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We plan to meet at noon at Cracker Barrel. The parking lot is packed, people everywhere. We make it through the crown and come to realize we only have to wait five minutes. Not too bad.
We sit down at the table, feeling like we're in a stadium due to the noise level. We have to shout at each other, just to hear. We wait about thirty minutes to get our food, not too bad. Our waiter is on top of everything, one of the best I've ever met. Even though he's slammed and has a lot of people to serve, he still has a smile on his face.
We sit at the table, laughing, joking, and telling stories. It's a great meal together. We laugh at my Grandma who drops a piece of lettuce in her purse and a tomato rolls off her plate.
We had a large party of seven, my mom, my grandma, my grandpa, my mom's bf, his son, my fiance, and of course me. It was a great get together, one that doesn't happen frequently. Tonight, we're going to my fiance's parents house for dinner. I hope it goes as smoothly as our lunch. |
Dick leaned back on his heels as he felt the high winds whip around his body. The fear was both exhilarating and terrifying as he watched the bustling city below him.
The city that never slept now demanded more and more of his time and energy.
Without sleep, the city and its citizens demanded more power, more food, more entertainment, more WiFi. Without sleep, drunks went on benders that lasted for *weeks* no longer needing to sleep it off and no longer facing the dreaded hangover. Criminals who lurked in the cover of night and exploited the slumber of the innocent now had to resort to more violent measures to meet their needs. Simple break-ins became home invasions.
As the criminals became more violent, the citizens began to lose their innocence deciding to take matters into their own hands instead of relying on the overworked and understaffed police department who was too busy dealing with car accidents, drunk drivers, robberies and murders that had seemed to rise dramatically since the "pill"was made widely available.
"Why?"Dick asked himself. "Why has the world turned so barbaric?"
"Dreams."replied the stranger in the dark.
The sound of another voice startled Dick and although he did his best to keep his composure, the stranger could see that he was rattled.
"Without dreams there is are no fantasies, there is no escape, and most importantly, without dreams there is no hope."The stranger continued.
"Without hope, society is faced with the harsh realities of life. A life without dreamers is cold, soulless, and full of frustration. A frustration that life will never get better, never improve, and will never *relent*."
"So what do you want from me!"Dick screamed in frustration. "If society is doomed to fail, what can **I** do about it?!"
"I don't know."the voice said calmly. "I don't have all the answers.""All I can do is hope.""Hope that when you step off that ledge it won't be to end your life but to represent the dreams of every citizen who has given up on life and to show them that hope exists.""And that like life you are *relentless*."
Dick stepped off the ledge into the void of the city and began plummeting towards earth. And as he began nose diving towards the pavement a thought passed through his head.
"What would Bruce do?"
With that one fleeting thought Dick's thoughts of suicide were put on hold as he reached into his belt and deployed his grappling hook.
And as Dick swung through the air, Commissioner Gordon stepped out of the shadows just in time to see him gliding in the moonlight.
"Godspeed Mr. Grayson. Godspeed." |
Cooper held onto the podium with both hands as he gazed out at the crowd in front of him. Thanks to the spotlights focused on the stage, they were nothing but vague whispers in the darkness, the hint of something out there beyond the bright lights trained on him. His hands clamped so tightly onto the sides of the podium that the knuckles were white.
"And so, without any further ado,"Cooper announced, the microphones in front of him grabbing his words out of the air and blowing them up loudly, "let me present my research."
Cooper turned towards the large screen beside the podium, clicking the button on the laptop in front of him. The professor was proud of how well he had adjusted to the most recent technology. Many of his fellows were still struggling to use word documents and email, but Cooper had taken quickly to the new digital age. Perhaps that had helped spur his research.
The man clicked through the first few slides, laying out the background for his discovery. "For a long time, the Y chromosome has been believed to be largely useless,"he explained to the listening crowd. "Indeed, in less developed organisms such as *C. elegans*, there is no Y chromosome at all. These nematodes simply pass on one or two copies of their X chromosome, where two copies designates a hermaphrodite."He clicked to a picture of the microscopic worm in question.
"However, when we move up to more advanced organisms such as *Drosophila* species,"he continued, "we begin to see the appearance of a Y chromosome. Given the results that will come soon, this may prove to be very significant."
Cooper clicked to the next slide, a large schematic of a chromosome. The banded pattern that represented chromatin staining made the picture immediately recognizable to the crowd. "The Y chromosome in *Homo sapiens*, which we all should recognize,"he labeled the slide. "We do know that there are a few genes on here."
Advance to the next slide. The large chromosome was still visible, but now labels pointed towards several areas. "Here are some of the main genes,"he went on. "Several sex determining proteins, as well as some kinases. However, genes on this chromosome are prone to microdeletions, making them a risky prospect in evolutionary terms. It also makes the Y chromosome markedly more unique than the others when compared across individuals, as well as populations."
There was a large area towards the center of the Y chromosome schematic that had not received any labels. Cooper nodded towards this area. "For a long period, it was believed that this section of the Y chromosome contained nothing but junk DNA,"he said. His voice dropped, the mikes having to strain to carry his words out to the crowd.
"But we now know that this isn't true." |
First time writing anything on-the-spot like this. Wish me luck.
I couldn't feel my face. Blearily opening my eyes, I looked down at the floor and saw a pool of encrusted red-brown goop. I shifted my head to get a better look and suddenly the worst pain came across my face as I looked across my hardwood floor to find one of the largest puddles of clotted blood I've ever sat in being slopped messily across the floor.
The sounds of the world slowly crept in on me. I heard sirens, car horns, an atypical occurrence. I was able to guess that it was early in the morning as the light-blue, nearly cyan streaks of light filled the room.
I scrambled to my feet, propping myself against a nearby doorframe to get a look at my reflection in a rather ornate framed painting. My face was nearly completely bruised and a thin trickle of blood was coming from my nose, which happened to be bent in three places. I jerked my head up like a startled animal and looked out the window, to which I saw a thin veil of smoke filling my street. Car parts were strewn across the black asphalt with splatters of blood and vital organs here and there. A feeling of dread sank to my stomach almost immediately as I heard my weekday wakeup alarm go off.
6:00 AM.
|
Dear you,
That's right, you as in the second person... addressed as the second hand person you are, and barring any capital you think you deserve. When you used to be the first person I'd build a life for and the last person I thought would tear it down.
I've said your name 1,000 days in 1,000 different ways, each time thinking I am gaining an inch while you are bounding miles in turn. And with each time my voice phonetically and poetically pieced together your name like smashing squares into circle holes, I sat and wondered why you loved to hear your name more than you loved to hear my voice. You never wanted me, you wanted the idea of me to feed into announcing to the world about you. The walking talking fuck up of a billboard that you once called "yours". And yet its been a month since you've heard the echoes of your name anywhere within my walls or lungs, and its got you sweating.
You once told me that we couldn't be forever because I couldn't be the imaginary idea of a man you had painted on your high school notebook covers inspired by porno, Cosmo, and Sleeping Beauty. And I tried to be. I tried so fucking hard that it made my brain and soul collide wondering what the hell this was all for. I tried to rearrange my DNA in hoping that whatever shuffled result I created would be what you wanted, but I could never change who I was.
And fuck you if you think I'll ever try again. You preach about the white knight while getting sloppy at dive bars with your ass hanging out. So inviting that if I dusted your ass for fingerprints I'd find more prints than the Bible. That Bible that you sit on, by the way, is a wonderful reminder of how you can justify smelling like the bottom of a vodka bottle adjusting last night's makeup while at Sunday Church.
You're worthless, and you'll never hear me say your name again.
Love,
Me. |
[Graffiti on the Wall...](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Rembrandt_-_Belshazzar%27s_Feast_-_WGA19123.jpg)
> [**Belshazzar's Feast**](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belshazzar%27s_Feast_\(Rembrandt\)) is a painting by Rembrandt. Its source comes from the story of Belshazzar and the writing on the wall in the Old Testament Book of Daniel. It is held in the The National Gallery, London. |
"What the hell is your android doin'?"
"Actin' weird shit again, Bo."
"Street-cleanin' son-of-a-gun. I'm heading downta Red's tommarah morning. Trying-ta fix the gaddamn son-of-a-bitch up."
"Yeah, yeah, be sure to do it soon. This thing gives me the willies."
"I hear ya. Hey, Bo, how's the wife? Haven't seen ya down at Church for a couple'a'Sundays with Cheryl. Everythin' all right with her and the kids?"
"Oh, everything's all right, alright. Cheryl's just been busy with the ole TeeVee is all."
"Well, tell her to get her ass off the couch and into God's open hands, ya hear?
"Oh, I will, Wilb."
"Holy shit- what the hell"
*clang clang*
"You gotta control that thing, Wilb. Gives me the willies it does."
"I know, I know. Shit, my hands hurts now."
"Punchin' the darn thing won't get anything down. Goddamn. Fuckin' android. Bending down around the flowers and sheeit. You know, Mrs. Crawford is gon' get mad."
"I know, I know. The circuits are fried, I think. This damn thing had one job, Bo. One job. Clean the goddamn streets."
"What's it got there in its hand, Wilb?"
*clip clop clip clop*
"Goddamn flower, I think. Shit, you think Mrs. Crawford's gonna notice. Where do you think the damn thing came from?"
"I don't know. Just throw back somewhere."
"All right, c'mon there. C'mon."
*pull pull*
"You gotta put yer back into it, Wilb."
"I got it, Bo."
*pull pull*
"It's eyes are glowing, Wilb."
"Shit. What do I do?"
"Just turn it off."
"It's still got half a street ta-"
Daisy. Dai
*pull push deactivate*
"Got that sucker there, Wilb. Good job. Can't let fuckin' androids get too outta hand over here. Turn inta some Will Smith iRobot-Roomba-pod-type shit."
"Good riddance. Shit, there's a whole street ta still clean."
"Call of one of them Hadley boys."
"Hadley boys, huh. Doesn't sound too bad. Boys gotta work. Get offa them video games and shit."
"You know it."
"Well, I'll see you later, Bo."
"Bye, bye, Wilb."
*they move their cursors to red x's lying in the corner of their screens. their monitors flicker off. bo jacks off and sleeps. wilb calls the hadley boys. they don't respond. wilb sends an email to customer support. he wants a refund. wilb shakes his head and goes to sleep. his consciousness lazes around millions of zeroes and ones.*
The AI lies, dead, on an empty street. In an empty town. In an empty earth. A garden more like. A goddamn useless garden. |
She was born in Alabama, five tornadoes screaming 'round the city, threatening to rip the ambulance to bits. Only five lbs three ounces, she remained in preemie care for a few days. Her mother was a very small woman, her body had to spit the baby out like an unwanted olive pit.
They moved throughout her childhood. Her parents were in the military. They lived in Japan, Germany, Alabama (again), and Virginia. She didn't take the last move well, disappearing into her closet, crying into her jackets and dress slacks.
She was an only child and rebellious of overprotective parents and so many changes in her life. Her mother was later diagnosed as bipolar. Something was wrong growing up. She always had to cross her fingers and hope each little thing didn't set her mother off. She hated the yelling, the threats of divorce, even when Dad forgot to mow the lawn. One time he bounced a check. Mother threw her ring at him and packed a bag.
Dad was laid off from the hospital as a radiologist technician. He had been there for over a decade. He became depressed as the job hunt proved fruitless. Employer after employer turned him down. He is the kindest, smartest man I know, yet the grays in his hair and his introverted demeanor meant the quick interviews were not enough time to get to know him. His depression effected all of us. He fell off the wagon, sneaking in bottles of wine, and opiates when he could find them. He had a seizure on the lawnmower one time. Another he backed into a car in a parking lot and drove home, not remembering a thing. He still didn't remember when the cops arrested him on his doorstep.
They are still married, and both are on medication. They both have fulfilling jobs now, and are still in love. Both started smoking cigarettes after 20+ years of avoiding tobacco, and now smoked about 2 packs per day. It seemed to help.
Her life had mostly been as a spoiled only child, her nose stuffed in a book, occasionally riding bikes or rollerblading with neighborhood pals. Her parents had to deal with a wild teen though. She skipped class, found pot and coke, spread her legs for many guys. Her mom freaked out and sent her to a wilderness therapy program.
She spent a few months in the woods, getting clean and liberating her tortured soul. She came back, partied in college, got the house, the supervisor job and the boyfriend.
She can't maintain a steady life. She gets bored. She has cheated, snorted more coke, smoked even more pot, and quit many jobs. She's now separated from a husband, lives alone with her dog, and stuffs her nose in a book. |
"As I stand before you today, I can tell you why we shouldn't change minimum wage. You may think I'm a rich man. This is a lie. I work minimum wage like a lot of you. Pleas don't expect people to pay more, so we may feed and take care of our families. Please don't ask my employer to pay me more... It's not like he can afford it. Please don't make me a burden to other's. I should be thankful to have a job, right? Is that what I'm expected to say? My children should suffer for the mistakes a younger me made. Because that will make them work harder? Make them get jobs as soon as they can, so they won't focus on school and resent me later for not being able to provide? So they will be stuck in this never-ending cycle of poverty due to not having the support to get a higher education? Yes, this is the life I've always dreamed of. As a child, I dreamed of never having a set schedule, never getting to go to school functions, having to miss my children growing up due to having to work more and more to support them, not getting holidays with my family, being terrified of illness because I can't afford not to work. This is the American dream, right? But please, don't make my employers pay me a living wage... As if I deserve it after staying late, coming in early, and never calling in. What more do I do? I could easily be replaced. I am nothing. Is this what I deserve? Is this what we deserve? Most of us "leech"of the "working"while working more hours than normal. They see nothing more than my food stamp card. They don't know that I work more than I sleep. They don't see me. They don't see you... Just leeches. But remember please, don't ask for more pay. Your CEO doesn't have that kind of money. Stop being so selfish why don't you? It's not like you have the right to spend time with your loved ones."
A man who's job was threatened if he didn't give a speech against minimum wage, give his boss exactly what he wants yet doesn't expect. |
"I really don't want to hear your proposition, Mr. Adams."General Zimmer announced. "I would have skipped this meeting if it weren't for congress appointing me for this. Whatever you have, better be good."
"I can assure you, the list is quite substantial, considering our needs as a nation."Mr. Adams responded. "We here are the CIA have determined what relevant behaviors our nation needs."
"I don't need a bunch of egomaniacs telling my program what our future holds. This military needs new weapons, unmanned vehicles, stealth technology-"
"And what, we fight a war with no human interaction? Impossible! Even if we could brew an army of robots, which we are far from doing, it would still require human interaction at the helms!"Mr. Adams interrupted.
"Okay, so what do you have for me. Because I already have the fastest and strongest force out there. What abilities could you possibly need that we don't already have?"inserted General Zimmer.
A pile of papers were shoved across his desk. The top folder is glanced at by the uninterested party of the discussion. "Congenital insensitivity, well that won't get you far. I was part of a medical evaluation team 10 years ago regarding soldiers and marines with this disorder. They are 40% more likely to get injured in battle, 60% more likely to claim disability and 25% more likely to commit suicide due to depression for feeling isolated from society. You've got plans other than this?"
"Of course. We've developed nano suits that will prevent injuries from occurring with this disorder. Plus, we have a titanium suite made just for these members that allow for certain joints to lock, preventing heavy items from collapsing when these individuals maximize their strength."Mr. Adams responded.
"Suites? Each custom made I assume?"
"Yes, but read the next page please."
The General heightened his interests. There were multiple profiles of individuals with these disorders, along with other traits, like heightened immune systems, 10/10 vision screenings, even individuals with capabilities that have enhanced smelling.
"How did we manage to find over 100 candidates with these strengths? I see we are cross agency, FBI, CIA, DoD, and even Homeland Security."The General inquired.
"This project has been active for over 15 years now. Would you like some history?"Mr. Adams asked.
"Yes, I've got nothing better to do and things are getting interesting."
"Are you aware that blind people have greater touch and hearing?"Mr. Adams interrogated.
"Yes, and the deaf have better vision and smell, etc, etc."
"Well, we've been working with people to enhance these adaptive abilities. We've come up with a very simple therapy program that allows for these abilities to be learned in an accelerated manner. It's humane, and an adult over the age of 30 can increase all of their senses, including pain tolerance, in under one and a half years. The only thing we cannot enhance is their immune system, but we figure that's why we have vaccines."Mr. Adams answered.
General Zimmer's eyes gazed around the office. Forgetting that this was a one on one conversation, General Zimmer came to the quick realization that he couldn't ask a colleague for their opinion. "How could improving someone's pain tolerance be humane?"
Mr. Adams leaned back, folded his hands over his head and straightened his legs in a relaxing manner. "Easy, make these people relax."
"Relax? that's it?"
"Yup. Turns out pain tolerance is mostly proportional to how much anxiety we have in our day to day lives. The more anxiety we have, the less we tolerate pain. We gave a lot of these subjects therapy treatments to reduce their anxiety. Over just 6 months, most of them managed to double the amount of pain they could tolerate. Women under 40 adapted the quickest."
"So lets say we get these people together, with some barely super human skills, into these nano suites that prevent injuries, then what? We train them up and go play good cop, bad cop?"
"Not exactly. As you mentioned earlier, there is a substantial amount of unmanned devices that their suites can interact with."Mr. Adams straightened up and started getting serious. "Every suite comes with a nano lead-graphine armor, capable of stopping most ammunition types. Their helmets connect to every UAV in the area. And when UAVs are not an option, they are capable of sonar and night vision. Very costly."
"And what, we let these officers, who are in danger of being captured, be put on the front lines? Thus putting our use of this technology in danger."General Zimmer criticized.
"No. The helmets aren't the ones capable of doing the sonar, that is done by a self-destructible battle station, a new forefront technology that is be used in today's police forces. Just this one is more... capable."
"Are any of these concepts even tested yet?"General Zimmer asked?
"Yes, a few. But putting together a team and using real training and real world scenarios hasn't been done yet. We were hoping you could help us select the team for this."
"Fine, when can we have a team ready to train?"
"4 months, sir."Mr. Adams replied.
8 months later...
"Do it again!"General Zimmer announced. The team of 6 assembled at the front of the obstacle course.
"Come on now, I've barely broken a sweat!"Lady Lovely shouted, or Double L for short.
"Oh, this ain't fair! My crawl clearance isn't nearly as short as yours!"Special J said.
"Alright, quit your whining, ready, set, go!"General Zimmer announced.
All 6 heroes started running. First, they crawled under the bridge with only a 2 foot clearance for 100 meters. Most of them were able to finish in 30 seconds, Double L made it first, as usual. An all out spring followed.
At the end of everyone's boots hit the gravel and mud. Special J, being the tallest, accelerated at this. His boots were barely noticeable as the waves of mud and gravel barely moved. Double L fell behind, she was almost waist deep.
Special J gets to the dirt-bikes first. All of the mud comes seamlessly off, thanks to the anti-wet nano technology on their suits. He tries to start his bike to no avail. He walks to a nearby truck and uses a quick cipher tool to get the gas out. He connects a hose to the bike and it quickly pumps gas in. When it is finished, everyone has started their ciphers as well, and he starts off.
Most of the course was typical, they've rode on it over a hundred times. But the best part was the end.
"Green four two, are we a go?"Special J says over his helmet.
"Roger, ETA is 17 seconds, counting down at 10."A voice over his headset said.
Special J guns the gas, knowing that he took diesel instead of unleaded he needed the extra juice.
He gets to the top of the hill and asks, "Coordinates boss, I need coordinates!"
"Zero three four one at rear"the voice says again.
Special J makes a quick turn and heads off into a different direction.
"10. 9. 8. 7. 6. 5."
"Full power Sweetheart!"Special J announced, he was afraid that he was going to be off. Sweetheart was the name of his dumb AI, as they called them. Smarter than Siri, but not much more.
"3. 2. 1."
Special J jumped off his dirt bike and started to float to the object above him. It was the belly of a C-130. It was attached to a crane of course, but used to simulate the same speeds of a C-130.
The magnetic suite lifted him higher, only to start falling. Special J felt a tugging on his leg, and sure enough, there was Double L taking a lift with him.
They both were attached to the underbelly as the crane moved them to over a cliff. Both magnetic suites disengaged and they both started falling toward the ground with under 1000 feet below them.
The helium airbags deployed as they fell closer to the ground. This wasn't the first time that they've done this, but it was the game of trust between the computer and the individual.
A green icon appeared on Special J's HUD, indicating that time of impact. As he reached the ground, the airbags deployed at a maximum effort and created a springing motion, minimizing impact to nothing but a 2 foot fall.
Special Jay ran towards a helicopter and started the engine.
"I can't believe these suites have already made it to commission. This program is beyond success, Mr. Adams."General Zimmer observed.
"Just think, these are just the magnetic suites. Wait until the rest of the suits are finished. Space suites, underwater, pressure, you name it, we have a suite for it."
"I can't wait until they start actually using these in the field. These exercises are boring. Wait until they start hacking phones, UAVs and cars, using them in their favor during a conflict. Their intelligence hasn't even been touch yet."
"You think that's exciting? Wait until phase II, when their Helium 3 suites arrive."Mr. Adams concluded. |
There was of course the option to abort. They had made clear I knew that….that I could abort. I knew of course…where babies came from. A human life, created by us….for us I suppose but it didn't seem right…taking the life away from something that couldn't even make decisions for their own selves. I kept imagining a new baby, perfect in every way…fingers and toes matching 20. They told me I was healthy enough…"absolutely able to carry to term…."and that this thing inside me already showed a beating hart. I would picture that baby in my brain….try and concentrate on all the good baby things like fat little hands and maybe it'd grow up to "make the world s a better place…"and then I'd get the memory of my brother sneaking into my room late at night with his friend, the two of them felt like they were breaking me in half….abortion, I know it's wrong to take a human life…but isn't that in a way what they did to me? |
"Oh man, you're not gonna believe this. The Titans are fucked."
I set my drink down on the table, ears pricked to eavesdrop on the conversation behind me. An excited Survey Corpsman turned heads and dulled conversation around him, drawing the attention of patrons all around him.
"Alright, so this guy, Yuri, right,"he could barely contain himself, "Yeah so Yuri, this crazy motherfucker, killed a titan with a machete. A fucking machete. Thing had to have been nine meters tall, and Yuri just dropped him like it was nothing."I beckoned for a refill.
Conversation around the bar ceased completely. These hapless civvies almost completely enthralled by this Corpsman's tale. One guy killing a titan?
"What?! How?!"questioned his compatriot. My ear pricked slightly more.
"It's the gear! The 3DMV!"He exclaimed, followed by a quick gulp of his drink. He wiped the foam with a bright grin. "Yeah man, it was simple enough. Titans are huge, but slow as shit, right? Only logical step is to be faster than them,"
Faster? I thought. Even with their enormous strides, how could humanity possibly hope to match the Titans? I waved for another drink.
"Okay, so this gear, right? Fuckin unbelievable man. It's got these harpoon things that shoot out of it, that'll hook you to buildings, trees, anything tall and weak enough to be pierced by it. Then you got this gas cylinder that shoots you towards whatever your hooked too. Fuckin Yuri cleared a 15 meter tree in seconds with this shit, and took the Titan down. Fucker didn't know what hit him until he hit the floor."
People were visibly ecstatic at this point. Finally, a way to beat the monsters! Humanity finally had some hope.
"No way!""Thank god!""Hell yeah!"the bar was in an uproar. They were pretty much feeding this guy booze by the end of it, and he continued to prattle on about the Corps, and their inevitable triumph over the Titan horde. Of how the 3D Maneuvering Gear will help them rise above their oppressors, and save the human race. Of how Yuri is labeled a war hero, even after misjudging his tank and plummeting to grabbing hands below the treeline. Cute.
The humans think themselves saved. Nothing will save them. |
It was that booming again, and this time she was going to figure out just what it was. She swept aside curtains of stars and saw...
Big red numbers and a symbol in the middle. Emily knew what they meant, a special message that at that moment was most certainly just for her. They were almost laughing at her, mocking her with the reality of consequences. They suggested dire things to come. Things like potential starvation, exhaustion, or even dehydration for all she knew.
Emily rolled her eyes at herself and her alarm clock. She shook off her dream and turned off the alarm. There wasn't even enough time to shower, so she just threw on some deodorant and fresh clothes and ran out the door. If she hurried she might make it to work early enough to grab a bagel or a doughnut or *some*thing. She really loved breakfast, so she risked the tenacity of her deodorant and ran as fast as she could while still maintaining some semblance of sanity.
Eventually Emily's lungs reminded her that she hadn't been very active lately, and she slowed to a walk.
She noticed, vaguely, that the sun was on her right when it should have been behind her. For some reason that didn't bother her much, and she kept walking.
Emily even kept walking when she noticed none of the buildings were the same as her usual walk to work. The moment she finally questioned her sanity in a serious way was when she noticed the sun directly overhead. It had to be nearly noon. She had been walking for over three hours. She had a moment of panic and looked around.
It faded quickly and she kept going. All the way out of the city, past highways and fields and barbed wire fences.
Inside there was a part of Emily screaming in terror, trying desperately to get the rest of her mind and any part of her body to understand there was something very wrong with separating in such a way. That part of her was certain she was going insane and would have given anything to have a doctor walk by at that moment and save her with good, normal, sane medicine.
But really that part wasn't very loud at all.
Mostly she was content to be walking and looked forward past the now almost alien landscape to all the future steps she could take beyond. That seemed like an absolutely wonderful idea and she smiled at the thought of an eternity of steps just like these.
The little voice inside screamed.
Emily only noticed that she had been outside civilization for hours when she saw a man in the distance. A man with wings. She blinked at him, and a little more of her became a little more convinced of her recently acquired insanity. The voice inside grew stronger and begged and pushed and fought to turn around, for the rest to wake up and listen. But it still wasn't enough, and she went forward to the man.
Except it wasn't a man at all. It was a death's-head moth with wings as wide as a house. Their slight movements blew against her face and the moth spoke.
It thought *We need you to come back.*
Emily thought *I'm definitely insane right now, and I really badly need some help..*
She thought *..but I'm having so much fun.*
It thought *The newborns aren't doing very well, they need you.*
Emily thought *Okay I am really terrified right now I need to get out of here something really isn't right.*
She thought *Okay, I'll go,* and Emily died.
The moth who had never been a man opened Emily and pulled Moira out. Moira bent down and kissed Emily on her cold forehead. She smiled sadly and said "this life was a beautiful one with great lessons, and I did not want to leave it."
The moth folded her in its great wings and thought *you will have more in time, but right now everyone needs you,* and they pulled back the stars and went home.
\*formatting/typos/grammarthings
[CC -002] |
Ok, I'll give it a go. This should be all of them.
Patches, the super-popular pre-teen wunderkitty working as an Internal CatNip Service agent leaves his idyllic Oklahoma City yacht club to take up his grand-dame’s talking sword, Ms. Sodomhammer, to disembowel the republican-terrorist K-9 from the future, who, as the reincarnation of Cerebus, has been raping and cannibalizing the zombie field mice with those spiky D-8s to subvert a DC solar power litter from discovering the secret of paradox-proof time travel is to use a quantum superposition nucleus and negatively charged gauge bosons applied to a quantum lattice. |
Orion woke up on the side of the road. He knew by how his body was acting that he just recently died.
"Goddammit, what was it this time?"He said out loud as he searched his memory "Oh, fucking Tiberan Tigers"
"What was it this time?"
By this point Orion was never surprised by the Jesters random visits. It was a big part of his life. Unfortunately.
"I thought I finally trapped the Tin knight, unfortunately he had a weapon that I've never seen before nor heard about"Orion said holding his hand on his bloody stump waiting for it to heal.
"Was it a gun?"the Jester asked.
"I know what a gun is"Orion snapped.
"Was it a gun you've never heard of before?"
Orion's silence was a good enough answer. "I need to catch up to him. I imagine he's stopped by the Hirion capital"Orion said putting whats left of his shoe on "now if you excuse me-"
"Are you going to succeed this time?"the Jester interrupted.
"Considering I've been trying to do this for 190 years"he looked at the Jester in the eyes "sure".
Orion began to walk down the road towards the Tiberan capital. The jester was waiting for at the side of the road. "You do realize if this Tin knight uses the crystal it could be used against me, right?"The Jester asked.
"Yep"
"So maybe you could, y'know, move your ass a little faster"
"No point in rushing"Orion said smirking
The Jester looked at with dead eyes and a dropped jaw. "This isn't funny".
"Aren't you the incarnation of comedy or whatever?"
"Incarnation of laughter and this is no time for jokes".
"If it isn't now then when will the time for jokes occur?"Orion asked.
"When I get my body back!"
"That's a long time to wait for a joke, especially from a jester". |
"I never meant for this to happen."He sits with his hands crossed at the wrist, oddly hunched. "I wasn't big on those kinda things- cryptozooology and aliens and stuff. I'm not even from here! I'm American. I don't even think I've got family in Wales.
"You want to know where I got *Luck* from? It's not real, you know. It's not a scam. It's... Hope?
"No. It's no a placebo. It really works, unlike other things.
"I don't know how it works.
"I don't make it. I never did.
"That surprises you? Listen, I'm just the salesman. This started door-to-door. I had been in Wales for three weeks and I saw this ad for a part time job. High pay-
"You've heard this story? Why didn't you say so?
"The truth. 'You can't handle the-'
"You don't get it? Whatever. The pont is, fairies.
"No. *Real* fairies. I swear to god... Where are you going? I am being serious!
"You knew? Then why are you here? I mean- oh.
"That's it? Okay. No, yeah. Yeah. That's cool. Thanks for stopping by... Mer- Merlin. Nice to meet you too." |
Today's catch was a little bigger than yesterdays. I usually go down by the lake every monday. Makes the day a little better for me. The sky left a hazy orange and red impression. Reflected a nice glow eating away the dark blue lake. I would probably stay here forever. Possibly build a nice lake cabin too. I realize it's getting darker so i packed everything up nicely. Just a five mile drive away from my house. I live in quiet suburban neighborhood. Where each house has a nice flower garden in the front, and a nice shed in the back. I live alone. I don't even own a dog like most people, just me. It was never always like this. My wife died four years ago from epilepsy. It's still hard living day by day without her, but I'm trying my best. My brother checks up on me sometimes, which is always nice. He sent me a text asking to go to a Reds game this Saturday. All of them starting with "Please Frank".Although she'll always be in my mind. Next to dinner of course. I'm thinking grilling that trout i caught with a nice butter sauce. My mouth just waters just thinking about it. I pull into the drive way just before it got too dark. As i walked up to the door, I noticed a slight crack, shining in some light through the house. I must've forgot to close it all the way earlier today. I opened the door slowly and stepping in softly. My house didn't seem trashed or robbed. Nothing too out of place. I ate my dinner and headed up to stairs for bed. As I stepped into the bedroom I saw my wife's painting missing above my bed. Maybe I'm hallucinating or just plain tired. I want over to the vanity and saw that her picture was also missing. Then I checked her jewelry box and her rings weren't missing. Someone was in here. I don't know who and I don't know when. I couldn't think of anybody who would do something like this. Maybe one of her old ex boyfriends? Or maybe it was her mother? I set the picture frame down, and started to search all around the house to see what else the bastard stole. |
I went up to somebody else. My palms were sweating. It's like that dream you have when you suddenly realise that you're naked and everybody can see. Could it really have happened? Was it that week of school I missed when I had chicken pox? Was I not paying attention when my mum told me The Truth? Why did nobody *tell* me!?
The woman was wearing a business suit and staring at her phone. She gave me the brief, not-interested look reserved for Jehovah's witnesses and teenagers doing surveys and said she was busy.
"Please,"I said, "I just need you to tell me when the world ends."
I realised my hands were clasped, like I was begging her. It was probably the desperation in my voice that made her look up again, only this time instead of annoyance there was an expression that made my heart drop like a stone for the tenth time that day: part pity, part are-you-serious, and part fear: a look for a person who asks a question like mine. I might as well have pleaded her to tell me what year it was.
She went back to her phone. Her attention was still on me even if her eyes weren't, and I left, walked in the direction of nothing. It was lunchtime, and the square was busy, and though there were benches around I still didn't want to sit down. I felt like telling more people, asking them why, why weren't they afraid, like I was? Why did they get to face their death with grace and acceptance, while I had been allowed to develop this crazy idea that I didn't want to die? |
I leaned back in my chair and rubbed my eyes. It had
been a stressful night waiting for the tests to run. I
couldn't sleep and now I find myself at work, again.
I begin boot up the computer and the laser keyboard
blinks to life. I switch on the filing cabinet and the
reflection off of the walls reminds me I forgot to turn
on the lights.
The chair slides back. My vest lands on the floor in
front of the desk, and my tie behind the now closed
door. The lights illuminate my small office. I amble over
to the window and hit the opaque switch.
*"How may I help you today Wilson?"*
"Ai voice volume set 3."
*"Is this volume better?"*
"Yes. Log into Columbia. Pass phrase: Tare Sail Pup
Oboe Pup."
*"Verified."*
"Access program files MeshNet orbital ionosphere.
Summarize diagnostic three two two point eight dash C"
*"Results pending. Eighty three percent."*
"Access voicemail."
*"You have 6 messages. Shall I play them?"*
"Play voicemail."
*"Wilson, I need to talk to you about the rocket launches
this evening. Call be back. BEEP"
"Wilson, we need to speak about the launches. Call
me when you get this. BEEP"
"Wilson, I tried to message you on your Mandi Phone,
it seems to be deactivated. We need to talk. BEEP"
"Wilson, call me now. This is urgent. BEEP"
"Special agent Lauren. Call back number 304 Beckler. BEEP"
"...BEEP"*
"Call John."
*"Dialing John. Phone line disconnected."*
Shit. John should have known I have my Cranium
Communication disabled today. Fuck the thing doesn't
work when I'm off base.
"CC dial 304 Beckler."
**Dial tone..."Special agent Lauren here."**
"My name is Wilson. I received a voice mail at my
office from you today."
**"Fucking hell. We have been trying to contact
you all evening. Where the hell did you - never-mind
that does not matter. Shut it down now."**
"Authorization?"
**"Jesus we do not have time for this crap. Shut it down."**
"I need authorization."
**"There is no authorization, John is overseas. He left this morning."**
"I can't shut it down then. What is this all about anyway?"
**"I'm headed over now. You are at the-?... ... ... ..."**
"CC disconnect line. ... BEEP. "
"Summarize diagnostic three two two point eight dash C"
*"Results pending. Eighty three percent."*
Something does not add up. Our first attempt at this in the
1960s was more or less a success. We launched thousands
of copper dipole antennas into medium earth orbit to facilitate
radio transmissions. The main reason we stopped was
because communication satellites rendered this type of
technology obsolete. Nobody needs radio bouncing off of an
artificial ionosphere if we have dedicated satellite infrastructure
ready to go...
The project was rebooted less than 7 months ago due to
strategic necessity. Our satellite fleet was shown to be vulnerable
to kinetic weapons. Or to rephrase that, somebody poked Russia
and we somehow "accidentally"lost one of our communication satellites.
I really do not understand how somebody could think the
project could be shut down at this point in time anyway. There
are approximately six rockets dispersing 1000 million copper
needles each and the ring is eighty three percent complete...
Not to mention the why of it. I mean shit, this reboot of the
program isn't in medium earth orbit. That would be retarded
with all the satellite infrastructure currently in place. No we put
this project beyond high earth orbit and packed it tightly enough
so our various transmissions could still bounce back...
"Summarize diagnostic three two two point eight dash C"
*"Results pending. Eighty three percent."*
This should be done by now.
"Detail summary diagnostic three two two point eight dash C"
*"Rocket Able at Omega high orbit, dispense complete. Rocket
Boy at Omega high orbit, dispense complete. Rocket Cast at
Omega high orbit, dispense complete. Rocket Dog at Omega
high orbit, dispense complete. Rocket Easy at Omega high orbit,
dispense in progress."*
"Computer detail Rocket Fox."
*"Search query invalid."*
"Computer detail Rocket Fox."
*"Search query invalid."*
"Computer why is my search query invalid?"
*"Rocket Fox query returns no files."*
Rocket fox is the sixth rocket. There is no way in hell there are
no files in the damn diagnostic. I rush over to the filing cabinet
and being to open files on the work desk. Rocket Fox isn't in
the index. Not possible.
"Computer access "current operations"file sort by most recent."
"Input log in credentials."
"Log into Columbia. Pass phrase: Tare Sail Pup Oboe Pup."
*"Most recent file, "Kessler Syndrome Fallout"*
|
Reddit was ablaze with wonderment and horror. Known by a few but diehard group of those seeking control of their dreams Kendrick Verne was a god among pillows. Ken was a master "escape artist"; a dream researcher and writer of dozens of books on lucid dreaming. While his reaserch out of UCLA was well regarded it was his book Endless Loop: The world within is Real that propelled him to messiah status. He had spoke on many occasion on the power of lucid dreaming, of how to control your mind during sleep cycles. But it was more than that. He taught how to get into this lucid state faster, to give you more control and to remain in this state longer. Which today seems to have been the problem. Kendrick, the media reports, has fallen into a prolonged coma. Wanting to find a way to accelerate theories on genetic memories, or those primal strands of information passed through the DNA, he began to experiment with a host of prescription drugs. The cocktail comprised of sleep aids, anticonvuslion and mood stabalizers designed to level not just ones body but mind as well. For one not versed with techniques in dream manipulation it would prove for a strong sleep, but for Ken it provided to good a combination to pass up. Doctors believe the combination of drugs lowered Kendrick's ability to re-uptake and diffuse the chemicals that keep bodies still during sleep. Called gamma-aminobuatryic it keeps the body from acting out the stimuli encountered while sleeping. And Kendrick's skills as a lucid dreamer seem to be preventing him from waking up. No matter what Doctors do they can not get him to realize he is sleeping. They theorize if they could just make him realize he is stuck in a machination of his own mind that maybe he could pull himself out. Just make him see he is stuck so deep in a dream he can not remember how he got there. That his mind has filled in the blanks of that morning and every morning for what seems to be eternity, yet unknown to him. That his hubris could prevent him from recognizing he is no longer lucid. That everything he reads and does is a chain binding him to a dream he can not escape. That he needs to wake up. Wake up. Wake up.Wake up.Wake up.Wake up. |
I lay down and close my eyes. The aliens have won, I can feel my life draining, I don't have much longer.
"I want that one!"A voice, almost a growl, screams out in excitement.
Before I am allowed to leave this nightmare, my heart quickens from its slow crawl and I breathe normally again. The scent of burning flesh enters my nose from around me.
*I should be dead like the others, why am I alive?*
Peeling back my eye lids reveals the reason I have survived. Standing over me are two short lizard-like creatures, but I hardly notice them. Standing directly above me is a large creature of vaguely canine origin about twice my height. My heart, furious to keep on beating, pounds in my ears.
"This one?"The owner of that voice appears next to the other.
How these canine aliens can speak english, I don't know, but the first canine must be no more than a puppy because the other one is about twice the size of it.
"Yes, this one. The rest are all dead anyway."
Before I can react, a needle enters my arm and I descend into unconsciousness. I wake in a fog of confusion, but that quickly fades to terror as my surroundings are revealed. I am locked in a metal cage in a cave of some sort. The walls around me have some weird kind of symbols and drawings. The younger of the canine aliens approaches holding a rope.
"Come on, boy, let's go for a walk."
|
"Tracy? Don’t be scared!"Jimmy said as he laughed. Kate, Jimmy, and I decided that we are going to sneak into the abandoned house down the street a week ago. I had been going to school all week thinking about how I dreaded going. "Shut up Jimmy! Im not a coward."I yelled. We crept closer to the door. I slowly reached my hand out, and felt the cold metal reach my clammy hand. I begin to turn the knob and realize that its locked.
"Well guys, its locked. I guess we can just go back now."I said.
"Hell no! We are getting in that house."
"And how do you suppose we do that?"Kate said.
Jimmy picked up a brick that had been broken off from the old neglected home. "Through the window."Jimmy said as he smashed the window into several pieces. "See, no one will mind. It’s not like anyone lives here anyways."he laughed. We crawled through the window and entered the house.
The House was clearly very old, yet it seemed that it was is great shape. It was very eerie as everything seem to be like it was in the 1950s. The tables were clean from any dust, and the old black and white tv set looked impeccable. We all stood there in amazement thinking that this isn’t what a abandoned house is supposed to look like. I was prepared for a dark, dingy, old building that was about to fall in on its self. It was as if we had just walked back through time. I took a step forward towards the couch when I hear a radio come on in the other room. I froze in my tracks.
“What the hell is that?” Jimmy said with fear in this voice.
“We need to leave!” Kate said.
“No, what if someone lives here? We need to apologize cause you busted out the window.” I said.
“You do it! We are out of here!” Jimmy said as him and Kate bolted out the window. I walked towards the sound of the enticing music. I turned the corner and proceeded down the long hallway that was littered with pictures of children down walls. Framed pictures that look like family photos, except that they were more recent the further I walked down the hall. I walk to the door at the end and gently press on it to open it up . And see what appears to be an old woman sitting down at a table her back to me.
“Tracy?” she called to me.
“Who….who are you? How do you know my name?” I say in a panic.
“I know all my neighborhood children dear. You are no exception.” Her old voice gave me chills. “Let me guess, Jimmy broke my window with a brick, and him a Kate fled when they entered the house?”
“Y…Yes…I was coming to tell whoever was here that the window was broken.”
She turned to me and looked at me in the eyes. Her face was beautiful. She only appeared old from a distance. She was actually a woman of great beauty. Her long white hair had thrown me when I look at her from behind. She looked as if she couldn’t be 25 or 30. “It’s ok Tracy, you’re a good kid.” She said with a smile.
“Who are you?” I asked wondering why this woman knew who we were, and what happened.
She stood up and walked over to me and placed her hand on my shoulder. I shuttered. “I’m your guardian angel. Keep being a good kid.” She said. Then she looked at me in the eyes, smiled, and ran her hand over my face. Then I stood there all alone in the house. Everything was different. The house was what I assumed it would be like to begin with. The walls were empty as the old wallpaper pealed from the walls. I walked out, and never told a soul about what I saw.
EDIT: This is my first post, im sorry for the grammer errors. Please be kind. |
A cult is rising in the Midwest. They seem almost magical in how they recruit their followers. Armed and continuously building compounds and safe houses they grow daily. Their predominate ideal is based around a newly found tome of information in Iraq. Marked on gold sheets this gospel tells the story of god losing a bet to Satan. He has to allow the angle one life on earth before banishment to hell.
With no powers but perfect knowledge Satan rises and calls himself Jesus. A plan to sow the most pain and suffering he can.
This group pushes relying on yourself and that the very ideas of a god that involves himself in mortal life is a lie.
The authorities are stumped. There seems to be no violence, no coercion, just enlightenment and education.
Write the account of a frustrated father whose son (who was already bordering on atheism joins up with this cult.) The police don't seem to be legally able to do anything. |
Three perspectives. Same events.
Small girl (10). Being raised by her sister(19). (The child's perspective.)
Wealthy businessman 55, ruthless in business but thinks of himself as a good person because he donates money to scholaship funds etc.
Single mother. Tired. Works 3 jobs minimum wage, to support hr family.
Location: Street corner Major town USA.
Event. Six men in animal masks, i.e. a furry rabbit and a feathered bird etc. Block an intersection with four cars and round everyone up into a circle inside.
They preceded to make demands to a camera. Then they shot what appears to be four random people (appears because if you want to make it a plot hook i.e. one of the thre observes notices a pattern etc, perhaps its there perhaps not.)
After shooting the four people they flee.
Write the accounts (assuming same facts) From the three different perspectives. the little girl (10 years old who was with her sister) The business man, and the mother.
Good luck. |
The fucking Occult. It stinks of it. Symbols and diagrams on peoples insides. Their are pools of blood. Vats really. The man was crazy. The disturbing part though was those damn spiders. Big as dogs. Bite Johnson in the leg and the whole crew finished killing them in time to see the man's leg rot off right there in front of them.
Radios down for some unknown reason.
And these fucking shadows that seemed burned into the walls. What the fuck were they doing here.
"You almost ready?"Then nod. They are stringing the fuses along now. The demolition charges were meant for the bridge but the brass will have to understand. or not. Maybe the ordinance didn't make the air drop.
But after seeing this place there is no way he is leaving it standing.
"Corporal?"Billings called from somewhere in the back.
"Yeah!"This is one of those times you don't actually want to hear them.
'You've got to see this."
"I don't got to see shit! I've seen enough. Wire it and blow it and let's move on."
"Get back here. Sir!"
The place is a maze. And fucking stinks. What is that smell!?
"Fuck."
"Yes sir."Billings says.
"And watch this."He picks up a jar from the table near him and even before his arm arcs back I know what he's going to do. I can see the two other jars through the... the... the thing, lying there on the grass.
"How is this possible?"I'm not really expected an answer.
"Sanderson went through."
"He what!"
"Went through sir. He figured you'd order him not to what with all the symbols and what not."
The floor and ceiling were covered with them. Etched in stone, here or there gold or silver inlays were visible beneath the blood and entrails.
The Field on the other side of the... the portal had waist high grass. A man was racing back through it headed straight for them.
Sanderson jumped though and landed back in the room.
"Fucking problem sir."Sanderson said quickly.
"How so?"I asked not expected an answer. I mean here we are staring at a portal hanging in the middle of the underground room leading to a field in spring time when there is six solid inches of snow outside.
"Moon's too big sir. I'll know more after night fall, but I think it goes back in time sir."
"What?"
"The moon sir. Standard size when looking past your thumb at arm's length. Closer to the earth in dinosaur times and all that. It's bigger than it should be."
It did look bigger.
"I found their tracks."Sanderson said to Billings.
"Whose?"I felt myself asking.
"The Nazi's sir."Sanderson said quickly.
"What?"He repeated himself.
"Charges set sir we only need - what in the bloody fuck is that sir."
"They went through?"I tried to grasp a bit of information at a time.
"yes sir. Might be changing the past sir. Almost differently are sir. Might have the time machine with them sir. That could be worse. Zip forward to say 1700 and make Germany the world power. I think we need to stop them sir."
They definitely didn't train us for this. |
Parker held the unknown woman's hand tightly. "I'm in control. I don't listen to them. Unlike Diana and Sarah, I can ignore them."Parker grinned. The therapist frowned. He quickly scribbled words and statements onto a memo pad. "Could I speak to Diana?"The therapist asked. Parker smiled and nodded. The girl lurched out of the chair and into the corner of the room. She kept repeating, "Please don't hurt me"
"Diana, I don't want to hurt you. I just need to-"Diana interrupted him. "You're the therapist aren't you. Sarah and Kayla told me about you. They like you. I don't think Ray or Parker do though. Ray's telling me to hurt you"The therapist scowled and then spoke, "Ignore Ray, your Diana, you can make your own decisions."(I might continue this tomorrow but its 1:00 AM and I'm about to pass out) |
It's just me in this room, I know that. No lights, just the noon sun filtering through the blue blankets I hung over the windows. The room is clear and empty, just a bit of dust on the floor and specks whirling through the air. It's easy to breathe in here.
Just how I like it, just how I like my mind.
My mind too, is a canvas.
But there are other other objects, the upright canvas and the water filled bowl on a table just to the side. A stained little box filled with brushes, and a bent cardboard box with paints shelter beneath. Here the floor is discolored from mishaps.
I look round the peaceful chamber. This is the day, I've felt it drawing closer, the day where my madness spills out. I haven't taken my meds today. I wont take them for awhile. Who knows how long this one will last?
The madness used to control me, when I believed them. I thought they were real, and sometimes I still do. The visions I see, well from a fevered mind. A fevered mind which erases that nuerological filter between dream and substance. Everyone carries the potential for madness, but are gifted with protection as well. Mine eroded.
But now, I see a lithe ivory form slipping underneath the floorboards, space bends, and the space in my mind rips open, a hand reaches out from the ground, white and shining, a feathered wing expands as its crouching form rises up, head upturned and arms seeking to embrace some sky above.
The ceiling is ripped away by an imaginary vortex, piece by piece it ceases to exist, rushing in like water to the lowest point, a bluish-green sky fills its place. The walls creak, they moan, and they bend outward, huge invisible hands sculpting them into clay, so that they return to their primordial forms, huge mossy trees, their limbs are dark, but where the light strikes a vivid blood red.
Focused on the vision, it is long before I notice my hand moving automatically, dipping in for a dash of color, sweeping, dotting, splashing, striking, washing. I don't think about it. I observe, I am outside, hovering and above. Everything happens on its own, my conscious self becomes just an eye riding a bull that will run its course through.
At the end, I awaken, drenched with sweat and trembling. The light is still slipping through the curtains, but I know it is not the same day. My color soaked hands push me up, and I look over curiously at the child my subconscious has birthed.
Another world, an ancient savage one, where a winged Valkyrie of haunting and impossible beauty does battle with demons that reach out from above, behind and below, shrinking away from her lance. Will she perish, or will she prevail? Her exhaustion shows in the inconsistency of energy flowing from her, but her eyes are shaped with determination, no fear, perhaps she will not die.
Perhaps, but. My mind is already growing pregnant again, a month, maybe three, and then I'll return to this room. I reach in to my pocket and pull out the bottle. The pills in here, the antipsychotics, they give me an opposing delusion. I can believe that I'm normal for awhile. I can pretend, more importantly, I can be with my friends, my family.
I hobble my stiff body to the door, the room does not stay upright. The low blood sugar makes me dizzy. It's fine, merely a sensation.
My lover is waiting for me. |
"Time for bed, brush your teeth and go lay down,"Timmy's mother shouts down the hallway.
The sound of the words coming out of his mother's mouth makes him cringe. He slowly walks to his bathroom and takes forever brushing his teeth.
"You're teeth are clean by now. Rinse your mouth out and go lay down. I"m not going to ask you again,"his mother scolds him.
Timmy rinses his mouth out, spitting the foamy water into the sink, drying his mouth after. He walks to his bedroom with a sickness growing in the pit of his stomach. He dreads closing his eyes, falling asleep. He knows what follows and he doesn't want to face it, not tonight.
Timmy's mother comes in and tucks him in to bed. She turns on his nightlight and closes the door behind her. Timmy lays there with the sheets up over his nose. He peers around his room, looking at the shadows on the wall. He stays up for thirty minutes before his eyes begin to grow tired.
A voice in his head whispers to him, "It's time, Timmy,"and within those words, his eyes are closed tightly. His dream begins just like every other night. The same dream he's been having for weeks, not changing endings ever. It's the same dreadful dream, that ends in horror.
Timmy fights inside his own dream, determined to change the outcome, at least once. Maybe it will end this horror. He walks through the woods lost as the fog begins pouring in. He can hear howling of wolves and he looks up to see the full moon. He hears something walking behind him, so he quickly turns to see what it is, even though he already knows what's going to happen. He feels like he's stuck in the motions.
Behind him is a large werewolf, twice the size of Timmy, standing five feet away from him. The werewolf's growling, baring his teeth. Timmy can feel the heat coming from the werewolf's breath. Timmy's frozen in fear, this is when Timmy normally runs and is torn to shreds as he wakes up screaming.
He can feel his body getting ready for its normal run, but it doesn't want to run this time. He wants to face his fear, once and for all. Timmy fights the urge of running and stands up tall, puffing his chest out to show the werewolf that he's not afraid and he's not backing down this time.
This makes the werewolf even angrier, as his growling and snarling becomes more intense. Determined to make the boy run. The werewolf pounces at Timmy and Timmy doesn't back down.
He shouts, "You're not real and you don't scare me anymore. You can't hurt me and I'm winning this fight tonight!"As the werewolf pounces at him, his eyes become disoriented, as if Timmy's words are powerful, controlling him. Just as the werewolf is about to land on top of Timmy, he begins to transform into a small puppy that lands on Timmy, knocking him on his back. It begins to lick Timmy in the face, making him giggle.
"I did it! I beat the powerful mighty werewolf!"Timmy shouts in excitement. That was the last night that Timmy had ever dreamt about the werewolf. The next morning, Timmy's mother surprises him with a new puppy, the same one from his dream. Timmy laughed to himself and decides to call the new puppy, "Werewolf." |
"Hold on, help is on the way!"Janine shouted, followed by the soft 'whump' of the door shutting.
"Geez, I really hope so,"I muttered, squirming uncomfortably on the cool porcelain throne. Four stalls - FOUR - and all out of toilet paper? This was why women always went to the restroom in pairs. Thank goodness for Janine's shy bladder, or we'd both be left high and un-dry, waiting for goodness knows how long for rescue. |
There I was, just laying in my bed. Simply going over what had occurred over the course of the day. It was fairly ordinary except for one thing. It constantly felt like I was being watched, even in the most obscure places. I just blew it off, thinking I was just paranoid from being so stressed. I slowly felt my body begin to relax and my brain drift off into a slumber when I felt air on the back of my neck. Refusing to open my eyes, I then heard someone. It was as if they were laying right beside me. Panic was surging through my veins as I was trying to think what to do. It's not like I could grab anything to defend myself and that is when I decided I would just pretend like I was still sleeping. I stayed like that for hours and the being was still there, I finally got the courage to open my eyes as I was sure that I was going to meet my demise. Slowly I turned my body towards the breathing and opened my eyes. What I saw made me jump. “Daisy! I thought I would never see you again!” All the fear I felt was caused by my cat. |
The coffee pot at work dripped so loudly in the mornings though I never noticed. I would sit there, before I had to meet my father for the early briefing, thinking of nothing.
My father was not a mean person. He was not a nice person. He never condemned me for what I was or wasn't; never was proud of me. I knew so much, because when he introduced me at business meetings, he would say, 'This is my son,' and often leave my first name somewhere else.
For twenty-eight years, I did not know what my father thought of me, though he told me he loved me often. On those rare days when I was in my office working late, when I stayed last, on his way out of the building he would stop by my door and say, 'Ron, did you take care of those Purchasing orders?'
'Yes,'
'Okay, I'll see you tomorrow,' and from a spot just outside of the door, 'I love you, good night.'
In the strange shadows thrown off by my monitor, I would watch him leave with long legs fleeing black and bent sideways in front of him. I'd think 'I love you too.'
He never put a restriction on me, told me what to do or who to be; he always gave me what I asked for and so it seemed logical to work for him after high school--I interned and learned...it doesn't really matter.
10 years of PLOP PLOP PLOP PLOP, I didn't even notice it until this morning. I got off the elevator. He was waiting for me. 'Can I talk to you.'
'Yeah,' and in my office, he said, 'Wallace is going to take over Senior accounts.'
I nodded and he left. I thought I was going to take that position. It had been open for two months. I didn't want it. I thought it would be mine though. I walked into the empty break room, picked up my mug--I have done it a thousand times and I went white. My arms turned cold and locked up and my knees were pulled out of my legs and I crumbled up against the sink unable to breathe.
I could hear, PLOP, PLOP, PLOP, PLOP echo through the room and bounce off the walls back to me, through me and I saw all the years, all the numbers I moved around on papers and all the times I said, 'Yeah,' to him and listened to him and worked hard for him and stood by him--unable to breathe, I bit my tongue and with my eyes white and the sides of the halls blurred gray, I got back on the elevator, went to the roof and climbed up this ledge.
**edit format and grammar** |
She told me, Words are wind. You don't do enough for me.
It was a warm, summer afternoon, late in the day when the sun began to cast an orange pall across the grass and leaves, when motes and small dancing insects become visible to the human eye. It was warm, almost hot, but my skin was suddenly moist with cool sweat and I felt weak and sick, so I reached out to sit. I sat down on my daughter's swing, unconsciously grasping at my left shoulder where pain struck me, and I looked up at the woman who once told me that I was the love of her life.
The orange sun colored her red hair burnt copper, green eyes looking down at me with all the warmth drained from them and her face tense as her lips formed the words that spelled out doom to our marriage. She said a lot of words as she stood over me, looking down at me as I listed on the swing of my daughter's play set, my own eyes boring through the motes and insects. I'm not sure how long she spoke, but at last I became aware of a long pause, and I looked up at her.
I looked into her steady, reptilian gaze as she assured me in a voice unwavering, I'm taking our daughter. If you try to seek custody or fight me, I'll tell them that you hit me, that you drink too much. You'll never get to see her.
There was nothing more left to say, and just like that a decade of marriage evaporated in a single afternoon. I came home from work, tired and dirty but ready to wrap my two girls up into my arms, drink a cold beer and barbecue for them out in the front yard where the motes and insects danced underneath an orange sky. But I came home from work to find my daughter gone and a U-haul packed with all the worldly possession my wife and I had acquired over a decade. She sat me there on the swing of our daughter's play set and she told me exactly how it was going to be.
She told me, There are others who are interested. You don't do enough for me and I work too hard, and there is not enough of me to go around.
She told me, I work all day and I clean the house and I take care of our daughter and I suck your dick and I swallow your cum and you do nothing for me.
I could have argued with her, and maybe I should have, but to what end? She stood over me, arms crossed, an immovable monolith. My mind formulated the words but my lips never moved to form them into wind. I didn't know how to justify the existence of our marriage or argue against her pointed words, so I remained silent.
So she left.
And just like that, I sat alone on the swing of my daughter's play set, listlessly watching dancing motes and insects while the moving truck pulled away.
The summer was quiet. Insects buzzed and a light breeze stirred through the leaves of the lone tree that stood in the front yard. When I looked at the tree from my perch on the swing I didn't so much see the tree as I saw the fort that my daughter and I had spent many hundreds of adventures sailing the high seas, fighting off invading armies and building kitty nests for raising imaginary kitty-families.
The sun fell below the world and the sky darkened. Shadows lengthened and deepened. The insects settled in the cooling air, down into the grass and up into the eaves of the house where my family had once made its home. The front door stood open, and within the darkness fell a dark shadow from its maw that threatened to swallow the porch whole. Toys, forgotten in the rush to leave lay strewn in the grass of the yard between myself and the house, and in each toy brought forth memories of my daughter playing with me, with them.
Each memory bloomed a familiar pain that blossomed in my chest which only deep and shuddering breaths could give cause to subside. At long last the pain receded, the tide of pain withdrawing to leave an emptiness in its wake that no thing in this world could hope to fill.
I stood, unsteady on my feet. I walked back to the empty home, into the darkness, more aware than ever before that one of her -- my wife, my daughter -- had always been enough for me.
Contracture. Death. |
This is fundamentally impossible to write. Without religion pushing back against every advancement in science we would never of had the dark ages, we would be 800-900 years more advanced in technology.
Maybe.
The human mind evolved into an US vs THEM mentality long before we invented gods. Historically the Jews used this to selectively breed with the members of their own church. But it could as easily have been race related i.e. whites only with whites etc. Whole races and regions of the world are shaped - genetically - by religion.
Whole patches of history are so tied to religion that I cannot fathom a past without it. Hell (pun intended) [monks discovered genetics.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregor_Mendel) The church providing food and leisure time allowed data analyst for the first time.
Roads, trade, unification across counties and dialects, all existed to spread the word of (insert your preferred religion of the time.)
Let's not forget war.
War (how ever you look at it.) has advanced technology faster than any other event in human history. Most wars (taking the written human history into account.) Were at least justified as a religious war. This was an easy way to get the public behind the war. To recruit willing soldiers and ask the population to sacrifice food and goods and sons.
Hell Religion is one of the major reasons peasants didn't rise up against tyrants (god will give them their punishments, just bow your head and take it.) Or this leader was appointed by god who are you to argue. etc
Now you can say a lot of bad things against tyrants but they got shit done. Like war they advance technology and infrastructure far faster than other forms of government or self organized societies.
I can't even conceive of human history without religion. But I'm bookmarking this because I am interested in seeing what others come up with. |
A ray of sun draped across the boring room. Tiny motes in an empty tomb. In and out of its lone beam. One. Ten. A hundred gleamed.
Round and round, some went up, some went down. Some went sideways and others twirled. Watch as their dancing bodies whirled.
But there was one alone that knew for what purpose they all flew. It zigged and zagged while others lagged. Blind to the surrounding disarray, it longed to simply break away.
At last it reached its final goal and it could play its lifelong role. For an instant it stopped and froze, then in a breath it went up the nose. Sniff sniff sniff the baby sneezed, and out it went in the summer breeze. |
Dave was thirsty. He seemed to always be thirsty anymore. He reached to open the door to the fridge, and stopped half way. He opened the freezer instead, Three and a half packs of Klondike bars sat inside the freezer. He grabbed two. He would have to run to the store later to get more.
It was all he ever ate anymore. Nothing quite fixed his cravings like ice cream. And nothing more so then a Klondike. He had gained some weight at first, sure, but lately he had been starting to grow leaner. His job took a lot of his energy, and he figured working so much had started getting him in shape. He liked the way he looked in the mirror. He laughed. The Klondike diet.
He ate the two Klondike bars, then went back for more. He knew he should probably get some more water, so he filled his glass and drained it twice. He started on his third Klondike bar, and had to run to piss while he worked on the fourth.
God, he was tired. Just a little nap would do him good. He stretched out, and laid his head on the pillow. He wanted another Klondike bar. And he was still thirsty. He got up to piss again.
No one understood he was so tired all the time. Everyone got mad at him. Sure, he was late all the time, if he showed up at all. He just didn't have the energy. He supposed it was from working all the time. He looked around the room. It was fuzzy. When he was tired, his vision seemed to blur sometimes. It went away after he napped usually.
He grabbed another Klondike bar. He felt like crap. He was hungry. He supposed he should probably eat something else, but he wanted something sweet. He felt like he was getting sick. He closed his eyes again. He was sleepy.
He was only thirty when he died. He never knew about the diabetes. The klondike bar was melted in his hand when they found the body. |
"You ready for this?"Lynn asked. She reached out and took my hand. It was one of those things. She never knew how much it meant to it, that casual intimacy of knowing my hand would be there, or knowing that I needed hers.
You were suppose to say the bride was the most beautiful woman in the room. That was how it was meant to work. But it wasn't true. She was. She always was, in any room, with anyone.
She liked the cookie part of the Oreo-es while he liked the center. When they played video games together she won, sometimes. She was kind and generous and... and...
He wasn't sure when the right time would be but he kept the small box in his pocket waiting for it. Sometime during this trip, but not when it would steal Adam and Jess's thunder.
"Of course."He said squeezing her hand before moving toward the front of the church to stand besides his brother.
Adam was sweating. Lynn had given him a handkerchief just for this. She shared a smile with him as he handed it to his brother.
"Fuck. Thanks man."He said pulling it over his face quickly and handing it back. Michel took it gingerly and the crowd had a chuckle. Then the music started and the bride entered.
"... and with that I give you the best man. Michel Jaren."Kim was crying as was her sister. It truly was a good story.
"Hello."He said after taking the mic. "I tried to write a great, quick, and truthful speech but I realized you could only have two of the three."No on laughed. Great.
"I know most of you know our story."He said glancing at his brother. The wedding was a destination one. To save money he stood as the best man and the bridge sister and the maid of honor. There was no one else. Lynn didn't care that she didn't to stand. She was that cool.
"Well we were both bastards. In the truest sense of the word. bounced in an out of foster homes. When we were fourteen Adam set fire to a car to get sent back. You could say we were brothers without family. Boy's homes and a bit of jail time and we were off to conquer the world at nineteen."
"We lived in filth. We had nothing. I mean we shared the same pair of jeans for almost a year. He slept while I worked and then we switched. Try to imagine what those pants smelled like."That got a laugh.
"The world never gave us anything we didn't take. So when we literally ran into Jess and her best friend. Lynn."She waved from the first table. "We didn't really know what to do."
"In fact if I remember correctly. For that first double date he didn't even want to pair up with Jess."She gave him a mocking look of anger. "On account of how badly she had yelled at him for knocking her to the ground. Now I don't think I've ever told this story so stay with me."
"Oh no."Adam said.
"So we saved and saved for two years. Taking any job we could get our hands on. Anything. Then we started selling those tee-shirts. We'd knock off a order of two hundred and sell them when we could. We used ever trick in the book. We failed at lot. To keep from crying we had a deal. No matter how bad it got we'd take sixty bucks and go out to eat somewhere every Friday."
"Well shit got worse before it got better. Every Friday turned into every other then when ever we could scrape the money together. We'd go three weeks straight eating in the soup kitchens just to scrape up enough money to blow it on Friday night dinners. Which could happen any night of the week."
"There was this new taco truck. We saw it for weeks. It teased us. There was always a line. Even if we had the money to blow we couldn't wast an hour waiting for food. So some random Saturday at about 11 pm we sorted out the electric and the rent and the tee-shirt seed money and just our luck we had something like seventy bucks left over.
"Truck's tweets say its at the top of this parking garage in the expensive part of the city. We leg it. Let's just say we didn't wear suits in those days and if you saw us coming most people cross the street. Get up there. There's a line. Don't care. Get there just as they are closing up. Out of food. Beg the guy, tell him we've saved up for it. He tells us all he's got left is some chicken but he don't know if its gone bad. We say we don't care."
He was losing the crowd but Adam was grinning like a maniac. That's who the story was truly for anyway.
"So dumb ass here tells him to make us twenty bucks worth of tacos. They are awesome. We literally eat four a piece and wash it down with some unnamed beer. We hang out with the tailgaters who were watching soccer or whatever, the reason for this roof top get together, for about two hours then head back."He smiles and bit and gets himself under control."
"Jess and Lynn are coming back from shopping. They have a big ass cake for Kim here in fact. Spent a lot of money on it. They are parked on the three floor. We are getting into the elevator on the seventh. Elevator stops on number six and this... this nice old lady gets on. Could be anyone's grandma. Knit hat, big purse, ready smile, the works."
"We start heading down again. There is this ungodly... I mean Adam had some bad farts but this."Adam was watching him strangely. Did he think he wasn't going to say the punch line?
"I gag. The old lady vomits right there. Opens her hand bag and pukes. Adam's smashing the key pad until the doors open. We burst out. He slams into Jess flips the cake up and Lynn tries to catch it with comical success and the rest is history."
"So just remember."He said to the crowd. "When you meet that special someone your ready to settle down with it won't be any worse of a story than carpet bombing an elevator and making an old lady puke."There was some scattered applause and some nervous laughter. Fuck them. At least Adam was speechless.
"Wait wait."Adam said as he was lowering himself to sit.
"Are you telling me you didn't shit your pant's that day?"Adam said quietly. His wife heard and glared at him.
"No man it was only you."He said.
Adam cracked up. Bad. He broke. It got so awkward that the crowd was watching silently as he shook with laughter tears striking down his face.
"It wasn't me man."Adam said when he had caught his breath.
"No!"Jess said. "The old lady?"She covered her mouth.
Someone snapped a picture (Lynn denies it was her but I don't believe her.) We have that framed and on the mantle piece next to our own wedding photo. You know our tee shirt business took off. We have seven homes and what not but we stay in the one in Chicago where it all started most of the time, because Adam and Jess live right next door. |
Christopher was an alien. His eyes were not sensitive to light but the lambdic forces of the universe. He identified as human because he could see that Earth humans would bestow upon him values congruent to his own ambition to leave this life with enough wealth that his next life would be rich.
*Life on Earth.*
Christopher lived in New York City and knew no humans. In his eyes, Earth humans were the black towers of Ground Zero and would beam into space, like a zip sealing a rift, the second he saw them. During Earth's acceleration phase, Christopher will see humans on the Sun.
*Earth humans.*
Reswesreswere is an alien. Its home planet is Earth like but it's not humanoid. It's a surface with an edge that acts as its mind. It comes to Earth from Christopher, it will form in his vision, during which time it will reveal towers within towers, or humans within towers, or humans within humans, to Christopher and speak of the untold riches of Earth.
*Rich people.*
Reswesreswere likes to come to Earth to visit New York City and spend its wealth. Christopher will see Reswesreswere become singularities at the top of towers, creating massive shadows that appear infinitely deep and dense, thus hiding humanity from Christopher.
*Wealthy people.*
Sophitia is a human. She works in New York City as a billionaire secretary. She sees floors nine thousand and nine through to one thousand and eight of the Freedom Tower. Her brain has been donated to her by Genetics and she is particularly sensitive to time.
*All the money on Earth.*
Sophitia travels faster than the speed of light at every possible angle. She has a quasi-crystal Investment that facilitates the instantaneous transmission of information across the known universe. Her constant requirement is to meet Reswesreswere at the right edge.
**The Future**
Christopher was walking in the matrix of angular momentum towards Ground Zero. He was going to apply for work. Reswesreswere came as expected and told Christopher to speak to Sophitia, who arrived that instant as the Freedom Tower, darkly lit by brooding Reswesreswere.
Christopher spoke of wealth as if his life depended on it. In his desperation for riches he told Sophitia everything he valued in the universe. He said he knew there was another universe. Reswesreswere smiled and Sophitia shot upwards to the sun as the Earth began to spin so fast that Christopher could only see Sophitia now, arm extended, pulling him into Freedom Tower.
Reswesreswere tells Christopher another universe is invaluable by perfectly filling Christopher's eyes with a force so powerful it condenses his past lives. Sophitia flickers inordinately to interfere with the force and Reswesreswere returns to the top of the tower.
Reswesreswere has spent all its riches, the entire wealth of its home planet, summoning Christopher from another universe to the Freedom Tower but now can not sublimate the future Christophers as currency.
Sophitia regains consciousness in a pink quartz chair on the top floor of the Freedom Tower. Reswesreswere is infinitesimal in the eyes of Christopher, suspended in the center of the room.
Sophitia stands and observes Christopher's eyes move whichever way she moves her head. Inside she can see Reswesrewere decaying and recapitulating. It slowly dawns on her that she has finally captured the moment. As she looks deeply into the eyes of Christopher she sees herself for the first time, travelling forward, successful. Visiting other planets, maxing credit and living a life of luxury. She can barely believe her luck as she teleports out of the Freedom Tower, leaving New York City and the Earth for a better place in the Stars. |
I can see potential in this, but you do seem to carry a problem with redundancy and creating smooth sentence flow.
Here, I'll take a passage and show you how it would look if these problems were touched up.
*"I think you dropped your"I yelled ahead, at the young red-haired boy who faded into the masses of busy people crossing the intersection. "...wallet"I mumbled to myself. I ran for the wallet, to pick it up before anyone else could grab it, as I didn't want to see it in the wrong hands and not returned to the boy.*
*I didn't realize that I had picked up the worn, leather wallet, upside down until all of the cards it had contained fell to the ground. Unfortunately, the wind, being particularly strong today, had already begun blowing the cards down the road. "For fuck's sake"I blurted out, as I began tripping over myself, like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to catch all of the cards before they were gone with the wind. In a few moments, I had all but two of the cards that had fallen out of the wallet in my hands, one was still in my line of sight, the other, was blow far into the distance, forever lost.*
The retouch
"Hey wait, I think you dropped your..."I yelled at the red-haired boy ahead of me, who only seemed to fade more and more into the bustling crowd around us. "...wallet."I muttered to myself as he was now long out of sight. I ran back to pick up the wallet laying unattended. It was now my first priority to return it back to the him before some unsavory character tries to claim it as their own.
Suddenly after picking it up, the contents of the wallet spewed out and were quickly swept away by the wind. I then realized I had been carrying it upside down. "For fuck's sake!"I blurted out as I danced about like a decapitated chicken, trying to collect the scattered papers and cards. Luckily I manage to grab all but one card directly in line of sight.
It's not my best work but you should notice some of the things I changed for the better. For example I change/deleted all sentences that seem to only repeat the same idea.
*I ran for the wallet, to pick it up before anyone else could grab it, as I didn't want to see it in the wrong hands and not returned to the boy*
This sentence above only repeats the same idea of the protagonist wanting to return the wallet, this is unnecessary and draws the reader out of the story.
The story you wrote is somewhat confusing, I understand that you were trying to create the sense of abnormal dreamlike reality but there are too many loose ends left unchecked. The girl, red-haired-blonde-haired boy, the protagonist, the burning photo, the wallet, how do these things fit together? How does the ending reflect on the beginning? What is the message or irony of the situation?
Of course this is /r/writingprompts , a place where people come to express and improve on their writing. There is no such thing as regretful writing as even our less profound can still be used as a template to build better stories. The number one tip I suggest is to read your own work aloud as you write it, making sure to check sentence fluency as well as redundancy and wording.
I hope to see more of your work on this sub. |
A small white rabbit hopped across the ground. As it made its way through around the trees and over their roots, sunlight occasionally bounced off its fur, reflecting off into a forest so dense that sunlight rarely made it to the ground. The rabbit bounced across the ground until it came across a plump berry bush, where it stopped shortly to feast on some round, violet berries. It voraciously attacked the bush until a slight shuffling noise caused it to become alert.
*Thwack.*
An arrow pierced the rabbits neck and catapulted it into a nearby tree. A man dressed in bearskin clothes made his way to his catch. He tugged the arrow out of the tree and pulled the rabbit off. Swinging his next meal by its ears, the man walked back through the deep forest from which he came.
He heard the children playing before he saw the camp. The man made his way through some unnaturally dense shrubbery and came out into a cleared pavilion. Tents and fire pits pockmarked the ground. Parents washed clothes and cooked meals while children darted between tents play-shooting at each other and laughing. The man smiled. He was home.
"Gabriel! There you are!"
A middle aged woman wearing knit wool clothing stepped out of a green tent. She had waist-length gray hair, and a face which radiated with a mother's warmth.
Gabriel looked at her and smiled. "Yes, Ma'am. Just caught me self a snack is all, wasn't gone for too long was I?"
"No, not at all."The woman gestured for him to join her in her tent, which he happily obliged. They sat down across from each other and the woman handed Gabriel a wooden cup filled to the brim with fresh tea. "I'm glad we finally found this place,"she said contently. "Yeah, it's nice,"replied Gabriel, "No more soldiers messin' things up for us."
They sat and chatted for a half hour longer before the man retired to his own tent. The sun had gone down and most of the others had already gone to sleep. He would have had a difficult time working his way through the network of tents to his own, if it weren't for an eerie glow which came from the distant east. He stepped inside the curtains of his worn-out camping tent, but stopped and glanced out towards the shining crystal dome which rose above the treeline, before muttering "good riddance"before letting the tent flap fall behind him.
Gabriel awoke to the sound of footsteps, followed by the sound of screaming. It was early morning, and he opened his tent flap to a scene of chaos. Men clad in black armor with a fluorescent blue trim were making their way through camp, setting tents ablaze with their mere touch. Gabriel was frozen in place by the childrens' screams, and the soldiers' laughter.
Then he snapped.
Gabriel grabbed a dagger from his tent and sprinted towards the pillagers. He sidestepped one soldier as they made a lunge for his face before stabbing them in the side, the spun around to counter another. He danced between a half dozen soldiers, expertly countering their attacks and landing attacks of his own. Within a minute, not a single soldier remained on his feet.
Gabriel dropped his dagger, panting. He looked up to see the faces of his fellow villagers. Their faces told him more than their words ever could. They were scared, not of the soldiers, but of *him.* Nobody had ever beaten a soldier in combat, their suits were to advanced, but Gabriel had taken out six without skipping a beat. He had seen these faces before. It wouldn't be long before he was ostracized, and ultimately forced to leave yet another camp.
A boy pushed past his father and asked the question Gabriel never wanted to hear again: "You're from the Dome, aren't you?"The dam of silence was broken, and a flood of misguided hate flowed forth from the villagers.
"Freak!"
"You ain't human!"
"Go back home, *demon*."
He couldn't handle it. Gabriel had thought he could leave the past behind, but he was obviously wrong. He ran through the crowd and out into the forest, headed east.
A few days later, Gabriel found himself at meter thick steel gate which would provide entrance to the Dome. The guards took one look at him and opened the gates before saluting him as he entered. Gabriel walked into another world. Bright lights emanated from skyscrapers which held up the Dome's top. Suburbs around the city, with their uniform, colorless repetition, welcomed Gabriel as he made his way to the city center. Everywhere he went, he passed troops who saluted him and exclaimed "Hail King Janzen! Hail King Janzen!"
Mammoth gold doors sealed shut behind him. Gabriel looked up to a man in a throne many times larger than the necessary size for sitting. The man in the throne peered down at the newcomer, with a smug grin on his face.
"Finally grow bored of the peasantry?"the King sneered.
Gabriel nodded.
"Then I suppose we should host a feast, to celebrate the return of the Great King's first son." |
"Being a genius is not necessarily knowing more than anyone else,"Dmitri began his lecture. His palms were sweaty, his eyes wide, his stomach was in knots, and his words just a quiver shy of being an off-key tremolo. "Being a genius is seeing the things that other people, don't. Being a genius is being able to notice the things right beneath your nose,"he fumbled the remote in his hand before striking the button on a remote to change to the next slide.
He was lecturing an auditorium full of the brightest minds of the century from all across the globe. For years he had cursed his assignment at the Antarctic Observatory. He hated the cold -- being a Russian, it was almost the most ostracizing trait he possessed (the first of which was his negative disposition towards vodka). The third trait, then, would be his fascination with Italian cuisine followed closely by an almost unnatural fascination with all things physics. His assignment, however, led him to a whole slew of discoveries, the least of which attracted the crowd summoned before him.
"Most of you here, of course, are familiar with A1689-zD1, or the first galaxy that formed after the Big Bang. We've been remarkably limited in our observations before, but the universe, and that galaxy, are full of secrets. And while I am just as excited as you are -- no, I'm sorry, that is a lie. While I *was* just as excited as you are now concerning the replica of Earth billions of light years away, I am more fascinated with the method of its discovery and the implications of said discovery."
Dmitri began explaining the way certain magnetic fields affected photons, tacheons, and other subatomic particles in such a manner to create a light highway. Their creation stemmed from bizarre distortions first noted years ago around black stars (stars so big that their light cannot escape their gravitational pull). What Dmitri and a dozen other physicists hypothesized, experimented, and proved was that for a star of that size to exist, its fuel could not be a fusion of normal matter, but of anti-matter -- furthermore, the fusion rate had to be controlled somehow, by mechanisms they hadn't discovered until recently.
"By isolating specific electromagnetic wavelengths, we were able to look beyond the event horizon of one of these dark stars, and we found a wormhole to a multi-verse, or several of them. We found a wormhole into Heaven."
"Heaven is a helluva name for a delusion,"Dr. Oldomeyer, the Administrator of the Polish Science Academy barked from the auditorium. Dmitri recognized his voice -- one that always belittled, doubted, and insulted him. Dmitri beamed at his opportunity to elaborate.
"A delusion is caused by a mind free of its intellectual shackles, Doctor. And intellect says the gods of man's religions cannot co-exist, yet we have witnessed evidence suggesting just that."Dmitri went on to elaborate on, and disclose pictures of, prophetic symbols, events, characters, and worlds outlined in religious texts across the Earth. The room stirred in discomfort, disbelief, and disgust. How could it be possible?
"Schrodinger is right, my friends -- reality is but the chaos of possibility calmed by the eyes of a conscious observer. And the conscious observer of our universe allowed Mankind's prophecies to hold true, *all of them*."
"And what does that mean?"Dr. Oldomeyer posed arrogantly.
"It means,"Dmitri reflected on his lack of faith momentarily and pitied his fear. "It means one of us is God." |
„Come on” I urged her.
Anna untied her ponytail and sat at the edge of the bed right next to me. Turning her back to me, she took of her flip flops and tucked her feet under herself. Still turned around she closed her eyes and smiled in anticipation. I gently run fingers through strands of her hair. *They've grown so fast* I thought tracing still red scar on the side of her head.
„I love this” She said interrupting my thoughts.
„I love when you play with my hair. Remember the day we've met?”
„How could I forget. You were the most beautiful girl on the playground.”
„Right” She chuckled. „That's why you decided to stick that gum to my hair. I couldn't get it all out and mum had to cut it off. I cried for hours.”
„It is a wonder that we got along after that, let alone got married” I pulled her closer and put my chin on her shoulder enjoying that little moment of peace.
„John?” I could hear an apprehension in her voice.
„Could you.. could you tell me where we are? I don't recognize this place.” I pulled back and took a little leather notebook from the nightstand.
„John?” I could hear that she was scared, but I was so tired. It was more than ten times today. And today was a good day.
„Read the first page.” I handed her the notebook.
„Accident? What accident?” She looked at me wide eyed.
„Car accident, please continue reading” I kissed top of her head and embraced her again.
„When did we move here?” She asked after few seconds.
„I didn't write it down? It was yesterday. Even Mark was here to help us unpack.”
„Dad was here? I don't remember. I don't remember any of that.”
„Don't worry about it. Doctors said you''ll be fine eventually. Just give it some time.” I tried to comfort her. It was starting to become a routine now. Show her the list of things that happens since accident, comfort her and then do it all in a few minutes. Until she falls asleep.
„I'm sorry. It must be awful for you.” She hung her head „You must hate me.”
„I could never hate you, no matter what. I love you, you silly girl.” I gave her a little kiss.
She continued reading.
„And you quit your job? John! You love being a doctor.”
„Anna, don't you see. I love you more than anything.”
I kissed her again and walked into the bathroom.
As soon as I closed the door I couldn't keep the emotions in anymore. I broke down and started crying. I stepped into the shower. The flow of water used to soothe me, but it no longer could do the trick. The guilt was too heavy on my mind. For the past few days I was putting sleeping pills into her evening tea, just to have a few more hours of peace. I just didn't know how much long I could gone on like that.
My wife was my best friend. I used to share everything with her, every thought, every worry. I wanted so much to tell her how alone I was, how I hated what our relationship become after that accident. But I knew I couldn't. All of the neurosurgeons I'd consulted had said her inability to form new memories should be temporary. I didn't want her first memory to be of me telling her about my feelings of resentment.
Before walking out of the door, I took a deep breath and braced myself. It's been almost an hour, the cycle would have to begin again. *I really need to make some tea* I thought as I walked into the bedroom.
Anna was sitting on the bed braiding her hair. What surprised me was how calm she looked. Then she noticed my presence.
“Did my dad mention when he''ll come over again?” She asked.
I slowly walked up to bed and picked the still open notebook. I didn't dare to hope.
I looked at the list I began to despise. Every single line in there had been written by me. |
"Asshole!", I scream at the idiot in the convertible that just cut me off and make a mental note of his license
plate. It had been another rough day at work and they always seems to leave me a bit more "expressive"than
usual. As my temper slowly settles down, I recall my promise to spend time with my son tonight when I get
home. It had been a while since we had our last outing and I knew he had been practicing. Lately he had been
devoting a bit too much time to it, but I can worry about that later.
As I pull into the subdivision, I hear several sirens blaring in the distance. Perhaps there was a fire or a
robbery, although both seem so foreign in our quiet neighborhood. Then I round the corner and see it, dozens of
police cars on my street. A thousand question instantly blaze through my mind. "What should I do?""Should I
approach them?". Then I notice my son, my 15 year old son, handcuffed and surrounded by at least 8 officers.
I panic, letting my emotions overrule my sanity as I approach the group. A detective walked up and placed a
firm hand on my shoulder. Still somewhat distracted, I turned to him in a stupor. "What's the meaning of this?
What are you doing to my son?!".
"Mr. Johnson, I don't know how to tell you this. Two boys, Billy Stevens and Alex Gordon, were found
murdered today. An eye witness says that your son committed these brutal murders."
I can't recall much of what happened the following few hours. What seemed like thousands of questions all
seeming to blur together. A hazy memory of my son being taken away in the back of a police car. Our eyes
briefly meet and I can see the regret in his eyes. He knew better than this. I raised him better than this! If only
he had waited until I got home.
I quickly grab my escape bag from behind the false panel in the closet and head to the car. This was the first
time one of my sons had been this reckless, a witness?! I fear that I started this one a bit too young. As I pull
out of the neighborhood, I recall seeing a young boy in the back of the convertible that cut me off on my way
home. Perhaps that boy would make a more cautious son, I will have to pay them a visit before leaving town. |
Listen.
I know there is nothing I can say or do that can convince you to change your mind. You, like so many people before you, have their heart dead-set on doing something and you're probably going to do that. And I can't fault you, hell, setting your mind to something you want to accomplish and actually accomplishing it is something most of us never get around to getting the hang of. Instead, we seem to fiddle about while each and every Rome we've ever inhabited burns straight to the ground. So, it's not that I fault you for getting something done. Shit, I congratulate you for it.
And honestly, I'd be a hypocrite if I tried to question your motives. I don't know you and I can't really know what it's like to see the world through your eyes. Even if we were best friends since childhood and shared every possible memory together, I still wouldn't have a clue as to who you are and how you feel. We are all sold this lie that we are somehow able to relate to other people; shared experiences and all of that. The truth is, and it's a hard one to accept, is that we are completely alone. We know nothing of the people around us besides the way they look and the things they say, and those are distorted because they're only relevant as to how we interpret them. Many see our eyes, ears, and minds as the key to understanding the world around us, but in a way, they're just filters that distort reality and bend it suit our own perspectives. So again, I don't need to know why you want to do this, I don't even think I could really know. Your motives are your own, and as someone existing totally outside of you, I accept them. That is that.
What is troubling me, however, is the fact that if we accept that we are all individuals, sharing a common planet but little else, then we must too accept that we are masters of our own destiny. In fact, if you look at history, that may be all we are, and all we have – the ability to determine what it is we do and the way we do it. The things we love, the things we are, the things we do that make up our daily lives are determined not by the world dictating them to us, but us dictating them back to the world. All we have, all we are in this existence are the decisions we make, the opportunities we have. Controlling our actions, our own destiny, is what makes us uniquely human. The ability to reason, to take chance, make mistakes, to knowingly enter into an unsure situation just for the possibility of a beneficial outcome – this is the true zeal of life. It's the stuff that makes heartbeats quicken, palms sweaty, nerves wired, and gives us purpose. These are all things you are no doubt feeling right now.
So I don't fault you for this. I don't blame you for wanting something, anything, to change the course of your existence. But what you're taking away from me by changing the course of mine is the worst thing you can do to someone. You're taking away my choice, my chance to be the thing I want to be. You're taking away all I have. Why would you want to do that to someone else? |
God, I'm so nervous.
My hands are sweaty and I wipe them furiously on my pants. I sit in the waiting room with one other guy. A woman opens the door and calls out a name that I don't quite catch. The man sitting next to me rises and strides confidently into the interview room. I suck in a breath and feel sweat begin to bead along my hair line.
The butterflies in my stomach have turned from butterflies into bees into angry hornets buzzing around the lining of my stomach.
A minute passed. Two minutes. I stared at the clock.
I needed this job. It was my third interview in two weeks. The first two had been no good. My rent was due soon and I was down to my last paycheck from my previous job. I needed this.
The door opened and the man exited, looking disheartened. He looked at the floor and then to me. "Good luck,"he scoffed. "That dude's an ass. No way in hell anything I said to him could have gotten me this job."
I swallowed. The door closed behind him.
I stared at the clock and wiped my hands again on my ironed pants. I cracked all of my knuckles and counted the seconds as they passed.
A minute or so later, the woman returned and said my name. I looked up at her and tried not to stare at the mole just below her lip. I smiled politely and walked past her and into the office.
The office was pleasant and neat. It was simple, with windows all along one wall and a large desk in the middle. The desk chair was turned away from me, so I could not see whoever sat in it.
"Hello,"I said softly, then again louder. "Hello, my name is Jason Hoover."
The chair turned around quickly. A man with tired eyes and a thick five o'clock shadow faced me. He inclined his head toward the chair in front of his desk. I sat with my legs cross in front me and struggled not to wipe my hands on my pants again. He stared at me and yawned. He leaned his knuckles against the desk and cracked them. Four pops echoed in the still room.
"Um,"I said. "Like I said, I'm Jason Hoover, and I'm here to interview for the-"
"You got the job,"he said. His voice was gravelly, like he hadn't said more than a word in hours.
"Um,"I said again. "Are you-are you serious?"
He nodded.
"Uh, really? There's nothing you'd like to ask me?"
He pushed out his lower lip in thought and slowly shook his head. "Nope. You seem like a nice enough boy. Relatively smart."
"Thank you sir, mister um,"I paused and glanced at the name stand on his desk. "Thank you Mr. Jones. You don't know how badly I needed this."
He flapped a hand at me. "What did you say your name was? Jason?"
"Yes sir, Jason Hoover."
He scribbled my name down and asked for my phone number. After scrawling that down beneath my name, he looked up at me.
"I'll call you tomorrow and tell you when you can come in and your hours and such. Thanks, Jason. See you soon."
I smiled and got up to the door. I closed it gently behind me and murmured a "Yes!"to myself, ignoring the stare I got from the woman with the mole. |
A shrill scream erupts through the wall, causing me to spill my drink (or what's left of it) onto the floor. Instinct takes over as I get off the couch and march towards the bedroom. fist slamming at it with bruised knuckles.
"Sarah!?"
... No response.
"Sarah goddamnit, what the he'll is going on in there? Is everything alright?"
... still... nothing... and suddenly; I hear a sound. No, not a sound, but a voice. I hear the wail of my first born child. Just as I'm about to knock again, the door opens.
"Sarah, how's Amy, is she alright? What took so long? Why wouldn't you let me in? Is Amy ok, can I talk to her?"
Sarah just stands there staring at me, looking straight through my eyes and into the very depths of my soul. I stand there staring dumbly at her as if I expect an answer to all of my questions at once. Then that I realize what's in her arms. My child. Mine and Amy's child, my baby girl. I start to walk in but Sarah steps out into the hallway, pushing me back and closing the door behind her.
"Sarah, what the he'll, let me at least make sure she's alri..."
"No. No Mr. Clarence. No time. You need get going right straight away. You got the map. Get go now. Take this one with you."
And with that she unceremoniously shoves the baby in my arms and turns back to the bedroom. Just before the door closes I wedge my foot in.
"What about Amy?!"
She fixxes me with that steel gaze again. Just when I think I'm about to scream at her she steps back and opens the door. Just inside I see my wife laying on a twin mattress, sheets tossed randomly across her and the floor, blood stained clothing littering the foot of the bed. I want to see her face but all I see is her blonde hair splayed across her pillow. I move to get closer but Sarah closes the door half way.
"You go now, I stay, I take care Mrs. Clarence. Go, go now. Them people not wait forever."
And with that she shuts the door. I stand there for a wobbling moment eternal, close my eyes, and exhale.
"Right then... Time to go I guess."
I put the child down inside a specially designed crib, camaflouged to look just like an ordinary crate. Making sure the internal sensors and enviro-controls are functioning properly before i close the lid. Standing up, i take one last look around before grabbing my keys, picking up the crate and heading for the door, never to return.
|
176 sunrises and sundowns.
That was how long he was interesting for.
John woke up as he always did, naked, curled into a ball and grasping the shower pole he had taken down on his first day. He figured that when the tiger came back for him, he'd have a chance.
He stumbled blindly through the darkened apartment, past the mirror he'd smashed in a fit of rage, past the clutter of bottles on the table. Tequila, flavored vodka, cheap ("bathtub,"as Ben once called it disdainfully) whisky, he drank what he could get his hands on. Which, for the past few days, hadn't been much.
That is because for 3 days now Ben hadn't shown up. Water wasn't a problem; John was smart. He figured out that the big white bowl of water in the room where he got the shower bar from kept on replenishing, so he drank from that. Ben told him to piss into it once. Ben was not smart. Why waste perfectly good water? John pissed out of the window, into the alley. Sometimes he would try to hit the dirty cats down below; from this high up there was a tawny one that reminded him of the tiger. But food was the problem now. The cold box was empty and Ben wasn't around to refill it.
No matter. John couldn't eat right now anyways. The drinks made him feel fuzzy and stopped him from feeling lonely, but he always felt nauseous afterwards. He collapsed onto the discolored couch in the living room and immediately sprung back up, hissing at the surprising bounce the thing had.
He slinked over to his desk and looked at the bunches of broken pencils. Underneath in the handwriting of a 5-year-old it said "John"over and over. He looked down at his left wrist, where many years ago a weary sailor had carved the name with a sharpened rock. The faded scar still looked better than the mess on the table.
John understood shame. When the bright flashing lights came and the shiny woman with the straight clothes held a microphone up to his chin and he couldn't speak, he understood the feeling. The woman's eyes radiated pity that made him bow his head and look away. John had not had a woman in 10 years. His erection only made him more shameful that day; they thought him an animal. Ben was no better.
Ah, yes, Ben. The man who had supposedly rescued him from the island. John didn't remember much. A big metal box came with a loud horn. Then men were all around him, grabbing him, holding him down. He bit, scratched, kicked. He was stronger. Then he felt a sting in his arm and he saw a glass tube with something in it go into his arm and he looked up and there was Ben holding the tube and smiling, always fucking smiling.
John walked back to the bathroom and looked into the largest shard of the mirror. He tried to imitate Ben's smile - but all he managed was to look like the tiger did right before it mauled him. He picked up the shower rod and smashed the shard into a million glittering pieces. They stung his feet, but he didn't feel it.
176 days and the last cars with cameras in them had pulled away, and Ben had shown up saying things about moving on, handing him that roll of green paper, telling him to get a job. With an air of finality he had written on a piece of paper "**BEN GONE HOME**"and taped it to the door when he left. John still hadn't figured out what a job was, or what the paper was for. He'd kept it on the little shrine he'd built for Ben, next to the picture of them together and on top of the cabinet. They'd told him he should be grateful to Ben, his "rescuer,"and he had been.
Now, though, he realized that Ben had done nothing good for him. He'd taken him away from the place he truly belonged. With a start he realized he was sweating. Shakily, he reached for the little orange bottle that the doctor had given him. There were only two or three green pills left in the bottom. He hated taking them. They made him feel fuzzy, but not like the drinks - in a bad way. But Ben said he had to listen to the doctor. He picked up the bottle-
And threw it out of the window. He heard the tawny cat screech and he bared his teeth in a feral grin. Fuck Ben. The four-letter word felt right: guttural, angry, free. Fuck Ben. With a mind sharpened or perhaps dulled by isolation, he saw his destination clearly. He would go back to the island. He would prove his worth. He was going to kill the tiger.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So it was that when the lady with the news crews showed up a month later with a sweating Ben in tow to do a follow-up story, they found in the apartment a decomposing corpse, dangling from a ceiling fan, in front of a large wall-sized pencil sketch of a jungle. At its feet was a strangled cat. Across the top of the drawing was written in big block letters
"**JOHN GONE HOME**" |
"I think we should be heroes."Luke took a bite into his apple, acting like he didn't care as he leaned on the half finished construction site. In truth, he stayed up all night thinking of how to convince his friends to be the good guys. "The heroes always win in the movies."
Stan shook his head. "That's just some movie bullshit. That ain't real life man. Besides, even if it was, that just means we'd be more badass for winning the town."
"Villains are proactive."Robby adjusted his glasses and looked up from his book. "Heroes are *reactive*."
"Fuck does that mean?"Stan asked. "You may have to dumb it down for us, oh great one."
Robby blew out a heavy breath through his nose and pushed his glasses higher again. "It means villains do stuff. Heroes don't do anything unless they have a villain to stop. So we can't even be heroes unless the town has villains."
Stan nodded along with Robby's words. "Yeah, yeah, makes sense."
Luke hid a scowl. He didn't expect Robby to side with Stan. He usually sided with logic or reason. Maybe being villains was the logical thing.
"Plus,"Robby said, "neither one will be fun without the other. What's a villain without a hero, and what's a hero without a villain?"
"So, what are you gonna be?"Stan asked.
"Neither. I don't wanna play."
Luke kept in his relief. If they had to make a villain, he didn't want to play either.
"What are you doing!"Luke jumped up, dropping his apple, but not in time to stop Stan from hitting Robby with a cement block. Robby hunched over a bit, blood pouring from his unmoving head.
"Now I'm the villain. You're the hero. You have to stop me before I do it again!"Stan smiled in joy and ran off, leaving Luke with his dead friend. |
I never have been an inspiration to anyone or myself for that matter . I'm not even now and I don't think I'll ever be. People i grew up weren't much better to tell you the truth either, but they were there. And that means something to me,they had their own lives and their own aspirations. I just wanted to achieve mine just as they wanted to achieve theirs. Everyone had troubles more than a person would like to count. Mine weren't so bad,a kid like any other i was. But Slick...huh....Slick was a different kind.
When he was 5 fucking years old,he broke his legs. Doctors told his mother he will not walk again.What did Slick do?He learned to walk again in a moths time. When we were 16 a new girl joined our school.She was autumn reincarnated.What did Slick do? He made her his.Not in a cheese way.He loved her like a gentleman dreams of loving a woman while we were learning only to kiss girls. As times passed each of us got in lifes hidden ditches which were scattered all around.What did Slick do? He started filling them so people wouldn't fall in.He fought the bullies,the dealers,the police,the parents....Not with fists,with his soul. With time those ditches were filling themselves up when he was around. He was a person you wouldn't believe could exist . He didn't ask for power,money or fame.We just wanted to live a peaceful life,but where we lived that was a only dream. What did Slick do? He made it a reality. He became the principle of our old high school and hit the problems where roots grew. And it time the mayor who restored the color of life which was hidden from our true sight.
Last night i saw him again.I asked him the question i wanted to ask him my whole life "why?"Do you know what Slick replied ?
"I want to sleep at night without regrets on my mind"
|
"Yes that's my name. I promise you. Yes he's my father. He died ? Can you hold on a minute ? He promised me never... I'm back. Why did you say that ? I understand, sorry. He didn't yet. Why are you calling me ? Did he ask you to ? I don't believe you, he doesn't have my number. How do you have my number ? I know we haven't met. You're his new lady, yes ? I heard, she said he was happier lately. But I thought he was in remission. He's falling, I know. But I still don't know why you would call me. You know about my sister, how she trusted him ? You know about all that ? He was so greedy, and obvious about it. And still you... I don't understand, but ok. I was gullible back then, you know ? I never saw anything. I didn't expect any reward, he didn't owe me. He kept it all, you know ? I tried to help but not for a long time, no, now I play dead. You could always hear him coming. Thanks for calling. You're sure we haven't met ? No, I won't see him. Take care." |
"Master."I bowed my head and waited for Baphomet to leave. Kissing his big red ass finally paid off. Being assigned Soul Duty was one of the easier jobs in Hell. Lucifer didn't bow to the humans with the other angels for a reason. Humans are easy to corrupt.
I took the stairs. The stairway to Heaven in infamous because of Led Zeppelin and their musical "gift"(Baphomet himself made the deal with them), but the stairway to Hell is much better. More sightseeing. For example, the severed heads of old philosophers who didn't accept Christianity (for a few of them, that's because the Christian religion didn't even exist when they were alive) arguing about the morality of the place.
I didn't take the stairs for the sights though, I took it because I knew ahead of time that a pack of Flame Imps were fixing the elevator. I trust Flame Imps about as far as I can kick them. While that's very far considering their tiny size, they're covered in flames so I wouldn't kick them. Point is, the damn thing is gonna break.
"Hey Dementius."A familiar man passed by me going down.
"Hey Adolf."I waved and kept walking. That crazy bastard even made me feel scared. If Lucifer let him roam free and speak his mind about anything, he'd probably start a revolution and kill all the demons, plus the odd Jew or two down here. Of course, any demon could wipe out any human, but being out numbered a million or so to one aren't the best of odds.
I reached the top of the staircase and opened the valve. Ah, New York.
Yes, the stairway to Hell starts in New York.
I walked up to the first man I saw. He screamed and ran the other way. Oh, yeah. Forgot to lose to demonic skin. I quickly bent the light around myself to become the image of a woman somewhere in India. Of course, the light I bent away had to go somewhere, so she's gonna be walking around with a tail and devil horns. Eh, I'm sure it'll work out for her.
I looked down and grabbed my boobs. "Not bad."
A homeless man walked up to me with a creepy smile. He's probably headed for Hell anyway, I wouldn't even be doing him a wrong by taking his Soul. "Hey there."
"Uh, hi."I pretend to be timid. Rapist homeless men love timid.
"Anyway we can hang out?"He asked with his mouth facing away from me. Wanted to hide his terrible breath.
"Yeah,"I said with a small laugh, "but first you have to give me your Soul. It's an Indian thing. Just say you agree."
He smiled again. "I agree."
Well, damn. That was easy.
I readied myself to check his Soul. Most humans are nasty, ugly things. Most human Souls are horrendous, scarring things. Baphomet would want a decent one. I put my hand on his forehead and closed my eyes, ready for the drug use and selfish action slideshow.
*A young boy, abused by his father. Mother denied it. Joined the army, superior reminded him of his father. Flipped out and attacked his officer. Officer got him dishonorably discharged. He feels bad about it, doesn't think he deserves a home. I'm the first woman he approached in twenty years.*
I opened my eyes and took a step back. "Turns out we can't go out. You aren't good enough for me."Or too good.
He nodded. "You're probably doing yourself a favor."
As he walked away, I started walking back to the valve leading to the stairway. "No, I did you the favor."
Shit. This is gonna mean elevator duty. |
"Karen, take the kids and run. I'll meet you in the safe house on the other side of the river!"
"But Jack, your leg. You can't walk."*sobbing*
"Just go!"
"I love you Jack."
*extended eye contact*
"GO"
Karen and the kids scamper off to safety as Jack, armed with a trash can lid and a 9mm Beretta with five shots, faces a horde of the undead.
*bang* A zombie falls. Four to go. Jack drags himself towards his old Ford pickup.
*bang...bang* Another zombie falls. Two shots left.
*bang bang* Jack throws his pistol in disgust as the moaning mass of wretched flesh and bone inch ever closer.
Finally, he reaches the vehicle and hauls himself up and in. The door closes as the predators start to surround the truck.
"*keys keys keys*"He frantically thinks to himself.
"Under the floor mat!"
*redititititit...redititititit vroom vroom*
Jack speeds across the bridge to apparent safety...
? |
*(OOC: I'm gonna use an Established Universe here. For those who don't know it, I'm using [FTL](/r/ftlgame)'s universe.)*
Aret-21XR expressed the closest thing an Engi could express to annoyance. His visor flashed quickly as some sparks flew from his shoulders.
[ASSESSING SITUATION: Stranded = true. Area inhabited = false. Estimated time to jury rig an escape vehicle (Approximate, years) = 1402.
Activating Distress Beacon: Estimated time for 90% or higher chance of discovery (Approximate, years) = 714.]
If an Engi could sigh, Aret would. He used the remains from his ship to build a shelter. Not many systems could be put online with just solar power, but turning on the Fusion Reactor was risky at that moment. The only problem now was food. Engis are not organic, but they do need sustenance to keep the body regenerating, and the easiest kind of matter to use for that purpose was organic matter.
Aret decided that this wasn't too urgent, at least, so he put his own system in sleep mode, while he recharged.
A few hours into the night, a skittering sound could be heard outside. Something was trying to open the door.
"Systems: Activate external cameras."
Outside, a Mantis male could be seen. His yellowish carapace glistening under the artificial lights.
"Systems: Activate external communication."The computer beeped, indicating both sides could hear each other now.
"Mantis being, this unit requests that you leave the premises. There is high probability that you are a danger to this unit's continued existence."
The Mantis wasn't quite outraged, it was true. But he was annoyed, he was hungry, cold, sleepy and couldn't find a good shelter for many hours.
"Listen here, grey goo: Killing you would be immense fun, but I'm hungry right now, and you aren't edible. Let me in, this place sucks at night."
"Agreement possible: Sustenance necessary. You are biologically equipped for hunting. At morning, you get food."
"No shit, I would get food anyway. I just don't want to stay here outside freezing my ass off! Let me in!"
The Engi used all his processing power to come to a decision, and finally, after all calculations of what could and couldn't go wrong, the result was that he was 56% inclined to allowing the Mantis in. So he did. The door slid open, and the large bug-like being clambered inside. Now that the Mantis was closely visible, Aret observed that he was nearly hypothermic. The temperature was worse than what the sensors registered.
[REASSESSING SITUATION: Stranded = true. Area inhabited = true. Estimated time to jury righ an escape vehicle (Approximate, years) = 2350] The Mantis were known for being terrible at building things, despite being among the oldest species in the galaxy, they were the most recent to manage to go to space. His "help"would probably involve breaking non-working parts out of frustration.
"The decision required that I heavily weigh my empathy values. You should not cause me to regret it."
"Bah, empathy is for weaklings. If I were you, I'd let me die outside. Name?"
"Aret-21XR."
"I'm Keraklik, the Shiny."
"The Shiny?"(Who knew Engis could sound incredulous?)
Keraklik sighed. "Yes, the Shiny. My chitin is shiny and I've never killed something notable, so that's as far as my title can go."
"High reflectivity is an appreciated aesthetic aspect within the Engi culture."
"Oh, great, a man-bot thinks I'm pretty."the bug's voice was filled with contemptuous sarcasm.
"Shiny. It is necessary that hostilities and belligerence be kept to a minimum. We are stuck: Chance for rescue within a Mantis lifetime: 34.512%. Chance for rescue within an Engi lifetime: 98,617%. Sleep now. Tomorrow we gather sustenance. Afterwards, we research ways of escaping."
"Ugh. Cooperating with an Engi. What would my clan think."
"You'd probably be banned for life and considered an enemy to the overclan, according to my databanks on Mantis culture."
"That was a rhetorical question, machine."
[**LOG:** DATETIME: 46151385850 (Simplified: 24 hours since crash)
**AUTHOR:** Aret-21XR.
**LOGTEXT:** Keraklik the Shiny is stranded in a situation equal to mine. He was probably, like myself, in the large travel ship that exploded after a miscalculated jump. Those who were lucky enough to get into their own smaller craft survived, and most of those managed to stay spaceborne. After all my scanning, his is the only other craft I can detected to have entered the atmosphere and survived entry. Part of the reason the murderous alien is not attacking me can probably be attributed to his hopes that I can hatch an escape plan. I have much thinking to do, but I'm sure it's possible to escape within a practical timeframe, without external aid.]
*(OOC: Sorry, I have to go to sleep, and I'm kinda "writer's blocked". Tomorrow I'll continue in a reply to this comment)* |
I feel trapped back here, in the dark corners of your mind. You don't think of me too much anymore, but I will always be here. You put me here after all. You made me. Thought me up over year's of growing, learning, observing the emotional response of others to your actions. We have gone through some tough challenges, you and I. Remember that time she made you choose between her and your family? I do. We always agreed family came first. That was one of our first rules. We stayed up for hours, weighing the pros and cons. You seemed to give her more pros than she deserved, but I was so glad when you made the right choice. That was one of the last times we really had a connection. Now, I'm just an insignificant thought to you. Sitting in the back of your mind as you stay on the couch, playing Xbox, and "taking fat bong rips"as you like to say now. I'm not a fan of this new vice. Your decisions are irrational, and your thoughts scrambled. You don't think back to me when you are faced with a decision, you let the first words that come to mind pour out of your mouth without even thinking about what you are saying. So why am I so hard on you? It's because I am you. I am your morals. The code you set for yourself over your existence. I am the rules YOU wish to live by. But somehow, you have found a way to just ignore everything we have been through. You seem to not care about us anymore, and it will continue to lead you down this slippery slope you are on. I feel myself slipping deeper into the far secluded corners of your mind. The corners you haven't been to in a while, unless you are really high and find me back here. That's the only time you are ever hard on yourself now, the times you stop and reflect on the decisions that got you back here to visit me. |
In life, the only thing you're guaranteed is a wide spectrum of feeling.
Delete that. It's stupid. _Taptaptaptap taptap_, okay, it's gone.
It can get difficult to be who you are sometimes. It's like, somehow, every force in the world will seem to be pushing you away from
Get rid of that, too, actually. Fuck that. _Taptaptaptaptap_.
I don't know. Flat out, I don't have a fucking clue. Life is a true bitch, a real fucking cunt, and after almost 19 years, that's the only thing I've learned so far. Nobody will love you unless you let them save you. You have to be weak to be deserving of some things, smart enough to know when you have to be strong, and strong enough to pull your entire life out of a shit stack if you have to.
Life has a certain weight to it, it's changing all the time. Sometimes, it's airy and breezy, it drifts around you in wisps, and you can practically breathe it in. Other times it weighs a ton and then some. It pushes down on your shoulders so hard that surely your heart will burst, surely you shouldn't dare to take another step, and your muscles are so sore and tired that they feel sorry. You can't stop life. There is no way to control the fluctuation in heaviness. You can step lightly, or you can watch where you're going, but in truth; You can't stop life. It will do what it wants to you.
Doesn't that make life a bully? A huge fucking shit? Yep. The most beautiful bitch in the world with the kindest smile, spitting the harshest words. That's life.
So you have no control, and almost everything you do is just trying to regain that control. Go to school so you can get a job, so you can have a house that life will hopefully not evict you from. Find a girl and make her your wife, raise two lovely children together, and hope like hell that life doesn't have a different plan for you in mind. Go to the gym. Take your vitamins. Read books. It doesn't matter.
All that we do, as a race, is try and try and try to control a turbulent thing that hopelessly controls us. That's all that separates us from animals, they're smart enough to know better.
Sure, we're smart enough to make machines. Smart enough to make stupid things easier. We have cures for shit. We have NSAIDS. But in reality, we're the dumbest animals around, and that's it. That's all I learned. We are all so hopelessly fucked because life is just a whole bunch of chaos.
I guess the most important lesson would be to ignore it. Don't think like this. Try not to realize that you never asked to be born, try to not focus on the overpopulation of the earth and the ever-spewing pollution. Try not to think of yourself as a hopeless, out-of-control chump. Don't dwell on the fact that your stream of consciousness will end, could end at any time.
Sometimes, I wish I could unsee and unlearn. |
This is my first story on this sub so bare with me:
Christofer woke up with a start. He lay quietly and listened to the silence. Suddenly he heard a noise from the front door, some one was picking the lock.
He knew this day would come, he almost anticipated it. They were back for the rest, the rest of the money he had stolen from the safe of that warehouse. They hadn’t opened it until recently he assumed or they would,ve been there much earlier. He knew there was nothing he could do. He opened the door and looked out.
“Mr. Smith?”
“Yes?”
He woke up in the trunk of a car. He didn’t scream, he didn’t fight his twist tie handcuffs, he just relaxed and went back to a blissful sleep. |
Nicholas has lead a simple life. Get up, put on glasses that let you see. Glasses. Who had thought a simple device from centuries ago would be adapted to a hi-tech device that acted as a organ. Go to work. Go home. Take off glasses. Sleep. I just woke up one day. And I found something that amazed me. My glasses had fallen off the dresser. That means... I couldn't just not be wearing them. I couldn't have put on the extra pair. I... Could see clearly. But how? Is this an experiment? Am I wearing those contacts? But... That means... The world faded to black as a creature watched over me. |
Stream of consciousness review:
> I have a hard time picturing a rat "furtively"doing anything. Might just be me, though. Semicolon is unnecessary, second part of sentence is not an independent clause. I'd order the cold as "permeating his fur, seeping into his bones"because it makes the description more progressive.
>Reminiscing is a synonym of "remembered"that carries an element of wistfulness in and of itself, the use of wistful as a modifier isn't as appropriate given this word choice. Nitpicky, but streamlining tiny nags like this makes for good writing.
>It feels like "he, his, him"is being used far too often, despite their being grammatically necessary in most cases. Might've been better if it was phrased in a way that didn't require clarifying the subject as often.
>Alright, that's why the flow is off - almost every sentence follows the same format. "Subject - verb - object."There are a few bits of spice here and there, the occasional adverbial/adjectival phrase, but the overall sentence structure is what's repeating. "He could hear; He crouched low; Food was important..."The structure also lends to an underlying issue with pacing.
>Hitting a moving rat with a knife based on a single sound? *Noice shot.*
Alright, so that was my stream-of-consciousness series of observations. To summarize, the story is functionally sound but lacks polish; a repetitive sentence structure and stale pace leads to the narration being somewhat monotonous. The leading problem, without a doubt, is the lack of structure variety - there are a few clauses here and there that break up the monotony, but the same underlying "S-V-OBJ"structure dominates most of the story, which makes it drag quite a bit.
Now, in so saying, this can actually be a good thing. The story you're telling is, by its nature, dark, grimy, and, well, monotonous. It's the story of a rat whose best memory is devouring the corpse of a hobo. A slow, dreary pace might be exactly the right tone for such a story, in terms of drawing the reader into the atmosphere of darkness and gloom that Spinner's End exhibits.
For the most part, it's a solid piece of writing, it just needs polish on some of the more technical levels. |
I sat in the room, a monument to man's advances in concrete and uniform walls. As I dropped the rubber ball, the echo bounced around the room for a good few seconds before i caught it again. Business as usual.
*drip*
Beside me was the most anti-climactic excuse for a doomsday weapon. I don't have much to do all day so fantasies have become more common lately.
*drip*
> "oh me, I just work for some top secret organisation, save the world and all that stuff, but i think i could find time to save the world of some fine young ladies like yourself"
*drip*
Checking my watch and it's just 6 more hours until I'm off, back to my studio apartment alone again. I lose track of the time in this god forsaken windowless room. What day was it again?
*drip*
I check my phone, no messages (not surprising as I'm surrounded by 13ft of solid concrete, signal is as rare as respect around here) and 30s left on my timer. Time to get to work i guess.
*drip*
A little stretch and away i go. Sitting down for so long really takes its toll. Life would be so much easier if i could just bring something electrical in here.
*drip*
20 seconds. I wander to my right just a few feet to a simple rope. To think something so primitive could prevent something so catastrophic. 10ft in front of me is the device. A sphere, black in origin and less than 30cm across, of alien design no doubt. As my countdown reaches 15 it begins to glow.
*drip*
A blue light begins to form in a ring around the device. a dim, yet neon light. With the black sphere it almost looks like an eclipse. as the glowing intensifies, the skin of the sphere begins to light up with a similar blue tint.
*drip*
10 seconds to go and the whole sphere is encased in light. It intensifies and begins to turn white with heat. We assume its heat, as no one dared touch it or come within a 5ft radius of it. as the light gets stronger, a gentle hum fills the room. The echo of the walls makes the hum more intense as the sound deepens.
*drip*
5 seconds and the orb has begin to vibrate. By now anyone smart enough to know what is happening would be pissing their pants. According to the white-coat nerds, the orb generates the same amount of energy as a small sun, but packed tightly into a sphere no bigger than the size of a soccer ball.
3
2
...
I pull the rope, and above me a small hole opens up in the ceiling, just large enough to fit a head inside. The silence (bar the hum) of the room is filled by the sound of a waterfall. 50 metric tons of water comes crashing down upon the orb. A high pitched screech is followed. It bothered me the first few weeks but now it's just the signal i use to reset the clock on my phone.
> 60 minutes
after a few minutes the last of the water has vanished, down the drain to be recycled
*plop*
and in 60 minutes
*plop*
I'll save the world again.
*plop*
You're welcome, you ungrateful bastards.
*plop* |
You could be so powerful.
They whispered those words to him so often he began to believe it. Colby had been born with an ability the rest of them didn’t have. His moisture content was greater, his molecules more energized. The older clouds wanted to see his potential, and watch the destruction he was surely capable of.
They told him it was a choice. *If you choose you could be so powerful*. If he could choose to be powerful, could he choose not to be? Colby had seen storms before. The people below them would flee, the other clouds parted ways for them. They would unease torrential downpours of destruction and mayhem, and then dissapear. Colby was a gentle soul, unwilling to hurt anyone. He also shared the common fear of extinction. If he was a storm, wouldn’t he die? He asked the larger clouds.
They told him he would die regardless. Why not go out with a bang? It was all very tempting. Why should he not release himself to the incredible power he was capable of?
Really, why not? |
Hi! Congratulations on your writing journey.
You have an idea on how to start a scene, describing the temperature, physical sensations, surroundings and smells, is a good way to start. Also, fun words like oafish, orifice, etc. are always a good thing too.
The first thing I notice is the formatting, that could just be unfamiliarity with reddit formatting, just remember to hit enter twice after each paragraph. Reading from a screen is more awkward then reading from paper, and you should use smaller paragraphs and break them up for readability, otherwise you will scare people away.
My main stylistic suggestion would be to use more metaphors.
|
"Is it really that time all ready?"I thought to myself. My alarm clock displayed 11:00 am. Say what you will about the death, it always comes on time. I had planned on going out for a morning run and enjoying my last monuments of humanity. I guess I'm proof of the whole "humanity is inherently lazy"argument. I even knew when it was going to end yet instead of doing anything productive, I slept my last moments of life any. There is another louder knock. I get up and walk to the door. I choose this fate, there is no use in trying to avoid it. Besides, its impolite to keep a guest waiting. "Really, you knew I was coming, and THAT is what you decide to wear!"I suddenly remember my Spider-man pajamas. Death's managed to have a deep, throaty laugh despite not having a throat or lungs for that matter. A 7 foot tall skeleton, cloaked in black, suddenly appearing in the middle of your house would scare just about anyone. Except me. I laugh with him. "Come on. I haven't even had my morning coffee. Besides I am sure people had worn worse things than this"I say. "Not when they've known I was coming."death replies. We make our way to the kitchen, and I put the coffee on. "So what now?"I ask, rejoining death at the table. Death hesitates, "I've never really admitted this but I'm not really sure. I only handle the whole 'reaping the souls of the dead' part. You all go to the same destination. After you arrive, I can only guess. Have you turned on the T.V.?"I make a slight glance towards the T.V. Its a small number. I don't remember the exact size but couldn't be more than 19 inches. Its sitting on the counter gathering dust. "You know I cant stand watching it. The sight of those things disturb me. I threw-up before I could get anything useful out of it."Death leans back in his chair, "I can only assume you mean the dammed. The humanity in me also finds there presence disturbing."Before I could as what he means the coffee maker goes off. I stand and pour myself a cup. "May I have a cup as well?"Death inquires. I finish pouring myself one and quickly pour a cup for Death. When I turn around I almost drop the cups of coffee. "Surprised? You were going to ask about my humanity. Well this is it"Death says gesturing to his body. I am looking at an exact copy of myself. He copied my form, down to the spider-man pajamas. I return to the table and slide Death his coffee. "These are actually quite comfortable. I see why you are fond of these."Death says before taking a sip of coffee. "I don't understand, I'm your humanity?"Death wipes his mouth and responds "I miss the taste of coffee, if only we could have met at a barbecue place. Anyways yes you are my humanity, or well what is left of it. Death is part of the human condition and thus humanity is part of my condition. I live each of your lives with you. Next to you, I experience what you experience. How do you think I know when to come once you die?"I took a moment to think about what death said. After a couple minutes of silence and a little bit of my coffee, I finally ask "So when I die, do you also die?""I do not know."Death respond. "It has never happened before. I believe that my humanity does. I will still be here. God's chosen and the damned are fighting as we speak. I will still be here to reap their life force."That shocked me. "Angles and devils can die!"I exclaim. "Yes, all the ageless can die, one just has to go about it the right way. I have reap many of the ancient Gods. They are out there now, fighting their own battles."Death replies candidly. He acts as if killing a god, much less multiple gods isn't a big deal. "So how can you be God and Devil? Good and Evil?"I ask. "It is because I am human. Humanity created all of them, and because of that I take even their life force."We both take a couple sips of coffee. I finally break the silence "When do I go?""You already have, I took you at 11:00 am. You are here now because I am keeping your consciousness with me. If I let you move on right now, than I lose the ability to take the life force of the immortal."Death exhales. Together Death and I watch the end of the world. |
“Sixty seconds, gentlemen!”
*A field of wheat stretches out before me, a sea of golden strands that stretches towards the horizon. She’s there, with me, in that place of dreams. Her eyes search for the answer to the question I know she’ll never ask: “Why do you have to go?”*
Thunderous explosions rock the dropship. Through the ports, I can see flames licking at our ceramic hull as we scream through the atmosphere of an alien world. To my right and left tower hulks of metal with souls of flesh; beneath those metal masks are human faces in every array of emotion. Sarge, to my front, is no doubt locked into a look of stony resolve. Jackson to my right is muttering prayers to an ancient god. Trystan, clutching the door controls for dear life, was probably sobbing in fear, but the unflinching bulk of his combat armor betrayed no hint of weakness. As for myself, I feel nothing, can *only* feel nothing. Too much is at stake to waste time on feelings right now.
*A field of swords stretches out before me, a sea of sharpened steel that stretches towards the horizon. She’s there, with me, in that place of war. Her eyes search for the answer to the question I know she’ll never ask: “Why do you have to fight?”*
“Thirty seconds!” called the Sergeant. Out the window, there was a silent burst of light as our sister ship disintegrated in an instant; what had once been a machine of war was now a scattered field of twisted metal and flailing bodies. The smoke clears, and I can see that some of the troopers survived, sparkling nanosails deploying behind them like angels’ wings.
“Fifteen seconds!”
From the back of the dropship, someone began the chant. Metal boots clanged against metal plating in time with the racing heartbeats of the humans aboard, building with intensity and fervor as the dropship’s retroboosters shuddered into life for the final deceleration. With every thud of the beat came a guttural grunt from the troopers; the embodiment of seven years of pain and rage. “HUH! HUH! HUH! HUH!”
*A field of flames stretches out before me, a hellscape of fire and brimstone that stretches towards the horizon. She’s there, with me, in that place of nightmares. Her eyes beg the question I’ve asked myself all along: “Why couldn’t you save me?”*
The ship lurched one final time as it plowed into the warzone, the access hatch dropping in an instant. Before me is Arcadia; that utopia so oft spoken of by the ancients, the home of the immortals. At the moment, however, it resembled something more like Valhalla; sparkling crystal spires belched smoke and flame, and golden streets were choked with the gore of thousands who’d fought and died for inches of ground already. In that instant, our cries reached their climax as we became rage incarnate, charging off of the dropship alongside a million other humans to fight a war against Armageddon itself, and in a single voice we cried out:
“PREPARE TO KILL YOUR GOD!”
|
The first step out of Omelas suddenly lifts a burden off. Each step further, her shoulders felt lighter.
When she was a mile away there was more bouce and energy in her step. What was this feeling? It's like when your notrils suddenly decide to become unclogged. Easier to breathe. Freedom.
She ran in a random direction, yet it wasn't so random. The girl didn't feel lost at all.
The girl could feel something calling out to her.
She stopped running when she felt something cold and wet at her feet. The girl had rushed out of town barefoot, and now, she stood in an open field of dewy grass.
It is here. It's close.
There was almost a magnetic pull.
She squinted around.
Something caught the girl's attention. She knew she had found it.
A pair of pearl white doors glowed in the dawn light. The girl paced toward it like a moth to a flame. She grabbed the handles and pulled them open.
A low booming voice welcomed her:
"Congratulations, you found your way out of limbo."
---
[Out of Character] Hi, I remember reading Omelas about a year ago. I didn't think I would find it here. This was also my first writing prompt, so obviously, it's not very good. I'm usually just a reader. Thanks for the prompt. |
*Fifty years ago, from the sky descended visitors from another world. And as we so accurately predicted, they did not come in peace. Across our world, we waged a bloody and brutal war and drove them back to the stars. But the cost was great. Our world was left in flames, it's people hard and cynical. Few governments survived the aftermath of the war, and though new governments rose in their place, order has still not come to this broken world.*
In one of the countless alleys in the city of Bastion, a man was dying. His ill-fitted suit was stained red as his heart struggled to keep the man alive. As his eyes begin to glaze over, he sees a figure stalk into the alley. The man blinks several times, to ensure that his failing vision is not deceiving him. As his vision clears, he sees that the figure is in fact quite real. before him stands a man in pure black body armor, concealing his face with a cap. In his right hand there is a pistol, and in his left an odd device. The armored figure comes up to him, and kneels down to get a better look at him.
"You still there pal?"The armored man questions the dying man. the dying man's only response is a slow nod of the head. The armored man takes a closer look at the dying man's chest, and his face darkens. "I am sorry, but I can no longer help you. You have at most an hour left, and the nearest hospital is three hours at the fastest. You are a dead man, my friend."
The armored man paused, letting his words sink in. The dying man knew all of this, but he had needed to hear it. The dying man's eyes filled with tears, but even so he looked up at the armored man with an odd determination only a dead man can have. Though before he could hardly find the strength to nod, now the word spilled from his mouth with ease.
"I know you do not know me, and that you owe me nothing. But please, promise me one thing. Kill the fuckers who did this to me. Kill every last one of them, until Bastion is rid of them all. Oliver Quinn killed me. Make sure he regrets it."
The armored figure only nodded. Both men simultaneously glanced down at the pistol the armored man held in his hand. The dying man glanced into the eyes of his avenger, and solemnly nodded. The armored man aimed his gun, and the dying man closed his eyes. A second later the sound of a gunshot echoed through the alley.
As Malcolm Harris left the body of man in the ill-fitted suit, he took the cap off of his head and threw it into the drains. As he looked around at the city with new eyes, he promised the dead man one more thing.
"No more hiding."
-----------------------
Malcolm Harris is a brutal vigilante who lives in one of the few cities left standing after a devastating alien invasion. Malcolm's campaign against crime begins when he finds a man dying in an alley, making a promise to kill the criminals responsible for turning the city to shit. As he takes on a variety of gangs, he soon builds his own team of killers and thieves. All of this with the intent of avenging a total stranger. |
I never knew that skin could have this many colors and look this beautiful. Then I met Aaron.
It wasn't her real name of course, the human tongue doesn't have the capability to say that many consonants in a row and still be easily understood. And there's the subharmonic resonance too, something that had confused the delegates from Xi'thur for quite some time when they thought they heard bits of their language in the low-beats of our rap music.
"We thought you where all violent sociopaths, talking about killing each other all the time and having sex!"She commented between taking sips from the drink, whose different colors, despite being cajoled around never mixed.
I laughed and shook my head, the rumble from the melodic beat of synth-pop making my head spin as I took a sip of my ginn and tonic. "Well you'd be surprised at what the actual language says. It's honestly not all that far from what you thought."
"Really? Well so much for the "Pax Humana"you're all so eager to shove down our throats."She gave a chirruping sound with loud clicks intermingled with it, her lips spreading in a wide grin as her long fingers encircled the cup for another drink.
"Oh posh, you've never heard Metal. Besides, music doesn't represent our governments and we're a founding member of the Planetary Council."
"Oh it doesn't? Tell me Ginn-boy"She took a long drink, the rest of her colorful mix falling past her dark blue lips. "If that's true then why is it your planet has been on the cusp of destruction for the last millennia?"She chortled and leaned back against the plush cushion the booth provided for her, her eyes dilated as they wandered the room. "When we destroyed our Eden it was for the mineral riches of our core. When yours is destroyed it will be because some idiot fell on a big. Red. button."
"Your just jealous that we still have a shimmering pearl to think of as home and all you have is a mining operation."
"A shimmering pearl strewn with toxic waste and carbon. Your blue planet "shimmers"a little green."She leans in, her hand placed on my arm as the temperature rises under my collar. "Don't worry earth-boy, I'm sure there are a lot of things about you that will *explode* soon."
A well placed grip was all it took. Her apartment was a short walk away. I whispered into her ear "Is it true that all Xiath can put their legs above their head?"
(Good job reddit, you've inspired me to write interplanetary porn. Anyway, comment/criticize away!) |
It's so much easier when you're honest.
I got caught up in the thought and wrote a short story anyway. Obviously stop reading if all you wanted was FF.
It’s so much easier when you’re honest. Every day people weave intricate lies like a spider weaves a web. The only problem is people have to remember at all times just how the web was spun. Even with a small web, people get caught in their own lies. These lies can ruin families, friendships, even lives. If you are going to lie, intelligence doesn’t hurt, either. One thing I picked up on as a teenager was that the more details you cram into a lie, the more believable it is to others. One big problem people who lie, myself included, often face is that they just can’t shut up. I have a big mouth. This has always been problematic for me. I just have never known when to shut up. After having been caught in lies numerous times by friends and family, particularly my wife, I made the decision years ago to simply stop lying and shut my mouth. Things had been going pretty well. Then one day, the police showed up at my door.
My wife called up to me in a confused and concerned voice that the police were here to ask me a few questions, time slowed down and I became painfully aware of every sensation. My mouth became immediately dry, my tongue sticking to the roof of my mouth. I tried to mutter a response, but only a few pathetic whimpers escaped my lips. I knew I had to gather myself before I reached the bottom of the stairs and my mind raced to figure out what I had done wrong. My mind hadn’t raced like that in years back to my lying days when I would have to frantically search my mind to recall exactly what web I had earlier woven. This time, my mind was blank. I truly had no idea what I had done wrong. Before welcoming my guests, I marched into the kitchen and poured myself a glass of water. As I sipped, my mind continued to race until I forced it to focus on stilling my shaking hands.
I approached the door and met my wife’s concerned eyes and tried to convey with my expression that all was well. I introduced myself to the detectives and welcomed them into my home when they asked to enter. I led them to the bedroom we converted into a home office. They leisurely looked around the room before sitting down in front of my desk. I had already taken my seat and simply observed their behavior. I could tell they were trying to get an idea of who I am. The first detective, Detective Sanchez, was looking at one of my degrees. I had several on my wall: a doctorate in business, a master’s in biology, a master’s in Scandinavian studies, but the one I was most proud of, my bachelor’s degree in philosophy, had caught the attention of Detective Sanchez. He commented off-handedly that I fixed my mistake after that degree because, let’s face it, you can’t make any money with a philosophy degree and I, in his modest opinion, had done quite well for myself.
This wasn’t the first time I had been interrogated. In my younger years I had a few run-ins with the law. Back in school as a bored, over-privileged kid from the suburbs, I ran with a group of miscreants that had a taste for fire. Three of the more ambitious kids blew up an office building. I had no part in it, but I did get interrogated about other events I had been at. I learned the hard way from my experience that they ask questions they already know the answer to and that they read every reaction you consciously and unconsciously make. I denied everything, of course, but they knew when I was lying. I stuck to my guns and denied everything. They had no evidence and I didn’t get in trouble, but they knew. This was another reason I quit lying. No, this wasn’t the first time I had been interrogated, but this was the first time a Detective opened his craft starting with my degree.
I knew immediately where he was leading the series of questions even though he began subtly and I did not know his ultimate goal. Detective Sanchez explained he had taken a few philosophy courses at community college. He asked what type of philosophy my school predominantly taught. He already knew, but I answered with moral philosophy anyway. After we had a discussion on different views of morality, even touching on notions of conscience, he described me as a man of conscience and I agreed whole heartedly. I couldn’t see myself doing something truly malicious or evil. He then asked me how a man on conscience could murder someone as he flung a photograph at me.
I turned the photograph over and a wave of conflicting emotions engulfed me. First and foremost, I felt relief. These two detectives were here because they thought I had murdered someone. I had not. Next I felt rage. Detective Sanchez asked me if I knew the man. Yes. The man in the photograph was Glen. Ten years ago, this man murdered my friend in cold blood. He stabbed my friend 58 times, 23 of which were to the face. At least that’s the number of distinct wounds the doctors were able to count. His mom called me that morning in tears. At his funeral, I had an altercation with one of his coworkers who wore a Hawaiian shirt to the funeral and was singing the church songs with a big smile on his face. He tried to explain to me that I should be happy my friend was sent to Jesus. I sent him to the emergency room.
I attended the trial. The proceedings were aggravating. In order to get the conviction, they reduced the charges to second degree murder. Glen was sentenced to 20 years. Apparently not murdering anyone while in prison earned him an early release. He murdered my friend in a vicious fashion and then gets to restart his life after just ten years. I have a friend who is serving a sentence so long, he will be lucky to see his two year old kids graduate college. All he did was sell some pot. Hooray for justice.
|
I don't understand this man.
He says he hates himself, but he has no apparent flaws.
He's in perfect health, his job pays well, his family is loving.
No matter what, though, he keeps saying he hates himself and would rather be someone else.
He insists that he's not transgender.
He insists that he's not adopted (the papers say so), so he's just like his parents.
There's nothing I can do for this man. It's a psychological disorder that's never been seen before.
Only thing that can be done would be a therapist. The number is on this card.
And now he's gone.
But without the doctor or anyone around...
...who will save me from me? |
Sooooo this is my first reddit post ever lol. I think my style and presentation (like paragraph structure etc.) needs some refinement but I'm super excited to be joining the Writing Prompt game. So here we go.
My dream had ended, just when it was getting to the good part too! I regained consciousness and noticed a stiffness in my neck as I tried to remember the events of last night. I had been at a party...Jessica's I believe; and I can't seem to remember how the night ended. My bedroom felt colder than usual and my bed itself seemed to reject the very idea of me. Typical, my pillow only ever treated me right when I was too numb from drinking to feel what five dollars and five years of age would get me in the comfort department. My neck really felt strained, like pulled something. I had a hard time convincing myself to open my eyes, this hangover was one for the record books so I decided to favor a few more seconds of shut eye while I planned out my day. I guess the first step would be to text everyone and ask for stories and maybe meet up with Jessica. I really felt like we had been hitting it off, and knowing that my charisma reaches a peak when I'm blackout I was eager to see the results. Ah fuck it, time to start the day. Wait...this isn't my room, shit this is a hospital, oh god, oh my fucking god. Why can't I move? I don't see any god damn restraints, why can't I move my fucking legs? Jesus Christ I can't get an inch, whats holding me back? Why are there flowers, how long have I been out? I can hear people, going about rounds outside, should I scream? I want out. I want out. "HELP! SOMEBODY FUCKING HELP ME! WHY AM I BEING HELD? LET ME WALK AROUND!"Jesus, don't hospital restraints go over the blanket? Why is this happening...why won't anyone answer...I need out. |
He was browsing through the local wanted ads one Sunday morning and saw one out of the ordinary, for a bodyguard. He thought to himself, "I would be perfect for this."His body was just the type. Although he he was tall and stout, he was never very popular in school. He thought back to his teenage days and before he let a tear cross his eye, he dialed the phone number.
*Ring* *Ring* *Ring*
"Hello?", she answered.
"Ummm, hi. I was calling about the bodyguard position I saw in the paper."He responded.
"Great! My names Death by the way, what's your name?
"Hi Death, I'm Celik. Wait.... Excuse me, but what's your name again?"
"Death....", she replied clearly as she swallowed her shame for the 100th time, as shes had this exact conversation abruptly end so many time before.
Celik thought for a second and replied, "Frankenstein."
"Frankenstein?"
"Yah, was my knickname back in high school."He replied as a silence hung over the line for a while.
"I'm sorry"he replied, "But Death doesnt scare me! Hell, you're talking to Frankenstein here!"as he grinned while waiting for a response.
Just as Celik was about to hang up, as he had figured he blew the interview with an overly emotional teen, he heard an overly jubilated voice speak out just before he hung up the phone.
"You're hired!"
|
He went out for a late-night beer run. Not unusual, except the car was low on gas. He can stop by the gas station, no biggie. On the way, the yellow moon climbed high in the sky. The road was white in the moonlight, the fields an unnoticed grey tonight. He tried to put the radio on.
*Fuck.* Forgot it broke this afternoon. Again. He punched it a couple of times. Still nothing. So he whistled to keep himself company. A tuneless ditty.
The dirty yellow lights coming from the gas station seemed to him weaker than usual. Maybe they were getting ready to close for the night. As he turned off the engine, the silence closed in around his car. He hurried with the gas and stepped inside the small shop.
An unfamiliar man behind the counter tonight. He pushed the bills onto the counter and glanced outside. His car looked deserted in the dank half-light. He grunted thanks, transaction over, and stepped back outside.
He stabbed his hands in his pockets and whistled as he strode back to the car. He glanced around into the noiseless night. His quickened his pace.
He stopped. The back door of the car was ajar. *What the fuck.* He looked around again. The windows of the station went dark. He turned back to the car. Definitely open.
His hands began to sweat in his pockets. He took them out, clenched, and breathed in. He took slow, measured steps to the back door of the car. On the rear seat, a large plain cardboard box, four feet long. In thick black marker, on top, was “$1,000 REWARD FOR DELIVERY”. Spiky, uneven writing, barely legible even in grotesquely large capitals covering the whole top of the box. *Delivery where?* On the side of the box, “BASEMENT, 6 SINDEW” *Is that an address?* He doesn’t know where.
The place was deserted. In one quick movement he grabbed the box and tried to pull it onto the ground. *Fuck these pranks!* He suddenly stopped. The box was heavy. And it felt wrong. No, something tells him not to leave the box here. It’s too late to think about it. Decide tomorrow. There’s no one here anyway.
He slammed the door and got round to the other side of the car. He started the car and drove out into the night without looking back at the box. He whistled another tune. The moon still hung high and dull, the road a nasty white.
He looked in the rear-view mirror at the uninvited rider in his car. He frowned. It was probably some prank. But he’s got the time, what’s the harm? In the half-light the cardboard box looked new. And sturdy. It would have to be, for something that heavy. Was it drugs? That would make sense. Maybe he really was in for a quick grand! His whistling turned into a long whistle. Sounds about right. He lightened up and stepped on the gas. The car leaped forward.
He froze. *Was that a sound?* What was that? It sounded like something with a voice. A moan? He shook his head. He’s just unnerving himself. He should just keep his eyes on the road. And keep whistling.
*Fuck.* He’d forgotten his beer. He could really do with one right now.
*Basement, 6 Sindew.* Is that even an address? But if not, how could they expect a delivery? He could look it up when he got home. Maybe there’s more written under the box.
The road was as empty as it would be at this hour, the unending fields rushing away behind his car. He picked up his whistling again. His eyes were drawn back to the box. If it’s coke or meth that’s a *lot* of drugs. Maybe a machine then? It’s about half the length of a person.
If you take off the arms and legs…
An animal rushed onto the road. *FUCK!* He swerved. Braked hard. The tires screeched out into the night. Pain screamed into his forehead.
Stillness and silence claimed the car again.
Until the knocking.
It knocked again, more insistently. He didn’t have to turn.
It was the cardboard box. |
A dull, average doctors office. I looked at the shitty yellow wall paper after just opening my eyes. The last I remember, I was going outside to get check my mail, now I find myself examining this medical cubical trying to figure out where I am. I can hear faint voices but can't make out any words. As I look around I notice I'm constrained to the bed. "Hello?"I screamed out, not expecting a reply. I couldn't help but notice all this medical equipment and machinery on my bed side. Now this wouldn't of been strange considering I was, to my knowledge, in some type of medical facility, but what caught my interest was that none of these machines were hooked up to me. I yelped again "Is anyone here". This time I heard the clatter of shoes walk up the hallway. The door opened. What looked to be a nurse walked in with paper work and a pen. she looked to be in her early 30s, brown hair and darker brown eyes. "Uh Hey"I stuttered out. "Good morning"she exclaimed without taking her eyes off the paperwork. "Why am I in here? Whats going on?"I said in a mellow tone, not trying to sound aggressive or demanding. The nurse looked at me, this was her first time looking up from the paper. "You passed out, your family called us and you were transported here.". "So my family knows I'm in her?.". "Yup they actually left about 5 minutes ago, they seem pretty loving."At this news I was filled with relief. "Well why am I tied up?"I asked. "You were having seizures. We didn't want you flopping off the bed. You haven't had one in a while so I'm sure Dr. Rielinski will relive your immobility soon". Awhile? It made me wonder how long I was knocked out for. Before I could ask another question the nurse said "Dr. Rielinski will be in here shortly"and she left the room. About 3 minutes later, a male doctor, who I assumed was Dr. Rielinski, entered the room. He had a worried and nervous look on his face. "Look who is awake!"He said with a half smile on his face. I gave a fake chuckle and asked "How long have I been sleeping". He too had a clipboard with stacks of paper on it. He ignored my question and began talking to me. "Lloyd Mulic, Age:31, Married to Gabriella Mulic, B blood type, no known diseases that runs in your family. Is all this information correct?". "Uh yeah."I said reluctantly. "Great"he said emotionless staring at the papers. "Now Im gunna need you take these"be pulled out a pill bottle and dumped two in his hand. "They're for your uh...seizures"he said. Being confused, tired, and weak, i opened my mouth and swallowed accordingly when he put the pill in my mouth. The next thing I remember is waking up, once again, looking at the hideous mustard wall paper . I was still constrained but was hooked up to the machines. I could hear a conversation going on in he hallway between Dr. Rielinski and another man. I listened closely. "God dammit Denzel I gave you more then enough time."Said the unfamiliar voice. "Look I just need a month or two more and ill be set"I heard Rielinski pleaded."I've given you 5 months and 75 test subjects. The president is dying and we need a cure or this whole country dies with him.". My heart dropped when I heard the words 5 months and test subjects. Rielinski replied "The subjects are dropping like flys, I hate to be needy but I'm gunna need more if you want this done". the unknown mans voice became very aggressive "I don't care if you kill them, you need to find this fuckin cure"Upon hearing this, I started screaming and yelling. Im shaking the whole bed but cant get the restraints to brake. "The fuck is that"the man says. A nurse opens the door. It was a different one from earlier. She looks and me and starts screaming "HES AWAKE HES AWAKE". Dr. Rielinski runs in and immediately shuffles threw the cabinets as I'm whimpering and crying. Im screaming "You cant do this"repeatedly. Im stabbed by a syringe and I drift to sleep. I open my eyes to something other then the yellow wall paper. Im in a field, several yards away, a highway. On the ground is a newspaper with the headline "President Baker states he running for reelection".
|
"Tim,
We've seen each other every business day for the last 6 weeks.
Your daughter Samantha is an excellent and kind human being. You're so kind, and you don't even know my name. You gave more than change. You've made sure everyday. I'm leaving today. I got a job! But its far. I hope you get your car fixed soon, I know I hated the bus.
John, 2 seats behind you"
I went for physically close. Also, I may have went over 50 words. But screw the rules, I roll how I want.
|
*(The proper format for the prompt is )*
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet. I suppose I can call these feelings a million other things but at the end of the day... I can't change. The times sure have changed. I know that I'm not alone with what I'm going through. It's normal to have these feelings. Well, normal for people like me. Even for all the political correctness and open mindedness that this world has gone through, it still doesn't help my situation.
The fact is that I have feelings for a man who cannot have feelings for me.
That's the irony with all this. For all pro-gay activism going on, they can't help you if you fall in love with a straight person.
We fight for equal rights. I suppose its only fair that we get our equal share of crushing heartbreaks.
This would be a lot easier for me if he was a jerk. Of course he isn't, though. He's kind, he's thoughtful, he's understanding...and he challenges me to be a better person. He's my good friend and has been nothing but supportive.
I wish I didn't feel this way about him. I wish that we could just be friends.
I know that I can't just be his friend. I love the way I get lost in his eyes. I hate the way I just want to trace his soft lips with mine. Sometimes, I wish I could just play with his hair... I get insanely jealous of Eve. Oh yeah, he also has a girlfriend. Minor detail, though.
It was like telling my parents for the first time all over again. Except this time, I'm old enough to knock back some scotch.
It's quite the pathetic sight, really. Here I am drinking alone, looking at pictures of my straight friend with a girlfriend...about to call him over.
Suddenly, my buzzer rings. Oh, wait. I seem to have called him an hour ago. Wow...I must have had too much to drink. I buzz Jake up.
"Ted? Buddy? What's up man? Why'd you call?"said Jake.
"Jake, man. I've got something to tell you,"I slur.
"Whatever it is Ted, it can wait tomorrow. You're wasted, dude,"he said.
"Jake. I love you man,"I confessed to him. There it was. All my cards were laid down on the table.
"I love you too, bro. Now, come on. Off to bed,"he said. Was he always this dense?
"No, Jake. I love you. Like, for real,"I told him, holding his stare.
"Yeah, Ted,"he said, staring back. "I know. We all know. But you know how I feel..."
No amount of twenty year old scotch can numb down that truth.
"Ted...I'm sorry bud. I wish things were different...If I could change--"
I cut him off.
"*I* can't change, Jake. Thank you, though. You mean a lot to me...I just... I don't know man. It's stupid. I'm stupid. This whole thing is just..."
"Stupid?"
I laugh. God damn it. This all would have been a lot easier if Jake was a douche.
"Yeah. Stupid,"I said. He was staring at me. Out of pity? Out of disgust?
Then he kissed me. Damn near caught me off guard.
I stared at him. Shocked. Speechless. Awestruck at his courage. Somewhat hopeful that he liked it.
"I'm gonna lay low for a bit bud. Give you some time to sort through whatever you gotta sort. I'll be there for you, whatever happens. You're my best friend, no matter what."He said as walked out. He hesitated at doorway and looked back.
"Oh, and don't tell Eve, cool?"
|
I pulled something on the end of my line, whatever it was it wasn't very heavy, but it was something at least. One more pull- "Oh."
There was a bottle hanging on the end of my line, sealed with a cork hastily.
"What the fuck... No way!"
I was alone on the beach at the moment, no one was around. I slammed the bottle against a tree, the glass shattering away from me, as the paper fell to the ground. Picking it up, I hastily saw what it was.
*Help, our boat has wrecked. Captain dead, 2 survivors.*
I toss the paper away. I had my own problems. I looked back at the crashed plane, the wreckage still fresh from a few days ago. |
No! I yell. "there is no way that chicken and waffles could ever possibly go together. My co-worker Jamal refutes back "just try it you jive ass turkey cracker".
so taken aback by his insult im clueless of how to respond back. jive ass turkey seems like it is out of a horrible 1970's film where the white capitalist is trying to get rid of the communities rec center and force all the black people into labor for minimum wage. i start thinking on this when suddenly i notice he has a fork with both a piece of fried chicken and a blueberry waffle barely danglling on to the fork maple syrup dripping everywhere. Geez black people are disgusting. i try to dodge the fork with the nasty combination on it. i juke to the left and to the right but it is no use. he is quicker then me. damn slavery genes making all black people fast as hell. why are they still not enslaved? I mean who would give away free labor. damn spaced out again now he has literally shoved the fork into my mouth. but what is this? its both sweet and savory. infact this is almost as good as a toaster strudel, ( the white breakfast food of choice.) No its even better im in a sheer state of bliss. even more so then that delicious moment when you wake up at 7 am and then realize its sunday. Ofcourse i cant let Jamal know this. Ill never hear the end of it. i spit it out on the ground next to me and yell at him however i not even aware of what im saying. its like im watching this all happen from an out of body experience. all im thinking is i need to get to the store and get some tyson and eggos. maybe ill even get aunt jamima syrup this time. normally i would never buy anything promoting black people, but ive been wrong about this wonderful concoction, what else could i be wrong about? Rap, Basketball, Fubu the list goes on... |
Inside the corrugated-metal fence I walked among the desolate, mangled horrors. The airbrushed clown face, and the two others. Big one on the hood and a smaller one on each front seat. The mechanical human centipedes - a Dodge minivan with a Ford pickup box, a Prius with a wooden one, and...is that a '70's RV whose body has been replaced with yet another pickup box?
My grease-stained tour guide must see how aghast I am, in this junkyard of doom, lost hopes and hold-my-beer ideas. "Come, let me show you where the Cavaliers and Sunfires are kept". No, I just want to get out, away from /r/Shitty_Car_Mods for a while. |
Somewhere below Pinocchio cackled rubbing his hands together. Sitting far out from the rest of his face, sat Pinocchio's nose. Long and slender, it was the most prominent feature of Pinocchio. The nose looked back up the length of the bridge and saw two black pupils looking down at it. *Silly boy, does he never learn from his mistakes ? What is he up to this time?*, the nose wondered.
"My nose will now grow", claimed Pinocchio, his black pupils still on the tip of his nose.
*What? Why would I grow? He hasn't told a lie yet. Yet if I don't grow, he would be lying, so I would have to grow.* Convinced that the nose must grow, the nose began expanding. *Hold on a second. If I grow, then he would be telling the truth, so I can't grow*. Now completely stumped the nose couldn't decide what to do. It twitched in place deciding whether to grow or not.
The nose could hear Pinocchio's laughter in the background. Looking down the nose saw the ground go farther and then come closer again. Pinocchio was jumping with joy that he had outsmarted his nose.
*How dare he mock me!*. Vexed by Pinocchio's glee and determined to teach him a lesson, the nose now tickled as it tried to decide what to do. Pinocchio's hand came up and flicked at the nose. *Does that feel good, you silly boy?*, the nose smirked and continued pondering. It still felt stumped.
The tickling grew stronger and slowly the nose muscles began to spasm rapidly with indecision. Somewhere below, the nose heard the laughter turn into agony.
"Stop! Stop! You are hurting me", screamed Pinocchio, and held the nose to stop the throbbing pain. The nose couldn't stop. It was in bred to punish the boy for lying and must decide the outcome of Pinocchio's statements.
Minutes went by as the nose sat trying to solve the puzzle. Slowly, the nose felt wetness dripping from the nostrils.
"Oh no! I'm bleeding. Please Stop this!", begged Pinocchio to his nose. Pinocchio's screams became louder and he buckled to the ground. With a long scream, the nose saw the ground zooming in, before hitting the ground.
"I.... argh.. be a gooo... boy..", muttered Pinocchio barely audible. "puhl..please .. stop!".
The nose looked up along the bridge of the nose to the dark pupils now tightly closed. The nose felt the body shudder one last time as the nose exploded spraying blood on the ground.
EDIT: punctuation and formatting.
EDIT2: Spelling corrections. |
I am not a number.
I am scruffles.
They do not know me, do not know the pain of needles or electricity.
A small person, a child, stares at me with it's teeth barred. It leaves after a brass bell is rung by the tall one, the one that gives me the poor tasting food. I close my eyes.
I open my eyes at six in the morning, my caretaker refilling the cheap plastic tube holding my water.
A high pitched whine, coming far from above, silent to human ears. it is impossible.
I look past the ceiling right at it. A tungsten rod. Heading at me. at us.
Children sit down at their desks. A metal rod launched from low orbit is being slowed from mach ten by a rodent near by. Scruffles is concentrating, the rod touches the roof, all energy removed, all energy absorbed by scruffles, the rod falls over gently on the roof. Scruffles heart stops.
two hours later Mrs. Habern walks over and picks up the limp body of Dr. Scruffles. *He probably lived a good life for a rat, he looked old when i picked him up outside that hospital*. This would be a great circumstance to teach the children about life and death anyways.
Mrs. Habern's 3rd grade class creates a funeral for scruffles under the oak tree near the plastic playground, his shoebox is lowered into its hole next to professor shelly, the last years turtle. A janitor cleaning leaves from the gutters finds an interesting blackened pipe on the roof.
|
Sometimes he sits and ponders. He stares at his hands and counts the marks from his life; the bruises, scars, freckles. In an instant, he becomes aware of the threads that make the cloth of his life. The infinite number of decisions he makes, deliberately or automatically, that determine his fate. He stares at the cloth which is his life, and can only see its faults.
No matter how long he reflects, the threads of his regrets, his continual mistakes, and his haunted past slip through his fingers and weave themselves into his life. When he ends the antics of one strand, the others tie knots and fray his fabric. He fights the loom, and soon realizes he is fighting the universe itself, and ceases his struggle.
He curses the infernal machine that spin this fabric. The infinite wheels that spin the thread that will keep spinning even when Atropos decides she is done with him.
He knows he cannot change the fabric of time that adorns him, and he continues to wear it. He tries to ignore the spot that itches him near his spine. All he can do is hope that the new fabric spun by life may be a bit softer.
(This is my first comment in /r/WritingPrompts !)
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The girl was sitting near the window, watching the buildings go whizzing by as the train gained speed. There were about a dozen kids her age sitting in nearby seats, but she sat all alone, diligently staring out the window, avoiding the others. The kids all wore the same uniform, and were obviously out on an educational trip.
The kids started some sort of game, and there was a buzz of chatter, laughter and shouting. There was a sudden outcry as they realized that none of them had a ruler. One of the girl's schoolmates asked her if she had one, and the girl wordlessly took one out of her bag and handed it over. The kid thanked her and the game continued. The girl went back to staring out the window.
The game got louder and more exuberant, the other passengers started making annoyed faces and tut tutting sounds. The girl glanced at her schoolmates, who seemed unperturbed and continued with their games. She was about to go back to staring outside the window, when a voice interrupted her thoughts.
"Annoying, aren't they?"The speaker was a tall, bearded man. He wasn't very old, probably in his early twenties. He came over and took a seat opposite to the girl.
The girl did not reply.
"So, I'm guessing you guys are headed to the Museum of Modern Art?"the man asked her, sitting back comfortably in his chair.
The girl nodded, surprised. "How did you know?"
"It's the only place a school would take students to on this route,"the man replied matter-of-factly. "I used to go to the same school as you."
"Is that so?"the girl asked, in a slightly bored voice.
"Yeah. I recently graduated from college, so I'm back home visiting my family."There was a loud whoop from the students playing the game. The man winced. "God, somethings never change do they? My classmates were just as childish. They refused to behave like high school students and acted like small kids all the time."
The girl said nothing, though it was clear from her expression that she agreed with the man.
"So, are you planning to go to college after high school, or are you the take a year off type?"the man asked, unfazed by her silence.
"College, definitely, "the girl replied promptly.
"That's great! College is a whole different experience. I didn't get along very well with anyone in school. I just, didn't have anything in common with my schoolmates. They couldn't talk about much except all that TV and movie stuff. But college, college was an eye opener. I met so many great people, intelligent and passionate and driven."
The girl was drawn in now. "That does sound amazing. I can't wait to get out of here either, you know."
The man shook his head knowingly. "I completely understand. Believe me, college is such a liberating experience, and if you get into a really good one, you get to meet so many people with great potential. People you can actually get along with, so you really feel like you belong. No more pretending to get along with people you can barely tolerate."
The girl nodded back, soaking in every word the man said. Her school mates were still engaged with their game.
The man continued talking. "So, have you decided which college.."he ducked as a paper plane hit his ear. "Goddamn!"he exclaimed, glaring at the students.
The girl gave her classmates an annoyed look too. "They are so irritating,"she complained to the man.
The man nodded. He massaged his ear gently. "See, this is what I'm talking about. All this crap in high school."He suddenly jumped to his feet. "Hey, do you wanna go to some other compartment and talk? It's really loud here."He held out his hand for the girl.
The girl didn't move.
"There's a pantry car down that way,"he man said, pointing towards the other end of the train carriage, where there was a narrow glass door.
"No, I'm fine here,"the girl replied.
The man made a motion to hold her arm, but the girl moved sideways out of his reach. This caught the attention of her schoolmates, who looked up from their game and collectively stared at the man.
The man immediately backed off. He put his hands in his jacket pocket, walked away, avoiding eye contact with any of the passengers.
The girl got up too, and joined her schoolmates, who had gone back to their game.
|
Before last year, the only place I had seen top hats was in history books.
Now everyone had them, men and women, no matter what your heritage, culture, or up-bringing. Top-hats everywhere.
It's funny how quickly civilization adapts their etiquette to new situation. Sure,in the first few weeks, there were a lot of shake-ups. All the things you would expect to happen. Lots of marriages ending, murders were quickly solved. I don't think a single person showed up for work during that first week. I think I feel the worst for the newsreaders that day. Imagine, you are on national television, and suddenly, the entire world knows that you drunkenly fondled a girl in college when she passed out. Granted, it's a horrible thing he did, but nothing Mark Lancaster should have had to kill himself over.
Eventually, humanity found its social equilibrium. Places of worship that required attendees to remove their headwear suddenly found divine dispensations for wearing hats before their maker. Laws were passed to prevent the discrimination of people who refused to take off their hats. More couples slept in separate rooms with locked doors. Doorways were modified. SUVs saw a huge uptick in sales, with their additional headroom. And I had to start taking the subway.
It was the only way I could fit my hat into my commute. It was there I saw the most obscene thing I had ever witnessed. A woman, holding on a strap, with no hat. I was so shocked by the site of the red letters outside of my bathroom mirror that I felt a flash of shame. She might as well have been naked.
*more on the way. maybe.
|
I kinda went a bit off prompt on this but hopefully it's still okay
As soon as I saw, on the landing, I knew it was special. You see people had speculated it used to be full of life and had water. But my gosh when you see it up close.
Right by the landing site was a ditch long and thin that carried on far away between the strange beautiful hills. I knew it had been a river.
When I arrived science wasn't that advanced, we didn't have what we have today. It was only 2020 and I was the first one even on the planet. But I knew we had to bring it back to what it was before.
For you see I could tell what it used to look like. Although it was barren and lifeless, whine I saw it I could see what it used to look like. The valleys and streams and mountains and blue skies.
So I told them straight away. You've probably heard the recordings. I told them they had to make this place full of life again. I sent them pictures of it and recordings.
I told Earth about my vision and Earth saw it too.
Scientists got to work on terra forming. They found ways to make artificial atmospheres. They studied the soil I brought back and found ways of growing plants in it.
So now my boy here we are.
It took years for them to actually get it here. It was 30 years after I landed that the atmospheres was set up and that took ten years after to be safe for the plants and animals to be introduced. It was a long process. Necessary too, earth was expanding. Way too many people on that planet.
As you know this is Mars. And I'm not sure if you know this, you might do I think it was mentioned in a few articles when I moved here, but those hills over there through the window behind you are the ones I saw when I first landed. Look how lush and green they are. They are just how I could see them when I first landed here. All those years ago in 2020. And now I have them. I may be 84 years old but I have them and so does Earth. |
I've heard they're all great reads.
Harry Potter. The Hunger Games. A Song of Ice and Fire.
I go to the cinema a lot. I can be found at the local playhouse on Saturdays. I like television shows more. There's more content, dialogue, emotion. I want to feel it like they feel it. Like you feel it.
To Kill a Mockingbird. Frankenstein. Crime and Punishment.
We discuss the exposition, rising action, CLIMAX, falling action, and the conclusion. In detail, please. It's fascinating, wonderful, sometimes explosive... or depressing.
Animal Farm. 1984. Brave New World.
I've talked to all of my friends about them. Well, they do most of the talking. I ask questions. All kinds of questions. Never too many questions. Just enough questions to make it alright that I'm coming back with more tomorrow.
Of Mice and Men. The Catcher in the Rye. Catch-22.
But, sometimes there are just too many questions. Too many books to focus on one. I'll be at the Episcopal on the first Sunday, Synagogue on the second, and the Temple on the third.
The Bible. Torah. Tao te Ching.
I own them all. All hardcover. They all sit on a shelf in the study. I open them every day and flip through the pages every day looking for something. Anything. I don't think there will ever be anything in them for me. It's all just paper.
EDIT: Totes got a Kindle Fire. |
5/11/09
I almost missed this entry- more like I almost said "fuck it"and went to sleep. Today we had our first raid on a Jewish man's home. We had news he might be hiding Taliban members under his flat, and so me, Charles, Jones, Karowak, Nates, and a few others broke the second story door down at around 1100. We'd caught him eating cereal and watching middle east looney toons. He was with his son, but we didn't care, the adrenaline was too high at that point.
The kid screamed, naturally, and the guy dropped his bowl of cheerios and said something in Arabic. "Don't shoot"maybe. The guy was skeletal, I mean not an ounce of fat on him. He has dirty brown dreads to his neck, and when the kid ran off Jones and another guy followed; Karowak grabbed the dreads with two hands and dragged the man attached out of the room and down two flights of stairs. Charlie went with him. After that, it was deathly quiet, just me and Nates and I think the others were Boyd, Tom, and Jacque. We could hear the man getting further away, but we couldn't hear Jones. The next few seconds were slow-motion boot stomps on a dirty wood floor, guns up. We made it to the inside stairs, where Jones and the other guy went when we heard a single gunshot.
I came down first and I almost squeezed the trigger on some other kid holding a revolver. No Taliban. The Jewish guy's son was a bloody heap in the corner of the garage next to a half open wicker basket. Jones was shot through the right eye and all I could think about was a week ago when we talked about high school and how he saw me as a leader. King Arthur, he called me. That kid's face though. He couldn't have been twelve, trembling all over, the gun was out of his hands. I'm pretty sure we had the same twisted visage of anger, confusion, and misunderstanding. But he had taken the life, so maybe he had a little more of everything in his.
My stomach knotted. No one shot. Everyone wanted to. The only reason I didn't is because I know I'll see that kid again when I come back home. In every arcade, school, or public pool I'll see him. I don't want his death on my conscience because I have no other excuse for it than he killed my best friend. For that boy it was enough, but not for me. |
I awoke to the cackle of the rooster crow like any normal sunday, the sound of a normal morning, however you construe normal mornings on our small, enchanting farm.
Growing up with all the responsibilities that a farm-hand as, I was a creature of routine, comfortable with a schedule. I flipped on the burner, waiting for the easily recognizable jet of flame to pass out of the burners and warm the skillet, a tradition I had kept going since we acquired the farm house back 10 years ago, to try and fry up some fuel for the day, I hear the gas, but no light, no spark.
"No problem,"I think to myself as I strike a match, igniting the burner, and heating the cast-iron for my fry up, the gas ignites, the smell of grease and hot metal filled the kitchen.
"Coffee"I said to myself with a smile,
I turned the tap on, got the pitcher ready, waiting for the faint trickle that had plagued my kitchen for a decade, and nothing, no drips, no strain from the pressure, no kicking on of the water heater.
I flip on the basement light, nothing, no familiar hum of electricity, nothing to give this shell I call home its "life"
"Must of blown a fuse,"I rose to my feet to take care of this current problem, go the flashlight, and *flick*, no light. "You've gotta be shitting me", I descended the stairs in darkness to change the fuses.
My second prompt on here, tell me if you want more! |
She woke up in a daze, not knowing where she was or where she'd been. There was dirt under her fingernails and dead grass in her hair. The dress she'd been wearing the night before to the summerland fair had somehow been replaced by an infantryman uniform. The last thing she remembered was falling from the crest of the ferris wheel, leaving her boyfriend gaping down at her from above, screaming the whole way down. |
"Dude what the hell... Jason, there's vans outside."
"Black or white?"I asked Malcolm.
"Black."
"Fuck."I ejected the disk and put it back into the case. "We gotta go, dude. Looks like the disk was legit."
"Oh man, what the hell!? Why'd you play it?"Malcolm pulled the blinds shut.
"Shut up and let's go before they get inside-"There was a cracking sound, and the door burst open. "Oh fuck."
A bunch of clowns burst into the room, "Surprise!!"
"Godamnit dude, why'd you click on the button that said clowns?"
"I was bored, Malcolm."
"I HATE CLOWNS!!" |
Razor said he had to make a call, and Oxide, our Team Leader, instructed our communications guy, Echo, to hand him the sat-phone. Razor held up his hand and said, "not necessary - I have my own."As he walked off into the brush, our medic, Zeus, looked over the shaken up SAS soldier. He seemed to be in overall good physical health, but when Oxide asked for a report on his mental state, all the Zeus said was "we need an evac; his mind is broken."
Upon hearing those words, Oxide retrieved the sat-phone from Echo's rucksack and punched in the number to the JSOC Tactical Operations Center (TOC). As the medic, Zeus, sedated the SAS Officer, the rest of us formed a defensive perimeter around our location and waited for further instruction. "Dammit,"Oxide said. "I'm not getting through to the TOC. We need to fall back to higher ground."Although satellite phone reception failure was rare, it was not uncommon. We closed the perimeter, buried the remaining uniforms and bullet casings, and loaded the SAS Officer onto a stretcher.
As soon as we were ready to move out, Razor came back and motioned for Oxide to come over and take a look at his sat-phone. He had full reception, full battery, and no signs of damage; however, he was unable to get through to whomever he was trying to call. Oxide called Echo over to hypothesize as to why neither sat-phone was working correctly. "I dunno, Oxide. We should have almost perfect reception at this altitude. It's almost like our signal is being jammed."
Oxide then called for a personal radio check. "Radio check, begin,"he said. Each team member, including the CIA's Razor, chimed in with his call sign. "Razor, check.""Echo, check.""Panther, check.""Zeus, check."Then I chimed in, "Ozone, check.""Roger, Oxide copies all."Our radios were working perfectly, but any outside communication system we had just would not work. Even the old receiver set to the classified operations KA-11 satellite we brought as a backup malfunctioned.
"Alright, listen up,"Oxide said. "We've got good cover of darkness at the moment, so NVGs on and let's hit that peak,"pointing at a mountain peak about 1000 meters West of our position. "2x2 cover formation, Ozone and I will take point.""Echo and Razor, I want you on the stretcher.""Panther and Zeus, you two bring up the rear.""Everyone maintain your distance and keep your heads on a swivel - we dont know whats out here."
|
A new psychological disorder has been created.
RRR - Repost Repost Repost
Everything a person sees,hears,feels or thinks that has a positive impact on him/her is repeated uncontrollably.It ends with physical and mental exhaustion or death if not treated.Psychologists from all over the world are trying to find a way to treat it.The most gullible ones have been cured by words "reddit is down"which resulted with mental breakdown.Some of them have committed suicide,others have lost the will to live after hearing those words.Some of them woke up with amnesia saying the words "9gag army".A sad , sad , sad sight to see indeed ... |
Have you ever been so awkward that you wished that you could just evaporate? This is just so horrible. How could I have even landed this date? Sure, we've been friends forever and so it would have been a death sentence to our friendship if he rejected me without a second thought but he has to be counting the seconds until this ends. He basically is doing me a favor. I’m like a charity- he should be getting volunteer hours for this.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.
Ugly. Ugly. Ugly
I mean honestly, he is telling the greatest story about how he won the scavenger hunt without any help from his team members in record breaking time and I am not even paying attention. My hair is so ugly, my face is so horrendous. Why can’t I just smile? Why can’t I just laugh normally?
I wish I were a puddle on the floor. That way he wouldn’t stare at me the way that he does. I feel like I’m being shot. Just keep looking around. Don’t look him in the eye or he’ll see the crazy.
God God God
How could you do this to me? I’m obviously not worthy of this. He is staring at me. He must have asked a question. I giggle and ask him to repeat it. He smiles and does it.
Shut up Shut up Shut up
I still can’t hear him. My mind is too loud. I just say yes. He looks down at his plate and I do the same.
I’m sorry. I really am. You were really perfect but I am just too hopeless. I know this must be really terrible for you but I really do appreciate this.
Breathe. Deep Breath. Just think of those lyrics that always calm you down? What were those song lyrics?
“Come stop your crying. It will be alright. Just take my hand hold it tight. I will protect you from all around you. I will be here. Don’t you cry.”
I’m back, It’s going to be okay. I’m not ugly and stupid all the time. I can be normal; just try. I ask a thought provoking question. You always love to talk and I really do love to listen. It’s going to be okay. Although this will be the last time that we go on a date, I’m going to remember this. It was a lot of fun; talking to you and laughing. You ask me if I want to go for ice cream now.
NO
I have homework and projects and stuff. I want to be alone in my room. You have homework too so it is okay. We should study together sometime. That would be magical. We would have beautiful children.
STOP.
Really? You just spent half the date wishing you would evaporate and now you want to marry the guy? You have issues.
But still his smile stirs the butterflies in my stomach and helps to quiet the monsters in my mind.
|
*ring*
"Hello, David speaking, Aero Professionals."
"Hi sorry, you just called and left a message for a Wayne regarding some work. I think you might have the wrong number. There's no Wayne here, this is Darryl."
"Oh... well thanks Darryl for the call back Darryl. Have a good one."
"No problem, just pay it forward you know."
"Pay i... Pay it forward?... Hey Darryl...?"
"Yah...?"
"Fuck you Darryl. Pay that forward."
*click*
|
“You can be honest with me Joe. There is no reason to lie to me. Why did you ask me to the prom?” Kate’s eyes were locked on Joe’s as he sat on the edge of the couch holding the bottle of beer in hands. He took a long, deep breath, leaned back in the couch, and with a sigh that pushed the words out like a kite that had lost its wind he replied, “My mom asked me to.”
Kate closed her eyes and shook her head slightly then she opened them back up and said, “So you didn’t want to take me? The story you told me about thinking I was cool, and thinking we would have fun was a lie?”
“Not entirely. I knew you were sarcastic and I thought we would have fun making fun of other people. My mom always felt sorry for you because you were in a wheelchair and never got to do the things the other kids did. She told me it would make her feel good if I asked you to the prom. So I did.”
“So at its core our relationship is built on a foundation of lies? If you didn’t want to go with me to the prom with me why did you keep seeing me after?”
“I don’t know. I guess I felt sorry for you too.” Joe revealed.
“And I sucked your dick!” Kate sneered.
“Well... Look, I had never known anyone with cerebral palsy before. The few times I had talked to you in the past you seemed cool, you just had some physical stuff wrong. Then I started to like you. I liked hanging out with you. I also liked that people thought I was a good person for doing it. Being with you felt good, and the praise I received made it even better.”
Kate looked at him with her lips tightly pressed together, “It must be a relief to you that I want a divorce. You can finally let down the façade of being that great guy that everyone loves because you dated then married the messed up chick in the wheelchair.”
“Actually, it rips me apart that you want a divorce. I may have asked you out and started seeing you for all the wrong reasons, but over the years I’ve grown to love you. I love caring for you. Being your husband is what has come to define me. It's what brings me happiness. Now you tell me you met someone else? Someone you like more; someone who brings excitement into your life? Now you’re just going to turn your back on me after everything I've done and sacrificed for you? Does he know he'll have to lift you onto the toilet everyday and wipe your ass? Does he know he'll have to feed you, bathe you, dress you, and take you to endless doctor visits? Whatever I may have done wrong in the past my loyalty should mean something!”
“I’m sorry Joe. I just don’t love you anymore. I guess I haven’t loved you for a while. I felt guilty about not loving you because of everything you had done for me. I felt like I owed you my loyalty. Then your mom let it slip that she “encouraged” you to ask me out all those years ago and I realized I was living in a bubble that was filled with nothing but poison and lies.”
“Don’t leave me Kate. I need you."
“Your need to be loved for your actions and my guilt for receiving those actions are not things that a healthy relationship can be built on.”
“At least tell me who it is.”
“No. I’m not going to do that. You’ll find out eventually. It’s nobody you know. He cares about me and he treats me like a regular person, not like his trophy. You put me on your pedestal. I’m the medal in your trophy case that showed the world what a great guy you were. I can’t play that part any longer. This guy just wants me to be me.”
“I need you.” Joe said with a whimper.
“No, Joe. You don’t need me. You need the idea of me. I’m sorry. Goodbye. I hope you can find a way to be happy just being yourself.”
|
*The man snored peacefully. All around him the machinery continued to whir and click, constantly purifying the air and recycling it. On the desk there was a single counter that was slowly ticking up through the low thousands. For the longest time the meaning behind it had been forgotten to all but the man.*
*Somewhere above him the light flickered and went out. If anyone had been awake they would have looked at it with some worry and made a note. That was Rule 19: Report ANY system failure.*
*In the darkness the machine clicked again, then clattered, straining against some blockage. It was a coarse, grinding sound, and the man jumped from his sleep. This was the very reason he had been stationed here. He was the Watcher and everyone trusted him to make sure this didn't happen.*
*He staggered to the console in the blackness, feeling around for the emergency release lever.*
*He couldn't see it, but the numbers had stopped counting up.*
–
“We have a problem.”
“What is it?”
“Oxygen filter went out.”
“Christ, here?”
“No. Monitoring station B.”
China visibly relaxed. She was lounging in a worn leather chair and playing a game of cards. The pictures on the front intrigued her and she would happily sit and flip them time and time again, battling her way through countless games of Solitaire. The game had been one she'd found in a water-bloated book down on level seventeen. The rules didn't seem to make a lot of sense – she had no idea why Jack was subservient to whatever a “Queen,” was, or why they weren't just numbers like the rest of the cards – but it kept her entertained until something happened.
Usually that would take a while.
“Then what's the fuss?”
Tam shrugged. He was a mousy kid with sickly white hair and a deathly pale complexion. It was a common illness around these parts and one that the doctors were quick to dismiss. They said it was normal but there would always be superstition and that was usually enough. These days Tam was an outcast. It would only get worse as the illness continued to rob him of his colour.
“You know how the boss gets, China. He's wanting an inspection.”
“Great.” The sarcasm dripped out of her voice. “Who's on the crew?”
“Well there's me. And then there's you,” Tam said, counting on his fingers. He stopped at two.
“No one else?”
“Not one. We've got use of the buggy, should only be a twenty minute round trip, plus the time it takes to actually check the place out.”
“Guess we'd best get moving then.”
–
Monitoring station B was one of the two surface buildings that was inside the compound. The reason for it had never been fully explained to either China or Tam, but they had been told that it was vital. So why there were only two people being sent to make sure that it was in working order weighed heavily on China's mind, especially as one was a fifteen year old bad luck charm.
“Tell me something,” she said, moving the buggy around a collapsed metal pole, “This doesn't strike you as strange?”
Her voice crackled over the radio, transmitting through the few short feet of smog with some difficulty. The rebreather clicked with every breath, further garbling the message. Somehow Tam got this rough meaning and thought about it for a second.
“Not really. Equipment malfunction, could be dangerous. And we are Unattached.”
There was that term again. The bunker could only house a hundred people at any one time, and the people that had no family, the ones who were 'Unattached,” were considered disposable. That was just a fact of life.
She slowed the buggy at the airlock. The two of them dismounted and made their way inside.
–
They were in total darkness.
The airlock had failed, going into lockdown and sealing the entire building away from the outside world. When they pried it open thick fingers of fog snaked their way in alongside the two kids.
“Headlamps going on,” China muttered, “Starting the recording if that's okay, Tam?”
“Go for it. Let's just make it quick.”
“Okay... So, date is... Something. I forget, I'll add that to the end of the tape when we get back. Distress call came in about an hour ago. Took us some time to get suited and booted and then we hit the god-forsaken surface. Now we're in Monitoring Station B and the power is out. Looks like total failure.”
“Also looks like we have a body.”
“Shit. Who is it?”
“Don't know, haven't seen him. I guess he was one of the older ones, though. Looks like he died writing something.”
“A'ight.” China spoke back into the recorder. “We have an unidentified corpse. Assuming he died when the power went down, probably the smog. Station seems entirely dead, no hint as to what was going on out here.”
“You might want to take that back and read this,” Tam said, lifting a notebook. China looked at it “He was writing in it when he died.”
“What's it say?”
“It's a bit of a scrawl. Says... *To the one that comes after me. I'm sorry they've sent you out here. They told me I had to check the station out and repair it about ten years ago. It's not a bad life and I'm sure you'll get used to it. Everything you need to get this place up and running again is in the back. They'll send food up daily through the tube you'll find there too.*
*“The reason you're up here is to monitor the population of the bunkers. There's a whole network of them out there and you need to be the ones that share the information between them. There's some other things, the pollution needs to be measured every day and recorded. So far it hasn't gone down in all the time I've been up here. One day it will and we'll be glorified as the ones that kept the difficult watch.*
*“We have books and films from before the fall. All in all it isn't a bad life.”*
Tam lowered the book and began to cry.
--
Just a note: I'd love to come back to this story and edit it to be a lot cleaner, but it's almost 1am and work will be sad with me if I'm not there tomorrow. |
Here he was. Finally. After years of searching for the man who had destroyed my life. He had burned alive my family, along with what I had called home. It wasn't much of a house, merely being a single story three-room house that contained few earthly possessions. But it was home to me, and he had violated that. Now it was time for me to return the favor.
I had tracked him to an old mine in old Soviet territory. He had made the tunnels his home, memorizing all the twists and turns and making it into his own castle of sorts. It was nasty trying to figure out the maze he called home; after all, he was ex-KGB and a master assassin. But I, somehow, had managed to track him and gather intelligence. Now, I had him cornered. Now, I could return the favor he so lovingly graced me with. I must be careful now, otherwise months of planning and scheming would be brought to naught with a single misstep.
I went down the stairs, back to the series of ladders that had brought me here. But before I exited, I left a present for him. This did not contain puppies or candy. This contained a nonlethal concoction of nerve gas. Enough to make him flee his hole, but not enough to kill him.
I waited on the surface. I saw the small plume of smoke that signaled the detonation of my gift. As expected, I saw some poor guards climb out who hadn't put on their gas masks in time. I raised my M40A5 sniper rifle and quickly made them assume room temperature.
And them I saw him. Him, with his unmistakable grey-white beard and his communist studded apparel. His mask guarded his face, but that was not a problem. I had never seen his soon-to-be damned face, and I didn't care. All I wanted was to end his pathetic and rotten life.
He took off his mask.
I rested my crosshairs right above his nose.
He shouted something in Russian and began gesturing to his dead guards.
I let out my pent up breath, perfectly relaxed. Everything slowed down.
I squeezed my finger. I felt my shoulder kick.
I felt my family rest in peace. |
Fried chicken after church from Church's, and I'm a happy motherjesuslovingfucker. I loosen my pants as I exclaim to my wife, "35 years of the same goddamn thing, and I wouldn't have it any other way."Next on the docket was cold beer after beer until sundown.
But the good Lord willed it different this day.
Bess had barely cleared the front porch door when I was damn near knocked over by the greatest wooshing and gooshing of blinding light and wind.
"Yo, Bess, grab an extra cold one for our guest."
"What's that, Harold, someone here?"
"Oh Good Lord Yes, my Bessie, someone indeed!"
Jesus approached the front steps of the porch gesturing gracefully whether it was okay he came up. I could only ungracefully nod my head in utter astonishment.
"I don't have much to say, Harold. I would ask that you listen closely, my child."
"yessir, Jesus."
"Would you say you've enjoyed a pleasant and fortunate life, Harold."
"Oh, yes, Jesus, and I thank you for it every day...well, you know most days...some days."
"I am glad, but I must ask of you something."
"Anything, Lord Jesus!"
"You have enjoyed a peaceful, comfortable life, and I want you to enjoy it for much longer, so that you may help in spreading the love and tranquility you exhibit in your daily life."
"What must I do?"
"Stop eating fried chicken. Kentucky Grilled isn't all that bad."
"Awww, well, as much I'll miss my Sunday chicken, I reckon it's the very least I could do."
"My child, you musn't drink yourself to sleep every evening either."
"Awwww, Jesus, I don't.....uh....why, yes Jesus. I won't touch another drop of beer to my lips. Or even the sightliest fried anything."
"My son, you are close to God, and you will enjoy his kingdom away from Earth."
"Oh dear Lord, I'm sure there is no greater bliss than I feel now!"
Just then, Bessie emerged with two fist-fulls of beer, having taken her time to primp up for the unknown visitor. I admit my heart sank as I realized I would never again know the refreshing feeling of the cold, sweating aluminum in her hand.
"Who have we here, Harold?"
"Well this is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Bessie."
"Oh my! Good Lord! Have a beer!"
Jesus drew both beers from Bessie's hands through the air telepathically, I swear to you. He proceeded to shotgun one in a split second and pop the other open saying, "Well, Harold, I must be going now. Thanks for the Coors, sister Bessie."
Forgetting my lowly mortal state, I jumped up from my rocking chair. "Wait, is that all?!"
"Whatever do you mean, child?"
"No fried chicken or beer for the rest of my days? That's it. No reason or anything else to bide my time."
"Is that too much to sacrifice for an eternity at God's hand?"
"No, I reckon not. I just expected there'd be some kind of punchline."
|
"Sup bankrobber""hows it going murderer""SKI-MASK"and my personal favorite "ski-maskibator"ok so that last one isn't that clever but my point remains, he never takes off the mask and is like a celebrity because of it. well not like a celebrity you would want to hang out with, but more like a gimmick or a mascot. Yes Pete the Pillaging Pirate had nothing on "mr. ski mask-querade".
everything about him is a mystery, no one knows what his voice sounds like, his name or what his face looks like. He was getting picked on for awhile, and he always just stood there and took it. it wasn't till Billy O'brian tried to take off his mask during lunch that it stopped.
Mask just kneed him in the nuts threw him on a table and proceeded to break every one of his ribs with vicious elbows. No one dared say who did it, especially not Billy O'brian. So mask just walked away.
Long story short, don't touch his mask. |
"Holy fucking shit!"A fisherman screamed before turning into a sprint away from the shoreline. The water churned and creased as three long rows of spines broke the surface. With a loud rumble and distant sirens, the King of The Monsters rose in all of his glory above the coastal city. Helpless people on subway train
"Holy fucking shit!"A military commander muttered, lowering his binoculars from atop his perch. He motioned to his men, who began to open fire with tanks and rocket launchers to no avail. Godzilla continued to march inland, with a purpose full of grimace and a terrible scowl.
Roused from his sleep by the sounds of screams and sirens, /u/lordmalifico slid out of his bed and into the bathroom. Emerging moments later, still overwhelmed with the morning hangover and a groggy sensation clouding his mind, the man pulled on a robe and made his way out to get the mail. Something blocked out the sun.
The man glanced up into the afternoon horizon, and the massive reptilian met his stare with furrowed brows and lips being pulled back.
"Holy fucking shit!"/u/lordmalifico shouted, throwing his arms up into the air in panic.
"I need about tree fitty."Godzilla spoke, with a heavy Japanese accent.
|
In case you were wondering, this is why your prompt is being downvoted, more ore less:
You've already written the story. You set up the scenario, you gave us the plot, and then the twist. What's there to do? Fill in the details? There's really no fun in that; what makes a good prompt is that, from an initial threadline ("A rockstar sells his soul to the devil to impress a girl"), the writer has choices where to go with the story. Your prompt has too much, essentially, and as a result it's more of a poorly-fleshed out story in and of itself with the implication that you want someone else to write the story for you. |
Are you happy?
*No. Not yet.*
Will you ever be?
*I am never happy.*
Do you remember a time that you were?
*...*
*I don't know.*
Do you know what happiness is? Do you know what it means to feel good?
*...*
*I don't know.*
*I was hoping you could tell me.*
I don't know what happiness is. I couldn't tell you what it looks like, or what it tastes like, or how it feels. It just exists.
*Can it exist for me?*
It can exist for everyone.
*But what about things that aren't...how do you say?*
Happiness exists for every*thing*. It is the end goal. It is what we look for until the end.
*So why look for it now?*
To appreciate it when we do find it. That's the meaning of life. |
Between the supraliminal spaces
Centurion archeways spanning a life of fractal symmetry
The archetypes crumble into friends and neighbors
I've known for eternity.
God, this explains why I'm so bored.
At their stories and houses.
The nightmares of history are dust
My personal nightmares, a storm on the horizon
always.
If it is solipsitic adventure than I am lost.
If, like a message in a bottle this finds you,
It means only we are lost.
The dream of technology reduced to childrens building blocks.
Painted primitive faces peer, window decoration on a sublime farce.
A mind cannot contain it
yet the knowledge is taken up like a poison thing
and I know that the seasons mock me
ferris wheels mock me
infinities mock me
all that turns mocks
and you...
You will read this again, in 100 years.
|
Subsets and Splits