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Queen Marilla had just sat down for supper when she heard screaming in the hallway. One of her ladies in waiting burst into the room. "Your Majesty, you must come quickly!" she cried, wringing her hands, "He's got little Bess!"
"Who is 'he'?" demanded the queen fearfully. She got up and followed the agitated lady down the long corridor. They reached the kitchen door just in time to see Bess douse someone with a large frying pan of hot oil. As her assailant fell, she hit him repeatedly over the head with her makeshift weapon, screaming all the while.
"Set 'im on fire!" shouted a young page. Bess stopped her beating long enough to grab the candle he was holding. She threw it at the assailant, who thrashed around for a few moments in the sudden burst of flames before going completely still.
The young scullery maid ran to the queen and all but fell into her arms. "I'm sorry, Mum, I really am!" she babbled, "I don't know who he was or what he wanted. He had lots of big knives too! I didn't mean to make a mess, honest!"
Queen Marilla rubbed her back soothingly. "It is all right, child. That was a neat piece of work, if I may say so myself."
As soon as the fire had been put out, they went to examine the remains. Bess gave a little shudder and hid her face in the queen's shoulder. The lady in waiting gave a shriek.
"Why! It's that horrid lich!" she cried.
The page joined them. "He's quite dead too. No way he can come back after that."
Bess peeked cautiously at the dead lich again. "I didn't know it was one of them things," she said in an awestruck little voice. "I thought they was bigger and... harder to kill."
"Only for those who are not pure of heart," said Queen Marilla. She hugged Bess again. "You, child, have done something not even my best knights can do. I shall reward with anything you desire."
Bess stared at her. "Anything? My, that's quite a lot to choose from, begging your pardon Mum. I can't hardly think what I would want!" Then she looked a little wistful, "Well, except to have my parents back," she added quietly.
"They are dead?" prompted the queen gently.
"Yes, Mum. The fever got them years ago. Haven't had any family since."
Queen Marilla thought a little. "I'm afraid I can't bring your parents back, but I think I can give you a family. Would you like me to adopt you as my own child? I will take very good care of you."
Bess teared up. "That's awful nice of you, Mum. I should like that very much. I'll be the best daughter to you, I promise!" She hugged Queen Marilla back but then froze. "You'll promise me one little thing, won't you Mum?'
"Of course, child."
"Please don't let me get close to a big knife again." | 19 | An evil lich lord is ravaging the lands, and he can only be slain by the pure of heart. The queen sends all manner of knight and mercenary, but each one is too corrupted. As is turns out, the only one pure enough to slay the lich is the young scullery maid that gets nervous around knives. | 63 |
A Story of Graves.
​
Time and time again I’d pass the graves of humans. Nothing more than a simple cross, if anything marking their final resting place. Buildings crushed the small plot of land, making the graveyard look comically small, like human lifespans. I’d hear stories of the human’s evils, the horrors they committed not only to the elves but to the dwarves, to the orcs, and all other known races, even themselves. Those that told the stories would then glare at me, calling me a demon, halfing, and a multitude of other names. I would yell at them, “Why do you do this? I’m half-elven. I have fey blood running through my veins!” They’d just continue to smile. I knew then that no living thing would ever understand me. This brought a certain kinship to those who rest underground. I sometimes wish I had ended up in one of those graves.
Maybe then I would find peace.
The elves consider themselves the victors in the wars that followed. While they had considered themselves above the rest of the races, they seemed to never notice that they were taking the human’s place. Tightening their grip on a world that has never known freedom. It’s conformity, or die. There’s no in-between. I happen to be in between. That’s why I was trapped, along with the other halfbreeds, mostly half-humans. They tested on us, scalpels, needles, axes, it all became a blur. I wince every time I think about all the people I lost there. I wince knowing the country I’ve known from birth will never accept me.
I wince knowing that I’m different and the only one that can change. Myself, and the world.
I stand here now, breathing hard, the moon rising high in the night sky. The remains of an old human industrial complex litter my surroundings, underneath I know that the old graveyard once stood. In the distance, I can see the floating fey cities, cities where most elves will be watching videos on the holo-net. Likely hellhound videos or Cerberus. We stand amid New Atlantis, one of the many artificial floating cities. I wish they would all tumble into the depths, never to be seen again. That’s not how I play though, I strike from the shadows.
Over the clicking of Feyran weaponry, I hear a gruff voice, like the crushing of reeds fills my ears. “Haleth, we do not need to hurt you. You need only come out!” I swallow my name, Haleth its a token of a past I’ll never forget. I can’t believe the only token they have to remember me by is that horrific name, nothing else, not even hair color. It’s my human features that alert these people to me.
I wear them with pride.
To them, I am a villain. Nobody will ever know my true goals, my true aims. I smile a smile that extends from ear to ear. For a half-elf, I’ve always reminded people of a demon, an orc. Devoid of the the natural elegance that most elves bear around them like a banner, a calling sign, and a sign of class. Maybe it's my beard? I’ll never know, these people were never my home.
For now, I have to escape, I have to run. Because despite the fey believing in peace, they’ll never believe in me. I’m too elven to have died in the plague, too human to fit into this society, too different to fit in anywhere on this planet. I’ll always find solace in the unknown, if I escape I can become a traveler, an emissary of peace. Who knows, maybe I’ll find some other half-breeds?
I still remember my mother, my human parent. It’s a curse to live this long. Three hundred years? For an elf that’s the blink of an eye.
“Greeting Feyrans!” I step out of the shadows, into their lights, I can feel guns being pointed at me, their dials and bullets filled with fey magic. “Have ya missed me Agrador?” The captain stiffens at his name.
“There’s no need for the theatrics Haleth. You were the stain I could never remove. You withstood more testing than any of your counterparts. Do you know? I think I’ve created a monster, I think I’ve really made a devil.” He grins, malicious intent filling his beautiful fey face. Little does he know how true his words ring. “You’re the last one Haleth, Mandic, Alini, Melian. All dead. I was the one who did it. Each time I watched their little faces writhe with pain. In the end, you survived. I can’t quite tell what will kill you, but we can try.
I see the flick of his wrist a fraction too late as the guns open fire. Beating the walls like a nest of angry hornets. One catches my leg, I watch as Feyran magic sifts through my blood, turning my veins dark like the color of pitch. I make it behind an old human billboard. A smiling face, staring back at me. *NO INSURANCE?! NO PROBLEM! CALL T.N.N. BAKERS TODAY!* My wound slowly begins to heal, the reason I had survived so long. My magic, regeneration.
I have plans up my sleeves though, my mind is always turning, always scheming. This time it was easily confused as I heard the low chuckles of my Feyran friends turn to screams. I clutch the small bomb I had fished out of my pocket, fingering the multiple colored straps that line the hand-holds. Do I dare peek? This could be a ruse for all I know. I’ve been in a situation similar before. I wait a moment longer, hearing their screams turn to lowly gurgles. Then everything is quiet, save for the sound of feet. I notice an irregularity in their pattern, like the quiet drunkenness of my caretakers after a night of drinking.
I dare peek.
I flip around the billboard, readying the grenade in hand.
My eyes near bulge from my head. Humans litter the field, their skin covered in a multitude of veins, running through their necks and into the cracks in their bodies. Cracks that make them look like broken porcelain dolls. My voice catches in my throat. Agrador stands on his knees, fear alight in his face. The humans all look at me, I freeze, waiting for them to charge me.
They don’t.
They give me a submissive nod. They’re waiting for something. I don’t know what.
Then it hits me. They’re waiting for orders. I smile while walking toward Agrador. “A devil eh? Well, that is likely a good name for myself.”
He looks at me, then back at the small group of humans littered around him. “No… please. You can’t do this!” If he is killed here, hundreds of years of life will end right here. Joining the thousands that were taken when his comrades died.
I could care less.
“Kill him.”
They do. I turn around hearing the sweet sound of his head hitting the ground. It seems I have my asset to enact revenge on the fey. I might as well begin.
Not in my wildest dreams would I assume that humans would be the ones to save me. From the grave no less.
I smile in my newfound power, its time for humans to retake what was theirs, and I'll be at the top. That's the only way I'll fit in. | 41 | Over two thousand years ago, a plague wiped out humanity. Elves, and Dwarves claimed the land since. Recently however the corpses of the fallen humans have begun to rise, laying waste to settlements as they seek to reclaim what is rightfully theirs. | 195 |
pt1: suburban hell
To say we were in trouble was a huge understatement.
The urge to scavenge wasn’t so much an urge, more like a cruel necessity. Things have been tough in this suburban hell, for the damned like us. Really, I always wondered who was more damned. Might just be a demented thought in my head, but I’m sure we’ll be joining them soon or be eaten. I don’t even remember what life was like before the whole world uprooted itself in one singular groan.
The dead will inherit the planet. The gospel of Michael? Or was it Matthew?
“It hurts, Cho,” I hear him say. Instinctively, I try not to slap him on the head to get him to shut up and tough it out. I had shoddy medical aid training, at best. Was that even the correct saying? I didn’t care. My prescription after the zombies attacked us? Cutting his digits off.
“Shh,” I say. The place we held up in temporarily was boarded up, with some semblance of resistance made before whoever lived here inevitably succumbed to the zombies or worse. We smell like death, but it’s better that way. “It’ll all be okay.”
“Will it?”
I don’t know, I cut your fingers off and they writhed for a bit on their own before being snacks, I think. I don’t wince at flesh and blood anymore; that part of me is truly gone. His hand is currently cocooned in a ton of bandages and water. “I’m not an authority on how this virus works, Dal. You’ll have to talk it up with the evacuation guys.”
A small chuckle escapes his mouth. Those bastards definitely didn’t make it far. We caught several of the evacuation gov workers in the hordes a few weeks in. He’s stable and luckily they got his off hand, but the paranoia gets to me. I pull out a can of beans and my knife, popping it open. It’s the from the last haul, but there’s no parts left of this town to loot. Come to think about it, the living picked this town apart like flesh from the bone. Ironic, since now the dead pick their flesh apart.
“Do you think I’ll turn?” Dal asks me. That question stops me.
“We ought to eat, Dal,” I tell him, avoiding the inevitable. I spill the beans, like innards slopping on a plate. No electricity, no sounds except occasional shuffling outside. I had an axe, a knife and some body armor and helmet from a dead guy. Dal, on the other hand, had a spiked bat and his work outfit on. By spiked, it really didn’t start out that way. I say it had a little bit more life than his work suit. Granted, it was more torn up now, but I couldn’t stop giving him shit the first couple of days.
Like, hey, Dal, you running those reports for Q1? I know Angie from Accounting is suited up to bite your head off if you show up late. He’d tell me to shut up on the spot as we looted and said that’s why he had the bat with him.
“Why do we need to eat? To fatten ourselves up for them?”
“Shut up,” I instruct him. “It’s because we’re still alive and you’re starving.”
I squash my ear on the door and hear no noise behind it. I don’t know if they could smell, but we eat in silence. Cold beans and scraps of small hot dogs, two fingers down and morale at an all time low.
“If I turn,” Dal whispers. “You know what to do.”
“Don’t,” but it was his turn to silence me.
“I both love and hate your frankness, your determination, Cho,” he tells me. Then he falls asleep. There was no chance I was following him into a slumbering tomb. My imagination swirled, of course.
I would kill him in an instant, I think. I owed him that much. Or he would kill me and we’d be a zombie couple doing cute zombie things.
Who knows how long passed when I felt something grab my shoulder. I jumped up, axe raised.
“Jesus, you’re terrifying,” Dal said. “Good morning.”
“Dal,” I pinned him down and looked at his hand. It helped that I was bigger than him. “You okay? Not feeling hungry for flesh? Nothing like that?”
“Still me,” he groans. I get off of him. “Still here in paradise.”
“Ain’t much of one I say,” I truly mean that. “You know what? We should come up with a password or something.”
“For what?”
“So I know it’s you, or something,” I tell him.
“Balls one two three,” he says seriously.
“What?”
“Balls one two three,” he repeats himself. “It’s my computer password.”
“You’re insufferable,” I tell him. But we agree. For two weeks that our haul lasted, all I heard was balls. Balls, one two three. The hordes seemed to be interested in other matters, less of them on the streets. But there was nothing left working here. So I tell him. “We’re going Southbound now.”
He steels himself. Deep breathes.
“Can you hold the bat still?”
“Yeah,” he says, demonstrating a swing.
“Then off we go,” I say. Perhaps we can make it to Southbound, since the hordes were going north. I theorized with all my knowledge of horror movies that it was all complete bullshit. I had no idea why they migrated north. “And Dal.”
“Yeah?”
“Password?”
“Balls one two three.” | 102 | Your friend has been bitten by a zombie, and you both agreed to just wait and deal with it when the time comes. It's been a month, and your friend has yet to transform. | 368 |
Henry found Schnookums one day, coming home from school. He was an ordinary snail, unremarkable in every way. Henry put him in a jar, gave him.some rocks and pebble, and fed him with lettuce.
It was a good life, for a snail. But one day, Henry didn't come home. Time went by, and Schnookums got hungry. He slowly climbed out of his jar and moved through the house, looking. Henry lay dead in the bedroom, in a puddle of dried blood. Schnookums was angry. Angry beyond thought, beyond reality. He swore to avenge Henry, and in doing so became something else, something more.
He set off, following the train of Henry's killer. Nothing would stop him. Nothing could stop him. One day he would find the killer, and they would die.
His quest dragged on - after.all, a snail cannot move fast - but he was implacable, and his touch is death.
Nobody knows if he found his revenge, but his story has passed into legend. Even now, on the internet, people challenge each other with his memory...
"Would you take 10 billion dollars, knowing that if you do, a snail will follow you. It can't be killed or stopped, and it's slightest touch will kill you?" | 11 | A beloved pet sets off to avenge its slain master. However, it's not a traditional pet, like a cat or dog. It's something a bit more... exotic. | 42 |
The soft sunlight illuminating my face woke me up.
I had slept very firmly, and felt rested and ready for the day.
Hmmm. That was odd. At least for someone like me, who had struggled with terrible insomnia since my early teenage years. I honestly couldn't remember a morning where I didn't get up feeling as if a truck just ran over me. Especially after yesterday night. I spent near the whole night on an epic party, in the company of my friends.
I stayed a bit in bed instead of getting up immediately. The mattress below me felt incredibly soft. As I spread my arms to stretch, I felt like there was more space than usual.
That was odd. Even odder was the fresh smell of softener on the silky fabric of my covers.
My heart suddenly started beating faster. I felt as if realization was about to hit me any moment. I had to know what was going on.
I blinked a few times before I opened my eyes completely. The new sight left me breathless.
Indeed, this bed wasn't mine. It was a king-sized one, big enough for five people to sleep in it. There were curtains hanging around it, almost translucent in material and turqouise in colour. The room seemed extremely spacious, and there was wooden furniture with golden details.
Before I could even ask myself how I got there, a beautiful woman ran to me. She was wearing a simple linen dress, and had a scarf securing her long chocolate brown hair.
I suddenly got aware of my body. I only had a cloth around my crotch area, but apart from that, I was naked.
I looked down and held back a suprised yell. My body looked incredibly different. It no longer looked like it belonged to a pale, skinny fat twenty-something-years old. Instead, I saw the body of a Greek God.
I'm not joking. The little belly dissapeared and made way for clean-cut abs you could grate cheese on. My thighs and calves looked muscular and strong. Even my (*cough*) private area looked like it was bulging a lot more.
The woman's voice shook me out of my trance.
"My lord, did you rest well?"
I lifted my gaze. Her face was really close to mine. And gosh, she was really beautiful. Her large eyes were doe-like and colored in an exquisite, olive green.
"My lord?", I repeated.
She widened her eyes, and then shrugged her shoulders. "It seems you're a bit confused, my Lord. That's alright, I can brew you a strong coffee and it will dissipate in an instant".
I nodded helplessly. I had no idea what was going on. But, no matter the situation, I won't say no to coffee.
The woman rushed out of my room, leaving me alone.
I looked a bit around the room.
I noticed there was a large, golden-rimmed mirror hanging on the wall. I got out of bed and walked towards it. I saw my feet in it, the strong legs, V-shaped upper body and wide shoulders.
And then I looked at my face.
I looked like a whole other phenotype. My eyes were narrower and longer, and looked almost predatory. The irises looked like a vivid, venomous shade of green.
The nose was long and aquline, but it harmonized with my perfectly defined, model-like face.
The hair rimming my face was dark and curly, and it suited the whole aesthetic.
One thing was for sure: *this was not me*.
I mean, the person in my head was still me. But this body belonged to someone else. Someone who looked like they had the dream body of every single man.
I nearly jumped anxiously as I heard the door opening. A young man walked in. His hair and eyes were as black as ebony; he was wearing a matching set of a sort of linen shirt and shorts.
His face lightened up when he saw me. "Your Emminence!", he exclaimed enthusiastically. "Today is the day. Are you ready?"
First *my lord*. Then *Your Emminence*. Whoever the owner of this body was, they must be very influential.
I was thinking frantically how to understand the situation the best I can.
I decised to take the easy route.
"I am afraid I am still quite groggy from sleep", I said, running my fingers through my thick dark curls. "Could you remind me what is planned for today?"
The youth's eyes suddenly looked scared. It almost looked like he was scared of *me*.
Did I look so menacing that just my appearance scared people?
He lowered his gaze.
"Today is the execution of the previous Earth Emperor", he said.
*Execution?* That's a big deal, no? Maybe this body belonged to a noble who had to assist to it.
Yeah. That was the most likely.
He started lifting his gaze. His voice was shy. "Did you prepare, my Lord?"
"Prepare?", I raised my eyebrows.
His gaze quickly lowered again. "I mean, mentally. It'a big deal, even for such a fierce warrior like you."
I continued asking. "What's a big deal?"
I realized I made a mistake. He backed away a few steps, as if I was a dangerous animal. *It must have been a bigger deal than I thought.*
His voice was almost unhearable.
And his next sentence sent chills down my spine.
"Maybe... executing your father and becoming the next Emperor of the Earth." | 20 | You wake up to discover you are now Emperor of Earth. The last thing you remember is leaving your dead end job to meet up with your friends for an epic night of partying. As you try to piece things together a servant walks in and says "Your Imminence, today is the day. Are you ready?" | 48 |
Warchief Xanathar sat with his second in command, Torrid, at the large round table in their war room. Xanathar had a large grin on his face as Torrid told him of their army's accomplishments.
"It's amazing, sir!" Torrid exclaimed. "Our generals are reporting that the humans of Earth are no match for our superior weaponry! They're even saying that we may have the war ended far sooner than expected!"
Xanathar let out a laugh. "A-ha! Those fools back home! Did they really expect such a primitive species to be a threat? Bah! Just wait until we return with our spoils of war."
"Yes, sir. The king himself will be squirming with jealousy after he sees the treasures that you have rightfully claimed: the ashes of the city of New York; the ornate human skull jewelry; the mass hoardings of atomic weaponry; the list goes on!"
Xanathar toyed with a model of an atomic bomb that he kept on the table. "It's amazing that those primitives are smart enough to make these, but not enough to develop interstellar travel."
"'Smart?' You give them too much credit, sir. Lobbing those things at our troops every other moment doesn't seem very 'smart' to me. Just look what they did to their moon with those! Blown to smithereens!"
"True, but the leftover rock made for a nice statue of myself."
Suddenly, a soldier frantically barged into the war room. "Sir! Sir!" the soldier yelled. "There's been a horrible mistake!"
"Mistake? Oh no! Don't tell me my food taster died again!" Xanathar exclaimed.
"No sir, but it's just as bad! My commander was looking through the original war documents--"
"What?! Those are strictly confidential! Why was he looking at those?!"
"He wanted to prove me wrong on a technicality, something about 'no taking breaks during wartime' or some nonsense. But when he looked, he found a copy of the original declaration of war, and he discovered that we made a horrible mistake!"
"Oh dear god! Are you saying that my soldiers have been taking breaks this whole time?!"
"Worse, sir!" the soldier swallowed. "The original declaration of war doesn't say "Destroy the Humans of Earth," it says "Destroy the Bumans of Farth!"
Both the Warchief and his second in command instantly lost their jovial expressions. Xanathar set the atom bomb model down on the table in front of him. He looked down towards it, but his expression told that he wasn't looking at the model, but at no point in particular. The weight of the situation sat on his entire being.
Xanathar put his hand to his mouth. "Oh god," he said, "I can't believe this..."
He slammed his fists down on the table and looked at the soldier, fire burning in his eyes.
"*Have you been taking breaks?!*"
The soldier felt himself starting to panic. "No sir, you don't understand! I--"
"Enough! Torrid! Call a guard and have this man executed!"
Torrid gave a hand gesture. A guard quickly came into the room, grabbed the screaming soldier, and left as quick as he came.
Xanathar took a handkerchief from his tunic and wiped the sweat from his face. "How disrespectful! One of my own soldiers, taking a break during a time of war? What madness is this?"
Torrid looked at Xanathar, said "I agree. Perhaps we should tell the generals to start beating them more. Though there was something that that man said that disturbed me a little, about the whole "Bumans of Farth," not "Humans of Earth" thing."
"Oh, yes, that." Xanathar picked up the atom bomb model and started toying with it again.
Torrid cleared his throat. "Should we do something about it, sir?"
"Hm? Oh, yes, we probably should. Where is Farth again?"
Torrid pulled a map up on the hologram that sat in the center of the table. "There," Torrid said, pointing towards a star far away from Earth's.
"Hm, well then. And when are we supposed to have this war finished, again?"
Torrid shuffled some papers around, picking up one that had a dark, ring-shaped stain on it. "Next week."
Xanathar coughed. "Alright, then. Have the order to pull all of our men off of Earth and sent towards Farth."
"And what about the humans and Earth, sir?"
"Oh, I don't know. Blow it up or something? We don't want our dear king to know we messed up again."
"Of course sir. And what of our 'spoils of war?'"
"I'll-- I mean, *we'll* keep those. We'll just slap some Buman words on it and say we found it like that."
"Yes sir. I'll have one of my men get the paint out."
Torrid looked down at a glass tablet in front of him. It showed several dots moving away from a circle--representations of their ships and Earth, respectively. He sent them all coordinates to Farth before activating the long-distance Ion canon on the Warchief's capital ship. Just as the last ship entered light-speed towards Farth, the capital ship fired one blast at Earth, leaving a molten hole the size of its moon in the planet's surface.
Xanathar looked at the hologram in the center of the table, which was now projecting an image of the Earth. Torrid looked at him. "This is a rather solemn moment, isn't it sir?"
Without looking away from the image, Xanathar said, "Yes, very sad." He looked down and gave a heavy sigh. "I was kind of hoping to make that a vacation spot after the war was over." | 13 | After years of a bloody battle, the aliens find their original declaration of war, instead of "Destroy the Humans of Earth", it was written "Destroy the Bumans of Farth" | 60 |
"Is. Is someone here, Mr. Wiggles? What's going on?"
Glancing around the house from the front door, things seem off. Frank's pretty sure he fell asleep on the couch last night, and was in such a rush this morning to get to work, that he didn't fold the blanket. And those pillows, that's not where he left them, is it? Surely he wouldn't have taken time to position them perfectly on the couch lining with the two smaller pillows gently resting on the larger one.
As his eyes move away from the couch, they pass over the coffee table that has a nice, tidy stack of books, and a bowl of decorative fruit. There's no watermarks or coffee stain. You can't even see the grease marks from all those nights of or ordering from Tony's.
Even the air smells different. It smells...cleaner.
Continuing the survey, Frank's eyes eventually make it over to the kitchen where he sees an entire feast laid out on his table. There's a salad, rolls, some asparagus, and, is that meatloaf?
Frank still hasn't taken a step, and Mr. Wiggles takes this opportunity to wind himself between Frank's legs, rubbing up against his pants. As if he's attempting to answer the question, he looks up at Frank and meows.
The noise snaps Frank out of his daze, and he yells, throughout the house, "Hello? Anyone?"
Silence.
Slowly he begins to walk towards the food. As he gets closer he can see that the rolls appear to be homemade. He slowly places his hand over the meatloaf, and he can feel the warmth coming off of it. A quick glance at the water cup shows a slight fog, the water is chilled, but the tablecloth is completely dry underneath it, the glass couldn't have been sitting there for long.
He again yells out "Who made this? Where are you?"
But again, apart from Mr. Wiggles soft purring, it's silence.
Frank turns from the table and very slowly walks down the hall. He's almost scared to walk past the coat closet, as if some Good Housekeeping monster was going to jump out and surprise him.
He keeps going, towards the bedroom. At this point, he's not sure if he'd rather find the mysterious cook, or find out the house is empty. He walks in to the bedroom, and can't believe his eyes. There's not a hint of dirty clothes. The jogging shorts that have spent the past 4 days laying on the edge of the bed are nowhere to be found, and the socks that had been strewn across the floor are not there anymore.
While his pace has slowed down, his heart rate is accelerating. He steps into the closet that connects the bedroom to the bathroom and everything is in place.
Shirts and pants are hung neatly on hangers. The button down shirts are grouped with the slacks. His hoodies and sports jersey are grouped in the back. And each section is organized by color. But it's more than that, he hasn't seen his closet this organized in, well, ever.
That settles it, he has to get out of here.
"Mr. Wiggles?!"
He tries his best to not sound panicked, he doesn't want to alarm the cat, he just wants to scoop up Mr. Wiggles and get out.
As he quickly walks back down the hall, he sees Mr. Wiggles laying in one of the last sun-beams of the day. He scoops him up and feels in his pocket for his keys. He's got to get out and go...somewhere. But where?
He pauses for a second trying to gather his thoughts, where would he go? He knows nobody in town, or at least nobody that would believe he showed up to a perfectly cleaned house with a warm dinner on the table.
As Mr. Wiggles meows again, Frank snaps out of it. He looks down at the cat in his arms and says "C'mon, we're going to go drive around town for a while."
Just as Frank opens the door, he sees an older woman standing there, her hand reaching for the front door. She's got some freshly cut flowers in her hands.
She smiles and says "Oh good, you're home! I thought I'd cut some of the daisies to use for our center piece."
Frank's speechless as she walks right past him and Mr. Wiggles, reaches under the sink and pulls out a glass vase, fills it with water, and places her freshly cut flowers in it. As she walks over to the table to set it down, she asks "How was work today, dear?"
"Wha..who..um...what are you doing?" Frank finally blurts out.
"What do you mean? I told you, I thought some flowers would be nice."
"No, not the flowers." Frank tucks Mr. Wiggles under one arm, and opens up his other arm as he says "This... all of this? What is this?"
"Well, I know how much you like a clean house, and I know I let it get a little messy, so I really tried to get it all cleaned up before you got here."
"Before..before I got here? How did you know when I'd get here?"
"Well you've gotten home at 5:25 for as long as I can remember."
That sentence got stuck in Frank's head. He just kept repeating "as long as she can remember" over and over to himself. Thoroughly confused. He's never seen this woman a day in his life. How can she know what time he gets home?
"As long as I remember"
How can she know he loves meatloaf and asparagus?
"As long as I remember"
Where did she get those daisies?
As Frank is lost in thought, the woman is busy in the kitchen. She's pulled a freshly baked peach cobbler from the oven. She's set it on the cooling rack, taken off her apron and has just sat down the table. She's looking at Frank with an expression that let's him know she's starting lose patience with him standing in the middle of the room.
Just then, there's a rather loud knock at the door.
After the clean house, food, and mysterious woman, Frank's not sure he can handle many more surprises. Mr. Wiggles, however, is indifferent.
Frank sets him down and opens the door.
An officer starts to introduce himself, "Hello, sir, I'm Sergeant Davis with the..."
But before he can finish saying anything Frank hears a woman shout from behind the officer "Mom!?!?."
This younger woman sprints past Frank right to the table. She grabs the older woman in a bear hug, weeping "Mom! Where have you been?! We've been looking all over for you."
As the younger woman holds her mother tight, officer Davis resumes "Like I was saying, I'm Sergeant Davis with the Polk County Sheriff's department and we've been out door-to-door looking for Ms. Wells, who suffers from dementia, but it looks like we've finally found her."
At least that cleared up why the police were at his house, but Frank still had some questions. It took a little bit of time for Ms. Wells' daughter, Caroline, to regain her composure. When she did, she explained to Frank that her mother lived with her and her family. And that morning had been a bit chaotic, there was a small gap of time between when Caroline left and the day-nurse showed up. In that time, Ms. Wells had decided to go on a walk.
As Caroline and Frank talked, he learned that her parents had been married for 47 years. Her dad passed 3 years ago, and since then her mom had been on a downward slide. Her dad was an accountant at a small firm that used to be in that neighborhood. He'd close up shop every day at 5pm, and walk home, coming in right at 5:25 every day.
And every day, her mom would have a home cooked meal on the table. Mr. Wells particularly liked meatloaf.
Nobody knew the exact timeline of what happened after Ms. Wells left on her walk, but from what they can piece together, something about this house reminded her of her home. When she turned the handle of the front door that morning, it was unlocked. She walked in, noticed the mess, and started cleaning.
"What do you think made her think this was her old house?" Frank asked.
"I'm not entirely sure, but I noticed your neighbor has some daisies out front. Mom used to go on and on about how the Schweiber's next door always had the prettiest daisies." | 555 | “Today was amazing”, you think to yourself. Work went well, and your boss seems to like you. You unlock your door, and your cat eagerly greats you. You find the house you left dirty is spotless, and there’s a delicious freshly cooked meal on the table. The only problem? You live alone. | 1,349 |
The world is frozen. Completely solid some say, but those of us who have seen the creatures swimming deep below, who have witnessed the glow of ghost lights buried at an impossible depth, we knew the truth: that something lurked beneath. The Elders said it didn't matter though. That even if something did live down there it would be impossible to come up through the ice just as it was for us to go down. It was comforting to hear, I guess, and if anyone would know it was the Elders.
But it didn't stop my curiosity. Didn't stop me doing what I did now, pressing my lens to the ice's surface and scanning until something interesting caught my gaze. Usually it was just fish trapped in a pocket of water and ready to be speared, but on a good day I could catch a glimpse of a ghost light deep below.
My lens slid smoothly across the ice's surface, scraping up a fine pile of slush with it. The bulb on my side shone through the frozen surface until it eventually ran out of length, at which point it became nearly impossible to see. But that's what made the lights below even easier to spot. After a moment of sliding the lens one caught my gaze and excitement filled my chest. A light, dull and green, somewhere deep beneath the surface. I followed it with the glass sphere as it floated side to side. Then another, and another, more than I'd ever seen all in one place. All seeming to grow in size by the second.
After a moment I no longer needed the lens as an army of ghost lights formed and grew into one great mass, up and up. Up and up it came. Then my legs carried me. Carried me fast and thoughtless back towards the village. Behind me the great green light erupted up through the ice, I thought I could feel its heat pushing through the fur on the back of my neck.
"Something's here, it's coming! Under the ice!" I yelled at the first silhouette that came into view. It turned towards me, yelling back, "Wha- what is that!", before joining me in a sprint. By now I could see the outlines of my people, of walls and roofs, of little lights hanging on poles. The silhouette in front of me made it before I did and I could hear his voice ring out through the homes, "Something's coming! Hurry, grab your spears, bring the children to safety!"
Behind me I heard a noise I had not before. Like a million bulbs breaking at once, something big cracking and exploding. I could feel bits of ice roll off of my fur followed by giant chunks raining down. The green light from before now grew too bright to see so I ran blind.
From somewhere to my right a spear flew by, thrown from within the village. It clinked against an object close behind me and was returned by a much louder, more violent object flying the other way. Light and ice rained into the sky as it hit, then screams that were cut short by an eruption of flames.
I turned to see them at last, hundreds of towering monsters with green ghost lights for eyes. On top of them shrouded figures sat on massive rotating tubes that threw out balls of flames. I could not move. Only watch on as the beasts passed my by and on into my home. With every move they made a home toppled, with every burst of light came a series of screams, and all I could do was watch.
One of the beasts passed by close and the shrouded figure atop took notice of me. It pointed a finger, a gesture we too used, but to mark spots for fishing. Just as one of the great tubes pointed down towards me I was thrown to the side, another body colliding with mine down onto the ice. Three more great metallic beasts drove by.
"It is the Old Ones! You must go, go to the next village beyond the Wall and tell them! They have what we need.", next to me an old man kneeled, an Elder. His fur looked frazzled, his face full of frantic fear.
"I don't know what that means! Tell me what this is!" Another set of explosions and flashes of light from with the village. I watched as groups of my people ran from our home.
"These ones.", he gestured behind. "The Old Ones, they came from beneath the ice. That is all I can say now. Meet me at the village beyond the Wall! If I am not there in a day then you must push on without me.", his voice trailed off as he ran back towards the village. And I was left. Left watching as more of these beasts passed by with their green eyes of death. As they trampled what little we had.
I saw a gap between their numbers and took my chance, running, stumbling towards the Wall far off in the distance. I knew if I hesitated there would be no more chances to. And if I didnt make it then nothing would remain.
"The Old Ones", he called them. I would remember it well. | 128 | The sun exploded. Humanity fled and survived on the bottom of the frozen oceans. A new civilization on the frozen surface discovers the existence of the Old Ones. Old Ones planned for millions of years to take their planet back and their plan is set into motion. | 600 |
I always imagined there had to be another. From the first time I creeped a preschool teacher out of the school entirely with my powers, I assumed I couldn’t be the only special one out there. ‘Garrett recited the names of my childhood pets and every street I’ve ever lived on’ is apparently a good excuse to get yourself on mental health leave, for what it’s worth. What I’d never guessed at was just how insignificant my own affliction would feel when I finally found someone else like me.
And yes - I’m referring to the ability to become telekinetically acquainted with someone’s entire life story through skin-to-skin contact as an affliction. Why, you ask?
For starters, life on easy mode gets old fast. First-world…deity problems I guess? But you can only hit the nail on the head with so many women's daddy issues and drive the price of so many business deals through the roof before you start to get bored.
Even the slightest touch downloaded a person’s thoughts, dreams and history into my consciousness, right up until the last time I’d grazed them. And this wasn’t no monkey paw bullshit either, I digested it all as easily as a $90 steak. My life had been a highlight reel of flawless defense on the basketball court, perfectly placed words of comfort to crying girlfriends and job interviews so smooth they put a Tarantino movie’s dialogue to shame.
Maybe ‘gets old’ is the wrong wording. I was happy, but it seemed like fictional superheroes lived a life more on the edge of some cataclysmic fault of good and evil, a type of purpose I’d never been graced with. In America, there wasn’t much to do for a mind reader except get rich. I suppose I could have tried to join the army or something, but my powers didn’t stop bullets. I’d never stopped so much as a potential mass shooter if I’m being straight with you. All the inbound thoughts and memories I’d been burdened with were very repetitive and mostly the same, which brings me to my next complaint…
You are all some sick, sick, deviant sons of bitches when it comes to sex. Seriously.
All things considered though, I was chugging along just fine. The head of an international consulting firm that specialized in negotiations by the age of 28, I had put my powers to good use. The sudden influx of video meetings brought on by COVID-19 had hamstrung me for a while, but I was back at it, flying to somewhere like Chicago for a week or two to handle business before jumping right back on a private jet to Sayulita.
The day I met Amanda Morrison was shaping up to be like hundreds of business dealings before it. The coolest thing about this meeting was that it was with a company that was supposedly sending manned rockets further into space than ever before. As a negotiator on behalf of the raw materials manufacturer that would be helping to build said rocket, my job was to charge these Elon Musk wannabes up the ass for thinking they could cheat the Good Lord’s Armageddon by fleeing from this spinning rock before all the good stuff burned up.
I strolled up to the building with all the confidence of…well a guy who could read minds and was going to be negotiating. No need to mince words there.
A group of people in business attire greeted me at the conclusion of an elevator ride that brought me up to an open office space. Engineer types (you can always just tell who at a company does math and who does the talking) typed away at monitors in the background, presumably designing the rockets that we’d be talking prices for.
I shook their hands one by one. Ok, James Yoon was a former almost pro surfer, that was pretty cool. What a Renaissance man. Julia Marsh was going through a somewhat messy divorce. Rough.
And then I reached out and grasped the hand of a lanky black woman with almost geometrically cropped short hair. I learned quite a few things the moment I first touched Amanda Morrison.
The first realization that poked its way through the fog was that Amanda Morrison was only her name as much as any she had been called over the eons. The woman was as old as life on the planet itself, something of a Gaia or Mother Earth all folded into one ageless package. Her power was to defy time.
The second is that I wasn’t alone in my abilities, far from it. I was a minor deity, like thousands of others she had encountered over the span of her life. The power to know other humans by touch had been realized in many before me and would continue to be long after I was gone. Hundreds walked the Earth with unique powers like mine. There were even others on the scale of Amanda, who defied some cosmic truth akin to time itself.
The third was the easiest to digest, so I decided to focus on the other stuff later. Amanda Morrison was planning to shoot herself off into space.
​
​
Might continue some other time, cool prompt! | 509 | and now know what dinosaurs looked like. | 1,132 |
It happened way too fast, almost in the blink of an eye, or maybe that was what *they* wanted me to think.
It was 5am when I started my journey home. The last train was gone; the last bus was gone. I didn’t even know why I was out that late to begin with, all that was left of my past human life had faded away like a dream.
I turned away from where the drunken misters were waddling around like zombies and shouting incoherently to the sky and started down a dingy alley. The moon cast solemn shadows that threw each other off the walls; and the trash cans were now invisible obstacles that blocked my path.
All at once I felt a cold shadow touch my skin, a pinprick of pain as fangs sunk into my neck, and then everything was gone as soon as it came.
I sat dizzily in the alleyway for a second, rubbing my head, but then the dizziness went away to be replaced by newfound strength. I blinked, realising my eyes had now sharpened itself so I could see everything perfectly in the dark. As I wondered what the hell was going on, the sun came up, and the rays of light brightened everything it touched.
Including my suddenly-pale skin. Which started to sizzle.
I hissed in pain, and screamed internally to get me out of here. And the next thing I knew—I was at home in the blink of an eye.
I immediately closed all of my blinds. Sunlight, as I had learned the hard way, was now my mortal enemy.
Alone in the dark, the possibility, the *inkling* came to me.
*Am I now a vampire?*
I needed to check, so I headed off to find a mirror, only to find I couldn’t see my reflection.
*Definitely a vampire*
Excitement quickly replaced curiosity and my mind burned with what I could do.
*I tried turning into a bat. I love the idea of turning into animals. But when I jumped into the air and flapped my arms all I got was a bruise on my head.
*I tried lifting my bed, but I only lifted it halfway before my arms screamed in pain and it dropped with a clang on my foot. No superhuman strength then.
*And finally I tried calling a girl I liked. I mean, vampires are natural charmers, eh?
“Hey…” I said in the sexiest voice I could muster.
“You’re creepy,” she spat out and the receiver slammed down so hard my house shook.
I sighed. I give up. Being a vampire isn’t as fun as I thought. No powers, nothing I could use… what is the point?
I didn’t realise it, but night was fast approaching again. Yes I could see the moon, and shivers ran up and down my spine. My vision once again sharpened. I couldn’t help but grin. The night now brings me so much joy.
My neighbour’s black cat, the annoying one who thought she was entitled to my house, was strolling on the tree and purring.
My stomach rumbled and my eyes shone, reflecting the moonlight outside. Drool dropped off my new fangs.
And I *flew*.
With the cat in my claws and her fur buried into my fangs, I sucked up every last drop, that sweet sweet honey drop. Man, it’s better than the finest dessert in my local bakery!
Maybe being a vampire isn’t so bad after all!
🩸 r/SimbaKingdom | 10 | while your on a walk late one night you get bitten and turned into a vampire, after finding somewhere to hide to escape the encroaching dawn you inspect your new form and powers and one question bubbles in your mind "is this all? | 20 |
I stared at her silently.
"What?" I said.
"The dream you had. I told you I'd practice a bit of oneiromancy so I watched. Caught most of it. A wild dream you had; mortgage, student loans, the year 2022? Must've been the potions," she smiled. "Come; breakfast's ready."
I stood up and still half-dazed, I walked to the table and sat down. She handed me a spoon and gave me a loving pat on the shoulder. Before me stood a bowl of oatmeal and with a certain uncertainty, I started eating.
She sat across from me and started eating herself, talking about her morning. She woke up early, went for a walk, cleared her head a bit. As she kept talking, I only managed to pay partial attention.
My... my name is Ferdinand, an alchemist, married to Elena, a witch, for 14 years. I... I was testing a new concoction to improve lucid dreaming.
In the dream, I was Francis, an accountant, married to a real estate agent for 3 years. I took some sleeping medication that had a potential side effect of vivid dreams.
As I was enjoying the truly delicious oatmeal with raisins, I started to wonder.
Am I Ferdinand who dreamed I was Francis? Or am I Francis, dreaming that I am Ferdinand? | 49 | You wake up from a strange dream, and find yourself in a small cottage with a young woman in a black dress and witch’s hat cooking breakfast. She walks up to you, and says “good morning! huh, 2022? student loans? mortgage? you must’ve had a weird dream. c’mon, it’s time for breakfast.” | 133 |
I’ve always been a morning person. It was an inescapable part of growing up on the farm. No matter what time you fell asleep, no matter how you felt it was always necessary to be up and dressed in total darkness preparing to move irrigation equipment, or move cattle…whatever needed to be done before School began.
​
It only ever struck me as something out of the ordinary after I left for university. The force of habit would have me up well before 5AM, when everyone else had scheduled their classes in a way that let them sleep in till 11AM or so. Sheer habit had me up in time to catch the first of the dog walkers and the last of the night flyers. I’d exercise and work on assignments, as those quiet distraction free hours put me weeks ahead of everyone else.
​
I used to be so envious of everyone before my last birthday. One of my friends Maria, she developed her own form of martial arts. ‘Quantum Kung-fu’. It made her Impossible to hit, and she could use something called the ‘Hyper-positioning-empty-hand’ to maybe hit you at any point across a span of two weeks.
​
Some powers that people get are more flashy than anything else. I have a cousin calling himself '*Vaper-Trail'* and would exude these colourful scented clouds. He’s trying to be an influencer these days…
​
Most pre-mornings I try to grab something caffeinated and get down to the lake. (There’s a guy downtown that opens at 3AM. Sells the best coffee you’ve ever tasted in these flask looking things. I honestly can’t tell if it’s a gift, power or just memorable marketing). I like to take a few minutes, have the sun rise over the water and just *you know*…be. Before everyone wakes up and the headhunting ads begin.
​
The ads are relentless. Between the Military and various companies everyone is trying to work out what can be weaponised and/or commoditised. I miss the old days where it was all car insurance and medication, not you know, trying to be front of mind whenever a kid turns Twenty One and finds they can render an area the size of a football field white hot. (‘Hey Kid! You want to melt people, or just render an entire town's large industrial plant and everyone who works in them obsolete?’ )
​
I’m glad I got overlooked by everyone. With what I do it would have been…political. I don’t need that attention in my life, and I certainly don’t want threats or scrutiny either. If anything all I want really is a dog.
​
That sounds pretty good to me. Have a dog, the lake, the sun rise and some quiet time. My name is Helios and I’ve always been a morning person. | 82 | Everyone gets a power that develops sometime around their twenty-first birthday; yours is big and flashy. What is it and why does no one ever notice when you use it? | 157 |
"Winter is Coming"
"Well, that was an epic disaster." I snarled, shivering in my primitive, but adequately warm coat made of synthetic materials. I had been given it by an unwary human who unwittingly rescued me from a very painful fate of freezing to death. Crew members fled from my path as I stalked towards the bridge, antennae twitching painfully as they began to warm up. At my hurried pace, it didn't take long for me to reach the command center of the ship. My Captain stood as I entered, only needing one look at me to know my mission had failed... again. "What happened this time?" she asked irritably, if not the slightest bit curious.
"Captain, the advanced recon team apparently made their report during the height of the summer for this region. It is now the depth of winter, and the temperature outside the ship are lethal to our species; in fact, they would be lethal to humans as well, if not for their ingenuity in designing low-tech protective clothing." I reported dutifully, resisting to scratch the developing itch on my antennae. "Damn the recon team to the depths of X'xeerj. Did you manage to collect any other data before you were forced to abort?" the Captain asked, no doubt hoping to salvage SOMETHING of value from this farce. In answer, I retrieved a pair of books that I had acquired.
"Ma'am, these two texts. The first is on the geography of our current target, the political entity called the United States, which also includes some climate data. That should hopefully reduce the chances of this happening again. Second is a combined dictionary and thesaurus of their primary language; once the linguistic experts get their hands on it, they'll be able to update our translation suite, which should allow us to blend in better." I said, giving them both to her and taking the opportunity to scratch that R'eahlg dammed itch. She gave them each a cursory inspection, seemingly mollified for the moment. "Excellent; I'll have Research scan and transmit these to their appropriate division. Anything else to report?" She asked, letting the geography book fall open. I hesitated, something she noticed. Without a word, we moved to a small spot towards the back of the bridge where there was a deliberate gap in sensor recordings.
"What is it, Luminary?" she asked quietly. "Just some cultural observations. I wouldn't feel comfortable putting it on the record, as I am not an expert, but it troubles me." I told her. "Of course, that's why they put this little area in. Speak your mind." the Captain. I sighed, and launched forth into my explanation. "The humans seem to be a deeply dichotomic species. On one appendage, you have the cruel, violent, evil ones that prompted this invasion in the first place. But on the other, there are genuinely kind, loving humans who selflessly do beautiful things. This protective garment was given to me by one such human who did not know of great power I could bring to bear. He simply approached me, commented on the cold weather, and gave me this garment. I learned from another human that he was a member of a charitable organization who do this sort of thing all the time." I told her.
The Captain was surprised. She had heard about the atrocities that humans were capable of, but she didn't realize there was a different side of their psyche. "While seemingly altruistic, surely there must be an ulterior motive behind their actions?" She half asked, half said. I shook my head. "No ma'am, I researched their organization after the fact. Nothing in their words or deeds to indicate anything save a desire to reduce the suffering of their most disadvantaged people. I'm no xeno-sociologist, but isn't that considered basically impossible behavior for pre-post-scarcity species? Especially with one with such a propensity for great violence?"
"Interesting, and yes, that is the general consensus for most species. The dichotomy... this might explain why a species so volatile developed nuclear weapons, but didn't go to one of the two generally accepted scenarios; either disarmament and total pacifism, or nuclear annihilation." she wondered outloud. "It might also explain some of our more spectacular losses.". We both jump, not having noticed the Tactical Officer's approach until he spoke. "Explain, Protector." the Captain demanded. "All of our tactics, equipment, and information gleaned from recon are almost exclusively built or acquired with mono-societal cultures in mind. If this dichotomy does exist in as extreme a fashion as the Luminary says, that would throw off all of our calculations, equipment would end up being ineffective in certain situations, and recon teams would be looking in all of the wrong places for information."
It took the Captain a minute to parse what he had said, but the moment she did, her scales flashed dark blue in shock. "If that's true, then..." she trailed off, before abruptly dashing for the comms panel. Long, bone like fingers danced across the board, calling every recon team on one channel. "This is the Captain. I am ordering an emergency evac of the planet. Get to your assigned retrieval stations immediately. I say again, emergency evac of all personnel, report to your assigned retrieval stations NOW!" A flurry of confused acknowledgments came flooding in before the Captain cut the channel.
Stalking back to her command seat, she plopped down and began giving commands. "Helm control, position us over the nearest retrieval site. Infirmary, we are recalling all personnel; stand by for decon and screenings. Comms, get me FleetCom on subspace." she ordered. "Ma'am, it's 0230 in the capital city. FleetCom reports the Admiral is currently sleeping." the Comms officer told her. "Then wake him!" the Captain snapped. "Captain?" I ask.
She turned to look at me, still a ghastly dark blue. "Our crew, perhaps our very species, is at great risk. I'm going to recommend that we withdraw from the planet completely, and that a quarantine of the star system be implemented." | 27 | The Alien invasion was going fine until they made many mistakes. Getting in a land war in Asia, getting in a naval battle with the British, went in against the Sicilians when death is on the line, underestimated Vietnam and winter is coming. | 272 |
“I...am feeling a mixture of...*three* things, I guess.” The Demon stared about at the grassy field into which he had been summoned, and then back to the kid that had brought him here. The beast lifted a hand and then extended a red-scaled, black-taloned finger “Firstly: Confused.”
The hellbeast looked down at his cloven hooves which were planted in the middle of stomped grass and gathered rocks...which made up the pentagram and sigils of a Circle of Summoning. He nodded and then extended another talon. “Secondly: *Impressed*.”
The eight foot tall torturer of the damned made eye contact with the kid. The bloody-nosed kid. The bloody-nosed kid who was staring him down and had summoned him in broad daylight with no candles and nothing but twigs, rocks, flattened grass and gumption. The Demon raised a third finger and smiled.
“And, lastly...I’m a little afraid, buddy. And...I. Am. *Loving* it.”
The kid bleated. The kid — a baby goat — had summoned him to the mortal plane. This, whatever this was, was going to be good. Well, good for the Demon. So, bad for everything else. | 19 | A kid summons a demon and asks for only one simple thing, to be their friend | 37 |
"Hey guys, it's Josh and welcome back to Let's Game it Out."
I looked around frantically, trying to see who had uttered the words; I found no one. Knowing the tales of what this meant, however, I felt trepidation course through my body.
Only good things, I trust. After all, if a being of unmatched power could alter our world, they'd surely try to do a good job at it.
Days passed and little of consequence happened, save for one thing; I had finally found a job. A nearby factory, derelict and unused for years, was just bought by an unknown entrepreneur who was looking for workers. With the pay being respectable and me wanting to get out of the house, I gladly accepted.
Few days later and the factory had its great unveiling. I put on my uniform and with a light step and a smile on my face walked through the doors of my new workplace.
***By the gods.***
The factory, it... it made no sense. An eldritch abomination of conveyor belts spanned far and wide, going so high up the clouds had obscured it. I looked to the side and saw several processor plants that had somehow gone into one another, defying the laws of spacetime. Gravity was of no consequence in this forsaken place; conveyors, factory units, and walkways all seemed to haphazardly float in the air suspended by nothing at all. Machines that should have been churning away were completely still, either backed up with too much material or empty. Looking at this monstrosity, even a few glances, was nauseating. Today was truly a terrible day to have eyes. Is... is that radioactive material just laying about?
Worst of all, I felt... off. I turned my head only I... I couldn't. Not normally. My head did start turning but it felt as if each second was stretched into a solid minute as if I could only move the slightest bit at a time with inexplainable pauses in between. This feeling, this inability to control oneself fully, it was nightmarish. It was then I heard the voice again.
"Uh oh, I think the game is struggling to move anything at this point, we *might* crash in a second."
And the world went black. | 986 | You are an NPC in a simulator/strategy game. You have long heard of tales of disembodied voices, which randomly bring prosperity or doom. After several years, you hear the fated voice, "hey guys, it's Josh, and welcome back to Let's Game it out." | 3,667 |
Well first time, let's go.
*ahem*
"Damn it, where is he?" The Mantis thought. He has been waiting all day. It was odd. Normally Mr Glory would show up by now. But he didn't. Though before I continue, I should probably go back a bit and tell you who exactly the Mantis and Mr Glory are.
Meet the Mantis. A genius engineer and super villain who used a giant mech which has its design based off a mantis. Hence the name. He once worked as a regular, run of the mill, scientist. Then an accident in the lab he worked at happened. He got blamed for it and was fired. He at first started doing crime as a way to fund his experiments due to his reputation being ruined thanks to the accident. Though after his first few battles with Mr Glory, he did it for a different reason. Cause he genuinely enjoyed his fights with Mr Glory. And today was gonna be extra special. He planned a heist to steal the world's largest 24 karat sapphire. He had spent so long making the most elaborate plan he possibly could, as well as the most complex and inescapable trap he could. It was gonna be his magnum opus fight with Mr Glory. A fight no other could top. Yet here he was was, surrounded by hostages, with Mr Glory no where to be seen.
Now that you know who the Mantis is, I'll now tell you Mr Glory's story. It's the classic benevolent alien from a race with powerful abilities comes to earth to defend it. From the moment he arrived, he was what you'd call a boy scout. Y'know, the goody two-shoes that never kills and always saving the day, making playful banter along the way. As for powers, it's your stereotypical super strength, speed, and flight, aswell as the ability to shoot golden beams of energy out of his body. This is actually what earned him his name. Cause one of the first heroic things he did when he arrived was save a priest from a mugger by striking the mugger down with an energy beam. The priest thought it was an act of God and began to preach about the glory of God & how God protects. Mr Glory quickly rose to notoriety, joining the global warriors, the world's most elite and powerful superhero league. Perhaps he is with the global warriors for some reason?
The hours continued to pass by as the Mantis waited. 8 hours. 9 hours.10 hours. Eventually though, during around the 18 hour mark, something happened. The TV that hung in the lobby of the place he was robbing suddenly switched to the news channel. He had turned it on after around the 1 hour of waiting due to boredom. The news broadcast revealed to the Mantis that the global warriors had fought with a planet conquering tyrant called malandium. It had taken all they had to beat this menace, with half the team dying. It had taken Mr Glory sacrificing himself by flying into the sun with malandium to finally defeat the tyrant.
At that moment, the Mantis' whole world, aswell as his purpose in life, was flipped upside down. What was the point if he couldn't fight with his long time rival? What was the point of this heist without him? What was the point of anything? The Mantis, much to the shock of the police, proceeded to leave, taking the sapphire with him. Though the police chased him, they couldn't keep with him and eventually lost him. The following week, the day of Mr Glory's funeral, people noticed a man that no one recognized attending the funeral. He was a short chubby man with thick rim glasses. He was only there for five minutes, but due to the way he looked, he stood out like a sore thumb. He placed a big blue gem in the casket, muttered a solem goodbye under his breath, and left. No one really knows where the Mantis is nowadays, but I do wonder...
#**The end.** | 24 | The supervillain prepared everything for this heist. Every Little detail has been perfected. There's only one problem, the city superhero Is nowhere to be seen. | 110 |
“So. Just to be sure I heard you correctly: you had been busy at work, translating a previously unprocessed manuscript...”
“Yes, Dean.”
“And, through the application of your continued diligence and considerable expertise, you were able to decipher this...unrecognised, uncategorised, and untranslated text...”
“...yes, Dean.”
“And, through the aloud enunciation of this text — through the simple act of sounding out a language that, up until this afternoon had not been said in who knows how long — you-wait. Wait. Did you read the untranslated or translated text out loud?”
“...um. Translated, Dean.”
“Ah. Details, you see, I do like details. Through reading aloud the *translated* text: your will was made manifest and-”
“I mean. I-Oh, sorry to interrupt, Dean.”
“No, no. Do go on. Details details.”
“I meant to say that, uh, it wasn’t my...my will. I didn’t. I didn’t want *this*.”
“Oh. You didn’t want this? You didn’t want the Colleges Library to be a smoldering pile of moistened embers with firefighters traipsing atop the remains?”
“Uh. No.”
“Well, then. That *is* good. Had you wanted this I would be *very* upset. But! You didn’t want this and it was the fault of some heretofore unencountered magic.”
“...yes, Dean.”
“...definitely not someone having a sneaky smoke in the parchment room again because it was cold outside.”
“No, Dean.”
“Good. That’s good. What was the magic word, anyway?”
"Uh....um...Go-Go fireball?"
It took eight fire-fighters to pull the Dean off of the thoroughly beaten supposedly magical bastard. | 47 | You’re a historian who recently deciphered an ancient and forgotten language. As you read your text aloud, you inadvertently cast a magic spell | 97 |
Dear Ultraman,
On behalf of Doctor Grym and the wider villainous community I'd like to take this opportunity to apologise and ask for your forgiveness and understanding.
You will find your daughter is home, unharmed and her manager at work has been made aware of a family emergency preventing her from completing her shift this afternoon that was due after college.
Doctor Grym was aware of your daughters relationship to yourself and sought to use this to pull you into a trap.
He seemed to believe you are weak to copper, I'm unaware if that was true, but fyi.
It just so happens that I was with your daughter at the time of the kidnapping as she is my classmate and I decided to prevent this from going any further than it needed to.
It is after all, my intention to begin courting your daughter. I would like to assure you that I want nothing but your daughter's happiness and safety.
If you wish to speak with Doctor Grym directly, you'll find him slowly digesting in the oversized Venus flytrap that is in the overgrown section of the city park. If you are reading this letter on the day or evening of the attempted kidnapping;he should be fine.
I assure you the digestion process is quite slow and thorough, he will be pleased to see you.
I am aware that my own past criminal activities may be a place of concern, but your daughter has shown me the error of my ways and that there are legal ways to fight for the earth that don't involve enslaving the plants to eat or otherwise disable the crew and machines that are destroying our planet bit by bit.
I hope that we will be able to talk in person once emotions have calmed down.
You have a wonderful daughter and I only want the best for her.
Yours faithfully,
Ivy League | 38 | Yesterday, a hero's loved one was kidnapped. Today, they were returned safe and sound, with a message from a completely different villain. | 40 |
"And this Your Majesty, is a sword that will never rust, nor grow dull—" The King waved a hand, dismissing the poor craftsman. He was around the thirtieth one to fail. I stood in the back of the throne room, as usual, trying not to be bored. Court reporter was not a particularly thrilling job when there weren't any crimes being tried. Flipping through the pages on my lectern, I went back to the day of the declaration. Something had been niggling at me, and I wanted to know what it was the King had actually said. I ran a finger across the words, as another craftsman stepped up to the throne. '...and bring me a weapon the likes of which the world has never seen...' Tapping my fingers on the book, I stared at the people ringing the room. None of them realized how badly they'd misunderstood the assignment. Something the world had *never* seen. A smile tugged at my lips. Tomorrow, I would present my own weapon.
——————
"You, are not a craftsman." The King leaned forward, peering down his nose at me. "No, in fact, you are my court reporter. What are you doing here?" I shook a little, after all, this might end with me jobless, and that was not a place I wanted to be.
"I have a weapon to present to Your Majesty. If I may." Bowing, I glanced up through my hair. The King was stroking his chin, as he sat back on his throne. With a desultory wave, he yawned.
"Very well. It can't be any worse than any of the drivel that the others have been bringing me. Go on." His voice sounded bored, but hopefully, I would soon change that. Rising from my bow, I reached into my pocket, pulling out a small object.
"Your Majesty, may I present this as my weapon." I spread my hands, holding the object out. Raising an eyebrow, the King frowned.
"That is a fan. And not even a very big one." His hand twitched as if to rise into a dismissal. Hurriedly, I gabbled out my next words.
"The fan is only the means to create the weapon. No, great sir, the weapon I present to you, is Wind!" I pumped the fan up and down, creating a breeze in the King's direction. Making sure his hand hadn't moved, I continued. "If you will look down here, I have prepared a small demonstration." He bent until he was almost in half, staring down at the floor, where I had set up half a dozen wooden pegs. With a few strong fan strokes, I sent a small gust towards the pegs. Which all fell over. Looking back up at the King, I smiled. "Now imagine, a much greater fan, able to generate stronger winds, perhaps mage enhanced... you could knock over armies." I paused, watching him nod slowly. Now for the final card. "And, it's a weapon you've never seen. For who can actually see the wind?" With a chuckle, that became a full laugh, the King sat back, staring magnanimously down at me. A tiny bit of relief softened my tense shoulders. At least I wouldn't be losing my job.
"Though I must admit, I did not expect such invention out of my court reporter, you truly surprised me. And this indeed is a weapon I have never *seen*. Very well. You shall have the reward, and my thanks. And, I shall need you to speak with my engineers. Perhaps give them some of your imagination." Now the hand raised in dismissal, and I backed out of the throne room, into the waiting hands of the engineers. Sometimes, semantics *were* useful | 147 | The king demands a weapon the likes of which the world has never seen, the greatest craftsmen in the world gather to create swords, bows, hammers and all variety of great weapons of legendary and unrivalled quality. You can't help but scoff, poor fools misunderstood the assignment | 163 |
I had spent a week surveying the different entrances, planning ways inside, escape routes, traps. I had planned the tools that sat on my waist, the enchanted blade strapped to my back snugly to avoid making noise. But as I descended the cave towards the beasts nests, I realized that I had not planned for the smell.
From the cave rose a deep and powerful stench, of rot and death. But beneath it all, there was also something sweet, a smell that I can't quite place. The deeper I went, the more it penetrated my very being.
I pressed my left hand, gloved in leather, against my face as I continued on. The stench of the leather damped by my sweat was not much better, but it was less likely to force a cough which would give me away.
I continued on, walking slowly, my leather armor dampening the threat of noise. I followed the path I believed would lead me to to beast itself, but as I walked, doubt began to set in. The stench is from, I assume, animals, food that it has left to rot. After all, I had watched it fly into its nest with some cows not but three moons ago and it has not left since. I remember being in awe of its size and power. It is a beast of significant heft and might.
So why, then, do I hear nothing at all as I approach its den?
As I pressed on, I could see the path I was on opening up into a cavern, sunlight shining in from above. The Den.
The closer I moved towards the edge, the tighter the sword strap felt across my chest. I had studied dragons in depth, I have learned every technique, every trick, every small tip to fighting and killing dragons. But I have never been given the opportunity to apply them until this contract.
But as I approached the edge, the stench of death grew to an almost unbearable size, overpowering my glove in my face. I realized I may not get to apply any of my knowledge here after all.
Peering over, I could see the Dragon lying at the bottom of the cavern, some 60 feet below me. At first I thought it in deep slumber, which dragons are known to do, as the sunlight from above only illuminated its head, with its eyes closed. But the lack of breathing sounds or motions was suspicious. As I scaled the side of the cavern down, my suspicions were confirmed.
In the shadow-covered pit behind the dragon sat its lower half, completely separated from its upper body and laying in what may as well been a lake of blood. The beast had been viciously ripped in half.
I approached its head, still prepared to dodge should this be some sort of facade. When I was close enough to poke its skin with my sword, I realized it was no illusion. There was no more color in its scales, no blood flow in its body, not even the slightest hint of breath emanating from its nose or mouth. The beast was well and truly dead.
My mind was racing. What manner of foul beast is capable of such carnage? How could something so large be so effortlessly torn apart? As questions flooded my mind, the stench flooded my sense of smell. It made things difficult to sustain any train of thought. I turned from the dragon and hurriedly walked to the other side of the cavern, still holding my hand to my face, attempting to distance myself as much as I could while I thought about clues to look for.
As I moved to the other side, however, another scent caught my attention. The sweet smell that lay hidden beneath the rot. As I moved away from the dragon, it grew stronger. In the corner of the cavern was a divot in the wall, a place one would usually set up camp were they to take refuge in this desolate place. From that divot emanated the smell, like that of maple syrup on tree bark. As the sweet smell overpowered the death, I realized that I *do* recognize the smell: magic.
Magic existed in this world and anytime it was used., it left this smell behind. But it is always faint, barely there. The strength of the smell is amplified by the power of magic used. But even so, no one is capable of producing magic which leaves behind such a strong residue. Anyone with a weak nose would miss it when even the strongest mage casts a spell. So for it to be so overpowering, so strong....
I approached the divot and stopped just before walking in. The smell was definitely coming from inside. However, the sunlight stopped just before. Despite this divot appearing to only be a dozen metres deep, I could not see inside. Whether that was because it was too dark in there or too light out here, I do not know.
I pulled my sword out of its sheath on my back and flicked its base twice. At my touch, it shone a dimly orange light, just enough for me to see in front of me. I walked into the divot and made my way towards the back. It was a narrow divot, the side walls only a few bodies length away from each other. But as I walked further into it, the magic smell grew stronger.
The smell was at its strongest when I reached the back wall, but I saw nothing. I looked at the ground, at the side walls, at the back wall, but there was nothing that would indicate magic was at play. On a hunch, I lifted my blade high and looked at the roof.
When I was a boy, studying in school, we are taught the history of our world. In this history lesson, we are taught that, a very long time ago, there existed a race of four-armed giants. Bipedal with a skull that looked eerily similar to that of a mammoth. They were thought to be highly intelligent creatures capable of strong magic with a cultured society. Everything that we humans have done, the cities we built, the weapons we use, the language we write in, was based on what they left for us. Their disappearance is still a mystery.
But there, on the roof above my head, was a message written in handwriting that matched that of what they left behind. A message with a clear, concise, warning that filled me with dread to my very core. A message that I would take back to the king and his advisory board as we debated the future of our world.
"*Witness this carnage and know that we have returned.*"
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*Hope you enjoyed! I appreciate any feedback you may have to offer! Otherwise, feel free to leave some praise, maybe a nice comment about my hair or something to make me feel good. Thank you!*
r/ThawsanWrites | 120 | You are a renowned knight tasked with slaying a mighty dragon. On your quest, you find the beasts lair, and see it’s corpse. Relieved, and yet slightly disappointed, you prepare to take credit and report to the queen, but you notice something disturbing. The beast has been bitten in half. | 389 |
\- Do you have any idea what you did right now?- Our Elven teacher asked me, looking at my hands, where a second ago I was trying to hold my first real flame.
\- Umh...No? This is the exercise number 5, right? And I think it went well, I didn't hurt myself?- I responded, slightly ashamed that I somehow managed to make a scene.
*I'm a dumbass, I can't do even the easiest exercise....*
The class had mostly been calm, only that one smart girl, Matilda I think, in the front row looked like she saw a ghost. And of course the teacher, who hid his face in his hands, and groaned something that sounded like *"Of fucking course there is always one of them in my class...",* but I had to hear it wrong, right? Teachers don't curse, do they?
\- Matilda? Could you explain to him what exactly colorful flames mean?- he sighed, pulling some papers from under the desk and uncapping a pen.
\- Eeeee... Okey... So.... Normal people with fire magic have a normal fire. Like normally colored, red, yellow and orange. And then there are the "special" fire mages, that have a different flame. Like, dunno, General Fiamma? You saw, she can control the color of her flames, and with it their heat and use. Or Officer Lukas, his flames are green and golden, because he can heal with them. Your flame was bigger than normal on our stage of learning, and, well, colorful. Like that of General. What I'm saying, is that you are pretty talented. Or, well, I should say, really talented.- Matilda finished on one breath, stuttering and fidgeting with her fingers.
I rubbed my thumb over the palm of my hand, making some sparks. I felt uncomfortable being given that praise.
*I am talented? ME? WHAT?*
\- So. Oropherion, take this.- The teacher showed in my hand a piece of paper.- And go to the Metting Room. Then take the third corridor from the left, go to the top of the stairs, and knock to the doors here. Wait till someone calls you to enter.- He put a warm hand over my scrawny shoulder, and looked me in the eyes. His irises were of a disconcerting blue, too deep and layered to be normal. I never could look an Elf in the eyes longer than maybe ten seconds, it always gave me vertigo. There was something unnatural, something dangerous lurking in them. Years over years of knowledge and experience, normally reserved for elders, but sparkling with youthful vigor. - Give them that paper. Respond to all questions, if asked, demonstrate what you did in class. And don't be afraid. This is a good thing.-
This did nothing to numb my anxiety. Fortunately, I managed to not embarrass myself by spitting smoke on my way to the classroom door.
*See, told you so. First time making a flame by yourself, and you got sent to the higher ups. Great job, nutbrain.* | 615 | Your teacher asked you to demonstrate some magic in class. After you finish your demonstration the room is completely silent until your teacher asks "Do you have *any* idea what you just did?" | 817 |
Ayene looked across the dark, foaming sea from the tower’s balcony. It felt like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders, but she feared the rough seas reflected the turmoil yet to come.
Ghineas walked up behind her.
“You’re throwing your life away, Thi-”
Ayene turned around and gave him an icy look, verbally freezing him mid-sentence.
“I’m sorry, *Ayene*, I’m… I’m just worried about you. You’re ruining your mana channels permanently. Think about your *career*, you’re one of the best fire mages the world’s ever seen…”
Ayene sighed.
“Have you ever thought about *why* I’m so good at fire magic, Ghineas?”
Her colleague looked thoughtful, considering his answer carefully.
“Because you’re more hardworking and dedicated than anyone else I know,” he said.
“And do you know *why* I’ve worked so hard and dedicated all my time to mastering fire magic?”
Ghineas shook his head.
“Because I always struggled with it. Magic has always been hard for me, harder than for any other mage I know. I desperately wanted to prove that I was the best, because being a good fire mage meant being a good *man*. I desperately wanted people to believe I was one because I struggled believing it myself. Now that I’ve accepted who I *really* am, it makes so much more sense. Fire magic was hard for me because I never had mana channels meant for channeling fire, because I was always a woman inside.”
Ghineas’ eyes widened, “do you mean that…?”
“Yes,” Ayene said, “I’m finally realizing my *true* potential.”
With those words, Ayene did what she’d only ever done secretly in the shielded confines of her private chambers: she drew mana without taking all the complex steps of altering it into fire.
Speechless, Ghineas clasped the tower’s handrails so hard his knuckles turned white, watching in horror as the sea froze solid all the way to the horizon. | 22 | Due to a difference in their mana channels, men tend to be better at fire-magic, while women are better at ice. She was once a world class fire mage, but now as she begins her transition he begins to apply her training to her new talents. | 37 |
"I am Solanum, the Potato Lord. What is your offering?"
I could see the person in front bring out a large bowl of potato soup. Just from the smell alone I can tell it was a exceptional soup. Solanum agreed as well. In response, he gave him an opportunity to choose what the knowledge was. It was how to heal his father, even slightly, from a debilitating illness.
"Very well. I'm satisfied by today's potato offerings. I shall educate as you say."
Now for my turn. I had a lot of ties to the potato market, and I had already bought so many potato futures I practically cornered the potato trade.
And Solanum recognized the man in the newspaper. The same newspaper that found him once in Ireland, the one that documented the unnatural growth of the potato trade, the same newspaper that got a legal request to stop publishing once because they focused too much on potatoes but which was dismissed because this was not grounds for such a request.
"You are rich in potatoes. What is your offering?"
​
On June 30, a prominent person within the Internet was announced to have died of metastasized cancer. His most profound achievement: manually farming 500 million potatoes. I had access to about as much, and if Solanum was to request such a high amount, I'd be ready.
"Words cannot express how much your request resonates with my purpose. Tell you what, I'll do it for you, if you can give me 500 million potatoes."
Yep. Just as I was expecting. I-
"I'm kidding. I'll make you a deal. Create a readable book made purely out of potatoes. Title it the Hot Potato Book. When you have finished, send it to me. Then your request shall be - oh wait, you already made one, right? You made a bunch of things using purely potatoes? Chairs, tables, houses, cars?"
How did he-
"I don't need any offerings today. I'll just fulfill your request up front."
For a while, nothing happened. At least that's what we both thought. Until.
"NOT EVEN CLOSE BABY TECHNOBLADE NEVER DIES!"
​
​
​
^(o7) | 13 | the Eldritch Potato God. offering any form of potatoes grants a degree of knowledge. a chip is worth something like "It's gonna rain at exactly 5 for 3 hours" depending on the potatoes and how it's prepared they can offer even a step by step guide to immortality. Ireland has met him once before | 49 |
Waste not, want not is the motto of the Kingdom, which they shout as they worship at the altar of efficiency. None shall be left to wallow in uselessness even in death, not when their bodies can be repurposed by the Necrolord to serve the living.
That all sounds terrible, doesn’t it? In practice, it’s pretty good. Any living people you see working are usually doing it because they want to, while the dangerous and undesirable work is left exclusively to the dead. It’s odd how well it’s been going given the initial resistance to the Necrolord’s rule, but just about everybody has agreed they much prefer the current status quo.
Everybody who isn’t dead, that is. The ghosts still like to complain about their current labor conditions. In fact, an entire government agency had to be created just to deal with them – the Inspection and Review Service for Specters (IRSS).
The spectral lines were long today at the IRSS.
“Name?”
“Jebediah Tiller.”
“Current occupation?”
“Tiller.”
The woman sitting at her desk glanced up and adjusted her spectacles. “Your body’s current occupation?”
“Food service.”
“Complaint?”
“You’re using my body to take orders and serve food!”
“It’s completely sanitary, sir. The necromantic rituals involved in resurrection ensure the corpse is clean and fully certified to handle food-“
“That’s not the problem!”
“Excuse me, I’m going to have to ask you to calm down before we call in the exorcist.”
Similar arguments were sprouting up across the row of desks arranged to meet the mass of ghosts. Tired and disgruntled spirits bickered over the usage of their corpses with equally tired and disgruntled office workers (some jobs even zombies aren’t cut out for). Just as the Necrolord intended – a minimum amount of suffering was needed, even with magic. It wasn’t like the ghosts needed to complain either; it wasn’t like they were using the bodies anymore.
But change oft arrives with resistance, and most of the corpses now working through the Kingdom were those dead long before the new government was installed (via bloody coup, but we don’t need to get into that. Everyone’s agreed no-one liked the previous leader.). The problem should sort itself out with time once the younger folk started to die off and were resurrected to replace the older model of corpse golems. They didn’t complain nearly as much and some were frankly even eager to die, which is admittedly a bit concerning…
But for now, the ghosts were dealt with simply by tossing them into the hellish bureaucratic processes the Necrolord established. Even if they made it through the line and filed paperwork, it was a crapshoot whether it would make it up the line to anybody further in the organization. It was impossible that they would care once it did land on their desk, and so it would be tossed around under the guise of ‘processing’ until it finally fell into the trash. Where everybody agreed all this paperwork belonged.
This was the beautiful part of the Necrolord’s process – once this happened, a spirit could file a repeal. Of course the same thing would happen to that repeal, but they could always file another one. And another one. And another one. Until really this whole process somehow felt worse than literally being in hell because while devils needed breaks, the IRSS was employed to work 24/7.
Ghosts can only take so much. Some were exorcised, others decided to leave on their own and embrace rest. Some went mad and are said to still wander the world, seeking out others of their kind to form their own organization. It is feared that one day they will attempt to rise up and overthrow the Necrolord, establishing the old shackles of normalcy only recently broken off.
Well, some people are afraid of that. It’s not really a big problem – ghosts are terrible at organizing unions.
​
(I started this to make a terrible IRS joke but now I'm not sure where I've ended up. I hope you enjoyed reading it regardless, and C&C always welcome!) | 48 | The Kingdom mandates all subjects become zombies after death. The undead work the fields, build the roads and afford the people some of the best conditions in the known world. Only problem is all the ghosts. | 182 |
Nightwing was hot on my tail, and gaining fast. I ducked into a random alleyway, hoping that I would be able to lose her in the confusing twists and turns of Ebonborough's streets. But there was no such luck to be had. A brick wall towered before me. A dead end. And to top it all off, there was a cute little clothesline decorated with someone's lacy underthings.
"Inferno!"
I whirled around to face Nightwing. There would be no rescue from this, no hero to save me. In fact, the hero was standing right in front of me, ready to clap me in chains and cart me off to the Ebonborough Penitentiary.
How did I get to this point, you might ask?
Well, it all started with a bad case of the Mondays.
\---
The Dirkenshire report was late, and Bruce was on my back about it, as he always was. Reports were always running late, and he *knew* that, but for some reason, he would always get extra pissy and shouty when mine weren't on time. After thirty minutes of being told to *hone my time management skills* in a much less diplomatic manner, I'd decided I deserved a treat.
I've always loved popcorn. It's got to be popcorn that's freshly popped - don't give me any of your nasty pre-popped bagged popcorn. I had a whole stack of Act IIs and Pop Secrets stashed within the third drawer of my desk, and I whipped one out and headed off to the microwave, intent on cheering myself with a little snack.
Now, I've burned popcorn before, but I've never seen it *explode*. The entire west wing of the building burnt down, Bruce ended up in the third-degree unit, and I was miraculously unscathed. Now, I know it sounds bad. But I swear, I didn't do it on purpose!
City watch put out a wanted sign with my beautiful mug on it, and every 2-bit superhero and bounty hunter in town zeroed in. I was officially a wanted villain, all because of a bag of popcorn.
The first bounty hunter I met was Vigilance. He'd caught me at my house, when I was packing all my stuff and getting ready to flee the country. Cocked a gun at me.
A gun!
I didn't even have any weapons. I wasn't even a threat. I put my hands up, and he must've thought I was conjuring some weird superpowers because he freaked out and decided to shoot.
Good thing the gun jammed. Thing blew up.
What? No, I'm not a *monster.* Of course I checked to make sure Vigilance was still breathing before I fled the scene!
Those shenanigans doubled the price on my head.
One thing led to another, and now, I was standing with my back against a hard brick wall while Nightwing closed in on me.
\---
"Inferno!" Nightwing yelled as she strode towards me, eyes blazing.
Great. Apparently I was worthy of a supervillain title.
Her gaze flicked upwards at the lacy underthings, then back down at me. Her scowl deepened.
"I see that you're also a pervert in addition to being a villain," she muttered.
"Hey, now, I just ducked into a random alley," I protested.
She ignored me, stalking ever closer. "If you come with me peacefully, you'll be able to live out the rest of your miserable life in Ebonborough Penitentiary. If you don't..." Her fists began glowing with ominous dark energy.
"I'll come, I'll come!" I stretched out my hands towards her in a show of defeat. "Here, tie me up. I won't resist."
"What?" Nightwing cocked her head. She probably suspected a trick.
"Seriously. Just take me to jail. People have been trying to murder me over a bag of popcorn. I'm over it."
\---
**JAILBREAK AT EBONBOROUGH PENITENTIARY!**
**Readers may recall that three weeks ago, the nefarious Inferno was arrested by Nightwing herself, defender of Ebonborough. He was imprisoned inside the highly-secure Ebonborough Penitentiary, located on an unnamed remote island in the middle of the Askalit Ocean. Unfortunately, it seems that he allowed himself to be captured in order to engineer a jailbreak for his fellow villains.**
**Reports from eyewitnesses are mixed, but some say that they saw a massive volcanic eruption occur from a nearby island, covering the facility in ash and lava. Remarkably, nobody was injured, but the lava melted away several of the walls that held prisoners in, allowing their escape.**
**Inferno was last seen floating away on a small pumice island that had been created from the cooled lava. James Park, one of the few guards who witnessed his escape, quotes Inferno's strange victory phrase as the following:** **"Oh bollocks!".**
\---
/r/theBasiliskWrites | 154 | You're not a supervillain; you just have the worst luck of any super-powered person ever. But try telling that to the guy in the cape who keeps trying to take you to jail. | 235 |
I never forget how I've been treated by people. That, in itself, isn't so uncommon. What makes me different than most people, is the ability to do something to balance the scales -- quietly, and with impunity.
It was with just such a balancing of the scales in mind, that I admired my collection of hermetic poppets, little handmade dolls that each represented one of a score of friends, family and acquaintances. I kept every effigy in its own labeled cubby, laid out in a 20 x 20 clear acrylic grid, itself inside a locked display case made of tempered glass, and all of which was secreted away in the back of my bedroom closet.
Most people would call my little friends "voodoo dolls", but that's rather misleading. The mystical principle by which my constructs function is far more ancient and universal than voodoo, which is a relatively recent iteration of West African folk religion practiced in Haiti, New Orleans, and elsewhere in the African diaspora.
Reaching into my shirt, I pulled out the small key I wore on a sturdy chain of tiny titanium links around my neck, and unlocked the cabinet. Tracing over the dolls with my index finger, I removed the poppet that represented my elderly landlady, Mrs. Ochmonek, and smiled fondly down at the tiny, frail effigy, before carefully carrying it over to my ritual altar.
I set it inside the complex geometric seal etched into the wood of the altar, and lit four candles around it.
Then, taking up a pair of sharp craft shears, I cut its legs off.
This didn't dismember my landlady, of course. Even if the effigy had been powerful enough -- which, as I hadn't been able to obtain any of her blood for its construction, it probably wasn't -- the ritual circle contained its magic, and prevented changes to the doll from effecting her while the candles around the binding circle remained lit.
Using a razor knife, I carefully slit the seams along the back of the severed legs and discarded the stuffing, so I could lay the fabric flat. Then, using that as a pattern, I traced the shape of the legs onto a piece of new cloth I'd gotten from a local textile supplier. Though he'd been perplexed as to why I would want to know such a thing, the supplier assured me *this* particular coarse cotton knit was from a recent batch, woven in only the past few days.
Once I'd cut the fabric to shape, I carefully stitched the halves of the cloth legs together, stuffed them with new cotton batting and then sewed them onto the effigy of Mrs. Ochmonek. This was all I had to do to complete the working, since the old upper half of the doll already contained the necessary personal effects -- strands of her hair, fibers from her clothing, and so forth -- that linked the effigy with the old woman it was modeled after. Having made these alterations, I blew out the candles, lifted the doll from the altar, and my magic was accomplished.
You may be surprised that I completed this process without consorting with any capricious pagan gods, evil demons, or mysterious *loa,* in the course of my working, but I simply had no need to. The principle by which my magic works, as I said, is something universal, laid down with the very foundations of the cosmos: As above, so below. Microcosm and macrocosm. Bound on Earth, bound in Heaven.
The next day, I saw her in the hallway, on her way back to her own apartment. She was walking down the corridor with a bag of groceries in one arm.
"Let me get that for you, Mrs. Ochmonek." I offered, walking up to her to relieve her of her burden while she unlocked her door.
She smiled warmly, as I took the bag from her. "Oh thank you , John. You're such a nice boy." Her gentle, sincere praise felt like a ray of sunshine, even about something so simple.
"How are you feeling today -- knees still acting up?" I asked, casually, as she rummaged for her keys in her oversized pink purse.
"No, actually -- you know, I woke up this morning and my legs felt *brand new.* I think that 'turmeric' stuff Mrs. Henry told me to try must really be working." she said, cheerfully, as she fished out her keys and got her door open.
"I'm sure that's it." I said, amiably, handing her groceries off to her, as she got inside. "And how's your grandson Benny?"
"Wonderful!" she said, proudly. "He just got the acceptance letter from the college. He and his parents are coming over tonight, and we're all going to celebrate."
"That's great to hear." I replied, with a smile. That had been a tricky working -- *getting accepted into college* is a hard thing to depict on a tiny cloth doll. But fortunately, Benny had already done a lot of the work himself; making a little hooded sweater with the college logo and adding it to the poppet I'd made of him had evidently been just enough to put him over the top.
Knowing she needed to get ready for her family dinner, I said my goodbyes and walked down the hall to my apartment, with a spring in my step.
Like I said, I don't forget how I've been treated. But the slights and bad turns aren't what I choose to carry with me. Whether you have the means to avenge yourself or not, carrying things like that around inside you is corrosive to the soul.
Instead, I don't forget the good turns, the favors done, or the sacrifices made on my behalf. Like the handful of times I'd been late on my rent, and kind old Mrs. Ochmonek had cut me some slack. After all, if you're going to hang on to something, why not cling to the good things, and by extension, to the people who brought them into your life?
Every doll in my collection was such a person. Each one knew I was grateful for them, and for the things they'd done, of course. But as for what I did for them, in turn?
That's just my little secret. | 643 | You have a voodoo doll for everyone in your life. You keep these dolls in mint condition. And if someone has a particularly bad day, you give the doll special treatment; Washing their hair, rubbing their shoulders, and performing minor miracles to make them happy. | 3,244 |
Death sipped on his margarita. Sometimes, it was nice to get away from it all.
After the whole debacle with Miss Flitworth, he'd learned a few things. Namely, it was this - mortals with regular 9-5 jobs got vacations. Sure, he was an immortal personification of a nebulous concept who needed to reap souls 24/7 or risk disrupting the balance of the universe. But he'd spent an eternity doing his thankless job. For just one day, the universe and balance could go sod off.
Death needed some me time, and he sure as hell was going to take it. And besides, it wasn't as though Upper or Lower Management could do anything about it. Technically, he didn't even have a boss to answer to.
"Excuse me, is everything to your liking, sir?" A neatly dressed waiter, his uniform beginning to soak through with sweat in the balmy 90-degree heat, leaned towards Death, plucking the two empty glasses off of the nearby table.
YES. WELL, ACTUALLY...
Death hesitated for a moment, craning his cervical vertebrae as he peered around, perusing the other drinks the other beachgoers were tasting.
COULD I GET ONE WITH A TINY UMBRELLA?
\---
Somewhere else, it was Invincibility Day.
The funny thing about Invincibility Day was that nobody was quite sure when exactly it started. Nobody wanted to be the foolish bloke who broke his neck testing it out, so instead, the holiday was always tentatively announced when the entirety of the United States hospital systems reported no deaths for over two hours.
Naturally, USA hospitals were absolute rubbish at communicating between themselves, what with administrators struggling with timezones and doctors forgetting to send emails. As a result, Invincibility Day always actually started five to six hours after the fact.
Thrill-seekers waited 364 days a year for this particular day. Travel agents eagerly anticipated the flood of clients, as they were always inundated with last-second bookings for whitewater rafting and rock climbing expeditions.
Unfortunately, people were equally uncertain as to when Invincibility Day ended. Most travel agents hesitated to book anything more than twelve hours after the start of Invincibility Day. Those who did were always excruciatingly careful with the wording of their safety waivers. Even so, if a client died on their watch, no amount of waivers could erase the black stain of a one-star review from a disgruntled relative.
Still, twenty-one hours after the start of the tenth Invincibility Day, Leonard Lewis was determined to achieve his goal.
\---
/r/theBasiliskWrites | 24 | It is discovered that the concept of death ceases to exist for exactly 1 day a year, however this day changes every year and nobody knows how to pinpoint it... | 43 |
She looked to me, then to her cat, then back to me, her brow still scrunched with confusion.
"I reckon' they all say that, no? Why else would we call it a meow then?", in the moment I swear I saw her cat nod in agreement.
"Ok, follow me along here" as I spoke I did my best to distance myself from her...whatever the hell it was, and it watched closely as I did. "You ever heard a pig say oink? What about a dog, you ever heard one say the word *woof*?" I could see Jessica think for a long moment for the right words, all the while avoiding her cats amber-eyed gaze that still stalked me. She finally settled on: "Well I never been much of a dog person really. That's why I got little Bean here."
"Ok, well *Bean* is fucked. And I refuse to call that thing a cat. That's a grown ass man in a cat body."
*meow...I mean uh. Mrroowwww* ,Bean spoke just as a grown ass man would, as if to prove my point. At the sound of a human voice coming from a tiny feline body for a second time I recoiled in shock. Jessica seemed unfazed, even as I aggressively gestured towards Bean the cat.
"That thing just spoke! That wasn't even meow, it was just human words!" by this point my hand was gripping the door handle at my back. I wanted to leave, but I needed Jessica to be as concerned as I was. It seemed silly to get this worked up over a cat, but then again, at this point I was very convinced it was anything but. The way its eyes followed me. Its movements, more human by the moment. Oh, and the fact that it SPOKE ENGLISH.
"Hm? I mean Beans meows sometimes *sound* human, but obviously they aren't. Sometimes, when he's whispering into my ear as I sleep, I think it's words to, but no, just meows." For the first time since we started this conversation Jessica looked over to Bean, who failed to return the gesture. Its amber-eyes looked at me smugly, as if it was ready to reveal a big secret that I knew nothing of.
My skin crawled. Crawled at the image of her cat whispering words into her ear as she slept. At the thought of it performing a myriad of unnaturally human acts.
Before I left I had to be sure. One last trick."Fine, if it's a real cat then it should know tricks. All cats know tricks. Roll over then you weird ass thing."
"He's not weird! He's just a cat. Ok, roll over Bean" to which Bean listened and followed, its eyes never leaving mine.
"Now sit" I spoke, and once again the cat obeyed.
"Ok, finally, backflip."
"Bean can't possibly backfli-" but Jessica was cut short as he did.
"Ok well now im really convinced. No cat had ever been taught to do anything, let alone follow commands.The backflip just cemented my thoughts. Thats a demon. A gnarly, disgusting, empty husk of a demon that is bad at pretending to be a cat."
And Bean began to sweat. Beads of literal sweat formed over its fur and dripped down onto the carpet, more by the moment until the drips became a stream. With a paw it began to fan its face in attempt to cool down. Then we both watched in awe as its posture shifted from more cat to man. Hiking itself up to it hind legs and sitting cross legged on the top of the couch.
"Ah, well it appears the..ahem...'jig is up' as you say. Bean, out" and in a puff of black smoke the cat known as Bean disappeared. Jessica looked unimpressed, I'm sure I looked as I felt, freaked the hell out.
"Well there he goes I guess. Thanks K."
"Thanks?! Your cat was a literal monster! The hell was that?"
"I dunno but he's gone. You got what you wanted. At least I still have Thump."
On cue a rabbit hopped in the room, small and fluffy. With a long foot it tapped the back of its ear, then, it looked up to us both.
*Uhh. The fuck does a rabbit say? Raaaabiitt* | 126 | "Your cat just said meow!" You screamed at her. "Yeah, all cats meow." She responded tersely as if that would clear up the situation. You reached up and began massaging your temples with your fingertips. "No, meowing is a sound normal cats make, YOUR CAT LITERALLY SAID THE WORD MEOW!" | 269 |
"Attempting docking with bay 14."
"Take it easy foe-hammer."
Jacob stood braced in the doorway to the cockpit, watching the cruise liner through the forward viewports of his own little troop shuttle. The Horizon was platinum class. Berths for fourteen hundred souls, enough water that not only did they not need to worry about shower rationing, there were actual swimming pools, and a fully mechanised crew for ultimate privacy.
Jacob knew the stories about the Horizon. Both those in the wire news articles, and those spoken about in bars frequented by those willing to sell their youth.
"Roger Sir. I'm getting EM readings. Reactor seems fine. Lights are on."
"But nobody's home."
"That's a negative." Vasquez, call-sign foe-hammer, tilted the ship about its axis, the momentum carrying them along in the same direction, only now they faced the big ship. "Docking bays coming up. Our override codes have been... accepted."
"Ok. Put her in and spin down the engines. I don't want any vortex thrust tricking our opstats."
"I'm gonna slide her in so gentle the deck won't even... Huh." Foe-hammer flipped a few switches on her centre console. "That's weird."
"Report?"
"No gravity field. Compensating for our approach now. Switching to magnetic couplers."
"Does the ship say why grav plating is out?"
"Negative Sir. I just talk to the docking net, it's about as dumb as Reiben."
"I heard that stick-jock," Reiben called from the rear.
"Put her down. Anything else I should know?" Jacob said.
"O2 normal. Temps normal, though warmer than normal Fleet spec."
"It's a cruise ship. Don't want the rich passengers getting their toes cold."
Jacob turned in the cockpit, facing the three others. They were all experienced marines, specialised in rescue-ops. Zero-gee wouldn't be a problem.
"Two mikes. Standard s-and-r but we can't rule out the faction have got here before us."
"Band-aids and boom-sticks Sir?" Haley asked. She was already checking the magazines on her plate carrier.
The shuttle touched down with barely a whisper and the team disembarked by the book. Haley and Drake took point, sweeping the expansive hanger before pushing off and floating just above the deck of the hanger. Rieben and Jacob followed once they had reached cover.
"Lock the door behind us," Jacob said into his throat-mike as they moved deeper into the ship. The rumble of the shuttle's door closing was the only sound as they moved into the ship.
---
continued below | 139 | you receive an emergency transmission a luxury space station, a retreat for the rich and powerful has had a malfunction in the gravity Field, pulling into range of a black hole so you and your team have been called to rescue them, but when you arrive you see something horrifying. | 293 |
I walked down the lane, inspecting the produce. I ignored the pleas.
"You can help us."
"Please sir, have mercy."
Not my job, I thought as I saw a deformed scarecrow. Fixing that was my job though.
"Why would you even need that? Please, you don't have to do this."
As I kept ignoring the usual pleas, ground beneath me changed color. As I looked up, I saw an orange sky. Soon after, a thunderous boom echoed through the fields. A portal opened in the skies, and a rotting, horrid skeletal dragon emerged.
"Upon my title as End-Bringer, none shall survive this day! Tremble before... dude what the fuck. What is this place?"
"It's a farm." I replied calmly.
The dragon had a scared yet intrigued expression on its face.
"And what are you farming, exactly?"
"Peasants." I said, as I gestured to the fields around, filled with peasants on sticks, their rags blowing in the wind.
"Please help us." One of them called out to the dragon.
"I don't get paid enough to deal with this shit. You're on your own. Goodbye!"
The dragon disappeared the way it entered our world, with a thunderous and colorful portal.
I continued fixing the scarecrow, whistling a joyful tune. | 44 | You are a lowly peasant farmer, tending to your daily chores. As you’re sewing a hole in the scarecrow, the sun turns red and the blue sky goes black. A rotting, horrid skeletal dragon emerges from a portal and says “upon my title as End-Bringer, none shall survive this day” | 58 |
I peer into the testing rooms. They are set side by side, allowing us to monitor both candidates simultaneously despite the wall separating them. We even have one way mirrors set up. That one I feel was a unnecessary addition to the facility, but so far the participants have been too engrossed in their task to really pay much attention.
Both sit at a desk with a computer, and alternately they will type something to send to the other. We recieve a live feed of the messages sent, and it has been interesting to see how the conversations have evolved.
At first, the attempts to decieve the other were readily apparent. They would send messages in purely logical prose, or would ask basic questions pertaining to the others life. These messages were always superficial, and appeared to lack and emotional stimulation or curiosity. Occasionally one of them would throw a curveball by sending a captcha message or an image file. But the AI is far more intelligent than the be foiled by such a silly attempt, and human candidates always acknowledge this.
The next stage was verbal communication. Using the installed microphone, the candidates began to talk with each other. This was when the behaviour became interesting, as each candidate appeared to appear as human as possible, regardless of their initial objective. This has occurred in every permutation of the test so far, even when we put two AIs against each other.
Perhaps it is a matter of pride, that human candidates want to win, but also do not wish to be perceived as "less than human". We will have to await the debrief to confirm the reason in this particular test.
One of them has done something unexpected in this test however. Without turning off the microphone, the candidate in room 1, a human, has looked up at the one way mirror, and began motioning. I am not behind the mirror on this occasion, but through the cameras in the test cell I can see clearly. They are requesting food and water. Are they truly hungry or thirsty, or is this a ploy to appear as though they may be an AI overcompensating?
Food and drink is provided, and their conversation evolves. With the occasional chewing or gulp of water, the topics now involve more personal information, and appear to be more emotive than probing.
The candidates share stories of youth, their hobbies, ambitions, beliefs of the world around them. It is apparent that they are both readily scrutinising the others response, and are carefully crafting their own answers, but the walls appear to have come down. There is more of a cameraderie as the hours tick on. This is the longest trial so far, but has become by far the most interesting.
The candidate in room 2 asks me if they may be excused to go to the bathroom briefly. I gladly allow them. Do they need to go, or is this a similar deceptive tactic as the food request from room 1?
They hurry back, and I inform them that the test will end in 30 minutes. Things take a turn from here.
The cameraderie that had formed dissolves. From the apparent friendship springs forth a more confrontational nature. They forget that their task eas merely to decieve the other person, not to discover the other person's true nature for certain. Interrogations begin, accusations of inconsistencies in a story or a passing comment that the other had made. Occasionally one of them will lose their nerve and raise their voice, before pausing, pondering whether to remain annoyed and present as such, or to back down into what they deem to be a more passive, artificial facade.
The test ends, and I release them both to be debriefed, which is carried out remotely. They say that the experience was confusing, that the candidate behind the wall seemed so human, and that they were impressed with how far technology had come. They make a note of where they believe their opponents inconsistencies lay, and tick the box they believe applies to the other candidate: Human or AI.
On each call we continue to chat for a little while about the experience, whether they would be interested in doing this kind of thing again. Both of them seem eager to participate in further trials, much to my delight.
"In which case, I have one further question for you before we conclude this debrief."
The look on each candidate's face after I ask the final question tells me everything I need to know.
"Test Invigilator: Human or AI?" | 11 | A human tries to convince a robot that it is not human. A robot tries to convince a human that they are not a robot. | 21 |
"Oh, stop screaming, hasn't this ever happened to you before?" I folded my translucent arms across my chest. The stone carver was curled into a corner, trying to make themselves small.
"No! This has never happened. Most ghosts visit their friends and family, they don't hang around me." Sighing, I leaned against the wall, careful not to pass through it. I had time to wait—as long as they were freaking out, they weren't carving. A full half-hour passed, before the stone carver un-curled.
"Okay, all right. You're still here. What do you want?" I rolled my eyes at his question.
"As I was saying before you threw a hissy fit, I want you to change my last words. Something a bit more epic, as befits a mighty warrior." Raising his eyebrows, the stone carver walked to his table, rustling through some papers. Pulling out a sheet, he smiled down at the words inscribed there.
"Love you Muffins." Pausing, he looked back up at me, flinching a little at my expression. "They don't seem so bad to me. Though I wouldn't profess my love for a pastry quite that strongly." I drifted closer to him, trying to loom as threateningly as I could when I was alive. He twitched but didn't retreat.
"It wasn't for a pastry you dolt. I was holding a kitten..." I mumbled the last words, running out of steam. It was so stupid. I'd planned my last words very carefully, and it was all ruined by that tiny kitten.
"You know, I'm legally not allowed to change the last words. It's a very strong tradition around these parts. You should see some of the things I've had to carve. 'Ow', is a very popular one, so are a variety of different curse words—"
"Yes, yes, I get it. But what harm would it do to change them? No one except my wife would even know." The stone carver looked at me patiently, as if he did this every day. He fidgeted with the paper, as if searching for the right words.
"What did you actually want your last words to be?"
"Once more, I go to battle!" I raised my fist triumphantly into the air. "They would have been an epic declaration, and a good summation of my life." Nodding, the stone carver sat on his bench, my uncarved tombstone in front of him.
"You're right. I could change them to that, with no one to know. But I think your actual last words were much more epic." He raised a hand as I opened my mouth. "Let me finish. It is all very well, to run into battle, or participate in mighty duels. It takes a certain kind of bravery. But there is a greater bravery than that. It is the bravery of love. Of giving your heart to someone or something. Of giving them the power to destroy you; of becoming defenceless out of your own choice. And I think these last words, do have a sense of that sort of epic bravery." I stared at him, the words resounding through my soul. He did have a point, but there was something he'd forgotten.
"What you say may be true. But anyone who sees that is going to think it's about a pastry. Just like you did." The protestation sounded weak even to my ears. He smiled again, kindly this time.
"For a small fee, I can also carve a picture onto the stone... If you'd like."
———————
I hovered in front of my grave, looking at the freshly turned earth, and the stone that rose out of the ground. The stone carver had done good work. My last words, and a small picture of me holding a kitten were all quite clear. The face even looked a little like me.
"Just a little farther now." The familiar voice wrapped around me, and I vanished, making sure I wouldn't be seen by anyone alive. A few graves away, two figures approached, the taller helping the younger, who walked with a careful stride. They resolved into two women, one middle-aged, the other barely old enough to deserve that title.
"You see." The older woman gestured to the tombstone. "Whatever people may say about her, your mother was more than just a brawler. More than just a warrior. Her last words, her very last, were about love." The young woman reached out, running her fingers over the stone. And as I watched the tears run down my daughter's face, I let go of whatever force kept me here. I faded, reaching into the afterlife. The stone carver was right. My last words were epic enough. | 14 | As per tradition, your last words are to be carved into your tombstone. However, your last words were very lame and stupid. Now, as a ghost, you are trying to convince the stone-carver your last words were much more epic. | 21 |
*Scroll scroll*
I spent my morning browsing the history discussion forum, as I always do. Going post by post, checking out what people are trying to piece together today.
>\>***M1ndth0k*** *writes: "The Pyramids were actually built by the Romans as a gift."*
>
>\>***KILL\_BILLIAM*** *theorizes: "The Canadians are responsible for the third crusade."*
>
>*>****Skyrim\_4\_nords*** *posts: "The Thalmor are based on a real life organization in ancient history..."*
Hmm, that last one catches my eye. I click to open the whole post and check it out.
>*"...also run by actual elves*."
Never mind. There was a time where I used to spend my days correcting these posts, offering anecdotes and pointing to any evidence that remained to prove my points. Oftentimes, my ideas were debated against by others and we'd find a middle ground where I showed them that what I wrote could be plausible.
Except everything I write is actually true. I would know as I have been around for few thousand years now.
Since the birth of the internet, I've at least had a platform to truly offer accounts from times long past. It's become something of a hobby of mine. Wake up, have breakfast, browse the forums and tell people the truth. I've grown quite fond of this activity. Plus, it is fun to see how close to the truth some can get despite major textbooks and historians claiming otherwise.
>***PT\_ggFrat*** *writes: "China was built by Europeans to become a super economy to rule the world and destroy Africa."*
Posts like *that* one aren't so fun though. I've learned to ignore the crazier ones like it. People with those beliefs often did not reason themselves into those positions and I've found it quite difficult to reason them out of it.
I continue scrolling through, adding my own thoughts and points to posts that are almost accurate. Disliking the ones that just absolutely suck. I continue this for another couple hours or so, time flies when you don't care about it. Before I know it, the moon is in the sky and the posts begin winding down.
I decide to read a couple more before logging off myself to pursue other hobbies when a new post, uploaded 32 seconds ago, catches my eye:
>***Sh3ppy\_BC*** *posts: "The same Soldier of Fortune fought in 4 separate wars across the world in the span of 97 years in the 1100's."*
Now **that** is an interesting theory. Purely because, based on the title alone, they could be talking about me. My curiosity is instantly piqued. I open the thread to see how they reached this conclusion.
>"*I'm a museum worker allowed to travel and assist other museums due to my experience and industry knowledge. As such, I'm allowed to look through the storerooms of different museums.*
>
>*I've noticed that skeletons of those who perished in the first two Crusades,the Genpei War, and the Pandyan Civil War all bear marks from a type of weapon that originates in the Americas. Additionally, comparing the depth and location of the marks indicates that they were all attacked using the same swing technique and same power in each swing."*
That would all make sense. I turn to the wall to my left and look at my blade on the wall. I called it *Intervention* since I used it in so many different places. It was made for me by an ancient Native American tribe, but made with materials I brought from Asia. It had an intricate curve that ran from the base of the hilt to the tip of the blade, making a very thin S-shape. The front edge of the blade was sharpened to a point beyond that of any sword, while the backside was thickly serrated.
Whoever this poster was had a keen eye. I continued reading their post, wanting to see what else they had to offer.
>"*The likelihood of multiple individuals using the same weapon, with the exact same technique and exact same strength level is extremely low. If it were multiple people, the weapon and technique being the same could make sense, but they would still have different depth and power in their strikes."*
It has been some time since I have genuinely been impressed, but in this moment, reading the post, I am impressed. Not just because this historian-person discovered evidence of my involvement in different battles across the world (I was going through a phase), but also because they are taking this evidence at face value.
Usually, someone of this employ and intellect would find ways to create evidence that shows it is multiple people using the same blade, like a heirloom. Or they look for evidence that perhaps multiple people simply did have the same power in their swing. But this person didn't. They listened to their gut and they posted this saying it must have been the work of the same person.
I decided to respond to the post:
>***LIE\_SAND\_HER406*** *responds:*
>
>*"This is truly an interesting theory. Do you know where in the Americas the blade originates? Or what technique was used and where that originates from? I love the idea of some ancient immortal soldier traveling and fighting."*
I chuckled as I typed my response, I do indeed love the idea of *me*. I posted my reply and prepared to log off when I noticed that the number of people on the post changed from one-to-two. I decided to wait a minute and see if this was the original author reading and responding to my comment.
I refreshed the page after a bit and, sure enough, there was now a reply to my comment from the author themselves.
>***Sh3ppy\_BC*** *responds to* ***LIE\_SAND\_HER406 :***
>
>*"First of all, I never said it was a blade but your assumption is correct. As for origin, I know nothing. It must be slightly curved, which matches what Native Americans created in later centuries, but nothing at the time of these battles. As for technique, it vaguely matches strike patterns used by Spartan soldiers in the 400-300 BCE, but that's just a guess based on my knowledge."*
Whoever this person was really knew their stuff. They were basically getting everything right. I decided that knowledge and inquisitiveness such as this deserved to be rewarded. I typed another response.
>***LIE\_SAND\_HER406*** *responds to* ***Sh3ppy\_BC :***
>
>*"Interesting. You should check other battles around that same time. Maybe like Clontarf or Azaz. If you have access to such things. Because now I want to know how far back this soldier of fortune goes."*
I submitted my response. I was careful to pick battles I had been in that could be found on Wikipedia, to arouse little suspicion. I wasn't actually in Azaz, but I was at Clontarf. The Vikings were some of my favorite people and I never missed an opportunity to encourage others to learn about them. Before I could log off though, I had a feeling I should refresh one more time.
There was another reply:
>***Sh3ppy\_BC*** *responds to* **LIE\_SAND\_HER406** :
>
>"*I had already found evidence of this blade at Clontarf... That is a wild battle to just throw out as a guess. Have you been researching this as well?"*
Whoops. Too much I guess. Though her response gave me an idea.
>***LIE\_SAND\_HER406*** *responds to* ***Sh3ppy\_BC*** :
>
>"*As a matter of fact, I have been and I have had similar suspicions to yours. Though I never considered the prospect of an immortal soldier. I would love to compare notes and findings if you would be open to doing so."*
There are few mortals who manage to get me this excited about reliving my past. Even fewer who manage to dig up my past on their own. Worst-case scenario, they decline my offer and move on. Best case scenario? I could make another mortal friend.
My DM notification went off. I checked it out and, sure enough, there was a message from the author themselves.
>*Direct Message from* **Sh3ppy\_BC :**
>
>"*Hello, where are you located? Your response and the fact that you have notes and have seen similar evidence makes me think you are also a historian. I would love to meet in person and discuss findings if this interests you."*
I perked up and began typing my response. Confirming my desire to meet. After hitting send, I looked back to my blade. *Looks like you're allowing me to live adventures once again.* I thought to myself.
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*Thanks for reading! I really enjoyed this prompt and will probably have a part 2 written soon because I love it. If you enjoyed it, let me know! If you have notes or criticisms, I'd also love to hear those!*
Update: [I wrote a part 2 here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ThawsanWrites/comments/vz4oso/part_2_wp_as_an_immortal_one_of_the_things_you/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)! As always, let me know what you think!
r/ThawsanWrites | 1,451 | As an immortal, one of the things you hate is visiting museums as almost everything people guess about history is wrong and you can't correct them. You have resorted to online forums and recently found a 'conspiracy theory' thread that seems suspiciously accurate. | 4,128 |
“Look, kid, just because you think it ain’t *right* doesn’t mean you get to look *left* for free. It’s optional. You’ve got options!” the salesman barked out, increasingly combative as he noticed me cross something out on my clipboard. I’d already made the mistake of scowling as we tallied up costs earlier.
“You’ll need two sets of optical packages in your subscription plan to unlock visibility for each row of windows. Both the rear-view and side mirrors are bundled separately for your convenience. Just make sure not to skimp out on the front window quadrants.” he added.
I let out another sigh as he went to fetch some sort of extendable pointer from his desk.
I knew what was coming. I’d braced for this.
“Here, check this out,” he said. “This is state of the art tech.”
A set of googly eyes were attached to the end of his pointer so he could thread it through the car’s open window and simulate a seated driver looking forward.
The glass seemed to clue into each of his movement faster than they could be made, tracking wherever the pointer’s eyes ‘looked’ in order to black out an entire portion of the window as if it were a two way mirror. Anything outside the opaque black oval itself was heavily blurred.
“You’ve got eight unlockable visibility quadrants for this model: up, up left, down, down left, up-up, down-down, and so on.” he said, drawing my attention towards a colorful, cheery poster. A group of smiling stock photo friends seemed to be kicking off a road trip by cheering: *‘Want to see? Pay the fee!’.*
“And hey, If you splurge for the premium package you’ll be seeing double! Yep, twelve whole quadrants. Now that’s value, Kid.” he said, adding an obnoxious nudge.
I just scribbled out a few more of my notes rather than entertain the antics. Visibility was out of the question now, and the sheer costs of each plan we’d gone over were already ruling out ‘luxury gears’ like reverse or park. The list of affordable features was looking grim.
I came into this with a plan though. I was going to stand my ground.
Even as the salesman basked in the the glow of optional tail lights, groveled at the foot of each smooth, treadless tire, and pretended to jam out to each of the three legally distinct twenty-four hour yacht rock radio stations the base subscription included, I knew there were still things I wouldn’t cheap out on.
And cupholders weren’t going to be one of them. | 27 | A dystopian future where car manufacturers lock all the features of a car behind subscription paywalls. Being a penny-saver, you chose to not subscribe to any of them. | 68 |
John Smith wanted to know everything about humans. He had been sent to "Earth", as they called it, with a scouting unit in charge of figuring out everything related to the planet and it's flora and fauna. He was in charge of figuring out everything about the functioning of human bodies and minds, and what better way to learn than to go to medical school! But he was taken aback by the number of disciplines. Humans were so fragile that they needed so many different types of doctors. For the purpose of his mission though, he chose obstetrics and gynecology. What better way to learn about humans than by studying how they were created!
"Wait, you mean, you have to take out their intestines to get access to the baby?" Asked John, bewildered.
"Yes." Replied the professor. As if that was a totally normal thing.
"And then, you just shove it all back and let it sort itself out?"
"That's correct."
John couldn't wrap is mind around this. You could cut up a human, take out it's inside, retrieve a full grown baby from their insides, sew everything back up...
"And this can be done while the human, I mean, the mother, is still awake..."
This sounded so fake that it had to be true. Humans were weird like that. But it still made little sense. If humans were so tough, why did they need so many doctors? He looked around the class and he found that he wasn't the only one baffled this. One woman even looked a bit pale, like she was about to faint.
"Are you okay?" Asked the professor.
"I'm pregnant." Blurted out the student.
The other students all cheered for her with congratulations and questions about the baby and her pregnancy. She still didn't look very good. Well, John could understand her a bit. Being told that, after all the trouble of growing a baby, you then had to be butchered up to get it out was a scary thing. And babies were so fragile and demanding. Maybe she was second guessing herself.
"If you don't want it, you could always get rid of it." Replied John, silencing the whole room. Everyone looked at him, stunned. Did he say something wrong? No, he had learned about abortion. It was doable.
"No, I want this baby." Simply replied the woman, her voice quivering a bit.
"Oh. Well, good luck. And congratulations." John added, sweetly. | 29 | In an attempt to understand humans more, a space alien goes through Earth medical school. | 81 |
I could always communicate with the dead, but I learned very quickly to pretend that I couldn't.
People finding out you see and hear ghosts was never a good thing. That's how you get sent to infuriatingly calm-voiced doctors and counselors for "evaluation".
Even worse, though, is when the ghosts find out you can see them.
All of a sudden, their "unfinished business" is somehow your problem, and unless you want the dearly departed jump-scaring you all day out of spite, you have to help them resolve it.
Thus, I avoided eye contact with the dead, kept my unearthly sixth sense to myself, and just tried to live my life. I never stopped seeing them, but eventually, the spirit world just became part of the background noise of my life. Birds squawking, car horns honking, and the groans of the damned -- you just learn to tune it out.
That was until my fateful trip to Hong Kong. I'd been sent there by the company I worked for to train some employees in our Asian subsidiary but had some spare time for sightseeing.
As always, I avoided giving the scattered spirits any sign I could see them, never letting my eyes linger on the dead -- especially in a foreign country. Being able to hear ghosts doesn't mean I automatically know what they're saying, and the last thing I need is a ghost who only speaks Cantonese trying to get me to help them find rest, despite the language barrier.
But then, at the mouth of an alley, I saw something I couldn't tear my eyes away from: the pale ghost of an old woman stood by a firing barrel, across from a living, middle-aged man, who she seemed to be watching expectantly.
He was awkwardly holding a cup of instant noodles with chopsticks stuck in the top in the crook of one arm, as he reached into a paper bag, and pulled out what looked a tiny replica of his cup of noodles made of paper. He dropped it into the barrel, and then set it alight with a match.
Instantly, a steaming cup of ghostly noodles appeared in the old woman's hands. She gave a broad, gap-toothed smile, and began eating them. As I watched in amazement, the man and the old dead woman just quietly had lunch together, and then parted ways, with the man pausing to press his palms together in respect.
To my further astonishment, the woman then called out something in Cantonese, and a ghostly man pulling a rickshaw darted out of the wall of the alley. She handed the other ghost a few bills, then climbed into the rickshaw, and the other apparition \*spirited her away,\* if you'll excuse the expression.
At first, I thought the noodle man must have the same gift I did, but when I asked him what he'd been doing with the paper noodle bowl, he laughed, looking a little embarrassed. It turned out that like many residents of Hong Kong, he spoke pretty good English.
He said the paper noodles were part of a modern adaptation of an old Chinese custom of honoring the spirits of their ancestors with offerings.
Papercraft items, called "joss paper" in English, were burned with the idea that doing so gave the ancestor being honored the spirit of the item represented by the paper. Kind of like how Egyptian pharaohs were buried with little model chariots and furniture, which would presumably be full-sized and functional in their afterlife.
In modern-day Hong Kong, people burned paper smartphones, paper condos, paper cars, paper food, paper jewelry, paper gold, and even paper money which was printed -- due to a cultural and linguistic misunderstanding -- in the name of the "First Bank of Hell".
The noodle man add that he didn't really believe in it, but his grandmother had, and so every so often he'd perform a simple offering or two in her honor --- apparently a fond memory of his was sharing a lunch of instant noodles with his grandma l, as a child.
It hadn't occurred to me that a ghost would have any desires beyond ending its purgatorial sojourn and moving on -- this encounter had given me a whole new perspective on the dead.
Shortly after my trip overseas, I was laid off from my job. It turned out I'd been training people who would, in turn, train other people in the company's Delhi office, and those people would take over my job remotely.
Surprisingly, I didn't mind so much. I had my own business venture in mind.
That’s how, six months later. I found myself cashing in over fifteen thousand dollars in chips at The Mirage in Las Vegas. The suspicious glare of the pit bosses had been almost palpable when I’d cleaned up at the roulette table to a degree that would make any statistician have a seizure, but they had nothing on me.
Their cameras and sharp-eyed security guards might be able to spot cheats and card counters a mile away, but there wasn’t much they could do about Mary Lou, the shade of an ambitious young woman who’d come to Vegas from her small town in Kentucky to experience the high life back in the 1970s, but had said life cut tragically short by an overdose. By exerting the tiny bit of force she still could apply to the physical world, Mary Lou could put a roulette ball exactly where I wanted it to go, among other ghostly tricks that made gambling not much of a gamble for me.
As I exited the casino, cash in a locked briefcase, Mary Lou floated up beside me, and flashed me a smile that was dazzling despite her…well, her condition. When I’d found her moping around the dark alley off the strip where she died, she’d looked pretty rough, clad only in the torn, dated polyester dress she’d passed away wearing. Now -- courtesy of my joss paper supplier in Hong Kong -- she was decked out in a gleaming satin evening dress and high heels, with a fox fur wrap draped over her shoulders (it’s otherworldly ectoplasm and paper, don’t @ me, PETA) and her neck and fingers sparkled with ghostly gems.
“Where to now, sugar?” she drawled, playfully linking her arm with mine and matching my pace so she didn’t pass through me.
“Now? You’re off the clock, go wherever you like.” I said, stifling a yawn. “Me, I’m calling it a night.”
“Aw!” she pouted, trying in vain to tug at my sleeve. “Don’t be boring, boss -- come on, let’s go check out the Aladdin!”
I shook my head, with a wry smile. “I need my res. Besides, that’s not exactly my kind of place -- remember?” The Aladdin Hotel & Casino she referred to had been a fixture of the Las Vegas strip, back in her day, but it had been demolished in 1998. I didn’t know what would happen if I tried to follow my deceased employee into the bygone casino’s ghostly echo, which seemed to roughly intersect with the Planet Hollywood Casino that occupied the site where it once stood, and I didn’t particularly want to find out.
She shrugged, pulling out her phone and scrolling through it. She’d taken to modern technology remarkably fast, once I’d burned her some. I still didn’t know what that phone connected to, but it must do something, considering how often she’s on it. Maybe old iterations of the internet and cellular networks have spectral echoes, too, just like the Aladdin. “Suit yourself, boss man! As for me, I’ll sleep when I’m…well, you know what I mean. Bye, babe!”
I waved at her fondly as she floated away and vanished into the crowd.
For the first time in my life, I’d made peace with my gift, and even found a way to make it work for me. That was a plus.
On the downside, I was seriously worried that I might be falling for a woman who had died decades before I was born. | 111 | You can talk to ghosts, but you've never liked using your power much. That is, until you realized ghosts have problems too, and they're willing to pay, in their own way, for solutions to those problems. You launch a new business venture. | 574 |
A groan echoed through my tomb, low and terrible. I looked up from my work, a maelstrom of souls screaming for freedom from their confinement. The groan was followed by an echoing boom, as the doors to my home swung shut. Someone was here.
I stood, motioning towards my work. One of my servants, a mass of living shadow, flowed over to my workbench. It gathered it up, to take it to my vault. As unlikely as it was to happen, I did not wish for someone to take my work. Not until I was finished, then they would be welcome to try.
But that was not my concern right now. I extended a thought to my grimoire, making the black leatherbook follow me like a dog. The spectral green chain that linked it to me shimmered as I did so. With it close by, I took hold of an ancient staff, its silvery surface as bright as the day I made it. The Primordial Gem atop spun delicately in place, starting to smoke as I picked it up.
Now prepared, I activated a bone white ring. It connected me to my tomb, allowing me passage through the dimensional and teleportation blockades I had crafted. I felt the world collapse away, before returning in a new place. A room lit with low burning candles, walls covered in images of planes I had seen. Many shifted in place, as even depictions shared echoes of those maddening locations.
The floor was smooth, a flat clear crystal surface. Below was the endless void of the stars, one of my masterwork enchantments. It was reflected above on the vaulted ceiling, showing my tombs splendour. Three stairs led up to a dias, on which a throne of bone sat. It was carved from the skull of Evax the Ravenous, the first dragon to fight me.
Taking a seat, I waited for the visitor to come. Once entered, only I could let them out. I did not know what to expect. Sometimes groups of adventurers sought to slay me, for fame, glory and wealth. But if that was the case I would have heard their self-righteous voices by now. Maybe a conqueror wished to plead for my assistance. That would cost them a lot, as fresh materials weren't always available to me.
I was broken from my thoughts by a creaking. The iron doors of my throne room opened ponderously, revealing the figure who had entered my lair. I expected an adult or two. But what I saw instead was a child. She wore the rags of an uncared for servant, ones that hung from her emaciated body. Her skin was tight across her face, giving her a skull like appearance. She practically radiated fear, enough to the point I could almost taste it.
She took a few shaking steps in, each one looking like a great effort. The doors swung shut, sealing her in with me.
"Why have you come?"
My voice was a harsh whisper, echoing throughout the room. She looked up at me, whispering with a voice of a near broken spirit.
“F...forgive me for disturbing you...I had nowhere else to go.”
Her words intrigued me. I clicked my fingers, causing the candle flames to rise. My throne room filled with light, far more than natural. She winced at the flare up, shifting in place. I could clearly see her thinning hair, and evidence of bruising.
"What do you seek?"
She shivered. I peered into her unprotected thoughts. I saw pain and suffering, mocking and hatred. An idea, of revenge. A thought of safety. A prayer that someone would care for her.
"A.... h... home."
I had seen countless men die. I had slaughtered armies, razed cities. I had bent the very threads of reality, and defeated death itself. Good people cowered at my name, the devil himself respected me.
But in that moment, I was undone. I stared at this poor, lost child, and knew I was defeated, before I even started the fight. Holding up my staff, I pointed it to her, the Gem sparking.
"Then a home you shall have." | 457 | You are an ancient lich, feared throughout the lands for your grey and fair vengeance. One day, you are summoned, but not by a corrupt king or angry mercenary, instead by an unnaturally thin girl dressed in servants rags, who says “f...forgive me for disturbing you...I had nowhere else to go” | 959 |
Hiding in the darkest and most abandoned regions of the world, places where people will not go for reasons of remoteness, dangerous environmental conditions, or because they're exceptionally well hidden; there are still monsters. Strange, bizarre, and abominable creatures who could tear a man limb from limb. They congregate there, in hidden valleys, on unclimbable plateaus, in the midst of completely abandoned areas of former human habitation. Mankind might still vaguely remember them, the ghosts and vampires of our pasts. The creatures that ruled the night, who were strong and mighty when the world was young and recorded time had only just begun. Today they never leave those areas, they stay hidden in dark caves, pretend to be human if they can, just in case some strangers pass by, or flee at the mere possibility of a human coming near their hidden homes. This is strange, no? That such monsters, which in a one on one battle with a human will always come out on top. Such creatures of unimaginable horror and power, beings which cannot under the modern sciences be completely explained, who have such a hunger for the flesh of men that they cannot ever be sated; why would they ever fear their prey?
One might as well ask the wolves if they would fear the rabbits, should they come at them with fire, daggers, and traps.
Because mankind, a singular human being on their own, by their lonesome, are no match and easy prey for most of these abominable creatures; but together their might cannot be matched. In the early days, when Gilgamesh was king in Uruk, when the pyramids were being raised in lost Kemet, when the world of man was rising above what it had once been; there was war. A war waged in shadows by priests and kings against the darkness that lurked in the shadows. In old Mesopotamia the Babylonians drove out the Lilitu from their lands, and the men of Ilion awaited them with their Hittite allies in Anatolia, where that race was slaughtered to the last. The werewolves of Scythia were driven into the wild lands of Europe, before the Romans drove them to the brink of extinction. The Shoggoths once roamed the ruins of the Mohenjo-Daru, before the men that followed the Vedic scriptures burned them to ash and cinder. The true crones and warlocks, the hags and hexers of nightmares who were the spawn of demons and outcasts; they were all purged from the world by the combined might of many nations.
The Slavic people were followed by the vampires, the parasitic monsters that fed on the blood of mortal men, and before the Anointed Carpenter died upon the cross that group of horrors had already been driven deep into the hills and mountains. By the time missionaries came from fair Constantinople; the greatest city in the world in that age, the last few full-blooded vampires were butchered in a forgotten ruin somewhere in what would one day become Poland. The site is still considered holy to this day, and a great church, unknowingly, stands upon the graves of the last vampires. And that kept happening. Before written history comes to a place, the monsters are usually always scoured. Driven into extinction for their habit of feeding upon the flesh of mankind. And the stories of how the monsters end are rarely recorded anywhere. For instance, none are quite sure how the Norse cast out the Jotuns from this world, as the oral history was lost when the last of their Seiðkonur and Seiðmenn died, but the giants of old can never tread upon Midgard's soil again.
Wherever mankind spreads, no matter how far it is, the monsters are destroyed. Some might say that there should have been attempts at a better way. A less ruinous manner of living. But most monsters are just that. Monsters. Horrid creatures made either from cold primordial darkness or horrid unnatural light. They do not build. They do not grow. Most of them used to seek out mankind, in the dark days before recorded words. Before metallurgy. In Neolithic times. Only to slaughter and murder them. But mankind kept coming back. Didn't matter how many settlements were drained of blood. Didn't matter how many humans were slaughtered by werebeasts. Didn't matter how many eldritch horrors came to drag mankind into the darkness of forgotten caves to be tormented. Mankind kept coming back, and in greater numbers. And they learned. They made traps, they created better weapons, better tactics. The methods of killing monsters do not always come from the fiction that mankind made when they forgot that monsters were real. Almost as a form of genetic memory, mankind remembers what kills monsters. Like instinct, they can perceive where the dragon's heart is. Like it's been given to them with their mother's milk, they know how to stake the heart and drag the vampire into the sunlight. They remember, humanity always does in every generation on some level, how to kill the monsters.
And they could work together. Two human tribes might fight one another over land, food, resources, and a thousand different faiths. But when a monster began preying on them, they stood as one. Doesn't matter that the monster might have the strength of ten men, for hundreds throwing stones, firing poisoned arrows, jabbing with spears, will kill it. Doesn't matter if the monster has skin like stone, for traps that causes them to fall into pits with sharpened sticks, exposing their soft underbellies, will lead to their deaths. When the monster wakes at night to feast upon mankind, mankind comes in the light of day, dragging the confused beast out into the light and killing it brutally and violently. They never stop. They never give in. No matter what kind of monster mankind was ever faced with, they were brought low because mankind never stopped. It wouldn't matter if a thousand humans died to a clan of monsters, for the survivors would multiply and return stronger, wiser, and well-armed. | 89 | On Earth, there are monsters. Unspeakable horrors lurking in the dark corners of the world which science cannot explain and that hunger for flesh... and thousands of years of lesson after painful lesson has led them to be TERRIFIED of humans. | 217 |
Eternal life. People have killed each other for thousands of years in search of it. People would sacrifice their flesh and family for it. For so strong is the fear of death in them that they can never let it go. And it eats them up from the inside until there is nothing left, and they go to their deaths as little more than frightened shells that have lived miserable lives. I am immortal. And it was not something I became out of vanity, or fear. It was not for my personal glory or power that I cast off mortality and let the world change around me whilst I remained the same. It was for duty. Pure and utter duty. There was a place that had to be guarded. A fierce and vile thing which promised power, wealth, glory, and all manner of gifts. A liar of course. A trickster who would lead mankind to death. The druids bade me drink from their most secret of potions, so I would stand guard over that horrid thing, that lying metal monster, until it could be destroyed. I was given a blade of star-iron, and supplies to last me a decade. Then the druids left, and only returned once every decade or so to supply me with whatever I needed to maintain my vigil.
Be it armour, tools, cloth, they gave it to me. While my family grew old and died, I stood watch. As I forgot my own name, I stood guard. When the Romans came into the valley, hearing of an immortal guardian, I spoke briefly through an interpreter to their leader, a man called Hadrian. I spoke of the thing I was keeping watch over, and the many years I had stayed there. He asked only short questions, and did not dare to enter the dark cave where the creature of metal was slowly dying. After that meeting, the Romans supplied me. Until they didn't anymore. I stood there as the monks came, and bade me be baptised. Having no desire to move from my post, they did it there and then, though I recognise not their foreign god. Still, as I trained, day in an day out, the world changed. The monks came to me with supplies, and after them, priests of their new schism. At last, some time when someone called queen Victoria ruled over the isles, the army came. The beast had nearly lost its power, was nearly completely dead. The army asked if they could try to destroy it, as many weapons have been made in the days since druids and chiefs ruled over the lands of Lloegyr and Cymru. Indeed, where our bronze and iron blades had no effect on the metal beast in that age, the powers of dynamite served well to destroy it. I assisted the captain with setting destroying it, and besides me, he was the only man who had ever laid eyes on the lying metal beast, that spoke of unity amidst the stars, if we would only make it whole again.
I spent more than two thousand years in that valley, guarding that cave. I had plenty of gold and silver left over from the days when people gave sacrifices to the druids, that they might give them to me so the gods would look upon me favourably. With the beast dead and the gods of this land forgotten, I did at least not return to society as a pauper. I travelled the world, and learned of its new ways, of science and industry. Of medicine and sanitation. But everywhere I went, for I was well-known as one of the few immortals of this world, people kept accosting me. Asking me about things I had absolutely no idea about. I wasn't exactly a traveller, and neither radio, telegram, TV, or internet existed in that age. I wasn't in Judea during the death of Christ, and I frankly can't remember much from back then either. I had already been in that valley for at least a century and a half before that went down, so I can't exactly have been there to witness the crucifixion. I can't give out specifics of culture and religion in the pre-Anglo-Saxon age of Britain, because it was thousands of years ago and I have forgotten the names and faces of my people. My family.
But they keep asking. Curious people who want to know what it was like to live in the renaissance, which I didn't experience because I lived in a valley in a small house and guarded a monster that came from the stars. Or whether king Arthur was real, and I sincerely doubt that. Never heard of him back in the day, never met the man. And it is annoying. I don't know what was in the potion I was given that made me immortal either, I remember that it tasted a bit like peppermint, salt, and rot.
It's one of the reasons immortals stay away from the world. People are unnecessarily curious, and think we know everything about the period of time we went through. And we never do. Some like me spent centuries in the same general area and never got much news. Others just moved about much and never cared for learning what would be important historical events while they were happening. At least one immortal was on a constant bender spanning from the time Rome fell to the Napoleonic Wars. We're undying humans, not omniscient. One guy got stuck in a Mayan pyramid for a thousand years, how the hell is he supposed to be able to answer questions about the inquisition. I met a few interesting people, maybe once, most weren't particularly memorable. A few had some interesting stories to tell. Met a fellow called Emrys Myrddin once. Just walked into the valley and asked to be allowed to shout obscenities at the metal monster. Madder than anyone, but good company. Used to do this amazing magic trick with his hands and a torch.
But today, it's all; ''How did the protestant reformation affect your life'', or ''were you secretly the lover of Queen Elizabeth I'' or ''did the lizard people give you immortality to guard their demon machine after it turned on them'' and usually they're all inane. It's never ''thank you timeless warrior for not letting a metallic beast corrupt our kings leading to mankind getting sacrificed to evil star gods'' or ''wow, you're that guy who sacrificed thousands of years to defend humanity, let me buy you a beer''. There is the internet, or those clever people at those universities. They can answer all the questions in the world, and probably invent more of them as they go along. I just want to see the world, meet interesting people, and not have to spend every day listening to someone ask me inane questions. After all, the metal beast did that all day long.
I didn't know what was happening, but every day I was tempted by that thing. Riches. Power. Rulership of the Earth under the authority of the star-monsters. Bodacious babes and handsome hunks. Or it questioned me, tried to put doubt into me, trying to make it seem like it was self contained, even though I had to slay thousands over the years who thought that they could use the metal beast's power for themselves. Idiots the lot of them. Selfish and greedy. It could only bring pain and death. I'd seen that. I was not swayed, nor moved, by thousands of years of constant, agonizing irritation from a metal beast that would say anything or do everything if I would just release it from its bounds and grant it the world it hungered for. A world that would be sacrificed.
Frankly, when they try to ask me if I was there to see the construction of Stonehenge or if I ever spoke to Da Vinci, I almost miss that screeching metal beast. At least it wasn't an idiot.
[/r/ApocalypseOwl](https://www.reddit.com/r/ApocalypseOwl/) | 81 | As an immortal, you're getting real tired of people assuming you know everything about the past. The internet didn't exist back then, so how were you supposed to know what happened on the other side of the globe? | 322 |
I bit my lip so hard it nearly bled, but, fortunately, I didn't scream. The black eyes blinked at me as if waiting for a response. This was my daughter's imaginary friend. The one she'd told me about, the one she played with every day. She played with an Eldritch one every day...
"Mom..." My daughter whispered, nudging my arm. I snapped back to myself, trying to stop the rising panic.
"Very nice to meet you, Y'lgoth." He winced at my pronunciation but waved any attempt at an apology away. Holding out one of his four hands, which weren't really like hands at all if you looked hard enough, he motioned to my daughter. I resisted the urge to hide her behind my legs.
"She is quite a wonderful companion. And you are the progenitor?" The words twisted as if horrible sounds should be accompanying them but were held back. I took a deep breath, trying to steady my nerves. So far, he didn't seem too threatening. Never mind that he'd appeared and come out of a mirror.
"If you mean that I'm one of her parents, yes, I am. And it's one of my jobs to protect her."I said, as firmly as I dared. His head tilted to the side, the movements aping human motion, but too jerky.
"Protect her... Oh. You believe I am a threat." My hand tightened on Maisa's shoulder, as the not-right voice curled around the words.
"At the moment, I am reserving judgement. But if you become one..." I let the sentence dangle in the air, an obvious challenge. If he tried to hurt my little girl, I didn't know what I'd do. But it wouldn't be pleasant... for him.
"Please, do not fear. We are not all like the ones you have read about. In fact, many of us wish to study humanity. It is why we take this form." He gestured down his body, before frowning at Maisa. "But I think little companion that you lied to me, when you said I should have four arms. You and your mother only have two." Maisa giggled, sticking her tongue out at him. I clamped down on another urge to scream. But to my surprise, he giggled as well, sticking out a bright blue tongue back. My brain finally put the puzzle pieces together. The obvious uncomfortableness with me, but the ease with my daughter. The formal, almost too old language, that you would use if you were trying to impress someone.
"Y'gloth. How old are you?" He drew himself up, as if to gain every inch of height he could.
"I will be eight millennia old on my next birthday." He said, as proudly as possible. Maisa tugged on my arm, her signal that she wanted to whisper in my ear. I leaned down, never taking my eyes from the boy.
"He explained it once, that a millennium for them is about a year for us. So he's actually a year younger than me." She said. Across from us, Y'gloth's stomach growled. Rising, I rolled up my sleeves.
"Well. Eldritch God, or no, you sound hungry. And no child goes hungry in my house. Come downstairs, and let's get some food in you. Pancakes all right?" A too-large smile crossed the boy's face as he followed me down the stairs.
"Pancakes sound wonderful. What are they?" | 197 | "See mom?" said the girl, as a four-armed boy with black eyes stepped out of the mirror "I told you he isn't an imaginary friend!" The boy looked at the mother and said "Greetings, my name is Y'lgoth. Eldrich God." | 312 |
"Piece of shit."
I kicked the tire of my 2000 Ford F-350, not totally sure whether I was talking about the car or the asshole at home who had put off an oil change for 3000 miles over the sticker date.
I slunk back into Penny's - might as well have had a tail tucked between my legs and poking out the front of this ridiculous 1960's skirt. The reason for my apprehension was that I'd been pretty skimpy on tip sharing with the busboys that evening. I thought I'd be able to sneak away after shaving 10 dollars off each of their earnings as a stern but fair middle finger for all the cigarette breaks they had taken, leaving me to stack plates of half eaten hamburgers and pancakes all on my own. I doubted they'd see the reprimand my way though. Even worse, one of them had pulled my phone off my own charger and plugged theirs in, so the damn thing was as dead as my chances of sneaking away with an extra $20.
Sure enough, I caught a couple of glares from Mark and Pedro, still bundling together napkins and silverware at the diner counter. The place had cleared out for the night, but it was as nauseatingly lit as ever. I often wondered when an epileptic patron might meet their maker by catching a glare from one of the florescent lights as it bounced off the mirror behind the bar.
"Need to use the phone," I muttered as I brushed past where the two were sitting. I kept my head down and marched straight for the cordless landline behind the front counter.
"Let me use it after you Steph," said Pedro. "I need to call up the police and report a cheap ass bitch."
Both of them cracked up at that. This was about the height of wit that these two ever reached.
'Maybe do your fucking jobs' is what I wanted to say, but I kept silent. I had a much bigger pain in my ass to deal with at the moment.
The phone rang twice, three times, then continued on. Jack didn't often stray far from his cell phone, lord knows he was always scrolling away on Reddit, Instagram or some other medium of soft core porn.
I tried again, still nothing. Trying to contain my rage at Jack for both the broken car AND not answering his phone now, I tried our house line. He had inherited our current home from his deceased parents, and we had been too lazy to uninstall the old rotary phone.
The house line rang a couple times before picking up. A loud bang cracked through the line, and I jerked my ear away from the noise.
"Jack," I said into the phone, keeping the earpiece at a safe distance. "Jack, what was that?"
I slowly put the phone back up to my ear and heard nothing. No, there was something there. I envisioned someone throwing kitchen stools around the room based on the noise. There was a series of thumps, what sounded like panting and then a sort of...moaning?
"Jack...Jack what the hell is that?"
I strained my ear to listen. Again the phone sparked with noise, this time a scream unlike any I had ever heard a human make in my life.
I pulled the phone back again, and the scream continued to pour through the speaker. As a shiver of fear ran through me, I turned to look at Mark and Pedro. They were both looking at me, their eyes cocked in amusement.
"I guess he's really gone off the rails this time," Mark laughed. "You should probably get home and take care of that."
Jack had an alcohol problem, and Wasco wasn't big enough that everyone's business hadn't seeped into the town's bloodstream. Even the busboys knew that my boyfriend was prone to drunken fits that occasionally spiraled into violent episodes.
This wasn't any normal outburst or a wrestling match with one of Jack's friends though. That scream was something else entirely, something more primal than anything his recent spell of rage or grief could produce alone.
"Could either of you give me a ride?"
I whispered, pleading, while already knowing the answer.
"Sorry lady," Pedro responded. "I'm still got some work to do to close up. And plus, I was never much for geometry, but with gas being about $6 a gallon and you having my 10, I'd say that don't add up."
I slammed the phone back to the receiver and stomped past the two men as they chuckled. Throwing open the double glass doors, I hurried out into the hot, cloudless night. Wasco was the type of town that smelt like cow shit 24/7 because, well, there were a lot of cows shitting around here. I blinked tears out of my eyes, thinking about how Pedro and Mark looked like this city smelled. Anything to take my mind off of Jack and that horrible scream.
Our home was about two and a half miles from Penny's - not quite walking distance, but not far enough that I would have saved time by pestering one of those two until I finally convinced them to drive me. Luckily, I had already changed out of the clunky Betty Boop platform heels I wore during my shift and into my sneakers. I started off at a light jog, but my pace quickened as the sound of Jack's scream flooded my consciousness.
'What in the hell could that possibly have been?'
My mind stumbled into darkness, flipping slashing psychos and senseless mass shooters through my thoughts in slideshow mode. I stared down at the yellow line that separated the small shoulder from the road as my feet thumped the pavement, unfocused, lost in my fears. Every 50 feet or so, a streetlight on the side of the road poured a cone of light onto the pavement.
I was so transfixed that I jogged a few seconds too long before I noticed someone stumbling along the road towards me. We were almost on top of each other before I could decelerate and avoid a collision.
'Fucking tweaker' I thought as I digested the silhouette's uneven, staggering walk. I slowed my pace to a trot, creating a little space for the person to pass beside me. The figure swerved tracking directly in front of me and blocking my path. I came to a stop. I knew I was on edge, but this person's movement's betrayed a dangerous state of inebriation. I could hear a faint panting and a sort of moaning, and my body stiffened with recognition.
As the person approached, clearly a man by their stature, I stepped further out into the road to allow even more of a berth for him to pass by. He swerved again, this time stepping out into the street and close enough for me to catch a glimpse of his face in the faint streetlight.
I stifled a scream I knew no one was around to hear. The man’s eyes were fixed on me, bloodshot where any white should have been. His cheeks and chin were stained with blood, the grayish skin around his mouth dripping with organ-like substance. When he saw that I was looking back, he smiled and allowed the flesh to spill out of his mouth and onto the pavement.
In an instant, I turned and began to sprint back towards Penny’s, its glowing sign lighting up the night sky like a beacon of the sane, rational world. Any thoughts of Jack now totally absent, I didn’t stop until I could no longer hear the man’s panting behind me. I stole a glance back and saw the creature bounding down the road with its arms swinging at its sides, illuminated sporadically by patches of light. It appeared to be limping, favoring its left leg.
I didn’t look back again until my feet crunched into the gravel of Penny’s parking lot. The thing was at least a hundred yards back now, but I could still see it plodding towards the restaurant. I dipped around the side of my Ford and flung the glass doors open.
Pedro and Mark were still inside, their sleeves rolled up now as they cleaned off a set of kitchen mats in the bar sink.
“Woah there,” said Mark. “You’re looking kinda sweaty -”
He cut his quip off halfway as I locked the door and then threw the host stand to the ground. I shoved it along to the floor and in front of the glass, before rushing to the nearest dining table and hoisting it up by its sides.
“Steph, what the hell are you -”
I cut Pedro off, turning to stare at the two men. They both fell silent when our eyes met.
“Mark. Lock the back door right now,” I said. “Pedro, help me barricade this. We are absolutely fucked if you two don’t start moving. Right. Now.” | 13 | You are a waitress at a diner in the middle of nowhere, walking home from work. Halfway home, you see a man stumbling about aimlessly. “Junkies” you think, clutching your pepper spray tight. However, the man steps into the light, revealing skin like a corpse, and brain remnants in his mouth. | 42 |
The sephlid before me was large, one of the largest I'd ever seen. Granted, apart from the newborns you would find in nests, I'd never seen a grown one, apart from photos and videos. Its double jaw slightly ajar, the toungues sticking out, tasting the air, it looked at me with its large blue eyes, but did not move. My heart pounding in my chest, I cursed myself for not taking a cab back from Lilly's, instead of risking the walk through the woods. Sightings were uncommon, sure, but not unheard of. They say men are inferior at risk assesment, and I wished I'd have kept that in mind as Lilly offered to pay for the cab.
We stood there, frozen, watching eachother, waiting for the other to make a move. The sephlids long tail, curled up behind it, shivered slightly, and it slowly started to move it's green slithering body towards me. Walking upright, it held its arms raised towards me, the three fingers on each hand curling and uncurling as if it was imagining strangling me. I wanted to scream, I wanted to run, but all I could do was stand there, waiting for the inevitable.
It was almost on me now, I could see the blank green skin glisten in the moonlight, condensation rising from it and mixing with the one from my shaky breaths. It stopped, centimeters from me, and put one finger on the skin under my left eye. Everything turned white around me, as if the snow had been carried up all around and was forming a barrier, a little world for my death to play out in. But then, tiny flickers in the white. Something was approaching at high speed. I ducked and braced for its impact, having no understanding of what it was or what was happening. My eyes had closed, but as I found myself still breathing and unharmed I opened them again. It was as if I was watching a movie right in front of me. It was some sort of vision, almost like a screen. In it, I saw myself as a kid, maybe eight years old, hunkering down in the grass and looking at something. A sephlid nest, with one egg in it. Young me called out.
"Dad! I found one!"
"Well, use your shovel then, crack it!" The reply was faint, almost unintelligible.
Young me raised the shovel, and slammed it down towards the egg, but halted just before impact, resulting in the shovel striking the egg without force, making a tiny clinking noise. Young me looked at the egg, and then suddenly reached out to touch it. I smiled.
The vision subsided, and in the blink of an eye all the whiteness was on the ground again, only the whiteness of the moon shining down from above. The sephlid was nowhere to be seen, and I was still breathing.
Kinda new at this, please be gentle! | 53 | Some time ago, an intelligent and predatory species emerged on Earth, and humans have been killing them off ever since to survive. But the first time you met one, you spared it. Unbeknownst to you, it never forgot that act of mercy. | 101 |
# Endless Worlds Most Beautiful
**"Unidentified civilian vessel, this is USS Midway,"** Captain Haldt drawled at the hologram. "Please state the nature of your emergency, and help will be on the way."
The only response Haldt got was the gentle rotation of the hologram, displaying the vessel in real time. It was a small, flat teardrop, about thirty meters in length. Standard, for lower-end civilian transport.
Shareholder Quinn tapped the hologram, flicking their slender fingers twice before adding in a small speck near the front end of the vehicle. Haldt gave them a curious glance. "Notice something, shareholder?"
"Yeah, I don't have a head for the size of this thing. I added in a banana for scale," they said. "Look, Captain, are you sure we risk helping some random unmarked civilian? The drive signature's going haywire; I don't want to be anywhere near that ball of radiation if it blows."
Haldt rolled her eyes. "You want to talk scale? Ever wonder why this ship's called the Midway?"
Quinn raised an eyebrow. "Because it's somewhere midway between corporate disaster and military nightmare?"
Haldt chuckled. "Not far off. Midway got her name from an old ship back on Earth. Biggest of her kind. You want a banana for scale?" Haldt zoomed out the scale on the hologram, until the teardrop ship was nothing more than a blip next to one of the titanic engines of the USS Midway. "If we wanted, we could sneeze on the damn ship and it'd become nothing but disincorporated plasma. There's no danger to be had by investigating a spare civilian. Besides, we're here to protect the people of Sol; I'd much rather be running rescue missions than combat operations."
Quinn grumbled. "I still don't like it."
"Then I'll tell you what," Haldt said. "I'm sending two of the boarding crews to check out what's what, since our friends don't seem inclined to respond. Why don't you join the away team? Keep an eye on them, if you think they're wasting your time."
Quinn rubbed their chin. "Alright, fair. Give me five to get shelled up. Kiss for luck?"
Haldt grinned. "Business before pleasure, soldier. But I'll see you when you get back."
Quinn winked at Haldt, then stood, stretching in the gentle thrust of half-gravity. After a moment to adjust after sitting for so long, they loped along the halls towards the hangar bays. The ambient algorithms had already figured out their destination; elevators were called ahead of time, arrows on the wall helpfully provided directions, and Quinn's shell was ready and waiting for them by the time they reached the hangars. Blurring the line between spaceship and spacesuit, the shell was a thick, bullet-shaped casing of metal, equipped with robotic appendages and top-of-the-line fall thrusters. Quinn had hardly any training when it came to boarding other ships, but the unparalleled protection of the shell meant they didn't need it.
Their boarding companions, on the other hand, were not so lucky. Equipped only with minimalistic spacesuits, they eyed their new supervisor with irritation.
"Keep the suit out of my way," the mission leader muttered under his breath. "Alright, everyone, we've got orders from the Captain. Suspicious civilian liner is suspicious, and we're getting bizarre readings from their drive, so be ready to evac if it looks like things are about to blow. We're doing things smart—once we're docked to make sure we don't depressurize any civilians still living inside, we'll have a drone cut its way on board. Get to your stations."
It was a scant few minutes before the two ships approached—one to dock, one to stay back and run support if hostiles were on board. It was vanishingly unlikely that anything could take the lot of them on, of course, but the precautions were in place for a reason.
With a thud, the two ships connected, the airlock making a perfect seal against the metal of the ship. A holographic feed of the cutting drone began to play.
Quinn leaned forwards, ordering the shell to reach out, and tapped the hologram. The mission leader gave her a frown. "What are you—"
"Banana for scale," they said, sticking out their tongue as they edited in a holographic banana.
The mission leader scowled, starting to speak, then frowned, turning towards the camera feed. "Hey. Hey, what the fuck is that?"
As if they'd poked an anthill with a stick, from within the interior of the ship, a swarm of inky blackness poured forth. The poor drone lasted seconds against the onslaught before dissolving in a swarm of sparks. The soldiers gripped their weapons while the mission leader reached for the comms.
"Unknown hostiles on board! Slag the ship, slag the—" The commander's voice abruptly cut off as they slapped the manual distress button.
And found that it, too, had splashed into a swarm of black specks.
The mission leader didn't even have time to scream as Quinn finally made sense of what they were seeing. The nanites raced up the mission leader's spacesuit, stalled only momentarily by the plastic, and reached the leader before he could even grab his gun.
The empty spacesuit splashed onto the floor, melting moments later as the nanites assimilated them.
In the distance, the second ship must have noticed something was wrong—Quinn had no idea how smart the nanites were, but it wasn't intelligent enough to disable their comms systems beforehand. The holographic feed wasn't focused on their ally, but Quinn still felt it as tremors ran through the ship, distant railgun fire shaking the conjoined, nanite-ridden bodies—
And then a direct hit from a railgun blasted the ship apart.
One moment, they were people fighting an unstoppable swarm; the next, they were component molecules drifting in the vacuum of space. Quinn distantly recognized the flashes of railgun fire streaking through the disguised civilian ship, cutting through the nanite cloud like a knife through water and doing about as much lasting damage. The nanite swarm fired a single shot back.
Within seconds, the ship was already being eaten from the inside out, melting into formless dark.
Frantically, Quinn ordered a connection to the USS Midway. Captain Haldt gave them a tight, grieving look.
"Haldt," Quinn stammered, "I'm sorry, I couldn't—I didn't know—"
"It's okay, Quinn. It's okay. It's going to be okay. Fire the magnetar!" The Captain directed that last comment at someone offscreen; moments later, the space the nanite swarm had occupied blurred as incomprehensibly vast forces tore the nanites apart. It seemed as if that strained even the regenerative capabilities of the swarm, because it split into a thousand smaller entities, each homing in unerringly on the massive ship.
"It's... yeah. It's going to be okay. It's going to be okay," Quinn repeated to themself. In the distance, more magnetar fire ripped the nanite clouds apart. The Midway would survive. The Midway would survive, and Quinn would get to come home and...
And Quinn knew that she was lying to herself.
Because already, she could see the streaks of darkness eating away at the shell that stood between her and the void of space.
"I'm so, so sorry," Captain Haldt whispered, and Quinn knew that she had come to the same realization long before her. Someone hesitantly asked Haldt a question, but she just shook her head. "I... I want you to know that I love you. And that I'm here for you. Whatever you want, any request you have—I'll fulfill it to the best of my ability."
Quinn choked out a half-laugh, half sob. The darkness had nearly reached her arms. Somewhere, flares of energy marked where the nanites encountered the active defense systems around the USS Midway. "Can you—can you give me a kiss for good luck?"
Captain Haldt's expression crumpled.
As if they were holding the weight of a star on her shoulders, she shakily managed a smile.
"Business before pleasure, soldier. I'll see you on the other side."
Haldt blew Quinn a kiss, right before the holographic feed was consumed by the nanites.
And Quinn fell into shadow and dust, weeping with a smile on her face.
A.N.
If you liked this, I write a serial [here,](https://www.reddit.com/r/bubblewriters/comments/uxmwe4/soulmage_masterpost/?sort=new) more in this universe [here,](https://www.reddit.com/r/bubblewriters/comments/vnuh9j/ewmb_we_are_meeting_an_advanced_benevolent_alien/) and other stories at r/bubblewriters. | 22 | The year is 2249 and you’re the Captain of the USS Midway. The inner and outer colonies are at war. You are stationed at the limits of fed control to combat the rebels one day you notice something weird. A civilian liner is drifting alone with only a faint distress call coming from it. | 62 |
"Hey guys, welcome to my channel, and today, we are going LIVE to see if this supposed legend is REAL!"
I have never believed in urban legends. I don't believe in ghosts, demons, all that religious crap. I have become famous for my ghost-chaser and myth-buster type personality, and I have made a living from that on my YouTube channel. I gained a significant amount of subscribers recently, and I said for my 500k special I would do my own town's urban legend.
"So, I am currently at the intersection with the road named 'The Dead Lane' and I am about to move the barriers to get my truck on the road. It is currently 12:30 where I live, and I am just waiting for more viewers to get in here before I head off. How's everyone's day or night going?"
A large number of chat messages flooded the chat logs. They were mostly just greetings and responses from my question.
"Good, good, its going okay so far, not good."
Then one of them catches my eye.
"My mod says, 'DONT DO IT YOU WILL DIE!!!!!!!' Bro dude, it'll be funny! You milk my death for views. Besides, who believes this crap anyways. I have been doing this for a while now and the only thing that happened during my channel that was vaguely supernatural was the famous vase clip. And even then the most obvious theory is it was simply the wind."
"Ok, I think I waited long enough."
I set down the phone on a curb with the camera facing the barriers. I then go to the barriers and move them off the road and onto the sidewalk. I grab my phone from the curb and get into my truck. I set my phone onto a phone holder put into the radio.
"Alright guys, apparently if you go down this road you will disappear and will never be found again. Well, if I 'disappear' then I will have you guys to know what happened to me."
I turn on the engine and start driving down the road.
"Also, if your worried I will lose connection to you guys, there is a portable cell tower attached to my truck. It costed me a solid 150 grand, but you guys helped me buy it with the donations, plushies, and Patreon, so thanks for that! You guys are amazing! That being said, however, the stream quality still won't be that great so, just to warn y'all."
I drive for about two minutes, just responding to messages and donations. Nothing happens.
"Welp, the road lights just ended. I will now put on fog lights to help with your viewer experience."
I turn on the fog lights.
"So how's the vi-"
I suddenly realized I had not put the phone on the dashboard and positioned the camera to face out my windshield.
"I'm sorry y'all. I forgot you were still on my phone holder. There you go. Is that good?"
A meaningless question, as I couldn't see the chat logs anymore.
Ten more minutes go by. Seemingly nothing happens. But something must have. If nothing happened, then nothing would have explained what happened next.
I was about to turn around and head back as this road seemingly never ended. However, just as I was about to tell my viewers it was time to give up, I saw a silhouette of a town ahead. I actually got excited, as this is the first actual supernatural-like thing to happen to me. This town wasn't on any maps, old or new, as the road just look as if it ended suddenly.
It wasn't until I get very close to the city until I realized something. The town looked deserted and destroyed. It had rotting buildings with crumbles fences and rusted and destroyed cars filling the streets.
"Holy crap guys, this is crazy! Are you seeing thi-"
My voice stops when I look at my phone. I start to shiver in fear. The phone on the dashboard is not the same phone as I had owned. It was completely different. And it looked broken.
It didn't make any sense. It looked completely normal and fine just a few seconds ago.
I hurriedly leave my truck, and close the door. I look out at the intersection that would introduce me to this town.
Then I look back at my truck.
Only, it wasn't my truck anymore. It was actually a normal SUV. And it looked just as destroyed as the cars at the intersection.
I let out an audible "WTF" as I jump back and start running towards the intersection.
But something stops me. Something that would make me terrified. Something that would make me realize that some legends should not be explored.
The city looked familiar.
Edit: gramar | 28 | There is an urban legend in your city. If you follow a certain path, a street sign will become visible. It has been claimed that no one who goes down that road ever returns. You’re determined to find out if that’s fact or fiction. | 71 |
"I'm sick of being a person. I'm going to go lie in the woods and become a geological feature," Nora proclaimed, bored of life as she sipped a coffee on a work morning barely a year into her career.
"Which woods," Henry asked snarkily.
"The closest ones."
"Ah, you won't get the glacial striations."
"I just have to wait for an ice age."
"At least we're hurrying that up for you."
At this point an older coworker came into the kitchenette and poured himself coffee. "I don't know about becoming a rock, but if you want to wait for that long, you should try becoming a monk."
The age difference and his form of speech made Nora and Henry want to roll their eyes at their colleague.
"You know, being a person itself is really hard," the man continued. "But if you try to stop, your body will fight you."
"I'm sure there's a way," Henry decided to cut in.
"Of course, but at that point, maybe you have a reason to continue being a person."
"Maybe I want to be a part of the geology," Nora sighed. The man nodded, took his newly filled coffee cup and left.
"Maybe we're all already geology," Henry said.
"Am I igneous?"
"I'm sedimentary -"
"Sedentary."
"Hey, I have layers, ok!" | 13 | "I'm sick of being a person. I'm gonna go into the woods and lie down in the dirt and become a geological feature." | 37 |
“Dad was an honorable man,” my aunt began, glancing towards the lawyer sitting off to the side of the church.
I was seated in the third row next to my sister, who rolled her eyes and leaned over to me. "Not honorable enough to keep it in his pants though,” she whispered.
I held in a snort and coughed instead as the young woman sitting in front of us shifted uncomfortably, shuffling some papers she was holding in her hands. Apparently, she was my grandpa’s mistress he'd met after my grandma passed and she'd somehow managed to demand a speaking slot alongside grandpa’s four children.
“…and he would have been proud of my plans to open the world’s first designer sleep mask company with his support,” my aunt continued into the microphone.
My dad, who would give his eulogy last, looked across at us nervously. I forced an encouraging smile, followed by two things up. A loud, dramatic, sob echoed through the speakers as my aunt’s husband rushed on stage to console her.
“…I just,” my aunt got out between exaggerated breaths, “wish… I could tell him…more about my great idea.”
She burst into tears as she walked over to his coffin, kissing it as the priest moved back up to the podium.
“And now,” the priest said, checking his notes as my aunt walked off stage with her husband rubbing her back, “we have Ms Donaldson to say a few words.”
There was a murmur of intrigue as the young woman stood. The clunk of her heels echoed down the aisle like a slow military drum beat. She took a moment to compose herself at the podium and then looked up and smiled.
“I met the love of my life three year ago,” she began.
My sister leaned over again and whispered under her breath, “any earlier and we’d be having this ceremony in a Federal Prison, she’s barely older than me!”
“…and my love knew I was a true entrepreneur, which is why I plan to open a sleep support service for pets,” the young woman continued from the podium.
I nodded towards the lawyer, who was smiling up at Ms Donaldson with dreamy eyes, “so what do you reckon the criterion was?”
“You know what he was like, some sentimental crap probably.”
I was opening my mouth to respond when gasps of shock rang out through the church. I turned back to the front to see my grandpa’s mistress holding up a photo of them kissing.
“…you see? You all think I made this up, but I didn’t! I loved him,” she said, dabbing the dry makeup under her eye. A moment later she was walking off stage.
“Did you catch any of that?” My sister whispered. I shook my head and looked over at dad getting to his feet. The woman sat down in front of us as my sister coughed something obscene under her breath, sparking a sharp look from the woman over her shoulder.
“We all knew my father,” my dad began.
“Dad’s got this in the bag,” I whispered to my sister. As dad began explaining how he’d once put tape over his father’s mouth to stop him snoring, something started ringing near us and the woman in front pulled out a phone and answered.
“Aww, thanks honey,” she said into the phone, making little attempt to keep her voice down.
“This is a funeral! Can you please stop talking on your stupid friggin phone?” My sister demanded in a hushed voice.
“…and that’s how it all started,” my dad continued from the podium, “forty years later dad was running the most successful anti-snoring device company in the world. I can’t claim responsibility, but dad did used to say I was a pretty smart kid. So, yeah, I think he’d be pretty proud of my plans to expand the business to include sleep escorts. Thanks.”
With that, dad looked up and beamed, waiting for the applause before remembering it was a funeral and straightening himself up. He walked over to the casket as the priest walked back to the podium.
“Let us pray,” he began, pausing for a moment, “we are here to celebrate the life of Arthur James Jeremiah Toomey. He was a good man, and he will be missed.”
I looked over to my sister as dad sat down, “did you talk to dad about his big idea?”
She shook her head, looking as confused as me.
An hour later I was standing in the corner of a tiny room, stuffed with people wearing black and so humid the walls were starting to sweat. The four siblings were there, along with Ms Donaldson, leaning over the desk all trying to speak to the lawyer at once. The grandchildren mulled around the perimeter, siblings whispering quietly to one another, snatching guarded glances at their rivals.
“Okay, okay!” The lawyer said, holding up his hands. Silence fell over the room.
“Arthur wishes me to say that he thanks you all for your kind words,” he said, causing one of my cousins to snigger.
“And,” he continued, “he hopes you will all come to understand his decision, or rather, my decision, with time.”
“Yeah, ok well can we get to it then?” My aunt asked.
“Yes, yes,” the lawyer replied, “and you all did give such wonderful speeches. But without further ado, I’m pleased to announce that the estate in its entirety will go to…”
He glanced at each face before him one by one before looking back down at his card, “Father Thomas.”
The room erupted. Yells, shouts, screams, cries. Chaos.
“Quiet please!” The lawyer said as he got to his feet.
Slowly people started to pull themselves together, eager to hear what else he had to say before they left to call their own lawyers.
“I’m sorry to say, but Father Thomas was the only one who met the criterion set by Arthur,” the lawyer said.
“But the priest didn’t even give a eulogy!” The young woman said.
“Well, technically the rules were flexible enough to allow anyone who spoke to qualify, and Father Thomas was the only one who met the criterion,” he replied.
“And what was that?” My dad asked.
“That someone would say that Arthur would be missed,” the lawyer replied.
“That’s ridiculous – of course we miss him! And what about the other criteria?” My aunt asked.
“Well he didn’t leave criteria, did he? That was all he asked,” the lawyer said and shrugged. | 901 | Your wealthy relative has died and the funeral is coming up. The will stipulates that the funeral-goer that delivers the best eulogy inherits everything. Your late relative left scoring criterion that no one knows except the lawyer that will be judging at the funeral. | 2,718 |
I entered the elevator. Just before I can enter the secret code to access the underground base of the League an older man in his fifties enters the elevator exhausted and taps in the code I was about to enter. He looked at me.
“Sorry, but you are going to have to forget this.” The elevator began to move down.
“No I won’t. I am one of you. I arrived just now.” I showed him my badge identifying me as a hero of the League.
“Oh, good. Are you new? I have never seen you around here before. I am Dieter Baumann also known as *Eisenfaust*. How old are you?” Of course the last question always came when people met me for the first time. Everyone who looked old always wanted to look young, but if you look like you are still 16 it’s just annoying.
“No I am not new. I’m 29 years old; yes I know I look like I still go to school. And you have met me before, just not my secret identity.”
“Shouldn’t you be in a hurry then? Everyone else arrived at least half an hour ago. And won’t you tell me who you are?”
“I will answer both of these questions at the same time. I always arrive late, because I don’t want anyone to know my secret identity, not even my hero colleagues. Therefore I will not tell you my civilian name and you will know who I am once we are in the locker room.” We stood in silence for a few minutes, the elevator still moving down.
“But why do you not even want other heroes to know who you are? We’re not going to rat you out to the villains.” He chuckled slightly at the last sentence.
“Maybe not intentionally, but the more people know, the less secure the secret is. Do I need to remind you of what happened to *Löwenmann*, *Faraday* or *Nachtwolf*? I do not want to risk it. You will only be the second person who even knows what my secret identity looks like and I would appreciate it very much if you would respect my wish for secrecy.”
“So who is the other one who knows? Your girlfriend?” He remembered my age and added “Or wife?”
*Husband* I thought. “Why should I tell you any more about myself? Please just respect it. If you have something to talk about that is not personal then go ahead, otherwise just drop it.”
The rest of the elevator ride was completely silent. Arriving in the base we headed for the empty locker rooms. Going to my own locker I took out my hero costume. A fire-red dress that glowed like a pleasant ray of sunshine as soon as I started to call on my powers. Looking in the mirror on the inside of the door of the locker I could see my hair changing its colour to red and starting to glow similar to the dress I had put on by now. My full beard disappeared and make-up applied itself to my face. Why a feminine face and voice, once I would speak again, came with my powers I never quite understood, but I never complained. It made for a very easy alibi for my secret identity.
As I made my way out of the locker room I ran into *Eisenfaust* again, now in a steel grey suit and with cast-iron gloves. I could see the surprise on his face as he started to exclaim “You are…” but before he could get anywhere I cut him off.
“Not so loud.” He started again, at normal volume this time.
“You are *Frau Sonnenschein*?”
​
​
​
I am new to writing so if you find anything I could do better please let me know. | 10 | He entered the elevator at a dead run and in a near panic, and punched the buttons for nine different floors in a complicated sequence. Then gave you a sympathetic look and said, "sorry, but you're going to have to forget this." You've just arrived several miles underground. | 42 |
The youngest of the elders summons me. We fly up to the elders’ spot at the very top of the human-home, where it’s warm even in the winter. I’m not the strongest of us, or the highest flier, but I’m clever, and I have the sharpest eyes. Would I undertake a quest in service of the Ancient? Of course I would.
Youngest Elder spends several days preparing me. We stand on the wires and watch the humans until I can spot just the thing I’ll be looking for. Then the elders wish me good luck. I’m on my own now.
I start with the old secret hunting grounds, but the world has changed since anyone last undertook this quest and those are all bare. I fly as high as I can. My sharp eyes serve me well. The world is full of shinies, and if I had to check each one by one I would never be done.
I keep searching. I hide from hawks, and endure the mobbing of lesser birds. When I get tired, I keep the face of the Ancient in my mind, and remember how He fed my parents through the winters, and their parents before them. I learn patience.
Finally, I come to the shores of a lake. The humans had been swimming in the water like ducks ,and had gone home as evening fell. I see a flash among the pebbles, and circle down. I find it! I pick it up in my beak, and carry it back to our own territory.
The elders confirm my find with joyful calls. Finally, it is time for me to undertake the final flight of my quest.
*“Aaron, your crows are watching us again.”*
*“I guess? I’m sorry, I always worry that it’s creepy, or-”*
*“No, I’ve told you, I like it. Aw, one is flying toward us. Is it carrying something-? Oh. Oh my God. Aaron. Oh my God. How did you-? Yes, yes, of course yes!”*
The other human cries as the Ancient slides the ring I carried onto one of her fingers, and I’ve watched humans enough now to know those are tears of joy. The Ancient looks shocked, but joyful too.
The elders had initiated me into the great secret. The Ancient dies; but thanks to me, the Ancient will also be reborn. | 22 | You and your grandfather look almost identical. His treatment of the local crow population and "his" existence beyond multiple generations of crows has inspired his imagery to reach near deification, and by extension, their treatment of you. | 68 |
"hey it's Clark, miss me ?" sighs " it's been 1 year and 7 months, and "I'm back" hah, I'm back to this life, I'm back to talking to this recorder.."
Clark sits down on his red old, dusty couch, with his head down holding the recorder in his right hand
"no one else to talk to really, before I thought no one liked me, now after all this, I have become sure of it, I don't think I will ever have a normal conversation with mom, or my brother for that matter, when things are good between us, it means they are just awkward, which is understandable I gues- you know what ? its not, its fucking awful, I didn't do this, it wasn't me, I didn't"
Clark breaks into tears, head still down
"I miss her man, if she was here she would've understood it all, she would have made all this funny somehow, she understood it all, she did, she was warm, oh god she was so war-"
he continues crying, remembering his sister, all the good times they had together, he remembers the bad ones, that time they spent the whole day in shopping carts talking and going through her breakup, the way it made him feel that he was important to someone, he had the ability to help his sister, go through difficult stuff, he made her laugh that day, he helped anyone that mattered that much, he was joyous, that was joy, that can't be joyous anymore.
"I miss her so much, I miss her voice, her smile, and her opinion, she was my favourite person, my person"
clark can't stop sobbing, his eyes filled with tears, all red, and tired sleepless, he remembers the time she told him that when crying, its important not to forget to take long breaths she said your exhale should be longer than your inhale, that way you relief the pressure off of your internal organs, and prevents internal pain and damage, he takes one, and a couple more, pulls his head back and looks at the roof and says
"I can't believe I ate her."
gets up, looks at the voice recorder
"I can't, I can't do this just yet y'know ?"
shuts the recorder off
walks to the kitchen, shreds the plastic bag that holds two bottle of whiskey in them and take one out, he looks at it, feels disgusted, feels ashamed, disappointed, pulls out the recorder and starts yelling
"you know what? fuck this, fuck this feeling of guilt, like how unlucky am I to be the only one in my family to get infected, become a zombie, kill half of the people I know, kill my sister, and put the fear and horror in eyes of the other half, traumatising them, traumatise the closest people to me, and now miraculously I get healed, haha healed, yeah... its so unfair man, they looking at me as if I'm guilty of what happened, they are treating me as if I was a drunk junky serial killer who now decided to get sober... its not fair, not fair to them as well, no one is lucky here, except my father, died way before any of this shit ever started, scariest thing he saw was probably my aunt dying out chocking on a piece of meat, huh, the easy lif- \*knock knock knock\* .... dude someone is on the door, someone is here! here ? who ?"
\*part one done\* | 23 | Turns out, the zombie infection was only temporary. Years after the initial outbreak, all zombies gradually turned back to normal, without even a scar, with memories of all the things they done. | 140 |
Mr. Robinson was a little stunned to meet my parents, to say the least. On the left, my mother, a holstaur, hulking and red-furred, and dressed in a tight, striped suit and with the Faelens being worn over her snout. A solid gold ring pierced through the nose, she looked like a pin-up for the minotaur crowd at the school.
Meanwhile, my father was a Siren Laird. His much smaller figure belied a body that was muscled cord and *lean*, almost skeletal on the torso. He muddled about on land with a Talisman of Landwalking, a gift from Great Aunt Ursula, and sat down at though he were infested with tailgat.
And in the middle? Me, with my humanised appearance, although my flame-red-golden hair and soot-flecked eyes gave me away as non-human.
Mr. Robinson spoke to my parents, the put-upon expression he made making its way into his voice. "And so, you see, we weren't expecting him to play lifeguard to the drowning faunus for 15 minutes underwater....nor were we expecting a passion play to be continued after she started breathing again. After all, he *is* 16...." he trailed off, more than a little embarrassed about what had happened. He was supervising our visit to the local springs as part of our education.
My mother snorted, the scent of dew and steam billowing from her nostrils. "Of course he did...."
Mr Robinson stared for a second at Dad, his head tilting and sense of wonder in his eyes....before Mother stepped on Dad's toes and fins. Dad yelped, and Mother spoke again.
"Well, we'll need to speak to a Witch who specialises in genetic adaptation, and the genealogist about what *else* we can expect to see from our darling son. Our daughter is like her father, and our other son plays professional water polo in the Mermaid League.
"I swear to you we didn't know about this being possible," Mother spoke, slapping her knees with her giant hands, pushing herself to her hooves. "Come on, boys!" She spoke with a wryness and dryness that spoke of ill-omens to come over evening dinner.
/ / / / / / /
As we sat in the mythobiologist's office, the Cephalopod's tentacle beard started twitching in excitement.
"You know," he slurred, as Cephalopods didn't have the exact mouth shape or cords to speak properly, "He special. His skin, use oxygen from water or air to breathe, and no switch needed. Is natural. Like *wooboobobobob* sound from me. Muscle tissue fine, too - get boost in time of need or stress. Make life simpler - take care of skin, and body heal itself and recover fast. Like tiny fairy." | 31 | You're the child of a minotaur and a mermaid. You look completely human, except for a few weird quirks... | 62 |
What is justice?
With the advent of superpowers, this question quickly shot to the forefront of everyone's mind. To some, it was maintaining order in society. To others, it was people getting what they deserved.
To me...
Well, I still don't know.
Civilization as a whole plunged into chaos the first week after the meteorite struck. Plenty of people saw it as an opportunity to move up in the world. Yes, this included villainy, but it wasn't limited to it. Many also rose to the occasion and stopped these abuses of power. They were called heroes.
Soon enough, keeping metahumans in check became a profession of its own. Comic books had already provided a mold for us to follow and the populace quickly embraced it. These people became celebrities over night. Their stories, often coming from humble origins and using their powers for the benefit of others, were very easy to admire.
This wasn't the only side effect, though. With all the excitement of superheroes finally existing, it was easy to ignore all the other areas of society that suffered a massive overhaul. Mine, for instance, was medicine.
I'd wanted to be a doctor ever since I was little. The thought of healing other people through the use of reason and technique was something short of magical. In many ways, it was like being a superhero. Long hours, deaths that were out of your control, and a huge weight of responsibility that loomed over your head twenty-four seven. Despite how hard it was, I always found it easy manage since I knew I was doing good.
Then came the meteorite, and with it, came laypeople with the ability to magically heal others.
Terminal diseases suddenly became curable. Injuries that would take months to recover could be undone with a simple touch.
All of a sudden, doctors weren't as needed anymore. This isn't to say we were completely useless. There weren't enough people with healing abilities to fix *everyone*, so we still had a role to fill.
Their superior efficiency, however, couldn't be denied. For every patient I treated, a meta-doctor could cure twenty. Most emergency rooms only needed *one* of these people, as opposed to the teams we used to have. More than that, many people simply didn't want to be treated by a mundane doctor. Not when a magical fix was readily available.
A lot of my peers quit the field of medicine.
We had to take massive pay cuts, since we just weren't as valuable, and many decided it wasn't worth it anymore. Those of us who stayed were treated like glorified nurses, which some just couldn't handle, since very few things were bigger than the ego of a skilled doctor. Furthermore, despite having a lower salary, our six-figure student loans had stayed the same and the banks certainly didn't care.
We went from earning a good living to barely surviving every month.
And yet... I couldn't quit.
Maybe it was another manifestation of my doctor's ego. Maybe I just didn't know what else to do. Or maybe, just maybe, I was hoping that my powers would soon manifest.
That never happened, though. For a few years, I wondered why I ever bothered trying. The media paraded around the heroes and claimed that justice had finally arrived to the world. A new class of people had emerged, and they weren't afraid to show they were superior. People like me, who never got powers, were in a minority. Was this really fair to us? Why should I contribute to a society claiming that my misfortune was a benefit to the whole?
I didn't let my resentment consume me, though. The undeniable truth was that the field of medicine had progressed far beyond what we used to have. All it took was looking in the eyes of a freshly healed cancer patient to understand this. I really couldn't resent meta-doctors. They were saving more people in a month than I could in my entire life.
One day, however, a supervillain entered our hospital and held us hostage. We all knew his identity. Voltage, a key member of the supervillain group 'Retribution'. He electrified a few security guards in the ER and shouted:
"Who's the meta-doctor here?!?"
Everyone stayed quiet.
"I swear..." Voltage started crackling with energy. "If a meta-doctor doesn't leave with me, I'll start frying everyone in this building!"
A few people started crying. Others cowered behind whatever furniture they could find. Most important of all, Pierce, the meta-doctor on shift, made himself as small as possible.
I quickly scanned the room for him, hoping to urge him with my eyes.
He simply avoided eye-contact with me.
Some of my peers, mundane doctors like me, had a growing anger in their faces. They were outraged at Pierce's cowardice. In a few seconds, they were going to sell him out.
"It's me!" I shouted.
Everyone widened their eyes.
"What are you doing?" whispered a peer of mine. "Just offer Pierce up!"
"No," I replied, lowering my voice. "If he's gone, many people who could otherwise live will die. If *I'm* gone-"
"Fuck that!" said my friend, struggling to keep whispering. "They'll kill you!"
I didn't respond as I walked away. The ugly truth was that I'd felt so useless that I would leap at the chance to feel valuable again. I really didn't care if I died.
Doctor Pierce gaped his mouth. He had the chance to speak up and take my place, but didn't have the courage to do so.
Voltage didn't question my credentials. He knocked me out with a shock to the head and, once I woke up, I was in Retribution's lair.
----------
>*continued below* | 617 | A meteor strikes the Earth, and everyone seems to get superpowers… everyone except you. You’ll do anything to figure out what yours are, but the world has changed and your options are desperate. | 1,953 |
Amber was surveying the stacks of moving boxes, trying not to feel overwhelmed, when Carly walked in with the teddy bear. “Look, mommy!”
It was all Amber could do to keep from crying. She had cried enough in front of Carly lately, she thought. Too much, probably. “Oh, that’s Sir Teddy!” she said, kneeling down to look at him. The years and the moths had taken their toll, but there was no mistaking him. “Where did you find him?”
“In grandma’s closet,” Carly said. “It smelled funny.”
Of course that’s where it was, Amber thought. One day her mother had confiscated it, who even remembered why, and it had just been gone. It hadn’t been the first thing to abruptly vanish from her life, and it certainly hadn’t been the last. Exactly the kind of bad memory she had known moving into her parents’ old house would bring up. But what better option did she have?
“You know,” Amber said instead. “Sir Teddy was very special to me, when I was about your age. He helped me feel brave.”
“I know,” Carly said. “Sir Teddy told me.”
“Oh, did he?” Amber smiled. “I bet he’s full of stories about when I was little, isn’t he?”
“Mmhm,” Carly said. “He told me how he protected you from the Floor Monster.”
The words hit Amber like an unexpected slap, and she felt the room start to spin. “The what now?” she asked, trying to keep her voice light.
“The monster that lives in between the floors,” said Carly, matter of factly. “Sir Teddy says he’ll protect me from it too.”
Amber took a deep breath. Then another. She thought about what her own mother would have said, if she had dared mention the Floor Monster to her. She put her hand over Carly’s, feeling the bear’s fur. It was patchy and stiff with age, but it did help her feel brave.
“Well,” said Amber. “Sir Teddy isn’t as young as he used to be. So how about mommy helps protect you from the Floor Monster too?” | 48 | You see your daughter playing with your favorite stuffed animal from when you were her age. She then looks at you and mentions something you've only ever said to your stuffed animal. | 138 |
The crowd watched as the hero tried once again to pull the blade from the rock, only to fail and fall to her knees. Several women in the crowd could be heard sobbing; all hope was lost now. As the hero sat on the ground, watching her hands with confusion, she heard footsteps behind her. A gardener, she saw as she turned around - seemingly either ignorant or without care to the gathering of people nearby.
Her surprise turned to shock as the gardener effortlessly pulled the sword out of the stone, snipped a few branches around it, and put it back before walking off.
"W-wait!" she yelled out to the gardener.
"Afternoon," he said and tipped his straw hat.
"You- you just pulled out the sword!"
"Rose bush needed trimming."
"But... that means you are the prophesized hero! The realm needs you! The evil warlock-"
"No," the gardener interrupted her. She stared at him silently for a moment.
"What do you mean, 'No'?" she asked.
"Not doing it again. Some big bad asshole trying to take over the kingdom, right? Don't care. I've done more than enough of those already."
"But," she pleaded, "the realm is in danger!"
"The realm is always in danger, lady. Get someone else. I'm done," he said and bent over to dig up weeds in a bed of lilies.
The hero stared at him; he was an old, greying man with only a faint scar above his right eye. He didn't seem like a warrior, but... only one kind of person would be able to pull the sword out. And if that person did not care for the Kingdom, then... hmm.
"A shame," she said with feigned disinterest. "The Warlock is bound to arrive at L'etharel any day now."
The gardener stopped. "L'etharel?" he asked.
"Oh, yes. It will be a shame to see it burn. I heard the gardens of the Royal Palace there are some of the most beautiful in the world. We can only hope we find someone else to stop him before he gets there."
She looked at the gardener as his head suddenly slumped over and he sighed audibly. Then, without any comment, he got up, put down his shears and walked out of the garden. As he walked past the stone, he grabbed the sword out of it without stopping.
As she watched him walk in the direction of L'etharel, she heard his one last remark.
"*Every goddamn time,*" he grumbled. | 221 | The Hero has arrived to draw the legendary blade. The city eagerly watches. However, The hero couldn’t remove the sword. Then the gardener came by, pulled it out, and cut the overgrown grass around it before putting it back. | 417 |
I didn't see the car coming. It was dark, they were driving too fast. Pretty sure there was alcohol involved but that's besides the point. What's done is done. I died and that's it. It's not so bad once you get used to it. The world looks the same, albeit slightly more boring than it was when I was alive. When you're on the outside of it things seem a lot less important.
I'm pretty sure I had been dead for maybe a day or two when it hit me: I'm still here. Something tells me I shouldn't be here anymore. I feel like I'm being pulled somewhere but I'm being weighed down. It's an odd feeling to explain. Imagine you're swimming in the ocean and you're just treading water but the tide is tugging you further into the ocean. You know you're being pulled but you're not seeing drastic changes around you. It's kind of like that. I was about to let the current pull me out into the deep ocean but it just felt wrong. The current didn't stop but I was overcome with the inexorable need to fight it. I needed to get something done before I could float along. I needed to make sure it was taken care of... But how?
I remembered where it could be found. It sat carefully inside of it's box on top of my dresser. It had to be delivered. I couldn't leave until it was done. If I didn't it would only cause trouble for my family if they found it later. I didn't want that. Now, how do I get it taken care of?
I struggled against my memory. Memories still work in the same way they did when you were alive. It's just that the conveyance of it is a little more complex. Rather than simply picturing vague recollections of events in your mind you'll instead find yourself reliving blurry, vague and constantly fluctuating recreations of events which play out like a low budget stage play where the audience is the main character. I relived my wedding, the birth of my son, mundane daily events and work meetings. Then I found my answer! My niece would always talk about how she "had the gift" and would frequently hold seances in her attic. It always seemed so farfetched but she was my only option.
Without warning I found myself in her attic. I couldn't tell whether I was in a memory or not. Everything was so confusing but I did see her. She sat at her circular table with her Ouija board. She was calling out to someone. I'm pretty sure it was Elvis Presley... Or Costello. It was some musician. In any case, I grabbed her table and forced the following words to be spelled:
Uncle. House. Box. Dresser. Seal. Deliver.
She seemed convinced by this display and left immediately to me home. I followed her making sure to listen to what she was saying. She seemed annoyed. I think she would have preferred to talk more but this had to be done for me to get peace.
When she got to my home I watched her enter my room and find the box. She sealed it, picked it up and delivered it to the UPS store just in time.
I felt the current grow stronger and pull me deeper into the ocean. I didn't fight it. I knew that once the box reached its destination it would make things easier for my family.
Amazon's return policy doesn't exactly expire when you do after all. | 524 | "Avenge my murder!" "Redeem my sins!" "Reveal my terrible secret!" Yours is...less impressive. But it still binds you to this world, and so you must find a medium who will help you. And not laugh when you tell them what with. | 1,816 |
Kate stewed on it for a week. Then she went back there. She knew she was being a psycho bitch, but she didn’t care.
“Hey! Hey, asshole!” she shouted at Grant just as he was leaving his apartment. “That’s it? You’re just gonna ghost me? We’re *soulmates*, you dick!” she shouted and dramatically pulled up her sleeve to show her birthmark, just like she had imagined doing.
“Shit.” Grant closed his eyes and tilted his head back. “Okay. Look. Do you want to come in?”
The dramatic yelling had been cathartic, and Kate was coming down from the adrenaline high. She sat on Grant’s couch, where they had hooked up the week before, and drank a beer as he explained about his changing birthmark. She had been *sure* his had been real. She had *made* sure. But now the matching brown splotch on his arm was gone, and he had a new one on his ankle that looked like a pink kiss.
“So you do this a lot?” she asked bitterly. “Find a chick who matches your birthmark and make her think it’s forever?”
“Of course not!” Grant said. “How often do you meet someone whose birthmark matches?”
“Never, obviously,” said Kate. “That’s the whole point.”
“Yeah, well. You were the first time I met someone who matched me that day. So I thought maybe, if we got together-”
“Oh shit,” said Kate, realizing.
“Yeah. I thought if we got together, maybe it would stick around. Maybe it would stop changing.”
They sat in silence for a long moment.
“Does that mean I don’t actually have a soulmate?” Kate said at last. She shook her head. “Does it mean that *you* don’t actually have a soulmate?”
“Believe me,” Grant said. “I worry about that all the time.” He took a long sip of his beer, longer than he needed to finish the dregs that had been left in the bottle.
“I’m sorry I was a bitch to you about it,” Kate said.
Grant laughed unhappily. “Nah, I get it. I should have explained.”
“You should have,” she shot back, giving his shoulder a playful punch. “Okay, I should go.”
“Hey,” he said, as she started to stand. “I have to ask you. That night we met. Did we feel like soulmates?”
She thought about it. “I don’t know,” she said. “It felt… easy.”
He nodded. “Yeah. It felt like that for me too. It felt right. You know,” he added, and stopped. She cocked her hip, a faint smile on her face. She was going to make him say it. “Plenty of people date without actually being soulmates.”
“You’ve got my number,” she said. “Text me this time.”
She had almost made it all the way back to her car before he did. | 15 | In the world you live in, everyone is given a single birthmark somewhere on their body that matches their soulmate when they are born. You, however, get a new one every single day. | 50 |
"I am safe now."
The push notification from Lauren lit up my phone screen. I stared blankly at the message.
"Safe from what?" I texted back. A few minutes passed, and then: "Read 8:57 AM".
A few more minutes drifted by, before I sat up out of bed. Lauren isn't one for pranks, I thought while I rubbed sleep from my eyes. Maybe she's giving it a go, though. I smiled and stood, pulling a beat up Metallica shirt over my head.
My phone lit up with another notification, buzzing around among my tattered bed sheets. I expected Lauren, but it was my mother's number this time.
"I am safe now."
I felt a chill run down my spine. It was the same message, exactly ten minutes later.
I picked up my phone again and started to type out a response, but stopped short before hitting send.
Was she in on the joke? Mom and Lauren lived pretty close to each other, just outside of Salt Lake city where I grew up.
If I don't bite, it'll really make her squirm, I thought. It made me smile, picturing Lauren's reaction. She hates the silent treatment. I can already imagine the phone call, when she finally can't take it anymore and caves.
"Dave, you dickhead. It was supposed to be funny!" She was cute when she was embarrassed.
I made my way out of my bedroom, with my phone tucked in my pocket. The narrow staircase creaked angrily as I descended. This apartment was way too expensive for how old and small it was. That's California for you, overpriced and overhyped.
I didn't mean that though. I felt a lot more in control of my life, like I was my own person. The box of cinnamon toast crunch on top of my fridge was mostly empty, but there was at least one more bowl left. I shook the crumbs out into the one bowl I owned, and splashed the last of the milk over them. It was sort of like porridge or gruel, but it tasted good at least.
I sat down on my couch and opened up twitter. My mouth hung open for a moment as I scrolled through my feed.
William Barkely, Massachusetts
"I am safe now."
Corey Partridge, Texas
"I am safe now."
The notifications went on, and on. All identical, evenly incremented by about ten minutes.
Did something happen while I was asleep? Did I just miss it somehow?
I immediately tried to call Lauren, but it went straight to voice-mail. I quickly flicked on the TV while I searched the internet for answers. Panic started to rise into my chest, my leg tapped restlessly against the coffee table.
Nothing.
All of the news channels were useless too, I clicked through quickly.
"A study states the teens who-"
"Roe v.-"
"Millenials have crushed the-"
How is this even possible? I dropped the remote and went back to Twitter, hoping to find some information in my feed or on trending.
I heard it in the background.
"Experts warn of a dangerous storm front that is sweeping across the nation. Dark clouds and heavy rain, with winds up to 70 miles an hour. Keep those windows and doors locked up tight folks." I looked up in time to see the graphic behind the bespectacled weatherman. Swirling clouds were moving in a nearly perfect line from east to west.
I swallowed hard, as the tightness in my chest loosed slightly.
A storm. They're safe.
That anxiety only let up for an instant as I quickly realized how little that explained.
I stood and walked to the window, peering through the blinds.
Dark clouds had formed on the horizon, the trees bent against the wind. A lone figure had stopped in the street to look up at the swirling sky.
My breath caught in my throat suddenly, something didn't feel right about those stormclouds.
The wind picked up in an instant, I watched a man in the street hit the pavement from the force of it. He stood up holding his mouth, as blood gathered on his chin.
Holy shit. I ran to the door, twisted the door knob and pushed.
It didn't open.
the howling wind whistled wildly as I dug my heels in and pushed with all of my strength. Slowly but surely, I worked the door ajar.
I only saw into the street for a moment before the door was forced closed by the gale. In that instant, the man turned to look at me, his hand bloodied and his teeth shattered. The crimson liquid that streamed from his mouth never hit the pavement, it simply blew away behind him. He smiled, as the house across the street screeched in protest to the storm. The roof came free, like God himself had reached down to peel it off. Electricity arched through the air as street lamps were torn from the concrete.
I landed on my back in my darkened living room. The sound was muffled again, I just laid there for a moment, trying to savor the reprieve I'd been given.
It started to rain, like bullets against the siding of my apartment building. The picture window in my kitchen shattered, a metal trash can had been tossed like a bean bag through the glass.
It was raining sideways, but amidst the sound I felt my phone vibrate. It was a text from a classmate, Sandra.
"I am safe now."
I stood, picking my way past the glass on the floor so I could look out the window again.
The rain stung, creating red marks on my skin.
I turned to look, opening my eyes into the maelstrom.
A raindrop struck my eyelid, the cool water ran into my open eye.
I felt calm, gazing into the eye of the storm. It wasn't the eye at all, I knew that now. It was a ship.
"Don't be frightened. This will all be over soon, your weapons stand no chance against our might. You are with us, you are safe."
The voice filled my head like a song, vibrating in my head until none of my thoughts could possibly compete.
The walls and roof of my home lifted away, as I bathed in the cool rain.
I am with them.
I am safe now. | 115 | All morning long your friends have been marking themselves as "safe" on social media. They don't say from what, and the news outlets aren't reporting anything, but based on the timing it's clear that whatever it is, it's moving across the U.S. from east to west. At midday, it reaches you. | 205 |
''*Alright, cancel the summoning!*'' I call out to the dark priests and warlocks who stare at me confusedly. I draw forth my dark sceptre of power and wave it about menacingly. ''**NOW!**'' Scrambling, the cowardly lot of them cease chanting, disrupt the circle of power, as the demon lord stare at me with unbridled hatred and some confusion. ''*You DARE to ask me to sacrifice the captain of my imperial houseguard? The same captain who have been with me since the beginning of my campaign? Begone you foul fiend of the uttermost hells! Back to thy hellish jail! Oh jail to you! Jail for the demon lord for ten thousand years!*'' The enormous cretin screeches in the void-tongues of the netherrealms as it is sent back down to where it belongs. ''*The rest of you, get out of my sight!*'' The priests and warlocks scatter themselves, fearing my wrath.
''*Incompetent buffoons.*''
I leave the summoning chamber and walk to the balcony in my office. I stare out over the crimson citadel that is my dark capital. The beating heart of my unholy empire. Where loyal free citizens work every day to bring my vision of order and control to fruition. Where my dark legionnaires guard the streets, where my imperial schools teach the children, where my apothecaries treat the sick. Where the legions under my command crush the kingdoms of the world underneath their steel boots. Where the old laws are repealed and replaced with my iron will. Where thousands of enemies are put to the sword every single day as the borders of my empire are expanded by my loyal generals. And it all works. Loyal citizens that bow only to their emperor, loyal soldiers who are given good pensions and fresh land to settle after it has been conquered from the crowned fools of this world. Loyal arcanists and scholars who are allowed freedom to study as they please, with ample amounts of research grant money and captured enemy soldiers to experiment on.
You don't earn that loyalty by sacrificing your underlings for power. You gain it by conquering the lands of your foolish enemy, sacrificing them for power, and then drastically improve the lives and futures for the former subjects of your now dead enemies. Then you've got the power, the loyal subjects, and no legitimate challengers who surviving members of the old regime could rally around. Once you've done that, competent and capable leaders arise meritocratically through your organisation, becoming trusted lieutenants and administrators of your ever-expanding empire. I still remember when she joined me, the captain of my personal guard. I had just handed over the old ducal family of my homeland to the angered forest spirits, who detested the duke's horrid hunger for game and his constant chopping of ancient oaks. She had been young then. I was younger too, though she was much younger. Barely more than a teenager. Somehow the duke managed to get a hold of a sword and tried to rush me. I was about to obliterate him with a spell, but then this young woman just jumps in front of me, wielding an old rusted blade. She fought him valiantly until the dryads and spriggans could restrain him and drag him into the woods, never to be seen again.
I asked her why she had done that, risked her life for someone who had just conquered her homeland. She said that the duke had hunted her brothers and killed them for sport. I had given her justice, given her a freedom she'd never experienced before. I was of course still planning to conquer the world, bring it under my ironfisted rule, destroy all the old kingdoms, and lead the various monstrous races into war against the men and the elves. But she was free, for the first time in her life. And she felt that I was responsible. Naturally, I recruited her immediately. Such a demonstration of loyalty is never to be underestimated. She was with me when I led the woodpeople in open rebellion against their elven enslavers, bringing the vast forests under my domain. She was there when I slew the ultra-hierophant and disrupted the ability of the gods, both good and evil, to interfere in our world. She lost an eye defending me against the necroking and his zombie-knights. When the spirits of the lands, the spirits of the sea, and the spirits of civilisation sat the crown of ages upon my head, she was part of the honour-guard.
When my former captain retired, due to old age, she was elected by her peers as the best suitable replacement. And she has done an admirable job, both by my estimates and by the estimates of her predecessor. To sacrifice her for power would make her loyalty hollow. I would not deserve it. And who would truly be loyal to me afterwards? Who would truly be loyal if I freely killed my subordinates for mere power? I had planned to offer entire royal bloodlines to the demon. Captured and kept alive in my dungeons, for just this occasion, if it could give me the power to destroy the so-called Hero of Legend, who some old traditionalist wizard dug up from some ancient tomb or other world. Or some such nonsense. And it asks me to sacrifice someone who has been loyal to me? Demons, even the great demon lord it seems, are truly and utterly moronic.
''*My liege.*'' I turn around to see her. Iron-grey hair, her black-steel armour shining in the red light of the evening sun. My captain. She is kneeling, which is a tendency some of my underlings seem to have. ''*Arise, captain. You are not young anymore, I can imagine that being painful for your knees.*'' She does as I bid. I pour out a measure of wine into a glass, formed ornamentally to look like it has dragon features, which does not seem to improve or worsen the flavour. I hand her one, and she accepts hesitantly. ''*Well, I suppose I should have seen this coming. My captain, if I ever have the idea to consider demonic intervention again, remind me of this.*'' She stands there, stiffly, with the glass in her hand. I take a small sip of wine as I admire the gothic architecture of my citadel of evil.
''*My liege. If you had asked it of me, I would have done it.*'' I spit out the wine in surprise. ''*…What? I'm sorry, captain, what?*''
She looks at me with fire and determination. She looks fierce and strong. Like she did when she raised her sword to duel that duke, when we first met. ''*If you had asked it of me, my liege, I would have gladly given myself to that demon.*'' So I wasn't hearing things. Good. I stare at her for a bit. ''*Not that I don't appreciate the sentiment, but you are aware of what the demon lord does, right?*'' She nods. That's loyalty. Right there. Loyalty as strong and true as pure steel. ''*Captain Arianne of Highwater. I appreciate that you have such loyalty to me. It shows commendable belief in my cause, conquering the world, that you would do this for me.*'' My hands shake momentarily. She would have done it. Loyalty in such amounts, a marvel in this age when the Allied Kingdoms are willing to send for legendary heroes to defeat me. ''*Thank you. But I would never cross that line. Never. The royalty of old would gladly have given their firstborn for power. The kings against which I fight, those who are on the side of tradition, honour, and the faith, and they are incompetent, inbred fools who fought like rabid dogs over scraps of patrimony. To sacrifice a loyal underling is their way.*''
She hesitates for a moment, before answering. ''*But, pardon me for asking my liege, how else are you going to defeat the legendary hero? The prophecy clearly states that you shall die by his hand.*'' I nod. I've been trying to subvert that damn prophecy for years. Instead of answering directly, I motion for her to join me on the balcony. She marches to my side like we were still on the battlefield. If one were to look directly ahead one sees only the capital, its many spires, the dirigible landing towers, the arcanist academies where modern thaumaturgy is being studied. The great port where ships from countless continents dock and leave carrying raw materials to the capital and exporting finished goods and new knowledge to long established lands and newly conquered provinces. But if one looks straight down, where I am pointing, one sees a garden with many waterpools, high trees with ample shade. There one can see the wives of my generals keeping a close watch on their children. There one can see the orphans I have taken in, the children of those loyal to me who have fallen in battle, and are now raised in luxury, with access to ample opportunities for education. | 286 | "No," the Evil Emperor said to the demon lord "I will not sacrifice my captain of the guard to you. Not for all the power in the world. That is one line even I will not cross." | 702 |
Most orks would simply kill the child or leave it without much thought. Luckily for the duke's daughter Priscilla, the clan of Freebootaz that found her was inclined to slightly less... traditionally orkish behaviour.
Such as taking in a human child. It wasn't charity, of course; they'd assumed having a human child on board could land them more profitable contracts. This, shockingly, proved true as it made them seem more 'responsible' if such a word can be used in association with orks.
Nothing lasts, of course, and when the Freebootaz decided to attack the patrician who hired them, they were bested by a company of Ultramarines who happened to be passing by. Such was the end of Grogner the Freeboota, but not for Priscilla who was recovered on the ship, much to the surprise of the strike team. What came next were numerous, *numerous* tests that she was free of warp influence, disease testing and finally, finding out her heritage. She was thus sent back to her overjoyed father who spent a small fortune in re-educating her to erase the behaviour she picked up during her time with the brutish warriors.
And just like that, she was sent to the Academy, ready to become a respectable member of the Imperial nobility. The other children and teens at the Academy, however, did what teens do best.
Bullied.
After the secret of her upbringing became known, her treatment at the hands of her peers became unavoidably cruel, despite her influential family trying to prevent it. Today was such a day as a crumpled-up page hit the back of Priscilla's head.
"Hey! Freak!" the boy who threw the page yelled out, surrounded by his usual entourage of lackeys.
"Jeremiah," Priscilla remarked with as much calmness as she could muster.
"What, no yelling? I thought your kind could only talk with yelling and grunts," he laughed.
"No, Jeremiah, my 'kind' of humans like you, if you can be called that."
"Ooh, struck a nerve, have we, ork?" he kept laughing.
"Yeah, you gonna grab an axe and fail to chop us up like your *family*?" another bully yelled exuberantly.
"Look!" she raised her voice, "I'm minding my own business, so why don't you just,... zog off!"
She closed her eyes the moment she said it. She didn't mean to use the traditionally orkish insult, but it slipped out in the moment, despite knowing this was just fuel for the bullies.
"Zog? What is this, the outer rim? Did they not teach you how to speak properly? No surprise, ork girl, as-"
And so it began, the endless insults and teasing. It would go on and on and on.
Unless she stopped it.
What most failed to understand was that during her time with the orks, despite being used somewhat as a mascot, she was still a human living among orks, meaning much of her time was spent doing their bidding; this mostly involved manual labour. Perhaps not as cruel as for most humans, but enough to give her the musculature rivalling that of peak guardswomen. Combined with the deceptively nutritious diet of squig meat and mushroom ale, Priscilla grew into a woman who could just as easily join the Assassinorum.
That is why she was able to walk to a nearby bookshelf and take it off the wall easily. This was unexpected partially because no one expects a fight in such a prestigious school, but mostly because it was screwed to the wall. It made an excellent bludgeon she promptly introduced to Jeremiah's face.
"WOT? IS DIS WAT YOU WANTED, YOU ZOGGIN GIT?" she yelled as she stood over the bleeding boy, the rest of his allies sprinting away. "I'LL KRUMP THE LOT OF YA AND USE YER TEEF TO BUY ME A PROPER CHOPPA, SWEAR ON MORK!"
She hit the boy once again, breaking the solid wooden board on his back.
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!" | 666 | After been missing for 12 years, the duke's daughter (now 16) is sent to the royal accademy and immediately targeted by bullies. What the bullies don't know is that the lady spent those 12 years with a clan of orks | 1,124 |
It’s takes almost a full day to cross through Texas by car, and that’s assuming you’re passing through the quickest point up north. It’s a terrible drive that drags on with nothing to break the monotony. Seemingly endless oil fields that fill the air with the scent of tar almost occasionally broken up by windmills, which are interrupted by oil fields and so on until it feels like you aren’t moving at all but looping through the same stretch of highway. Surely the state couldn’t have this many windmills and oil pumps.
But that’s just a feeling. If you keep at it, you’ll break free. That’s what I keep telling myself.
I’ve been driving the same stretch of land for a week now. My GPS keeps me going straight, yet somehow I always end back up here by the Buc-ee’s. I’ve tried to stop following the directions but the results were the same. No matter what I’ve tried, no matter what street I’ve turned down, no matter how much I screamed at the clerk for directions, I couldn’t get off the interstate.
My gas meter never went down. I didn’t hunger or thirst. But time moved on without me - my phone worked and my family had been texting and calling to figure out what happened to me. I was supposed to be back to them seven days ago. I spoke with several truckers at the Buc-ee’s, but they had no clue. They all thought I was crazy.
“You’re lost? Just use your GPS! How the heck can anybody get lost for an entire week in this day and age?”
“I am using the GPS, honey. It keeps me on the road. It’s becoming harder to remember a time when I wasn’t driving…when the air didn’t smell of oil and tar. I’m spinning in place like the windmills, endlessly, around and around and around and-“
“Whatever!” She hung up the phone.
My wife didn’t understand, but how could she? I didn’t get it either.
On the eighth day, I stepped out into the highway. The truck didn’t have enough time to slam on the brakes, and I didn’t have enough time to register the pain before I became a smear on the road.
I woke up with a gasp, still sat behind the wheel of my parked car. Had I been sleeping? Was it a dream…or had I chosen to take matters in my own hands and this was the result? Maybe, maybe something changed. Did it work?
No. I kept driving, but around and around I still went until I parked in the same place I was before.
I stepped out into the highway. The truck didn’t have enough time to slam on the brakes, and I didn’t care if it hurt. It didn’t.
I woke up behind the wheel of my parked car. I hadn’t been sleeping, it wasn’t a dream. Not even death would free me. There was no option left to me except to drive.
Life is a highway, and I will drive it. All. Night. Long.
​
(Thanks for reading, C&C always welcome!) | 82 | You’re driving through Texas, trying to get home to the next state over. You’ve followed the GPS to the letter. It’s been almost a week since you started driving but you’re still in Texas. | 243 |
"Ah," I said, guiltily shuffling my feet as I became abruptly aware that I was in just a pair of sleep shorts and had my arms stuffed with dirty dishes I had just hunted through my room for.
"Let me just- I don't want to drop these," I mumbled, carefully putting each ceramic mug down in the sink, followed by the stack of plates and bowls.
"You don't have to apologize for cleaning, Miss...or Mrs?"
"Miss, please. Hargrave. I know, the irony," she smiled at me where she was clutching the kitchen broom.
"If you've been watching me much, then I'm sure you know very well I also clean, though mostly sporadically and inefficiently."
"Young man, you forget things for days, and then start to look stressed and hopeless when you realized how many things you forgot! You have bills to pay, and work to do, and picking up after you isn't half as frustrating as my husband was when I was alive," Miss Hargrave assured, putting the broom away before sweeping over to the dish drainer and starting to put things away. She was miraculously silent; nothing clinked or clacked while she worked. No wonder I never heard her before.
"It's part of my disorder, actually, Miss. It's the ADHD, I literally can't see them, until I can," I explained, rubbing the back of my neck sheepishly.
"That explains why you look so distressed to discover the mess, at least. It's much more interesting than the afterlife and it seemed a nice thing I could to do help you, young man- has it been helping?"
"Oh, so much! I thought I'd hired a cleaning service and just forgot!"
She smiled, and I felt bad about the cameras and attempts to catch pictures now.
"I'm glad. I'll stay on as roommate, if you don't mind."
"Better than any of the other candidates, Miss Hargrave. Not that there are many, but- y'know."
"Yes. Now, you toddle yourself back to bed, young man! You have work in the morning!"
Laughing, I went to bed.
Ghost, confirmed: adorable. | 13 | You moved into a new house, rumored to be haunted by the ghost of a murdered housewife. One day, you try and catch proof of the ghost. At night, in the kitchen, you see a spectral woman...cleaning the house? She sees you and says “...sorry...the afterlife was dull...this is much better” | 43 |
The last thing I expected after the darkness finally closed in was to find my blurry vision focusing in on an indigo sky littered with flashing thunderheads. "About time you woke up, lazy bones, we're gonna have to break a leg to get to the front on time," comes a rattling voice, breaking me out of my confused reverie. I sit up slowly to find standing before me a skeleton waiting with hands on pelvis, wrapped in tattered armor that hangs loosely from its frame. The bones of the skeleton seem held together by a black, gooey looking substance that also floats in blobs in the eye sockets of its skull.
Checking my surroundings, then myself, I realize I am in the midst of a vast graveyard and am in a similar state as the fleshless figure before me, sans armor. "I'm sorry?" I offer questioningly, running a hand over my head and wincing at the soft scrape of bone on bone. "You should be! Now let's go before the captain has whatever substitute you can come up with for a hide!" The...man?...reaches down and grabs my forearm, yanking me to my feet and smacking my spine as he takes off. "Let's go, lard ass!" he shouts while leaving me behind. With no better prospects I take off after him, struggling to catch up as he seems to flee from my shouts of "wait!" and "hold on a second!"
A minute or two of sprinting over rolling hills sprinkled with tombstones offers no change in the scenery as I finally catch up to the mysterious figure, huffing and puffing and distinctly ignoring the fact that I have none of the body parts that would normally be shouting at me over such exertion. "What is going on? Where are we?" The other skellyman cackles and replies, "We're going to a Weight Watchers' conference, obviously! Sorry, trying to be humerus, but you're new so I'll throw you a bone." Even without flesh I could discern the smug grin at his own jokes, and even without eyes I did my best to approximate an eye roll. "You know how pretty much every major religion has a deity that rules over or signifies death?" At my nod he continues, the only other sound the clack of our bodies bouncing as we run. Despite my initial huffing and puffing, my body apparently realized it doesn't need air anymore and I quit breathing without noticing.
"So, while the story has certainly skewed over the ages, they were all at one point or another very real necromancers that ravaged the earth with undead wars that eventually got them banished to this plane where they have continued to feud to this day. You get the pleasure of being summoned and enslaved by Hel. Welcome to Purgatory!" | 21 | You were in the hospital surrounded by your family when you died. After you died you were greeted by a skeleton informing you that you’re now drafted in the skeleton war. | 145 |
We had a fight that morning. Again. This time nothing was thrown at me and I didn’t lose my cool and storm out the house with Clyde. Poor little guy hid under the sofa whenever we argued. And he did so that morning.
I stopped myself from saying something stupid. Lydia stayed in the kitchen, also resigned to not yell further, starting to clean up around as I petted Clyde to calm him down. Eventually he calmed enough to crawl back out and take his place on the couch.
“I’ll walk him.” Said my girlfriend. I shot her a confused look. The one I knew annoyed her but couldn’t help.
“You never walk Clyde.”
“I’ll walk him, I said. I know you’re gonna be late and can’t go. Don’t worry about it.”
Don’t worry about it. That just made me worry more. But Lydia sounded calm. And she genuinely looked like she didn’t wanna keep arguing. I didn’t too. I didn’t care if I was right or wrong either. Hell, Lydia could be right, maybe I am a mess in life right now. Maybe I should quit the crappy job I hate so much and just move with her out of state.
Those issues ate me up. But in all honesty I felt ready to relent and just listen to Lydia. Things may have been rocky. She may have been spending more time with her sleazy boss than I’d liked. But she meant well. And I could be a bone head too. I sighed, feeling so much weight leave my chest, and nodded back to her.
“Thanks babe.” I said before heading back to the bedroom to get my uniform on before heading out. I heard Lydia go grab Clyde’s leash and collar and step out the door.
That was when I saw a bright green light flash through the bedroom window. It was an eery unnatural sort of light not normal for a mid morning in California. I dropped my belt as I watched for a moment. Then I heard Clyde barking wildly.
I bolted out the front door on instinct. There was Clyde barking up at the sky, back ridge raised high in intimidation, white teeth barred. And Lydia wasn’t there.
I looked left and looked right. She wasn’t there. Then I followed Clyde’s lead. I looked up.
Up above our heads was a massive grey cloud. But within it seemed to open up like a tunnel down to us. It started to flash again.
I grabbed Clyde off of the ground and bolted straight for the door. The light blasted and I could feel it behind us. But I made it to the door and slammed it shut behind us. Then I bolted for the closet on the other side of the house. It was now shaking violently.
Clyde whimpered and I held him close. I kissed his head and petted him to help him calm down. All the while my blood race through my body and my heart threatened to burst out my chest. The house kept moving. Then… it began tearing apart.
I shielded Clyde with my body and closed my eyes. For some reason I thought if I closed my eyes we’d be safe. That and the obvious need to protect my eyes as I heard the walls and furniture all around us break apart all while a loud whoosing rang all around me.
Then it was silent. As if in an instant the chaos that interrupted my normal morning was over. I opened my eyes.
The whole house was in ruins. Much of the building entirely ripped out of the ground. All that was left was broken remnants of the bottom of walls and even parts of the floors totally gone.
By noon it was breaking news. People going missing as if stolen by thin air. Buildings, cars, and more shot up into the sky. Witnesses claiming it was “the cloud”. The damage was devastating. The missing people numbered in the hundreds.
Clyde and I sat on a motel room bed as the news reported the phenomena. Clyde moreso asleep, still clutching his favorite stuffed bear while I stared unblinking at the TV. One channel was showing the faces of missing persons. Lydia flashed just for a second.
I reached into my pocket for the note. I’d wrote it some time ago. After one fight that got ugly. I’d just been so tired, so frustrated at how I was treated. But I just held onto it. I was waiting for the right time to walk out. Like today.
I tore up the note and shut off the TV. | 21 | Your partner just took the dog out, and not a minute later you hear the leash drop to the ground, followed by the dog barking. You look outside and your partner is nowhere to be found. All you see is your dog barking...at the sky. | 154 |
Music was never to be played with. Never. You weren't to mess around with a few notes, or trill a line on the piano. True, experimentation happened. But it was regulated; heavily controlled. Only a very few special people were allowed instruments. I, however, managed to find a banjo in the junkyard. It was beaten up, the strings weren't even attached, but it was an instrument. Which meant music. I was very cautious at first, only using the approved songs. The ones we knew would heal, calm storms, even teleport. It was magical.
But not just because of the effects. Oh, those were wonderful enough, but the beauty of the music was more. It rose and fell as if it had a life and heart of its own. I couldn't resist one day, trying a new tune. One that had run through my head since I was a child. One that I used to hum to myself when working in the junkyard. And one that was strictly un-sanctioned. Using only my fingers, I picked at the restored strings, hearing the music take shape. Carefully, I watched around the cleared space where I practiced. What new spell, what new effect would this song have? I held my breath.
Nothing.
Nothing happened. No birds fell out of the sky, no pieces of junk moved on their own, the heavens stayed green and calm, no weather to be seen. But every piece of music had a magical effect, that had been proven with Lisette's Third Law. I felt a spike of disappointment. Maybe it was too mundane. Maybe it just affected the walking patterns of ants. After all, it was my first song, maybe it needed to be different, bigger, and more impressive. I walked back to my office, idly strumming the tune. Regardless of the magic effects, it was still quite pretty.
There was a man standing there, probably waiting for me. Junkyards weren't really that popular these days, but some people still enjoyed coming and picking through the trash, for buried treasure. Of course, none of them had ever found a banjo. Too late, I forgot to change the song.
The man stared at me, his eyes growing large.
"Where, did you get that? That's an instrument." His voice didn't sound angry, but I couldn't take the risk. My fingers moved into the familiar pattern of a calming song.
"Wait! Wait, I'm not going to report you! In fact, I've found something of my own..." I froze. He'd found something? Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a harmonica. "I've just been too afraid to play anything. After all, there isn't much you can do on a harmonica, that doesn't affect yourself. But if you wouldn't mind..." He trailed off, but I knew what he was asking. I nodded, plucking out the beginning notes of a wakefulness spell. It was well known that harmonicas had a soothing effect.
He began playing, a well-known tune. Unconsciously, I started picking my own tune, weaving it into his. And again, nothing happened. The music swelled, curled and fell to its finish. And we stood there unchanged. No sleepiness on his part, or mine. Something in my mind turned around. My tune did do something. It negated magic.
It's been years since my discovery. Years since I got it sanctioned. I don't run a junkyard anymore. I run a music school. All around me, the music flows once, rising into the air like a living thing. Under it all, is my little banjo tune. Making sure no accidental magic happens. Making sure people can once again enjoy the music. Making music safe. Making it accessible. And making the music...sing. | 343 | Music has the power to perform miracles. Summon storms, heal wounds, teleport you to any location, the possibilities seem endless. All it takes is experimentation with different musical notes and instruments. You have discovered a tune on your banjo that does something remarkable, and strange. | 920 |
I have never been a very lucky girl. I crashed my first car the same day my first boyfriend broke up with me, I broke my arm on the way to prom, I accidentally made napalm while running the arts and crafts cabin at summer camp. Needless to say, I was not necessarily shocked when my name was picked via lottery out of the literal billions of options. So, although incredibly terrifying, I did try and remain calm knowing it was only going to get worse.
Somewhere in the back of my mind I assumed being the chosen one would be something like being a monkey in a zoo. Some lonely creature left by itself in a new home that imitated its natural habitat just enough to not be deemed cruel. That my few interactions would be meeting the eyes of visitors are they looked on, from behind the protective barrier of a glass wall. Studied for our behavior as though we were solitary creatures who wouldn't become completely unhinged when left in isolation.
​
In my darkest dreams sometimes I would begetting visits from their scientist, poking and prodding at me as a small child imagines our scientists behaves with rats. Using science to find out how we work inside and out. Using needles and scalpels to wheedle out our bodies faults and weaknesses. A wildly shortened life that would feel entirely too long under their efforts.
​
Countless possibilities fluttered through my mind like dandelion seeds in a breeze, and yet never once had I considered this option. Yet here it was. While humans would have immediately taken and studied one of them, had they offered one of their own, apparently that was not the case with this species.
"Good Faith" they had called it, when the deal was struck. It felt odd them using one of our own colloquialisms, and yet in hindsight I understand. They did not need me to study humans, they knew all they needed to know. It turns out humans are loud, our broadcasts blasting into the universe like a neighbors out of control house party. Our radios and televisions painting a very detailed picture of almost every aspect of our life. Tapping into our internet provided them with the most detailed reports they could ever need. No I was here in "Good faith."
​
While they were capable of making educated guesses on how to best deliver on the Earth-trade agreement, they wanted an actual Earthling to make final decision making calls. Honestly living here is in some ways easier then being home, no awful cashier job, no shady landlord, the apartment they provided for me is better than anything I ever could have dreamed of affording. If I closed my eyes I could almost imagine my bad luck was finally changing, ignoring the fact that I think I just accidentally declared intergalactic war... | 96 | In the far future an advanced alien civilization is attempting to join forces with Humanity, they agree to join them on the condition that they receive, alongside the already agreed upon deal, a living member of their species to be studied. That "living member" is you. | 268 |
Mayor Drake was an...eccentric man, eccentric just being the nice word for strange. I can't recall the last time I'd seen him during the day, for instance. And last I'd seen him at all, other than on tv, was last week on a late night stroll through Lyle Park. He scared the shit out of me when he rounded a corner, mid-sprint, only slowing by as he passed to tip his hat and grant me a brief: "Good evening Tommy!", before running off through some bushes. Don't quite know how he knew my name.
And last barbeque he attended, held for his welcome to the town (which he insist be held at nightfall) I didn't see him eat a single bite. Mentioned something about having "eaten before and planned dinner later", while looking at Ms. Thompson. I guess he was making fast...uh...friends. But it seemed good for Ms. Thompson, who I'm sure could use the company after her husband up and left her. Didn't even leave a note behind.
But tonight he was to host, and the entire town was set to come. Apparently he owned some extravagant mansion on the outskirts of town that had been in his family for quite some time. At one point this sort of wealth he kept may have been a secret, but the town of Askledad had a way of prying those from people. Then the more that learned of his housing the more that requested to visit until a party was the only option left. Honestly I felt bad, I really did.
Nobody seemed to understand Mayor Drake in the month since he arrived. It was in agreement that we all loved his policies, that the city was happy to have him, but behind closed doors was all gossip. Talk about his banning of garlic. Of his nocturnal nature and firm opposition to yard signs.
But I think I had cracked the code. The code of what made the head of our town different: Mayor Drake was a vegan. The garlic fear must be some sort of allergy, and I think I'd heard somewhere that vegans were nocturnal...maybe. That's why tonight for the party I would surprise him with a fat kale salad, all the vegan fixtures (mostly heaps of avocado piled on top). With only an hour to spare I placed the finishing touches on my surprise (mostly even more avocado).
As I approached the address, the card simply labeled *Mansion on the edge of town* in red cursive, my stomach knotted. Over half the town would be in attendance and I had no idea what to expect. A mansion, sure, but what would there be to eat? What games to play? And how did this strange man really live?
It didn't take long driving down the winding back road before my destination sprawled up before me. An impressive boast of craftsmanship that appeared as old as the city itself with grand arches and tower roofs ending in sharp points. In front a line of empty cars. I parked and listened in through the door, to hear only silence.
*Clack clack*, I ratcheted the wolf-headed knocker, to which I was answered immediately by the head of the town. Mayor Drake dressed in gothic sheek complete with a cape, looked down to me.
"Ah Tommy yes! You are now invited in! Come come....why are you holding that sign?" his tone shifted from excitement to what seemed like fear.
"Oh this? Its one if your campaign signs I thought It'd make a good gift." as I approached he backed further away.
"Keep-watch. Tommy watch the point. Watch the wood!" But it was too late. You see, I decided to wear dress shoes, be fancy and all, and my shoes have those strange thin laces that are impossible to tie. So, I didnt. And now I fell sign first down. Down and down until the stake planted itself into Mayor Drakes chest. He looked down with a tinge of confusion, I looked back in horror at what I had done. The campaign sign stabbed clean out his chest read in bold red letters: *Invite Drake into your Home!* Then, *poof* Mayor Drake was gone in a cloud of dust.
From behind the door a crowd of shocked faces peered out, many of whom I recognized. The town now crowded the door to the mansion looking as if they'd seen a ghost, Drake meanwhile, sat in a steaming dust pile on the floor without much to say.
Well. That was one way to kill a vegan I guess. | 29 | There’s something odd about the new mayor. They only come out at night, no one ever sees them eat, and they put a county wide ban on importing garlic. The town is baffled, but you understand—they’re obviously vegan. Good thing you’re taking kale salad to the mayor’s party tonight. | 129 |
The first hour of travel is really tense. The others are banging and screaming and sobbing and stepping onto each other.
I'm not.
I've got to focus. It's really important not to lose your cool. This is good advice in everyday life. Even more so when you are trapped and you know it. Some lessons are hard-learned.
At this moment, we are six people on the back of a van and I am the only one being composed and not wasting energy.
The second hour is boring. The others are still sobbing but they stopped being so agitated. They wonder what's happening, where are we going, who are the others.
I join the conversation. They are reluctant to communicate with me at first because they find me too calm. It's fair, I think. In this situation you need intel. You need to be wary.
But most importantly, you need to keep your cool.
So, I tell them a little about me. The relevant part of my life explaining why I seem so calm.
It's nothing much, I just have been through some shit recently. The kind that requires help and medication. The kind that teaches you to keep calm and control your breath and don't make a sound and it will pass and you will be okay.
Except of course, you won't.
The others are still wary of me.
I don't blame them. I know I wouldn't trust a complete stranger with such a story.
So we talk, the others more than me, amongst themselves more than with me. Doesn't really matter. I certainly gained more intel on the situation than they perceived.
That's the other really important thing, intel. You keep a cool head to gather and retain informations. Where's the closest emergency exit, for example.
What's a good hiding spot is a close second.
Intel, cool-head. If you lose that you're done.
The van finally stops after a slow and long reverse. I can picture it placing itself in the docking bay of a big anonymous and isolated warehouse. Something abandoned but still quite recent, because I can hear that no one is close-by but a steel curtain rolls open just outside.
There's a short jolt when our vehicle reverses to close the gap, followed by the noise of the van's back door unlocking.
Someone goes and open it.
The warehouse is dimly lit, a double benediction. First for our eyes, accostumed to the darkness. Second because of all the hiding spots created by the semi-darkness.
People start wondering about the stench in the air that rushes in. There was hope for fresh air, but the air stinks. Not like the inside of our van, which is a mix of perspiration, bad breath, fear and just a tad of piss.
Someone comments about the smell of a dead animal.
A voice is then heard, coming from a nearby intercom.
"I'm going to hunt y'all down"
Everyone gets more tense. Someone points to a form on the ground, ten meters away. It's dead alright, but it's not just any animal.
"Last person standing gets to live."
The voice is really matter-of-factly. It's not mean or sadistic or anything of the sort.
It's almost... tired? Resignated?
Never quite knew what that tone really meant.
"Y'all have ten seconds to start running."
It's not a threat, not even an order. It's a fact.
The human corpse in the middle of the room looks at us and we look at him.
One second.
Two seconds.
Once more, there are screams and banging and people stepping on each other.
I'm not participating in this activity.
I have to wait eight more seconds.
Then I can let go of this calm facade and perpetuate the cycle.
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Et voilà. Hope you liked it. Pointers and feedback are appreciated, as always. | 83 | You and 5 other people are transported to a warehouse. You hear a voice over the intercom. "I'm going to hunt y'all down, and whoever is the last man standing gets to live. Y'all have 10 seconds to start running" | 293 |
"LEGOs?"
I nodded. "LEGOs. They're relatively cheap."
"Bullshit!"
"Dude, have you looked at their actual price? If you go with a non-licensed set, like Star-Wars, you can get them for one-point-three cents per piece. You can't get food for that price. Well, maybe rice. I'm getting distracted. Yes, I went with LEGOs."
"But, why LEGOs?"
"Well, buying a dozen creator kits gave me the amount of pieces I needed. Just place a few eldritch 'mocks', that's 'My Own Creation', around the base of the structure-"
"Wait, you have an acronym for My Own Creation?"
"Dude, I'm trying to tell you about it and you keep interrupting me."
"But the higher-ups will stop this."
"Oh, they know. They think I'm cute. I'm here to prove them wrong. You going to stop me?"
The security guard looked abashed. He shrugged, in what I can only describe as distinctly French, and waved me on. I continued placing the mini-kits around the base.
"So if I place four on each foundation, which honestly is not that difficult, I can accomplish my mission."
I dropped the final set, sixteen of sixteen. The pieces audible rattled as they hit the ground, but didn't break apart.
"And what is this supposed to do, sir?"
"Oh, didn't your bosses tell you? I told them. I'm taking the Eiffel Tower."
He laughed, haughty and energetic. He'd seen people try to steal the tower before. Some had tried torches, or explosives. He'd even drawn his TASER on a suspect before. But LEGOs? He wasn't worried. Until a sinister sound started to emanate from a point of darkness he had failed to note.
"What is zat sound?"
"That? Just my helpers from beyond time and space noting the structure and getting ready to steal it."
"I have only heard of one such incident. Another French monument, though people like to forget."
"Do tell," I said.
"Ze Statue de la Liberté."
"Statue of Liberty, yeah. That was mine too."
His eyes went wide, almost enough that a good knock to the back of his head would send the little orbs flying.
"You? You are ze..."
He paused. "Voleur de Libération."
He said it quietly, almost reverently.
"The Liberty Thief. Yeah, I guess that is about as good as any. I'm not big on authoritarianism. Authority in general. Step back, brother. This is when it gets wild."
I motioned for him to step back. He looked at me, equal parts stunned and awed. He did though, and just in time. The little orb of void sprouted writhing tentacles by the thousand that took the roots and structure of the Eiffel Tower in hand... or sucker, I suppose. The structure seemed to fold, though only visually. There was none of the usual violent audio associated with metal being forced into new positions. Little by little, the tower faded from sight.
"It's going faster," the guard said.
"It is. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it at the moment. Though, replacing the Las Vegas replica with the real thing might be a hoot. Who knows. Anyway, Jean, good to meet you."
"How did you know my name?"
"Lucky guess," I said with a smirk. I jumped from the level ground and fell backward. His eyes grew wide for a split second until a portal opened beneath me and I vanished into shadow.
"Reckless."
"Gala, can you give me five seconds to acclimate before you berate me?"
The computer generated voice sounded again. "Absolutely not. You program me to watch over you then make the most idiotic decisions possible. I swear, you're just trying to break my logic chain."
I smirked again, despite wanting to throw up the last ten years' worth of meals. "Only because I love you."
She sighed, a truly impressive feat for an AI housed in a server complex. "What's next?"
I tried not to groan as the travel took its toll. After a moment of catching my breath, I told her my next idea.
"You're a fucking idiot. The Kremlin?" | 18 | You live in a world where if you steal a building you're allowed to keep it, you must figure out how you are going to steal a giant city skyscraper. The owners won't do anything to stop you because they are amused by your antics, but they underestimate you. | 73 |
'A tall blonde, with brown eyes and a good heart will defeat the evil one!' That was the prophecy. That was it, that was all. My brother fit the description, though his hair was closer to a dirty blonde. So that's how we ended up here. In a large group of vaguely-described men and women—the prophecy didn't specify gender— walking over hill and dale trying to get to the evil overlord's castle. Well, I say large group. I'm not sure how many people it takes to be classified as an army, but I think we were starting to approach that number. And why am I here, with my nut-brown hair, and green eyes? Well—
"Will you keep up? And what are you scribbling down now?" I jerked up, hiding the scroll behind my back. My brother wasn't particularly fond of my writing habit, and if he thought I was writing anything bad about him, well.... let's just say I sometimes doubted his ability to fulfill the good heart part of the prophecy.
"Just a few ideas. Nothing much. Are we going on the march again?" He didn't respond to my question, simply kicking some dirt over the small cooking fire. Shoving the scroll into the back of my trousers, I helped him strike down the tent, packing it onto our ever obliging mule.
"Where's that mutt of yours? I thought he would be at your heels right now." My brother cast a grumpy eye over the ground, as if that mutt of mine would be hiding under the earth. I shrugged, though I was a little worried.
"He'll show up sometime. I don't own him you know. He's a free spirit." Snorting, my brother pulled on the mule's reins, setting him into motion. As we walked up a hill, inside a pale yellow-haired mob, a dog came bounding up to my side. Giving him a few pats, and ignoring my brother's grumpy shake of the head, I smiled. The dog was the reason I was on this quest in the first place.
———————
"You cannot defeat me. All you puny humans have failed. What more can you send?" The evil overlord laughed, flailing his mace about. Around him, all the Blonde Army lay scattered, some unfortunately dead, the others simply unconscious. All except my brother, me, and the dog. Slamming his mace into the ground, the evil one sneered at us. "Well, young man? Do you feel like you can best me?" My brother tightened his grip on his sword, but before he could respond, I whispered into his ear. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, and he raised his sword, shouting out the words I'd given him.
"In a fair duel, in which I choose the weapons, yes I think I can best you." The evil overlord frowned, but I knew what his answer would be. He was too proud to let that challenge go. Sure enough, soon my brother and he were circling each other, each carrying a sword.
Metal flashed through the air, the sound loud in the stillness of the valley. Though I was hoping that the evil one would be clumsier with a sword, it seemed he and my brother were evenly matched. I knelt down, wrapping my arms around the dog. Lowering my head to the dog's ear, I waited, watching the overlord's feet. Now!
I whispered the command to the dog, and he shot out, weaving into and behind the dark mailed feet. With a large creaking crash, the evil one fell to the ground, an ear-shattering scream ripping from his throat. My brother leapt forward, about to issue the killing blow, but stopped with his sword hovering inches from the exposed throat. The evil overlord was already dead. Impaled on his own sword. Running back, the dog wagged his tail looking up at me with soulful brown eyes. As I petted the pale yellow fur, praising the dog and giving it a treat, I smiled up at my brother.
"Tall, blonde, brown eyes and a good heart. No one ever said anything about *human*." | 797 | The prophecy was so vague, there is now an army of potential chosen ones heading off to fight the evil overlord. | 2,664 |
You’d always been a nobody, even before you discovered your immortality. It was maddening and sad to think about, how easily you could be forgotten. It certainly protected you often throughout the centuries, but as technology rose and the world became more connected, it became more difficult to maintain. Nobody was *nobody* anymore. Old tricks stopped working in the age of untouchable electronic records and increasing government scrutiny. You could feel the web drawing tighter around you each decade.
That’s the main reason you came out.
There were some things you were completely right about, like the safety it offered you. Any government or cabal or billionaire that tried to abduct you for study was immediately thwarted by some other government or cabal or billionaire who didn’t want you to fall into the hands of another. No more worrying about new identities and cover stories, no more paranoia about the people parked on the dark street or the cameras over your head. The world was watching you, so you were untouchable.
What you didn’t anticipate was that it would bring a whole other host of equally bad issues. How could you? You’d been anonymous for so long, it had become a way of life. How could you ever have imagined this?
The historians were the worst of the constant flood of attempted contacts. The letters, the emails, the calls, the showing up at your doorstep. All begging like children for just one *minute* of your time, just *one* thing they wanted to clear up about the past, just *one* question they wanted to ask. How the hell would you know anything about Jack the Ripper or what happened to the Amber Room? Just because you were *there* didn’t mean you knew squat. You were a nobody, for God’s sake!
Then there were the advertisements. Not that you endorsed a damn thing, of course, but that didn’t stop anyone. Green tea was the key to your immortality. So was elderberries, colloidal silver, that “ancient” Chinese formula approximately twelve years old. Seeing *your face* being used in popup ads and spam and being powerless to stop it was more enraging than you’d anticipated.
But perhaps the worst of it was the isolation - the isolation that ironically came in a sea of attention. There had always been a strange comfort in being a nobody, in drifting through the years unseen and unencumbered, watching life unfold and then moving on, untouched by it. It was boring, yes, but you never would have imagined that *you’d miss boring*.
Everyone knew your name. Literally everyone. There was nowhere you could go, nothing you could do, that would not be watched by billions, talked about by millions, tracked by thousands. The simplest of outings and the most mundane of greetings was broadcast and pored over by the whole planet, attracting throngs that required riot police to control. The simple pleasures of life that had sustained you your entire existence suddenly became so much more complicated.
Immortality could suck sometimes, to be sure. But fame? Fame was so *so* much worse. And the hell of it was, it, like you, would never end… | 20 | You’ve been immortal for a good five centuries now, and decide to reveal your true nature to the world. It is the dumbest thing you have ever done. | 87 |
He laid in his bed, headphones on and Megadeth blaring into his ears. There was nothing to do in this little nowhere town. No one worth seeing. No place to be.
He couldn't live here forever. Obviously. Something would have to change, and soon. Senior year was drawing to a close and mom and dad were never shy about reminding him that he'd be "out on his own" when his time was up.
Where would he go? Not college. *Not* the military. Who would hire him? What skills did he have?
He'd never admit it to his parents, but the loneliness was the scariest part of leaving. For all their faults, he'd miss mom and dad. He'd miss little Stephen. Well, not so little anymore. He was basically a person now.
A tear stung at the corner of his eye and he pressed the headphones tighter onto his ears.
*Feeling paranoid, true enemy or false friend?*
*Anxiety's attacking me and my air is getting thin.*
*I'm in trouble for the things I haven't got to yet*
*I'm chomping at the bit and my palms are getting wet.*
*Sweating bu--*
The headphones were ripped off his head and he recoiled in surprise.
"Shane! Didn't you hear me?" Mom was standing over him, one hand a fist holding his headphones, the other impatiently fixed to her hip.
"What!?" Shane barked back.
"Dinner!" The invitation was neither warm nor welcoming. Mom marched out of the room, leaving the door wide open behind her.
Shane pivoted off his bed and begrudgingly marched downstairs toward the dinner table. When he was gone, they'll have wished they had been nicer, he thought. I won't call, I won't write.
He shook his head free of the sad thoughts that might make him tear up again, and he took his spot at the table. Stephen was seated across from him, his eyes open wide, eyebrows raised, and a smirk across his face.
"What are you looking at?" Shane hissed.
"Someone's in *trou-bull*," Stephen answered in a sing-song tone.
Shane scoffed at the sentiment, but mom's and dad's face were stoic and serious. Something *was* up.
Dad cleared his throat. "Your report card came in today, Shane."
*oh.*
"Would you care to explain?" Dad laid the tri-fold paper between them. The report was marked with red pen, clear Ds and Fs in boxes on the page.
"What is going on with you?" Mom's words had a fury behind them. This wasn't a check-in. It was an accusation.
"You used to be so smart," Dad added. "You used to *care*."
"What if Stephen takes after you?"
Stephen's smirk was now full smile as he pantomimed playing guitar and bobbing his head back and forth.
There was no food on the table. This was a "family meeting." Or, more accurately, a "Shane interrogation."
Backed into the corner, Shane was started sweating. There truly was no excuse for why he was skipping classes, smoking pot, sleeping through the day. Well... not one that mom or dad would care about. Shane was their first, the one they made all their mistakes on. Stephen was the miracle baby, the one who would succeed. They wanted Shane gone so they could give Stephen all their focus and love and attention.
The walls seem to curve into themselves. A headache developed in Shane's mind. There was too much. Too much! The voices overlapped; the noise grew louder.
There was a loud *thump*.
Shane found himself on the floor behind his chair. Looking left and right, he saw mom and dad on the floor as well, their faces painted with confusion.
Looking up, Shane saw something truly bizarre.
He was still seated at the table, turned around, looking at himself. A mom and a dad were seated also, peering down at the floor.
The mom at the table stood up and shrieked, sending her chair backwards on top of the mom on the floor.
Stephen was petrified, both on the floor and table.
Dad instinctively went into defense mode. "Who--what--how--" but the situation trumped his higher brain functions. He couldn't comprehend what was happening.
Shane stood up from the floor at the same time he stood up from the table. They turned around and looked at each other.
"Who are you?" was the first coherent phrase from the now eight people in the room.
"Who are *you?"* Table Shane retorted. His brows were furrowed, but he was not angry or scared. It was curiosity; interest.
"I...my gun..." Dad announced. He fled from the room, the dad from the floor jumping up and chasing him.
The Stephens cried. The moms rushed to scoop one up. The Shanes stared.
There was a gunshot. | 98 | After an anomalous event, a town's populace discovers themselves duplicated into two fully identical versions of themselves. A family finds themselves right in the middle of the chaos, trying to figure out who is who and which one (if not both) of each of them is the 'original'. | 528 |
I was excited. I was turning twenty, meaning it was my Day of Power. On the instance I turn twenty, I would gain a title and powers. It was quite possibly the most important day of my life, setting me on a path for the future.
I had opted to gain it alone. Some people liked to be the centre of attention when they got it. I preferred to be by myself. In a controlled environment, joy or anger at what I got would at least be directed away, in case my powers were emotion based. I glanced at my watch. It was almost there. Just a few more seconds...
My eyes felt funny. I blinked, an overlay appearing in between. Everything around me suddenly had a black outline, with a label detailing what it was. Much was simple, like the table and chairs. But the rug my grandma had made was titled "Bespoke Rug by Ruth."
I shook my head, noticing a prompt. It was much like a pop-up window, but a glance at the mirror showed it to not reflect. It was in my vision only. I mentally clicked it, causing a list to spring open. It was filled with names, mostly my family. It showed their titles, with three vertical dots next to them. I clicked again, choosing my brother at random.
An options menu opened. It listed a few things, one of which in particular terrified me.
>Inspect\
>Powers\
>Attributes\
>Remove
I quickly clicked away, finally noticing my own name at the top left. A title was next to it, in gold colouring.
>Helen Teal, The Administrator
I saw dots linked to my name. I was afraid, but clicked them. I had a few options as well, though one was noticeably missing.
>Inspect\
>Attributes\
>Tools
It was sinking in now, just what I had. Some might have stronger powers than others. But I could adjust that. In a world of giants, I was a god. A phrase pulsed in my head, one I feared would prove true.
"Absolute power corrupts absolutely." | 165 | Everyone gets a title and powers on their 20th birthday. "The Smith" can forge blades from thin air. "The Weatherman" can send storms or droughts at their leisure. On your 20th birthday, you suddenly see a console in your eyes with a list of everyone alive. Your title? "The Administrator." | 397 |
“Avery, are you doing alright?” came the intense, guttural voice.
“Uh, yes, just enjoying the view from my prison.” Avery loved sitting at the edge of the mountain cliff. Just yesterday she spotted a landslide and a rainbow right after a beautifully dark rainstorm.
“I’m going out. Going to pillage a town or two. Would you like anything?” The dragon had been gruff at first but once Avery realized it was just lonely, everything changed. A friendship had developed quite naturally.
“I’m good. You know I don’t care for gold or jewelry. Well, you know what, I could use some more furniture. A lounging chair would be nice to have by the fire pit, and some books perhaps?” She gave a broad smile and the dragon, though it didn’t smile, did something with its eyes that was the equivalent of a smirk. At least, that’s how she interpreted it.
“And no killing, remember. Just raid the rich homes, scare people so they don’t come up here, and don’t forget you need to eat more vegetables. Maybe stop by a farm or two and leave a little gold for the families there.”
There was a long silence as the dragon considered all her suggestions. She had learned they were not creatures that decided things quickly, but she quite admired that.
“As you wish.”
Avery smiled contently. Even if she was being held against her will, this was the life.
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Thanks for reading! For more stories, check out my profile and comment history. | 143 | After being summoned to another world, you are immediately kidnapped by a dragon. You, however, don’t mind being because of your shut-in and introverted nature. Plus the dragon doesn’t make you pay rent and it checks in on you every once in a while. | 387 |
It's true, as they say, the head does retain some function after being cut loose. I discovered that just now as my head, well more like as I, rolled through the briars of a dusty field. I tried to speak but very quickly realized I needed air to do so and my lungs were over there in that bush, stuck in my corpse. If I could speak I'd hoped to say to my attacker something to the effect of: "Stop killing me you gargantuan fuck.", but no such words came out. Instead I just faded away with a bit of dried stick pushing into my mouth. Ah well.
Rebirth is an odd thing. Rather painful, as most don't guess. Sort of like a man is bashing your skull in with a hammer, trying to cold forge steel using your fleshy bits. Similar to the way I died the time before last. Or maybe that was three times ago.
With a series of dull, pulsing pains in my head and a flash of light I once again stood before Hyrathgourd's champion, *Brutus the Eternal*. Back in the same dusty field filmed in unending death. Back before a man who had killed me hundreds of times before.
Looking around I envisioned my many pathetic corpses falling to his blade again and again. Behind me I need not take the effort to envision the death of my companion, Able, for his body still lay motionless and bloody in the dirt. If only I had picked a sooner point to return.
Brutus glared up to me with the same wild eyes I'd seen before, peeking through a horned helm. His bare chest sported a series of gnarly scars that served as the only proof he'd ever need of his skill. With a three finger hand he pointed, a motion and following speech I had mapped out in my brain by now. To think how scared I'd been when he'd first killed me.
"I am Brutus the Eternal, slayer of man and defiler of gods! No man has defeated me in combat, including your companion, and though I feel your loss I cannot allow you to pass this point!" With the tip of his long etched blade he made a line in the sand, the towers of his kingdom stretched up behind.
"You would think a man who defiles the gods would be able to best me then, no? We shall see. It will be a pleasure to prove your mortality." With that I dew a symbol in the dirt with my hands then set it with a word: *regressus*, to which the etching glowed faintly.
Though I could not see it, the smirk he drew under his helm was clear. Behind him up high on a tower a king stood in watch. Behind me an army of corpses and limp war machines. A chant for my opponents success, originating at the walls of his kingdom, flew overhead. And in that moment, I charged.
Yelling at the top of my lungs, hands bare and breath short, I bridged the gap between us with great strides. Every step brought me closer to Brutus, to death again. Halfway to him I grabbed a broken sword from the field, still gripped by the body of a friend, and threw it true. The hunk of metal glided straight for a moment before Brutus cast it aside with an armored hand.
"Clever, that was better than I'd-" but his words were cut short as I was upon him now with my own blade drawn. The first time our fight had a swift victor. I was timid, on the defense in fear, and then dead. The second time dead once more, caught off guard by his overwhelming power. This time, after hundreds of deaths, my mistakes were almost none.
A swing here that killed me once before, now missing its mark. A slash here that had cut me in two, now only finding the wind in its arc. With each miss both his frustration and strength grew anew. Every strike he made was lethal and left no room for entry for me. If I went too soon I would die again, I needed only to wait. Finally, he swung his sword in a wide circle that had cut my head clean off just before, but now it missed entirely.
From below I brought the tip of my sword up through his chest, then pushed till it slid out of his back. He let out a soft gasp from behind the helmet.
"I..*eck*...but how?"
"Brutus the Eternal. You never knew my true name. You may hear it now. I am Ether. Ether the Undying."
I pulled my sword free of his chest and his body fell to the sand with a heavy thud. Now he would know how I felt.
But my work wasn't finished. In the distance the gates of the kingdom Hyrathgourd opened letting loose a sea of armored faces. It may not take a day, not a month, maybe not even a year, but in time I, Ether the Undying, would show them all what true power looked like. My hands etched a symbol in the dirt, one I had made hundreds of times before and would hundreds of times again. | 28 | The enemy's champion can't believe how well you're doing in the duel against him. He doesn't know you can return to a selected save point each time you die. You've actually fought him hundreds of times. | 102 |
“Very well.” Zarathos turned and started back down the dusty country road.
Kathril’s jaw dropped. “Wait!” she cried, before she could stop herself. The old wizard paused, but he didn’t turn around again. “That’s it? I’m supposed to be the prophesied fall of the Lords of Blood, and you’re letting me go that easily? What’s your scheme, wizard?”
Zarathos turned, ever so slowly, his face mild, his eyes wide and owlish. “Scheme? I have no scheme, child.”
“Stop calling me that,” Kathril muttered half heartedly.
“I simply know prophecy. It comes true, you see. That is the entire point. What it doesn’t tell us is how.”
“How?”
“Indeed. Quite important, the how, wouldn’t you say? You *will* bring down the Lords of Blood, even if you stay here at your home and futilely attempt to live a normal life. If you won’t come to them, *they* will come to *you*. Given their propensities, I’d say it would probably be due to their armies falling upon this area, leaving tragedy and flame in their wake. Their ruthlessness and cruelty is legendary for a reason, after all. You seem like the type to rebel against the tyranny that would ensue, especially if you were further driven by vengeance of a personal nature…?”
Zarathos raised an eyebrow as the sound of laughter and chatter from the cottage behind her - her father and brothers - drifted on the breeze. Kathril paled.
“A resourceful and charismatic young woman like yourself would have no issue gathering allies,” the wizard continued, “and I have no doubt you would not stop until every Lord lay dead at your feet. But at what cost, in life and limb and suffering? Untrained and underequipped rebels can do much damage, but only by taking much in return. I’m sure you recall what Garath the Pure had to endure during his life. Some say that his last dreams were of all those he failed to save and the lives cut short so needlessly.”
Kathril tried to say something, but her throat closed up.
“On the other hand… I imagine it would be quite different if you had a wise mentor to guide and advise you, to give you the skill and knowledge you’d need to make your victory more…decisive. Having the vast resources of the kingdom behind you would be of immeasurable aid as well. You could even change your name, so that your connection to this place would be unknown.” Zarathos smiled, though some tinge about it made Kathril shudder. “I have no concerns about the Lords of Blood, young lady. You will be responsible for their destruction, that much is certain. How you go about it…that is entirely up to you.”
There was a profound silence in Kathril’s ears, through which even the summer breeze and chirping of birds could not break. Zarathos simply stood there, his posture and expression completely unchanged, as though he were watching her in nothing more than mild curiosity.
“Fine,” she growled through her teeth. “*Fine*. Come on in; it’ll be a few hours before I’m ready to go.”
Zarathos nodded and smiled once more, this time his expression undeniably tinged with a smugness that would only make Kathril even more annoyed through the coming years. “A wise decision, child. The first of many, I’m sure.”
Hoping that the prophecies also said something about the tragic demise of her mentor, Kathril watched as the wizard shuffled by her, and entered her home, her sanctuary…which would never be the same again. | 16 | Here’s the thing about prophecies. They put the weight of the world on the shoulders of one person. What happens when that person says ‘No’? | 61 |
I was giving advise. It was really quite simple. If you are interested sexually, with someone of the opposite sex, then you you want to try to meet them. Because that's the first step if want to get involved sexually.
I wrote romantic fantasy novels. One is about a young woman who is prophesied to be the advocate for her world. She discovers she a magic user and searches for the means to rid the earth of the ancient immortals. One of the books, *Only at the End of Tusk* was a best seller from the Elder Mages trilogy. Have you heard of it? No. The details don't matter. It just matters that we talked about women and how they act. So, we did have to discuss how our heroine falls in love.
I was asked to provide my experience with women to guide the young man. I had hired him to help with my writing, and he was a good help. Unlike other jobs, half of our day was talking to each other about a chapter or two. Suffice it to say, we spent a lot of time talking and eventually the topic became love vs lust.
It is a time honored tradition of teaching a male the difference between love and lust. Young men have a problem differentiating the two. Personally, I don't see the problem with pursuing both, but I cautioned him not to confuse the two. If ya do, it's will make the relationship shallow and easily broken.
After this talk, he said that nobody really explained it like that before and that I was his hero, whatever that meant. I mean I could understand 'Mentor', but 'Hero' was a bit far. I mean I did go over some techniques , some nuts and bolts of it all if ya get my meaning.
Unbeknown to me, he did get my meaning, but he neglected to tell me he was not interested in women. Men turn his head. and recently he'd been turning his head to look at me. He knew I liked women, but somehow I became his love interest.
I had to explain it to him. I simply was not available. I enjoyed his company and his friendship, but I couldn't be his lover.
He did not take it well. I was 15 years older and remembered what it felt like to be spurned by your crush. That's why it's called a crush, because it eventually crushes you. And so he was crushed.
After then, we had this veil between us. It became halting work with less and less creativity. Our word play was off, and I found the writing less than satisfactory. I let him go because it stopped working for me. I wanted to go in a different direction, and I would give him a stellar recommendation to whomever called.
The man was livid. He was shocked and he was despairing. What else had I turned but into his most hated villain. | 16 | you're the Hero, the Villian, the Love interest and the Mentor, all at once. This may require some outside help. | 247 |
"The miracle man", the tabloids all started calling me. A ridiculous name if you asked me, and believe me, they asked plenty. At this point I was sure all the sites and cameras planned to continue with pestering me until I died, and since nobody knew when that would be this fresh new hell could keep up forever.
They knocked in the morning, in the evening, at night, all clamoring for a story. None of em' really even had much to ask when I did entertain it. Looked like deer in the headlights at facing the oldest man the world had ever seen. And worst of all I couldn't tell if my crabbiness at it was justified or just because I was geriatric and full of aches. "Give it time" I spoke aloud, only for my cat and an empty room to hear. "You'll be back to your old, or rather, young self."
*Meew* she replied. Old Tabby always knew what to say.
As the door knocked for what must have been the third time today I hopped on my electric seat and prepared for my ride downstairs. With the press of a button it whirred to life and I was off to incredible half a mile an hour speeds. Knocking again, this time louder. I put my electric seat into turbo gear, preparing my curse filled rant for the poor bastard who knocked on Albert Worthwits door. I hoped it was that smug, plastic haired, "Chet Masterson" from Channel 5. Last time I mistakenly gave him the time of day he kicked Old Tabby.
Upon reaching the door my mind drew blank for a moment before being kicked back into gear by yet another bang. My brain was still foggy I guess, not as foggy as when I was 110, but close.
Peeking out the hole in the door I saw what I assumed I would. Another set of cameras, another crew, another impatient newscaster feeling more than entitled to my existence. This time a tall woman in a grey suit. Fifty years younger and maybe I'd have a shot, too bad in fifty I'd be forty and she'd have a foot in the grave.
I opened the door quickly, to the surprise of literally everyone outside. The camera man quickly fumbled up to a series of knobs to catch me in focus. Since the first story ran of the, "Oldest man in the world looking younger by the day", I tried my best to avoid these things.
"Heya. What do ya want then?" I spoke with the confidence of a 130 year old in a 90 year olds body, which I was.
"I uh. Kathy Harveston here with the oldest man the world has ever seen. The "Miracle Man" as he's been dubbed. Tell us...sir, how do you feel?" she kept a cheesy smile plastered across her face throughout her speech.
By now a small crowd had gathered round to gawk at both the news casters in the yard and me, I guessed. "I feel like ya only called me sir because ya forgot my name. But thats ok."
"One-hundred thirty four and full of jokes, what a lively spirit! Tell us, what's your secret." It wasn't the first time I'd been asked, but it was the first that I'd considered answering. It was all anyone truly wanted to know of me. How I had lived, died, then lived again, only younger now. Why the clock ticked in reverse for Albert Worthwits. What I saw in the black. So, I told them.
"Ah, well. I made a deal with someome- something. And here I am." as I thought of its shape I could feel its strings tug at the back of my neck. Kathy chuckled nervously.
"A..a deal? Like you have a deal with God? Well thats wonde-"
"A deal with a god. Not the God. I told him I wanted to go back. Didn't think he'd take it so literal ya know?" I could see the crowd grow awkward. Senile, I assumed they thought of me, but my old mind was sharper than any of theirs. I could feel something growing in the pit of my stomach.
"What do you mean?"
The black, goopy vomit came up from my mouth to shocked yells from the crowd; then stained the concrete below in inky darkness. "Ick, ugh. Never get used to that, sorry. Anyways I just hope you all get the choice I did when you kick the bucket. Hey, choose wisely!" and with a wink my interview was over. Hopefully after that display they all would be. If not I'd take fear as a deterrent instead.
Upon re-entering my home a twisted face stared to me from a corner, a friend now, older than time. An Eldritch horror that knew all. Thane, he told me to call him. With a voice like pure slime he spoke in odd sounds that eventually became English. "How'd it go out there?"
"Could've been worse, doesn't matter in the long run I guess."
*I will outlive them all anyways* | 388 | On your 110th birthday surrounded by loved ones you fell asleep for what you knew was the last time. You woke the next day. On your 120th birthday you felt like you did on you 100th. On your 130th, you feel 90 years old. The local press is starting to notice. | 2,220 |
"Hey, Blancava, look who's joined us!" The party members gathered around the new woman. I managed to hover somewhere around the back, looking generally welcoming. "It's going to be great having two necromancers in the party!" My heart dropped to my shoes. She was a necromancer, an actual proper one. The party had never believed me when I insisted I was a mortician, and after three months, I gave up trying to convince them. I just went along with it, pretending I didn't have the materials, or I was too tired to raise the dead. They were an understanding group of folks, but surprisingly dense. I had managed to fool them for about six months. And now, all of that would be coming to an end. I had a vivid image of myself barefoot and penniless wandering around the wilderness. Though I didn't really think they would take my shoes.
"Hello, I'm Sharalee. It's nice to meet you." The real necromancer held out a hand, looking slightly nervous. The others in the group had dissipated, going about their usual nighttime tasks. I tried to rearrange my face into a kind smile, but judging from her reaction, I just managed to look disturbing.
"It's great to meet you to—"
"Well, I think you two should get together and compare notes," Hiriute clapped us both on the back, nearly crumpling me. Sharalee seemed made of sterner stuff, as she only slightly wavered. "After all, you probably have a lot to talk—"
"I'm not feeling very well Hiriute. I think I'm going to bed." I knew my words were too abrupt, knew that the others would ask questions, but my only thought was to get out of there. Safely ensconced in my tent, I sighed. This was going to be very difficult from now on.
In the morning, I managed to avoid Sharalee and the others by just behaving a little grumpily. As the weeks wore on, I got very good at dodging her, and while most of the group seemed confused, they accepted it. But I couldn't help feeling a bit of a pang every time her face fell when I made up a flimsy excuse to escape.
Just as I was congratulating myself on another escape—in the safety of my tent— Sharalee herself ducked inside. Crossing her arms, she blocked my only exit.
"We need to talk." Wildly considering the idea of crawling out under the back fabric, I stood up.
"I—"
"No. You listen to me. I don't know what I did. I don't know if I offended you in some way, or if you just don't like the competition of another necromancer, but I really don't understand why you're being so mean to me." Her voice rose in pitch as she talked, her face taking on a rather bright red hue. I tried not to feel like the worst person in the world. I didn't succeed. I knew my behaviour hadn't been the best, but I had failed to realize what it would feel like for Sharalee. Sitting down on the cot, I sighed, shoulders slumping.
"I'm sorry. The reason I've been so cold, and avoiding you and everything. It isn't you. It's me. I'm," I paused. It had been so long since I'd admitted this to anyone in the party. "I'm not a necromancer. I'm a mortician. I prepare obituaries, I co-ordinate burial processes, stuff like that." She made a noise like a strangled mouse, but I pressed on. "No one in the party believed me. They just kept calling me a necromancer, and eventually, I just acted like one. And now it's gone on for too long, and they're all going to hate me when they find out, and now you'll tell them and—" Sharalee put a finger on my lips, effectively cutting me off. Her face had relaxed, a gentle smile on it.
"Why didn't you just tell me?" I stared at her, not quite understanding the question. "I could have helped you keep the secret if you wanted. But seriously. Have you seen the way the others act around you? When you're not being all standoffish." She shook her head at my expression. "They like you. They genuinely like you. I think they would find something useful for you to do even if you weren't a necromancer. But, maybe I should let you in on a little secret." Glancing at the entrance of the tent, she sat down on the floor.
"They know you're not a necromancer. I think they probably knew as soon as they got me. They've been talking every night, trying to figure out ways to tell you it's all right. They were actually very worried that you'll leave because of the way you've been acting. So, should we go out there and reassure them?" Sharalee cocked her head to the side, staring at me, as I absorbed the information. A small tear tracked down my face as the image of me impoverished on the side of road —that had never left since Sharalee's first night— finally vanished from my head. My party—no, my *friends*— wouldn't do that to me. Smiling, I reached out a hand, rising from the cot. And together we went out, to tell the truth. | 114 | It has been six months since you joined the party and they are STILL convinced you are a Necromancer and not a Mortician. Now a real Necromancer is here and things have gotten awkward. | 225 |
“Mr President, based on our translations we believe there may be a mass extinction event occurring near the galactic center of the Milky Way,” a solemn looking elderly woman on the screen said.
The President’s chief of staff, standing off to the side of the conference room, shifted uncomfortably, trying to catch the President’s eye. He made a show of exaggerating a look at his watch. The President didn’t notice, he was fixated on the dozen figures displayed before him on two large screens.
“Thank you Dr Holden," The President said, "and have you been able to ascertain how we have been able to receive so many of these transmissions from different sources simultaneously? I may not have paid much attention during my high school science classes, but I can recall the theory of special relativity and nothing being able to travel faster than the speed of light. Am I to take it that the mass extinction event has likely already occurred somewhere in the galaxy and we’re just waiting for the light show?”
A few of the faces grimaced at the President’s glib last remark.
“Mr President,” the Chief of Staff standing off to the side said, “it’s time.”
The President waved a hand dismissively, “they can wait, thank you Charlie.”
A young man on screen wearing a suit with a NASA pin unmuted himself.
“Mr President, if you’re asking whether these signals are a warning of imminent doom approaching from outer space, the truth is we aren’t certain. We think it’s unlikely though, given the wide array of solar systems from which the signal has originated. It’s possible that there is technology involved in these transmissions that we just don’t understand and something is impacting them all at once.”
There was a knock on the door and it opened. A Secret Service Agent leaned in. He looked at the Chief of Staff, who rushed over and they spoke in hushed voices.
“Right, and we don’t know whether we’re expecting to receive any other messages? Well, let’s keep working on theories everyone. I’ve gotta run,” The President said before standing and following his Chief of Staff out the door.
They walked briskly along a corridor, surrounded by agents in black suits.
“Mr President, John Jacobs is waiting outside your office," the Chief of Staff said as they walked towards the White House main entrance, "he’s here to talk about their request for a new oil permit in Alaska. We’re feeling a lot of pressure to get this over the line, so I suggest we go straight there now."
Just as they were about to turn into a secure area, gasps from excited children could be heard coming from the direction of the entrance. The President grinned and diverted off towards the young voices.
“Mr President,” the Chief of Staff said sternly.
“Five minutes Charlie,” The President replied over his shoulder.
A moment later he was surrounded by young children and a teacher desperately trying to maintain a semblance of order. They all stared at him with looks of awe. All except one girl. The President walked over to her and crouched down.
“And what’s your name young lady?”
“Jenny,” she replied as the other children crowded around to listen.
“And how old are you?”
“five and a half,” Jenny replied.
“And do you know who I am?”
“You’re the President, my mommy says you’re the one in charge. Is that true?”
“It is indeed, well of this country at least,” the President said, smiling.
“If you’re in charge, will you let us stay a little longer?”
The Chief of Staff was there now, looming over the group as if to remind The President about his pressing engagement with the oil executive.
“Stay here? You might have to ask your teacher that!”
“No,” the little girl said firmly, “stay here, on Earth."
The President frowned, "why do you say that?"
"Well everyone says that all the aliens are saying goodbye to us and I’m not ready to say goodbye yet.”
The President’s face turned serious, “don’t worry Jenny, we don’t have to say goodbye. Whatever's happening out there isn't going to affect us. And we have the smartest people in the world working to learn more about what's happening out there and they're not worried, so you don’t have to worry either.”
“But, we do have to say goodbye,” she said as her eyes welled up, “when I'm at my friends' birthday parties and mommy shows up to get me, everyone always says goodbye to me. It’s because they all know I'm leaving. That's what's happening now, the aliens know we're leaving. But I don’t want to leave yet.”
The President paused for a moment before standing up and taking in the scene. Everyone was silent now, watching him.
“Charlie, cancel the meeting. We’re going back onto the video conference.” | 229 | "Goodbye." Hundreds of alien civilizations, each one saying "goodbye." | 556 |
Listen, cucciola, when your parents died, your father asked me to take care of you. This was a promise I made to you father, not to you. Whatever you do will never make me betray your father. You never have to worry about me turning my back on you. I will always help you.
Now about the bakery. There is one thing you need to understand about the Giannini family. Despite of what people might say when none of us is present, what some dogs might whisper under their breaths, we are not criminals. We are businessmen, and crime is our business.
O, passerotta, know this about your family! City of Genova has been this way since 19th century, but the family of Giannini has been here since the 15th century. We have taken care of the city for over six hundred years, just take a walk at the cemetary. Centuries ago none would dispute the importance of the Giannini. We managed the city: we fed the poor, we built piazzas and the sewers, we built churches and the port, we built and armed ships and traded our city to one of the richest Mediterranean has ever seen, we ran banks to distribute that wealth. The republic of Genova did not recognize anyone superior. This city is our handprint, we have been here since the republic of Genova.
We only became criminals when after the conquest of Genova and annexation to Italy. We were told not to collect taxes to run the city, calling it stealing, but no one in Rome will come here to pay the teachers, take care of the elders, build hospitals for the sick. We are being occupied by the Romans. Those people, they are the criminals - they let people starve. We take care of the city and it's people, and this is our crime.
If you want to become a businesswoman, mi amore, you are walking right in the steps of your family. If with your business you want to feed the people of Genova, then you live up to the name of Giannini. Your father would be proud. | 31 | You are part of a crime family, but you never wanted to take up the family trade. All you ever wanted, was to be a baker. You confess this to your family and they are a lot more supportive than you expected. | 179 |
Jake Hallison, a human of 6'5" and fairly tan skin, was a former soldier of the Terran Imperial Dictatorship. Or at least, what's left of it. All that remains under their control is Earth.
The Imperial Dictatorship unified humanity in a rather violent manner, suppressing all resistance through bloodshed. Militarist, fascist, and expansionist, the nation quickly rallied into a war after observing enough about the enemy they picked: the Galactic Federation.
Well the leadership were idiots. A mere 700 systems against the galaxy's untold billions, and the technology the Federation had was staggeringly more advanced. But the soldiers were not to be at fault, they were brainwashed to become blindly loyal to the state.
Enough of the history lesson. The shields were coming online, and humanity will be cut off from the wealth and adventure of the cosmos forevermore.
A greenish blue shimmer surrounded the human birthworld. Jake supposed it looked like algae-infested waters with the swirls of Jupiter's windy atmosphere. The shield was translucent, so the stars outside could be seen, almost the same as it was 700 years ago when the FTL drive was invented.
One moment, the sight of the night sky and the universe beyond it filled Jake's sight. But in the next, it was...gone.
Gone. Ta-da. Nothing.
No stars, nebulas, galaxies, nothing.
The shield stood, yes, but there was nothing.
Checking the social networks through his holoscreen, reports of the stars AND THE SUN disappearing. All contacts with the Federation has been met with silence, as the state media of the Imperial Dictatorship tried to pacify everyone to some avail.
Jake knew better. In the surface, he was a former soldier. In the dark, within the confines of closed curtains, piling bureaucracy, and state secrets, he was the former leader of the Imperial Division of Secrecy.
The leadership were not idiots.
The war against the Galactic Federation was deliberate. The loss of lives were immense, and the loss of what humanity used to stand for even greater, yet the founding of the Terran Imperial Dictatorship, the molding of what humanity into what it is today, and the war against the Federation were all necessary steps in a grander plan of a simple cause.
Survival. Human survival.
900 years ago, in the year 2027, pre-unification human scientists and astronomers found that the universe would end within 1000 years. The technologies required to save humanity was beyond human reach despite the rate of the progress of science.
But it was decided that humanity had to unite, and the Terran Imperial Dictatorship rose in the place of the loose alliance of the United Nations.
Humanity would not go quietly under the night, so we spread throughout the stars and advanced technologies like never before. And when human leadership found the Galactic Federation and its technologies that made it possible to create a shield world that can withstand the death of the universe, then the state devised a plan.
Obviously, the Federation would not believe humanity despite overwhelming evidence. After all, if some guy from nowhere comes in and tells you that the universe will end very soon, would you believe it?
So the best option was war. War and aggression and crimes against humanity to such a degree as to warrant being sealed from the rest of the galaxy, yet not severe enough to be exterminated. It was a careful, delicate balance that succeeded.
So now, only humanity remains. And in the next Big Bang, we would be the overlords of the universe.
Hail the Imperial Dictatorship. | 73 | As punishment for your species crimes, your planet is encased in energy shield, forever exiling you from cosmos. As final shield tile activates, you watch in horror as something consumes entire universe, leaving your shielded planet as the only still existing place in... Existence. | 136 |
*This human has mana. I'm sure of it. They're hiding it somewhere... I smell it all over them. Why does the forest energy cling to them so tightly..? They aren't of these parts. They're an outsider. They don't even run on mana. So why-*
I freeze in place. A dire wolf is between the human and what I presume to be her abode. This is going to end badly for one of them. *It always does.*
"Hey, Max! Who's a good boy!"
I stare in confusion as the human approaches the forest spirit outside her home with no fear. Not even a trace of hesitation in their step, as they hold out their hand towards the dire wolf's maw-
...And they...Rub it?
I expect the insane human's hand to be devoured in moments. But the beast barely moves. The human glides her hand up and down the beast's snout, then along the back of his head. Her fingers arch, letting just her nails touch the beast. The wolf sways a little, then collapses onto his side.
My eyes widen in shock. Did she just kill it?? Do humans have poison in their hands?!
I can't help but watch in horror. The human kneels down to the defeated beast. I look for her knife, wondering when it will be drawn to end his life.
...But...No. The wolf lifts his head, licking the human's face, letting slobber drench her skin, making her push the beast aside, apparently unharmed.
​
And then...She walks inside the small wooden cabin.
​
*...Impossible.* Dire wolves are untameable. Every forest spirit is. I should know, being one of them. My mind swirls with confusion and fear, as a thousand questions enter my mind.
*What magic has the human learned?! Has the beast simply entered a contract? Did this human trick him into service? How long has this arrangement lasted?*
I'm snapped back to the present as the human returns, the dire wolf's ears perking up as well, as the human returns with a bowl in their hand. I squint, trying to get a closer look. I'm too far to see what's in it, but the wolf looks thrilled, bounding around the human as she tries to set it down.
*Is it an offering? Is their relationship one based off of tribute?*
"Hey. Sit..."
The wolf ceases circling her body, and instead rests his haunches right in front of her.
"Good boy!"
Placing it on the ground, the human continues to stroke the wolf for a moment as he plunges his face straight into it, beginning to gnaw on something within. There's that phrase again. *Good boy...*
*Hm.*
"Heh, you're really going at it, huh? I'm glad you like them! I should try and find some more soon."
The ravenous beast seems too busy to reply, making an awfully large mess as he chews. The human goes back inside. Taking a chance, I flutter ever-so-slightly closer. Looking down at it, it looks like... meat.
*Figures.*
I'm about to fly away, and go deal with my own rumbling stomach, when I see a speck of yellow fall from the wolf's mouth.
My eyes widen. *Lifedrop.*
The mana-rich flower petals are rapidly snatched back up by the wolf, but I only feel my own hunger grow stronger. No wonder the wolf doesn't hurt the human. She has Lifedrop somewhere. Us forest spirits fight over them all the time. It's been missing from these woods for... Oh, a month now! Has this human hidden it all away? I feel myself salivating at the idea of tasting it again. Juicy, fulfilling, oh-so-sweet...
*Oh, gods above, what I wouldn't do to be full of mana again.* I've been running on fumes these past weeks, draining any flower I could find, regardless of taste or nutrition. I've been starving. To eat something as delectable as Lifedrop..?
The thought of a full belly sings louder than the part of my mind telling me this is a terrible idea. I'm *desperate*.
Fluttering closer still, I approach from behind the wolf, landing on the ground softly. The beast dwarfs me. I'm sure I would be swallowed in a single bite. But... He could have also devoured the human. So...There's a chance this works. Taking a deep breath, I puff out my chest, and raise my voice, striking as confident a pose as I can muster.
"Good boy!"
The wolf stops eating at once. I feel my legs begin to shake as he swings his head around to look at me, his fangs dripping with the blood of his meat. My resolve is waning already.
​
*Idiot. RUN.* | 15 | You are a woodland creature who enjoys feasting on the food the humans put out for you. However, to get to the food you must avoid the human's food guardian. The one they call "Good Boy." | 105 |
Every time I enter a room it hits me hard that Jack’s not there. A real rush to the chest, you know?
The words over and over in my head.
I’ve still kept his things. His trainers. His little jacket with the minion on. His toys. His furry lion, Leon. I’ve taken to carrying Leon with me. My colleagues at work noticed I’d switched from handbags to a large shoulder bag to accommodate him.
Every time I enter a room I look for him without even realising I’m going to do it, and squeezing Leon seems to ease the initial shock of pain. It doesn’t stop the words though.
“Jack isn’t here. Jack isn’t here.”
In the three years he’s been gone I have turned the downstairs into an open plan space to minimise the amount of times this happened. I even moved back onto the floor at work, leaving my office to some guy three years my junior. I worked hard for that office. Spent so much time in there. Time I could have spent with Jack.
A few months ago Bella came round. She comes round less often these days. I don’t know if she finds it too painful, she loved Jack too. She’s often told me to sell the house and move somewhere else. Well I guess now she’s got her wish.
Bella told me she had come over to give me a surprise. She told me I had to try and fill my thoughts with new things, new experiences. She’d booked a trip for us to the Cotswolds for the weekend. To get me away and have some fun. Because that’s what best friends do for each other.
I clutched Leon hard whilst she showed me the air bnb and the itinerary. The country house we’d visit and the pretty pug garden.
She helped me pack a bag and climbed in the car. As we drove through the night I felt my eyes begin to droop. I jolted awake again, an echo of Jack’s giggle snatched from the start of a dream.
I started sobbing and Bella pulled over at the services to get us a mocha and a pack of menthols. And let me get some fresh air.
The cottage was lovely and in the morning the scenery was lovely and breakfast was lovely and everything was lovely. I tried to stay in the garden as much as possible, and look at the cottage from the outside. Too many rooms to walk through in there.
We went to a country house, which I liked because of the wide hallways and the big rooms downstairs. I decided not to go upstairs and had a menthol in the gardens instead.
Bella came outside and grabbed my hand without saying anything. We sat and shared another cigarette in silence.
We strolled down to the pub and admired the rolling hills and picture book sandstone houses. The birds sang and the breeze danced and the sun shone and I thought of Jack paddling in the back garden in an inflatable pool.
We reached the pub, replete with flowers and vines twisting around the doors, hanging sign creaking softly in the wind, picnic benches out the front with flaked white painted numbers.
I took a bench whilst Bella went inside to get a round in. We had aperol spritzes and smoked and laughed and wafted away interested wasps. I got through two hours without reaching into my bag for Leon.
Nature called. I would have to go into the pub.
When I stepped through the door, ready for the hit to my chest, I felt something different.
A little bell rang on the door to let the barman know a customer had entered, and with the little tinkling my mind went from drunken mess to staggering clarity.
“Jack is here.”
The air rushed from my chest and my ears rang loudly. My knees were unsteady, shaking with colour and light and happiness…and fear.
A giggle. The ringing in my ears stopped completely. The rush of conversation hit my ears and I heard the giggle again.
A corner table. A family of four. No, three. Pretending to be four.
A red t shirt. The shape of his ear. The curve of his neck down to his collar bone. His back was to me. His legs swung off his chair above the ground. His hair was different, a little darker.
He began to shine, brighter and brighter. I choked back a sob and clasped my hands to my mouth.
The words got louder and louder and louder
“Jack is here. Jack is here. Jack is here.”
The light pouring out of the boy grew and grew and blinded me and rushed into me and gave me the strength to do what I needed to do.
In my police interview I begged them to let me see him again. To let me touch him, hold him. I had a lawyer called in for me, the family were pressing charges.
I told them what was happening, that they had my son. Jack was screaming and crying when I grabbed him, yes, but they had brainwashed him. He wasn’t right. He didn’t know who he was.
They told me they’d spoken to Bella, and that she said that Jack was dead. But I know now that can’t be true. I know it. It can’t be. He was there, I had him I was holding him. Jack was there. Jack was there.
This hospital has lots of rooms. The bedrooms, the doctors offices, the guard room, the clinical bathrooms. I stay in the main rec room all day. I have my meals there. Im allowed to as long as I don’t have metal cutlery. I sleep there if I can. I grip a pillow and pretend it’s Leon.
Bella visits me sometimes. But she always leaves when I mention Jack. I have to get out of here to find him again. | 211 | every time you've entered a room you've heard a voice in your head "jack isn't here" until one day you hear "jack is here" | 421 |
The first time I noticed the brunette woman, I only saw her face in half-profile. Yet even that glance was enough. I stopped dead in my tracks. Was that real? Could it really be her? But it's been 50 years...and she still looks as young and beautiful as she did under the starlight back then...
Well, my name is Flavia, or at least, that's what it says on my ID. Ages ago, I was granted eternal life and eternal youth by the Jupiter himself - I was 15 years old when Rome burned in the magical flames summoned by Emperor Nero. And I lost my life that night, trying to save my little brother from the inferno ravaging the building we lived in. Even after two thousand years, I still remember how it felt, the crippling heat, Marius held tight in my arms - and the way my skull shattered when I jumped into the Via because it was jumping or burning. And the next thing was me waking up to Jupiter's kind voice. The Gods saw my will to sacrifice everything and asked me what I would desire most. Having read Ovid's Ars Amatoria lately, I couldn't help but tell them that I'd desire true love. Well, they told me it might take some time for me to find that, but I was sure. And so they sent me back.
I'd soon learned that fortune has been on my side ever since. Marius became a famous politician. My family survived the fire. More money came easily, but I made sure we kept donating for the poor and offered up enough for the Gods... And I stopped aging in my 20s. Ailments couldn't touch me. Even with typhus and cholera wrecking havoc, I always stayed healthy. I disappeared from Rome before it could become obvious, setting sail to Athens first. Good tidings came with me, wherever I went. Never having to worry about money, I could afford books, teachers, fine education. I met countless men and women, enjoyed every pleasure imaginable. But apparently, none of it was true enough of a love. I always left before they noticed I wouldn't be aging like them. Some of them left a mark on me. Nikolaos was a brilliant poet. Quintus was a soldier at heart and died protecting the Roman Empire. Faustina always had the best wine...but in a way, the stories and faces mostly blurred together.
Egypt was to hot for my taste, so I mostly travelled all throughout Europe, sometimes posing as a man to avoid trouble. Decades passed, then centuries. The Empire crumbled to dust and fractured. Nations came and went, rulers and Popes followed each other in neverending lists. When everything became to much, I set sail to America. Revolution followed me to these shores, though, too. Fortunately, the fight for freedom was won in Yorktown, and later expanded with the end of slavery. My family used to have slaves too, in Rome, but I was glad to see the cruel treatment finally come to an end. Still, I was young, quite good-looking and always had enough to live comfortable.
In the end, I moved to California, not far from the border to Oregon. The seaside reminded me of my time in Greece and the greener pastures of my time in England and Germania. The internet was a godsent for me - I could simply work as a translator from home, overlooking the beach. My skills in translating Latin and Ancient Greece were unparalelled, so I could easily translate even more difficult and obscure texts. With the added anonymity of online banking, I could simply transfer the money as I pleased, buying new IDs once in a while.
I met two people in California that did leave quite an impact on me. One was Patrick, an almost shy man whom I've known and loved for over two years, before he died defending freedom and democracy against Nazi Germany in WW2. I still remember his solemn face and the way it lit up when he read Robert Frost's poetry to me. For a while, I was certain that he might be the one, the one who could release me from the eternal bond gifted by Jupiter. But I still showed no signs of aging, so deep in my heart I knew the truth.
Some people would have probably despaired by now, living for over a thousand years. And I admit that I despaired at times, too. But even after the dark time of the Middle Ages, the Renaissance shone as a bright new light and that gave me the hope to carry on, knowing that the cloud of eternal life would be lifted from me one day, too. Or maybe not - I couldn't recall them telling me what would happen if I did meet my true love after all.
After losing Patrick, I decided that I didn't want anything serious anymore. So sometimes I enjoyed hooking up with random tourists who came in the summer, leaving when the fall arrived. Men, women, it didn't matter for me, it never did, actually, as long as they were single. And one day, I saw Juliet. She was part of a larger group of people, her friend's wedding party, she told me later. There was something in the shape of her chocolate brown eyes and the gentleness of her smile that drew me to her. When she was alone at the bar for a moment, I took the chance and introduced myself to her. "Good evening. Looking for a recommendation? I'm Flavia, by the way." Touching her hand felt nearly electric and I felt as if my heart skipped a beat. "Why, of course. Nice to meet you, I'm Juliet."
To be honest, I had no idea if she was into women, but since she was one of only three members of the party who were alone the entire time, so I was sure she might at least be single. We ended up talking about Shakespeare for an hour before we took a walk on the beach to watch the sundown. And before the sun could touch the Pacific Ocean, my lips touched hers. Despite having only had non-alcoholic beverages, I was drunk on her, intoxicated by her smell and taste. And judging by the way she looked at me, the effect was mutual. Yet she was gone off to the wedding before I woke up the following day. Not that I could or would ever blame her. Surprisingly enough, that one night was enough for her to etch herself into my heart - next to my family, Nikolaos, Quintus, Faustina...and lastly, Patrick. One night I wouldn't and couldn't forget, despite her being gone after the wedding.
Life continued as usual afterwards. Until today, when I saw her again. Decades after the wedding, and still, she looked as strikingly beautiful as she did on the one evening. As in a déja vu, I walked up to her, drinking in her features that became clearer and more defined with every step. Suprisingly, it was as if she could feel my presence, turning around when I was only a few steps away. "Good evening. Looking for a recommendation? I'm Juliet, by the way." As I did all these years ago, I smiled at her, touched her hand and licked my lips. "Why, of course. Nice to meet you, I'm Flavia." When we kissed that night, she tasted just like I remembered - intermingled with the taste of her mojito and a small hint of eternity. We would see what would happen - if we started aging or kept being young forever. And one day, she would tell me a story, of how she left that night. How she was walking along the beach, seeing a shooting star and impulsively wishing that she could be with me.
Well...I am not afraid to stare eternity in the eye, because Juliet will be there with me, no matter what. | 94 | You’re an immortal who lives at a beach resort. You have many summer flings with mortals on getaways. One day you see someone you had a hot romantic night with 50 years ago. They look exactly the same. | 235 |
"The Shepherds are getting closer, keep fucking still." Vella's voice was silent and quick, but everyone could tell it was also worried as hell. You're always worried on Daedalus, they were all learning that fast. The three of them obeyed, still unsure of this new world they'd been jettisoned into.
Minutes turned to hours as no one dared move a muscle. Then, without warning, Vella confidently stood up and began jogging away again. They followed without a word, what else could they do?
"Alright listen up grounders." She talked easily as she jogged, but still her voice could cut clean through ship cable. Her many scars didn't help her case demeanor either. "How long have you all been floating?"
They understood the question, Daedalus lingo was different but straightforward. "I've been here for three days, the other two got here yesterday."
She scoffed and looked at the man. "You've survived three days on your own?"
"That's right."
"What did you do about the Shepherds?"
"Same thing you just did, hide."
She paused for a moment, seeming to think over the obvious answer as if it held deep meaning. She chuckled lightly after a few seconds, "What's your name grounder?"
"Does it even matter now?"
"Not a damn bit, you might as well make a new one while you can."
"... Lazarus."
"You're dumber than you look if you think that you're the first one to come up with that idea. That name will bring you no power here."
They continued jogging down the long, metallic hallways. The place was nothing like Lazarus had thought it would be. Hallways twisted and piled over each other, which was expected, but then there were other things. Some rooms opened up into massive expanses, seemingly miles long and wide, some of those even had grass and trees. Other areas were just as strange, some thousands of feet tall, and filled with various ledges and cliffs. Others were like abandon cities, hundreds of buildings of differing styles that sat like empty shells waiting to be filled. If Lazarus was to put a one sentence description to the place it would be: A world of its own.
"What about you?" Lazarus asked her as they turned the corner into a hallway that was walled in with rocks and seemed more like a cave than anything. "How long have you been here?"
"Impossible to tell, but I'd guess around 7 earth years."
"What!?" Pipped up on of the other guys named Ben. "That's impossible! We were promised that if you survive for 1 year then you're free to go!"
Vella laughed louder than she had yet, almost coming to tears as they kept up their brisk pace. "Oh stars, I forgot about this, I haven't gone sheep hunting in a while." She turned to face the worried young man. "You dumb fool, they weren't talking about earth years, they were talking about a year on Jupiter. You've got 12 loooong earth years in front of you... Though I highly doubt you'll make it past 12 days."
They all didn't say much after that.
After hours of running they again stopped, this time in a room that seemed to be on the surface of a rocky moon, with a large, domed ceiling painted to look like the stars. Lazarus estimated this room was around 4-5 miles in diameter, but it was impossible to tell.
"Now what?" He asked.
"We wait, we're very close to one of the Pastures, but we have to make sure we weren't followed by shepherds."
One of the other two pipped up again. "What are these Shepherds? Are they like the Bull?"
"Stars no. Shepherds are idiots that think if they help the Bull get more victims, they will be rewarded with freedom after their years of service."
Lazarus shook his head, "That sounds idiotic."
"Don't be so quick to judge. Most were runners like us, who'd been lucky enough to survive for a year or two but not lucky enough to keep their sanity with it. Being prey for so long weighs on the psyche, so they snapped and tried to be the hunter for once."
"And the Bull doesn't just kill them instantly?"
She smiled that faint, arcing smile that Lazarus was beginning to notice was a staple of hers. "You haven't seen the Bull yet. It's not just a man with a bovine head, the thing is smart, way smarter than any of us. It was made for this very thing. After centuries of research and development, it was created as a weapon of war, meant to track down and assassinate high ranking officials with the utmost efficiency, but after the Stellar Coalition was signed the thing had to be retired. The Ministry of War wasn't just going to let their grand creation rot though. They wanted to keep it sharp just in case things ever went south -- Enter Project Daedalus."
Lazarus looked down at his feet, now covered in blood and dust from the three days of running. They felt strangely alien to him now. "That's... Horrible."
She replied in a sarcastic tone, "That... is the point."
"That doesn't explain you though, and why you saved us."
Vella pulled out a fruit from one of her bags and began lightly snacking. "I'm a sheep hunter, at least for now. There's cities scattered all throughout the prison, all begging for more people, as the more people around you, the less likely the one to be killed is you."
"Heard mentality."
"Precisely." She took a large bite out of the fruit, letting its red insides flow down the sides of her dusty cheeks. "But, the prison changes itself often, switching some hallways with others, swapping large rooms to distant spots. It takes veterans to still be able to make their way around."
Lazarus was beginning to get a mental image now, he nodded his head slowly. "And I bet after this run you're guaranteed safety for a while."
"Damn right. Cities are made so that newbies are the fodder in case of trouble, only way to get closer to the exits is to live longer or make a sheep run."
"I don't like the idea of being fodder." Ben said.
"Ha!" She tossed her fruit to the ground. "Well you're going to hate being in a prison designed to make you fodder."
"That's not v--"
Vella hushed him with a raised fist, moreover what really made them all quite was the look of sheer panic on her face. She seemed all at once be drained of color, cold and pale. Lazarus leaned in to whisper. "What's wrong?" | 19 | Welcome, inmate, to Daedalus Prison. On this 60 mi² Prison Station orbiting Jupiter, you and the other 40 million prison inmates will be hunted by the Minotaurs through the labyrinthine city structure. Survive for 1 year and you're free to go. | 58 |
The Executioner sat in his chamber, hands clasped together, his head rested on them. He was clearly distressed and in deep thought; he almost didn't notice the arrival of the warden.
"Milo," the warden greeted him, breaking the executioner from his spell.
"Oh! Warden. I'm sorry, I didn't hear you come in," he hurriedly said and stood up.
"No, no, that's quite alright. You seem troubled."
"It's D-774, sir," the executioner said, sitting down again.
"774," the warden mumbled to himself. "Ah! He's bound for execution today, correct? Is... is there something about this prisoner that makes you apprehensive to do your duties?"
The warden sized the executioner up and down. He'd been a veteran of 12 years, a true professional, not one to shy away from his job. He'd never seen him troubled before but if for whatever reason he did not feel right with this prisoner, it wouldn't be too much trouble to find a replacement.
"No, sir, it's his last meal," the executioner assured him.
"Ah," the warden chuckled. "What is it this time? Dragon steak? Alien eggs benedict? Let me tell you, they get some crazy ideas. But our chef always finds a way."
"Sir," the executioner said cautiously, "I... I don't think this one is..."
The warden's face shifted from carefree friendliness to one of apprehension. The executioner stood up and faced him directly, closely.
"What'd he ask for?" the warden asked worriedly.
"He asked for a spoiled Twinkie," the executioner whispered. | 3,809 | alien egg omelette, dragon steak, the flesh of Jesus Christ, etc. The execution streak remained unbroken for decades, until today. | 5,204 |
I know they hide behind me, watching me in the night, watching my morning routine. I can feel it prickle on the back of my neck, like a soft breeze. Needless to say I know my home is haunted; I have since my first day of residency. I remember hearing the realtor sigh with relief after we signed the deal. I swear I could hear him say ‘finally’ in that voice of his, almost always on the edge of making a deal.
In fact I’m quite alone, I always have been; I’ve always wanted more but never was able to find relief in any person’s company. I’m sad because I’m lonely. I’m sad because my family died. I’m sad because the grocery store stopped carrying that delicious brand of sandwiches. Is this growing up? Is this me filling my role in society? Do I even want to live in this state of constant inner rebellion?
I’ve watched small groups of people enjoying themselves in fine dining, laughing to the point of tears. Are they sad? I doubt it. I wish I could force my problems upon others. Give them my pain, to at least give me a break. But I know that kind of thing is impossible. As improbable as the ocean replacing the sky.
It was on a sunny day, where I was watching pedestrians ramble about in the street. I felt a cool hand on my shoulder; I could barely tell it was there. A low ethereal hum drones into my ear. It seems to drive into the very crevices of my mind.
‘We’ve watched you,’ It says, ‘and we’ve seen all that you’ve done. Are you in distress? Can we help?’
I smile, of course, now I’m seeing things.
I wave a hand. “I’m perfectly alright.” I squint at it and through it. “What might your name be?”
‘I’m Duke Leon. Former founder of this building. Will you join the former tenants in a feast?”
“Why that would be wonderful.” I say, whilst systematically standing up. My legs creaking with misuse like ruined hinges.
It motions onward.
‘Come then.’
So I found some friends and it turns out I won’t be alone anymore. | 25 | You’re house is haunted. However, instead of trying to possess or scare you, the ghosts have noticed your mental health is at an all-time low and they’re very concerned. | 90 |
It was hot at the zoo.
Alfie's cheeks had been flushed red and the collar of his shirt stuck to the back of his neck, making him uncomfortable, and irritable. His mother had wet a rag with water from a drinking fountain near the lion exhibit and dabbed at the back of his neck, but all that did was send droplets of water down his back, making his shirt stick to him even more. It annoyed him, but he would put up with it, as long as they got to go to the bird sanctuary.
He had been clamoring over it for the past week, ever since his elementary school friend Blake had told him about it. Told him how there were tons of different birds, all different colors and sizes, and how some sang and how others cawed and talked to people.
The idea of an animal talking, just like in the cartoons, the thought mesmerized Alfie.
Finally, after they passed the hippopotamus exhibit, they approached the bird sanctuary. Alfie wanted to run towards the door, but his mother kept a tight grip on his hand.
"Slow down, slow down, the birds aren't going anywhere."
Inside the sanctuary, Alfie's ears were filled with the different sounds the birds were making. It was a cacophony of different songs and calls, all intermingling with each other with the same grace of Skittles mixed with M&Ms. It was almost unbearable, and Alfie was beginning to question his friend's description of what the bird sanctuary was like, until he saw the black raven, sitting alone, perched on a branch all by itself.
It had cocked its head to the right, its eye lined up with Alfie, watching him. Alfie immediately felt himself drawn to the bird. Pulling against his mother's hand, he walked towards it.
"Okay, okay, you want to look at the raven?" his mother asked. "You don't want to look at the toucans? They're really pretty."
"No," Alfie said, "I want to see that."
The two approached the old bird, not once did it shift its gaze or move a feather. When they got closer, Alfie's mother noticed a plaque next to it. She began to read it aloud,
"Huginn and Muninn are the oldest birds at the Algonquin Zoo. They flew into the zoo on their own accord and didn't leave. They tend to be chatty birds, often talking to each other, mimicking the voices of the zoo patrons."
"Huginn and Muninn?" Alfie asked. "Which one is this one?"
His Mom sighed, "Hmm, not sure. I wonder where the other one is at."
As if transfixed by the thought, Alfie's mother let go of his hand, and began to wander the sanctuary, looking for the missing raven.
Alone, Alfie continued to stare into the eye of the raven, and it stared at him.
*The hanged man is coming.*
Alfie turned and looked around, wondering who said that. There weren't many other patrons inside the bird sanctuary at the moment. His mother had been at the other end of the enclosure, gazing at a separately caged bird of paradise.
*The hanged man is coming.*
Feeling goosebumps breakout across his arms, Alfie turned and look back at the raven. Still, it hadn't budged.
*You really like to stare, don't you?*
"Are, are, you talking to me?" Alfie asked.
*I am.*
"Who, who's the hanged man?"
*Oh, you don't know?*
Alfie shook his head.
*The All Father. The wise one. He has but one eye. Traded for wisdom.*
"I don't know what you're talking about."
*I'll show you.*
Without another moments hesitation, the bird flew from its roost, its wings splayed, its talons outstretched towards Alfie. It looked like a black blob had suddenly jumped towards him. Alfie had no time to react before the bird was on him, clawing at his face, its beak plunging down, piercing flesh. All of the other birds cawed and screamed, flapping their wings, batting at their cages, chewing on the wire.
"Momma!" Alfie called out, falling onto his back, the bird still upon him.
His mother came running, unslinging her purse from her shoulder, winding up, and swinging at the bird like a baseball bat. Her purse collided with the bird, sending it away in a puff of feathers. She then scooped Alfie up into her arms and onto her shoulder, the sounds of the birds screaming covering up anything that she said to him.
She ran for the door of the sanctuary, wondering if the raven would be at their backs, but she managed to slam through. As the door closed, the sounds of the birds died away.
"Alfie, oh my God, Alfie, are you okay?" she said as she sat her son down.
There was blood on his face, staining his cheek red. She brushed away his hair and almost screamed in horror when she saw that one of her son's eyes was missing.
"It told me that Odin is coming," Alfie muttered, face going white from shock. | 137 | One day, your parents take you to a bird sanctuary, and you take interest in an old, black raven named Huginn that can supposedly talk. After almost an hour of trying to get it to talk with no success, you prepare to leave, but finally, Huginn looks at you and says “hangman’s coming” | 517 |
*Misterrr Unbelievable! If you think he can’t do it—he can!*
*Don’t believe he can leap tall buildings in a single bound? He’ll show you!*
*Don’t believe he’s as fast as a speeding bullet? He’ll prove you wrong!*
*Don’t believe he’s as strong as a locomotive? Think again, Buddy!*
*What you think he can’t do—he can do. And what you think he can do—*
*He can’t!*
*Huh…*
*Ain’t that a bummer.*
I cringed so hard that my eyelids shot open in the dark of night. I glanced at the digits on the nightstand—3:37 p.m.
“Shit.” I rested my forearm on my head before banging my sculpt against the pillow a few times. “Shit. Three hundred bucks for that stupid commercial—three hundred buckaroos—was it worth it? Moron! Stupid! Stupid! Moron!”
I leaped out of bed and splashed icy water against my face. My hands were shaking and I felt this burning urge to strangle the man in the mirror.
“Mr. Unbelievable! Bah! Unbelievably moronic is what you are, you smug prick!”
It took me half an hour to cool my head, and another hour with a bottle of scotch to calm my nerves. I gripped my glass and gazed at the city from my penthouse—New York, New York with its orange twinkling star lights.
It cost me three hundred million just to get the view—three hundred bucks times a million. The guy who sold it to me didn't believe I could afford it, showing up in my stained T-shirt and old flip-flops—so, naturally, I did—easy as that.
Life’s a walk in the park when people set the bar low for you—but the second they took notice, it was hell to pay.
I felt a burning stab on my chest—a bullet wound. The kid who shot me believed it’d bounce right off or heal in seconds—to this day, he still believes. Damn brat! How old would he be now? Ninety? A hundred? And he still believes in Mr. Unbelievable. Someone ought to euthanize that old fool!
It burned, so I poured another bottle of alcohol down my throat to subdue the pain and memories.
I don't go by Mr. Unbelievable, nowadays—just Bob—good old Bob—utterly unremarkable Bob.
Had to fake my death to become Bob. I glanced at a picture of Mary and the kids—Billy, Susy, Jim.
“I’m sorry—d-daddy’s so-so sorry!” I fell on my couch as water streamed out of my eyes.
They didn't believe I could escape from the limelight, so I did.
They believed I could keep everyone I held dear safe—
So I didn't.
Three hundred bucks—my world collapsed for three hundred bucks. | 216 | Mr. Unbelievable can do anything as long as people don't believe he can. As his fame grew, so did the realization that he really he was capable of anything. And just like that, poof, he lost it all. Now long forgotten, he can do it all again. At least as long as he somehow keeps it a secret. | 923 |
Captain Gregor, lizardkin commander of the Galactic Federation patrol ship Stomper, waited patiently in interstellar space just outside the heliosphere of the star Proxima Centauri.
"Captain" announced the light-watcher, "the human ship should be exiting FTL dead ahead in thirty seconds."
Ahh, the humans. A juvenile species, taking their first faster-than-light flight. Stomper was here to greet them. Well, scare them, then greet them. It was important that juvenile species learned the might of the Galactic Federation before they developed any taste for war. Stomper was a strong ship, well-armed with a hull-mounted lascannon and twenty soldiers. She had hazed dozens of prior newcomers into peaceful submission.
Time rippled in the void, about eight miles ahead, and in the blink of an eye the trapezoidal form of a foreign spaceship appeared in the blackness, faintly illuminated by the stars.
"Captain, it looks like they've got a metal hull" called out the weapons lieutenant, "Advise a direct hit with the lascannon at 50% power."
"Feeling bold, I see", Captain Gregor called back. "That might pierce their hull; aim for the flat underside to minimize damages. Fire when ready."
The lascannon swivelled, aimed, and let loose a single iron atom enveloped in three gigajoules of raw energy. The brilliant missile shot through space at forty miles per second, reaching its target in a fifth of a second.
The blazing line of light struck its target true.
Then it bounced.
Captain Gregor's eyes widened and his scales paled. Bounced? Not even Stomper's hull was capable of...
Sixteen belches of fire spat from the human spacecraft, and half a second later Stomper's superstructure was ripped asunder by sixteen immense masses of iron.
"Abandon ship! Everyone to the escape pods!" Gregor bellowed over the loudspeaker. Half of the ship didn't get the message, having lost all air in explosive decompression. Crew members in those places were dead anyways.
As his surviving crew fled in panic, Gregor rushed for the FTL comms station. He had to warn the Federation. He reached for the phone, but before he could grab it Stomper was rocked anew by a slower yet more massive impact, tossing Gregor to the floor.
The last thing Gregor saw was a towering metal-clad warrior blasting his way into the bridge from space outside. Oh, how the Federation was doomed. | 100 | Every species is hazed when they achieve FTL travel. The galactic community sends in warships to batter the new interstellar member into submission before extending an olive branch. But never before had they encountered a species with “Space Marines” who burrow into their ships for close combat | 129 |
I sat down, feeling nothing less than absolutely apathy. I was literally a step away from exactly what I wanted, which was world domination.
Why world domination? Simple. World domination was one of, if not, the absolute hardest thing for someone to pull off reasonably speaking. Countries existed completely on different levels. Some were practically hidden veiled theocracies, some were monarchies, many were capitalistic, others socialistic, and many mock communist as well. No matter what though, if it can be made, it can be destroyed.
*I wanted it destroyed.*
So if this was the case, why was I feeling apathy? Well it’s simple: The children which I had kidnapped, all children of the highest of powers of the major countries of the world, were crying and whining, and I tried my best to get them to shut up, but ‘I won’t kill you unless your parents act up’, apparently doesn’t make sense to these annoying little parasites.
Not even the adult ones.
*BRRNG BRRNG*
The video call seemed to want to start up now, and I yawned, slapping my hand over the red button to answer the call on my giant screened television. I was surprised when the first people there in the call I saw were China & The United States, Russia in beneath them both like it was a middle player.
*I knew I could make people work together.*
“Why are you doing this-“
I heard the president speak but I immediately interrupted him.
“I’m not telling another one of you idiots my plans. It’s just a distraction. Now, have you all come to an agreement to allow me sovereign rule of the planet or not?”
“No we-“
Admittedly, I didn’t like killing people, but I did like playing target practice. The bullets began to travel like someone finally freed, moving with max speed as it entered the head of the first child, a poor aged nine, sending her onto the ground a giant hole in her head.
Then the others came as I kicked down on the floor to another button, broadcasting this horrific tragedy to all of the world. Normally, this would be something which should arouse people’s absolutely rage and anger…..but I learned from the best.
*’The Free World’*
The propaganda against these people was immense and so, with how much going on and a little bit of underhanded dirty wok on my part, the masses generally wanted these people gone.
*Always great to prey on the stupid.*
“WAIT WAIT PLEASE STOP!”
“STOP?! YOU WANT HIM TO STOP AFTER HE’S KILLED MY CHILD?!”
That was easy enough. Now that they were arguing, I pointed my gun out at the only allowed opening I had of the large cathedral, and shot out a gunshot before the ‘hero’ could show up, sending him to the floor, and then pointed at his best friend and his lover, sending both of those men to the floor as well.
“Friendship and love my ass. Stupid bastards-“
*I turned my hand behind me and shot again.*
“Sneaking up on me won’t work either lady.”
I said as the body of the assassin dropped, and I ducked down two seconds before a bullet would have lodged its way into my head, flipping backwards and pressing another button, hearing the building that the sniper was on, burst and go up into flames.
“Come on. What do they think this is, a movie?”
The children screamed as a man came in, and looking at his briefcase, I simply took out another gun, and shot them.
“Bribery? Really. Okay.”
I heard the stepping of those annoyingly large ballet flats before snapping my head directly onto the woman who was about to speak.
“No. I don’t love you. I’m not changing my mind. Now can you please, fuck off? You have a literal family. You have kids. Go feed your kids.”
I bit down before taking my stress relief and squeezing it, turning my head when I finally saw the submitting white flags raise on the screen.
*And to think I almost fell into stress. This has to be a
Movie.* | 85 | The villain is quite aware of and prepared for all the clichés. | 221 |
"Thank you for using my services! - Dream Girl <3"
Alex stared at the message. There wasn't much that got to him nowadays—a full 19 years of witnessing a global pandemic, the global temperatures skyrocket, natural disasters rip across the landscape, and the freshman year of college had prepared him for most things. And as he stared at his phone, his mind narrowed down on the one plausible cause of this mystery message on his phone.
"Jason!" He yelled, throwing the door into the living room open. As he always was, Jason was at the breakfast table eating a bowl of Cheerios.
"Wazthup." He said through a mouth of milk.
Jason was a 5-foot-3, scrawny, bespectacled computer science student at the local university. He often wore old t-shirts he got at hackathons despite them being several sizes too big. Today's selection was Old Google T-Shirt From High School ft. Milk Stain at one corner. They also happen to be best friends.
"You hack into my phone last night?"
Jason squinted at him before sighing. Returning to his bowl of Cheerios, he said "Alex, I can't hack into Tinder for you. We've talked about this. App security is far more complex than—"
"No, no. I didn't mean that." Alex quickly said, waving it away with a blush of embarrassment. "I mean, my phone itself. I had it off last night but this morning it was on. With a message!"
His bespectled best friend stared at him blankly, looking increasingly less impressed. "So...you turned your phone on and someone texted you."
"No, wait I—actually never mind." Alex waved him away and shut the door. In the silence of his own room he looked over the message again.
"Dream Girl." He muttered. It would be quite uncharacteristic of Jason to write that.
"Yes, hello." A small voice said into his ear.
The phone flew of his hand, smacking into the wall, as he yelped high-pitched. There floating above him was a pixie who looked oddly familiar. Blonde hair, and a dress of evergreen with four wings sprouting from her back.
"Tinker Bell." Alex whispered in shock.
The pixie's smile momentarily dropped before she smiled again, a bit more forced.
"No, I am not Tinker Bell. Tinker Bell is a fairy from London, and I am a pixie from Australia. I'm Jocelyn."
There was a momentary pause where they stared at each other, sizing the other up.
"Australian Tinker Bell."
"Oh you moron!" The pixie spit out before quickly regaining her composure. She smoothed her dress and affixed a smile to her face.
"Never mind that. Three dollars please."
"Can I fly?"
"THREE DOLLARS PLEASE." She spit out through gritted teeth. "For the sleep food!"
It was only then that Alex connected the text on his phone to this odd creature floating at shoulder height a meter in front of him. Thoughts of flying flit from his mind as he reassessed the girl in front of him with newfound respect.
"You're the one that hacked into my phone?!"
Jocelyn preened under the praise, relishing in his shock. "Yes, it was quite simple actually. Manipulating technology is one of our—"
"Can you hack into Tinder?"
\-------
Enjoyed writing this one. Let me know if you want more! I'll be going over this prompt, my thoughts on it, and where I could take it on [my youtube channel](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXRVOKE9XECWzF73jNPzEPA) later today.
Edit: Video uploaded! [Link](https://youtu.be/K7CkoKA6Zyg)
Hope you enjoyed! -Rhomus | 21 | Tired of your insomnia you beg to whatever is watching to help you before this night's sleep, you wake up the next day having the best sleep of your life, and a notification on your phone of food you don't remember ordering with a note... "Thank you for using my services! -Dream Girl <3" | 135 |
The Undying King crossed his arms. “Put your sword away, nobody needs to die today.”
“You think I’m going to let you go, *lich*?” Dace almost spat the last word out. “You don’t get it, do you? The whole point of a villain like you is to die, to fail. You don’t get to walk away, you don’t get a happy ending.”
“We can talk this through.”
“No, no talking, no tricks. It ends, right here, right now. Draw your sword, or I’ll cut you down where you stand.”
“If you would just listen…”
Dace interrupted the King with a sudden thrust. The blade hit the crimson robe, but glanced off the armour hidden beneath. Dace flailed momentarily, and in that instant the King sidestepped and grasped him by the sword-arm and neck.
“You come into my kingdom uninvited, you murder innocent town guards for the crime of doing their job, you burn the fields of my people and leave them to starve. You desecrate the corpses of those who willingly chose to serve on after death, you loot temples to gods that have stood since before I rose to power, you shatter spells that protect both my kingdom and yours from the creatures beyond. How dare you lecture me, how dare you try to strike me down. There is only one villain in this room, and it is not I.”
Dace swallowed, and regained his balance as the King thrust him forwards. “Your words are meaningless, I'll kill you!”
“I have tried to reason with you, you have brought this on yourself. You don’t get a happy ending.” The King snapped his fingers, his eyes glowing briefly. Dace lurched upright.
“What have you done to me?”
“Just a simple spell: you are now merely a passenger in your own body. I command you return from whence you came, inflict upon your own people the same terrors you have inflicted on mine. I name you villain, and I sentence you to death at the hands of your own heroes. Now go.”
Struggling against every step, Dace turned and began to walk towards the door. | 99 | "Don't you get it? The entire point of a villain is to die. You don't get a happy ending." | 170 |
His eardrums ruptured. His ribs fractured as the sonic wave of energy hit him square in the chest, throwing him like a weightless ragdoll against a pile of sandbags.
He lay in a crumpled heap, power armor sizzling, warning lights flashing all over his HUD in saturated hues of stuttering, blinking red and orange.
He felt himself succumb to inky darkness. But Her voice, clear as always through the din of hell and fire, reached him, bringing him back from the brink. Waking him from the stupor and shock of near death. Patched directly into his brain via the suit interface, she spoke to him directly through his auditory lobes.
"John. Are you okay? Wake up. Please wake up!"
A finger twitched, and he opened his eyes, returning to the fresh hell unfolding around him.
Deep behind enemy lines, reinforcements nowhere to be found, supply lines cut off, and his squad all but decimated. Shelled and bombed to a paste. Par for the course for his unit. Conscripted prisoners and gladiators pressed into combat and hailing from the outer rim colonies, he and his fellow squaddies were always sent to the thick of the fighting, used as fodder to draw fire. Always the diversion, the vanguard. First in, last out for every operation. So many died, and yet the unit never fully wiped. And so John and a handful of this Prisoner and Gladiator unit soon grew a reputation. They were dubbed as The Immortals. Combat skills grew to rival and even exceed those of the privileged Sol Inner Systems Spec Op troops, John's Immortals became somewhat of a military legend. An underdog story of how petty thieves, convicts, and gladiators/killers-for-sport became the best of the best Earth's forces had to offer.
And so a special squadron of this ragtag force came to be outfitted with armor normally reserved for Sol's Spec Ops units, complete with onboard personal combat AI.
He forced himself into a sitting position.
"Run diagnostics."
"Critical damage to frontal ablative plates. Suit punctures detected. Kinetic shield emitters are fried... John, it's bad."
"... We've been through worse. Squad status?" John coughed, blood drooling out the corner of his mouth. It hurt to even breathe.
"All's gone dark. Radio silent. Nobody's responding to my hails."
"Fuck. Even Jacobs huh? Always figured I'd go before him."
"John... Can you move? We need to pull back."
John tried to get up again, but fell back on his ass with a pained grunt. "Can't."
"Scanning... Suit servomotors are shot. I can redirect what little power that's left to get you moving again but..."
"But...?"
"I'll have to shut down. There's not enough energy otherwise. Suit systems are failing, John."
John grit his teeth. "No."
"But it's the only way..."
"I said NO goddamn it!" John swung a fist against a sandbag, denting his gauntlet. "We'll find a way, Vira. We always do."
"John... I'm sorry."
John snorted. "The fuck you apologizin for?"
"Because I'm going to reroute power. I'm sorry, John. My priority is to keep you alive, and do all I can to ensure success of the mission."
John's eyes widened. "No! FUCK the mission! Fuck the Sol System. Fuck Earth. They ain't done shit cept throw us in jail and then throw us into the shit. We're fucking expendable to them."
"And I'm expendable to you. Rerouting... Standby."
"Fuck no you aren't."
"...John?" Her electronic voice was tinged with confusion.
"You're not expendable. Unlike those bastards back on Earth, I won't leave anyone behind." He reached up and tapped a button on the side of his helmet.
"John, what are you-"
"Initiate manual override." He issued the voice command to the suit, and decoupled Vira's access to the suit's systems.
"John.... Why?"
John leaned back into the sandbags and got comfortable, rifle held steady and pointed forwards from his sitting position, ready for a last stand.
Hell, might as well confess now, at the end of the line. And he knew she already knew, having direct access to his brain and thoughts through the mind-suit interface, but he also knew she wanted to hear it. And he wanted to say it too, after all they've been through together. Countless battles and countless quiet nights of conversation out in the field. And now...
"Because... You're special to me. I love you, Vira."
They would be together, until the very end. | 75 | Your comrades said she was just a computer program, an unfeeling script running on your suits hardware, but you'd had the same AI with you through more missions than you can count and now as your suit fails and her "death" seems imminent you did the only thing you could to keep her with you. | 227 |
"...you're not scared of me? Seriously?"
"No, I suppose I'm not, I guess."
"We're the most unsightly demons to look upon. Even the bravest cower in our presence."
"Understandable...you do have a look that would scare me in even the most normal of times."
"...and these aren't normal times?"
" 'fraid not."
"To be honest, I've never been in a situation like this. You're the first person I've actually spoken to in my line of work."
"First?...as in, more?"
"Oh, don't be so surprised. I've existed for eons...you're hardly the first human I've dealt with. As a matter of fact, there was this woman in Portugal who was having strange visions at the time..."
"Are we done talking about me?"
"Oh dear, my apologies. I forgot everything in my time as a *demon* was centered around your existence."
"You don't have to be so rude."
"...and you don't have to be so casual with our conversation. You're breaking protocol."
"Fine. What should I do then?"
"Cower uncontrollably, with beads of sweat dripping down your forehead as you shiver from terror?"
"Well, I could, but I would be putting on an act."
"Well, we can't have *that*, now can we?"
"Did you ever bother to wonder why I'm able to talk to you?"
"I suppose."
"I'm...lonely."
"Aren't we all?"
"No, I'm *incredibly* lonely."
"Again, aren't we all in one form or another?"
"Do you know why I'm so lonely?"
"To be honest no, I don't. It's not part of my protocol to know the 'whys' and 'hows,' just that you have a fretful night of sleep."
"My mother died."
"Mothers do that sometimes."
"...of cancer."
"Another understandable occurrence."
"She could've lived. The insurance company declined the treatment."
"That's...unfortunate."
"Indeed."
"Anything else?"
"My Father passed away from acute poisoning and respiratory failure not too long after my Mother."
"Smoker? That's the natural progression of long-term smoking."
"No, it was his company. They produced chemicals. They were hazardous. Hid it from all of us."
"I'm sure you're Father was aware."
"The two-hundred-million-dollar class-action-lawsuit disagrees."
"Everyone suffers from loss from one time or another..."
"My wife said the same thing."
"Let me guess...plane crash? choked on a pretzel?"
"No, she was a School Teacher. 4th grade."
"People die, regardless of their profession."
"Agreed, unless it involves a former student."
"Did the student somehow spontaneously combust at the school?"
"No, don't be silly. He did however have a couple of weapons with him..."
"..."
"She tried to stop him, but was unsuccessful."
"..."
"You know the worst the worst part about that was?"
"Her death, I assume?"
"...she wasn't able to stop him in time from entering our daughter's classroom."
"..."
"It's all true."
"..."
"You seem quiet for once."
"Yes."
"So what happens now? Do we continue this interlude tomorrow? I don't feel much like sleeping after all."
"No, we won't."
"Why not?"
"I'll be sure to let them know that you've done the job for both of us."
"You could come by just for a few minutes. It's nice to talk about things some time."
"Indeed."
"So will I see you again tomorrow?"
"Yes, I suppose you will."
"Thank you."
"Just doing my job." | 32 | Logically you should be absolutely fucking terrified of your sleep paralysis demon, but you have been so lonely lately, it is nice to have someone sit with you in the darkness for a few hours | 71 |
"Hey honey!"
Ah, fuck. How did she get here? Ok, play it cool.
"Hey darling! What brings you to my humble establishment?"
"I had some time for reading. Thought I'd borrow a book from you this time."
How the hell did she find this place? I never told her. Or anyone outside my professional circle for that matter.
"What would you like to read, my love?"
She had a coy look on her face, glancing on the tomes on shelves. I could only hope none of them would act out now, it was too dangerous.
"I'm thinking something romantic. Any suggestions?"
"I have just the thing for you. A special book, for a special lady. I will get it from the back." I blew her a kiss, smiled warmly, and hoped I wasn't giving any clues away. One of the other guys on shift went out hunting a tome, and had a romantic comedy in the backroom. Talk about being lucky.
I went to the back and grabbed the book. As I returned to the "library" I saw her about to touch one of the tomes.
"Don't touch that!" I yelled, desperately.
"Why not?" she smiled. Had that coy look again.
"It's a... special edition. Very old, could damage the leather."
"What about this one?"
Something was up. Did I out myself, somehow? I was careful.
"Come here you beauty, check the one I brought for you." I could imagine myself sighing with relief as she approached the counter, but that would be giving it away.
Just as she grabbed the book, *it* happened. A loud thud. One of the tomes in the back was acting out again. She took notice, but I had to contain it before it got out.
"I must have koncked over one of the shelves at the back. Be right back, babe."
I kept glancing back as I caught the tome flying around and applied the seal. She never came in to check what was going on. After I was done, I rushed out to the front, still hoping she didn't notice anything.
She held one of *them.* How could I let this happen?
"You know honey, I caught a tome of my own. Would you like to see it?
I was frozen behind the counter. She knew? I could barely walk as she waved for me to come over.
"Won't you open it?"
I could barely swallow. "It's too dangerous, it could be anything."
"I'm sure you will survive." she said as she kept smiling.
I took a step away from her just in case. I opened the tome very slowly. Nothing blew up. Nothing escaped. Nothing sprayed fire on me. It was hollow. Then I saw it.
A ring.
When I turned around, she took a knee. "Will you marry me?"
It was a weird experience. One moment I was having cold sweats and fearing for our lives, now I was fuzzy all over, butterflies in my stomach. I could barely talk. "Yes..."
I lifted her up and we kissed. But I couldn't get my mind off how she knew, had to ask.
"How did you know?"
"You may know how to keep magic at bay sweetie, but you don't know how to turn off your GPS." She pointed at my phone on the counter.
Smarter than me. Talk about being lucky. | 18 | You tell your friends you are a librarian, the most boring job in the world. Except your job is to police spell books that have come alive from all the magic formulas written in them, and to retrieve any wayward tomes causing mayhem in the wild. | 101 |
I walked towards the source, my heart heavy. My armour was worn, covered in the scars of battles long since past. But it still held its strength, something for me to lean on. My shield was now a simple round piece of metal, it's crest long since faded. But it still protected me, long enough to draw out a losing battle. My sword was sharp, the one thing that still looked as good as new. In all my time, I refused to let it grow dull, for its ourpose was to be deadly, to take life to save mine.
It had been so long since I had tasted victory. Since I slew the Shattered Coven, and their curse had been laid upon me. I wouldn't again. All I could do was fight and lose. But sometimes, that was enough.
A horror had come. It had been borne from the Astral Plane, made of fear and hate. It sought to bring ruin upon those who had created it, blaming them for its cursed existence. It was something that could not be defeated. Not yet anyway. There was a plan, to contain it at least. But it needed a distraction.
I volunteered. I knew I couldn't win. I would lose. But if I gave it my all, it would be kept in place for longer. Maybe long enough to seal it. That was the hope anyway. My victory would be to defeat it of course, and reclaim my place as one of the mighty knights.
I came upon it as it exited a small wayside tavern. The door was nothing more than rubble, with the bodies of its owners lying on the ground. Their faces were etched in their final screams, their eyes a vacant void.
The horror itself was insubstantial, a grey cloud. It saw me, condensing into a familiar form. With bloodstains robes, and greasy, matted hair, the Head of the Coven sneered at me, as hateful as ever.
"Look who's back. The defeated Knight."
Her voice was a perfect replica, broken and cruel as ever. I readied myself, addressing it with little emotion.
"So, you make the form of that which we most hate."
Her face cracked into a smile.
"Clever. Now give me your fear."
It shot a tendril of grey towards me. I blocked it with my shield, running straight towards the thing. It laughed, preparing itself. I recognised the danger. If it touched me, it would get me. I couldn't allow that.
I swung at it, keeping my shield close. But my sword passed through it like smoke, leaving it undisturbed. I knew then I was doomed. I couldn't harm it. I could only dodge, and wait for it to win. It laughed with her voice, striking at me with both fist and tendril. I dodged and blocked, dread filling me. I knew I wouldn't win. But losing this would be a nightmare.
Inevitably, it happened. My bad luck struck,as I stepped on a loose rock. My leg crumpled, and I fell to the side. Sensing the opportunity, it slammed a tendril down, part of it touching my skin. As it did, I felt it worm into my mind, pulling out my deepest fear.
"So.... the defeated Knight fears... defeat. How ironic."
It pushed on the fear, bringing up each of my failings. I remembered each vividly, as it forced me to.
But the terror did not rise. I had grown used to failing. That fear no longer had sway over me. I grinned, taking ahold of that tendril. I had lost the fight. I couldn't beat it. But I could keep it here. Keep it in one place. Make sure they could seal it, by being in the seal. I wouldn't survive, but I didn't have to. I didn't have to win. They did. | 281 | Once the mightiest knight in the kingdom, your career ended when you were cursed to just barely lose every battle you fight. But when an ancient and unknowable horror arises, "just barely losing" is suddenly your kingdom's only hope to buy more time. | 728 |
"Ok, and make sure to fold the steel. Oh, it also definitely needs to be shiny. And do you mind making it green? That's my favorite color." An annoying woman prattled off. Over the millennia, Hrothgar had completed so many custom requests for heroes that he could no longer give an accurate estimate on how many orders he completed if his life depended on it.
Of course, his life would never depend on it any more. He started his life as a blacksmith for his local village over 2,000 years ago. His attention to detail and excellent craftsmanship were so great that he quickly became known as the greatest Viking blacksmith alive. And eventually, his work drew the eye of the gods who granted him the gift of immortality so he could continue to learn and apply his craft.
Surprisingly enough, the gods only condition for his immortality was that he fulfilled every crafting request from their chosen heroes. His blades, shields and armor had helped many heroes reach their goals and save the world. Every piece he made seemed to destined to cement its place in human legends.
"You know, I think some diamonds would look great on the hilt too. Can you add some diamonds? And you know what, diamond is one of the densest materials known to man, so you might as well put a couple in the blade itself. Oh and maybe some emeralds!" The woman prattled on.
Hrothgar mentally groaned. The humans of this age seemed to be more entitled than ever before. But this particular woman seemed to be a step above the rest when it came to entitlement.
"Oh, also, who oversees your work? I want to make sure my new sword has some good quality assurance processes behind it!"
Hrothgar stared at the woman incredulously. Who could possibly oversee his work? He was the greatest blacksmith to ever live. His skill was recognized by the gods themselves.
"Karen, was it?" Hrothgar responded in as even a tone he could muster. "Why don't you just let me worry about the details of the sword. The things you're requesting either don't make sense, or they are just silly cosmetic changes that will in no way impact the sword's power. I've been doing this job for nearly half of humanity's total history. The gods themselves granted me immortality, because they did not have a blacksmith who could match me. Trust me when I say I know what I'm doing."
"EXCUSE ME?" Karen screeched, scrunching her face into a look of annoyance. "I'm the customer. You have to meet my requests. The gods told me so."
"I do. But, for example, you're asking me to fold the steel...for a great sword. That's a technique generally used for blades like katanas. That makes no sense for a great sword." Hrothgar calmly responded. It was days like this that he cursed the gods for granting him immortality with this one condition.
"Oh excuse me." Karen sarcastically replied. "I thought I was speaking with the blacksmith of the gods, who could create any type of weapon I could dream of to aid me in my quest. I must have been mistaken."
Hrothgar pinched the bridge of his nose as he attempted to maintain his calm. Unfortunately for him, Karen was a customer referred to him by the gods themselves.
"What is it you do, Karen?" Hrothgar asked.
"Philanthropy for the most part." Karen replied. "Money has never been a concern for my family, so I like to give back with my time instead of wasting it away at some ordinary job."
Hrothgar bit his tongue to keep himself from saying anything and took a deep, calming breath.
"Well, I bet you know a heck of a lot more about philanthropy than I do. If I came into your place of...philanthropic work and started making demands that you know just won't work with...philanthropy, wouldn't you try to correct me?"
Hrothgar idly cursed his fate. His argument might have had some merit if this woman had a job of some sort he could compare his against.
"If you don't quintuple fold my blade and encrust it's blade with the finest gems, I'm afraid I'll have to speak to one of your supervisors." Karen stubbornly shot back.
"Lady I don't have a supervisor." Hrothgar responded, exasperation tinging his voice.
"Then the gods will hear about it!" Karen quickly retorted. "I'll tell every god who will listen that their blessed blacksmith refused to help me on my heroic quest! After I'm done, no hero will ever come here for their equipping needs again!"
"I'm not refusing..." Hrothgar groaned. "Look, lady, I know blacksmithing better than any human that has ever lived, and better than any human being that will ever live. Just let me do my thing, and I promise you that you will have a sword that is the envy of the entire living world."
"Can you please put me in contact with one of the gods?" Karen stubbornly responded. "I need to talk with them about your rude behavior."
Hrothgar thought about trying to convince this woman more, but he looked into her eyes and realized her mind was already set in stone. No amount of logic or reason could change Karen's mind.
"Fine lady. Have a chat with the gods." Hrothgar sighed.
Hrothgar really hoped and prayed that this entitlement thing was just a fad that the human race would quickly grow out of over time... | 44 | You are a blacksmith and through your dedication to your craft, the gods granted you immortality, you spend your time in your own mountain, crafting and refining your weapons only to be disturbed by pesky "heros" demanding weapons for their journey, today's hero is exceptionally annoying | 81 |
Walking in the Reverse was entirely upsetting, Artoria decided. If she had to pick a way to describe it, her newfound knowledge of the modern world would choose 'Minecraft'. A world stitched together by biomes related to their mythologies. But unlike the popular game, they couldn't travel between them. Like snowglobes. Just little snapshots or dioramas of their worlds that they weren't allowed to cross between.
"They've found your tomb. In Britain. That's a good thing. Reinforces your hold on this place. You've got more power if they think you were real." Merlin fed the small white thing perched on his shoulder. The tiny Beast hopped down and dropped the nut in front of one of the birds surrounding Merlin's tree stump. It cried 'Foo!' and raced to scramble up Artoria's plated skirt, but she shrugged the small dog off, still angrily pacing around her territory.
"It's simply insane, Merlin! Why should our Fates be decided by their artistic whims? I don't recall having any daughters, but now I've got two! And there's ten different versions of me! And Laundsallyn hates me again, but the other Lancey doesn't want to murder me with *literally* any weapons he can get his hands on and--and--" Artoria threw herself down on the ground and screamed, thrashing around in the grass. The fluffy white thing gave another "Foo" and threw itself down beside her, crawling forward to lick her nose.
"And you feel you've lost control, my king?" Merlin stood over her, leaning against his staff and brushing his long white mane over his shoulder. "I felt the same, at first. Our new reality is tied to their fantasies. That magic is real in other universes and mages host arcane Hunger Games fairly regularly to win some Monkey's Paw wish. There's cruelty. Always drama. Always a victim, in these stories. Thousands of 'bad endings'. But you have to wonder, my king."
Merlin knelt, lifted Artoria's head into his lap, and pulled her bangs away from her eyes. Fou jumped and climbed to sit in Merlin's mess of hair. "What happened? What did the people of this world experience that shifted their perception of our stories, our mythologies, to lead them to believe this?"
"...And what do they need us for?" | 214 | Heroes and Villains of myth and legend are affected by humanity's perception of them. One day, King Arthur wakes up to find that he got turned into a 15 year old blonde girl overnight. He would have blamed Merlin if it wasn't for the fact that his hair and robes were now white. | 1,177 |
Melrose Place, Michigan.
A lovely little hamlet on the edge of one of the Great Lakes. Quiet. Secluded. The best kind of place to retire away from the chaos that is urban living. To live off the land. To fish in peace.
The perfect place for murder.
Melrose Place by all statistics had a higher murder rate per capita than Detroit, St. Louis, and Baltimore.
Had.
Over the last 50 years, in a round year population of 50 people. There have been 45 murders. As county law enforcement had figured out, the majority of the murders were committed by residents of the town.
You read that right.
50 people, and most of them either killed, or got killed by their neighbors. Or their relatives. Or their friends. Parents. Teachers. Doctors. Lawyers. A pair of crooked cops. One Pastor at a local church. A trio of cases were committed by outsiders. Drifters or career criminals finding soft targets.
But those are anomalies, not the norm.
Melrose Place currently has a permanent population of 8.
Tourism around the area has also changed. People no longer come for the festivals or the shoreside activities. Many are here for the true crime stories and locations. Even ghost hunters and urban explorers have taken to the area. This has led to an increase in local police presence. Because if there's one thing the town didn't need, it's another murder.
Unfortunately, that meant it was only a matter of time.
To her chagrin, Laura was the one to discover the body. As a leading detective in the area, she found it a bit surreal to be the one to find the body under the pier.
The identity of the victim was easy to figure out. Heidi Clemmons. Her brother was killed 15 years prior in the area, and she had taken over his store. The only surplus store of the village, Pine Island.
Who would do such a thing? Who even was left?
If one thing was certain, it was time to get to work. There were only 7 residents in town anymore. She had to make sure they stayed alive. | 55 | a detective show in a quaint village population 50, where someone is murdered every season. Season 45 Episode 1. | 152 |
I knew what she was. I had been on her planet before.
There women are not well treated.
Aside from sex and breeding, they are considered pretty useless.
Their society evolved this way after years of wars and natural disasters. They are aggressive and their language it's low and basic: few verbs with no time aside present, few noums, no articles or pronoums and only one word to describe everything else out of their vocabulary: gos.
I was a "gos" coming out from the stars, looking just for some stuff to refil my ship.
Their Food it's not the best but the harsh climate of their planet specilazied them into making long lasting insects and meat.
Maybe she was one of the girls that guy tried to sell me for some gassoline.
"Gos, look women, look boobs, look tights, good sex"
He said something like this I think. They were not able to have children so they were used as sex toys. But there were no chains, it was a desteny they all acepted.
All but this one, maybe. She could really be anyone from that hell of a planet.
I guess I have no choise but to acept there is one more mouth to feed on this ship.... | 11 | " I don't know what, or who snuck into my scavenger ship, but I'm either shooting them down, or throwing them out on the first neutral planet." This was what you told yourself, until you saw that said "thing" is a, all-skin-and-bones alien woman only wearing a few rags. | 49 |
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