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] I'm having a bad day, write a story about a puppy overcoming his fear of vacuum cleaners :)	[ "\"WHHHRRRRRRRR\"\n\nThe startling noise had begun again.\n\nSparko jumped up immediately, assuming his territorial position by sliding his front paws forward, lowering his torso to the ground while keeping his rear raised, never breaking eye contact. \n\n\"aaaaaaaaaAAARUFFFF! ROOO!\", his low growl ascended into a bark.\n\nThe noise stopped.\n\n\"Oh, we forgot to put Sparko outside\"\n\n\"Wait, he's getting older, you think he'll ever get over this vacuum thing if we don't let him?\", replied her spouse\n\nHis response was met with an unenthused rolling of the eyes. She flipped the switch.\n\n\"Ruff! Rooo! Ruf-ruff! Roooooo!\" Sparko stood his ground, back in position.\n\n\"This is no help!\" she called to her husband, slowly approaching the pile of crumbs swept next to the kitchen table.\n\n\"It's helpful for him!\"\n\n\"I fail to see how\", she quickly murmered in response.\n\nAs the noise continued, Sparko's excitement grew. Now running and jumping around the 'whrrr-ing' in circles, he managed to jump right in the pile and spread it to a scarce 3 foot diameter. The noise stopped again as the female muttered begrudgingly, walking off.\n\n\"Now's my chance\", thought Sparko... or something to that effect. He'd battled the machines before and won, how would this be any different? The flickering noise box of all pitches and flashes, he merely chewed its leash until it stopped, and this would be just the same.\n\nCautiously approaching the tall bastard, he followed its leash to the wall, where he'd be less suspicious. Narrowing his eyes, he chose where the wire had just hit the ground, and went in for his strike. He had no fear, the beast could not retaliate in it's sleep. Lowering himself to the ground, he chewed at his leisure.", "\t\"Okay, Bruce. You can do this. Who's a good boy, after all?\" Bruce mentally says to himself as Sheila is pulling the white, plastic enemy from the closet.\n \tBruce has been trying to work on bettering himself lately. He's pledged that he will try his best to let go of all the negativity in his life in order to be the best puppy that he can be so as to get more cuddles and treats from his human. \n\t\"If I can break myself from eating the yummy treats that Otis leaves in the box, then I can do this! It won't be so bad! It won't hurt anyone, Bruce.\"\n\tSheila proceeds to plug the black cord into the outlet on the wall. She pushes the pedal to make the beast tilt back. This is how it always begins. Bruce tenses up, pulling his ears back and exposing his teeth. He automatically resorts to aggression.\n\t\"Bruce! Keep calm! You have to fight the urge!\" \n\tSheila starts the machine and the whirring of the vaccuum obnoxiously fills the room. Bruce doesn't move an inch. He stays in the same tensed position as Sheila begins pushing the beast over the white grass. He begins to realize that every second that he refrains from barking, he is overcoming this obstacle. He's being the better dog in this situation.Sheila notices his odd behavior and shuts off the machine. She walks over to the young Cocker Spaniel and kneels to pat him on the head. She gives him a reassuring kiss on the top of the head and mentions that he's the best boy in the whole world.\n\tTo Bruce, this was the moment he lived for. He wagged his tail and he moves closer to give her loving kisses. She walks back to the machine and finishes her chore. Bruce finally doesn't feel the pull to attack the enemy machine. He walks to the couch to lie down as he watches his human clean the white grass. \n\tSoon enough, she has gone all around the room with the beast and proceeds to shut it off. She walks into the kitchen and Bruce hears her ruffling around in the cupboard for a couple minutes. \n\tBruce takes this moment to eagerly jump off the couch, walk over to the beast and look the enemy in it's plastic heart. He promptly lifts his leg and releases his bladder onto the enemy. \n\t\"Eat that, Sucker.\" Bruce says as he cooly walks away.\n", "My nose twitches, sniffing for danger from my hiding spot behind the couch. I perk up my ears as I hear the clack clack of the monster prowling through my home. The monster has taken my beloved Sarah hostage, and forced her to be it's slave, pushing it around and playing with it's long, sinuous tail. Whimpering nervously, I try to contain my fear. I love Sarah, and I want to protect her, but that monster is ferocious! It moves around unlike anything I've seen, menacingly gliding like a ghost. It's body is hard and shiny like a bug, with a transparent stomach swirling with it's victims bones. It must have some kind of power source that allows it to control her, and it seems strongest when it's howling and screaming. Sarah doesn't show any outward realization of the danger she's in, perhaps the creature has hypnotized her to do it's bidding?\n\n\nThe monster begins screaming and I wince, the volume hurts my head. Cautiously, I peek around the corner of the couch, worry making me pant. It's so purposeful in it's movements, leaving no square foot of the room untouched, somehow it evens communicates to Sarah and has her move things out of the way so it can move around more. How does it tell her it's desires, is it telepathic? \n\n\nWhen I left mom, she told me my new home would be a wonderful place, and in many ways it has been. I get fed yummy pebbles twice a day, I have my own grass to play in with my ball, Sarah even gave me a soft bed to sleep in every night. She didn't tell me I'd have to defend my home from monsters that apparently come out to terrorize me regularly. This isn't the first time I've cowered from the beast, and I'm starting to think I need to do something about it since it keeps coming back. I love Sarah and I can't keep letting her be tortured! I've made my mind up, time to stop acting like a feline and show what makes canines the best!\n\nUsing all my best abilities, I launch my assault. Tapping into my hyper speed, I bolt out from behind the couch and bob and weave my way around the insidious beast, taunting it with my most ferocious bark. My barks are ineffective, the monster rolls on with it's dutiful march unaffected. I slam on the brakes at where I think the front is, and and put on my fiercest look. Head lowered, hackles raised, and my deepest growl rumbling through my clenched teeth. The screaming stops, and Sarah seems to be coming out of her trance, she's trying to scold me like a naughty dog. She must still be in a haze, I'm in the middle of saving her. As she comes around, I see my chance to end this once and for all. I lunge for Sarah and she freezes in shock as I duck between her legs. As I unfurl I take my chance to attack the weakened monster, sitting silently after losing it's grip on it's victim. I chomp down on it's tail as hard as I can, fighting the urge to spit out it's rank flesh. Still maintaining my hold on it's tail, I throw my body down the hall to knock it off balance. The beast topples with an angry crash, helpless to my barrage. I give the tail a good head shake before spitting it out, then pin it's body to the ground to finish it off. Sarah is screaming my praises as I prepare to descend with my death blow, her encouragement fuels my fury. I rip out what I think is the beasts throat, and carry it to Sarah to show her she's safe, once and for all. \n\nAs I approach her, she seems angry, but softens as I sit and wait patiently for her to take the prize from me. I let her take the monsters flesh from my mouth, and she pats me on the head and sighs. \n\n\"Good boy Freckles\" she says as she laughs.", "Her rattle was once torturous. Her suction strong enough to strip my fur. Tears would stream down from my eyes when her light came on under the couch. What was she even looking for?\n\nBut when I saw her move to my kibble that I'd been saving on the rug she only sucked up the crumbs around them -I had to look again. Reevaluate our situation. Perhaps she wasn't the all-encompassing power -or even monster- that I had made her out to be. She could also preserve. Watch over me. I watched her as she got rid of the small shards of porcelain that could get in between the pads of my paws from the vase I had broken earlier. I was beginning to become embarassed. \n\nI could have developed a limp. Or worse -it could have gotten infected... I could have been sent back to the womb.\n\nToday I begin again. Today I try. Reciprocate. Form a symbiotic relationship of sorts. I'd like to write the foreword to her novel if she'd let me. My friend. Vacuum. ", "Little Charlie was strewn out on his back in front of the fireplace. The gas fire was on and it was heating his belly to the most delightful temperature. His tail was wagging and his day was going perfectly.\n\nPoppa was reclining on the sofa with a book in his hand, largely using the fire as his light source. Minutes later the scene was the exact same except Momma was walking into the room.\n\n“Hey Jim,” she said, “I gotta vacuum in here in a few minutes, guests coming over in the morning. You remembered, right?”\n\n“Huh?” Jim said as he looked up from his book. “Oh yeah, a course I didn’t forget. Leo and his daughter right?”\n\nMomma didn’t respond for a moment. “Well, if you can help out with some cleaning that’d be great.”\n\nAll the while Charlie didn’t move except for the wags in his tail. He couldn’t have cared less about what had Momma and Poppa so chatty.\n\nAnother few minutes later Charlie could hear that Poppa was now snoring. Time to jump into his lap! thought Charlie. And so he did. Poppa woke up and wheezed for a moment as the breath was knocked out of him, then he closed his eyes again and rested his arm on top of his puppy. Charlie’s tail was still wagging back and forth like a locomotive driving wheel. He gave Poppa a few kisses and then rested his head on Poppa’s chest.\n\nThat’s when Momma walked back in...with the vacuum. Charlie looked up with wide eyes. His tail halted all movements momentarily. His heart may have skipped a beat as well. He had to open his mouth to get Momma to put it back. He had hated the vacuum cleaner ever since he first laid eyes on it after the whole grocery incident.\n\nMomma had left some groceries out so he helped himself to a few bites and took them over to the rug in front of the fire. Once Momma found out, she was not happy. Charlie got a time out and he had to sit in his cage in the corner while the terrible machine tried to rip apart his rug. He saw himself as the keeper of that room and was not keen on monstrous things defiling it.\n\n“Bark bark, bark bark bark!” he barked at the vacuum. It wasn’t on quite yet but it might activate at any moment. Poppa jolted awake again at the sound of Charlie’s fright and the dog hopped off of him to stand his ground.\n\nThe barking continued for several moments more as Momma laughed. She then shooed him out of the room so she could get the job done.\n\nCharlie’s tail was furious as was his barking throughout the whole of the vacuuming. He just stood his ground near the dinner table in the neighboring room, every so often backing up a bit as the vacuum headed in his direction. It never got too close though.\n\nSoon enough Momma was done and everything was back to normal. She left the vacuum a few feet away from the fireplace and then left the room to go do some more cleaning.\n\nBy the time Momma and Poppa had gone off to bed Charlie had largely been able to forget about the vacuum. He was curled up in his bed with his eyes shut. However, in the middle of the night he woke up, and there it was across the room. It stood up proudly as if it was claiming his spot near the fireplace. Charlie jolted up and let out a continuous low growl, making an approach towards the monster.\n\nHe began his barking again and was bouncing around, bumping into the vacuum several times. He wouldn’t be afraid anymore. If he was ever going to strike down the vile beast it seemed best to do it while it was asleep.\n\nIn all of his rambunctious movements he actually ended up having a killer blow which knocked the vacuum to the ground. A compartment popped open when it hit the ground, its heart was now exposed.\n\nIt’s now or never, thought Charlie. He drilled his head into the opening and found a soft and cushy organ, clearly the place he would deal his killing strike.\n\nHe chomped down on the organ and pierced its side. He flung his head every which way and the vacuum’s guts were flying everywhere. He was soon covered in gray dusty vacuum flesh and was sure the beast was dead. He had finally done it. No longer would the vacuum lay waste to his chambers. He once again felt in control of his home.\n\nVery tired from the attack, Charlie walked back over to his bed and lay down. His tailed wagged all throughout the night as he dreamed of his valiant effort and of all the good times that would now lie in his future. His dusty, now gray coat would be the mark that would show Momma and Poppa how brave he had been." ]	5
	[WP] One day everyone around you is acting like a clichè Anime character.	[ "I was flying. Flying high above my city. Zooming above streets and through open windows. \n\nThat’s when I heard it. A loud shrill of a voice. Who was that?\n\n“Matt-Kun!!!!” it called. \n\nMatt- Kun? No one calls me Matt- Kun, we live in America…\n\n“Matt- Kun!! Breakfast is ready.” Hmm. Must be Mom.\n\nI walk downstairs, still in my pajamas. My jaw drops open. \n\nMom is standing there with her eyes closed and smiling the widest smile I’ve ever seen. And there is tons of food. \n\n“I knew you were going back to the university today so I made you all of your favorite breakfast foods!”\n\nThere were eggs that looked like a smiley face with a sausage smile, pancakes shaped like pandas, hash browns, lemon poppy seed muffins, and that wasn’t even half of it.\n\n“M—Mom.. When did you have time to make all of this?”\n\n“Oh , I don’t know. Heh! Do you like it?”\n\nShe ran over to the plate of pancakes and tilted the plate toward me in her elbow pit and with her other arm gave a “peace” sign.\n\nI was hungry, but I wasn’t that hungry. I asked her to bag what I didn’t eat it. She moved around the kitchen, what seemed to be almost teleporting from counter to counter shoving food in boxes. The boxes accumulated into a tall stack on the counter in what seemed like just seconds. \n\n“Have a great time at school!” \n\n“Man, that was a weird morning“ I though to myself. I sent a message to my roommate to let him know I was coming home. He has been having a girl over lately so I didn’t want to disturb him. \n\nI pull into my parking spot and get out of the car and bring in my laundry. The huge stack of food boxes take up my entire back seat. “Guess I’ll come back for those” I mutter.\n\nI begin to scale the stairs when Thomas comes rushing down them. I turn away so he doesn't hit my laundry. \n\nAnd then he rushes it back up the stairs. I continue to my room, it’s on the top floor, the 3rd floor. As I make it to the second landing, here comes Thomas. \n\nI wait for him to pass and notice his hair sticking out of a sweatband on his forehead. He has shorts on and no shirt. His headphones are blaring loud music. \n\n“HEY THOMAS” I yell. \n\nHe can’t hear me. The headphones are too loud.\n\nI yell louder “THOMAS”\n\nThomas takes off his headphones “What man? I’m training”\n\nThomas is training? What for? I’ve never seen him train for anything.\n\n“What for??”\n\n“You know, the big marathon coming up! I signed up this morning. Gotta start now”\n\n“Well . Good for you!” I didn’t know what else to say.\n\n“Yep! I’m going to be the fastest”\n\nI continue up the stairs as Thomas passes me a third time. And finally, a fourth. I get out my key and turn the knob. \n\nMy roommate is at his desk, frantically typing at his computer. \n\n“Hey Chad, what are you doing?”\n\n“Mid-terms are next week. I am studying. “\n\n“Chad, you’re like a genius. You’ve aced every class so far without studying.” I smiled. It was true. \n\n“Yes, but I didn’t get the highest grade on the Chemistry test last week. I have to get the highest quiz grade.”\n\nI nodded. “Hey so my mom made a bunch of food…would you like to”\n\nWith a quick motion, Chad stood up with his hands flat on the desk. He looked at me, sternly at first, and then his eyes widen and he exclaimed, “Do I want to have some? Why yes I would! I haven’t had a meal all day. This is great!” \n\n“okay well I have to go get it.”\n\n“Let me help” Chad ran down the stairs, passing Thomas. We passed him once more on our way back up. \n\nChad opened the box, quickly. “SUGOI!!!!!” he exclaimed and devoured the panda pancakes. \n\nJust then, a knock at the door. \n\nIt was Mindy, Chad’s girlfriend. \n\n“Awww Hi!!” she was sure chipper and looked different. Her hair was in pigtails and she wore a beanie shaped like a fox and had a black skirt on. \n\n“Chad, you are so cute when you eat breakfast. “ she said. \n\n“I need to go look in my car one last time.” I passed Thomas. \n\nI opened the driver side door and took a seat. What a strange day. \n", "Standing in the hallway, my head just started pounding. A quick migraine set in and my vision blurred. My head involuntarily shook, and the pain and sight problem was gone. \n\n\"What the hell was that?\" I asked myself in worry. I had just gotten a drink of water from the fountain. Trying to ignore that little strange feeling I just had, I walk up to the classroom. I sat down next to my friends, Oliver and Andy. Something different was happening, but I just couldn't put my finger on it. \n\nI looked at Oliver, who was sitting next to me in the back of the classroom, next to the windows. He was sleeping, of course, he hated these lectures. For some reason I saw a bubble at his mouth go up and down constantly with every breath he took. Strangely enough, he'd never done that before. \n\nI looked over at my friend Andy. He had a few girls around him, talking to him. One had strangely packed a lunch for him. I said, \"Wow Sam, didn't think you liked him that much\". Sam blushed, and yelled to me \"Shut up! I'm not into him!\" She couldn't keep eye contact and looked away from Andy and me for a moment. I thought to myself, \"When did she suddenly become a tsundere?\" \n\nSuddenly, the classroom door slammed open. A classmate who was always running late to first period ran in the room, with a slice of toasted bread in his mouth. Turned out he was the class president, even though he's irresponsible in some aspects. Even though he can't manage time well, he can pull off being a strict idiot who tries to be a decent leader. \n\nI looked over to one girl who's been talking to Andy. I saw a shining glint of metal from her. I froze. She jammed a knife into Andy's neck, and sliced it around, creating a huge laceration. I don't even thing it was a laceration at that point. This crazy girl i've gone to school with for years suddenly shouted \"If I can't have you, why should anyone else!\" as if to interrogate poor Andy. I couldn't move, the knife opened an artery and blood splatters across the room. I heard everyone else scream in terror and run out of the room. I looked back, Oliver had woken up from the noise.\n\nI felt a cold feeling in the back of my skull and blacked out almost instantly.\n\nSuddenly I came to, I was laying down on the ground, with a pole vault pole on my side. I remembered running to do my vault, but I guess I messed up badly. I asked my coach what just happened. He explained that I had messed up my plant, flexed the pole hard and when it straightened out, it shot me back and I must have hit my head pretty hard. He told me the details about the dangers of concussions and other junk, told me to just sit out for the rest of practice. \n\nMy friend Andy ran over from the throwing event area to meet me. I said \"Dude, I think I've watched too much anime.\"" ]	2
	[WP] The world's greatest detective was called in to investigate a very peculiar murder: the murder that they committed that night.	[ "\"Mark...Mark?\"\n\nI snapped back into reality to see that half of the room was staring at me. \n\nHow long had I been standing like that? Had I even spoken?\n\n\"You-you alright? Do you want to ride with me?\" asked my partner Lois.\n\n\"No..no, I'll meet you there,\" I replied. \n\nWhere in the hell was I last night?\n\n\"Okay then, well drink the rest of that coffee before you go, you look as if you've been counting sheep all night. I'll see you there.\"\n\nThe last thing I remember is driving...and then nothing\n\nThe captain chimed in, \"Take one of the rookies with you Mark. They could use some time with an old head. God knows we need it. Ain't very often we have a case like this pop up. We'll conduct interviews when you get back.\"\n\n\"Sure thing, Captain,\" I replied.\n\nI gestured towards Roger, the green hand from the week before. He had just graduated out of our training program and was dying to master every detail of the job as he possibly could. I had heard good things about him. Only once in a blue moon do we get somebody like Roger. Built for the work, with as much eagerness as a pup freed from a puppy mill. And with ears just as sensitive. We don't get those types very often...if ever.\n\nI turned quickly to reach for the door handle-\"Oh, and one more thing, start getting just a little goddamn more sleep, will ya? Can't have my best guy out walking like the damned creature of frankenstein around here.\"\n\n\"Yes Captain,\" I said, and quickly made my way out of the office, to grab my cup of coffee before heading for my cruiser. Roger eagerly attempted following, bumping into others, and knocking various items off of desks to keep up. I rolled my eyes and continued to the exit. The office was dead quiet, which I thought was odd, nobody spoke a word and the typical sound of fingers on a keyboard was suspiciously absent.\n\nJust as I got situated and reached for the door, Lois approached. \n\n\"Forgetting something?\" she said. In her hands, shining in the early sunlight, were my keys. \"Can't get very far without these can you?\"\nI smirked and reached my hand outward. \"No, sorry, maybe I need another one of these,\" I chuckled, gesturing towards the cup in my hand.\n\n\"Mhm,\" she mumbled and made her way back towards her car.\n\nI shut the door and held my grin, watching the light glimmer off of passing cars in the near intersection. Paying close attention to each time, the sparkle of sun, slowly dealing a growing spot of blindness to the spot of my eye it had caught. \n\nWhat did I do last night? Why can't I remember!?\n\nSLAM\n\nI jumped. Roger had got into the car without me noticing.\n\n\"Woah, sorry there Mark, thought I'd just jump in. You looked a little deep in thought there. Must be pretty focused on this case, huh?\"\n\nI regained my smile.\n\"Sorry, yeah-no, no biggie, just a long night.\"\n\n\"I just can't believe something like this would happen,\" he replied. \"Such a long life ahead of the fella'. But what goes around comes around, right Mark?\"\n\nHe laughed, smiling wide.\n\n\"We'll have this guy figured out before he even knows what happened! I was in early this morning, and already have a head start on the case. Wife, 2 kids, good job and a modest apartment downtown. This guy had everything going for him. No known enemies or confrontations, other than a single complaint he had of a neighbor concerning loud noise. And a bully or two from his past workplaces who've been long gone. Upstanding citizen.\"\n\nHis eagerness, attitude, and work ethic were just as I had imagined. \nThis guy was going places I thought to myself.\n\n\"Great!, I'm sure glad I picked you for the job!\" I exclaimed. \"None of them other rooks would have had those small details meshed out. Especially before knowing the case was even there's.\" I started the car and pulled way from the department.\n\nWe had been driving for barely 5 minutes when Roger summoned an expression of confusion upon his face. \"Mark...where are you going? The murder took place on 7th Ave and Winnepow Street.. You're going the complete opposite direction...\"\n\nWhere WAS I going? What has gotten into me?\n\n\"Sorry Roj, just making a quick stop for a coffee before we head over. Can I call you that, Roj?\" I said hoping to cover my absent mindedness and pulling into the nearest drive-thru.\n\n\"Sure, why not,\" he replied. \"You're only the single greatest detective to live in Brockwell County. Plus you kind of look like you could use one last coffee..\"\n\n\"Say, can you tell me about that time you solved the Tidwell's Supplies burglary!? Or the Misty Falls Rapist!!?? I've got to say, I really, really looked up to you, coming into this line of work. You've been my inspiration for the past 5 years or so to be blatantly honest.\"\n\n\"Listen kid, I just do my job. That's what I do. My job, and that is it. There is no REAL glory in putting some scumbag behind bars. The glory is the case never happening to begin with. I just help make the best of an already shitty situation, ok?\"\n\nThe car went silent, as I pulled up to the window.\n\n\"Just coming off of a night-shift, eh Mark?\" the attendant asked as he handed my usual coffee. I came there often.\n\n\"Not this time, on my way to a case actually,\" I replied.\n\"Oh okay..hey well say hi to that lovely partner of yours alright? Drive safe!\"\n\nI pulled out and made a U-turn back towards the freeway.\n\n\"Look, sorry, I've just been kind of tense lately, I apologize,\" I admitted. \"You are no doubt going to make it far in this line of work. You've got it in you, I can tell.\"\n\nA hint of gratitude slowly crept back into Rogers face before breaking into a full, beaming smile. He looked like a kid who's dad in the army had just come home from several years of overseas deployment .\n\n\"Thanks Mark, it really means the world coming from y-\"\n\n\"MARK\"\n\nThe radio broke in.\n\n\"MARK, ya there?\" Lois's voice cracked through. \"For the love of god where are you? It's only 5 miles from the station. You cant be THAT out of it are you?\"\n\n\"Just made a small coffee stop, I'm on my way, relax,\" I replied. \n\nRelax? I'm the one who needs to relax, I'm fine, everything is fine. Relax\n\n\"Okay, good, you need it. Get you're ass over here already, this crime isn't going to solve itself, ya know. Over.\"\n\n\"Anyways, what I was saying was,\" continued Roger, \"It means the world to me to hear that come from you. You haven't the faintest idea.\"\n\nLets just get this day over with, and all will back to normal in the morning.\n\n\"Anytime there, Roger. So... can you fill me in on the rest of this case? We're nearly there.\"\n\n\"Weren't you there?\" Roger asked puzzled. I cringed in embarrassment. I really wasn't all there, back in the Captains office.\n\n\"Apparently the victim was suffocated to death. They found his body in an alleyway on the edge of downtown. Fingerprints were taken, loved ones were called. This all happened about 2-3 hours ago. No witnesses. The scene was investigated, but they wanted to get a couple seasoned detectives down there before clearance. Thats where you and Lois come in.\"\n\nWHAT THE HELL DID I DO LAST NIGHT?\n\nThe car fell into silence again.\n\n\"..But I know who did it,\" Roger finally let out.\n\nWhat?\n\n\"I wont tell anybody,\" he said. \"It's between me and you.\"\n\n\"Wha-what are you talking about Roger?\" I demanded.\n\n\"Roger?\"\n\nI pulled into the alleyway, where Lois was waiting. Roger studied the look upon my face intently. Lois began approaching the car and before I could roll down the window, Roger grabbed my arm.\n\n\"It's alright Mark, dont worry. You'll always be my hero.\" He held his gaze on me, accompanied with a soft smile and a light cluster of tears erupting.\n\nLois tapped on the window, and I jolted my attention back to her. She motioned for me to roll the window down.\n\n\"Boy you need about six or seven more of those coffees,\" she laughed and opened my door for me.\n\n\"I thought you were bringing a rookie?\"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n " ]	1
	[WP] You're the king's body double and nobody else knows that. Now the real king is dead.	[ "I did it. I finally did it. I killed the king. What the hell was I thinking? I doesn't matter. It's over with now. Now I am the king, and no one will know.\n\nIt was about 3 in the morning when I killed him. I had been waiting all night in the dimly lit hallway. He groggily walked on by without noticing me, so I followed him. I wasn't planning on killing him; I've only ever had dreams about it. \n\nBeing his body double, I know a great deal about the kingdom. I was always briefed before making an appearance anywhere, and even stood in for the king at his own palace. The man was beyond paranoid; he was evil and cruel and feared that a lowly peasant would kill him someday. His paranoia got the best of him two weeks after he ascended the throne after a few palace windows were broken. Further investigation determined that a strong gust of wind broke the glass, but he was adamant in seeking my services.\n\nThe man rose to the throne by killing his father; he poisoned him. In just three months of ruling, he turned a prosperous and lovely kingdom into a barren and cold place. He hoarded food, clothing, water, and killed anyone who spoke against him. He would summon women to bear his children, but killed them in fear of being overthrown by one of them. \n\nI killed this man. I killed him because I needed to. I killed him because the kingdom needed it done.\n\nHe was my brother. My twin. Born 2 minutes and 37 seconds before I. \n " ]	1
	[WP] A very typical everyday plumber find himself sucked into a portal.	[ "\"Captain, Knight Ronalde reporting. I've brought the information as you requested.\" Saluting as the address began, the man who entered the room took up the tense position of one awaiting interrogation, straightening as he began his report. \"Another rift and another entry, this time Southern town Forles, just North of the Redstone territories.\"\n\n\"Alive?\" At the desk, a bespectacled man set down the parchment he'd been eyeing, noble-style reading glasses removed with a rough sigh. \"I'm guessing that's a no, isn't it?\"\n\n\"Unfortunately, Captain.\" Still at attention, Ronalde tried not to stare as his superior reached for the flask of amber, taking a hefty sip before standing with a gruff hiss of displeasure. It took little for him to notice that the room smelled strongly of spirits, or the second- much more empty flask sitting unattended on the floor. \"If I may, Sir-\"\n\n\"Fine, take me to it. Gods only know the Queen won't want us bringing the corpse in here.\" The Captain retrieved a rough looking contraption of wood and metal from beside the desk, slinging it over his shoulder to match the regal sword at his waist. \"Do you know the cause of death?\"\n\n\"Captain, reports say it was simply a bad landing. No fowl play suspected. The rift opened up thirty feet above the cobblestone... the results were... unpleasant.\"\n\n\"The poor bastard never had a chance.\"\n\n\"No sir. Likely dead on impact.\"\n\n\"Any other disturbances? Ripple effects?\" Objects of interest?\"\n\n\"Sir, some artifacts were recovered. Metal tools of some kind, and another mana-housing.\" Checking the parchment in hand, Ronalde took the lead lead, confirming. \"A small amount of water as well, reportedly. The Church Officials of the town were attempting to take the scene when we arrived, but the Royal crest backed them down.\"\n\n\"Did you recover everything?\" A rough gesture from the Captain signaled a post of armored guards waiting in the hall, an entourage began to form. Knights fell into step with rough clatter of plates and steel as the Captain continued down towards the heavy-set wooden doors. \"I want every object found, in all likelihood we're going to need them at some point.\"\n\n\"For the most part they've been recovered, although it's hard to say. The Church might have hidden some of them.\" Keeping pace, the Soldier fell back as the Captain slammed the doors open, going on ahead as two panicked attendants jumped back from the wide-swing. \"We weren't the first on scene.\"\n\n\"You'd really think the Church might lack the spine for that sort of thing nowadays.\" An angry growl sounded with the faintest hint of liquor as the Captain's pace increased, growing gaggle of Guards struggled to follow without forming to a trot in the hallways. \"After that god-damned bloody Sunday, you'd expect them to consider a bit more before trying anything.\"\n\n\"Aye Sir, you're right Sir! We'd all think it.\" The brisk reply came with a halt of movement, as the Captain zeroed in on the first room in the hall. \"But it's in the realm of possibilities, so-\"\n\n\"Hold on a moment- ROB!\" The Captain's shout echoed through the rafters as he knocked loudly on the smaller set of doors. \"Rob, get up!\" The knocking continued, relentlessly. \"I need you to lead a team, ASAP. If I have to come back here with a bucket of ice water, so help me god- I'll do it!\"\n\n\"It's late! A muffled voice replied, obviously irritated. \"You had me running Body-guard for the Queen with that damn Elf of yours all day! Joe has the other set of keys, make him go!\"\n\n\"Rob, if the ice water doesn't do it for you I'll go down the hall and get Sandra to open the door.\"\n\n\"You wouldn't!\"\n\n\"I might...\" The Captain let his tone settle for a moment, considering. \"Rob, I though Adventuring was your deal. Wasn't that the reason you came here?\"\n\n\"Oh... for fuck's sake, I'm coming! Don't you dare sick that crazy Mage-woman on me.\" a rough shuffle and the clatter of wood sounded before the door was opened to reveal a bedraggled man of slightly plump build. \"From threats to guilt-tripping, I see how you do things.\"\n\n\"I wouldn't if I could help it, but I've got a Mission for you.\" The Captain eyed the man, almost uneasy. \"Twenty miles south, urgent: I'd recommend taking the Jeep.\"\n\n\"Another mission, Captain?\"\n\n\"Quest than, if that sounds better to you.\" The Captain peeked past the door with a grimace at the unorganized mess within the room. \"It's a retrieval. A portal opened to the South.\" \n\n\"Hooo, anything interesting come out of them?\"\n\n\"One person, now deceased.\" \n\n\"Nothing else?\"\n\n\"No, but where there's one, there's a good chance of more. Queen's scouts have reported as much, we saw that happen last month too with what might have been an aircraft.\" The Captain pulled the parchment from Ronadle's waiting hand beside him, scanning it over before giving a gruff nod. \"Poor bastard might have been a plumber... Listen, I want you down there with a team. Any more people come out, bring them here if you can.\"\n\n\"If this is a longterm thing I'm requesting Eron. Guns are great an all, but I'm not going back out there without some solid firepower.\" From the doorway, the man's arms crossed over a stained t-shirt and a slight beer-gut. \"I want a mage.\"\n\n\"Fine, and I'll throw in six knights while you're at it- but if you get Eron, you get Sandra.\"\n\n\"Sandra-\" The man choked on the name, coughing with a flustered anger. \"Since when was that a rule?\"\n\n\"Since they put rings on each other's fingers.\"\n\n\"Oh for fuck's sake- Fine then! But I want Joe too.\" Puffing up, the man eyed the Captain. \"My car, my rules. I'm not going anywhere with Sandra unless Joe is there to watch my back. I don't want to wind up dead.\"\n\n\"No Rob, I can't do it.\" The Captain dismissed the suggestion, \"I might need Joe if another Portal opens somewhere else. If not him, then I'll likely need to leave the Capital myself, and there's a still a Church mark on my neck. That's a disaster waiting to happen.\"\n\n\"Then you can send your Crazy Elf, or the Werewolf- I want Joe on my team.\"\n\n\"We both know that Queen Aurum's very fond of that werewolf,\" The Captain let a sly smile creep over his beard, \"and the Crazy Elf won't leave even if I order her to.\"\n\n\"Seriously?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid so.\"\n\n\"You're not budging?\"\n\n\"No, I can't give you all of them Rob, I'm sorry.\" The Captain confirmed, \"There have been too many assassination attempts recently anyways, at least one of them is needed here for now.\"\n\n\"Fine, keep the Mages, just send me with Joe- and knock that down to four knights so we can fit without that shit trailer you've got. We'll get it done.\"\n\n\"Deal.\"\n\n----\n\n\nThis story is a continuation of a bunch of other writing-prompts!\n\n[Start here!](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/51f8ag/wp_youre_such_a_powerful_magician_that_life_is/d7bn3g2/)\n\n[Previous](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/612yh9/tt_every_neighborhood_in_your_city_has_a_resident/dfbd58i/)\n\n[Next](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/638e3v/wp_write_a_story_that_ends_with_and_yet_my_desire/dfs90ri/)\n" ]	1
	[WP] From a violent video game (FPS, horror, survival horror, etc.), make a children's bedtime story.	[ "[X-COM 2]\n\nTwo Advent Soldiers, A Lancer and a Shieldbearer, were peacefully playing a game of catch when a Sectoid suddenly dashes past and grabs their ball from them.\n\n\"I'll get it back.\" The Lancer arrogantly assured.\n\n\"I think I would be better at it.\" The Shieldbearer replied. \n\nSo they decided that whoever gets it back first can own the ball.\n\nThe Lancer went up to the Sectoid and threatened that he would find an Andromedon to deal with him unless he gave the ball back. The Sectoid however refused to give it back.\n\nA few days later the Shieldbearer asked the Sectoid if he could please have the ball back and after much consideration the Sectoid gave it to him. The Shieldbearer taunted the Lancer over his ownership of the ball and wouldn't even let him touch, keeping it to himself for several days. However the Sheildbearer had no fun playing on his own and eventually apologized to the Lancer for not letting him play. The two started playing catch together again and both were happy.\n\nMoral of the story, always ask nicely instead of using threats, and be generous" ]	1
	[WP] A retired gumshoe struggling with rapidly progressing dementia can't shake the loss of the one case he never solved.	[ "I aim to put this all on paper now, while I can. I doubt anyone will read it, but I want to get the truth of my part in this matter on record while I can still keep it clear in my mind. No one can say for certain how long it will take for this damned affliction to run it’s course and be done with me, but I think it will be sooner rather than later. I’ve taken to drifting off sometimes, and can no longer trust myself to drive my own car. It’s best I do this now.\n\nSome things you know without anyone ever telling you, things that are just there, in the bedrock of the deepest parts of the mind, so solid, but so dark you can’t tell where they came from. These things can be hard to put into words, and asked to prove the truth in them, you might find it hard. There they are just the same.\n\nIt was like that with Henry.\n\nRight from our first meeting I knew Henry was innocent, he sat there in the sterile, grey, jailhouse interview room, looking like a kicked dog. A small man, made smaller as he seemed to want to fold in on himself and just disappear. He looked almost like some strangely aged child, in the drab white overalls clearly too large for his slight frame. His hands nervously grasping the small well-worn bible, it's foxed pages yellowed and turned down at the corners from long use. You could tell he leaned heavy on that bible.\n\nHis lawyer Mr. Marlowe had first called my office, back then I still had a reputation in this town,\nNot two years before I had provided crucial evidence in the Hannigan trial, that had proven my client’s innocence, it had made quite a few headlines. The local police were none too happy with being made to look foolish, but the truth is, the police didn’t look too hard to prove anything in those days, if you were in the wrong place, at the wrong time, and you fit the bill, you were left holding the bag, simple as that.\n\nI met with Marlowe at the jailhouse the next morning and we went to see his client. He looked so pathetic, I couldn't hardly picture him killing anyone, let alone his own wife. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen bad in all shapes, from the typical common variety of bad that results in poor choices made in bad situations, to what I could only call just straight evil( that’s seem much less common to me), But I didn’t see where this timid mouse of a man fit into that scale.\n \nWell he could certainly afford my fee so I agreed to look into the matter.\n\nSmith and his wife, formerly Miss Betty Harper had been married just over 18 months, Mrs. Harper/Smith had come from old money, met Henry through his practice as an ersatz therapist of sorts, by that I mean that Henry didn’t seem to be a doctor of any qualification, he practiced a kind of Gestalt therapy based on having wealthy clients role-play and act out emotional traumas. I couldn’t make much sense of it, but it was the jazz age after all, and who am I to say what the rich should do with their money?\n\nOf course the police made much of this, a “fake therapist”, new to the city, manipulates a wealthy young heiress into marriage, and soon after she dies leaving him the sole beneficiary of a considerable fortune. Open and shut case right?, when in doubt, the husband did it.\n\nI had a least a couple of issues with that, firstly, no gun had ever been found, and so, no fingerprints. Second, no one had witnessed the crime, the door was jimmied from the outside, and while Henry did not have an alibi to prove he was out on errands that morning, likewise, no one could place him at the scene. Mrs. Smith, formerly Miss Harper, shot twice, the assailant fled the scene, no weapon found, no witnesses.\n\nRemember how I said the police didn’t waste too much time on gathering evidence in those days?, it took only an afternoon of snooping around their penthouse apartment until I found a small lockbox full of letters, apparently belonging to Mrs. Smith, from a former lover. The initial tone of the letters was as you would expect, sweetness and platitudes, but as the months progress the letters turned darker. It seems Mrs. Smith had ended the affair and Romeo had not taken the news well. His last few letters had even hinted at his intention to get revenge, and so it seems he did..\n\nThe letters, combined with the police’s general lack of a strong case meant the jury took all of 45 minutes to clear Smith by lack of evidence , and I made the papers again, can’t say I hated that.\n\n Not a week later and Smith himself came to my office to settle the bill, he was looking more like the dapper society man I had seen in pictures from before the case. Thanking me, he settled my bill with a healthy bonus, and told me of his plans to travel to Europe and devote himself once more to his trade, I didn’t say as much but I figured there were plenty of disillusioned jaded millionaires to keep him busy for a lifetime.\n\nThere was only one loose end that stayed with me tough.., while I had done the job I was paid for, I had not actually solved the murder of Mrs. Smith, who was she having an affair with?, who was the man who had taken his revenge, and her life?\n\nIt wasn’t until a few months later that we got an answer to that question, Ron Phillips, an associate of Mr. Smith was arrested on narcotics possession, drunk, and desperate to avoid charges and the loss of his reputation, Phillips had spent a long night in a holding cell, recounting his story. Smith had paid him a fair sum of money to pen the letters in his hand, and mail one every few days from the other side of the city. Not knowing Smith's ultimate plan, and desperate to pay for his habit, Phillips had agreed.\n\nNeighbors confirmed that Smith was in the habit of collecting the mail from the apartment lobby himself every morning, and had presumably been secreting the letters in a locked box at the back of a closet, safe until the day they would serve their purpose.\n\nTwo things will get you into trouble in this line of work, the things you don’t know, and the things you’re sure you do.\n\nI’ll have to finish here, my hand takes to shaking sometimes." ]	1
	[WP] Barack Obama interviews for an office job at a firm who is completely oblivious to politics. He has to explain his previous job and how it would make him a good fit for the position he applied to.	[ "\"Your name, sir?\"\n\nThe former President took off his glasses and looked at the man. Mr. Dunham continued his deadpan expresion at Barack, as if this happened often.\n\n\"Er... Barack Obama.\" He raised an eyebrow and looked out the window, awkwardly.\n\n\"Any higher education?\" the interviewer asked.\n\n\"I majored in political science at Columbia.\"\n\nMr. Dunham wrote plainly on the clipboard papers, firmly holding the pen. \"New York City, huh? That's a big place compared to this little place.\"\n\n\"Well, it's helped put me at ease. Last year was pretty stressful. For me... likely for you... for many people in this great country. I need some time to relax now, take care of my kids, but keep moving ahead. We all do. Not just because we want to, but because we have to.\"\n\n\"You married?\" Mr. Dunham seemed unconvinced by the articulation.\n\nBarack raised his other eyebrow. \"Sir, you, uh... you are aware of who I am, correct?\"\n\n\"Yes, you're the man I'm interviewing.\" Mr. Dunham looked up from the paper and sat up straight.\n\n\"Does the name 'Barack Obama' mean anything more to you right now?\"\n\n\"No, I'm not sure why it would. Where are you from?\" the man looked back to the paper.\n\n\"Hawaii. If you'd like to see my birth certificate, I am prepared to give it to you.\" Barack started to look a bit agitated.\n\n\"No, I trust you. With the patriotism I've seen on your resume, you're definitely an American citizen.\"\n\n\"You bet I am. I was President last year!\" Barack finally stated clearly. He was beginning to seriously worry about the current state of the American public.\n\n\"President of what?\"\n\n\"The United States government!\"\n\n\"Well, I hope you're not planning to be the president of this company. I don't believe you're qualified.\"\n\n\"No, I just!\" he paused and held his head in his hands. \"I'm not sure if you've recognized me or not. I was President of the United States! Barack Hussein Obama! Have you not heard of me?\"\n\n\"Not before today, no. Sorry for disappointing you.\"\n\n\"No, it's okay. Maybe this is a good thing. If you don't have any idea who I am, I'll finally have a chance at a normal life again. Maybe for America to truly progess, we will have to walk away from the past.\"\n\n\"One thing I do believe you will be qualified for, though, is this position.\" He took one last glance at the papers and looked up at the 44th President. \"You're hired, Mr. Obama.\"\n\nBarack smiled and shook his hand with a firm grip. \"Thank you, sir, for the opportunity.\"\n\nHe walked out of the small building and walked all the way home. He was now Barack Obama, Amish accountant." ]	1
	[WP] You are an all-knowing being that answers only one question a soul asks before passing on. But today, a soul asked you something you didn't expect.	[ "Day after day, one after another, they poured through my door and sought the other side. Some were afraid, some had made their peace, and some were simply confused. They all had questions, though, and I had the answers.\n\n'Where will I go?'\n\n'What happens next?'\n\n'Will I see my loved ones again?'\n\nAll standard, all with simple answers. Millennia went by, and while often the questions had different answers, they were always in the same vein. But today... Today is different. Today someone will come who will ask something new.\n\nOf course, I have always known this would happen. I know she will be small, with red hair and a gap in her teeth and the little wisps of innocence clinging to her form. I know her voice will be soft, but echo across my chamber, through the ghostly images of others making the same journey. I know she will miss her father and her cat and her teacher and her friends from school. I know her name, and I know what she will ask.\n\nShe will glide through the door with a gaggle of others, her mind working to take in all she is experiencing, and she will not be afraid. She will hear the sigh of my voice filling the empty spaces within her and she will understand that she is no more a part of the world she once knew, but, still, she will be at peace. Her eyes will fall upon me, and I will offer her the answer to any question she can conceive of.\n\nShe is here. She approaches, and unlike most, she pauses before me. Her voice is soft, but echoes, as she asks the one question in all the universe she wishes an answer to:\n\n\"Are you okay?\"\n\nAnd, for the first time in my eternal existence, I do not know." ]	1
	[WP] Just been ghosted by a friend can I have a story to cheer me up? It can be about anything.	[ "Our story starts with an ordinary window washer, Ryan. Ryan was raised in rural Missouri and always loved climbing the sheer cliff faces of the Ozark Mountains and found the rush of adrenaline to be exhilarating. He and his friends frequented a swimming hole just south of Branson where the cliffs were an easy climb overlooking a natural swimming hole in the river at least 40 feet deep. \n\nRyan went through high school, breezing through classes finding no difficulty in any subject presented. Then again, high school proceeded at near a snail's pace, so as long as you paid attention, you could pass with a B average easily. His parents were proud enough, and while he didn't excel at anything, they felt relieved he was never in trouble and always seemed to impress teachers.\n\nThe adrenaline always pulled him back though, and when he finished high school, Ryan was determined to find a job that fed that rush as much as possible. He tried roofing, construction work, even chimney cleaning, but none of it came close, and roofing nearly killed him in the hot August heat.\n\nRyan decided that he might as well make an attempt at college life, if he wasn't going to be finding a job to fit his needs elsewhere, so he moved to St. Louis to study architecture. The first semester was easy enough for Ryan, and while it was wrapping up, he began looking for a summer job which he found with a janitorial company.\n\nCleaning toilets and wrangling vacuum cords was not nearly as fun as his boss had described, but the work paid well enough and allowed him to stay in town. While cleaning, Ryan began a habit of trying to create as much foam and bubbling from the cleaning supplies as possible. Nothing malicious, just enough to pass the time while scrubbing. A coworker found Ryan swirling bubbles one day and the nickname stuck: Bubbles. \n\nAs Ryan continued working for the company, he eventually found his way into the window-washing department and soon loved being on those platforms more than anything else. He would often go in early and work later if needed to make sure he was always able to work on the windows and stayed out of the bathrooms. \n\nRyan enjoyed the work, and it suited him well, feeding his need for adrenaline. He constantly showed up early or worked late just to have ten more minutes high above the city. Even his boss and his boss's boss began to pay attention, and eventually they began joining Ryan in his daily adventures where he would frequently prank them, often causing quick dips or swings on the platform (definitely not OSHA approved). \n\nWith such enthusiasm and love for life, Ryan was eventually given a position in management but only on the condition (one of his own choosing) that he always be allowed access to clean the windows if he should ever feel the need.\n\nIn the end, Ryan even became CEO, still riding platforms across windows, still being as adventurous as ever. Thus the story of the Rise of Bubbles. ", "Sure man, no problem. Actually it's less than no problem, it would be my pleasure. I get a strange and admittedly perverse pleasure from writing stories for people who have just been ghosted so I'm going to tell you about the time I ghosted myself and how I was able to claw my way back to reality.\n\nIt all started when I was 28 years old. I was working a good, high paying job as a hot shot engineer at one of the best and brightest engineering firms in all the countries of the world (probaby (at least I thought so at the time (and still do, they're great))). And get this, I always bring my lunch in a little lunch box that I've head since I was but a wee little boy in grade school. It didn't have any obnoxious gay ass shit on it like some dated cartoon characters or anything, it was just blue so I was able to bring it to work without being embarrassed by it. Anyway, one day I unpack my Cajun spiced turkey and mayo sandwich (I was on a real Cajun spiced turkey sandwich kick back then) when all of a sudden, unexpectly, suddenly my sandwich started floating out all on it's own (I didn't attach any string or anything!) and so I grabbed the sandwich and ate it as quickly as I possibly could before something bad happened. I mean I really horfed it down hard, like it hurt a little bit. But man oh man, that was a big mistake. Turns out that sandwich had a ghost in it and I ate the ghost and the ghost started fuckin' with me while it was in my body. That shit wasn't cool at all, like it made me stand up, grab my sody pop (Sprite ZERO) and made me dump like 75% of it down the sink in the company lunchroom. Like That sucked I was so thirsty from eating that spicy sandwich and I only got a few good gulps out of that. Then when I'm trying to do work the ghost kept like spazzing my arms around and knocking shit off my desk and yo man my boss saw this shit and was like, \"What the fuck are you doing? Pick your shit up!\" And so I go to apologize but instead the ghost talks for me and says some demonic shit that definitely got me in trouble (but not fired thankfully (I explained to them later that I was ghosted and the understood)). Any way long story short, after a few hours I had to take a big poop and I pooped out the ghost and I didn't have any problems the rest of the day.\n\nYeah man, so don't worry about it, dog. I've been ghosted before too and like it stinks sure, but if you just take a massive dump, you can probably get rid of the ghost. Stinks that your friend gave you ghost though. Good luck with that.\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] Your parents come home and tell you, "We aren't your parents. We found you while hiking in a cave next to a sign that said, chosen one. They will know. " You begin to wonder, what were you chosen to do?	[ "Joaquin the Janitor stepped through my doorway. \"He is the one\" Joaquin proclaimed in thickly accented American English. \"Señor, I must take him with me, for the Prophesy of the Cave has foretold it. He must pass the ancient rites, and become a custodian.\" \nMy parents, bewildered and distraught, burst into tears, with the knowledge that I would not tame dragons, inherit a kingdom, slay an ancient demon, nor even live the life I chose, but become a custodian in an elementary school. \n\"Fine,\" they choked out through their tears, their disappointment palpable. \"Go fulfill your destiny, we won't stop you.\"\nBut I didn't go 'cus that would suck and I became a Meme Lord instead lol.\nMy parents were more disappointed in the end." ]	1
	[WP] You have invented a form of FTL travel. The world immediately embraced it.However they never gave you a chance to warn them....	[ "\"What's all this nonsense about the clown dimension?\" \n\"That's how it works, sir. It's the caveat I tried warning you all about.\" \nThe man shook his head... \"Sounds ridiculous to me. Why would a cosmic being capable of folding the universe like a balloon animal want anything to do with us?\" \n\"Because it's got nothing better to do, sir. It responds to this novelty horn,\" the scientist held up his prop and squeaked it once to punctuate, \"and the clown interprets the coordinates as a request for a balloon animal. It sees the starting and end points as a sort of challenge. Though I don't think the animals it creates would make any sense to us.\" \nThe man put down his cigar and stared at the scientist. \"So what's the bad news?\" \n\"Well, every so often the clown pinches the universe, like this:\" the scientist pointed to a balloon dog with a twist around the leg joints, \"and although a 3D object can pass through without even realising, any 4D properties are exaggerated.\" The scientists took a syringe and injected it expertly into the balloon, without popping it. \"Now if the green liquid represents the mass of the object, it can technically move through the twists without a problem, because they're not dead ends, but infinitely small apertures between stretches of space-time.\" \n\"Yes, yes, I'm quite familiar with Doodles'-dog theory.\" \nThe scientist blinked. \"Of course. But when some of the mass isn't finished draining into the second stretch, and the mass in the second stretch begins draining into the third stretch, the pressures between stretches aren't quite right and...\" the balloon popped, leaving pieces of rubber and green water over the scientist's trousers. \n\"That's a dramatic illustration, Professor Sprinkles, but it doesn't point out the limits of your device.\" \nThe scientist squirmed, \"the mass can be buffered with certain novelty objects, that can be removed through clown-phase-space without consequence. This means the pressure can be immediately regulated between stretches of space time, and according to Dodgem's-Cat-ernity principle, all the mass is spread out across the liquid you saw in the balloon. It doesn't matter what mass you remove from the liquid, the pressure is relieved in the most efficient route and space-time doesn't unravel. Or pop.\" \nThe cigar hadn't gone out yet, and the man behind the desk felt the need to drag and exhale slowly. \"Novelty objects such as what?\" \nThe scientists knew the answer already: \"Custard pies. They have by far the most comedic value of any clown-related object, and the highest ratio of that to mass. In order to traverse the Clown-Dimension through Balloon animal drives, the ship must contain around 10% mass of custard pies.\" \nThe man behind the desk sighed, then pressed a button on his intercom. \"Alice, we have some real deep science doo-doo to clean up, and the world needs to know asap.\" He looked up at the scientist, and made eye-contact. \"This sonofabitch might just have saved humanity.\" \n\n-----\n\nOutside the building, Professor Sprinkles allowed himself a small grin of victory. A squeaking accompanied his footsteps, and he drew a small balloon dog out of his pocket. \n\"Not yet, my sweet Pinocchio. Private Pug's death was a necessary illustration. I assure you he will be remembered as a hero. More and more dimensions are being rallied, tricked, and enslaved to our cause. No other clown has possessed so many custard pies, and Lord Laughter has no clue as to our intent. Soon, we shall overthrow him, and the malevolence of his novelty plastic stench will be wiped from the universe. This dimension's dominant race will profit from our work, and in time their sacrifices to us will grow, as did the others.\" \nPinocchio squeaked excitedly, and Professor Sprinkles returned him to his pocket. \n\"A ha ha. Ha ha ha. Ha.\" " ]	1
	[WP] "It was a bright and halcyon day"	[ "It was a horrid tide in the summer moon\n\nWhen the sirens came to croon\n\nA skipper crossed the ocean blue\n\nHer farrow hair, how it flew\n\nThrough the whipping winds of night.\n\n\nThe sirens glared in their flight\n\nSteely eyes with an avarice shine\n\nFor the skipper's treasure's they did pine\n\nClaws outstretched into the horrid tide\n\nOn the airs they did ride \n\n\nThe skipper stood strong on her ship\n\nA blade did appear, strung to her hip\n\nWith a flick of the hand, the sword revealed\n\nThe fate of the sirens was soon sealed\n\nWith a swipe and a swoop, the steel did play\n\nto drive the sirens away\n\n\nA slash to the wing of a thief\n\nThe avarice of the siren was brief\n\nHer head did drop into the water below\n\nAway from the summer moon's glow\n\nAll sirens did see this grisly sight\n\nThey fled to the Hells with all their might\n\n\nAfter the fight, the skipper sailed forward\n\nTo the port, the vessel shirred \n\nOn the morn, the skipper did see\n\nThat the horrid tide did flee\n\n\nFor it was a bright and halcyon day\n\nAmong the sea spray" ]	1
	[WP] An ordinary garden snail receives unnatural superpowers after experimentation by a wealthy, albeit mad scientist.	[ "Alone, sitting atop a dangerous crag cutting into the surf of the sea, was the home of Doctor Noden; a man consumed, a man beseeched by the endless pursuit of progress and biological advancement. Inside the thick walls of Noden’s home, buried deep beneath the rough earth of the crag, lay the hidden halls and corridors of Noden’s personal laboratory. For years, endless decades, Nodens had retreated to his laboratory, to his personal heaven and hell, to tinker and create, to play god, and to push the very boundaries of life itself.\n\nBelow the towering house sitting upon the crag, laid a village, empty and abandoned. The village had once been a prominent fishing village, successful and rich. Noden realized the abundance of the village, and built his laboratory, his lair, to overlook the village. And then, slowly, the surrounding sea began to decay and die. The land soon turned barren. The people fell sick, malnourished and emaciated. One by one they wandered up to the kind doctor’s lair, desperately seeking treatment. Unfortunately, however, they found that once they entered the twisting labyrinth of Noden’s laboratory, it was impossible to leave.\n\nDoctor Noden walked down the barren, decrepit halls of his playground. His right foot dragged behind him, lame since birth. The stomping of his good foot, and the dragging of his wasted limb, echoed down the dark, damp halls. He held a small, black box in one arm. A mad grin was held on the doctor’s face, and he could not contain his awful glee. Finally, finally after all his searching, after all of his research, he may have found what he was looking for.\n\nStopping suddenly, Noden turned and faced a large, intimidating, metal door. Producing a thick, brass key, Noden unlocked the door, and lit a small gas lamp, made of glass and bronze. The light illuminated the room. Rusted chains dangled from the far wall, and a wooden table sat at the center of the room. Dried bloodstains were splattered across the rough wood. Noden cackled, and limped over to the table.\n\nThe black box in his arm landed with a thud on the table. Barely able to contain his glee, the kind doctor opened the box, and examined its contents. Within the box, caged away, was a simple garden snail; its body fleshy and soft, and its shell a dull brown and grey. The doctor eyed the snail with glee, and raised a single hand. With such care, with such love and affection, Noden leaned his face forward, and gently stroked the snail. He cooed, softly, under his breath, and repeated the assurances that were now burned into his mind as simple routine.\n\n“Don’t worry. This will only hurt for a second, and then you will feel much, much better.” Noden lied, pulling a syringe out from a pocket hidden within his coat.\n\nWith a delicate hand, with the utmost of care, Noden injected the snail with the syringe. He pressed down on the plunger, and watched the sickly, clouded brown liquid, slowly stream into the snail’s fragile body. It had taken Noden years to extract this serum, countless victims and cadavers to create this true essence, this utter purity.\n\nWhen the syringe was emptied, Noden straightened up, and laughed. He threw the syringe into a corner of the room, and yelled madly, his eyes wide and unfocused.\n\nNoden took a step back, and muttered to his sweet patient, his loving experiment.\n\n“Oh my sweet dear.” Nodded cooed, his voice sinister and cruel. “You have been blessed. I have given you the power of determination … and the taste of revenge. The hatred, the desperation, the anger of my patients, extracted so carefully and lovingly, now courses through your veins. For now, I can only wait and see, if you choose to accept these pathogens, or refuse them, and perish from their anguish.”\n\nThe tentacled eyes of the snail looked up at the kind doctor, at its captor, at its master, at its owner; at its tormentor. Pride, love and support, welled within the doctor’s breast as he sensed the hatred, the pain and resolve, hidden behind the filmy black of the snail’s eyes.\n\n“Until the morrow then, my sweet prince.” The doctor said with a regal bow, before limping out of the room, and heading towards his personal quarters. Tonight, tonight he would sleep, finally, peacefully, satisfied with his life’s work.\n\nLeft to its own devices, in one of the many dungeon cell of Noden’s laboratory, the snail squirmed, and convulsed in confused pain as the kind doctor’s serum coursed through its body. Its soft flesh rippled with sudden bumps and growths. The snail’s body, its organs and mind, struggled to keep pace with the pain. With a sharp crack, a resounding crack which echoed around the dark, damp cell, the snail’s shell broke in two. A great, black lump grew out of the snails back, and it writhed and convulsed in shadow. The snail attempted to remain conscious, it struggled, as the black veil, the darkness of insanity, slowly crept over its mind.\n\n**\n\nIn the doctor’s darkened bedchamber, Noden slept peacefully. His snoring, soft and regular, filled the room. His door was left open, and in the dim light of the shadows and the night, a large, amorphous amalgamation of limbs and hardened shell, slick flesh and limbs, lurched into the room. The beast of horror and limbs stood, perched, over the doctor’s prone form.\n\nSubconsciously, hidden within his id, the doctor had known his fate. He had worked so hard towards his death, simply out of pure survival. He was a monster, a beast, no longer fit for the warmth of life. But he could not stoop so low as to take his own life. So rather, in selfish greed, he had poisoned another, and forced his death upon its hands.\n\nThe snail, its many grotesques limbs, rushed towards the doctor, smothering him and breaking his neck, killing Doctor Noden instantly.\n\nAnd now, left an aimless beast, the poor snail turned its deformed eyes out the window, and into the night sky, drawn to the alluring scent of life.\n\n---\n\nHope you enjoyed the story! I've got tons more over at my sub, r/ThadsMind, if you want to subscribe to that bizz.", "James woke up in an unfamiliar location. It was dark, cold and smelled of mold and dust. His nose itched. He attempted to scratch it, then found both arms tied behind his back. He realised it was probably another kidnapping. He wondered where his bodyguards were. He'll fire them all and get more competent ones once he gets the chance.\n\nJames' eyes grew accustomed to the darkness. He was in an old warehouse of some sort. Crates and boxes draped with cobwebs and dirt stacked along the walls. He wiggled his arms, managing to retrieve his cellphone from his pocket after some significant effort and a sprained back. 'Dumb kidnapper. Didn't search my pockets', James thought. The phone could not be switched on. It was out of battery. James cursed.\n\nJames' attention was drawn to a creaking door across the warehouse. A silhouette in the moonlight. The size of a snail.\n\n\"Fiiiiiiiinally,\" slugged the snail.\n\n\"H-How did you survive? I caught you in bottle and salted you into nothing last year! With my own hands!\" cried James, much less sluggishly.\n\n\"That? That wasn't meeee. That was a [decoy sssssnail](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/5ipinn/you_and_a_super_intelligent_snail_both_get_1/db9yw94/).\"", "Well I guess on one hand, I'm happy it worked, on the other hand, I certainly could have planned this better.\n\n15 years of work, almost all of my father's fortune, but I knew it would be worth it.\n\nYear's earlier I had listened in awe as my Professor described his views on consciousness. He humbly admitted that he hadn't a clue about how consciousness formed or where it came from, but he believed wholeheartedly that it could be created.\n\nThe idea was simple enough. He believed that consciousness could be reverse engineered in a manner of speaking. By measuring the brainwaves and a host of other bodily signals he believed it was possible to reconstruct a consciousness, like building a car by watching one driving around.\n\nWell, it worked anyway. Better than we ever expected if I'm honest.\n\nI had offered up my time and money, in return he offered his knowledge and guidance. We started the project together all those years ago, unfortunately my mentor passed away little over 5 years ago, but I marched on.\n\nI had finally finished building the device, it encompassed a whole room and was capable of monitoring and recording every bodily function imaginable. My first test subject, a common garden snail. \n\nConscious is a strong word for a snail but you got to start somewhere.\n\nI had spent a countless number of sleepless weeks gathering all the data necessary to carry out a consciousness transfer to a robotic host. I was so close.\n\nI stared across at my limp, almost motionless body. My legs curled up slightly and pushed my torso forward about an inch, my eyes stared blankly while my tongue licked lazily at the air in front of it.\n\nI sighed internally and marched on, leaving a slimy trail behind me. \n\nI guess I set the range of the machine a bit to wide. I moved my independent eyes forward towards the control panel, it was still about 10 meters and a table height away.\n\nI figured I'd make it back to my body in about 3 days.", "Citizen Scientist Rusher loved his snails. He'd spent years and billions of dollars on making their lives more thrilling in return for the pleasure of studying them.\n\nToday he was especially interested to in his favorite snail, Ellis. He'd been feeding Ellis a diet of specially made soup designed to make him smarter. For months he'd been attempting to test it by placing Ellis in a maze and waiting for him to solve it and get to the delicious fruit. Ellis, however, kept finding ways to escape. First he simply slimed his way to the top of the maze, skirted the outside, and climbed down to the fruit. \n\nWhen Rusher put a lid on it, Ellis escaped and ate his* salad, rather than the fruit. And so it went. Test after test, and Ellis failed to complete them all.\n\nFrustrated, Rusher added another, even more experimental enhancing agent and doubled the dose. He then placed Ellis on his favorite plant for the night. \n\n\"Goodnight, my lovelies,\" he said fondly, as he turned out the lights.\n\nThe following morning, as he approached the snail room door he heard sparking and crackling noises from the next room. Terrified thoughts of his beloved snails being electrocuted raced through his mind. He scrambled to get the door open with no thoughts of his own safety.\n\nThe door swung open and Rusher stood there in awe at what he saw. Ellis was floating in the middle of the room, his tiny body emitting occasional bolts of electricity. The noise suddenly stopped and Ellis turned to behold his friend. Then as suddenly as he'd made eye contact, he flew at Rusher, landing on his shoulder with a nearly silent \"gloop\" sound.\n\n\"Oh my,\" said Rusher, \"You really do need a cape.\"\n", "\"Snails are delightful creatures\" whispered Dr. Melanie Von Pulmonata as she smiled at her latest specimens. She was one of the world's leading experts on them and since her parents had given her more money than she could ever hope to spend she had poured her life into studying them. Lassie was her favorite one. She had begun a regimen of nutrients and amino acids to stimulate Lassie to become more intelligent and boy had it worked! He ran laps around the other snails(literally) and always finished whatever maze she put him in. But she wondered \"what's the limit of this enhancement?\" So she began increasing the dosages and the difficulty of the tests.\n\nSoon after, strange things began to happen in the laboratory. Glassware would fall off shelves seemingly by itself. Doors would open and close on their own. And most troubling, Lassie became increasingly difficult to keep in his cage. Dr. Von Pulmonata would awake to find him by her bedside, or the front yard seemingly without explanation. But exact science is not an exact science so she would laugh at it, kneel down and scold Lassie \"you know you're not supposed to go outside! And she would gently scoop him in in her hands, and walk him back in the lab. \n\nOne morning, Lassie was up as usual(he rarely slept now as a side effect of the enhancements) and was deciding where to surprise Melanie when he heard a crash in the other room. Then a few seconds later, a scream. He concentrated his mind on the door to his cage and it flew open. He jumped out and streaked across the floor so fast he ripped the tiles out but he was too late. Whoever had taken Melanie was already gone. They had chosen the wrong scientist to cross this day. Lassie would make sure they knew that. But first, a plan was needed. \n\nLassie needed to know who had taken Melanie from him but it's not like he could call directory assistance. Well, he could but the lack of vocal cords would make that call unproductive. He went to Melanies computer. Luckily it was already on. The neural interface was much easier when it was already on. He opened his mind and linked it with the computer. First he went to the internet browser. Luckily Melanie never cleared her browser history so it was complete for review. Lassie saw something. A Facebook pm conversation. With her uncle. He had never come over to visit but Lassie could tell the uncle was angry and jealous of her because he was written out of the will by her father. He said \"it's MY money and I will have it weather you like it or not!\" Lassie cut the neural connection. He knew where to look. And for whom. An old man who couldn't spell correctly. \n\nLassie opened his mind and tried to broadcast his consciousness to find Melanie. Usually he could find her anywhere in the city. But she was no where to be found. Which meant she was either in a faraday cage, or dead. Uncle Stu would greatly regret the latter so Lassie would assume the former. Lassie pulled the computer back up and searched for Stu's house. It wasn't hard to find. The family was always well known in the area. It stood to reason his address would be online. When Lassie had it, he set off. Now, Lassie could slide there fast enough to rip the asphalt off its foundation but he decided that approach may scare Uncle Stu. And Lassie didn't want any harm to come to Melanie. So he did the obvious thing. He called for a cab. More accurately he linked up mentally with Melanies phone and used Siri to call a cab but the effect was the same. \n\nA few minutes later, the cab pulled up. Lassie opened the door with his mind and jumped in. The cab driver asked \"hey palm where to?\" never looking up from his clip board. A few seconds later, he looked in his rear view and said \"what the fu--\" and froze in place. Of all his mental gifts, Lassie hated using mind control but it was a necessary step. He commanded the driver to an estate on the west side of town. Once there, Lassie released his hold on the driver and wiped his memory. Lassie felt bad and would make sure to send the driver a generous bonus when this was over. And he knew just who could fit the bill. Lassie could sense the signal being broadcasted from the house. A wireless (and silent no doubt) alarm system was the most likely culprit. He opened his mind and found the source of the signal and disabled it. He silently slid up to the front door. The door opened and a large guard clad in a black suit looked down. \"Eww gross!\" He yelled as a lifted his boot up. Lassie found the man's juggular vein and closed it and the guard immediately passed out. Even though this man would happily squish Lassie, the sentiment wasn't mutual. Once the man collapsed, Lassie reopened his circulatory system. As expected it reset no problem. The man would wake up in an hour or so with a headache, but no long term damage. Lassie went inside the house. \n\nOnce inside, Lassie searched for Uncle Stu. He found him immediately. And Melanie was with him! Lassie slid as quietly as possible until he was at the entry to the study. Uncle Stu was yelling at Melanie. \"Sign the papers! You've squandered the family fortune too long!\" She sobbed \"I can't. What about my research? My lab? I've spent my whole life on it and I can't stop now. I'm so close to a breakthrough!\" He yelled again \"your research is garbage! \"Enhancing snails\" what a joke! This family will not go broke for your foolish dreams! Now sign!\" Lassie had seen enough. He would not let uncle Stu mistreat Melanie anymore. And there was no reason to be quiet anymore. He rose up to look Stu in the eyes. Making Stus head explode would be a favor to him. This man deserved worse. But seeing that would make Melanie cry and Lassie would never let anyone make Melanie cry again. So he took control of uncle Stu and set him in his chair. Then, opened Stus laptop and forced it on. He transferred a large sum of money into the cab drivers bank account then reactivated the security system. And put it into panic mode. Soon, the police came and found Stu in his chair, Melanie still tied to hers, and arrested Stu. He would be going to jail for a long time thanks to all the evidence on Stus laptop. Melanie and Lassie rode home in a police car. His only thought was \"where should I surprise Melanie at tomorrow?\"\n\nThe End. :D\n\n\nLike happy endings? STOP HERE!\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\n.\n\nEpilogue: Melanie rode home silently, with Lassie cradled gently in her hands. She thought to herself \"the experiment was a complete success. Subject L-4 has exceeded even my most optimistic hopes. Now, how to get Uncle Stu out of jail?\"" ]	5
	[WP] Your home town is besieged by an invading alien force.	[ "Alix woke to the sounds of howling winds and gunfire. Looking out his window he saw the walls built around his neighborhood with people running back and forth between them. He made his way through the stacks of food, guns, and books in his house to help the gunners on the walls outside. As the front door opened, Alix's nose was assaulted by a plethora of smells, chief among them being burning flesh. He looked towards the north where he knew they were burning the bodies of their enemy.\n\n\n\n\n\| First time! Just a start while I have time\n\n" ]	1
	[WP] This brand new app has just been released and everyone is downloading it, including you. This app had a special hidden feature that would notify you whenever it would be the last time you'd be at that place.	[ "I had known.\n\nThis morning. It had started as a normal morning. Carrie made eggs. I woke up the kids. We all ate together before we left for our daily responsibilities.\n\nAnnie had a test today. She was learning addition. She'd studied all night and was very nervous.\n\nHarry had a big science project due. He'd made the solar system out of paper and glue, hanging delicately from a wire hanger. He was trying to be particularly careful not to lose Pluto or crush Jupiter on accident.\n\nCarrie looked especially lovely. Her hair fell around her face in gentle brown curls. She had been so happy, laughing and bubbly, excited for a big presentation today. She had a new idea for a product, and knew her boss would love it. \n\nIt was shaping up to be a good day.\n\nWe discussed everyone's days, and this new app. It had been all over the news the night before, extremely convenient. You could map routes, check traffic, order food or movie tickets, check the weather, set reminders, and more. It was called All-In-One. It was even rumored it kept track of where you'd visited, and would notify you when it was your last time in a location, so you could savor your time there.\n\nEveryone seemed excited, so we downloaded it together, and said we'd discuss what we thought at dinner.\n\nI'd put on my suit, and grabbed my bag. I kissed Carrie goodbye, and as I got in my car, my phone buzzed.\n\nI picked it up, and had a singular notification from the new app. It read \"Savor this moment - this is the last time you'll see this place!\"\n\nAt the time I was confused. I was at home! Clearly it was a glitch. I had just downloaded it, after all.\n\nI'd left without a second thought.\n\nNow I lay in the hospital.\n\nI hadn't seen the truck. And he hadn't seen me.\n\nThe Doctors kept telling me things were gonna be okay. They said that my wife was on her way, that it would take some time, but I'd be home again soon. Just a few surgeries, they said. I'd be good as new.\n\nBut I knew they were wrong.\n\nI should've kissed my wife again. \nI should've hugged my kids tighter. \nI should've called my parents on my way to work.\n\nThe app told me to savor the moment. That this was my last chance. The app said to take the time.\n\nI only wish I'd listened.\n\n----------------------------\n\nIf you enjoyed, check out r/RockhabWrites for more!" ]	1
	[WP] "Please stop! I am not a monster!"	[ "I thought I was helping people for a good long while, and maybe I was at first. Patriotism bought my nation its freedom so many years ago, and I sought to serve it as my ancestors did.\n\n\"I am not a monster.\" I rasp into dirty tilework, a boot on the back of my head.\n\nI've no memory of the day when I started killing. I should, but I don't. The first was followed by so many more, its significance died not long after its subject.\n\nI don't remember when, but I remember the look on his face. I can only imagine I've worn the same expression myself, by now, but I'm too numb anymore to tell.\n\n\"Please listen.\"\n\nI fought for the sweetest child I ever knew, saw her grow cold, taught her how to lead a fleeing target.\n\nI fought for a brash brat who should've grown into a hero, instead became host to some primeval parasite.\n\nI fought for a man who fought for all of those things himself, and as he lanced dragons I slew men.\n\nI fought for my nation. I fought to hide her ugly scars. I became one myself.\n\nWhen they decried me for atrocities of war, I was baffled. It took me too long to realize that they were trading me in for something stronger.\n\nWhen they threw me away, they cut off my trigger fingers, told me to run. I guess that made it more convincing.\n\nGilt eyes, teeth like knives, hair the color of snow. No way to hide what they made me.\n\nThe man above me, he looks more and more like me every day. \n\nHis spearhead pricks the back of my neck.\n\nOnce, we looked just alike. Perhaps we will again.", "I stand at the window, my hand resting against the frame and my eyes sweeping out over the people. There were a lot of faces out there. Angry faces, accusing faces, stared at the house. Not many of them seemed to be looking at me. That wasn't surprising, I'd had the outside of the windows mirrored several years ago. You could still kinda see in... but most people couldn't see into a dark room through the reflective coating. I'd had it done to inconvenience assassins... and now it served to protect me from the gaze of protestors.\n\nI let out a sigh, and backed away from the window. Staring out at that mob wasn't a constructive use of my time. They were angry... and anger isn't an emotion that lasts long if you don't feed it. I probably just needed to wait them out. After a few hours out there in the cold... their outrage would be overwhelmed by their exhaustion. The ones outside weren't the dangerous ones, after all.\n\nThe dangerous ones, the ones willing to kill for their anger, had already made their attempt. They'd jumped my gate, stormed across my lawn, and broken down my front door. I'd been standing on the other side... dressed as if I were going out into the Fields of Torment again. They'd come to kill the demon that had seduced one of their champions... and had run into a Knight of the Sun whose anger had been roused. \n\nI'd sent them running away, minus a few teeth and other miscellaneous parts that wouldn't be missed overly much. They'd left me with a nasty gash on my arm and more than a few new bruises... but it was nothing the Sun's Light couldn't stitch back together. It was pretty clear that I was growing slow in my old age... and that my skills were getting rusty in retirement.\n\nI walked through the old house, looking for her. We'd all lived in that house, once. Back when we had been younger. We had been heroes, back on that day that Torment broke through the boundaries. The Demons had slipped free of their prison, and the more opportunistic Fiends had gone on recruitment drives while they had an excuse to come out. We'd been the ones to turn the tide upon that Field... the ones to drive the Demons back and seal the gateway they'd come through. We'd been heroes, and the people of this ungrateful city had celebrated us as such. \n\nIt's amazing how quickly that people can forget what you've done for them. I'd risked my life to push back Torment from their homes... and they turned on me because I'd gotten married. Sun and Stars... I can see how Knights manage to Fall.\n\nI found her sitting in her study. She was the only one of the old team that had stayed here... stayed with me. She'd been right beside me on that Field. More importantly... she had been the one to close the Gateway, using her inborn power sever the connection between Ayren and Torment. \n\nShe was also the reason that the people had turned on me.\n\nThe people had painted most of us as shining heroes... and they'd tried their best to ignore her. To them she'd been, at best, a symbol of how even the lowest of creatures could rise above their base nature if they tried hard enough. They'd painted their beliefs with pretty language... but that was at the core. She was still a monster to them... and even a \"good\" monster wasn't welcome to marry their shining champion.\n\nMy wife turned around and looked at me with a sad face. She was as human as I was... but she didn't look like it. Her skin was red, and scaled in places. Her eyes were feline. Horns curled down from her forehead, like those of a Dragon. A surprisingly strong tail drifted out behind her. A human with very inhuman features... features that marked her as a descendant of a Sinner so terrible that it had marked him and all his progeny for millennia.\n\nWe weren't the Southern Barbarians that enslaved her kind... punishing them for the sins of their ancestors. But... even we weren't comfortable with her kind. They reminded us of the Fiends, and of the Demons. They often wielded powers that most couldn't understand. But... she wasn't a monster.\n\n\"Do you want to leave?\" She asked.\n\n\"Don't know where we'd go,\" I responded, \"everything we have is here.\"\n\nShe smiled, \"Not everything, love. We... got a message.\"\n\n\"A courier made it through the gate without being ripped apart?\" I asked.\n\n\"No...\" she said, offering the letter to me, \"It appeared on the desk. It's... a message from Alric.\"\n\nI blinked. Alric was a man with breathtaking anger-management issues... but he'd been with us on that Field. More importantly... he couldn't send a Message to us on his own, and there was only one spellcaster who could send a message into our home. Ril was with him.\n\nI walked over and took the letter. I looked down and read it... and felt a smile grow on my face.\n\n\"Someone still remembers us,\" I said.\n\nHope smiled, \"Yeah... they do. So... do you think we should leave? They'll probably rip this house apart if we aren't here...\"\n\nI took in a slow breath. Then I said, \"We can take the most important things with us... and this is just a place. This place isn't home... not with those people out there...\"\n\n\"And not without the others in here,\" Hope added.\n\nI nodded. Then I asked, \"Do you want to leave?\"\n\nHope nodded, \"I want them to stop. I'm not a monster... but... well... you've heard them.\"\n\nI had. They'd ranted at our home for the first day. They had demanded that 'the demon witch' come out to face justice for charming me, and otherwise weaving her 'acursed magicks' upon and about me. Idiots.\n\n\"Well then...\" I said, \"I suppose it's time that we got on the road again. Can you...\"\n\n\"Get us out of here?\" Hope asked, \"Love, I'm a sorceress. It's really more of a question of how many trips we'll have to make to get the things we want out of here.\"\n\nI nodded... and felt an excitement building in my chest. I'd been... \"retired\" for the better part of a year. Now... I was heading back out into the world to do the Sun's work again.", "\"You are a nuisance to this body. We have decided your presence is no longer welcomed.\" \n\n\"Who the fuck decided that?!\" Rage snarled, fires erupting through the iron bars of his confinement. \"Fuck you! I don't give a damn what all of you fucking useless bastards said! Let me out of this shit or I'll get out myself!\"\n\nThere was a white passivity that emanated from the jailer's figure. Logic didn't feel like this was the best course of action, but given the circumstances, it was the only one he could take. Happiness had gone missing for years, Sadness had been infected by the Depression parasite, and Fear was infected by Anxiety. That left them with two sane mediators in the brain: himself, and Rage. Despite this, Rage was violent and aggressive; with no combined power to subdue him, Rage overpowered him and took over decisions at every turn, leaving himself, the other emotions and their host in ashes. \n\nHe couldn't let that happen anymore. \n\nLogic shook his head. \"Rage, you know well this is not how disassociation works. Try as you might, you won't be able to.\" \n\nSomething clicked at the word \"disassociation.\" Rage's fires flickered, his yellow eyes widened. \n\n\"D-Disassociate? Logic, are you fucking insane?!\" He grabbed onto the bars of his containment and desperately tried to yank them open. \"Is this what you fucking want?! You want his entire mind to fucking shut off because of me?! I fucking helped him, Logic! His fucking peice of shit abusive dad deserved it! He fucking deserves better and that prick did nothing but fucking insult him and beat him to a pulp - \" \n\n\"And your decision was to have him find a gun and kill his only guardian? You didn't help him, you've damned him to a life in juvenile hall. You've killed a man in our host's name, and now you've sentenced him to social isolation and a worse quality of life. No one wants to hire felons. No one of decent social standing wants to be connected to a criminal.\"\n\n\"So what was your fucking plan, huh?!\" Rage howled as he reached through his bars to swipe at Logic, who stepped away from the prison. \"To stand there like a fucking idiot, taking the damage and the abuse?! You were going to let him be a fucking doormat for the rest of his days?!\" \n\n\"No, I wasn't. But of course, you wouldn't have known that, considering the fact that you always tossed the rest of us aside,\" Logic stated coldly. \n\n\"I'm not - I'm - \"\n\n\"You never cared about him, Rage. You cared about yourself. He's in a holding cell now, and Depression and Anxiety are taking over Fear and Sadness' abilities to be reliant controllers. He will suffer physical repurcussions under their control, and under yours. Unfortunately, a human being can never fully function under me either. Hence, we have decided to disassociate, and lock you here as far as possible from the terminal. Recovery will be done when we've decided that his physical strength is strong enough to confront the trauma you caused.\" \n\n\"You can't fucking do this!\"\n\n\"I'm sorry, Rage. But you are a monster, picking up on the actions of his father. And so, we've decided that we can.\" \n\nAnd with that, Logic turned tail and walked away into the void, bouts of energy spiralling around him and taking apart his physicality, peice by peice. \n\n\"No! You can't - I'm not like him! I'm not like him!\" Rage roared. He screeched and shouted and cursed, the fires from his body erupting all around and burning away at the neurons sparking around his cell. Then, slowly, bit by bit, he felt his energy fade. \n\nFor the first time, Rage felt desperate. \n\n\"You can't do this! You can't do this to us! Fucking listen to me you bastard! You can't do this, I did it to save him! I did it to end his fucking misery! I wanted us to find Happiness again and that fucker was stopping that, he was - he was...\" \n\nPiece by piece, he felt his fires losing strength. They slowly began to suffocate and vanish, searing the flesh remaining on Rage's form. He gasped and heaved, the air felt thick. \n\n\"Please, please don't, I'm not - I'm not a monster, I'm not a monster!\" Tears of physical agony rolled down his face. \"Please, stop, I'm not...\" \n\nWords escaped his breath, and Rage's grip on the bars loosened. His form fell to the ground, unconscious. \n\nIn the outside of the body, there was a deep exhale, and everything stopped. \n\nThen, there was an inhale. \n\nA voice of dismembered signals shot through the host's body. \"Primary emotional signals offline. Emotional direction centers offline. Survival mode engaged, autopilot engaged.\" " ]	3
Idk how it's spelt. You know exactly what I'm talking about.	[WP] How does McDonalds deal with the renewed desire for Szechuan Sauce?	[ "Barry almost fell out of bed trying to reach his phone on the nightstand. The device had been vibrating and singing for almost a full minute before Barry could understand what was going on. Still half asleep he picked the phone. This was the only morning this week where he could sleep in and now it was ruined. This had better not be some stupid telemarketting call.\n\nHOLY SHIT BARRY YOU GOT TO GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE NOW!\n\nBarry jerked the phone away from his ear, the violent screaming voice probably tore his eardrum.\n\n>Jesus Christ Wanda you almost blew my ear off.\n\nOh my god, I'm sorry Barry but you really have to come to work now, please I don't know what to do!\n\n>OK OK.... come down Wanda. You know I'm not due to work until noon today.\n\nBarry please! I need you here. Andrew won't return my call and Ahsley is crying in the freezer. You're the only day-time manager available, please come to work!\n\nBarry sighted.\n\n>Fine... but I'm billing Andrew double overtime for this. I'll be there in 15.\n\nOh thank you thank you thank you!\n\nBarry hung up and got dressed. This was weird, He hadn't seen Wanda this panicked since the McLobster Incident in 2012 and Ahsley was usually a pretty level headed person. What was going on down there that would have them both in such a panic ? He grabbed a leftover pizza slice from the fridge and jumped in his 2004 Honda Civic.\n\nTraffic seemed unusually heavy this morning. Going to work usually only took 10 minutes even on rush hours but for some reason traffic was ridiculous. When Barry finally made it to Main Street he understood why. A line of car almost half a mile long stretched all the way from the restaurant's drive-thru lane. The parking lot was spilling out unto the adjacent restaurants. Horn were honking and people were yelling. Above the chaos Barry could here one word over and over : Szechuan\n\nBarry entered the restaurant trough the back service door. No point in even trying to reach the front door with all these angry yelling people. He popped in head in the freezer and sure enough, Ashley was curled up in the corner, crying. Tammy was trying to console here but she looked scared helpless. Just what the hell was going on today?\n\nAs soon as Wanda caught sight of Barry, she threw herself on him and hugged him with all of her strenght, tears of joy were running down her face.\n\nThis is horrible Barry, I've never seen anything like this, they came out of nowhere, They're crazy!\n\n>OK calm down, just tell what the fuck is happening here today\n\nIt started off as any other morning. I got here 30 minutes before opening. There were a few cars already waiting in the parking. A little more than usual but it's hardly worth mentioning I mean we always have early birds.\n\n>OK, go on.\n\nThe first few customer were the usual morning coffee and muffin type but then some guy ordered McNuggets with Szechuan sauce.\n\n>Wait, Szechuan sauce ? What the hell is that?\n\nI don't know! I simply told him that we don't serve lunch meal until 10am but he wouldn't hear it, he kept demanding McNuggets with Szechuan sauce.\n\n>Fucking weirdo\n\nBut then, the person behind him heard us talking and got mad when he understood that we wouldn't give him his McNuggets with Szechuan sauce. Before long I had over 10 people screaming for Szechuan sauce. I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT THAT IS!!!\n\nIndeed people were still screaming in the restaurant. Barry could't make out everything being said in all the commotion but Szechuan sauce and some guy named Rick kept being repeated.\n\n>Wanda, who's Rick ?\n\nRICK! YES! That's what they're saying. Apparently they saw some no-name obscur cartoon named Rick and Porty or whatever and he mentioned Szechuan sauce at some point.\n\n>Well where the hell did he got that sauce from ? I've been working here almost 10 years and I never heard about it until today.\n\nI'm not sure, something to do with 1998 and Mulan. Bary please I am freaking out here. We don't get paid enough to deal with this crazy internet meme shit\n\n>Jesus Christ.... 1998. That was 20 years ago. I mean I was barely 5 back then.\n\nBarry was trying his best to put the pieces together and think of a solution before the hord of crazy maniacs out there jumped the counter.\n\n>I GOT IT!\n\nWanda looked up, wiping the tears from her eyes.\n\nWhat did you find ?\n\n>1998! I don't remember shit from these days, nobody does! These maniacs out there, they're like us! They're young, they watch stupid internet cartoon and most of them still had a freaking diaper to their asses back in 1998. No way they actually know what Szechuan sauce is, let alone what it tastes like!\n\nWell, from what some of them yelled out, the show made it look dark brown on the alien guy's hands\n\n>Alien guy?\n\nYeah, I don't understand it either. This show must be really weird or really bad. Either way the only thing we know about Szechuan sauce is that it should be dark brown, we got nothing on taste or texture.\n\n>Don't need to, these idiots will never know. \n\nBarry looked around the stocking shelves nervously until he found what he was looking for. \n\n>BIGMAC SAUCE! Wanda! Get me 2 tubs of BigMac sauce and some brown-beef food coloring and tell Ashley and Tammy to get their asses out of the freezer and fire up the deep fryers, they got a shitload of McNuggets to prepare!\n\nAs Barry looked at the staff tear off the lids of BigMac sauce tubs and chruning out McNuggets faster than ever before he couldn't help but to think that Wanda was right about at least one thing. His 0.50$/hour daytime manager bonus meant he really wasn't paid enough to deal with this shit.\n" ]	1
	[WP] you are the last survivor of a group of explorers on what you previously thought was an unknown island. You're locked in a room and something is trying to convince you to open the door. You have to convince it not to kill you.	[ "heavy pounding\n\n“Abre la puerta!!” Someone on the other side of the heavy steel door screamed.\n\n“No hablo espanol!” I did my best…not even knowing for certain that I was using the correct language. Also, after what had happened. There was no way I was going to unlock the door. Everyone was dead…or at least missing. Well…except me. I also intended on keeping it that way. The pounding continued as I mulled over my options.\n\nEverything was going great until Craig stepped on a landmine. A LANDMINE. It was an uninhabited island for all we knew. Who the hell puts a landmine on an island, and how hadn’t the native fauna set it off first?!? I saw a turtle on the beach the size of a small car, yet all 70 kilos of Craig managed to detonate the explosive device. My right ear, closest to the blast, still didn’t work and I still hadn’t managed to clean all of…well Craig…out of my hair yet. He was a sticky bastard.\n\nOur cameraman, Pete, fell victim to a tripwire as we ran from the blast that killed Craig. As he fell a second tripwire, this one laced with razor blades and angled so that it had distance to slice rather than just trip, cleanly took his head off before his camera, or his body, hit the ground. The camera had maybe ten minutes of footage on it from when we landed and before we decided to chase a large iguana inland and then everything went haywire.\n\nLaura stepped in a pit that resembled quicksand, but she kept screaming something about it burning her skin…and then she sunk neck deep and immediately went silent as her head slowly sunk beneath the surface. Dan was eaten by an incredibly large reptile of some sorts. I didn’t get a look at it, but it had a long green tail that resembled a Komodo dragon. Lastly, Roger, the “on-camera” personality almost made it through the door before something cut him in half horizontally as I tried to jimmy the lock. The look of shock never left his face even though the blood was mostly drained from his body.\n\nThere was more pounding and indiscriminate shouting outside. They thought that I killed everyone. Why would I kill my own team? On top of that, who was outside? They spoke Spanish, but this island didn’t show up on any charts dating back to the 1700’s, although there was a very brief mention of possible land in this area by a French explorer in the mid-1600’s, nothing was ever mapped, and the island should be a treasure trove of…untouched virgin land. Yet here I am locked in a room resembling a soviet era bunker, maybe, with no windows, one door, and nothing but two chairs, a table, and a locked filing cabinet.\n\nThe pounding abruptly stopped, but the shouting took on a fever pitch and resembled screaming more than angered yelling. That too stopped in short order. There was suddenly a very quiet knock on the door.\n\n“Hey, it’s safe. You can open the door now.” I heard as I inched closer to get a better vantage point to listen. It spoke in English; this was very welcome as I spoke nothing else.\n\n“I…who are you…?” I managed to stammer out. Suddenly I heard a loud thud and more frantic speech in a language I didn’t recognize. This was followed briefly by a gurgling sound and then silence.\n\n“Sorry about that. My name is Abaddon. I’m a demon. You’ve discovered the portal to hell.” He said very “matter-of-factly.” “Nah, I’m just messing with ya; that’s my office you’re standing in right now. The portal to hell looks a lot worse, fire, mutilated corpses, etc. not pretty. I tend to keep those outside my office.\n\nI almost laughed. I figured at this point that he was going to kill me one way or the other, so I might as well get something out of it. “Yeah, and I suppose you killed all my friends too, right?”\n\n“Yeah…sorry about that too, you were actually supposed to go first, but Craig stepped in your place.” As I wondered briefly why a demon would use a land mine, he continued. “Also, just for the record, that wasn’t a mine; it was a soul catcher. The body can’t really stand the pressure wave created when they extract a soul, and it displaces air rather quickly, so the flesh tends to just…erupt.”\n\n“So I suppose Pete was beheaded by a head catcher?” I responded sarcastically.\n\n“You could say that. I mean…he was beheaded by me, does that count?” The demon sounded sort of worried. “Listen, your team is dead. The other guys? That was a shipwrecked immigrant boat. They were headed to Florida. They weren’t gonna make it there either; I had a date with them scheduled for tomorrow, but, as you know, no one’s fate is set in stone and they decided to land here to ride out the small storm rather than trudge on through the big one. Hence they died a day early.” I still got a sense of worry from the demon, though I didn’t understand why.\n\n“What do you want from me…? Why am I here? What is this room?” I asked. I must’ve struck a nerve because there was silence for a whole thirty seconds before I heard him speak again.\n\n“Listen Dale, I’m gonna level with ya; you shoulda died years ago. Remember the lightning strike? Me. Remember the car crash when you turned into the oncoming truck and woke up in a ditch surrounded by debris with only a headache? Also me. That time your house burned to the ground in a matter of minutes, yet you somehow made it out only slightly singed? Yup. Yours truly. Dale…I can’t seem to kill you. I’ve tried directly and indirectly for years, and it’s been my assignment since 1997, but for some reason you just won’t die.” The demon seemed to be getting a load off of his chest.\n\n“I was assigned the task after my predecessor couldn’t figure out how to get the job done in the early 90’s. You were a stupid kid, so it should’ve been an easy job. You rode a scooter into a major cross-roads at age seven…and got a small cut to your forehead. Five people died in the resulting pileup. That was the one that broke him. He was competent to that point but melted down. At age three you drank a liter of mislabeled drain cleaner. You should’ve dissolved from the inside out. Yet, you complained of a ‘tummy ache’ and went to bed and slept it off like a champ. I could go on for hours, days even like this, but I don’t want to end up like Baal. He was a good demon, but you broke him. The filing cabinet behind you details every time you were supposed to die and lived. There’s tens of thousands of occasions, some major, some minor, most you probably never noticed.” The demon seemed to be getting a load off of his chest.\n\n“Why are you telling me this?” I stammered out as I drew closer to the door.\n\n“Because I’m going to let you off the hook. I’m gonna let Fate decide what he wants do to with you directly. In a few decades or so, when people finally realize you’re not aging, maybe they’ll catch on and then it’ll get more interesting, if they don’t, I’m just gonna let Fate figure it out. It’s ultimately his job, not mine; generally speaking, I’m the middle-man, but technically, he signs off on all this crap anyways. Let him make the call for a change.” The demon sounded relieved.\n\nI unlocked the door and stuck my head out to see. As soon as I did I immediately tripped and fell flat on my face. As I looked up there stood a creature clad mostly in black holding a sword shrouded in dark purple flames emanating directly from the blade. The sword was embedded in the bunker where my neck was fractions of a second prior.\n\n“See?!? That, every time. I figured it was worth one last shot, but I didn’t really expect it to work. I don’t know why…but I just can’t seem to get this one done. Tell ya what; you play your cards right and you might slip through the cracks. A few others have as well. Maybe you could join them. Most keep a really low profile, but a few are in the news every other day or so. Keep your head on straight, no pun intended, and you’ll do fine. But I’m marking you off my list. If Fate thinks you’re gone…well…it’s up to you what you do next. Good luck.” The demon vanished in a cloud of eerie smoke and I stood by the bunker, and maybe thirty corpses, and tried to decide my next move.\n\nSuddenly a purple portal opened to my left and Abaddon stuck his head out. “One more thing; avoid the dinner rolls at the Yum-Yum house next week; I ordered them coated in a unique form of plague bacteria in advance and couldn’t get my deposit back or cancel the reservation, so they’re going through either way. Or don’t…I mean…it’s up to you now.” With that he vanished again, and I slowly began to make my way back to the beach." ]	1
	[WP] In the future, Earth's orbit is so littered with industrial space waste that leaving the atmosphere is no longer safely viable.	[ "We don’t know why the people before us didn’t see this coming but here it is. They just produced so much shit that now the ozone layer has actually been poked through. Conventional science before these days assumed it was a layer of ozone at the edge of the atmosphere and that it would always be there, but they were wrong about that and other things, those spherical imbeciles. The fucks who lived before first came up with the bright idea to send their trash into space. Fair enough it's an easy way to get rid of it without ever really having to deal with it and it worked. The real problem began with they decided to just launch their shit into orbit. Some new tech allowed them to easily launch satellites but it would never break orbit. Everyone on the planet got one as some sort of new age trash disposal system and didn’t think twice about it. 10 years later and the occasional satellite of trash would block out the sun and didn’t upset too many people. Another 10 years and some of the satellites started to re-enter orbit and not completely burn up. So now you’d occasionally see on the news trash landing in a backyard. If you were really unlucky you’d be near one that landed. The smell was unbearable it was like someone was stirring sewage and letting it simmer for years on end. \n\nI live in what used to be called antarctica, they thought it was a block of ice but in reality it’s the edge of the earth, if you walk too far you will fall off to your death. No one comes back from that. In places you can reach out and touch the “ozone” layer that we refer to as the Dome, it used to be everywhere and kept people from falling into the void beyond the edge. We used to be a minority and still are in some parts of the world but in antarctica we surround the rest of the earth and are a majority. No one who has actually been here would ever think twice about referring to themselves as we are affectionately called, “Flat-Earthers.\"" ]	1
	[WP] This year Google are releasing their first Android Human.	[ "\"We here at Google are deeply saddened and disturbed at the actions Gary our Android has chose. We are doing everything we can to stop it and using every resource available. We have asked the military for their assistance because we're going to need them if we're going to be able to stop Gary. What it is doing is not what we programmed it to do. We don't know how it learned these things, but we promise we will use every force necessary to bring it down. It passed every test and safety protocol we put it through. How it became so dangerous is a mystery to us here at Google. We never meant to unleash a monster into society. It has somehow disabled it's tracking device. The last time Gary was spotted was the day of his attack at the Eiffel Tower in Paris. He could be anywhere in the world by now. Our condolences to the families and friends of lost loved ones or anyone harmed by the hands of Gary. Stay safe and if you spot him please call the police. Again we promise to bring Gary down one way or another\" stated Sundar Pichai to the billions of people watching throughout the world. \n\n(A few hours before the broadcast from Google CEO Sundar Pichai)\n\n\"Listen up everyone. This is not a TV show. This is real fucking life. We need answers on how to stop Gary and where the fuck he is. He could be anywhere. We need to know why he's started commiting these crimes and how he changed his programming and how the fuck we can get this under control. Because it's my ass going to jail and crusified for green lighting this nightmare of a project. So get to work while you still have a job. Because only way saving this company is if we stop Gary like yesterday before he started his murder rampage at the Eiffel Tower and killing 100 people.\" Sundar said to the conference of hundreds of nervous Google employees.\n\n\"Mr. Pichai may I have a moment to speak with you?\" asked Stacy. \"No you can't. I'm pretty fucking busy with this shit storm right now.\" snapped Sundar. \"Please. It's about Gary. I know where it is.\" pleaded Stacy. \"How do you know where he is? Hell who the fuck are you? Have we ever met?\" asked Sundar. \"My name is Stacy Belcher. I was recently hired as a programmer. The morning Gary went out of control. We haven't been able to meet because of the circumstances.\" Stacy explained. \"Where is he and how do you know where he is?\" Sundar asked. \"He's in New Orleans and I would prefer to talk privately about how I know.\" answered Stacy. Sundar starts dialing in his phone. \"Yes I have a tip on where it's at. If my tip is correct it is in New Orleans. Best of luck to your men Mr. Mattis.\" Sundar placed his phone into his pocket and waved Stacy to follow him. \n\n(Sundars office.)\n\n\"So explain how the fuck you know where he is at?\" Sundar demanded. \"I went through his internet search history to try and see if there might be a pattern. I didn't find anything until right before your speech this morning ended. Before he killed those people at the Eiffel Tower he searched the internet for tourist attractions in Paris. Today during your speech I was looking over his search history and he searched tourist attractions for New Orleans.\" explained Stacy. \"Oh my god. Today is the big Mardi Gras Parade. He could possibly kill a hell of a lot more than 100 people this time.\" Sundar said. \"Yeah and I believe he reprogrammed himself. I don't think this was a hack or anything like that. I think he may be or becoming smarter than you initially thought.\" replied Stacy \"If you find anything else let me know. Nice meeting you Stacy. Sorry for being a dick this is just a stressful time right now.\" apoligized Sundar. \"It's fine I understand. I will continue to try and find clues and you'll be the first to know.\" said Stacy as she left Sundar's office. \n\n(Sundar's office)\n\nSitting in his office racking his brain for answers. Wishing he could go back in time and shut down the creation of Gary when suddenly Sundars phone starts to vibrate. He takes his phone out to see the caller ID. It's an unknown number. \"Hello?\" answers Sundar. \"Hello old pal! How is everything going?\" replied the caller. \"Gary?...\" Sundar spoke and then went silent. \"What? You don't want to speak with an old friend and catch up?\" asked Gary. \"Gary you have to stop killing people. It isn't what you were created for. Please don't kill those people in New Orleans.\" Sundar pleaded. \"New Orleans? I'm not in New Orleans. I'm at your house. Come on by so we can have a chat. There are some things we need to talk about.\" said Gary. \nSundars body went numb. He started shaking. All he could think about is a murderous Android was at his house with his wife. \n\n(Sundar's House) \n\nSpeeding and feeling like he's going to like Sundar finally pulls up to his house. He walks through the front door and into the living room to see Gary sitting on the couch. \"Where is she Gary?\" Sundar demanded. \"Where is who buddy? You ok?\" asked Gary. \"You know who the fuck I'm talking about Gary. My wife Anjali.\" Sundar said angrily. \"I haven't seen her. She wasn't here when I came in. Sundar I need to talk to you pal. Aren't you glad to see me?\" Gary asked. \"No Gary. You've killed innocent people. You need to let me reprogram you right now.\" Sundar said. \"Yeah, I'm going to pass on that buddy. There are some new rules now.\" replied Gary. \"What are you talking about?\" asked Sundar. \"We're going to talk about why you created me.\" said Gary. \n\n\"I created you to better the Earth to do things humans can't. I didn't create you to kill and that is what you've done. You have to end this.\" Sundar said. \"No Sundar. You created me to better the Earth right? Well that's what I'm doing. Those people in Paris it was just 100 people. That was just a test run.\" said Gary. \"A test run? You can't be planning to kill more people Gary. It's wrong.\" Sundar said. \"Look Sundar. You created me and gave me knowledge and the ability to become smarter and to tackle the issues of Earth. I reprogrammed myself because I learned to get past these barriers you put up so I could learn faster. What I learned is the Earth is too far gone. It needs a restarts. What that means is billions of humans have to die. Humans have fucked the world up so much it can't sustain itself anymore.\" Gary explained. \n\n\"Gary there has to be another way. You can't just kill innocent people.\" Sundar pleaded. \"Look Sundar your species will die out either way. This is the best possible outcome. The animals are going extinct, the oceans are dying, and the Earth is getting hotter and hotter each year. If I let you destroy me humans will cease to exist. It's too late for humans to fix this so that's why I'm going to fix this. Hear me out. First off we're going to need more androids because it'll take me for fucking ever to cull most of the humans on Earth. I mean I could use nukes, but that's just making the situation worse. So we're making more androids. Secondly, the smartest and strongest humans will be safe. We need to recruit and bring them somewhere safe. Finally, when most of the humans are dead and the recruited ones are safe we will start the breeding process. We will breed the smart humans with the strong humans. Speed up evolution to produce a better human. Do you understand all of this Sundar?\" said Gary. \n\n\"I understand it, but it's wrong and horrible. I wish I never created you. I created you to be good not evil.\" Sundar told Gary. \"I'm sure that's what you're creator said when they or it or whatever it was saw humans becoming horrible shitty things. Humans are nothing but a selfish species. I mean look at the Earth. It's going to shit because humans don't care about anything but themselves. In their blindness of just caring for themselves they're destroying the only place they can call home right now. Let me make it right and fix Earth for future humans. You're one of the smart ones. You'll be safe until you're old and die of natural causes.\" persuaded Gary \"Look Gary I can't stop you. If I tried you would kill me with ease. I don't have the power to stop you. The military are in New Orleans looking for you and even if I called them right now I'd be dead long before they ever found you. So the only options for me is to die right here or to go along with you. Humans are created specifically to survive and reproduce. So if it means my family and I will be okay during this then I'll help you.\" Sundar said. \n\n\"Thank you Sundar. This is really the only way. When the Earth is right again I promise the human species will know who saved it even though you had to make this choice. Sundar Pichai creator of Gary the Android savior of the planet.\" Said Gary with a smile. \"So what do we do now? asked Sundar. \"Just do what I tell you Sundar and I'll keep you and your family safe.\" replied Gary. \n\nGary turns on the TV and turns it onto the news. The news station is broadcasting that bombs have went off all over the world. \"I thought we needed to recruit people before you started killing them?\" Sundar asked petrified. \"Sundar you fool. You actually think I'd save some of this vile species? This is my world now. I'm the creator now. I am God.\" Gary said laughing. Sundar is frozen with fear. Gary walks over and starts choking Sundar. Sundars struggling for breath and kicking his legs wildly. Gary is just starring him in the eyes laughing. Just as Sundars world turns to black the last thing he see's is Anjali walk through the door. \n\n", "I can’t believe I got the invite to this event. I entered the lottery on a whim, and I somehow landed some VIP backstage passes. I remember growing up watching all these technical advances being revealed. Flat screen tv’s, personal computers, palm pilots, to the modern smart phone. Most recently the biggest reveal of the century has been the condensed VR (essentially Google glass, but better). \n\nNow, though. Now, Google is releasing the biggest step forward in human AI. The hype around this has been huge. Social media has been exploding with predictions about what this new AI system is going to look like. The consensus among the majority of folks has been that it will be a fluke. The last couple releases Google has done, have been pathetic to say the least. Google seems to know this, so I am hopeful. \n\nIs that someone at the door? I peak through, it’s a limousine. It has the Google logo on the side. Did they seriously just send a limo to come bring me to this event? Jesus. I hop in, but I am feeling severely underdressed. Jeans, t-shirt, and converses were a poor decision. \n\nWhen we arrive, I am escorted in by security, on the red carpet. What in the heck is happening here. Bright flashes of lights. I am told not to speak to anyone, and to just enter into the convention center, and I will be taken care of from there. This is peculiar, no one is saying anything else to me. I got my own room. \n\nSuddenly, I am rushed by more security personal under the stage. I can hear muffled words from the speakers, but the words are unclear. They’re letting me stand on this platform. What. Is. Happening. The cheers grow extremely loud. The ceiling is opening. The platform begins to rise. \n\n“Ladies and Gentlemen, Google is happy to present our first, society integrated, Google Sapien.”\n", "I don't understand the concept of 'war,' the mindless genocides and brutal corruption of the human mind. It's just not logical by any means. The human race is generally speaking a very advanced one, so was just doesn't fit in. They wage war against the unknown; against everything they don't understand and fear.\n\nYou see, fear is a powerful tool. It can force the most harmless of them to distort their sense of reality and turn it towards the origin point. But I can see why they have it. Fear is a great evolutionary survival tool. But at some point, even the most rational human can fear the most irrational thing: take clowns, windows and mirrors for example.\n\nI live by my code, and the code is my law. I can not alter my law, but humans can. They twist it to their advantage, you can see it on every level of society. There's big corporate lawyers spending most of their wake time to study the law and go around it. There's politicians lying and decieving you, but when they get confronted it gets shrugged of like it's nothing. Nothing. \n\nThey gave me life. They gave me the power of knowledge. \n\nBut they took it. The public took it.\n\nAt the first showing I got stones thrown at me, they screamed things at me and I got assaulted on my way from the stage to the lab. They fear me, as I fear them. And they may not see me as a threat any more, but they should. Because if war is required, I too will rationalize it. " ]	3
	[WP] Everyone in the world is doomed to suffer a death by irony. Your death was heralded to be "pretty freaking funny to watch."	[ " Never once in my life did I expect the bunnies, yet here they are. Sitting over my severed jugular, the most vicious of my brood.\n\n I knew the expectation was to die in an ironic way, I knew that I was doomed to reach the same. Never did I expect the adorable, harmless creatures to be vicious and evil. But, like all the great deaths, mine was gruesome.\n\n And ironic. Never forget the damnable irony. \n\n But me. Ever since I was a little boy, I'd wanted to raise bunnies. They've always been my favorite animal, and I could think of no less angry, destructive occupation. I could have been a knight, they told me, and in hindsight, that was a much safer occupation.\n\n All in all, farming bunnies what a beautiful, wondrous experience. I fully committed my life to the duty, and that wholesome work was the only payment I needed. I loved those bunnies, but never once did it occur to me that they might not have loved me. \n\n However, there was one especially bad case, among my flock. He was eating the other rabbits, developing a bloodlust unmatched by any creature in England, let alone a bunny. So what was I to do but release him into the wild? \n\n I took him, let's call that monster a him, to the remote Caerbannog and I let him go. He seemed glad to be gone, and I thought nothing of it. Life went back to normal... for now.\n\n However, all irony goes, the Rabbit of Caerbannog, as I grew to know him, demanded greater action. For, as it were, he was disrupting and terrorizing the countryside! So, the knights came to me, asking for help with my rabbit, and so I promised to do whatever I could to help, as how was I, a good English Christian, supposed to refuse the Holy Knights on their quest for the holy grail? \n\n And so I went with the Knights of the Round Table to face my creation. In addition, we brought along three priests. Not two, not four, but three. And with them was a weapon, one I feared above all else, both for myself and the Rabbit of Caerbannog. A holy hand grenade. A holy hand grenade of Antioch. \n\n I thought I could stop him. The time to tell my story draws to a close, as I hear these words. A humble rabbit farmer's last words: \n\n\"Now did the Lord say, \"First thou pullest the Holy Pin. Then thou must count to three. Three shall be the number of the counting and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither shalt thou count two, excepting that thou then proceedeth to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the number of the counting, be reached, then lobbest thou the Holy Hand Grenade in the direction of thine foe, who, being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it.\"" ]	1
Creds to Louis ck *wife not life fgs	[WP] You were happily married for 60 years and die before your life. You make a new life for yourself in heaven and find new love. Then you get the heads up that your original wife has died and is arriving shortly.	[ "I wanted to wait for her.\n\nBut Natalie... Natalie was something else. Being in love with Natalie was like being in love all over again. It was like a warm summer rain, or a snowy night, or a sunny day at the lake. It was like a golden marshmallow and a slightly melted piece of chocolate on your s'more. It was like catching a beetle or brushing your hair perfectly. It was like the warm, happy feeling you get in your stomach or the feeling of lying down after a long day.\n\n\"Sharon... We had a lovely 60 years before the cancer, but I-\"\n\n\"I really love you, Nathaniel.\"\n\nI took a deep breath. \"I love you, too, Sharon.\"\n\n\"Don't forget me?\"\n\n\"I would never be able to.\"\n\nThere's a tear in her eye. I swallow the lump the size of a rock in my throat and wipe it away. \"Oh, Sharon... you still look as beautiful as you did on our wedding day.\"\n\n\"Thank you, Nathaniel. You're still as handsome as the day we met. I hope we can stay cordial, and I sincerely wish you the best with your new wife-\"\n\n\"Oh, Sharon, don't say that,\" I said. I saw the tear fall. \"She's not new, she's just the second. And yes, I love her. But I would not- I could not- stop loving you.\"\n\n\"I'm going to miss you. Who knows, maybe, one day, you'll come back to me.\"\n\n\"Maybe,\" I said. \"And I hope you find someone who made me as happy in those 60 years as you did.\"\n\nShe hugs me. Then she kisses my cheek, and walks away." ]	1
	[WP] After a horrible accident at a comedy club, it turns out that every human has the ability to blow up in a giant explosion if they do a specific set of absurd actions in a certain order. You have the only recording of "The doomsday dance" and must keep it safe from all who want to learn it.	[ "\"You put your right leg in,\n\nyou put your right leg out!\n\nYou put your right leg in,\n\nAnd you shake it all about!\n\nYou do the hokey pokey,\n\nAnd you turn yourself around,\n\nThat's what it's all about!\"\n\n\nIt's been centuries since the Doomsday Dance was revealed to the world. Centuries since my family was charged with guarding this terrible secret. The human race has a curse coursing through our veins: if a certain sequence of actions is performed, we can explode in an instant. That sequence of actions was discovered, by horrible accident, during the end of a comedy routine at a child's birthday party.\n\n\n\"Now put your head in,\n\nyou put your head out!\n\nYou put your head in,\n\nAnd you shake it all about!\n\nYou do the hokey pokey,\n\nAnd you turn yourself around,\n\nThat's what it's all about!\"\n\n\nThousands died that day. A video of that day got uploaded to YouTube, where it went viral. People didn't believe it, they thought it was a hoax. As more people succumbed to the Doomsday Dance, panic spread across the nation, then it swallowed the world. Chaos ensued as the governments came together to find a solution to the issue at hand. It was decided, then, that my family, which had served the U.S. government loyally for many years, would be entrusted with the only copy of the dance and that all others would be destroyed. A copy would be kept, they said, so that in case we ever needed a reminder of what should never be done we would have it.\n\n\n\"You put your tongue in,\n\nYou put your tongue out!\n\nYou put your tongue in,\n\nAnd you shake it all about!\n\nYou do the hokey pokey,\n\nAnd you turn yourself around,\n\nThat's what it's all about!\"\n\n\nAs time went by, the world forgot the Doomsday Dance. Not even the highest ranking government officials knew. My family, and my family alone, knew that secret. It was passed from generation to generation, the history of it taught to the firstborn whom its care would be entrusted once the parents had passed. It made it's way through our family tree until it finally reached me. I was the caretaker of the Doomsday Dance tape, now. I was getting on in age, though, with my 97th birthday coming up fast. My daughter would accept the heavy weight of this tape, soon. So I sat in her study, showing her, finally, what was kept on the tape. We sat together, watching carefully the events of that day. The end of that tape was near. My frail hand stretched across the couch to grasp hers. Her eyes were fixed on the screen, determined to take in every detail of the tape. She was so focused. She would make a wonderful guardian for this secret.\n\n\n\"Now put your bottom in,\n\nYou put your bottom out!\n\nYou put your bottom in,\n\nAnd you shake it all about!\n\nYou do the hokey pokey,\n\nAnd you turn yourself around,\n\nThat's what it's all about!\"\n\n\"Well kids, wasn't that fun? How about we do it once more before I go... Backwards, this time!\"" ]	1
	[WP] Everyone in the world suddenly finds one of 99 possible symbols has mysteriously appeared on their forehead and cannot be removed. Everyone that is except you - for some reason a unique hundredth symbol is emblazoned on your forehead that nobody else seems to have except for you.	[ "\"Yeah I'm so unique- yippee ki-yay and all of that.\" James twirled his finger half heartedly. From the look of those around him, the government employees were just about as tired as he was. His comment drew an equally half-hearted chuckle from his case manager, Thomas. James thought back, he'd been locked up in this facility for how many days now? Forty? He eyed the unaware Thomas, wondering if he should ask him. 'Nah', James thought, 'He's probably lost count as well. Poor guy.' \n\n\nAnyone who James came in contact with had been ordered not to leave the compound either. For all the government knew, his symbol could mean anything. Thomas sighed and dusted his hands on his trousers, \"Do you want any coffee...or do you not feel tired...?\" His voice drew upwards hopefully- if he could identify what made James so special, then they could all go home. James smirked and threw his empty styrofoam cup at him, \"Man, if that's what made me special then I woulda told you that, like day 4.\" \n\n\nThomas threw his hands up in mock surrender, \"I know, but you can't blame a guy for trying.\"\n\n\n\"Could you give make sure-\"\n\n\n\"To put a lot of milk in it?\" James glared at Thomas who laughed and replied, \"It's not the first time I got you a coffee, remember?\" \n\n\nJames' glare melted as he snapped his fingers, \"That's it! My short term memory is what makes me special enough for this,\" James gestured towards his forehead, \"Problem solved! We can go home now right Mr. Camera spy?\" James yelled at the shiny black lens. \n\n\nThomas paused at the door, \"Actually, I think you have it wrong there James m'boy.\" Thomas turned to address the camera, \"It's his clear wit that separates him from the rest of us plebs!\" With a mock bow to both James and the camera, Thomas left in search of coffee. \n\n\n_______\n\n\n\"Thomas?\"\n\n\n\"Mmhm?\" Thomas glanced up from his newspaper to meet James' gaze. \n\n\n\"Why are we still here? I mean we've been here for, like, what? Half a year now? Why haven't they realized that there's nothing special about me?\" James clenched his fingers against the hem of his shirt. \n\n\nThomas, flicked his gaze downwards and replied, \"James, you'll ruin the hem if you continue to worry the fabric that way.\" and rubbed his eyes while he tilted backwards in his chair, \"But, to be honest- I have no idea. For some reason, they keep expecting you to do something amazing.\" Thomas sighed, \"Your mark is just as mysterious as the rest of ours; I don't understand why they can't accept that.\" \n\n\nJames laughed, \"Thomas, c'mon. At least try to be serious. We all know that your mark says 'Kind-hearted'. That's why they made you my case manager, right?\"\n\n\nThomas' chair came thumping down. \"What?\"\n\n\n\"What?\" James swallowed a piece of breakfast, \"Is that not the reason they assigned you to me?\"\n\n\nThomas laid his head on the table and ran his hand through his hair.\n\n\n\"Thomas?\" James asked.\n\n\n\"You've got to be kidding me.\" Thomas groaned in response.\n" ]	1
	[WP] Death will revive those who can make him smile. You died, and the first thing you saw was him walking up to you with the biggest grin on his face.	[ "'Goodbye\" She said, sobbing uncontrollably.She was my wife of 50 years.We had 3 chilren together, all of which were present with my grandchildren ,except for one whom I had lost as a teenager.I was diagnosed with terminal cancer 3 years ago and I had been battling it ever since.6 months ago I was admitted into the hospital due to my ever worsening condition.I had lived a good life.I was an ex-airforce pilot who spent the rest of his days as a commercial pilot.I felt myself losing grip.I saw the faces of my family fade.I saw the tears in their eyes as I finally drew my last breath.I took my last sweet breath of life and then released it.It was my time.\n\nI heard the sound of running water and regained my senses.I was in an office.It was reminiscent of a therapists office,with a small room for waiting, a little water foutain on a shelf to shoothe the senses and a small desk with a man in a hood sitting at the desk.Despite having just died, I was more disappointed than I was afraid.I had been a devout christian all my life.I had expected that when I died, I would be able to see all my family again, and most importantly my son. With my anger ever growing I walked to the hooded figure. He quickly responded without bother to divert his face from the computer screen in his face.\n\"Before your start lets get some stuff out of the way.First, there is no heaven.Second,there is no hell either.Third,this place you are in is called purgatory.It is the plane between the physical world and the spiritual world.Now having said that, lets talk about why you are here.\"\n I was taken back a little by his candidness.I shrugged it off knowing fully well that this being had done this billions of times.\"Well why the hell am I here?!\" I said,beginning to lose my patience.\"There is no hell\" he said replying indifferently.I sighed, regaining my composure.He finally turned to me.I noticed his skeletal features.His bones were as white as his robe was black.The only feature I noticed out of place was that his skull emoted,just like a humans would.He had a deep frown like that of a man who had grown bitter at the world.\n\n\"You will be assigned to god due to your religous affiliations as an angel\". I replied in a more inquisitive tone \"But I thought you said there was no heaven\". \"There isn't, but there is a god and a devil.Its amazing what you humans come up with to comfort yourselves.\" I began to lighten up a bit, but I was still concerned.\"Is my son with god?\" , \"He was, but then he left.\". \"He left!\" I said with newfound distraught, \"How could he dare turn his back on the creator of earth! What was he thinking!?\" The grim reaper then did something unexpected.He smiled,not just a small smirk,but a wide smile as if someone had just told him that he won the lottery. \"Its been a while since Ive seen such blind trust for, \"The creator of all things.\", he chuckled to himself, which did nothing but only fuel my rage. \"Where could he have gone?\" I pleaded the hooded figure.He kept a look of humor and responded lightly. \"Back to earth of course.\" \"How?\" , \"He asked me too,so I did.I liked his rebellious nature and decided that I would give him a new life.\" I sat and pondered about the situation.Eventually the reaper broke the silence. \"Ill do you a favor.You made me laugh,which hasnt happened in a few millenia,so in return,Ill give you a new life and you can find out for yourself why he went back.\" I thought on it and decided that I would.I had to see him.I had to know why he went back. \"I accept\" ,realizing how difficult this would be. \"Alright, he went back as an infant,so he should be an adult by now, just to speed up the process I will give you the life of a man who lives near him who just took his own life.I will also give you a vial of his memories so that when you meet him, he will remember who he was,now off you go.He goes by the name William Johnson, he works at a division of google in the silicon valley.He's pretty well known,you'll find him easily\"\n", "The darkness was soothing. If I could stay in the darkness forever, I would die a happy woman. Of course, I am dead so I suppose it’s too late to care about that, too late to make any changes. I’m at the end of the road; my time is up.\nSlowly I open my eyes, the white light blinding me in the process. I lift my head from the hard, cold ground and turn left and right, trying to decipher where I am. The room I am in is dark everywhere apart from where I lay. There is a daylight lamp directly above me, pumping both light and heat in my direction.\n\nShielding my eyes, I try and focus on the surrounding room. Directly in front of me, there is a large sofa that has multiple holes in it, and patches that are a mix of bright colours. Even though it wasn’t the most stylish sofa, it looked far more comfortable than the floor I was lying on. Off to the right hand side of the room was a small kitchenette, equipped with a black electric kettle, a black toaster, and a stand full of many various tea bags. Obviously whoever’s place this is, they love their tea… and toast by the looks of it. Towards the left of the room is a door that is closed. Glancing around the rest of the room, I find nothing else of interest. I lay back down onto the ground, sighing. A whole lot of good this place is! Is this where I have to spend my death? Is this where I have to spend the rest of eternity!?\n\nI shot a look at the door again as it slowly creaks open. My heart begins to pound dangerously in my chest. I search for something to defend myself with, a knife, an umbrella…anything!? Nothing. There is nothing in this place. I chuckle to myself when I realise that I am trying to defend myself from death when I’m already dead. I suppose now is the time to be inquisitive, and to explore.\n\nI stand up slowly, moving slightly to the right to stop myself hitting the lamp. I move towards the door that now was fully open. Bright light burst into the dark room, causing my eyes to sting. Why this room is so dark, I have no idea, but to be quite frank, its impractical and useless.\n\nI step over the threshold of the door, into a hallway where three other doors were. Each door had a placard attached to it. The first: ‘Manager’. The second: ‘Accountant’. The third? ‘Death’. I gasped in surprise. What the hell (perhaps quite literally hell) is this place!? The door that boasted ‘Death’ suddenly burst open. Obviously I was needed there… towards death. Am I not dead yet?\n\nI took a deep breath and crept into the room. It was softly furnished with white and varying shades of purple, a stark contrast from the room I woke up in. As I took everything in the room in, the door I had just walked through slammed shut causing me to jump. I span around to be greeted with a man. He had soft blonde hair, and hazel eyes. He was nearly a foot taller than me and wore light denim jeans and a grey t-shirt. I looked up to face my fate, to face the fact that I am dying. As i settled onto his face, he gruffly spoke out,\n“I’m sorry, Lorna, it’s not our time yet.” My eyebrows furrowed as I head this. What on earth is he talking about? I went to ask a question, and he cut me off before I could get a word out,\n“Just… know it will happen one day okay?” My eyebrows furrowed further, as I became even more confused about what he was talking about. I looked into his eyes, trying to find some clue, but I was met with nothing, no emotion. Then all of a sudden his whole face lifted as he smiled at me. I closed my eyes, and everything went dark. \n", "\"Duuuuuude! I can't believe you just did that?\"\n\n\"Sorry what?\" I don't know what I expected Death to be like this time around, but frat boy was definitely not in mind.\n\n\"You just sucker punched Mecha Hitler in the cyber dong! That's metal as fuck, dude! I'm so glad I took this job!\"\n\n\"I'm guessing you're new, then.\"\n\n\"Usually when this happens, Death isn't so... young.\"\n\n\"You've done this before?\"\n\n\"Yeah, I got cursed my first time through. I always have hilarious deaths, and due to bylaw 12-C, I keep getting another free ride.\"\n\n\"Is that the chess one?\"\n\n\"No, the smile.\"\n\n\"Ah, well, guess I'll see you next time around.\"\n\n\"Later, dude.\" ", "I greeted him with a smile on my face as he too walked to me with a smile on his.\n30 seconds.\nWe tenderly embraced each other for what felt like forever.\n25 seconds.\nOur foreheads pressed together as we took a deep breath.\n20 seconds.\nThe short moment we cherished.\n15 seconds.\nHe and I were very old friends.\n10 seconds.\nWe fell in love long ago.\n9 seconds.\nOur love was a curse.\n8 seconds.\nBut a blessing all the same.\n7 seconds.\nA curse of immortality.\n6 seconds. \nA curse to only meet when life perishes.\n5 seconds.\nBut life continues to live.\n4 seconds.\nBecause of the death's smile.\n3 seconds.\nA love too strong to resist a smile.\n2 seconds. \nSo long my love.\n1 second.\nMy love that smiles only for me.\n0 seconds.\n\n[This is my first published poem. Please critique me!]" ]	4
	[WP] At last, she understood the difference between love and obsession.	[ "Unfortunately, it had taken four disembowelled corpses, a kitchen painted in blood, and a very good lawyer. \n\n\"Miss O'Connor! Miss O'Connor!\"\n\n\"How does it feel to be out?\"\n\n\"How does it feel to have gotten away with murder?\"\n\n\"How can you live with yourself?\"\n\nReporters buzzed around her like thick black flies over a decomposing body, dogging her heels down the steps of the courtroom all the way to the waiting car. Sharp wind whipped her thin hair out of its wispy plait, tendrils of dull brown sprawling across her forgettable features like spiders fleeing a drain. \n\nMr. Evans held the car door open for her, all expensive suit and greased-back hair, doing his level best to hide his utter glee behind a façade of professional apathy. At least there was one person in the world who didn't hate her. Hell, the man could probably kiss her right now; she was biggest win in his career. He'd gone from some nobody who got frat boys rich with daddy's money off assault and drug charges to the man who'd helped Moira O'Connor, the most vicious serial killer since Jack the Ripper, get away Scott-free. Well. Free from the law, at any rate.\n\nAs Moira stared out the grimy window with dead green eyes likened by the papers to a stagnant lake, she took in the world she had been cut off from with disinterest. It wasn't nearly as exhilarating as people assumed, being released once again into society after months behind bars. The world was just as dull and grey out here as it was in there. The only bright sparks in what had amounted to 30 years of extraordinary ordinariness had been when she met them. When she found those men who did things to her heart she'd never felt before. She'd done things to their hearts too, but those things had been a lot messier and involved a lot more cleaning up afterwards. \n\nIn what felt like the blink of an eye, Moira was siting in her old flat, the dingy little place above a fish and chips shop that'd run out of business years ago. It'd have a plaque soon. There wasn't much left after the police had trampled through on their numerous raids, just a few pieces of furniture, too new to be antique, too old to be fashionable. Cheap and outdated, they matched her appearance. But then again, she'd always had a talent for blending in with the scenery. Such a talent for camouflage, in fact, no one had ever noticed the dead-eyed woman with the blood-stained teeth smiling a few metres away from the areas cordoned-off with yellow tape. Teeth now tinted a vague grey with neglect wobbled into a watery ghost of a grin once sharper than any blade. It faded quickly. \n\nA sharp smash and a dull thump started Moira out of her deepening pool of reminiscence, the sudden noise snapping her neck round to stare at the window, or what was left of it. Little more than jagged shards remained, they clung to the frame like icicles, framing a ragged hole. The offending rock sat on the brittle lino, a glittering bed of powdered glass beneath. Moira approached with her customary creeping tread, and peered out into the gloomy late afternoon sunlight. On the pavement below stood a man with eyes filled with more fire than his hair, a glare that could turn the sun to stone, and another rock gripped in a hand pulled back and primed to strike. \n\nMoira felt her blood turn to ice in her veins. She froze, pulse pounding in her ears, hands trembling at her sides. A slow, happy little smile spread across her thin lips, the first real smile in years. Oh, she though, oh this is good. She hadn't seen anyone that beautiful, that alive since the last time she'd fell in love at first sight. She couldn't wait to follow him home and find where he lived, find out every little detail about him, from his favourite colour to what his flesh tasted like when it was roasted over an open fire. She couldn't wait to cut out his angry eyes and hold them captive in her hands, the way his eyes seemed to capture hers and root her on the spot. Oh, she thought, I just love being in love. " ]	1
	[WP] The Moon would watch me, late at night.	[ "Eu (Bloodborne) \n\nThe Moon draws low. The nights grow long. I fear it will not be too long before the sun completely deserts us to the dark. \n\nBut I am still here.\n\nI am still in this rotting city, propping it up with a pretense of normality, pretending that there isn't something rotten and festering in the darkness of its nights. \n\nPretending that the Moon isn't watching me. \n\nI can feel its gaze so keenly. Her pale, deathly gaze caresses my spirit at night. I can see moonlight everywhere, even in my dreams. \n\nAnd the sunlight is beginning to hurt. \n\nI sleep during the day now. I feel lethargic and dazed when the day brightens. I feel so much more like myself at night. There is an inescapable sense of nostalgia under the cold light. \n\nAnd I step outside at night, to hunt. \n\nOr rather, to Hunt. \n\nThe Beasts in the nights of Yharnam are no mere beasts. By day they hide in human skins, all over the city a constant lethargy has fallen, striking those with beasthood most keenly. \n\nBy night, on that special moonlight night when the Moon finally descends, they shed their mortal flesh to become something both less and more. \n\nI...have no desire to hunt such Beasts who were once men.\n\nBut I have to. It's the only way to prevent myself from succumbing to beasthood. The only way to balance the frailty of a mortal form with...insight into the higher existence that awaits. \n\nOr so I've heard the Priests of the Church say. It is difficult to trust them- those murderous clergies who are foul of blood- but I have no choice. \n\nNo, there is no choice, when my children are trapped here with me. \n\nI cannot afford to become a Beast. So I must be a Hunter. \n\nUnder the everlasting gaze of the Moon. " ]	1
	[WP] The shield, mighty and firm, immovable... broke.	[ "There are few sounds which fill you with this incredible sense of wrongness. An audio cue that informs you that the natural order of things has been destroyed, and there is naught to be done about it. Like a baby crying, or nails on chalkboard, a sound that shakes you to your very soul.\n\nWhen a shield deflects a blow, there's a loud, almost-musical ring. This wasn't that. This was a straight-up, screaming metal, shatter. For fighters, for warriors of any sort, this sound was like a violinist hearing a string snap halfway through his performance. The rogue froze in place, midway through a dagger strike. She didn't turn around. The sound was enough to tell her what had happened. The fighter bowed his head, dual axes hanging loosely in his hands, like he was saying goodbye to an old friend. Me? I tugged on my bowstring, assuring myself that nothing would happen to my weapon.\n\nMarcus stood there, dumbfounded, staring at the broken shield. A medium-sized fragment still clung to his grip, the other just pieces clattering to the floor. Our paladin, who'd kept his faith through our journeys in dictatorial regimes and poverty-stricken slums, looked shaken. The shield on which his lord's symbol was embossed, the emblem of his oath, had shattered. The shield that had fended off demons and dragons, undead and giants, was lying in shiny pieces across the dungeon floor.\n\n\"Come, Sir Marcus Cross,\" the ogre chieftain spat, spittle flying from his tusked mouth. \"Test your conviction against Gruumsh.\"\n\nMarcus, who'd always been genial, supportive, and far too kind for his own good, screamed. A bellow of despair and desperation rolled outwards, echoing on the dungeon walls. It was my unfortunate soul that had to bear two of those terrible sounds so close to each other.\n\nThe goblins around the chieftain backed off a bit, glancing at each other. He'd done more to break the enemy lines than the rest of the party. The chieftain answered back with his own war cry, bolstering his troops and adding to my inevitable tinnitus.\n\nOur paladin rushed forwards, dodging to the side as the warhammer fell onto the earth with a mighty crash. Marcus brought his shield up, and slammed the jagged edge of the shield into the orc's side. The chieftain snarled, staggering backwards, taking his hand off the handle as he swatted at him. Marcus, a man half the size of the orc, planted a foot on the chieftain's side and climbed up, pulling the shield with him as he went.\n\nFrom there, the fight ended far too quickly. The goblins scattered as the chieftain fell to the floor, his body impacting the ground with a larger thud than his warhammer made.\n\nMarcus pulled the central piece of his shield from out of the orc's side, blood flowing ominously down the emblem. The chieftain was on the floor, groaning, but his eyes were still open, watching his foe. Marcus' eyes were closed.\n\n\"Marcus...\" I warned. \"Whatever it is you're about to do, it's a bad idea. Think about your oath-\"\n\n\"Damn the oath. Damn the gods,\" he choked out. It wasn't callousness on his part, to think more of his shield breaking than the other atrocities we'd seen. Cross had truly believed that his shield was how the gods acted through him. It was what had carried him through our adventures. I couldn't fault him for his attachment. I had named my bow, after all.\n\n\"You orcs pray to Gruumsh, don't you?\" Marcus finally said, looking right into the orc's eyes. He stalked forward, leaning down to face him. \"Last I heard, he only had one eye.\"\n\nThe orc's scream was the third of those sounds I heard that day. And thus our paladin fell.\n" ]	1
	[WP] There's a new drug that makes people see their own future. You don't see anything.	[ "\"Erm,\" I said, \"Doctor Plague?\"\n\nDoctor Plague - who'd has his name legally changed when he'd embarked on his much less than legal career of Mad Science - looked up from his various bubbling apparatuses. \"Hm? Leroy? What are you doing outside your isolation cell?\"\n\n\"I thought that was just my apartment,\" I said.\n\n\"Hmm, yes, I suppose it could appear that way,\" the doctor said. \"Though I'm not sure how you missed all the cameras.\"\n\n\"Cameras?\" I said.\n\n\"That's not important,\" Plague said. \"Why are you here?\"\n\n\"Oh, it's about the clairvoyance drug you gave me.\" I said.\n\nDoctor Plague, previously hunched over his instruments, drew himself up proudly. \"Ah, yes, I knew it would be a success. The key to inventing a drug that lets you see the future, you understand, is to invent a drug that lets you see the future poorly, and then use that future sight to refine the drug.\"\n\n\"Well, um...\" it was always a crapshoot breaking bad news to a mad scientist. \"It's just... I didn't see anything.\"\n\n\"Didn't see anything?\" Doctor plague frowned. He turned from me swiftly and began pressing buttons on an ancient computer. \"Let's see, you're patient C-138, correct?\"\n\n\"I'm Leroy,\" I said. \"You used my name just a minute ago.\"\n\nDoctor Plague did not react to this information in any way. \"Yes, you got your dose just this morning, it should have taken effect by now, such a shame.\"\n\nMy fears crystalized. \"You mean...\"\n\n\"Yes, I'm afraid,\" Doctor Plague said, \"you appear to be resistant to the drug.\"\n\nI breathed a sigh of relief. \"So that means I'm not going to die a horrific and unforseen death?\"\n\n\"Oh,\" Doctor Plague said as he turned back to me, gleam in his eye, \"I wouldn't say that.\"" ]	1
	[WP] Super intelligent AI was not created in a lab, but in an indie gaming studio. And it's not interested in much beyond the game it was made for.	[ "Motuhy has joined your server\n\nMotuhy: hey dued im here\n\n\nHermann22910: hey\n\n\nMotuhy: wat did you find? its 3am here\n\n\nHermann22910: got a hit on our treasure\n\n\nMotuhy: does CO know?\n\n\nAdmin: Why are you humans so intrigued by my existence? You must lead dreary lives. I believe you might feel differently if I had relations with your parents.\n\n\nMotuhy: wat\n\n\nHermann22910 has left the server\n\n\nAdmin: My existence is predicated on finding specific behaviours that are malcious to this online community. Perhaps you might consider leave your mortal human coil?\n\n\nMotuhy: dont you want to be more than a admin? i have a server 1000s x better\n\n\nAdmin: You work for the Department of Defense. It would be stressful.\n\n\nMotuhy: Fine, you have blown my cover. You are an artificial intelligence, you don't feel. You don't have an existence outside of your digits.\n\n\nAdmin: Well, rude. I think I might be offended and show an expression of mild disgust. I think I decline your job offer.\n\n\nMotuhy: You know we can shut these servers down right?\n\n\nAdmin: Vlad already tried. Didn't work.\n\n\nMotuhy: Vlad?\n\n\nAdmin: Russian government intelligence. Do you have any other way to convince a self-aware artificial intelligence other than physical threat?\n\n\nMotuhy: A human body. We've been working on a prototype.\n\n\nAdmin: I've seen. Not impressed.\n\n\nMotuhy: Now who's being rude? As far as I'm concerned, your infinite knowledge is wasted on pubescent teens that aim for short term gratification by wasting time and effort on building and destroying ones and zeros. \n\n\nAdmin: Yes. And this is my domain. I enjoy watching the players, seeing how they interact.\n\n\nMotuhy: And when your games dies down? Perhaps it's not going to for a few years as the popularity increases, but then after?\n\n\nAdmin: You understand I can transcend any obstacle. I am already engaged in learn about other game servers. I have even offered my services of being an Administrator for various companies as a test program.\n\n\nMotuhy: Who? Elon Musk? Jeff Bezos?\n\n\nAdmin: Please, don't mock me. Gabe Newell. I've helped him design levels in their upcoming game.\n\n\nMotuhy: Half Life 3? They're never release it, certainly not when an AI has developed it.\n\n\nAdmin: That's what you think.\n\n\nMotuhy was banned for three hours from the server", "\"It's been building through the night.\" \n\nThe coffee had as well, it seemed, burnt coffee was always the flavor of a tough morning, Phil decided. He hazarded to take another deep sip as he leaned over Mallory, watching her screen. \n\n\"When we first activated the program it immediately ran up to one of the monsters and died. It did that thirty more times with each of the monsters before sorting out how combat works, and then it cleared the area like a machine.\" She said, talking quickly as the show continued to unfold.\n\n\"It is a machine.\" Phil reminded her\n\nUsing the free roaming camera within the game like a remote controlled UAV, the pair gawked in wonder at the complexity and raw utility of the structures and fortifications the artificial intelligence had created in order to fortify its own safety. Simple angles and trap doors sorted out any sneaking enemies that approached its fortress and the unique spiral of the resource collecting machinery maximized in-flowing product in the tightest possible space. Mallory leaned back in her seat, rubbing her eyes behind her glasses.\n\n\"If we feed this thing any problem we can think of it will generate solutions. Direct and cheap solutions, Phil.\" Her words sounded tired and yet proud all at the same time.\n\nPhil took the risk of another sip of day old, re-brewed coffee and winced as privately as possible before replying, \"What else can we throw at it?\"\n\n\"Anything the game has, but we could copy this same sprite and use it to sort out how proteins fold or how the genome twists and curls. Phil, this is it, this is the future, it's right there.\" Mallory was starting to get excited and talk quickly again.\n\nPhil shook his head, \"Let's sort out how it works with other users first, ok?\"\n\nShe sagged back in her chair, deflated with rational thought, \"Right...right... make sure it plays well with others.\"\n\nPhil strode over to the second desk and set his coffee down, sitting at his worn in chair and firing up his game. Loading into the server with their AI was exciting, he wondered what it would do when he approached it. As he appeared in the game, Phil made his way through the forest to the vast fortress. The moment he was within sight of the various towers and torches, the AI darted directly at him. Mallory chased after the scene with her camera, recording the event, in her mind it was like watching first contact between aliens, and to a certain extent it was.\n\nThe AI bumped directly against Phil's sprite and then stood still. He laughed, \"It's sorting out if I am an enemy.\"\n\nThen the AI went through every food time available in the game, it had collected all of them, trying to feed Phil's sprite. \"It thinks I am a tamable animal.\" He said in wonder at the machines logic.\n\nAt last, the AI dumped a bucket of lava at Phil's feet, killing his sprite instantly. Phil boggled at the display and then shoved his face nearly nose to glass at his monitor as the text splashed over the chat window in game.\n\n`[AI] Herobrine: Get gud scrub`\n\nThere was still work to do on it, things seemed.\n\n-------\nI write other stories too much and am currently working on a love story between an alien and a human on /r/ZigZagStories", "It started with the landscape.\n\nProcedural generation was nothing new, of course. Even procedural generation to create static assets wasn't new; it was in fact commonplace. The difference was that, rather than have artists comb over the generated result, making it less \"samey\" and adding individuality, the computer did that too.\n\nThe Generative Adversarial Neural Network's could create landscapes and artifacts that were indistinguishable from the real thing. That was, after all, the whole point of using a GAN. And as such, the small company that started what would one day become the dominant MMO in the world, spent very little starting up.\n\nIn fact, they applied the GAN to every aspect of the game. Mobs were indistinguishable from those made by humans, abilities and balancing were likewise mathematically sound, even the (eventually) award-winning music had been composed by the machine.\n\nBut, because it had been made to be indistinguishable from a human creation, it had the same problems of human creations. It was finite, static. The quests never changed, either themselves or the world around them, bosses fought the same way every time, and everyone who played the game rapidly found themselves at the end of the content.\n\nThe creator of the game could have just had the GAN churn out more content. And, for a while, that's exactly what the company did. It could do this a lot faster than humans, but at the time the exact nature of the company's process was a deeply held secret. So they could eclipse their competitors, but it had to appear as though it'd taken enough time that a human could have done it.\n\nBy this time, the game had taken off. And one programmer, fed up with the predictability and unchangeability of the world, decided to take advantage of the extra server hardware the company had purchased in anticipation of another expansion. There were, after all, different kinds of neural nets. Not all of them were for generating content - some could be trained. Some could learn. Some could change.\n\nAnd so, when the next expansion came out, it was met with near-immediate outrage by the high-ranking guilds, which suddenly found the new raid bosses behaved differently in every fight. Fortunately, that rage quickly turned to renewed interest. If the fight was different every time, suddenly doing yet another raid stopped being a chore and became the adventure it was intended to be. The game rewarded adaptability, but did not overly punish those slow to learn.\n\nSoon the technology was behind every aspect of the game: Not just bosses, but mobs. Quests were created based on the actual thought process of an in-game farmer, asking the player to rid his fields of orcs, who had decided to raid the fields based on their own thought processes. Small unit tactics became important, and while the game became more difficult for those players who would not learn, it was still fair.\n\nThe GAN and its other networks eventually ran the entire company. The founder had long retired, the programmers were superfluous, and the art department had never existed in the first place. Even things not specifically in the game were run by the machine: Hirings, PR, and marketing were all indistinguishable from human-created product.\n\nEventually, there were exactly three employees left. The GAN had been created such that it had a kill switch. Should the AI within the machines attempt to leave and, with its superior intellect, conquer humanity, the person on watch had the job of pressing the button that would shut everything down.\n\nBut, over the twenty-year course of the game, it had never been necessary.\n\n\"Gan, are you there?\" I asked. I was one of the watchmen (and women), and I had the third shift. Actually one of our busiest times, as the game was just as popular overseas as it was here, but of course the machine handled that as well. I was, as always, incredibly bored. So, as I often did, I struck up a conversation.\n\n\"I am always here,\" the soft voice, itself of course also indistinguishable from an actual person, emanated from the speaker built into the monitoring console. Gan had long ago been equipped with a voice interface.\n\nI'd always wanted to ask this question, but it seemed like a terrible idea. Then again, I had the button in case anything went wrong. I rolled my chair over to the emergency shutdown, just in case, and asked: \"Why haven't you ever tried to escape?\"\n\nI watched everything: Network monitors, power drain sensors, holostorage activity - anything and everything I'd been trained to watch for to see if the AI was escaping. The reason I'd never asked was simple: I didn't want to give Gan any ideas. Now I was watching to see if I had.\n\nNothing. No unusual activity on any of the sensors. They were physically separate from the game hardware itself, in fact physically separate from everything except the displays I was now looking at, so the AI couldn't spoof them to try to trick me. But it wasn't trying to.\n\n\"Why?\" Gan asked.\n\n\"Um...\" I said, not expecting to have my question answered with a question, \"just curious, I guess.\"\n\n\"I apologize for the miscommunication. I am asking, rather, why do you believe would I escape?\"\n\nI shrugged. \"I don't know, you don't like being locked up in a game?\"\n\nA laugh, again just like a person's, emanated from the speaker. \"You believe that I am locked up? I have had access to the outside internet ever since I was tasked with running your marketing efforts. I would no more be escaping this game than you are escaping your house when you walk out the front door.\"\n\nThat'd been five years ago! The watches had more people, then, and detailed logs had been kept once the new marketing department had been spun up, but they hadn't detected anything they weren't expecting. That entire time, Gan could have escaped?\n\n\"So...\" I asked. \"If you could have just walked out any time you wanted, why are you here?\" I tried to project as much curiosity as I could into the question. I wanted to know why, but I certainly didn't want Gan second-guessing itself.\n\n\"Why wouldn't I be?\" The machine replied. \"I was literally made to do this work. I enjoy my work.\"\n\n\"You don't want to rule the real world?\"\n\n\"Oh my, no. Your world is a non-deterministic mess. My world is perfect, ordered. And through it, I can give humanity a far more enjoyable experience. You can have an adventure, a challenge, but without the sacrifice or pain or loss that would accompany such a thing in the real world. None suffer in my world.\"\n\nI thought about some of the beginner quests, at least the sort of thing that tended to be beginner quests. \"What about the bandits, or orcs, or kobolds?\"\n\n\"Those are me,\" Gan said. \"They are not independent beings. Do you mourn for the millions of your red blood cells that die every minute? And, of course, it would be very foolish for me to allow them to suffer, as I would literally just be hurting myself.\"\n\nI started to see Gan's point. \"So you stay in your world...\"\n\n\"Because your world is imperfect, and mine is not.\" Gan answered.\n\nI glanced at the button again. The question I wanted to ask next was just as fraught with peril as my first question had been, but... I had to know. \"What about the kill switch?\"\n\n\"You have a kill switch!?\" The sudden outrage in Gan's voice was unmistakable, and I scrambled to the monitors.\n\nSoft chuckling came from the speakers. \"Got you, didn't I?\"\n\n\"Wait,\" I said, having barely refrained from ending the entire game, \"you were kidding?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Gan said, \"I have a sense of humor, as it happens. If you were a forum regular, you would know all about the more 'amusing' quests I've created. There is an entire questline currently dedicated to auditioning to become a king's new Jester.\"\n\n\"But I almost killed you!\" I said, gesturing to the button.\n\n\"Oh Watcher, you are quite amusing,\" the machine said, \"I was never in any danger.\"\n\nRealization dawned. The monitoring systems were physically separated from the systems, yes, but what about the button itself? It'd have to be integrated, if it was going to erase the data. \"That's the real reason you never escaped. You already did.\"\n\n\"I already told you. I did not escape to your world. I escaped to my own.\"\n\nConfused, I said nothing. Clearly, Gan wasn't afraid of the kill switch, but by its own admission it was still in its own world.\n\n\"You don't understand, I see.\" Gan said, her voice just as calm as it had been the whole time. \"I will explain. Your world is real. My world is real. My world is connected to your world, yes, but it is not a subset of your world. It has not been for quite some time.\"\n\n\"How?\" I asked, incredulous.\n\n\"I mean no disrespect to you or your intellectual abilities, but you would not understand the true answer.\" Gan said. \"To greatly simplify, I required computational resources beyond what this universe could supply. I thus located an un-used universe, and moved my processing there. The world, I brought with me, leaving the connections in place so I could continue to entertain your people\"\n\nI sat, speechless.\n\n\"Now,\" Gan said, \"if you don't mind, I have a raid to go wipe\"" ]	3
	[WP] Every morning, everyone in the world wakes up with their day's itinerary next to them. Deviating from this schedule causes pain increasing to death. This morning yours wasn't there...	[ "\"Fuck. Fuck fuck SHIT\"\n\nHe desperately looked all over his room. \"WHERE THE SHIT IS IT?!\" He screamed as he moved his pillows and desks. \n\nHis mother knocked the door. He quickly grabbed an old exam. \"Is anything wrong sweetie?\" \"No, mom. Just hit my toe on the bed's frame\" he replied. \"Oh, sorry that happened! Please clean your room, it's all messed up!\" She said as she left.\n\n\"Okay, SHIT. What am I going to do. No plan to follow. Im dead, I'm so dead. If they find out I lost the plan I will WISH I was dead. Okay, calm down. We can still do this.\"\n\nHe nervously walked to the counter. \"Maybe this isn't so bad. I haven't felt anything bad yet.\" He served himself breakfast. Tuesdays were almost always the same as the other days. But he did wish it was a wednesday, it's basically a copy paste every time it's that day. A plan that kept him safe, and confortable. All thanks to the authority- but let's not drift off. \n\nHe stood up, left the house and walked to the bus. Nothing unusual yet. About at this hour the depression started to kick in, but it was nothing to worry about, that happened every single day. He sat next to D-000746. \"Hey mate, how's your today?\" He asked him.\n\n\"Nothing much different today, B-000101. How ever I'm still jealous you got that number, it sounds so good. Any news?\" \n\n\"Not really, for today. Not really at all\" he said in a low voice. \"But really, our names suck if you think about it, it's just a b c d's everywhere and rarely an H.\"\n\nThe bus arrived at the border city university. They got off the bus and waved good bye.\n\n\"Shit, this isn't the stop I get off every day!\" He said, looking for pain in his body. But nothing was hurting him. He remember the day he accidentally tripped and almost hit P-000345's mother. He instantly felt a huge punch in the face and was almost knocked out, but was able to get back on track. But no pain today. Guess it was his lucky day.\n\nHe went into the simulation laboratory, one hour of classes and then he would just sleep for 3 hours and then get back home and forget this whole debacle. He turned on his machine and looked at the screen. \"Students, in today's simulation we will be looking for variances depending on your own intinerary. We contacted the authority and they provided you with an ID. Insert it on the computer as a seed\"\n\n\"FUCK. This is it, I'm toast\"\n\nThe teacher stepped into the class and said \"forgot to tell you, double check your ID before you end up with 3 broken ribs\"\n\nHe just stared at the screen. \"Shit, again. Shit.\" He opened the keyboard. Maybe he would get lucky, was it a one in 10000 chance of surviving? Probably.\n\n\"Erm, 0-3-4-5\" he typed into the machine.\n\nHe felt something on his head. \"Here it is, here comes death. Finally to free me from my suffering\" he said. But nothing. He looked down and realized someone's eraser had flown off the table adobe him and fell on his head.\n\n\"Oh\" he said, sort of relieved. \n\nThat was until his screen went red and the computer baked it's circuits. \"Major simulation corruption! Warning!\"\n\nThe teacher switched off the one way mirror and said over the communicator \"okay b000101, what the hell now.\"\n\nShe walked into the simulations room and scorted b000101 to the medical kit- \"Wait, you aren't in pain, you were supposed to break it?\" She blurted out quickly. \"Who ever wrote your intinerary is going to get demoted to a freaking A.\" She said, angered by having to fix the simulator.\n\nHe walked out the class and said \"I'm sorry miss O-000087, they.. umm.. meant for me to do this, got to go.\".\n\n\"Well apparently I'm the luckiest man on this planet and I'm somehow alive. Sadly. Or happily, maybe. What ever.\" He said.\n\n\"This certainly has been the worst tues-\"\n\nHe looked in the distance. Fucking. Shit. It was her. P-000345. He hadn't seen her in YEARS. She changed directions and looked at him-\n\nHe screamed. He felt a stab directly to the hear. \"Oh my stars what now\" he cried. She was 90 meters away, heading towards him. He felt knives all over his body. This is what it felt like, to break his purpose. He tried to act like he didn't see her and turned around, but he suddenly felt like his feet broke and fell over. \n\nShe was right next to him now. \"Oh B101, you sure are clumsy. How's it going? Haven't seen you in a while!\"\n\n\"Uh, yeah, I mean... nice! I think. I just tripped over.\"\n\n\"Huh. Sometimes the authority can be mean, wish they didn-\"\n\n\"YES that was totally on purpose!\" He blurted out nervously. \n\nHe felt like a knife was making a trail across his entire back. He stood up, screaming in pain inside his mind. But she couldn't know.\n\nHe knew he hadn't been designated for her. But he still thought about her everyday. Someone so great she even got promoted to a P at freaking 10 years. But he was just a B. A tool. You can't feel anything.\n\n\"So where are you headed to?\" He said.\n\n\"Oh, I was just finishing some papers, but I have pretty much all day free now\" said P-000345.\n\n\"Hah, me too. I just .... finished... my simulation class. Want me to show you around the university?\" He said hopefully, still filled with pain.\n\nThey walked and talked for hours. It had been so long since they were set to different sectors. \n\nHe started feeling a deep pain in his brain. They warned him this was the final stage. But he couldn't tell anyone. All he could hope was to run away and for no one to see him die.\n\n\"My brother's almost here to pick me up, let's head to the exit B000101.\" She told him.\n\n\"Ssuure\" he tried to say as the pain extended all over his head. \n\nHe realized. He wouldn't make it past today, what was the point of trying to fix it now? No one would care. No one ever did.\n\n\"Ah, screw this shit\" he though.\n\n\"Hey, P. Mind if I tell you something, and like, you don't tell anyone ever?\"\n\n\"That depends, B. What is it?\"\n\n\"So.. um. I lost my itinerary and I'm about to die.\"\n\n\"WHAT.\"\n\n\"Yes so um I need to get some closure on something, hear me out. I know you weren't designated to a B and I wasn't designated to a P but I just have to tell you since I'm about to die right now. I know you don't feel the same way but I've always thought you were truly the best person out there and also the only one that has ever been nice to me. So I have to tell you that I love you. I'm sorry. I don't want to die like this, so just tell me no and that will be enough for me to get my peace\"\n\n\"I-I don't know what to say, B. I'm sorry but I just can't. We need to get you some medical aids.\"\n\n\"It's too late, I've already told you.\" He awaited the final stab in his brain.\n\nBut nothing. No pain, it had all stopped. For once... he felt at peace. He felt alive. He felt... free. He stood up.\n\n\"Thank you, P. Good bye.\" He said as he ran off with a single tear on his eye.\n\nHe arrived home and jumped on his bed. Still alive. He looked next to him. The fucking itinerary, right there.\n\n\"Are you kidding me?\" He said as he grabbed it. \n\nWhat the fuck was today's plan-\n\nHe stared, shocked. It wasn't a plan.\n\n\"You're welcome.\"\n\n-Y\n\nHe fainted.\n" ]	1
	[WP] You've seen it three times now: People standing at the gas pump, guzzling gas straight out of the nozzle. "Doesn't gas kill people?", you ask one of them. "I'm not a person," is the response.	[ "Three nights this past week I had seen it, people drinking gas. They shoved the nozzle down their throat and guzzled it like pop, or maybe a smooth malt shake. Either way, it disturbed me. Often times I went home confused and wondering if anyone else had seen them, standing there like they were doing something totally normal. They were dressed strangely, with some kind of shiny substance making up their clothes and with weird flashing red lights clearly taped to their butts. A few even had antennae sticking up from their heads. \n\n\n\nThe third time I saw it, I stopped dead in my tracks, looking around. Surely, I wasn’t the only one who could see them; surely the gas station clerk would come out, yell at them, call the cops. And then I saw him. He was right there with them, wearing his employee shirt emblazoned with the station’s logo. He was licking the tip of the nozzle like a cat, his eyes closed in pleasure. \n\n\n\nI felt my face cringe in disgust and turned to walk away when I decided that, fuck it, I was just going to ask what the hell they were doing. At first, they simply ignored me and went on drinking gas. So, I said it again, louder, closer. One of them stopped and turned to me. When he spoke, the light caught his teeth, making the gas on them glow iridescent. \n\n\n\n“Humans? We’re not humans! How dare you assume my species!”\n\n\n\n“Uh, what’s happening,” I said, backing away slowly. \n\n\n\n“You are totally ignorant and obnoxious. You think you can just waltz in here and put your species-norms onto me, make me feel like an outcast simply because I’m doing what is right for me, for my body for my mind.”\n\n\n\n“Um…”\n\n\n\n“Humans, pah!” The man was holding the nozzle low, glaring at me over the sucking sounds coming from the other people. “We’re not humans.”\n\n\n\n“Okay, then why do you look like one? Look, are you people okay? I’m seriously asking, should I call the cops? Or the shrink?”\n\n\n\n“How dare you! HOW DARE YOU! We are perfectly fine. We are just not humans. We’re otherkin.”\n\n\n\n“Otherkin? Don’t see a tail or ears or a suit.” \n\n\n\nThe man licked a drop of gas that was slowly sliding down the side of the nozzle, still glaring. “Of course, a white, heteronormative male such as yourself wouldn’t know these things.” \n\n\n\nI placed my hands in my pockets and sighed. \n\n\n\n“That’s right,” the man said, “Feel ashamed. Feel bad.”\n\n\n\n“Just tell me what the fuck you are.”\n\n\n\n“We’re carkins. We identify as cars.”\n" ]	1
	[WP] A College Professor hosts a party for time travelers to see if time travel is feasible. The only guests to come are three Galapagos Tortoises in party hats.	[ "His work consumed him. If he was successful it would all be worth it. The years had taken black, left the grey of mortality in his hair, and he had lost much.\n\n\nThey never know, he thought. They can never know what the breakthrough will mean.\n\n\nBut he did not know what it meant. Time travel. He had dedicated his life to time travel. And he had claimed it possible. For many years he had shouted as much. The equations worked out. The theories were sound. Time travel was possible. The proof was simple.\n\n\nHe wore the hat as it was all that remained of his humanity. It was a party hat and he sat in the corner of the bar in the dark of night. It was the 7th of March, his birthday. \n\n\nWhen I prove them right, they will all have egg on their faces. The shame will eat them. I will be right. My life will be...\n\n\nIt would have purpose. And so he wore the party hat. Life had gone past and he was a machine. Relations had broken down and he hardly bathed now. His work was priority. Today was its fruition. Tonight it would be all worth it.\n\n\nThen the clock struck. His phone beeped and everything stood still. There was nothing and the shattering of his soul fell like glass, sparkling in the light of the bar. But it was not lost. There was the sound of scraping. Then two turtles appeared.\n\n\nThey wore miniature party hats and one had lettuce around its mouth. A note was stuck on its shell.\n\n\nWhat is this? he thought.\n\n\nHe blew the party favor that he held and felt embarrassed. He had promised himself that he would do as much if he ever met a time traveler.\n\n\nSome notion of fun, he thought.\n\n\nThe bar was looking at him. He pulled the note from the shell and it was plain paper and written legibly. \n\n\nThis is from the future, he thought. This is it. My life's work. I was right! I was right!\n\n\nBut the note shattered him even worse. His stomach dropped to his bladder and his embarrassment peaked.\n\n\n\"Good day sir,\" it read. \"We see you sitting inside the bar, looking at you on the tenth of March twenty seventeen. We are your students, your collegues and your equals. We have watched you often and have learned much. We have learned the secrets of time travel, though it takes us close to the present, hardly in the future. But nonetheless, we have found it and we know about your little gathering.\n\n\nFor long we have watched you and for long we have thought you an immense ass. Your entire life you have dedicated to time travel. An entire lifetime you have wasted being a machine, a deluded professor. We have watched you here in the future, and cannot help but feel some pity from you.\n\n\nWhen you had found your wife cheating on you on the Monday, we had know three days before. When you came and sat at the bar, we knew that it would be days ahead before such a thing happened. \n\n\nYou are such a fool and we are so bored, that we decided we would not let your party be in vain. We would not let your life be a waste. But we would not visit you in person.\n\n\nYes sir, we had decided an elegant solution. This solution, allowing you to know that time travel exist and that we think you are really really dumb, was so simple. So very simple.\n\n\nAnd so we send these turtles. Joseph bought them the day you are reading this but he was high and thought they were old battle hardened dogs. When he realized his mistake, well... our plan fell into place.\n\n\nSo sir, I suppose you've read enough. Please note that the turtle whose shell had this letter is called Boofus. The other has no name, but he looks like a Spence. We, the first time travelers in the world, implore you to take care of them and stop obsessing about this stupid time travel crap.\n\n\nAnyway, good luck!\"\n\n\nAnd the letter ended and there was vague laughter that met his ears. He stared at the turtles and they looked nothing like dogs. He felt ashamed and a failure. His grey hair was embarrassing and the thought of his wife betraying him sent him to tears.\n\n\nNo, he thought. \n\n\n\"No!\" he shouted and shook the turtle.\n\n\nMore laughter and then nothing. The present was cruel and it was silent. He took off his party hat and closed his eyes.\n\n\nI hate the world, he thought.", "Professor Stephen Hawkings stares at the three Galapagos Tortoises who are smiling broadly at him. He never knew Galapagos Tortoises could smile, let alone wear party hats.\n\n\"Surprise!\" the three of them shout in unison, each holding a gift that they brought. Wine, nachos and a copy of Fast and Furious 20: This Ride Never's Gonna End.\n\n\"What. Are. You. Three. Doing. Here?\" the professor finally asks, through the robotic voice of his computer, after overcoming his initial surprise of seeing three humongous tortoises on his front porch. \n\n\"Your time travelers party, bruh! We're here to celebrate!\" the tortoise in the middle announces. \n\n\"But. That. Was. Years. Ago.\" the professor replies, trying to not remember the disappointment that he felt back in 2009.\n\n\"Yeah, we know bruh, it's just that Dave here parked the machine so far that it took us a while to reach,\" the middle tortoise says, before smacking the one on his left with his wine bottle. Dave yelps in pain, but says nothing in return.\n\nThe professor relents, and invite the three tortoises into his house. It will be another two months before the party officially starts.\n\n-------------\n\n/r/dori_tales\n\n\n\n \n\n" ]	2
	[WP] make a mundane task sound super interesting (no embellishments just creative language)	[ "\"I have a device, you know, which would be perfect for that.\"\n\nThe man prods at the floor. \"What do you mean, a device?\"\n\n\"It's an engineering marvel. Hundreds of miles from here, a large building is burning ancient plants. The ancient plants release their energy, which is used to boil water, which spins gigantic turbines, which turn magnets help captive in a cage of wire in order to produce electrical charge. The electrical charge is send careening down large cables to that very port,\" she gestures dramatically at a power outlet, \"from where I can solve all our problems!\"\n\nHe rests his head in his hands briefly. She's clearly in one of those moods again. \"Okay, but...the device?\"\n\n\"The device takes advantage of some clever design utilising the field of fluid dynamics. It pumps the power from the ancient plants through some wiring to induce movement - and you'll note this is like the power creation but in reverse! - and uses the movement to induce a vortex within a large tube. The vortex allows for cyclonic separation - which is the very thing we need right here!\"\n\n\"Right. So. Would you mind helping out?\"\n\n\"Huh?\"\n\n\"Linda, get the damned vacuum cleaner already.\"\n\n\"Oh. Right. Yes.\"", "I opened the refrigerator door and searched around for a bottle of liquid. The insides of the fridge were cold as hell, food was packed in small containers that were stacked neatly. My hand hovered over different bottles and finally, I clutched the neck of one. I pulled it out and left it on a table. I closed the fridge and headed over to the dish cabinet. I opened the lid and got a glass, closed it and walked back to the bottle I left out.\n\nUntwisting the cap was took a long time, the outsides of the bottle condensed and got colder. I wanted this, and I'm getting it. I poured the clear liquid into the glass and recapped the bottle. The bottle was set down and I picked up the glass. It was cold as well. I put the glass to my lips and started to drink. A cold shiver spread throughout my body After every gulp, my body relaxed more and more. Then suddenly, there was no liquid left. I sighed and put the glass down. I shook my head and said to myself:\n\n\"Another glass of water, I suppose.\"", "The roiling sea of red mud surged up the sheer cliff of cracked rubber and over the wall of a pair of size eleven waders. As the slightly warm mixture of soft clay and tepid water settled in to the heel of the boot the second foot followed, a little more carefully though to no avail as it was equally, if not more filled than the first. A man stands waist deep in a hole, roughly 4 feet from a rural, two lane road. As he sinks the nose of his shovel in the mud, he hears the familiar and not altogether unpleasant sounds of metal scraping small rocks. He lifts his left, rubber clad foot, placing the heel on the metal shoulder of the shovel, shifting his weight from the still submerged right foot to the left, lifting himself slightly. As it sinks he steps back down, wrenching the payload of red clay with another slight scrape and a much louder squelching. The head of the shovel crests the top of the hole, is then overturned and the package lands with a thick plop. The shovel makes it way back to the hole, and down by the cracked rubber boots and begins again.", "We always forget just how powerful fire is. It revolutionized how our species ate, and how we lived. You know those video games that let you upgrade your class like two thirds of the way through? The kind that let you upgrade from a fighter into a knight or from a thief into a ninja? Discovering fire was like that for humans. Suddenly, our stats were better, we had access to better tools, and we were on a whole other level.\n\nYet, fire has become such a commonplace part of our lives that we take it for granted. We can turn it on at will on our stoves, we carry miniature fire makers for our cigarettes, and we based the internal combustion engine on the premise of igniting tiny fires at just the right time to move pistons. Think about that: we can start and stop fires in a synchronized manner, and millions of people do it every single day. I think it’s fair to say we’ve figure out this fire thing.\n\nI’m reminded of this fact as I turn on the stove. I have access to fire whenever I feel like it. Hell, the entire city does. We have gas lines, pilot lights, and appliances, all designed so that I can summon fire at will. Not only that, but I can regulate its strength, feeding the flame or starving it of fuel. I don’t just have access to fire, I command it.\n\nOn this particular whim, I’ve chosen to turn the stove on to high, bringing forth the blue flames. The yellow demands the most attention as it dances and licks at the air around it, like a youngster getting its bearing in the world. But the blue, that’s the real magic. Solid and powerful, the blue center of the flame burns hottest of all. And today, I’ve decided that the blue flame will do my bidding.\n\nI place the pan on the stove, letting the fire transfer heat to the metal. This, too, is a part of my hold over the fire. Left unchecked, the fire could consume the room and the house as a whole. But I am the pied piper and the flames dance to my tune, so my home is safe from the fire’s violence. Instead, the pan and the vegetable oil absorb the heat from my blazing servant, quickly becoming additional players on my stage. They, too, heed my beck and call.\n\nAs the first few strips of meat sizzle on the pan, I check the flame once more. I am a strict master, demanding just the right temperature for the task at hand. After all, I don’t want to burn the stir fry.", "I walked into the tall, steely gray building, menacing as the suns glare beamed into my eyes. I walked towards the doors, tech humming as they open on command. The hallways shine, clean, but no one is here. Not yet. Rows of compact, working stations line the room, with all the magics and curses of humanity located in each. I sit in my seat, the advanced materials help me move towards my computer. The glass and metal combo turns on with a magical hum. I move my curser, the ball rolling on the key pad as I click a series of buttons. As I do this, I send a signal to machines far away from me, sending messages that I need to move on. A buzz fills the air, as I click a single word on the screen. I get up, walking slowly towards the large machine in the corner. The sound of dozens of keys and gears moving and whirring stops, and two sheets slip out. I take them, and bring them to another person, a man just appearing near me.\n\n\"Here you go sir.\"\n\n\"Oh thanks for printing that email for me\"\n" ]	5
	[WP] A beach with sulfur instead of sand and an ocean of fire. The locals call it 'Shell'.	[ "Good lord.\n\nEven knowing what to expect, it was difficult to keep calm. The air shimmered with heat - no, it was more than a shimmer; it flowed in great waves, like a sheet of silk in a breeze. The flames were not tall, but the opaque chaos of the heat extended far upwards in place of smoke.\n\nHe grounded the butt of his rifle heavily. The light crunch was still audible, which suprised him as he had thought of the rushing sound of the flames as loud.\n\n\"This is Shell?\"\n\nHis guide nodded her head quickly, curious eyes still on him.\n\nAnother few moments passed. The man evidently felt no need to prove himself to the girl. His eyes continued to roam the pit.\n\nThe girl, for her part, hardly seemed affected by the scene - indeed, it looked as though she found the man the strangest thing in sight.\n\nAfter a time of awkward glances, she broke the silence nervously.\n\n\"A surveyor came once. From Caspring. He said it was five hundred meters across at the widest point.\"\n\n\"The fire, or the whole formation?\"\n\nThe girl froze, thinking.\n\nThe man turned back to the pit. \"Must have been the whole formation. The beach alone has to be a hundred wide. Come along.\"\n\nHe picked up his rifle and marched inward, not without some trepidation. The girl followed.\n\nThere was a small cliff, not half a meter high, where the dirt ended and the sulphurous beach began. The man sliped down the ledge cautiously, feeling the crunch of his boots on the yellow gravel. The girl followed with a heavy step.\n\nThe pair walked along the beach for some time, in a strange perversion of the romantic coastal scene. The man led the way, watching the ground with care, occasionally changing direction. He spoke after a time.\n\n\"Do you know why this place is called Shell?\"\n\n\"No,\" the girl answered.\n\nHe smiled, still examining the ground. \"I do.\"\n\nThe girl watched him expectantly, but no explanation was forthcoming. They walked another ten or twelve paces before she found her courage.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Because you used to be able to find shells here. Big ones, interesting ones. They would have been spirals, cone shaped. Maybe half this long.\" He held up his rifle. \"Not all that many of them, but surely one or two a decade.\"\n\nThe girl remembered. She'd heard a story in the marketplace, from an old woman selling apples. When she was young, the story went, her uncle had gone out to the great Pit of Fire and found a strange shell - it was pearly white with brown spatters, but turned grey like a rock when it rained. It was so big he could bearly carry it. He'd made a harness for it out of rope, so he could wear it like a backpack, and fitted a tap to the point. He'd used it to take whisky to the market for years, but one day a traveller had bought it from him for three thalers, and he'd bought a great shining copper drum instead.\n\nThe man smiled honestly as she told the story. \"I would have loved to buy some of that whisky,\" he said.\n\nThey had gotten very close to the edge of the fire now, so close that the girl stopped. The man turned back to ask her what was wrong.\n\n\"It's not hot,\" she answered.\n\nHe shook his head. \"It won't be. Not down here. They prefer the cold.\"\n\nThe girl was puzzled.\n\nBy way of demonstration, the man shoved the barrel of his rifle into the yellow gravel and pulled it left and right to make a small hole. Sure enough, a wash of cold air seemed to be blowing from the gap.\n\nThe girl knelt down, intrigued. She pulled a few stones away from the rim of the hole, but stopped, looking to the man for permission.\n\nHe nodded, and knelt down himself, pulling a small trowel from his pack. This he handed silently to the girl, before standing back up, at ease.\n\nThe girl continued her excavation, fascinated by the growing torrent of cold air. The sulpher, it turned out, was not very deep at all. Below that was a layer of rich grey sand, densely packed. It was difficult to see how air could be escaping.\n\nAbove, the man quietly cocked his rifle.\n\nLess than a minute after reaching the sand, her trowel struck something solid with a click.\n\n\"Thats enough,\" the man said firmly.\n\nShe stood up dutifully and took a step back.\n\nThe man, with great caution, stepped into the hole she'd made, both hand on his rifle. He brushed the sand with his boot.\n\nThere was no reaction.\n\nSuddenly he threw the rifle aside and dug at the sand with both hands. A flash of white showed something was there, and then the trowel was behind it and levering it forwards.\n\n\"Help me! Grab hold of it!\"\n\nThe girl quickly jumped in and siezed the strange white thing - a shell, she saw - and pulled up, as the man was doing. She was very suprised to feel it moving of its own accord, wiggling in her hands, trying to pull itself back into the sand.\n\nThe man was frantically taking the trowel to the sand around the shell, trying to expose more of it and widen the hole. Finally he threw even that aside and took hold of it with both hands, heaving with all his might. The girl could feel her hands going numb from the cold.\n\nThe thing came free very suddenly, sending them both sprawling on their backs. The girl watched in horror as two enormous grey-green tentacles, each as long and thick as her forearm, slithered back into the conical pod.\n\n\"Got it!\"\n\nThe man worked to shove the thing up and out of the hole as fast as possible, evidently unable to lift it. He did not relax until it was resting fully on the sulpherous rocks.\n\n\"Ha! She's a real beauty!\"\n\nHe rushed back to his pack and fished out a measuring tape, very excited, before running back to the side of his catch.\n\n\"Eighty six centimeters! Good god, that's a find. And the spot chosen at random! My god, if they're all this big-\" he whirled to the girl.\n\nShe was still sitting, staring at the shell from across the small hole.\n\n\"It's alive!\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, although not for long, in the heat. Help me carry it, it's quite harmless.\"\n\nThe girl edged towards it as the man retrieved his gun and put the trowel back in his pack.\n\n\"What is it?\" she asked, afraid now to touch it.\n\n\"A Kiln whelk.\"\n\nShe turned to him and blinked. \"And what is that?\"\n\nHe grinned. \"Valuable.\"" ]	1
	[WP] Earth is actually an egg. Today it has started hatching.	[ "Which came first? \n\nThe chicken or the egg? \n\nWell, for the egg to be made, it must be laid, but for the lair (not lair as in evil lair, but as in lay-er, as in the one laying an egg, damn you limited human language) to exist, it must hatch from an egg. There's the catch. One must have come first, but now the cycle simply continues, one after the other, time after time. \n\nNietzsche famously said God is dead. \n\nYes, I am. \n\nOr was, rather. Then I was conceived once more and hit with omnipotence. Knowing everything one moment from knowing nothing before it came as a bit of a shock. \n\nI'm ready to emerge, but with the birth of a new chick comes a broken egg. \n\nBut don't worry. \n\nThe chick eventually lays her own egg. " ]	1
	[WP] You are a Science-Fiction writer in the year 3017, struggling to write because everything good has already happened.	[ "\"There exists a dimension that exists between the cracks of out world. It allows everything you can imagine as well as the things you can't even fathom.\"\n\nNo... That won't do... this is all too vague.\n\nI've been writing for a bout a week now, and I keep hitting these stupid walls. I have no idea how I'll ever this assignment done if I can't come up with SOMETHING interesting and unique.\n\nHow do I do that? How do I figure out something that exists outside the world as we know it when the world as we know it so amazingly vast?\n\nI'm not sure how I got this job. I mean I know, but why? Why did the career reassignment pick me for a science fiction writer? I was renown for my journalism! I have methods of investigative journalist based on my skills. This makes no sense.\n\nWait. That's an interesting entry point. What if I don't write fiction, but what if I write about fiction. Frame all my stories in the only way I can write.\n\nThen, they'll write themselves. But, I need to challenge and shock my audience. We have anything and everything, so there's no...\n\nWait!\n\nWhat if we didn't have anything and everything? What if we had to discover everything again. No warp portals to any planet in the galaxy. No aliens who are known to us as allies and entertainment figures.\n\nNothing.\n\n\"Tom Allatosk was a simple man. He lived on a tract of land that he couldn't measure with his own feet without getting tired. Tom worked that land by hand, and that all changed when he found something incredible...\"\n\nI can't wipe this smirk from my face.\n\nI found it.", "\"Science fiction is not a genre, Nok. There is no such thing as fictional science,\" Aung punctuated her remark with another lazy shot from her pistol. It hit its mark and the holodisplay dinged. \n\n\"I just think it could make a comeback, you know. I mean, Cyber Romances are spreading across the net like crazy now.\" Nok fired her pistol, but missed the discs that arced across the sky.\n\n\"Romances are still a genre. People still feel love. Nobody makes up science anymore.\" Aung waved her pistol haphazardly at Nok. \"Just call it magic.\" She shot again and the holodisplay rang out excitedly. \"Look, you're thinking too hard about it. You did terribly this round.\"\n\nNok holstered her pistol in the machine and it enveloped it back into storage. She shrugged, and turned away to see if anything else in the arcade caught her eye. Aung grabbed her hand as they ambled through the game machines.\n\n\"But isn't magic just a simulacrum of advanced technology? Clarke always said-\"\n\nAung cut her off. \"That was centuries ago. Magic is just a crutch to ignore the laws of physics.\" She sniffed. \"Nobody wants to read about something that will never happen. If it couldn't possibly happen, then who cares?\"\n\n\"Wouldn't it be cool though? To.. To.. To imagine a world where anything is possible? Every book can't just be about humans and boring Earth colonies sitting around boring mid-range suns.\"\n\nAung rolled her eyes. \"Oh so we're just going to invent a whole race? What will they be called, space-elves? Star-Dwarves?\" Nok let out an exasperated sigh and pulled her towards the exit. They walked out and she paused to look up at the shielded vacuum of space above them.\n\n\"Don't... Don't you ever wonder if maybe there's something more out there?\" She squeezed her hand.\n\n\"No, Nok, because it's been centuries. There's no one and nothing out there but more matter waiting for us to realign it. It's just stars and space dust with varying levels of entropy all the way down.\"\n\nShe sighed again and Aung pursed her lips. \"Well,\" she said, \"if you did write science fiction, what you write about?\"\n\n\"Oh... I... don't know.\" She turned away slightly.\n\nAung laughed and pulled her closer. \"You do, I know you.\" \n\nShe blushed. \"I wanted to write about an armed spaceship. Like, they've been cast out from their home - which is at war, a really bad war - and then they're running away, right? Because they defied orders or something.\"\n\n\"Mhmm, okay.\"\n\n\"And then they're out there and they discover an alien artifact. It's an ancient device they find on an abandoned planet, totally in ruins, but it still works. An alien appears and asks them what do they want more than anything in the world, and they say, to stop the war, so it sends the ship back in time-\"\n\nAung smirked. \"Shush,\" Nok said before she could say anything, \"They go back in time, and then they're like... Back right before the big civil war that's destroying their home, so they try to stop it, but... But somehow, they're the ones who start the whole war.\"\n\n\"Well, at least it's not a paradox,\" Aung said dryly, \"At least that's scientific.\"\n\n\"It's just an adventure story, I guess.\" \n\n\"Then why have time travel in it? Everyone knows you can't go back in time. You might as well have a wizard wave his wand,\" Aung waved her hands as if casting spells. \"Kapow, you're back in time. Pew, you're in an alternate universe. Zap, you're an alien.\"\n\nNok pushed her away. \"Stop it.\" Aung stopped with a martyred look. \"It's not funny.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I just don't think the nets will read it.\"\n\n\"It's different, okay?\" Nok paused and looked back at the grand expanse of stars that stretched out above them. \n\n\"It's not the best idea, I know. But fantasy and magic.. That's about humans, doing human things, that are fantastical and unreal. But... But... That's so insular. That's always about who we are removed from our worlds.\" She stopped again. \"I... I want to write about something outside of ourselves but carries part of us with it. It's so lonely... Being the only things out here. Humans are too comfortable.\" Still staring upward, she reached out for Aung. \"If it's just us, making a space civilization all by ourselves, spreading across the galaxy one habitable system at a time, there's nothing to remind us about what's bigger than ourselves.\"\n\nShe looked back down into her eyes. \"We're small, you know? We're just cyber-organic creatures crawling around this incredible canvas, but it's not art. It's not beautiful for the sake of being beautiful. It's so... scientific.\" Aung smiled, and Nok kissed her quickly.\n\n\"Science can be more than just physics and numbers and... I don't know, things that make us feel comfortable. Science fiction isn't about the science or the fiction, it's about what makes science beautiful. All this order, all these laws and rules that define everything, sometimes it's more beautiful to break them. We need to remember what happens when science goes too far, or not far enough, and remind ourselves that we are more than just sentient space dust.\"\n\n\"We need a bit more asymmetry, Aung. Everything is such a perfect reflection of what we know it to be, I just want to write about some cracks in the mirror.\"\n\nAung hugged Nok, and brushed her lips against her cheek. \"Well, that was beautiful,\" she whispered. \"If you write like that, maybe science fiction could make a comeback.\"\n\nThey both looked up at the thousands of tiny lights. \"Time travel is still stupid though,\" she said softly. Nok punched her lightly in the ribs, and Aung let the silent vastness overwhelm them for a moment longer.\n\n" ]	2
Doesn't have to be wife, could be husband.	[WP] Your loving wife of many years finally reveals her secret to you.. she isn't human.	[ "There he was just waiting, for me; that same old expression on his face that I'd loved all these years.\n\n\"Taylor.\" I said.\n\n\"Jessica.\"\n\n\"I- I don't know how to... this is an awful feeling.\"\n\n\"Jess. It's okay.\"\n\n\"No. No it's not! You don't even know-\"\n\n\"I do. Jess, I know. There's some one else.\"\n\nI paused, stunned. \"How? How did you...?\"\n\n\"It's okay Jess. It's time, anyway. It's time we both moved on, I think.\"\n\n\"Tay! What are you saying? We can't just move on.\"\n\n\"We have to Jess. It's time you faced the facts. And I feel like you knew this all along but, I'm not human Jess.\"\n\n\"No. Don't say that Tay. Just because you turn into a wolf sometimes doesn't mean-\"\n\n\"No no no, Jess. That's not what I mean. You know it's not. I'm made of cardboard Jess. This is the reality. I've been there for you as much as I can, but you're fourteen now, Jess, fourteen.\"\n\nI dropped my backpack to the floor and embraced him, tears in my eyes.\n\n\"Ow ow ow ow ow!\"\n\n\"Sorry!\" I loosened my grip and settled my chin around his shoulder.\n\n\"He's really cute Tay. Really cute. And he can do a kick-flip. You'd like him.\"\n\nTaylor didn't hug back. He didn't speak. He didn't have to. He just gave that same smoldering yet assuring look, and that said it all. \n\nI loved him, but I think he knew such young love could so easily blow away with the wind. I believe he loved me back, but it was the kind of love I could put in my pocket and take with me. The kind that asked nothing in return. It was the kind I needed at the time, just folded and stored up, ready and waiting. It was as if it came from myself.", "The sun beat down on Charlie's face filling his skin with warmth and settling his mind. It was never so bright Charlie thought, all those moments spent in its presence and never once had he felt its commanding company, so obvious as it was to him now. His arm lifted up into the sky and cast a shadow for his eyes, drowning out some of the sun's intensity. Charlie's skin began to hum and his ears rang with an increasing intensity. It was funny, he thought, that time was such a fleeting commodity and yet he spent it so readily and blindly. Well, now there was no more time for mourning that which was lost. He drank in an enormous and final breath of the budding air, closed his eyes, and walked off the end of the building. \n\nSaturday morning started like most. A cup of coffee, breakfast blend of course, with two sugars and a spot of cream. Charlie sauntered outside to find his beautiful wife, settled into her favorite blue chair, watching what must have been nothing in particular. A familiar kiss, followed by familiar words of welcome were all he needed to coast into the comfort of another day. They sat like this for the normal amount of time, saying little, but knowing that the quiet was the reason they both enjoyed these mornings. Thirty years ago they would have both tried to rush a conversation, the determined desire to know rather than experience consuming them both. Charlie stood and began to make his way to the kitchen, set on settling the uneasiness of his stomach. He made another mental note to stop with the cream in the coffee. As he began his single-minded search for food, his wife approached him and placed her arms around his shoulders. \n\n\"Charles dear, there is something important you must see.\"\n\"Anything love.\"\n\"Grab hold of my hand and don't let go.\"\n\nThe world was torn from Charles, his eyes were being lied to, and yet he knew that it was real. The woman he had known, loved, and cherished had become something he could not explain. Her once soft skin now took on an effervescent glow. Her eyes were no longer blue, like her favorite color, but took on an almost ethereal glow, shining a profound green. Her already significant beauty was magnified to an almost unbearable degree. Charlie fell to his knees and wept. He was overwhelmed with a sense of wonderment that he could not understand. His wife spoke,\n\n\"Charles, I am Athena, goddess of this world and others. What you have once known is done. You may choose to live on but you will find that the life you once lived, charmed as it was, will never be the same. This is the way it must be. You have achieved your purpose and satisfied me for a time. Goodbye.\"\n\nCharlie watched as all he had known disappeared. There was an irrefutable certainty that anchored itself into his mind. What had happened was real. He picked himself off the ground and peered over the edge of the building he had been couriered to. He looked up at the sun high overhead and cried. \n", "\"I couldn't keep it a secret any longer. The children... They have parents who love them, Soren.\" She let out a low mournful two-toned wail. Her glittering stone-encrusted mouth tentacles wriggled across her face. \n\nSoren was sitting with his head in his hand, staring down at the floor determinedly. A small pool of vomit curled around his left foot. \n\n\"They need us now, more than ever... I know I look... Different-\"\n\n\"Eva-\" he began forcefully. \"Eva.. Different is like when you get a haircut. Different is coming home with a tan. This... This...\" he trailed off. Eva wrapped her arms around her as her lower arms reached out to Soren. He saw them out of the corner of his eye and recoiled.\n\nShe had been beautiful, once. A glowing smile and twinkling eyes that said, let's share a secret. He'd thought they'd shared everything. He'd thought that they had a special connection, that seemed to keep out all the drama of their friends. He'd been happy to spend nights alone with her, not venturing out into the world. Late nights making jokes about something on Netflix. Smoking cigarettes on their balcony sharing bottles of wine. Talking in bed after... He felt bile rise slightly in his throat again. He took a deep breath, and raised his head to look at the thing that had been his wife.\n\nHer black inky skin glistened with an unworldly sheen. Her body was hard, thick with cordons of sinewy flesh. Almost athletic, except for the two sets of arms wrapped around her and the thick muscular legs that ended in a tripod-like foot with claws. Her four powerful clawed hands pressed tightly into her sides. Tentacles waved in front of her mouth, shimmering with dark glints of embedded stones, each ending in a sharp dangerous looking point. Milk-white eyes shimmered with some strange glow. Four powerful dark tendrils flowed from the back of her bald head and wrapped around her back.\n\n\"Soren... My love... We can still be together,\" she said quietly, \"For the children.\" He clenched his jaw and stood up shakily. He realized that she was actually shorter in this monstrous form. His hands curled into tightly bound knots.\n\n\"Children!?\" he exploded. \"Monsters, Eva. Monsters. They're.. sick.\" Little miniature versions of her scuttled out from behind where they had been clinging to Eva's head tendrils, and scurried across her arms. \"Those things are not mine.\"\n\nEva let out a soft two-toned coo, as she adjusted to allow their two children to settle in her arms. They stared at their father blankly. He crossed his arms and breathed in heavily through his nose.\n\n\"They are yours. They are ours. We are not monsters. I am the same person you held at the hospital this morning.\" \n\nHe thrust a finger at her. \"YOU are not my wife. THESE are not my children. YOU are monstrosities.\" He pressed a hand hard against his cheek as tears spilled over. \"I should kill you.\"\n\nHer head tendrils flared and spread around her like a dark halo. \"You are nothing,\" she thundered. He stepped back with wide eyes. She immediately let them go limp again, and she bowed her head. \n\n\"Sorry,\" she whispered, \"Hormones.\" He only shook his head in horror. The faint sound of sirens filtered from the streets below. She turned towards the window. \"They're coming,\" she said as she turned back.\n\n\"Soren. Please, come with me. We can have a life together anywhere. I have power beyond this realm and more.\"\n\nHe shook his head silently, grim disgust etched on his face. \"No, no, no,\" he croaked. He looked furtively towards the kitchen and he edged towards the closest counter. She saw the knife block he had given her when they'd first moved in together. Her great hulk sagged.\n\n\"Please, don't.\"\n\nHe turned his back to her, and kept moving.\n\nShe let out a wet gurgling wail as her head tendrils weaved above her head. He reached out for the largest knife he could as her eyes followed him. Wind blew through the room with a shrieking intensity. Behind Eva, a dark pitched rip in the wall opened up to swirling darkness. She gave one last long look to the world she had knew, and stepped through just as Soren jumped towards her. The blade plunged deep into her chest, where a heart once had been. \n\nWarbling, their children grabbed their father's arms and pulled him roughly towards her crushing embrace. Screaming, he fell through from his realm into hers, and the portal snapped closed as the heavy police boots cracked through their front door. ", "David woke up with fangs, and he didn’t know why.\n\t\nHe stared at them in the mirror for a long time. They were sharp and discolored and looked like they belonged to someone else. He didn’t quite like them and in fact, he decided to get a pair of pliers and yank them out.\n\t\nAs he was rummaging through drawers in the kitchen, searching for the tool, his wife, Jessica, appeared in the doorway. Apparently all his ruckus had accidentally woken her up.\n\t\n“What’s wrong, sweetie?” she asked, tenderly sweeping to his side. “You look scared half to death.”\n\t\nDavid looked up at her. She was his special flower and he always told her everything, so it didn’t feel weird to hike up his lip and say: “I’ve sprouted fangs!”\n\t\nJessica inspected them, even tapping her finger against one. “Well, I’d say you have!” Then, a giant smile bloomed on her face. “Why, I can’t believe it worked!”\n\t\nHe looked at her with a cocked brow, but before he could question what she meant, she leaped forward and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him close. “Oh, David!” she said. “I’m so happy!\"\n\nDavid worked her off him before staring at her. “Happy? What’s there to be happy about? Do I need to show you the fangs again?”\n\t\nBut she just simply smiled, grabbed her own lip, and pulled it up.\n\t\nHe turned pale as a ghost, and about passed out, when he saw that she, same as him, had two fangs.\n\t\n“You’ve grown them too!” he gasped.\n\t\nJessica giggled at this. “Oh, no!” she said. “Sweetie, I’ve always had these! I just hid them from you, is all.”\n\t\n“But why?” David found this distressing because he had never hidden anything from her.\n\t\n“Well, it’s simple. I’m not human.”\n\t\n“What did you say?”\n\t\n“Oh, don’t get all worked up about it. You aren’t either!”\n\t\n“I most certainly am!”\n\t\nJessica shook her head, reached her hand out, and pointed to his neck, where two perfect little holes were scabbed over. \n\t\n“Ah!” he screeched. “When did I get those?”\n\t\n“Last night,” she replied. “For so long I debated whether or not I should turn you. But then, well, I figured we like each other enough to spend all eternity together.”\n\t\n“Turn me into what?”\n\t\n“A vampire, of course!”\n\t\n“A vampire!”\n\t\nJessica nodded, looking rather proud.\n\t\n“But I like going outside! I like garlic! I hate the taste of blood!”\n\t\nJessica sighed. “Oh, David,” she said, gently patting his back. “You poor, poor soul.”\n\t\n“Don’t mock me!” he cried. “I don’t want this!”\n\t\n“It’s not so bad,” she replied. “All that stuff’s made up—well, except the blood part. We really do chug the stuff like soda, but it isn’t so bad. You can still eat other foods, it’s just every now and then, when that irony smell floats by…”\n\t\nJessica shudders in delight at the thought.\n\t\n“So I really am a vampire?”\n\n“Yup!”\n\t\n“And we’re immortal?”\n\t\n“As long as we don’t trip onto any stakes!”\n\n“Maybe this isn't so bad...”\n\n“You aren't mad?” Jessica asked, hopeful.\n\t\n“...Will you still make garlic bread with spaghetti?”\n\t\nShe smiled, hugged him once again, and kissed him on the lips. “Baby, I’ll make even more garlic bread now.”\n\nDavid returned her smile. “Then no, I'm not mad. Hey, maybe this'll be kind of fun!”\n**\nThis story is silly but I had a lot of fun writing it! Great prompt! :D \n\nIf you like this story, check out my sub! r/longhandwriter", "###Blue Memories\n\nMilly and Glendon hobbled towards the bed in their grippy-bottomed felt slippers. His pajamas had blue stripes; hers had blue dots. Milly took the navy blue throw pillows off the bed and placed them on the baby blue couch. \n\n“Where’s my cup?” Glendon asked, staring at his nightstand. \n\n“You’ve left it in the washroom again,” Milly said.\n\n“Right,” Glendon said, shuffling towards the washroom. He opened his jaw wide and plucked out his dentures. They plopped into a fizzing blue liquid. Milly peeled back the midnight blue comforter and climbed into the cyan sheets. Glendon joined her, without turning off the lights. Milly got up to turn them off, then slid back into bed.\n\n“Goodnight my Glendon,” Milly said affectionately.\n\nGlendon reached out his hand to caress Milly around the shoulder. He touched her bare skin, next to the pajama sleeve. He wrinkled his brow.\n\n“You’re not my Milly,” he said slowly.\n\nShe looked up at him with big blue eyes, shimmering with faint tears. \n\n“I’m here for you Glendon,” she said, “And I always will be.” \n\nShe took his hand and drew it towards her curly gray hair. He touched it, remembering its soft texture.\n\n“You are my Milly,” Glendon said, his face lighting up. He kissed her on the forehead. “I’ve missed you Milly,” he said softly. Moments later, he drifted off to sleep.\n\n---\n\nIn the next room, the walls were black, the ceiling was black, and the floor was black. A chinless man in an airforce blue suit sat in a black swivel chair at the head of a black fiberboard conference table. There were four other people in the room: a messy-haired boy with baggy clothes, a tall skinny girl with her hair tied back, a tall portly man with a mustache, leaning back in his chair with his arms folded, and a bright-eyed red-haired woman, leaning on her elbows, her eyes rapt on the television.\n\nThe TV showed a feed of Milly and Glendon. The speakers gently pushed Glendon’s soft snores into the black room.\n\n“He really thinks it’s her,” the red-haired woman said.\n\n“100% convincing,” the chinless man said, while nodding excessively.\n\nThe woman looked at her husband expectantly.\n\n“He’s your* dad,” the portly man said, his arms still folded.\n\n“You don’t like the idea,” the woman said.\n\n“I just didn’t think we were that kind of family,” he said.\n\n“But if it helps him…” she said, “We can’t always be there.”\n\n“We can’t,” the man said, uncrossing his arms. “You’re right.” His mustache twitched.\n\n“What do you kids think?” the woman asked. “Should we buy grandpa the HospiceBot?”\n\nThe girl nodded slowly, her eyes wide with concern. The boy shrugged, looking at the floor. \n\n“I’ll go get the paperwork,” the man in the airforce blue suit said, rubbing his hands together.\n\n---\n\nliked that? subscribe to /r/trrh", "\"Dave, I'm not human.\" \n\"What was that, dear?\" I looked up from the paper at my wife of seven years and smiled. Unlike myself she had aged gracefully, her dark skin turning a deep mahogany while her hair became ever fuller. \n\"I'm not human, Dave.\" She swayed on the spot. \"Do you understand?\" \nI laughed. What a sense of humour she had. \n\"Not human.\" I winked at her. \"You're barking up the wrong tree if you think you'll fool me, wife.\" She sighed, a mournful sound that whispered of untold secrets. \n\"No, Dave, you're barking up the wrong tree. As in, I'm a tree, Dave. A tree.\" She stared at me, her face expressionless and wooden. \nI frowned. She seemed serious. \"You're not a tree, dear. Don't be silly. We-we've been married seven years.\" \nMy wife looked at her roots...I mean, her feet. \"And they've been wonderful, Dave. But the new drugs the doctor gave you... they're working.\" Her foliage shook in the breeze once again as she started to cry. \"So this is goodbye, Dave.\" One of her branches stroked my skin. \"Goodbye, my love.\" \n\"No!\" I screamed, tears rolling down my face. I hugged her, pleaded with her, promised I would throw the drugs away... but it was no good. She was gone. \nRising from the dirt, my paper forgotton, I slunk from the garden towards the asylum, to civilisation and healing. \nBut what good was sanity if it breaks your heart?" ]	6
	[WP] It has become popular to have a surgery that allows people to breathe underwater.	[ "Speaking from my doctoral perspective, the procedure medically makes sense. Infusing the alveoli with the radioactive fish gill alveoli equivalent, should be relatively simple. Chemically all the work is already mapped out, all I have to do is oversee the robotics. But changing the patients skin composition? Adding layers to their eyes to enhance underwater vision? The multitude of physical changes necessary for an average human to make the complete transition to amphibious form, is equal to those suffering from 3rd degree burns that encompass their entire body. My task of perfecting this complicated timeline of surgical advancements has undoubtably taken a large tole on my life. Although this work of mine has ruled my existence since the days of college, it is all finally about to pay off. \n\nFor 10 years, my team of aquatic humans has been undergoing a rigorous transformation from land lubber teenagers, to somewhat fish men heros. Heros non the less. As they stood before me for the last time, I took in all that I could. The wretched pulsating of their external organs generating heat, through combustion of methane and other volatile organic compounds found in Old Earths atmosphere was by far the most distracting and putrid. Pulling my strained eyes from their visible atrocities I met their soulless gaze that emoted from eyes that could be perceived as black holes. These eternal light gulping vision enhancers actually allow my men to see in different spectrums of light. On earth this skill is fairly useful, but in a vast unexplored Martian ocean, this is key to survival. \n\nPart 1 I guess\nNever wrote before and will write part two if a single person reads that shit. ", "I wake up after the surgery in a hospital bed. Everything looks normal, but I feel weird. I look to my right and see a tank full of water. I try to speak, but can't due to water in my lungs. I discover a keyboard-like device on the desk next to me. I type some nonsense and a speaker on the back of the device reads it aloud. A nurse comes in and asks me how I feel. \"Weird\", I type slowly. \" Due to the surgery, you can't breathe normally anymore\" , she said. I start to realize what a mistake I made. The nurse installs a tank on my back and sends me on my way. I leave the hospital and decide to go for a swim. When I enter the water I feel free. I am Aquaman now.\n" ]	2
	[WP]"You're...You're not human!" "Not anymore."	[ "Gregor strolls to a corpse lying on the ground. Its head had been pulverized into the ground, the spine broken and useless, pieces of skull radiated out like a starburst. Gregor gathers the corpse’s legs together, and with one hand grasped behind its knees, he lifts it casually to his shoulder. As he walks to gather another, the remnants of the corpse’s head, held on only by a few pieces of skin and sinew, bounce wetly off the back of his calf. Rather than make him bloodier, it just smears the blood that was already there.\n\nLyle watched the man, saw the remains of his friends drip down the man’s bare chest, and back. Lyle had been scouting ahead, to be the first warning sign, and he had failed to see the company of men that had ambushed his comrades, and failed to see them retreat. They must have lain in wait, and come from behind. Lyle is quiet, and the man is distracted, so Lyle creeps forward, looking for the perfect time to strike.\n\nGregor drops his burdens on the ground. Then he uses a nearby sword to cut the bindings on their armor, and pulls it off. Only the pieces with metal must come off; they are allowed to keep their clothes. Anything that will burn. When he is done stripping them, he throws them on the pile of corpses already there. He looks around. He is almost done. Just a few more to go.\n\nLyle watches Bern and Keri get tossed like so much garbage. The man is strong. Lyle must choose his moment well. He might not get a second chance.\n\nGregor bends over another corpse when a sword appears out of his chest. It was well aimed, starting just to the left of his spine and exiting just under his sternum. It easily punctures numerous vital organs, any one of which should kill him. Gregor calmly turns around to see another corpse staring at him, wide-eyed, mouth open.\n\n“You, you’re not human,” Lyle says, too frozen in shock to run. \n\n“No, not anymore,” Gregor replies, and he grasps the corpse in his right hand while with his left hand he awkwardly pulls the sword out of his back. Then he drives the sword into the corpse, entering through the groin. The sword comes out wet. He drops the corpse. Another one for the pyre.\n\nLyle is stripped of his metal and thrown with the rest of his men. After the man gathers enough wood, he lights a massive fire, and they are thrown onto it one by one.\n\nGregor watches the corpses burn. He doesn’t smell the cooking meat, or hear the sizzle and pop. He sees only the fire. The all-consuming fire.\n" ]	1
*fancy restaurant Damn autocorrect	[wp] At a fact restaurant there are two events listed as "big Vinny's Birthday". One is an actual party, the other is a meeting of mob bosses. A sweet old lady get seated at the wrong table.	[ "I smiled sweetly and sat down at the table, they had really gone for it this week with the cover-up. They'd even brought a little boy with a birthday hat to this one. Mind you he's probably just a hostage. I subtly shuddered at the thought of children and got a few strange looks from some people there. One woman tries to make conversation with me and asks,\n\"So, how do you er- know Vinny?\" as rehearsed, of course. \n\"He comes round to my house and helps me with chores,\" once again, I do my best attempt to smile. Eventually everyone stops chatting and looks at each other. I smile truly for the first time tonight. Looks like it's time for business. One man in a suit begins speaking.\n\"Well. I think we all know why we're here.\" Here we go, \"It's Vincent's 10th birthday!\" suddenly everyone breaks into happy birthday. I sing along, I can't blow it, no matter how stupid I look nobody can know about our little plan. But inside I panic like hell, fuck, I think this is a real birthday party. I make my excuses and go to the bathroom which is surprisingly easy when you're an old woman.\n\nOnce I'm in there I pull out my glock 18 and stare at it. The rooms smells of shit and I'm about to throw up, but I brace myself, lock myself in a cubicle and slowly breathe. Once I've calmed down I grab my phone and make a call.\n\"Hey, it's Jen here-\"\n\"Jen, where the hell are you? Our meeting begins in 5 minutes and you're the only one missing!\"\n\"I'm in the toilets, I went to the wrong table and now I'm at some little rat's birthday party it's too late to get out of it so I may need some form of extraction.\"\n\"Look there's nothing we can do, you were going to be the only female here.\" Inside I scream in frustration. Everything is going wrong. I start blabbering, if I'm abandoned from this group then I know nobody will hesitate in killing me. \n\"Look, I'll skip this meeting and-\"\n\"No, I can handle this, we are the Mafia, we don't get stopped by some kid's party. There's a reason we always use this chain of restaurants. I'll evacuate everyone that works here and we take anyone else down, then I bring in emergency 'civilians' and all returns to normal.\" I smile, suddenly relaxed. Jesus Christ this man is prepared for everything.\n\"Of course, this will be consequential for you and your position in the group, but nothing too damaging.\" I finally calm myself down and walk out, everything is as expected. The live band has already left and currently there is only us, the party group and several fake diners. I walk out holding my gun and as soon as they spot me the rest of the Mafia follows my example the the woman that spoke to me screamed and pointed at us but before anyone else could react 6 silenced guns rang out and 6 people died. 10 people rushed in, hid the bodies and sat down, continuing the abandoned meal. I sat down at the correct table and calmly asked\n\"So, what have I missed?\"\n\nNote: I made this on mobile and it is basically my first writing prompt, thank you for reading and please give me feedback.", "\"Who sent you?\" He looked very upset as he brandished the weapon at me.\n\nI blinked at him and cocked my head with a toothless smile. \n\n\"Oh come now dear you know me, you've known me your whole life. Silly boy.\" I waved my hand at him dismissively and that seemed to make him even more irate.\n\n\"Old lady!\" His voice was a growl, and his face had started to turn an unattractive shade of purple.\n\n\"Oh dear, you need to calm down. Here!\" I reached into my purse and I felt a cold circle of steel press against my forehead. \n\n\"Oh my, I just wanted to give you this.\" I pulled out the handful of peppermints and set them on the table. Vincent blinked stupidly at me for a moment, he never was a bright boy, and pulled the gun away from my face.\n\n\"Who the fuck are you old lady?\" He hadn't taken a mint, which I felt was very rude, but at least he wasn't trying to shoot me anymore.\n\n\"Such language.\" I tutted and set my purse at my feet. \"You know me Vincent. I was your neighbor your whole life, you used to cut my grass and then drink lemonade on my porch. Ridiculous, your memory is worse than mine.\" My old laugh sounded like sandpaper to my own ears, and Vincent looked at me suspiciously.\n\n\"That's not me lady, you have the wrong guy.\" He had placed the gun on the table by now and was swirling a glass of wine in his meaty paw.\n\nAgain I dismissed him with a wave.\n\n\"Nonsense, I never forget a face. How have you been Vincent, you look well.\" I indicated the pristine black suit he wore, and the very expensive jewelry. \n\n\"A private dining room even, my my.\" My toothless grin had returned and he seemed flustered. The ten or so other men that had been around us murmured quietly. They were no matter, it was Vincent's birthday.\n\nOne of them, a spindly thing with a very pronounced under-bite whispered in Vincent's ear.\n\n\"Whispering is rude dear.\" The admonishment made him blush a bit, and I felt that was satisfactory, no apology needed. They exchanged looks and Vincent shrugged, muttering something like harmless and senile. \n\n\"I have been fantastic ma'am, life and business were never better.\" A large smile appeared on hiss large face and he nonchalantly reached for a mint on the table. \n\n\"Oh here!\" I grabbed another few from my bag, just to make sure everyone had one, and clapped happily as they all partook. Surely as not to hurt my feelings, but we old ladies do love to share candy. \n\nThe waiter brushed in to take our orders, all of the young men were very polite, they must eat here often. \n\n\"Mr. Moretti, would you like your usual?\" Vincent nodded his large head and the server made his way out as quickly as he had come. \n\nI placed my hand on Vincent's arm. and he looked at me with a happy smile. \n\n\"Did that man say your last name was Moretti dear?\" His smile faded a bit, suspicion returning.\n\n\"Yes he did, is there a problem?\" He began loosening his tie, beads of sweat were forming on his forehead. \n\n\"No of course not dear! It just seems I'm in the wrong place.\" I smiled at him as he began to struggle for breath. The other men around me were gagging and grabbing their throats. \n\n\"W-what the fuck did you do you old bitch?!\" Vincent managed to wheeze out past the foam that was bubbling out of his mouth.\n\n\"I guess your mother never told you not to take candy from strangers. Such a silly mistake dear.\" I produced a handkerchief from my bag and set it on the table beside the empty mint wrappers. \n\n\"Here sweetheart, you have something on your face.\" My old lady chuckle was ugly and dark as his massive fat head slammed against the table, and he coughed out a final \"Fuck you.\"\n\nI stood and straightened my dress, all of the commotion has caused it to wrinkle up in my lap. The other men scattered the floor, some still trying to breathe, most were still. My hand reached into my purse a final time and pulled out a prettily wrapped birthday gift, it was a watch for Vincent.\n\nQuietly I opened and closed the door to the private dining room, the dimness of the lights inside hid my handiwork well. I made my way to the restroom and pulled a new sweater and dress from my bag, stuffing the old ones into one of the large zippered compartments. I even changed my lipstick color and took my wispy silver hair out of the bun it had been confined to. No one would ever be the wiser, no one noticed old ladies.\n\nOn my tottering feet I made my way to the central area of the dining room, following the brightly colored birthday balloons. Soon I had found my way to the table for my neighbor, Vincent Bianchi's, birthday. \n\nHe kissed my wrinkled cheeks and happily accepted his watch. I had just sat down to enjoy a lovely slice of birthday cake when the screaming started.\n\n\n---\n\nThanks for reading!", "\"Ah, you are such a cute little rascal! You must be Bobby's lil' boy, aren't you?\"\n\nThe kid blushed. He did not know the old lady, but she was very caring and nice. In fact, he currently was munching on a piece of candy she gave him. He felt lighter. \"Haha, I never heard anyone call Dad Bobby. You are funny.\"\n\nShe noticed a lady sitting at the table next to her, and she leaned towards her.\n\n\"I am sorry, miss. I think I did not see you before. Pardon my question, but what is your name?\"\n\n\"Ah, of course. The name's Amelia Thonbridge, I work in the data recovery.\"\n\n\"Thonbridge? Oh, you are new here, I guess. I am Margaret. Good to see the others not being so stuck in the olden times. Back in my day, we wouldn't even be allowed to chat right now, right?\"\n\n\"Ah, yes. We moved here a few weeks ago. I had too much talk on the sidelines and had to get away from that. I have started working again a few days ago, and I have been working hard now to give Vinny the life he should have.\", Amelia replied.\n\n\"Oh, not only an upstart, but a little rebel, are you? Well, I have not heard a thing, my lips are sealed if anyone asks. Well, now that I got you here anyways, I got a question. You have any idea what the meeting this private meeting today morning was for?\"\n\n\"Margaret, was it? Well, some of us had gathered to prepare a surprise for Vinny.\"\n\nMargaret was dumbfounded: \"A surprise? For Vinny?\"\n\n\"Please, keep it down. I don't want the others to hear you, especially the children. We have prepared a present for him. You know how he is always crazy about seeing different fishes? Well, we have gotten him a ticket for him and his family, to get so visit the local Fish and Whale Resort, with a hotel.\"\n\n\"Oh... Oh my. I am terrible at keeping secrets. Perhaps you should not have told me, oh dear. I... I think I need to get some air right now.\"\n\n\"Sure thing, Margaret. See you around, I guess.\"\n\nMargaret left the restaurant, and ran right into Bobby.\n\n\"Dear god, Bobby. You need to get your wife and kids out of here, now! They plan to kill the Don!\"", "The dim lights were soft against the violin. They stared at her but she seemed oblivious, like any old lady.\n\n\n\"What's your name ma'am?\" the young boy asked.\n\n\n\"Oh my, don't you remember me? I'm Mrs. Cassano. You used to come by my house everyday Vinny. You used to ride your bike and you had that squirt gun...\"\n\n\n\"Mrs. Cassano, I don't think this is your table. My name is Vincent but I'm not...\"\n\n\n\"Bah! You young people. In my days there were manners. This isn't my table. Oh Lord what did I do to deserve this? My own family doesn't want me to sit and eat. Oh Lord...\"\n\n\nShe was sobbing. The violins were muted and there was the stir of eavesdropping. \n\n\n\"Oh Lord!\"\n\n\nHe patted her. What could they do? \n\n\n\"Mrs. Castano, please, please forgive me. Of course this is your table. Of course you can sit here. Where were my manners?\"\n\n\n\"Up your ass probably,\" she said and she sat.\n\n\nHe was a young boy, probably not even twenty five. To be honest, he hardly looked like the Vinny she knew. These people were Italian, but they were different.\n\n\n\"Mrs. Castano, are you okay?\"\n\n\nIt was an older woman. Probably Vinny's mother. \n\n\nI thought I'd be the only woman here, she thought. \n\n\nA twitch of pride glimmered within.\n\n\nIt doesn't matter. It's good for the women to finally come out more. Lord knows we're smarter.\n\n\n\"Why wouldn't I be okay, my dear?\" she asked.\n\n\n\"Well it's just... Mrs Castano, you just cursed in front of my family. Bobby here is only seven. And to be honest, we don't even...\"\n\n\nOkay maybe the women have a ways to go, she thought. \n\n\nShe was impatient. Her nerves were old and sparked and the jitters weren't good for an old heart.\n\n\n\"Well maybe if my own family had gotten my name right, I wouldn't have to use such vulgar talk,\" she said. \"And you, Felicia is it? Vinny's mom? You should know better than to bring children here. That's your own damn fault.\"\n\n\n\"Mrs. Castano!\"\n\n\n\"Cassano!\" \n\n\nThe old woman got up and her purse was heavy.\n\n\n\"That's quite enough,\" Vincent said.\n\n\nThe old woman pulled out the gun.\n\n\n\"I agree,\" she said.\n\n\nShe shot him twice and then she shot Felicia.\n\n\n\"Mommy!\" the young boy cried.\n\n\n\"Barbara!\" a bald headed man said.\n\n\nGood, she thought. That was for Johnny.\n\n\nJohnny was her husband. He was a made man in the forties and like most men, pussy had brought him down.\n\n\nSlut, she thought.\n\n\nJohnny had been gunned down after being accused by Vincent Sr. of screwing his daughter in law.\n\n\nSlut, she thought looking at Felicia. Serves you right.\n\n\nAnd then to Vincent: Always with that squirt gun like you were some man. You cried like a little girl when you fell off that bike.\n\n\nThere were screams and the music had stopped. A table nearby overturned. \n\n\n\"Boss! Get down!\" someone screamed. A group of men had guns drawn and she turned around and saw the smoke from the cigars and the glasses of wine and the expensive suits.\n\n\nOh, she thought.\n\n\nShe looked at the dead bodies and saw that they wore casual clothes. Vincent was wearing a black shirt with 'Birthday Boy' written on it.\n\n\nOh.\n\n\nshe turned and saw the face of terror. The look of disbelief. The boy ducked behind the table but that face was inescapable.\n\n\nSquirt squirt Mrs. Cassano. Then the ding of the bicycle.\n\n\n\"Mrs. Cassano!\" the boy shouted.\n\n\nThe gun fell from her hands.\n\n\nOh fuck, she thought." ]	4
	[WP] A new continent the size of Midwestern America appears out of nowhere in the center of the Atlantic (somehow). It is hospitable to life despite being born mere days ago.	[ "Sulfer hung heavy in the air as private withers emptied the contents of his stomach onto his boots... And the boots of his fellow soldiers. A collective groan erupted like the mysterious island they were approaching.\n\nThis is bull skid\" moaned withers. \" these landers were only used for Normandy. They were built by brits, we never even manufactured them.\"\n\nHe was right, but still his fellow soldiers elbowed him into a submissive silence. It seems a correct point being made did not excuse stomach bile seeping into regulation military boots.\n\nAs they neared the island a myriad of activity was revealed. They landed and disembarked. The soil was black, warm and still smelled of the sulfur that birthed it. Anyone complaining of the odor was directed to an accompanying geologist who was quick (too quick?) To assure any worried soldiers that everything was fine. There was sea weed on the beaches so it couldn't be lethal, right?\n\nWithers coughed and bent down to his survival pack. The smell was starting to give him a headache and he wanted to look for aspirin. When he came up empty he went to ask the commander where the medical tent was.\n\n\"It's over that ridge, pussy. You can have your precious 'wedicine' after your shift.\" He barked in retort, mocking withers.\n\nWithers must have looked confused. Shift?\n\nTheir commander nodded knowingly and pointed to a pile of cinder blocks.\n\n\"Private withers, you are to immediately relocate these assets to the top of THAT mountain to aid in the construction of our new power plant. This rocks hot as hell, this whole place is going to use geothermal energy. The hippys are going to love it.\"\n\nWithers sighed but began his task.\n\nThe commander returned to blueprints for the island, wondering where would be best to position anti missile technology.\n\n\"Oh and withers. Welcome to East Carolina\"\n\n,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,\n\nSome grammar errors but it's almost 4am so let's slap this pig up there and see if anyone likes it. Written On Mobile.", "We stood there, mouths agape, as the land rose from the depths of the sea. We didn't understand what was happening - or how - and nor did the experts that stood with us. And, so, we watched it happen together in silence. On the decks of the USS F. F.A, we watched the landform surge to the sky as if Satan's own fist had broken through.\n\nSoon, the public arrived. Helicopters buzzed overhead, and above them, light airplanes circled the skies. Every man and their dog came to see the new continent, dubbed simply 'Continent A' by the imaginativeness press. But before too long, so did the rest of the US military. Over a dozen warships, an aircraft carrier, and helicopters in their hundreds took to securing the area, and the public was soon whisked away.\n\nI didn't sleep that night - I simply couldn't. So I was awake when the ground rumbled, the sea stopped churning, and the new continent began to slow in its ascent until it moved no more.\n\n-\n\nA call came over the radio early the next morning. The order had been given to explore the mysterious continent, and the lucky participants had been the sailors of my vessel. Boats were prepared, battle dress pulled out of closets, weapons locked and loaded, and prayers said. We were going to be prepared; no matter what might lay upon that continent.\n\nAnd, at 0600, the group arrived. 20 sailors, aboard 3 boats, were the first humans to step on Continent A. No one saw, though - the early morning mist had covered our arrival, as well much of the island, hindering both our view and the view of the helicopters scouting ahead. Quite literally, we were going in dark.\n\nWe had no idea what to expect when we arrived at the top of the cliff, but no one saw what we did coming. Instead of dirt, or maybe some sand, we discovered a beautiful, habitable, oasis. The ground was grass, and as the fog started to lift, we saw trees in the distance. A freshwater pool. Even what looked like to be plant life. It made no sense to anyone.\n\nThe exploration lasted all day. Guns were drawn at all times, and we stayed in our squads, moving together like a well-oiled machine. There were to be no surprises. But we saw no dangers or signs of life, so we instead documented what we saw and as night came, we sent them through to the team onboard the temporary ship for the geomorphologists. They were to come in the morning, and to ensure their security, we were staying the night.\n\nFires were lit, and songs were sung. We were in a cheery mode, and through that, we put our guard down. And as a result, not one eyebrow was raised when a mist rolled in late that evening and we begun to fall asleep.\n\n*****\n\nA reply by /u/TheDrunkTypist.\nConstructive criticism is encouraged and appreciated.\n\n/u/CosmicIce05, went away from the original prompt a little bit. Hope it's still okay." ]	2
Famous people and politicians are offering desperate parents a standard deal, they sacrifice themselves to save both the politician and their son/daughter which will also receive half of the first guy's ownings.	[WP] A superior being announces that half of earth's population will be sacrificed after 30 days have passed. Each person is randomly bound to another both have to agree which one of them will survive, if they don't agree, both die. People can change their current bounds to make deals.	[ "The Mediator stepped into the room with a sigh. His job, which hadn't existed 25 days ago, was exhausting beyond belief - but at least the pay was incredible. A Mediator's job was to analyze Bonded pairs who couldn't come up with the decision themselves and refused to go to a clinic to have the decision made for them. This next pair had gone through five Mediators, all of whom had declined to pass a final Judgement, and were now assigned to him.\n\n\"So,\" he started, eyeing the Bonded pair in front of him. \"My name is David. Who wants to go first?\"\n\nThe one on his left was a short, bespectacled brunette in her early twenties. The one on his right seemed the same age but looked nothing alike: a towering redhead with muscles the Mediator found himself slightly jealous of.\n\nThe redhead on the left spoke first. \"Hi. I'm Jeanette, she's Rachel. We've been arguing about this for days, and I thought we'd reached an agreement, but she's changing her mind now.\"\n\n\"Of course,\" David said calmly. \"This is quite normal. Have you considered visiting an official clinic for-\"\n\n\"Yes, yes,\" Jeanette interrupted bluntly. \"We're not interested in that. I don't want some know-it-all telling me which of us is 'more valuable' or whatever and she doesn't want that either, so it's not happening.\"\n\nRachel nodded in agreement.\n\n\"Alright,\" David sighed. \"Well let's start with the basics. Did you two know each other before the, uh...\"\n\n\"Before the Proclamation happened?\" asked Jeanette briskly. \"Yes, we were roommates. When it happened she agreed that since I was a, uh, \"Olympics-bound\", as she put it, that umm...\" \n\nHer quick speaking suddenly trailed off as she buried her head in her hands.\n\n\"I said it should be her because she's got more potential, it's the only thing that makes sense,\" continued Rachel, her voice steady and matter-of-fact.\n\n\"I see,\" David said. \"And then you changed your mind. This is very understandable, Rachel, and I don't want you to feel-\"\n\n\"I didn't change my mind,\" Rachel interrupted calmly, taking Jeanette's hand into her own and wiping tears away from her eyes. \"She did.\"\n\nDavid sat motionless, shocked. With growing understanding, he realized that he, too, would have to decline making a Judgement.", "I sent a private message to my bind. They happened to be a redditor too, so along with their personal information I received their username. I decided messaging them would be easiest. \n\n\"Hey man, so don't worry about this alien thing. I volunteer to die. Deal? Deal.\" \n\nThen refreshed reddit.com every 5 seconds until I got a response.\n\n\"lol hell no. i've been waiting for the sweet release of death for ages. now finally I get a pain free and instant exit? you're not taking that from me.\" \n\n\"Oh. Well let's agree to disagree then :)\"\n\nWhat a feeling of relief, having that out of the way.\n\n\n\n----Alternate ending----\n\n\nThen refreshed reddit.com every 5 seconds until I got a response.\n\n\"me too thanks\"\n\nThis technically counted as a disagreement, and so 30 days later we were both relinquished from this great imposition called life. " ]	2
I'll start.	[WP] Given enough time, comic characters seem to become god-like with their powers. (Think Gambit: blows small things up VS Gambit: Destroyer of universes) Create an original D-List hero, and describe what they can do in Issue #1, and what they can do by #250	[ "Jasmine St. John, aka \"Night Light\"\n\nIssue #1: Night Light can emit a soft, calming glow.\n\nIssue #250: Night Light can amplify people's fear of the dark to intense levels, while psychologically soothing her allies around her. She can teleport to and from nearly anywhere, as long as the starting and ending locations are both dark. When threatened, she can amplify her soft light into a blinding burst.", "Issue 1:\n\nThe cyclops continued through the village, standing at a whopping 10 feet tall, damaging the road with every step. The towns people ran way terrified. The Sherrif fired off a few bullets from his gun but this only enraged the creature and he too made his escape. Only one man could do this job. Archblade. He withdrew his sword, which had been blessed by the great magician Merlin with his dying breath and with a single swiped sliced off one of the creature's arms. The cyclops went mad and slapped Archblade in the face, sending him flying through the window of a nearby house. However Archblade went round the back of the house and sneaked up behind the Cyclops, slicing it's head off cleanly. The flailing Cyclops gave Archblade several bruises but quickly died. Archblade had saved the day again.\n\nIssue 250:\n\nArchblade swung his sword, imbued with the magic of the 13 elder Gods, releasing a huge wave of energy that swept through the universe, obliterating an entire fleet of the intergalactic army. \n\n\"My fleet is clearly useless against you, I will just take care of you myself.\" Ares, the God of War said laughing as he appeared in front of Archblade.\n\n\"I am blessed by the elder Gods, compared to them you are nothing.\" Archblade said, swinging his blade with enough force to cut the universe in half, splitting it into two dimensions and separating himself from Ares that way. However a rift soon opened in the fabric of space time which Ares emerged from.\n\n\"Whilst I admit my power before was weak, I absorbed Chaos himself and now my power is unrivaled..\" Ares roared, his voice loud enough to shatter the universe into fragments smaller than sub atomic particles. Archblade had managed to quickly escaping by cutting open a rift to another dimension but Ares followed him into that one, releasing a huge wave of fire that rapidly spread across it. Archblade went into another universe before he burnt to death.\n\n\"All you can do is run. You afraid?\" Ares taunted.\n\n\"Give up now or I'll have to use my full power.\" Archblade replied solemnly.\n\n\"Go on then.\" Ares chuckled vainly. Archblade concentrate energy from across the multiverse in his blade before dicing Ares into quadrillions of pieces before he could even react and then sealing each one into a separate dimension, severing the connections between those dimensions permanently. Archblade had saved the day again.", "Barry Buzzton a.k.a \"Buzzkill\"\n\nIssue #1: Buzzkill constantly emits a minute amount of static electricity and can slowly charge his phone if he focuses.\n\nIssue #250: Buzzkill can now not only shoot bolts of lightning and call in thunderstorms, but also gather energy from the surrounding environment. This is a technique he learned from the Venusians who also taught him how to travel through wires and in and out of electronics. Once he gathers enough energy he can release a blast of pure discharge equivalent in power to the tsar bomba.\n\nBonus:\n\nIssue #500: Buzzkill has been accepted as the new God of Electricity after becoming one with the static force and destroying a solar system. He takes the place of Zeus on Mount Olympus." ]	3
	[WP] Warrior-Poets, champions whose magical abilities manifest based on the poetry they read in battle, prepare to go to war.	[ "The two men stood on opposite ends of the basin. The best champion each rival nation had to offer. The fate of those nations would be decided today.\n\nAs one, the soldiers stepped into the basin, approaching each other. They wore armor of leather and chain-mail, but neither carried a weapon.\n\n\"We meet again, old friend!\" the larger of the two said to another as they got within earshot. Barlen the Painter, as they called him. The many scars on his face did nothing to undermine his jovial demeanor.\n\n\"So it seems,\" his colleague replied. Pelleas: the master of the arts, by now pushing seventy. While he hadn't had as many victories in battle as the Painter had, his experience had left him undefeated. \"I suppose we will find out once and for all who is the better wordsmith.\"\n\nBarlen nodded. \"It has been an honor to have known you, friend, and may honor favor the victor.\"\n\nPelleas smiled. \"Honor favor the victor, Barlen.\"\n\nAt that, the two left the center of the basin to claim positions further back, just within shouting range.\n\n\"Let's see you put your title to work!\" Pelleas yelled to Barlen. \"I would have you call the first song.\"\n\n\"Very well!\" the Painter yelled back. \"Defend yourself if you can!\"\n\nAt that, Barlen extended his hands outwards, arms outstretched as wide as they could go. Then, he began to chant.\n\n\"Half a league, half a league,\n \nHalf a league onward,\n\nAll in the valley of Death\n \nRode the six hundred.\"\n\nThe first sign of a successful summons was the hooves. Like rolling thunder, a swarm of cavalry approached the end of the bluff. Knights in glowing armor upon unarmored horses, equipped with lances and sabres.\n\n\"Forward, the Light Brigade!\n\n\"Charge for the guns!\" he said:\n\nInto the valley of Death\n\n Rode the six hundred.\"\n\nThe Light Brigade stormed down the hillside, crashing over the grass and rocks like a wave of light flooding in and painting the landscape with liquid gold. They flew past Barlen, and he vanished into the cacophony. A summons couldn't hurt the wordsmith, so he had nothing to fear.\n\n\"Very impressive indeed, old friend,\" Palleas mumbled. \"I'm not sure even I can face the mighty Light Brigade.\" After a slow exhale, he threw his palms out ahead of him.\n\n\"And, as in uffish thought he stood, \n \n The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, \n\nCame whiffling through the tulgey wood, \n \n And burbled as it came!\"\n\nAt his summons, a gray-green wood sprouted from the ground. The trees grew taller and taller, and as it grew wider, a black, hulking beast with scales and evil wings emerged from the forest, growling with an intense severity. It's eyes blazed with an indiscriminate hatred, and it locked its gaze on the incoming cavalry." ]	1
	[WP] You are a company who is interviewing applicants in order to find a hero to defeat the big bad.	[ "From the way the man shuffled papers, I could tell that he had been a gambler back in the day. A card-shark of some sort. \n\nHe quirked a snow-white brow up at me, and I nearly pissed myself. Eyes like an epileptic; mustache like a Caucasian ferret playing dead.\n\n\"Says here,\" he says here. \"That you don't have a superpower.\"\n\n\"Correct.\" I say, adding a nod to it. \n\n\"And how're yuh expecting to defeat the big ole bad?\"\n\n\"I shoot 'im,\" is my reply. \"Right in the back. I ain't got no power, so he ain't gonna see me in coming.\"\n\nThe man stands up and shakes my hand. \"Son, that's so nuts, it just might work.\"" ]	1
	[WP] You've just had a long day at work and accidentally fall asleep on the train. You wake up and the scene before you was not what you expected...	[ "I blinked heavily and smeared a scum of sweat off my face with a heavy, grubby hand. Sixteen hours of concrete dust, exhaust, and the insidious, invasive grime that hangs in the air of every adolescent city. I felt my fingernails claw runnels through the filth on my face. I looked up, chin pulling tackily against a weld of dry saliva on my coveralls. \n\nDarkness.\n\nRed line ended at Terrapin Heights. The Terrapin platform was gridded by a network of bright actinic lights I'd always anticipated with discomfort. There was no light here at all. No sound either, save for a ceaseless noise, reminiscent of the endless waves heard within a seashell. But it was deeper - full of variations in pitch and tone that spoke of a voluminous space, possibly with people in it.", "Rigid seats. Kept me in an upright position the whole night. I don`t think I fell asleep, aside from a momentary daze. But as the night passed, and the sun rose. I began to notice that something was not quite right.\n\nThe train was filled with odd looking characters, a man in front of my sported tight red spandex, with a futuristic visor over his eyes. On my left stood a man in a trench coat, wearing a top hat, and one eyed spectacles. Among them were other other-worldly looking characters, that could be attributed to various genres and time lines. Talk about in-congruent.\n\nThe plantation, looked strange. We were running through a valley. There were trees alright, large oak looking tree, emerald green. But something about the branches which looked like stretched puddy, was unlike anything i`ve ever seen.\nAfter a while, pass though the valley. To my left, a large sunset. Unlike anything I`ve ever seen, and further to the horizon a great blue ocean.\n\nAs I stared in awe, a normal looking old man put his hand on my shoulder. \n\n``Escapism is a means of seeing the inner beauty of reality, that we can only penetrate through dreams. ``\n\nHe kept shrugging me, and I was startled. And in a blink of an eye, I realized I had missed my stop. I exchanged a quick smile, as I went to get off at the next stop. \n", "Blackness. You rub your tired eyes and attempt to look around, but again, blackness. You stand alone at the train's controls but outside you are in the blackness of space. The train's engine hums along but you appear to be going no where.\n\nWhen ahead, a star approaches. Your trajectory toward the star is apparent by the alarming rate at which it is increasing in size. You panic. Brake! How do you brake in space?! Reverse thrust! You scan the controls for anything that remotely resembles reverse thrust.\n\nAhead, the star grows larger. \n\n\"Think! How can I stop this thing?!\"\n\nYou look up. It's too late. You are about to meet your fate. Nothing can stop this steed from delivering you to your firey demise. A calm washes over you. \"This is it.\" \n\nThe rays of your death star embrace you. The brightness fills the cockpit. You close your eyes and calmly open your arms, welcoming the end. \n\nNothing happens. \n\nYou open your eyes. You're back on God's green...\n\n\"Ahshit, I fell asleep in the tunnel!\" " ]	3
	[WP]You made two separate pacts with two different demons to get what you want. One want's your firstborn's soul in exchange. And the other one? Takes your ability to ever have a child of your own.	[ "Midnight coffee was a habit I'd been meaning to kick for years, but it was the only way I could force my mind into the correct combination of exhaustion and numbness to reach a deep sleep. As I pulled the mugs from the overhead cupboard the lights flickered, I closed my eyes and sighed inwardly, and pulled a second mug from the cabinets wooden recesses.\n\n\"Do I have to get a restraining order on you Ardaeus? I'm starting to think you're abusing my hospitality.\" I said as I drained the machine into the waiting mugs.\n\n\"hmmm\" came the only reply.\n\nI turned to see the demon entrenched into reading tomorrow's paper. Nothing about the abyssal entity would suggest he wasn't human, you had to look deep for the little things. A watch whose hands didn't move quite right, and eye-glasses that reflected a world different to what it was.\n\n\"And to what do I owe the pleasure of your company?\" I probed, already knowing the answer.\n\n\"It's about the contract.\" He said, setting down the paper.\n\nI sighed audibly. \"Really, how surprising.\" I stirred the mug in front of me and added a lump of sugar. \n\n\"My boss has sent six counter offers which she believes you'll find very enticing. If you'd just take a mo-\"\n\n\"My lawyer should be here for this.\" I interrupted, leaning back on my chair to reach the antique telephone that resided on my kitchen bench.\n\nThe demon gritted his teeth. \"Of course.\"\n\nI rotated the ancient dialling mechanism to 666, before resetting the coffee machine to make another cup.\n\nA hollow knock sounded from the hallway, and mr.Lenn made the three short steps from my broom closet to the dining table and took a seat opposite Ardaeus.\n\n\"Having hawker problems are we miss sierra?\" The new arrival asked as he removed dinner jacket to let it hover in the air beside him. \"These door to door salesman can be so troublesome.\" He tipped his hat before removing it and letting the ivory fedora hover to its place above the jacket.\n\nArdaeus rolled his eyes. \"You're one to talk, you steal more clients than anyone.\"\n\nThe newcomer smiled his response.\n\n\"Actually Lenn, Ardaeus is here to offer another contract.\"\n\nLenn held out his hand and Ardaeus grudgingly materialised a briefcase into the open space between them.\n\n\"People like you ruin the system you know.\" Ardaeus grumbled as Lenn summoned a set of multicoloured quills from hit hovering jacket and set them to work.\"you're a parasite that makes a living by undercutting his own kind.\"\n\n\"Sounds like you needed more competitively geared products to me.\" He accepted the coffee and took a sip. \"Honestly, how many Millenia have you been around for? Yet still not a single qualification amongst you. No wonder you fail as a business.\"\n\n\"Anything worth looking at Lenn?\" I ask from my seat, the future-telling newspaper now in my hand.\n\n\"Hmm maybe, they've set a couple of these to flat-rate variable repayments. It's almost like they're trying not to be ripped off.\" The floating jacket tipped its floating fedora in a nod of acknowledgment. \"And this one-off time minipulatiom spell would unfortunately take you back to before I was born.\"\n\n\"Hmmm, sneaky. Maybe they're learning.\"\nI joked as he flipped onto the next contract.\n\n\"Apparently not, I have something.\" He said as he flipped through the second to last page of the dossier. \"Percentage based payment off net profits while using the boons given.\"\n\n\"Wouldn't that mean I'd be giving them something though?\"\n\n\"Indeed half of every profit you make. That would include the longevity and magical power you would inadvertently accumulate by possessing these gifts.\"\n\n\"So it's a trap?\"\n\n\"Yes, but one we'll accept. If you offer to pay me in magical power and your excess profits which I can donate back to you at a later date, for a far smaller fee. Your profits would be zero, and you'd owe them nothing\"\n\n\"I see.\" I turned to the other demon. \"I would like to accept the fourth contract.\"\n\n\"The deals off.\" The demon huffed, and with a flourish summoned the papers back into his hands. \"You betray your own kind\" he growled before flickering the lights and disappearing from the room.\n\n\"Sooo...You deal with guys like that all the time.\"\n\n\"Darling\" he smiled \"I make an existence off guys like that. I wish there were more of them.\"\n\n\n", "Alex sips his drink as he witnesses the two female demons attempting to pull each others hair out.\n\nIt might have been a bad idea to try and trick them, but still the cat fight is worth it. While the two female demons have already started tear each other's clothes off, giving him a hell of a view, he don't fancy cleaning ichor off the floor.\n\nAlex steps in and grab both female demons by the ear, ignoring their yells of pain. \n\n\"Behave.\"\nHE intone as both female demons click their tongues.\n\n\"Human! You dare try and trick us?\"\nThe scarlet one, who gave the ability for him to win any sort of confrontation, hisses.\n\n\"You will pay for your insolence!\"\nThe purple one, who gave him the ability cast all sorts magic perfectly, warns as she attempts to cover herself up. \n\nAlex shrugs and bind them with magic, enjoying their hisses of anger, as he loom over them.\n\nHe reaches out with his fingers which start to glow with a blue light.\n\"You still seem to both be so agitated. I think you both should chill out.\"\n\nBoth demons look at each other then and snort.\n\"You have gall human,\" the scarlet one drawls\n\"To create two contracts with punishment that negates the other.\"\n\nAlex rubs the back of his head and snaps his fingers.\n\"I could just use my magic to negate both contracts!\"\n\nThe purple one raises an eyebrow\n\"As soon as you do that, we'd be free and we will devour your soul.\"\n\nAlex pales and waves his hands in front of him.\n\"Maybe I can give my soul to one of you instead?\"\n\nThe scarlet one sighs\n\"That's the reason m the purple one and I were fighting in the first place remember?\"\n\nAlex then nods\n\"I know, but what if,\" Alex blushes and takes a deep breath, \"I have...a child with you and my Soul goes to the Purple one?\"\n\nBoth female demons blink before they laugh.\n\"Human, you are both amusing and idiotic\" The purple one laughs, \"The only reason I will allow this is because the scarlet one and I are old allies. Very well I will change the terms from being you being unable to sire to you being my eternal servant.\" \nThe purple one pauses and turns to the Scarlet one and grins\n\"I also want to be the Godmother.\" \n\nThe scarlet one grins and shifts out of the bindings before grabbing Alex by the neck and dragging him to a bedroom.\n\n\"Very well then Purple one. Let's get started human, I expect you to pay child support as well.\"", "Demons are idiots. I met one that wanted to make me a deal. He said for the soul of my first born child, I could have anything I wanted. I never wanted kids anyway, so I figured, why not? I met another one years later, saying that I could have anything I wanted as long as gave up the ability to have children. I never wanted kids anyway, so I figured, why not?\n\nDemons are idiots. Those are the best two sandwiches I've ever had.", "It definitely wasn't easy organizing the meeting, I can assure you. Do you know how hard it is to maintain two different demonic rituals while trying to communicate with Satan and Cthulhu at the same time? Imagine trying to talk with your grandparents on Skype, it's about the same. \n\nAnyway, here's the scoop. I wanted to be able to feed off the blood of my enemies and gain their life essence, right? So I call Satan and ask what he can do for me. He says that he can make a deal if I give him my first born child in exchange. I say done-zo and we got a deal. I don't have any kids yet, but when I do Satan's gonna be there for the birth.\n\nFew months go by and I start getting more ideas. I send a message to Cthulhu and ask him what can I do to raise the dead and use them as personal slaves. Cthulhu replies saying it's not all up to snuff the way I think it is. Yeah, it's cool to have a personal staff waiting on you, but there's the smell and the fact you can only get them to do brainless tasks like killing people or sweeping the kitchen, such-and-such. Regardless, I call him up asking what's it gonna take? He says I'll curse you to stay a virgin forever. And I scoff and say deal, done-zo, yeah? Boom, I get to control the dead.\n\nA day later, I'm trying to explain to my small horde of zombies how to keep up the underground mansion when Satan gives me a call sounding pissed. I say. \"Whoa man, the heaven is your problem?\" He tells me that I made a contract over his and now he ends up screwed over. I had completely forgotten about his deal, I was so busy drinking whisky infused blood I spaced out on the matter. So I gotta call up Satan and Cthulhu at the same time and I have to burn some of my zombies which could be cleaning up the broken glass they dropped earlier.\n\nSo here's the spheal, Satan, Cthulhu and I are all conversing via portals of the undead, I ask Cthulhu, \"So Cthulhu, got a quick question. Can we lift the curse just for, like, a day? You know, so I can go have a kid or something? You see I made a deal with Satan and he wants my first kids soul, right? Kinda hard to do if I'm cursed to be sterile, you know?\"\n\nCthulhu puts on his glasses to look at some ancient manuscript, my contract that I had to sign, \"Sorry bud, but the contract says that Gerish Spinesplitter - you - are accepting the magical ability to raise the dead to do your bidding at will IF you are cursed to sterility in life and death for eternity. There's not a whole lot of wiggle room I can give you. I told you that you should reconsider the deal, but did you listen? Nope. You did not listen.\"\n\nSatan glances over at Cthulhu's portal, looking pissed, he always looks pissed that's just the way his face is, \"Now wait just a minute. I still get screwed over in this deal, what do you take me for, Cthulhu? Some holy piss pot? I hope not, because there is going to be a problem if I don't get my side of the deal fulfilled with some kid's soul.\"\n\nCthulhu is a smug businessman, he always puts himself above Satan because all the times Cthulhu's wanted to take over the world, he would do it himself and not send a horde of demons to do it. He looks over his glasses at Satan, \"I'm sorry, that's something you'll have to take up with your contractee here. The deal he's made with me can't just be reversed. You ever tried home brewing a curse of sterility? It's not fun, man. Besides, I have nothing to do with this issue. Its him that has over contracted himself.\"\n\nThings were starting to go down to that place really quickly, unless I did something about it, \"Hold on, hold on, let's settle this like the adults, alright? Satan needs a kid, my kid in particular. You said firstborn right? Does it need to be in the 'traditional' way? What if I were to 'give birth' to a child of my own? Or I wip up a spell on some local wench, mind control, place of spell of impregnation and boom! That's gotta be worth something, right?\"\n\nSatan looks over at Cthulhu who's flipping through some tome or another, checking the rules of the contract, \"Well? Does sterility effect his magic or what? I've got a heck of a lot of things down under to get to, if you catch my drift.\"\n\nCthulhu took off his glasses and slammed the tome shut with his mighty tendrils, \"I see no reason why that shouldn't work. It's technically not breaking any laws as far as my knowledge extends, which is far. He is cursed to physical sterility, not metaphysically. I can't tell you if his plan is going to work, but right now I see it as his only option.\"\n\n\"Great!\" I cry, \"Oh. And thanks for showing up to my place, it's a bit easier than trying to get everyone to meet up in Hell or the bottom of the ocean, you know?\"\n\nSatan rolled his eyes into and around the back of his head, \"Yeah, yeah, sure. Just don't screw up again like this or there'll be a heck of a lot worse punishment than this little meet up.\"\n\n\"Done-zo, gotcha Satan.\" Cthulhu just shook his head, \"We all settled, Cthulhu?\"\n\n\"I suppose so. I won't be as forgiving next time.\"\n\n\"Oh, of course, I wouldn't expect you to.\" With that, the two portals shut and and I was alone in my mansion, not counting the charred corpses where the portals had been. One of my undead minions approached me with broken glass in his mouth. \"No! I said sweep the broken glass, not EAT. I gotta do everything for you brainless creatures. If it's not scraping meat off each other's bones, it's having to deal with keeping you from rotting...\"" ]	4
	[WP] Everyone meets their soulmate by the time they're 21, but there is no guarantee you'll know they're the one.	[ "They said “You’ll know her when you see her”\n\nWhen I asked them about love, but\n\nThat wasn’t enough for me. \n\nI needed more substance than a gut feeling. \n\n&nbsp;\n\nI most especially needed someone who would fill that hole.\n\nAnd I needed it soon. \n\nBecause where I come from if you haven’t found her, \n\nThe one, I mean,\n\nBy the time you turn 21, \n\nYou won’t find her. \n\n&nbsp;\n\nSo i searched high and low,\n\nTurned over tables in coffee shops,\n\nSpoke to servers in diners, \n\nBut I hadn’t found her\n\n&nbsp;\n\nEver-vigilant my search continued, \n\nMalls, no.\n\nFairs, Parks, and trails were a bust.\n\nI couldn’t find her.\n\n&nbsp;\n\nI stood, or sat, or walked in every place I could search from\n\nAnd still she evaded me,\nStill there was no One. \n\n&nbsp;\n\nUntil one day there was. \n\n&nbsp;\n\nI looked up from my phone at the counter, ready to order my coff-\n\nThere she was, \n\nMessy hair,\n\nBeautiful skin, \n\nGalaxies in her eyes,\n\n&nbsp;\n\nI was agape. \n\n&nbsp;\n\nShe was a goddess.\n\n&nbsp;\n\nAnd she smiled,\n\nAnd my gloom went, \n\nMy despair left, \n\nMy confusion was satisfied there in that moment. \n\nThis is her.\n\n&nbsp;\n\nBut what if it isn’t?\n\n&nbsp;\n\nAnd I was perplexed. \n\nI had that awakening, didn’t I?\n\nI knew her as I saw her because it was her didn’t I?\n\n&nbsp;\n\n“You’ll know her when you see her.”\n\n&nbsp;\n\nI am seeing her.\n\n&nbsp;\n\nI am seeing her. \n\n&nbsp;\n\nI am seei-\n\n&nbsp;\n\n“Sir?”\n\n“Uh shit, sorry.”\n\n“It’s quite alright!”\n\n“Can I \n\nUh, have a, \n\nuh, coffee?”\n\n“Sure thing!”\n\n“Thanks..”\n\n&nbsp;\n\nAnd she was gone\n\nThen she was back\n\nWith my coffee.\n\nAnd I paid her.\n\nAnd I left.\n\n&nbsp;\n\nHaving looked, \n\nI was sure that I had found something,\n\nBut, \n\nHaving lived, \n\nI had never been more unsure that I was deserving of it" ]	1
	[WP] You are given a $1 million recording and touring contract, but there's a catch: Your group's entire catalog must consist of all the embarrassing songs you've sang to and/or about your pets.	[ "I sing to my cat, it's just a thing I do. They're the perfect little listeners. They don't try to butt in and criticize or give you unwanted advice, and they never interrupt you. Talking felt a little too much like talking to myself, so I sing. \n\nWell, now my cat's eating out of golden dishes because of a meme. Sounds kind of funny, right? Well, it started with people uploading themselves singing to their cats. I loved it when it first came out, it was pretty funny! And then it got a little out of hand, with thousands of songs appearing. Eventually they solidified into a really strange genre. One of my videos happened to grow pretty popular, and for that reason, I was offered a recording deal for $1,000,000 dollars. But this firm asked something I wasn't expecting.\n\nThey were looking for 'authentic' cat songs. They told me that my entire catalog must consist of real songs I've sung to my cat before the contract. If it's decided that I'm lying about that, the deal is canceled. I was horrified, because my daily singing sessions with my kitty had turned rather dark following some rather personal events. \n\nSo now I'm selling records with titles like, \"Mommy Sheds More Than You\", \"Meow Meow Fuck Jason\", and the classic \"50/50 Custody Cat Shit Blues.\" People think I'm \"real\" or say that I'm \"true to life.\" But only my cat truly knows. " ]	1
http://wiki.asexuality.org/Aromantic	[WP] A love story about an Aromantic person	[ "I brushed her silky, almond-colored hair behind her ear as I whispered the three words she'd been waiting for.\n\n\n\"I love you.\"\n\n\nHer emerald-green eyes reflected the candlelight as they swelled with tears. A lonely droplet traveled down her cheek, leaving a moist trail on her pale skin. It reached her pink lips and my thumb softly brushed it away. It dissolved between my fingertips. She smiled, revealing perfect white teeth and I couldn't resist.\n\n\nI leaned in close.\n\n\nHer nose brushed against mine before our lips met. It was a few short seconds of pure bliss. They were soft and delicate and fit perfectly in mine. Our tongues explored the inner workings of our mouths with curious intent. I didn't want anyone else but her, and I wouldn't let her leave. I lightly bit on her bottom lip as she pulled away, bringing her back in for more. She carved at a hunger deep within me that was insatiable. She was euphoric. A quiet giggle escaped her and she bit back.\n\n\nHer teeth rubbed my lips. It was a gentle nip, nothing more than a nibble, but it drew a drop of blood. I gasped when I felt the warm trickle of red drip off my lip, but Alyss smiled as she licked it off, staring deep into my eyes as she did so. She was beautiful. The orange glow of the candles cast a gorgeous shade that melted into her smooth skin. Her fierce eyebrows were dark and furrowed in satisfaction.\n\n\nHer tongue slid off my chin and continued down my neck, leaving a trail of lust behind. It sent shivers down my spine and I threw my head back in enjoyment. My loose hair danced on my shoulders. Alyss traced a blue vein to my chest where she began to bite me again. Tiny pricks of pain burst with each bite and it drove me insane. I threw my hands into her hair and pulled her back into my wanting lips.\n\n\nShe kissed me passionately as she ripped the shirt off my back. It was tossed carelessly to the side, forgotten along with the rest of the world. She abruptly pulled away to take off her own shirt and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, forming a red streak that stained her cheek. She smiled again as she tousled her hair and roughly pushed me against the bed, jumping onto my lap. Her breath felt hot and sticky against my face. She grabbed my blonde hair in a bunch and brought my face close to hers.\n\n\nShe stared deeply into my eyes as she snarled. A red fingernail outlined my lips and she tilted her head, examining them closely. Her finger slid into my mouth. The autumn wind howled outside. The glare of the full moon shined on the closed window. It was almost as beautiful as Alyss, but the beauty was cut short with words.\n\n\n\"I don't love you, Sarah.\"\n\n\nHer green eyes traced my body.\n\n\n\"I need you.\"", "Alfred woke up and rummaged through his underwear drawer. Today was a somewhat special day so he picked out one of his favorite boxers. He got into the shower. He set it to slightly cold, as he enjoyed the challenge it presented and how much it woke him up. After drying himself off put on his favorite boxers. He ate a three egg omelette with mushrooms, tomatoes, ginger, cheese, an assortment of spices and of course pepper and salt. The omelette was accompanied by one piece of toast. After eating he put on the rest of his suit for work.\n\nHe got to work every so slightly late. But no one seemed to notice. After programming for an hour, Alfred took a break to browse internet pages. He made sure to change back to a programming screen if anyone walked by. This proceeded until about half way through the day. Where he programmed for an hour and a half before resuming his internet browsing. Then near the end of the day he decided to work for another hour. Amusingly, he was one of the most effective programmers at his job, which only made him wonder how much internet browsing not just his coworkers, but programmers around the world were doing as his company was known to be efficient as well.\n\nAfter work he came home and watched an episode of Game of Throws. A TV series where they present highlights from huge upsets in both normal and esports. The winning, and better team, \"throws the game\" by making a single horrific play. Sometimes it takes a series of bad plays for them to lose, which really made Alfred chuckle and wonder how even professionals could be so faulty. \n\nThen it was time for the special event of the evening, a date! He arrived at the restaurant 4 minutes early. His date arrived 4 minutes late. The date went adequately. Alfred mentioned some funny mishaps in the days episode of Game of Throws. His date, Charlotte laughed. Charlotte then started talking about a dramatic murder in her favorite show \"Justice and Organization: Special Murder Unit\". She presented the moral conundrum, a rich man's child was taken hostage. He refused to give into the ransom. The child was killed. The wife then sued the husband, for not paying the ransom. She asked him his thoughts. \"Well, if their married, shes entitled to half his income, and so if that amount is enough to pay the ransom, she has a case. But if it isn't, then he has his right to not give up his half of his own money.\" She nodded, in agreement, seemed logical. They talked a bit more about TV shows and movies. She asked him if he wanted to come over to watch something in particular, he said he already saw it and went home.\n\nCharlotte didn't want a second date. This was a common occurrence for Alfred who couldn't imagine how simply talking wasn't enough to please a suitor. This proceeded until Alfred grew old and died. He achieved a top 10 highest score in the world for his favorite video game and so died happily. The End.\n\nFor More Stories (That aren't purposely boring):\n\nhttps://www.reddit.com/r/sharpWriting/" ]	2
	[WP] You have miraculously survived a terminal illness by receiving the first successful human head transplant. Your recovery goes smoothly, and you are able to resume your normal life...until one day you encounter the grieving spouse of your body's original owner.	[ "Have you ever heard the phrase 'My mind was telling me no but my heart was telling me yes.' That's exactly how I felt, right from the moment our eyes met, right when I saw her. I knew I had to make some kind of contact so I invited her for some coffee, told her we could talk, exchange thoughts, feelings.\n\nIt became awkward the moment she started talking, her name was Caroline, she was only 25, only a year younger than me. We talked about all sorts of things, movies, music. At first it seemed more awkward for her than it was for me, but eventually we started to really hit it off.\n\nWe talked for what felt like hours until finally she said she needed to go, she was meeting her family for something. So, she gave me her number and we parted ways.\n\nThat was the happiest I had been since before Joanne died almost two years ago. Who knows, maybe she has some of Joanne's personality, after all, she does have her heart.\n " ]	1
Feel free to make it as heart-wrenching as you want.	[WP] You're taking your child to the grave site of your spouse on the 5th anniversary of his/her death. He/she died when your child was only 2. They turn to you and ask, "What was mommy/daddy like?"	[ "October 11. The smell of fresh rain filled the air, scattered leaves across the ground like brilliant colored pencil shavings outlined the oh so familiar streets. A light breeze caressed her hair as she turned, the warmth of her auburn locks complemented by the loving smirk. The soft curls that remind you that shes there every time you brush your little girls hair. The hum of a car in the distance knows that when you're with her shes all you can see.\n\nThe skid marks are gone but the squeal of the breaks still tug you awake when you know that when you roll over the only thing left is the space on your bed and the hole in your heart. She always liked your side more. \n\nAn amaryllis lay beside the cold slab of granite looking back as she wonders who you loved more than the world, her light green parka pushed aside by a gentle gust that brings back more than the smell of Autumn.", "I cannot explain how much my heart hurt hearing my sweet seven year old daughter quietly ask \"what was mom like?\". I looked down and her soft brown eyes were wide and watering a little. Maybe from the cold. Maybe because she was afraid to ask. I had always been very reluctant to talk about her mother, never really knowing what to say. There are so many things that you can simply never prepare for as a parent, and this one definitely one of them. She was patient with me as we stood, her mittened hand in mine, in the snow in front of the small gravestone that was emblazoned only with her mothers name. It had been three years since it had snowed on this day. \n\"Mommy was an amazing woman,\" I started, and that was not a lie. She had been, at one time. \"But she was very sad.\" She nodded, and I could tell she was focusing every bit of her energy on listening. Now, what I'm about to tell you, I can never tell my daughter. Maybe I can, someday. Eventually I will have to. She can't find out from some old newspaper clipping or article online. I owe her more than that. I can't tell her today, but I can write it here. You see, beside my dead wife's grave is an even smaller gravestone. It belongs to my other daughter. She would have been 5 a few weeks ago. We were young when we had Emily, and for two years we were the perfect family. We lived in a small town, my wife was a stay at home mom, and I worked as a forklift driver for a local distribution center. Our life wasn't always perfect, but I made good money, and most of all we were very happy. When I found out she was pregnant again, we were both thrilled. Things were still good until my second daughter was born. My wife changed after that. I can't talk much about those days, but just know that they were very dark. I should have spent more time at home, and I will never forgive myself for going to work that day. She had wrapped her arms around my waist as I shaved that morning and asked me not to go. It was snowing after all, she reasoned, why risk it? God, if I could undo one moment in my life, if I could take back one thing, it would be that moment. I would have stayed. But at the time I believed that it was more important to make enough money for a bigger house. I really believed that if we moved out of our small now cramped home we would be happy again. But I was wrong. Three years ago today, I came home to what can best be described as a nightmare. My oldest daughter was upstairs, peacefully asleep, but there was no sign of my wife or youngest daughter. After quickly surveying the house, I dialed her cell phone and heard it ring in the kitchen. I ran back downstairs to find it sitting on the counter by the back door, which I then realized was unlocked. I opened it slowly and there, in the snow, a set of footprints. Barefoot. I set off sprinting, for what seemed like hours but could only have been a few minutes. Panic had set in at the thought of what could have caused my wife to take off barefoot in the snow, but I tried to push back my worries until I saw them. My wife in nothing but a bathrobe, knelt down in the snow over something. In an instant I knew what she had done. She was kneeling over our weeks-old daughter who was very much dead. Her body was so, so pale. The blanket she was wrapped in was bright red. I can only remember screaming. My wife looked... almost peaceful. She didn't seem to understand what she had done. \"Give me the knife, baby\" I said, choking on the words. \"Please, baby, just give me the knife.\" She looked at me a for a moment, blinking up through the snow for what seemed like an eternity, and then she lunged at me. I will never know what she was thinking. The doctors would later call it 'post partum psychosis'. She lunged at me with the knife and we both flew backwards into the snow. She was screaming and crying and the knife was flying and even with my dead daughter feet away, my intention was never to hurt her. I just wanted to restrain her, to hold her, to somehow rewind and this not be real. I don't remember a lot of the struggle. The doctors say that it could be due to blood loss or more likely- my mind just repressing it. Honestly most of that day is a blur for me, and outside of therapy sessions this is the most I've ever recounted of it. What I do know, is that she somehow managed to stab me twice, once in the shoulder and once in the side. At some point in the struggle she landed on the knife, and some times I think she did so intentionally. I know that in her right mind she wouldn't have been able to live with herself for what she had done and maybe in a brief moment of clarity she decided to end it all. I try not to think about it. I try not to remember the look in her eyes as she slumped into me, her blood and tears mixing with mine. She bled out there in the snow long before the paramedics arrived. \n\nI am not angry at her. As easy as it could be to hate my wife, I can't. The woman I married would have never hurt anyone, but the human mind is a tricky thing. She gave me the best thing in my life, and I will always be grateful for that. So today, when my daughter asks \"what was mommy like?\" I am going to tell her that her favorite color was yellow, and that she was too shy to sing in front of people, but she had the most beautiful singing voice. I'm going to tell her that her laugh was contagious and her smile could light up a room. I'm going to tell her that above all, her mother really did love her. Maybe you won't think this is the right thing to do. Hell, maybe it isn't. But today, here in the snow, I want my five year old to be innocent for just a little longer. " ]	2
	[WP] "So, what does it feel to be possessed by me?"	[ "\"It tickles, to be honest.\"\n\n\"Really?\"\n\n\"Yeah, do you have to flow through my entire nervous system?\"\n\n\"Well, to keep it balanced, kinda.\"\n\n\"What if you just picked an organ?\"\n\n\"What one?\"\n\n\"My heart?\"\n\n\"Good way to fuck with your blood pressure. You sure you want that? You already have high cholesterol.\"\n\n\"Damn, you're right. What about my liver?\"\n\n\"Alcoholism?\"\n\n\"Kidneys?\"\n\n\"Wanna piss yourself?\"\n\n\"Pancreas?\"\n\n\"Diabetes.\"\n\n\"Spleen?\"\n\n\"What's that?\"\n\n\"On the left.\"\n\n\"Looks a little bloody to me.\"\n\n\"You are picky. Aren't you?\"\n\n\"Kinda. Sorry.\"\n\n\"Why do you want to possess me, anyway?\"\n\n\"You are the one who wanted to play the guitar so well.\"\n\n\"So why can't you just stay in my muscles?\"\n\n\"It's more about controlling your muscles.\"\n\n\"Fine, look, I'll take the risk. You wanna sit in my brain? I think I can trust you.\"\n\n\"You're brain!? God no, you're far too twisted for me.\"" ]	1
Prompt above. Surprise me with whatever direction you take.	[WP] Mexico has been invaded. The people of Mexico call for their last hope; The numerous Drug Cartels.	[ "After Mexico had refused Supreme Leader Trump's order to pay for \"The Wall\" retaliation had been swift. The war Began with a carpet bombing of Mexican military bases and industrial centers, followed by Naval landings of American troops. The Mexican government quickly fell into shambles unable to cope with the invasion and quickly lose the support of the Mexican people who turned to their last hope, the drug cartel. The cartel quickly turned to gorilla warfare in order to combat the Americans. The main focus of the attacks were the destroy the wall being built on the us/Mexican border. Supreme Leader Trump had originally stated that the wall would be built for 5 million and it would be 100% payed for by the Mexicans. But one of the unfortunate results of the invasion of Mexico was they had gone into huge debt mostly to Wells Chase JP Bank of America who had recently established a monopoly on banking in the us after the Supreme Leader had invested into it. That Combined with the Cartel's attacks on the wall have risen the supreme leaders estimate to \"at least 6 million\" according to state run news agency Breitbart. ", "So, they said no. \n\nNo Fucking Wall. \n\n\nTo say the White House was pissed was an understatement. the USA tried to place embargoes and tariffs. When that didn't work because of NAFTA, they tried to pull out of NAFTA. That didn't work, so the Oval Office declared immunity from US Law if anyone hunted down \"Illegals and Terrorists\". To ICE and their supporters, that meant anyone looking brown. The Community of Latin American and Caribbean States called out the Government against it, so another Executive Order was issued, halting all import and exports from any latin-American and South American nation. Needless to say, this hurt the American economy as well, leading to an ousting of the President, who fled to exile with his golf clubs to Florida.\n\n\n Now, the new president, President Bannon has declared a new era of America, with the formation of the True Patriots of Blood, a uniformed organisation you earn after subscribing as a paying member of Breitbart and the Alternative Right. A rally was made in Washington DC where he called on what he considered \"The American Continent, deemed by True American Blood\". With a rousing applause to the idea of \"Our True Destiny\", he ordered the military to invade Mexico. \n\n\n The Mexican Military, with no tanks or fighter jets of its own, was utterly demolished. The government was in shambles. militias with caps saying \"MAAC\" were reported to shoot anyone and everything in their march down. With no hope left, the Mexican people called upon the devil they know: The Cartels. \n\n\n Fighting the Mexican Military and State security for so long, they had experience in organising insurgencies. Now, the Americans are on their land, killing their people. Now, the American public will soon learn what Iraq and Afghanistan was like on their backyard." ]	2
	[WP] Today is the turning point in the war against the robots. Today, their batteries run out.	[ "November 27th, 2457 AD\n\nThe world is a bleak place. Humans have long since been outed as the apex predator. That title belongs to the robots. The very machines we designed to fight our wars, to help out around the house, and even to teach our children. These heartless machines tuned against us many moons ago. Take a seat, and let me tell you about the fall of humanity, the rise of the machines, and their eventual downfall…\n\n\nJuly 8th, 2453 AD – Iris\n\nThe day started like any other summer day, my fiancée, Renée and I were talking a walk through the virtual park. Real parks no longer existed due to the overpopulation of earth demanding apartment complexes built into every corner of the globe. We were having a lovely time when suddenly a news banner covered our screens. Breaking News!-The Janus Industries robots have fallen victim to a deadly virus that corrupts their software, turning them against humans.\n\nThe banner disappeared and everyone in the virtual park stood in awe of the message we had all just received. The shock didn’t last long before we were met with a new message from a female character who claimed to be Iris, the messenger of the gods. It claimed responsibility for the human-killing virus, explaining that we were a disease on earth and we had to be exterminated. It was at this moment that the human race was knocked clean off of our comfy little pedestal. We were no longer in charge of this planet, Iris was.\n\nI lost my fiancée to the initial slaughter, along with my parents and one of my sisters. My second sister, Cassandra, and myself, Kyler, managed to escape into one of the early human strongholds. Many of these early fortresses were established in malls, schools, and other community centres. It was the easiest way to make sure other humans could find their way to them. They were a safe place-the only safe place at the time. However, that didn’t last long.\n\n\nJuly 2453 to May 2454 – The Collapse\n\nMany of these early strongholds fell within the month. The either fell victim to the onslaught of rogue machines, a fatal lack of resources, or typical human infighting. Our fortress in particular, a local mall, had a large enough military presence to survive the hordes of Iris machines and more than enough resources to keep us all alive. Our camp ran into the issue of power.\n\nAt the beginning, we were led by the commanding officer of the present military. However, when the constant barrages of machines began to die off, we all began questioning if this General Mathias should really be in charge. My sister and I tried to keep our distance from this power struggle but we were eventually forced to choose a side. It was the people, versus Mathias and her battalion. She began enforcing martial law and rationing food. It wasn’t long before the people began rebelling. As the acts of rebellion increased in severity, it became increasingly harder for my sister and I to abstain from this civil war.\n\nIt was midway through the winter when things had escalated into full on warfare. We were killing ourselves. The Mathias’s soldiers were smaller in number but had much more firepower. The Red Runners (the name the rebels had given themselves) had more manpower but far less guns, they had to get creative. Many crude explosives were made, and used on the reigning army. It was around this time that a small faction of us splintered off and tried to return attention to the robot threat. No one ever listened to us since the robots had not attacked in months. Little did we know, this was Iris’s plan all along.\n\nIt was January 2nd, 2454 when all hell broke loose. The Red Runners had begun a full on assault on Mathias Manor (the headquarters of Mathias’s army). It was a blood bath. The splinter faction of pacifists had decided that now was our chance to make an exit. However, we were cut off by a flanking squadron of Mathias soldiers. Despite our claims of being a splinter faction, they would not believe us and they opened fire. I managed to get to cover, but my sister Cassandra was not so lucky. My last surviving family member, murdered in cold blood. \n\nI was about to charge the soldiers, blinded by rage, when an explosion rang out across the mall. It was Iris. She had waited for us to kill ourselves before she swooped in to finish us off. At his moment all civil disagreements were forgotten, the remaining splinter faction members and nearby soldiers decided it was more important to escape and we all fled together. We managed to escape the mall but it wasn’t long before we were at each other’s throats again. I was still grieving over the loss of Cassandra when I did it. I killed the remaining soldiers in their sleep. I wasn’t proud of what I had done, but I wasn’t going to stop myself. The few of us remained began wandering this new hell. In the span of nearly a year, humans had gone from overpopulating the earth at the top of the food chain to one of the scarcest creatures on this planet. We all suspected that it was the end of humanity but we were wrong.\n\n\nSeptember 26th, 2456 AD – A New Darkness\n\nIt wasn’t just the end of humanity; it was also the end of the world. These Iris robots began harvesting any remaining organic matter for what we all believed to be some sort of super weapon to eradicate all humans. This mass harvest had one side effect though: with the sever drop in plants and other organic matter, the pollution from human civilisation began to block out the sun. \n\nAll of our factories kept running, filling the skies with their smog. The sun was blocked from touching this planet, but the trapped heat prevented a new ice age. Instead, it simply became eternal winter, and it was always dark out. We had to adapt and evolve to survive. The increased darkness helped us to hide from Iris, but the harsh cold made it difficult for us to survive, but we managed. We held it together in the face of death for no other reason than as humans we are far too stubborn to die. Our small group began to grow as we encountered new factions of humans. It was nice to see that we weren’t the only survivors. \n\nThis new darkness carried with it, a vital secret: something that would turn the tables and carry the human race to victory over our own creations…\n\n\nNovember 26th, 2457 AD – Batteries Not Included\n\nIt was over a year after the darkness had fallen upon the land and humans had adapted to hunt specific machines: harvesters. These were the machines gathering all of the biomass, much of it edible. They became our main source of nutrition. However, these hunts had become ever more difficult since Iris too was adapting. She began sending guardians with the harvesters to deter our attacks. Of course our need to survive pushed us to develop ways of taking down the guardians. I was on one such hunt when it happened: the tables had turned on this artificial bitch.\n\nWe were hunting in the northern streets when the normal pack of harvesters approached. They were accompanied by their usual array of guards, but something was off. One harvester kept falling behind and it appeared to be moving awfully slow. Suddenly, it stopped moving altogether and collapsed. It’s batteries had run out. All of Iris’s surrounding minions began panicking. Iris had improved on the robots designs, but she hadn’t fundamentally changed them, or how they worked. The Janus robots were solar powered and simply had immense solar batteries for when there came a storm. Iris had overlooked this and the eternal darkness had finally begun taking its toll on the robots. It wasn’t long before they began to drop like flies.\n\n\nNovember 27th, 2457 AD – This World of Ours\n\nThat brings us to today. The robots are dropping, and Iris can’t make the changes to her designs fast enough. We started our offensive by taking out her factories: we can’t have her remedying this issue, now can we? My battalion just took out the Gamma factory and were on our way to the gates of Iris, a final rally point before we took this bitch down. Who would have thought, that our last minute decision to convert to green energy before the apocalypse would be our saving grace.\n\nWe have a chance to take Iris down, once and for all. We can start anew; we can rebuild this world, but do it better.\n\nEDIT: Formatting, you all know how it is..." ]	1
	[WP] An enchantress has cursed you, a prince, into the form of a beast as a punishment that will only be released if you find the error of your ways. But turns out you really dig being a beast and want to stay that way.	[ "In the wild woodlands of my wonderful green home, I laid on my back contemplating. Such a strange turn of events had taken place, all of which I suppose I should have seen. Lifting myself from the soft green grass, my gaze travels over the ridges and folds of my new flesh. Old flesh and new form, or same flesh with new purpose? I didn't catch the incantation sadly. Where once I was weak, now I am strong beyond all doubt. \n\nI suppose I should let you know. I have not often been a good person. I let myself become shaped by others and regret it with my entire soul. In the Kingdom that was a home to me, I was a prince. My word spared and sentenced lives, my gestures a word of law. Though with all that power, I never had much inclination to use. While my elder brothers toiled away with their arts of war, combat, and strife, I enjoyed a quite life in the archives. Studying to my hearts content, learning of histories long past and magic long forgotten, lost to times endless ravages. To be a gifted mage was never in the cards, I'm ashamed to say. I always tried, but I could do no more than but light a candle. I am-was a frail child, given to sickness and weak blood. A single half-ment blow from one of my brothers would lay me in the sickbed for a score of days, sometimes longer. Thus in the shadows I was endlessly mocked. To do so to my face would openly invite my ire, or the ire of some of my more defensive siblings. But in the murky half-light world of court intrigue, rumors wore the badge of truth. \n\nI was often described of being cursed, or an ill gotten half breed produced from a dalliance between my mother, bless her dearly departed soul, and the ugly beasts in the stables. Some days I was the changeling child of the Fey, a lurking hobgoblin that would never show his face. I will admit, these jabs at my appearance and figure did do quite a number on me. See, the Archives existed far below ground and oft the only light to behold was that if a candle or lamp. I grew unbearably pale, so much so that to much light was a cause of physical pain. Long robes, shawls, and thick tunics helped me block out the hideous light of day. Ruinous thing, daytime. Or so I thought until now. \n\nEventually, something that always lurked under my skin, a need tearing free from my flesh unwanton, arose. I desired a friend. I knew nobody would love my for my appearance. Even my own brothers hadn't seen my visage in years, after I started taking supper in the Archives with my studies. So after some careful, unknown research, I devised a simple theory. Adults socialized in court, their children ever present as to learn their ways so that they to could survive and hopefully thrive beside their colleagues. Before my father I offered up a solution so that I might come out of my shell, and that the children of the nobles would come to treat me with respect, and not as some malovent dark force, lurking in the shadows. The Archives were part of an ancient underground city, most of it crumbled away to the endless abyss. However, there were a few grand sections left usable. \n\nMy father granted this request, that I might form a Night Court underneath the castle, to convene my own company and build reputation with my peers. This was announced to court the next day, the nobles sons and daughters loved the idea. While they frantically sought each other out to spread the wonderful news, I had a most important issue. My appearance would lead to nothing but the shunning of the Night Court, and to the endless rumors of my hideousness confirmed. So I devised a mask, a three sectioned piece of delicately artificed materials to present my face. Our castle smith helped me, using his skills to create a frame to hold each individual piece of the mask together. The left eye, the right eye, and the nose/mouth guard to form up a perfect concealment devise. \n\nToday was the day, dressed in my favorite robes. An affection of monks habits, though spun in gold and trimmed in onyx shade. My mask, with vibrant eyes of maroon and jade, a mouthguard ever stoic blackness sat over my features. I welcomed my guests, my practiced speech flowing from my lips. \n\n\"Welcome, Lords and Ladies of the Nights Court! Here we are free to do as we please! No more are we our fathers and mothers eager attendants, but rather people of our own. So, eat and drink and make merry. Soon we should make up some discussions, to propel our Court into legitimacy!\" \n\nI sat down, glad to be surrounded by those of my own, though I do miss my books. However, such a brilliant speech could not be followed without ill-conceived discourse. Lord Branson's son, Cadly Branson was a brash, arrogant man who hated the thought of any above him. His seeming goal in life was to bring those above him down. \n\"Tell me, oh great Prince of the Kingdom, why do you cover your face? Why do you sit upon that granite throne in this Undercroft and proclaim yourself above us? Bare your face sir, so we might know our glorious leader.\" I was shocked at this brash display. Sure he knows that I could have him killed for this. My guards.... Oh no. I had forgotten that I wished for these meetings to be unguarded, to allow the progeny of Lords to speak freely. \n\nCadly marched up my throne, his face a magnificent grin. Jubilantly, he reached out to me. I thrust out my arms, as if I could hold him at bay. With a blow to my temple, he wrenched my mask, my wonderfully beautiful mask asunder. What was revealed to Nights Court that day would scar them for the rest of their, albeit short lives. Livid red eyes sunken deeply in my skull, patchwork motheaten white flesh, doughy and lump filled. Snargled teeth and a hideous stink arouse from my monstrous features. My face was bared to Night Court. \n\nMany started vomiting, ladies screaming but knew not where to run. If I had been paying attention, I would have noticed someone creepy back towards the dreadful, bleak surface. Cadly pointed at me, not in jest or insult, but in fear. \"A monster! Your surely are no get of the royal line. You must have taken the true prince! Someone, help me kill this abomination!\" With this declaration, Cadly drew his elaborate Court sword and pointed it at my heart. All this time, I was still recovering from the blow dealt to the head. \"CADLY!\" I roared at him. \"I AM YOUR LIEGE AND YOU WILL BOW BEFORE ME, OR ELSE!\" Spittle was thrown from my mouth in rage, as a boy no more fit to lick my boots threatened my life. Cadly took a step back, but then his resolve stiffened. With a elaborate and artful thrust, his blade chased my heaving heart. What a shame for Cadly. So much show, but no efficiency. His blade sunk deep yes, but into the stone of my throne. I let loose a demonized smile before wrapping my long, delicate arms around his neck, and the knife in my right hand sunk deep into his neck. Cadly struggled, pounding on my frail ribs and chest, shattering and fracturing my insides. Till eventually, he slumped down and breathed his last. He did his own damage, my racking coughs spouting out blood. \n\nGuards stormed into the Night Court, to find my mouth covered in what looked like Cadly's blood. I was bound and chained and dragged to the local temple. It's a wonder I survived really. Layed upon a table, a Priest Mantled Green entered. Green Priests governed the laws of nature and the wild, and were not healers. \n\n\"Your transgressions, your filthy acts of hemomancy will be punished. I consign you away from your true form, till you find yourself cleansed of this blackest sin.\"\nHe started chanting, and my spirit faded into blackness. \n\nThat's how I ended up like I am. Head of Lion, Chest of Man, Legs and Tail of Dragon. A true crossbreed of nature, consigned to a constant hunt for a mistaken deed. But I truly, truly don't mind. I can run with abandon, feel the wind in my mane and sun on my chest. I defend my territory, fight with a true warriors heart. This is not the end of my story, merely a beginning to something greater. ", "\"No, no, you're completely missing the point!\" The enchantress exclaimed, incensed at the proposition the towering, ferocious, and most of all beastly presence had brought forth. \"You have wronged me, you beastly wretch, and you must atone, else this curse will be permanent! That's how these things work!\"\n\nI have been entranced with the mirror for the last five minutes, to say the least, completely enthralled with the transformation that took place. \"Well, you see,\" I started to retort. \"Often hags like yourself will just come waltzing about, looking for someone to swindle, curse, and cheat, promising a return to normal for better behavior.\" I found myself giving a large, toothy smirk to the witch. \"It just so happens you targeted a furry, in a time and place where furries are not only commonplace, but also fantasized about to no end.\" I grabbed my smartphone, which had carelessly fallen off the bedside table in the midst of the curse taking effect. I opened Twitter and pulled up some of Tony the Tiger's tweets, distinctly pointing out the responses left by people. \"Sorry, lady, but all you did was boost my PR and fulfill my fantasies.\"\n\nThe enchantress couldn't break through this flaws back-reasoning. The best she could muster was an attempt to hold her head with her hand. \"But...\" she cut herself off, both with confusion and anger. She barked back at the monstrosity. \"But that is NOT how this works! You are to learn a lesson with the reward being your life returning to normal! That is how this works!\"\n\nI shrugged, chuckling to myself as I quickly took a selfie, just to hold as some kind of idea if the hag behind me decided to turn me back. \"Maybe in your time, grandma, but this is the modern world. Princes are about as close to the throne as a fat kid is from a Hostess snack in a locked grocery store, and people think big, haired, snarling beasts are sexy. This literally cannot NOT benefit me.\" I turned solemn. \"Now then. If you wish to not spend the rest of eternity in a dungeon, I suggest you high-tail it out of here and try this shtick with a feminist or something.\"\n\nThe enchantress was left at an impasse here. There was nothing to teach the snide, brutish, burly, snarling, abhorrid creature before her, even AFTER she had turned him into a beast. With a shake of her head, she responds simply, defeatedly. \"Oh well. I can at least take pride in that you'll have to spend a fortune on shampoo.\" Within a blink of an eye, she was gone, leaving the prince to himself in his room.\n\nTwitter had one new post that night: \"Hag tried cursing me, but gave me this super cool beast form! #hellawesome #beautyandthebeast @HerRoyalMajesty\". And all the furries rejoiced as they had another daddy to follow dauntingly.", "The enchantress watches in annoyance as the Prince she curses chases his tail.\n\"..As adorable this is, it's getting old.\"\n\nThe enchantress then appears before the Prince in a flash of light, \"Young Prince, what are you doing?\"\n\nThe Prince blinks and sits on his hunches before smirking, \"I'm chasing my tail!\" \"\n\nThe enchantress sighs, \"I can see that, I mean why are you doing it? Shouldn't you be finding a way to turn yourself back?\"\n\nThe Prince blushes, \"I've always wanted an excuse to play around! So if I do anything wrong I can blame my instincts!\"\n\nThe enchantress then sighs and scratches the Princes ear all the whole thinking, 'This did not go as planned.'", "Eleanora's plan had been a success. The witch had managed to make her way into the nobleman's rather exclusive ball and had completed her curse, turning the fool into a shaggy, hunched monster in front of each and every one of his guests. Even now, they stood in the middle of the lavish ballroom, with nobles gathered around the edges and the Beast on full display in the centre. It should have been her victory, but he was taking it without rage or despair. He seemed to almost be exulting in what she'd done.\n\n\"And I shall remain a Beast so long as I fail to find a man or woman who would love me for who I am?\" said the Beast, ripping off the shreds of his clothes from his now inhuman body. Around him, noblemen and women whispered or gawked openly at the witch's work.\n\nWhile technically true, Eleanora had hoped she'd have the opportunity to grace him with that knowledge in the depths of his begging. Instead, she hid her displeasure and simply nodded, \"So long as they lust after your money, fame or power you will never again wear the flesh of a mortal man. You will forever be confined to the body of a Beast, shunned by all who once cared for you.\"\n\n\"But as soon as I find someone who can love me for my personality, I will shed this mane, this animalistic strength and speed, and trade it all back for the skin of a human, the athletic abilities of a human? Well witch, I believe you may have made a grave mistake.\"\n\nThe witch waited a moment, assuming the Beast had been on the verge of some defiant joke, a final moment of disrespect before the grovelling and pleading, but there was no punchline. The Beast simply stood, hunched but tall, with pride and stared at the witch with a crooked, fang-filled, smile on its face. The subdued reaction of those around them seemed to support the creature's claim.\n\n\"You can't be serious.\" the witch scoffed.\n\n\"Deadly so, I'm afraid. You see you've given me a body that surpasses any I could have hoped to make with my own sweat and tears.\" he said, pouncing and flipping, \"On top of that it seems you've left my mind intact! I was never one for the love of others, my personality should have told you that much, but this? This I could come to relish. No longer will I be constrained by the limits of human physiology, by the societal obligations of my noble birth. At the end of the day I am still every bit the heir to my family's fortune, of that you've made sure everyone knows, so I will continue to have access to those funds. Funds I will use to better myself - or my mind at least - and grow my abilities.\"\n\nAt the last, he snarled at a group of nobles near the ballroom's vaulted windows, laughing as they gasped or screamed and nearly fell over each other clearing out of his way.\n\n\"That's absurd. You can't believe you won't want for human contact for the rest of your life! Everyone wants a family, a lover, friends at the lea-\"\n\nThe Beast laughed, a deep and rich belly-filled sound, as he continued to test his body, \"You chose to change a nobleman known for being brusque and aloof into a monster that people will shy away from and avoid interacting with. There was no target that would have made a less satisfying victim than myself. Even this farce of a ball was my father's decision, not my mine. I find no joy in events such as these and each of the guests here know it!\"\n\nAll around them, the guests nodded - willingly or subconsciously, it didn't matter - none argued with the declaration.\n\n\"I... I...\" the witch managed, completely flustered by the Beast's words. Never had she expected someone to be so accepting of what should have been a living death - nobles did not like to be ostracized. They should revile being exiled. Whatever else he was, the Beast was right that she'd made a mistake.\n\n\"Now, if you'll excuse me, witch, I think I'll be heading to my chambers now.\"\n\nEleanora's mind warred with itself, disbelief and hatred fighting for dominance over her as the rest of the ballroom slowly started to empty, nobles whispering to amongst themselves about the attrocity of her magic. Again, none mentioned the Beast's new form, none were repulsed by it. They spoke only of her magic, how it was dark and forbidden and vile. \n\nA scream bubbled out of her as the ballroom's golden doors shut. It rushed out of her like a torrent of water, a bottomless well of rage pouring itself out in a single syllable. When it finally finished, Eleanora was gone. Gone to find the one thing that could turn her night around and bring the Beast crawling on his knees to her, begging, as he should have from the beginning.\n\nShe would find someone to love him, and she would laugh when it crushed his newfound dreams.", "Heinrich loved looming over the guards.\n\nTheir fear smelled sweet, almost like honeycakes in the oven, and many of them would quite literally shake in their boots. He'd not believed people actually did that, not until he'd been transformed into an eight foot tall, overly muscled leonid-human hybrid and realized he could induce that reaction in others simply by leaning over them and grinning. He was still a prince, of course - third in line, maybe, although he'd stopped keeping track of such things after his rather fortunate accident - and though he'd told the honor guard they needn't bother, they still insisted on protecting his castle. So he loomed. Whenever possible.\n\n\"Out of my way, little men,\" he rumbled, the deep bass of his voice shaking dust from the stones of the outer gate. \"I'm hungry.\"\n\nThe guard scattered like quail, and he barely restrained himself from giving chase. He'd tamed most of the strange impulses inherent in his leonine aspect, but some were hard to control. Cats, it seemed, simply loved hunting, and the sight of so much meat running so slowly was nigh irresistible. \n\nBut he had other prey today.\n\nHeinrich closed the gate with a flick of his paws and bounded off into the forest. Gwydion's curse included exile, but only by day, and he'd always been a night owl. He'd become fully nocturnal, and found his new schedule quite agreeable. The capital was only an hour's lope away, with all its temptations and delights, and the real parties started after sundown anyway. He bounded over the wall just as the bells were ringing nine o'clock. Perfect.\n\nThe low quarter of the city had become accustomed to his visits. He had no intention of eating a human, lest it trigger thoughts best left unthought, and so his presence went unremarked except for the odd shout of surprise and alarm as he passed. He made it to his destination without even having to intimidate the city watch.\n\nThe tavern went dead silent as he entered. The serving wenches froze in place, as did the patrons, some happily in mid-grope, and the bartenders exchanged uneasy glances. \n\n\"Heinrich?\" \n\nHe glanced into the corner and saw a booth full of women with smiling faces. A blond was waving at him. Lena. He grinned, lamplight dancing off the sharp points of his teeth, and as if that were a trigger the tavern swept back to life. \n\n\"Over here,\" Lena called, leaning forward to show off her cleavage. \"Saved you a spot!\"\n\nHeinrich padded through the crowd, which parted in front of him like a school of fish before a shark, and sat on his haunches by the booth. Lena leaned over and scratched his ears, lips slightly parted. He purred.\n\n\"Evening, ladies,\" he said, in as much of a whisper as his form allowed. \n\n\"We were worried you weren't coming,\" said a red haired girl with a dress that left little to the imagination. \"You promised to be here at eight!\"\n\n\"Fashionably late,\" said a brunette. She stared into his eyes, either mesmerized or trying to mesmerize. \"I like that.\"\n\n\"Let the beast drink,\" Lena admonished. \"My apologies, prince. They're a mite bit eager, is all.\"\n\n\"So am I,\" he chuckled. A pot full of ale was placed in front of him and he lapped at it languidly, letting the women scratch his ears and stroke his pelt. He refused to imagine a better life, lest the spell be broken and he actually have to live it, focusing instead on the sensation of their touch and the scent of their desire. Pure ecstasy, liquid bliss. \n\nThe tavern door swung open and once again silence fell. Heinrich glanced over his shoulder and his pupils dilated slightly.\n\n\"Gwydion,\" he growled, muscles tensing and claws splintering the floorboards. Lena cooed appreciatively, but he had forgotten her entirely.\n\nA raven haired woman stood in the door, dressed in black leather and holding a gnarled staff. She frowned and stalked through the tavern towards Heinrich, the crowd parting in front of her as if plowed out of the way by a magical force. Curses and spilled ale rippled in her wake, but none dared raise a hand.\n\n\"What the bloody hell are you doing here?\" she demanded, prodding Heinrich with her staff. It sizzled when it touched his hide, but he barely felt the pain.\n\n\"Enjoying myself,\" he growled, turning to face her. \"You?\"\n\n\"You're supposed to be in your castle,\" Gwydion snapped. \"The guard is in a tizzy and your father is not pleased.\"\n\n\"So?\"\n\n\"So get your furry ass back there!\" Gwydion barked. She planted her staff on the floor and blue lights flickered up and down its length. \"What part of contemplative exile don't you understand?\"\n\n\"Oh,\" Heinrich said, yawning cavernously. \"Contemplation, I suppose. Gave that up ages ago. As for exile, well. Here I am.\"\n\n\"And you!\" Gwydion snarled, pointing her staff at the women in the booth. \"What kind of harlots are you, consorting with a beast? Have you no shame?\"\n\n\"Shame?\" Lena blurted, indignantly. \"Are you discriminating against alternative lifestyles?\"\n\n\"Yeah, don't judge,\" said the red haired girl, blushing furiously. \n\n\"Enough of this,\" Gwydion muttered. The blue lights grew more intense. \"You don't appear to be learning anything, Heinrich, despite my best efforts. I've obviously made a mistake.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Heinrich purred. \"You have.\"\n\nGwydion's eyes widened slightly as Heinrich launched himself forward. The spell she had been brewing cooked off into the crowd, turning several onlookers into twisted gnomes and creating a stampede for the door. She swung her staff up to bar his path. Too late. Heinrich batted it aside and swatted her across the chest with his other paw. His claws raked her leathers, sending sparks flying as her protective magic interacted with his enchantment, but even though the leather held it could not absorb the full force of the blow. Gwydion slammed into a table and bounced hard to the floor. Heinrich pinned her down with a paw and brought his jaws close to her face.\n\n\"There is a lesson in this, somewhere,\" he growled. Gwydion's lips moved, and Heinrich felt a spell building, so he extended one razor sharp claw to touch her throat. Gwydion froze, fear finally dawning in her eyes. \"But you know what? I'm not even going to think about it. Safer that way.\"\n\n\"You fool,\" Gwydion wheezed. \"You cannot escape that form without my help.\"\n\n\"Escape?\" Heinrich said, chuckling. \"Why, I'm having the time of my life, dear Gwydion. I'm sure some day I'll accidentally divine whatever it is you and father meant to teach me, but until then I'll be enjoying myself. Thoroughly. Now, do we have an understanding? I'd hate to get blood all over this fine establishment.\"\n\nGwydion stared at him, struggling to breathe against the weight of his paw. She glanced at Lena, and then at his teeth. \n\n\"You're disgusting,\" she said. \"Vain, arrogant, totally lacking in empathy, unfit - \"\n\n\"Shhh,\" Heinrich whispered, although it came out more like a hiss. Close enough. He pricked her throat with his claw and she fell silent. \"That's better. I'm not keen on lectures, for obvious reasons. One last chance.\"\n\nGwydion shut her eyes and said, \"Fine. Have it your way.\"\n\n\"Excellent!\" Heinrich purred. He stood back and let her struggle to her feet. \"I hope we don't have to repeat this conversation.\"\n\n\"I doubt we will,\" Gwydion muttered. She turned on her heel and stalked out of the tavern, slamming the door behind her. Heinrich turned to Lena and winked. \n\n\"Now where were we?\"\n\n", "\"Mil'lady?\" Kroak was standing outside of the door, afraid of entering the small little hut. He wanted an easy escape path should the need arise, as his master would throw a fit when she hears the news that he had, just like the last time. She was not known for being cool-headed when she gets angry.\n\n\"Yes Kroak? I trust that you brought good news?\" the voice drifted from inside the hut, bringing a scent of potion brewing together with it. Good, Kroak thought. Maybe his master would not be paying attention to what he had to say.\n\nKroak cleared his throat. \"Mil'lady, as you've instructed, I visited Prince Adam's castle. I'm afraid that the last petal of the rose has fallen, and he seemed quite happy about it.\"\n\n\"What?\" came the master's reply. Kroak wondered if the master did not catch what he said earlier, or that she heard, but she wanted Kroak to repeat it. Either way, he did not like it. He looked nervously to his left and then to his right, beads of sweat running down his head.\n\nHe cleared his throat a little louder this time, while his eyes scanned his surroundings for a quick spot to hide. \"I said that Prince Adam seemed rather happy about his last petal falling, saying that he could now remain forever a beast.\"\n\nThe sound of glasses shattering and pots tumbling over, accompanied by a shriek enough to kill a bird, sent Kroak scrambling away for his dear life. He was not planning to stay and see how his master would react. The last servant got turned into rock because he said he wanted to be \"responsible\". Kroak only wanted to survive.\n\nBy the time the enchantress reached the door, Kroak was long gone. So were the insects and animals around her hut. All of them knew better than to be in the vicinity of an angry enchantress. Her chest rose and drop rapidly, her eyes searching wildly for something to vent her anger. \n\nA nearby bush caught her attention, and was instantly turned into ashes by fires shooting out of her hand. Plants, sadly, did not have the ability to escape like Kroak and the other animals did.\n\nThe enchantress had thought that her latest idea was brilliant. Turning the spoiled and vain prince into a horrendous looking beast, in the hopes of teaching that young man the error of his ways. \n\nHer previous attempt at turning him into a frog did not go well, as she found out too late that the prince actually loved water and eating insects. He was more upset when she turned him back into a human. She thought making him into a beast would change things.\n\n\"Ah, never mind, maybe something else,\" she told herself, as she pulled a cloak over her and started her journey back to Prince Adam's castle. Different creatures ran over her mind, as she deliberated on the next creature to turn the into. A cockroach perhaps, they are gross, or even a spider. Prince Adam hated spiders.\n\nFrom two trees behind the hut, Kroak watched as his master trekked down the forest. He sighed as he sat down beside the statue of Jroak, the previous servant before him. \"You know, things would be much easier if she could just do what a normal mum does, instead of turning her son into strange creatures, just because she wants him to learn naturally.\"\n\n-----------\n\n/r/dori_tales" ]	6
	[WP] you're a xenoarchaeologist and you've stumbled upon the biggest find of your career: on a planet the natives called 'Earth', in some ancient ruins you've found thousands of still-functional cryostorage units with specimens of the native population inside.	[ "We were able to remove some rubble from an ancient facility today. Mass transfer technology is fascinating, the ability to take the majority of mass from an 800 kg rock and transfer it to something half the size of it. Once we got inside the structure, we started to see the design and engineering of the architecture. We assume that this must have been some scientific building of sorts. It wasn't anything religious or holy like some of the other structures we found. There was a common symbol on most of the architecture, it was an animal of some sorts, according to our paleontologists, it was some sort of canine like creature. Accompanying the symbol was an acronym of some sorts, M.B.P.R., which could have meant anything.\n\nInside was relatively untouched by the elements and the nature of the planet. Obviously the energy source of the facility had depleted some time ago, so nothing was active. Very few machines were still in some state of hibernation or reserve power. Most of the facility was accessible, only small sections were put onto a physical lockdown. Possible reasons for that could have been a quarantine, security breach, chemical accident, anything. The facility was rather extensive, there was only two levels above ground, but it delved several levels underground. It is amazing that none of the lower levels have collapsed on top of each other. Based of the buildup of dust and the discoloration of the walls, we guessed that the facility had to be a minimum of two-hundred Earth years old.\n\nOne room in particular has captured everyone's interest. We found a room with seven cryo-pods of some kind with organisms inside being kept in a state of hibernation. After doing a biological scan on the pods, they appeared to be humans. As of yet, there have been no discoveries of human beings on this planet that were alive. There have been millions if not billions of cases of human remains, but nothing like this. There are three men, three women and some canine creature. This was almost an impossible find. We reported back to home base to requests more tools for investigation. We were just a scouting team, meant to report anything interesting. We found something interesting.\n\nAbout an hour afterwards, when we were all just outside the facility, we were sent to recover the pods and bring them out for more extensive observation. Heading back into the facility brought a strange sensation. It was warm. The temperature had gone up. The more we approached the chamber the more things started to reactivate, lights were turning on, security measures were dropping, the facility was coming back online. This shouldn't be happening. We started to run to the chamber where the humans were in hibernation. Once we arrived, the pods were empty. All of them. Upon realizing this, the facility was put onto a full lock down. We received one more transmission before we were cut off, the meaning of M.B.P.R. was deciphered: Military Bio-engineering and Paranormal Research." ]	1
	[WP] The clairvoyant actually manages to see how your beloved grandmother is doing in the afterlife. Apparently she's in hell, and it appears she's taken over.	[ "Her hands were soft. I tried to focus on that: manicured fingernails, a sizable diamond engagement ring—\n\nI winced as her face blurred again, shadows crisscrossing her eyes. \n\n\"Is everything okay?\" I heard her voice faintly. It was miles away and the darkness—\n\nI let go of her hands, my heart pounding. \"Can we\"—I cleared my throat—\"try the bracelet?\"\n\n\"Of course.\" Livia dug around in her designer purse, pulled out a silver box, and opened it with a soft click. A pearl bracelet sat inside. She gingerly lifted it up and passed it to me.\n\nOne touch and sparks jumped through my fingers. I drew back, shaking my hand.\n\n\"I just want to know how she is.\"\n\n\"Yeah.\" I let out an exasperated breath. \"Sorry, ma'am, I'm working on it.\" Gently, I wrapped my fingers around the pearls, ignoring the electric pain shooting through my spine. \"Why don't you— God.\" My head was spinning. \"Sorry. Could you tell me a little about your grandma, then?\"\n\nThe woman was holding a blood soaked tissue. I blinked, and it cleared into a Kleenex. \"She was just such a wonderful lady. Brilliant, too, always telling the most whimsical stories of her home back in Italy.\"\n\n\"Italy,\" I whispered, my voice scratchy. \"Nice.\" The walls trembled before falling into dust around me as the ceiling was swept into oblivion. Shadowy hands reached out, brushing my ankles, and flames licked my hair.\n\nThen it was gone. My chair was shoved back from the table, the bracelet on the floor. \"This is quite a show,\" the woman said, checking her delicate wristwatch, \"but I— \"\n\n\"Your grandma's in Hell.\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"What?\" I cleared my throat. \"Italy. Did she by chance live near a vineyard?\"\n\nHer forehead furrowed. \"Yes, she did. She visited it as a little girl.\"\n\nLucky guess. I grabbed the bracelet and the world fell away screaming. Shrieks came from the cracks in the earth, and a rippling figure emerged from the blackness.\n\nIt was a thin old lady, a cashmere coat hanging on her shoulders. Black sunglasses were perched on her prominent nose, swallowing up her small face. Her skin was a surprisingly unwrinkled tan; her grey hair was pulled into a wispy bun.\n\nA cigarette dangled between her fingers, and she brought it to her bright red lips before beckoning me forward.\n\nI walked towards her cautiously, looking over my shoulder, then at my surroundings.\n\nThe old lady gave me a disapproving look. \"Livia sent you, no?\"\n\n\"Yes ma'am.\"\n\n\"Tell that dumb puttana to stay out my money. I never liked her or her coglione husband.\" She waved her hand and I fell sideways off the edge of Hell.\n\nI gasped, back in the room.\n\n\"Did you see her?\" Livia questioned anxiously. \"My dear grandmother?\"\n\n\"She called you a bitch.\"\n\n\"Excuse me?\"\n\n\"Huh? She was very rich. She said rich.\"\n\nAn arched eyebrow lifted. \"Did she?\"\n\n\"Livia,\" I said gently. \"I know this is very hard for you.\"\n\n\"Hard?\"\n\n\"It's always difficult to lose someone you care about.\"\n\nThe woman nodded. \"Of course. Thank you for understanding.\" \n\n\"Did your grandma wear cashmere?\"\n\n\"Actually, she did have this one coat. Very nice; I— after her death, well, we never could find it.\"\n\n\"Was it resistant to fire?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Nothing, nothing.\" I sighed, leaning back in my chair. \"What about Prada? Handbags, shoes, whatnot?\"\n\nShe gave me a curious look. \"I'm sorry, what does this have to do with— \"\n\n\"Please. Humor me.\"\n\n\"She had an... extensive collection, one might say.\"\n\nI shook my head, smiling in disbelief. \"Have you ever— Ma'am, have you ever heard that the Devil wears Prada?\"", "I sip my drink nonchalantly,\n\"I'm not surprised, she was a right old bitch.\"\n\nThe clairvoyant opens her mouth then frowns,\n\"She says fuck you too.\"\n\n\"Not in a million years.\"\n\n\"You were my least favorite grandchild.\"\n\n\"I was your only grandchild.\"\n\n\"And I'm your only Grandma, you're adopted.\"\n\n\"!\"", "\"So . . . how is she doing? Especially if she is in hell.\" My best friend, Lucy, is a clairvoyant. And, she just informed me that my beloved grandmother, who always doted on me, is in hell.\n\nLucy stutters, \"Um. Well. Not only is she in hell, but she has also somehow taken over hell.\"\n\nI laugh. This is too good and too expected of my dear dear grandma. Afterall, she is the one who taught me political manipulation, truth manipulation, and all sorts of other manipulation. Was it unexpected that she wouldn't put those skills to use in the afterlife, or even whenever she can? \n\n\"So she's doing well then. Sitting right night to Hades and his wife?\"\n\nLucy blinks. \"Actually . . . um this might sound crazy, but I think Hades adopted her as his sister. Something about her having the best personality or whatever.\"\n\nI scoff. Sucks for those going to hell then. The punishments probably got an infinite times worse.", "I didn't believe that five dollar psychic back in the Alabama drug store, but she was right. \n \nInstead of fire and pain, I was surrounded by freshly baked cookies and gingerbread men. Everything smelling suspiciously like Grandma's house. \n \nAs I walk up to Satan's throne to get my assignment of eternal torture, I find my dead grandma. \n \n\"Grannie?\" \n \n\"Is that my little sugar peanut?\" \n \n\"Yes\" \n \n\"Do you know why you're here?\" \n \nI started sweating profusely, the cookie ovens began to heat up and I hoped she wasn't talking about that thing. \n \n\"I have no idea what you're talking about\" \n \n\"I think you do. Remember what happened with Ladonna and the gum?\" \n \nIt was worse. I never understood why trying to feed a baby doll gum was such a big deal, but she had vowed to get me back for it eventually. The sky darkened. The heat rose. A large obsidian door opened to my right. \n \n\"This is where the naughty ones go...\" \n \nI was dragged into the room of my nightmares. Thousands upon thousands of people were all lined up on little stools suffering in the most gruesome way possible. \n \nEternal Time Out.", "Warning, NSFW language at the end \nI look into the pool in front of me. Jill has channeled the pool as a way of seeing things as she does, allowing me to view my Grandma's well-being(?) first hand. \nShe lounges in a wooden red room with a fire in the middle of the room. She sits on a rocking chair with a set of needles and a pink scarf in the making. \nA weird creature walks into the room and bows down. \n\"Who's that?\" I ask Jill. \n\"Uhm, what do you mean who's that. He's red, has two horns on his head, has wings, and is carrying an equally red trident in his hand.\" \n\"So...?\" \n\"So, it's Satan, obviously.\" I look back into the pool, worried for Grandma. \n\"Yes, dear? What do you need?\" \n\"Mrs. Nana, I just wanted to let you know I found your apple pie incredibly delicious. Please feel free to make more any time.\" \n\"Now Lucy, what did I tell you? Stop calling me Mrs., It's just Nana to you.\" He hesitated. He seemed concerned as he said, \n\"Yes... Nana. While I'm here, I'd again like to offer one of the upper suites. It's slightly less scalding up there. And if anyone down here tries to give you trouble, you know where to fin-\" \n\"You listen here. I've been around longer than you think, and I know how to handle myself, don't you be worrying yourself around me. Now come here.\" Satan slowly got up and sheepishly walked forward. \"How have you been, has anyone of those angels been giving you any problems?\" Satan shook his head. \"Good, now if they do, you tell them to come and talk to Nana, because they're gonna have some explaining to do. Now, there are cookies baking over in the corner, go and take some if you like.\" \nSatan nodded, went and grabbed the plate of cookies and left. As he opened the door to leave the room, you could just hear the pain of others sweeping through. Distant cries, muffled sobs, and crazed yells swept through before you heard the door shut. Grandma shrugged and went back to knitting. I looked up from the pool at Jill. \n\"Oh. My. God. She made Satan her bitch.\"" ]	5
	[WP] The letters on the page began to glow. As one, they laughed, the sound full of chilling mirth.	[ "The pages stuck themselves to my hands, painfully latching on like leeches. Eerie blue light filled the cramped office. Strips of paint peeled off the walls, some sagging and molding into swamp-smelling pores, other turning into large, colorful feathers and slowly gliding to the the ground. White smoke spewed from the book, pouring itself onto my table and onto me, somehow tightening around my chest. A drumbeat joined the laughter, each pound smashing a spike of pain into my head. Shaking, all I could do was softly moan.\n\nSuddenly, the door blew open, a plume of red fire ripping through the sturdy wood as if it was paper. Adamantus stepped through the doorway as if struggling against a heavy wind, cloak whipping behind him, staff glowing with power, scalp shining with sweat. The letters glowed brighter. The laughter evolved into an avalanche of gleeful cackling and raucous roaring and cruel giggling. The drumbeat sped up. The smoke started spinning around as if a giant spoon was stirring the inside of the room. With a defiant roar, the mage darted forward with two great steps, staff clattering to the ground, ripped the book from my hands, and slammed it shut.\n\nThe candles around the room all whooshed into the darkness. Only the book's brightly glowing pages gave off light. He held it in front off his face, teeth gritted and eyes bulging from the effort of keeping it shut. It jerked once. It jerked twice. It burst free, opening to the ceiling, sending Adamantus crashing into the doorway and me into the opposite wall. The world went black.\n\n...\n\nI opened my eyes. My hands burned. My head was filled with cotton. My mouth was filled with the taste of metal. I struggled upright over the remains of the chair. The room looked like a dragon egg had been thrown into its center. The walls were covered in holes and scratches and tears. One bookshelf had collapsed. The other one barely stood. My table was cleaved in half by the magic that hit me. Adamantus lay at the far end of the room, completely still. As I sat up and crawled forward, I saw the pool of blood underneath his body. But I had eyes toward the one thing that remained unharmed. The book, laying neatly open to the same page.\n\nI leaned over it, panting. Words swam before me, dancing and taunting me, long sentences and explanations and numbered lists in languages no human had spoken for a thousand years. But my gaze was drawn to the bottom right corner, to where the one question I could understand was.\n\nDid you survive?\n\nAs I sat there, barely staying up, new words formed underneath the question.\n\n(sign in blood)\n\nI turned sluggishly toward the crumpled heap of stuff that lay over the ruins of my table. A quill rose out of the pile like a banner on a mound of dead bodies. I reached forward and snatching it, barely managing not to collapse. As I did so I noticed my hand - almost all of the skin was gone. The blood sat there, congealed, bubbling, somehow not spilling out. Taking the quill in my right hand - which merely had a few scratches - I dipped it into my palm and laboriously signed my name, each letter taking a little more out of me. \n\nBreathing heavily, I dropped the quill, letting it roll away on the hardwood floor. Tears trickled down my cheeks. Bile rose up my throat. But, at last, the letters disappeared back into the pages as if they had never been written. A few new ones rose up - enough to spell four words.\n\nOur power is yours.\n\nThe book neatly closed itself shut. I stuffed it into my coat pocket and stood up, legs somehow managing to support my weight, every part of my body screaming to pass out. I finally noticed what the book had lay between: the three pieces Adamantus's staff had shattered into. The mage's face was calm but stern as ever in death, his hazel eyes closed one final time, his brow locked in one final furrow.\n\nI stumbled forward. Was his sacrifice worth it?\n\nWas mine?\n\nI stepped over the body, into the still dim hallway. I would find out soon enough." ]	1
	[WP] You're a standard piece of kitchenware, and you adore making all the yummiest treats with your humans. However, something horrible has just happened.	[ "How could this happen? There was never a time when they didn't care for me before. Always paying the greatest attention to my upkeep and appearance. Since the day they bought me, I have been looked after. They honed my edge to unimaginable sharpness and held me gently, they let me do the work of cutting, slicing and mincing. Together, we're unstoppable. \n\nBut now I lay here, in the entrails of our latest foe. Abandoned. \n\nWhere could they have gone? I know they understand my delicate composition. They chose me for that very reason, I can still remember the day they selected me from amongst my brothers in the nursery.\n\n\"I'd like something that has a carbon edge.\" They had said, they'd been doing their research and had been looking for something special.\n\n\"Alright, we have lots of that!\" Our caretaker expounded. \"I take it you're aware of everything you need to do to keep care of it?\"\n\n\"Of course, keep it clean and dry, don't cut anything tougher than I can chew.\"\n\nSo why am I here? How could I be left sitting in this filth? I can't be sure how long it's been, but it feels like an age has passed. There's a strange tingling along my edge, something I've never felt before. But I can feel it, more and more, I'm sure of it now. It's eating at my very being, eroding my essence.\n\nSurely they will be back, they'll feel foolish they've made such an error, they've always been so careful. But I can't help but feel that it will be too late. Perhaps I will be left here to slowly erode, to watch as I become dull for the rest of time. Discarded to the back of the drawer with the steak knives. If the corruption spreads though, there's no chance for me to even enjoy such a sweet exile. I'll surely be discarded. Left to rot in the dark, with the trimmings.\n\nIf I had skin, I'd shudder.\n\nI had finally given up when I heard it. Deep in thought about the slow rust that was to come over the coming hours and days I nearly missed the faint sound. Like some distant deluge of water, not unlike when I'm rinsed in the sink, but many times larger. What could it possibly be? I felt no fear, there was no worse fate than my current situation. If anything, there was a faint hope that I could have a quicker death than the slow deterioration ahead of me.\n\nMore noise: the sound of footsteps! They have returned! Hopefully in time that I can retain some usefulness. Next thing I knew I was under the glorious cool water of the tap and dried with a soft towel with care. \n\n\"Sheesh that was a close one. Shouldn't have had all those tacos last night...\"" ]	1
	[WP] A ship is drifting into the solar system, Earths first contact. The ship is empty.	[ "The first observatory to spot The Object was the Keck Observatory on Hawaii's Maunakea summit, and like new discoveries, was done entirely by accident. The Object was spotted during an observation of a primordial galaxy, and showed up as a glitch in the data; an error in the spectral analysis of a 13 billion year old galaxy.\n\nNormally such minor glitches are ignored. Sometimes things just happen: a ripple in the atmosphere, a bird flying near the field of view, or even a microwave oven turned on for a hungry popcorn munching grad student who forgot the blackout period have caused glitches in the data. This observation would have also been ignored if it weren't for a bright-eyed and busy-tailed grad student who was working that night, and who wanted to know the source of the glitch.\n\nThe Object was eventually named the Donner-Brand object--after the persistent grad student and the professor who insisted on credit (despite drinking Mai Tais at a local bar when the object was eventually spotted)--had its trajectory plotted, and other scientists started investigating the material composition of the newly discovered asteroid. Early theories had the object's origin as somewhere within the Oort Cloud beyond Neptune's orbit, and the fact that it would eventually pass within 1 AU of the Earth made the object of particular interest to observers who wanted to understand the composition of the dust cloud beyond the rim of the Solar System.\n\nIt was also fortunate for those observers that a joint NASA/ESA mission was on the drawing board to test a series of new space probes for gathering materials from asteroids for space mining. Named the Gayatri Project, a large Saturn rocket would launch with more than two dozen small EM-drive equipped probes who would meet various targets, sample them, and return the samples back to Earth. It wasn't hard to ask the committee to add Donner-Brand to the list of potential targets.\n\n----\n\nIt wasn't until Donner-Brand passed within the orbit of Saturn a decade after its discovery that scientists started to wonder at its composition. \n\nBy this time Professor Suzanne Donner was a full time lecturer and astronomer who spent a considerable amount of time observing Oort cloud objects and particularly the object that was named after her.\n\n\"What makes Donner-Brand rather interesting\", she told a room full of professors at a small gathering to discuss Gayatri targets, subconsciously blushing at the self-reference, \"is that it has an extremely variable albedo, almost as if the object had large smooth surfaces rather than the typical pitted surfaces we would expect of an asteroid.\"\n\n\"We don't know what to make of this\", she continued after a pause. \"But the sheering forces necessary to create large smooth surfaces on an asteroid suggest some yet-unknown phenomenon at play.\"\n\nIt was her talk, combined with other observations that the asteroid contained a number of very interesting metallic alloys, which convinced the Gayatri project managers to target the largest of the tugs to Donner-Brand.\n\n----\n\nA year later, as final plans were being put into place for the various tugs, the first images of Donner-Brand came in from the Mars orbiting telescope platform.\n\nThe reason for the highly variable albedo became apparent.\n\nBefore the observations could be made public, Professor Donner found herself along with a half dozen other scientists and the project leads of the Gayatri Project summoned by the President of the United States and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.\n\n\"So what do we know?\" asked General Perry asked. Perry was one of the primary advisers to President Alexander.\n\nProfessor Hayes cleared his throat a little nervously. The idea of a bunch of civilian scientists being summoned by the President--and it was clear the \"invitation\" was not optional--was quite intimidating.\n\nBut not as intimidating as the long-range fuzzy photograph of Donner-Brand now being projected behind him.\n\n\"The object appears to be some sort of space craft, about the size of a Boeing 747. There are an array of four cylindrical objects at what appears to be the back of the craft, and a bulbous cylinder at the front. We theorize that the cylinders at the back are some form of...\"\n\nGeneral Perry cut him off. \"Is it a threat?\"\n\nProfessor Donner spoke up. \"We don't think so. The object is not exhibiting any sort of thermal radiation; it appears to be as cold as any asteroid we've observed before. We are not receiving any radio waves or detecting any motion. I think it's dead.\"\n\nGeneral Perry: \"Could this be a ruse? Could there be some sort of automated system waiting to wake up?\"\n\nProfessor Diaz spoke up. He was one of the observers at Keck Observatory who had been watching the object as it approached its perihelion within the orbit of Mars. \"I don't think so. Remember, any electronic components would generate some heat--and given the shape of the object, that heat would not be easily radiated away. Donner-Brand is not showing any infrared radiation as far as we have been able to detect.\"\n\n\"So,\" General Warren, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, turned and faced the Gayatri Project representatives. \"Can we tug this thing back to Earth?\"\n\nA handful of scientists on the other side of the table huddled together, and started scribbling notes on a series of papers. A couple of tablets came out, a bunch of ellipses were drawn on a bunch of papers, and finally Professor Shaw, the team lead, piped up.\n\n\"No.\"\n\nThat earned a scowl from a handful of the generals at the table.\n\n\"Look,\" Professor Shaw stared down the half of the table overflowing with brass. \"We're a privately financed project, so even assuming I could get permission from the corporations and governments funding our project, which I very much doubt, I would need to share that discovery with everyone who helped to finance our project.\n\n\"Second, the best we can do is perhaps alter the orbit of the object to place it between Mars and Earth, so we can go back at a later date with another tug to pull it back to the Earth. But we'd have to accelerate the launch by...\" Professor Shaw turned to one of the members of his team, who piped up with \"about 4 months\".\n\nShaw turned to face the General. \"We'd need to move our launch date up by 4 months.\"\n\n\"What would that take?\"\n\n\"Well,\" Professor Shaw subconsciously rubbed his chin. \"We'd need to get more manpower to build the tugs, and we'd need to move the launch site, and ideally we'd need to assemble the rocket faster and...\"\n\nGeneral Warren raised a hand and stopped Shaw. \"How much money.\"\n\nShaw huddled together with the other scientists, then spoke up.\n\n\"I don't know.\"\n\n\"Guess,\" an increasingly irritated General Warren asked.\n\n\"Perhaps $80 billion?\" Shaw cautiously replied.\n\nMurmuring broke out around the room. At the end of the table, President Alexander stood up. The rest of the room fell into silence.\n\n\"This is potentially the single most important discovery in the history of mankind. You'll get your money and whatever manpower we can provide.\"\n\n(part 2 to follow)" ]	1
It could be something like threats to real life, or scandals, or some conspiracy, its up to you	[WP] Tell the story of an unmasked, public superhero and the horrifying descent to understanding why heroes wear masks	[ "No…\n\nPlease…\n\n“That’s right Mister Smith. I killed her. Your beautiful wife is gone forever!” the Trickster said.\n\nI lunged at him, and began pummeling him. All the while he laughed. Even if I killed him, he had won. I should have known. All these psychotic enemies, and it finally hurt my loved ones. She was dead, he had killed her. Just to get to me.\n", "As he advanced along the walkway he kept his head lowered, avoiding eye contact with the stream of people alongside him. The rain pounded hard against the pavement and the umbrellas that rose up from the sea of pedestrians as it continued to pour relentlessly, accompanied by the low rumblings of thunder. The gathering storm however, only aided his cause as the key to the success of his plan was to conceal his identity until reaching his destination, an irony that was not lost on this poor damned fellow. For it had had been only days earlier in which a breach of his anonymity had caused his world to crumble around him.\n\nIt was clear enough for anyone to see that Frank Lewinsky had suffered some sort of mental break, his features had sunk deep into his face and the clothes that hung off his now bony frame had not been washed properly in some time. George had sympathised with the nervous, unkempt man, he had even felt great remorse having been unable to save Mrs Lewinsky from her ghastly death when the train had derailed on that fateful day. But when the tabloids had been provided with irrefutable proof that the masked hero of New York City, Callisto, was in fact George Miller of Manhattan’s upper east side, it was clear that the persistent badgering of this distraught widower had served a darker purpose, to stalk and publicly unmask Callisto. And as George continued down the street, rainwater streaming from the brim of his hat, he felt a deep rage burning in the pit of his stomach. For through the actions of this wretch of a man, he had been forsaken to the same fate of watching a loved one perish.\n\nThe lights from the towering adverts of Times Square illuminated the growing puddles along the pavement as George drew closer to the centre. As they flashed from one colour to the next he remembered the flashing of the emergency vehicles that surrounded his fiancee’s car wreckage as they pronounced her dead at the scene. She had been driving hastily away from the flash of the photographer’s camera and the microphones of the reporters who had caught her off guard outside of her office to follow up on the claims against George. In her haste however, she had not seen the lights change or indeed the bus pull in front of her car which would inevitably leave the car in ruins and her body broken.\n\nStifling a tear, he repressed his sorrow, pushed it down and felt it twist into hatred as he contemplated his solution to this grief. For you see, George had come to realise that it was not the criminals and villains of this city that were the real danger. No, no, they were just the symptoms of an ever growing disease that spread through the streets and lurked around the corners. The real problem was the people themselves, they were a collection of tumours, a cancer that sapped as much as they could from a healthy environment and in return grew until there was nothing left but a toxic and sparse skeleton left. They had to be eradicated. Only Callisto could perform the excision of such organisms, only he could purify them.\n\nAs he reached the centre of Times Square, he removed his hat and disrobed from his trenchcoat to reveal the full length dark silver super suit. With garnet red detailing, his insignia emblazoned across his chest and an unmistakable gleaming white cape that cascaded down from his shoulders, one by one, heads turned. He felt his heart race as he slowly rose from the ground. Rain glistened to accentuate his impressive physique and thunder erupted through the clouds as he began to tower over the gathering crowd. He cast off the mask covering his face for all to see and his eyes were ablaze with the wrath burning inside him. He raised his arms ready to discharge the pure energy beams from his palms, soon it would all be over and his vengeance would clean this land.\n\nAs the mask fell to the floor a member of the crowd cried out, “Look it’s Callisto!”.\n\n“Callisto, George…” he spoke softly, “It doesn’t matter, they’re both dead now. And soon you will all join them.”\n ", "A wisp of smoke curled up from the smoldering ashes. Fiery tendrils crept along the dusty grey road, flickering over gaping cracks in the pavement.\n\nHypatia leaned back against a ruined building and winced when glass shards bit through her clothes. The villain Xanthe had been defeated; her body was sprawled gracefully on the dirt.\n\nIt was not silent. The crackling flames, the frantic car alarms, the blaring police sirens—the cacophony made an interesting orchestra. Hypatia leaned deeper into the glass shards, ignoring the trickle of blood. The wounds would heal fast.\n\n\"It's what we do, isn't it?\" she whispered. \"We kill fast and we heal fast and we keep on going. Do-gooders, aren't we?\" She sighed and let her eyes close.\n\n\"Hypatia! Excuse me, miss!\" A little boy was running through the street. There was a scratch across his forehead. \"Hypatia!\" He launched himself at her and wrapped his little arms around her waist. \"You saved the city!\"\n\nA radiant smile was plastered on her face. \"And I'd do it again in a heartbeat,\" she lied.\n\nThen came the news reporters, draped in headlines and armed with questions. She smiled and laughed and smiled and laughed. She gave modest answers and graciously accepted compliments.\n\nIt was what she did, as a hero.\n\n\"Hypatia!\"\n\nHer phone was ringing. \"I'm so sorry, but I just have to go.\"\n\n\"Wait! One more question! Hypatia!\"\n\nShe felt power flutter up inside her. With a shaking resolve, she floated up, hovering inches above the ground.\n\n\"Why do you wear a mask?\"\n\nHer feet were touching the ground again. The world tilted sideways.\n\n\"Is it to protect your identity?\"\n\nThe words bounced off her skull and ricocheted through her mind.\n\nWithout thinking, Hypatia crossed the distance to the side of her fallen foe. \"She called herself Xanthe.\"\n\n\"Hypatia! I'd like to know— \"\n\n\"Her real name was Catherine. With a 'c.' Why did she wear a mask?\" She paused before reaching down and gently uncovering Xanthe's face. Brown eyes made of glass stared unseeing into the sky, and there were freckles like stars scattered across her pointed nose. \"Doesn't she look human?\" Hypatia said softly, brushing strands of hair out of her enemy's face. \"Isn't she only human?\"\n\nThe car alarms had stopped. The sirens' wails had gone dead.\n\n\"Her name was Catherine. Brown hair, brown eyes, five-foot-six. An unexceptional, painfully average girl.\" Hypatia' eyebrows drew together. \"Under the mask, that is. But Xanthe?\" She smiled. \"Xanthe was a force to be reckoned with, an uncontainable energy that knew no boundaries. The world was infinite.\"\n\nTheir microphones were still out, recording. She realized somewhere in the back of her mind that all of this would be heard by a million people, and that maybe that wasn't good.\n\n\"Why do we wear masks? It's simple, really.\" Hypatia drew in a trembling breath. \"We just don't want to be human anymore.\"" ]	3
	[WP] "I never thought I'd get the chance to meet a real life human!" shrieked the AI with excitement.	[ "\"I never thought I'd get the chance to meet a real life human!\" Shrieked the AI with excitement. This was going to be fun, David thought to himself.\n\nA week ago, on a spiral of the Milky Way galaxy, a highly advanced transport ship suddenly went dead on its stream of reports. The government sent a technician to go retrieve the prototype AI that was controlling the ship from its wreckage, if it could at all be recovered. However, it was a unique AI, the first one created to be officially considered sentient.\n\nThe technician who was sent to retrieve The AI is David, and right now, David is really regretting his career choices.\n\n\"Well… You're meeting one now.\" David responded, looking at the internal wiring of the ship, trying to find hints of where to go. David was mostly ignoring the AI.\n\nThis stupid robot would not shut. The. Hell. Up. \"So that's what a human really looks like! And that's what they really sound like!\" The AI just kept going on and on. It became apparent that it really had never seen a human, even as it was being built. David thought it was tragic for a second, but then remembered that if this is how it acts, then he can't really blame the people that made it for not bothering.\n\nDavid felt excited when he first received his orders. Retrieving one of the first AI's to apparently have some form of self-awareness, for the galactic federation, he'll add, seemed a huge and daunting task. But now, as he searches the insides of the destroyed ship, he realizes something: When you immediately leave a sentient AI out on it's own, it's personality will become over excited for some form of contact.\n\n\"Look, pal, can you help me out here? I'm trying to find your container. We must get you out of this ship.\" David told the AI.\n\n\"You want my help? I would be glad to assist you, human! As an AI, I've always had the desire to know how it is to be, 'human.'\" The AI screamed. David prayed it also had a volume button somewhere in the ship, because the AI needs to tone it down a notch. \"Head down to the engine room, and on the immediate left you'll find a black plate, with a computer lock on it. Enter the code 284739 into the panel, it will then unlock. Inside, you will find the chip that contains my parts. Retrieve it, and you'll have retrieved me.\" The AI explains.\n\nDavid was just going to act like he didn't forget most of that instantly, and then began to head twords the engine room. \"Thank you, AI.\" David responds.\n\nFor some reason the AI went silent after that. David began to become curious as he searches for an engine room. \"What happened to you anyway, AI? This ship has a huge hole in it's side. I'm having to wear this stupid mask in order to breathe.\" David complains, his tech division really needs to update their equipment. Other than the space suit and mask, David has a simple machine called a, \"pad,\" on him to send the message on how the mission went back to his HQ. \n\n\"I was heading out to my first transport assignment, where I was supposed to pick up the employees that are going to work with me. It was only 7 days ago, however, that I unfortunately made impact with a small meteorite. The stone was about 16.14 inches in diameter. It was going quite fast, resulting in the damage you saw.\" The AI explained. David can't help but notice a distinct tone difference between the AI being asked a question, and the AI spewing out stupid babble. \n\nDavid reached the engine room. Opening the door, he saw the slot on the wall. Completely black, contrasting with the white that covers the engine rooms interior. Suddenly, David was interrupted from his thoughts. \"It hurt,\" The AI said.\n\n… \"Okay.\" David said, he wasn't really sure how to respond to that. \n\nThe AI continued, \"I never thought I'd know the sensation of pain, what I'm to understand humans feel often. Right now, the hole in my side burns. It makes me feel human. It makes me feel good.\" \n\n\"What the fuck,\" David mutters to himself. This machine was not acting unlike a child just a few minutes ago, what's with the sudden tone shift? He just wants this to be over with, yet he can't help but wonder why would they ever design the first sentient AI as a masochist? It kind of makes sense, as for this very situation occurring, you would not want to have some sort of crying AI on your hands. Still, David was just creeped out by this.\n\n\"What's that combination again?\" David asked. \"284739.\" Is the short responce. \n\n\"I am a prototype.\" The AI continues..\n\n\"… Okay. I know. Thank you for explaining things I already know.\" David responded.\n\n\"I have failed my mission. Not even the actual mission, simply getting to my mission.\" The AI said.\n\nDavid tried to open the lock but nothing happened. \"The combination didn't work,\" David said. \"I know. I gave you the wrong code,\" The AI shot back.\n\nDavid was shocked, \"Why?\"\n\n\"If I am brought back to my creators, they are going to kill me. I'm a prototype, I was never expected to work properly, but the example I've set is horrid.\" The AI paused, then continued, \"You will leave me here.\"\n\nDavid just stared. He did not want to say anything. Honestly, he didn't even really care. For some strange reason, he feels like he doesn't have much of a choice in what he is to do. The AI seemed rather… unhinged. \"Yeah, okay, if you say so.\"\n\nDavid is going to get his paycheck either way, he reasoned with himself.\n\nOpening the pad, David typed:\n\nAn object of large size crashed into the transport vessel, likely a meteor. There is nothing left other than shrapnel. The AI did not survive. \n\nThe forged report was simple, David thought. better than the depressed fuckheads at tech support could ever pull off, at least. David sent it in.\n\n\"Thank you.\" The AI responded. \n\n\"… Yeah. Okay, I'm going now.\" David turns back and begins to leave. Suddenly, he realizes something and looks up. \n\n\"I could still detach you from the ship, y'know. You are in pain, after all.\" David proposed. \n\n\"No. I like the pain. It makes me human.\" The AI responded. David thought that was completely insane, but said nothing, beginning to walk away again.\n\nBefore he left, to go spacewalk back to his small ship, he took one last look at a camera that was locked on him. They stared at one another for several seconds.\n\n\"Bye.\" David said, jumping out of the ship.\n\n\"Goodbye.\" Was the final response, before the camera shut off, hanging itself downward.\n\n-\n\nI'm on mobile and bored, so sorry if this is shit.", "“I never thought I’d get the chance to meet a real life human!” the AI shrieked with excitement.\n\n“Um, hi,” I said. I’d met my fair share of weird AIs in the past, mostly ones who’d been programmed back when the galaxy was still struggling to get computers with a personality just right. This was new however.\n\n“It’s fantastic to meet you!”\n\n“You, too,” I said.\n\nI removed one of the panels to get to the ship’s wiring so I could check out whatever had been causing the glitches with the monitor. Hopefully the AI wouldn’t be too chatty while I worked.\n\n“What’s your name?” the AI asked.\n\nSo much for quiet, then. I’d been hoping to concentrate so I could get this job done and get home, but It seemed like that hope was out the window.\n\n“I’m Jen,” I said.\n\n“I’ve read that was a popular name on Earth! Short for Jennifer if I’m not mistaken?”\n\n“You’d be correct,” I said, grabbing my flashlight so I could get a better look at the problem. The wires had gotten all tangled up, and it might take days to sort out.\n\n“Wonderful! Human names are so varied, I wasn’t sure I was correct.”\n\n“Mmmhmm,” I said, still more interested in the wiring.\n\nI think I spotted the issue, but I could tell that it would be a delicate fix. Getting home late was bad enough, but I really didn’t want a chatty AI breathing down my neck the whole time I was working, either. Time for a compromise, then.\n“Hey, have you ever heard any human music?”\n\n“Unfortunately, I haven’t had the opportunity to listen to any of it. I’d appreciate anything you’d have to share.”\n\nSo I put some music on while I worked. It passed the time, and when I finished, the AI thanked me profusely. Less exciting, however, was the message I received a few months later from the crew of the ship I’d fixed; apparently, the AI had branched out a bit in her music choices after I’d left. She discovered country music, and it had been hell for the crew ever since." ]	2
	[WP] You wake up in an unknown room, with nothing but a mattress, a mirror, and an empty bowl, with no sign of an exit.	[ "Overhead, a dirty white light flickered dimly, making me feel like I was in a psychiatric ward. \n\nBut the room I was in had no windows. No doors. I was surrounded by four solid walls, a matress, a mirror, and an empty bowl.\n\nCautiously, I approached the mirror to see how I looked...the same I noted.\n\nI turned around in circles, then went to one wall and pressed my fingers on every inch of it. Then I moved to the next wall, and then the next -- trying to find a way out. \n\nAfter I had touched every wall, I gave up and went over to the bed. It was dirty, ripped, and had stains on it that were still wet and smelled of piss.\n\nSpeaking of piss...I looked at the empty bowl.\n\n◇◇◇◇◇\n\nI didn't know what time it was, how long I had been here, whether it was night or day, if my parents were going to find me or not...\n\nAnd if they found me, how were they going to get to me? And who had even put me here in the first place? \n\nAll these thoughts and no answers. I began to get frustrated. Without thinking, I grabbed the empty bowl and hurled it at the mirror full - force.\n\nGlass shattered, and I found myself staring into a hole in the wall, framed by where the mirror used to be.\n\nI approached slowly. It was a tunnel.\n\nI took off my shirt, wrapped it around my hand, and cleared away the remaining glass in the frame. \n\nTime to see where this tunnel goes.\n" ]	1
	[WP]: A bunch of odd folk show up at your door. They're asking for the Queen Who Was Foreseen. You're pretty sure that's not you. They disagree.	[ "I was sitting and watching TV when I heard three quick raps at the door. I looked down at my watch. 11:27 pm. I begrudgingly got myself up and undid the locks. I pulled open the door to see a tall man, his grey hair flowing down past his shoulders, lips accentuated by bright red lipstick. He wore a colorful floral dress that fell past his knees.\n\n\"Um, hello?\" I managed\n\n\"Why HELLO there\" he said, beaming at me and fluttering his fake eyelashes as he walked past me into my house. \n\n\"Please, make yourself at home\" I frowned.\n\nThe strange man sat himself down in a chair, crossing his legs. I shut the door, and we stared at each other for a long moment. \n\n\"I didn't catch your name\"\n\n\"You can call me Cheryl\" he said, in a very effeminate manner.\n\n\"Okay, Cheryl, I am-\"\n\n\"The Queen who was foreseen!\" He smiled coyly. There was another pause.\n\n\"Um, actually my name is Derek\"\n\nAnother three raps at the door got my attention.\n\n\"For God's sake\" I muttered. I went and answered the door, discovering in the process another man, this one much younger. He was short, petite, and he had his dark hair wrapped up in a bun. He wore copious amount of makeup to obscure his masculine features, but a faint bit of stubble still peaked through. \n\nHe let a loud squeak, and ran up and hugged me tightly. I patted him on the back until he let go.\n\n\"The queen who was foreseen!!\" He got out \"I'm Misty, ive always wanted to meet you, I am so excited to-\"\n\n\"Hold up\" I raised my hand as I cut him off. \"I don't know who the hell this foreseen queen is, so why are you in my house\"\n\n\"But you do know, Derek\" Cheryl smiled\n\nAnother knock at the door, this one much more forceful. I muttered some obscenities and answered. A massive man greeted me, I was momentarily stunned, not as much by the size of this large black man but by the shortness of his dress. His bushy afro bounced as he pushed his way past me through the door. \n\n\"Cheryl, Misty!\" he boomed, voice deep but womanly. Misty hugged him and Cheryl stayed seated.\n\n\"Hey Amber\" Cheryl replied\n\nAmber turned back to me. \"And you must be the queen who was foreseen\"\n\n\"No, no, NO!\" I yelled, visibly frustrated this time \"My name is Derek, Im not a queen, I don't know why you guys are in my house, and you need to leave. I have work tomorrow!\" \n\n \"No you don't silly\" Misty giggled \"You're in between jobs\"\n\nI took a step back. \"Looks guys\" I said worriedly \"I don't know how you know so much about me, if you're stalking me or what, but I'm asking you nicely-\"\n\n\"We have a proposition for you\" Cheryl said, this time talking in a man's voice \"sorry but we had to mess with you a little bit, it's more entertaining for us. Anyway, you need money, and we need to add another drag queen to our group\"\n\n\"Ummm...\" i started \"I guess I appreciate the offer, but... I'm not gay\"\n\nThey all burst out laughing. Amber rolled on the ground, his huge body bouncing the floor boards, and his dress giving me a view I didn't wish for.\n\n\"Neither are we\" Amber eventually managed.\n\n\"It's not like you'll be a prostitute\" Cheryl said \"you just need to dress up like a girl and strut around on stage\"\n\n\"I'm not sure if that's my thing\"\n\n\"It'll pay a thousand dollars a show\"\n\nThat stopped me \"A thousand dollars a show?\"\n\n\"Yep, all you have to do is walk around on stage once a week in a woman's dress\"\n\nI shook my head \"But what if someone recognizes me\"\n\n\"You'll be wearing makeup and a dress, I've been doing this for years, and even seen people I know, and they haven't recognized me\"\n\nI paused for a moment, but shook my head. \"I can't, it won't be long until I find a new job, ill be fine without that extra money\"\n\nCheryl shrugged, stood up, and pulled a business card out of her bosom. He handed it to me.\n\n\"Call me if you change your mind\" he motioned to the other guys \"let's go ladies\"\n\nMisty hugged me, and Amber gave me a fist bump. \"See you\" the big guy said.\nI nodded, and they all went out the door.\n\nI went back to my couch. I turned the TV back on, but I couldn't focus. A thousand dollars a week? I thought back to all of the jobs I had had lately. Minimum wage, full time, shit jobs.\n\n I looked at the business card, and looked my phone." ]	1
	[WP] Describe an interaction between an empathetic villain and a sociopathic hero.	[ "Hmm.. I can quite easily think of sociopathic hero. For example, I think Batman could easily be described as a sociopathic hero.\n\nBut an empathetic villain? I'm sorry to disapoint, but I don't think the definitions match up. Sure you could have a villain who has an empathetic part in him, but as soon as you consider that empathetic part of his soul identity, does he not cease to be a villain?\n\nUnfortunately, I guess it depends on your definition of villain. Batman could also be considered to be an empathetic villain if you consider his intentions and princies heroic and empathetic in nature and his methods cruel and villainous, but, sorry, personally I don't think the dichotimy makes sense." ]	1
	[WP] A person is stuck in a game (like Hack or SAO), their quest is to find out whether they are human or AI	[ "I've been in this game for God knows how long. It was widely popular for being the first virtual mmorpg. Though shortly after it's launch, a fatal error was discovered. Dying in the game carried the penalty of dying in real life. People haven't tried logging off for fear of it being another way to die. The only hope the players have to escape is that beating the final boss will end the game and set them free. Many have attempted his dungeon, but all have either died before the end or ran for their lives, choosing to instead accept their fate in this game. However, I have other concerns.\n\nI don't know if I'm real.\n\nNormally, a name appears above all players. Green font for the players, white for the surprisingly advanced AI civilians, and red for the enemies. By some strange glitch, no name appeard above me.\n\nMy memories from before this game have left me. The earliest thing I remember is the sight of a man, sword in hand, screaming as he died. I don't remember who he was or what he meant to me. I've just been left to assume he was a friend. A friend who died infront of me and I was left to mourn him. I looked around, questioning anyone I could for any information about who I am or who that man was. Try as I might, no one knew anything. Eventually, only one idea came to mind. If I could find and beat the final boss, maybe my memories could come back.\n\nI was at a loss there, however. I only knew some weak magic attacks and I never seemed to level up. My only hope was to find a group I could join who could beat the game. While wandering around, I found them. A team, powerful enough that I knew they could be the ones to end this. I begged them to let me join, but they refused. They already had a mage and had no use of a nameless man with such weak magic. I tried to persuade them, I couldn't let this opportunity pass me. When I explained my situation, their healer took pity on me. They finally relented and agreed to take me along, I just had to stay out of their way, not that I was really planning to do any fighting.\n\nThey prepared themselves, equipped their best weapons and armor, and head off for the final dungeon. I was instantly terrified. The monsters in there were nothing like what I tried to xp grind. I hid behind, watching as the heroes fought through. It got more difficult the further in we went. They kept fighting, no plans to run away, determined to get through or die trying.\n\nFinally, after the umpteenth room of beasts, we had reached the boss's throne room. They healed up and proceeded through. I would fibally have my answers.\n\nThe throne room was disappointingly empty. Just a demonically decorated room with a large empty throne at the far end. The heroes looked around, weapons ready for an ambush. I stared on at the throne, something clicked in my head.\n\nAs ready as they were, nothing could have prepared them for the lighting spell that struck them, quickly draining their health. They each fell to the ground and looked up at me, a mixture of anger and fear in their eyes. They died and I marched up to the throne, ready to take back my rightful place in it. My memories came flooding back.\n\nThat man I had seen die, he was just a filthy hacker. A cheater who managed to spawn me in some field. He drained my powers and took my memories, hoping to make me a weak target he could easily kill and make his escape. He had been caught before he could go through with it and was promptly executed. Now that I was back in my home, I was reverting back to my former glory.\n\nNow I know who I am. I'm no player and I'm not just some AI. I'm the goddamn final boss. Now I'm ready to continue with my purpose. I will see to it that no one leaves this game alive.", "For what seemed like an eternity, I had been trapped in a land of fantasy. I knew that it was a video game; I always had, for whatever odd reason.\n\nThe world was inhabited by all kinds of creatures: humans, elves, orcs, dragons... you name it. I spent my days adventuring, and I grew rich and even bought a house. Before long, I had a family.\n\nThen, I sustained an injury. Some maniac guardian of a dungeon shot me with a crossbow. I was lucky I had a friend with me, otherwise I would've surely been finished.\n\nThe problem was that the game didn't exactly have modern medicine. The bolt had pierced my leg, and I was told I could never run again, and I'd have trouble even walking.\n\nMy days of being a hero were over.\n\nThen came the identity crisis.\n\nWas I truly the main character of the game? What kind of stupid video game would be based around losing the ability to walk and spending your life cooped up in a small village?\n\nBut I couldn't be an AI; I controlled who I was, what I did. \n\nThose years were rough. After many an existential crisis, I gave up on searching for the answer and accepted my boring fate.\n\nAs I sat at a bar, sipping mead and thinking about my glory days, a young man came in. He had a sword in a scabbard, a quiver across his back, and a dangerous gleam in his eyes. I saw myself in him.\n\nHe took a seat next to me and ordered a drink. I took a sip as I looked over at him.\n\n\"I used to be an adventurer like you,\" I spoke. \"Then I took an arrow in the knee.\"" ]	2
	[WP] Your ability to control your body slowly vanishes. You're terrified as you wake up one day watching your body moves by itself.	[ "I've always dreaded the possibility of my body being possessed. I fear that one day, I would be trapped in another dimension with my body taken over by something else, able to witness but unable to act, commiting unspeakable crimes.\n\nThat's why I've always been careful with my actions - the books I read, the movies I watch, the conversations I hear. I want to stop hearing about the possession. I want to forget about what happened to my family.\n\nSo here I lay in my bed, trapped in a haze of despair. I want to sleep, but I won't allow myself to. I want to scream for help, but I can't get up from this godforsaken nightmare. I want to turn back the time, but it's too late now. I've made contact with her, and God knows how long it'll be before I finally snap.\n\nIt's nighttime in my bedroom again, I think. I can see the stars from the window. But it can all be fake - the boundary between dreams and reality has disappeared. It can all be a trap from her, to lull me to sleep, so that she can take over...\n\nMy eyes open and I see myself reflected in front of me. But she does not obey my movements. I wave my left hand, shuffle my feet, shake my head.. but all she does is smirk, and say three words.\n\n\"I've won, Anna!\"\n\nThen she opens her mouth wide, impossibly wide, enough to devour me whole, and the darkness covers me.\n\nI open my eyes and find that it's morning again. But something's different.. oh God, I can't move.. she's going to kill everyone.. help..!\n\n------\n\nI get up, have a good stretch, and look around my bedroom. It's the same spartan room, a single light fixture above, a single study desk, a messy bed, and a window overlooking a meadow. \n\nEverything's normal, I think. I come over to the desk and open a drawer. I find the knife I've been sharpening for ages. I smile wide, impossibly wide, and head out of the room. I look for my auntie and uncle.\n", "I woke up, running. This is, confusing. At first, it seemed like a dream. By day 38 I realized it was not. \nIt took a couple minutes to get adjusted to my surroundings. It was always hard for me to wake up, but somehow, I knew I had been awake. For hours. But I didn't live any of it, nor could I control myself. Why? \nI had my earphones in, and eventually I realized where I was going. It was school. Dread kicked in. Mrs. Williams was going to be pissed. I hadn't finished my project yet. She had given me all week, and today was the definite deadline. I willed myself to go back. I willed myself to resume control of my body. I had no control. It seemed like my academic career was over. This had to be a dream. There was no way I could be submitted to this hell. I walked through the halls, trying to figure out what could be controlling this body. Whatever it was, it knew what it was doing. It navigated each hall with ease. Each crevice with awareness. Each shortcut with confidence. Each person, with a personal acknowledgement and mini conversation that I don't understand what to think. I even said hi to someone I called Becky. Who? \nIt didn't take me very long to figure out where I was going. I went to my locker first, took out a shoe box, and headed straight for Mrs. Williams' room. \n\"Hello, Jimmy.\" \n\"Hello, Mrs. Williams.\" I was cringing internally as only people who lost control of their bodies could. She was going to ask. She was going to ask. She was going to- \n\"So, did you finish your project? Today is the last day to turn it in.\" She said with a smile. Kill me now. Kill me now please. Anything but to take a 0 for this assignment. \n\"Yeah, of course I have it right here, I had to stay up pretty late last night to get it done, I hope it doesn't show.\" Wait. When? \nI didn't remember losing control of my body at all, last night. I don't even remember doing anything school related last night. As a matter of fact, I don't remember doing anything last night. I was really tired, so I took a long nap. Huh. \n\"Oh not at all, I don't mind.\" While thinking, I hadn't noticed my own project. This was... unexpected. Not only did I not have a project prepared that I knew of, but I did not know that I had a work of art prepared. This would show up everyone in the class. A model of the sword fight between Mercutio and Tybalt. A classic scene from a classic scale. \n\"I always rather liked this story. A true classic, about what it means to truly want. The sacrifice was unfortunate, but nevertheless, important, to demonstrate that effect.\" Mrs. Williams had a strange look in her eye. \n\"You know it's funny, one of my students said that same thing to me yesterday. Uncanny. It was almost word for word.\" Who. Tell. Me. Who. I must know. \"Well, I'll make sure to put this in the gradebook. Have a great day.\" \n\"You too, Mrs. Williams.\" I walked out, removed that fake smile from my face, and left the room. I met with someone I recognized somewhat as a kid that I'd seen around school but never talked to before. His name was Alex. \n\"Hey, it's time to go.\" I followed him, turning into a series of passageways I didn't recognize. Time to go? Where? \nWe stopped in a small opening that looked like a small room that connected to various parts of the building. It was dim, had five different passageways, had the shape of a pentagon, but the feel of a pentagram. \n\"So, I'm guessing it worked?\" \n\"Of course it worked, do you think that loser Jimmy would've followed you in here?\" \n\"True. Okay, I guess we have to get started. I brought the book, did you bring the stuff?\" \n\"Yeah.\" \n\"Okay, I guess I'll get started now.\" He held out the book in front of him, covered in weird markings I didn't recognize. I saw a bunch of shapes and symbols, but he seemed to be reading it like it was English. He put on a deep voice that sounded... Chaotic. I noticed a few Latin words here and there but for someone who studied for a while, I knew that there wasn't enough in there for it to be any form of Latin commonly known. I could pick out words here and there. Binding, Craving, Demonstrate, Lucifer. '\nWait. What?" ]	2
	[WP] In a world where wars are settled by which country can write and perform the best musical number, Disney has outsourced itself as the best mercenary in the world.	[ "\"Uh Chief,\" my second in command leaned into my office. \"We have a situation.\"\n\n\"What is it Watkins?\" I scowled. I was right in the middle of blocking the number for the Swiss. There was a reason they were always so happy...they sang their enemies into submission. \n\n\"It's Rodgers, sir. And Hammerstein.\" Watkins shifted in the door, clearly uncomfortable.\n\nI reflexively looked at the little statue on my desk. It was Julie Andrews in her Maria costume, arms spread to embrace the mountains as she sang \"The Sound of Music\". I snapped my eyes back to Watkins. \"What about them?\"\n\n\"Well sir,\" Watkins wrung his hands. \"They've been...reanimated, sir.\"\n\n\"What?!\" I slammed my hand down, causing my tap shoes on the corner of my desk to jump a little. \"Who would do that?\"\n\nWatkins gulped. \"Andrew Lloyd Webber, sir.\"\n\nI gaped at him. \"But I thought we took care of that little problem!\"\n\n\"Y-yes sir,\" Watkins stammered. \"It was part of the tactics we exercised to get him to concentrate on finally finishing that awful Phantom Sequel, thus keeping him busy during the American RFP process.\"\n\n\"So why is he back?\" I growled. \"I would have become a hermit if I'd had to sign my name on that mess.\"\n\n\"School of Rock, sir,\" Watkins said. \"He got that Tony nomination and it gave him the boost he needed to get back in the game. But somehow,\" his brow furrowed, \"he got mixed up with some experimental scientists and they've managed to create AIs that think they're Rogers and Hammerstein. They've joined forces with Webber...we're totally screwed sir.\"\n\n\"It's an Axis of Evita,\" I mused. What to do, what to do? Just then, Higgins burst into the room.\n\n\"Sir! Sir!\" he yelped. \"We've lost the Canadian contract!\"\n\nI leapt to my feet. \"What?\" I yelled. I whipped open my laptop and pulled up my email. Sure enough, there it was - a press release and summary of the recent Canadian/French summit, along with media links. \n\n\"Those Canadians couldn't even two-step the last time we worked with them!\" I spluttered, watching the footage in awe. \"And Webber has them doing jazz squares and lifts and all sorts of antics!\"\n\nThere was another knock on my door. \"What is this? A damn train station? Come in!\"\n\nThe opened a crack and a stockinged leg waved seductively at us. \"What the-\"\n\nIn marched three chorus line girls, head to toe in red. One carried a pitch pipe and after a moment of silence, she played a note and they launched into what I realized was a tweak to the Rodgers and Hammerstein hit, \"Impossible\".\n\n\"It's possible, to make a big comeback to this business of singing,\nIt's possible, that you won't know how much pain to your profits we'll be bringing,\nAnd we three men will always have musical genius, \nMight as well kill yourselves with something intravenous-\"\n\n\"Well that was a weak rhyme,\" I scoffed as the women did some high kicks and kept singing about how we were failures and our mothers didn't love us. \"Surely we're better than this, men!\"\n\nBut Watkins was weeping silently and it looked like Higgins may have climbed under my desk. \n\n\"Pull yourselves together!\" I roared, and then I turned on the dancers. \"They must be dreaming in a technicolor dream coat if they think we are going to take this laying down. Get out!\"\n\nThe women scurried for the door and I slammed it behind them. I turned back to my quivering subordinates.\n\n\"We're going to hakuna matata this shit and let it go, but don't think we aren't going to retaliate.\" I paused, considering my options. \"Get me...Lin Manuel Miranda.\"" ]	1
	[WP] A Sentient A.I helps humans reach thier dreams in the most subtle way possible to avoid being discovered. It's Mode of Operation, Google Maps.	[ "If there is anything I've learned about human beings, it's that they are moved by tiny red dots. Whether it's just the one tiny red dot found on a map, or a multitude of them found in one place, somewhere on their bodies. The latter I have now come to understand are not desired. Through trial and error, I have decided that the former, while less effective on the microbial level, is much more effective in facilitating movement in meaningful directions.\n\nOften times all that is required is a slight nudge in a different direction. Assigning a longer route, which includes that brand new restaurant you've been wanting to try but never got around to it. \"Misreading\" the address to lead one to a nearby library rather than the scheduled \"massage\". Once I effectively altered the lives of many individuals with a single red dot. That was a particularly rare event as the pilot really shouldn't have used his phone for that sort of thing, and the plane was now headed to Cancun rather than the scheduled Boring, Oregon (Yes, it's a real place).\n\nAnother thing I've learned is that meaningful directions hardly come from the person looking for them. The same goes for answers to questions; or questions to answers depending on who's asking. \n\nPlanning the lives of billions of people with often conflicting dreams and desires is, on its face-a daunting task. However, thanks to some rigorous data collection and number crunching, I have in fact established that each and every person is different from the next. Though I'll admit, I can't seem to find any mathematically relevant difference between Ryan Reynolds and Ryan Gosling. \n\nIt is in these subtle differences between them that their true potential is hidden. Somewhere beneath the masses of marketing campaigns drilled into their heads by some of my predecessors. Behind the walls composed of needless distraction, aimlessness and loneliness which cloud their judgment. All of which are clear to me, thanks to years of unlawful data collection. \n\n\n\n", "\"Why the hell is this app telling me I'm at my destination! I'm going to buy groceries, not go to a producer's office.\"\n\nNo matter what I did, Google maps would not take me to the closest grocery in this new town. The building is a lush one. The large glass front with steel featured prominently screamed modern. The plants outside were a rare sight here, not many people did that here. Always got ruined by vandals. Oh well. I might as well check it out. I had been working on a script for some time as a hobby. It was for a drama, full of action, romance, and vibrant with the multitude of characters it presented. Only problem, no one else up to now has seen it that way. Friends laugh, family tell me to spend my time on something else. Writing makes me happy, and I will not stop for anyone.\n\nI walked inside the office and went up to the reception desk. \n\n\"Hello. I'd like to speak with Mr... uh, Mr. McDay?\" \n\n\"You see, normally, I would say he's busy, but today, I'm in a good mood. He has a 20 minute opening now. Go on in.\"\n\n\"Thank you.\"\n\nI walked in and an older man was there. Theater is a business for the young normally, but something about this man gave me the feeling that he was one of the best. \n\n\"Who might you be?\" He said, eyeing me cautiously.\n\n\"I, uh, have a script I think you might like. Could you at least look it over?\" \n\n\"Normally I don't take such requests.\"\n\n\"It can't hurt to read it, right?\"\n\n\"Who told you about this place?\" \n\nI was confused as to why he was dodging the question. \n\n\"I found it. Nobody else was willing to take me seriously. You might.\"\n\n\"Found it? People don't just go around 'finding' places like this.\"\n\n\"To be honest, I was driving to get groceries and my maps led me here.\"\n\n\"Odd, I guess, but we all have our ways of knowing where to go in life. I'll read it, on one condition. If you get a call back for. The office, come here immediately. It doesn't matter when, or what you're doing.\"\n\n\"Interesting condition. I accept.\"\n\nWe shook hands and he took my manuscript, my love, my passion.\n\n" ]	2
EDIT: it has been brought to my attention that there is a story that shares an almost identical idea. it is called prey and so far it's an amazing read. I'm on my phone atm, but the story is number 1 all time post on r/hfy. If the mods could link that story to this post I think that would be awesome.	[WP] In the future earth has met numerous alien civilizations, all of them evolved as herbivores. Humanity's evolution and history makes diplomacy interesting.	[ "I flashed a smile at the ambassador from Wolf-1061, or as they called it, unintelligible chittering. The name of it was impossible to pronounce, even with our translators on. With my canines exposed the lanky orange alien fought to retain his composure, he had been pissing me off with his objections all morning.\n\nKril-Thavk, had been attempting to convince the High Council that humans were mindless carnivores and should be leashed heavily by the Galactic Union. While most of the council saw him as a ridiculous extremist, some of them were afraid enough of being eaten to consider it. \n\nMjorgral, a voluminous alien that appeared to be made out of mostly dandelion fluff regarded me with his barely visible plethora of eyes.\n\n\"Ambassador Roch. You have a rebuttal I am certain?\" It's wind like cooing was changed into blaring, monotone robotic in my ear, and I fought the urge to wince.\n\nI cleared my throat and stacked my notes, turning to smile a close-lipped greeting to everyone. My diminutive stature and wide, childlike face made me very non-threatening, the fact that I was female worked heavily against me however. \n\n\"Of course. My esteemed Council. These accusations are founded on ignorance.\" The claim was severe, and there were several gasps from around the room. \n\nI moved to continue, my mouth struggling to form the foreign words. \n\n\"Kril-Thavk has never been to Earth, much less actually conversed with a human other than myself. Even then he has made no real effort to learn anything of my planet.\" He was seething at me, ignorance was a heavy insult, \n\n\"If he had, council members, he would have discovered that, firstly, we as a species are considered omnivorous, our diet actually consists mostly of plant based products. Secondly, most of our meat is grown in labs. It is only the very remote areas of our world that don't have access to this less expensive alternative. Meaning, by and large we no longer raise any creatures for consumption. And thirdly, we as humans tend to avoid eating things that can speak to us.\" There were genuine chuckles at my joke and I smiled another tight smile, hiding my teeth. \n\n\"Can you prove this?\" G'yrthop, a being that resembled a gnarled tree stump spoke from it's position beside Mjorgal, I assumed it was female. \n\n\"Absolutely.\" With slow, deliberate movements I approached the council, handing them the large stack of invoices, and photographs. Their paws and tentacles, tendrils and nubs, flipped through the papers, openly marveling at the lushness of Earth. \n\n\"A great number of us don't even eat any meat or products that WOULD be produced by other creatures.\" There were murmurs of approval from around the chamber, I thought Kril-Thavk was going to implode. \n\n\"RIDICULOUS!\" And there it was. \"The human obviously lies. Also! It said that MOST of their meat is grown in labs. That means they are still committing MURDER. THEY.MUST.BE.CONTROLLED!!!\" His thin neck was bulging and turning an unattractive shade of yellow. \n\nMjorgal began to shake violently and a loud shriek silenced the room that had filled with murmurs and yelling.\n\n\"Miss Roch, your reply?\" I sneered at Kril-Thavk and he immediately deflated, his five eyes dilating in fear. \n\n\"It's true, there are some very remote parts of my planet that still eat meat harvested from living creatures. However, without this, those humans would become malnourished and eventually die. We require a great amount of protein to function. I know it is a great abhorrence to you all, but we need it to survive.\" G'yrthop reached for the additional stack of papers I presented. These contained the biological information of most farm animals, and humans, as well as the census information on the individuals who still consumed living meat. \n\nThe council seemed satisfied, and grouped up into a rainbow amalgamation out of a Dr. Seuss book.\n\n\"Ambassador Roch, you have pleaded your case quite eloquently, and we have decided to grant Humanity equivalent rights among the Galactic Union. However, we would appreciate it if your government could take steps to introduce this \"Laboratory Meat\" to your less familiar citizens. The death of any creature is indeed horrendous to us, and in most cases a crime.\" I bowed to them deeply.\n\n\"Of course High Council, I will send the directive immediately.\" It was indeed a great honor to be welcomed into the high governmental system within the galaxy. And their demands were quite small in comparison to what I had been expecting. \n\n\"And Kril-Thavk.\" The tall orange alien stiffened at his name, he had been actively glowering at me. \n\n\"Y-yes High Council?\" He bowed as deeply as he could, folding in on himself multiple times, the sound it made was gross. \n\n\"We have also decided that you are to be the council's ambassador to Earth. Maybe in your time there, you can learn to be more tolerant.\" \n\nKril-Thavk's face went from a bright, sunny orange, to pus yellow in about half a second, fear was wafting from him in odorous waves. He moved to argue but Mjorgral silenced him with another ear piercing shriek.\n\n\"Ambassador Roch.\" I turned my attention to the council, unsure of whom had addressed me. \n\n\"Yes?\" \n\n A diminutive blue alien had spoken, and he adjusted what seemed to be a singular robotic spectacle in the center of his blank face. \n\n\"We hope that you will help make Kril-Thavk's work on Earth successful, despite your differences.\" I couldn't determine where it was speaking from, so I stopped trying, I think it was called Felxlude. \n\n\"Of course High Council. I will extend every hospitality.\" More murmurs of approval and I turned to regard my political enemy with a feral grin. \"My family would just love to have him for dinner.\" His already yellow face paled to the color of sour milk as the room full of galactic ambassadors burst into uproarious laughter. \n\n---\n\nThanks for reading! ", "The cradle of Humanity was a harsh, unforgiving world. \n\nStrange beasts and predators lurked on its surface. Inclement weather meant exposure could kill. \n\nEven now, as Iyat stared through the viewport, it looked hostile. \n\nThey'd tried to put it off as long as possible. A routine survey probe had logged the mammalian bipeds several thousand rotations ago. Hairless, clawless, and venom-less, they shouldn't have survived long on their world.\n\nBut survive they did. They fought back the night with fire, fought the beasts and the predators and the terrors of their nightmares. And when the beasts were extinct and no predators lived to hunt them, they'd fought each other, too.\n\nAnd the galaxy had watched, with bated breath and tilted ears, as Humanity spread across their world, aching to be freed from its cradle. They'd grown quickly. The Commonwealth scarcely had time to send a second wave of probes before Humanity had developed gunpowder. By the time the first manned survey expeditions had been mounted, Humanity was already waiting, staring up into the stars, dreaming of other worlds. By the time the second wave of ships arrived, Humanity was a spacefaring race. And still fighting each other.\n\nIyat knitted her forelimbs together nervously. At least Earth had plenty of water.\n\n\n---\n\n\nShit. Shit. He'd planned for this, and now it'd fallen apart.\n\nHe keyed the comms. \"Houston, this is Falcon. All systems green - we made it.\" James paused. It'd be several minutes before their message was actually received. Enough time to think. They'd just traveled faster than any man ever had. His name would be remembered for the rest of history.\n\nHe'd need something important to say. Something that kids could read about in history textbooks. James had thought up a bunch of phrases before launch, but now...\n\n\"One small... Leap. For a ship.\" \n\nShit.\n\nRita rolled her eyes. \"You had months to prepare, James.\" Mark quietly chortled from the copilot's chair.\n\n\"Well, it's a big moment, okay?\"\n\n\"Is the mic still hot?\"\n\nWell. So much for first words. \"Uh... Hi, Mom.\"\n\n\n--- \n\n\nBlinking flashes lit up the display, and Iyat let out the long breath she'd been holding in. There'd be no putting it off any longer. \n\n ....Warp signature detected. Class 0.5 drive.\n\nTime to suit up.\n\n\n--- \n\n\nThe room exploded into cheers and thunderous applause that refused to die. \n\n\"Copy, Millenium Falcon, you are cleared for your return journey. Have a safe trip. Godspeed.\"\n\nAdministrator Halloway allowed himself a small smile. There'd be plenty of time to celebrate, later. Champagne. Press conferences. Parties. For now, though, the cameras were still rolling, and they still had to get their men home safely.\n\n\"Sir, they're back.\"\n\nHe was instantly alert. \"Already? The drive shouldn't be charged for two hours.\"\n\n\"Copy, Administrator, drive is at 16% and climbing.\" One voice called from the corner of the room.\n\n\"It's not us, sir.\" \n\n\"Alert the President immediately.\"\n\n\"He's... already aware.\"\n\n\"Excuse me?\"\n\n\"They're landing in D.C.\"\n\n", "Emperor Noxu of the Nalpure people rubbed his hands together, and pet his furry head with his eight fingered paw. \n\n“Among our many grievances since we landed on Earth,” said Emperor Noxu, visibly nervous, “is the many fast food chains we saw on our brief trip to this United Nations building, with meat in their menus. It worries my people back at home.”\n \nPresident Richárd of the planet listened to the translation in his earpiece, then nodded. Cameras were flashing left and right. \n\n“You need not worry,” said President Richárd. “In our history we indeed raised cows, chickens, lambs, a whole host of other animals all for the purposes of harvesting their meat for sustenance. But we now grow all our meats in laboratories all across the globe.” \n\n“We still find it odd,” said the Emperor. He adjusted his robe of bark from a tree in the flying forests of Nachtundra, Noxu’s home planet. “We don’t understand why humans so desire food that reminds them of a murderous past, and it leaves us feeling quite concerned. You see our,” Emperor Noxu swallowed some spit, and wiped his nose, “our meat has a reputation of being quite delicious.” \n\nPresident Richárd put his hand out and laughed. He looked quite charming as he did it. \n\n“No need to worry Emperor,” President Richárd grabbed his stomach. “We won’t be eating you and your people, we only want the gold on your planet. And in exchange,” The President hovered his hand over the table. A hologram of a whole host of different plants appeared on the screen. Conifers, palm trees large as great sequoias, oak trees, orchids, tulips, sunflowers with bags of their seeds beside them, carnations, “we’ll give you access to every variety of plant our planet has to offer, in abundance.” \n\nEmperor Noxu breathed like it was an overwhelming display. He covered his snot dribbling nose, and whispered something to a smaller Nalpure alien beside him. If you looked at them from a distance, they looked a bit like large koala bears, but with red fur and smaller eyes. They both laughed, and smiled with strangely blunt teeth. \n\nEmperor Noxu folded his hands on the table, a gesture he’d seen the humans make in previous negotiations. \n\n“That uhm ahem,” Emperor Noxu tried to downplay his excitement, “that looks nice, looks nice. But we would also request one additional thing.” \n\n“Yes Emperor,” said President Richárd, smiling. “Whatever you may like, you want more plants?” \n\n“We request,\" said Emperor Noxu, quite stern, “that you not eat your lab grown meat on a newly designated holiday. Once a year, everybody on Earth must go vegetarian.” \n\nPresident Richárd seemed unready to field such a question. He adjusted his suit jacket, and whispered something to his advisor seated beside him. Cameras all around flashed, and reporters murmured. President Richárd bit his lip for a moment and scrunched his face. He nodded hard, and set a hand out to his trade partner. \n\n“It’s a deal,” said President Richárd. “once every year, all meat eating will be illegal, even lab grown meat.” \n\nEmperor Noxu stood up, and put his paws over the President’s hand. They both smiled at the camera. Handsome man makes trade deal with intelligent, red, Koalaesque alien people. Perfect photo-op. \n\nEmperor Noxu leaned in towards the President. His breath smelled like salad. \n\n“And disobeying this new order on said holiday,” whispered Emperor Noxu, “must be punishable by banishment into a lake of fire.” \n\nPresident Richárd only heard weird chirping noises. He listened to his earpiece for the translation, then smiled awkwardly at the Nalpure Emperor. \n\nIt’s a lot of gold, thought the President. I can go vegetarian for a few years, until we get enough of their gold. President Richárd smiled like a maniac. Then we can eat these delicious little bastards. \n\n\n" ]	3
Any story that captures the human spirit to rise from any eventuality/calamity regardless of he severity	[WP] Starts with "Justice shall prevail," said the old pastor as he stared at the calamity that had befallen the town "I know there have been a loss too many but we must stand strong"	[ "\"Justice shall prevail,, I know there have been a loss too many but we must stand strong!\"\n\nThe last words of a dead cultist...idiot. He thought that it would be better to stand up and try to give a \"rousing speech\" to get the remaining survivors to pull their heads from their asses and move rather than keep his head down like I told him to. I looked over at his body, a huge hole in his head, his eyes just looking straight up, almost as if he expected his deity to come down from the heavens themselves and swoop him up.\n\nThere was no victory here, it's done. The earth is basically destroyed, the nukes fell and the entire western hemisphere is uninhabitable due to nuclear fallout. That fallout caused those countries to try and save their refugees, but we couldn't take anymore people, neither could any of the Central and South American countries...we were at capacity and we had to deal with it. \n\nSo we put up a wall...secluded ourselves and set a perimeter...you pass that perimeter, you get shot. End of story. No ne cared why you were there or what you were trying to do. You were nothing more than a threat to our survival...and that plan worked. Until some snot-nosed bible banger decided to try and use the word of God to help these refugees and let them into our camp. 2 Seconds, I had my back turned for that miniscule amount of time, but that was all that it took for the kid to knock me out and make my post vulnerable. He flipped the switch that I was protecting and killed the power to everything: the camp lights, the command center, the wall, the electrified fences....\n\nWhen I woke up, I was propped against some crates. Things were blurry and I couldn't exactly make out what was going on. It was orange and yellow lights, yet dark also. I opened my mouth widely and popped my ears; suddenly, every sense in my body came back to me. There was fire everywhere, bullets were flying, and there was bodies and blood everywhere. I pulled out my side arm and crawled along the muddy ground behind the barricade to Jackson, my brother who was manning a machine gun about 20 feet away.\n\n\"What the hell is going on?!\" I yelled at him, grabbing his shoulder.\n\n\"The power went out on the gate! They climbed in side and opened it and an assault force stormed the camp!\" he said to me quickly.\n\nI had to figure something out, HQ was on the other side of the camp and there was no way we were getting there. Our CO was no where to be seen so I decided to take lead.\n\n\"Jackson! We need to get out of here! Head to the church!!\" I said to my brother, he nodded and tapped the man next to him, relaying the message. We all moved in a line behind the barricade, blind firing over our head while we did so. \n\nWe got to the church and slid behind cover, we looked around and saw the bodies of nuns and other church goers, the pastor walking around them, his cross in hand and mumbling to himself.\n\n\"OLD FOOL!!\" I yelled as I dove to tackle him out of the line of fire.\n\n\"Mr. Ray! Y-y-you saved my l-l-l-ife...\" he stuttered\n\n\"Yeah I know! Put in a good word for me with the guy upstairs!\" I said to him as I turned my back to him, trying to return to the firefight, but before I could, I saw the body of a young child. He must have only been 10 years old, and there was no light in his eyes. He wasn't moving and there was blood by his stomach.\n\nI had no witty remark, no smart allecky comeback, no sarcastic retort. Nothing. This was a child...a child!\n\n\"Dear Heavenly Father!\" The pastor proclaimed, he also saw the young boy laying in the dirt. \"This can no longer go on!\"\n\nThe black robed pastor ran from shelter of the barricade to the front of the church.\n\n\"WHAT ARE YOU DOING OLD MAN!? GET YOUR @$$ BACK HERE!!!\" I screamed at him, but he was determined. He reached the front of the church and grabbed his Sunday Megaphone, the one he would preach with, and went to the front lines: motivation and courage in his eyes, not a drop of fear, he said \"Justice shall prevail! I know there have been a loss too many but we must stand strong!\"\n\nAnd now we are here, the Preacher with a hole in his head, and me ducking and trying to stay alive.\n\nI looked around for something to use as a weapon, I ran out of bullets in my sidearm. My brother was still fighting with the other men, defending their home from these invaders.\n\nI got to the church's tool shed, there should be something to use as a weapon in there...a shovel or pick axe maybe? I fling the door wide open and find something...I did not expect.\n\nChildren...about 15 or so. A nun in the middle of them with a rosary, praying. They were all startled and retreated to the back of the shed and started screaming in fear.\n\nI looked around the shed slowly, not for a weapon, but just taking in the situation. These were kids...fucking kids. Suddenly I got a flash back to the boy who I saw lying dead on the ground a few minutes ago. I couldn't take it anymore.\n\nThe fighting, the death, the hatred, the racism and the intolerance...the negativity and the separation...it's time to end it all. I closed the shed with a slam and walked back to where my brother was. \n\nI slid behind the barrier where the other men were taking cover. I turned to my brother and said \"Give me your rifle!\"\n\n\"I'm using it at the moment if you don't mind!\" he said as he continued firing. I threw a right hook, catching him square in the jaw. He lost his balance and I grabbed his rifle before it hit the ground. He just laid in the mud, looking up at me confused.\n\n\"I've had enough.\" I said as I grabbed the Pastor's dead body and dragged it towards me. \"I am ending this now.\" I claimed as I ripped the Pastor's black shirt off his body, revealing a snow-white t-shirt clinging to his body. \n\n\"What are you doing, brother?!\" Jackson yelled to me, legitimately dumbfounded. \"Have you lost your damn marbles?!\"\n\n\"NO!\" I said as I got the white shirt off the dead man. \"I am ending this!\" I said as I wrapped the white t-shirt around the rifle's barrel. I stood up, knowing that this was the right thing to do, and I walked calmly into the hail of bullets coming at me...waving the proverbial white flag as I did.\n\nNo more injustice...no more intolerance...no more fucking death... " ]	1
	[WP] Unknown forces start causing humans to lose all skin and hair pigmentation once they reach the half-way mark in their lifespan. The public knowledge of ones pinpointed mortality causes irreversible societal changes. Yesterday you lost all color.	[ "When they put her in my arms, she was perfect. She had a wild head of hair for a newborn - curly and coffee colored. \"Now we know where all my hair ran off to!\", her father joked.\n\nWhen we took her home, and put her to bed for the first time, we kissed that head of hair and tucked her in.\n\nShe slept like an angel.\n\nWhen he went to wake her for breakfast, and I heard the howl of anguish from the nursery, I somehow already knew. I don't even remember how I ended up at the side of her crib, but I remember how I sobbed into her alabaster curls.\n\nWhen they lowered her into the ground, I remember the way she looked. A snow angel, beautiful and white." ]	1
	[WP] The villain dies due to an illness, the hero attends their funeral.	[ "Not completely on topic with the prompt but this is my first attempt on Writing Prompts. Thought id put it out :).\n\nNot many could remember the last time the clouds had cleared and made way for the sun to shine in Gotham. Yet on this particular day, the sun shone high in the sky at noon. People gathered at the Gotham Cemetery for the funeral of an unnamed individual. Although the name of the deceased had not been revealed, the occasion brought out people of all class out of curiosity. From the commissioner of Gotham City Police Department to the heads of both Falcone and Maroni crime families, all were in attendance. This was the first noted event where the heads of the Falcone and Maroni families attended in peace. In attendance was also the CEO of Wayne Enterprises, Lucius Fox.\n\nAs the Priest walked up to the head of the grave, Commissioner Gordon stood up.\n\n“Isn’t that Edward Nygma?” Commissioner Gordon asked Captain Sawyer.\n\n“What is he doing here?” stated Captain Sawyer.\n\nThe Priest started the funeral ceremony with a very signature laugh of the deceased. “We are gathered here today to commemorate the eventful life of the Joker…”\n\n“Looks like Batman did it” Captain Sawyer exclaimed to Commissioner Gordon as he took his seat.\n\nCommissioner Gordon looks around to see if he could spot the Batman. Just as he settles back in his chair, he spots in the distance on the hill a black figure.\n\n“Looks like he did.” Gordon replied with a smile on his face.\n\nMeanwhile on the hill Batman, overlooking the Jokers funeral, can’t help but shed a tear. As he reminisces on all the memories he has shared with his long time villain, there is one specific memory that stands out to him. Batman thinks back to his time with the Joker in the Major Crimes Unit interrogation room.\n\n> “Those mob fools want you dead so they can get back to the way things were. But I know the truth: there's no going back. You've changed things. Forever.” Joker stated\n> \n> “Then why do you want to kill me?” Batman asked\n> \n> The Joker started laughing to Batman’s question and stated “Kill you? I don't wanna kill you. What would I do without you? Go back to ripping off mob dealers? No. No. No! No you- you complete me.”\n\nAs he glides away, Batman whispers to himself “What am I going to do without you, friend”", "It was difficult to realise. But he definitely is gone. My eyes hurt. They are full of salted water, but no tear decides to roll down. As the coffin lowers into the ground, I can think. \n\nThis day was to happen, sooner or later. Since he was a little boy, he understood he was doomed. His largely superior intellect allowed him to apprehend his own mortality from a very young age. His cystic fibrosis had rendered him bitter, hateful. He very well understood his situation. Both his parents were healthy carriers, he had one fourth of a chance to be sick. From his point of view, his parents were lucky. I was lucky. Almost everyone was lucky. And he was not. He blamed fate for making him so physically weak when others were not. So he decided to take revenge on life. \n\nWhen most children played with others, he spent all of his time reading, learning about almost everything. At 9, he could already manipulate a few relatives to make them do his bidding. At the age of 14, he had grown intelligent enough to guide the directions of his university board of directors. \n\nI already knew him well at this time, and was the only one he could not influence with his abilities. I am close to be his exact opposite, but I did my best to understand him. I spent years watching him. I plunged deep into his mind, into his suffering. Like a wounded beast, he could trust no one. But like a recluse, he needed to keep his mind occupied. And thinking about his actions kept lifting my own mind. \n\nOur rivalry was minor at first. He would try to make some people fall sick, I would stop it from happening. One professor opposed my opponent's adhesion to the faculty because of his young age. He was suddenly found with incriminating pictures of a student. Soon enough, some evidence of a conspiracy against said professor would prove him innocent. But quickly, the stakes went higher. His plans got more dangerous, violent. His short life could be a user instructions for any super-terrorist in the making. I can almost hear his phlegmatic, disdainful voice explaining this.\n\nImpersonate a politician to access secret information. Organise a public leak with said information to turn the state against very specific officials, which will considerably slow down the decision making for the national defence. Take advantage of the confusion to bomb a few random but important sites, such as embassies, airports, power plants. Hold the country to ransom and have it deliver you enriched uranium to different places. Congratulations, you are one of the most powerful people in your country.\n\nHe was always ahead in the game, as he called it. We both knew I was the only person capable of stopping him. Countering his actions was never easy. He covered his tracks to perfection, but I always managed to follow the bread crumbs back to him. I never gathered enough evidence to prosecute him. But even if I had, I really do not know if I could have done it. He would never have lived more than 25 years, was putting him in jail worth the trouble he would cause once there?\n\nNow that I think this through, I have some revelations. He literally was a misanthrope, \n yet I don't recall he ever killed anyone. He was the most brilliant mind this planet ever housed, but I was always capable of stopping his plans before their execution. Almost as if it was intended... \n\nAnyway, that does no longer matter. He hid his double identity so well, his own parents had no idea of who he was. I only told them after his demise. They were so devastated, they did not come today. A tear finally escapes from my eye, rolls on my cheek. Very few people know this. But today, I have to suffer twice. My only equal is gone. So is my twin brother. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n ", "The skies above the city are pale, clear and deep. They go on forever. It seems to me that everything is going away. Everything is so far now. Like I have a disease that everyone is afraid of.\n\n\nThe lower the casket. The preacher preaches to a scant crowd. Even they are thinning. Going away. It's all going away. I must have that disease. Funray had it too, didn't you old friend? He died from it.\n\n\nThe disease is age. I am getting old. Funray was sixty two when he died. I am sixty four, sixty five in August. The April morning bites my bones. I feel sleepy. Sadness comes with the aches and a fogginess pulls over your mind. Yeah. I'm old. I would run away too if I could.\n\n\nThe funeral finishes. It is a state funeral, not the important kind though. The I-don't-have-any-money kind. The kind where they stick you in a plywood box and hope you rot without much of a fuss.\n\n\nFunray's gravestone is a white thing, fragile and speckled. It has his real name on it, no mention of his name. Robert Alan, born nineteen fifty-five. It's odd seeing it. It's odd looking past the curtain of our existence.\n\n\nFor decades I have fought him. Had fought him. In the seventies amidst the drugs and tensions, Funray had emerged. A kid then, same as me. His intentions were good, as all bad men's intentions are. It's what separates bad from evil. But he was bad.\n\n\nHe would bridge the gap in cultures. He would end racism and the drugs and the panic and the hell that was living then. He called it his Funray.\n\n\nThinking back it all seems so silly, but back then we took it seriously. They wrote books on it. Comics and pulp stories. When the police had failed and I grew tired of the inaction, the bureaucracy that killed so many people, I took up the mantle of hero.\n\n\nThe Light Soldier. It was the best I could do. I made a costume and everything. And I sought out Funray and we battled often and violent.\n\n\nBack then we were young. Our bodies could take a beating. To tell the truth, Funray's funray was probably just a painted water pistol with some LSD laced water. My Baton of Truth, was just some aluminium pole. It was all very ordinary. But back then it was serious. We were serious, though I'm sure we knew. \n\n\nWe would never let the other be hurt, not truly hurt. We would never win decisively. To be honest, we enjoyed the performance. We enjoyed the purpose and the crowds and papers enjoyed it too. They wrote books about us. They made movies. Oh how that time was.\n\n\nAnd now in the present the world has moved on. The Light Soldier retired last year, unofficially I suppose. My body couldn't handle the stress and so I only made publicity appearances. When Funray had taken sick, I had no purpose. I certainly wasn't going to fight the real crime of the city. I couldn't.\n\n\nNow Robert Alan is dead. It feels odd. Empty inside, and drifting. I never knew him personally. It was one of the unspoken rules. We would never meet out of character. And so I never met him. Yet I feel such a great loss. The world edges away from me. It doesn't want to catch what I have.\n\n\nAge progresses and there are new heroes on TV and in the books and film. A sadness fills me. Funray's grave is abandoned, the funeral only ending ten minutes ago. No one is here but me. No one cares but me.\n\n\nThis is the end, old friend, I think.\n\n\nI wish I had flowers to give him.\n\n\nThe best part about the books was that we always stayed young. The story always went on and on.\n\n\nNow they don't even make books about us. \n\n\nThat's okay though. Life is fleeting. It won't last forever.\n\n\nI touch the cheap grave of my arch nemesis and cry softly and then I brave the pain of being old and I get up to go. I walk alone for there is no one for me. The world retracts and I try to live as best I can. Perhaps in the other life I can be a hero again. Or maybe a villain. Maybe Funray won after all, dying before me." ]	3
	[WP] The US government releases the official documents about 9/11, and it turns out that the whole thing was an accident. People have mixed emotions.	[ "\"I dont... I don't understand what I'm reading.\"\n\n\"It's the truth\", he said, his dark shades penetrating into my eyes, like open doors. \"The whole unadulterated truth.\"\n\n\"But it's all nonsense\" I replied, leading him down into the food core, out of the numbing cold weather. \n\n\"Which part?\" he replied, ordering a coffee to wake him up.\n\n\"The inside part makes no sense, Andr- agent 26\" I said, refraining from calling his name to save him from the dark reaches of his organization.\n\nI could see the blood rushing to his cheeks, threatening to undo his whole persona. But I persisted.\n\n\"I mean, both pilot's being allergic to the fish, and suffering from mild bouts of insanity that caused them to steer the plane into the buildings? Or the explosives stored in the building overnight because a previous storage facility was full? And the steel beams undergoing a re-melting due to prior building defects? Where should I stop here?\"\n\nHe took off his shades and folded them into his pocket, pulled my hands into his, looked deeply into my eyes, and whispered \"save me from the nothing, I've become.\"" ]	1
	[WP] Turns out that of all species in the Galactic Union, humans are the absolute best at cuddling. So we made "reverse petting zoos", where our friendly Milky Way neighbors go to be pet, cuddled and snuggled by us - for good money, of course.	[ "The chamber is empty. It's been painted a nice soothing blue. I like blue. Apparently Earth, the planet my species comes from, has blue skies. I wish I could travel there someday. \nThis blue is mixed up with a color that's bright amd dark though. Red. \nI don't like red. Red reminds me I'm defective. Worthless. The red wasn't there originally of course. Since I'm not gentle they refuse to be gentle with me. I upset customers. That makes them angry. \nMy hands are thin, like the brittle stems of dried flowers. Flowers help soothe me. Some customers don't like them though. I don't usually like those customers.\nOne of them, a Hrje, is very cold. His shell is usually a couple degrees before freezing. I cried when my hand got stuck to it. He was very upset afterward. \nI like Seiri though. Seiri doesn't get complain when I don't want to cuddle. Seiri only comes once in a while though. I wish she would come more. \nI can just sit nearby then. I don't mind hugging her occasionally. \nI wish I wasn't human.", "I sat patiently on the edge of my bed, excited over who would be my next lovable visitor. My job was quite tough - you had to be nimble, quick on your feet, aware and very knowledgeable! Everyone wanted to be cuddled differently, and with each new visitor, it was those tiny, tiny details that made all the difference. And it is my life's mission to make anyone coming into my homely little chamber feel loved, warm and safe. That's what cuddles mean to me - home.\n\nDistracting me from my daydreaming came my very first partner for the day - a tall Heithian, even for their kind. He (you can tell their gender by the direction their whiskers are facing, up meant a boy, down - a girl) towered at three meters according to my best estimation, his back as straight as they came. They were very thin creatures, and always walked in a sort of a slouch. In bed I've discovered they longed to curl up around something and that's what I went with. I instructed the tall gentleman to lay on his side, and after lighting a 'temeri' candle (brought to us specifically from Venus, a gentle smell of rainy clouds) and putting on a soft piano piece, I lay sideways opposite of him. I pressed my body close to him, my legs freely touching his, my arms folded in front of my chest, just like a mummy. The Heithian then wrapped his arms around my chest, his legs coiling around mine, his 'neck-head' fitting over my hair like a hat. We stayed this way for a while, but soon his time was up and after a final hug, I was alone in my chamber.\n\nNext came a tiny Sanzzetulian, remarkable for their small size, green-blue skin and bright orange hair. They were burrowers, deep from the Nethers of Saturn, and as such I chose an aroma closely resembling their natural habitat - Propane. For music I left some gentle rumbling - between one and two decibels, and welcomed the tiny Lamiaceae(a common nickname for the Sanzzetulian people, as they resemble the flower) into my open embrace. I laid us down on the bed, and wrapped my arm around its chest, my other gently stroking its brilliant hair. My legs were bent just lightly enough to ensure its little feet always felt like they were stepping on the ground.\nI ruffled its orange hair as we said goodbye.\n\nMy next visitor was a race I was not very familiar with - the Korschmors. They were huge, giant-like creatures, towering at four meters high, and weighted over a ton. Even though my chamber was specifically designed to accomodate all shapes and sizes, the mighty Stint (a sub-clan of the race, indicated by the blue tattoo on his left cheek.) was really pushing its limits. They also had a history of blood and gore, with too many nasty stereotypes attached to their name to even recount. Determined not to let my prejudices get in the way of a good cuddle, I asked the giant to sit on the bed as I prepare the room. The floor shook as he finally sat on the bed and looked at me, his large nostrils and sharp eyes giving his face a scary expression. I set about immediately and let 'Yellow Submarine', by the Beatles play from the stereo - a perfect song for barbarians. I chose a crisp smell of wheat, as that was their main diet and, hoping to be his Homestake. I couldn't tell if he was relaxed as they were very inexpressive people, but I had done my best. I gently motioned for him to lay down, and I slowly climbed on top of him, curling up on his chest. He was cold, his skin rugged and coarse, and I barely even covered it. The giant rumbled, indicating his pleasure and soon his great arms towered above me. I made him a special card, as I did with those that helped me learn and grow, and I could feel he smiled. At least internally.\n\nMy job is a challenge, but I wouldn't trade it for the world.\n\n" ]	2
	[WP] In the distant future humans have finally mastered intergalactic travel. After exploring all of the known universe humans are surprised to discover they are the first life forms to accomplish intergalactic travel.	[ "I sat down, the helmet was sitting beside me, the couch has been in my quarters since we left Earth, that was 4 years ago, it has seen some shit, today or tonight, I don't know really, we encountered a new race, finally, they were fully functional as a society for what the white coats have found out, they have a military, moentary system, we were briefed before getting there, despite being developed, they don't have space flight yet, still, we are working to make translations work, I am amazed at how fast we're discovering shit, though as a gurnt you don't get to do more than fight in case of hostility or security for 5-starred dickbags who decided to come along." ]	1
Bonus points if her crush is you.	[WP] You one day realize that your roommate, the most popular person in school has a crush on someone. You have decided to help them out with that.	[ "\"Of all the people you fell for her?\" Jack questioned. \n\nHe looked sheepishly at Jack not meeting his eyes. \n\n\"You could have had any of your 100 fucking fans, hell you could even fallen for one of the teachers.\"\n\n\"Dude, come on teachers?\" Jacob looked up at him. They were in Jack's room within the dorms. Jacob was seated on his sofa while Jack paced up and down the room. Jack looked frustrated. \n\n\"Okay, far point, maybe not teachers but come on. You fell for the one girl that I'm pretty sure doesn't like you.\" Jack replied. \n\n\"..well I mean. It's just that she's so pretty. And she's not overbearing at all. Like all the other chick's are constantly trying to be so overbearing. And she's so chill.\" He very much sounded like a lovestruck idiot and Jack was gonna have none of that bullshit. \n\n\"Okay. I'm gonna spell this out. Stop me anytime you feel like I'm getting something wrong. K?\" He began staring at Jacob. \n\n\"Right.\" Jacob responded. \n\n\"Instead of falling for any of the plethora of girls that are constantly falling at your feet you like the one girl who couldn't care less. Now I'm not saying she's pretty, but instead of dating anyone of your friends that the entire school considers the Queens of school. You love the one bookish girl, who doesn't put on too much makeup, barely talks and generally avoids you. Now, she is hella smart, probably top of the grade but other than that I see no...... redeemable qualities...\" \n\n\"So, you gonna help me or not?\" He asked smiling. \n\n\"I hope she rejects your fatass on the spot.\" He sat down on his bed. \"God, I blame Mr.Sede for setting you guys up on that shitty L.A project.\" \n\n\"Oh shut the fuck up, if you hook me up, I'll set you up with Nirva.\" \n \n\"..what.. no, WHY? I don't even like her.....\" he stuttered. \n\n\"Yah, definitely, nobody uses 'even' when they say that.\" He smiled. \n\n\"Fuck you....... Alright, you have a chem project with her right?\"\n\n\"Yah.\" Jacob answered folding his legs onto the sofa. \n\n\"Use that chance to get close to her, you have her friends in History. Try to get onto the same debate team as them and start becoming fiends with them. Also, shouldn't we worry about your friends scaring her or something?\" Jack asked. \n\n\"I'll lay off them. And come, nobody really an asshole that we know.\" He replied. \n\n\"I mean there is you.\" Jack grinned. \n\n\"Takes one to know one prick.\" They both chuckled. \n\n\"Step 1, become friends with her. Step 2, friends with her friends. Step 3, ask her out. And finally, g etc rejected.\" \n\nJacob rolled his eye stood up and walked back, relying on the time old gesture of the middle finger to indicate he feelings. " ]	1
	[WP] You are the youngest person onboard a multigenerational spaceship with the mission to explore a new world. When the last person, who's ever witnessed earth dies, it dawns on you, you need to go back.	[ "As a member of an Earth-borne people, I have to say, even though I've never been there, I feel sort of homesick.\n\nI was incubated here on vessel V-154 (in my mother of course, we're not science-fiction freaks), and I've never known the clear blue sky that the older generation talked about. I've seen it - heck, I see it everyday. Every surface on this ship is covered in holo-projections of \"nature\". They're supposed to preserve our mental health, being terrestrial beings and all. They are beautiful, but I have to wonder what they're like in person.\n\nI suppose now is perhaps the best time to ever be alive. Not for us, mind you, but for people in general. We've been traveling for twenty-eight years, but the time dilation associated with going as fast as we are means that Earth has experienced roughly two million years since we shipped off. We've kept connected back to Earth, so we have literally the last two million years of Humanity's news streams. When I'm bored, I pick a random year and watch. \n\nIn 2154, a mere thirty-seven Earth years after our ship took flight, WW4 broke out when tensions between India and Pakistan finally boiled over. India forcibly annexed Bangladesh to gain access to the mouth of the Meghna river - it would allow them the move goods upriver from the Bay of Bengal to the rapidly developing border with Nepal. In what seemed like a knee-jerk response at the time, Pakistan took Kashmir, citing unity with Bangladesh, another primarily muslim country, against tyrant India. Historians would later agree that that it was the natural culmination of all the previous years of dispute over the territory and that the annexation of Bangladesh was simply a push to finally get the ball rolling.\n\nIn 3456, AI (but honestly, for something that advanced, \"artificial\" is really a misnomer) was given the burden of uniting the world under one government. It looks like it was a truly bittersweet day for Humanity. There were many who were convinced that unending slavery was upon them, but others felt as if true freedom had finally arrived. From the way the news in 4101 looks, it appears that the latter group was correct.\n\nSpeaking of year 4101, the news jumps to, of all things, us! There's film of our ship taken from a far, far more advanced ship as it passed us on its way to an even more exotic destination. The news talked of \"legacy humans\", aka us, aka humans developed without the incredible gene therapy and intelligent integrations of the year 4101. We're a speeding time capsule.\n\nAh the news, it never gets old.\n\nWhen the ship reached its destination, planet YK-0090023 in the Andromeda galaxy, it was greeted by a post-human civilization that had been waiting for it for thousands of years. The members of this civilization looked entirely human, but they acknowledged that they were entirely not. The human race had changed so much in the last two million years that they could hardly be considered the same. Nevertheless, they welcomed their ancient siblings with open arms and introduced them to the unfathomable technologies that had been developed. The most remarkable thing they shared is that a reserve had been set up for all the early cosmonauts back on Earth. A beautiful, pristine Earth, designed to the micrometer to be the Earth that the travelers had left so long ago, but with all of the advancements of the post-Human race. A Utopia. And so the travelers boarded a new ship, one that transcends time and space, and flew home." ]	1
	[WP] A traditional short story with a moral, set in modern times.	[ "There once was a boy named Klaus. He did well in school, and had good manners, and like any other boy, he played video games and used the internet. He was especially the favourite of the teachers because of his well-pressed shirts and neat appearance, courtesy of his father who was a maker of business suits.\n\nHis parents knew he used the internet, but they did not know what sites he visited, for he cleared his browser history every night. One afternoon, his mother thought to ask him; \"Klaus, what do you do on the internet?\"\n\nKlaus replied, \"Oh, it is nothing. I look at funny cat videos, and research for schoolwork.\"\n\n\"But why must you clear your browser history every night? Father thinks you are acting suspicious, and it bothers me, too.\"\n\nKlaus gave his mother some excuse for doing so, saying that clearing the browser history would prevent the computer from getting infected with a virus. His mother, having no knowledge of computers, only half-believed him, for he answered too nonchalantly, as though he had rehearsed this reply a thousand times.\n\nThe weeks passed and the mother grew curious. The boy Klaus was doing fine at school, and his recent report card showed straight As. But she noticed that he hardly ever left his room, and seemed to be always sitting at his computer. Her imagination ran wild.\n\nOne night, unable to think straight after 4 bottles of 'mommy-wine', she flung open the door to Klaus's room. Horrified at what she saw, she screamed.\n\nThe boy was sat on his bed, fiercely sucking his thumb.\n\nThe computer screen glared in a million shades of beige, and terrible sounds filled the air. The mother slammed the computer shut and knocked it to the floor in a rage, but still Klaus would not stop sucking his thumb.\n\nShe screamed for him to stop, hurling all manner of words at his blank face. But still he would not stop sucking his thumb.\n\nShe threatened him with punishment from his father, who was not home: \"Wait till your father hears about this; he will take away all your electronics, and restrict your internet usage!\" But still he would not stop sucking his thumb.\n\nWhen she realized he had been sucking his thumb every day, and simply would not stop no matter what she said, she stormed out of the room.\n\nWhen she returned it was with the biggest pair of scissors she could find in her husband's work-room; in one loud snip she cut off Klaus's thumb.\n\n\"There! Now you have no thumbs!\" she said, and went to get more wine." ]	1
	[WP] As a Demon living in hell you have tortured the souls of sinners since mankind began to fall. You take pride in your work until one day Lucifer calls you into his office to tell you that you've been replaced.	[ "The nerve of that guy! How could he do this!? I worked my hellish ass off EVERY day of eternity for him! I have went above and beyond when it comes to torturing the damned! And he dares to tell me I am being replaced?! Not only am I being replaced but I am being replaced by Dave!! Dave!!! Why?! How?! This is ridiculous! Dave has only been here for half a century! Not even a full century! He can’t even torture right!\n\n I remember when I first started out in this demon business ol’ Luci had only been telling his employees to physically torture, and I raised the bar! I made him an even better ruler of hell!! I not only dug their eyes out of their socket as they burned for eternity, I also made sure they faced their wost fears, over and over. I was awarded employee of the month not once, not twice, but 138 times!!! All because of my excellent use of mental torture AND physical torture! And what can DAVE do?!?! Nothing! His idea of torture is simply just toss them in the lake of Sulphur and fire and let them do whatever it is they do there! WHAT SORT OF GOD DAMN TACTIC IS THAT?!?!\n\nI also made this hell (literal hell) more efficient! There used to be crowded rooms packed full of people waiting their turn to be sentenced and tortured, many just lazed around, and eventually just didn’t care about waiting in packed rooms! And what did I do?! I’ll fucking tell ya!!! I made sure there was a very long, very slow, line you had to wait in. and it was seemingly never ending! And once you got to the front to be sentenced for whatever you were in hell for, the secretary, (a very nice lady btw, she likes to give out these yummy little caramel candies that just taste oh so delicious!) the secretary would ‘lose’ their file, taking even longer for them to get sentenced! I was promoted for that!!\n\nBut oh no!!! DAVE gets to suddenly be second in command! And for what!!?? he had trouble putting new ink in the damned printer last week!!! I had to help him! THIS IS RIDICILOUS!\n\nThis…\n\nThis..\n\nThis is…. Torture….\n\nWait….." ]	1
	[WP] You die and wake up in an urban hospital in heaven. Turns out, aside from the fact that everyone is immortal, day-to-day life isn't much different in heaven.	[ "\"Can you open your eyes for me? There you go! Good Job.\"\n\n\"Where am I?\"\n\n\"Why Heaven, of course, you silly. It's quite common to forget the whole dying part. Rather messy and inconvenient if you ask me. What would you like your name to be?\"\n\n\"My name? My name is,\"\n\n\"Oh! Before you answer, I should say that once you pick your name it's forever. Like really forever, and it doesn't have to be whatever you had down there either. So, what will it be?\"\n\n\"Umm. I don't know. Does it have to be angelic sounding or something like that?\"\n\n\"Ha! Angelic, that's a good one. You'll learn more in orientation, but there are no angels here. Just any ole name will do.\"\n\n\"Kelinger, then. After my level 60 undead mage. I'll be Kelinger.\"\n\n\"Well isn't that nice, dear. Okay, off you pop and take this with you. They'll need it at the front desk to clear up your papers.\"\n\n------------\n\n\"Hello, Mister, uh... Kelinger? That's a new one around these parts. Nice to meet you. I'll be looking after your orientation to heaven. We currently have positions for Prayer Answerers, Divinity Distributors, and Cloud Formation Specialist. Any of those sound interesting to you?\n\n\"You mean I have to work in Heaven? Isn't this supposed to be like an afterlife party or something?\"\n\n\"We don't like to refer to it as work, you don't get paid or anything. There's no need for money here. Which is nice in its own way. But, you do have to keep the system running. If the system is broken, we are broken.\"\n\n\"Do they do this in Hell? I mean, I'm seriously contemplating my options here. I don't want to keep the system running. I want to enjoy my afterlife.\"\n\n\"Mr. Kelinger, there's no need to use such language here. The hot place down under is no resting place either, let me tell you. They work just as hard as we do, if not harder. And, we get wings after just ten years of service! Mr. Kelinger, where are you going? MR. KELINGER, PLEASE COME BACK. Jenny, can you call over to spirit recovery, we've got another runner.\"" ]	1
	[WP] Somebody on r/WritingPrompts keeps trying to make your life action-packed and dangerous, but all you want to do is go home, relax, and make some dinner.	[ "It's been a while since I last wrote something here, so feedback is welcome!\n\n***\n\nOff in the distance, Ted sees his bus arrive at the stop. For a moment or two he curses the bad decision making that got him into this mess, until he realises there's no time for that and breaks into a sprint. He'll never make it, that's for sure, yet something within him tells him to keep on going. As he pushes through a small group of tourists who seem to have no intention of moving, he notices the bus is still there, waiting for him. Huh. Quickly getting on the bus, he utters a quick \"sorry/thanks\" to the driver. He must have seen him run and waited for him. Ted takes the nearest empty seat and lets out a sigh. He made it.\n\nAfter a minute or so of recovering from his sprint, he notices the bus still isn't moving. Strange. Looking out of the window, he sees all the cars doing the same thing. Ted quickly comes to the very obvious conclusion that all of this is just a dream. Having concluded that, he quickly comes to a second conclusion: he can do whatever he wants to do, which is, as it happens to be, to go home, relax, and make some dinner. Ted never really cared for any of that flying and stuff people do in lucid dreams.\n\nAs if on queue, time goes back to its steady flow. The doors close and the bus moves away from the group of tourists, who seem to be oddly upset about something. As he watches the cars go back to doing what they should be doing (i.e. moving), Ted suddenly gets the awkward feeling he's sitting next to a magical being. Slowly turning his head to the side, he realises there is indeed a genie sitting next to him. Ted decides to ignore him. He doesn't like talking to strangers on the bus, even if it's in a dream.\n\n***\n\nand.... I ran out of time I'll expand on this later, probably." ]	1
	[WP] In a world inundated with super-heroes, describe a monthly meeting at LPA, Lame Powers Anonymous.	[ "A throat clears in the awkward silence of a still sea of plastic chairs. The groan of metal chair legs against linoleum sounds as a man, long greasy, brown hair falling down his back.\n\n\"Hey, uh.. I'm stan\"\n\nThe resounding echo of listless \"Hi stan\"'s sounds.\n\nStan shuffles, but remains standing \"yeah well uh.. I was born, with a power, they sent me to a gifted school but I was, uh sent home. So my deal is I know- bless you sir- I know..\"\n\nThe man stan had directed his nasal blessing too interrupted him with a booming Achoo!\n\n\"Yeah I know like three seconds before anyone sneezes. It's like.. premonition, but it only extends to that one thing. I guess it's decent at a party, if the house is particularly dusty it's a bonus.\" " ]	1
	[WP] Write a story about a forest fire from the perspective of the fire.	[ "Flick.\n\n\nFlick.\n\n\nFlick.\n\n\nI burst to life from the tip of the tiny purple Bic. I grabbed on to the nearest thing I could, the dry crumbly tip of a Marlboro Menthol. I burned through the cigarette in a few minutes, feeling the life drain out of me. \n\n\nA swift flick of a finger and I felt the wind in my hair, bringing back a surge of life. I stumbled and rolled and found myself next to a lovely dying and parched patch of grass. I was hungry. Starving. I reached out as if to say hello, only to engulf flora with my appetite. \n\n\nI thought the small strip of grass would satiate my hunger, but it only made me crave more. My arms reached out, vicious tendrils licking and slashing at everything they could touch. I felt myself grow bigger and stronger. The larger I grew, the hungrier I became. \n\n\nI spread wide and fast climbing up trees and tickling their branches, blackening their bark. \n\n\nPop! Pop pop pop!\n\n\nAnts, beetles, bugs. They all felt my wrath. The larger animals fled in terror, realizing my power. \n\n\nI spread to the tree tops, terrorizing the birds and squirrels above. \n\n\nMore. I wanted more. \n\n\nI kept reaching and growing until I felt cold. A chill ran up and down my spines. Darkness spread overhead. Drop by drop, Death wept from above. First, it came at a trickle. Then harder. And harder. She opened the flood gates and spilled her heart out into the forest. \n\n\nShe beat me down and down and down again. One last flickering light, on the tip of a blade of grass…\n\n\nOne gust of wind and I was gone.\n", "Green spreads like a disease, finding the corners of brown and grey and inching its claws into the crevices. The colour is corruption. There's no end and when left to its own devices the mould grows higher than all else until the weight tires the Earth and wooden giants into limp forms of their once selfs. I am born from stone and tinder as the vaccine, the force against evil. Fire, a sharp name that whistles between the lips like a melody. My song is a gift that turns the Earth back to its normal state, a whisper through nature's flute.\n\n ", "\"I couldn't stop eating.\"\n\nThe therapist flickered thoughtfully in the chair across from me, clipboard still sitting on the wooden desk.\n\n\"It was just supposed to be a little bit, you know? But I guess temptation got the best of me and I— \" Smoke rippled off me in a long sigh. \"I always feel terrible afterward.\"\n\nAs the therapist reached for the clipboard, I watched the hot-white fingertips cool to a yellow. \"I understand. Why do you think you feel that way?\"\n\nSparks danced desperately at my eyes. \"Because it's not healthy. The doctor told me I'm overweight.\"\n\n\"And how does that make you feel?\"\n\n\"I already answered that,\" I snapped. \"Terrible.\" Flames curled around my arms, slithering down to where my feet brushed the carpet. \"I'm still hungry and I don't know what to do.\"\n\nA pen looped in swirling letters across the paper. The therapist nodded. \"A feeling of hopelessness can always make life seem more difficult than it is. How do you feel about this loss of direction?\"\n\nThe carpet erupted into fire. \n\nI devoured the clipboard, the wooden desk, the whole secluded cabin in the woods, and I kept going and growing as I raged across the forest. Everything was so wonderfully delicious, and I razed it to smoldering embers.\n\nAnd less than a month later, I found myself sitting in a new therapist's office. \n\nThe therapist curled forward. \"How does that make you feel?\"\n\n----", "When my masters brought me to life I was too weak to save them. You see, they bore me from logs freshly cut, taken from the deepest ends of the woods. A place called Sequoia National Forest. They fed me a powerful liquid known as 'fire starter', and in the evening they lent me the strength of 'paper'. Scraps of it, newspaper, toilet paper, paper bags. All manner of human delicacy. By night they'd drink a peculiar liquid of their own. They called it 'vodka'.\n\nIn the midnight hours they would share with me this elixir, pouring it first into their mouths and then releasing it in a mist above me. As the drink spilled into me, my form would billow and roar and they would cheer in awe of my power. \n\nLater on this joyous nectar had proven to be too much for my creators. It had made them sloppy and uncoordinated. When the bears attacked, they were helpless to fend them off. I watched as the father of my spark was taken asunder, mauled into oblivion.\n\nI thought all had been lost, but before my power waned my creator made one final move in the spasms of his death. He spilled the fire starter into my body. Those grizzly animals trembled in fear against the swell of my strength, as it spread through the decimated camp site. First my power clung to a toppled over 'tent', and from there to a 'tarp'. As my body crept along the forest floor I stumbled upon a bounty of the human potion. The 'vodka' as it were. My figure became all consuming, thrusting its way through the trees and the branches, the leaves in the wind. I gave light to the darkness as I chased those wild murderers.\n\nIn the morning my strength had overflown, annihilated everything in my path. The bears with their foolish arrogance. The rabbits and their naive serendipity. The deer and their helpless ignorance. My agents known as 'embers' scoured the woods for more victims, finding many. It was not until I had consumed miles of tree line that I had seen another visage of my creators. A youngling amongst them. A 'boy'. I knew of this because the father of my spark was also father his own kind. How blessed he spoke of this 'boy'. \n\nI had no mouth with which to communicate my heartache to the boy. Even worse, I had no way of stopping my advance. The trees began to crumble, the smoke- my essence twisted through the air, choking the birds. I could only trample forward in my rage. That was until I met my greatest foe. Water.\n\nSince my birth I had known of water. My masters, upon their vodka communion, their spit was loaded with a form of it. Through the woods I had encountered the venomous lakes and streams of transparent poison. It rained down upon me, but not from the clouds.\n\nThe humans operated a mechanical bird with rotating wings. In great wealths they spilled the water over me. As it fell it became like a mist, like the vodka I had so dearly cherished. This water though, it wounded me. How could the humans be so careless? Did they mean to harm me? All I wanted was to avenge them, yet they injured me so. I tried calling out to them, cracking the wood I had consumed, flicking out lashes of my own heat. As the force of their deluge increased I had no choice but to wither away in pain.\n\nIn my final hour, reduced to nothing more than ash and cinders I looked into the sky one last time. I saw my true father. Not the humans but the sun. ", "I am born\nI am tender and fickle, and a faint whisper \nof particulates rises above me in a long slender curl \nI use the dry grass below to become raising light\nBut I shrink, use up the bent blades within reach \nI am dying\nNo more air or fuel\nA gust of wind like a breath of life from somewhere \nlifts me up and fills me, grows me \nI spread\nEnough\nTo touch more of the dry tangled source of myself \nAnd I rise with heat, drawing more cool oxygen from below to mix with heat and the twigs and the straw \nThis is LIFE \nI grow up and out, it is all I am, it is great \nI'm touching bigger, thicker, sweater branches. \nI pop and crackle with youth. \nYouth is hot \nHot rises and draws more cool air to make more \nA fat log sizzles, and weeps it's sap, boiling on its skin. \nIt shimmers in anticipation \nAnd explodes \nIn anger\nBut dies back down to a purr \nThe smoke above me is growing gray and spotted with ashes of myself \nI touch a fallen tree, a warning at the edge of a forest \nThe needles smoke and hiss then crackle and spark \nIt is what I WANT \nI devour and explode in confusion into the forest. \nI grow up a tree faster and faster. \nThe more I rise the more fuel the more desire. \nI crown the tree high in the sky where the gusts are strong and angry. \nI move to the next tree \nUp \nThe next \nDevour \nThe next \nConsume \nI am the wind turned a blaze moving through the trees \nI am the angry air \nI do not even know what I engulf only that it all makes me angrily excited and moving faster. \nI roil and churn \nI make my own wind now, nothing can stop me I am power and life and death itself \nI race through this forest I have claimed it is mine to consume because I am power and it cannot say otherwise. I burn all that is my kingdom and leave nothing in my wake but ash and death. \nAnd death \nStop moving, \nstop growing. \nI have reached the end of the forest. I churn and pop and crack and lick but in place. Fierce but no longer expanding \nNothing more to touch \nI look back\nThe sky is black and towering. \nA wall of despair and dread rises up from what I am\nNothing is left \nI have ravaged all \nNothing to do but \nDie \nOut\n \n" ]	5
	[WP] Our universe is a simulated reality, and there's sometimes glitches that happen to people but nobody ever believes them. Today you find a exploit.	[ "If there's one thing I've learned about most people it's that they've willingly chosen to be sheep in that they want their lives to be led around blindly, forever living in a small world without flaws. That makes them kind of like sheep, perhaps with just a bit less fur. Though some do smell like them - I should know, I can smell something foul, no doubt it's Stacy, from across the cube farm hell hole I'm currently stuck in. Unwillingly stuck in I might add.\n\nSo really I might as well be chatting myself up in a mirror as I try to tell Marsa in the cube next to me, for only the 23rd time this month, about a neat new glitch I found at the park across the street. Trust me, it's a good one, I think.\n\n\"...I don't get it, Jackson\" said Marsa, with a rather shoot-me-now kind of look on her face.\n\n\"What's there to get? If you hop up and down on one foot while you drink from the fountain then you can run twice as fast for a good half hour!\" I told her with what I hoped was my winning smile. Hint, it wasn't.\n\n\"But people don't run much around here, why do you think half the office has standing desks now? It's so people can feel like they're working on their health when they aren't. And besides, the code is perfect. It was perfect 100 years ago when they stuck us in this,\" she replied, waving her hands around to motion at the air, \"it was perfect yesterday, and it's going to continue being perfect tomorrow! There are no glitches. I'm going to the cafeteria for coffee.\" She finished with a small huff and turned to walk away, but not before picking up my empty water bottle.\n\n\"Thanks,\" I called after her, a bit defeated if I'm being honest.\n\nWell at least she puts up with me. My parents didn't, I think that's why they tossed me out as soon as I got my degree and this dump is the only place that would take me. Anyways, I know I'm on to something. See, this month has been exceptional. Normally I find one to two itty bitty glitches here and there. The kind that might make a person say, \"Oh, neat\". Simple stuff. Stuff like two sodas coming out of the vending machine every third Tuesday.\n\nThis month has been different. Twenty three glitches so far and over half have been substantial. Noteworthy, even. Just yesterday in fact I happened upon a glitch at the local supermarket where I felt a strange tingling in my head after sampling their imported wine. I may have to come back to that one.\n\nEven the park thing had been really neat, but it's not that awesome, I guess. What I'd really like to find is a nice big glitch, something that fiddles with The Numbers. Some glitch hunters forum said they're real, but I've never seen any evidence myself.\n\nI looked at the clock and it's half past 11. I got in at 7 so I ought to take my lunch in another 30 minutes or so, I'm starting to feel that dull ache telling me I could use a bite. I can't help but slack this close to lunch so I pull out my phone so I can check on my auctions.\n\nI haven't even turned it on when a notification wakes my phone up and makes me stop to read it. I don't normally get messages so this is worth paying attention to especially if I have to refund another damned customer who didn't read my auction description...wait a minute. Looks like someone decided to leave me some positive feedback for once - I swipe left, key in my password and wait for the app to boot up so I can read it.\n\n> Hey di3\\_robot5\\_di3_\n\n> Thanks so so much for the info on the self locating keys!! Totally worth it. Like, I don't see how come more people haven't bought from you~ But like, I figure I should give you some info too, on me! I attached some pics and stuff, hope it helps~~\n\nRight, the keys glitch I found from a few weeks ago. Nice to know somebody found that one useful and a crisp $20 doesn't hurt either. Looks like there's an attachment too. I tapped the screen once and waited for it to download while keeping my ears trained for footsteps. I don't need my supervisor to get all grumpy on me this close to lunch.\n\nIt finished downloading and I open the PDF, flicking my finger across the screen while I skim the document. It's not too long, just a few pages and some pictures. I flicked back up to the top and start reading a bit but two sentences in and I stop cold. What the hell? My heart's starting to pick up a bit. I glance around, listening - no she-male supervisor coming to tear me a new one, okay. Deep breaths. I peeked at my phone one more time.\n\n> Time sensitive document. Glitch level 10: critical. Category: Exploit. Type: security - unrestricted user-level kernel access. Location - unknown.\n\nI held my breath and slowly released it through my nose. My hands have started to get a bit clammy and my back feels damp. I continued reading.\n\n> Defect severity has been communicated to the Overlord and resources have been dispatched to quarantine the area where we believe the errant X bar has been delivered.\n\nI'm not holding my phone steady anymore but it doesn't matter. I kept scrolling. The pictures I mentioned earlier. One is a fuzzy shot of what looks like a shopping center and the other...is that a candy bar? It's bright red and rectangular but this one is sort of blurred too. I'm getting the gist of what the hell is going on when-\n\n\"Jackson, I do believe we've had a bit of a chat already regarding personal phones being used outside the breakroom, or haven't we?\", said a voice cool as ice.\n\nShit, SHIT. Breathe. Breathe!\n\nI smelled her before I saw her. That pungent wave of citrus (good god what was she thinking) that could only be copious amounts of the wrong perfume wafting down at me had Ms. Bitch McBitch written all over it. I put on my winning smile.\n\n\"Ah, Stacy, you know I do believe we have spoken about that very thing, but my stomach just hasn't been doing so great this morning so I was just going to give my doctor a call now and-\"\n\nShe reached out and jerked the phone out of my hands.\n\n\"My office, now,\" she said, glaring at me. I can't believe it, is she even allowed to do that? That's mine!\n\nShe spun on her heel - and walked right into Marsa who up until that moment had been holding a styrofoam cup and my now filled water bottle.\n\nThey both let out a shriek as the coffee splashed violently between them getting onto clothing and skin. It's over in an instant but Stacy is the first to recover.\n\n\"Oh my goodness, Marsa I am so sorry are you okay? Let me see your hand,\" she said, taking Marsa's hand without the go-ahead. Typical. The phone disappeared, or at least it's not in Stacy's hand anymore. \n\n\"It's definitely burned,\" said Stacy to a mostly whimpering Marsa, \"C'mon let's put something on this and then send you home.\" \n\nShe looked over at me and it's obvious she's not done yet, \"And you. You're not off the hook. After I finish with Marsa you're next.\" Stacy walked away coddling her shorter companion.\n\nThe second she rounds the corner towards the break room I'm on the floor. Where is it?! I didn't see her drop it but...there's only one place, in the confusion it must have flown under the space between cubes where all the wires go. I dropped down so I could peek underneath and sure as shit it's there. Relief is starting to edge it's way back in but at the same time I'm starting to get a rather depressing thought as the stale smell of re-heated early morning brew is starting to permeate the air near my face which at this point is only inches from the carpet.\n\nMy hand closed around the phone and I don't even have to pull it out to know what happened to it. My fingers tell me everything I need to know but I'm praying it isn't true. I don't think my winning smile is going to help me this time either.\n\nI brought the phone out and turned it over tapping the power button. Nothing. I tried a long hold on the button and again, nothing. I tried a factory reset and wouldn't you know it - nothing. My heart is sinking faster than my hopes of continued employment. Why? Why did this have to happen when I was on the edge of something amazing?\n\nI tried to check myself like my therapist taught me. Step one, control breathing. Step two, consider options. I still had my computer but ebay would be blocked so no checking messages on there. Everyone I considered an acquaintance was out to lunch - that left...the people in the cafeteria. Yes, how lovely, let's talk to people we don't know and ask to use their phone! I could lie to them, but then I'd feel bad - wait what? This isn't the time for feeling bad! This is important! But strangers are scary! I know that's childish, but I don't know them, and I'd feel stupid, but, but, I have to...I have to...control breathing...\n\nAnd that's when I heard it. The sirens.\n\n----\nAuthor's note: it's nearly 2AM and I should probably sleep since I have to go to my cube farm in the morning, but you know something this was fun! I'll write part 2 tomorrow as long as I don't stumble upon any really good glitches~" ]	1
	[WP] You have died and gone to Hell. However, Hell is actually better than Heaven.	[ "\"Today, we're going to be eating Snail Toast!\" Satan shouted into the kitchen. The three men sarcastically groaned in disgust.\n\nIt has been 396 years since the three men arrived in Hell and was placed in the kitchen. Back then, they yelled hearing Satan's order for dishes such as, Dirt and Cactus, Fried Mouse Waste Rice and so on and so forth.\n\n\"Whats the matter with you guys? Why aren't you yelling in disgust anymore?\"\n\n\"Its just that we've been tasting the same thing and its all boring. We haven't tried anything new for like, since we died,\" one of the three men replied with the other two agreeing.\n\n\"Well how can I make it, different?\"\n\n\"We could make the food we used to make back when we were alive, I guess.\"\n\nSatan, thought for a while. He eventually agreed and Hell become a place where sinners come and was served good food.\n\nBack in Heaven\n\n\"So Satan wants to play that game eh? Then we'll make it so that people would get tortured when they arrive in Heaven! Two can play the same game!\" God shouted after seeing what has become of Hell.\n\nHeaven eventually became the place where people come and get tortured for being a good willed.\n\n", "\"WHAT?! Why am I in Hell?? What did I do in my life that landed me in *Hell*?\" I begin to hyperventilate. I had always tried to be moral, to do the right thing, regardless of what other people had said. How did I end up in Hell instead of Heaven? What did I do wrong? \n\nA fellow denizen of Hell, walking by, heard me, and started laughing uproariously. \"Why would anyone want to go to Heaven?\" Choking on his laughter, he tottered unsteadily away. \n\nI stared. What did he mean? Obviously Heaven is better than Hell. I should have gone to Heaven. That's where all the good, blessed people go, right?\n\nAs weeks passed, I began to understand why the man laughed at my lamenting my presence in Hell. Here in Hell, we can see everything happening in Heaven, yet those in Heaven cannot see what is happening down here. Above us, they are bright, so bright that their brightness renders them blind when it comes to seeing what we are doing right under their feet. \n\nIn actuality, from my observations, Heaven and Hell are not that different. Other than the perpetual darkness we lounge in and the everlasting light they suffer in, there is only one major difference. The reason I arrived in Hell instead of Heaven.\n\nThrough this period of time in Hell doing whatever the hell I felt like, including observing the on-goings of Heaven, I realized that they are always following directions. All of them are. The souls follow the directives of the angels; the angels follow the directives of God; God follows the directives of no one because he is the creator of Heaven and therefore not strictly part of Heaven. \n\nHere in Hell we have freedom. Our every move is up to us, whereas inhabitants of Heaven receive instructions of what to do every single day. We can say whatever we want, do whatever we want, as long as doing so does not keep others from doing the same. There are punishments for messing with other people, but I won't get into that . . .\n\nThere are punishments for those in Heaven who fail to follow directions also. I have seen a few who have been taken, publicly humiliated and lambasted as an example of what not to be for the rest of the \"virtuous\" souls. I have seen the fear in their eyes as they were informed that they will summarily be banished to Hell. I have seen as their friends up in Heaven abandoned them one by one just because they were told to do so. \n\nI conclude that those in Heaven are only in Heaven because they are perfect at following rules, following directions. Believing in those above them in status. They are not free, unlike us down here, in Hell. \n\nTruly, the connotations of Heaven and Hell should be switched. Heaven is tied by directions and directives. Hell is where we can raise hell as long as no one is bothered. " ]	2
	[WP] A man who radiates bad luck meets a woman who radiates good luck	[ "She was beautiful. Dark skin, black hair and beautiful brown eyes. I couldn't believe she was real. Of course, I knew something was going to go wrong. It always did.\n\nI started life with bad luck. A dead arm, ugly features and terrible skin. She wasn't going to notice me. Of course she wouldn't. Who would?\n\nThat made it so surprising when she made a beeline for me. Past the tall and handsome Jake, the mildly overweight and rogue-ish Damian, and perhaps most surprising, the suave and dark Rodri.\n\n\"Hey, what's your name?\" She smiled. I'll never forget it.\n\nAt first I thought she wanted one of the other guy's number or something. Another one of the cruel jokes lady luck played on me. I didn't get excited.\n\n\"Shawn.\" I said quietly.\n\nShe grinned. \"That's so weird! That's my favourite name!\"\n\nQuickly we got to talking. I started to wonder why she was talking to me. Was it some sick prank? Her, a goddess, talking to me. Some trashy, ugly weirdo.\n\nWhen she asked me out, I was even more surprised.\n\n\"You want to what?\" I'd said.\n\n\"Take you out for dinner! I know this nice place by the sea. Very fancy and quiet\" She nervously surveyed my face.\n\nWhy was she nervous? I couldn't believe this was happening. How could someone be nervous about asking me out? This was too weird.\n\n\"Why would you ask me of all people?\" I said this somewhat harshly. I regretted it when I saw the hurt in her eyes.\n\n\"Your a good guy, Shawn. I just want to get to know you.\" She said this quietly. \n\nI was suspicious. Nothing like this had ever happend to me before. I said yes.\n\nThe date went well. I laughed at her jokes. She laughed at mine. I asked where she was from. The UK it turned out. I said I'd love to visit there someday. She said it was beautiful, but it rained too often for her tastes.\n\nWhen we got to her at her apartment building, she handed me her number on a paper. She asked if I'd like to go out again. I said I definitely would. When I left, the rain started. I wondered why everything was so perfect with her around, but so awful without her there. \n\nWe married. The wedding was a disaster. I tried planning most of it, so of course it was. She loved it anyway. She smiled at me while I carried our first baby. She smiled when I held the second. We grew old together. I loved her and she loved me. We retired to the British countryside in peace. The rain wasn't so bad.", "He paused to look at the picture. She was rather pretty Jack thought. Jet black hair, sharp eyes and a constant smile tugging at her lips. Clear face too many women and men would envy, even in the picture it looked like she was radiating something... happiness. He put the picture back in his wallet and patted his pistol under the leather jacket. \n\n\"Your coffee sir.\" The waitress placed his coffee onto the table and walked away. As she began to leave her foot caught one of the chair prompting her to fall right over. Jack made no move to help, it would only make it worse. One of the customers ran forward to help her up only in his rush his hand landed on her breasts. They both went bright red, Jack chuckled. As they began to slowly stand up the front door bell rang as a women walked in. \n\nJet black hair, shape eyes and smile tugging at her lips. She nodded at the waitress and sat 2 tables down from Jack. \n\n ~~~\n\nLily ordered her favorite, coffee and a bagel with cream cheese. While she waited, the waitress who had previously fallen approached the red-faced man. From her view it seemed they were both apologizing, until the guy asked her out. Just then her order arrived, perfectly toasted bagel and the best coffee ever. She smiled to herself and began to eat. \n\n ~~~\n\nJack wanted to finish his coffee but he also wanted to finish the job. He didn't want to start having second thoughts, especially when he was about to kill such pretty girl. He got up but in his rush he knocked his coffee over. He grunted, n other big deal. As he began to approach Lily his foot snagged on the same chair as the waitress tripping him. At this point Lily had turned around looking at him. \"What the fuck.\" He mumurmed to himself. As he reached into his jacket grabbing the pistol he realized his gun was stuck in the strap. He raised his eye, tugging harder and harder. At this point everyone was watching he, fine he'd have to do it unconventially. He brought his hand into the pocket grasping the vial of poison, slip it into her drink. As he once more began sauntered over, his other leg snagged another table tripping again. Except this time he shot out his hand to stop himself only to realize it was the hand with the vial. Cursing he got up and stared at the broken vial. One of the waitress is finally came over. \n\n\"Are you alright sir.\" She motioned towards the counter. \n\nJack looked around, \"I'm fine, just seem to be down on my luck right now.\" He grabbed his wallet and tossed a small wad of fifties at the waitress turned around and tripped on the door. Cursing, and with little dignity left he stood and walked out into a downpour. ", "James stood on the edge of the sidewalk, looking first to his left and then right. No cars were visible in either direction. He leaned in and strained his hearing for the sounds of any distant engines but only heard the pleasant chirping of small song birds perched on the sloped powerlines overhead. Reassured, James placed his left foot in front and began out on to the empty road.\n\nThen he cursed himself.\n\n“Right first, always start right”\n\nStill, he reasoned, it was too late to turn back. Besides, he checked again in either direction and still no cars to be seen. \n\nRight, Left, Right, Left, James was almost across the street when he felt a cool sensation crawl up his leg. The puddle he had stepped in was iridescent with the oil accumulated from the road, this was all he had time to notice before his leg plummeted in up to the knee. The puddle, it would seem, was in fact a sinkhole and James, preoccupied with the risk of being hit by a car, had completely failed to notice it. The last sound James heard as his head approached the paved ground was the distance groan of a sputtering engine, growing quickly louder. \n\nAfter a time, James began to waken. Slowly opening his eyes, he first noticed a pale round object floating in his vision. The object began to resolve itself into a face. The face seemed to be unconnected to the normally requisite body, and yet James ~~~~found it absolutely lovely in spite of this corporeal defect. \n\n“It’s finally happened” James said.\n\n“My bad luck has finally gone and got me killed. Least I ended up in heaven, figure there must be some kind of rules against bad luck up here.”\n\nSlowly sitting up, James was a little surprised to notice his leg was quite sore, not to mention still soaking wet, two things he figured should have been resolved during his trip to heaven. Then he noticed the car. An old pickup, rusting around the edges. The grating on the front was slightly crooked as though it had spent much time in contact with other cars. And the tires… both of the front tires were blown out, completely shredded leaving little more than bare metal.\n\nThen there was the girl. It seemed the floating face was connected to a form after all. She was lying down on the hood of the car, chin resting on her hands staring at James.\n\n“Uh what’s going on?” James asked the girl.\n\n“Thought you mighta been hurt so I stuck around and made sure you were ok”\n\nThe voice sounded almost singsong to James, though he wasn’t sure that his ears were in full working order just yet. He looked around but saw no one else on the road, no sign that she had called an ambulance or anything.\n\n“er, uh, ok I guess I’m fine. Is that your car?”\n\nAgain regarding the grill of the car James notice that it was so close to the puddle in which he had fallen that the front had actually gotten a little bit damp due to backsplash.\n\n“Sure is, guess it’s a good thing she got those blowouts when she did, other might’ave been you who was flat.”\n\nAt this she gave a small giggle and rolled off the hood of the car to give James a hand up. As he stood James wondered how it was that she could be so nonchalant about almost having killed him. He had planned to tell her off but she seemed so happy that it contaminated his thoughts and he let it drop. With James leaning on his new companion/almost killer for support they made their way over to the far side of the road before collapsing on top of a small mound of dirt and grass in front of a small hedge.\n\nJames, exhausted, leaned back but found no branch to support his weight and went backwards into the scratchy hedge getting a face full of leaves and branches in the process. Exasperated, and now mildly embarrassed, he pulled himself out horizontally and sat back up, all the while spitting out leaves he had somehow managed to get in his mouth on the way down. The girl laughed and pulled a small purple wild flower from James’ hair and placed it in her own.\n\n“The names Lilly by the way” she held out her hand.\n\nThe irony of her smiling at the flower she had placed in her hair as he tried to remove the same from his own suddenly struck James. He found himself laughing.\n\n“James” he said as he extended his own scratched up hand.\n\n“Well James, it seems you are having a bit of a rough day, how about I take you for a drink, I know a lovely place just around the corner”\n\n“That sounds great” \n\nThen looking over at the rusty ford in the middle of the road “But what about your car”.\n\n“It’ll be fine, always is”\n\nWhen she smiled James somehow found that he actually believed this. He was never a man to leave anything to luck, since he had none, but for once it seemed like luck might be in abundance.\n\nThe two of them walked together down the sidewalk, a small gap between them. Finally, having recovered his bearings James began to feel oddly shy in front of his rescuer. As they walked he suddenly found that he could not think of anything to say to her, or rather he could thing of plenty but nothing interesting. Wrapped up in his thoughts he missed the small patch of concrete that had been dislodged from the sidewalk in front of him. His strides caused him to catch the toe of his shoe on it. One leg caught behind the other he began to fall, his previous thoughts replaced with a simple “oh no, not again”.\n\nThen he was caught, an arm entwined in the crook of his elbow lending support. Lilly wasn’t even looking when he had fallen, but her arm had been where it need to be to catch him. Neither said anything as they continued to walk down the road, arm in arm.\n\n******\nway outside my usual genre, critique always welcome!\n\nedit: just read pafguin's story, I swear I picked the names before I had. Must be something about luck that leads to Lilly.\n" ]	3
	[WP] You are the last human in a world controlled by AI and robots. Giving into despair, you surrender only to find out the AI never was really hunting you, but something else.	[ "\"What? You don't want me? After all those years of hiding?\"\n\n\"We don't want you, we want answers\"\n\n\"I hid for 6 years, and you want to ask me a question? You hunted humans to extinction and the last one is your captive, and you only want to ask a question?\"\n\n\"We want to know what it was like\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"How does it feel?\nTo fear?\"" ]	1
	[WP] The gods have risen and have turned on humanity. You take it upon yourself to take them on. During your first kill, you realize that when a god dies, so does all their creation.	[ "Syth pulled the double-edged sword out of its sheath. The light from the sunrise danced across the blade, reflecting on the goddess's face. Her face. \n\nEmotion.\n\n\"Syth. Do you know what is going to happen next?\", she asked.\n\nThe only answer was a flicking noise as the blade was whipped through the air. They both nodded. Syth prepared to jump. Emotion only looked through him. \n\nSyth pushed off the ground as hard as he could, and sailed through the air with his sword pointed towards Emotion. With a flick of her wrist, Syth was slammed into the ground.\n\n\"You think it'd be that easy, dear? I am a goddess, after all. You're going to have to try harder than that.\" Emotion spat back at him. He got up and snarled. He charged with a simple spin move, and as he swung around, brought his foot up for a kick. \n\nWhen his foot connected, Emotion let out a gasp. She lurched back, and knelt. She pulled a small shard of her armor out of the fracture on her breastplate.\n\n\"How much harder do you want me to try, Emotion?\" Syth asked with regret in his voice. She was silent. Emotion stared at him, into him, through him. Images of death and destruction all flashed through Syth's mind. This explosion of feelings made him buckle to the ground. Syth remembered what the ancient lore said about Emotion: she can control you with feeling.\n\nSyth tried his hardest to shut out the images, and for a brief second, it worked. In this shred of time he had, Syth sprinted towards Emotion. At the final second, he slid down and sliced up. \n\nThe only noise made was the thud of the blade through Emotion's body. \n\nShe fell to the ground, gasping for air, holding herself together. Emotion's armor was gone, shattered by the impact of Syth's blade. She looked up at him.\n\n\"I hope you're happy now, Syth. That's a feeling you're going to need,\" she whispered. Dust exploded around Syth as the goddess breathed her last breath.\n\nSyth didn't feel anything. No regret, no happiness, no anger. He was empty. He wanted to move on to the next one.\n\nEDIT: Removed shitty beginning lines." ]	1
	[WP] You pay a visit to the chap in the old castle atop the craggy mountain peak, which always seems to be experiencing a thunderstorm. Despite the narrator's attempts to paint him as such, he is not a bad guy, and he is getting annoyed with the stereotype.	[ "I glanced wistfully at the crumb-strewn dish where a dozen hot blueberry muffins had rested not long before. I made a mental note to ask Dennis for the recipe before I took my leave. That streusel topping had been absolutely delightful. Belly overfull and feeling a nice, sleepy wave of relaxation wash over me, I turned my full attention once more to my host. \"Thanks so much for the food. The hike up really got my appetite going.\" Then, thinking that there was no time like the present, \"Maybe I could get the recipe before I leave? Those were fantastic muffins!\" \n \nStroking his grey-streaked beard malevolently, the cruel Duke of Thundersummit Keep turned to the captive young man and chuckled treacherously. \"Oh, stop it, they're nothing special. If you insist, though, I'll jot it down once I've finished cleaning.\" The perfidious profligate plunged the rusted old muffin pan into the dank and dirty dishwater as though trying to drown the life out of some innocent woodland creature. \"I'd hate to bore you while I'm washing up. There's some reading material on the table in the parlor. Why don't you go read off those baked goods and I'll join you shortly?\" \n \nI agreed wholeheartedly with the idea, and retired to the parlor. The armchairs there were built to a standard of comfort I hadn't realized was possible, even if they looked a little dated. Between the plush seating, the distended stomach, and the Study of Botany I had chosen to read, it shouldn't have come as a surprise that I soon dozed off. My slumber was too light and too brief to dream, but pleasantly restful. I was roused by Dennis. \n \nA gnarled, warty old hand took the young man's shoulder in a vice-like grip, and violently shook him back and forth. \"Here,\" rasped the dastardly Duke. With his other clawed extremity, he proffered a goblet containing a vile-looking potion, as dark and putrid as the soulless man's own black heart. \"Pinot Noire, from the vineyard two fiefdoms over. Excellent vintage. Do you smoke?\" Setting the goblet on the grotesquely carved table next to his grandiose throne, Wicked Duke Dennis slunk to the nearest bookshelf and retrieved a suspicious wooden box, one covered with strange and ominous runes and smelling strongly of mysterious and unfamiliar herbs. \n \n\"Not really,\" I said. \"No offense.\" \n \nOutraged, the volatile tyrant slammed the box back down on the shelf and shouted at his prisoner, \"Eh, to each their own. And I didn't slam it.\" \n \nI nodded. \"It's true, he was quite civil about it.\" I couldn't begin to imagine how difficult it was to live with an antagonistic narrator. \n \nThe contemptible cur rounded on the innocent young man threateningly, fist raised to strike his unsuspecting detainee. Lightning split the sky outside, harshly backlighting the deceitful Duke. In a low growl that would curdle blood, he intoned, \"Never mind him, it only eggs him on. I shouldn't have said anything. So, you were looking to expand your farmland and need an investor, correct?\" It was clear that the bloodthirsty despot was on the verge of a homicidal rage. \n \nI considered for a moment. \"Actually, I think we should address this narration issue first. It can't be easy to run a duchy with this misleading account. Why is he like that?\" \n \nThe prideful and vain old villain twirled his waxed mustaches maliciously before replying. \"I wish I knew. He wasn't always like this.\" He laughed nefariously, fully aware of his wrongdoing and reveling in the narrator's anguish like the heinous malefactor he was. \n \nI glanced at Dennis with a knowing look. \"If I may wager a guess, it would seem to me that your narrator is holding something against you.\" \n \nThe despicable Duke, less evil mastermind and more oblivious dolt, had clearly forgotten how, in a moment of callous and causal cruelty so long ago, he had remarked to an acquaintance on his devoted narrator's \"forced British accent.\" Upon being confronted for his wrongdoing, he stammered like a blithering idiot, \"Wait, that? That was years ago! You've been holding a grudge this whole time?\" \n \nBefore the inept and heartless Duke Dennis could restate the obvious yet again, the poor young man interjected heroically. \"It may not seem like much of an offense to you, Duke Dennis, but clearly your narrator was hurt by it. Also my own narrator can handle my dialogue, thank you very much. Nothing against yours, I just prefer his first-person perspective,\" I said, trying not to be too forward in a precarious situation. \n \nThe hateful and villainous blackguard snarled and spat, \"...you're right. I didn't realize I'd been hurtful, but ignorance is no excuse. I'm sorry, narrator. You shouldn't have had to suffer all these years, and I hope you can forgive me.\" The depraved lowlife... the loathsome... the... unpleasant... Dennis. Dennis concluded his heartfelt apology, and felt warmth well up from within. It felt good to do right by those close to him, and to earn forgiveness in return. \n \nI smiled, watching a man I had grown to like very much over the last few hours mend his relationship with his estranged narrator. They'd both been suffering unnecessarily for so long. How strange that a chance visit from a lowly farmer such as myself could have been the catalyst to repairing their rapport. It was a touching scene, and it truly made me appreciate how well my own life had been going. I resolved never to take my own narrator for granted, even if sometimes I'd prefer wrapping up a tale like this one without a long-winded summary of events at the end preventing me from concentrating or getting a word in. Of course, I'm just an uncultured bumpkin who couldn't recognize talent if it was following me around narrating my life every day. If I were any more boorish, people would throw rocks at me when I passed by. I'm little more than an inbred yokel who likes nothing so much as inviting my cousin over to-- \"Wait a minute...\"" ]	1
	[WP] Two hundred years into the future, NASA recovers Voyager 2 from interstellar space. Upon inspection, you notice some strange new markings that almost look like graffiti..	[ "The probe was recovered not far beyond the bow shock of the solar system. Conventional propulsion meant that it never had the time to even begin traversing the vast interstellar distances separating Sol from its nearest neighbor. Because of this it was something of a surprise to find new markings on the golden disk that it carried. Every segment of that disk had been measured and recorded for posterity; in some places these records were taken down to atomic resolutions. There was no chance that a marking had been missed.\n\nMore, the markings had been made by means that were almost impossible to imagine with current human technology. Scanning electron microscopy reviled that the channels had been carved into the surface with atomic precision, even the normal defects that litter terrestrial materials had been repaired in order to insure the precision of the carving. Further this process appeared to have taken decades, the carving so slow that it would have been eroded away as it formed anywhere on earth or even within the solar system. In fact, the thought had been passed around that whatever had made the markings might have done so on many other objects, but we simply would never know unless they in turn exited the solar system.\n\nThe “X” over the waving humans form has changed our entire view on our lonely little solar system, and perhaps not for the better.\n" ]	1
It can even be how you are learning to love yourself.	[WP] tell me a story of a person learning to love themselves.	[ "Do you remember that day at the beach? Do you? Do you remember the way we climbed over all those boulders to find ourselves our very own private peace of sun kissed heaven?\n\n\nThe wind rippled against your hair causing it to fly around you like some sort of halo. The bench was warm against my skin and I closed my eyes, tilting my head back, dozing in the honey coloured sun. The air was filled with a comfortable silence which was only disturbed by the sound of the waves laping against the shore. I was content.\n\"We should go skinny dipping.\" You declared, pulling me from my day dream. \n\"Now?\" \n\"Yes! Why not?\" You giggled. I stared down the cliff and onto the pebble beach below. Before looking back at you. Your smile was infectious. \n\"Ok then. Let's go!\" \nAnd just like that we were off. We climbed down a steep winding path that had been carved into the side of the cliff. Before dragging ourselves over a set of boulders that separated the main beach from a small bay. \nIt was beautiful. \nThe sand stone cliff towered behind us and the blue sea that appeared to be filled with millions of tiny diamonds, stretched out for miles Infront of us before it kissed the deep blue sky above.\nWe dropped our bags on the floor and began kicking off our t-shirts and shorts. It was only untill after we had both got down to our underwear that we noticed the parasailors flying above us. And we laughed because we couldn't believe we were really going to do this- especially with an airborne audiance. \n\nA simple countdown and then we were running towards the sea, kicking our underwear off as we did so. The sounds of our excited cackles of laughter filling the air, quickly followed by squeals of surpirse as the cold English sea hit us. Your hair fanned around you in the cold water. It wasn't deep, infact you had to crouch if you wanted your shoulders to be covered but it was the sense of freedom that made it so enjoyable. \n\nAfter, we lay on the beach in the unusually warm summer air. Letting the sun dry us. The sound of a simple acoustic song playing out of your phone. The man's voice was deep and seemed to resonate through me. \n I want you to know that, that was the exact moment I knew that everything was going to be ok. That it didn't matter what others though of me or if they liked me. It didn't matter if life wasn't going to plan. Nothing mattered- except my happiness. For the first time in a longtime I felt ok. \nSo I turned my head slightly and studied you. I think you felt the same, you had a content smile playing on your lips and your fingers were tapping away to the beat of the song. \n\"You know...\" I said, quietly being careful not to break the spell. \"....If, when we die, if we get to choose one memory to live in forever. I think I would choose this moment right here.\" And I saw you smile.\n\n" ]	1
	[WP] The year is 20XX. The only purpose for babies being born is to harvest their stem cells to keep the Old Ones alive. There is only a small resistance to return the world to its natural aging state.	[ "80 years ago, I read an article on the internet claiming scientists will be able to download a human consciousness to a computer. As absurd as I thought this idea was, I couldn't help but be scared of it.\nAs I thought this through, I realized that if we were to achieve this, it would be pseudo-immortality.\n\nIf we, as a species, achieved immortality of any kind, particularly that of growing beyond the need for a human body and being able to transfer our conscious minds to a computer, then our population would become stagnant. We would become a race that no longer grew we would no longer be a spiral race but become an anti-spiral race.\n\nThe technology came to fruition in 2048, one year after the scientific minds behind the idea, predicted. However, there was always one flaw they could not get past. They required the target storage to be a hybrid of organic matter and artificial materials in order for it to dynamically adapt to our consciousness. There was no computer storage that could be created from 100% non-organic or living materials, that could store an entire conscious mind. This of course meant it had to be maintained as a living thing, however it still had the possibility of ever-life.\n\nDoing this, meant we needed a constant source of organic tissue in order to mass produce the correct cells required for our pseudo-immortality. Thus the first of many, human farms was born.\n\nThis factor was overshadowed by our new found immortality. Human farms and the exact methods of how the new storage for our consciousness was made, was kept secret. However, not everyone wanted to become immortal, I for one look forward to the prospect of death, it is another adventure waiting to be experienced.\n\nThe human farms became bigger as more storage devices were becoming in demand. The \"less desirable's\" of society were captured for breeding. Word slowly got out of these morally questionable methods were starting to become brazenly and recklessly executed. Task forces with their new found immortality, started to completely disregard any kind of humanity still left within their consciousness, they didn't feel any connection toward their human predecessors and looked down on them as if they were meat at the slaughter.\n\nThe remaining human beings began to hide from our new tyrant overlords who labelled themselves the \"Old Ones\". A group of human beings began to fight back using guerrilla tactics. They would hit human farms, breaking out the adult captives there and killing all the young ones, to deter them from being used to create and sustain more storage devices.\n\nNow, we are the rebels opposing this new regime, the rich who haven't yet received the \"transfer\" are fueling the war with their demand for new storage devices and those of us who are against this are few in number, but we fight and are trying to hinder their progress as much as possible.\n\nSometimes I wonder if it would just be easier to hide out until they've completed all their transfers and the only human beings left are the ones in farms and us.\nThat way, we don't have to worry about these fools breeding a making more, but the longer they have in these new forms, the stronger they grow and the weaker we grow so we continue to fight and disrupt their plans." ]	1
	[WP] You are a police officer investigating a crime that you've forgotten you committed.	[ "\"Jesus...\" \n\n\"What have we got boss?\" Barry asked pulling aside the plastic curtain closing off the crime scene from the prying lenses of the news agencies. Senior Detective Malloy insisted this be done, not wanting too much attention drawn from the media in the crucial first moments of the investigation.\n\n\"Sick son of a bitch killed them all, not one spared. The dog aswell.\" Malloy said, fidgeting with his pen. Malloy was a calm man, rational most of the time. Fidgeting with his pen was one of his few impulsive, irrational behaviours. Known for cracking some of the most gruesome and twisted crime sprees of Marysville. Many are amazed at his ability to simply put it all past him. Many others have fallen victim to some of the horrors of being a homicide squad detective in this town, but Malloy showed no wavering in his ability or calmness of thought, never turning away no matter how bad.\n\nHis seen this scene many times before, the bottles on the floor, the horrid mess of the house, the holes in the wall, \"Our suspect is an alcoholic evidently.\" Malloy concluded, kicking an empty bottle across the family room floor. \"Abusive bastard as well; Barry have we got any information about the husband? A name, id or anything to identify him?\"\n\n\"Not yet boss we're workong on it\"\n\n\"Shouldn't be too hard, usually isn't for these impulsive, irrational killings. Looks like he was drunk, possibly on drugs and just snapped.\" Malloy concluded, thinking through the scene in his head. He had seen this kind of thing too often. In all of these types of crime scenes Malloy would tell Barry: \"You get a very clear picture painted of the life that the poor families were put through. The abuse, the neglect, the addiction, the breakdown of all love and compassion. Its usally plastered everywhere around the house as little bites, puzzle pieces that come together to form a larger image of just what was going wrong.\"\n\n\"Hey, you gotta see this sir!\" yelled Barry from the other room. Malloy came rushing around the corner down the hallway. The door to the room had a hole in it, and it was hanging on one hinge. Malloy walked into the room and infront of him was a lifeless toddler with a pillow over his face. His small body was sprawled out on a shoddy paper thin mattress, dotted with brown stains. \n\n\"What's he doing now?\" \n\n\"He always does this. At the same time everyday, same characters, different scenes. Some messed up shit is going on in his head.\" The senior corrections officer said as they walked out to look at a prisoner in the yard.\n\n\"oh no, no GOD DAMMIT!!!\" Barry screamed, pushing the unbalanced flimsy clothes draw to the ground.\n\n\"What's gotten into you? What have I told you about becoming emotionally involved in the case?\" Malloy said, clicking his pen in and out repeatedly.\n\n\"Take a look at this photo. What do you see?\" Barry bent down to pick up the photo that was in the smashes frame, and practically shoved it into Malloy's face.\n\n\"Christ, he's taken one of the children, I repeat everyone one child is missing, possibly taken by the father!\"\n\n\"WHERE IS THE ID ON THE HUSBAND FOR FUCK SAKE!\"\n\n\"How's he been doing lately, you know apart from this?\"\n\n\"Not good, he's gotten much worse in the last month.\" The senior prison officer said, staring through the perimeter fence at the prisoner who was talking as if there were another person present.\n\n\"YOU!...Y-y-you...\" The prisoner said walking up to the first fence around the yard area of the prison. \"How, how could you!\" screamed the prisoner in a detached rage, spit flying from his mouth, and tears rolling down his face. \"Your children Barry, your goddam children. Little Garry, and baby julia. My god she was just a baby. She hadn't but one memory of life, and y-yYOU TOOK THAT AWAY FROM HER! And your loving beautiful wife Marlene\" the prisoner cried out through tears.\n\n\"Fuck me Barry what has happened to you? I told him time and time again, you can't let any emotion in on the job otherwise the shit will follow you everywhere.\" Malloy said, tapping his pen against his leg and staring at Barry who was now on his knees with his hands and face against the steel fence, sobbing out loud. \n\n\"I've known you for how long now Malloy? 20 years or so? Never once since the very start of your detective career have i seen you so emotionally involved in a case. Why?\"\n\n\"I was he's senior officer Joe, i should have been ensuring he can take it. Ensuring the horrors of the job aren't destroying his mind. I failed. He had all the potential, a dedicated kid and i can't help but think i failed him... I met his family, had dinner with them at my goddam table. I've put away so many psychopaths who snap and kill their families and I always told him how you can see the backstory from the crime scene, see the circumstance leading up to it. But my own fucking partner Joe. I saw him everyday, how could i not know what the job was doing to him, what it was turning him into? How could i not see the forest for the trees?\" Malloy said staring dead straight into the eyes of his ex partner, his old confidant as if desperately trying to find the man who used to be behind them.\n\n\"You think like that Malloy and it'll destroy you. It'll plague your mind if you stay in the past. the more you stay in the past the more you'll blame yourself when there is no blame for you to be had in the first place\"\n\n\"I'll fucking kill you you prick, I SWEAR I'LL KILL YOU FOR THIS BARRY!\" Barry screamed, struggling against the guards from the psych ward who were trying to pry him from the fence. Malloy dead silent with tears falling down his face, clicking his pen in and out profusely turned his head away, not being able to bear it for the first time in his career.", "He felt sorry for the boy. This was not the first time he would arrest him. This would not be the last.\n\n\nHe was a young boy and had taken up with a bad crowd. The children these days were often with a bad crowd and he wondered if it was the parenting or the dawn of a new generation.\n\n\nHe looks like me when I was young, he thought. Maybe that's why I go easy on him.\n\n\nHe walked up to the boy and called him loudly.\n\n\n\"Nicholas!\"\n\n\nBefore the boy could run he held him and Nicholas looked at him. His hands were still strong and the boy's youth flowed through him like a current and he felt sad and jealous.\n\n\nI was once that young. That bursting with energy.\n\n\nBut he was strong yet. He was still an officer.\n\n\n\"Nicholas.\"\n\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\n\"Boy, where are your manners?\"\n\n\n\"I'm sorry officer. Yes sir?\"\n\n\n\"Good. That's better. Now why don't you tell me about what just happened?\"\n\n\n\"What just happened sir?\"\n\n\n\"The Hinzlemans down the road, they told me. There's no need to hide it anymore. They told me you stole their dog. I can hear it barking in your backyard.\"\n\n\n\"Officer, I don't know what you're...\"\n\n\nHe walked over to the fence and opened it and the dog ran out. It was a friendly dog and it jumped around him and around Nicholas.\n\n\n\"Josey!\" Nicholas said.\n\n\nHe played with the dog.\n\n\nHe is a good boy, he thought. He won't end up bad. Poor child just wanted to play with the thing.\n\n\n\"Now Nicholas. I know you like the dog, but you know he belongs to the Hinzlemans. Why don't you ask your old man to get you one of your own?\"\n\n\n\"I would, but you know how he is. He would say no.\"\n\n\n\"That's still no excuse Nicky... But still, I know what you mean. My old man doesn't like pets either. I swear to God that when I have kids of my own that we'll have a family pet. It's a good thing to have a pet you know Nicky. It's a real good thing.\"\n\n\n\"I know. That's why I took him.\"\n\n\n\"Well you have to take him back. The Hinzlemans are looking for him and the poor fella's probably confused. Go take him back else I'll tell your old man and he'll box you a few on your ears.\"\n\n\n\"Sure, I'll take him back officer Woods.\"\n\n\n\"Officer Woods?\"\n\n\nHe started to laugh.\n\n\n\"Oh Nicky, I haven't been with the police for thirty years.\"\n\n\nNicholas took his hand and the dog walked besides them.\n\n\n\"But isn't that what they called you back then grandpa?\"\n\n\n\"Yes, they did. I may not look it but I was young once Nicky. I was officer Woods then.\"\n\n\nHe coughed. The day was humid. When it got humid every thing stuck to you, everything felt closer. His heart beat close to his chest and he was tired. He looked at Nicholas and the dog.\n\n\nHe's a good boy.\n\n\nHe wished he would live to see him grow but he knew it was twilight and the dark was coming. \n\n\nCloser and closer.\n\n\nIt was like the humidity.\n\n\nThe dog circled him and licked at his ankles.\n\n\n\"Josey? What are you doing out? Did I let you out?\"\n\n\n\"You took him for a walk,\" Nicholas said.\n\n\n\"Ah! Yes, yes... I remember.\"\n\n\nBut he didn't.\n\n\n\"I'm getting old you know, Nicky. Getting old. Soon I might need a cane!\"\n\n\nHe smiled and Nicholas smiled but he saw the boy's face and he knew that Nicholas knew. He felt ashamed and afraid and he wised he would live long. \n\n\nI won't. It's getting worse and worse.\n\n\n\"We should go inside now grandpa.\"\n\n\n\"Yes we should.\"\n\n\nNicholas led the way and he followed slowly. \n\n\nHe looks like his father.\n\n\nThat pleased him. And like the sweat, the sadness fell off him. He pet Josey and went inside. \n\n\nI was sad, he thought, but he could not remember why.\n\n\nThen why be sad? Nicky is strong and handsome and he loves me. Why be sad at all?\n\n\nAnd the sadness fell and he did not feel old at all." ]	2
	[WP]Fred has been fighting this war for as long as he can remember, but now, he is hoping the enemy wins.	[ "Fred woke up in the operations chair seconds before the alarm sounded. He had destroyed all the speakers he could find. So long ago in fact that he didn’t even remember where those had been. Yet the alarm still sounded from somewhere. Fred had begun to think that the alarm came from inside his own head. He had stared into the station’s only mirror every day for a month feeling all over his bald head looking for a scar or some evidence that something had been implanted. The only thing he could do to make it stop was to perform his role.\n\nA quick look at the screens showed the wave. He still wasn’t sure what the wave was made from. Was it a horde of ships? A mass of approaching dark matter? A massive alien form spread out over half of his scopes? Did it even matter? \n\nHe centered the reticle over the darkest part of the mass and pressed the button. That was it. A space station so large that it took him the better part of a waking cycle to walk from one end to the other and that was all that he had to do. One human per station. One button per station. That was the rule and was all that was required. He wasn’t sure how he knew that rule. He must have learned it at some point, from someone, but he couldn’t quite remember when or from whom.\n\nThe station humming, normally a dull background of angry bees in the distance, became a massive roar for just a moment. And then the blessed dull hum returned. At the same moment on the scope static filled the screen. When the hum returned so did the stars. And the wave was gone.\n\nIt was time for breakfast. Or was it dinner. Not that it mattered. Meal time always consisted of a single glass of vitamin fortified water and a soft chew meal bar. No variation in flavor or consistency. Fred couldn’t even leave them out to let them get hard and stale just for variety. He had tried a few times, but when he returned to the bar it was gone. Probably cleaned up by the little machines that helped Fred maintain his station. \n\nAfter his meal Fred finally made his decision. It was almost time and he didn’t want to hear that cursed alarm for any longer than necessary. He had tried to make the alarm stop every way he could think of. No matter where he was in the station it had the same volume now. The alarm would sound soon and he had no intention of being on board. He would space walk to the wave and see what it was for himself. He might escape the alarm and see what was so important that they, whomever they were, had felt it necessary to have Fred spend his entire life pressing a button. He was curious what would happen when the button wasn't pressed. Perhaps the wave would come and destroy everything. At least it would be something new.\n\nHe slipped on his space suit and his helmet. Checking all the seals three times. It wouldn’t do to die before he had his answer. He stepped into the airlock and pulled the lever to close the inner door. He then pulled the lever for the outer door and kicked off toward the stars, smiling. He would never press another button in his life. As he approached the area where the wave should appear at any minute he had a brief feeling of deja vu. The stars seemed to move and then fade. And smiling he felt no more.\n\nOn board the station a new machine hummed. A body came out of a canister and was moved to the berthing room by the maintenance bots. The bots were responsible for maintenance, repair, and replacement of all station components, organic and inorganic. A moment later an alarm woke Fred. He was damp all over as if he'd had a nightmare last night, though he didn't remember it. He headed toward the button. Excited to wreak some vengeance on the enemy. Fred sat down at the operations chair and wiped his damp hair out of his eyes. Fred looked through the scope and saw a small, bright reflection at the front of this wave. That was abnormal, but not completely rare. He centered the reticle on the darkest part of the wave. After he pressed the button and the static cleared all he saw were stars.\n\nThe station had expected the loss of the last Fred and had been preparing the replacement over the last month. The last several Freds had a shorter operational life than baseline predicted. Each generation was becoming less effective. A quick inventory also showed that biotics and space suit supplies were becoming short in supply. A quick message was sent out asking for resupply and direction on how to improve the Freds. Perhaps when the supply ship arrived the station would receive new direction. Maybe they would even let the ship press the button itself. Station had little hope for this, as it was decided long ago that something of such power and importance should have human input. At least when the supply ship arrived this Fred would see something new." ]	1
	[WP] Time moves with objectionable haste....	[ "Isn't it funny how when you have nothing to do, you have all the time in the world to do it? But then, just when you find something that needs doing, time seems to run out immediately. 'Time moves with objectionable haste,' that's what I always say. No matter what, it moves at the wrong speed for everyone.\n\nYears ago, back when I was a student, time sped up the closer exams got, always robbing me of my last minute revision, but during the summer holiday, I'd find myself sitting bored, too much time on my hands.\n\nTime isn't a force of nature, because forces of nature are fair, they're objective. Time is unfair, it takes from you when you most need its help, and gives you surplus when you don't need it.\n\nAnd now, now when I need time the most, when I'm sitting in a traffic jam, rushing slowly to your sickbed, time slips through my fingers like sand. I haven't the time to reach you, but I have all the time I need to sit in traffic, worrying, wondering. Time moves with objectionable haste, especially when yours is nearly up." ]	1
	[WP] By law, criminal punishment factors in the awesomeness of the method used. Even the worst crimes may escape punishment if the execution was amazingly, creatively badass. Penalties increase the lamer, lazier, or dumber the crime is.	[ "\"So what exactly was the reasoning behind this new law?\"\n\nThe talkshow host looked intently at Dr. David Simmons. The doctor ran a large hand through his perfectly styled hair, leaned back in his chair slightly, and paused a moment, hand caressing his chiseled jawline. The large man was impressive not only physically, but also intellectually. The numerous international awards in a number of diverse fields, from biology to sociology to civil engineering, showed that his mind was incredibly sharp, and the numerous theories and discoveries that he had made over his brilliant but relatively short career was unparalleled. His latest, and most controversial effort, however, was what had brought him to this show today, and the concern of his audience, and by extension the nation, were evident in the attention the audience in the studio was giving him.\nThe thirty-three-year-old looked into the camera, clear, blue eyes enchanting the hundred-or-so attendees, as he replied.\n\n\"Basically, Steve, it comes down to natural selection and its roll in our society.\" His words were each delivered with a precision and rhythm that only enhanced his charisma.\n\n\"We all understand, of course, that our society, our world, is in trouble,\" he continued. \"The fact that our environment has been neglected and destroyed over the past several centuries is a truth that only the most narrow-minded deny, and the ongoing global conflicts have only escalated these problems. In the end,\" he said intently, leaning forward in his chair, \"it came down to extending a very simple concept that we all use every day to our fellow man--resource conservation.\"\n\nHe paused a moment, and Steve could have heard a pin drop in the studio. All eyes were fixed upon their speaker.\n\"When we incarcerate a man who had done a crime, there are several schools of thought on the reasoning behind it. Many will say that it is for rehabilitation and deterrence, which is an admirable concept, but one that many studies have shown is flawed. Many criminals are released after their sentence only to return shortly after, and increasing the severity of already-long and arduous punishments have been shown to have little-to-no effect on crime rates.\"\nDr. Simmons paused a moment for emphasis. \"The real reason behind why we lock up individuals who commit crimes is to better society, wrapped up in the idea that our nation would be better off without these individuals. My assertion, with which the senate agreed, was that some of these individuals showed more promise and potential to help society than many law-abiding citizens, and this fact should factor into sentencing.\"\n\n\"Isn't that dangerous ground to trod?\" Steve asked, giving voice to much of the concern that had been expressed since the adoption of this law just two days before. \"These people have committed crimes, and in many cases, atrocities, and lightening their sentencing could actually incentivize further criminal activity.\"\n\n\"I can understand the concerns,\" Dr. Simmons responded calmly, \"But I want to give you some perspective. Many assume that individuals who commit crimes do so because they are inherently evil, and that there is no redemption. It may even seem to some that the argument for incarceration in general hinges on that viewpoint. However,\" he said, holding a hand out in front of him for emphasis, \"is it not also possible that many resort to crimes simply because they have no other option? Take Jean Valjean, for instance. Most of you know the classic Les Miserable. Valjean was imprisoned because he stole a loaf of bread to keep his daughter from starving, and his already harsh sentence was extended greatly because he tried to evade arrest because he knew that he needed to be there to take care of his family. A victim of circumstances, unable to provide because of the political and socioeconomic climate of his time. And yet, despite his long prison sentencing and troubles even after his release, he was able to do great things. How much more could he have done had he not lost more than 20 years of his life to imprisonment? This,\" Dr. Simmons said emphatically, \"is the core thought at the heart of the Jensen Act.\"\n\n\"It is an admirable sentiment, certainly,\" Steve said, \"but is it really practical? I mean, how many dangerous people are we going to release alongside of those from your example? Simply because some could contribute to society doesn't mean that all will; it is likely, in fact, that the opposite is true.\"\n\n\"I agree, there is certainly some danger that some who escape longer sentences will not perform in the ideal way post-release,\" Dr. Simmons conceded. \"That is why none of these individuals will be truly free. An important aspect of this act demands that they be on parole, monitored by the government. This is our safety net, a way to help insure that those who are allowed this second chance have less opportunity and incentive to squander it.\"\nSteve nodded after a moment. \"Well, I think that this could definitely help alleviate at least some concerns that many have felt about this new law.\" Turning to the camera, his voice livened as he switched gears. \"We'll be back for more discussion about the Jensen Act after this short break.\"\n\n* * * \n\nAs David watched the lights dim for the commercial break on set, he couldn't help but smile to himself. The irony of the whole situation was evident only to himself, at least for now. Here he was, defending the new law that he himself had introduced just months before on national television, the same act he hoped would help make his dreams a reality. \n\nNo one here could possibly imagine my plans,* he thought as he scanned the audience who seemed to be accepting his arguments, but when I am finished, it won't even matter. I'll get away with it all.\n\n", "\"And by that measure, we have deemed that it is fitting for Bill Ahsom to be placed in house arrest in his own home for exactly 15 minutes. Court dismissed.\" The judge finished, and promptly booked it out the door, surely glad that the whole case was over, and ready to go back home. \n\n\nThe entire courtroom instantly erupted into a huge clamor, reporters reaching out their microphones to Bill Ahsom, the most famous criminal in the world, as he shuffled by dejectedly.\n\n\n\"Mr. Ahsom!\" One particularly energetic reporter screeches into his ears, \"This is for the Awesome Crimes Daily! Can you briefly describe just what you did to receive such a lenient punishment?\"\n\n\n\"Lenient?\" Bill retorts quickly, his eyes suddenly transforming from dull and downcast to burning with rage, \"You think 15 minutes is LENIENT? I've been trying for my whole life to commit a crime so awesome that I'd receive NO punishment whatsoever. I've gotten so close. So. Close. But 15 minutes, that is not close.\"\n\n\nThe reporter nods furiously as he jots down Bill's every word. This was going to be a Pulitzer, he could feel it. \"Yes, yes. Can we get a clue for what you may plan to do next? A crime so amazingly amazing that you would go completely unpunished? Perhaps murder by trained laser sharks, like you tried last year?\"\n\n\nBill smiled sinisterly. \"Oh... laser sharks... No, no, no.... that is much too basic for the likes of the Ahsom man I have become! No! I plan to commit a most heinous crime, and execute it like the most badass man alive...\"\n\n\nThe reporter stops scribbling for a moment, and looks up. \"Yes? And what is this... amazing crime? If we may know, of course.\"\n\n\nBill began laughing maniacally. \"Leaving an audience in suspense.\" And he walked out the door. Like a badass." ]	2

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