like it in London, Mr.Wayne?\"\n\n\"Interesting. And very charming. However, I feel that there are people in need of help here. Hence all this, Mr.Bond,\" the host explained smilingly. \"Let me get you another glass. Martini?\"\n\n\"I figure you will not leave me drinking on my own, Mr.Wayne?\" said James Bond.\n\nBruce Wayne hesitated for a moment. He ran his hand across his chin. \"Well,\" he said, \"that wouldn't be my style.\"\n\nJames Bond smiled a smooth smile in his eloquent manner.\n\"Shaken, not stirred.\" he nodded.\n\nBruce Wayne lifted his hand and a waiter approached the two men. \"Bring us two Vodka Martinis. Stirred, as my new friend demands it.\"\n\n\"So, what do you do, Mr.Bond?\"\n\n\"Call me James,\" he replied.\n\n\"James. What is your business in the royal capital?\"\n\n\"I serve my nation. You could call me a ...\"\n\n\"Jack-of-all-trades!\" Bruce interjected.\n\n\"Precisely.\"\n\nThe two men were given their drinks and engaged in conversation. James' mission was simple: Stay within reach of possible target until given confirmation to take him out.\n\nBruce, on the other hand, had a lot more meet and greet on his schedule. He needed things to wrap up quickly enough for him to roam the streets as another kind of rescuer. As a dark avenger, a hero in the dark.\nFor now, however, he was standing in the spotlight.\n\n\n\nThe men had just finished their drinks, when a group of two young, well-dressed women appeared.\nOne was wearing a long, black dress, which was showing a lot of back, and the other wore a short red one.\n\n\"Oh, look at that, Stacy. If that isn't the man of the hour!\" said the long-legged woman in red as she laid her petite hands on the big man's shoulder.\n\nThe other one seductively circled James, whose eyes subtly followed her motions.\n\"And who is this other charming man, a good friend, maybe?\" Stacy in the black asked as she giggled.\n\n\"You two are going to spare some time to have a drink with two ladies, aren't you?\" the women proposed.\n\n\"Sure,\" Bruce said. \"One drink, ladies, then I'll have to leave.\"\n\nThe waiter served the group another round of drinks. One drink lead to another, and another.\n\nJames and Bruce were in the center of attention. They told stories and laughed, causing more laughter in the people around them. The two men, who held their arms tightly around their newly added female companions, seemed to enjoy each others company fairly well.\n\nThe hours passed and the alcohol flowed as freely as the conversation.\n\n\n\n\n10 am, Wayne Estate, London.\n\n\nJames opens his eyes to the sound of a door closing.\n\nBond coughed, his breath smelled of Vodka - lot's of it. \"Oh damn it,\" he said aloud.\nHe tried to find the clock but there wasn't any on the nightstand next to his side of the bed.\n\"Wayne!\" he thought to himself and flipped his head to the other side, only to see Bruce Wayne staring back at him in panic.\n\n\"Well... fuck,\" Bruce, who hadn't seen the two women from before either, said to James.\n\nBond picked his pants from off the ground and pulled them underneath his blanket.\n\n\"So, we're not gonna talk about this, right?\"\n\n-\"Right,\" James Bond agreed.\n\nJames awkwardly removed himself from the bed and got into his suit, again.\n\n\"Well, James. This did not turn out the way I thought. I wasn't expecting any of this, but, tell me: Was I good at least?\"\n\n\"I meant to ask just the same.\"\n\n\"I bet you were terrific, James. And so was I, I'm sure.\"\n\n\"You're Batman, aren't you?\"\n\n\"Yup ...\"\n\n\"All right... I'll be on my way, then.\"\n\nJames picked up his shoes and quickly paced out of the apartment. Time for the walk of shame.\n\nAnd so ended the collision of the two heroes. London and Gotham remained same and sometimes, to this day, James and Bruce would still exchange snapchats.\n\n\n\n\n", "Bond gave a quick cursory glance around the hall, briefly assessing the exits and blind spots of the cameras, and catching the eye of a tall, elegant brunette in the flowing purple dress talking to Wayne. The folder M had passed him over his ostentatiously large mahogany desk this morning had given him an insight into Bruce Wayne of Wayne Enterprises and some of his close associates. Some of the financial comings and goings of the corporation had sparked some interest in the old Admiral, so he had pulled Bond away from the tables at Blades this evening to come and do some \"sniffing\", as he had put it. And to make things more interesting, Q had piped up after the encounter, expressing an almost fanboy-esque interest in one Mr Lucious Fox, head of R and D at Wayne Enterprises.\n\nSo Bond made his way through the ambling crowd towards the centre of the room where he positioned himself just behind the brunette in the purple dress.\n\n\"Ms. Selina Kyle, I presume?\"\n\nShe turned to face him, a brief look of surprise giving way to a sultry glance up and down his dinner jacket.\n\n\"I don't believe we've had the pleasure of meeting, Mr...?\"\n\n\"Bond. James Bond,\" he replied.\n\n\"A pleasure, Mr James Bond. Tell me, what brings you to the fundraiser this evening?\" she enquired, holding eye contact with him just slightly longer than necessary.\n\n\"I'm actually here on business. Universal Exports. I'm what you might call a... problem-solver. I believe that there may be some interest in my company working with Wayne Enterprises.\"\n\n\"A problem-solver... that's a pretty vague job title. So how did you know who I am, may I ask?\"\n\nBond smiled, deciding to deflect the question and keep her waiting to order a drink. And besides, he wanted to stir things up a bit. He turned to his left and touched the arm of the man in the white tuxedo,\n\n\"Excuse me, I'd like to order a drink please. Vodka martini, shaken, not stirred. Over ice with a thin slice of lemon peel. And...\" Bond glanced at Kyle's glass, \"a glass of Champagne.\"\n\nThe man in the white jacket turned with a bemused look on his face. He was tall with almost jet black hair, a broad chin and a charming but firm smile.\n\n\"Forgive me,\" he began, in a well-spoken Gothamite accent, \"but I think you've mistaken me for a member of the catering staff. My name is Bruce Wayne.\"\n\nBond, without missing a beat, replied \"Mr Wayne, my apologies. I should really be paying more attention! Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Bond-\"\n\n\"James Bond. Yes, I've heard of your work in field research for Universal Exports. Quite the travelling troubleshooter, one might say.\" \n\nThey shook hands, both noticing the firmness of grip, and the steady, balanced stance of one another.\n\n\"So tell me Mr Bond, what brings a man of your... expertise to a fundraiser for supporting OrphanAid?\"\n\n\"Personal interest. I was an orphan myself, as a young boy. It led me to where I am now, actually. I believe that's something we have in common. Being orphans, that is. Not in terms of career choices.\n\n\"... I wouldn't be so certain. Walk with me Mr Bond. I think we might have more in common than I thought. Excuse us Ms. Kyle. A pleasant surprise to find you here this evening, by the way. I'm sure we'll run in to each other later this evening.\"\n\nThey turned to walk towards the bar, Bond slipping his business card into Selina Kyle's free hand as they left. \n\n\n[UPDATE] Well quite a few people are asking me to continue this. I'm at work right now (UK) so will try to have a think where I can go with it and do what I can. Thanks for all your feedback!]\n" ]	7
	[WP] You wake up every night at 3am overwhelmingly hot	[ "He wakes up, blisteringly hot. It's at least 130 degrees Fahrenheit. He whips his blankets off of him and jumps up. The ground jerks alarmingly and he stumbles back onto his bed. He runs to the window and shoves the curtains aside.\n\nChaos. People are running through the streets, cars crash into street signs and are completely abandoned, even police officers are seen running in horror. Street lights are out and it's in near darkness. Ominous light leaks onto the scene from beneath, from the ground itself. He sprints to his door and yanks it open, only to be blasted with a wave of heat, as if he opened a oven. Sweating profusely, he runs to the nearest person and asks what's happening. They don't respond, just continue running in a random direction.\n\nThe ground beneath his feet breaks as if it were thin ice floating over a lake. He hears it before he sees it, bubbling, frothing, and pushing toward the surface with enormous pressure. Lava erupts from below and swallows him whole.", "The alarm clock wakes me from my slumber. It's 2.55am. I step out of bed groggily and stand in front of the mirror.It's become a daily ritual for me now, and although it only lasts three minutes, I enjoy every second of it. It's 2.59am now. I take a deep breath. As the second hand ticks towards twelve, I feel the transformation happening. In an instant, I become smokingly hot. I become the most attrractive woman in the world, for just three minutes.\n\nI rapidly start taking mirror selfies. Flaunting all my curves and perfect complexion, I take different poses, some sexy, some cute, all unbelievably stunning. I show cleavage, thighs, just to document my perfection. One minute left. Since today's theme is space, I quickly change into my spacesuit costume, a tight, body-hugging latex outfit. I continue to take pictures, being as materialistic as possible.\n\nSuddenly, my precious three minutes are up and I transform back into my normal, drab self. It doesn't matter. I'll be spending the rest of the day posting all my selfies on Instagram and dating websites. Every guy falls head over heels for me, and every girl wishes to be me. The donations I get from all those desperate men has become my pocket money. I don't understand why or how I become so hot at 3am, but it works out fine for me.\n\nYou can follow me on Instagram as \"3amgurl\", donations are appreciated." ]	2
	[WP] In this poker game, the players are betting something far more valuable than money	[ "I looked down at the table studying the pile of chips that had accumulated over the course of the game. I normally didn't get into these back room poker games but while playing in my routine poker night at the bar a spot had opened up and I couldn't help my curiosity from getting the best of me. I glanced up from the table and to my hand for a brief second. I had nothing, but I couldn't let them see it in my face so I tried to keep my expression blank. \n\nI set the cards down and nodded my head slightly as if I was considering my next move. Really I was trying to convince myself that these guys were only kidding when they had said these chips represented my lifespan. I was down to $1250 worth of chips, which according to the rules that they went over before letting me in meant I had 25 years sitting on the table still. I'd lost about 15 years if I could believe that they weren't just fucking with me. \n\nThere were four other people sitting around the table and I didn't recognize one of them which was a little strange considering I'd been taking part in this particular bar's weekly poker night over the past three years. There were two burly looking men to my left that looked like brothers, then a woman to my right whose face was hidden under a large hat and beside her sat a pale, skinny and downright creepy looking kid who couldn't have been more than fifteen years old. \n\nI've always been one to gamble and I figured this was some sort of initiation that would get me behind these closed doors for future games so I wasn't about to let them intimidate me with this whole \"chips represent your lifespan\" bullshit so I decided to bluff and pushed my pile into the center of the table. \n\n\"All in.\" \n\nLuckily my voice hadn't cracked and I was sure that my face remained stone-like so there was no way they could see the bluff I was trying to pull. As the rest of the table folded assuming I had a great hand when I was really holding a 7/2 off suit it was time for the gaunt looking teenager to make his bet. I was shocked as he called but the most terrifying thing happened next as we flipped our cards over revealing I had nothing and he was sitting on a fullhouse - jacks over fours. \n\nSuddenly I felt the air rush from my lungs and I was falling to the floor grabbing at the edge of the table to steady myself. I missed and came down with a hard crash feeling as if I was drowning. It was like I couldn't remember how to breathe, I clawed at the floor thrashing around wildly as the young child stepped over to my seat and pocketed the chips. It was the last thing I saw.\n\n\n[this is my first ever attempt at writing since high school essays/english class assignments. any tips on how I can become any better?] ", "Three of a kind. It was a good hand, not a great hand. I wondered if it was even worth betting with only three of a kind, but when Jack matched the bet I knew I could come out on top. Jack has the worst poker face in the history of mankind. I saw the bet, raised ten, and when the round of betting was over, exchanged two cards. \n\nAnd there it was...what I had been waiting for the whole game: a set of aces. The improbability of what I had in my hand was staggering, but there it was. A full house, aces high. I watched and waited as people brought the pot higher and higher, waiting for my turn to add to the confusion and stress of the game. When it came around to me, I saw the bet of 50, raised it by 20. Immediately half the table folded. All except Jack, the bluffing moron who would soon lose it all. \n\nHe raised by 10.\n\nI saw it, raised by 10.\n\nHe saw it, raised by 20.\n\nThe back and forth was beginning to grind on my nerves. Jack normally folds when the stakes get this high, but he was holding fast. I wondered briefly if he actually had a hand this time, something that could possibly beat my full house. He was still letting his tell show, a slight quiver of his left eyebrow whenever he raised the pot. I decided it was time to end this, and possibly him. \n\n\"I'll see it, and I'll go all in.\" The table froze. I don't think a player who has sat at this particular table had ever gone all in; It was just too risky, the price too high. But that didn't matter this time because I knew he was bluffing. He had to be bluffing. \n\n\"All right,\" Jack whispered, \"let's see 'em.\" I slammed my hand down in victory, showing him the aces and 10's that would be his downfall. I was waiting for \"the moment.\" Every real player knows \"the moment.\" That sweet, sweet instance where the jackass who had been driving up the pot realizes his mistake, and leaves the table. Instead, he smiled. Then giggled. Then laughed. Not at the situation, but at me. \n\n\"The fuck is so funny, asshole? Show your cards! C'mon, show 'em!\" I was beginning to sweat. Maybe Jack had gone loopy? I've heard rumors that those brave enough to play at this table went mad from time to time. The stakes at this table are too high for most. Perhaps he had gone mad in defeat. \"SHOW THE CARDS!\" Some one yelled. I realized that some one was me. Jack stifled his laughter, took a deep breath, and showed his hand.\n\nI stared, comatose. The odds were just astronomical. The tell had been present. It shouldn't have been there, and yet, there it was: a royal fucking flush. The fucker had sharked me.\n\n\"Jack, please. You can't let me cash out like this. Jack, please don't do this.\" I realized I was crying as he swept the chips into his pile. \"Jack, I'm begging you. I'll do anything you want, just please, please, please show me a little mercy. Please!\"\n\n\"I'm sorry, buddy. You knew the rules when you sat at this table. Everyone knows the risk when they sit at this table. If you can't handle the risk, you shouldn't have played. Pit boss! Pit boss! I need this guy cashed out!\"\n\nAll the sudden, I felt the paralyzing beam. I had only ever seen it used once, on another man who played at this table and lost. It was much more terrifying in person. The pit boss walked over, approved the totals from Jack, and took out the small, innocuous looking metal device that they used to collect payment from this very particular table. Like a little dildo that brought about the ultimate climax to one's existence. Jack smiled. \n\n\"Thanks for the years, buddy! I promised my new wife at least 70 together, and you just put me over the top. In your honor, I think I'll learn piano this century. That'll be fun, don't you think? Don't look so glum, pal! You'll be remembered when I write a top 10! Sweet dreams.\"\n\nAs the world started to tunnel into darkness, the remaining years of my life slowly draining out of me, I made a final realization: time is the greatest treasure one can squander. It's a pity I didn't learn that before sitting down. " ]	2
	[WP] You are the only magician left in the world. Every spell you cast brings you one step closer to death. Today, you cast your final spell.	[ "When I knew it was time, I sent myself back in time and saved the world, all while feeling my life cripple like a glass of water poured into the ocean never to be seen again, though one glass of water can go a long way and then... I fell into the beating grass, the wind swaying my body ever so slightly as I closed my eyes in resignation; knowing not what was to come but what was to be was terrifying, but I mustered my strength as I had one final thought \"Life was--\"", "\"Well, that's that.\"\nWith a flick of his quill, the weary magician printed his signature on the letter. He stood up gingerly from his creaky reading chair, careful not to wake the young man sleeping in the second room. His eyes swept the familiar room one last time, his gaze landing on a weathered cork board. Tacked onto it were photographs, letters and maps collected over the years: cheeky correspondences with William, a photograph of him in New York with a crowd waving the American flag and 'Nazis Surrender!' banner, another one where he's shaking JFK's hand. He crossed the room and untucked a dried flower from the board. Under the dim candlelight, memories of smiling young kids posing in front of a quirky statue came rushing back: university friends on the night of a formal dance. Marc had laughed at him the entire night for being the only man wearing white to the event, and had not offer to help rinse off the giant wine splash on his shirt until after he'd fall flat on his ass laughing. Still, if it hadn't been for his best friend's ruckus, our magician would not have met Perrie. \n\nOh, Perrie, he thought to himself, What a life I've lived.\n\nHe folded the letter and tucked it under a '221B Baker Street' magnet on the fridge, in plain sight for the young man to see the next morning. The magician had found it hard to say goodbye to Edward. Although now an accomplished chemist, Edward was just a precocious, yet juvenile 12 year old when the magician took him under his wing. In only 5 years under the magician's tutelage, Edward had absorbed all of the magician's teachings, moved to the city and was now working at the finest research labs even in his first year of undergrad. \n\nHe bid his apprentice a silent goodbye, excited the country cottage, then walked out into the cool field. The sun was starting to break through the horizon when he finally reached the top of a quaint little hill. He sat down in front of the only tombstone.\n\n\"It has been almost eight centuries since the day I met you,\" the magician began \"and not a day passes by that I don't find myself wanting to talk to you.\"\n\nHe reached out and stroked the name on the tombstone. \n\n\"But it's done. Our legacy lives on in him, Perrie.\"\n\nThe magician stood up and took a deep breath. One last time, he thought, and gathered his palms flat against each other at the centre of his chest.\n\nWith that, his body start disappearing and dissolving into golden fireflies. They floated gently upwards and then slowly came raining down, weaving around the tombstone, showering it in a magnificent light.\n\nWhen the last firefly disappeared, a second gravestone had appeared to the right of the first. It read:\n\n\"Here lies Nicholas Flamel and Perenelle Flamel - From immortality to eternity.\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n", "Uriel, the God-king narrates to his thrall:\n\n\" I awoke early in the morning, knowing my trip would be a very difficult one. All of my companions died on the way through this frosty abyss, but legend has it that the Bastion of Souls lies just beyond the mountain's peak. \n\nI would never have wished for imortality had I known the consequences. The bastion of souls is where all of the magical essence goes when people die, and where the magical essence comes from when they are born. I didn't realize what this meant untill just a few decades ago, no more magic was being spread through the young as it had before. Before, everyone could atleast manage a few simply conjurings, today none are capable, and most doubt magic's very existence. As my kingdom's unrest was threatening to overthrow my rule, I fled. After nearly a century of research I believe I have found the place where all human magic rests in the world, long lost to all human kind. \"\n\n\"How was that\". Uriel inuired\n\n\"yes sir\", the thrall muttered \n\nUriel longed for the contact of another, for nearly a week he had been alone on his journy, and he now began to deeply regret conjuring such an unintelligent thrall so many years ago. His memoir served as the only thread maintaining his sanity and he feared it too may fall away. He was to fearfull to even look at what the thrall was writing, fearing that he was too unintelligent to even comprehend what was being said to him. \n\n\"It was my immortality which prevented more magic from entering the world\" Uriel continued.\n\n\"All of the magic that would normally go to the brith of another, instead went into keeping alive my ever decaying body. Stopping time is no laughing matter, and it takes an exponentially larger amount of magic as the years go by. Now, every three years, I am half as living as I was before. This is my last chance to expell my magic and make things right in the world. Without magic, the people are cowardly and soulless, fear and hate brew a powerfull toxin that brings nothing but destruction. \"\n\n\nAs Uriel took his last few steps up to the peak of the mountain pass, he paused, struck by complete awe. He never expected to see what was before him. A massive towering palace surrounded by large walls and shrouded in an etherial myst, the kind only seen in the cosmic plane. He feared this may be such a powerfull ward that his quest would all be for nothing. \n\nHe stepped forward, and felt the ground quickly shift under him, he had stepped on a loose rock and while he tried to leap back, it was too late, and he found humself tumbling down the steep mountain slope, his thrall bounding downward with relative ease. Uriel relized where his tumble was leading him; a cravace of incredible depth. He comanded his thrall to catch him, and they lept accross. Uriel quickly grabbed onto a rock, frozen halfway in the icy wall, his thrall carrying his memoir vanished into the icy depth. The fall was so incedible, no sound was heard from the thrall, along with all of the gear he was carrying, hitting the ground. \n\nUriel wondered what the point even was. At this point he knew he would not make it up. There was no way he would be able to pull himself up off this ledge, having broken both of his legs in the fall. He belted out a thunderous roar, the kind that can only come from a millenia of hardship and war. His kingdom fallen into chaos, his closest friends all dead because of him, and his son, never able to know the joy of magic. He had failed, his life was a waste. Thining back to his days as a slave, he wondered if that would have been better than the life he chose. Had he not found that spellbook and freed his fellow slaves, led the revolution, and built an empire. As he recalled the dying eyes of all of his friends, his companions, and the people he freed from the bond of slavery, he knew he had to compelte his quest. He pulled with every bit of strenght that he could, his head now peering over the edge of this frozen cliff. He leaned his chest forward trying to gain leverage and just then, his hand slipped. The single defining moment of his life, seeming like an eternity. He felt every small detail of it, his chilled hand failing to grasp at what he thought was a solid hold, his foot failing to catch onto the small dent in the ice. He was detached from the earth, and contemplated his doom. \n\n...\n..\nA hand shot down, grabbed his arm, and threw it over the edge, a massive arc he flew, and landed harsley onto the hardened snow. A bearded monk stand in front of him, while clearly a very elderly man, he had the build of a most skilled warrior in his prime. \n\n\" You certainly have been through much\" the monk said in a sympathetic and caring tone. Like a father coming to help an injured son, he comforted Uriel, picked him up, and carried him towards the glowing cloud of iridescent myst, a glittering stardust of soothing light.\n\n\"We had been waiting for this day. I was just a young man, of 20 years when the last other monk here died. It was our duty to keep this place safe from the gods, and safe from men who migh abuse its power. When we relized what happend with you, we knew we had failed. It was too late to send anyone out for you, as we could not leave this place unattended.\" \n\nThey were going down a long corridor now, built of gray brick the castle still glimmored on the inside, the only comparison would be that of the night sky, twinkling startlight shined through the entire building, there were no torches or laps around, but the room glowed like a mystical twilight. \n\nStruck with awe Uriel tried to speak, and ask what was happening, only to realize that his body was all but dead, himself a lving husk. Unable to move or speak, he pondered if it was too late. His only solace was the peacfull calm of the monk that spoke to him, his words now incomprehensible. The soft warm voice carried him through many rooms and towers, untill he foundhimself at the very top of a golden arena, with an ocean of a pool in the center, it was the time for his last spell. He lifted his spirit out of his body, tearing his very essence away from his lifeless corpse, he didn't realize how difficult it would be, his curse pulling him back in. Years of training with the liches of old, learnign their skills for the isolation of the souls. He now wondered if he was right in trusting those ghosts and their ancient ways. Suddenly, a flash of light, and he felt himself fade away losing all of his individuality as his essence pooled into the source of all human magic, he had made it, the world could now resore balance. With his last second of himself, he felt the embrace of all of his lost loved ones and companions. He had been forgiven, and the world could now be set back on course. \n" ]	3
	[WP] Gravitational waves have just been measured which originate from a region of the universe not previously observed. Reality itself changes in response with catastrophic results: the universe is going to end, tonight.	[ "\"Well shit\" after hours of racking my brilliant mind I realized that at our current technology acumen we couldn't do anything to protect ourselves against this cataclysm, assuming that I could even convince the goverment in the time we have left. \n\n\n\n\n\nI finally understood the phrase that ignorance is a bliss, my survival Instincs were at full intensity racking my brain for possible solutions that I knew weren't there, and that knowledge presented it's own dilemma, after all I was the only human with the technological mastery to even Detect the event.\n\n\n\n\nI reclined on my chair, something I never did, looked at the ceiling of my lab and I remembered my brother and mother. I never attended to mom's funeral I was too busy building this laboratory, the most advanced on earth, and my brother had made it clear that he would never forgive me... Now that I though about it I never even said I was sorry, I never did, it was a waste of my time, and suddenly I had 16 hours where no matter how many scientific discoveries I achieved would matter, the revelation hit me with such a force that I had to stand up, and the tears wouldn't stop coming, my kneed trembled and I grabbed my desk to try to stay on my feet, I placed one of my hands in my own invention the commlink that as all of my other inventions it remained in the obscurity of never being published. \n\n\n\n\n\nI pressed the archaic combination of numbers of my brother new house in Denmark, the phone rang a few times and a woman answered in English, young maybe in her 20s, my voice was weak and I spoke \"Hello I need to speak with Russell\" the woman giggled and she said most probably not to me \"grandpa! Someone on the phone for you!\" That joke made me chuckle, my brother was still a young man that acted like and old man. I heard the phone exchange hands and before he could say anything I blurted \"I am sorry\" my voice broke several times, and it heard feeble and pathetic, I heard him gasp and what he said broke me in so many ways I can't even begin to understand \"Johnny, is that you Johnny?! Oh my god Johnny thank god, it's been 30 years since I Las heard from you, Johnny please please don't hang up, I love you brother...\" I hung up, the revelation of passage of time and suddenly everything dissolved into darkness.\n\n\n\n\n\n\nIteration 6780098634621 Failed.\nInjecting Caffeine and Proteins into Containment tank.\nTank temperature ideal.\nBrain integrity 83%.\nCalculated damage in next iteration 2%.\nTime Remaining 23:49:42\n Warning! Moral & Ethics Processors deactivated by administrator.\nInitiating simultaneous multiple iterations.\nWarning! This will cause massive integrity loss. \nDo you wish to continue?...........................................................................Yes.", "\"Well, at least we got an answer now.\"\n\n\"I guess we do.\"\n\n\"It's not like it's our fault anyways.\"\n\n\"Yeah, who could have though...\"\n\n\"... that the whole thing was going to be that fragile! Right?\"\n\n\"Right.\"\n\n\"Do you think He'll be mad at us?... You know, for breaking the universe?\"\n\n\"He? Hopefully it's a She. Women are more forgiving.\"\n\n\"Hah! Right! Maybe it's a Them, though...\"\n\n\"Or an It.\"\n\n\"Anyways. Just wondering if we'll be there in the next one.\"\n\n\"If there's a next one. I mean, maybe these things are expensive. Maybe even He, or She, or Whatever can't afford a new one.\"\n\n\"Damn...\"\n\n\"Yeah.\"\n\n\"Hey, want another beer?\"\n\n\"No, thanks. I'm good.\"\n\n\"There! Another one went out! You saw that?\"\n\n\"Yes! Which one was that?\"\n\n\"Let me see... I think it was Antares, in Sagitarius.\"\n\n\"How far?\"\n\n\"About 500 light years.\"\n\n\"Wow... it's moving fast.\"\n\n\"Faster than light.\"\n\n\"Not much time remaining.\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"So... tell me... why did you stay here? At the observatory? Most people left to be with their families.\"\n\n\"...\"\n\n\"I mean, if it's not...\"\n\n\"No, no. It's ok. I just... well, don't have much of a family, you know?\"\n\n\"Oh.\"\n\n\"You?\"\n\n\"I just didn't want to spend my last hours stuck in a traffic jam. This is more... entertaining I guess.\"\n\n\"Yeah, seeing the stars go out one by one. Such fun...\"\n\n\"But it is! See? That was Sirius, right?\"\n\n\"Yeah. Shit. That one is close.\"\n\n\"Anytime now...\"\n\n\"I guess... I kind of feel like I had to be here and see it through... Like it's our responsibility, you know? We ruined it, after all.\"\n\n\"No, we didn't.\"\n\n\"No?\"\n\n\"No. It's God's fault. He should have checked His goddamn pointerssssssssaiaiaiaiaiaiaia46 55 43 4b 46 55 43 4b 46 55 43 4b 49 54 48 55 52 54 53 49 54 48 55 52 54 53 48 45 4c 50 48 45 4c 50 46 55 43 4b 46 55 43 4b 46 55 43 4b 49 54 48 55 52 54 53 49 54 48 55 52 54 53 48 45 4c 50 48 45 4c 50 46 55 43 4b 46 55 43 4b 46 55 43 4b 49 54 48 55 52 54 53 49 54 48 55 52 54 53 48 45 4c 50 48 45 4c 50 \n\nCRITICAL ERROR: INVALID_MEMORY_ADDRESS\n\nMODULE: UNIVRS42.DOS\nSIGNAL=0xBA CODE=GRAV35\n\nPRESS ANY KEY TO REBOOT\n\n" ]	2
	[WP]When one person mentions they forget something, everyone around them forgets something as well.	[ "Hey Jim buddy what up! \n\nOh nothing, just had breakfast! \n\nOh what'd you have? \n\nGrill cheese...or uh, wait a minute I don't think thats right...I can't remember...\n\nwait sorry , uh, Jim? don't sneak up on me like that, whend you get here?! \n\nUh, ed, when did I get here? \n\nLike a minute after uhh..fuck whats his name?\n\nJim ? \n\nYeah Jim! \n\nokay what about him? \n\nI don't know ...hey they forgot to lock the doors at Bestbuy and the alarms are off?\n\nBestbuy? whats that again? \n\nelectronics store, but i'm not sure what bestbuy has to do with anything?\n\nthis is one of my first posts on WP, kinda forgot the topic halfway through, rookie mistake I guess. \n", "Blue skies, the sun warming his skin. Her laughter, his sighs. Somewhere in the distance, someone was calling out to him, but he didn't want to hear them. He wanted to stay right here, right here for all of time...\n\n\"Jimmy! For fuck's sake, Jimmy, I've been calling you forever\"\n\nAs he awoke, he knew why he'd been so wanting to stay in that dream-world of his. Here, there was no sun. Everything was cold and hard.\n\n\"Sorry, man, I nodded off\" \n\n\"Here? Now? Fuck off, we've got to get out of here\"\n\nJimmy looked at the straps holding him in place. He couldn't even get out of the chair, let alone find a way out of the maze they'd found themselves in. \n\n\"You know the funny thing about isolation?\" Jimmy asked. \"It's like, time has lost its meaning. I don't know how long we've been here, man. Shit, I kind of forget why we're even here in the first place\"\n\n\"How could you forget why we're here?\" Kyle asked, sounding almost annoyed. \"That fuckhead out there, he... Hmm. Hang on a second...\"\n\n\"Dude, I was joking. I was trying to express how surreal it felt. Obviously, we're here because... Shit, why are we here?\"\n\nThe big, red, rusted door opened, slowly, and without any attempt to be quiet on its part. The 'fuckhead' came in, a confused look on his face. \n\n\"So, I'm not exactly sure why I bought you here. Uh... consider it a big mistake on my part\" the man said, as he moved to Jimmy's side and started fucking around with the straps.\n\n\"Fuck, really?\" Jimmy asked, completely unsure of what was going on.\n\n\"Yeah, I mean, uh... I'm sure there was a reason, but uh...\" the man stumbled, and then he stopped. \"Actually, fuck that, I can't let you go. There's drastic, legal consequences to this shit. Sorry for the mix-up\"\n\nAnd he killed them both. :O !!!" ]	2
Doesn't have to be romantic, or even with another person. Or any persons at all. Be as creative as you like. As usual, I'm willing to give feedback and detailed critiques to anyone who wants them. And I will give a reply of my own.	[WP] Write about the end of a relationship	[ "Our middle was hypotheticals so we never aligned. We held back so when we gave ourselves it was with a different context. So we laughed different humor and its trigger was different. We looked different because we only said the same of the other. Now we're over thinking what if we were ourselves. But we remember so it'll never be the same, because that's what we remember, the triggers and if my emotions were off and my fear was too then what of my love; was it all a waste of time? How can we try again or would we be starting over with a heavy context that was all made up.", "There's something about an idea that makes it worse than a memory. Memory fades, is malleable, is what we want it to be. Ideas are like an infection, a parasite that gets under the skin and latches on to something vital. Try as you might, they don't go away. Because there's nothing harder to not think about than what you're trying to not think about.\n\nSo it was only a matter of time before I found myself standing outside Aunt Emma's Futures. A small shop that piggybacked on a late-night pizza place, it was one of those local curiosities that actual locals chose to ignore. Its only concession toward being an actual business, the type of place that wanted people to find it, was a gaudy purple-and-gold sign--faded canvas over am old, splinter-ridden sawhorse--kept chained to the streetlight outside. I'd been eating that pizza place's greasy cardboard for as long as I could remember, and the sign was always there, day and night, rain or shine. Aunt Emma herself, I'd soon learn, was long gone. And hadn't been named Emma in the first place.\n\n\"That's all marketing,\" said the woman sitting behind the desk. \"But this isn't the 90s, and I'm not Miss Cleo. We don't do that anymore. I'm modernizing.\"\n\nShe introduced herself as Allison. \"Not that exotic, but it's who I am.\" Who she was didn't seem to involve the old stereotypes. Instead of a B-movie gypsy woman surrounded by candles while she read tarot or life lines, or a motherly black woman trying to disguise her cold reading with Patois, Allison was normal looking. A little on the goth side, with her bleached-white hair and dark eyeliner, but not so much that I'd put her in a lineup after a heist involving out of print Cure vinyl.\n\nHer office wasn't typical, either. I make that assumption based on those same B-movie and late-night infomercial impressions of fortune tellers, and it's possible all of them look like something an upstart lawyer might put together. There wasn't a candle in sight, and heavy, wide bookshelves lined the walls shoulder to shoulder like the crowd at a sumo wrestler's funeral. Imposing leather-bound hardcovers filled the shelves, gilded titles in Latin or other, less identifiable languages. Allison sat behind a wide wooden desk covered with more books. I took the chair opposite hers\n\n\"You want to know your future,\" she said. A statement.\n\n\"Sure,\" I said.\n\nShe gestured, and I gave her my hand. Her fingers were warm, their tips carrying a slight sense of skittering energy, like a static charge that didn't want to release a shock. She ignored my palm, and instead stared at me until I stared back and lost myself in her brown eyes. They were oddly reflective, like still puddles in autumn. I can't honestly say how long we stayed like that. It ended when she let my hand go. I felt like I was waking from a trance, and I blinked at my dry eyes.\n\nWhen I could focus again, I saw that Allison was leaning back in her chair, head cocked slightly, as she watched me. \"You're going to ask me out,\" she said.\n\n\"What?\" I said.\n\n\"That's why you're here. Didn't need magic to decipher that. You've seen my come and go for weeks, and this reading was an excuse to talk to me.\"\n\nI shrugged. \"Maybe.\"\n\n\"So you don't want to ask me out?\"\n\nI hesitated, and she laughed. Not a mocking laugh. It was genuine, and it made me smile despite the awkwardness of the situation. \"You're the one that can see the future.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she said. \"And I can tell you it won't last.\"\n\n\"What?\" I said, again.\n\n\"Don't take that the wrong way,\" she said, leaning and closing a big book full of what looked like hand-written zodiac signs. \"Nothing lasts forever. Entropy is the most immutable law in the universe. But that doesn't mean we have to be the victims of fate, or something as cosmic as all that. My name's Allison, not Cassandra.\" She grinned, showing teeth. \"If you know what I mean.\"\n\n\"I think I do,\" I said, and I thought I was right.\n\n\"I've seen your future. Any relationship we have, it'll end, but how it ends is up to you.\"\n\n\"What?\" I said, for the third time.\n\nShe had an impish little smile that came more from her eyes than it did the slight upward curving of her mouth. \"Two years from now, we'll have a huge fight over something small, and we'll both drag out everything. Every slight, real or imagined, every disagreement, every time you wanted pho and I wanted burgers, what your mother says about me when I'm not around. All of it. You will leave, and, because we have no mutual friends, we will never speak again.\"\n\n\"I'm sure it won't be that bad,\" I said.\n\n\"It doesn't have to be. In nine months we'll realize that we never had much in common, and we'll drift apart. I'll stop texting, you'll stop looking for my texts. Or, in thirteen months I'll move away, and we'll try to make that work for a little while, until we both meet other people, but we still try to Skype once a week to watch Doctor Who together. Or, you'll be the one to move. Or--.\"\n\n\"Wait,\" I said. \"All of these will happen?\"\n\n\"One of them will happen,\" she said.\n\nI found myself leaning back in the hard chair, lost to the idea of it. \"So what are you trying to say? That I can choose how it ends?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she said. \"But it will end.\"\n\n\"And if I walk away right now?\"\n\n\"That's another ending.\"\n\n\"And this is all on the assumption that you'll say yes,\" I said. \"Would you say yes?\"\n\nShe winked, or tried to. It came out more like a series of slow, playful blinks, but I got the message.\n\nI thought about it. A relationship with an expiration date stamped on the label. How would I even start? And how could I not try it? Even if it was self-defeating, if the very idea that it would end became part of the prophecy. And she was cuter now, in person, than my first impression, seeing her fumble with an old key chain outside the pizza place as she opened her shop for the afternoon.\n\nMaybe the idea would ruin us, but is that how I'd remember it?\n\n\"Which would you choose?\" I asked.\n\nShe smiled again. \"I'm glad you asked.\"" ]	2
	[WP] You are the best detective in the world, and have been hired to investigate a crime that you have committed.	[ "It had all happened in a flash. Detective David Black, in the heat of the moment, had killed that woman. It was a night of passionate love, something that had become rare for him, after his wife's death three years ago. Hookers usually weren't his thing, but then again, he didn't tend to think rationally after a night at the bar down the street. He was so hammered, he didn't even remember why he did the deed, when he woke up the next morning. Then again, when a dead hooker was in your room, covered in blood and your own seed, the \"whys\" and \"hows\" weren't too important.\n\nThis kind of thing had happened before, but he never slipped. Well, never before this morning, anyhow. He walked into his office, and lit up a cigarette. They say smoking kills, but Black didn't have a helluva lot to live for anyway. A man who looked worried sick came stumbling in, right after him.\n\n\"There's a girl in my life, and I know your reputation. She didn't come home last night, and that usually means trouble. If anyone can find her, it's gotta be you! It's not that uncommon with her, but it just feels wrong.\" the guy told Black, shaking and shivering like a new-born puppy.\n\nHe handed Black a photo, one that almost made the cigarette fall right out of his mouth. Sure enough, it was the girl he'd had the misfortune of calling up the previous night. There was no mistaking it, even in black and white, you couldn't forget those eyes. He could have easily said no, but David Black never turned down a case, and he wasn't about to start today. He put on his coat, and started out the door, with the photo in hand, and everything else he needed in the pockets of that coat. There was no reason to tell the man that he'd do it, there was a mutual understanding.\n\nAfter a short drive, he pulled the car up to his house. The dead hooker was still lying there in his bedroom. He hadn't bothered to clean up the mess, since he didn't tend to have many house-callers. Black decided to put his expertise to use, in a way he'd only done once. To fake a crime, rather than find the perp of one. He took her into his bathtub, and hosed her down. The blood would have to come later. Luckily, the corpse wasn't anywhere near drained of blood yet, otherwise, the plan would have gone to shit. David dressed her up in her original clothes. It was a very good thing for him that she hadn't exactly needed them that night.\n\nHe put a pair of sunglasses on her, and loaded her up in the passenger's side of the car. He'd made sure to wipe the prints off of his knife, and brought it along. Black also grabbed a pair of latex gloves, and bought a pair of regular gloves from some pawn shop. Whatever poor sap had them before was going to be in some deep shit now. Finally, he pulled into a back alley, about four miles away from his house. It was here where she'd stood alone the night before, and where Black had picked her up. He took the sunglasses back, put both pairs of gloves on, and grabbed the knife. Black had only stabbed her a few times the night before, it seemed.\n\nHe got to work, slashing her up many times, so this looked like something done by some random psycho. Black also ripped into the dress with the knife, in the places where he'd stabbed her the night before, so as not to arise suspicion. He left the knife planted in her stomach, and took off the outside pair of gloves, throwing them in the dumpster. He also took his coat off, which was the only thing that had been stained by the blood, and shoved it in the trunk of his car. Finally, he put the latex gloves in the glove box. Calling up his police contact, he knew his work was done.\n\n\"Hey Frankie, it's Dave. Tracked down this dame for a client, you might want to get somebody up here...\"", "I absolutely hated sinners. Thieves, rapists, murderers, all the same to me. The Bible is very clear. Sinners must be punished. That’s why I became a detective, you know. Best in the world. The way I see it, I was doing the Lord’s work for him. I trap sinners in their own little limbo, not even giving them the satisfaction of their final judgement. But there was one. There’s always one. One so evil, so ABHORRENT, that purgatory was too good for them. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 6:23. I knew the risks. There were the cops, but I didn’t worry about them. Most of them are stupid as a brick, and the smart ones can be, err, persuaded, to look the other way. Then there were detectives. THEY were my problem. Detectives know criminals. Most of them used to be, although they don’t admit it. But I wasn’t too worried about them either. P.I’s can think like criminals, but I had an advantage they didn’t. \r\nI could think like a P.I.\r\nSo I constructed my master plan, my Große Fuge B-Dur Op. 133, my Requiem. It was simple, really. A little bit of hydrogen cyanide, colloquially known at Zyklon B, in the chimney, and he would never know what hit them. The hard part was getting it in the house. Scratch that, it was getting the gas in the house with nothing pointing back to me. So I hired the mob. Everyone expects the Watney Streeters to do something like this. Maybe he didn’t pay up, or he offended the boss. No one would bat an eye. And where I was going, paying for the job wouldn’t be a problem either. And after months of deliberation, I prepared for my final symphony. \r\nI couldn’t watch the job. People would notice a carriage hanging around at the time of the crime, and once they tracked down the cabbie, it was game over. I had to put my trust in some hustling lowlife. Trust them to do the job. Trust them to do it sloppy, and get caught in the process. I showed the kid to 641A Chagford. The victim had moved recently. Had a bit of a quarrel with his roommate about their business. Things got pretty nasty. Then I went back to my flat, only a few streets across. And I waited. Oh, how I waited.\r\nAfter about two minutes off schedule, I got a knock on my door. It was Esther, the woman in 641B. “Oh, he’s been killed! By the Streeters, no less!” I pretended to look interested. I had gotten very good at that over the years. People always think they’re reciting the words of the Lord himself. “Please, you have to help! The coppers won’t take up the case!” My doing, of course. Like I said, all the good police can be bought out. \r\n“I’ll be right out.” Did I mention I had also gotten very good at lying? I walked over to my chair and pulled out my pipe, with no intention of getting up.\r\nWhich brings us to the present. My gun is in the opposite hand of my quill as I am writing this. I just realized, and am admitting now, there is one variable I did not consider; He himself. What will he think of me now, dedicating my whole life to getting rid of sinners, only to become one myself. Well, no matter. I am prepared for the consequences that I will face when I get to the Accursed Land. “But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.” Matthew 5:39. And so, my final words. My legacy, to be passed down through the generations. It is inevitable now. I, Sherlock Holmes, admit to being the sole proprietor in the murder of one John Hamish Watson for committing a sin for which he cannot atone: leaving his duty as my partner.\r\n\r\n\r\n" ]	2

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