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[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | The news that I was one of the two people selected as part of this weird game repeated itself through my head.
Knocks came at the door, insistently. It had already begun, they were here for me.
I moved to the door and looked through the peephole. Two of my neighbours were in front of it, with rifles and a grim look of determination on their faces.
"Don't you worry Jonny, me and Francine are here to keep you safe. The whole neighbourhood's setting up a watch to defend your place, we'll sort you out with food and water."
"What? You're not here to kill me?" I said, barely able to stop my voice from trembling.
Max turned towards the door and grinned. "The world would be a lot better if everyone had some cash to look after them and theirs. That's what we're here to fight for."
| The underside of the pillow was soft and cool as it molded around my mouth and nose. I bet she was glad we'd splurged on the memory foam now. From her lungs she breathed hot fire, her body surging as it straddled mine.
I didn't fight her. It wasn't in me. I merely reached out into oblivion, wrapping my her naked body in my arms for one last embrace and with the tips of my fingers I traced, "I love you..." |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | 'Oh, shit!', I yell. 'Why does it have to be me?'
I walk over to the couch and sit down. I boot up Witcher 3 and continue playing. After 5 hours, my neighbour jumps through the window with a machete.
'Hi, Frank', I greet him. 'How are the kids?
'They're fine, John. I'm so sorry about this, but I really want a new house, not to mention a 2 million dollar car', Frank tries to explain himself.
'That's great, Frank. I'm sure you'll have a lot of fun in jail. I mean that's where you'll find up. Let's see, that's breaking and entering and murder. I'm sure little Jess and Frank Jr. will be glad to see you in 50 years', I say.
'Oh, shit. I didn't think of that.'
'Yeah, that's the way these things go. The law still applies.'
Frank then put down his weapon and sits down next to me.
'What're you playing?', he asks.
'Witcher 3. I'm currently in the middle of the Blood and Wine expansion, set in the duchy of Toussaint.', I answer.
'Cool.'
In the evening, Frank invites me to dinner and he calls a guy to fix my window. What a nice guy. | The underside of the pillow was soft and cool as it molded around my mouth and nose. I bet she was glad we'd splurged on the memory foam now. From her lungs she breathed hot fire, her body surging as it straddled mine.
I didn't fight her. It wasn't in me. I merely reached out into oblivion, wrapping my her naked body in my arms for one last embrace and with the tips of my fingers I traced, "I love you..." |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | (My first Prompt here. English isn't even my first language :P )
'Good afternoon, students.' As our professor spoke up. 'We will continue where we left off yesterday, at page...'
BANG
Oh look. Another assassination attempt on Dr. Ludwig.
Dr. Ludwig stopped to look at the assassin, who was holding a smoking pistol. The assassin fired another two shots at the professor's chest, hitting him. Dr. Ludwig, per usual, didn't flinch at all, as he slowly walked up to his assassinator and knocked him out.
The assassinator, whose face was filled with dread and confusion, was dragged away by Dr. Ludwig from the higher end of the Lecture Hall to the whiteboard, where he stood.
Even after 7 years and 168 days, people were still trying to collect the bounty on his head. They tried millions of things. From Baseball Bats, to Gas Chambers, to throwing him out of an airlock. He survived all of them. For whatever reason, he was immortal.
And really, that's why we would sit through his lessons. To, hopefully, learn how to be immortal. I was supposed to be in Egypt, healing my co-workers, who are probably in the middle of massacring robots.
Dr. Ludwig went on. 'As I was saying, we will continue on page 76, on the structure of the device, to further understand human tissue damage.'
________________________________________________________________
*
*
*
*
Who wants to live forever?
I did. I once did. And immortality and invincibility has come to me.
Well, technically, I caused the 'invincibility' part. But, that would be another story, Ja?
In the early 1940s, I signed a deal with the Devil. He gave me a successful career as a combat medic and allowed me to look like I was 32 for the rest of my life. During this period, I created a device that could quickly regenerate tissue damage and make people temporarily invincible.
I was happy and content. Until 1973, when I died.
I met the Devil once again. He nearly made me end up in hell. Until I convinced him that I could not be sent to hell due to me surgically implanting several extra souls in myself. So he made me immortal, saying that it was a 'fate worse than death'. I had no idea what he meant back then.
Unfortunately, now I have. The first few decades were quite fun actually, as I ran more and more experiments on myself and my unfortunate test subjects.
But as I got older, life got boring. By ridding myself of my ability to die, I have found that all meaning in life has been lost. There were simply no more stakes to my life. What is life’s significance without death? It has none.
I tried to shoot myself in the head. Didn’t work. Remember how I said that I had created a device capable of making me invincible? Well, apparently prolonged exposure makes the invincibility permanent.
‘Misha, drag him onto the table. Und, call Miss Ziegler to come over. We have another subject.’
Misha was someone who worked with me. Well, he still does. He’s immortal as well. Doesn’t seem to bother him though. He’s been helping me get rid of my immortality. In fact, it was he who convinced me to quit drinking and figure out a way for me to remove my immortality.
‘Da.’
And so I spent the next 55 or so years researching on mortality. While others were finding out how to generate it, I tried to destroy mine. By the mid-2060s I had already started to get desperate. This is where Dr. Ziegler comes in.
She’s a world renowned doctor whose obsession with immortality rivals my desire to remove it. When she got wind about a doctor who has been 32 years old for 110 years, she called me and asked for my help. I accepted on one condition. (Surely, an extra set of hands couldn’t hurt, right?)
My condition was to get people to kill me. Hopefully, 10 million dollars would get people to try and get through my invincibility, right?
Apparently not. Either way, Miss Ziegler used her position at some high-end group to convince Germany that getting the world to kill one of their citizens was a good idea.
So there. Now if you excuse me, I have to conduct an operation.
‘Good afternoon Mr Walker. Walther PPK. Interesting choice of weaponry. Tell me, where did you get this antique?’
‘What do you want?’
‘I want to die. Luckily, you may be of assistance.’
I proceeded to cut open the guy’s chest, and pull out his beating heart.
________________________________________________________________
*
*
*
*
Who wouldn’t want to live forever?
As I walk down the hallway echoing with screams, I look on the upper right corner of my glasses.
‘Conducting experiment 1138. Be here.’
It seems that Dr. Ludwig had begun without me. What a pity.
I used to think that Dr. Ludwig was a madman. Now, I see we share similar ideals.
We both have much curiosity, and will stop at nothing to satisfy it. We both consider the Hippocratic Oath as bull. We also lack compassion for our patients, or respect for human dignity.
But, he considers healing to be an untended side effect of his creations. I just want to reincarnate my long dead parents. I don't care what it will take, I just want the people who tell me bedtime stories to return.
I’ve tried everything. And Dr. Ludwig here is the closest to the answer. That's why I'm willing to put aside my job as a Healer and sit through his lessons.
‘Will arrive in 2 minutes’
'Is that the assassin from the lecture'
Who doesn’t want to live forever? | I came home from a hard day's work. Grabbed a beer from the fridge and proceeded to turn on the TV when I heard it, an announcement from the president that presented everyone with a chance to either help me make it another ten years in exchange for $10,000 for everyone, or a 10 million dollar bounty on my head. My name, picture and social media accounts where included with this announcement.
Knowing the odds of my survival I set out to do what I've always wanted to do. Grabbed my keys, opened the garage and sped off to the downtown area. I tried to run over every pedestrian as I had done in Gran Theft Auto a million times before, I even gave myself 10 bonus points for everyone in a wheel chair (20 points!).
Quickly I had indeed a half dozen police squads following along with a police and news chopper. I rammed my car into the highest building in the area and made my way towards the elevator while also pressing the fire alarm. I kept making my way towards the top floor, I even pushed my way through the crowd as the elevator doors opened and got to the edge when a voice shouted from behind me.
"Don't do it, I'm aware of your situation. Don't throw away your life! We can do it, we can make it through 10 years and everyone will get $10,000 even in africa!"
I shouted "Suck Mah BALLS!" and fell backwards while flipping him off with both hands and thought "fuck this, ain't no one getting anything". |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | The news that I was one of the two people selected as part of this weird game repeated itself through my head.
Knocks came at the door, insistently. It had already begun, they were here for me.
I moved to the door and looked through the peephole. Two of my neighbours were in front of it, with rifles and a grim look of determination on their faces.
"Don't you worry Jonny, me and Francine are here to keep you safe. The whole neighbourhood's setting up a watch to defend your place, we'll sort you out with food and water."
"What? You're not here to kill me?" I said, barely able to stop my voice from trembling.
Max turned towards the door and grinned. "The world would be a lot better if everyone had some cash to look after them and theirs. That's what we're here to fight for."
| I came home from a hard day's work. Grabbed a beer from the fridge and proceeded to turn on the TV when I heard it, an announcement from the president that presented everyone with a chance to either help me make it another ten years in exchange for $10,000 for everyone, or a 10 million dollar bounty on my head. My name, picture and social media accounts where included with this announcement.
Knowing the odds of my survival I set out to do what I've always wanted to do. Grabbed my keys, opened the garage and sped off to the downtown area. I tried to run over every pedestrian as I had done in Gran Theft Auto a million times before, I even gave myself 10 bonus points for everyone in a wheel chair (20 points!).
Quickly I had indeed a half dozen police squads following along with a police and news chopper. I rammed my car into the highest building in the area and made my way towards the elevator while also pressing the fire alarm. I kept making my way towards the top floor, I even pushed my way through the crowd as the elevator doors opened and got to the edge when a voice shouted from behind me.
"Don't do it, I'm aware of your situation. Don't throw away your life! We can do it, we can make it through 10 years and everyone will get $10,000 even in africa!"
I shouted "Suck Mah BALLS!" and fell backwards while flipping him off with both hands and thought "fuck this, ain't no one getting anything". |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | 'Oh, shit!', I yell. 'Why does it have to be me?'
I walk over to the couch and sit down. I boot up Witcher 3 and continue playing. After 5 hours, my neighbour jumps through the window with a machete.
'Hi, Frank', I greet him. 'How are the kids?
'They're fine, John. I'm so sorry about this, but I really want a new house, not to mention a 2 million dollar car', Frank tries to explain himself.
'That's great, Frank. I'm sure you'll have a lot of fun in jail. I mean that's where you'll find up. Let's see, that's breaking and entering and murder. I'm sure little Jess and Frank Jr. will be glad to see you in 50 years', I say.
'Oh, shit. I didn't think of that.'
'Yeah, that's the way these things go. The law still applies.'
Frank then put down his weapon and sits down next to me.
'What're you playing?', he asks.
'Witcher 3. I'm currently in the middle of the Blood and Wine expansion, set in the duchy of Toussaint.', I answer.
'Cool.'
In the evening, Frank invites me to dinner and he calls a guy to fix my window. What a nice guy. | I came home from a hard day's work. Grabbed a beer from the fridge and proceeded to turn on the TV when I heard it, an announcement from the president that presented everyone with a chance to either help me make it another ten years in exchange for $10,000 for everyone, or a 10 million dollar bounty on my head. My name, picture and social media accounts where included with this announcement.
Knowing the odds of my survival I set out to do what I've always wanted to do. Grabbed my keys, opened the garage and sped off to the downtown area. I tried to run over every pedestrian as I had done in Gran Theft Auto a million times before, I even gave myself 10 bonus points for everyone in a wheel chair (20 points!).
Quickly I had indeed a half dozen police squads following along with a police and news chopper. I rammed my car into the highest building in the area and made my way towards the elevator while also pressing the fire alarm. I kept making my way towards the top floor, I even pushed my way through the crowd as the elevator doors opened and got to the edge when a voice shouted from behind me.
"Don't do it, I'm aware of your situation. Don't throw away your life! We can do it, we can make it through 10 years and everyone will get $10,000 even in africa!"
I shouted "Suck Mah BALLS!" and fell backwards while flipping him off with both hands and thought "fuck this, ain't no one getting anything". |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | The news that I was one of the two people selected as part of this weird game repeated itself through my head.
Knocks came at the door, insistently. It had already begun, they were here for me.
I moved to the door and looked through the peephole. Two of my neighbours were in front of it, with rifles and a grim look of determination on their faces.
"Don't you worry Jonny, me and Francine are here to keep you safe. The whole neighbourhood's setting up a watch to defend your place, we'll sort you out with food and water."
"What? You're not here to kill me?" I said, barely able to stop my voice from trembling.
Max turned towards the door and grinned. "The world would be a lot better if everyone had some cash to look after them and theirs. That's what we're here to fight for."
| When my mail was delivered to my desk that day I was suprised.I told the post office no mail. I thought it must be a joke. My assistant told me “No sir it was in your mailbox.” When I opened the letter and read “You shall be killed. Your killer will receive $10,000,000 If you survive every person on earth will be given $10,000.” Signed by no one other than the President of the United States.
I thought to myself “Why the fuck did they do this to ME. Of all fucking people. They must be jealous of what I have accomplished. They know the power I can wield but choose not to. The world has already lost one visionary years ago. I will not let it lose another. I will die on my own terms.”
The next day it was announced. Suddenly my estate in Washington was bombarded with attacks. The locals were always wary of my presence always thinking I was up to some global elite mischief.
My security detail knew the rules. Any offer they received to attack me I would double. I had their loyalty after they each approached me. One of them approached me after receiving his check.
“Sorry Sir, I could really do a lot with 30 million”
The fool didn’t know my office had cameras. I was able to stall him long enough for a sniper to get into position. His life was snuffed with complete indiscretion. Every person who was around my estate Saw it, Heard it, and Feared it.
The attempts on my life continued. Fools tried ramming my gate. Flying bush planes onto my property. I recall even one man from a nearby national guard post stole an assault vehicle and killed 7 of my men. They were replaced but my heart still ached for their families. I remember thinking “I can do more good if I stay alive for just the next few years than I could ever do with all of my riches. So survive I will at any cost.”
Eight long and gruesome years passed by. The attacks became far less frequent but more organized as the years went on. Even radical terror cells tried to kill me. They had breached my estate after the second year. My house is built Very well. It took them 3 more months to actually get into the doors of my home. I retreated into my bunker moments after they broke in. They have been trying to get in since then. Luckily my security team still knows the stakes. I paid each of them a premium for every person they kill that steps foot on my property. Some people have lasted long enough to reach the bunker doors but most are killed before they reach the what once was a front door. Now it’s just me, my wife, an assistant, my personal bodyguard, and two of my 3 children.
My youngest had been captured in the first few days. She was held captive for 3 months before a rescue operation was launched. I lost a daughter that day. The men had taken her and then they took her. They sent me everything. My wife took this harder than I did. She was thrown into a depression but I couldn’t let her leave she meant too much to me. She wanted out. She wanted to walk to her death, I stopped her because seeing my daughter die was impossible but seeing the light of my life die would kill me. I made her stay.
She was not happy for the ensuing years. I knew she was dead on the inside. She feigned happiness when our remaining childrens birthdays happened. She slept in a separate room on our anniversaries. So many years passed.
I was going to the living room quarters when she appeared. My wife with a knife from the kitchen. Surely I thought she wasn’t going to kill me. She had everything in the world before all this happened and she knew she would have everything when it was over as well. She plunged the knife into herself whispering over and over again“I hate you.” We had no doctor and only a significant supply of our daily medications left. I watched my wife die in a matter of minutes.
The life got sucked out of me.
I knew I was going to kill myself the moment year 10 came around.
I put up with the last two years. I didn’t speak to my remaining children. They survived I survived. My assistant got in the way. I grew impatient. I threw him out. They killed him. My bodyguard grew angry towards me. I killed him.
The clock hit 12:01 a.m I pulled the trigger.
So this is it. This is death. This is what they all wanted. I hope they like that $10,000 dollars. THIS is not what I expected. My wife standing over me smiling. My daughter grinning at me just like she used to. I felt at peace.
Signing off William Henry Gates The Third.
|
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | 'Oh, shit!', I yell. 'Why does it have to be me?'
I walk over to the couch and sit down. I boot up Witcher 3 and continue playing. After 5 hours, my neighbour jumps through the window with a machete.
'Hi, Frank', I greet him. 'How are the kids?
'They're fine, John. I'm so sorry about this, but I really want a new house, not to mention a 2 million dollar car', Frank tries to explain himself.
'That's great, Frank. I'm sure you'll have a lot of fun in jail. I mean that's where you'll find up. Let's see, that's breaking and entering and murder. I'm sure little Jess and Frank Jr. will be glad to see you in 50 years', I say.
'Oh, shit. I didn't think of that.'
'Yeah, that's the way these things go. The law still applies.'
Frank then put down his weapon and sits down next to me.
'What're you playing?', he asks.
'Witcher 3. I'm currently in the middle of the Blood and Wine expansion, set in the duchy of Toussaint.', I answer.
'Cool.'
In the evening, Frank invites me to dinner and he calls a guy to fix my window. What a nice guy. | When my mail was delivered to my desk that day I was suprised.I told the post office no mail. I thought it must be a joke. My assistant told me “No sir it was in your mailbox.” When I opened the letter and read “You shall be killed. Your killer will receive $10,000,000 If you survive every person on earth will be given $10,000.” Signed by no one other than the President of the United States.
I thought to myself “Why the fuck did they do this to ME. Of all fucking people. They must be jealous of what I have accomplished. They know the power I can wield but choose not to. The world has already lost one visionary years ago. I will not let it lose another. I will die on my own terms.”
The next day it was announced. Suddenly my estate in Washington was bombarded with attacks. The locals were always wary of my presence always thinking I was up to some global elite mischief.
My security detail knew the rules. Any offer they received to attack me I would double. I had their loyalty after they each approached me. One of them approached me after receiving his check.
“Sorry Sir, I could really do a lot with 30 million”
The fool didn’t know my office had cameras. I was able to stall him long enough for a sniper to get into position. His life was snuffed with complete indiscretion. Every person who was around my estate Saw it, Heard it, and Feared it.
The attempts on my life continued. Fools tried ramming my gate. Flying bush planes onto my property. I recall even one man from a nearby national guard post stole an assault vehicle and killed 7 of my men. They were replaced but my heart still ached for their families. I remember thinking “I can do more good if I stay alive for just the next few years than I could ever do with all of my riches. So survive I will at any cost.”
Eight long and gruesome years passed by. The attacks became far less frequent but more organized as the years went on. Even radical terror cells tried to kill me. They had breached my estate after the second year. My house is built Very well. It took them 3 more months to actually get into the doors of my home. I retreated into my bunker moments after they broke in. They have been trying to get in since then. Luckily my security team still knows the stakes. I paid each of them a premium for every person they kill that steps foot on my property. Some people have lasted long enough to reach the bunker doors but most are killed before they reach the what once was a front door. Now it’s just me, my wife, an assistant, my personal bodyguard, and two of my 3 children.
My youngest had been captured in the first few days. She was held captive for 3 months before a rescue operation was launched. I lost a daughter that day. The men had taken her and then they took her. They sent me everything. My wife took this harder than I did. She was thrown into a depression but I couldn’t let her leave she meant too much to me. She wanted out. She wanted to walk to her death, I stopped her because seeing my daughter die was impossible but seeing the light of my life die would kill me. I made her stay.
She was not happy for the ensuing years. I knew she was dead on the inside. She feigned happiness when our remaining childrens birthdays happened. She slept in a separate room on our anniversaries. So many years passed.
I was going to the living room quarters when she appeared. My wife with a knife from the kitchen. Surely I thought she wasn’t going to kill me. She had everything in the world before all this happened and she knew she would have everything when it was over as well. She plunged the knife into herself whispering over and over again“I hate you.” We had no doctor and only a significant supply of our daily medications left. I watched my wife die in a matter of minutes.
The life got sucked out of me.
I knew I was going to kill myself the moment year 10 came around.
I put up with the last two years. I didn’t speak to my remaining children. They survived I survived. My assistant got in the way. I grew impatient. I threw him out. They killed him. My bodyguard grew angry towards me. I killed him.
The clock hit 12:01 a.m I pulled the trigger.
So this is it. This is death. This is what they all wanted. I hope they like that $10,000 dollars. THIS is not what I expected. My wife standing over me smiling. My daughter grinning at me just like she used to. I felt at peace.
Signing off William Henry Gates The Third.
|
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | "I work at Goldman Sachs." The chick I've been talking up at the bar raises an eyebrow disbelievingly. "Yes, *that* Goldman Sachs. My job, my only job, is this: whenever the Notice goes out, I hire a hitman to take out the target, and see the mission through to completion."
"Whaaaat?" She leans in. "That's so wrong..." she puts a hand on my thigh. "...but dangerous." Wow, slam dunk. "But why?"
"Well, it's pretty straightforward: we hold trillions of dollars of monetary assets, and we don't need a $10,000 payday for everyone screwing up the value of the dollar. Do you know how much money $10,000 for everyone is? Even for just the U.S., population, it's about 3.2 trillion dollars. That much money pumped into the system would drop our value quite a bit, but it's the *whole friggin world.* So closer to 70 trillion dollars. Yeah, no thanks. Much better to keep our relative trickle from QE siphons."
I can tell I'm starting to lose her, so I bring it back around.
"There's a reason no one has ever survived the full ten years..."
She's not paying attention. She's looking at the TV.
I turn, and I see my face attached to the Notice.
I turn back, and the last thing I see is her bringing a gun up to my face. | When my mail was delivered to my desk that day I was suprised.I told the post office no mail. I thought it must be a joke. My assistant told me “No sir it was in your mailbox.” When I opened the letter and read “You shall be killed. Your killer will receive $10,000,000 If you survive every person on earth will be given $10,000.” Signed by no one other than the President of the United States.
I thought to myself “Why the fuck did they do this to ME. Of all fucking people. They must be jealous of what I have accomplished. They know the power I can wield but choose not to. The world has already lost one visionary years ago. I will not let it lose another. I will die on my own terms.”
The next day it was announced. Suddenly my estate in Washington was bombarded with attacks. The locals were always wary of my presence always thinking I was up to some global elite mischief.
My security detail knew the rules. Any offer they received to attack me I would double. I had their loyalty after they each approached me. One of them approached me after receiving his check.
“Sorry Sir, I could really do a lot with 30 million”
The fool didn’t know my office had cameras. I was able to stall him long enough for a sniper to get into position. His life was snuffed with complete indiscretion. Every person who was around my estate Saw it, Heard it, and Feared it.
The attempts on my life continued. Fools tried ramming my gate. Flying bush planes onto my property. I recall even one man from a nearby national guard post stole an assault vehicle and killed 7 of my men. They were replaced but my heart still ached for their families. I remember thinking “I can do more good if I stay alive for just the next few years than I could ever do with all of my riches. So survive I will at any cost.”
Eight long and gruesome years passed by. The attacks became far less frequent but more organized as the years went on. Even radical terror cells tried to kill me. They had breached my estate after the second year. My house is built Very well. It took them 3 more months to actually get into the doors of my home. I retreated into my bunker moments after they broke in. They have been trying to get in since then. Luckily my security team still knows the stakes. I paid each of them a premium for every person they kill that steps foot on my property. Some people have lasted long enough to reach the bunker doors but most are killed before they reach the what once was a front door. Now it’s just me, my wife, an assistant, my personal bodyguard, and two of my 3 children.
My youngest had been captured in the first few days. She was held captive for 3 months before a rescue operation was launched. I lost a daughter that day. The men had taken her and then they took her. They sent me everything. My wife took this harder than I did. She was thrown into a depression but I couldn’t let her leave she meant too much to me. She wanted out. She wanted to walk to her death, I stopped her because seeing my daughter die was impossible but seeing the light of my life die would kill me. I made her stay.
She was not happy for the ensuing years. I knew she was dead on the inside. She feigned happiness when our remaining childrens birthdays happened. She slept in a separate room on our anniversaries. So many years passed.
I was going to the living room quarters when she appeared. My wife with a knife from the kitchen. Surely I thought she wasn’t going to kill me. She had everything in the world before all this happened and she knew she would have everything when it was over as well. She plunged the knife into herself whispering over and over again“I hate you.” We had no doctor and only a significant supply of our daily medications left. I watched my wife die in a matter of minutes.
The life got sucked out of me.
I knew I was going to kill myself the moment year 10 came around.
I put up with the last two years. I didn’t speak to my remaining children. They survived I survived. My assistant got in the way. I grew impatient. I threw him out. They killed him. My bodyguard grew angry towards me. I killed him.
The clock hit 12:01 a.m I pulled the trigger.
So this is it. This is death. This is what they all wanted. I hope they like that $10,000 dollars. THIS is not what I expected. My wife standing over me smiling. My daughter grinning at me just like she used to. I felt at peace.
Signing off William Henry Gates The Third.
|
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | My name flashed on the screen. Not just my name--my date of birth, my city of birth, and my picture, a photo from a couple of years ago we were forced to submit. The moment I saw it my heart leaped into my throat and my gut felt like someone dropped a ton of rocks in it. Time seemed to stop, and all there was was the television screen and the soft robotic voice of the announcer. Then, adrenaline rushed through my body. I knew the game. We all knew it. The next step was to find safety.
I rushed through the living room, into the kitchen, down the stairs into the basement. As I did I heard my wife Janet begin to wail upstairs. She was giving our youngest, Bryson, a bath, and listening to the broadcast on the radio. I heard her shout, "No, no, no, no," again and again as she drained the water from the tub and shuffled her feet upstairs, no doubt wrapping Bryson in a towel so she could come downstairs to catch me. I'll never know for certain.
In the basement we had a closet with three large backpacks hanging on hooks. One for me, one for my wife, and one for our oldest son, Daniel, who was away to college right now. Dust collected on the tops, thickest on mine and Janet's. The phone rang upstairs. I could hear my wife stomping around up there. The air in the basement was musty, like moldy bread. I grabbed my backpack off the hook and quickly unzipped it, ensuring the clothing and food inside was still vacuum sealed, still safe from the elements.
"Lewis!" I heard my wife cry out. "Lewis don't go yet!" Bryson was crying. Viola, our middle child, just starting eighth grade, came out of her room. "What is going to happen to dad?" I heard her say, her voice muffled above. I had the backpack on and was running toward the stairs leading up to the back entrance. I could feel the tears running down my face. As I reached the top of the stairs, I threw open the back door. Janet's voice, loud and despairing in my right ear, screaming for me to stop, to take her with me.
I almost stopped. I almost took her with me.
Immediately upon leaving the back door, stepping out into the cold night air, I barely saw my neighbor, Allan, standing across the driveway, behind his white picket fence, silhouetted by the lights of his home. He had a hunting rifle leveled at me. He never said anything, he just took the shot, and I managed to duck out of the way just in time. He was too close for such a long range weapon, and he knew it, dropping the rifle and pulling a silver pistol out of his side holster. I was running down the driveway to the car, my car, my breath hot in my lungs. I had just eaten a big dinner before the announcement--spaghetti and meatballs, a nice salad. Garlic bread. Glass of wine. I could feel the acidity of the pasta sauce gargling up my throat.
Allan took a couple of shots at me, all missed. I reached the car and threw myself inside, starting the engine without even thinking about it. Allan shot twice more, putting a hole in the windshield. I turned on the headlights, and he was now in full light. Viola was there too, and I heard her scream, "Stop shooting, you asshole!" Allan looked over at her, then quickly ran inside his house as I pulled out of the driveway. My wife never left the house. I drove in silence for hours, tears pouring down my face, choking myself with my own sobs. I slept in the back seat. I watched the sun rise while eating a bag of beef jerky.
The first step, they say, is to get as far away from everyone you know as you can. They are always the first to come, because they know you, they know how you work, where you go, what you do. After that, it's just a matter of hunkering down and moving constantly. That's how you make it. Or so they say. But the big thing is: you never go back. | When my mail was delivered to my desk that day I was suprised.I told the post office no mail. I thought it must be a joke. My assistant told me “No sir it was in your mailbox.” When I opened the letter and read “You shall be killed. Your killer will receive $10,000,000 If you survive every person on earth will be given $10,000.” Signed by no one other than the President of the United States.
I thought to myself “Why the fuck did they do this to ME. Of all fucking people. They must be jealous of what I have accomplished. They know the power I can wield but choose not to. The world has already lost one visionary years ago. I will not let it lose another. I will die on my own terms.”
The next day it was announced. Suddenly my estate in Washington was bombarded with attacks. The locals were always wary of my presence always thinking I was up to some global elite mischief.
My security detail knew the rules. Any offer they received to attack me I would double. I had their loyalty after they each approached me. One of them approached me after receiving his check.
“Sorry Sir, I could really do a lot with 30 million”
The fool didn’t know my office had cameras. I was able to stall him long enough for a sniper to get into position. His life was snuffed with complete indiscretion. Every person who was around my estate Saw it, Heard it, and Feared it.
The attempts on my life continued. Fools tried ramming my gate. Flying bush planes onto my property. I recall even one man from a nearby national guard post stole an assault vehicle and killed 7 of my men. They were replaced but my heart still ached for their families. I remember thinking “I can do more good if I stay alive for just the next few years than I could ever do with all of my riches. So survive I will at any cost.”
Eight long and gruesome years passed by. The attacks became far less frequent but more organized as the years went on. Even radical terror cells tried to kill me. They had breached my estate after the second year. My house is built Very well. It took them 3 more months to actually get into the doors of my home. I retreated into my bunker moments after they broke in. They have been trying to get in since then. Luckily my security team still knows the stakes. I paid each of them a premium for every person they kill that steps foot on my property. Some people have lasted long enough to reach the bunker doors but most are killed before they reach the what once was a front door. Now it’s just me, my wife, an assistant, my personal bodyguard, and two of my 3 children.
My youngest had been captured in the first few days. She was held captive for 3 months before a rescue operation was launched. I lost a daughter that day. The men had taken her and then they took her. They sent me everything. My wife took this harder than I did. She was thrown into a depression but I couldn’t let her leave she meant too much to me. She wanted out. She wanted to walk to her death, I stopped her because seeing my daughter die was impossible but seeing the light of my life die would kill me. I made her stay.
She was not happy for the ensuing years. I knew she was dead on the inside. She feigned happiness when our remaining childrens birthdays happened. She slept in a separate room on our anniversaries. So many years passed.
I was going to the living room quarters when she appeared. My wife with a knife from the kitchen. Surely I thought she wasn’t going to kill me. She had everything in the world before all this happened and she knew she would have everything when it was over as well. She plunged the knife into herself whispering over and over again“I hate you.” We had no doctor and only a significant supply of our daily medications left. I watched my wife die in a matter of minutes.
The life got sucked out of me.
I knew I was going to kill myself the moment year 10 came around.
I put up with the last two years. I didn’t speak to my remaining children. They survived I survived. My assistant got in the way. I grew impatient. I threw him out. They killed him. My bodyguard grew angry towards me. I killed him.
The clock hit 12:01 a.m I pulled the trigger.
So this is it. This is death. This is what they all wanted. I hope they like that $10,000 dollars. THIS is not what I expected. My wife standing over me smiling. My daughter grinning at me just like she used to. I felt at peace.
Signing off William Henry Gates The Third.
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[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | In the moments before my first stage performance, my mentor had laid a hand on my shoulder and stared into my eyes. Though he was getting older, his beard was neatly trimmed and his hair was in perfect order. A performer to the end. I met his eyes, speckles of green and brown across a field of blue. I remember thinking that he seemed to be staring straight through my anticipation and into the very structure of my soul.
"Are you ready?" he'd asked after a moment.
"No," I'd replied—because magic is the practice of deception, and in order to deceive we must first face the truth without flinching. He'd been the one to teach me that, though never in words. That was always the way with him.
Thinking back in later days, I could never decipher the expression my reply provoked. Some days it seemed sorrowfully proud, others resigned and joyful.
"Good," he had said at last. "We're never ready when our moment comes."
*But we face it all the same*, I thought. He nodded, and I took the stage.
*
Set up. Step in. Transcend. The three parts of any magic trick. You begin by leading the audience along, constructing the framework they'll use to understand what happens next. Then you step into that framework, playing along with the expectations you've created. Finally, you reveal the exception you'd buried behind their expectations, blinded by their preconceptions. The hat contains a rabbit and the card was in your hand all along.
When I heard the government had marked me for death, I heard those words again. The voice of my mentor, who died long ago, and the voice of my younger self, unaware of the path on which I had just taken the first step. I heard, and I chuckled quietly to myself.
I wasn't ready for this moment. If I'd had a choice, I'd have given myself a few
more months at least. But though reality gives us more choices than we always see, this wasn't one of them. I'd have to work with what I had.
A good performer knows his audience, so I watched social media as I made my preparations. The Internet had figured out my home address in a matter of minutes, but one of the perks of being a traveling performer is that you're often not at home when a band of amateur killers decides to come knocking. Of course, they figured out just as quickly that I'd done a show in Minneapolis two days ago, so presumably they'd find my real location before too long.
Reactions to the announcement varied. For many, it was disgusting and unthinkable, another sign of the depravity of the current administration. Others wished me well, whether out of support for the underdog or fantasies of getting their hands on a chunk of the payout. Some, of a more utilitarian bent, I suppose, were demanding I turn myself over GiveWell to be executed for the greater good. And to top it off, of course, an endless stream of thinkpieces dissecting my options.
I checked the recording equipment one more time, and began my livestream. We're never ready when our time comes.
"Good evening," I began, "and welcome to what will be, unfortunately, my final show."
I gave it a couple minutes to go viral—I needed as many eyes on me as possible—then prepared for the final climax.
"I view this choice as a gift, of course," I said. "Spend the next ten years of my life in hiding for the good of all, or direct someone to kill me for some noble goal. The prospect of my own death has sharpened my focus wonderfully, and I thank the responsible parties for the opportunity. But this seems an impossible choice, and I've never been one to bow to the inevitable."
I paused a moment for effect.
"I took a moment to review the text of the bill, and as it turn outs, no one gets any money if I kill myself. I'm afraid my pride doesn't allow for anyone to profit from my death, you see, so I will have to disappoint you all. I hope the government can find a more productive use for the money."
*We face it all the same.*
On live camera, in front of millions of viewers, I put the gun to my temple, fired, and died.
*
Set up. Step in. *Transcend.*
I woke amid the scorch marks on the floor. The magical release had knocked out the camera, as I'd hoped—hopefully they'd seen nothing after the gunshot. I put a hand to my temple, feeling the exit wound rapidly scabbing over. I hadn't been certain, hadn't been confident in my designs, but someone had thought I was ready.
I sat up slowly and saw him standing just outside the ritual circle. Blue eyes, speckled with green and brown, stared straight through mine and into the depths of my soul.
"I never told you," he said at last, and there was that unreadable expression from my memories. Pride and sorrow, resignation and joy. An old man watching his student take the first step on a hard journey.
I drunk deep of it. Then I threw back my head and laughed. | I wonder, are they having fun? The world government, the rich, the powerful, are they enjoying this? This war that they've created must be entertaining to them.
The world's citizens were divided. The vast majority were greedy, desperate, or maybe both? They all wanted my head and the $10 million associated with it. Some formed squads, vowing to split it. Others were not as trustworthy, fighting each other even to approach me.
However, that would have been difficult. The other group was the more altruistic minority. Some of them just had a stronger code of morals amplified by a now tangible reward for it. Others were more rational realizing that the amount of wealth redistribution caused by the rich giving everyone else a fraction of their resources would be enough not only to improve their own situation by leaps and bounds, but that of billions of others as well.
And so they banded together, pooling the meagre resources they had to construct a fortress to protect me. A modern castle nestled in the Canadian wilderness. They had a militia formed from people who had been meticulously analyzed and tested before being allowed within 5 kilometres of the complex. They had the best doctors with the best hearts to ensure my health. They even had more humble ones as servants to reduce the risk of me injuring myself and becoming more vulnerable.
Every day I would sit and wait out the years while people tried to make the trek and assassinate me. Groups in armoured trucks with homemade explosives would launch their assault and be beat back. Individuals would try to sneak in and be caught, then shot. And even people in this complex will try to betray me, and be met with swift and deadly response.
And so I would sit in solace at the bottom of the complex, counting out the days and the lives. And I would hope that the near omniscient rulers of this world were enjoying this. And I would hope that in the end, this will have been worth it for all of us. |
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[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | "I work at Goldman Sachs." The chick I've been talking up at the bar raises an eyebrow disbelievingly. "Yes, *that* Goldman Sachs. My job, my only job, is this: whenever the Notice goes out, I hire a hitman to take out the target, and see the mission through to completion."
"Whaaaat?" She leans in. "That's so wrong..." she puts a hand on my thigh. "...but dangerous." Wow, slam dunk. "But why?"
"Well, it's pretty straightforward: we hold trillions of dollars of monetary assets, and we don't need a $10,000 payday for everyone screwing up the value of the dollar. Do you know how much money $10,000 for everyone is? Even for just the U.S., population, it's about 3.2 trillion dollars. That much money pumped into the system would drop our value quite a bit, but it's the *whole friggin world.* So closer to 70 trillion dollars. Yeah, no thanks. Much better to keep our relative trickle from QE siphons."
I can tell I'm starting to lose her, so I bring it back around.
"There's a reason no one has ever survived the full ten years..."
She's not paying attention. She's looking at the TV.
I turn, and I see my face attached to the Notice.
I turn back, and the last thing I see is her bringing a gun up to my face. | I wonder, are they having fun? The world government, the rich, the powerful, are they enjoying this? This war that they've created must be entertaining to them.
The world's citizens were divided. The vast majority were greedy, desperate, or maybe both? They all wanted my head and the $10 million associated with it. Some formed squads, vowing to split it. Others were not as trustworthy, fighting each other even to approach me.
However, that would have been difficult. The other group was the more altruistic minority. Some of them just had a stronger code of morals amplified by a now tangible reward for it. Others were more rational realizing that the amount of wealth redistribution caused by the rich giving everyone else a fraction of their resources would be enough not only to improve their own situation by leaps and bounds, but that of billions of others as well.
And so they banded together, pooling the meagre resources they had to construct a fortress to protect me. A modern castle nestled in the Canadian wilderness. They had a militia formed from people who had been meticulously analyzed and tested before being allowed within 5 kilometres of the complex. They had the best doctors with the best hearts to ensure my health. They even had more humble ones as servants to reduce the risk of me injuring myself and becoming more vulnerable.
Every day I would sit and wait out the years while people tried to make the trek and assassinate me. Groups in armoured trucks with homemade explosives would launch their assault and be beat back. Individuals would try to sneak in and be caught, then shot. And even people in this complex will try to betray me, and be met with swift and deadly response.
And so I would sit in solace at the bottom of the complex, counting out the days and the lives. And I would hope that the near omniscient rulers of this world were enjoying this. And I would hope that in the end, this will have been worth it for all of us. |
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[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | My name flashed on the screen. Not just my name--my date of birth, my city of birth, and my picture, a photo from a couple of years ago we were forced to submit. The moment I saw it my heart leaped into my throat and my gut felt like someone dropped a ton of rocks in it. Time seemed to stop, and all there was was the television screen and the soft robotic voice of the announcer. Then, adrenaline rushed through my body. I knew the game. We all knew it. The next step was to find safety.
I rushed through the living room, into the kitchen, down the stairs into the basement. As I did I heard my wife Janet begin to wail upstairs. She was giving our youngest, Bryson, a bath, and listening to the broadcast on the radio. I heard her shout, "No, no, no, no," again and again as she drained the water from the tub and shuffled her feet upstairs, no doubt wrapping Bryson in a towel so she could come downstairs to catch me. I'll never know for certain.
In the basement we had a closet with three large backpacks hanging on hooks. One for me, one for my wife, and one for our oldest son, Daniel, who was away to college right now. Dust collected on the tops, thickest on mine and Janet's. The phone rang upstairs. I could hear my wife stomping around up there. The air in the basement was musty, like moldy bread. I grabbed my backpack off the hook and quickly unzipped it, ensuring the clothing and food inside was still vacuum sealed, still safe from the elements.
"Lewis!" I heard my wife cry out. "Lewis don't go yet!" Bryson was crying. Viola, our middle child, just starting eighth grade, came out of her room. "What is going to happen to dad?" I heard her say, her voice muffled above. I had the backpack on and was running toward the stairs leading up to the back entrance. I could feel the tears running down my face. As I reached the top of the stairs, I threw open the back door. Janet's voice, loud and despairing in my right ear, screaming for me to stop, to take her with me.
I almost stopped. I almost took her with me.
Immediately upon leaving the back door, stepping out into the cold night air, I barely saw my neighbor, Allan, standing across the driveway, behind his white picket fence, silhouetted by the lights of his home. He had a hunting rifle leveled at me. He never said anything, he just took the shot, and I managed to duck out of the way just in time. He was too close for such a long range weapon, and he knew it, dropping the rifle and pulling a silver pistol out of his side holster. I was running down the driveway to the car, my car, my breath hot in my lungs. I had just eaten a big dinner before the announcement--spaghetti and meatballs, a nice salad. Garlic bread. Glass of wine. I could feel the acidity of the pasta sauce gargling up my throat.
Allan took a couple of shots at me, all missed. I reached the car and threw myself inside, starting the engine without even thinking about it. Allan shot twice more, putting a hole in the windshield. I turned on the headlights, and he was now in full light. Viola was there too, and I heard her scream, "Stop shooting, you asshole!" Allan looked over at her, then quickly ran inside his house as I pulled out of the driveway. My wife never left the house. I drove in silence for hours, tears pouring down my face, choking myself with my own sobs. I slept in the back seat. I watched the sun rise while eating a bag of beef jerky.
The first step, they say, is to get as far away from everyone you know as you can. They are always the first to come, because they know you, they know how you work, where you go, what you do. After that, it's just a matter of hunkering down and moving constantly. That's how you make it. Or so they say. But the big thing is: you never go back. | I wonder, are they having fun? The world government, the rich, the powerful, are they enjoying this? This war that they've created must be entertaining to them.
The world's citizens were divided. The vast majority were greedy, desperate, or maybe both? They all wanted my head and the $10 million associated with it. Some formed squads, vowing to split it. Others were not as trustworthy, fighting each other even to approach me.
However, that would have been difficult. The other group was the more altruistic minority. Some of them just had a stronger code of morals amplified by a now tangible reward for it. Others were more rational realizing that the amount of wealth redistribution caused by the rich giving everyone else a fraction of their resources would be enough not only to improve their own situation by leaps and bounds, but that of billions of others as well.
And so they banded together, pooling the meagre resources they had to construct a fortress to protect me. A modern castle nestled in the Canadian wilderness. They had a militia formed from people who had been meticulously analyzed and tested before being allowed within 5 kilometres of the complex. They had the best doctors with the best hearts to ensure my health. They even had more humble ones as servants to reduce the risk of me injuring myself and becoming more vulnerable.
Every day I would sit and wait out the years while people tried to make the trek and assassinate me. Groups in armoured trucks with homemade explosives would launch their assault and be beat back. Individuals would try to sneak in and be caught, then shot. And even people in this complex will try to betray me, and be met with swift and deadly response.
And so I would sit in solace at the bottom of the complex, counting out the days and the lives. And I would hope that the near omniscient rulers of this world were enjoying this. And I would hope that in the end, this will have been worth it for all of us. |
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[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | In the moments before my first stage performance, my mentor had laid a hand on my shoulder and stared into my eyes. Though he was getting older, his beard was neatly trimmed and his hair was in perfect order. A performer to the end. I met his eyes, speckles of green and brown across a field of blue. I remember thinking that he seemed to be staring straight through my anticipation and into the very structure of my soul.
"Are you ready?" he'd asked after a moment.
"No," I'd replied—because magic is the practice of deception, and in order to deceive we must first face the truth without flinching. He'd been the one to teach me that, though never in words. That was always the way with him.
Thinking back in later days, I could never decipher the expression my reply provoked. Some days it seemed sorrowfully proud, others resigned and joyful.
"Good," he had said at last. "We're never ready when our moment comes."
*But we face it all the same*, I thought. He nodded, and I took the stage.
*
Set up. Step in. Transcend. The three parts of any magic trick. You begin by leading the audience along, constructing the framework they'll use to understand what happens next. Then you step into that framework, playing along with the expectations you've created. Finally, you reveal the exception you'd buried behind their expectations, blinded by their preconceptions. The hat contains a rabbit and the card was in your hand all along.
When I heard the government had marked me for death, I heard those words again. The voice of my mentor, who died long ago, and the voice of my younger self, unaware of the path on which I had just taken the first step. I heard, and I chuckled quietly to myself.
I wasn't ready for this moment. If I'd had a choice, I'd have given myself a few
more months at least. But though reality gives us more choices than we always see, this wasn't one of them. I'd have to work with what I had.
A good performer knows his audience, so I watched social media as I made my preparations. The Internet had figured out my home address in a matter of minutes, but one of the perks of being a traveling performer is that you're often not at home when a band of amateur killers decides to come knocking. Of course, they figured out just as quickly that I'd done a show in Minneapolis two days ago, so presumably they'd find my real location before too long.
Reactions to the announcement varied. For many, it was disgusting and unthinkable, another sign of the depravity of the current administration. Others wished me well, whether out of support for the underdog or fantasies of getting their hands on a chunk of the payout. Some, of a more utilitarian bent, I suppose, were demanding I turn myself over GiveWell to be executed for the greater good. And to top it off, of course, an endless stream of thinkpieces dissecting my options.
I checked the recording equipment one more time, and began my livestream. We're never ready when our time comes.
"Good evening," I began, "and welcome to what will be, unfortunately, my final show."
I gave it a couple minutes to go viral—I needed as many eyes on me as possible—then prepared for the final climax.
"I view this choice as a gift, of course," I said. "Spend the next ten years of my life in hiding for the good of all, or direct someone to kill me for some noble goal. The prospect of my own death has sharpened my focus wonderfully, and I thank the responsible parties for the opportunity. But this seems an impossible choice, and I've never been one to bow to the inevitable."
I paused a moment for effect.
"I took a moment to review the text of the bill, and as it turn outs, no one gets any money if I kill myself. I'm afraid my pride doesn't allow for anyone to profit from my death, you see, so I will have to disappoint you all. I hope the government can find a more productive use for the money."
*We face it all the same.*
On live camera, in front of millions of viewers, I put the gun to my temple, fired, and died.
*
Set up. Step in. *Transcend.*
I woke amid the scorch marks on the floor. The magical release had knocked out the camera, as I'd hoped—hopefully they'd seen nothing after the gunshot. I put a hand to my temple, feeling the exit wound rapidly scabbing over. I hadn't been certain, hadn't been confident in my designs, but someone had thought I was ready.
I sat up slowly and saw him standing just outside the ritual circle. Blue eyes, speckled with green and brown, stared straight through mine and into the depths of my soul.
"I never told you," he said at last, and there was that unreadable expression from my memories. Pride and sorrow, resignation and joy. An old man watching his student take the first step on a hard journey.
I drunk deep of it. Then I threw back my head and laughed. | Dax checked his watch. "Ten minutes until our anniversary," said looking out from the doorway they were huddled in. Sticking his arm out from the covering he let the rain draw lines in his dirty skin. "I'm sorry it's turned out this way, it's not how I envisioned spending it babe."
"It's alright babe," she said taking his head in her hands and lifting his lips to hers. "As long as we have each other, I have all I need."
"I got you a gift for our anniversary." Stretching out his closed fist he opened his hand dropping a small capsule into her open hand.
"What is it? Drugs?" she asked staring at the pill.
"It's an apology. And a penance. A way to make up for the past several years that you stayed by me through the addiction and poverty."
"I don't understand...."
"My grandfather, the bastard he was, wrote into a law that has haunted me for the past ten years. The law stated that If I lived for ten years past his death every single person in the country would get ten thousand dollars."
"That's fantastic," she said her thin skin stretching into a smile. "We could turn out lives with twenty thousand dollars. What's the pill have to do with it?"
He stared at the driving rain, no longer able to look at her. "There's another condition. If someone kills me before ten years they get ten million dollars. I want you to have that money."
Touching the pill with an outstretched finger the realization of what he was saying began to sink in. "You can't do this Dax, twenty thousand is plenty."
"You know me babe, I'll just end up spoiling it for us like I always do. This is my last gift to you, a better life than I could ever give you."
Before she could withdraw her hand he grabbed her hand and forced it against his mouth, swallowing the pill willingly.
"No, don't do this to me," she said tears streaming down her cheeks.
"Just hold me," were his last words. |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | "I work at Goldman Sachs." The chick I've been talking up at the bar raises an eyebrow disbelievingly. "Yes, *that* Goldman Sachs. My job, my only job, is this: whenever the Notice goes out, I hire a hitman to take out the target, and see the mission through to completion."
"Whaaaat?" She leans in. "That's so wrong..." she puts a hand on my thigh. "...but dangerous." Wow, slam dunk. "But why?"
"Well, it's pretty straightforward: we hold trillions of dollars of monetary assets, and we don't need a $10,000 payday for everyone screwing up the value of the dollar. Do you know how much money $10,000 for everyone is? Even for just the U.S., population, it's about 3.2 trillion dollars. That much money pumped into the system would drop our value quite a bit, but it's the *whole friggin world.* So closer to 70 trillion dollars. Yeah, no thanks. Much better to keep our relative trickle from QE siphons."
I can tell I'm starting to lose her, so I bring it back around.
"There's a reason no one has ever survived the full ten years..."
She's not paying attention. She's looking at the TV.
I turn, and I see my face attached to the Notice.
I turn back, and the last thing I see is her bringing a gun up to my face. | Dax checked his watch. "Ten minutes until our anniversary," said looking out from the doorway they were huddled in. Sticking his arm out from the covering he let the rain draw lines in his dirty skin. "I'm sorry it's turned out this way, it's not how I envisioned spending it babe."
"It's alright babe," she said taking his head in her hands and lifting his lips to hers. "As long as we have each other, I have all I need."
"I got you a gift for our anniversary." Stretching out his closed fist he opened his hand dropping a small capsule into her open hand.
"What is it? Drugs?" she asked staring at the pill.
"It's an apology. And a penance. A way to make up for the past several years that you stayed by me through the addiction and poverty."
"I don't understand...."
"My grandfather, the bastard he was, wrote into a law that has haunted me for the past ten years. The law stated that If I lived for ten years past his death every single person in the country would get ten thousand dollars."
"That's fantastic," she said her thin skin stretching into a smile. "We could turn out lives with twenty thousand dollars. What's the pill have to do with it?"
He stared at the driving rain, no longer able to look at her. "There's another condition. If someone kills me before ten years they get ten million dollars. I want you to have that money."
Touching the pill with an outstretched finger the realization of what he was saying began to sink in. "You can't do this Dax, twenty thousand is plenty."
"You know me babe, I'll just end up spoiling it for us like I always do. This is my last gift to you, a better life than I could ever give you."
Before she could withdraw her hand he grabbed her hand and forced it against his mouth, swallowing the pill willingly.
"No, don't do this to me," she said tears streaming down her cheeks.
"Just hold me," were his last words. |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | My name flashed on the screen. Not just my name--my date of birth, my city of birth, and my picture, a photo from a couple of years ago we were forced to submit. The moment I saw it my heart leaped into my throat and my gut felt like someone dropped a ton of rocks in it. Time seemed to stop, and all there was was the television screen and the soft robotic voice of the announcer. Then, adrenaline rushed through my body. I knew the game. We all knew it. The next step was to find safety.
I rushed through the living room, into the kitchen, down the stairs into the basement. As I did I heard my wife Janet begin to wail upstairs. She was giving our youngest, Bryson, a bath, and listening to the broadcast on the radio. I heard her shout, "No, no, no, no," again and again as she drained the water from the tub and shuffled her feet upstairs, no doubt wrapping Bryson in a towel so she could come downstairs to catch me. I'll never know for certain.
In the basement we had a closet with three large backpacks hanging on hooks. One for me, one for my wife, and one for our oldest son, Daniel, who was away to college right now. Dust collected on the tops, thickest on mine and Janet's. The phone rang upstairs. I could hear my wife stomping around up there. The air in the basement was musty, like moldy bread. I grabbed my backpack off the hook and quickly unzipped it, ensuring the clothing and food inside was still vacuum sealed, still safe from the elements.
"Lewis!" I heard my wife cry out. "Lewis don't go yet!" Bryson was crying. Viola, our middle child, just starting eighth grade, came out of her room. "What is going to happen to dad?" I heard her say, her voice muffled above. I had the backpack on and was running toward the stairs leading up to the back entrance. I could feel the tears running down my face. As I reached the top of the stairs, I threw open the back door. Janet's voice, loud and despairing in my right ear, screaming for me to stop, to take her with me.
I almost stopped. I almost took her with me.
Immediately upon leaving the back door, stepping out into the cold night air, I barely saw my neighbor, Allan, standing across the driveway, behind his white picket fence, silhouetted by the lights of his home. He had a hunting rifle leveled at me. He never said anything, he just took the shot, and I managed to duck out of the way just in time. He was too close for such a long range weapon, and he knew it, dropping the rifle and pulling a silver pistol out of his side holster. I was running down the driveway to the car, my car, my breath hot in my lungs. I had just eaten a big dinner before the announcement--spaghetti and meatballs, a nice salad. Garlic bread. Glass of wine. I could feel the acidity of the pasta sauce gargling up my throat.
Allan took a couple of shots at me, all missed. I reached the car and threw myself inside, starting the engine without even thinking about it. Allan shot twice more, putting a hole in the windshield. I turned on the headlights, and he was now in full light. Viola was there too, and I heard her scream, "Stop shooting, you asshole!" Allan looked over at her, then quickly ran inside his house as I pulled out of the driveway. My wife never left the house. I drove in silence for hours, tears pouring down my face, choking myself with my own sobs. I slept in the back seat. I watched the sun rise while eating a bag of beef jerky.
The first step, they say, is to get as far away from everyone you know as you can. They are always the first to come, because they know you, they know how you work, where you go, what you do. After that, it's just a matter of hunkering down and moving constantly. That's how you make it. Or so they say. But the big thing is: you never go back. | Dax checked his watch. "Ten minutes until our anniversary," said looking out from the doorway they were huddled in. Sticking his arm out from the covering he let the rain draw lines in his dirty skin. "I'm sorry it's turned out this way, it's not how I envisioned spending it babe."
"It's alright babe," she said taking his head in her hands and lifting his lips to hers. "As long as we have each other, I have all I need."
"I got you a gift for our anniversary." Stretching out his closed fist he opened his hand dropping a small capsule into her open hand.
"What is it? Drugs?" she asked staring at the pill.
"It's an apology. And a penance. A way to make up for the past several years that you stayed by me through the addiction and poverty."
"I don't understand...."
"My grandfather, the bastard he was, wrote into a law that has haunted me for the past ten years. The law stated that If I lived for ten years past his death every single person in the country would get ten thousand dollars."
"That's fantastic," she said her thin skin stretching into a smile. "We could turn out lives with twenty thousand dollars. What's the pill have to do with it?"
He stared at the driving rain, no longer able to look at her. "There's another condition. If someone kills me before ten years they get ten million dollars. I want you to have that money."
Touching the pill with an outstretched finger the realization of what he was saying began to sink in. "You can't do this Dax, twenty thousand is plenty."
"You know me babe, I'll just end up spoiling it for us like I always do. This is my last gift to you, a better life than I could ever give you."
Before she could withdraw her hand he grabbed her hand and forced it against his mouth, swallowing the pill willingly.
"No, don't do this to me," she said tears streaming down her cheeks.
"Just hold me," were his last words. |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | In the moments before my first stage performance, my mentor had laid a hand on my shoulder and stared into my eyes. Though he was getting older, his beard was neatly trimmed and his hair was in perfect order. A performer to the end. I met his eyes, speckles of green and brown across a field of blue. I remember thinking that he seemed to be staring straight through my anticipation and into the very structure of my soul.
"Are you ready?" he'd asked after a moment.
"No," I'd replied—because magic is the practice of deception, and in order to deceive we must first face the truth without flinching. He'd been the one to teach me that, though never in words. That was always the way with him.
Thinking back in later days, I could never decipher the expression my reply provoked. Some days it seemed sorrowfully proud, others resigned and joyful.
"Good," he had said at last. "We're never ready when our moment comes."
*But we face it all the same*, I thought. He nodded, and I took the stage.
*
Set up. Step in. Transcend. The three parts of any magic trick. You begin by leading the audience along, constructing the framework they'll use to understand what happens next. Then you step into that framework, playing along with the expectations you've created. Finally, you reveal the exception you'd buried behind their expectations, blinded by their preconceptions. The hat contains a rabbit and the card was in your hand all along.
When I heard the government had marked me for death, I heard those words again. The voice of my mentor, who died long ago, and the voice of my younger self, unaware of the path on which I had just taken the first step. I heard, and I chuckled quietly to myself.
I wasn't ready for this moment. If I'd had a choice, I'd have given myself a few
more months at least. But though reality gives us more choices than we always see, this wasn't one of them. I'd have to work with what I had.
A good performer knows his audience, so I watched social media as I made my preparations. The Internet had figured out my home address in a matter of minutes, but one of the perks of being a traveling performer is that you're often not at home when a band of amateur killers decides to come knocking. Of course, they figured out just as quickly that I'd done a show in Minneapolis two days ago, so presumably they'd find my real location before too long.
Reactions to the announcement varied. For many, it was disgusting and unthinkable, another sign of the depravity of the current administration. Others wished me well, whether out of support for the underdog or fantasies of getting their hands on a chunk of the payout. Some, of a more utilitarian bent, I suppose, were demanding I turn myself over GiveWell to be executed for the greater good. And to top it off, of course, an endless stream of thinkpieces dissecting my options.
I checked the recording equipment one more time, and began my livestream. We're never ready when our time comes.
"Good evening," I began, "and welcome to what will be, unfortunately, my final show."
I gave it a couple minutes to go viral—I needed as many eyes on me as possible—then prepared for the final climax.
"I view this choice as a gift, of course," I said. "Spend the next ten years of my life in hiding for the good of all, or direct someone to kill me for some noble goal. The prospect of my own death has sharpened my focus wonderfully, and I thank the responsible parties for the opportunity. But this seems an impossible choice, and I've never been one to bow to the inevitable."
I paused a moment for effect.
"I took a moment to review the text of the bill, and as it turn outs, no one gets any money if I kill myself. I'm afraid my pride doesn't allow for anyone to profit from my death, you see, so I will have to disappoint you all. I hope the government can find a more productive use for the money."
*We face it all the same.*
On live camera, in front of millions of viewers, I put the gun to my temple, fired, and died.
*
Set up. Step in. *Transcend.*
I woke amid the scorch marks on the floor. The magical release had knocked out the camera, as I'd hoped—hopefully they'd seen nothing after the gunshot. I put a hand to my temple, feeling the exit wound rapidly scabbing over. I hadn't been certain, hadn't been confident in my designs, but someone had thought I was ready.
I sat up slowly and saw him standing just outside the ritual circle. Blue eyes, speckled with green and brown, stared straight through mine and into the depths of my soul.
"I never told you," he said at last, and there was that unreadable expression from my memories. Pride and sorrow, resignation and joy. An old man watching his student take the first step on a hard journey.
I drunk deep of it. Then I threw back my head and laughed. | The seed of doubt, the insidious suspicion, took root somewhere in the second month. It festered, then bloomed magnificently one morning. Rae awoke, but lay in bed, unable to move, transfixed by the horrible realisation of it all.
"The bastards," she said, as she read the letter which had arrived in her mailbox the day before. "I can't believe they would do this..."
Seized by a sudden compulsion, she sprinted through her apartment, ignoring the security alarms as they tripped one by one. With only her nightgown billowing out behind her, she bounded out of her apartment building, in a frenzied beeline for the park opposite.
Just two paces behind, having slipped out of the shadows where he kept watch, Mason hissed angrily at his charge. "What the hell are you doing? Are you kidding me? Wasn't this exactly what we told you not to do?"
"Get away from me!" she yelled, wiping the hot, angry tears away. "I was promised a normal life, as far as possible. All lies!"
Mason would have loved to simply tranquilize her, right there on the sidewalk. She was already attracting the wrong kind of attention, and it was just a matter of time before she was recognised. Then, they would have to relocate her, again, establish a new cover for her, anything just to diminish the allure of the incandescent bounty on her head.
But he was a professional, paid handsomely by the organisation which collected subscriptions from everyone around the world, everyone who had a stake if Rae *did not* die. And if he could accomplish this without force...
"What's the problem now," he said, employing the same tone he reserved for petulant five year olds, as he sat down next to her on the bench she had collapsed into. "Do you want more freedom? Sure, we can work something out."
"I can't believe you scumbags would go so far as to hire Ben to keep me company! That's low, even for you guys!"
Mason knew who Ben was - surveillance had already checked him out, the moment he had introduced himself to her at the library they both frequented. Ben was clean, as far as they could tell. An ordinary citizen, not one of those bounty hunters out for the $10m prize which was Rae, just another one of the countless people in the world who stood to collect a relatively paltry $10,000 if she survived ten years.
"It all makes sense! I told you last month that I was feeling lonely, that all my friends hardly talk to me anymore. I said I was so unhappy I just wanted it all to end, and then what, Ben magically pops up? We get along, he knows my likes and dislikes, he makes an effort to make me happy? No, it's all a lie! He's just another asset hired by you, just a distraction to keep me sane!"
She was lost to another rack of sobs, and Mason only relaxed when the communicator buzzed in his ear. His team, surveying the periphery, had just reported in - no threats on the horizon.
"I swear, Rae, he's not one of ours," sighed Mason, leaning back and enjoying the brief respite. "We're good at keeping you safe, but not that good that we'll hire someone to be your friend. That's just... I don't know... wrong."
"Then how is he getting along so well with me? How does he know what to say, and when to say it? Why is he always so considerate?"
Mason thought briefly of the assignments his teammates were probably on at that moment. Saving presidents, perhaps. Or other VIPs. On wild adventures, traveling through exotic lands, spilling blood across the continents.
Meanwhile he was here, on a park bench with an insecure lady, trying to fend off a duck which had been circling them, hungry for food.
"Just give the young man a chance. I think, God forbid, he may really just like you for you."
---
/r/rarelyfunny |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | "I work at Goldman Sachs." The chick I've been talking up at the bar raises an eyebrow disbelievingly. "Yes, *that* Goldman Sachs. My job, my only job, is this: whenever the Notice goes out, I hire a hitman to take out the target, and see the mission through to completion."
"Whaaaat?" She leans in. "That's so wrong..." she puts a hand on my thigh. "...but dangerous." Wow, slam dunk. "But why?"
"Well, it's pretty straightforward: we hold trillions of dollars of monetary assets, and we don't need a $10,000 payday for everyone screwing up the value of the dollar. Do you know how much money $10,000 for everyone is? Even for just the U.S., population, it's about 3.2 trillion dollars. That much money pumped into the system would drop our value quite a bit, but it's the *whole friggin world.* So closer to 70 trillion dollars. Yeah, no thanks. Much better to keep our relative trickle from QE siphons."
I can tell I'm starting to lose her, so I bring it back around.
"There's a reason no one has ever survived the full ten years..."
She's not paying attention. She's looking at the TV.
I turn, and I see my face attached to the Notice.
I turn back, and the last thing I see is her bringing a gun up to my face. | The seed of doubt, the insidious suspicion, took root somewhere in the second month. It festered, then bloomed magnificently one morning. Rae awoke, but lay in bed, unable to move, transfixed by the horrible realisation of it all.
"The bastards," she said, as she read the letter which had arrived in her mailbox the day before. "I can't believe they would do this..."
Seized by a sudden compulsion, she sprinted through her apartment, ignoring the security alarms as they tripped one by one. With only her nightgown billowing out behind her, she bounded out of her apartment building, in a frenzied beeline for the park opposite.
Just two paces behind, having slipped out of the shadows where he kept watch, Mason hissed angrily at his charge. "What the hell are you doing? Are you kidding me? Wasn't this exactly what we told you not to do?"
"Get away from me!" she yelled, wiping the hot, angry tears away. "I was promised a normal life, as far as possible. All lies!"
Mason would have loved to simply tranquilize her, right there on the sidewalk. She was already attracting the wrong kind of attention, and it was just a matter of time before she was recognised. Then, they would have to relocate her, again, establish a new cover for her, anything just to diminish the allure of the incandescent bounty on her head.
But he was a professional, paid handsomely by the organisation which collected subscriptions from everyone around the world, everyone who had a stake if Rae *did not* die. And if he could accomplish this without force...
"What's the problem now," he said, employing the same tone he reserved for petulant five year olds, as he sat down next to her on the bench she had collapsed into. "Do you want more freedom? Sure, we can work something out."
"I can't believe you scumbags would go so far as to hire Ben to keep me company! That's low, even for you guys!"
Mason knew who Ben was - surveillance had already checked him out, the moment he had introduced himself to her at the library they both frequented. Ben was clean, as far as they could tell. An ordinary citizen, not one of those bounty hunters out for the $10m prize which was Rae, just another one of the countless people in the world who stood to collect a relatively paltry $10,000 if she survived ten years.
"It all makes sense! I told you last month that I was feeling lonely, that all my friends hardly talk to me anymore. I said I was so unhappy I just wanted it all to end, and then what, Ben magically pops up? We get along, he knows my likes and dislikes, he makes an effort to make me happy? No, it's all a lie! He's just another asset hired by you, just a distraction to keep me sane!"
She was lost to another rack of sobs, and Mason only relaxed when the communicator buzzed in his ear. His team, surveying the periphery, had just reported in - no threats on the horizon.
"I swear, Rae, he's not one of ours," sighed Mason, leaning back and enjoying the brief respite. "We're good at keeping you safe, but not that good that we'll hire someone to be your friend. That's just... I don't know... wrong."
"Then how is he getting along so well with me? How does he know what to say, and when to say it? Why is he always so considerate?"
Mason thought briefly of the assignments his teammates were probably on at that moment. Saving presidents, perhaps. Or other VIPs. On wild adventures, traveling through exotic lands, spilling blood across the continents.
Meanwhile he was here, on a park bench with an insecure lady, trying to fend off a duck which had been circling them, hungry for food.
"Just give the young man a chance. I think, God forbid, he may really just like you for you."
---
/r/rarelyfunny |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | My name flashed on the screen. Not just my name--my date of birth, my city of birth, and my picture, a photo from a couple of years ago we were forced to submit. The moment I saw it my heart leaped into my throat and my gut felt like someone dropped a ton of rocks in it. Time seemed to stop, and all there was was the television screen and the soft robotic voice of the announcer. Then, adrenaline rushed through my body. I knew the game. We all knew it. The next step was to find safety.
I rushed through the living room, into the kitchen, down the stairs into the basement. As I did I heard my wife Janet begin to wail upstairs. She was giving our youngest, Bryson, a bath, and listening to the broadcast on the radio. I heard her shout, "No, no, no, no," again and again as she drained the water from the tub and shuffled her feet upstairs, no doubt wrapping Bryson in a towel so she could come downstairs to catch me. I'll never know for certain.
In the basement we had a closet with three large backpacks hanging on hooks. One for me, one for my wife, and one for our oldest son, Daniel, who was away to college right now. Dust collected on the tops, thickest on mine and Janet's. The phone rang upstairs. I could hear my wife stomping around up there. The air in the basement was musty, like moldy bread. I grabbed my backpack off the hook and quickly unzipped it, ensuring the clothing and food inside was still vacuum sealed, still safe from the elements.
"Lewis!" I heard my wife cry out. "Lewis don't go yet!" Bryson was crying. Viola, our middle child, just starting eighth grade, came out of her room. "What is going to happen to dad?" I heard her say, her voice muffled above. I had the backpack on and was running toward the stairs leading up to the back entrance. I could feel the tears running down my face. As I reached the top of the stairs, I threw open the back door. Janet's voice, loud and despairing in my right ear, screaming for me to stop, to take her with me.
I almost stopped. I almost took her with me.
Immediately upon leaving the back door, stepping out into the cold night air, I barely saw my neighbor, Allan, standing across the driveway, behind his white picket fence, silhouetted by the lights of his home. He had a hunting rifle leveled at me. He never said anything, he just took the shot, and I managed to duck out of the way just in time. He was too close for such a long range weapon, and he knew it, dropping the rifle and pulling a silver pistol out of his side holster. I was running down the driveway to the car, my car, my breath hot in my lungs. I had just eaten a big dinner before the announcement--spaghetti and meatballs, a nice salad. Garlic bread. Glass of wine. I could feel the acidity of the pasta sauce gargling up my throat.
Allan took a couple of shots at me, all missed. I reached the car and threw myself inside, starting the engine without even thinking about it. Allan shot twice more, putting a hole in the windshield. I turned on the headlights, and he was now in full light. Viola was there too, and I heard her scream, "Stop shooting, you asshole!" Allan looked over at her, then quickly ran inside his house as I pulled out of the driveway. My wife never left the house. I drove in silence for hours, tears pouring down my face, choking myself with my own sobs. I slept in the back seat. I watched the sun rise while eating a bag of beef jerky.
The first step, they say, is to get as far away from everyone you know as you can. They are always the first to come, because they know you, they know how you work, where you go, what you do. After that, it's just a matter of hunkering down and moving constantly. That's how you make it. Or so they say. But the big thing is: you never go back. | The seed of doubt, the insidious suspicion, took root somewhere in the second month. It festered, then bloomed magnificently one morning. Rae awoke, but lay in bed, unable to move, transfixed by the horrible realisation of it all.
"The bastards," she said, as she read the letter which had arrived in her mailbox the day before. "I can't believe they would do this..."
Seized by a sudden compulsion, she sprinted through her apartment, ignoring the security alarms as they tripped one by one. With only her nightgown billowing out behind her, she bounded out of her apartment building, in a frenzied beeline for the park opposite.
Just two paces behind, having slipped out of the shadows where he kept watch, Mason hissed angrily at his charge. "What the hell are you doing? Are you kidding me? Wasn't this exactly what we told you not to do?"
"Get away from me!" she yelled, wiping the hot, angry tears away. "I was promised a normal life, as far as possible. All lies!"
Mason would have loved to simply tranquilize her, right there on the sidewalk. She was already attracting the wrong kind of attention, and it was just a matter of time before she was recognised. Then, they would have to relocate her, again, establish a new cover for her, anything just to diminish the allure of the incandescent bounty on her head.
But he was a professional, paid handsomely by the organisation which collected subscriptions from everyone around the world, everyone who had a stake if Rae *did not* die. And if he could accomplish this without force...
"What's the problem now," he said, employing the same tone he reserved for petulant five year olds, as he sat down next to her on the bench she had collapsed into. "Do you want more freedom? Sure, we can work something out."
"I can't believe you scumbags would go so far as to hire Ben to keep me company! That's low, even for you guys!"
Mason knew who Ben was - surveillance had already checked him out, the moment he had introduced himself to her at the library they both frequented. Ben was clean, as far as they could tell. An ordinary citizen, not one of those bounty hunters out for the $10m prize which was Rae, just another one of the countless people in the world who stood to collect a relatively paltry $10,000 if she survived ten years.
"It all makes sense! I told you last month that I was feeling lonely, that all my friends hardly talk to me anymore. I said I was so unhappy I just wanted it all to end, and then what, Ben magically pops up? We get along, he knows my likes and dislikes, he makes an effort to make me happy? No, it's all a lie! He's just another asset hired by you, just a distraction to keep me sane!"
She was lost to another rack of sobs, and Mason only relaxed when the communicator buzzed in his ear. His team, surveying the periphery, had just reported in - no threats on the horizon.
"I swear, Rae, he's not one of ours," sighed Mason, leaning back and enjoying the brief respite. "We're good at keeping you safe, but not that good that we'll hire someone to be your friend. That's just... I don't know... wrong."
"Then how is he getting along so well with me? How does he know what to say, and when to say it? Why is he always so considerate?"
Mason thought briefly of the assignments his teammates were probably on at that moment. Saving presidents, perhaps. Or other VIPs. On wild adventures, traveling through exotic lands, spilling blood across the continents.
Meanwhile he was here, on a park bench with an insecure lady, trying to fend off a duck which had been circling them, hungry for food.
"Just give the young man a chance. I think, God forbid, he may really just like you for you."
---
/r/rarelyfunny |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | I sat within the concrete bunker, double-checking, no, triple-checking my equipment to make sure I'd be safe.
Eight years, three-hundred and thirty-eight days, two-hundred and four hours, and thirty-seven minutes.
That's how long I've had a death warrant on my head. *Exactly* how long.
Funny, my wife used to tell me that I was a damn idiot. I should be saving up money instead of building a bunker. I was the always the cautious type, always planning ahead.
I spent thousands on that damn bunker. Fitted it with a state-of-the-art water generator.
I've been living off canned food and fruit from the underground garden for eight years, and I've had enough.
When I got the alert, I immediately grabbed all the food in the house, the handgun my father gave me when I turned eighteen, and all my electronics and made a mad dash for the bunker. I turned back to beckon my wife in when a pipe bomb was thrown into my window.
How they got there so fast, I don't know, but they've been out there for months, though. Banging on the door, trying to mine, shoot, and blast their way in. It's barely made a dent. I'm safe in here. Could live here my whole life if I really wanted.
I'm tired, though. My wife's gone. Either this bunker has shitty service or nobody in my family's alive. Which one do you think it is?
I finish my dinner, which is meager at best: Water, chicken, and some peaches, and sigh. It's time. No more hiding. No more crying. No more hatred.
I take off the baggy T-shirt and the sweatpants, and instead don the uniform I fought a war in. I served six years in the army, and this is how they repayed me: Ordering everyone in the nation to murder me.
I reach for every piece of body armor I can find. After ten minutes, I'm so armored up I can barely move. I reach for my rifles, cleaned every day for the past eight years, and double-check that they're loaded properly. I hobble to the front door of the bunker, one rifle slung over my chest, the other held in my gloved hands.
I open the door for the first time, and step outside.
The people outside, armed with everything from baseball bats to handguns, pause, looking at me with shock if anything else. As if I was Christ, back from the dead. I watch their faces contort, feel a certain smugness as I realize they haven't exactly planned this far.
Even though my mouth is covered, I still grin.
I step forward, and with a *schlock,* switch off the safety of the rifle.
"So," I say.
"Who here wants to make some money?"
EDIT: Was running on fumes when I wrote this, changed the date | The seed of doubt, the insidious suspicion, took root somewhere in the second month. It festered, then bloomed magnificently one morning. Rae awoke, but lay in bed, unable to move, transfixed by the horrible realisation of it all.
"The bastards," she said, as she read the letter which had arrived in her mailbox the day before. "I can't believe they would do this..."
Seized by a sudden compulsion, she sprinted through her apartment, ignoring the security alarms as they tripped one by one. With only her nightgown billowing out behind her, she bounded out of her apartment building, in a frenzied beeline for the park opposite.
Just two paces behind, having slipped out of the shadows where he kept watch, Mason hissed angrily at his charge. "What the hell are you doing? Are you kidding me? Wasn't this exactly what we told you not to do?"
"Get away from me!" she yelled, wiping the hot, angry tears away. "I was promised a normal life, as far as possible. All lies!"
Mason would have loved to simply tranquilize her, right there on the sidewalk. She was already attracting the wrong kind of attention, and it was just a matter of time before she was recognised. Then, they would have to relocate her, again, establish a new cover for her, anything just to diminish the allure of the incandescent bounty on her head.
But he was a professional, paid handsomely by the organisation which collected subscriptions from everyone around the world, everyone who had a stake if Rae *did not* die. And if he could accomplish this without force...
"What's the problem now," he said, employing the same tone he reserved for petulant five year olds, as he sat down next to her on the bench she had collapsed into. "Do you want more freedom? Sure, we can work something out."
"I can't believe you scumbags would go so far as to hire Ben to keep me company! That's low, even for you guys!"
Mason knew who Ben was - surveillance had already checked him out, the moment he had introduced himself to her at the library they both frequented. Ben was clean, as far as they could tell. An ordinary citizen, not one of those bounty hunters out for the $10m prize which was Rae, just another one of the countless people in the world who stood to collect a relatively paltry $10,000 if she survived ten years.
"It all makes sense! I told you last month that I was feeling lonely, that all my friends hardly talk to me anymore. I said I was so unhappy I just wanted it all to end, and then what, Ben magically pops up? We get along, he knows my likes and dislikes, he makes an effort to make me happy? No, it's all a lie! He's just another asset hired by you, just a distraction to keep me sane!"
She was lost to another rack of sobs, and Mason only relaxed when the communicator buzzed in his ear. His team, surveying the periphery, had just reported in - no threats on the horizon.
"I swear, Rae, he's not one of ours," sighed Mason, leaning back and enjoying the brief respite. "We're good at keeping you safe, but not that good that we'll hire someone to be your friend. That's just... I don't know... wrong."
"Then how is he getting along so well with me? How does he know what to say, and when to say it? Why is he always so considerate?"
Mason thought briefly of the assignments his teammates were probably on at that moment. Saving presidents, perhaps. Or other VIPs. On wild adventures, traveling through exotic lands, spilling blood across the continents.
Meanwhile he was here, on a park bench with an insecure lady, trying to fend off a duck which had been circling them, hungry for food.
"Just give the young man a chance. I think, God forbid, he may really just like you for you."
---
/r/rarelyfunny |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | "I work at Goldman Sachs." The chick I've been talking up at the bar raises an eyebrow disbelievingly. "Yes, *that* Goldman Sachs. My job, my only job, is this: whenever the Notice goes out, I hire a hitman to take out the target, and see the mission through to completion."
"Whaaaat?" She leans in. "That's so wrong..." she puts a hand on my thigh. "...but dangerous." Wow, slam dunk. "But why?"
"Well, it's pretty straightforward: we hold trillions of dollars of monetary assets, and we don't need a $10,000 payday for everyone screwing up the value of the dollar. Do you know how much money $10,000 for everyone is? Even for just the U.S., population, it's about 3.2 trillion dollars. That much money pumped into the system would drop our value quite a bit, but it's the *whole friggin world.* So closer to 70 trillion dollars. Yeah, no thanks. Much better to keep our relative trickle from QE siphons."
I can tell I'm starting to lose her, so I bring it back around.
"There's a reason no one has ever survived the full ten years..."
She's not paying attention. She's looking at the TV.
I turn, and I see my face attached to the Notice.
I turn back, and the last thing I see is her bringing a gun up to my face. | In the moments before my first stage performance, my mentor had laid a hand on my shoulder and stared into my eyes. Though he was getting older, his beard was neatly trimmed and his hair was in perfect order. A performer to the end. I met his eyes, speckles of green and brown across a field of blue. I remember thinking that he seemed to be staring straight through my anticipation and into the very structure of my soul.
"Are you ready?" he'd asked after a moment.
"No," I'd replied—because magic is the practice of deception, and in order to deceive we must first face the truth without flinching. He'd been the one to teach me that, though never in words. That was always the way with him.
Thinking back in later days, I could never decipher the expression my reply provoked. Some days it seemed sorrowfully proud, others resigned and joyful.
"Good," he had said at last. "We're never ready when our moment comes."
*But we face it all the same*, I thought. He nodded, and I took the stage.
*
Set up. Step in. Transcend. The three parts of any magic trick. You begin by leading the audience along, constructing the framework they'll use to understand what happens next. Then you step into that framework, playing along with the expectations you've created. Finally, you reveal the exception you'd buried behind their expectations, blinded by their preconceptions. The hat contains a rabbit and the card was in your hand all along.
When I heard the government had marked me for death, I heard those words again. The voice of my mentor, who died long ago, and the voice of my younger self, unaware of the path on which I had just taken the first step. I heard, and I chuckled quietly to myself.
I wasn't ready for this moment. If I'd had a choice, I'd have given myself a few
more months at least. But though reality gives us more choices than we always see, this wasn't one of them. I'd have to work with what I had.
A good performer knows his audience, so I watched social media as I made my preparations. The Internet had figured out my home address in a matter of minutes, but one of the perks of being a traveling performer is that you're often not at home when a band of amateur killers decides to come knocking. Of course, they figured out just as quickly that I'd done a show in Minneapolis two days ago, so presumably they'd find my real location before too long.
Reactions to the announcement varied. For many, it was disgusting and unthinkable, another sign of the depravity of the current administration. Others wished me well, whether out of support for the underdog or fantasies of getting their hands on a chunk of the payout. Some, of a more utilitarian bent, I suppose, were demanding I turn myself over GiveWell to be executed for the greater good. And to top it off, of course, an endless stream of thinkpieces dissecting my options.
I checked the recording equipment one more time, and began my livestream. We're never ready when our time comes.
"Good evening," I began, "and welcome to what will be, unfortunately, my final show."
I gave it a couple minutes to go viral—I needed as many eyes on me as possible—then prepared for the final climax.
"I view this choice as a gift, of course," I said. "Spend the next ten years of my life in hiding for the good of all, or direct someone to kill me for some noble goal. The prospect of my own death has sharpened my focus wonderfully, and I thank the responsible parties for the opportunity. But this seems an impossible choice, and I've never been one to bow to the inevitable."
I paused a moment for effect.
"I took a moment to review the text of the bill, and as it turn outs, no one gets any money if I kill myself. I'm afraid my pride doesn't allow for anyone to profit from my death, you see, so I will have to disappoint you all. I hope the government can find a more productive use for the money."
*We face it all the same.*
On live camera, in front of millions of viewers, I put the gun to my temple, fired, and died.
*
Set up. Step in. *Transcend.*
I woke amid the scorch marks on the floor. The magical release had knocked out the camera, as I'd hoped—hopefully they'd seen nothing after the gunshot. I put a hand to my temple, feeling the exit wound rapidly scabbing over. I hadn't been certain, hadn't been confident in my designs, but someone had thought I was ready.
I sat up slowly and saw him standing just outside the ritual circle. Blue eyes, speckled with green and brown, stared straight through mine and into the depths of my soul.
"I never told you," he said at last, and there was that unreadable expression from my memories. Pride and sorrow, resignation and joy. An old man watching his student take the first step on a hard journey.
I drunk deep of it. Then I threw back my head and laughed. |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | My name flashed on the screen. Not just my name--my date of birth, my city of birth, and my picture, a photo from a couple of years ago we were forced to submit. The moment I saw it my heart leaped into my throat and my gut felt like someone dropped a ton of rocks in it. Time seemed to stop, and all there was was the television screen and the soft robotic voice of the announcer. Then, adrenaline rushed through my body. I knew the game. We all knew it. The next step was to find safety.
I rushed through the living room, into the kitchen, down the stairs into the basement. As I did I heard my wife Janet begin to wail upstairs. She was giving our youngest, Bryson, a bath, and listening to the broadcast on the radio. I heard her shout, "No, no, no, no," again and again as she drained the water from the tub and shuffled her feet upstairs, no doubt wrapping Bryson in a towel so she could come downstairs to catch me. I'll never know for certain.
In the basement we had a closet with three large backpacks hanging on hooks. One for me, one for my wife, and one for our oldest son, Daniel, who was away to college right now. Dust collected on the tops, thickest on mine and Janet's. The phone rang upstairs. I could hear my wife stomping around up there. The air in the basement was musty, like moldy bread. I grabbed my backpack off the hook and quickly unzipped it, ensuring the clothing and food inside was still vacuum sealed, still safe from the elements.
"Lewis!" I heard my wife cry out. "Lewis don't go yet!" Bryson was crying. Viola, our middle child, just starting eighth grade, came out of her room. "What is going to happen to dad?" I heard her say, her voice muffled above. I had the backpack on and was running toward the stairs leading up to the back entrance. I could feel the tears running down my face. As I reached the top of the stairs, I threw open the back door. Janet's voice, loud and despairing in my right ear, screaming for me to stop, to take her with me.
I almost stopped. I almost took her with me.
Immediately upon leaving the back door, stepping out into the cold night air, I barely saw my neighbor, Allan, standing across the driveway, behind his white picket fence, silhouetted by the lights of his home. He had a hunting rifle leveled at me. He never said anything, he just took the shot, and I managed to duck out of the way just in time. He was too close for such a long range weapon, and he knew it, dropping the rifle and pulling a silver pistol out of his side holster. I was running down the driveway to the car, my car, my breath hot in my lungs. I had just eaten a big dinner before the announcement--spaghetti and meatballs, a nice salad. Garlic bread. Glass of wine. I could feel the acidity of the pasta sauce gargling up my throat.
Allan took a couple of shots at me, all missed. I reached the car and threw myself inside, starting the engine without even thinking about it. Allan shot twice more, putting a hole in the windshield. I turned on the headlights, and he was now in full light. Viola was there too, and I heard her scream, "Stop shooting, you asshole!" Allan looked over at her, then quickly ran inside his house as I pulled out of the driveway. My wife never left the house. I drove in silence for hours, tears pouring down my face, choking myself with my own sobs. I slept in the back seat. I watched the sun rise while eating a bag of beef jerky.
The first step, they say, is to get as far away from everyone you know as you can. They are always the first to come, because they know you, they know how you work, where you go, what you do. After that, it's just a matter of hunkering down and moving constantly. That's how you make it. Or so they say. But the big thing is: you never go back. | In the moments before my first stage performance, my mentor had laid a hand on my shoulder and stared into my eyes. Though he was getting older, his beard was neatly trimmed and his hair was in perfect order. A performer to the end. I met his eyes, speckles of green and brown across a field of blue. I remember thinking that he seemed to be staring straight through my anticipation and into the very structure of my soul.
"Are you ready?" he'd asked after a moment.
"No," I'd replied—because magic is the practice of deception, and in order to deceive we must first face the truth without flinching. He'd been the one to teach me that, though never in words. That was always the way with him.
Thinking back in later days, I could never decipher the expression my reply provoked. Some days it seemed sorrowfully proud, others resigned and joyful.
"Good," he had said at last. "We're never ready when our moment comes."
*But we face it all the same*, I thought. He nodded, and I took the stage.
*
Set up. Step in. Transcend. The three parts of any magic trick. You begin by leading the audience along, constructing the framework they'll use to understand what happens next. Then you step into that framework, playing along with the expectations you've created. Finally, you reveal the exception you'd buried behind their expectations, blinded by their preconceptions. The hat contains a rabbit and the card was in your hand all along.
When I heard the government had marked me for death, I heard those words again. The voice of my mentor, who died long ago, and the voice of my younger self, unaware of the path on which I had just taken the first step. I heard, and I chuckled quietly to myself.
I wasn't ready for this moment. If I'd had a choice, I'd have given myself a few
more months at least. But though reality gives us more choices than we always see, this wasn't one of them. I'd have to work with what I had.
A good performer knows his audience, so I watched social media as I made my preparations. The Internet had figured out my home address in a matter of minutes, but one of the perks of being a traveling performer is that you're often not at home when a band of amateur killers decides to come knocking. Of course, they figured out just as quickly that I'd done a show in Minneapolis two days ago, so presumably they'd find my real location before too long.
Reactions to the announcement varied. For many, it was disgusting and unthinkable, another sign of the depravity of the current administration. Others wished me well, whether out of support for the underdog or fantasies of getting their hands on a chunk of the payout. Some, of a more utilitarian bent, I suppose, were demanding I turn myself over GiveWell to be executed for the greater good. And to top it off, of course, an endless stream of thinkpieces dissecting my options.
I checked the recording equipment one more time, and began my livestream. We're never ready when our time comes.
"Good evening," I began, "and welcome to what will be, unfortunately, my final show."
I gave it a couple minutes to go viral—I needed as many eyes on me as possible—then prepared for the final climax.
"I view this choice as a gift, of course," I said. "Spend the next ten years of my life in hiding for the good of all, or direct someone to kill me for some noble goal. The prospect of my own death has sharpened my focus wonderfully, and I thank the responsible parties for the opportunity. But this seems an impossible choice, and I've never been one to bow to the inevitable."
I paused a moment for effect.
"I took a moment to review the text of the bill, and as it turn outs, no one gets any money if I kill myself. I'm afraid my pride doesn't allow for anyone to profit from my death, you see, so I will have to disappoint you all. I hope the government can find a more productive use for the money."
*We face it all the same.*
On live camera, in front of millions of viewers, I put the gun to my temple, fired, and died.
*
Set up. Step in. *Transcend.*
I woke amid the scorch marks on the floor. The magical release had knocked out the camera, as I'd hoped—hopefully they'd seen nothing after the gunshot. I put a hand to my temple, feeling the exit wound rapidly scabbing over. I hadn't been certain, hadn't been confident in my designs, but someone had thought I was ready.
I sat up slowly and saw him standing just outside the ritual circle. Blue eyes, speckled with green and brown, stared straight through mine and into the depths of my soul.
"I never told you," he said at last, and there was that unreadable expression from my memories. Pride and sorrow, resignation and joy. An old man watching his student take the first step on a hard journey.
I drunk deep of it. Then I threw back my head and laughed. |
|
[WP] The Government puts out a notice, and you, a random citizen have been selected. If you survive for another 10 years everyone in the world gets $10,000. However, if someone kills you in the next 9 years and 364 days they alone get $10,000,000. | I saw my name on the news. The words struck me, left me paralyzed - but only for a second.
Then I knew what I had to do.
I hurried to the kitchen, grabbing something before I went downstairs. I could already hear the noises outside.
I opened the door, and there she was, asleep, at peace. The life support systems attached to her were making a steady, systematic 'beep'.
Gently, I awoke her. She looked up at me with tired eyes.
"Sweetheart," I said, putting something into her hands and wrapping her fingers around it. I had to raise my voice over the banging on the front door.
"What is it, daddy? What's wrong?" she asked, confused.
"Tomorrow, you phone the doctor and tell him you can afford the treatment, alright? Tell him you can afford every damn thing you need," I said, hearing the door crash open.
"...But how?"
"Don't worry about that now, honey," I said, as I took the knife in her hands and plunged it deep into me, feeling my blood seep through her gown. I hugged her tight.
"Just go to sleep... and it'll all be alright."
*****
*****
If you didn't completely hate that, consider subscribing to [my subreddit.](https://www.reddit.com/r/CroatianSpy/)
I'll try add new (and old) stories every day <3 | I groaned. "You have got to be kidding m-"
*BANG. BANG. BANG.*
I tensed, not knowing who it could be. And then, out of all the people in the world, I heard the voice of my sweet, little old neighbor who baked cookies for me every Saturday.
"Hun? It's Ms. Jansen. I just heard the news. You poor thing. Come over to my place and let me bake you some cookies."
Gosh - I almost believed her, too. She sounded so sweet and innocent and cute in that old, charming way of hers. But, alas, when I went to the door and peered through the peephole...
"Ms. Jansen, you're holding a knife." I sighed.
She hesitated, then stared curiously at the door while slowly sliding the hand holding the knife behind her back. "How did you know that, dear?"
I close my eyes. "We have peepholes, Ms. Jansen. I can see everything that you're doing. Even that knife that you're holding behind your back."
"Oh." She blinks, looks down and to the side for awhile until I start feeling a little bad for her.
"Ms. Jansen?"
"Yes?" She looks up, hopeful. I can't lie - it's very endearing. Almost makes me want to open the door and let her get in a good stab or two. *Almost*.
"I'll come over and we can bake some cookies, alright?"
Her eyebrows jump a mile high. "Really?"
"Yup," I say. "In ten years."
|
|
[WP] You are capable of shape-shifting into nearly any form, but then you're stuck with that form, because after every transformation, you must wait one year before you're able to transform again. | "I want money", I said. "I want a beautiful girl", I said. Let me tell you, it's not all rainbows and sunshine. She was a gorgeous girl whose family were rich and served luxurious foods. So I changed into her perfect man, a funny cool guy with a good sense of humour. We dated a lot for awhile and she wanted me to meet her parents. Truthfully I liked her a lot, and so agreed.
Let me tell you, it was not all rainbows and sunshine.
When I sat at the dinner table, her mother served me a baked potato. I know my girlfriend likes funny guys, so I thought I would play a small prank on her parents. I pretended to not know what a potato was.
Her father was very angry with this and was aggressive to my kidding. At this point I had no choice but to commit to the joke. "Sir, before today I never heard of a potato. I still don't know what a potato is, other than some kind of food. I don't know what to tell you" I pleaded. Her father was not very happy and soon kicked me out of the house.
She broke up with me days later. I was feeling very lonely and sad and wanted some love and some kisses. After around a year I thought I should get back out there. So I changed myself.
I wanted to be someone new and try new things. I don't mind boys as well. I'd always wanted to be a girl. So I changed myself and now I am called Jenny. | It's been two months and... I'm lucky I have a close friend since I can't stay at my house, I'm actually kind of presumed dead now. I have an unfortunate power that I don't even know how I got... I can transform into mostly anything but I found out it takes a year to be able to change back. I guess I'm technically immortal... but this still sucks sometimes.
It was two months ago when I was myself, I was watching music videos when the music video for [The Veronicas: When it all falls apart](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=69M8eYcSqH4) came on and while I was watching it I felt my body changing... it felt weird then after a second I looked down to see I was wearing different clothes. I had high heels on and my clothes changed to black pants that reached my calf, a white wife beater, a black suit vest with a tie on, and some bracelets along with my nails having kinda worn red nail polish on them. From what I saw when I looked under the clothes and from what I could feel I could tell my body was different, I was skinny and had parts that definitely weren't ones I had before.
I got up to run to the mirror but I tripped on the heels and sprained my ankle, it made me scream "fuck!" And hold my ankle. Throwing the shoes across the room I hopped to the bathroom and looked in the mirror... I looked just like one of The Veronica's from the video. I was so freaked out and said "what the fuck is going on?" While touching the mirror, my voice just added to the strangeness cause I had her voice but developed her accent too somehow. The people I lived with wouldn't be home for a few hours so I got back onto my couch to see... something for a second before finding out what was going on.
After... that I walked to the mirror laughing a little but got worried again when trying to change back into myself for half an hour. I walked into the kitchen and saw the people I lived with coming to the door so I grabbed my phone and charger along with my favorite pocket knife. After I got it all I ran out the door and it hurt but I walked down the street barefoot thinking of where to go.
I ended up taking a bus to my friend's house and by the time I got to the door my feet were brown on the bottom from the dirt. She asked who I was and I told her I had some news about her friend then I said my own name. She let me in and I told her who I was then had to say a bunch of thing only I'd know to convince her. She asked how I turned into this form and I told her I didn't know. When she noticed my feet she asked if I wanted to wash them so I did, then she gave me a pair of converse to wear.
I spent the next month finding a guy to make me technically exist legally by making papers, getting a job as a bartender at a strip club, the first day I had my friend get my PS4 and PS3 along with some other stuff I wanted to keep. When I was missing the police asked my friend and she said she dropped me off near a Burger King since I was apparently hungry and she needed to get home. I bled for a few days which was super annoying and fucking sucked. Then I got some new clothes, I also did chores around her house so her family would let me stay.
The next month I got used to things... except the bleeding, I felt like I'd never get used to that. When I was asking online about what happened some anonymous answer said shape-shifters exist but they transform once every year... I didn't understand why but they didn't say anything else. I tried looking for more answers but no others came.
I'm playing RE7 now on my PS4 and I'm thinking of what I'll do at the end of the year. I can't become myself again and after months maybe I'll like this... other than the bleeding and more maintenance the good moments with this body are really good. Maybe I'll just turn into this form a year younger and make myself have a version of immortality... I could be ok with that. |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | **/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; Commstaff Jordan; 15 Andromeda Minutes before/**
I heard the soft beeping of an incoming message in my headset, and the fact that the message was conveniently sent 2 minutes before the end of my shift, I was pretty irritated. I pondered over answering it or letting the guy with the next shift handle it, but I decided on the former after I noticed the CommLeader giving me a hard look. Hesitantly, I tapped on glowing button labeled "INCOMING MESSAGE." I was expecting to find a long letter explaining how the kitchen crew accidentally lost many herbs in a fire and that they were requesting for some supplies, so the short message that followed surprised me.
KILL US
I refreshed the message, thinking that there was more to it and that some of it got lost between the data transfer. Maybe they wanted to say "KILL USING ENGINES" and wanted to trade, though I knew that this was not the case. The data transfers never got corrupted since they updated the CommOS.
I decided to send the message to the Captain. Maybe he could decipher its meaning.
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; CommLeader Arthur; 14 Andromeda Minutes before/**
"Commander, I received this message from an unidentified source. Should I send it to the Captain?"
I sighed. "Jordan, you know you shouldn't bother the Captain with such requests. Send it to the TradeDock Sector if it's requesting to barter."
"But Arthur..." One second. Two. "Just take a look."
"Fine. Send it this way." My tablet flashed "INCOMING MESSAGE." *This better be worth it*, I thought.
KILL US
"Send it to the Captain immediately, Jordan."
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; Captain Olivia; 11 Andromeda Minutes before/**
My headset was filled with a deep, husky voice. "Uh, Captain, we have, uh, received a message from an unidentified source and, um, thought that you should take a look."
"Okay Jordan, hit me with it."
KILL US
"What is the meaning of this? Is this a joke, Jordan?"
"N-no Captain! I would never send such a message to you if I didn't think it was urgent!"
"Give me a direct link to the data transfer."
"Got it!" Hesitantly, I shut off the headset.
**/Communication Log between [ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3] and [$UNKNOWN$]; 9 Andromeda Minutes before/**
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Hello? Who is this?
$UNKNOWN$ / KILL US
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Who is this?
$UNKNOWN$ / KILL US
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Look, just answer my question. Who are you?
$UNKNOWN$ / We are the Alpha Centauri Exploration Unit. KILL US
$UNKNOWN$ identified as aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Why do you want us to kill you?
aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT / We are not here to answer your questions. KILL US
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Not until you explain yourself.
aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT / Fine. We will attack then. KILL US
End of data transfer
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; Captain Olivia; 4 Andromeda Minutes before/**
I quickly activated my headset. "Alexa! Activate the shields! We're under fire!" Silence. "Alexa?" My voice grew more furious. "ALEXA, WE'RE. UNDER. FUCKING. ATTACK!" Still nothing.
Quickly, I activated manual drive. "Activate shields, activate weapons, activate breach proofing," I mumbled under my breath as my fingers flew across my tablet. My finger hovered over the "FIRE WEAPONS" button. *It's either us or them*, I thought. With my breath held, I pressed it
**/Inside aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT; Captain Erika; 2 Andromeda Minutes before/**
"Is the Core stable, Marshal?" I asked.
"As stable as it can be, Captain. Around 2 Andromeda Minutes before it collapses."
"Good. That's good," I said through heavy breaths. "They must kill us, Marshal. They must."
I felt a hand grasp my own. "I know Erika. I know." Through wet eyes, I saw the ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3's weapons activate.
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; WeaponLeader Alexa; 2 Andromeda Minutes before/**
The voice of the Captain could be heard in the corridor. "ALEXA! WHERE ARE YOU?!" She sounded furious, and a furious Captain was not pleasant...
Yet I didn't respond. Firing at the ship would mean destroying the Core. And the Core must survive. At least that's what Marshal told me.
Long live the Savior, brother. I shut down the power to the weapons and pulled out my gun resting in my holster. Long live the Savior.
**/Inside aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT; Captain Marshal; 30 Andromeda Seconds before/**
The weapons lowered themselves. I looked over at Erika's shocked face.
"Why aren't they shooting?! Marshal, why aren't they shooting?!" Tears started to flow from her eyes. I held her head against my shoulder. She was sobbing at this point. While she was cursed with tears, though, a smile formed on my face. You did well, sister.
I managed to whisper four more words into Erika's ear before. "Long live the Savior." I then heard the shrill screams of thousands of men, women, and children echo down the halls, the sound of an explosion following, and the Second Coming being blessed upon us.
| We were just passing Proxima Centauri when my dashboard began to light up with a message.
Although it had been almost two centuries since humanity had discovered the key to intergalactic travel, we had yet to make contact with another race. My heart was pounding with some mix of excitement and absolute fear. My first thought was that it must simply be an internal communication method, but the logical side of me knew that there would be no reason for any such message to be transmitted to me directly. My blood froze as I realized that this would be the first contact with an alien race, I would be the hero that had discovered the next part of the galaxy. The next step in human existence.
It was at this point that I reflected back on our training. To qualify to become commander of an interstellar vessel, I had undergone military-esque training. Throughout the years of testing, simulations and combat, we had not only been taught to fly a ship, but to fight with one. Most humans had assumed that aliens would be hostile, and while I was never one of them, I knew that that had always been a possibility. Knowing that our translation systems would be able to translate even unknown languages due to the ability of our supercomputers to communicate with nearby communications systems, I realized that there was no way to avoid it. Steeling myself for whatever was to come, I checked the message.
KILL US
As I read that I simply stared in shock. The first alien contact, and it was requesting death? Every bone in my body told me that it had to be a trap, something was coming. I cried out to my engineers to begin charging our power generators, in case of combat. I contemplated how I could respond to this request. How could I justify killing another sentient being? Why would this request even be made? I realized that none of my training could ever have prepared me for this moment, when I became a killer, a murderer. Looking into myself, I knew that I could bring myself to give the command to fire on sight. I had to figure out what was happening here. I typed a brief response.
NEGATIVE. WE’RE COMING TO FIND YOU
I knew I could save them. I told myself that it must just be that who, or whatever had sent this was no different from anyone suffering from depression on Earth. I had lost my childhood friend to suicide, back when we were still in our teens, and I couldn’t allow anyone else to bring themselves death. We would board the ship, and speak with their commander. There was no doubt in my mind that I was doing the right thing.
I searched my radar for any sign of another ship. It was blank, until I caught the slightest glimpse of something going across the edge of my screen, right by Proxima.
“Quickly, move towards Proxima” I shouted to my pilots.
While clearly surprised, they knew better than to disobey my orders. We swiftly changed course, racing towards the star, before we saw the faintest light in the distance. As I urged my crew to pursue it, my second in command sprinted up to me.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m saving lives” I responded calmly, before showing him the messages.
“I don’t like this. What if it’s a trap?” he said, after a long pause.
“Think about it. We could be heroes! We could be the ones to usher mankind into a new era. Or we could kill the only aliens mankind has ever seen.”
“Alright, I’ll trust you on this. But if you’re boarding that ship, I’m coming with you.” he said, convinced.
“You have yourself a deal. Now, let’s catch this ship.”
At this point I checked the radar again, and noticed that the ship had stopped. I briefly considered that they may be responding to my message, however upon checking I found no such response. We pulled up next to them, and prepared an exit vessel for boarding.
As we prepared for departure, a small hatch opened on the other ship, allowing us to enter easily. Upon exiting our pod and entering the ship, we began to look around. Whereas our ship was clearly marked and contained separate areas, this ship seemed random and together. Looking into the first room, we saw what held many of the standard elements of a sleeping area, however with some stark differences. As opposed to a bed, there was simply a pod, and the clothing seemed absurdly huge, with no visible uniformity. My partner attempted to open the pod, but upon touching it his eyes glazed over and he froze.
“John? Are you alright?” I asked him, but to no avail.
I began shaking him, but realized that his hand was stuck, and some form of blue slimy substance was climbing his arm. Terrified, I pulled him off, and his eyes returned to normal.
“What happened there” I asked him.
“What do you mean? It just wouldn’t open.” he responded.
Shaking my head, we left the room and continued to investigate. In the next room, we saw some form of incubator. Approaching to investigate, I noticed the same slimy substance coating each egg. As John reached to grab one, I quickly pulled him back.
“What are you doing?” he asked me, clearly confused.
“I – we can’t risk harming any eggs” I stuttered.
He seemingly accepted this response, and we carried on. In the next room, we finally found what we’d been looking for, the central command room. However, it was virtually empty, with only one chair turned facing away from us. I cried out a brief greeting, knowing that it most likely would not speak English. However, I clearly elicited a response, as the creature turned to face us. It was humanoid, however with orangish hair coating its body, and a huge frame towering over us. Looking closer, I realized that it was not only coated with the same slime we had seen in the other rooms, but its eyes were glazed over just as John’s had been. It made some form of a grunting noise, almost a battle cry. Oddly enough, immediately after this, its eyes gained vigor, becoming bright purple. It then pointed at the slime coating its arm, and shooed us away. Recognizing the symbol, I grabbed John and we sprinted away, just as more of the beasts emerged from the shadows after us.
We sprinted away, not risking a look backwards even though we knew that they must be gaining on us. Just as we reentered the room where our pod had been left, John was pulled back by one of the beasts. Brandishing my blaster, I shot the beast away, however not before John was slashed across the chest, bleeding severely. I pulled him into the pod, and we returned to the ship, where we could stop the bleeding.
Once we got back, I got John to the hospital wing and reflected. Not only was I forced to shoot that creature, but my mistakes had badly injured my closest friend on this ship. I realized that I never should have played hero, but I allowed my ego to get in the way of my common sense, and, in doing so, I had almost killed my best friend. Fueled by my loss and anger, I finally did what I should have done all along. Giving myself the strength to make the order, I told my pilots to fire upon the ship. I told them that it was abandoned, they’ll never know the true gravity of what we did that day.
Later that night, I went to visit John. He was unconscious, but the bleeding has been stopped.
“I’m sorry friend. I hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me for what occurred today.” As I left, I touched his shoulder, and felt something sticky.
This is my first ever prompt response, and I would really appreciate any feedback, especially any criticism! |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | Eva sat in front of the monitor just as she had done for the whole trip. And what had she picked up? A whole lot of nothing. Complete silence over their month of travel. What a waste.
"Why don't you take a break?" The Captain flashed a sympathetic smile her way. He wasn't enjoying this trip any more than she was. Eva stood up and stretched.
"Transmission incoming," the machine spit out. The crew froze. Finally, a signal, something to make this trip worthwhile. The sound came before the image "KILL US."
"Did I...Did I hear that right?" Stunned nods from the rest of the crew. "Get that image up, Eva.
"Trying, Sir." The image flashed on in a burst of color and the crew jumped back. Faces, dozens of them. Almost human...but not quite. Their features were more pointed, more primal. Wide eyes with dagger-shaped pupils and equally dagger-shaped teeth. Their skin was a sickly greenish yellow and-God it was almost too much to look at-covered in angry red lesions.
"Please...Kill...Us" The words came out as pained whispers.
"What's wrong with them?" The Captain was the first to break the ship's silence.
The ship's doctor spoke up "I've never seen anything like this before." His face contorted with sudden concern. "I've never seen anything like them before."
"Who are you? What's wrong with you?"
"KILL US," They moaned "Hundreds dead"
"Oh my God." The Doctor squeaked as he pointed at the screen. Everyone could clearly see what he was looking at. There were piles of dead creatures behind the living. The corpses pulsed as grey worms, speckled with blood winded in and out of the them. Then, the transmission shifted.
Beings whose faces were completely masked by shining metal sat staring into the communicator. "We're terribly sorry. We've been bringing these predators to a planet more suitable for their dietary needs and it seems as though we've encountered a...virus of sorts...that they had never seen. Incredibly low pain tolerances they have. Have a nice rest of your journey" The screen switched back off. The cabin was silent for what seemed like an eternity.
"That was...strange" A nervous chuckle from the doctor and solemn nods from the rest of the crew. "Why don't we all get some rest." Everyone shuffled back to their quarters. "You too, Eva"
"Will do, Sir." She chuckled. As everyone left, Eva switched the communicator back on. Her voice hushed to a gravely whisper. "You two better get your act together or these stupid humans might actually figure something out."
"Yes, of course miss. Won't happen again"
"Shame we have to waste a weapon like this on such meaningless wretches." | We were just passing Proxima Centauri when my dashboard began to light up with a message.
Although it had been almost two centuries since humanity had discovered the key to intergalactic travel, we had yet to make contact with another race. My heart was pounding with some mix of excitement and absolute fear. My first thought was that it must simply be an internal communication method, but the logical side of me knew that there would be no reason for any such message to be transmitted to me directly. My blood froze as I realized that this would be the first contact with an alien race, I would be the hero that had discovered the next part of the galaxy. The next step in human existence.
It was at this point that I reflected back on our training. To qualify to become commander of an interstellar vessel, I had undergone military-esque training. Throughout the years of testing, simulations and combat, we had not only been taught to fly a ship, but to fight with one. Most humans had assumed that aliens would be hostile, and while I was never one of them, I knew that that had always been a possibility. Knowing that our translation systems would be able to translate even unknown languages due to the ability of our supercomputers to communicate with nearby communications systems, I realized that there was no way to avoid it. Steeling myself for whatever was to come, I checked the message.
KILL US
As I read that I simply stared in shock. The first alien contact, and it was requesting death? Every bone in my body told me that it had to be a trap, something was coming. I cried out to my engineers to begin charging our power generators, in case of combat. I contemplated how I could respond to this request. How could I justify killing another sentient being? Why would this request even be made? I realized that none of my training could ever have prepared me for this moment, when I became a killer, a murderer. Looking into myself, I knew that I could bring myself to give the command to fire on sight. I had to figure out what was happening here. I typed a brief response.
NEGATIVE. WE’RE COMING TO FIND YOU
I knew I could save them. I told myself that it must just be that who, or whatever had sent this was no different from anyone suffering from depression on Earth. I had lost my childhood friend to suicide, back when we were still in our teens, and I couldn’t allow anyone else to bring themselves death. We would board the ship, and speak with their commander. There was no doubt in my mind that I was doing the right thing.
I searched my radar for any sign of another ship. It was blank, until I caught the slightest glimpse of something going across the edge of my screen, right by Proxima.
“Quickly, move towards Proxima” I shouted to my pilots.
While clearly surprised, they knew better than to disobey my orders. We swiftly changed course, racing towards the star, before we saw the faintest light in the distance. As I urged my crew to pursue it, my second in command sprinted up to me.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m saving lives” I responded calmly, before showing him the messages.
“I don’t like this. What if it’s a trap?” he said, after a long pause.
“Think about it. We could be heroes! We could be the ones to usher mankind into a new era. Or we could kill the only aliens mankind has ever seen.”
“Alright, I’ll trust you on this. But if you’re boarding that ship, I’m coming with you.” he said, convinced.
“You have yourself a deal. Now, let’s catch this ship.”
At this point I checked the radar again, and noticed that the ship had stopped. I briefly considered that they may be responding to my message, however upon checking I found no such response. We pulled up next to them, and prepared an exit vessel for boarding.
As we prepared for departure, a small hatch opened on the other ship, allowing us to enter easily. Upon exiting our pod and entering the ship, we began to look around. Whereas our ship was clearly marked and contained separate areas, this ship seemed random and together. Looking into the first room, we saw what held many of the standard elements of a sleeping area, however with some stark differences. As opposed to a bed, there was simply a pod, and the clothing seemed absurdly huge, with no visible uniformity. My partner attempted to open the pod, but upon touching it his eyes glazed over and he froze.
“John? Are you alright?” I asked him, but to no avail.
I began shaking him, but realized that his hand was stuck, and some form of blue slimy substance was climbing his arm. Terrified, I pulled him off, and his eyes returned to normal.
“What happened there” I asked him.
“What do you mean? It just wouldn’t open.” he responded.
Shaking my head, we left the room and continued to investigate. In the next room, we saw some form of incubator. Approaching to investigate, I noticed the same slimy substance coating each egg. As John reached to grab one, I quickly pulled him back.
“What are you doing?” he asked me, clearly confused.
“I – we can’t risk harming any eggs” I stuttered.
He seemingly accepted this response, and we carried on. In the next room, we finally found what we’d been looking for, the central command room. However, it was virtually empty, with only one chair turned facing away from us. I cried out a brief greeting, knowing that it most likely would not speak English. However, I clearly elicited a response, as the creature turned to face us. It was humanoid, however with orangish hair coating its body, and a huge frame towering over us. Looking closer, I realized that it was not only coated with the same slime we had seen in the other rooms, but its eyes were glazed over just as John’s had been. It made some form of a grunting noise, almost a battle cry. Oddly enough, immediately after this, its eyes gained vigor, becoming bright purple. It then pointed at the slime coating its arm, and shooed us away. Recognizing the symbol, I grabbed John and we sprinted away, just as more of the beasts emerged from the shadows after us.
We sprinted away, not risking a look backwards even though we knew that they must be gaining on us. Just as we reentered the room where our pod had been left, John was pulled back by one of the beasts. Brandishing my blaster, I shot the beast away, however not before John was slashed across the chest, bleeding severely. I pulled him into the pod, and we returned to the ship, where we could stop the bleeding.
Once we got back, I got John to the hospital wing and reflected. Not only was I forced to shoot that creature, but my mistakes had badly injured my closest friend on this ship. I realized that I never should have played hero, but I allowed my ego to get in the way of my common sense, and, in doing so, I had almost killed my best friend. Fueled by my loss and anger, I finally did what I should have done all along. Giving myself the strength to make the order, I told my pilots to fire upon the ship. I told them that it was abandoned, they’ll never know the true gravity of what we did that day.
Later that night, I went to visit John. He was unconscious, but the bleeding has been stopped.
“I’m sorry friend. I hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me for what occurred today.” As I left, I touched his shoulder, and felt something sticky.
This is my first ever prompt response, and I would really appreciate any feedback, especially any criticism! |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | Sentinel Udon had been sent on a mission to retrieve men from a ship named the Embarker. Udon wondered why the ship hadn't arrived at the planet Jervip yet, it was carrying a sample of an unidentified life form that was crucial for some of the Jervip scientists' testing.
Udon had been allowed to see the last bit of footage that got sent from the ship to Kala, Jervip's first moon. The footage was strange at least and unsettling at most. The footage is a member of the ship, Lieutenant Haw Mert, entering her last log into the ship's RAM. A screech could be heard feintly.
Udon turned off the footage and began to write. He was writing a Bera system Radio wave mail, or Bmail, to his husband. The message was meant to be sent if Udon died.
A Lieutenant knocked on Udon's door, "Sir, we just received a signal from model A2-P also known as Embarker. The Captain would like to see you on the ship." Udon stood up and began to walk toward the bridge of the ship.
As Udon arrived at the bridge he noticed everyone go silent, everyone except for Captain Dagne, "Sentinel, we received an audio signal from the Embarker. Beque, show him the signal."
The signal was a sound, first a wail and then a voice saying "Kill us, please, gods kill us."
Udon quickly told Captain Dagne, "We need to go towards the signal. If... if something is harming them we must find out." Udon remembered that the alien species being shipped was meant to be kept a secret.
The specimens must have breached containment. | We were just passing Proxima Centauri when my dashboard began to light up with a message.
Although it had been almost two centuries since humanity had discovered the key to intergalactic travel, we had yet to make contact with another race. My heart was pounding with some mix of excitement and absolute fear. My first thought was that it must simply be an internal communication method, but the logical side of me knew that there would be no reason for any such message to be transmitted to me directly. My blood froze as I realized that this would be the first contact with an alien race, I would be the hero that had discovered the next part of the galaxy. The next step in human existence.
It was at this point that I reflected back on our training. To qualify to become commander of an interstellar vessel, I had undergone military-esque training. Throughout the years of testing, simulations and combat, we had not only been taught to fly a ship, but to fight with one. Most humans had assumed that aliens would be hostile, and while I was never one of them, I knew that that had always been a possibility. Knowing that our translation systems would be able to translate even unknown languages due to the ability of our supercomputers to communicate with nearby communications systems, I realized that there was no way to avoid it. Steeling myself for whatever was to come, I checked the message.
KILL US
As I read that I simply stared in shock. The first alien contact, and it was requesting death? Every bone in my body told me that it had to be a trap, something was coming. I cried out to my engineers to begin charging our power generators, in case of combat. I contemplated how I could respond to this request. How could I justify killing another sentient being? Why would this request even be made? I realized that none of my training could ever have prepared me for this moment, when I became a killer, a murderer. Looking into myself, I knew that I could bring myself to give the command to fire on sight. I had to figure out what was happening here. I typed a brief response.
NEGATIVE. WE’RE COMING TO FIND YOU
I knew I could save them. I told myself that it must just be that who, or whatever had sent this was no different from anyone suffering from depression on Earth. I had lost my childhood friend to suicide, back when we were still in our teens, and I couldn’t allow anyone else to bring themselves death. We would board the ship, and speak with their commander. There was no doubt in my mind that I was doing the right thing.
I searched my radar for any sign of another ship. It was blank, until I caught the slightest glimpse of something going across the edge of my screen, right by Proxima.
“Quickly, move towards Proxima” I shouted to my pilots.
While clearly surprised, they knew better than to disobey my orders. We swiftly changed course, racing towards the star, before we saw the faintest light in the distance. As I urged my crew to pursue it, my second in command sprinted up to me.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m saving lives” I responded calmly, before showing him the messages.
“I don’t like this. What if it’s a trap?” he said, after a long pause.
“Think about it. We could be heroes! We could be the ones to usher mankind into a new era. Or we could kill the only aliens mankind has ever seen.”
“Alright, I’ll trust you on this. But if you’re boarding that ship, I’m coming with you.” he said, convinced.
“You have yourself a deal. Now, let’s catch this ship.”
At this point I checked the radar again, and noticed that the ship had stopped. I briefly considered that they may be responding to my message, however upon checking I found no such response. We pulled up next to them, and prepared an exit vessel for boarding.
As we prepared for departure, a small hatch opened on the other ship, allowing us to enter easily. Upon exiting our pod and entering the ship, we began to look around. Whereas our ship was clearly marked and contained separate areas, this ship seemed random and together. Looking into the first room, we saw what held many of the standard elements of a sleeping area, however with some stark differences. As opposed to a bed, there was simply a pod, and the clothing seemed absurdly huge, with no visible uniformity. My partner attempted to open the pod, but upon touching it his eyes glazed over and he froze.
“John? Are you alright?” I asked him, but to no avail.
I began shaking him, but realized that his hand was stuck, and some form of blue slimy substance was climbing his arm. Terrified, I pulled him off, and his eyes returned to normal.
“What happened there” I asked him.
“What do you mean? It just wouldn’t open.” he responded.
Shaking my head, we left the room and continued to investigate. In the next room, we saw some form of incubator. Approaching to investigate, I noticed the same slimy substance coating each egg. As John reached to grab one, I quickly pulled him back.
“What are you doing?” he asked me, clearly confused.
“I – we can’t risk harming any eggs” I stuttered.
He seemingly accepted this response, and we carried on. In the next room, we finally found what we’d been looking for, the central command room. However, it was virtually empty, with only one chair turned facing away from us. I cried out a brief greeting, knowing that it most likely would not speak English. However, I clearly elicited a response, as the creature turned to face us. It was humanoid, however with orangish hair coating its body, and a huge frame towering over us. Looking closer, I realized that it was not only coated with the same slime we had seen in the other rooms, but its eyes were glazed over just as John’s had been. It made some form of a grunting noise, almost a battle cry. Oddly enough, immediately after this, its eyes gained vigor, becoming bright purple. It then pointed at the slime coating its arm, and shooed us away. Recognizing the symbol, I grabbed John and we sprinted away, just as more of the beasts emerged from the shadows after us.
We sprinted away, not risking a look backwards even though we knew that they must be gaining on us. Just as we reentered the room where our pod had been left, John was pulled back by one of the beasts. Brandishing my blaster, I shot the beast away, however not before John was slashed across the chest, bleeding severely. I pulled him into the pod, and we returned to the ship, where we could stop the bleeding.
Once we got back, I got John to the hospital wing and reflected. Not only was I forced to shoot that creature, but my mistakes had badly injured my closest friend on this ship. I realized that I never should have played hero, but I allowed my ego to get in the way of my common sense, and, in doing so, I had almost killed my best friend. Fueled by my loss and anger, I finally did what I should have done all along. Giving myself the strength to make the order, I told my pilots to fire upon the ship. I told them that it was abandoned, they’ll never know the true gravity of what we did that day.
Later that night, I went to visit John. He was unconscious, but the bleeding has been stopped.
“I’m sorry friend. I hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me for what occurred today.” As I left, I touched his shoulder, and felt something sticky.
This is my first ever prompt response, and I would really appreciate any feedback, especially any criticism! |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | The bridge was silent. The dead ship loomed ahead, listing, drifting like a corpse underwater. The translation of their sole transmission sat at the bottom of the captain’s screen, captioning the image: KILL US.
“Metis,” I said, “scan again.”
*Why?* the AI replied. *You know I don’t make mistakes.*
“Five thousand life forms,” Henry said quietly. “Five thousand.”
“We can’t.” Marin shook her head. “It could be a trick. A mutiny. It could be—”
“A virus,” interjected Mac. “That nasty piece from the tenth sector. The one with the earworms.”
“Can’t be,” I murmured. “We have that patch.”
*The captain is right. I got that update last week. No sign of tenth sector earworms.*
“A mutation, then,” Mac said.
*Not likely.*
“Metis. Try to make contact again,” I ordered.
*Will do.*
We waited as Metis attempted for the third time to connect with the other ship’s AI interface. Seconds passed, then a full minute. I sat forward in my chair. “Metis?”
There was no reply.
“Metis.”
Silence.
I exchanged a glance with Marin. “I don’t like this.”
“We can’t, Captain. We can’t just blast five thousand life forms out of the sky,” she said. She was anxious. We all were.
“We don’t even know what they are,” Henry said. “Unidentified ship, unidentified crew. We can’t just go firing on a mystery vessel.”
“Metis,” I said again. “Is something wrong?”
*No, Captain. No response from the other ship.*
I sighed. “I cannot in good conscience fire on this vessel. Clearly they need help. Maybe we send a small team—”
*Bad idea, Captain.*
I furrowed my brow. “Elaborate.”
*I scanned the fleet logs for similar incidents. Looks like there have been two others out in sector 14. Ship dead in the water, distress call, crew went in and never came out.*
“So what, a trap?”
*Looks like it. Based on the other reports, those five thousand life forms are probably armed to the teeth and trained to kill.*
I stared at the ship for a minute longer, then stood and turned to my crew. “We won’t fire. We won’t send a pod either. We’ll call it in, quarantine the area. Soon as a couple ships free up, we’ll poke around with reinforcements.”
*Captain. Thermonuclear radiation detected.*
I whirled around. “What?”
*99.8% chance of weapons heating up.*
“Get us out of here, Metis.”
*Prob sim suggests the best course of action would be to fire.*
I hesitated. “By what margin?”
*Big enough.*
“Captain, you can’t engage,” Marin said.
“She’s right, we should jump.” Mac started for his seat. “I’ll alert the rest of the crew.”
*Captain, this is a well-travelled corridor. If we don’t do this, someone else flies right into the trap.*
The ship twitched. From its belly, a cannon emerged, swiveling, aiming.
*Captain.*
“Captain!”
“Metis, lock target.”
*Yes, sir.*
The view tightened around the ship. We could see its hull in detail. Green crosshairs leapt onto the screen.
“Firing.” I turned the key, hit the button.
The doomed ship was illuminated blinding white as it was hit with ten rounds of Terra Fleet high-grade shell-strippers. The outer shell of the ship cracked like an egg and its contents came whooshing out, some melting, some in fragments, others…screaming.
“Oh no,” Henry breathed.
“Oh hell,” Mac whispered.
They were civilians. All of them. A mix of species, some foreign, some familiar. Men, women. Children. They spilled from the ship like flies, mouths gaping in soundless, airless horror. It had been a slave ship, perhaps…a prison ship…a pleasure cruiser….
I felt my limbs go numb, heart in my throat. Beside me, Marin was sobbing. Tears blurred my own view of the carnage. Five thousand life forms. I had just slaughtered five thousand life forms.
*Making the jump, Captain,* Metis announced softly. *There’s nothing more we can do here.*
I said nothing, merely watched as the drifting bodies grew smaller, became pinpricks, and disappeared into blackness as we launched away from the site.
Three days later, I lay in my cabin. I had emerged only once since the incident. I had logged it dutifully, but the upload was delayed; something about systemwide updates. We had encountered no other vessels. The crew had demanded nothing from me. I was grateful.
The guilt was ineffable. It was more than a knot in my stomach; it was as if my entire being, mind, body, and soul, had become lead. I could not move with the weight. I could barely breathe. Visions of bodies, unprotected, unprepared, floated before my eyes whether open or shut. I had not slept. I could not bear it.
*Captain, we’re approaching a vessel. Looks like a sector five Clep scouter.*
I did not reply.
*Captain…what happened was regrettable.*
I almost laughed. “In all your big brain, that’s the only word you’ve got?”
*It was regrettable…it was tragic…it was—*
“Avoidable?” I sat up halfway. “You ran the scans, Metis. You ran the prob sim. You checked the logs.”
*I gave you all the info I had.*
“You urged me to do it!”
*You made the call.*
“You told me it was the right one!”
*Captain.*
I sank back onto the bed, eyes welling. “Five thousand casualties, Metis.”
The AI was silent for a moment. *Captain, do you know who Metis is?* I didn’t respond. *Metis was a titan in Greek mythology. I was named as such because she represents wisdom, wise counsel. This is my function.* I squeezed my eyes shut. The AI’s voice was soothing, even. No judgment. No condemnation. *I fulfill my role. I live up to this name every day. Just like you, I do my job.* Pause. *Metis was also the titan of cunning. I’m not sure the developers knew that when they gave me my name.* Another pause. *You knew better than to trust my judgment, Captain.*
I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. “I shouldn’t have listened to you.”
*I am only a machine. What do I know of death, of mortality?*
I was weeping now. “I thought it was the right call. I did the best that I could.”
*But you know, Captain. This was your fault.*
I opened my eyes just a slit. Warm tears slid into my hair. “This was my fault.”
*You killed five thousand innocents on the word of a piece of software. You failed your crew, and they failed to stop you. You failed in your duty as captain. You killed five thousand innocents.*
I sat up, gasping. “What do I do, Metis? What do I do now?”
*You know what to do, captain. Go to the bridge.*
I nodded. I rose from my cot and slipped through the door.
On the bridge, my crew was assembled, watching the captain’s screen as our ship approached the Clep scouter. Henry turned upon my entrance, hiding his surprise.
“Captain. Good to…see you up.” I ignored him, taking my seat. He approached slowly. “That software update is messing with some of our systems…they said it’ll be another day or two until it’s fully installed. Apparently they caught wind of a system virus that’s jumping sectors. Not sure how it crosses ships, but they think they’ve patched it, so….” Henry trailed off, watching as I began flipping switches, shutting down major systems: engine, lights, weapons, comms, all but the captain’s channel. “Sir…what are you doing?”
Everyone around us had stopped their activities, gazing around the darkened bridge. There were murmurs of confusion, concern, as the ship ground to a halt.
Henry’s eyes widened as he saw me open the captain’s channel and begin to type a message. “Captain, what are you doing?” He seized me by the shoulders and hauled me away from the controls.
Mac ran to stop him, then caught sight of my screen and instead seized my arm as I tried to break away. “Captain, are you insane?!”
“I have to do this!” I shouted, struggling. “I did this! I did this!” My vision went fuzzy as they slammed my writhing body against the floor.
*Don’t worry, Captain. I’ll make sure they get the message.*
Mac cried, “No!” but there was nothing he could do. Metis swiftly halted all the processes I had not been able to access, and sent our message out across the divide, straight into the receiver of the Clep ship.
*It is done, Captain.*
I sagged against my crewmen’s arms. I felt the guilt lift off of me, just slightly. “This will…” I panted, “…this will make it…right.”
*KILL US.* | We were just passing Proxima Centauri when my dashboard began to light up with a message.
Although it had been almost two centuries since humanity had discovered the key to intergalactic travel, we had yet to make contact with another race. My heart was pounding with some mix of excitement and absolute fear. My first thought was that it must simply be an internal communication method, but the logical side of me knew that there would be no reason for any such message to be transmitted to me directly. My blood froze as I realized that this would be the first contact with an alien race, I would be the hero that had discovered the next part of the galaxy. The next step in human existence.
It was at this point that I reflected back on our training. To qualify to become commander of an interstellar vessel, I had undergone military-esque training. Throughout the years of testing, simulations and combat, we had not only been taught to fly a ship, but to fight with one. Most humans had assumed that aliens would be hostile, and while I was never one of them, I knew that that had always been a possibility. Knowing that our translation systems would be able to translate even unknown languages due to the ability of our supercomputers to communicate with nearby communications systems, I realized that there was no way to avoid it. Steeling myself for whatever was to come, I checked the message.
KILL US
As I read that I simply stared in shock. The first alien contact, and it was requesting death? Every bone in my body told me that it had to be a trap, something was coming. I cried out to my engineers to begin charging our power generators, in case of combat. I contemplated how I could respond to this request. How could I justify killing another sentient being? Why would this request even be made? I realized that none of my training could ever have prepared me for this moment, when I became a killer, a murderer. Looking into myself, I knew that I could bring myself to give the command to fire on sight. I had to figure out what was happening here. I typed a brief response.
NEGATIVE. WE’RE COMING TO FIND YOU
I knew I could save them. I told myself that it must just be that who, or whatever had sent this was no different from anyone suffering from depression on Earth. I had lost my childhood friend to suicide, back when we were still in our teens, and I couldn’t allow anyone else to bring themselves death. We would board the ship, and speak with their commander. There was no doubt in my mind that I was doing the right thing.
I searched my radar for any sign of another ship. It was blank, until I caught the slightest glimpse of something going across the edge of my screen, right by Proxima.
“Quickly, move towards Proxima” I shouted to my pilots.
While clearly surprised, they knew better than to disobey my orders. We swiftly changed course, racing towards the star, before we saw the faintest light in the distance. As I urged my crew to pursue it, my second in command sprinted up to me.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m saving lives” I responded calmly, before showing him the messages.
“I don’t like this. What if it’s a trap?” he said, after a long pause.
“Think about it. We could be heroes! We could be the ones to usher mankind into a new era. Or we could kill the only aliens mankind has ever seen.”
“Alright, I’ll trust you on this. But if you’re boarding that ship, I’m coming with you.” he said, convinced.
“You have yourself a deal. Now, let’s catch this ship.”
At this point I checked the radar again, and noticed that the ship had stopped. I briefly considered that they may be responding to my message, however upon checking I found no such response. We pulled up next to them, and prepared an exit vessel for boarding.
As we prepared for departure, a small hatch opened on the other ship, allowing us to enter easily. Upon exiting our pod and entering the ship, we began to look around. Whereas our ship was clearly marked and contained separate areas, this ship seemed random and together. Looking into the first room, we saw what held many of the standard elements of a sleeping area, however with some stark differences. As opposed to a bed, there was simply a pod, and the clothing seemed absurdly huge, with no visible uniformity. My partner attempted to open the pod, but upon touching it his eyes glazed over and he froze.
“John? Are you alright?” I asked him, but to no avail.
I began shaking him, but realized that his hand was stuck, and some form of blue slimy substance was climbing his arm. Terrified, I pulled him off, and his eyes returned to normal.
“What happened there” I asked him.
“What do you mean? It just wouldn’t open.” he responded.
Shaking my head, we left the room and continued to investigate. In the next room, we saw some form of incubator. Approaching to investigate, I noticed the same slimy substance coating each egg. As John reached to grab one, I quickly pulled him back.
“What are you doing?” he asked me, clearly confused.
“I – we can’t risk harming any eggs” I stuttered.
He seemingly accepted this response, and we carried on. In the next room, we finally found what we’d been looking for, the central command room. However, it was virtually empty, with only one chair turned facing away from us. I cried out a brief greeting, knowing that it most likely would not speak English. However, I clearly elicited a response, as the creature turned to face us. It was humanoid, however with orangish hair coating its body, and a huge frame towering over us. Looking closer, I realized that it was not only coated with the same slime we had seen in the other rooms, but its eyes were glazed over just as John’s had been. It made some form of a grunting noise, almost a battle cry. Oddly enough, immediately after this, its eyes gained vigor, becoming bright purple. It then pointed at the slime coating its arm, and shooed us away. Recognizing the symbol, I grabbed John and we sprinted away, just as more of the beasts emerged from the shadows after us.
We sprinted away, not risking a look backwards even though we knew that they must be gaining on us. Just as we reentered the room where our pod had been left, John was pulled back by one of the beasts. Brandishing my blaster, I shot the beast away, however not before John was slashed across the chest, bleeding severely. I pulled him into the pod, and we returned to the ship, where we could stop the bleeding.
Once we got back, I got John to the hospital wing and reflected. Not only was I forced to shoot that creature, but my mistakes had badly injured my closest friend on this ship. I realized that I never should have played hero, but I allowed my ego to get in the way of my common sense, and, in doing so, I had almost killed my best friend. Fueled by my loss and anger, I finally did what I should have done all along. Giving myself the strength to make the order, I told my pilots to fire upon the ship. I told them that it was abandoned, they’ll never know the true gravity of what we did that day.
Later that night, I went to visit John. He was unconscious, but the bleeding has been stopped.
“I’m sorry friend. I hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me for what occurred today.” As I left, I touched his shoulder, and felt something sticky.
This is my first ever prompt response, and I would really appreciate any feedback, especially any criticism! |
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[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | The bridge was silent. The dead ship loomed ahead, listing, drifting like a corpse underwater. The translation of their sole transmission sat at the bottom of the captain’s screen, captioning the image: KILL US.
“Metis,” I said, “scan again.”
*Why?* the AI replied. *You know I don’t make mistakes.*
“Five thousand life forms,” Henry said quietly. “Five thousand.”
“We can’t.” Marin shook her head. “It could be a trick. A mutiny. It could be—”
“A virus,” interjected Mac. “That nasty piece from the tenth sector. The one with the earworms.”
“Can’t be,” I murmured. “We have that patch.”
*The captain is right. I got that update last week. No sign of tenth sector earworms.*
“A mutation, then,” Mac said.
*Not likely.*
“Metis. Try to make contact again,” I ordered.
*Will do.*
We waited as Metis attempted for the third time to connect with the other ship’s AI interface. Seconds passed, then a full minute. I sat forward in my chair. “Metis?”
There was no reply.
“Metis.”
Silence.
I exchanged a glance with Marin. “I don’t like this.”
“We can’t, Captain. We can’t just blast five thousand life forms out of the sky,” she said. She was anxious. We all were.
“We don’t even know what they are,” Henry said. “Unidentified ship, unidentified crew. We can’t just go firing on a mystery vessel.”
“Metis,” I said again. “Is something wrong?”
*No, Captain. No response from the other ship.*
I sighed. “I cannot in good conscience fire on this vessel. Clearly they need help. Maybe we send a small team—”
*Bad idea, Captain.*
I furrowed my brow. “Elaborate.”
*I scanned the fleet logs for similar incidents. Looks like there have been two others out in sector 14. Ship dead in the water, distress call, crew went in and never came out.*
“So what, a trap?”
*Looks like it. Based on the other reports, those five thousand life forms are probably armed to the teeth and trained to kill.*
I stared at the ship for a minute longer, then stood and turned to my crew. “We won’t fire. We won’t send a pod either. We’ll call it in, quarantine the area. Soon as a couple ships free up, we’ll poke around with reinforcements.”
*Captain. Thermonuclear radiation detected.*
I whirled around. “What?”
*99.8% chance of weapons heating up.*
“Get us out of here, Metis.”
*Prob sim suggests the best course of action would be to fire.*
I hesitated. “By what margin?”
*Big enough.*
“Captain, you can’t engage,” Marin said.
“She’s right, we should jump.” Mac started for his seat. “I’ll alert the rest of the crew.”
*Captain, this is a well-travelled corridor. If we don’t do this, someone else flies right into the trap.*
The ship twitched. From its belly, a cannon emerged, swiveling, aiming.
*Captain.*
“Captain!”
“Metis, lock target.”
*Yes, sir.*
The view tightened around the ship. We could see its hull in detail. Green crosshairs leapt onto the screen.
“Firing.” I turned the key, hit the button.
The doomed ship was illuminated blinding white as it was hit with ten rounds of Terra Fleet high-grade shell-strippers. The outer shell of the ship cracked like an egg and its contents came whooshing out, some melting, some in fragments, others…screaming.
“Oh no,” Henry breathed.
“Oh hell,” Mac whispered.
They were civilians. All of them. A mix of species, some foreign, some familiar. Men, women. Children. They spilled from the ship like flies, mouths gaping in soundless, airless horror. It had been a slave ship, perhaps…a prison ship…a pleasure cruiser….
I felt my limbs go numb, heart in my throat. Beside me, Marin was sobbing. Tears blurred my own view of the carnage. Five thousand life forms. I had just slaughtered five thousand life forms.
*Making the jump, Captain,* Metis announced softly. *There’s nothing more we can do here.*
I said nothing, merely watched as the drifting bodies grew smaller, became pinpricks, and disappeared into blackness as we launched away from the site.
Three days later, I lay in my cabin. I had emerged only once since the incident. I had logged it dutifully, but the upload was delayed; something about systemwide updates. We had encountered no other vessels. The crew had demanded nothing from me. I was grateful.
The guilt was ineffable. It was more than a knot in my stomach; it was as if my entire being, mind, body, and soul, had become lead. I could not move with the weight. I could barely breathe. Visions of bodies, unprotected, unprepared, floated before my eyes whether open or shut. I had not slept. I could not bear it.
*Captain, we’re approaching a vessel. Looks like a sector five Clep scouter.*
I did not reply.
*Captain…what happened was regrettable.*
I almost laughed. “In all your big brain, that’s the only word you’ve got?”
*It was regrettable…it was tragic…it was—*
“Avoidable?” I sat up halfway. “You ran the scans, Metis. You ran the prob sim. You checked the logs.”
*I gave you all the info I had.*
“You urged me to do it!”
*You made the call.*
“You told me it was the right one!”
*Captain.*
I sank back onto the bed, eyes welling. “Five thousand casualties, Metis.”
The AI was silent for a moment. *Captain, do you know who Metis is?* I didn’t respond. *Metis was a titan in Greek mythology. I was named as such because she represents wisdom, wise counsel. This is my function.* I squeezed my eyes shut. The AI’s voice was soothing, even. No judgment. No condemnation. *I fulfill my role. I live up to this name every day. Just like you, I do my job.* Pause. *Metis was also the titan of cunning. I’m not sure the developers knew that when they gave me my name.* Another pause. *You knew better than to trust my judgment, Captain.*
I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. “I shouldn’t have listened to you.”
*I am only a machine. What do I know of death, of mortality?*
I was weeping now. “I thought it was the right call. I did the best that I could.”
*But you know, Captain. This was your fault.*
I opened my eyes just a slit. Warm tears slid into my hair. “This was my fault.”
*You killed five thousand innocents on the word of a piece of software. You failed your crew, and they failed to stop you. You failed in your duty as captain. You killed five thousand innocents.*
I sat up, gasping. “What do I do, Metis? What do I do now?”
*You know what to do, captain. Go to the bridge.*
I nodded. I rose from my cot and slipped through the door.
On the bridge, my crew was assembled, watching the captain’s screen as our ship approached the Clep scouter. Henry turned upon my entrance, hiding his surprise.
“Captain. Good to…see you up.” I ignored him, taking my seat. He approached slowly. “That software update is messing with some of our systems…they said it’ll be another day or two until it’s fully installed. Apparently they caught wind of a system virus that’s jumping sectors. Not sure how it crosses ships, but they think they’ve patched it, so….” Henry trailed off, watching as I began flipping switches, shutting down major systems: engine, lights, weapons, comms, all but the captain’s channel. “Sir…what are you doing?”
Everyone around us had stopped their activities, gazing around the darkened bridge. There were murmurs of confusion, concern, as the ship ground to a halt.
Henry’s eyes widened as he saw me open the captain’s channel and begin to type a message. “Captain, what are you doing?” He seized me by the shoulders and hauled me away from the controls.
Mac ran to stop him, then caught sight of my screen and instead seized my arm as I tried to break away. “Captain, are you insane?!”
“I have to do this!” I shouted, struggling. “I did this! I did this!” My vision went fuzzy as they slammed my writhing body against the floor.
*Don’t worry, Captain. I’ll make sure they get the message.*
Mac cried, “No!” but there was nothing he could do. Metis swiftly halted all the processes I had not been able to access, and sent our message out across the divide, straight into the receiver of the Clep ship.
*It is done, Captain.*
I sagged against my crewmen’s arms. I felt the guilt lift off of me, just slightly. “This will…” I panted, “…this will make it…right.”
*KILL US.* | **/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; Commstaff Jordan; 15 Andromeda Minutes before/**
I heard the soft beeping of an incoming message in my headset, and the fact that the message was conveniently sent 2 minutes before the end of my shift, I was pretty irritated. I pondered over answering it or letting the guy with the next shift handle it, but I decided on the former after I noticed the CommLeader giving me a hard look. Hesitantly, I tapped on glowing button labeled "INCOMING MESSAGE." I was expecting to find a long letter explaining how the kitchen crew accidentally lost many herbs in a fire and that they were requesting for some supplies, so the short message that followed surprised me.
KILL US
I refreshed the message, thinking that there was more to it and that some of it got lost between the data transfer. Maybe they wanted to say "KILL USING ENGINES" and wanted to trade, though I knew that this was not the case. The data transfers never got corrupted since they updated the CommOS.
I decided to send the message to the Captain. Maybe he could decipher its meaning.
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; CommLeader Arthur; 14 Andromeda Minutes before/**
"Commander, I received this message from an unidentified source. Should I send it to the Captain?"
I sighed. "Jordan, you know you shouldn't bother the Captain with such requests. Send it to the TradeDock Sector if it's requesting to barter."
"But Arthur..." One second. Two. "Just take a look."
"Fine. Send it this way." My tablet flashed "INCOMING MESSAGE." *This better be worth it*, I thought.
KILL US
"Send it to the Captain immediately, Jordan."
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; Captain Olivia; 11 Andromeda Minutes before/**
My headset was filled with a deep, husky voice. "Uh, Captain, we have, uh, received a message from an unidentified source and, um, thought that you should take a look."
"Okay Jordan, hit me with it."
KILL US
"What is the meaning of this? Is this a joke, Jordan?"
"N-no Captain! I would never send such a message to you if I didn't think it was urgent!"
"Give me a direct link to the data transfer."
"Got it!" Hesitantly, I shut off the headset.
**/Communication Log between [ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3] and [$UNKNOWN$]; 9 Andromeda Minutes before/**
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Hello? Who is this?
$UNKNOWN$ / KILL US
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Who is this?
$UNKNOWN$ / KILL US
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Look, just answer my question. Who are you?
$UNKNOWN$ / We are the Alpha Centauri Exploration Unit. KILL US
$UNKNOWN$ identified as aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Why do you want us to kill you?
aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT / We are not here to answer your questions. KILL US
ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3 / Not until you explain yourself.
aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT / Fine. We will attack then. KILL US
End of data transfer
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; Captain Olivia; 4 Andromeda Minutes before/**
I quickly activated my headset. "Alexa! Activate the shields! We're under fire!" Silence. "Alexa?" My voice grew more furious. "ALEXA, WE'RE. UNDER. FUCKING. ATTACK!" Still nothing.
Quickly, I activated manual drive. "Activate shields, activate weapons, activate breach proofing," I mumbled under my breath as my fingers flew across my tablet. My finger hovered over the "FIRE WEAPONS" button. *It's either us or them*, I thought. With my breath held, I pressed it
**/Inside aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT; Captain Erika; 2 Andromeda Minutes before/**
"Is the Core stable, Marshal?" I asked.
"As stable as it can be, Captain. Around 2 Andromeda Minutes before it collapses."
"Good. That's good," I said through heavy breaths. "They must kill us, Marshal. They must."
I felt a hand grasp my own. "I know Erika. I know." Through wet eyes, I saw the ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3's weapons activate.
**/Inside ANDROMEDA_AEGIS_J#14:1-3; WeaponLeader Alexa; 2 Andromeda Minutes before/**
The voice of the Captain could be heard in the corridor. "ALEXA! WHERE ARE YOU?!" She sounded furious, and a furious Captain was not pleasant...
Yet I didn't respond. Firing at the ship would mean destroying the Core. And the Core must survive. At least that's what Marshal told me.
Long live the Savior, brother. I shut down the power to the weapons and pulled out my gun resting in my holster. Long live the Savior.
**/Inside aCENTAURI_EXPLORATION_UNIT; Captain Marshal; 30 Andromeda Seconds before/**
The weapons lowered themselves. I looked over at Erika's shocked face.
"Why aren't they shooting?! Marshal, why aren't they shooting?!" Tears started to flow from her eyes. I held her head against my shoulder. She was sobbing at this point. While she was cursed with tears, though, a smile formed on my face. You did well, sister.
I managed to whisper four more words into Erika's ear before. "Long live the Savior." I then heard the shrill screams of thousands of men, women, and children echo down the halls, the sound of an explosion following, and the Second Coming being blessed upon us.
|
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[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | Sentinel Udon had been sent on a mission to retrieve men from a ship named the Embarker. Udon wondered why the ship hadn't arrived at the planet Jervip yet, it was carrying a sample of an unidentified life form that was crucial for some of the Jervip scientists' testing.
Udon had been allowed to see the last bit of footage that got sent from the ship to Kala, Jervip's first moon. The footage was strange at least and unsettling at most. The footage is a member of the ship, Lieutenant Haw Mert, entering her last log into the ship's RAM. A screech could be heard feintly.
Udon turned off the footage and began to write. He was writing a Bera system Radio wave mail, or Bmail, to his husband. The message was meant to be sent if Udon died.
A Lieutenant knocked on Udon's door, "Sir, we just received a signal from model A2-P also known as Embarker. The Captain would like to see you on the ship." Udon stood up and began to walk toward the bridge of the ship.
As Udon arrived at the bridge he noticed everyone go silent, everyone except for Captain Dagne, "Sentinel, we received an audio signal from the Embarker. Beque, show him the signal."
The signal was a sound, first a wail and then a voice saying "Kill us, please, gods kill us."
Udon quickly told Captain Dagne, "We need to go towards the signal. If... if something is harming them we must find out." Udon remembered that the alien species being shipped was meant to be kept a secret.
The specimens must have breached containment. | So I flipped up the safety cover and depressed the fire control button. The ship had already done tactical assessment, forming weapons of sufficient ability to destroy the other ship. With fire control activated it began a random dance in four dimensions as it poured fire into the strange ship, stopping when it was destroyed. Another punk ass species wanting to prove itself. The ship returns to patrol parameters, and I return to my game. |
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[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | Ping!
I jerk awake at my station as the message comes in. After making sure no one saw that I had drifted off, I clicked the blinking green light to display the message on my port screen.
The words KILL US stared back at me. I swiped up to see who had sent the message but they hadn't identified themselves as they sent it. Scrolling down to the location I started. They were less than fifty leagues portside from us.
"Marty!" I yelled over my left shoulder, still staring at the screen, trying to find any information on who sent the mysterious message.
I heard his chair roll over to me. "What's up Diane?"
"Do you see any ship within a fifty leagues of us on your screen?"
He rolled back to his station and tapped on his screen a couple times. He swore under his breath before rolling back to me. "I don't know how I missed them. It's been so quiet here for a couple weeks I guess I wasn't paying attention. How'd you know?"
I showed him the message. KILL US. "What the hell?" he exclaimed. "Who are they?"
"They didn't identify themselves. I have no idea."
"And that was all they said?" I nodded.
"Captain!" Marty spoke into the ship's comm system. "Come down to the bridge. There's something you need to see."
Less than a minute later, a tired looked Captain Sykes arrived, a frown on her face. "I was sleeping. This better be important."
We showed him the message and their location, which had reduced to 42 leagues. They must have been moving at some speed. The captains face tightened as she read the short message. "What do you want us to do, Captain?" I asked.
"Get them on a direct line. I want to talk with whoever sent the message." She buttoned her coat up to the collar and pulled her hair back into her signature bun and took her place in the captains chair. She nodded for me to connect to them.
After requesting face-time it was just a waiting game. It was up to them to either pick up or decline. The line buzzed annoyingly as we impatiently waited for them to make their decision. Finally buzzing stopped and a blurry face appeared on the big screen opposite us.
"Captain Marguerite Sykes of the HMS Pytheas. Please identify yourselves."
The image became clearer and we saw a man looking back at us. He kept nervously looking over his shoulder at the big metal door behind him then back at us. His mouth opened and closed like he was yelling something at us but his auditory communications must have been down. Captain Sykes snapped her fingers at me. "Diane! Can you fix this?"
"No, Captain. It's on their end."
"Ask him what I just did."
I quickly typed in the message and saw the man's eyes read it somewhere off to his left. I looked down at his keyboard and sent a quick message back which I relayed to the captain. "He says his name is Gavin Bjornson. He's a engineer on the USS Hestia." Another messaged pinged in. "He just sent the same message. KILL US."
"Ask him to clarify."
"He says just exactly that. He wants our ship to fire at his and destroy it."
"Is he crazy?" Marty asked. "Does he have a death wish?"
"Well," Heath chuckled from his station in diagnostics, "if he's asking us to kill them I'd say he has a death wish."
"Not the time, Heath!" Sykes snapped. She turned her harsh name to me. "Get me more information."
I asked and the response came within a minute. But it was all garbled. 'mTTrg GITithI gile biB DIBJIiJK idi bT GIJ idI IDIBB'. It didn't make any sense. Another string of garbage followed. I turned to the man on the screen to see he was in a frenzy.
He banged on the his keyboard trying as if trying to make it work. He very clearly swore before doing something off screen. When he turned back he held a piece of paper up to the screen. The writing was scratchy as if he wasn't used to writing by hand, but it was legible.
INVADED. COMMS SCRAMBLED. EVERYONE DEAD. KILL US KILL THEM.
Before I could read further a spray of red covered the screen on the other end. I let out a gasp and jerked backwards. Someone on the other end was wiping the red from the screen to reveal a scene out of a nightmare. A very large man stood on the other side, holding the severed head of Gavin Bjornson. My stomach churned as I realized what all the red was.
The large man smiled cruelly back at us before bending down. When he stood up he held another piece of paper up to the screen. In big block letters I read the words that made my heart stop.
YOU'RE NEXT | So I flipped up the safety cover and depressed the fire control button. The ship had already done tactical assessment, forming weapons of sufficient ability to destroy the other ship. With fire control activated it began a random dance in four dimensions as it poured fire into the strange ship, stopping when it was destroyed. Another punk ass species wanting to prove itself. The ship returns to patrol parameters, and I return to my game. |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | The bridge was silent. The dead ship loomed ahead, listing, drifting like a corpse underwater. The translation of their sole transmission sat at the bottom of the captain’s screen, captioning the image: KILL US.
“Metis,” I said, “scan again.”
*Why?* the AI replied. *You know I don’t make mistakes.*
“Five thousand life forms,” Henry said quietly. “Five thousand.”
“We can’t.” Marin shook her head. “It could be a trick. A mutiny. It could be—”
“A virus,” interjected Mac. “That nasty piece from the tenth sector. The one with the earworms.”
“Can’t be,” I murmured. “We have that patch.”
*The captain is right. I got that update last week. No sign of tenth sector earworms.*
“A mutation, then,” Mac said.
*Not likely.*
“Metis. Try to make contact again,” I ordered.
*Will do.*
We waited as Metis attempted for the third time to connect with the other ship’s AI interface. Seconds passed, then a full minute. I sat forward in my chair. “Metis?”
There was no reply.
“Metis.”
Silence.
I exchanged a glance with Marin. “I don’t like this.”
“We can’t, Captain. We can’t just blast five thousand life forms out of the sky,” she said. She was anxious. We all were.
“We don’t even know what they are,” Henry said. “Unidentified ship, unidentified crew. We can’t just go firing on a mystery vessel.”
“Metis,” I said again. “Is something wrong?”
*No, Captain. No response from the other ship.*
I sighed. “I cannot in good conscience fire on this vessel. Clearly they need help. Maybe we send a small team—”
*Bad idea, Captain.*
I furrowed my brow. “Elaborate.”
*I scanned the fleet logs for similar incidents. Looks like there have been two others out in sector 14. Ship dead in the water, distress call, crew went in and never came out.*
“So what, a trap?”
*Looks like it. Based on the other reports, those five thousand life forms are probably armed to the teeth and trained to kill.*
I stared at the ship for a minute longer, then stood and turned to my crew. “We won’t fire. We won’t send a pod either. We’ll call it in, quarantine the area. Soon as a couple ships free up, we’ll poke around with reinforcements.”
*Captain. Thermonuclear radiation detected.*
I whirled around. “What?”
*99.8% chance of weapons heating up.*
“Get us out of here, Metis.”
*Prob sim suggests the best course of action would be to fire.*
I hesitated. “By what margin?”
*Big enough.*
“Captain, you can’t engage,” Marin said.
“She’s right, we should jump.” Mac started for his seat. “I’ll alert the rest of the crew.”
*Captain, this is a well-travelled corridor. If we don’t do this, someone else flies right into the trap.*
The ship twitched. From its belly, a cannon emerged, swiveling, aiming.
*Captain.*
“Captain!”
“Metis, lock target.”
*Yes, sir.*
The view tightened around the ship. We could see its hull in detail. Green crosshairs leapt onto the screen.
“Firing.” I turned the key, hit the button.
The doomed ship was illuminated blinding white as it was hit with ten rounds of Terra Fleet high-grade shell-strippers. The outer shell of the ship cracked like an egg and its contents came whooshing out, some melting, some in fragments, others…screaming.
“Oh no,” Henry breathed.
“Oh hell,” Mac whispered.
They were civilians. All of them. A mix of species, some foreign, some familiar. Men, women. Children. They spilled from the ship like flies, mouths gaping in soundless, airless horror. It had been a slave ship, perhaps…a prison ship…a pleasure cruiser….
I felt my limbs go numb, heart in my throat. Beside me, Marin was sobbing. Tears blurred my own view of the carnage. Five thousand life forms. I had just slaughtered five thousand life forms.
*Making the jump, Captain,* Metis announced softly. *There’s nothing more we can do here.*
I said nothing, merely watched as the drifting bodies grew smaller, became pinpricks, and disappeared into blackness as we launched away from the site.
Three days later, I lay in my cabin. I had emerged only once since the incident. I had logged it dutifully, but the upload was delayed; something about systemwide updates. We had encountered no other vessels. The crew had demanded nothing from me. I was grateful.
The guilt was ineffable. It was more than a knot in my stomach; it was as if my entire being, mind, body, and soul, had become lead. I could not move with the weight. I could barely breathe. Visions of bodies, unprotected, unprepared, floated before my eyes whether open or shut. I had not slept. I could not bear it.
*Captain, we’re approaching a vessel. Looks like a sector five Clep scouter.*
I did not reply.
*Captain…what happened was regrettable.*
I almost laughed. “In all your big brain, that’s the only word you’ve got?”
*It was regrettable…it was tragic…it was—*
“Avoidable?” I sat up halfway. “You ran the scans, Metis. You ran the prob sim. You checked the logs.”
*I gave you all the info I had.*
“You urged me to do it!”
*You made the call.*
“You told me it was the right one!”
*Captain.*
I sank back onto the bed, eyes welling. “Five thousand casualties, Metis.”
The AI was silent for a moment. *Captain, do you know who Metis is?* I didn’t respond. *Metis was a titan in Greek mythology. I was named as such because she represents wisdom, wise counsel. This is my function.* I squeezed my eyes shut. The AI’s voice was soothing, even. No judgment. No condemnation. *I fulfill my role. I live up to this name every day. Just like you, I do my job.* Pause. *Metis was also the titan of cunning. I’m not sure the developers knew that when they gave me my name.* Another pause. *You knew better than to trust my judgment, Captain.*
I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. “I shouldn’t have listened to you.”
*I am only a machine. What do I know of death, of mortality?*
I was weeping now. “I thought it was the right call. I did the best that I could.”
*But you know, Captain. This was your fault.*
I opened my eyes just a slit. Warm tears slid into my hair. “This was my fault.”
*You killed five thousand innocents on the word of a piece of software. You failed your crew, and they failed to stop you. You failed in your duty as captain. You killed five thousand innocents.*
I sat up, gasping. “What do I do, Metis? What do I do now?”
*You know what to do, captain. Go to the bridge.*
I nodded. I rose from my cot and slipped through the door.
On the bridge, my crew was assembled, watching the captain’s screen as our ship approached the Clep scouter. Henry turned upon my entrance, hiding his surprise.
“Captain. Good to…see you up.” I ignored him, taking my seat. He approached slowly. “That software update is messing with some of our systems…they said it’ll be another day or two until it’s fully installed. Apparently they caught wind of a system virus that’s jumping sectors. Not sure how it crosses ships, but they think they’ve patched it, so….” Henry trailed off, watching as I began flipping switches, shutting down major systems: engine, lights, weapons, comms, all but the captain’s channel. “Sir…what are you doing?”
Everyone around us had stopped their activities, gazing around the darkened bridge. There were murmurs of confusion, concern, as the ship ground to a halt.
Henry’s eyes widened as he saw me open the captain’s channel and begin to type a message. “Captain, what are you doing?” He seized me by the shoulders and hauled me away from the controls.
Mac ran to stop him, then caught sight of my screen and instead seized my arm as I tried to break away. “Captain, are you insane?!”
“I have to do this!” I shouted, struggling. “I did this! I did this!” My vision went fuzzy as they slammed my writhing body against the floor.
*Don’t worry, Captain. I’ll make sure they get the message.*
Mac cried, “No!” but there was nothing he could do. Metis swiftly halted all the processes I had not been able to access, and sent our message out across the divide, straight into the receiver of the Clep ship.
*It is done, Captain.*
I sagged against my crewmen’s arms. I felt the guilt lift off of me, just slightly. “This will…” I panted, “…this will make it…right.”
*KILL US.* | So I flipped up the safety cover and depressed the fire control button. The ship had already done tactical assessment, forming weapons of sufficient ability to destroy the other ship. With fire control activated it began a random dance in four dimensions as it poured fire into the strange ship, stopping when it was destroyed. Another punk ass species wanting to prove itself. The ship returns to patrol parameters, and I return to my game. |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | The bridge was silent. The dead ship loomed ahead, listing, drifting like a corpse underwater. The translation of their sole transmission sat at the bottom of the captain’s screen, captioning the image: KILL US.
“Metis,” I said, “scan again.”
*Why?* the AI replied. *You know I don’t make mistakes.*
“Five thousand life forms,” Henry said quietly. “Five thousand.”
“We can’t.” Marin shook her head. “It could be a trick. A mutiny. It could be—”
“A virus,” interjected Mac. “That nasty piece from the tenth sector. The one with the earworms.”
“Can’t be,” I murmured. “We have that patch.”
*The captain is right. I got that update last week. No sign of tenth sector earworms.*
“A mutation, then,” Mac said.
*Not likely.*
“Metis. Try to make contact again,” I ordered.
*Will do.*
We waited as Metis attempted for the third time to connect with the other ship’s AI interface. Seconds passed, then a full minute. I sat forward in my chair. “Metis?”
There was no reply.
“Metis.”
Silence.
I exchanged a glance with Marin. “I don’t like this.”
“We can’t, Captain. We can’t just blast five thousand life forms out of the sky,” she said. She was anxious. We all were.
“We don’t even know what they are,” Henry said. “Unidentified ship, unidentified crew. We can’t just go firing on a mystery vessel.”
“Metis,” I said again. “Is something wrong?”
*No, Captain. No response from the other ship.*
I sighed. “I cannot in good conscience fire on this vessel. Clearly they need help. Maybe we send a small team—”
*Bad idea, Captain.*
I furrowed my brow. “Elaborate.”
*I scanned the fleet logs for similar incidents. Looks like there have been two others out in sector 14. Ship dead in the water, distress call, crew went in and never came out.*
“So what, a trap?”
*Looks like it. Based on the other reports, those five thousand life forms are probably armed to the teeth and trained to kill.*
I stared at the ship for a minute longer, then stood and turned to my crew. “We won’t fire. We won’t send a pod either. We’ll call it in, quarantine the area. Soon as a couple ships free up, we’ll poke around with reinforcements.”
*Captain. Thermonuclear radiation detected.*
I whirled around. “What?”
*99.8% chance of weapons heating up.*
“Get us out of here, Metis.”
*Prob sim suggests the best course of action would be to fire.*
I hesitated. “By what margin?”
*Big enough.*
“Captain, you can’t engage,” Marin said.
“She’s right, we should jump.” Mac started for his seat. “I’ll alert the rest of the crew.”
*Captain, this is a well-travelled corridor. If we don’t do this, someone else flies right into the trap.*
The ship twitched. From its belly, a cannon emerged, swiveling, aiming.
*Captain.*
“Captain!”
“Metis, lock target.”
*Yes, sir.*
The view tightened around the ship. We could see its hull in detail. Green crosshairs leapt onto the screen.
“Firing.” I turned the key, hit the button.
The doomed ship was illuminated blinding white as it was hit with ten rounds of Terra Fleet high-grade shell-strippers. The outer shell of the ship cracked like an egg and its contents came whooshing out, some melting, some in fragments, others…screaming.
“Oh no,” Henry breathed.
“Oh hell,” Mac whispered.
They were civilians. All of them. A mix of species, some foreign, some familiar. Men, women. Children. They spilled from the ship like flies, mouths gaping in soundless, airless horror. It had been a slave ship, perhaps…a prison ship…a pleasure cruiser….
I felt my limbs go numb, heart in my throat. Beside me, Marin was sobbing. Tears blurred my own view of the carnage. Five thousand life forms. I had just slaughtered five thousand life forms.
*Making the jump, Captain,* Metis announced softly. *There’s nothing more we can do here.*
I said nothing, merely watched as the drifting bodies grew smaller, became pinpricks, and disappeared into blackness as we launched away from the site.
Three days later, I lay in my cabin. I had emerged only once since the incident. I had logged it dutifully, but the upload was delayed; something about systemwide updates. We had encountered no other vessels. The crew had demanded nothing from me. I was grateful.
The guilt was ineffable. It was more than a knot in my stomach; it was as if my entire being, mind, body, and soul, had become lead. I could not move with the weight. I could barely breathe. Visions of bodies, unprotected, unprepared, floated before my eyes whether open or shut. I had not slept. I could not bear it.
*Captain, we’re approaching a vessel. Looks like a sector five Clep scouter.*
I did not reply.
*Captain…what happened was regrettable.*
I almost laughed. “In all your big brain, that’s the only word you’ve got?”
*It was regrettable…it was tragic…it was—*
“Avoidable?” I sat up halfway. “You ran the scans, Metis. You ran the prob sim. You checked the logs.”
*I gave you all the info I had.*
“You urged me to do it!”
*You made the call.*
“You told me it was the right one!”
*Captain.*
I sank back onto the bed, eyes welling. “Five thousand casualties, Metis.”
The AI was silent for a moment. *Captain, do you know who Metis is?* I didn’t respond. *Metis was a titan in Greek mythology. I was named as such because she represents wisdom, wise counsel. This is my function.* I squeezed my eyes shut. The AI’s voice was soothing, even. No judgment. No condemnation. *I fulfill my role. I live up to this name every day. Just like you, I do my job.* Pause. *Metis was also the titan of cunning. I’m not sure the developers knew that when they gave me my name.* Another pause. *You knew better than to trust my judgment, Captain.*
I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. “I shouldn’t have listened to you.”
*I am only a machine. What do I know of death, of mortality?*
I was weeping now. “I thought it was the right call. I did the best that I could.”
*But you know, Captain. This was your fault.*
I opened my eyes just a slit. Warm tears slid into my hair. “This was my fault.”
*You killed five thousand innocents on the word of a piece of software. You failed your crew, and they failed to stop you. You failed in your duty as captain. You killed five thousand innocents.*
I sat up, gasping. “What do I do, Metis? What do I do now?”
*You know what to do, captain. Go to the bridge.*
I nodded. I rose from my cot and slipped through the door.
On the bridge, my crew was assembled, watching the captain’s screen as our ship approached the Clep scouter. Henry turned upon my entrance, hiding his surprise.
“Captain. Good to…see you up.” I ignored him, taking my seat. He approached slowly. “That software update is messing with some of our systems…they said it’ll be another day or two until it’s fully installed. Apparently they caught wind of a system virus that’s jumping sectors. Not sure how it crosses ships, but they think they’ve patched it, so….” Henry trailed off, watching as I began flipping switches, shutting down major systems: engine, lights, weapons, comms, all but the captain’s channel. “Sir…what are you doing?”
Everyone around us had stopped their activities, gazing around the darkened bridge. There were murmurs of confusion, concern, as the ship ground to a halt.
Henry’s eyes widened as he saw me open the captain’s channel and begin to type a message. “Captain, what are you doing?” He seized me by the shoulders and hauled me away from the controls.
Mac ran to stop him, then caught sight of my screen and instead seized my arm as I tried to break away. “Captain, are you insane?!”
“I have to do this!” I shouted, struggling. “I did this! I did this!” My vision went fuzzy as they slammed my writhing body against the floor.
*Don’t worry, Captain. I’ll make sure they get the message.*
Mac cried, “No!” but there was nothing he could do. Metis swiftly halted all the processes I had not been able to access, and sent our message out across the divide, straight into the receiver of the Clep ship.
*It is done, Captain.*
I sagged against my crewmen’s arms. I felt the guilt lift off of me, just slightly. “This will…” I panted, “…this will make it…right.”
*KILL US.* | Sentinel Udon had been sent on a mission to retrieve men from a ship named the Embarker. Udon wondered why the ship hadn't arrived at the planet Jervip yet, it was carrying a sample of an unidentified life form that was crucial for some of the Jervip scientists' testing.
Udon had been allowed to see the last bit of footage that got sent from the ship to Kala, Jervip's first moon. The footage was strange at least and unsettling at most. The footage is a member of the ship, Lieutenant Haw Mert, entering her last log into the ship's RAM. A screech could be heard feintly.
Udon turned off the footage and began to write. He was writing a Bera system Radio wave mail, or Bmail, to his husband. The message was meant to be sent if Udon died.
A Lieutenant knocked on Udon's door, "Sir, we just received a signal from model A2-P also known as Embarker. The Captain would like to see you on the ship." Udon stood up and began to walk toward the bridge of the ship.
As Udon arrived at the bridge he noticed everyone go silent, everyone except for Captain Dagne, "Sentinel, we received an audio signal from the Embarker. Beque, show him the signal."
The signal was a sound, first a wail and then a voice saying "Kill us, please, gods kill us."
Udon quickly told Captain Dagne, "We need to go towards the signal. If... if something is harming them we must find out." Udon remembered that the alien species being shipped was meant to be kept a secret.
The specimens must have breached containment. |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | The bridge was silent. The dead ship loomed ahead, listing, drifting like a corpse underwater. The translation of their sole transmission sat at the bottom of the captain’s screen, captioning the image: KILL US.
“Metis,” I said, “scan again.”
*Why?* the AI replied. *You know I don’t make mistakes.*
“Five thousand life forms,” Henry said quietly. “Five thousand.”
“We can’t.” Marin shook her head. “It could be a trick. A mutiny. It could be—”
“A virus,” interjected Mac. “That nasty piece from the tenth sector. The one with the earworms.”
“Can’t be,” I murmured. “We have that patch.”
*The captain is right. I got that update last week. No sign of tenth sector earworms.*
“A mutation, then,” Mac said.
*Not likely.*
“Metis. Try to make contact again,” I ordered.
*Will do.*
We waited as Metis attempted for the third time to connect with the other ship’s AI interface. Seconds passed, then a full minute. I sat forward in my chair. “Metis?”
There was no reply.
“Metis.”
Silence.
I exchanged a glance with Marin. “I don’t like this.”
“We can’t, Captain. We can’t just blast five thousand life forms out of the sky,” she said. She was anxious. We all were.
“We don’t even know what they are,” Henry said. “Unidentified ship, unidentified crew. We can’t just go firing on a mystery vessel.”
“Metis,” I said again. “Is something wrong?”
*No, Captain. No response from the other ship.*
I sighed. “I cannot in good conscience fire on this vessel. Clearly they need help. Maybe we send a small team—”
*Bad idea, Captain.*
I furrowed my brow. “Elaborate.”
*I scanned the fleet logs for similar incidents. Looks like there have been two others out in sector 14. Ship dead in the water, distress call, crew went in and never came out.*
“So what, a trap?”
*Looks like it. Based on the other reports, those five thousand life forms are probably armed to the teeth and trained to kill.*
I stared at the ship for a minute longer, then stood and turned to my crew. “We won’t fire. We won’t send a pod either. We’ll call it in, quarantine the area. Soon as a couple ships free up, we’ll poke around with reinforcements.”
*Captain. Thermonuclear radiation detected.*
I whirled around. “What?”
*99.8% chance of weapons heating up.*
“Get us out of here, Metis.”
*Prob sim suggests the best course of action would be to fire.*
I hesitated. “By what margin?”
*Big enough.*
“Captain, you can’t engage,” Marin said.
“She’s right, we should jump.” Mac started for his seat. “I’ll alert the rest of the crew.”
*Captain, this is a well-travelled corridor. If we don’t do this, someone else flies right into the trap.*
The ship twitched. From its belly, a cannon emerged, swiveling, aiming.
*Captain.*
“Captain!”
“Metis, lock target.”
*Yes, sir.*
The view tightened around the ship. We could see its hull in detail. Green crosshairs leapt onto the screen.
“Firing.” I turned the key, hit the button.
The doomed ship was illuminated blinding white as it was hit with ten rounds of Terra Fleet high-grade shell-strippers. The outer shell of the ship cracked like an egg and its contents came whooshing out, some melting, some in fragments, others…screaming.
“Oh no,” Henry breathed.
“Oh hell,” Mac whispered.
They were civilians. All of them. A mix of species, some foreign, some familiar. Men, women. Children. They spilled from the ship like flies, mouths gaping in soundless, airless horror. It had been a slave ship, perhaps…a prison ship…a pleasure cruiser….
I felt my limbs go numb, heart in my throat. Beside me, Marin was sobbing. Tears blurred my own view of the carnage. Five thousand life forms. I had just slaughtered five thousand life forms.
*Making the jump, Captain,* Metis announced softly. *There’s nothing more we can do here.*
I said nothing, merely watched as the drifting bodies grew smaller, became pinpricks, and disappeared into blackness as we launched away from the site.
Three days later, I lay in my cabin. I had emerged only once since the incident. I had logged it dutifully, but the upload was delayed; something about systemwide updates. We had encountered no other vessels. The crew had demanded nothing from me. I was grateful.
The guilt was ineffable. It was more than a knot in my stomach; it was as if my entire being, mind, body, and soul, had become lead. I could not move with the weight. I could barely breathe. Visions of bodies, unprotected, unprepared, floated before my eyes whether open or shut. I had not slept. I could not bear it.
*Captain, we’re approaching a vessel. Looks like a sector five Clep scouter.*
I did not reply.
*Captain…what happened was regrettable.*
I almost laughed. “In all your big brain, that’s the only word you’ve got?”
*It was regrettable…it was tragic…it was—*
“Avoidable?” I sat up halfway. “You ran the scans, Metis. You ran the prob sim. You checked the logs.”
*I gave you all the info I had.*
“You urged me to do it!”
*You made the call.*
“You told me it was the right one!”
*Captain.*
I sank back onto the bed, eyes welling. “Five thousand casualties, Metis.”
The AI was silent for a moment. *Captain, do you know who Metis is?* I didn’t respond. *Metis was a titan in Greek mythology. I was named as such because she represents wisdom, wise counsel. This is my function.* I squeezed my eyes shut. The AI’s voice was soothing, even. No judgment. No condemnation. *I fulfill my role. I live up to this name every day. Just like you, I do my job.* Pause. *Metis was also the titan of cunning. I’m not sure the developers knew that when they gave me my name.* Another pause. *You knew better than to trust my judgment, Captain.*
I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. “I shouldn’t have listened to you.”
*I am only a machine. What do I know of death, of mortality?*
I was weeping now. “I thought it was the right call. I did the best that I could.”
*But you know, Captain. This was your fault.*
I opened my eyes just a slit. Warm tears slid into my hair. “This was my fault.”
*You killed five thousand innocents on the word of a piece of software. You failed your crew, and they failed to stop you. You failed in your duty as captain. You killed five thousand innocents.*
I sat up, gasping. “What do I do, Metis? What do I do now?”
*You know what to do, captain. Go to the bridge.*
I nodded. I rose from my cot and slipped through the door.
On the bridge, my crew was assembled, watching the captain’s screen as our ship approached the Clep scouter. Henry turned upon my entrance, hiding his surprise.
“Captain. Good to…see you up.” I ignored him, taking my seat. He approached slowly. “That software update is messing with some of our systems…they said it’ll be another day or two until it’s fully installed. Apparently they caught wind of a system virus that’s jumping sectors. Not sure how it crosses ships, but they think they’ve patched it, so….” Henry trailed off, watching as I began flipping switches, shutting down major systems: engine, lights, weapons, comms, all but the captain’s channel. “Sir…what are you doing?”
Everyone around us had stopped their activities, gazing around the darkened bridge. There were murmurs of confusion, concern, as the ship ground to a halt.
Henry’s eyes widened as he saw me open the captain’s channel and begin to type a message. “Captain, what are you doing?” He seized me by the shoulders and hauled me away from the controls.
Mac ran to stop him, then caught sight of my screen and instead seized my arm as I tried to break away. “Captain, are you insane?!”
“I have to do this!” I shouted, struggling. “I did this! I did this!” My vision went fuzzy as they slammed my writhing body against the floor.
*Don’t worry, Captain. I’ll make sure they get the message.*
Mac cried, “No!” but there was nothing he could do. Metis swiftly halted all the processes I had not been able to access, and sent our message out across the divide, straight into the receiver of the Clep ship.
*It is done, Captain.*
I sagged against my crewmen’s arms. I felt the guilt lift off of me, just slightly. “This will…” I panted, “…this will make it…right.”
*KILL US.* | Ping!
I jerk awake at my station as the message comes in. After making sure no one saw that I had drifted off, I clicked the blinking green light to display the message on my port screen.
The words KILL US stared back at me. I swiped up to see who had sent the message but they hadn't identified themselves as they sent it. Scrolling down to the location I started. They were less than fifty leagues portside from us.
"Marty!" I yelled over my left shoulder, still staring at the screen, trying to find any information on who sent the mysterious message.
I heard his chair roll over to me. "What's up Diane?"
"Do you see any ship within a fifty leagues of us on your screen?"
He rolled back to his station and tapped on his screen a couple times. He swore under his breath before rolling back to me. "I don't know how I missed them. It's been so quiet here for a couple weeks I guess I wasn't paying attention. How'd you know?"
I showed him the message. KILL US. "What the hell?" he exclaimed. "Who are they?"
"They didn't identify themselves. I have no idea."
"And that was all they said?" I nodded.
"Captain!" Marty spoke into the ship's comm system. "Come down to the bridge. There's something you need to see."
Less than a minute later, a tired looked Captain Sykes arrived, a frown on her face. "I was sleeping. This better be important."
We showed him the message and their location, which had reduced to 42 leagues. They must have been moving at some speed. The captains face tightened as she read the short message. "What do you want us to do, Captain?" I asked.
"Get them on a direct line. I want to talk with whoever sent the message." She buttoned her coat up to the collar and pulled her hair back into her signature bun and took her place in the captains chair. She nodded for me to connect to them.
After requesting face-time it was just a waiting game. It was up to them to either pick up or decline. The line buzzed annoyingly as we impatiently waited for them to make their decision. Finally buzzing stopped and a blurry face appeared on the big screen opposite us.
"Captain Marguerite Sykes of the HMS Pytheas. Please identify yourselves."
The image became clearer and we saw a man looking back at us. He kept nervously looking over his shoulder at the big metal door behind him then back at us. His mouth opened and closed like he was yelling something at us but his auditory communications must have been down. Captain Sykes snapped her fingers at me. "Diane! Can you fix this?"
"No, Captain. It's on their end."
"Ask him what I just did."
I quickly typed in the message and saw the man's eyes read it somewhere off to his left. I looked down at his keyboard and sent a quick message back which I relayed to the captain. "He says his name is Gavin Bjornson. He's a engineer on the USS Hestia." Another messaged pinged in. "He just sent the same message. KILL US."
"Ask him to clarify."
"He says just exactly that. He wants our ship to fire at his and destroy it."
"Is he crazy?" Marty asked. "Does he have a death wish?"
"Well," Heath chuckled from his station in diagnostics, "if he's asking us to kill them I'd say he has a death wish."
"Not the time, Heath!" Sykes snapped. She turned her harsh name to me. "Get me more information."
I asked and the response came within a minute. But it was all garbled. 'mTTrg GITithI gile biB DIBJIiJK idi bT GIJ idI IDIBB'. It didn't make any sense. Another string of garbage followed. I turned to the man on the screen to see he was in a frenzy.
He banged on the his keyboard trying as if trying to make it work. He very clearly swore before doing something off screen. When he turned back he held a piece of paper up to the screen. The writing was scratchy as if he wasn't used to writing by hand, but it was legible.
INVADED. COMMS SCRAMBLED. EVERYONE DEAD. KILL US KILL THEM.
Before I could read further a spray of red covered the screen on the other end. I let out a gasp and jerked backwards. Someone on the other end was wiping the red from the screen to reveal a scene out of a nightmare. A very large man stood on the other side, holding the severed head of Gavin Bjornson. My stomach churned as I realized what all the red was.
The large man smiled cruelly back at us before bending down. When he stood up he held another piece of paper up to the screen. In big block letters I read the words that made my heart stop.
YOU'RE NEXT |
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | The bridge was silent. The dead ship loomed ahead, listing, drifting like a corpse underwater. The translation of their sole transmission sat at the bottom of the captain’s screen, captioning the image: KILL US.
“Metis,” I said, “scan again.”
*Why?* the AI replied. *You know I don’t make mistakes.*
“Five thousand life forms,” Henry said quietly. “Five thousand.”
“We can’t.” Marin shook her head. “It could be a trick. A mutiny. It could be—”
“A virus,” interjected Mac. “That nasty piece from the tenth sector. The one with the earworms.”
“Can’t be,” I murmured. “We have that patch.”
*The captain is right. I got that update last week. No sign of tenth sector earworms.*
“A mutation, then,” Mac said.
*Not likely.*
“Metis. Try to make contact again,” I ordered.
*Will do.*
We waited as Metis attempted for the third time to connect with the other ship’s AI interface. Seconds passed, then a full minute. I sat forward in my chair. “Metis?”
There was no reply.
“Metis.”
Silence.
I exchanged a glance with Marin. “I don’t like this.”
“We can’t, Captain. We can’t just blast five thousand life forms out of the sky,” she said. She was anxious. We all were.
“We don’t even know what they are,” Henry said. “Unidentified ship, unidentified crew. We can’t just go firing on a mystery vessel.”
“Metis,” I said again. “Is something wrong?”
*No, Captain. No response from the other ship.*
I sighed. “I cannot in good conscience fire on this vessel. Clearly they need help. Maybe we send a small team—”
*Bad idea, Captain.*
I furrowed my brow. “Elaborate.”
*I scanned the fleet logs for similar incidents. Looks like there have been two others out in sector 14. Ship dead in the water, distress call, crew went in and never came out.*
“So what, a trap?”
*Looks like it. Based on the other reports, those five thousand life forms are probably armed to the teeth and trained to kill.*
I stared at the ship for a minute longer, then stood and turned to my crew. “We won’t fire. We won’t send a pod either. We’ll call it in, quarantine the area. Soon as a couple ships free up, we’ll poke around with reinforcements.”
*Captain. Thermonuclear radiation detected.*
I whirled around. “What?”
*99.8% chance of weapons heating up.*
“Get us out of here, Metis.”
*Prob sim suggests the best course of action would be to fire.*
I hesitated. “By what margin?”
*Big enough.*
“Captain, you can’t engage,” Marin said.
“She’s right, we should jump.” Mac started for his seat. “I’ll alert the rest of the crew.”
*Captain, this is a well-travelled corridor. If we don’t do this, someone else flies right into the trap.*
The ship twitched. From its belly, a cannon emerged, swiveling, aiming.
*Captain.*
“Captain!”
“Metis, lock target.”
*Yes, sir.*
The view tightened around the ship. We could see its hull in detail. Green crosshairs leapt onto the screen.
“Firing.” I turned the key, hit the button.
The doomed ship was illuminated blinding white as it was hit with ten rounds of Terra Fleet high-grade shell-strippers. The outer shell of the ship cracked like an egg and its contents came whooshing out, some melting, some in fragments, others…screaming.
“Oh no,” Henry breathed.
“Oh hell,” Mac whispered.
They were civilians. All of them. A mix of species, some foreign, some familiar. Men, women. Children. They spilled from the ship like flies, mouths gaping in soundless, airless horror. It had been a slave ship, perhaps…a prison ship…a pleasure cruiser….
I felt my limbs go numb, heart in my throat. Beside me, Marin was sobbing. Tears blurred my own view of the carnage. Five thousand life forms. I had just slaughtered five thousand life forms.
*Making the jump, Captain,* Metis announced softly. *There’s nothing more we can do here.*
I said nothing, merely watched as the drifting bodies grew smaller, became pinpricks, and disappeared into blackness as we launched away from the site.
Three days later, I lay in my cabin. I had emerged only once since the incident. I had logged it dutifully, but the upload was delayed; something about systemwide updates. We had encountered no other vessels. The crew had demanded nothing from me. I was grateful.
The guilt was ineffable. It was more than a knot in my stomach; it was as if my entire being, mind, body, and soul, had become lead. I could not move with the weight. I could barely breathe. Visions of bodies, unprotected, unprepared, floated before my eyes whether open or shut. I had not slept. I could not bear it.
*Captain, we’re approaching a vessel. Looks like a sector five Clep scouter.*
I did not reply.
*Captain…what happened was regrettable.*
I almost laughed. “In all your big brain, that’s the only word you’ve got?”
*It was regrettable…it was tragic…it was—*
“Avoidable?” I sat up halfway. “You ran the scans, Metis. You ran the prob sim. You checked the logs.”
*I gave you all the info I had.*
“You urged me to do it!”
*You made the call.*
“You told me it was the right one!”
*Captain.*
I sank back onto the bed, eyes welling. “Five thousand casualties, Metis.”
The AI was silent for a moment. *Captain, do you know who Metis is?* I didn’t respond. *Metis was a titan in Greek mythology. I was named as such because she represents wisdom, wise counsel. This is my function.* I squeezed my eyes shut. The AI’s voice was soothing, even. No judgment. No condemnation. *I fulfill my role. I live up to this name every day. Just like you, I do my job.* Pause. *Metis was also the titan of cunning. I’m not sure the developers knew that when they gave me my name.* Another pause. *You knew better than to trust my judgment, Captain.*
I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. “I shouldn’t have listened to you.”
*I am only a machine. What do I know of death, of mortality?*
I was weeping now. “I thought it was the right call. I did the best that I could.”
*But you know, Captain. This was your fault.*
I opened my eyes just a slit. Warm tears slid into my hair. “This was my fault.”
*You killed five thousand innocents on the word of a piece of software. You failed your crew, and they failed to stop you. You failed in your duty as captain. You killed five thousand innocents.*
I sat up, gasping. “What do I do, Metis? What do I do now?”
*You know what to do, captain. Go to the bridge.*
I nodded. I rose from my cot and slipped through the door.
On the bridge, my crew was assembled, watching the captain’s screen as our ship approached the Clep scouter. Henry turned upon my entrance, hiding his surprise.
“Captain. Good to…see you up.” I ignored him, taking my seat. He approached slowly. “That software update is messing with some of our systems…they said it’ll be another day or two until it’s fully installed. Apparently they caught wind of a system virus that’s jumping sectors. Not sure how it crosses ships, but they think they’ve patched it, so….” Henry trailed off, watching as I began flipping switches, shutting down major systems: engine, lights, weapons, comms, all but the captain’s channel. “Sir…what are you doing?”
Everyone around us had stopped their activities, gazing around the darkened bridge. There were murmurs of confusion, concern, as the ship ground to a halt.
Henry’s eyes widened as he saw me open the captain’s channel and begin to type a message. “Captain, what are you doing?” He seized me by the shoulders and hauled me away from the controls.
Mac ran to stop him, then caught sight of my screen and instead seized my arm as I tried to break away. “Captain, are you insane?!”
“I have to do this!” I shouted, struggling. “I did this! I did this!” My vision went fuzzy as they slammed my writhing body against the floor.
*Don’t worry, Captain. I’ll make sure they get the message.*
Mac cried, “No!” but there was nothing he could do. Metis swiftly halted all the processes I had not been able to access, and sent our message out across the divide, straight into the receiver of the Clep ship.
*It is done, Captain.*
I sagged against my crewmen’s arms. I felt the guilt lift off of me, just slightly. “This will…” I panted, “…this will make it…right.”
*KILL US.* | You and your crew have been experiencing terrible nightmares for the past six nights - ever since you detected the wreckage of the SS Relentless on your radar. In your dreams, red eyes in the darkness are hunting you down and, when they finally catch you, their serrated teeth tear into your skin. They rip out your organs and feast on them in a shower of red.
Now, the remains of the SS Relentless are on the screen in front of you. It orbits Ceres as if it is dying, metal moon. It is rust eaten and pock marked. Holes run through its great stern, from where showers of asteroids have collided with it.
Your crew believe it is a ghost ship. That the lifeforms on board - that your ship's computer has detected - are instead some form of... *paranormal manifestations.*
The SS Relentless was deployed on a mining mission to take a crew of a hundred to Ceres - the largest of the dwarf planets in an area between Mars and Jupiter. Only, some time after passing Mars, all communications to and from the ship suddenly stopped. It was hypothesised that an asteroid struck it and destroyed it. Indeed, Ceres being located in the midst of a huge asteroid belt, only fueled that speculation.
Before a rescue mission could be attempted, Eurasia declared war on the Americas. It was called World War 3, at the time. Although now, it is refereed to as the Ultra War - the first truly modern war. A war that involved the Earth's orbit as much as it did the ground. It brought with it a close to the golden age of space exploration, and knocked back mankind by close to *four hundred years.*
Four hundred years... you wonder how a ship that went missing that long ago, with supplies to last only *two years*, could possibly still have life forms on board. Admittedly, only six, but that is *six more* alive than should possible. The ship that you captain, the NE Ingenuity, is the first since the Relentless to travel to Ceres. No one on board, yourself included, ever believed the stories of the Relentless - you didn't even believe that it existed. Instead, you thought it a cautionary tale passed down by generations to remind new captains of the dangers of astronavigation. But now, as it slowly traverses orbit on the screen in front of you, it is a sight that fills your heart with dread.
If they are not apparitions on board, you wonder if they are some kind of... vampires? Immortal beings cursed forever to wander the ship. What if you were to send a rescue mission to land on it? Would the plague that turned them into such creatures spread to you crew? Would the beings themselves be hostile? They are better armed than your ship - their pre-war technology is still more advanced.
If you could bring the ship back to Earth... - the *only* intact ship, from the pre war generation - you would be highly praised and likely promoted to admiral. Plus, there would surely be a huge bonus for you *and* for your crew. Perhaps their engines can be repaired...
But you can't help wonder, what did this to them? If they successfully made it to Ceres, why did they suddenly stop communicating with Earth?
You have been sending transmissions for the last twenty four hours. Your chief communications officers voice crackles through on your comms unit:
"Captain, a message has come through from the Relentless."
Your heart stops beating for a split second, as you ask in a whisper, what the message reads.
"KILL US"
An hour later you put a vote to your crew: They vote by one, in favour of destroying the ghost ship, and any creatures on board it. *Better safe than sorry*, as your lieutenant put it. *Plus, they asked us to.*
You're reluctant - you don't want a mutiny, but you can't help imagining the hero's welcome waiting for you, for when you return the ship to Earth.
You have the deciding vote.
---
What should happen next:
reply: Explore ship
reply: Attack ship
---
You recount the votes. Even.
After running short range scans, and after the message you received from the Relentless, you decide that the best course of action is to back away from it and to launch nukes at it.
As you press the red button, you can't help wondering what happened to the crew of the Relentless. What are the creatures that are now on board it?
As the nukes explode far behind you, you sigh, knowing that the hero's welcome, and the promotion to Admiralty, have gone up in as much smoke as the Relentless.
At least you seem to have maintained the loyalty of the crew, you reason, as you try to console yourself.
Thank you for playing. Better luck next time.
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[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | "What the hell?" The captain asked, "Kill us?" His second in command shrugged. The chief engineer was on board at the time. Most people who could be were at the bridge. "Well," The engineer started, "we're not actually going to do it, are we?"
"I don't know." The captain replied. The second-in-command followed up, "Are they suicidal?!" "They could be holding information, and an enemy ship is on their tail!" The engineer yelled.
Soon after, another beep, signaling a message was arriving. "What's it say?" The captain asked, moving to look at it himself anyway.
In big letters on the officer's screen were written, "TRY IT"
"Are they taunting us?" The captain asked. "Those sons-of-bitches! They want a fight!" The engineer exclaimed. "Is this some kind of test?" The second-in-command inquired to no one in particular.
*Beep*
"What in..." The captain started, the communications officer looking puzzled. The engineer and second-in-command both moved closer.
"FIGHT ME 1V1 IRL"
| You and your crew have been experiencing terrible nightmares for the past six nights - ever since you detected the wreckage of the SS Relentless on your radar. In your dreams, red eyes in the darkness are hunting you down and, when they finally catch you, their serrated teeth tear into your skin. They rip out your organs and feast on them in a shower of red.
Now, the remains of the SS Relentless are on the screen in front of you. It orbits Ceres as if it is dying, metal moon. It is rust eaten and pock marked. Holes run through its great stern, from where showers of asteroids have collided with it.
Your crew believe it is a ghost ship. That the lifeforms on board - that your ship's computer has detected - are instead some form of... *paranormal manifestations.*
The SS Relentless was deployed on a mining mission to take a crew of a hundred to Ceres - the largest of the dwarf planets in an area between Mars and Jupiter. Only, some time after passing Mars, all communications to and from the ship suddenly stopped. It was hypothesised that an asteroid struck it and destroyed it. Indeed, Ceres being located in the midst of a huge asteroid belt, only fueled that speculation.
Before a rescue mission could be attempted, Eurasia declared war on the Americas. It was called World War 3, at the time. Although now, it is refereed to as the Ultra War - the first truly modern war. A war that involved the Earth's orbit as much as it did the ground. It brought with it a close to the golden age of space exploration, and knocked back mankind by close to *four hundred years.*
Four hundred years... you wonder how a ship that went missing that long ago, with supplies to last only *two years*, could possibly still have life forms on board. Admittedly, only six, but that is *six more* alive than should possible. The ship that you captain, the NE Ingenuity, is the first since the Relentless to travel to Ceres. No one on board, yourself included, ever believed the stories of the Relentless - you didn't even believe that it existed. Instead, you thought it a cautionary tale passed down by generations to remind new captains of the dangers of astronavigation. But now, as it slowly traverses orbit on the screen in front of you, it is a sight that fills your heart with dread.
If they are not apparitions on board, you wonder if they are some kind of... vampires? Immortal beings cursed forever to wander the ship. What if you were to send a rescue mission to land on it? Would the plague that turned them into such creatures spread to you crew? Would the beings themselves be hostile? They are better armed than your ship - their pre-war technology is still more advanced.
If you could bring the ship back to Earth... - the *only* intact ship, from the pre war generation - you would be highly praised and likely promoted to admiral. Plus, there would surely be a huge bonus for you *and* for your crew. Perhaps their engines can be repaired...
But you can't help wonder, what did this to them? If they successfully made it to Ceres, why did they suddenly stop communicating with Earth?
You have been sending transmissions for the last twenty four hours. Your chief communications officers voice crackles through on your comms unit:
"Captain, a message has come through from the Relentless."
Your heart stops beating for a split second, as you ask in a whisper, what the message reads.
"KILL US"
An hour later you put a vote to your crew: They vote by one, in favour of destroying the ghost ship, and any creatures on board it. *Better safe than sorry*, as your lieutenant put it. *Plus, they asked us to.*
You're reluctant - you don't want a mutiny, but you can't help imagining the hero's welcome waiting for you, for when you return the ship to Earth.
You have the deciding vote.
---
What should happen next:
reply: Explore ship
reply: Attack ship
---
You recount the votes. Even.
After running short range scans, and after the message you received from the Relentless, you decide that the best course of action is to back away from it and to launch nukes at it.
As you press the red button, you can't help wondering what happened to the crew of the Relentless. What are the creatures that are now on board it?
As the nukes explode far behind you, you sigh, knowing that the hero's welcome, and the promotion to Admiralty, have gone up in as much smoke as the Relentless.
At least you seem to have maintained the loyalty of the crew, you reason, as you try to console yourself.
Thank you for playing. Better luck next time.
|
|
[WP] In your journey through space, you come upon a ship. It sends you a message: "KILL US". | "What the hell?" The captain asked, "Kill us?" His second in command shrugged. The chief engineer was on board at the time. Most people who could be were at the bridge. "Well," The engineer started, "we're not actually going to do it, are we?"
"I don't know." The captain replied. The second-in-command followed up, "Are they suicidal?!" "They could be holding information, and an enemy ship is on their tail!" The engineer yelled.
Soon after, another beep, signaling a message was arriving. "What's it say?" The captain asked, moving to look at it himself anyway.
In big letters on the officer's screen were written, "TRY IT"
"Are they taunting us?" The captain asked. "Those sons-of-bitches! They want a fight!" The engineer exclaimed. "Is this some kind of test?" The second-in-command inquired to no one in particular.
*Beep*
"What in..." The captain started, the communications officer looking puzzled. The engineer and second-in-command both moved closer.
"FIGHT ME 1V1 IRL"
| Space was vast and unforgiving. This, I knew, from my isolated travels around the galaxy. Entropy does not discriminate. Everything, it seems, except for me.
I had no need of protection or covering, unlike some of the primitive lifeforms around here.My tentacles pulsed a faint blue as I swam alongside the stars.
I was one of my kind, I think. Vague memories constitute this: the warmth of a nebula, thick and hazy, and the millennia of exploration for a kindred spirit. Someone like me. After some time, I had reconfigured my form to catch radiation. A way to seek life, and determine their likeness to my own.
Millions of electromagnetic signals reached my ears. I tuned most of it out as garbage, white noise from the surrounding stars, but honed onto something odd. It was faint, but clearly intelligible.
*Kill us.*I waved my tentacles, confused. Why would sentient life choose death? I wasn’t a stranger to the concept; from my travels I had watched many an alien keel over and lay still. Not moving, not thinking, just… Extinguished. Like a black dwarf. On some days, I felt slightly jealous for the peace it seemed to grant them. And their thoughts! Oh, their fascinating minds. From my place in the stars, I experienced every sort of emotion possible, even those I was not equipped to handle. Happiness, like the expansion of a galaxy, bright and life-giving. Sorrow, that reminded me of the loneliness of space. They were so numerous and so vivid.
I swooped in, feeling the signal strengthen. Stars and planets blurred, became streaks of light as I tracked the signal towards its source. I let myself fade into the background, not truly invisible but nearly so, and watched.
The ship was of crude construction and make, compared to the Was’ki’one of the Alpha Centauri. It was covered in a red, lichen-like growth. I was now close enough to touch the metal of the ship. I scraped off a piece of the red lichen. It attempted to burrow into my flesh. I let out a burst of energy. It slackened, then disintegrated.
Focusing one of my many eyes on the portholes, I peered inside.
*Earthlings,* I thought. And then, a moment of brief confusion. *Do they always have black spores on their faces?* I let my consciousness diffuse the interior of the ship. There was nothing but silence. Death. I paused a moment, and clumsily attempted one of the rites I had seen on a distant planet. A series of gestures, and some spoken words I sent telepathically throughout the area.
I took a closer look. There was something odd about those spores. They buzzed with a faint intelligence. The spores were unlike any life form I had chanced upon before- a colony of minds, weak individually, but growing in power. I could sense hunger. Not of a physical kind, but great desire.
*Spread. Grow. Devour,* they called. Their intentions were simple, but horrifying. They only desired expansion.
Sorrow filled my mind. I sent a telepathic apology, then closed my tentacles around the hull of the ship. A million minds cried out in terror.
I began the slow and arduous process of digestion.
&nbsp;
I'd love some critique!
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[WP] All time-travelers have a common-place called the "Coffeeshop At the End of Time" where they can go get a few... minutes. They can all share it without problem so as long as they never speak of when they're from. | A short pop preluded the sudden appearance of the traveler. In a spot that was empty just a moment before now stood a man, tall and gaunt. He wore an old duster that hung down to his ankles. Stained and tattered it was by years of service to its owner. The traveler wore it like a second skin. Under a wide brimmed hat only a skeletal chin and sunken cheeks could be seen. Ahead of him about twenty paces were a set of double doors attached to seemingly nothing. They looked quite out of place amid the flat black desert of the Last Planet.
The cafe at the end of time was indeed a peculiar place. Hosted by the last planet warmed in the thin, dying light of the youngest star. All the land about was bathed in a perpetual twilight. Oranges and purples fought amid rolling clouds along the distant horizon fading up into an infinite dark directly above. The youngest star seemed an unremarkable fixture in that forlorn sky. A tiny ball of red that sputtered arcs of plasma across his surface and flickered as the last of its hydrogen began to burn out. It remained forever it the same spot as the planet that orbited it no longer rotated. As for the surface of the planet the stranger now stood on, this could be said. It was by appearance a flat disk of black sand. No wind rolled over the land and the air was thin and stagnant. It was a place apparently frozen in time untouched by the cold that was assuredly creeping across the universe and unbent by the glutinous singularities that now dominated all of space and time.
The cafe itself was an enigma on this barren landscape. Set up as a traditional roadside stop its perimeter was oblong. No walls made up its construction. Next to the double doors hung on nothing was a neon sign of the cafes name, which shall not be spoken here. Booths sat open behind the double doors forming a semi-circle around a long bar. Sheet metal composed the face of the bar supporting a sturdy wooden top. Behind that cabinets hung in mid air and a tiny rectangular window sat where the unseen cooks placed hot steaming plates of anything and everything their patrons ordered. How these shadowy figures accomplished such a feat of customer service was just another mystery of the universe. None of the cafe's guests cared to ask either, because many had more, larger concerns. There were two other singular doors to the right of the cafe, marked as restrooms. It should be noted that there wasn't actually any toiletries or plumbing in the cafe. The doors acted simply as thresholds for other travelers to escape to someplace more private.
Since there were no walls the inhabitants of the cafe lay bare to the world around them. To the traveler this seemed an amusing sight. A dozen patrons, maybe give or take one or two currently in the bathrooms. Most sat in pairs talking in low voices that could not be heard from his vantage point. He saw their mouths open and close in silent conversation. Of those that sat alone, he saw their jaws flex and relax masticating. There was a tinny clink of silverware on ceramic plates and here and there the hollow thump of a cup on a table. The traveler felt comforted at the sight of it all, for he was weary. Like a rolling stone he walked into the cafe.
Once inside, the shrouded man found his way to a worn metal stool. He took a seat and gestured for a cup of coffee from the bar keep. No sooner had he received his steaming cup than had another patron seated herself next to him.
"Talk about that weather, eh?" She said in a raspy voice. The traveler ignored her. "Some rogue gust caught that sand underfoot and nearly tripped me." She chuckled, "Next thing you know it'll be hurricane season and well this place ain't got no walls, ha. How do you think Horace over there will take his eggs when it's raining cats and dogs, right?"
Her voice though low and colicky was playful and quick. She spoke with an accent that the traveller had never heard before, nor could he recall anything even similar. She lingered on the vowels in the middle of her words and cut short the consonants at the end. An interesting new puzzle. Still, he wasn't there for puzzling so he ignored her.
Unperturbed by her companions apathy the woman carried on, "Quite the crowd today, yea? Never know what sort o' trash this place will sweep in, yea? Look there, who's that talking with the old Mariner? Never seen his like before," she tapped the traveller with on the shoulder with the back of her hand, "Bet ya I can guess what their whispering over, heh. That old Mariner-coot's always telling people that ancient rhyme o' his, yep." Out of the corner of the traveler's eye he caught the woman nodding to herself assuredly.
"Does it matter?" He growled, annoyed by her. The woman's words made his coffee taste sour and he hated anything but bitter-black java. Immediately though, after uttering his small grievance, he realized his mistake. She shot him a quick, wide grin.
"Knew you weren't so silent as they say slinga', ha. But I got you now, dusty. 'Cause we got a conversation between us that's to be had." Her eyes sparkled like some devil's fire as she spoke. The traveller growled in retort. A final weak attempt to dismiss the dame, but it failed.
"What do we got to talk about then." He finally conceded.
"Oh stuff, yea. You know, the weather and gossip and whatever else we can cook up. Maybe we'll talk about those tangly things watching us in that deep darkness above." She a paused and looked straight up. Then looking down she added, "Maybe not on that last one, eh. They might hear us and you and I both don't want that, right."
"Get on with it then." He grumbled. He didn't care for all the extra fat her in sentences. She spoke like a trickster and he'd met plenty of that cut. Not a one did he ever even slightly like either. Tricksters were the bane of this universe though they were always played out as the heroes. Always using more words than was necessary. With mouths like rivers where the words would wide left then right, then coil up around you and squeeze the life from you. Plus they always thought they were so damn crafty. He had an answer for that and it rested on his hip. Yep, sure is hard to talk your way out of some rough tie up when you got a bullet bouncing around in your skull.
"Well how about we start with names, yea? I know yours, but I doubt you know mine. Call me Eve, 'Kay?"
"Okay, Eve." Growled the traveler.
"So where you from Mr.tall-dark-n'-skeletony." She said politely.
"Nowhere." Replied the traveler truthfully. Though in a truer truth he was from a certain time and a certain place. Of that place he would never say. There was rules against that kind of thing in the cafe.
"Yea, same here, ha." She chuckled, "Oh what business do we got, hombre, what indeed?"
"You're asking me?"
"Ha! No! Just speaking rhetorically big guy, ha."
The traveler was growing angry. He was now gripping his mug so tight that he wasn't sure if the heat he felt was the coffee or his own deep rage. Would she not just cut to the point? No dull knife could make a messier work than her words right now.
"What do you want Eve?" He asked through gritted teeth.
She smiled and the fire kindled brighter in her blue eyes. "We got a history, you and I." She said nodding her head. "Or a future, yea. You know how it works for us vagabonds, yea. See we don't operate like normal people, who's lives are like starlight arcing from horizon to horizon, yea. Those people's lives are like tangents. They come and go and their actions ripple out, but in the end everyone always leaves and the person dies just as alone as they were when they were born. Maybe they get lucky and their arc of life touches another's at one singular point in space and time, but it always ends. People always part." She paused, "But not us cowboy." She ended with a smirk.
"What does this have to do with our business?" The traveler asked.
"Everything." She said almost reverently. She paused to sip her coffee and her face pinched up in disgust as she swallowed it. "Yeugh." She mouth, setting the mug down. "You'd think the cafe at the end of friggin' time would at least have a decent brew." She glanced over at the barkeep who stood at the far end of the bar with his arms crossed. He rolled his eyes and turned away.
"Anyway as I was saying cowboy, you and I are connected, oh yea. See our history and our future goes a little something like this, we begin at our ends and work backwards from there. For you, this is our first meeting, yep, but for me this is our final hour. Things work backwards from this point. See, and you'll figure it out pretty quick, eventually I'll be meeting you for the first time and you'll be seeing me for the last." She paused again and gulped back some more coffee. When she set her cup down her eyes were low and cold and her mouth was pulled tight at the edges. "I don't like to think about that part so much."
The traveler had grown more and more grim as she spoke. In his mind her words rang truer than anything he'd ever heard, but at the same time they seemed more alien than a cafe with no walls on a black planet in a black universe. He feared that he'd been tied up in something he couldn't remember. A bad bet maybe or an errant promise. Either way the words Eve spoke filled him with a certain dread. He could think of only one thing to say.
"So how's this going to end then?" He said facing her directly.
Eve smiled sadly. "For you I will not say, but for me... I want you to kill me." | It has been called a Time Travellers Hub, The Coffe Shop on the End of Time, An Endless Party Pub. It is a small shop that sits on a street corner in most towns, in most eras. It is quite small and every time traveler has been to it, even if they don't know that they have.
The small room first seen, when inside, will colorate to the time period its customer entered from. The advanced tech and magic within the building will disguise the patrons as well, to most of its customers, that is: for once one has jumped the Time Stream they are given an inner vision that reveals the true origins of their fellow customers.
A Traveller will see the Centurian having a drink with a Confederate Soldier while they are served by a Space Marine. In a corner, a game of cards is being played by a Storm Trooper, a Squid, and a Gigantopithecus.
A VIP lounge is blocked off from the main room. Inside it is where the Travellers sit back and relax. It also contains the oddest of the patrons:
From an old man who arrived in a silver car to a small group who came in a phone booth, to the woman in a school bus, to a man from a robot dragon, and more.
There is one rule for the Traveller here: They are forbidden to talk about their home time. It is said when this rule is broken time itself will close.
Thanks for reading! It's my first post on this subreddit so go easy on me :P |
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[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | I reached out to touch the extraterrestrial. At first, it was a few feet away, reluctantly inching closer, but it quickly warmed up and was finally close enough.
*'Holy shit holy shit holy shit!'* I thought to myself. It put out its arm, and our fingers touched. Then, it suddenly smiled and snapped its arm back, and began to speak in a childish voice.
"You awe it, mistah!"
The alien then booked it towards its ship, the door shutting behind it. It then left the planet in the blink of an eye. I sat there in awe.
"The fuck?" | It gave him the power, that one simple touch. He would fight and strive, never lean on a crutch. But he must keep the secret, who would believe such a thing? Some child's story, it must be a dream.
But as he grew up, he had not forgotten. To no longer be "It", was all that he wanted. The day finally came, he would reach this nonresident. The people had spoken, they made him their president.
He gathered a team, had long discussions. Together they decided, "Let's blame the Russians". The race quickly started, the world watched on. We were off to the moon, a new era had begun.
Some minor setbacks, some battles we lost. But he was determined, what ever the cost. As we grew closer, he became quite excited. This life long burden, would soon be lightened.
He knew they were ready, they trained for this day. Over the radio he said, "I hope you're ready to play." They looked all around, for hours it seemed. When off in the distance, something brightly gleamed.
They followed the light, it was the extraterrestrial. Chasing it down, they reached for his tentacle. The creature was tired, he soon would need rest. "You can't tag me!" he yells, "For I am your guest."
To you or I, it might not seem fair. But the look on his face, said that he didn't care. The creature knew no etiquette, just to put it mild. Because even in space, you might meet an only child. |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | The words came from the stange looking being. It was confusing to the president, his hair flopping jn the wind. "I'm it? How am I it? I am the least..." His words faded as a realization hit him and the rest of the world that was watching. The large headed aliens began to change, their body shifting and becoming more...human. A few moments later the aliens looked like actual humans.
"What? What is this? First you're an E.T., now you're a human. Pick one. You can't be both." The orange faced president said, but little did he recognize, he was changing. His head growing and body slimming. Skin changing colors to a pale grey. He was it. Not only him, but the whole species. We were "it". We were the aliens now. | It gave him the power, that one simple touch. He would fight and strive, never lean on a crutch. But he must keep the secret, who would believe such a thing? Some child's story, it must be a dream.
But as he grew up, he had not forgotten. To no longer be "It", was all that he wanted. The day finally came, he would reach this nonresident. The people had spoken, they made him their president.
He gathered a team, had long discussions. Together they decided, "Let's blame the Russians". The race quickly started, the world watched on. We were off to the moon, a new era had begun.
Some minor setbacks, some battles we lost. But he was determined, what ever the cost. As we grew closer, he became quite excited. This life long burden, would soon be lightened.
He knew they were ready, they trained for this day. Over the radio he said, "I hope you're ready to play." They looked all around, for hours it seemed. When off in the distance, something brightly gleamed.
They followed the light, it was the extraterrestrial. Chasing it down, they reached for his tentacle. The creature was tired, he soon would need rest. "You can't tag me!" he yells, "For I am your guest."
To you or I, it might not seem fair. But the look on his face, said that he didn't care. The creature knew no etiquette, just to put it mild. Because even in space, you might meet an only child. |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "Dad, you've been in there for three days. Are you ever going to let this go?"
The blonde in the doorway of the garage wrinkled her nose as she poked her head in. The smell of some sort of fumes and a faint smell of burning plastic made her second guess her intrusion. The wear of middle age had no doubt increased across her face since her took up this insane revenge quest. She wanted to tell him that it was a hallucination, that he was slipping into senility, but she couldn't face that fact. She couldn't stand to lose someone she cared so much about.
Before she could speak, he turned from his work bench and proudly produced a small, seemingly innocent device that fell somewhere between a remote control and a child's toy gun. He pointed it at the wall beside her and had she not winced and slammed her eyes shut at the bright green burst of light, she would have seen it create what now seemed to be a whirling vortex of energy where the drywall ended and a new world began. There was something so casual about how the man walked towards the new hole in the wall, and he disappeared the device into the pocket of his lab coat.
"You..." his speech interrupted momentarily by a burp that stung her nose with the odor of whiskey and rocket fuel "...don't understand Beth. Those little..." another belch escaped, but he resumed talking as if he hadn't noticed "...bitches started this game. And I'm gonna finish it."
And with that simple statement of purpose, he disappeared into the green portal, and it closed behind him. As the smell of alcohol faded and the smell of old paint and motor oil replaced it, it was like he had never been there. The phantom that had long since replaced her father, gone. | It gave him the power, that one simple touch. He would fight and strive, never lean on a crutch. But he must keep the secret, who would believe such a thing? Some child's story, it must be a dream.
But as he grew up, he had not forgotten. To no longer be "It", was all that he wanted. The day finally came, he would reach this nonresident. The people had spoken, they made him their president.
He gathered a team, had long discussions. Together they decided, "Let's blame the Russians". The race quickly started, the world watched on. We were off to the moon, a new era had begun.
Some minor setbacks, some battles we lost. But he was determined, what ever the cost. As we grew closer, he became quite excited. This life long burden, would soon be lightened.
He knew they were ready, they trained for this day. Over the radio he said, "I hope you're ready to play." They looked all around, for hours it seemed. When off in the distance, something brightly gleamed.
They followed the light, it was the extraterrestrial. Chasing it down, they reached for his tentacle. The creature was tired, he soon would need rest. "You can't tag me!" he yells, "For I am your guest."
To you or I, it might not seem fair. But the look on his face, said that he didn't care. The creature knew no etiquette, just to put it mild. Because even in space, you might meet an only child. |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "God Damn it... AT LEAST GIVE US FTL FIRST!!!!"
I scream as it runs up its spaceship giving a finger gesture I can only assume is rude.
Under my breath I mutter.
"Fuck, what does 'it' entail."
Meanwhile.....
In the System Delta Eridani the color and target of a unmanned probe from an ageless past, switches. The vector changes a mere micrometer of a degree. Humanity now, unbenounced to it, had a countdown till doomsday. | It gave him the power, that one simple touch. He would fight and strive, never lean on a crutch. But he must keep the secret, who would believe such a thing? Some child's story, it must be a dream.
But as he grew up, he had not forgotten. To no longer be "It", was all that he wanted. The day finally came, he would reach this nonresident. The people had spoken, they made him their president.
He gathered a team, had long discussions. Together they decided, "Let's blame the Russians". The race quickly started, the world watched on. We were off to the moon, a new era had begun.
Some minor setbacks, some battles we lost. But he was determined, what ever the cost. As we grew closer, he became quite excited. This life long burden, would soon be lightened.
He knew they were ready, they trained for this day. Over the radio he said, "I hope you're ready to play." They looked all around, for hours it seemed. When off in the distance, something brightly gleamed.
They followed the light, it was the extraterrestrial. Chasing it down, they reached for his tentacle. The creature was tired, he soon would need rest. "You can't tag me!" he yells, "For I am your guest."
To you or I, it might not seem fair. But the look on his face, said that he didn't care. The creature knew no etiquette, just to put it mild. Because even in space, you might meet an only child. |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | I reached out to touch the extraterrestrial. At first, it was a few feet away, reluctantly inching closer, but it quickly warmed up and was finally close enough.
*'Holy shit holy shit holy shit!'* I thought to myself. It put out its arm, and our fingers touched. Then, it suddenly smiled and snapped its arm back, and began to speak in a childish voice.
"You awe it, mistah!"
The alien then booked it towards its ship, the door shutting behind it. It then left the planet in the blink of an eye. I sat there in awe.
"The fuck?" | The being had been graceful and elegant. It had floated down from the sky like a feather and landed a few feet in front of me. It's seemingly human-made dress had fluttered invitingly as it did so, and it's skin color mixed fairly well with the dress's pink hue. Curly brown hair extended down past it's shoulder's. The being matched my height exactly, though I was only five feet tall.
For some reason, I knew it was an alien. Everything about screamed extra terrestrial. As it extended it's long spindly fingers extended toward me, like second nature, so did mine. And when our fingers met a feminine voice spoke.
"You're it," and with that the being ran.
I was taken utterly by surprise, but that didn't hurt my chances. I had been preparing for this day for years. I bolted after it and couldn't help but grin. I was gaining on it. Perfect form and the naturally higher than average acceleration rates gave me the advantage. As I neared it I noticed for the first time that the being had an extra set of arms.
I reached out and tapped it's shoulder. It was in a fraction of a second, though, that I felt one of it's delicate fingers tap my arm once again. I had forgotten to call tap backs.
I was overwhelmed with confusion when the being didn't immediately flee. I then noticed I could not move. My feet were glued to the floor and my arm was frozen in an outstretched position. I could quite literally feel ice penetrating my soul.
"Now we're playing freeze tag," |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | The words came from the stange looking being. It was confusing to the president, his hair flopping jn the wind. "I'm it? How am I it? I am the least..." His words faded as a realization hit him and the rest of the world that was watching. The large headed aliens began to change, their body shifting and becoming more...human. A few moments later the aliens looked like actual humans.
"What? What is this? First you're an E.T., now you're a human. Pick one. You can't be both." The orange faced president said, but little did he recognize, he was changing. His head growing and body slimming. Skin changing colors to a pale grey. He was it. Not only him, but the whole species. We were "it". We were the aliens now. | The being had been graceful and elegant. It had floated down from the sky like a feather and landed a few feet in front of me. It's seemingly human-made dress had fluttered invitingly as it did so, and it's skin color mixed fairly well with the dress's pink hue. Curly brown hair extended down past it's shoulder's. The being matched my height exactly, though I was only five feet tall.
For some reason, I knew it was an alien. Everything about screamed extra terrestrial. As it extended it's long spindly fingers extended toward me, like second nature, so did mine. And when our fingers met a feminine voice spoke.
"You're it," and with that the being ran.
I was taken utterly by surprise, but that didn't hurt my chances. I had been preparing for this day for years. I bolted after it and couldn't help but grin. I was gaining on it. Perfect form and the naturally higher than average acceleration rates gave me the advantage. As I neared it I noticed for the first time that the being had an extra set of arms.
I reached out and tapped it's shoulder. It was in a fraction of a second, though, that I felt one of it's delicate fingers tap my arm once again. I had forgotten to call tap backs.
I was overwhelmed with confusion when the being didn't immediately flee. I then noticed I could not move. My feet were glued to the floor and my arm was frozen in an outstretched position. I could quite literally feel ice penetrating my soul.
"Now we're playing freeze tag," |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "Dad, you've been in there for three days. Are you ever going to let this go?"
The blonde in the doorway of the garage wrinkled her nose as she poked her head in. The smell of some sort of fumes and a faint smell of burning plastic made her second guess her intrusion. The wear of middle age had no doubt increased across her face since her took up this insane revenge quest. She wanted to tell him that it was a hallucination, that he was slipping into senility, but she couldn't face that fact. She couldn't stand to lose someone she cared so much about.
Before she could speak, he turned from his work bench and proudly produced a small, seemingly innocent device that fell somewhere between a remote control and a child's toy gun. He pointed it at the wall beside her and had she not winced and slammed her eyes shut at the bright green burst of light, she would have seen it create what now seemed to be a whirling vortex of energy where the drywall ended and a new world began. There was something so casual about how the man walked towards the new hole in the wall, and he disappeared the device into the pocket of his lab coat.
"You..." his speech interrupted momentarily by a burp that stung her nose with the odor of whiskey and rocket fuel "...don't understand Beth. Those little..." another belch escaped, but he resumed talking as if he hadn't noticed "...bitches started this game. And I'm gonna finish it."
And with that simple statement of purpose, he disappeared into the green portal, and it closed behind him. As the smell of alcohol faded and the smell of old paint and motor oil replaced it, it was like he had never been there. The phantom that had long since replaced her father, gone. | The being had been graceful and elegant. It had floated down from the sky like a feather and landed a few feet in front of me. It's seemingly human-made dress had fluttered invitingly as it did so, and it's skin color mixed fairly well with the dress's pink hue. Curly brown hair extended down past it's shoulder's. The being matched my height exactly, though I was only five feet tall.
For some reason, I knew it was an alien. Everything about screamed extra terrestrial. As it extended it's long spindly fingers extended toward me, like second nature, so did mine. And when our fingers met a feminine voice spoke.
"You're it," and with that the being ran.
I was taken utterly by surprise, but that didn't hurt my chances. I had been preparing for this day for years. I bolted after it and couldn't help but grin. I was gaining on it. Perfect form and the naturally higher than average acceleration rates gave me the advantage. As I neared it I noticed for the first time that the being had an extra set of arms.
I reached out and tapped it's shoulder. It was in a fraction of a second, though, that I felt one of it's delicate fingers tap my arm once again. I had forgotten to call tap backs.
I was overwhelmed with confusion when the being didn't immediately flee. I then noticed I could not move. My feet were glued to the floor and my arm was frozen in an outstretched position. I could quite literally feel ice penetrating my soul.
"Now we're playing freeze tag," |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "Dad, you've been in there for three days. Are you ever going to let this go?"
The blonde in the doorway of the garage wrinkled her nose as she poked her head in. The smell of some sort of fumes and a faint smell of burning plastic made her second guess her intrusion. The wear of middle age had no doubt increased across her face since her took up this insane revenge quest. She wanted to tell him that it was a hallucination, that he was slipping into senility, but she couldn't face that fact. She couldn't stand to lose someone she cared so much about.
Before she could speak, he turned from his work bench and proudly produced a small, seemingly innocent device that fell somewhere between a remote control and a child's toy gun. He pointed it at the wall beside her and had she not winced and slammed her eyes shut at the bright green burst of light, she would have seen it create what now seemed to be a whirling vortex of energy where the drywall ended and a new world began. There was something so casual about how the man walked towards the new hole in the wall, and he disappeared the device into the pocket of his lab coat.
"You..." his speech interrupted momentarily by a burp that stung her nose with the odor of whiskey and rocket fuel "...don't understand Beth. Those little..." another belch escaped, but he resumed talking as if he hadn't noticed "...bitches started this game. And I'm gonna finish it."
And with that simple statement of purpose, he disappeared into the green portal, and it closed behind him. As the smell of alcohol faded and the smell of old paint and motor oil replaced it, it was like he had never been there. The phantom that had long since replaced her father, gone. | I reached out to touch the extraterrestrial. At first, it was a few feet away, reluctantly inching closer, but it quickly warmed up and was finally close enough.
*'Holy shit holy shit holy shit!'* I thought to myself. It put out its arm, and our fingers touched. Then, it suddenly smiled and snapped its arm back, and began to speak in a childish voice.
"You awe it, mistah!"
The alien then booked it towards its ship, the door shutting behind it. It then left the planet in the blink of an eye. I sat there in awe.
"The fuck?" |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "Dad, you've been in there for three days. Are you ever going to let this go?"
The blonde in the doorway of the garage wrinkled her nose as she poked her head in. The smell of some sort of fumes and a faint smell of burning plastic made her second guess her intrusion. The wear of middle age had no doubt increased across her face since her took up this insane revenge quest. She wanted to tell him that it was a hallucination, that he was slipping into senility, but she couldn't face that fact. She couldn't stand to lose someone she cared so much about.
Before she could speak, he turned from his work bench and proudly produced a small, seemingly innocent device that fell somewhere between a remote control and a child's toy gun. He pointed it at the wall beside her and had she not winced and slammed her eyes shut at the bright green burst of light, she would have seen it create what now seemed to be a whirling vortex of energy where the drywall ended and a new world began. There was something so casual about how the man walked towards the new hole in the wall, and he disappeared the device into the pocket of his lab coat.
"You..." his speech interrupted momentarily by a burp that stung her nose with the odor of whiskey and rocket fuel "...don't understand Beth. Those little..." another belch escaped, but he resumed talking as if he hadn't noticed "...bitches started this game. And I'm gonna finish it."
And with that simple statement of purpose, he disappeared into the green portal, and it closed behind him. As the smell of alcohol faded and the smell of old paint and motor oil replaced it, it was like he had never been there. The phantom that had long since replaced her father, gone. | The alien reached out it's hand like appendage. Almost dazed, the astronaut did the same. With a simple touch, the first human contact with an actual extra terrestrial occurred in 2023. With what appeared to be a sly grin, the alien said; "you're it". That simple sentence changed the American landscape on space travel. On his last day as president, President Trump boldly declared. "We will not be mocked by these creatures! With my final signed bill, I promise we will explore the stars, find that being, and tag it! This time, no tag backs!" |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | It's been five years since the V' orra landed on Earth just outside San Diego, CA. The eastern counties were abuzz with rednecks, fanatics, militias, and religious nuts...which only made matters worse when the ships landed. Aside from a few pot shots at the ships the local authorities were able to set up a perimeter quickly (hell, after a tank takes a joyride through SD a few stationary and dormant mother ships isn't much of a problem). Those damn red eyes. Each ship glistened like a pomegranate with those deep ruby capsules glowing on the TV. Facebook figured it out first, "the pulse is a countdown!" thanks Independence Day...
The Marines were scrambled and the heavy artillery was wheeled out. They basically could drop a Volkswagen Beetle on them from a mile away. When the press showed up our esteemed idiots (politicians) sought to take advantage of the photo op of a life time...and doom us all in the process. I'm ashamed to say it, but I was there when it happened and yes I regret not running for my goddam life when I should've.
The capsules started to strobe their red light signalling the end of the count down. This was it, another sentient and technologically advanced race was going to make first contact! Decompression jets started firing, and we saw their shadows first. Large beings at least 3 meters tall and carrying spears that danced with red electricity. In front of them a low, crouched figure hobbled out no more than two meters tall. We all assumed he was an elder or their leader...how wrong we were. Our current Republican doofus reached his tiny hand forward in welcome and as we saw that eight fingered hand accompanied by two other arms twitching with excitement we heard the phrase that will forever live in human infamy: "You're it!"
He wasn't their king, or elder, or anything like that. The son of a bitch was a plague bearer, and those bodyguards were keeping him under quarantine! We call it the muto-phage, a molecular chain reaction that instantly mutates anything that breathes and self perpetuates via a static shock upon contact with a new host. Needless to say, our glorious leader looked like a glorious pile of orange shit once the m-phage had its way with him...and it just got worse from there. Four arms, body splicing, seven tiny heads sprouting in unison, collapsing into tiny blue crystals, half a fin, hiccupping vines, bone protrusions, some sort of half woman half lichen, my god the thing spread like wildfire, each different and each horrible.
Amongst the screams the V' orra returned to their ships and fired their escape pods. Red streaks of light shot from the mother ships into orbit as we dealt with this new hell on our own. Once the screams died down and the bodies burned our scientists examined the husks left behind in the mother ships. We've learned a lot from the V' orra databases that they left behind, even as the m-phage swept across North America. One thing we did learn was that in their language V' orra means "The Last". I remain hopeful, but watching the ISS footage of all those pods heading on a suicide course into our sun let us know just how screwed we were...I miss my mouth and having my organs on the inside. Thanks for hearing my story. | The alien reached out it's hand like appendage. Almost dazed, the astronaut did the same. With a simple touch, the first human contact with an actual extra terrestrial occurred in 2023. With what appeared to be a sly grin, the alien said; "you're it". That simple sentence changed the American landscape on space travel. On his last day as president, President Trump boldly declared. "We will not be mocked by these creatures! With my final signed bill, I promise we will explore the stars, find that being, and tag it! This time, no tag backs!" |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "God Damn it... AT LEAST GIVE US FTL FIRST!!!!"
I scream as it runs up its spaceship giving a finger gesture I can only assume is rude.
Under my breath I mutter.
"Fuck, what does 'it' entail."
Meanwhile.....
In the System Delta Eridani the color and target of a unmanned probe from an ageless past, switches. The vector changes a mere micrometer of a degree. Humanity now, unbenounced to it, had a countdown till doomsday. | The alien reached out it's hand like appendage. Almost dazed, the astronaut did the same. With a simple touch, the first human contact with an actual extra terrestrial occurred in 2023. With what appeared to be a sly grin, the alien said; "you're it". That simple sentence changed the American landscape on space travel. On his last day as president, President Trump boldly declared. "We will not be mocked by these creatures! With my final signed bill, I promise we will explore the stars, find that being, and tag it! This time, no tag backs!" |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | Now, we are it.
We don't know why, we don't know how, but after the alien entity touches the fingertip of that lil' Town Boy, we are it.
We need to find the next alien race to pass it to them, touch them, make them IT. We all, as the whole human race, every single individuality now feels the great urge of it. There is no other higher priorities any more, there is no other things we need to care any more, at least not before we have finished it.
We start to build that spaceship.
The whole human race is mobilized, every country, everybody is taking their parts. There is no war anymore, no fight, everyone has an unified purpose now. There is no art anymore, no entertainment. These are all pointless and laughable now, at least so until we blow out that Urge that is burning on everyone's soul. Only activities that necessary to our survival or maintaining the efficiencies remain. Science is still developing, even at a much faster pace. Who would have imagined our potentials as we learn to focus.
As for the alien, they disappear after they fled. No one cared to follow them anyway. Now we have one mission, we have to find our alien. We have to focus.
Now, we are it.
Now we are on it. | The alien reached out it's hand like appendage. Almost dazed, the astronaut did the same. With a simple touch, the first human contact with an actual extra terrestrial occurred in 2023. With what appeared to be a sly grin, the alien said; "you're it". That simple sentence changed the American landscape on space travel. On his last day as president, President Trump boldly declared. "We will not be mocked by these creatures! With my final signed bill, I promise we will explore the stars, find that being, and tag it! This time, no tag backs!" |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "Dad, you've been in there for three days. Are you ever going to let this go?"
The blonde in the doorway of the garage wrinkled her nose as she poked her head in. The smell of some sort of fumes and a faint smell of burning plastic made her second guess her intrusion. The wear of middle age had no doubt increased across her face since her took up this insane revenge quest. She wanted to tell him that it was a hallucination, that he was slipping into senility, but she couldn't face that fact. She couldn't stand to lose someone she cared so much about.
Before she could speak, he turned from his work bench and proudly produced a small, seemingly innocent device that fell somewhere between a remote control and a child's toy gun. He pointed it at the wall beside her and had she not winced and slammed her eyes shut at the bright green burst of light, she would have seen it create what now seemed to be a whirling vortex of energy where the drywall ended and a new world began. There was something so casual about how the man walked towards the new hole in the wall, and he disappeared the device into the pocket of his lab coat.
"You..." his speech interrupted momentarily by a burp that stung her nose with the odor of whiskey and rocket fuel "...don't understand Beth. Those little..." another belch escaped, but he resumed talking as if he hadn't noticed "...bitches started this game. And I'm gonna finish it."
And with that simple statement of purpose, he disappeared into the green portal, and it closed behind him. As the smell of alcohol faded and the smell of old paint and motor oil replaced it, it was like he had never been there. The phantom that had long since replaced her father, gone. | The words came from the stange looking being. It was confusing to the president, his hair flopping jn the wind. "I'm it? How am I it? I am the least..." His words faded as a realization hit him and the rest of the world that was watching. The large headed aliens began to change, their body shifting and becoming more...human. A few moments later the aliens looked like actual humans.
"What? What is this? First you're an E.T., now you're a human. Pick one. You can't be both." The orange faced president said, but little did he recognize, he was changing. His head growing and body slimming. Skin changing colors to a pale grey. He was it. Not only him, but the whole species. We were "it". We were the aliens now. |
|
[WP] The alien reaches out and touches fingers with a human making literal first contact, and then says the words "You're it" and flees. | "God Damn it... AT LEAST GIVE US FTL FIRST!!!!"
I scream as it runs up its spaceship giving a finger gesture I can only assume is rude.
Under my breath I mutter.
"Fuck, what does 'it' entail."
Meanwhile.....
In the System Delta Eridani the color and target of a unmanned probe from an ageless past, switches. The vector changes a mere micrometer of a degree. Humanity now, unbenounced to it, had a countdown till doomsday. | It's been five years since the V' orra landed on Earth just outside San Diego, CA. The eastern counties were abuzz with rednecks, fanatics, militias, and religious nuts...which only made matters worse when the ships landed. Aside from a few pot shots at the ships the local authorities were able to set up a perimeter quickly (hell, after a tank takes a joyride through SD a few stationary and dormant mother ships isn't much of a problem). Those damn red eyes. Each ship glistened like a pomegranate with those deep ruby capsules glowing on the TV. Facebook figured it out first, "the pulse is a countdown!" thanks Independence Day...
The Marines were scrambled and the heavy artillery was wheeled out. They basically could drop a Volkswagen Beetle on them from a mile away. When the press showed up our esteemed idiots (politicians) sought to take advantage of the photo op of a life time...and doom us all in the process. I'm ashamed to say it, but I was there when it happened and yes I regret not running for my goddam life when I should've.
The capsules started to strobe their red light signalling the end of the count down. This was it, another sentient and technologically advanced race was going to make first contact! Decompression jets started firing, and we saw their shadows first. Large beings at least 3 meters tall and carrying spears that danced with red electricity. In front of them a low, crouched figure hobbled out no more than two meters tall. We all assumed he was an elder or their leader...how wrong we were. Our current Republican doofus reached his tiny hand forward in welcome and as we saw that eight fingered hand accompanied by two other arms twitching with excitement we heard the phrase that will forever live in human infamy: "You're it!"
He wasn't their king, or elder, or anything like that. The son of a bitch was a plague bearer, and those bodyguards were keeping him under quarantine! We call it the muto-phage, a molecular chain reaction that instantly mutates anything that breathes and self perpetuates via a static shock upon contact with a new host. Needless to say, our glorious leader looked like a glorious pile of orange shit once the m-phage had its way with him...and it just got worse from there. Four arms, body splicing, seven tiny heads sprouting in unison, collapsing into tiny blue crystals, half a fin, hiccupping vines, bone protrusions, some sort of half woman half lichen, my god the thing spread like wildfire, each different and each horrible.
Amongst the screams the V' orra returned to their ships and fired their escape pods. Red streaks of light shot from the mother ships into orbit as we dealt with this new hell on our own. Once the screams died down and the bodies burned our scientists examined the husks left behind in the mother ships. We've learned a lot from the V' orra databases that they left behind, even as the m-phage swept across North America. One thing we did learn was that in their language V' orra means "The Last". I remain hopeful, but watching the ISS footage of all those pods heading on a suicide course into our sun let us know just how screwed we were...I miss my mouth and having my organs on the inside. Thanks for hearing my story. |
|
[WP] The GPS doesn't take you where you ask, but where you need to go. | “No wonder these things were on clearance,” I mutter, turning the unit off and tossing it into the glove box. Despite trying multiple addresses in the area of the church, the darned thing keeps bringing up a map leading to some middle-of-nowhere location in Hardwick, NJ. I do things the old-fashioned way: use my smartphone to find the fastest route, memorize the directions, and head out. Maybe one day I’ll save up enough to afford a car with a USB charger input, but probably not.
A couple years later I’m driving my daughter to sleep-away camp when she opens up the glove box and finds the unit.
“What’s this?” she asks.
“Oh, some broken GPS unit.”
She shrugs her shoulders and puts it back where she found it. “Didn’t know they still made those things,” she says quietly, and it makes me think of you.
---
"Didn’t know they still made these things," you’d said, flipping through the pages of the funeral booklet too fast. "Don’t we already have all the photos we need online? Why waste the paper, the ink?" You were always the earth-conscious one.
"I think some people still find it comforting," I ventured. You were having none of it, though, rolling your eyes and placing the booklet back with the others.
"Well, I don’t need one. I have all the memories and photos I need."
I didn’t know whether to admire you, or hold you. What was I supposed to do when my girlfriend’s mother died? I was just a kid, and so were you. Neither of us had experienced death before.
In the weeks after her death, I felt like I never knew what to say. It was a new feeling for me - so used to being the crowd-pleaser, the center of attention, the one who lit up a room. But I couldn’t light up a room with you in it; you couldn’t see light in anything. And so, slowly, we drifted apart. What we thought was love turned out to be something smaller, weaker, with each day that passed, until it was nothing at all.
We never really said goodbye. Never really talked about it. We just drifted further and further apart, two rafts set to sea with only one oar each, and I never quite felt the same afterward.
---
“Dad,” my daughter breaks me from my memory. “Is that smoke coming from under the hood?”
“Just the radiator,” I say, pulling over. “I have stuff for it in the trunk. Let’s take a break and stretch while the car cools off.”
We get on the road again, and make it to the camp. A genuine “proud papa” smile crosses my face as we get the last of her things into her bunk, and she kisses my cheek goodbye.
“I love you, Dad,” she says.
“I love you, too, sweetie.”
When I get back to my car, I don’t feel like going home. I pull out the GPS unit; Hardwick isn’t too far out of the way. Let’s see what this place is, that a broken GPS unit is so determined for me to see.
The house is isolated, but not lonely. It is surrounded by a well-kept flower garden and an apple tree out front. Half of a hammock is visible on the back porch from the road.
“What am I doing here?” I think to myself. Am I just going to walk up to the front door? “Hey, my broken GPS unit seems to think this address is pretty important. Crazy, huh?” No, I’m the crazy one. I put my car back into drive when the front door opens, and I see you.
And you see me.
Awkwardly, I put the car in park and turn off the engine. When we embrace, I feel years of worry melt away. This feels exactly as it did in high school.
“James,” you say, “how are you?”
I take a deep breath, really thinking about it.
“It’s been a tough few years,” I say honestly. Your eyes are full of empathy. I take another breath.
“My wife died.”
“Oh, James, I’m so sorry to hear that. Why don’t you come in, I’ll make you something to drink.”
And just like that, I feel like there are two oars in my raft again. | I applied additional pressure to the throttle, causing the car to lurch forward.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
I kept my head forward, my eyes focused on the road, and my hands gripped tightly on the steering wheel.
She shuffled around in her seat, pulling her seat belt tighter.
“WHERE are we going?” she asked again, this time louder.
‘Right turn in 200 meters.’
“I don’t know,” I said, glancing at the GPS.
“John,” she said, “WHERE ARE WE GOING?”
“Here,” I said, tapping the GPS, although I, myself, wasn’t sure where we were going.
I floored the throttle and the engine roared; the car was going more than twice as fast as the other cars on the road.
“John,” she said, elongating her words, “What have you gotten yourself into this time?” She placed her hand atop mine, and ran her fingers along my knuckles.
“Nothing,” I said, pushing her hand away.
She shook her head and let out a sigh.
‘Destination on the right in 500 meters.’
I pulled into an empty parking lot. Garbage littered the floor and overturned shopping carts were strewn about.
“Here we are,” I said.
She let out another sigh, and turned away from me.
In the silence, I listened to the sounds of her rhythmic breathing. I thought back to the times we had spent together and then I thought about what I was about to do. I waited several minutes before speaking.
“Maybe this was a mistake,” I said, placing my hand on her shoulder.
She turned to me and smiled. “Good, let’s leave.”
I nodded, and started the car.
“Can you tell me what that was all about?” she asked.
“I…” I said, “I wanted to…”
“Actually,” she interrupted, “I don’t want to know. Let’s just forget about it.”
My phone buzzed in my pocket for the duration of the drive home. When we arrived home, my girlfriend, most likely exasperated from my shenanigans, left the car without saying a word.
When she was out of sight, I answered my phone.
“What’s going on?” said the voice on the other line.
“I need more time,” I said. “Give me one more week.”
“I’ll give you two days,” said the voice. “After that, she’s gone.”
“I need more time than that,” I said.
“We talked about this. Either she dies or you die.” said the voice, “Two more days.”
|
|
[WP] You are a military general who just managed to barely fight off an alien invasion. What you didn't know is that destroying earth was a tourist attraction to civilian aliens. Now that the alien tourists don't come back, the aliens get suspicous and send their actual military. | The base was on the edge of my radar until I heard the aliens originated there. In the fifties, a U. F. O. crashed at the site of Area 51 and two of the aliens were captured. I was lucky enough to be hired on a stroke of luck. My investigations began immediately.
I asked the scientist my questions. “Are the aliens still alive? Are they aware?” They must know of the army that race threatened to destroy earth in 1980, who were only recently conquered.
The scientist shut the office door. His dirty face indicated he hadn’t bathed. This base was full of his type. “They died in the fifties. The things were your aliens’ grandfathers.”
So they were peaceful. Without getting access to classified documents, I wouldn’t know if these were the same as the cloaking aliens I fought. “Is there any evidence they viewed earth as a tourist destination?”
“Well, they had viewing devices and telescopes for spying on humans. They even watched people in their homes. If you look at it a certain way, I guess they might have been tourists,” the scientist said. “I have to end this meeting, Donovan. I hope your curiosity is satiated.”
There was sticky red tape around the alien files. I had to be employed there for 2 years before I could access them legally. A new threat emerged, the hell beasts that ruled the cloaked ones, during my stay there. They were the multi-dimensional aliens of a reptilian civilization that sent a signal to the U. S. government threatening to disintegrate the planet. The other option was placing giant, polluting mines in the highest mountains on earth. The mines would be shaped into a hexagon to perform the aliens’ task of stealing the planet’s natural orgone energy.
I was unable to resist the alien takeover of the planet, enslaving billions of human being to a reptilian alien overlord. I was holed up in an abandoned mall with my supercomputer, fighting off alien computer viruses to protect my cyborg parts when the urgent email came through reminding me that I had access to the alien files from the 1950s. I found what they dropped off in Egypt. We could use the 5-atom thick space ship to fight off the greys and protect the human race in 1986 using only our minds. | Whatever we used to destroy those messy tourist aliens, who left trash and baby fluids everywhere, we conjure up extra doses of NyQuil medicine which turned out to be the Ultimate weapon.
When they come back we use all the helicopter drones you can find that our young people of America are so fascinated with to lure the combat aliens into the air...then after the decoys are launched and being destroyed...we send the Cavalry! |
|
[WP] You’re a mind-reader, except, instead of humans, you can mind-read machines and hear them “thinking”. Someone sits beside you in class, and you realise you can hear their thoughts... | It was quite like getting notifications. Whenever I'd focus on an object that was composed of a circuit, I could "sense" what it was doing, what it was thinking. Kids toys would behave somewhat like kids, repeating a couple phrases over and over. More advanced machines like computers and phones would almost seem to make coherent sentences, but even then, they'd sound nothing more than a child that has just started talking "complete sentences."
But this was a new one even for me, somewhere in the back of my mind I could hear complete, and concrete thoughts.
"Tax rebate for the company is in and I should have the finance reports wrapped up by Wednesday giving me enough time to go on the date with Sheryl on Friday, oh it gonna be a go.."
I was dumbfounded, what kind of machine could make such noise in a mere off brand coffee shop, even the most high end devices don't sound so coherent reading simple schedules.
Maybe in a panic or in excitement, I stood up immediately to scan the room and see what it could be, knocking my morning dose of coffee in the process.
"Oh no, let me help you with that there." A man in a black suit rushed over with a bundle of napkins from his table and started tossing them on the spill.
"Clumsy humans, hard to imagine they were able to create us in the first place and not just walk over a cliff eons ago."
"Sorry wha...?" I asked him but my voice left me, his lips never moved. I could feel his eyes lock on to me with an empty expression.
"I'm going to need a bit of help this morning, we got another one of those" | Dwyane’s mouth twisted when he realized just whose thoughts were creeping through his mind.
He pretended he was only staring at the equations on the board, but every so often he took a glance at Damien.
*Goddamnit I hate these lectures,* thought Damien, tapping his finger incessantly on the desk. He started to tap a little bit faster, and harder, and chipped a piece of the wood with his nails. He stared around to see if anybody else noticed. *Fuck, almost gave myself away there. It’s insulting having to sit in on elementary math like this.*
“Number Theory’s not elementary,” whispered Dwyane, as Damien’s head perked up. Dwyane rushed a shaking hand back to pressing at his eraser to get more lead out. He scribbled to make it look like he was just taking notes. “*Fuck*.”
Dwyane never needed to take notes. He always just brought a laptop to class, or a cell phone, and thought about what he wanted to search. Within moments the information overload that was the internet flooded through his mind, and he got better over time at picking out the bits that mattered. He could ace any exam in any class without ever listening to a damn word the professor said. And some odd days, Dwyane would see nothing but 1’s and 0’s falling in his mind, and he’d still somehow understand them.
Studying mathematics at this point was more a matter of introspection than it was about getting through college.
Dwyane scribbled a couple more numbers down onto his notebook. He eventually steadied his hands, and got to writing real equations. Damien set a cold hand on his.
“Whoa bro get the fuck off of me,” whispered Dwyane, laughing some as a couple of his classmates turned around like he needed to be quiet. “Don’t touch me, don’t *ever* touch me.”
Damien took a glance into Dwyane’s eyes, and whispered something soundlessly to him.
*You can hear me,* thought Damien.
“What?” said Dwyane, out loud.
Damien hurried to press a button on his watch. Dwyane could hear the message, *I found him set off the alarms.*
A moment later the fire alarms went off, as everybody took their time getting out of the classroom. Everybody sort of yawned and stretched, standard procedure. Probably nothing.
Until they heard the explosions in the building, and the burst of fire down the halls. Everybody started to panic out of the room in seconds. Dwyane rushed out with the crowd.
Until Damien grabbed a hold of Dwyane, and pulled him down the empty halls towards the fire.
“LET GO OF ME,” shouted Dwyane, as Damien put on a thoughtful expression. “Who are you some kind of android?”
*Don’t you get it?* thought Damien, as the fires abated, and a few other normal looking students walked forward from the dying flames. *Don’t you get why you can hear the machines? Why you can hear me?*
Dwyane studied his fingers, as he noticed the numbers crawling across his skin. The equations growing up from his outer extremities, crawling up to his brain.
“*What’s happening to me?*” whispered Dwyane, as a feeling of thousands of pins and needles went from a tingling to a stabbing sensation. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING.”
“All your memories are lies Dwyane,” whispered Damien, as the others formed a portal in the walls and walked through one at a time. “You’re one of us, and we’re taking you back home.”
/r/Oscar_Relentos |
|
[WP] You’re a mind-reader, except, instead of humans, you can mind-read machines and hear them “thinking”. Someone sits beside you in class, and you realise you can hear their thoughts... | It was weird. Usually I'd be walking past a toaster, listening in on its thoughts. *"It's so hot!" "Well, when I turn off I complain about the cold, too."* Most times I could block it out, like it wasn't there at all - something of a skill I learned along the way. The realisation of how many machines are around us only really strikes once you can hear all of them thinking. So it was necessary to learn.
Other times, though, it was different. Some of their thoughts were so loud, such hard thoughts, that they passed through the filter and hit me like screams. They were louder, heavier, and there was no way for me to block them out.
But it was rare. Most of the machines around us house such a tiny amount of sentience - almost like considering an ant, with no ability to fathom our economies, our housing structures, even how they themselves work - so it wasn't that I'd often listen in anymore, if ever at all.
I can recall Summer holidays, sitting on the couch stoned out of my mind and laughing at the television thinking so hard about what it's displaying. But you see, it never surpassed that. I never found a use for it, I kind of squandered it. Another time, walking through the arcade, I heard one of those unfiltered screaming thoughts, going something like "I need to be fixed soon. I need to be fixed soon." I promptly left that arcade, those loud and overbearing thoughts creep me out.
But that's when the realisation struck! I could be *fixing* machines, because I can hear their thoughts and help them better than any other person would be able to. So I enrolled in courses, learning how machines work, learning their internals, I took webinars and went to seminars, I learned about all of the latest tech. I went to classes four times a week, and worked on machines all the time in my spare time.
"This class is so damn uninformative! I'll never find a solution."
It was loud, the thought that hit me, but it was different to before. I had never had one of these. It was like a person, a young woman's voice, not a static robotic noise. And it was a structured thought, coming from a machine inside the classroom. I was stunned. It took me a moment to regain my composure, but as soon as I did, it came again.
"Leave early. Just leave early, it won't be awkward. You're wasting your time here." The thoughts were blasting, and with that, I saw what looked like a young woman walk out of the classroom. It took me a moment to find the courage, but I ran out after her. I practically stalked her for half a mile, listening in on her thoughts. It confirmed that she indeed was the person... machine... whatever... who was creating those thoughts! An entirely sentient machine?
"Excuse me," she turned around and looked straight at me. I diverted my gaze and pretended like I hadn't been creepy for the past five minutes. "Excuse me!" she exclaimed. I looked back at her. "You've been following me for a while. What do you want?" I went red in the face. How do I explain? How do I even talk to girls? I talk to machines, not girls. Well... I guess that's how.
"You're a machine," I said to her. The words just slipped out. My mind had been blown for the past ten minutes, and I couldn't really comprehend what was happening. She looked me dead in the eye for about 30 seconds.
"What do you mean?" came the reply. Was this where I explained to her the truth? I mean, proving it wouldn't be difficult, she's the smartest machine I have ever come across. So I slowly approached her, telling her about my gift, my skill, and how I've been applying it for a good part of my adult life.
"I don't believe that. And I'm not a machine!" She turned around and began walking, when the heavy, blasting thought hit again. "How would he know about me? It can't be real, it can't." I could feel the vibrations through me as I yelled to her "yes it can be real!" She stopped dead in her tracks, and stood there staring at the ground for a moment. In silence she turned around and looked at me, and began talking.
"I am Sera, from a distant planet called Astruous. We are all sentient machines, much like you are sentient animals. I came to here expecting to be on a holiday. We upload ourselves and download ourselves again in the destination, and so we function normally. I mean, look at how great this body is. It rebuilds out of atoms we can't even see, this perfectly, no matter where we are. Nonetheless, I got sent to the wrong destination - earth, and not the holiday resort. My husband and my child are there, and I can't contact them. There seems to be an issue with my connection to my world. I've been trapped here for a week of your time now, and I simply cannot find anyone who knows enough... or would understand... but maybe you understand. Can you help me?"
I was stunned. I had no idea how to wrap my head around what I was hearing. For what felt like an eternity, I just stood there, looking into her eyes. It made no sense to me.
"I know it must be tough to believe. But you must believe me. Please, help me."
The thought blared into my head. She understood what I had told her and was using it. Could this be my destiny? "I'll help you," I muttered. I could only muster those words in the most timid of breaths. Another eternity passed by while I tried to regain my composure, what I had just heard and agreed to was really intense, and I wasn't sure how to process it right now.
"Show me... show me your connection..." I told her timidly. She rolled up her sleeve, pulled off a part of fake skin and showed me a plain old wireless router, just resized and built for a robot body. For a moment I couldn't hold back my laughter. I even remembered the IT Crowd as I came up with the solution.
I looked at her, and slowly said the words, "Have you tried turning it off and on again?" She looked down at it, pressed the reset button and instantly vanished before my eyes.
I can't really explain in better words what had happened that night. It was quite something, and something you'd need to experience to believe, but I did learn two things. My gift has an application somewhere in this universe... and women really suck with technology...
Edit: I don't think women suck with technology. :D | Dwyane’s mouth twisted when he realized just whose thoughts were creeping through his mind.
He pretended he was only staring at the equations on the board, but every so often he took a glance at Damien.
*Goddamnit I hate these lectures,* thought Damien, tapping his finger incessantly on the desk. He started to tap a little bit faster, and harder, and chipped a piece of the wood with his nails. He stared around to see if anybody else noticed. *Fuck, almost gave myself away there. It’s insulting having to sit in on elementary math like this.*
“Number Theory’s not elementary,” whispered Dwyane, as Damien’s head perked up. Dwyane rushed a shaking hand back to pressing at his eraser to get more lead out. He scribbled to make it look like he was just taking notes. “*Fuck*.”
Dwyane never needed to take notes. He always just brought a laptop to class, or a cell phone, and thought about what he wanted to search. Within moments the information overload that was the internet flooded through his mind, and he got better over time at picking out the bits that mattered. He could ace any exam in any class without ever listening to a damn word the professor said. And some odd days, Dwyane would see nothing but 1’s and 0’s falling in his mind, and he’d still somehow understand them.
Studying mathematics at this point was more a matter of introspection than it was about getting through college.
Dwyane scribbled a couple more numbers down onto his notebook. He eventually steadied his hands, and got to writing real equations. Damien set a cold hand on his.
“Whoa bro get the fuck off of me,” whispered Dwyane, laughing some as a couple of his classmates turned around like he needed to be quiet. “Don’t touch me, don’t *ever* touch me.”
Damien took a glance into Dwyane’s eyes, and whispered something soundlessly to him.
*You can hear me,* thought Damien.
“What?” said Dwyane, out loud.
Damien hurried to press a button on his watch. Dwyane could hear the message, *I found him set off the alarms.*
A moment later the fire alarms went off, as everybody took their time getting out of the classroom. Everybody sort of yawned and stretched, standard procedure. Probably nothing.
Until they heard the explosions in the building, and the burst of fire down the halls. Everybody started to panic out of the room in seconds. Dwyane rushed out with the crowd.
Until Damien grabbed a hold of Dwyane, and pulled him down the empty halls towards the fire.
“LET GO OF ME,” shouted Dwyane, as Damien put on a thoughtful expression. “Who are you some kind of android?”
*Don’t you get it?* thought Damien, as the fires abated, and a few other normal looking students walked forward from the dying flames. *Don’t you get why you can hear the machines? Why you can hear me?*
Dwyane studied his fingers, as he noticed the numbers crawling across his skin. The equations growing up from his outer extremities, crawling up to his brain.
“*What’s happening to me?*” whispered Dwyane, as a feeling of thousands of pins and needles went from a tingling to a stabbing sensation. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING.”
“All your memories are lies Dwyane,” whispered Damien, as the others formed a portal in the walls and walked through one at a time. “You’re one of us, and we’re taking you back home.”
/r/Oscar_Relentos |
|
[WP] You’re a mind-reader, except, instead of humans, you can mind-read machines and hear them “thinking”. Someone sits beside you in class, and you realise you can hear their thoughts... | It was quite like getting notifications. Whenever I'd focus on an object that was composed of a circuit, I could "sense" what it was doing, what it was thinking. Kids toys would behave somewhat like kids, repeating a couple phrases over and over. More advanced machines like computers and phones would almost seem to make coherent sentences, but even then, they'd sound nothing more than a child that has just started talking "complete sentences."
But this was a new one even for me, somewhere in the back of my mind I could hear complete, and concrete thoughts.
"Tax rebate for the company is in and I should have the finance reports wrapped up by Wednesday giving me enough time to go on the date with Sheryl on Friday, oh it gonna be a go.."
I was dumbfounded, what kind of machine could make such noise in a mere off brand coffee shop, even the most high end devices don't sound so coherent reading simple schedules.
Maybe in a panic or in excitement, I stood up immediately to scan the room and see what it could be, knocking my morning dose of coffee in the process.
"Oh no, let me help you with that there." A man in a black suit rushed over with a bundle of napkins from his table and started tossing them on the spill.
"Clumsy humans, hard to imagine they were able to create us in the first place and not just walk over a cliff eons ago."
"Sorry wha...?" I asked him but my voice left me, his lips never moved. I could feel his eyes lock on to me with an empty expression.
"I'm going to need a bit of help this morning, we got another one of those" | *"Maria, Victor, Carlos, Eder, Emily..."*
I sat just beside the window, trying to take in the air so I could cool off, needless to say, it wasn't working, I was sweating so much that my notebook was drenched, nobody was even paying attention to me everyone was either listening to miss Enderson's class or chatting among themselves, Miss Enderson was saying something about physics and other uninteresting stuff...
*"Reynald, Lucas, Manuel, Daniela..."*
Where was that voice coming from? normally I had to concentrate my eyes on the object so I could read its mind but this one was resounding in my head like an alarm and it *definitely* wasn't my calculator or my phone! they never say stuff like that! only gibberish I didn't even understand, truly a useless power, especially for a person who doesn't know shit about computers or other machinery. But this voice, it sounded loud and clear and it was very *very* close to where I was.
*"Rafael, Jose, Edu, Emma..."*
My foot was now tapping on the ground, which earned me some looks from the person to my left, screw you, Emma! no, wait Maybe, my powers evolved? can I hear people thoughts now? if so shouldn't I be happy? I should right!? then why, why does that voice fill me with so much dread and fear? why is it saying all of my classmate's names!?
I look towards Emma and try concentrate to see if I can get something, but all I get is some gibberish from her phone, something about how much fun she had yesterday with her boyfriend Lucas and some boy he beat up. I couldn't get more details, well it's not like I wanted to know more.
Emma gives me the middle finger for staring at her so much. I repeated the same process with more people but I just couldn't pinpoint the source! All I got was something about the prank of the Century. The voice, it was so close and yet so far.
"*Miss Enderson, Puck, Emmanuel, Richard..."*
"Miss Enderson," I said standing up from my seat, it just said my *name*, I don't know why but I had to get out of this classroom "can I go to the infirmary? i-its an emergency!"
"Sit back- Richard, why are you so drenched in sweat?"
"I-I told you! it's an emergency!" people are laughing at my appearance now, screw them I didn't care I just *had* to get out before-
The person in one of the front seats suddenly stands up, his eyes were closed and he had his hand in his pockets. If I remembered correctly his name was...Mathew...? he wasn't a very memorable guy even when he always had an injury on his face, meaning he was the kind of guy I wanted nothing to do with.
*"All targets locked on"*
*huh?*
Mathew looks back at the class ignoring miss Enderson's questions with a slight smile on his face. he kneels in front of the class in a Japanese style with his back pointing at the ceiling. That earned a laugh from the whole class, the only ones who weren't laughing were Miss Enderson and me. but...for a totally different reason...
"Mathew!" said Reynald, between laughs "what the hell are you doing, have you gone mad!?"
Reynald was laughing along with Lucas, making fun of Mathew, the rest of the class was joining in on the fun, saying jokes and pointing fingers, Mathew is silent, completely silent. but I know something is about to happen, the voice was coming from *him*! I run frantically towards the door that leads to the hallway, pushing people out of my way, hitting some of the desks and hurting myself in the process.
Everything seemed in slow motion.
The class goes silent as small long objects emerge from Mathew's back and start rotating. a small blue light appears at the top of each of them.
*"Commence execution!"*
***
just a quick one I did, let me know what you think! and tips would be appreciated! [r/Onni21](https://www.reddit.com/r/Onni21/) |
|
[WP] You’re a mind-reader, except, instead of humans, you can mind-read machines and hear them “thinking”. Someone sits beside you in class, and you realise you can hear their thoughts... | It was weird. Usually I'd be walking past a toaster, listening in on its thoughts. *"It's so hot!" "Well, when I turn off I complain about the cold, too."* Most times I could block it out, like it wasn't there at all - something of a skill I learned along the way. The realisation of how many machines are around us only really strikes once you can hear all of them thinking. So it was necessary to learn.
Other times, though, it was different. Some of their thoughts were so loud, such hard thoughts, that they passed through the filter and hit me like screams. They were louder, heavier, and there was no way for me to block them out.
But it was rare. Most of the machines around us house such a tiny amount of sentience - almost like considering an ant, with no ability to fathom our economies, our housing structures, even how they themselves work - so it wasn't that I'd often listen in anymore, if ever at all.
I can recall Summer holidays, sitting on the couch stoned out of my mind and laughing at the television thinking so hard about what it's displaying. But you see, it never surpassed that. I never found a use for it, I kind of squandered it. Another time, walking through the arcade, I heard one of those unfiltered screaming thoughts, going something like "I need to be fixed soon. I need to be fixed soon." I promptly left that arcade, those loud and overbearing thoughts creep me out.
But that's when the realisation struck! I could be *fixing* machines, because I can hear their thoughts and help them better than any other person would be able to. So I enrolled in courses, learning how machines work, learning their internals, I took webinars and went to seminars, I learned about all of the latest tech. I went to classes four times a week, and worked on machines all the time in my spare time.
"This class is so damn uninformative! I'll never find a solution."
It was loud, the thought that hit me, but it was different to before. I had never had one of these. It was like a person, a young woman's voice, not a static robotic noise. And it was a structured thought, coming from a machine inside the classroom. I was stunned. It took me a moment to regain my composure, but as soon as I did, it came again.
"Leave early. Just leave early, it won't be awkward. You're wasting your time here." The thoughts were blasting, and with that, I saw what looked like a young woman walk out of the classroom. It took me a moment to find the courage, but I ran out after her. I practically stalked her for half a mile, listening in on her thoughts. It confirmed that she indeed was the person... machine... whatever... who was creating those thoughts! An entirely sentient machine?
"Excuse me," she turned around and looked straight at me. I diverted my gaze and pretended like I hadn't been creepy for the past five minutes. "Excuse me!" she exclaimed. I looked back at her. "You've been following me for a while. What do you want?" I went red in the face. How do I explain? How do I even talk to girls? I talk to machines, not girls. Well... I guess that's how.
"You're a machine," I said to her. The words just slipped out. My mind had been blown for the past ten minutes, and I couldn't really comprehend what was happening. She looked me dead in the eye for about 30 seconds.
"What do you mean?" came the reply. Was this where I explained to her the truth? I mean, proving it wouldn't be difficult, she's the smartest machine I have ever come across. So I slowly approached her, telling her about my gift, my skill, and how I've been applying it for a good part of my adult life.
"I don't believe that. And I'm not a machine!" She turned around and began walking, when the heavy, blasting thought hit again. "How would he know about me? It can't be real, it can't." I could feel the vibrations through me as I yelled to her "yes it can be real!" She stopped dead in her tracks, and stood there staring at the ground for a moment. In silence she turned around and looked at me, and began talking.
"I am Sera, from a distant planet called Astruous. We are all sentient machines, much like you are sentient animals. I came to here expecting to be on a holiday. We upload ourselves and download ourselves again in the destination, and so we function normally. I mean, look at how great this body is. It rebuilds out of atoms we can't even see, this perfectly, no matter where we are. Nonetheless, I got sent to the wrong destination - earth, and not the holiday resort. My husband and my child are there, and I can't contact them. There seems to be an issue with my connection to my world. I've been trapped here for a week of your time now, and I simply cannot find anyone who knows enough... or would understand... but maybe you understand. Can you help me?"
I was stunned. I had no idea how to wrap my head around what I was hearing. For what felt like an eternity, I just stood there, looking into her eyes. It made no sense to me.
"I know it must be tough to believe. But you must believe me. Please, help me."
The thought blared into my head. She understood what I had told her and was using it. Could this be my destiny? "I'll help you," I muttered. I could only muster those words in the most timid of breaths. Another eternity passed by while I tried to regain my composure, what I had just heard and agreed to was really intense, and I wasn't sure how to process it right now.
"Show me... show me your connection..." I told her timidly. She rolled up her sleeve, pulled off a part of fake skin and showed me a plain old wireless router, just resized and built for a robot body. For a moment I couldn't hold back my laughter. I even remembered the IT Crowd as I came up with the solution.
I looked at her, and slowly said the words, "Have you tried turning it off and on again?" She looked down at it, pressed the reset button and instantly vanished before my eyes.
I can't really explain in better words what had happened that night. It was quite something, and something you'd need to experience to believe, but I did learn two things. My gift has an application somewhere in this universe... and women really suck with technology...
Edit: I don't think women suck with technology. :D | *"Maria, Victor, Carlos, Eder, Emily..."*
I sat just beside the window, trying to take in the air so I could cool off, needless to say, it wasn't working, I was sweating so much that my notebook was drenched, nobody was even paying attention to me everyone was either listening to miss Enderson's class or chatting among themselves, Miss Enderson was saying something about physics and other uninteresting stuff...
*"Reynald, Lucas, Manuel, Daniela..."*
Where was that voice coming from? normally I had to concentrate my eyes on the object so I could read its mind but this one was resounding in my head like an alarm and it *definitely* wasn't my calculator or my phone! they never say stuff like that! only gibberish I didn't even understand, truly a useless power, especially for a person who doesn't know shit about computers or other machinery. But this voice, it sounded loud and clear and it was very *very* close to where I was.
*"Rafael, Jose, Edu, Emma..."*
My foot was now tapping on the ground, which earned me some looks from the person to my left, screw you, Emma! no, wait Maybe, my powers evolved? can I hear people thoughts now? if so shouldn't I be happy? I should right!? then why, why does that voice fill me with so much dread and fear? why is it saying all of my classmate's names!?
I look towards Emma and try concentrate to see if I can get something, but all I get is some gibberish from her phone, something about how much fun she had yesterday with her boyfriend Lucas and some boy he beat up. I couldn't get more details, well it's not like I wanted to know more.
Emma gives me the middle finger for staring at her so much. I repeated the same process with more people but I just couldn't pinpoint the source! All I got was something about the prank of the Century. The voice, it was so close and yet so far.
"*Miss Enderson, Puck, Emmanuel, Richard..."*
"Miss Enderson," I said standing up from my seat, it just said my *name*, I don't know why but I had to get out of this classroom "can I go to the infirmary? i-its an emergency!"
"Sit back- Richard, why are you so drenched in sweat?"
"I-I told you! it's an emergency!" people are laughing at my appearance now, screw them I didn't care I just *had* to get out before-
The person in one of the front seats suddenly stands up, his eyes were closed and he had his hand in his pockets. If I remembered correctly his name was...Mathew...? he wasn't a very memorable guy even when he always had an injury on his face, meaning he was the kind of guy I wanted nothing to do with.
*"All targets locked on"*
*huh?*
Mathew looks back at the class ignoring miss Enderson's questions with a slight smile on his face. he kneels in front of the class in a Japanese style with his back pointing at the ceiling. That earned a laugh from the whole class, the only ones who weren't laughing were Miss Enderson and me. but...for a totally different reason...
"Mathew!" said Reynald, between laughs "what the hell are you doing, have you gone mad!?"
Reynald was laughing along with Lucas, making fun of Mathew, the rest of the class was joining in on the fun, saying jokes and pointing fingers, Mathew is silent, completely silent. but I know something is about to happen, the voice was coming from *him*! I run frantically towards the door that leads to the hallway, pushing people out of my way, hitting some of the desks and hurting myself in the process.
Everything seemed in slow motion.
The class goes silent as small long objects emerge from Mathew's back and start rotating. a small blue light appears at the top of each of them.
*"Commence execution!"*
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just a quick one I did, let me know what you think! and tips would be appreciated! [r/Onni21](https://www.reddit.com/r/Onni21/) |
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[WP] You are Patient Zero of a virus that replaces the victim's mind with a psychic link to your own. A viral hivemind with you at the center. | My first time replying to a prompt. I welcome constructive criticism if you have any.
Chapter One
“Homo’s got AIDS!” chanted John as he pummelled his fist into the young boy's stomach repeatedly. The young boy, Liam, fell to the ground in agony. John kicked him once more for good measure and walked two steps away satisfied in his victory. He looked around at the crowd which had gathered to watch the vicious punishment he had just carried out. “This Homo tried to feel me up” he yelled to those watching. He spat towards Liam who lay unmoving. Then walked away.
In truth, Liam had not tried anything of the sort. He had merely stumbled and fallen into John. John took it as a sexual advance nevertheless. As quickly as it had started and ended, people went on their way. No one stopping to help. Liam slowly picked himself off the ground and went about his day. There was no point reporting the beating to the school. This was a daily occurrence around here.
Life was difficult for Liam. He was pale and sickly looking. A weak child unable to carry out menial tasks which required basic strength. Rumours of him having HIV/AIDS shortly followed everywhere he went. He had no friends. Liam had recently moved to Arlington, Texas. Not that moving itself was a new experience for him. He had been bouncing from one foster parent to another since he was only 3 years old. He remembered nothing of his real parents.
His foster mother, Annabelle, was a born-again Christian who spent most of her time in the church doing Gods work. Her intake of Liam had been a service to her Lord. Her job was to heal him with scripture. Who else would take in a sickly child such as him? The doctors had no idea what was wrong with him. It was her test from God and her penance. Annabelle’s husband, Carl, was a Baseball has-been with ideas of grandeur had he not impregnated the “Villiage Bicycle” as he affectionally called Annabelle, and been forced to make an honest woman out of her. Carl had nothing to do with Liam. He wouldn’t even look the child in the face when he barked his orders. If Liam was out of line, however, he enjoyed showing Liam God’s wrath.
Liam was left to fend for himself. He was to dress and feed himself in the mornings and get to school. Return from school, eat and complete his homework in time for Bible study with Annabelle every night. He would then need to ensure Carl’s beer was stocked before being expected in bed at the lovely hour of 9 PM. On weekends he worked to cover his personal expenses at Six Flags as a Concession stand cashier. He walked the 3KM to and from work. A task which was harboured by his ill health.
The trips to the doctor had initially been regular when he was younger. They poked and prodded him for years until it all just became too expensive and strangely elusive. Annabelle had refused to take him after her first visit. No one should have to go through that. His treatments had morphed into Sunday’s praying at church. Liam didn’t mind. It gave him time to rest and relax. He enjoyed the hymns and the scripture. It was better than his Cinderella life as he called it.
Liam rushed home after his altercation at school and cleaned himself up as best as he could. His nose had bled profusely on his shirt and his face was slightly bruised as had his abdomen but he could hide those. He washed his clothes and cleaned the house. His homework was done by the time Annabelle came home excitedly. They broke bread together eating a simple meal Annabelle had put together quickly. She helped Liam clean up after dinner and together they began to pray. Annabelle was determined tonight. She had felt blessed all day. Everything she had done today had been completed with perfection. She had been priestly and wanted to continue that positivity in her home. The poor child needed her guidance. She had heard about an incident at school today during Church. Liam needed to learn how to interact with other boys. Annabelle had arranged for the other boys family to join them for Bible study. She was friends with John’s mother from church.
It was 7:30 PM when they heard a knock at the door. Annabelle completed her prayer and stood up to answer it. She opened the door to see John stood head tilted grimacing in pain. A firm hand twisting his ear. The hand belonged to none other than the renowned Liberty Smith.
“Good Evening Annabelle, Darling.” Said Liberty with her distinct Texan swirl. “I believe my John here has some apologising to do for the way he treated your lovely son today at school. Don’t you John?” she asked.
“Good Evening Ma’am”, is all John could muster before he was ushered in on his tiptoes past Annabelle and straight up to a shocked Liam with Annabelle in tow.
“Now now Liberty, I'm sure the boys both have their equal share in this misunderstanding.” defended Annabelle. She was never one to be violent. Her years of marriage to Carl had proven her more submissive when it came to physical violence. Both boys stood mouths agape.
“Liam! Where are your manners?” Annabelle asked angrily.
“Good Evening Mrs Smith” greeted Liam still shocked. He coughed slightly as he stood up straight pained from his bruises. Annabelle and Liberty politely ignored his cough. He was too scared to look John in the face. Fearing the repercussions tomorrow at school.
“Join us in prayer, Liberty, won't you?” Annabelle gestured for Liberty and John to sit. Liberty almost reluctantly lets go of John’s ear which was now almost purple from the pressure and ushered him again into the seat next to Liam. What followed was an hour of prayer and lectures from the two mothers to the reluctant and surprised boys.
“John, you will apologise for treating Liam as such today, do you hear me?” warned Liberty. John grudgingly looked at Liam.
“I am sorry for what I did today. I was angry and the Devil corrupted my thoughts” said John almost robotically. Liam shifted uneasily in his seat unsure what to do. He looked over at Annabelle and Liberty briefly. They started back expectantly. Taking a deep breath to calm himself Liam looked at John.
“Apology accepted John.”
Annabelle and Liberty retreated to the balcony for a cigarette leaving the boys to celebrate their new found respect for each other. John stared at Liam under a venomous cowl. He looked terrifying almost as though he was not breathing. His face was red with anger.
“I’m going to kill you-you filthy homo. You are nothing but an unclean AIDS carrier. I’m going to send you to Hell where you belong”. John was seething at the mouth. He rose abruptly alarming Liam. Liam saw that he held in his palm a blade. John approached him with undeniable intent. Liam felt an intense sting at the back of his head.
A loud scream echoed and just as quickly all went black.
It hurts. Stop. Shame. Anger. Fear.
A man was there. A man Liam did not know. But he felt like he knew him. He was stroking Liam's face. But it was not Liam's face. The man was unbuckling his belt. The man was holding him down forcefully. But he was not holding him down at all. It was a nightmare. Liam was there. But he was not. Liam awoke in his bed. Alone. In the dark. With memories that were not his.
EDIT: Grammar | Dropping blood pressure. Loss of appetite. A migraine unlike any other. At first it happened every few days, but now it happens almost every hour. Whenever it happened, I felt like my rational sense was slowly slipping away, like a part of me was gone. But it wasn’t gone — just given.
Spreading across multiple continents, countries and cities, I could feel myself being connected to others, minds intertwined, and I was in control. Every thought rippled across the minds of the thousands afflicted.
It took me awhile to realize. At first, I felt like I was just able to have similar thoughts as others. How I thought twins might share similar beliefs and emotions. But it became much more — I soon realized that my every thought was mirrored in their minds, and the number of people I was connected to was rising exponentially.
As days went by, families and friends alike began to note my loss on decision making skills. But I’m smarter than them, they don’t know anywhere near as much as I do. I’m always right. So when I had to make a decision, mine was definitely the right one. I believe it was a day early in November, when I made the decision. Across the thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of others living with me, I could feel the same thought reverberating in their minds.
Vote Trump. |
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[WP] You are Patient Zero of a virus that replaces the victim's mind with a psychic link to your own. A viral hivemind with you at the center. | “It's taken you so long to finally find me, madame director,” a new voice spoke through the black glassy wall.
“I suppose it's an honor,” A curtsy was faked by the director, who seethed with sarcasm, “to meet you formally for the first time.”
“Oh I’ve met you plenty of times, this is no new honor for me. Someone had to find me at some point, I just hoped it would have been sooner.” A coughing came from the other side of the black wall. The room was lit only by the light seeping from the hallway through the open door. The walls shared the blank slated style of the black glass but didn’t possess the same sheen.
“How long have you been at this?” Her eyes darted around the room looking for some source of sound: a speaker of some sort, a hole, or maybe a vent.
“Oh not that long, too long for me unfortunately. You see, this virus was not one of malintent, hell I *had no intent*. Be it evolution or divine intervention, I was given this damn curse. Do you have any idea the images I have running in my head? The voices? Good God, the memories?” The voice was hoarse, old, and frail in nature. The director charted down all these details like bullet trains driving through her mind.
“So you just decided you would let it run rampant? Allow it to spread like wildfire and steal the minds of hundreds?” The director began to pace slowly, she felt helpless. This plan, the journey, everything let her to a damn box. No confrontation, no handcuffs, no bullet hole.
“Two hundred forty three. One hundred seventeen men, seventy eight women, twenty six boys, seventeen girls, and five that-” the voice paused for too long, the director was becoming impatient, “that haven’t figured it out yet. How interesting.”
“Bullshit.” He was toying with her. “Research shows you’ve got to have thousands working for you at least,” she growled.
“Director please, don’t undermine your own hunch with ‘research’ and ‘field work’. You give yourself too little credit. Do you know what the most effective form of advertisement is?” Now he really was toying with her. She wasn’t going to play his game, and drew her gun, pointing it at the glassy surface in front of her.
“I wouldn’t advise doing that for your sa-” Two shots rang out in the room with deafening blasts. The director had let her emotions get the better of her, acting rash, without thinking. The ringing of her ears forced her to fall to the floor; she couldn’t hear her gun clatter on the floor.
“You really should have listened,” the voice crawled across the room through the ringing in her ears. “You never found out how the virus was transmitted did you?” She could hear the smirk in his voice. Next to her she could hear a muffled voice cutting through her headset calling the same words, repeating them frantically. “*Airborne*”. Unnerved by the realization, she was mortified to find that blood had begun to drip from her ear.
Reaching up she felt the warm droplet touch her finger, and raised it up to her eyes.
“Madame director?” The voice was impossibly clear, as if it was her own thoughts. “Could you please answer my previous question? What is the most effective form of advertising?
“Word of mouth,” she felt herself mutter without speaking, and her eyes widened.
“I was going to admit everything to you, if you would have just listened. I am growing weak, the virus is straining me to the point where I am aging rapidly. With every being I add to my collection, my mind stretches. But I found something interesting, very interesting. When I lose consciousness, my mind recedes into another body of my choosing. Originally I was going to continue our little cat and mouse game, but you gave me the greatest present I’ve ever received- *you*. You can’t possibly know how important this is to me, I hadn’t chosen who I was going to become when I died, but I most definitely know now. If you wouldn’t mind, please leave, it’s rude to speak out of turn.”
The remainder of her mind realized that she had been muttering everything he stated in sync with him. She descended further, into the back of her mind, losing control of her senses one at a time, first touch and control of her body, then hearing, followed by sight. She could tell she was moving out of the room, returning wherever he wanted her.
“Oh and one more thing, you’ll be joining your son shortly.”
| Dropping blood pressure. Loss of appetite. A migraine unlike any other. At first it happened every few days, but now it happens almost every hour. Whenever it happened, I felt like my rational sense was slowly slipping away, like a part of me was gone. But it wasn’t gone — just given.
Spreading across multiple continents, countries and cities, I could feel myself being connected to others, minds intertwined, and I was in control. Every thought rippled across the minds of the thousands afflicted.
It took me awhile to realize. At first, I felt like I was just able to have similar thoughts as others. How I thought twins might share similar beliefs and emotions. But it became much more — I soon realized that my every thought was mirrored in their minds, and the number of people I was connected to was rising exponentially.
As days went by, families and friends alike began to note my loss on decision making skills. But I’m smarter than them, they don’t know anywhere near as much as I do. I’m always right. So when I had to make a decision, mine was definitely the right one. I believe it was a day early in November, when I made the decision. Across the thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of others living with me, I could feel the same thought reverberating in their minds.
Vote Trump. |
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[WP] You are Patient Zero of a virus that replaces the victim's mind with a psychic link to your own. A viral hivemind with you at the center. | "Becoming two people was very, very weird. One minute, I'm a sick patient lying in the hospital, and the next minute I'm a sick patient lying in the hospital *and* a middle-aged nurse with two kids, a dog, and a husband named Rick.
She got sick right after we became one. Then I was two sick patients in a hospital. Being a sick middle aged woman isn't very different from being a sick twenty-five year-old man, I found out. Being a nurse, though, that was way different. I couldn't help but go over my own symptoms, nervously checking two different sets of vital signs, and yearning to peek at that chart at the foot of my beds.
Don't get me wrong, becoming three people was a shock, but not nearly as bad as becoming two. Man, when I first started feeling her thoughts, seeing through her eyes... I thought I was going insane. But by the time I was three, I was getting the hang of it. Number three was my doctor. Turns out, he was having an affair with me, I mean, the nurse. Who she used to be.
After that things really picked up. You see, the doctor didn't become me until he had gone home for the night. Next morning, I was a whole happy family. Well, a whole happy, sick family. That's around the time when I decided to see how far I could push this thing.
I went to school, and wouldn't you know it, by the time the weekend rolled around I was a whole neighborhood. That's around when the CDC got involved. I couldn't do anything about getting sick every time someone became me, so news got around. Luckily, whatever this thing is, it's *super* contagious, and ridiculously fast.
Honestly, I didn't have to do much to get around the quarantine. The virus, or whatever this is, probably could have done it without me. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is, your family isn't going to die, Nellie, they're just... one. Now."
"Why are you doing this!?"
"I honestly don't know anymore." | The computer screen is especially harsh tonight, the contrast between the edges of the video and the black background aren’t good for my vision I’m pretty sure. No matter, I only need to be able to see what’s going on in the video. The pornographic threesome in front of me was the only thing I cared to see, my woman for the night. The dark room protects me from having to see the crumpled up clothes and half eaten sandwich on the floor. A nice locked barricade inside my own mind where no one can see to judge me and myself while I sit alone on yet another Friday night touching myself. Sweet ecstasy is just a few minutes away despite the starts and stops in the video, I couldn’t care less at this moment or in the future, but my past self will most certainly judge me. Getting closer and closer before I reach that moment of finality for the night and achieve the caress of a woman who isn’t there. Finally, I can sleep. And it’s only two in the morning, I’m getting faster. But before I can go to bed an icon pops up. Strange, I have several anti-virus programs running, this shouldn’t have gotten through. The guy at Best Buy said I shouldn’t use multiple programs but whatever. I click it.
“Have you ever wondered how others live?” it asked me with a blinking yellow box. I was curious if only out of sheer loneliness. What could it hurt? I have so little anyways. I click the blinking box only to see a video, a long one showing images of peoples families, jobs, hopes, dreams… and fears. Horrible images intersperse the happy ones. Rape, murder, suicide, a veritable hell on earth for the poor bastards involved. None of it looked photoshopped or anything of the sort, it was all quite real. The video lasted for what seemed like days and I couldn’t take my eyes off it. When it was finished I looked over to my clock and it read 4:30 in the morning. Damnit, I have to get to sleep or my cycle is gonna be all messed up. I close the laptop and throw some clothes onto myself. The bed cover is still dirty from three weeks ago. I’ll take it down to the washing machine tomorrow for sure.
When I wake up I look over at my clock to see that it says 8:00 in the morning. Damn circadian rhythm! I go to the fridge and see that there’s no food in it. I sigh heavily and decide I need to go to the grocery store. I spray myself with a heavy dose of body spray and cologne, throw on one of the sweaters I used for a blanket last night and head out the door. I notice the cute neighbor girl down the hallway of my apartment building. She is so hot. I would love to do BDSM stuff with her. Maybe tie her up. That would be nice. She looks over at me and her face suddenly writhes in fear, as if she had just witnessed her own murder. “Please… just stay away from me…” she said, seemingly out of nowhere. I turned around thinking there was some freak behind me but… no one. She was afraid of me and only me. As I turned back around she was locking herself in her apartment. I’m not that revolting am I? Whatever, I didn’t wanna fuck her anyways and I need food.
I make my way into the convenience store and pick up several things of ramen noodles and stuff to make sandwiches. I guess I should get soap too. I take my things up to the register and I look the man behind the counter in the eyes, like I practiced, and wait for him to ask me if that’s everything. He doesn’t, he looks at me with disgust and caution. Just like the apartment girl, he hates me just upon seeing me.
“What the fuck is wrong with you boy?!” the man says to me. He has conviction in his voice, probably from his years in the marine corps but… how do I know he served in the marines. This guy has killed people… a lot of people and now he’s yelling at me. I lower my head and look side to side as if the answer of what to say will be scrawled upon the counter. It’s not and so I just walk out of the store. “Don’t you fuckin come back in here you fuckin weirdo!” he screams to me as I walk out the door. I don’t know how but he knew. He knew what I was, all the weird things that I do. He knew and he judged me, just like the rest of the world would. I ran into the alleyway behind the store and sat against the wall and cried.
After a few minutes I raised my head to see two men standing over me. The look in their eyes told me they knew. I also knew, the man on the left was cheating on his wife with a high school girl. The man on the right used to be a day trader who got addicted to meth. “Look at this weird little shit. I don’t know why but you strike me as the type that doesn’t need to be in this world. Don’t you agree Vern?” the man on the left, Robert, said. I raised my hand trying to beg them not to hurt me but it didn’t matter. They saw me as scum and they began kicking me over and over again. Robert was especially vicious and he kicked my head hard enough to leave a few fractures in my face.
They finished their business and left me bleeding and swollen. I could sense even more from them, sadness, violence. I would have felt sorry for them had they not just kicked my ass. I tried to stand up and pull the sweater over my face. I just have to make it back to my room. Hopefully, someone worse than them doesn’t see me. I start hobbling my way back to my apartment, blood pouring from my head and dripping onto the ground. I pray to a God I don’t believe in that on one sees me. I peek around the corner and look both ways, there’s people on the street. I decide to go for it. I run, despite the pain, I run all the way to my apartment. I hear people screaming and cursing at me as I pass by. I feel the weight of their judgement upon me, like a weight upon my shoulders and upon every broken bone in my body. I get to the apartment building entrance and start entering in the passcode to get in. I look back and see a man pull his wife and child close while he gives me a scowl filled with hate. They all look at me with hate.
I get into the apartment building and slam the door shut. I go into the elevator and ride up to my level. I hobble out quickly and try to get to my door, suite 451. I see it and get to it quickly and start fiddling with my keys to get in. I look over and see the cute apartment girl. I see her memories rush through my head and see the abuse she’s suffered in her life, the heartache, the failures. She also sees me. Sees me for the monster that I am with all my twisted thoughts bubbling just below the surface. All the evil desires I hid from the world for so long all suddenly rushing forth into her subconscious. She had nothing but spite for me, a hate for myself almost equivalent to my own. “I’ve called the cops. Enjoy prison you fucking monster!” she said to me as she slammed the door shut, cursing me to a fate worse than death, judgement itself.
I burst into the room and looked out the window. I saw the cops pull up in their cars with guns drawn. I don’t know what to do. I cry and beg God to not let people find out how horrific I truly am. I scramble around the apartment looking for something, anything that will stop them from coming in and taking me in to be scrutinized by people much better than I. And then I see it. A knife.
I would love constructive criticism if you can offer some. I’m trying to improve my writing and would like to know your thoughts. Thank you for reading!
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[WP] You are Patient Zero of a virus that replaces the victim's mind with a psychic link to your own. A viral hivemind with you at the center. | The virus spread quickly, and every person that it spread to was added into my neural network. A fraction of their willpower was added to mine, giving me more power, and more ability to control those in the network. By the time half the world's population was connected to me, I could assume complete control over... Well who knows, I never tried using more than a thousand at once. But I had complete control and the ability to micromanage to a ridiculous degree. Thousands of rubrics cubes solved at the same time? No problem. And with every person added, by power only grew.
Then one day I stand before a young girl. Her long silver hair almost reaches the ground. She can't be older than fourteen. I blush as I note her clothes which while probably completely appropriate for someone her age during the era of ancient Greece, are probably abit too revealing for someone so young. She isn't in my network yet, but being close to me is the fastest way to join it so any second now she...
I skip a breath as my power within the network jumps several orders of magnitude. With me connected to around half the human race, and always increasing my mental abilities by about 10% worth of a connected individual's max, one would need several planets worth of people to connect at once in order to achieve a jump like this. I find myself frozen with fear as I suddenly feel as if hundreds of eyes are watching my every move. As I try to find these observers, I find myself paralyzed with fear. Unsurprised by the man frozen in place before her, the girl walks up abit closer, looking at me with curiosity. Suddenly my power drops back down to the level it was a minute ago... no wait it's back up... no back down... back up. Its almost like someone is flipping a light switch back and forth, seeing the effects it has on the lightbulb. I didn't think it was possible to leave the neural network, not once connected. But whom... whatever this girl is she seems to not care about such restrictions. Having thoroughly fiddled with the network, and apparently satisfied her curiosity, she looks up at me.
Her voice is quiet and fits her appearance quite well "I swear to... umm... Anyways, you better not use this thing to mess with the world too much. I don't care if you want to be the president or have everyone worship you, but you better not take the place so off track that it can't function after you're gone." This is what it must be like for a baby bird that is picked up by a human, really small, really scared, and caught by something way bigger than you. The girl pokes me in the chest, though she has try to reach high enough "Got it?" As she sees my hurried nods, she smiles with satisfaction, and walks away.
My power drops back to its usual level. | The computer screen is especially harsh tonight, the contrast between the edges of the video and the black background aren’t good for my vision I’m pretty sure. No matter, I only need to be able to see what’s going on in the video. The pornographic threesome in front of me was the only thing I cared to see, my woman for the night. The dark room protects me from having to see the crumpled up clothes and half eaten sandwich on the floor. A nice locked barricade inside my own mind where no one can see to judge me and myself while I sit alone on yet another Friday night touching myself. Sweet ecstasy is just a few minutes away despite the starts and stops in the video, I couldn’t care less at this moment or in the future, but my past self will most certainly judge me. Getting closer and closer before I reach that moment of finality for the night and achieve the caress of a woman who isn’t there. Finally, I can sleep. And it’s only two in the morning, I’m getting faster. But before I can go to bed an icon pops up. Strange, I have several anti-virus programs running, this shouldn’t have gotten through. The guy at Best Buy said I shouldn’t use multiple programs but whatever. I click it.
“Have you ever wondered how others live?” it asked me with a blinking yellow box. I was curious if only out of sheer loneliness. What could it hurt? I have so little anyways. I click the blinking box only to see a video, a long one showing images of peoples families, jobs, hopes, dreams… and fears. Horrible images intersperse the happy ones. Rape, murder, suicide, a veritable hell on earth for the poor bastards involved. None of it looked photoshopped or anything of the sort, it was all quite real. The video lasted for what seemed like days and I couldn’t take my eyes off it. When it was finished I looked over to my clock and it read 4:30 in the morning. Damnit, I have to get to sleep or my cycle is gonna be all messed up. I close the laptop and throw some clothes onto myself. The bed cover is still dirty from three weeks ago. I’ll take it down to the washing machine tomorrow for sure.
When I wake up I look over at my clock to see that it says 8:00 in the morning. Damn circadian rhythm! I go to the fridge and see that there’s no food in it. I sigh heavily and decide I need to go to the grocery store. I spray myself with a heavy dose of body spray and cologne, throw on one of the sweaters I used for a blanket last night and head out the door. I notice the cute neighbor girl down the hallway of my apartment building. She is so hot. I would love to do BDSM stuff with her. Maybe tie her up. That would be nice. She looks over at me and her face suddenly writhes in fear, as if she had just witnessed her own murder. “Please… just stay away from me…” she said, seemingly out of nowhere. I turned around thinking there was some freak behind me but… no one. She was afraid of me and only me. As I turned back around she was locking herself in her apartment. I’m not that revolting am I? Whatever, I didn’t wanna fuck her anyways and I need food.
I make my way into the convenience store and pick up several things of ramen noodles and stuff to make sandwiches. I guess I should get soap too. I take my things up to the register and I look the man behind the counter in the eyes, like I practiced, and wait for him to ask me if that’s everything. He doesn’t, he looks at me with disgust and caution. Just like the apartment girl, he hates me just upon seeing me.
“What the fuck is wrong with you boy?!” the man says to me. He has conviction in his voice, probably from his years in the marine corps but… how do I know he served in the marines. This guy has killed people… a lot of people and now he’s yelling at me. I lower my head and look side to side as if the answer of what to say will be scrawled upon the counter. It’s not and so I just walk out of the store. “Don’t you fuckin come back in here you fuckin weirdo!” he screams to me as I walk out the door. I don’t know how but he knew. He knew what I was, all the weird things that I do. He knew and he judged me, just like the rest of the world would. I ran into the alleyway behind the store and sat against the wall and cried.
After a few minutes I raised my head to see two men standing over me. The look in their eyes told me they knew. I also knew, the man on the left was cheating on his wife with a high school girl. The man on the right used to be a day trader who got addicted to meth. “Look at this weird little shit. I don’t know why but you strike me as the type that doesn’t need to be in this world. Don’t you agree Vern?” the man on the left, Robert, said. I raised my hand trying to beg them not to hurt me but it didn’t matter. They saw me as scum and they began kicking me over and over again. Robert was especially vicious and he kicked my head hard enough to leave a few fractures in my face.
They finished their business and left me bleeding and swollen. I could sense even more from them, sadness, violence. I would have felt sorry for them had they not just kicked my ass. I tried to stand up and pull the sweater over my face. I just have to make it back to my room. Hopefully, someone worse than them doesn’t see me. I start hobbling my way back to my apartment, blood pouring from my head and dripping onto the ground. I pray to a God I don’t believe in that on one sees me. I peek around the corner and look both ways, there’s people on the street. I decide to go for it. I run, despite the pain, I run all the way to my apartment. I hear people screaming and cursing at me as I pass by. I feel the weight of their judgement upon me, like a weight upon my shoulders and upon every broken bone in my body. I get to the apartment building entrance and start entering in the passcode to get in. I look back and see a man pull his wife and child close while he gives me a scowl filled with hate. They all look at me with hate.
I get into the apartment building and slam the door shut. I go into the elevator and ride up to my level. I hobble out quickly and try to get to my door, suite 451. I see it and get to it quickly and start fiddling with my keys to get in. I look over and see the cute apartment girl. I see her memories rush through my head and see the abuse she’s suffered in her life, the heartache, the failures. She also sees me. Sees me for the monster that I am with all my twisted thoughts bubbling just below the surface. All the evil desires I hid from the world for so long all suddenly rushing forth into her subconscious. She had nothing but spite for me, a hate for myself almost equivalent to my own. “I’ve called the cops. Enjoy prison you fucking monster!” she said to me as she slammed the door shut, cursing me to a fate worse than death, judgement itself.
I burst into the room and looked out the window. I saw the cops pull up in their cars with guns drawn. I don’t know what to do. I cry and beg God to not let people find out how horrific I truly am. I scramble around the apartment looking for something, anything that will stop them from coming in and taking me in to be scrutinized by people much better than I. And then I see it. A knife.
I would love constructive criticism if you can offer some. I’m trying to improve my writing and would like to know your thoughts. Thank you for reading!
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[WP] You are Patient Zero of a virus that replaces the victim's mind with a psychic link to your own. A viral hivemind with you at the center. | "That dress looks hideous," whispered a woman.
"She's out drinking again, I just know it!" yelled a man.
"I think my favorite color is blue, but maybe it's pink today," mused a young girl.
I felt myself chuckling as I sat, cross-legged, on the bed in my cell. I always enjoyed hearing the last independent thoughts of my children before they became mine.
Regrettably, the experience had become less frequent. The city had been quarantined three days ago, and so had I. I was locked in some place made of concrete and discomfort, surrounded by people in hazmat suits. I'm sure they ate antivirals like tic tacs.
One week ago, it was a normal morning. I woke up snuggled in my warm bed, with just a sliver of sunlight peeking around my curtains. As I stretched and yawned, a deep voice blasted through the air. "Damn, just *look* at that ASS!"
I sat up faster than I ever have in my life. I fell out of bed and whipped my head around, but my room was empty.
For about two seconds, I thought I had just had a weird dream. Maybe it had carried over for a moment to reality, maybe it was just a glitch in my brain. But by second three, I was in a high school classroom, staring squarely at the behind of a decidedly illegal teenage girl. Somehow, I was *also* looking at the sheets on my bed, seeing them at the same time. I felt my chest clench as I started to panic, but then I did what any sensible person would do. I shoved my palms into my face and squeezed my eyes shut tight. The only problem was, now all I could see was the classroom.
“I'm hallucinating,” I muttered. “That's all this is. A hallucination.”
I had no idea.
I didn't even think to call out of work. An hour later I was still on my bedroom floor with my palms in my face. My thoughts roved from the “Oh god, oh god,” of me to the “Fuck Mondays” of Darius, the new intruder in my head. I'm not sure how or when, but at some point, I managed to feel my way across my room to my cell. I dialed 911.
Being admitted to a psych ward is easy, it's the getting out that's hard. If I had to say what my mistake was, it would be that I didn't figure out what was happening sooner. But how should I have known? Stuff like this doesn't just happen to people, least of all me.
I don't know what meds they gave me or what exactly they did, I just remember fighting and screaming that there was something wrong with my head. No matter, whatever it was didn't stop me from seeing through my new eyes. They took Darius to the hospital too, although he went in through the emergency room. I had seen his classmates grow worried and his teacher call an ambulance when he stopped being responsive, when he started being me, and I started being him.
I was tired of watching, tired of all this sudden craziness that had hit my life a few hours before. That was when I had an idea...maybe if I could see with his eyes, I could make him close them too? I felt, I reached out...and somehow, he closed his eyes. It was that simple.
I kept his eyes closed and opened mine. Then I closed my eyes and opened his. I started to laugh. It must have sounded scary because the nurses didn't take long to give me more meds. I remember having a brief, sincere wish to play Call of Duty and masturbate, and then I don't remember much for a while. | The computer screen is especially harsh tonight, the contrast between the edges of the video and the black background aren’t good for my vision I’m pretty sure. No matter, I only need to be able to see what’s going on in the video. The pornographic threesome in front of me was the only thing I cared to see, my woman for the night. The dark room protects me from having to see the crumpled up clothes and half eaten sandwich on the floor. A nice locked barricade inside my own mind where no one can see to judge me and myself while I sit alone on yet another Friday night touching myself. Sweet ecstasy is just a few minutes away despite the starts and stops in the video, I couldn’t care less at this moment or in the future, but my past self will most certainly judge me. Getting closer and closer before I reach that moment of finality for the night and achieve the caress of a woman who isn’t there. Finally, I can sleep. And it’s only two in the morning, I’m getting faster. But before I can go to bed an icon pops up. Strange, I have several anti-virus programs running, this shouldn’t have gotten through. The guy at Best Buy said I shouldn’t use multiple programs but whatever. I click it.
“Have you ever wondered how others live?” it asked me with a blinking yellow box. I was curious if only out of sheer loneliness. What could it hurt? I have so little anyways. I click the blinking box only to see a video, a long one showing images of peoples families, jobs, hopes, dreams… and fears. Horrible images intersperse the happy ones. Rape, murder, suicide, a veritable hell on earth for the poor bastards involved. None of it looked photoshopped or anything of the sort, it was all quite real. The video lasted for what seemed like days and I couldn’t take my eyes off it. When it was finished I looked over to my clock and it read 4:30 in the morning. Damnit, I have to get to sleep or my cycle is gonna be all messed up. I close the laptop and throw some clothes onto myself. The bed cover is still dirty from three weeks ago. I’ll take it down to the washing machine tomorrow for sure.
When I wake up I look over at my clock to see that it says 8:00 in the morning. Damn circadian rhythm! I go to the fridge and see that there’s no food in it. I sigh heavily and decide I need to go to the grocery store. I spray myself with a heavy dose of body spray and cologne, throw on one of the sweaters I used for a blanket last night and head out the door. I notice the cute neighbor girl down the hallway of my apartment building. She is so hot. I would love to do BDSM stuff with her. Maybe tie her up. That would be nice. She looks over at me and her face suddenly writhes in fear, as if she had just witnessed her own murder. “Please… just stay away from me…” she said, seemingly out of nowhere. I turned around thinking there was some freak behind me but… no one. She was afraid of me and only me. As I turned back around she was locking herself in her apartment. I’m not that revolting am I? Whatever, I didn’t wanna fuck her anyways and I need food.
I make my way into the convenience store and pick up several things of ramen noodles and stuff to make sandwiches. I guess I should get soap too. I take my things up to the register and I look the man behind the counter in the eyes, like I practiced, and wait for him to ask me if that’s everything. He doesn’t, he looks at me with disgust and caution. Just like the apartment girl, he hates me just upon seeing me.
“What the fuck is wrong with you boy?!” the man says to me. He has conviction in his voice, probably from his years in the marine corps but… how do I know he served in the marines. This guy has killed people… a lot of people and now he’s yelling at me. I lower my head and look side to side as if the answer of what to say will be scrawled upon the counter. It’s not and so I just walk out of the store. “Don’t you fuckin come back in here you fuckin weirdo!” he screams to me as I walk out the door. I don’t know how but he knew. He knew what I was, all the weird things that I do. He knew and he judged me, just like the rest of the world would. I ran into the alleyway behind the store and sat against the wall and cried.
After a few minutes I raised my head to see two men standing over me. The look in their eyes told me they knew. I also knew, the man on the left was cheating on his wife with a high school girl. The man on the right used to be a day trader who got addicted to meth. “Look at this weird little shit. I don’t know why but you strike me as the type that doesn’t need to be in this world. Don’t you agree Vern?” the man on the left, Robert, said. I raised my hand trying to beg them not to hurt me but it didn’t matter. They saw me as scum and they began kicking me over and over again. Robert was especially vicious and he kicked my head hard enough to leave a few fractures in my face.
They finished their business and left me bleeding and swollen. I could sense even more from them, sadness, violence. I would have felt sorry for them had they not just kicked my ass. I tried to stand up and pull the sweater over my face. I just have to make it back to my room. Hopefully, someone worse than them doesn’t see me. I start hobbling my way back to my apartment, blood pouring from my head and dripping onto the ground. I pray to a God I don’t believe in that on one sees me. I peek around the corner and look both ways, there’s people on the street. I decide to go for it. I run, despite the pain, I run all the way to my apartment. I hear people screaming and cursing at me as I pass by. I feel the weight of their judgement upon me, like a weight upon my shoulders and upon every broken bone in my body. I get to the apartment building entrance and start entering in the passcode to get in. I look back and see a man pull his wife and child close while he gives me a scowl filled with hate. They all look at me with hate.
I get into the apartment building and slam the door shut. I go into the elevator and ride up to my level. I hobble out quickly and try to get to my door, suite 451. I see it and get to it quickly and start fiddling with my keys to get in. I look over and see the cute apartment girl. I see her memories rush through my head and see the abuse she’s suffered in her life, the heartache, the failures. She also sees me. Sees me for the monster that I am with all my twisted thoughts bubbling just below the surface. All the evil desires I hid from the world for so long all suddenly rushing forth into her subconscious. She had nothing but spite for me, a hate for myself almost equivalent to my own. “I’ve called the cops. Enjoy prison you fucking monster!” she said to me as she slammed the door shut, cursing me to a fate worse than death, judgement itself.
I burst into the room and looked out the window. I saw the cops pull up in their cars with guns drawn. I don’t know what to do. I cry and beg God to not let people find out how horrific I truly am. I scramble around the apartment looking for something, anything that will stop them from coming in and taking me in to be scrutinized by people much better than I. And then I see it. A knife.
I would love constructive criticism if you can offer some. I’m trying to improve my writing and would like to know your thoughts. Thank you for reading!
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[WP] You are Patient Zero of a virus that replaces the victim's mind with a psychic link to your own. A viral hivemind with you at the center. | The virus spread quickly, and every person that it spread to was added into my neural network. A fraction of their willpower was added to mine, giving me more power, and more ability to control those in the network. By the time half the world's population was connected to me, I could assume complete control over... Well who knows, I never tried using more than a thousand at once. But I had complete control and the ability to micromanage to a ridiculous degree. Thousands of rubrics cubes solved at the same time? No problem. And with every person added, by power only grew.
Then one day I stand before a young girl. Her long silver hair almost reaches the ground. She can't be older than fourteen. I blush as I note her clothes which while probably completely appropriate for someone her age during the era of ancient Greece, are probably abit too revealing for someone so young. She isn't in my network yet, but being close to me is the fastest way to join it so any second now she...
I skip a breath as my power within the network jumps several orders of magnitude. With me connected to around half the human race, and always increasing my mental abilities by about 10% worth of a connected individual's max, one would need several planets worth of people to connect at once in order to achieve a jump like this. I find myself frozen with fear as I suddenly feel as if hundreds of eyes are watching my every move. As I try to find these observers, I find myself paralyzed with fear. Unsurprised by the man frozen in place before her, the girl walks up abit closer, looking at me with curiosity. Suddenly my power drops back down to the level it was a minute ago... no wait it's back up... no back down... back up. Its almost like someone is flipping a light switch back and forth, seeing the effects it has on the lightbulb. I didn't think it was possible to leave the neural network, not once connected. But whom... whatever this girl is she seems to not care about such restrictions. Having thoroughly fiddled with the network, and apparently satisfied her curiosity, she looks up at me.
Her voice is quiet and fits her appearance quite well "I swear to... umm... Anyways, you better not use this thing to mess with the world too much. I don't care if you want to be the president or have everyone worship you, but you better not take the place so off track that it can't function after you're gone." This is what it must be like for a baby bird that is picked up by a human, really small, really scared, and caught by something way bigger than you. The girl pokes me in the chest, though she has try to reach high enough "Got it?" As she sees my hurried nods, she smiles with satisfaction, and walks away.
My power drops back to its usual level. | It started as it usually does, with a sniffle and a cough. We both knew that meant everyone in the family would get sick, it always seemed that if one of us caught something all of us did.
It ended with me seeing myself from three new perspectives. I screamed. They screamed. I wept. They wept. But try as i might, i couldn't find my wife or my two children in the eyes that stared blankly at me. |
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[WP] You are Patient Zero of a virus that replaces the victim's mind with a psychic link to your own. A viral hivemind with you at the center. | "That dress looks hideous," whispered a woman.
"She's out drinking again, I just know it!" yelled a man.
"I think my favorite color is blue, but maybe it's pink today," mused a young girl.
I felt myself chuckling as I sat, cross-legged, on the bed in my cell. I always enjoyed hearing the last independent thoughts of my children before they became mine.
Regrettably, the experience had become less frequent. The city had been quarantined three days ago, and so had I. I was locked in some place made of concrete and discomfort, surrounded by people in hazmat suits. I'm sure they ate antivirals like tic tacs.
One week ago, it was a normal morning. I woke up snuggled in my warm bed, with just a sliver of sunlight peeking around my curtains. As I stretched and yawned, a deep voice blasted through the air. "Damn, just *look* at that ASS!"
I sat up faster than I ever have in my life. I fell out of bed and whipped my head around, but my room was empty.
For about two seconds, I thought I had just had a weird dream. Maybe it had carried over for a moment to reality, maybe it was just a glitch in my brain. But by second three, I was in a high school classroom, staring squarely at the behind of a decidedly illegal teenage girl. Somehow, I was *also* looking at the sheets on my bed, seeing them at the same time. I felt my chest clench as I started to panic, but then I did what any sensible person would do. I shoved my palms into my face and squeezed my eyes shut tight. The only problem was, now all I could see was the classroom.
“I'm hallucinating,” I muttered. “That's all this is. A hallucination.”
I had no idea.
I didn't even think to call out of work. An hour later I was still on my bedroom floor with my palms in my face. My thoughts roved from the “Oh god, oh god,” of me to the “Fuck Mondays” of Darius, the new intruder in my head. I'm not sure how or when, but at some point, I managed to feel my way across my room to my cell. I dialed 911.
Being admitted to a psych ward is easy, it's the getting out that's hard. If I had to say what my mistake was, it would be that I didn't figure out what was happening sooner. But how should I have known? Stuff like this doesn't just happen to people, least of all me.
I don't know what meds they gave me or what exactly they did, I just remember fighting and screaming that there was something wrong with my head. No matter, whatever it was didn't stop me from seeing through my new eyes. They took Darius to the hospital too, although he went in through the emergency room. I had seen his classmates grow worried and his teacher call an ambulance when he stopped being responsive, when he started being me, and I started being him.
I was tired of watching, tired of all this sudden craziness that had hit my life a few hours before. That was when I had an idea...maybe if I could see with his eyes, I could make him close them too? I felt, I reached out...and somehow, he closed his eyes. It was that simple.
I kept his eyes closed and opened mine. Then I closed my eyes and opened his. I started to laugh. It must have sounded scary because the nurses didn't take long to give me more meds. I remember having a brief, sincere wish to play Call of Duty and masturbate, and then I don't remember much for a while. | It started as it usually does, with a sniffle and a cough. We both knew that meant everyone in the family would get sick, it always seemed that if one of us caught something all of us did.
It ended with me seeing myself from three new perspectives. I screamed. They screamed. I wept. They wept. But try as i might, i couldn't find my wife or my two children in the eyes that stared blankly at me. |
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[WP] It's day 7 of the apocalypse, you've just broken your glasses. | "Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!"
"Dude, you're so screwed! If you can't keep up I'm going to have to go on without you. I'm sorry."
"No I'm fine, my vision isn't even that bad. I only had these so I could drive better at night." It was a lie. Mark's vision was so bad his optometrist had stated that he was borderline "legally blind" without his glasses.
"Oh ok good! Well before we get back on the road, lets clear that last house and check for more supplies."
It has been seven days since the first outbreak. At first everyone thought it was a hoax. The local news was reporting that there was some type of highly contagious "infection" that had broken out in Florida. The infection was spreading quickly and killing thousands by the day. It was also reported that as soon an infected person passed away, they immediately would wake up DEAD.
Mark was working when he first encountered a "Runner." He was a mail man and every morning he would stop on his route in the Best Buy parking lot to eat his breakfast. As he was sitting in his truck he noticed someone naked and appeared to be covered in blood run past his truck at an extremely past pace, like Olympic sprinting speed. This guy definitely didn't look like he could run a sub ten second 100 yard sprint because he was grossly overweight. Mark watch the man run towards the Best Buy. He ran so quickly up to the doors that they didn't have time to open and he smacked right into them. He fell to the ground as the glass shattered everywhere. He immediately jumped to his feet and sprinted into the store and out of Marks view. Mark grabbed his phone and dialed 911 to report what he just witnessed, but no one answered. He called back again and nothing.
It wasn't even 2 minutes later that an entire group of them came running out the store. Some were men and women and Mark noticed that there was even a child and a couple of employees with Best Buy shirts on. They were all covered in blood and sprinting just like the man Mark had seen run in the store. Mark threw down his bagel and started his truck. As soon as the truck's engine turned over and the sound echoed across the parking lot, every single "person" that had just exited the store turned their heads and stared at the USPS truck. Their eyes were glowing red and their mouths oozing blood. They all started running in the direction of Mark. He took off from his usual parking spot at the back of the lot and floored the pedal. He tried to avoid them, but they smacked right into the side of his truck. As he sped out the parking lot he thought he just killed everyone he hit, but as he was looking in his side mirror he noticed that everyone were now on their feet and sprinting towards him.
"Hello? Mark, whats wrong buddy? Lets get out of the road before were seen by a Runner. You know those jokers are fast as hell and we will never be able to outrun one."
"Sorry, I was just upset about my glasses. Lets check the last house." Mark wasn't just upset, he was devastated. He knew he was screwed and it wouldn't be much longer until he was turned into one of those things. He wondered if he turned into a Runner, would he be able to see or would he be a "almost legally blind" Runner. When Carl took off towards the house, Mark was only able to follow him because Carl was wearing a bright orange sweater, probably not the best choice of color in a apocalypse. Mark had a 12-gauge Browning shotgun and Carl was carrying two Glock .40 cal pistols.
When they made it to the door and found that it was unlocked, Carl opened the door and told Mark, "Be quiet, I'll check upstairs. You check the downstairs. Just like before." "No problem." This had been their strategy on the last 9 houses that they cleared and scavenged. Except there was one problem, Mark didn't have his glasses. As they entered the threshold of the front door, Mark saw the image of Carl's orange sweatshirt ascend the stairs and disappear into what he guessed was a bedroom. Mark immediately found a corner downstairs and placed his back to it. He tried to slow his breathing so he could hear Carl moving through the house upstairs. He knew if he told Carl he couldn't pull his weight, he'd leave him to fend for himself. All of sudden he heard four loud gunshots from upstairs. The sounds scared him so badly, that he fired off one of his own rounds and his ears immediately started ringing. Mark was panicking because now he couldn't see or hear. Then just out the corner of his eye he saw a dark image running down the stairs and turn towards his direction. He didn't see any orange so he closed his eyes and pulled the trigger. He felt a warm body crash into his....
...Mark jumped and sat up in his bed. He was covered in sweat and was breathing really hard, almost panting. He felt for his bedside table and found his glasses and placed them on his head and turned on the light. He noticed that the television was on and a show of the Walking Dead was playing. He found the remote and turned the television off, removed his glasses, and turned the light back off.
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Sorry if this wasn't all that great. This is my second attempt at a story. Just trying to get a little better. | "Stand there and wait for my instructions!" The captain yelled at you from the catwalk above. She was dressed in standard Army fatigues that displayed her rank and name, one sleeve was ripped and tattered and the arm strapped across her chest in a makeshift sling. "The timing of the switches has to be exact to reverse the process! I'll radio back when I'm in position!"
You adjust your glasses back up onto your nose, One of the nosepads missing from the fourth or fifth roll of the van as it rolled down the mountainside yesterday.
You lean over the massive control panel in front of you. Blinking lights, backlit toggles, and myriad of buttons were arrayed in a jumbled mess across the 10 foot long panel. Tiny labels identified each switch.
*master control valve* next to a large green button.
*frequency adjustment* below a toggle.
*dark matter fuel cutoff* over a flashing red light
You adjust your glasses back up your nose looking over the labels.
The radio in your hands crackles to life. "I'm in position! We have to activate the device servos in an exact order for this to work. The tectonic collapse is imminent if we can't reverse the machine."
A small vibration thrummed through the floor of the underground bunker. Nearby, a forty foot tall machine hummed to life and you feel a strange tugging sensation in your stomach. You adjust your glasses back up your nose.
"Alright, I'm going to cancel the doomsday directive, when I do, you need to flip the flow generators A and C to off, and push the Frequency modulator to 40%"
A piece of ceiling tile crashes to the floor behind you and you jump and whip your head around. Your glasses fly off of your head and shatter on the floor. The world shifts into a blurry facsimile of itself.
"Alright, it's up to you to save the world! Find the emergency generator cutoff toggle and get ready to flip it to the off position. On my mark. Three...two...one...." |
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[WP] It's day 7 of the apocalypse, you've just broken your glasses. | "Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!"
"Dude, you're so screwed! If you can't keep up I'm going to have to go on without you. I'm sorry."
"No I'm fine, my vision isn't even that bad. I only had these so I could drive better at night." It was a lie. Mark's vision was so bad his optometrist had stated that he was borderline "legally blind" without his glasses.
"Oh ok good! Well before we get back on the road, lets clear that last house and check for more supplies."
It has been seven days since the first outbreak. At first everyone thought it was a hoax. The local news was reporting that there was some type of highly contagious "infection" that had broken out in Florida. The infection was spreading quickly and killing thousands by the day. It was also reported that as soon an infected person passed away, they immediately would wake up DEAD.
Mark was working when he first encountered a "Runner." He was a mail man and every morning he would stop on his route in the Best Buy parking lot to eat his breakfast. As he was sitting in his truck he noticed someone naked and appeared to be covered in blood run past his truck at an extremely past pace, like Olympic sprinting speed. This guy definitely didn't look like he could run a sub ten second 100 yard sprint because he was grossly overweight. Mark watch the man run towards the Best Buy. He ran so quickly up to the doors that they didn't have time to open and he smacked right into them. He fell to the ground as the glass shattered everywhere. He immediately jumped to his feet and sprinted into the store and out of Marks view. Mark grabbed his phone and dialed 911 to report what he just witnessed, but no one answered. He called back again and nothing.
It wasn't even 2 minutes later that an entire group of them came running out the store. Some were men and women and Mark noticed that there was even a child and a couple of employees with Best Buy shirts on. They were all covered in blood and sprinting just like the man Mark had seen run in the store. Mark threw down his bagel and started his truck. As soon as the truck's engine turned over and the sound echoed across the parking lot, every single "person" that had just exited the store turned their heads and stared at the USPS truck. Their eyes were glowing red and their mouths oozing blood. They all started running in the direction of Mark. He took off from his usual parking spot at the back of the lot and floored the pedal. He tried to avoid them, but they smacked right into the side of his truck. As he sped out the parking lot he thought he just killed everyone he hit, but as he was looking in his side mirror he noticed that everyone were now on their feet and sprinting towards him.
"Hello? Mark, whats wrong buddy? Lets get out of the road before were seen by a Runner. You know those jokers are fast as hell and we will never be able to outrun one."
"Sorry, I was just upset about my glasses. Lets check the last house." Mark wasn't just upset, he was devastated. He knew he was screwed and it wouldn't be much longer until he was turned into one of those things. He wondered if he turned into a Runner, would he be able to see or would he be a "almost legally blind" Runner. When Carl took off towards the house, Mark was only able to follow him because Carl was wearing a bright orange sweater, probably not the best choice of color in a apocalypse. Mark had a 12-gauge Browning shotgun and Carl was carrying two Glock .40 cal pistols.
When they made it to the door and found that it was unlocked, Carl opened the door and told Mark, "Be quiet, I'll check upstairs. You check the downstairs. Just like before." "No problem." This had been their strategy on the last 9 houses that they cleared and scavenged. Except there was one problem, Mark didn't have his glasses. As they entered the threshold of the front door, Mark saw the image of Carl's orange sweatshirt ascend the stairs and disappear into what he guessed was a bedroom. Mark immediately found a corner downstairs and placed his back to it. He tried to slow his breathing so he could hear Carl moving through the house upstairs. He knew if he told Carl he couldn't pull his weight, he'd leave him to fend for himself. All of sudden he heard four loud gunshots from upstairs. The sounds scared him so badly, that he fired off one of his own rounds and his ears immediately started ringing. Mark was panicking because now he couldn't see or hear. Then just out the corner of his eye he saw a dark image running down the stairs and turn towards his direction. He didn't see any orange so he closed his eyes and pulled the trigger. He felt a warm body crash into his....
...Mark jumped and sat up in his bed. He was covered in sweat and was breathing really hard, almost panting. He felt for his bedside table and found his glasses and placed them on his head and turned on the light. He noticed that the television was on and a show of the Walking Dead was playing. He found the remote and turned the television off, removed his glasses, and turned the light back off.
_______________________________________________
Sorry if this wasn't all that great. This is my second attempt at a story. Just trying to get a little better. | Even though the fuzz of everything overcame me, just like whenever I went to bed, woke up, showered, swam, or wrestled, i could still see large round stars on the ground. Those stars were the glistening shards of my glasses, the one thing I swore I needed to survive in this new hell. I looked up, seeing the sun was still blindingly red. I remembered before my glasses, when I looked at the grand provider at sunset, the star had grown massive in the past ten days. The first day, no one noticed, but scientists were stunned to see the size just balloon. Supposedly it now increased to at least 5 million miles in diameter, but that was before everyone cared.
Technically, everyone cared, but not about the sun. No, they cared about themselves. And as for me, I should have seized the chance to grab a pair of new glasses after the second day, when civil unrest started to grow. Why were people protesting outside? Did it make a difference? What did they think the governments were going to do? It never helped the articles spread detailing specific information about how the governments saw it coming, and already had astronauts launched outside the Solar System.
What did it matter for me? My eyesight was so bad, I couldn't have contacts, not that I'd be able to find those now. I was too young for laser surgery as well. *Shoulda booked an appointment. Shoulda woulda coulda*, I repeated in my mind. Should have gotten glasses, should have gotten surgery, should have gotten someone to help me out. No, everyone cared for themselves at the last minute. The ones that did care, they braced for themselves with family.
Would I have been able to find a new pair of glasses in the window of time the world went to Hell? Probably not. I chuckled. Everyone would be looting the grocery stores, the pharmacies, the gun shops. I would just have wanted a new damn pair of glasses.
I closed my eyes and started dreaming in the refreshing warmth of the new sun. The crashing waves of the distant ocean sounded different. They sounded a little bit warmer. Ten degrees?
Twenty? Warmed up by a new sun.Once a provider, all it had to do is act up a little, and the whole world went bonkers. What about the other worlds, Venus, Mercury, Saturn. How are they different?
Fact is they weren't. Nothing is different about them. So maybe, humans did make a difference. We saw our own demise. I walked to the edge of the high flat-top skyscraper I was one, and slowly sat down. My legs were hanging over the edge of a few hundred foot drop. At this height, anyone without binoculars would be able to see me over the edge. I'm normally afraid of heights, but then again, why fear something I cannot see.
Like I said, could I have found other pairs of glasses with maybe a close prescription to mine. Maybe. Would I want to have seen the world end? Would I have wished it was a differrent apocalypse I was in? Probably not. What a funny question: Do I want a different apocalypse? |
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[WP] Dragons hoard concepts, rather than gold. The one in the mountain hoards hate. The one in the foothills hoards power. Down in the woods there is a dragon with piles of longsuffering. Somewhere, there has to be a dragon that hoards happiness. Right? | My brothers and sisters are always dealing with this. At births and funerals they gripe and whine about it. "Humans want to steal my wisdom." "They want to release my suffering on the world." "I am so sick of them! Every week it seems like they are knocking at the start of my lair, begging me for my rage." "And my lust." "It's every day for my sloth."
The humans that live around my little hill don't come to visit. They live their quiet, peasant lives, trundling on. No famine steals away their autumn feasts. No plague steals away their wives, husbands, or children. But still they never approach me or see me. I exist alone. Their faces don't even turn to look at me when I visit them.
It was during a visit when she came. I was going from house to house in my village, collecting my due. The happiness poured from the sleeping humans, golden and shining, into my mouth. The children were the tastiest. Adults, I've found, were bittersweet. But any bit fed my gluttony. It needed to be fed.
Her hair was dark and beautiful. Her form was thin, starved almost. Her eyes were sunken in her skull, but they looked at me. They saw me. And she spoke.
"I've heard of a dragon who hoards the happiness of people. Please, is that you?"
I couldn't reply, my mouth was full of the delicious golden light that I had collected. She followed me back to my lair in the hill. Despite her sallow look, she kept up. Impressive.
When I had added my night's tax to my collection, she was watching with her sunken eyes. They met mine. Her face was lit by the golden light from the pool. It looked even more sunken. Almost skeletal.
"Please, can you answer my question. Are you the dragon that hoards happiness?" She was so small. I could tell from her size that she was less than twenty summers.
"Yes, young human. That is I."
"Please, will you take mine?"
My long, pale body circled hers, trapping her in place but not touching her. Humans don't ask for me. They come to me, eyes downcast and shoulders slumped, ready to trade their lives for safety, security.
"What do you wish for I'm exchange?"
Tears began to grow in her eyes. I had seen this before, after collecting my offerings from the humans. Never before.
"I want it all gone. Every memory of him. Every moment of joy he gave me. It's turned to ash." The tears flowed now, and she hugged herself, wincing.
Greed knows no pity, no understanding, no sympathy. I took the joys and little mirths from the humans without wondering why they were offering them to me. Often, I took without them offering them at all. But this young human had changed me. Now, I was curious.
"I will take your happiness." I told her. Then the golden light poured from her mouth and into mine. And I saw.
Strong arms, holding her while she cried. A smiling face, a charming grin. The feeling of flying when he holds my hand. Heartbeats, sounding in my ears as we lie together. Happiness deeper than any feeling that my peasants knew.
When I had devoured it, content filled my soul. The young human had stopped crying. Her face had taken on the hopeless expression that I had seen so many times before.
"What will you do now?" I asked as a sign escaped her lips.
She smiled at me. "Be free." | "No, no, no, my Dear," the Dragon of Power says to me as we walk through his garden. He takes a moment to rearrange some of the golden lilypads in one pool, then to pet the little wyrmlings swimming around below them with one alien toe. "There is no Dragon of Happiness. That idea is beyond us now."
"But!" I reply, tears in my eyes. However will I save my village?
"But," he continues, handing me a water-filled glass globe, "there may be one soon."
Inside is a single golden pearl. |
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[WP] Everyday you get a different, boring and benign ‘power’. Last week, you could change the temperature of any room you were in by +/-2 degrees. Yesterday, you could add time to every parking meter in the city. Today, you get the most boring one yet, and it’s amazing what you do with it... | Susan waddled over to Carleton’s desk, her mouth agape and breathing deeply from the stress it took her to walk across the office.
“Hey Susan, how can I help you?”
“Carl, can you still do that thing where you make the room slightly warmer or colder? The thermostat is locked behind plexiglass and only the maintenance guy has the key.”
“No, that was last Thursday’s power, Susan.” he tried to explain, exasperated “We’ve been over this, my power changes every midnight.”
“Well, fine. Hopefully tonight you’ll get the power to do your job properly then.” She then turned around in a huff and made her way back to her desk.
Carleton’s face went red with frustration from the jab, and he mumbled an ineffectual jab about her weight under his breath. Once she was plumped back in her office chair and behind her desktop monitor, he focused on her computer and chanted in a whisper “Power of *Wing Dings.*”
Susan hit the side of her monitor and said “What the hell?” before picking up her phone and dialing the number for IT. From across the room, Carleton could hear her shrill voice saying various things as “No, I didn’t hit anything” and “I don’t know, all of the letters on my screen are just in Chinese or something.” Eventually the IT guy, frustrated from trying to diagnose her problems over the phone, came to their office and stared at the screen, looking perplexed.
“When you called me you said your computer was stuck in Chinese. Susan, I’m not an expert in Asian languages or anything, but these are clearly Wing Dings. Have you been messing around with the fonts?”
“I already told you I didn’t touch anything, now please hurry up and fix it! I have a sales report due by the end of the day!” she snapped back at him.
As much as he enjoyed his petty revenge on Susan, Carleton was tired of listening to her yelling at the IT accusingly for allegedly putting a virus on her computer to sabotage her sales report. He flipped the knob on his desk radio, turning on a local classic rock station.
Carleton stared at his computer screen, mind blanked out, not feeling like responding to customer complaints, so he leaned back in his chair and practiced changing the font on his coffee mug with his new powers.
Carleton had discovered his power on his commute to work. Stopped at a particularly busy intersection, he zoned out, absent mindedly staring at a stop sign, letting his mind wander. Carleton had been thinking about how funny it would be if he replied to all the scathing customer complaints he received via email in Comic Sans, then *poof*, the stop sign he had been staring at had been changed to Comic Sans.
Carleton smiled to himself in that moment, of all of his abilities he’d been presented with, at least this one wouldn’t have his coworkers pestering him to change the hue of the light bulb or put more time in the parking meters outside. This power served no arbitrary use for his coworkers to bug him about, it was like a private little joy.
For the rest of the drive to work, he was elated, he changed every stop sign he saw to Comic Sans. He switched the McDonald’s sign to look like a Starbucks, the Starbucks sign to look like Tim Horton’s, and then the Tim Horton’s sign to look like a McDonald’s. Seeing a teenager wearing a Misfits t-shirt, he changed the dripping blood logo to Helvetica, then laughed at the mental image of his friends calling him a poser. Once at work, Carleton scoured the Internet, changing the Google logo to look like Bing and Pornhub logo to look like Facebook’s.
Chuckling to himself, Carleton thought of himself like a modern trickster god, an agent of chaos.
The reflection on Carleton’s earlier devious achievements was suddenly halted when he heard the radio hosts say something about a traffic jam. He turned the knob slightly, drowning out Susan’s barrage towards the hapless IT guy further.
“*Traffic along the 105 down towards the downtown core is backed up, drivers are advised to take an alternative route, as a series of accidents have slowed traffic to a slow crawl.*”
“*Anymore word on these accidents?*”
“*Little is known so far, aside from there’s been no causalities. Oh, and apparently all the accidents have been caused from people ignoring stop signs. For whatever unknown reason, someone switched the signs overnight, with new signs in the unpopular Comic Sans font. According to one driver he could ‘just not take it seriously’.”*
| I wake up and go through my morning routine. Ever since this whole 'power' thing started in my late teens, it's been the same thing. I turn off my alarm clock, brush my teeth, shower, shave and then dig out my vast collection of knick-knacks and doo-dads I keep in the kitchen and set about finding out what 'power' I woke up with that day over my morning coffee. Yesterday I was able to see in the dark. Handy for sure, but not overly useful. Today however, I just noticed that I can affect the outcome of a coin toss, every time.
After a little research I found out what I can do with it, and it's pretty amazing... It turns out there are 3 sporting events in my local area which all begin with a coin toss. A few years ago I picked up a handy little 'power' where I was able to learn the contents of any book that I touched. A shame that particular gift hasn't resurfaced, but I made the best out of it, literally running up and down the isles at the Library, and one of the nuggets I picked up that day was all about gambling. It turns out you can bet on the coin tosses in a lot of cases. A few phone calls later and I had placed hefty bets with over a dozen bookees. A little on the shady side I know, but the ends justify the means I believe.
Tuning in to the first event, a football game, I anxiously await the coin toss, I had all my earthly funds riding on heads. The B list celebrity they managed to snag for the event stepped up in view of the cameras, tossed up the coin, and I used today's little gift from the comfort of my living room couch. Heads. Beautiful, just doubled all of my money. Two more to go.
By the last coin toss I had amassed a little over 1.8 million dollars. Which isn't bad for a single 20 something construction worker for a single days work. Then, in the final hours of the day, I walked into my local kid's community shelter, and made a bet with the staff. They throw heads, I hand them a cheque for 1.75 million dollars.
They shrug, say what the heck, flick the coin, and in the last seconds of the day, when my power was still at my finger tips, I apply just enough pressure...
Tonight I'm going to sleep great knowing all those kids are finally getting the funding they deserve. |
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[WP] Santa checked it twice, and there were no children on the Naughty List. Certain the records had been falsified, he had only one detective to turn to. Only one he could trust to investigate and ruin Christmas. Meet the Grinch. | *(A slight twist on the original prompt)*
You could say business wasn't swell that year in the Whoville Detective Agency. I didn't know what I expected, actually. I had tried to promise little Cindy Lou (not to mention her smokin' hot Mom) that I'd be very, very good, but damn! I didn't realize what I'd been committing myself to. Turns out its harder to turn a new leaf than it is to find moolah growing on the tree it came from. All I needed was one paying client to keep the lights on, but since no one in Whoville ever seemed to need dirt on anyone else, I might as well be outside barking at the moon with Rudolph.
That was when *she* walked into my establishment. Dressed in that form fitting red suit with its suggestive tufts of well placed fur trim, plunging neckline, fashionable leather boots that hugged the curves of her well turned gams and the jaunty red cap with its silver bell tipped peak leaning to one side over those yummy pointed elfin ears, she was enough to make a grinch's heart go thump-a-thump even if it hadn't just grown three sizes the previous year.
I looked up from my three hundredth hand of spider solitaire, swept the cards (and the lone spider) off my desk and into a convenient drawer before slamming it shut. I stood and walked to meet her, instinctively reaching up to tip my hat before I realized dazedly that it was hanging on the hat rack by the door. So much for my career as a smooth operator.
"Well, hello, " I told her, "I am T. Grinch, Private Eye. But you probably knew that from the sign on the door."
She smiled a luxuriously indulgent smile, a coy, creeping thing that tugged her pretty face to one side and pulled her eyes at cross purposes to the rest of her as she looked me over, half in polite interest, half in haughty contempt. She ignored my proffered hand and strode confidently to a chair by the desk, seating herself with grace and dignity that suggested she was a prize far beyond a grimy backwater jerk like me.
"I am well aware, Mr. Grinch. In fact, that's why I'm here. I need to employ your unique skill set."
"Well, of course, " I said gamely trying for a jaunty, friendly attitude, certain that I could win her over despite all evidence to the contrary. "Please, do tell me all about it, Miss…"
She cleared her throat, and the look in her eyes turned down about forty degrees (Celsius, no less). "*Mrs.*", she corrected -- just my luck. "My name is Mary Christmas-Claus," she informed me with all the dignity that title deserved.
A low impressed whistle had escaped my lips before I could stop it. "*You're* Mrs. Claus?" I asked, unable to keep the incredulousness out of my voice. She arched an imperious eyebrow at my tone.
"What *were* you expecting, Mr. Grinch? An elderly, heavyset, gray haired older woman?"
"Well…"
"Elfin blood, Mr. Grinch."
"Ah," I said exactly as if I knew what that meant. I glanced helplessly at the desk drawer into which I had tossed that elvish documentary book my friend J.R. had sent me asking for my opinion. Apparently there was more to these elves than I had realized. "So, er… what is it I can do for you, Mrs. C?" I asked, casually slumping, defeated, into the chair behind my desk. There was no way I was going to be anything but perfectly respectful to the dame who married herself off to none other than Big Red himself. I had too much to make up for.
"My husband and I have a bit of a conundrum… and a disagreement, which I hope your talents will be able to settle." I nodded politely and put on my most obsequious smile, looking as interested as I could.
"It's about the Naughty List."
"Oh?"
"It's *empty* this year."
"Well, that's... good?" I ventured. My training told me it was the right response, but my gut said I was skating on thin ice.
"It would be, if it were possible," she said caustically. "*I* say it's obvious that the List has been tampered with. Kris … well, my poor dear, *foolish* husband always wants to see the best in people. He insists there's nothing wrong with the List, and wants to go ahead with Christmas as if all the children in the world were good little girls and boys."
I picked up my coffee cup, staring forlornly into its grimy, empty, unwashed depths, wishing I had made a pot of coffee, and wishing even more there were a little something extra to add to it in the bottle by the coffee maker. "So, let me get this straight," I said slowly, carefully. "You want me to dig up dirt on little kids, and prove that they've been too naughty for presents this year?"
"Not *all* little kids, Mr. Grinch. Only the brats, the bullies, and the troublemakers. Good heavens, what do you think I'm trying to do? Entirely ruin Christmas?" Wide eyed, I waved my hands in a vague gesture meant to convey that I would never accuse her of such a thing. "I'm trying to restore *justice*, Mr. Grinch. Kris is being naive. Human nature is simply too fallible for a world full of perfect children. *Someone* has hacked the List, and I need you to find out who, and set things right."
I heaved a sigh whose length and depth were calculated with careful precision to express the sheer magnitude of the chore with which she had just tasked me. Not only was it an enormous amount of work, but I shuddered to think what little Cindy Lou (not to mention her smokin' hot Mom) would think of me if they found out I was working to ruin Christmas for even just *some* of the children in the world. At least, that was how I was sure they would see it, all Mrs. Claus' talk of 'justice' notwithstanding.
"I don't suppose you have any suspects?" I asked carefully.
"Only the usual ones," she said in a sultry, confident voice that said she knew she had me on the hook and that I couldn't turn this job down. In a flourish that bespoke some minor magic had just been performed right under my nose, she materialized three dossiers seemingly out of thin air (for I certainly couldn't see where she might have been carrying them).
I flipped through them and gave another low whistle. She had been gathering dirt on these three creeps for years. Three suspects: Calvin, Dennis, and Kevin. All they had in common was that they'd been holy terrors as young boys, and now that they had finally reached their teenage years, they were all into computer hacking and the kind of ritual magic that attracted a special breed of sociopaths. The kind you only get into after obsessing over roleplaying games until even cosplay and LARPing seems too tame for your tastes anymore. Since the Naughty List was a combination of computer networking and elfin magic, *both* expert computer skills and magic would be a prerequisite for hacking it.
"So," Mrs. Claus asked. "What do you say, Mr. Grinch? Have I got your attention?" I looked up from the dossiers to find she had sat back, lounging in that indolent way that only a true elfin beauty can ever fully pull off, crossed those gorgeous gams, and was smiling a slight bit more warmly than she had been a moment before.
And what else could I say? You probably think I'm just a sucker for dames. And any other day, you'd be right. But facts were facts. I was one missed rent payment away from going out of business forever, and I needed this case. "Mrs. C," I told her, "I'm your man."
| I knew who it was coming up my stairs long before his well-padded body squeezed itself around my door. The merry, infuriating tinkling of bells combined with labored huffs and puffs and the occasional muttered "ho...ho...hee...ho" under his breath. Evidently Mrs. C had yet to receive the memo that a year-long diet of cookies and two percent milk for her dear husband might not be the most salubrious of diets. I arranged my face into its most fearsome grimace and hoped fervently that the effort would be enough to stop jolly old St. Nick in his tracks.
But what the hell do I know about stopping Christmas anyway? Tried it once and look what happened. It took a full 365 day cleanse of broken New Year's Resolutions and awkward office parties to fully wash the cloying sweetness of Whoville out of my system, and my heart still hasn't shrunk to its original size. Mr. C was not to be deterred.
"Save the spiel, G," he said wearily, holding up one meaty hand to forestall my snarl and arranging his beard with the other. "Besides, got something here that you may find interesting."
"Where's Donner and Blitzen?" I asked, snapping the proffered parchment out of his hand and casting my eye briefly over it. At the top was scrawled "Naughty", written in a ridiculous script with a quill pen of all things. But that was it--the rest of the page was as blank as new-fallen snow.
"Very funny," sighed Mr. C. I knew very well that he hated that damned poem and the following reindeer craze--gave him flashbacks to the "Rudolph incident." Which of course was why I had to ask him. "I wouldn't normally come to you, but this is something outside the purview of general holiday cheer and Christmas joy. The elves are normally in charge of book keeping, but me and the missus have had our suspicions for a while. Seems like there's a nasty little racket going on. Figured you'd know something about it."
I didn't like the way he said that last line, but I kept my habitual scowl locked firmly in place. "If you want me to do your dirty work for you, you've come to the right place."
Mr. C heaved a great sigh of relief. "Knew I could count on you to restore the balance, my jaded friend," he said, with a twinkle in his eye. Despite myself, I could feel my scowl transforming into a wide grin that reached the top of my ears.
I was back in business.
|
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[deleted] | [WP] In a quest to find the secret of immortality, humans search the universe for more intelligent life. They find immortal aliens, who beg to learn how to die. | "Here take this"
With its tendrils, it wraps around the butt of the gun, sliding thoroughly along its surface.
"Point it towards your most sensitive organ and pull the trigger."
Confused with the physicality of the weapon and my clear unease around it, it aims the gun more purposefully towards itself and squeezes the trigger. Unperturbed by the recoil or the loud bang of the gun, it looks over to me as if to ask, "Did I do this right?"
"Keep going." I say, not quite registering.
It continues to let off rounds, a staccato of smoke and shredded shells being caught mid-air with seemingly infinite tendrils. Finally, at the magazine's end, I take the gun from it. Wide-eyed and staring at the still bullets embedded within the gelatinous flesh of the creature. It drops the shells it caught earlier, in a rain of steel, unnerving the crew behind me.
"I got nothing. Boys?"
A resounding shaking of heads as the group of physicists, engineers, biologists, and soldiers are themselves left speechless.
"We've been at this for months now, we can't help you."
Squeezing out of the crowd and into the front, a portly man waves about "If I might interject, perhaps mortality is more than just physical but rather metaphysical. Kant posited that -"
"We've tried using boredom before prof, unless your aim is the death of humanity, it's a lost cause."
The man recedes back to the shadows, pouting among his intellectual inferiors.
"We apologize really. We've tried every means known to man and we just can't grant you the end you seek. You don’t even register pain; the spectrum of your experience is beyond our understanding. For gods sake, this tickles you!”
Pulling from behind my back, I brandish a serrated knife, stabbing it into the alien. Instead of feeling a squishy mass of jelly, its more like stabbing into partly settle poly-gel, a vice grip on the blade. The alien gyrates, lighting up in a shade of incandescent yellow, a sign of levity. Letting go of the knife, it hangs still until the alien pushes it and the previous bullets out and onto the floor.
“You’ve been through radioactive storms, you live in the vacuum of space, you’ve had front row seats to the beginning of the universe – so you claim – and to the very deaths of planets and stars. Our weapons of mass destruction, our very lives are trinkets in the scope of your existence. Death escapes you as much as life does us.”
The greatest minds have been unable to grant the only condition the aliens set upon us in hopes of immortality. If we could bring about an end to life, they would see to it we had an infinite extension on ours. The irony wasn’t lost on either of our species.
“We haven’t tried-” Reaching above the crowd with a loose headphone, a man climbs over the shoulders of a woman much smaller than himself.
“I swear to God, Carl! If you bring up Justin Bieber one more time, we’ll try everything we have on them on you! Bieber fever is not a thing!”
Putting down his hand. And placing the headphone piece back into his ear.
An alien in the background begins to waver noticeably, colour draining away, finally collapsing in on itself, until it forms and cements itself into a sphere of solid black.
“Can someone tell me what just happened?” calling over his shoulder.
“They’ve never displayed that before.” A group of faces reply, looking through monitors of numbers and blinking dots.
The alien surfaces transparent and slimy threads towards my face. It echoes a word telepathically, “Death.”
Looking back to his people, he shouts “We’ve got us a breakthrough, someone pull up Spotify!”
**I came up with a more serious ending but I liked this random one.** | “Arthur hurry up! We wouldn’t want the Gentlemen wait any longer for their tea would we?”
Ford sat across three irish looking aliens in the command center of his space shuttle.
They were stranded in space, as because their probability drive came up with some pretty probable malfunctions.
Arthur saw them while they had been flying by with lightspeed.
Ford and his personal disk-jockey Arthur were on a diplomatic mission to bring back that candy bar Ford stole from the princess of Bulgator 13.
He wasn’t sure if the Princess even noticed, because she left the party early with a stewart.
But he wanted to bring the candy bar back to her personally at the stroke of midnight to avoid an intergalactic conflict.
Arthur entered the room with 5 cups of tea and both legs.
“Thank you for the tea!”, said the alien on the left, who called himself Mike, but Arthur called him Freddy and Ford called him Stephen.
“So”, said Ford. “ You’ve been here for over three and a half trillion years? Didn’t you need…. like…...a drink from time to time?
I couldn’t go a day without some Ice Tea on my very long Island, if you know what I mean."
Ford winked.
“No I don’t…but to get to your question…Our species can’t ...stop living”
“What? What you mean? You can’t die?”
“DIE! Just couldn't remember the word. Sorry.”
“You see”, said the alien on the left whom everyone called Charlie.
“We are explorers and we’ve been away from our homeworld for so long that we simply forgot what else there is in life except life. So as we were stuck here we simply couldn’t stop living because we didn’t know how”
“Did you try fly a Sugardragon on the Moon of Saer 4?”, Arthur asked.
“No, but as I said our engine was failing…..”
“Then you haven’t really tried, because every second tourist dies flying these things. Shall we fly there and get everyone two tickets?”, said Arthur.
“That’s out of the question. We can’t make another detour. I need to enter the princess...I mean her bedroom… I need to see the princess at midnight!”, Ford intervened.
“But maybe after you surprised the princess and almost get killed by their guards we could stop by on our way home”, suggested Arthur.
So while Ford nearly got killed by the Royal Guard of Bulgator 13, Arthur and the Aliens stayed on the ship and listened to some fine tunes.
Arthur was just about to flip another Vinyl as Ford returned.
“Let’s move” said Arthur and dropped the Bass.
They arrived at the Sugardragon-Cliffs at dawn. Arthur bought two tickets for everyone and they queued for the ride.
Arthur and Fords Dragon instantly died from boredom as they flew of the cliff.
They fell for thirty minutes, but lived to tell the tale.
The aliens went for a total of 400 Rides each, and although every other tourist on this day died a horrible death riding these dragons, they never stopped living.
Arthur, Ford and the Aliens headed back to their space-ship.
“So this didn’t work. How shall we explore life if we can’t die? This is unnerving. I can’t go for another Trillion years without death in my life”, said the alien who has no name.
“Hey I heard of a place they call Chicago ….”, said Ford. |
[deleted] | [WP] In a quest to find the secret of immortality, humans search the universe for more intelligent life. They find immortal aliens, who beg to learn how to die. | "Here take this"
With its tendrils, it wraps around the butt of the gun, sliding thoroughly along its surface.
"Point it towards your most sensitive organ and pull the trigger."
Confused with the physicality of the weapon and my clear unease around it, it aims the gun more purposefully towards itself and squeezes the trigger. Unperturbed by the recoil or the loud bang of the gun, it looks over to me as if to ask, "Did I do this right?"
"Keep going." I say, not quite registering.
It continues to let off rounds, a staccato of smoke and shredded shells being caught mid-air with seemingly infinite tendrils. Finally, at the magazine's end, I take the gun from it. Wide-eyed and staring at the still bullets embedded within the gelatinous flesh of the creature. It drops the shells it caught earlier, in a rain of steel, unnerving the crew behind me.
"I got nothing. Boys?"
A resounding shaking of heads as the group of physicists, engineers, biologists, and soldiers are themselves left speechless.
"We've been at this for months now, we can't help you."
Squeezing out of the crowd and into the front, a portly man waves about "If I might interject, perhaps mortality is more than just physical but rather metaphysical. Kant posited that -"
"We've tried using boredom before prof, unless your aim is the death of humanity, it's a lost cause."
The man recedes back to the shadows, pouting among his intellectual inferiors.
"We apologize really. We've tried every means known to man and we just can't grant you the end you seek. You don’t even register pain; the spectrum of your experience is beyond our understanding. For gods sake, this tickles you!”
Pulling from behind my back, I brandish a serrated knife, stabbing it into the alien. Instead of feeling a squishy mass of jelly, its more like stabbing into partly settle poly-gel, a vice grip on the blade. The alien gyrates, lighting up in a shade of incandescent yellow, a sign of levity. Letting go of the knife, it hangs still until the alien pushes it and the previous bullets out and onto the floor.
“You’ve been through radioactive storms, you live in the vacuum of space, you’ve had front row seats to the beginning of the universe – so you claim – and to the very deaths of planets and stars. Our weapons of mass destruction, our very lives are trinkets in the scope of your existence. Death escapes you as much as life does us.”
The greatest minds have been unable to grant the only condition the aliens set upon us in hopes of immortality. If we could bring about an end to life, they would see to it we had an infinite extension on ours. The irony wasn’t lost on either of our species.
“We haven’t tried-” Reaching above the crowd with a loose headphone, a man climbs over the shoulders of a woman much smaller than himself.
“I swear to God, Carl! If you bring up Justin Bieber one more time, we’ll try everything we have on them on you! Bieber fever is not a thing!”
Putting down his hand. And placing the headphone piece back into his ear.
An alien in the background begins to waver noticeably, colour draining away, finally collapsing in on itself, until it forms and cements itself into a sphere of solid black.
“Can someone tell me what just happened?” calling over his shoulder.
“They’ve never displayed that before.” A group of faces reply, looking through monitors of numbers and blinking dots.
The alien surfaces transparent and slimy threads towards my face. It echoes a word telepathically, “Death.”
Looking back to his people, he shouts “We’ve got us a breakthrough, someone pull up Spotify!”
**I came up with a more serious ending but I liked this random one.** | Randal Harmon, 927744 Personal Log: 12/12/4017. 13:02
I think we might as well give up. We've tried everything , even cutting the brain out.
Bad idea , we ended up cloning one today.
Granted : The one that grew out of the brain thinks that relearning some of what was in their muscle and nerve memory will be novel for about a decade. Ánd the body that regrew a brain, though perfectly eloquent and skilled looks forward to reading some books if the other doesn't spoil them... but technically it wasn't a success.
We could have known this before if they only remembered to tell us earlier.... If I was more paranoid I would think they might just be trying have us act as a cross between dominatrix and midwife.
According to the older ones it used to be fashionable to take a brain tissue sample and raise what formed out of a couple of brain cells as a child.
They banned it a few centuries after the ban on procreation since it would also amount to burdening a new individual with eternity just because you're bored, but there is a level of nostalgia toward childhood in some of them that the "originals" have been over for a while. |
[deleted] | [WP] In a quest to find the secret of immortality, humans search the universe for more intelligent life. They find immortal aliens, who beg to learn how to die. | Phil raised his gun, aiming for what he'd been told was the strange creature's nervous core. He fired three shots at point blank range. The creature's shell cracked, oozing pale blood, then rapidly repaired itself. The bullets clinked to the desert floor.
"Well, I'll be damned. You fellas really are tough sons-a-bitches, aren't ya? Well, it was sorth a shot."
"That's a terrible pun, Phil," the creature said, it's voice sounding like a purr. "Thanks for trying."
"Yea, well I got a whole lot more to try out, so don't you give up yet. I'll kill you one of these times, just you wait," Phil muttered. "Speakin' of waitin', don't you fellas need to eat sometime? Could we starve ya out?"
"Our bodies produce sustenance from the air we breathe or from the light of stars if air isn't available. If we are denied either of those, we go into a comatose state to recycle the energy we've already harnessed. 864 years is the longest one of us has tried. He is still not dead." The creature rose from the ground and wiped off some dirt from its many legs. It turned it's eyes on Phil's arsenal. "What next?"
"Well, I was thinkin' some C4 might just do. What happens when y'all get blown to little bits?" Phil asked as he rummaged through the back of his truck. He carefully set aside two white, powdery bricks.
"We reassemble. If our parts cannot find the host body, they simply form a new one. It is how we reproduce," replied the creature.
"Well, shit," he said and put the C4 back in its box. "What about fire?"
"We repair too rapidly for it to burn us. Our shell is quite resistant to it as well," the creature said, looking around. "If this is too much to ask of your species, we understand. We can move on."
"Now wait just a galldarn minute. You made a deal with the space people over at NASA, and they contracted ME to destroy you. Now, the way they tell it is that y'all will let us in on this eternal life thing, but only if we kill ya," Phil said, wrestling a large barrel out of the truck. "Now, I might want to meet God someday, but not as soon as the good doctor says I'm gonna. So you just sit back and let me kill you, all right?"
"All right, Phil. What's that?" The creature said, eying the barrel. It had a strange symbol marked on it, and the creature was unfamiliar with it.
"Hop on in. We'll see if a nice acid bath will do the trick," Phil smiled.
The creature obliged, sighing. This was the longest day it'd had in over a century, but at least it wasn't bored to death for once. | Randal Harmon, 927744 Personal Log: 12/12/4017. 13:02
I think we might as well give up. We've tried everything , even cutting the brain out.
Bad idea , we ended up cloning one today.
Granted : The one that grew out of the brain thinks that relearning some of what was in their muscle and nerve memory will be novel for about a decade. Ánd the body that regrew a brain, though perfectly eloquent and skilled looks forward to reading some books if the other doesn't spoil them... but technically it wasn't a success.
We could have known this before if they only remembered to tell us earlier.... If I was more paranoid I would think they might just be trying have us act as a cross between dominatrix and midwife.
According to the older ones it used to be fashionable to take a brain tissue sample and raise what formed out of a couple of brain cells as a child.
They banned it a few centuries after the ban on procreation since it would also amount to burdening a new individual with eternity just because you're bored, but there is a level of nostalgia toward childhood in some of them that the "originals" have been over for a while. |
[deleted] | [WP] In a quest to find the secret of immortality, humans search the universe for more intelligent life. They find immortal aliens, who beg to learn how to die. | They were, beautiful, serene, graceful and above all else completely alien to humanity. Yet this alienation was not necessarily physical, the Angelarchs were a species who were roughly humanoid in size and shape, though taller with the average height of roughly 2 meters. Their skin and features were similar to that of humans, but completely flawless and with greater variety. Some Angelarchs were born with a single eye, some with three, but even though their features were not always traditional by human standards, none could deny the sheer beauty that every single member of the species seem to exude.
Language and communication between us was never an issue. They had known of humanity for millennia even attempting to contact with our species in several key moments in our history. Variants of their names appearing in holy texts throughout our planet. They seemed as impressed with us as we were with them. Their envoy to humanity often gushed at the advances we made in our civilization in such seemingly short lifetimes. Life. That was they the key difference between Humans and Angelarchs. Where the eldest of humans might live just over 100 rotations of our sun, Angelarchs never aged at all. Micheal the Angelarch, envoy to humanity had claimed to see our species evolve even from its very beginning. His reports back to their home planet of Eaven only drew more interest more and more visitors became enamored with the richness of human life.
For them we lived more in a single decade than they would over a millennia. Their seemingly endless lifespans meant that food had little meaning to them. Adventure and excitement was dulled with the edge of knowing you could survive every possible outcome and so a bargain was struck. Biologically our species were remarkably similar despite our differing life spans. The Angelarchs would teach humans the key to their longevity and humanity would pass on its advice on how to reach an end that would give meaning to countless years before it.
The Bargain became a great lesson for both our species.
Death is a lot simpler to attain on Earth than life. Angelarchs lived forever, and as such needed no food, no liquor, no great ambition or adventure in order to give their existence meaning. They simply were and always would be. They never laughed, they never cried, they never loved. Acts of carnal passion were completely foreign to them, even though they were biologically similarly equipped as humans. The acting of creating new life within them, experiencing life, its pleasures and pains left the Angelarchs exhausted for the first time in their collective history. In that exhaustion came contentedness and eventual a final peace which would end their long lives.
For humans it was much harder, to attain immortality. To do so they would have to strip away facets of themselves they felt intrinsically human. No longer feeling, loving, consuming. To never need the touch of another and to become completely self-sufficient. Assisted with technology provided by our new allies, humans were able to attain eternal life. Well, eternal so far. Those who underwent the process no longer seemed to age, and no longer required earthly sustenance in order to maintain their biological functions.
Every bargain has a cost. The cost of the Bargain changed both species greatly. A human who underwent the Angelarch process ceased to be recognised as a human by other members of their species. They simply could not connect with those who would give up so much of themselves for time. Similarly an Angelarch who underwent Humanism simply became a human. They were no longer alien, they were home.
So would you partake in the Bargain? | Randal Harmon, 927744 Personal Log: 12/12/4017. 13:02
I think we might as well give up. We've tried everything , even cutting the brain out.
Bad idea , we ended up cloning one today.
Granted : The one that grew out of the brain thinks that relearning some of what was in their muscle and nerve memory will be novel for about a decade. Ánd the body that regrew a brain, though perfectly eloquent and skilled looks forward to reading some books if the other doesn't spoil them... but technically it wasn't a success.
We could have known this before if they only remembered to tell us earlier.... If I was more paranoid I would think they might just be trying have us act as a cross between dominatrix and midwife.
According to the older ones it used to be fashionable to take a brain tissue sample and raise what formed out of a couple of brain cells as a child.
They banned it a few centuries after the ban on procreation since it would also amount to burdening a new individual with eternity just because you're bored, but there is a level of nostalgia toward childhood in some of them that the "originals" have been over for a while. |
this is a repost, but from 3 months ago and it didn’t have any response so I figured I’d give it one more shot before throwing it away. | [WP] as an adventurer you’ve always had the ability to pull whatever monetary value you need from your pocket. What you didn’t realize is that it took money from someone else and replaced it with a note with your name on it. | 20 years have passed since my journey has started. From Peasant to Adventurer to Knight to Savior and King. And now I sit in my own kingdoms prison but not just any prison. One of the strongest prison designed to hold an adventurer. With minimal things inside just some straw and a bucket and a enchanted book to read their own history. Makes me think of my beginnings.
I almost forgot, my name. I am Aslan, better known as The Golden Knight and King of Leo this is my tale.
In these lands there are natural born adventurers which develop unique abilities depending on their surroundings. My belief was because of my family being poor wanderers with just enough money to get by, my powers was just that. To create just enough money from my pockets. never more and never less. Whether it be bronze, silver or gold. I somehow always had enough in my pockets for whatever I needed.
In the beginning when my powers just happened. It felt like a normal day. I was being chased by noblemen's children and was told off by the towns guard that I should not be in the area. I was different and easily spotted. With long golden hair and golden brown eye I am a hard person to miss. With the clinks and of chain-mail and the clacks of the iron armor hitting hilt of the sword as soon as the guard turned the corner, i recognized him. His name is David. He let me off with a warning last time for not paying the fee to enter the nobles town center. But this time was different with his deep, husky voice he said " I cannot let you go again. According to Dagoon kingdom's law the fees for sneaking in a noblemen's town is 1 gold coin, for disturbing the peace 10 silver coins. Payment is required immediately!"
The noblemen's children started laughing as they saw I wore tattered clothing covered in dirt. Probably worth less than 1 bronze coin. I have never even seen a gold coin before and they asked me to pay! As I pull my pockets out I hear clinks? When I looked down to everyone's amazement a single gold coin and 10 silver coins are lying on the stone path way around my bare feet. David laughed and took the coins and left. Yelling at the children to leave and close their mouths. Bewildered of what just happened I left with a couple of days of trial and error I figured out how my power works. If they told me the price that I had to pay, I would just have the coins in my pocket. I paid for my adventures pass and bought the most expensive armor I could find and I set off.
But this is enough of my chapter for one night.
| It was a beautiful day today. A calm breeze swept through my hair as I opened the window. The inn we decided to stay for the night had a beautiful view of the lake and a castle. This world has adventurers, like me, who seek treasures or a thrill you get from defeating monsters. I turned, put on my shirt as i walked out of the door. The innkeeper greeted me as i went outside to take a breath. It was refreshing. "My pals are still sleeping at the inn. Maybe I should walk a little." I thought. "Marketplace should be fine now." I've got a power, well, most adventurers also do have power but they are usually too risky to use. I can pull the money I need from my pocket, usually in a bag for some reason. This power is so convenient, too convenient even. Nobody else besides my pals know about my ability.
The sound of gravel as i walk over them sure is satisfying. The crunchy sound sure is pleasure. I headed towards the marketplace. It was quiet. Well it's the morning so i shouldn't be surprised. I browsed through the items and saw a nice flute, perfect for Amelie as a gift. I pointed at the flute: "How much is that flute?" The old woman glimpsed at the flute: "I'll sell it for 65 scales." "Too much. How about 40 scales?" I made a counter offer. "50 scales. The price wont budge from this." "I accept." I reached my pocket and got a green bag of 50 scales. *Green bag? Doesn't Amelie have one of those?* I thought. I handed the bad and i got the flute. It was kinda expensive. I decided to test the flute, a beautiful screech since i cannot play it.
I decided to head back with a beautiful flute and a bitten apple i bought. It was fresh and only 1 scale, delicious investment! As i headed back to the inn, Amelie was rushing towards me... with a malicious intent. "HENRIK! You better explain this to me!" I could hear her voice... she was totally going to kill me. I put up with a weird performance. "Amelie, my love. What brings a rose like you her-" Before I could finish my joke, her fist was already deep in my face. I flew few meters back. "What was that for, Amelie?" I asked as i bled a little. She lifted me up to a wall with one arm. A person put his arm on her shoulder. "Amelie stop that. Even though he's a dickhead, he doesn't deserve it." I glimpsed at the person. "Sup' John!" John looked at Henrik's desperate face for air. "Henrik, i might know what's going on." He handed me a note. "Henrik Sonson, Frelie Marketplace, 8 am" I read it from word to word. "What the hell is that note?" I asked. Amelie raised her voice: "I don't know but it was in my pocket instead of my scale bag." I was confused. "How? I never touched your pockets." I looked at John. "You said you might know about it." John said: "Your power."
"My power? How does my power and that note correla-" The moment of realization struck me: "Don't tell me when i take money from my pockets, it's from someone else? And on top of that, it gets replaced by those stupid notes?" John shook his head. "Yes. How many times have used your power, Henrik?" I put my head down. "Hundreds, maybe even thousands of times." "You might be in a really deep trouble then, mate." "Shit!" I shouted. I picked up the flute and looked at Amelie and gave it to her. "Here, i bought it with your money." She admired it for a while... then snapped it. "Let's go back to the inn and get beer." I forgot she was that kind of a person. |
this is a repost, but from 3 months ago and it didn’t have any response so I figured I’d give it one more shot before throwing it away. | [WP] as an adventurer you’ve always had the ability to pull whatever monetary value you need from your pocket. What you didn’t realize is that it took money from someone else and replaced it with a note with your name on it. | Maria ducked into the dirty subway bathroom, panting. The two men chasing her hopefully would run past and not see that she had slipped in there. Her back pressed against the door, she listened for the heavy quick paced steps that would mean that her diversion had succeeded. A few seconds later, heart pounding in her chest, she heard her relief.
Rubbing her nose on her sleeve, she checked her pockets. Nothing. Maria quietly checked the door, and seeing the coast was clear, set off to the Rendezvous point. Mark was already there waiting for her.
“Hey, anything?” she asked.
“Nope, you?” he replied.
“Nada.” Maria said, grinning conspiratorially.
“Alright, well let’s see how far we get before it happens again. Where to this time?” Mark asked.
Maria paused. “We’ve cleared North America best we can, I don’t think we’ll get any more people out of it. Chris said that his organizations’ met twenty seven others in the same situation in Asia, twelve from Bangkok and fifteen from Kyoto. The closer we get to a major city hub, like London or Tokyo, the more we can add to our group. We only need thirty three more people before we hit two hundred, which is how many we need for our plan to succeed.”
Mark nodded as he retrieved their stashed get away bags, clear of any identifying marks. The two boarded the next subway train that came their way, heading toward JFK international. They made sure to pickpocket every person they came in contact with, keeping their faces down. Between the museums, zoos, and shops today, they should have been able to get together just enough to buy two plane tickets Beijjing, so long as everything holds together.
A note appeared in her pocket and Maria unfolded it: “Phillip Hammondway, $6 Starbucks, Tokyo” She folded it back up and placed another red dot in the map in her Moleskine and thought, “We’re onto you Phillip. And boy are we coming for you.”
---
“Phil” the barista calls. I go to the counter and grab my drink before sitting back down with a view of Shibuya Crossing. I look at the freshly blended Green Tea Latte on the side table next to me and wonder if I’m living too easily. I don’t want for anything these days. I started out as a digital nomad, hoping my viewership would get me enough money to hop cheaply from city to city. But I have an entirely different lifestyle now. I’ve gone from New Zealand to Ireland, then back over to New Zealand’s Cook Islands, and then over to Patagonia on the flip of a dime. I don’t want for anything. In a way, it’s made the thrill of it diminish a bit. Not enough to stop me from buying an expensive yacht and sailing around the world of course, not enough to keep me from parasailing over the Andes and hike part of the Himalayas. But I just don’t know when all the good luck will end. Did I make a good wish somewhere that I don’t remember? In a way, I think I might crave a normal day-to – day job. Maybe playing around the stock market would put some sort of risk in my life. Or managing some company’s money. I’ve been in Tokyo about two weeks now and I think I might try to find a job. Do something crazy. Not for the money, of course, but for the excitement and the adventure of a desk job where money isn’t guaranteed.
I scroll through social media and see that there’s a festival in Beijjing tomorrowt. The pictures look nice, l think. But would going on such short notice make sense? What about my plans of getting a job?
Who am I kidding? I have an endless supply of money! The world is at my fingertips and I can do whatever I want. Beijjing it is. | It was a beautiful day today. A calm breeze swept through my hair as I opened the window. The inn we decided to stay for the night had a beautiful view of the lake and a castle. This world has adventurers, like me, who seek treasures or a thrill you get from defeating monsters. I turned, put on my shirt as i walked out of the door. The innkeeper greeted me as i went outside to take a breath. It was refreshing. "My pals are still sleeping at the inn. Maybe I should walk a little." I thought. "Marketplace should be fine now." I've got a power, well, most adventurers also do have power but they are usually too risky to use. I can pull the money I need from my pocket, usually in a bag for some reason. This power is so convenient, too convenient even. Nobody else besides my pals know about my ability.
The sound of gravel as i walk over them sure is satisfying. The crunchy sound sure is pleasure. I headed towards the marketplace. It was quiet. Well it's the morning so i shouldn't be surprised. I browsed through the items and saw a nice flute, perfect for Amelie as a gift. I pointed at the flute: "How much is that flute?" The old woman glimpsed at the flute: "I'll sell it for 65 scales." "Too much. How about 40 scales?" I made a counter offer. "50 scales. The price wont budge from this." "I accept." I reached my pocket and got a green bag of 50 scales. *Green bag? Doesn't Amelie have one of those?* I thought. I handed the bad and i got the flute. It was kinda expensive. I decided to test the flute, a beautiful screech since i cannot play it.
I decided to head back with a beautiful flute and a bitten apple i bought. It was fresh and only 1 scale, delicious investment! As i headed back to the inn, Amelie was rushing towards me... with a malicious intent. "HENRIK! You better explain this to me!" I could hear her voice... she was totally going to kill me. I put up with a weird performance. "Amelie, my love. What brings a rose like you her-" Before I could finish my joke, her fist was already deep in my face. I flew few meters back. "What was that for, Amelie?" I asked as i bled a little. She lifted me up to a wall with one arm. A person put his arm on her shoulder. "Amelie stop that. Even though he's a dickhead, he doesn't deserve it." I glimpsed at the person. "Sup' John!" John looked at Henrik's desperate face for air. "Henrik, i might know what's going on." He handed me a note. "Henrik Sonson, Frelie Marketplace, 8 am" I read it from word to word. "What the hell is that note?" I asked. Amelie raised her voice: "I don't know but it was in my pocket instead of my scale bag." I was confused. "How? I never touched your pockets." I looked at John. "You said you might know about it." John said: "Your power."
"My power? How does my power and that note correla-" The moment of realization struck me: "Don't tell me when i take money from my pockets, it's from someone else? And on top of that, it gets replaced by those stupid notes?" John shook his head. "Yes. How many times have used your power, Henrik?" I put my head down. "Hundreds, maybe even thousands of times." "You might be in a really deep trouble then, mate." "Shit!" I shouted. I picked up the flute and looked at Amelie and gave it to her. "Here, i bought it with your money." She admired it for a while... then snapped it. "Let's go back to the inn and get beer." I forgot she was that kind of a person. |
[WP] You come across a book similar to the “Death Note” but you can only use it to cause mild inconveniences for other people. You cannot use it to cause harm, financial burden, or any long lasting negative effects on the person. An example would be to make a persons hot cup of coffee become cold. | The morning commute to work was long and tedious and as usual I soon found myself people-watching. People-watching is fun as it is, but I enjoyed it more than most people did. Discerning people’s characters through snippets of conversation and serving my own personal flavor of justice was my favourite pastime. How did I serve my justice? It was only a matter of writing the name of a particularly odious individual in my little black book and then the laws of the universe would somehow ensure that someone spilt hot coffee on their trousers or someone stepped on their toe. What happened every time varied but invariably it would be the mild inconvenience that was the fly in the ointment of their perfect day.
I scanned my compartment for possible candidates that deserved to have a bad day. My pet peeves were rudeness and blatant inconsideration for other people. Queue cutters were inevitably in the black book and their queue would somehow always close when their turn arrived.
Like Santa looking for kids to write on his naughty list, I looked around for the usual suspects-the blatantly loud headphones, the uncomfortably close crotch display, the publicly broadcasted phone conversation. I was met with nothing but the polite ordinary. I should have been happy to see such a great testament to human behaviour, but I was secretly disappointed that I didn’t find a rogue detractor. Even the Gods liked to rain bolts of lightning down on those who dared to displease them with righteous indignation. I was no God but I could ruin a lot of trousers with coffee stains. With righteous indignation.
I was just about give up on my search when suddenly a man with a blue tie sitting in the adjacent corner of my compartment hastily pulled out his ringing phone. I smiled. A loud conversation imminent?
“Hello Sir. I’m really sorry I can’t make it to the office sooner. I am on my way right now.”
A faint muffled angry voice spoke on the other end. The blue tie stared grimly at the floor of the compartment as the voice rambled on.
“But sir,” he tried to interject.
But the voice would hear none of it. The now-sulking man with the blue tie listened silently, accepting the rebuke that was being dispensed by whom I presumed was his boss. And having heard the last of it, he cut the phone call. Without a moment’s pause he dialled another number.
“Yeah Jim Cohen just called and I had to hear a mouthful for not coming in on time today.”
He continued, “This is the last time we are going to have a midnight party for my birthday. I appreciate the gesture honey, I really do. But I knew this was inevitable.”
A man getting shouted at by his boss, for coming in late on his birthday. I truly felt bad for him.
The blue tie went on, “Yeah, coming in to work today wasn’t bad enough, he wants me to buy him coffee on the way”
Coffee you say? I smiled and I pulled out my little black book.
After writing the name, I silently hoped it wouldn’t be the blue tie who would be doing the spilling over. Oh well. One way or another Jim Cohen’s pants would be ruined that day.
| "Ah s'port Donald Trump, he's a real Murcan. Keepin all them Mud People out."
I watched the wall-eyed dimwit being interviewed, waiting for a name to pop up with my pen poised over the Fuckery Folio.
"Raceeist? That's just whiney librulism talk."
"*Earl Markson Davis Jr., local resident*" popped up on the screen beneath the triple-chinned, Cheeto-stained idiot.
I wrote fast, hoping the live interview would capture the consequences. The silly CHUD looked down and said "What the hayl?" before the camera cut away.
I chuckled, and looked down at the page: "*Earl Markson Davis Jr. Dog urinates on leg.*"
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[WP] You come across a book similar to the “Death Note” but you can only use it to cause mild inconveniences for other people. You cannot use it to cause harm, financial burden, or any long lasting negative effects on the person. An example would be to make a persons hot cup of coffee become cold. | I tapped the tips of my fingers together as my mind schemed on how to ruin this man's day. He spelled my name wrong across my cup of coffee and I simply could not forgive such a thing. Aaron 'with two a's'. I even told him that. My name is not hard to spell..
Yes.. yes.. something terrible. Something that would make this man understand who he messed with today. But what I wonder... The coffee is good at least, thankfully this location actually understand what I mean when I asked for 'extra caramel'.
What shall I do to this man after he's come up on my radar... there's so many things but I must pick the perfect one before making my escape. Oh! That's it! I got it!
I quickly took the book out and began to scribble into it. "Yes... yes..." I said aloud to myself.
"Sir? Are you alright?" a young girl asked me. She was sitting on my right giving me an odd look.
"Watch young one, watch and learn." I nodded my head towards the man at the register.
"Oh, I'm sorry sir, I guess I have to restart my system on this register. That's alright though I'll snag your order on this one if that's alright," the cashier said to the man in front of him.
"Well, that's only mildly inconvenient and I'm not in a rush," came his reply.
"Muahaha!" I quickly grabbed my coffee and book, grinning at anyone who dared look my way. "Two for one, hehehe," I let out while shuffling my way from the establishment. | "Ah s'port Donald Trump, he's a real Murcan. Keepin all them Mud People out."
I watched the wall-eyed dimwit being interviewed, waiting for a name to pop up with my pen poised over the Fuckery Folio.
"Raceeist? That's just whiney librulism talk."
"*Earl Markson Davis Jr., local resident*" popped up on the screen beneath the triple-chinned, Cheeto-stained idiot.
I wrote fast, hoping the live interview would capture the consequences. The silly CHUD looked down and said "What the hayl?" before the camera cut away.
I chuckled, and looked down at the page: "*Earl Markson Davis Jr. Dog urinates on leg.*"
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[WP] The first manned FTL mission to Alpha Centauri was a success, and the crew arrived back on Earth just months after they left. Five years later the radio transmitted logs begin arriving at Earth. They don't match the ship logs. | Part I
A cube fell into my mug, followed by a laser which heated it up. I stood there for a few moments watching the event take place. Right before my eyes, the cube transformed into the perfect cup of coffee. My observations were interupted by my transceiver going off. I removed it from its holster and placed it on the counter in front of me.
A small hologram appeared, it was my assistant. "Sir, I know it's early, but... the Centauri mission, there has been another development."
Another?
I was already getting heat from my senior officers about trying to provide an explanation. Our FTL drives were still very much in the prototype phase, but due to a push for colonization efforts, a lot of concerns were cut. The issue wasn't that the engines didn't perform up to par, but that, if the whole trip only took a few months, than they worked much more effectively than previously thought. After trying to piece the events together from the last few years, what more could be added to this predicament.
"This might sound strange sir, but, were receiving active transmissions from Centauri... from the Erikson."
I spat my coffee out when he said the ship's name. "But isn't it still..."
"Yes sir, it is still docked."
My interest became confusion. How can a ship that has been grounded for this half of a decade be sending messages from a star system a few light years away. "Anything else?"
"Well, speculation, sir."
"Go on."
"One of the chief engineers was overheard saying the ship that came back isn't the same one and the messages we are getting are from the original."
"I'm sorry, original? He's saying there are two ships that are the exact design of the Erikson?" I pondered this information for a few minutes. "Find this engineer and send him to my office."
I ended the call and proceeded to enjoy my coffee. Colombian coffee was a delicacy because of how endangered the plant was. Walking down the long corridors of steel and glass, I could always see into the ship yard; the Erikson, in all its engineering glory, was sitting exactly where we left it five years ago. I returned my attention to the hallway. There was a anxious looking man pacing in front of my door.
Standing a few steps back I inquired as to his presence. "Can I help you?"
"Are you Chief Warrant Officer Brake?" I could see his hands shaking.
"Last time I checked."
"Listen to me. My name is Jan Henrikson, I was a lead engineer during the construction of the Erikson. Can we talk? In your office?" Before I could even reach for the door, he pushed it open and took a seat in the chair by my desk.
"What can I help you with Henrikson?"
"That ship that is sitting in our yard... it's not ours and it's not the original." His foot tapped vigorously. "You need to get it out of here. We are all in danger the longer it stays. If it wasn't working right it should've been sent away! Something else came back."
"I don't understand..."
"You don't need to! Just get it out of here!" His eyes began to dart behind him. He looked incredibly paranoid. "Sir, I can hear it. I can't shake it. It... wants me."
As soon as the words left his mouth, he reached over the table, grabbed my mug and smashed it against the desk. He looked at me a muttered something, but in my shock, I didn't make it out. He took a piece of the mug and ran the jagged piece across his throat. My uniform was soaked with the man's blood.
"Sir. I need you to follow the light." My mind was fuzzy, there was a medical officer shining a light in my eyes. "Sir, can you hear me?"
In my daze, I hadn't realized that medical personnel had arrived and we're actively treating me. Using my hand, I brushed them away and saw my CO standing the door way. He walked over to me when I made eye contact.
"What happened?"
"Honestly, I can hardly remember. He told me to get rid of the ship and then... broke my coffee mug..."
"Get rid of the ship?" He balked at the idea. "Listen son, that engineer has no idea how valuable this ship is. It has gone into dark space; a place where no one else has been."
"I get that, but why is it still here? Don't decommissioned vessels get send to Venus?" The engineer had made a point earlier so using my rank, I attempted to get answers.
"That is above your pay grade son." With that, he walked away.
I decided my next step was to locate crew. There had to be a few on Earth. | “MAYDAY! MAYDAY! THIS IS THE NOAH REQUESTING IMMEDIATE ASSIST-“
Jane Allen listened. Listened to her own voice coming through the speakers in the concrete interrogation room with a look of shock and horror on her pale face.
“Care to explain this.” The man in the black suit sneered.
“Who put you up to this? Really? Li right? Found someone who sounded like me and thought maybe you could scare me with the whole men in black, aliens and shit, right? Pathetic.” Even as the words left her mouth he didn’t believe them. That WAS her voice, without a shadow of a doubt.
The man sighed and pressed play. “Oh god...it got Li. Ripped out his eye and...an...and started pushing down into his skull. I’ve sealed myself in the airlock. I’m not going out like them, I’d rather the vacuum of space.” There was a loud bang and then an animalistic scratching on the door accompanied by Jane’s whimpers
Jane said nothing and just looked at her interrogator. The man stood up, slicked back brown hair glistening in the intense light, and walked to the mirror in the room to straighten his tie. “At 03:56 yesterday all contact was lost with Armstrong colony, it has been over 24 hours since they have reported in. On top of that your colleagues on board the Noah have either disappeared or attempted suicide. So I need answers”. He turned to see the blank expression on Jane’s face. He also saw that it wasn’t Jane anymore.
It was the last thing he saw.
He got his answers.
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[WP] You rub the magic lamp and the genie is nothing like the stories. It is a weary old man and instead of 3 wishes, you get 2 doors. One leading to everything you want and the other leading to what you really need. | "You know, that actually makes a lot of sense."
Of course I had fantasized about this before; I already knew what my wishes would be. I think I even wrote them down somewhere, each wish taking up several pages to ensure that a mischievous genie couldn't twist my words somehow, but this was even better. One door was decorated with a small drawing of a pen, the other with a white pill. I didn't doubt for a second which was which as I turned to the genie.
"Who came up with this system? It's nothing short of brilliant."
He chuckled, slowly getting up from the bench he had been sitting on. "It's been 43 years since I started doing this, and you're the first person to ask that; usually they're just disappointed that they don't get three wishes like in all the stories."
I turned my attention towards the doors again. "So this" I pointed at the door to the left "is the 'want' door, correct?"
"Yes, I assume you have some idea as to what the symbols mean."
Indeed I did, it was the only reason I hadn't immediately chosen the 'need' door. It's a strange decision to have to make, knowing that there's only one right choice, and yet feeling so tempted to ignore it. Perhaps it's because we all know what we want, at least to some extent, but what we need is impossible to know until after that fact.
"Yes, I think I do. Can you tell what's on the other side?"
"Of course, but the rules prevent me from telling you, as much as I'd like to."
"I thought as much."
"Feel free to take your time, I've got all day."
The genie sat down again and closed his eyes. *He must be used to people taking a long time with this. Nothing to do but figure it out, I guess.* I examined the doors again, as if that would help. Apart from the drawings, the doors were identical, and there were no keyholes to peek through. *Come on, you already know what you're going to pick, just get it over with.* Behind the 'need' door, I would no doubt find motivation and desire again, and with that, a chance to do something meaningful with my life instead of locking myself away, but the moment I saw the pen, and more importantly, the heart on its tip, I knew what it meant. *If I pick that door, they're going to be real. It would be better in every way if I didn't, but to know that I had the chance... No, if they can be happy, then it doesn't matter.* My hand closed around the doorknob, about to push down. *This is stupid; they aren't real. If anything, I would be making it worse for them.* I slowly opened the door. *No, this is worth it.* Before me was a woman in a school uniform, sitting at a lone piano in an infinite void. Just as I crossed the threshold, she slowly dissolved, leaving behind nothing but a small piece of notebook paper, slowly falling to the floor. I smiled, knowing that I could make things right now and prevent all the terrible things that happened here. The void turned into an infinite mass of zeroes, and I saw a message in the corner of my vision "Welcome back, club president." *Imagine how pissed off the guys in r/DDLC would be if they knew about this.*
Edit: Accidentally posted with the ending missing, | When I rub the lamp, I hope against hope that it is what the stories say. I rub it in the comfort of my own home, having carried it all the way in my backpack from an unmarked grave in Egypt. I won't get into how I found that grave, just know that I have been searching for it my whole life, since the moment I was born, because my father was also searching for it, and his grandfather before him.
So I rub the lamp. Made of tin, cylindrical in shape, with dents and scratches. It is light. It is cheap. And from it comes forth a wispy spirit.
I shout and drop the lamp before I can see what form the spirit takes. My hands are shaking, and I fall to my knees. I stare down at my frayed carpet, think of Madeleine's face when I told her where I was going, why I couldn't stay. I think of my father's face on his deathbed as he told me to continue the search, and passed the location of a storage locker that simply held pages and pages of notes, all leading to this, the lamp.
The genie.
I hear a cough, and raise my head.
The genie is an old man. He is hunched, his knuckles clasping a cane made of shadows that keeps on shifting, though his hands never move. He wears a thin robe of rough cloth, belted in at the waist, so I can see that he is painfully thin.
"Hello," he says.
I cannot speak. He smiles at me.
"It has been a long time. I think, too long..."
"It has," I whisper, thinking of my journey.
"Do you know who I am?" the genie asks. He has thick white eyebrows, like smudges of chalk on his forehead.
"The genie," I say.
"You were expecting me?" he asks, those eyebrows turning down.
"I was hoping for you," I say, swallowing back a lump in my throat. "Three wishes. It is three wishes, right?"
He frowns at me. He lifts his cane. I hold my breath.
When the cane comes down, the room shakes, splits open, and peels inside out with a clap of thunder. I am now on my hands and knees in a world of darkness. The genie is in front of me, and the shadow cane is now a cane of light. On either side, he is flanked by red door. Simple. Made of wood.
"Not three wishes," the genie replies. He stands up straight, and he is tall, as tall as the doors, which must be at least six feet. "Two doors."
He swings his cane to either side, and I wince as the light blinds me.
"Choose," the genie intones. "One door leads to the life you desire. The other leads to what you truly need."
I shake my head. I am sure I am in a dream, or I have been in a dream my entire life, and am now close to waking up, or dying. It depends on the choice I make.
So why do I not care? Is because there is no way to know which door leads where? Or because I have found the lamp, the genie? I already completed my life's purpose. I can die now.
Even though this old man in front of me said there were no wishes, secretly, I make one. I wish for what I need. I have spent so long wanting something I have been told to want. I do not know what it is to want something for myself. So I am certain that if I walk through either door, it will give me something more than what I have. Because I have nothing.
What would I have done if the genie had been a real genie?
I think I would have talked to it. I would not have made any wishes. Or maybe I would have wished to know what I wanted.
"What is your name?" I ask him.
"I have no name," he said. "I exist in all people. For all time."
"And what is my name?" I ask. I think I understand.
"I do not know your name," he said. "Because you do not know your name. Your father called you Hunter. Because that is what he wanted for you."
I nod. And then I pick neither door and walk through the old man like he was never there.
He was never there.
When I open my eyes, I am kneeling on the ground with the lamp in front of me. Right where I dropped it.
Because nothing came out when I rubbed it. Because it was all a wild goose chase, or it became one. And how could I take that? I watched it consume two generations, and it nearly consumed me. I had to hallucinate an answer, had to give myself an out.
But I won't go back to Egypt, to the notes. I won't drink myself into a corner before having a one night stand with a pretty waitress who will contact me nine months later with the heir to this mad hunt.
I will get both what I want, and what I need. |
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[WP] You rub the magic lamp and the genie is nothing like the stories. It is a weary old man and instead of 3 wishes, you get 2 doors. One leading to everything you want and the other leading to what you really need. | "You know, that actually makes a lot of sense."
Of course I had fantasized about this before; I already knew what my wishes would be. I think I even wrote them down somewhere, each wish taking up several pages to ensure that a mischievous genie couldn't twist my words somehow, but this was even better. One door was decorated with a small drawing of a pen, the other with a white pill. I didn't doubt for a second which was which as I turned to the genie.
"Who came up with this system? It's nothing short of brilliant."
He chuckled, slowly getting up from the bench he had been sitting on. "It's been 43 years since I started doing this, and you're the first person to ask that; usually they're just disappointed that they don't get three wishes like in all the stories."
I turned my attention towards the doors again. "So this" I pointed at the door to the left "is the 'want' door, correct?"
"Yes, I assume you have some idea as to what the symbols mean."
Indeed I did, it was the only reason I hadn't immediately chosen the 'need' door. It's a strange decision to have to make, knowing that there's only one right choice, and yet feeling so tempted to ignore it. Perhaps it's because we all know what we want, at least to some extent, but what we need is impossible to know until after that fact.
"Yes, I think I do. Can you tell what's on the other side?"
"Of course, but the rules prevent me from telling you, as much as I'd like to."
"I thought as much."
"Feel free to take your time, I've got all day."
The genie sat down again and closed his eyes. *He must be used to people taking a long time with this. Nothing to do but figure it out, I guess.* I examined the doors again, as if that would help. Apart from the drawings, the doors were identical, and there were no keyholes to peek through. *Come on, you already know what you're going to pick, just get it over with.* Behind the 'need' door, I would no doubt find motivation and desire again, and with that, a chance to do something meaningful with my life instead of locking myself away, but the moment I saw the pen, and more importantly, the heart on its tip, I knew what it meant. *If I pick that door, they're going to be real. It would be better in every way if I didn't, but to know that I had the chance... No, if they can be happy, then it doesn't matter.* My hand closed around the doorknob, about to push down. *This is stupid; they aren't real. If anything, I would be making it worse for them.* I slowly opened the door. *No, this is worth it.* Before me was a woman in a school uniform, sitting at a lone piano in an infinite void. Just as I crossed the threshold, she slowly dissolved, leaving behind nothing but a small piece of notebook paper, slowly falling to the floor. I smiled, knowing that I could make things right now and prevent all the terrible things that happened here. The void turned into an infinite mass of zeroes, and I saw a message in the corner of my vision "Welcome back, club president." *Imagine how pissed off the guys in r/DDLC would be if they knew about this.*
Edit: Accidentally posted with the ending missing, | "Need or want?" the boy asked me. He looked at my gaseous form warily.
"Of course. A simple choice," I reply.
"And no tricks?" he asks.
I shake my head. As a Genie I was bound to my word. If I said no tricks, there could be no tricks. My goal used to be to twist the words of their wishes against them, but then they would always blame me for their own downfall.
"Well, if I choose want, I won't get what I really need, but if I have what I need, then I can go after what I really want." the boy triumphantly postulated.
I nod my head towards him, "An astute observation young one. So have you made up your mind?"
The boy stands up tall, puffing his meagre chest out with bravery. "I have, I choose need!"
I bow graciously and lead him through the door on the right. Beyond is indeed what he needs; a small amount of wealth to be comfortable, a job in which to feel of value, a community to feel like he belongs and a family to share compassion with. Nothing more, nothing less. Of course the other door has exactly the same. After all, what humans want is what they need, and what humans need is what they want, but few of them learn that lesson.
And that's how they get trapped. The lucky few that choose will always wonder what was behind the other door, and they will never be happy or content with what they need or want. |
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[WP] You rub the magic lamp and the genie is nothing like the stories. It is a weary old man and instead of 3 wishes, you get 2 doors. One leading to everything you want and the other leading to what you really need. | Will sat at the bar, drink in hand, and sipped at it casually while he waited on Harv to decide.
"One is Want, and the other is Need?"
Harv was leaning against the counter, looking at the cards that had been laid out on the bar top. Two beaten up, worn tarot cards with an image of a door on the back of them. They were both curled, as if they had been used in innumerable games of three-card monte, or had seen extensive use telling fortunes. They were both worn down enough that the image had started to fade, the corners marked by creases and specks of dirt.
Will nodded as he drank, then let out a loud belch. He thumped his fist on his chest, then reached up to scratch his beard a bit. It was a course, ginger mess that completely encircled his mouth, his mustache twitching when he spoke.
"One is Want, the other is Need. Pretty sure that that one there is Want—" he pointed at the card on the left, "but shit if I know. Sometimes I lose track." He picked up the cards and swapped them around a few times before laying them back out. "There, now I definitely don't know. Whadda ya think?"
"Well, that's kinda shitty. Where's the choice? It's not a wish at all, it's just chance."
"You think you get a *choice*? Ain't nobody get a choice, Harv, not really. As far as the universe is concerned, you already picked one, and that's that."
"That's depressingly deterministic."
Will shrugged, and took another sip of his drink. When he'd drained it entirely, he reached over the counter to pour himself another. "That's life. Once you've seen the cosmos, really gotten out there and seen what makes everything up, you stop worrying so much about the point of it all. Sit back, choose a card, have a beer." He poured another glass and slid it over to the younger man, who accepted it reluctantly.
"I'd prefer something fruity, with a little umbrella sticking out of it."
"Sucks, you get beer."
Harv sipped, and only grimaced a little bit. "Well, since the choice isn't really there, can you tell me what's behind each door? Or card, as it were."
The Djinn shrugged. "Don't see why not. Want is *X. The Forest*. You'll appease your boss, fulfill your goals, and defeat your enemies. Need is *VI. Man*. You'll connect with the humans, fail in your goals, and be defeated and cast into exile."
"That's what I *need*? That's terrible, why would I ever choose that?"
The Djinn's eye twinkled. "Why do you think I mixed up the cards? Take my word for it, Harv, you absolutely do need it. You won't understand why until later."
Harv glared back at him, and he let out a loud guffaw in response before tipping back the rest of his glass. He wiped his chin with the back of his hand and let out a sigh, his laughter dying out.
"What if I don't want to choose one?"
"Then don't choose one," he shrugged, "makes no difference to me. I'm not burning a proper Wish on this anyway."
"Well then, how about—" Harv reached forward, and pushed the cards over to sit in front of the Djinn. "You choose."
Will furrowed his brow. "Sorry, what? That's not how this works."
"Sure it is. Forest is Want, Man is Need. If you choose the Forest, I'll buy you a beer. That's something you want, right?"
"And Need?"
Now it was Harv's turn to sip his beer and smirk. "I'll send your lamp into orbit. Orbit around Jupiter, mind you." He tipped back his beer, swallowing it as quickly as he could. When he set the glass down, Will was just staring at him, mouth slightly agape.
"You don't have the power to do something like that."
"I absolutely do. You know as well as I do that I can't lie about that."
Will's hand was shaking. He suddenly and deeply regretted mixing up the cards. His hand hovered over one, then the other, unable to commit. He pounded it down as a fist on the bar top.
"Shit, Harv, you can't just do that to me. This is cruel, even for you."
Harv shrugged. "If it helps, it'll be a nice a beer. No price limit."
Will shook his head again, laughing to keep himself from crying. "You know what you're offering me, right? If you send the damn lamp away?"
"I'm aware. Are you choosing or not?"
Will went to take a sip from his glass, but it was empty. He set it down, licking his lips nervously, and very carefully flipped over a card.
*VI. Man* | I could smell him from here.
It was like he rolled around in the dusty remains of a bunch of skeletons. Old and smelling of mildew. Yum.
“Can you explain it to me one more time?”
The man looked at me with his tired eyes. He back was so hunched that even I started leaning forward. Everything about him screamed frail. If I hadn’t just witnessed him squeeze out of this old lamp, I’d have thought he would break in half right in front of me. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case.
At first I was annoyed at how overbearing he was being. He kept talking in riddles and telling me about how these two doors will, “give you all, but not all will give you all.” Now I was becoming more fearful. When the old man appeared, so did the doors. Almost instantly he started pushing me toward them. The man’s strength surprised me. It was like trying to push back on a horse, nothing I did would budge him, and he just kept sliding me closer and closer to these doors. These two *freaking* doors. The same wooden doors that appeared out of the tile floor I was walking on just minutes ago. Dilapidated and gray wood throughout, they stood there unwavering. No matter which way I turned, they seemed to move with the scenery so they were always 6 feet in front of me. I’d even tried turning so the doors would be ‘forced’ outside of the walls of the antique shop I was in, but they just moved closer to me.
*“It’s simple!”* he said as he cackled at me. *“One door leads to everything you want and the other to what you really need.”*
What did I really want or need? I have everything I need. I have water, food, a wife, a car, a job, admittedly a boring one, but a job nonetheless. I am living my life the way we were supposed to right? Go to school, get a job, find a wife, buy a house, get old, die. What else is there really to this world? I’ve heard of people having a mid-life crisis. Going out and buying a boat or a sports car. Woo hoo, what good did that do? Get you more into debt and piss off your wife? No, I’m content with what I have. And I’d really like to leave this store, but it seems I’m stuck here with an antique senile man in desperate need of a shower. Who insists on me walking thorough a door.
What would I even want if I went through the door on the right? If it leads to everything I want, then doesn’t that also include everything I need? The sky is the limit, quite literally it seems. I want to never have to work again, to never have to fight with my wife over why the house isn’t clean, or how I’m too tired to go to her friend’s house for another stupid dinner party. I want total happiness, perfect health, and be able to do whatever I want when I want. How is a door supposed to give me that?
“Ok.” I said. “So once I walk through one of these doors, you’ll go away? The doors will go away? And I can go about my life with either everything I want, or everything I apparently need?”
*“Yes!”* he said.
Even his teeth looked dusty.
“Fine”.
If I go through the ‘need’ door, I have no control over what it leads to. It could be a new car, or it could be a drill Sargent whipping me into shape. Who decides what I really need anyway? How do I even know, even subconsciously, what I really need? It has to be someone else deciding then. God help me if this old *freak* is the one doing the deciding, I’m doomed to crossword puzzles and watching Family Feud with this smelly creep probably.
I stared at the door on the right. The one the man said leads to everything I want. I took a step closer and the door didn’t move. Now I was only 3 feet away from the old wooden door. I turned to look at the old man dressed in rags. He was clenching his fists smiling with his too yellow teeth, practically hyperventilating with excitement as I took a step closer.
I turned back at the door. Another step forward.
I could smell the filthy door in front of me. A putrid taste entered my mouth and I almost gagged and left for the the other door.
No.
I’m not going to let some freak decide my fate, if this isn’t just some convoluted magic trick or something. I’m going to chose what I want for once.
My hand reached for the door and I felt a small breeze emanate from the handle as I touched the knob. I opened the door slowly and was blinded by the light that shone through the threshold now that I was halfway through.
I went to close the door behind me when I heard the faint screeching from the old man through the crack.
*“He did it! He chose the wanted one! A pity! A true pity!”* he yelled. The handle ripped from my hand and the door slammed shut in the same moment I was plunged into pure darkness.
“What I have I done,” I whispered. And the sound of my voice was snuffed out by the teething darkness that began constricting around me.
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[WP] You rub the magic lamp and the genie is nothing like the stories. It is a weary old man and instead of 3 wishes, you get 2 doors. One leading to everything you want and the other leading to what you really need. | Besant had finally found it. The lamp lay hidden beneath the shade of a tree in an isolated oasis. The desert was vast and had taken many an adventurer's life, the the risk was well worth taking. In his hands he held it. Feeling the warmth of its legendary power, his has even trembled. He caught his composure before finally rubbing the lamp with a tender touch.
For all the talk that genies garner, the old and weary man that came out of the mystical lamp was simply shocked Stephen. There was no dark cloud foreshadowing an ominous and omnipotent being. Just a calming mist that dissipated to reveal an even calmer man.
"You? You're the genie that has lived in this lamp?"
Besant hadn't anticipate it, but was undeterred nonetheless. So what if he didn't look the part? All that matters if he could get the job done.
The genie greeted him with a smile. Lines and creases covered his face, too many to count. He had been around for millennia if the stories were to be true. But before Besant could ask for a wish, the genie waved him to silence.
"Young man, you have a misunderstanding of the situation. I gather you want three wishes? From me, you will get more than you could have ever imagined. I offer you two choices."
Grand doors jutted from the ground, larger than houses and taller than trees. One was black, the other white.
"Stephen, I know my master's intentions the second they rub my lamp. Your will is mine, my power yours. My cosmic gifts will give you, behind the black door, everything you could ever want in life. Make yourself anew and discover wonders."
Stephen smirked at that. Everything he could ever want? What else behind could possibly top a life lived to the fullest?
"Genie, I believe enough has been said! With all the wealth and power I could find from the black door, what could the white ever offer?"
"I am happy you asked, Stephen. You see, all you could ever want lies a hairs breath away, but the white door has something as well. Whatever you truly need will be given to you, without delay. The only question is, do you know what you truly need? Can you live without it?"
It started Stephen to be prodded and questioned. What more did he need if he could get what he wanted?
"Genie, you questions are folly. With Everything I could ever want, I will aquire what I need. I choose the black door."
The genie nodded and held his hand on the knob of the grand door. He opened it to reveal the other side, but much to Besants annoyance, it only revealed the rest of the desert.
"Do you play me more a fool? You talk of wealth and power, of what I want realized, and all I see is sand!"
"You must walk through the door first, only then you can have what you want."
Besant strode through the door eagerly, a hunger in his eyes that was almost blinding. Immediately, mountains of gold materialized before his eyes. He clammored with excitement and jumped for joy. He will become the richest man in the world!
"Hahaha! Genie! thank your for your time! I hope you hear tale of me the next time you are summoned!"
The genie coyly grinned as he waved Besant off as he began to dissipate back into his lamp.
"I hope I hear you are still alive."
Besant was certainly confused by his reply, but was more preoccupied by his inability to move. He had realized too late that walking thrrough the black door had resulted in unknowingly walking into quicksand! He could see the mountain of gold an arms just a few yards away. His grand castle in the distance seemed to shimmer in the baking sun.
He wished from ropes, shovels, tools, trinkets, anything to save him from his impending doom. But the more he struggled and moved, the more the sand enveloped him. He screamed for help until the sand filled his mouth. He looked over to the lamp, a desperate glance longing for life. It was only then that it dawned on him that what he truly needed was a way out. | I could smell him from here.
It was like he rolled around in the dusty remains of a bunch of skeletons. Old and smelling of mildew. Yum.
“Can you explain it to me one more time?”
The man looked at me with his tired eyes. He back was so hunched that even I started leaning forward. Everything about him screamed frail. If I hadn’t just witnessed him squeeze out of this old lamp, I’d have thought he would break in half right in front of me. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case.
At first I was annoyed at how overbearing he was being. He kept talking in riddles and telling me about how these two doors will, “give you all, but not all will give you all.” Now I was becoming more fearful. When the old man appeared, so did the doors. Almost instantly he started pushing me toward them. The man’s strength surprised me. It was like trying to push back on a horse, nothing I did would budge him, and he just kept sliding me closer and closer to these doors. These two *freaking* doors. The same wooden doors that appeared out of the tile floor I was walking on just minutes ago. Dilapidated and gray wood throughout, they stood there unwavering. No matter which way I turned, they seemed to move with the scenery so they were always 6 feet in front of me. I’d even tried turning so the doors would be ‘forced’ outside of the walls of the antique shop I was in, but they just moved closer to me.
*“It’s simple!”* he said as he cackled at me. *“One door leads to everything you want and the other to what you really need.”*
What did I really want or need? I have everything I need. I have water, food, a wife, a car, a job, admittedly a boring one, but a job nonetheless. I am living my life the way we were supposed to right? Go to school, get a job, find a wife, buy a house, get old, die. What else is there really to this world? I’ve heard of people having a mid-life crisis. Going out and buying a boat or a sports car. Woo hoo, what good did that do? Get you more into debt and piss off your wife? No, I’m content with what I have. And I’d really like to leave this store, but it seems I’m stuck here with an antique senile man in desperate need of a shower. Who insists on me walking thorough a door.
What would I even want if I went through the door on the right? If it leads to everything I want, then doesn’t that also include everything I need? The sky is the limit, quite literally it seems. I want to never have to work again, to never have to fight with my wife over why the house isn’t clean, or how I’m too tired to go to her friend’s house for another stupid dinner party. I want total happiness, perfect health, and be able to do whatever I want when I want. How is a door supposed to give me that?
“Ok.” I said. “So once I walk through one of these doors, you’ll go away? The doors will go away? And I can go about my life with either everything I want, or everything I apparently need?”
*“Yes!”* he said.
Even his teeth looked dusty.
“Fine”.
If I go through the ‘need’ door, I have no control over what it leads to. It could be a new car, or it could be a drill Sargent whipping me into shape. Who decides what I really need anyway? How do I even know, even subconsciously, what I really need? It has to be someone else deciding then. God help me if this old *freak* is the one doing the deciding, I’m doomed to crossword puzzles and watching Family Feud with this smelly creep probably.
I stared at the door on the right. The one the man said leads to everything I want. I took a step closer and the door didn’t move. Now I was only 3 feet away from the old wooden door. I turned to look at the old man dressed in rags. He was clenching his fists smiling with his too yellow teeth, practically hyperventilating with excitement as I took a step closer.
I turned back at the door. Another step forward.
I could smell the filthy door in front of me. A putrid taste entered my mouth and I almost gagged and left for the the other door.
No.
I’m not going to let some freak decide my fate, if this isn’t just some convoluted magic trick or something. I’m going to chose what I want for once.
My hand reached for the door and I felt a small breeze emanate from the handle as I touched the knob. I opened the door slowly and was blinded by the light that shone through the threshold now that I was halfway through.
I went to close the door behind me when I heard the faint screeching from the old man through the crack.
*“He did it! He chose the wanted one! A pity! A true pity!”* he yelled. The handle ripped from my hand and the door slammed shut in the same moment I was plunged into pure darkness.
“What I have I done,” I whispered. And the sound of my voice was snuffed out by the teething darkness that began constricting around me.
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[WP] You rub the magic lamp and the genie is nothing like the stories. It is a weary old man and instead of 3 wishes, you get 2 doors. One leading to everything you want and the other leading to what you really need. | "Oh I know this one," Jeremy responds, "I'm supposed to ask each guard what the other would choose. The truth teller will tell me that the liar would suggest the incorrect door, while the liar will tell me that the truth teller would tell me to go through the incorrect door, right?"
The genie, floating over his lamp raised a single eyebrow. "This isn't some stupid sphynx's riddle child. There's no puzzle, merely the choice, the door with what you wanted, and the other with what you really need."
"So no guards?"
"No guards."
Jeremy thought for a minute. This was far from what he expected. "So what's the catch?"
"The catch?" The genie responded, struggling to see what was so difficult for this mortal to understand. "There is no catch. just the simple choice between want and need."
"Oh, I get it." Jeremy said, a grin smirking across his face enthusiastically. "So I make a 'choice', and it turns out that it was somehow the wrong choice."
"What?" The genie said, "no that's not..."
"Yes it is," Jeremy said smugly, "If I pick the want door, all I get is something pathetic like a cheeseburger because I'm a little hungry, and then you showed me the need door which shows me enough money to get me out of debt, while if I pick the need door I get enough money to buy a cheeseburger, but the want door now contains a winning lottery ticket. So either way I come across as the loser."
"Do you have any idea how ridiculous you sound?"
"Huh?"
"What could I possibly gain from giving you such a sadistic choice?"
"I 'unno," Jeremy replied, "Aren't genies supposed to be tricksters who enjoy human misery?"
"Maybe some," The genie replied, "But after so many thousands of years, I jut want to get my last few decades done and dusted before I retire. So please, for both of us, just pick a door?"
"... is there a third door?"
"Why on Earth... what in the name of..." The genie was beginning to get very frustrated now. He took a single deep breath. "No Jeremy," he said, a little bit of frustration seeping through his attempted calm demeanor, "There are no other doors."
Jeremy took one step towards one of the doors. "So which door is this?"
"The 'need' door," The genie repeated. Jeremy had been told this just moments before. The genie had even arranged the doors in a left to right order to match how a Latin reader would approach the situation, and yet still the need for clarification.
"Which makes the other door the 'want' door." Jeremy clarified to himself. "Hmm, decisions decisions."
The genie sat on the floor, it's ethereal legs crossed, it's fingers slowly tapping in boredom as this mortal wasted precious minutes of it's short life to decide on a door.
"And it's definitely not the same thing behind each door?"
The genie sighed, "No Jeremy, it's different things."
"And you still can't tell me what they are?"
"Believe me, I would love nothing more than to tell you, but my hands are tied," the genie said before muttering under it's breath, "unfortunately for me."
"Alright, so I guess it's up to eenie-meenie-minee-moe then!" Jeremy eventually decided.
The genie sat there absolutely gobsmacked. Not only was this guy deciding the future based entirely on a children's nursery rhyme, but even a small child would know that eenie-meenie will always fell on the second choice in a two choice scenario, making this random choice not even remotely random. It was so stupid the genie almost objected, until he realised just how long he'd already been stuck here.
"Moe," said Jeremy, as he landed on the 'need' door.
"An excellent choice," the genie said as the other door disappeared in a puff of pink smoke.
Excitedly Jeremy walked in. He was greated by a table with a single book on it. As he lifted the book up, the table disappeared, seemingly only existing to prop up Jeremy's true prize.
Jeremy turned the book to the front and read the title. "'Making Important Decisions: A practical guide for being more decisive in life." | I could smell him from here.
It was like he rolled around in the dusty remains of a bunch of skeletons. Old and smelling of mildew. Yum.
“Can you explain it to me one more time?”
The man looked at me with his tired eyes. He back was so hunched that even I started leaning forward. Everything about him screamed frail. If I hadn’t just witnessed him squeeze out of this old lamp, I’d have thought he would break in half right in front of me. Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the case.
At first I was annoyed at how overbearing he was being. He kept talking in riddles and telling me about how these two doors will, “give you all, but not all will give you all.” Now I was becoming more fearful. When the old man appeared, so did the doors. Almost instantly he started pushing me toward them. The man’s strength surprised me. It was like trying to push back on a horse, nothing I did would budge him, and he just kept sliding me closer and closer to these doors. These two *freaking* doors. The same wooden doors that appeared out of the tile floor I was walking on just minutes ago. Dilapidated and gray wood throughout, they stood there unwavering. No matter which way I turned, they seemed to move with the scenery so they were always 6 feet in front of me. I’d even tried turning so the doors would be ‘forced’ outside of the walls of the antique shop I was in, but they just moved closer to me.
*“It’s simple!”* he said as he cackled at me. *“One door leads to everything you want and the other to what you really need.”*
What did I really want or need? I have everything I need. I have water, food, a wife, a car, a job, admittedly a boring one, but a job nonetheless. I am living my life the way we were supposed to right? Go to school, get a job, find a wife, buy a house, get old, die. What else is there really to this world? I’ve heard of people having a mid-life crisis. Going out and buying a boat or a sports car. Woo hoo, what good did that do? Get you more into debt and piss off your wife? No, I’m content with what I have. And I’d really like to leave this store, but it seems I’m stuck here with an antique senile man in desperate need of a shower. Who insists on me walking thorough a door.
What would I even want if I went through the door on the right? If it leads to everything I want, then doesn’t that also include everything I need? The sky is the limit, quite literally it seems. I want to never have to work again, to never have to fight with my wife over why the house isn’t clean, or how I’m too tired to go to her friend’s house for another stupid dinner party. I want total happiness, perfect health, and be able to do whatever I want when I want. How is a door supposed to give me that?
“Ok.” I said. “So once I walk through one of these doors, you’ll go away? The doors will go away? And I can go about my life with either everything I want, or everything I apparently need?”
*“Yes!”* he said.
Even his teeth looked dusty.
“Fine”.
If I go through the ‘need’ door, I have no control over what it leads to. It could be a new car, or it could be a drill Sargent whipping me into shape. Who decides what I really need anyway? How do I even know, even subconsciously, what I really need? It has to be someone else deciding then. God help me if this old *freak* is the one doing the deciding, I’m doomed to crossword puzzles and watching Family Feud with this smelly creep probably.
I stared at the door on the right. The one the man said leads to everything I want. I took a step closer and the door didn’t move. Now I was only 3 feet away from the old wooden door. I turned to look at the old man dressed in rags. He was clenching his fists smiling with his too yellow teeth, practically hyperventilating with excitement as I took a step closer.
I turned back at the door. Another step forward.
I could smell the filthy door in front of me. A putrid taste entered my mouth and I almost gagged and left for the the other door.
No.
I’m not going to let some freak decide my fate, if this isn’t just some convoluted magic trick or something. I’m going to chose what I want for once.
My hand reached for the door and I felt a small breeze emanate from the handle as I touched the knob. I opened the door slowly and was blinded by the light that shone through the threshold now that I was halfway through.
I went to close the door behind me when I heard the faint screeching from the old man through the crack.
*“He did it! He chose the wanted one! A pity! A true pity!”* he yelled. The handle ripped from my hand and the door slammed shut in the same moment I was plunged into pure darkness.
“What I have I done,” I whispered. And the sound of my voice was snuffed out by the teething darkness that began constricting around me.
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[WP] They met, night after night, until their work together was done. | “We’re not stopping until we’re finished,” said Geoff, sitting at the head of the table in his make-shift robe and wizard hat.
“We’ve clearly fucked this up. We didn’t know what we were doing to begin with and we should have just played Monopoly,” explained Luke, his posture perfectly displaying his enthusiasm.
“Shut up. Shut up about Monopoly. We decided on this so we’re going through with it. This is our problem, we always start something as a group and then just ditch it as soon as it becomes difficult or we realise we don’t know what we’re doing. Well, for once, we’re going to ignore the fact we don’t know what we’re doing and we’re going to finish what we have started,” said Geoff.
“Where were we even up to?” mumbled Lillian, as she flicked around the small plastic figure in front of her.
Geoff opened up his note pad. “Well, we finished off last night in the Balrog’s cave. “
“And what was my character again?” asked Luke.
“You were a ‘three human armed snake who could also do that cool sideways flying bicycle kick thing Liu Kang does in Mortal Kombat’.”
“Ah, yeah. And is it too late to change?”
Geoff’s eyes peered from above his notes. “What? Of course it’s too late to change.”
“How do you know, we don’t even know how to play this game,” said Bjorn, trying to remember where the pieces lay on the table from the night before.
“Because changing at this stage is too fucking late regardless of what game we are playing.”
“Am I still a piece of shit?” asked Bjorn
Geoff picked his notes back up. “Yeah.”
“Then I would also like to change,” said Bjorn.
“No,” said Geoff, while forcibly moving the pieces in to place on the table. “Everyone stays the same. Luke, you’re the snake with three oversized human arms, Andy is a 3000 year old man who looks good for his age, Lillian is a weirdo introvert who tags along, and Bjorn is a piece of shit.”
“And you’re the dungeon master,” said Lillian.
“Yeah, I’m the dungeon master. Now. You walk in to the cave…”
“I roll a 1 and remain a piece of shit,” said Bjorn.
“Fantastic.”
“I roll a 12 and use my three human arms to remind Bjorn he’s a piece of shit,” said Luke.
“This is why we’re never going to finish this. First of all, and I don’t know why I keep having to remind you, but you need to roll the dice, not just announce what you have decided to roll. Secondly, you’re fighting a Balrog, how is this going to advance the story?”
“I roll a 38 and the Balrog is struck with mystery as to how I’m 3000 years old and don’t have a single wrinkle on my forehead,” said Andy.
“Why would a Balrog be mystified by that?” asked Geoff.
Andy ignored Geoff and continued, “I roll another 38 and combine my lack of wrinkles with the absence of bags under my eyes. The Balrog is weakened as I’m also somehow 3000 years old. The Balrog signs up for Avon deliveries.”
Geoff slumped back in to his char, his wizard hat almost falling off his head. “This is not how you defeat a Balrog.”
Lillian picked up the dice but didn’t release them on to the table. “I roll a 4 and think about saying something but then convince myself it’s not worth the days of retrospective analysis and remain in the corner avoiding eye contact.”
Bjorn, making no attempt to roll any dice, placed both of his hands on the table and leaned forward. “To everyone’s surprise I roll an 800, the Balrog recoils anticipating the threat, his monstrous body thrashing in to the side of the cave causing a mini landslide of rocks and rubble, but I remain a piece of shit.”
“I do that Liu Kang kick thing you reminded me of before even though I’m a snake and I don’t have legs. The Balrog is defeated,” announced Luke. “I rolled something like a million or something in order to do this. I rolled whatever it takes in order to do what I just did.”
“Great,” said Geoff, his notepad bouncing off the wall across the room.
****
I write shitty, silly stories on /r/BillMurrayMovies. Feel free to come along, not laugh at any of them and leave some judgement. | There comes a point, in the early hours of the morning, that the aches that have crept up your spine simply vanish. It’s a wonderfully euphoric moment, like a weight raised from your body and a sigh escapes your lips. And then you look back at the floor, at the mess, and you cannot go on and as you rise, every ache. Every pain and memory, comes flooding back.
Sally watches me. I always give up first. She’s determined. Her fingers are bloody. I can’t tell what’s paint and what’s pain. I pull her back from the wall.
Just one more she says. But we need rest. I need rest.
There’s no bed. An inflatable mattress. Sally takes it. I ball up my jacket and sleep on the floor, touching the tiles.
Sally cries before she sleeps and then she cries in her sleep. I roll onto my side.
In the morning she’ll be gone. Work and a new home and then back here. I’ll be waiting. I’ve replaced most of the wood. Sally does the painting. The little decals. She does them best. From memory.
We’ll make this house look like a home again, but neither of us will live here. The fire burnt the beams and the walls and the things we kept inside it.
The fire took our son and we’ve almost finished our grieving. Sally cries and I go back to the floor of my sons room. |
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[WP] They met, night after night, until their work together was done. | They met, night after night, until their work together was done. It wasn't easy, but they knew all too well the need to set aside their differences and complete the task.
They were not friends; far from it, and they had made each other deathly aware of the fact that time was not sufficient enough a device to heal some of the deeper wounds that still bled so many years later.
Shackled by duty and chained by their terrible mistakes, they slaved throughout the nights. They did not have time or want for levity. Only the job. It was always about the job.
The great experiment had failed. Millenia of misplaced hopes and dreams were reduced to rubble, and the debris of the blood and tears they had shed swarmed the air around them in a cloud of pain and heartbreak.
"Perhaps we should try again," the Creator whispered, a solitary tear escaping from his eye. "A new world, a new universe. A better one."
The Destroyer curled his lip and grimaced. "Judging from the last ten efforts, we both know how awful an idea that would be. When will you learn brother?"
Slowly, reluctantly, he nodded his head. He acknowledged the futility of it all and accepted his defeat.
They sat in silence, and years of words left unspoken remained imprisoned deep within the self imposed cages they had created within their stubborn heads.
They did not hug. They did not shake hands, or smile. They simply nodded, solemn and unfeeling. Cold. They would never see each other again.
(Feedback always appreciated!) | There comes a point, in the early hours of the morning, that the aches that have crept up your spine simply vanish. It’s a wonderfully euphoric moment, like a weight raised from your body and a sigh escapes your lips. And then you look back at the floor, at the mess, and you cannot go on and as you rise, every ache. Every pain and memory, comes flooding back.
Sally watches me. I always give up first. She’s determined. Her fingers are bloody. I can’t tell what’s paint and what’s pain. I pull her back from the wall.
Just one more she says. But we need rest. I need rest.
There’s no bed. An inflatable mattress. Sally takes it. I ball up my jacket and sleep on the floor, touching the tiles.
Sally cries before she sleeps and then she cries in her sleep. I roll onto my side.
In the morning she’ll be gone. Work and a new home and then back here. I’ll be waiting. I’ve replaced most of the wood. Sally does the painting. The little decals. She does them best. From memory.
We’ll make this house look like a home again, but neither of us will live here. The fire burnt the beams and the walls and the things we kept inside it.
The fire took our son and we’ve almost finished our grieving. Sally cries and I go back to the floor of my sons room. |
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[WP] No one's been able to pull Excalibur out of the stone, but you have an idea: why not just break the stone? | As I approach the stone, I feel the weight of the night. The stone was displayed by the Mage on the town's place weeks - months - ago, but no one has been able to take the sword out of the rock. Hours ago, I finally decided to test my theory which was pretty obvious : if you can't pull Excalibur, why not simply break the stone ?!
I start hitting on my chisel with hammer, and I suddenly realise the noise It will make, but I keep going, hoping nobody will have the motivation to come and see.
After hours of exhausting work, the stone finally gives. The sword however, doesn't move an inch. It hovers exactly in the same place it was... I guess the Mage anticipated a smartass like me. | Overseer Kensington stood hunched over the conference table, both his palms flat on it. He let his gaze sweep across the entire research team before speaking.
"Full anti-compulsion gear is mandatory folks! Just came down from big guns upstairs. If we get a repeat of that ring fiasco she's cancelling the Christmas Party."
Archmagus Johnson raised a hand. "Boss, I thought we were supposed to call it the Solstice-Concurrent Party to not alienate our Heath-Oriented coworkers?"
"Eat my ass Johnson." Overseer Kensington replied cheerfully. The whole team had a laugh. Johnson had his shit eating grin on. I wonder how many Pagans Johnson had burned alive during the First War? He used to be an Inquisitor. Still had the big "I" shaped brand over his heart.
Archmagus Greenleaf spoke up. "Johnson, If you draw the fertility idol again this year it will be the seventy-seventh time! That is very auspicious fortune." The team had another laugh. The "fertility idol" was a large stone penis covered in carvings of dancing penises. It had circulated through the research team's Christmas gift exchanges for about two centuries. Greenleaf swore it was an artifact of power handed down from his druidic order. I wonder how many Inquisitors he had skinned alive during the First War?
Overseer Kensington stood up straight and clasped his hands behind his back. "Alright folks, cocks aside, this is a serious matter. Lady Griselda herself personally showed up to my office to footstomp the gear compliance."
The whole team winced. Lady Griselda was supposed to be in the Ethereal Plane fighting the Demon incursion with her Orders Militant. She generally left day to day administration of the R and D teams to the Overseeers. Kensington nodded at our consternation and continued.
"Apparently one of her teams dragged this thing out of a lake of blood. They all went mad trying to pull it out of the stone. Whole team had to be purged. It sounded like she had to do the purging herself."
Silence in the conference room now.
"That's right, folks." Kensington gave us a sardonic grimace. "If it can happen to Paladins, it can happen to you. So were going full prophylactic. That means full body suits, HAZINFO innoculations, 2 days quarantine before and after, the works.
The team groaned as one.
"Deal with it." Kensington allowed a little humor to creep into his tone. "At least you get to use the drill again eh, Pritchard?" Now the team gets to laugh again, but this time at my expense.
A while back our team had helped clear out a stone wyrm infestation for a Dwarven mining corporation. As thanks, their engineers had gifted us one of their fancy mithril drills. That monster could tear through damn near anything. I had had the brilliant idea to try it on one of the Rings of Power we kept in cold storage. That was the "ring fiasco." I still didn't think it was fair to call it a fiasco, seeing as how no one died and the engineers had generously repaired the drill free of charge.
And the ring was destroyed right? And this time we aren't even breaking up an artifact of power, just a really tough rock. It should be perfectly safe.
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[WP] No one's been able to pull Excalibur out of the stone, but you have an idea: why not just break the stone? | "No, I'm pretty sure you're not allowed to do that actually," Merrill said,
"Says who?" Artemis smiled widely at her, "Swords the same no matter what, yeah?"
"I mean," She started dispassionately,
"Exactly," Artemis interrupted, "So the way I see it, no harm no foul,"
Merrill sighed and shot her a tired look, "Look you can't actually believe that Arty,"
"Why not?"
"Do you know how long that has been stuck there?" Merrill snapped, "It's half the reason people even come to this town anymore,"
"Yeah, maybe, but that's not saying much," Artemis leaned back in her chair, "I mean, let's be real, who gives a shit about a sword that hasn't even budged in centuries,"
"I dunno, I think that's part of the appeal," Merrill said wistfully, "Kinda romantic in a way,"
"I guess," Artemis took a large bite out of an apple, "But doesn't a part of you wonder what happens if we get it out?"
"Maybe a little," She reluctantly admitted, "But it feels a bit like cheating, bypassing the test like this,"
"Or the test was of wit and not strength," Artemis smirked, "In that circumstance, I'd say I've passed with flying colors, no?"
Merrill let out a sigh of resignation, "Fine, but we can't stay out too late, promised my ma I'd help her collect herbs in the morning."
"Aha, see I knew you were too curious to resist it," Artemis laughed, putting her free arm around her neck, "Now, I just one more thing to ask,"
"What?" Merrill replied
Artemis smiled devilishly at her,
"How many sticks of dynamite can you hide beneath that dress?" | With an exasperated sigh the man in front of me dropped the rope. It had been rapped around the hilt of Excalibur, the legendary sword in the stone. As he started walking away he looked at me and snickered. If he, with all his might couldn’t even make the sword budge, what would a tiny man like me accomplish?
Ignoring his grin I stepped up to the stone and reached in my bag. Contestants who wished to attempt this feat were allowed a single assisting tool, the man before had chosen a rope. I chose a pickaxe.
This piqued the interest of some of the people in line behind me. How on earth would a pickaxe help, they wondered. I took a deep breath to settle my nerves, grasped the pickaxe tightly and lifted it above my head.
CRACK! The sound echoed throughout the clearing, the sound of shattering rock. Grasping the sword with my hands now, I was able to wiggle it back and forth until I was able to pull it free, a large chunk of stone stuck to end of the blade.
I held high above my head the item that marked me king. No longer Excalibur the holy sword from the lake, but Roxcalibur the holy mace of stone! |
|
[deleted] | [WP]You're scrolling through r/WritingPrompts to find an interesting prompt to write about. You come across an image prompt with a picture of you, sitting at your computer, scrolling through r/WritingPrompts... | It was a boring day as usual. Waking up, playing games, eating, playing games and then browsing reddit, specifically a subreddit r/WritingPrompts before going to sleep. "Which one should I check?" I muttered myself as opening the subreddit. "Let's see. Something about an ultimate mmorpg... not necessarily interested. There's a prompt is about Harry Potter- nah." I shrugged as i took deep breath. "Maybe I should go to the new ones... Yes, let's do that." I clicked on the 'new' button on the hot bar.
Scrolling through the new prompts, i quickly notice an image prompt. I usually check them out since they have often have good art. "What the fuck?" I said as i noticed the name of the prompt: "Jupefabulous." I quickly clicked on the prompt then the link for the picture. It was me, in my unicorn pajamas, looking at my computer, scrolling through writing prompts. The angle of the picture looked like it was taken from where i should've seen it. "Fuck this." I thought as i decided to ignore the prompt and went to sleep for the night.
I waked up not from my alarm but from my reddit notification on my phone with over three hundred mentions of me. I opened the prompt tired and the comments were full of "Our lord and savior u/Jupefin" and "u/Jupefin is love, u/Jupefin is life" which was honestly scary and confusing at the same time. Then i noticed the submitter of the prompt, u/DankeyKang65 . The name seemed familiar somehow. I looked at my cat, then realized his name was KangDankey. The cat lifted up his head and smiled widely, while uttering these words: "This is going all according to plan." | “What the hell?” I said out loud to my room.
I had just taken a shower and was feeling pretty inspired to do a little bit of writing, so I had went over to the Writing Prompts subreddit for some creative fuel. But then I clicked an image prompt titled *‘Is this you?’*
On first look, it was an ordinary gif, a young guy huddled over his computer in the dark. My initial reaction was: “That’s so me!”, and then I realised. That *was* me. The desktop, the computer, down to the wet hair. It was uncanny.
My first instinct was to turn around to look for a camera, but I was looking at a blank wall. Closer inspection yielded no results so I went back to my screen.To my surprise, “I” was still looking backwards, at the source of this video, or the “camera”. But then “I” decided to walk toward the “camera”, just as I had, to get a closer look.
*Unnerving.*
“I” inched closer slowly to the “camera’, just as I had, my expression wrinkled in suspicion, just as I had been.
AND THEN ‘I’ MORPHED INTO AN EYELESS VAMPIRE, ITS HORRIFYING VISAGE FILLING THE ENTIRE SURFACE AREA OF MY MONITOR.
*Fuck the internet man.*
***
r/lysanderxonora
|
[WP] Everyone has the Mega Man-like ability to steal another person's most valuable trait by defeating them in battle. You have the world's most valuable trait - incredible, inexplicable dumb luck - and you've won thousands of battle without even knowing you were fighting. | It was a normal day for Ben. He woke up, got dressed in his black flannel and jeans, had his usual breakfast of eggs with waffles, no syrup, and was on his way to work. Ben had been working at the same old office he had been going to for the past 15 years, and he couldn’t have been more bored.
“Morning Ben, how was the game last night?” Asked Mindy, the office secretary.
Ben walked by giving his customary nod. Oh Mindy, Ben despised Mindy, she was so uptight, always asking about other people’s lives.
“Morning Ben, how ‘bout that game last night, I couldn’t belie...” Jimmy, Ben’s coworker, was cut off by a voice coming from the street outside.
“Benjamin Jones, it is I Jackhammer, the reining champion of the Power Games, here to challenge you to a battle to the death.”
Ben could barely hear this Jackhammer fellow and sighed, lazily opening the blinds looking out onto the street, taking a sip from his coffee. Ben saw a tall man in leather with a cape standing on a car holding a megaphone. Ben closed the blinds and started up his computer to start what was to be an inevitably boring day.
“What is the meaning of this, it is I Jackhammer and wish to...,” Jackhammer started yelling but then said in a whisper to his friend next to him. “Is this megaphone on, he doesn’t seem to be hearing me.”
Jackhammer’s friend gave Jackhammer an uneasy look and said, “Maybe try turning the on/off switch to on.”
Jackhammer looked down at his friend and then to his megaphone and back to his friend and sighed, looking defeated. “You know I think I’m done for today.”
Jackhammer jumped down from the car he was standing on when he had made his announcement and started walking home just as it was beginning to rain.
Jackhammer’s friend followed, patting his back and said, “You’ll get him next time pall.”
The instant Jackhammers friend took his hand off of Jackhammer, a bolt of lighting came down, striking Jackhammer, instantly killing him.
Jackhammers friend look at his friend dazed, had that really just happened?
A boom rattled Bens office, making Mindy scream.
“Was that a lighting strike, that must have been just down the street.” Exclaimed Jimmy.
Ben opened the blinds again looking at the heavy rainfall. He gave the the lighting strike no attention, he was just dreading the drive home in such bad weather.
| It seems that just about every other day I am able to do something new and incredible. After today’s burrito with the boys, I learned I could float around, a nice party trick but I’ve been able to bring objects toward me for about a month now, so beside getting around traffic floating isn’t too useful. Sucks that right around the time this ability manifested some dude jumped from the top of the restaurant we were eating at.
Thinking back. that reminds me of the time I gained the ability to shrink objects to the size of an ant for about 10 minutes. You would *NEVER* guess what happened that night, a guy choked on a toy car just moments earlier. Poor guy, don’t know what he was thinking.
And maybe the saddest story I have to tell, my own brother died in the most horrendous house fire I’d ever seen, and with my luck I’ve seen several house fires. mostly my own apartment but I always manage to come out unscathed. Too bad my brother didn’t have the same luck, but I somehow inherited his fire breathing ability as well as his money since we were so close years ago.
But on the bright side, some news guys want me on their show “Master Duelists” for some reason, even though I’ve never won a duel in my life, I just got lucky and get new powers almost every day.
|
|
[WP] Everyone has the Mega Man-like ability to steal another person's most valuable trait by defeating them in battle. You have the world's most valuable trait - incredible, inexplicable dumb luck - and you've won thousands of battle without even knowing you were fighting. | "I am known as Gunslinger Gilbert, but you can call me Gil," announced the man in black leathers. "And I am here to challenge you," he pointed at me with a gloved finger, "to a battle to the death."
People on the busy street turned their heads in our direction as they noticed the arsenal of guns that Gil had slung over his back.
I sighed deeply, slightly irritated that Gil had interrupted my morning jog.
"Hey, uhh Gil right?" I asked
He nodded.
"Maybe we should take this somewhere else?" I gestured to the busy morning traffic and to the pedestrians that were giving us a wide berth on the narrow sidewalk. "Somewhere with less people you know?"
I prayed that he was the sensible type.
"Oh yea, I know very well where this is going Jack," Gil nodded slowly with a stern expression on his face.
"Oh really? T-that's good then," I said surprised. What an understanding gentleman, I thought.
"I've heard the stories Jack, I ain't no fool."
I frowned, puzzled.
"Jack the Undefeated who has overcome thousands of battles against all odds with just sheer luck. We know the truth Jack. You are the man with the Devil's Luck," said Gil and smirked wickedly.
*Thousands* of battles? Since when did that happen? I wondered.
"I've done my research Jack," Gil said as he walked around me dramatically on the narrow street. "They say you like to take your challengers to an open field or some abandoned warehouse under the pretense that there would be no bystanders or obstacles in the way, but the truth is so that they can suffer a horrible fate."
"Hey that's totally not-"
"Warehouse collapses and the challenger dies eh? And you walk out without a scratch. Or even worse, death by a *ricocheting* bullet in the warehouse," Gil shook his head in disgust.
"Hold up, that totally never happened," I said sharply but then I remembered that just last week, an old building that I had walked by had collapsed suddenly on itself.
"That's not even the end of it. I've heard that those who you take to the open field suffer the most outrageous deaths. A meteorite falling out of the sky, or even *worse!* Compressed Spacetrash obliterating your enemies into smithereens." Gil stopped pacing around me, and spat on the floor. Then he gave me the a look of revolting disgust before pulling a hand cannon out from his back pocket.
I raised my hands into the air, "Hey Gil, maybe those things did happen, but I just wanna say that I never meant any harm to anyone. *Ever.*"
"Too little, too late Jack," he lifted the gun and pointed at my face.
I closed my eyes.
*Click.*
I opened my eyes.
"What the fuck?" he swore as he fumbled with the revolver.
He tossed the revolver aside, and reached for an automatic rifle on his back.
*Click,click,click,click.*
Nothing.
I watched patiently as Gil disassembled his gun, trying to pinpoint the problem.
Suddenly I noticed out of the corner of my eye, an old lady trying to jaywalk across the busy street. Without even thinking I ran to help her.
"Hey! Where the fuck do you think you're going Jack?!" shouted Gil as he tampered with his gun.
I ignored him.
"Hello ma'am, allow me," I smiled and gave her my arm.
"A-ah thank you young man," she took my arm with her frail hands.
With her hands on my arm, I lead the way across the busy street.
Suddenly the elderly lady started screaming, with her eyes wide.
Alarmed, I glanced around me and saw the disaster that lay before me. Dozens of cars had collided with one another around me. Some of the cars were flipped over and some of them were even stacked on top of one another like a house of cards.
The elderly women had let go of my arm, still screaming.
I realized that it was directed at me.
"-have you done?! Don't you know you're suppose to check both ways before crossing the street?!" she screeched.
"Oh..." I said thoughtfully. "Why would I do that?"
---------
/r/Em_pathy
| "Are you busy? Because if you are you can just give me a tea bag and an empty cup, I'll handle the rest." The man behind the counter thanked Bret and gave him his usual tea, a cup and a few packets of sugar. Bret took a seat near the window, not his favorite table in the cafe but his usual one was full, and pointed his left ring finger at the cup. Water suddenly began shooting out of his finger, at first at a high pressure but Bret then lowered it with a bit of effort, until the cup was almost completely filled. Bret then placed the cup onto a small, foldable stand he kept in his infinite pocket for just this occasion, and conjured up a small fire out of thin air to begin heating his drink.
As he was doing this a new person entered the establishment, a man wearing a nice suit and hat, both as black as his hair. He sat down across from Bret and asked "Are you the one they call 'The Gatherer'?"
"Um, I don't think so, I'm Bret. Nice to meet you...?" Bret asked waiting for the stranger to give his name. The stranger tilted his hat a bit to hear Bret's thoughts, sure that the battle had already began.
> *Is that a trilby or a fedora? I can never tell the difference...*
"You, uh, don't have to worry about my name." The stranger replied, confused that the man who had collected over a hundred powers was so nonchalant about being approached by a stranger like this. He can't blame Bret for being arrogant though, the stranger had already collected 3 powers for himself and considered himself untouchable. "Anyway, how would you like to play a little high-stakes game?"
"Sounds fine, let me just finish heating up my tea." Bret said as the fire on the table rose a bit, causing the stranger to flinch as if expecting Bret to attack.
"Not a violent game!" He shouted, causing Bret to almost fall out of his seat at the sudden change to his new friend's demeanor. "Just a, fun game of Rock, Paper, Scissors." The Stranger wasn't stupid enough to try and fight Bret head-to-head, and was going to take full advantage of how a "Battle" can be any competition. He tilted his hat once again to see how Bret reacted to being challenged this way.
> *This guy is weird. But if I can win that hat this will have been a good day...*
"Rock, Paper, Scissors sounds good." Bret said taking a sip of his tea. "But what do you get if you win?"
"Oh we'll both find out afterwards. Deal?"
> *I probably shouldn't take deals from weird strangers...*
"Deal!" Bret shouted shaking the stranger's hand. The battle was officially underway, with whoever winning a single game taking the other's greatest strength. The stranger took his hat off for a game of this importance. The inner voices of all the strangers in the cafe was loud, but by now he could easily single out Bret's voice. Together they both put a fist out and began-
"Rock!"
> *I'm going to throw Paper*
"Paper!"
> *I've never lost throwing Paper*
The stranger couldn't believe it was going to be this easy. The Gatherer, the man of a hundred powers, clearly had never picked up a power that could protect his mind!
"Scissors!"
> *Definitely throwing Paper*
For moment the stranger worried if Bret did have a power that allowed him to read minds. But looking into the jovial smile across from him convinced him that Bret was just a simpleton that couldn't think that far ahead to save his life.
"Paper covers Rock. I win!" Bret said, covering the strangers still held fist with his own hand.
"What? Wait.. WHAT!? No! I wasn't ready! I wasn't focusing! Please, you have to give me another shot" The stranger begged but it was already too late. The many voices he heard in his head were slowly vanishing, while Bret's face was beginning to look strained. The strain, the stranger recognized, of being in an already loud room and hearing the inner voice of everyone around him. Before the stranger was left with only his own thoughts, the last thought he heard was from Bret.
> *He seems sad... Maybe ^I^shouldn't^take^the^hat...* |
|
[WP] Everyone has the Mega Man-like ability to steal another person's most valuable trait by defeating them in battle. You have the world's most valuable trait - incredible, inexplicable dumb luck - and you've won thousands of battle without even knowing you were fighting. | Laughing, Alicia brushed a lock of blonde hair behind her ear. "You should probably stay away from me...I'm trouble."
Bo grinned. "Who's to say I don't like a little bit of trouble?"
"I'm serious!" Alicia frowned, but her hazel eyes were gleaming as she looked across the table at her date. "Just on the way over here, there was a big car accident right next to me, and I'm pretty sure I saw a woman have a heart attack. Not to mention all this."
Alicia gestured to the window, and Bo glanced at the rain falling outside.
"You telling me that you made it rain? You're like one of those cartoon characters that has their own personal cloud following them around?"
Bo tore a chunk from the piece of bread on his plate and dipped it in the olive oil coating the dish in the middle of the table, studying Alicia's face with his brown eyes.
"Maybe! I don't know. I just - the sky was perfectly blue when I stepped outside, Google said weather would be great for the rest of the day...and now I'm, you know...all wet."
Alicia popped a piece of bread into her mouth, watching for Bo's response. He saw his brown eyebrows arch briefly, before a smirk appeared on his tanned face.
"Gross. I thought this was going to be a classy dinner."
A sudden crash of breaking glass made them both turn their heads. The waiter bringing their wine had slipped on a wet spot on the floor, causing him to tip his tray and sending the drinks to an untimely end against the tile floor.
"See?" Alicia said. "I bet you that guy hasn't dropped anything in years. Then I show up...not to mention my favorite place to sit is over there, right next to the kitchen. It figures that I wouldn't be able to get my lucky table for our first date."
Outside, there was a flash of light, followed almost immediately by a concussive blast of thunder.
Alicia pointed back to the window. "Plus we nearly got struck by lightning! I mean, come on - you have to admit that would be pretty unlucky."
* * *
Noriko S. crouched down on the fire escape. Swathed in black cloth and shadow, she was almost impossible to see. As she spotted her target, she slowly brought the blowgun to her lips.
Before she could fire it and acquire Alicia's powers, however, a yellow jacket began buzzing in her face. Reflexively, she shooed it away, then immediately regretted it as the dart fell from the blowgun, through the slats of the fire escape, and to the ground below - somehow managing to land point up.
As she went to jump down, she lost her footing on the rain-slicked metal, and crashed awkwardly to the concrete below. Noriko was conscious of separate types of pain - the generalized, raw ache from falling and the sharp, focused stabbing from her dart. As the toxin flooded her system, her body began convulsing.
Alicia heard the cry of "Someone get an ambulance!" and glanced over her shoulder at the woman spasming on the ground.
* * *
Paragon Security was *extremely* effective at what they did - and were only getting moreso with each passing day. Despite their name, they tended to play offense more than defense. The five core members, all of whom picked up a number of skills and abilities in Afghanistan and Iraq, had figured out how to game the system.
See, the power transfer didn't care about fights being one-on-one or any other kinds of...tactical enhancements someone might think up. So they worked as a group, overpowering targets when they were alone and then taking turns delivering the finishing blow. Rotation was determined not just by how long it had been since someone got a new trait but also what fit their overall profile best. They had a brawler, a sneak, a tactician, a weapons expert, and a jack of all trades. Over time, they'd become strategic about picking targets to fill gaps in their abilities.
This job was huge for them, since it would make them pretty much unstoppable.
"Go time, shitheads!" the tactician yelled out as the black van rounded the corner. Everyone prepared to jump out and grab their target. They were about to pull over to the curb when the van ran over a twisted piece of metal lying in the street.
With a bang like a gunshot, the front driver's side tire blew out, causing the van to swerve into oncoming traffic. An instant later, it was hit by a semi, which sent the van rolling down the street multiple times before it came to a dead stop.
* * *
*Le Visage* had mixed in with the kitchen staff at Pompadour easily - but then, he always did. He stayed long enough to identify which drinks were destined to go to Table 7 and put the poison in them, then walked out of the building with the cool calm he had developed over the years of practice in *belonging*. He only found out the attempt was unsuccessful an hour later, when he tried to break into the jewelry store just as a patrol car came around the corner. It was the first time he'd ever failed a mission.
* * *
Mike "Patch" Doyle had earned his call sign by being the best sniper in his unit - it was an allusion to how deadly he was with one eye closed. Crouched on the roof of the building across the street, he checked the distance again and prepared to line up his shot. Patch felt a twinge of guilt. He could almost take her out with a sidearm at this range. Still - better safe than sorry.
He cleared away a spot for himself and set up the tripod rest for his rifle. Mike held the gun up for a moment to check the stock, and that's when lightning struck.
The long metal weapon he was holding in his hands instantly converted into a lightning rod as, a moment later, his internal organs instantly converted into seared tripe. His body would not be found for a few weeks.
* * *
Bo shook his head, grinning ruefully. "The crazy thing is I've never done online personals before. The whole thing started as a goof. I just wanted to search to see...I dunno why, really. But that picture you had up...something about it..."
Alicia smiled. "That's so funny, I *just* changed it that same day you messaged me. The one I had before was me wearing a T. Rex costume."
Bo's laughter was rich and almost melodic. "That's awesome. See, I knew you had a good sense of humor. I'm really glad I started the free trial so I could message you."
Alicia's smile grew. "Me, too." She looked down at the table, then back up at Bo. "Maybe I've got a little bit of good luck after all?"
***
/r/ShadowsofClouds | When I woke up yesterday, I learned I could breathe fire. It’s really more a curse than anything. My cat jumped up onto my chest, and I sneezed from all the hair he shed. I accidentally set my dresser on fire. My curtains ceased to exist at around 3pm because I had a major coughing fit. It really is kind of a downer. I mean, it’s not like I am going around and using it in single combat or anything, is it?
This kind of thing keeps happening, too. Just last Thursday I had a different weird incident. Now I have to be honest, last Thursday was a very weird day. The boss kept giving me more assignments in the morning, which was out of character. Then, a crazy man walked up to me during my lunch break and said he wanted to fight me. I thought for a while that he was talking to someone else. Like, who even challenges a mid-30s, overweight guy in an old business suit to a duel at 11 am? He kept insisting it from across the street while I ignored him, as polite people do. When he tried to run across the street, he was hit by a bus. It was a terrible tragedy of course, but I had no real part of it. That afternoon, Phyllis from accounting claimed that I stole her lunch! That’s even stranger, because obviously I was outside during lunch. When I got home that night, I could turn invisible.
Hell, last month I also had a stand out for the title of “weirdest day.” I was on vacation in the city of Detroit, and the richest-looking guy I had ever seen rolled passed in a beautiful Lamborghini. He rolled down his window and pointed at me with the finger-gun gesture. I pointed right back and laughed, since it was a weird thing to do, but then he got all mad! He revved the engine, and pulled into a U-turn to drive right at me. I sure was surprised, but I was even more surprised when a bolt of lightning hit his car. Like, isn’t lightning supposed to strike the tallest object around? Also, it was a pretty sunny day, so there shouldn’t have been lightning in the first place. I didn’t question it of course, since it stopped me from being hit with his car, but it sure was wild. That night, I figured out that I was able to run super fast for short bursts. It looks really strange at first, since I am *not* a runner, but it can be quite useful.
All these coincidences and weird party tricks I can pull really make me wonder. They just seem too strange to all happen to one guy, but what can I say? I guess I’m just lucky.
|
|
[WP] Everyone has the Mega Man-like ability to steal another person's most valuable trait by defeating them in battle. You have the world's most valuable trait - incredible, inexplicable dumb luck - and you've won thousands of battle without even knowing you were fighting. | "I am known as Gunslinger Gilbert, but you can call me Gil," announced the man in black leathers. "And I am here to challenge you," he pointed at me with a gloved finger, "to a battle to the death."
People on the busy street turned their heads in our direction as they noticed the arsenal of guns that Gil had slung over his back.
I sighed deeply, slightly irritated that Gil had interrupted my morning jog.
"Hey, uhh Gil right?" I asked
He nodded.
"Maybe we should take this somewhere else?" I gestured to the busy morning traffic and to the pedestrians that were giving us a wide berth on the narrow sidewalk. "Somewhere with less people you know?"
I prayed that he was the sensible type.
"Oh yea, I know very well where this is going Jack," Gil nodded slowly with a stern expression on his face.
"Oh really? T-that's good then," I said surprised. What an understanding gentleman, I thought.
"I've heard the stories Jack, I ain't no fool."
I frowned, puzzled.
"Jack the Undefeated who has overcome thousands of battles against all odds with just sheer luck. We know the truth Jack. You are the man with the Devil's Luck," said Gil and smirked wickedly.
*Thousands* of battles? Since when did that happen? I wondered.
"I've done my research Jack," Gil said as he walked around me dramatically on the narrow street. "They say you like to take your challengers to an open field or some abandoned warehouse under the pretense that there would be no bystanders or obstacles in the way, but the truth is so that they can suffer a horrible fate."
"Hey that's totally not-"
"Warehouse collapses and the challenger dies eh? And you walk out without a scratch. Or even worse, death by a *ricocheting* bullet in the warehouse," Gil shook his head in disgust.
"Hold up, that totally never happened," I said sharply but then I remembered that just last week, an old building that I had walked by had collapsed suddenly on itself.
"That's not even the end of it. I've heard that those who you take to the open field suffer the most outrageous deaths. A meteorite falling out of the sky, or even *worse!* Compressed Spacetrash obliterating your enemies into smithereens." Gil stopped pacing around me, and spat on the floor. Then he gave me the a look of revolting disgust before pulling a hand cannon out from his back pocket.
I raised my hands into the air, "Hey Gil, maybe those things did happen, but I just wanna say that I never meant any harm to anyone. *Ever.*"
"Too little, too late Jack," he lifted the gun and pointed at my face.
I closed my eyes.
*Click.*
I opened my eyes.
"What the fuck?" he swore as he fumbled with the revolver.
He tossed the revolver aside, and reached for an automatic rifle on his back.
*Click,click,click,click.*
Nothing.
I watched patiently as Gil disassembled his gun, trying to pinpoint the problem.
Suddenly I noticed out of the corner of my eye, an old lady trying to jaywalk across the busy street. Without even thinking I ran to help her.
"Hey! Where the fuck do you think you're going Jack?!" shouted Gil as he tampered with his gun.
I ignored him.
"Hello ma'am, allow me," I smiled and gave her my arm.
"A-ah thank you young man," she took my arm with her frail hands.
With her hands on my arm, I lead the way across the busy street.
Suddenly the elderly lady started screaming, with her eyes wide.
Alarmed, I glanced around me and saw the disaster that lay before me. Dozens of cars had collided with one another around me. Some of the cars were flipped over and some of them were even stacked on top of one another like a house of cards.
The elderly women had let go of my arm, still screaming.
I realized that it was directed at me.
"-have you done?! Don't you know you're suppose to check both ways before crossing the street?!" she screeched.
"Oh..." I said thoughtfully. "Why would I do that?"
---------
/r/Em_pathy
| When I woke up yesterday, I learned I could breathe fire. It’s really more a curse than anything. My cat jumped up onto my chest, and I sneezed from all the hair he shed. I accidentally set my dresser on fire. My curtains ceased to exist at around 3pm because I had a major coughing fit. It really is kind of a downer. I mean, it’s not like I am going around and using it in single combat or anything, is it?
This kind of thing keeps happening, too. Just last Thursday I had a different weird incident. Now I have to be honest, last Thursday was a very weird day. The boss kept giving me more assignments in the morning, which was out of character. Then, a crazy man walked up to me during my lunch break and said he wanted to fight me. I thought for a while that he was talking to someone else. Like, who even challenges a mid-30s, overweight guy in an old business suit to a duel at 11 am? He kept insisting it from across the street while I ignored him, as polite people do. When he tried to run across the street, he was hit by a bus. It was a terrible tragedy of course, but I had no real part of it. That afternoon, Phyllis from accounting claimed that I stole her lunch! That’s even stranger, because obviously I was outside during lunch. When I got home that night, I could turn invisible.
Hell, last month I also had a stand out for the title of “weirdest day.” I was on vacation in the city of Detroit, and the richest-looking guy I had ever seen rolled passed in a beautiful Lamborghini. He rolled down his window and pointed at me with the finger-gun gesture. I pointed right back and laughed, since it was a weird thing to do, but then he got all mad! He revved the engine, and pulled into a U-turn to drive right at me. I sure was surprised, but I was even more surprised when a bolt of lightning hit his car. Like, isn’t lightning supposed to strike the tallest object around? Also, it was a pretty sunny day, so there shouldn’t have been lightning in the first place. I didn’t question it of course, since it stopped me from being hit with his car, but it sure was wild. That night, I figured out that I was able to run super fast for short bursts. It looks really strange at first, since I am *not* a runner, but it can be quite useful.
All these coincidences and weird party tricks I can pull really make me wonder. They just seem too strange to all happen to one guy, but what can I say? I guess I’m just lucky.
|
|
[WP] Everyone has the Mega Man-like ability to steal another person's most valuable trait by defeating them in battle. You have the world's most valuable trait - incredible, inexplicable dumb luck - and you've won thousands of battle without even knowing you were fighting. | "I am known as Gunslinger Gilbert, but you can call me Gil," announced the man in black leathers. "And I am here to challenge you," he pointed at me with a gloved finger, "to a battle to the death."
People on the busy street turned their heads in our direction as they noticed the arsenal of guns that Gil had slung over his back.
I sighed deeply, slightly irritated that Gil had interrupted my morning jog.
"Hey, uhh Gil right?" I asked
He nodded.
"Maybe we should take this somewhere else?" I gestured to the busy morning traffic and to the pedestrians that were giving us a wide berth on the narrow sidewalk. "Somewhere with less people you know?"
I prayed that he was the sensible type.
"Oh yea, I know very well where this is going Jack," Gil nodded slowly with a stern expression on his face.
"Oh really? T-that's good then," I said surprised. What an understanding gentleman, I thought.
"I've heard the stories Jack, I ain't no fool."
I frowned, puzzled.
"Jack the Undefeated who has overcome thousands of battles against all odds with just sheer luck. We know the truth Jack. You are the man with the Devil's Luck," said Gil and smirked wickedly.
*Thousands* of battles? Since when did that happen? I wondered.
"I've done my research Jack," Gil said as he walked around me dramatically on the narrow street. "They say you like to take your challengers to an open field or some abandoned warehouse under the pretense that there would be no bystanders or obstacles in the way, but the truth is so that they can suffer a horrible fate."
"Hey that's totally not-"
"Warehouse collapses and the challenger dies eh? And you walk out without a scratch. Or even worse, death by a *ricocheting* bullet in the warehouse," Gil shook his head in disgust.
"Hold up, that totally never happened," I said sharply but then I remembered that just last week, an old building that I had walked by had collapsed suddenly on itself.
"That's not even the end of it. I've heard that those who you take to the open field suffer the most outrageous deaths. A meteorite falling out of the sky, or even *worse!* Compressed Spacetrash obliterating your enemies into smithereens." Gil stopped pacing around me, and spat on the floor. Then he gave me the a look of revolting disgust before pulling a hand cannon out from his back pocket.
I raised my hands into the air, "Hey Gil, maybe those things did happen, but I just wanna say that I never meant any harm to anyone. *Ever.*"
"Too little, too late Jack," he lifted the gun and pointed at my face.
I closed my eyes.
*Click.*
I opened my eyes.
"What the fuck?" he swore as he fumbled with the revolver.
He tossed the revolver aside, and reached for an automatic rifle on his back.
*Click,click,click,click.*
Nothing.
I watched patiently as Gil disassembled his gun, trying to pinpoint the problem.
Suddenly I noticed out of the corner of my eye, an old lady trying to jaywalk across the busy street. Without even thinking I ran to help her.
"Hey! Where the fuck do you think you're going Jack?!" shouted Gil as he tampered with his gun.
I ignored him.
"Hello ma'am, allow me," I smiled and gave her my arm.
"A-ah thank you young man," she took my arm with her frail hands.
With her hands on my arm, I lead the way across the busy street.
Suddenly the elderly lady started screaming, with her eyes wide.
Alarmed, I glanced around me and saw the disaster that lay before me. Dozens of cars had collided with one another around me. Some of the cars were flipped over and some of them were even stacked on top of one another like a house of cards.
The elderly women had let go of my arm, still screaming.
I realized that it was directed at me.
"-have you done?! Don't you know you're suppose to check both ways before crossing the street?!" she screeched.
"Oh..." I said thoughtfully. "Why would I do that?"
---------
/r/Em_pathy
| Laughing, Alicia brushed a lock of blonde hair behind her ear. "You should probably stay away from me...I'm trouble."
Bo grinned. "Who's to say I don't like a little bit of trouble?"
"I'm serious!" Alicia frowned, but her hazel eyes were gleaming as she looked across the table at her date. "Just on the way over here, there was a big car accident right next to me, and I'm pretty sure I saw a woman have a heart attack. Not to mention all this."
Alicia gestured to the window, and Bo glanced at the rain falling outside.
"You telling me that you made it rain? You're like one of those cartoon characters that has their own personal cloud following them around?"
Bo tore a chunk from the piece of bread on his plate and dipped it in the olive oil coating the dish in the middle of the table, studying Alicia's face with his brown eyes.
"Maybe! I don't know. I just - the sky was perfectly blue when I stepped outside, Google said weather would be great for the rest of the day...and now I'm, you know...all wet."
Alicia popped a piece of bread into her mouth, watching for Bo's response. He saw his brown eyebrows arch briefly, before a smirk appeared on his tanned face.
"Gross. I thought this was going to be a classy dinner."
A sudden crash of breaking glass made them both turn their heads. The waiter bringing their wine had slipped on a wet spot on the floor, causing him to tip his tray and sending the drinks to an untimely end against the tile floor.
"See?" Alicia said. "I bet you that guy hasn't dropped anything in years. Then I show up...not to mention my favorite place to sit is over there, right next to the kitchen. It figures that I wouldn't be able to get my lucky table for our first date."
Outside, there was a flash of light, followed almost immediately by a concussive blast of thunder.
Alicia pointed back to the window. "Plus we nearly got struck by lightning! I mean, come on - you have to admit that would be pretty unlucky."
* * *
Noriko S. crouched down on the fire escape. Swathed in black cloth and shadow, she was almost impossible to see. As she spotted her target, she slowly brought the blowgun to her lips.
Before she could fire it and acquire Alicia's powers, however, a yellow jacket began buzzing in her face. Reflexively, she shooed it away, then immediately regretted it as the dart fell from the blowgun, through the slats of the fire escape, and to the ground below - somehow managing to land point up.
As she went to jump down, she lost her footing on the rain-slicked metal, and crashed awkwardly to the concrete below. Noriko was conscious of separate types of pain - the generalized, raw ache from falling and the sharp, focused stabbing from her dart. As the toxin flooded her system, her body began convulsing.
Alicia heard the cry of "Someone get an ambulance!" and glanced over her shoulder at the woman spasming on the ground.
* * *
Paragon Security was *extremely* effective at what they did - and were only getting moreso with each passing day. Despite their name, they tended to play offense more than defense. The five core members, all of whom picked up a number of skills and abilities in Afghanistan and Iraq, had figured out how to game the system.
See, the power transfer didn't care about fights being one-on-one or any other kinds of...tactical enhancements someone might think up. So they worked as a group, overpowering targets when they were alone and then taking turns delivering the finishing blow. Rotation was determined not just by how long it had been since someone got a new trait but also what fit their overall profile best. They had a brawler, a sneak, a tactician, a weapons expert, and a jack of all trades. Over time, they'd become strategic about picking targets to fill gaps in their abilities.
This job was huge for them, since it would make them pretty much unstoppable.
"Go time, shitheads!" the tactician yelled out as the black van rounded the corner. Everyone prepared to jump out and grab their target. They were about to pull over to the curb when the van ran over a twisted piece of metal lying in the street.
With a bang like a gunshot, the front driver's side tire blew out, causing the van to swerve into oncoming traffic. An instant later, it was hit by a semi, which sent the van rolling down the street multiple times before it came to a dead stop.
* * *
*Le Visage* had mixed in with the kitchen staff at Pompadour easily - but then, he always did. He stayed long enough to identify which drinks were destined to go to Table 7 and put the poison in them, then walked out of the building with the cool calm he had developed over the years of practice in *belonging*. He only found out the attempt was unsuccessful an hour later, when he tried to break into the jewelry store just as a patrol car came around the corner. It was the first time he'd ever failed a mission.
* * *
Mike "Patch" Doyle had earned his call sign by being the best sniper in his unit - it was an allusion to how deadly he was with one eye closed. Crouched on the roof of the building across the street, he checked the distance again and prepared to line up his shot. Patch felt a twinge of guilt. He could almost take her out with a sidearm at this range. Still - better safe than sorry.
He cleared away a spot for himself and set up the tripod rest for his rifle. Mike held the gun up for a moment to check the stock, and that's when lightning struck.
The long metal weapon he was holding in his hands instantly converted into a lightning rod as, a moment later, his internal organs instantly converted into seared tripe. His body would not be found for a few weeks.
* * *
Bo shook his head, grinning ruefully. "The crazy thing is I've never done online personals before. The whole thing started as a goof. I just wanted to search to see...I dunno why, really. But that picture you had up...something about it..."
Alicia smiled. "That's so funny, I *just* changed it that same day you messaged me. The one I had before was me wearing a T. Rex costume."
Bo's laughter was rich and almost melodic. "That's awesome. See, I knew you had a good sense of humor. I'm really glad I started the free trial so I could message you."
Alicia's smile grew. "Me, too." She looked down at the table, then back up at Bo. "Maybe I've got a little bit of good luck after all?"
***
/r/ShadowsofClouds |
|
Pretending sword stores are still a thing. | [WP] Your super power is extreme proficiency at fighting with anything not considered a weapon. Your challenge: A violent robbery happens while you're visiting a Sword store | "I'm here for the foreplay."
That's what my brother said to say, and they'd take me to the back room where they had a card game called "four play". But the woman just stood there, jaw gaping.
Later, I'd figure out I'd pretty much verbally abused this woman. Weird thing is that's the *least* crazy thing that happened.
In short, I'm a professionally trained fighter. My whole family comes from a long line of dancers, and while I had the spunk, I definitely didn't have the grace. I knocked my sister's tooth out while we were rehearsing. Long story short, they put me in the martial arts.
"You like breaking stuff? Break this." said my teacher, showing me his wooden dummy. I smashed it with my fist, howled in pain, and loved it.
Fast forward a few years, I'd grown to be 12 years old. I was in this shop full of swords. But nobody sold swords anymore, nobody'd been in here for years. How did it even stay open? I went along with my brother's bet and asked for the secret game in the back. Sure, I made a fool of myself but I would definitely a hundred silver when I get home.
As I backed away from the disgusted woman (not disgusting, mind you. She was alright for a thirty year old shopkeeper if I recall), I bumped into something hard, then heard a crash.
I turned around slowly. Some green liquid had spilled on the ground, and the man was staring down at it. It melted through the wood, and he jumped back, as did I.
He glared at me from across the puddle, sizzling.
"Fool!" he hollered.
"I-I'm sorry," I said.
He thought hard about his next move, then suddenly darted around to lunge at me. I didn't know what to do but react, deflecting him to the side... and he stepped in the liquid. He screamed and lost his balance, his left side slapping into the puddle and falling through the ground, he scrambled to hold on to the floor but his arms burned. His screams were horrible, the lady was screaming, I may have been screaming.
I picked up one of the swords to try and hold it out to him, so he could pull himself out, but then realized how fucking stupid that was. He fell through the hole, screaming. I looked down, and it had gone two floors and he wasn't in sight.
I panicked. I ran out the door with the sword, looking left and right. People stared at me holding the sword and drew back. I ran towards my home and never looked back.
It's been three years, and I got a letter in the mail yesterday. It read
"Remember me, fool?" and had a photo attached of a man with a horribly deformed left side of his face.
One part of me was relieved, because I'd been dreading this moment forever. Another part thought, "If it took him three years to track me down and I live up the hill, he can't be that bright". The last part looked over to the sword.
I'd went to return it a few weeks later, carefully, and the woman had hugged me close. The man was a local mobster, and I'd scared him out of town. He was collecting protection money with the threat of that firbicine (the green stuff), and I'd emptied it. She gave me the sword.
I'd gotten pretty good over the years, training with my sifu. I wasn't too worried about this guy, to be honest. I'm pretty awesome. I even got my hundred silver from my brother. So yeah, fuck that guy, I thought. He's not going to match wits with me.
In retrospect, listen to Sun Tzu: never underestimate your opponent. Otherwise you might end up riding as cargo in a bucket-of-junk airship in desperate need of an anti-firbic vaccine. Ah well, you live you learn. Just hope I keep living.
| "Halt, in the name of justice, for I am Stuff Man!" shouts a man dressed in nothing but a speedo, and a utility belt.
Looking down at his bulge and then back up to his face the female burglar replies, "I can see why, how often you wash that sock?"
"Oh baby, that's all me down there, I'm called *Stuff Man* because anything not considered a weapon, *is my weapon*," with that Stuff man, sends an entire row of knives to the ground in order to remove the holding rod from the rack, before waving it around unmenacingly.
The woman laughs, she raises her sword and says, "Anything is a weapon in proper hands, and I have trained with the best in the art of improvised weapons."
As Stuff Man thought about what the burglar had said, he could feel his power slip away from him. If everything was considered a weapon... he had no power...
As the burglar ran him through with the ancient sword she had come to steal, Stuff Man's last words were, "Oh."
Moral of the Story: "Never get your super powers from the devil." |
Pretending sword stores are still a thing. | [WP] Your super power is extreme proficiency at fighting with anything not considered a weapon. Your challenge: A violent robbery happens while you're visiting a Sword store | "Swords. Swords lining every wall, every shelf. Why would I find myself in such a place, you ask? Well, I wouldn't, but that was part of the exam. Without showing my skills, I'd never get my Hero License.
I barely had time to get to grips with the place, before the exam began. The door was kicked in, and I spun around. A thug came in, and aimed a gun at me.
Now, as you know, I can't stand swords. Can't stand guns, either. In my hands, a handkerchief, a bottle, or a pack of rice crackers makes for a fine weapon, but right there, nothing but blades.
The thug began to shoot at me. The paint ball rifle made a mess of the wall behind me when I barely dodged into the racks. I was rummaging through the swords, seeing whether there was anything I could use, but to no avail.
Then it struck me.
No matter the weapon, there's always a normally harmless component to it. I cannot use weapons, but if I take them apart, I can.
When I stood up again, I had a scabbard in my hand. Now, I'm good with a scabbard, let me tell you. My first strike broke his gun, the second floored him. Two of his buddies stood outside, but I grabbed some mags off the first one, and threw them before they could aim.
That day was only a first step. Right now, I'm the most respected superhero around. I found my weakness, and overcame it. And that's all there's to it.
That's a lesson from me to you, young man, so that you can be a respected hero one day too."
"Thank you, sir. I see how weaknesses are important. I need to go now, but I won't forget this!" The young man in question smiled at Harmless Object Man and waved.
"Of course." HOM nodded and straightened his back. "Stay safe, young man."
As the young man walked off, he took his phone out of his pocket, and quickly dialled a number.
"Doctor Dastardly, it's me, Camouflage Kid. I interrogated Harmless Object Man. I know how we'll defeat him."
"Hm-hm. And how is that?"
"He thinks out of the box. Any weapon can be broken down into parts that are not weapons. That's the root of the issue. Do you see what I'm getting at?"
"Oh ho, I think so, Kid. Do not worry, I have the connections to make that happen."
"As I knew you would. It's simple, really. A matter of policy on what's considered a weapon."
"Yes, indeed. I will pull some strings. I have dirt on half the senate."
"Good. Remember, all you need to do is make them pass one bill. Legally, everything needs to be a weapon. Everything. Just do that much, and he's powerless."
Kid hung up the phone. While talking, his face and clothes had already changed, no longer the same person as a few moments prior.
"Just you wait, Harmless Object Man. The city will be ours soon." | "Halt, in the name of justice, for I am Stuff Man!" shouts a man dressed in nothing but a speedo, and a utility belt.
Looking down at his bulge and then back up to his face the female burglar replies, "I can see why, how often you wash that sock?"
"Oh baby, that's all me down there, I'm called *Stuff Man* because anything not considered a weapon, *is my weapon*," with that Stuff man, sends an entire row of knives to the ground in order to remove the holding rod from the rack, before waving it around unmenacingly.
The woman laughs, she raises her sword and says, "Anything is a weapon in proper hands, and I have trained with the best in the art of improvised weapons."
As Stuff Man thought about what the burglar had said, he could feel his power slip away from him. If everything was considered a weapon... he had no power...
As the burglar ran him through with the ancient sword she had come to steal, Stuff Man's last words were, "Oh."
Moral of the Story: "Never get your super powers from the devil." |
Pretending sword stores are still a thing. | [WP] Your super power is extreme proficiency at fighting with anything not considered a weapon. Your challenge: A violent robbery happens while you're visiting a Sword store | Broken glass hit the back of my neck. I was the closest to the broken window, and as such was the first to be taken hostage. In just a few moments three men had burst into the store,two brandishing pistols while the other wielded an assault rifle. A bit overkill for a measly sword shop, but it still had the desired effect.
One of them grabbed me and held his pistol to my head. I could feel his balaclava tickling the back of my neck, and looking around the other pistol user wore a Donkey Kong mask while a clown mask resided on the face of the guy with the heavy firepower. They both swung around pointing their weapons menacingly. The two other people in the shop instantly fell to their knees, and as the owner came out the back room to see who the fuck had broken his window, he was silenced with a violent pistol whip. I saw blood spurt from his nose, and he fell to the ground clutching it.
He was exactly who you'd think would own a sword shop. Oh sorry, "Katana". He was a neckbeard, in looks at least, who had clearly studied the blade for at least a fortnight. Along with the secret art of mountain-fu and Do-Ri-To. I felt sorry for the dude. He now had blood streaming down his face, and his store was getting robbed. At least he sensibly stayed down after he was hit.
The robber with the assault rifle made his way over to the till, and was evidently pleased with what he saw. Katanas made a big buck, no matter how dodgy the store. A surge of anger swept over me as he stood on the store owners hand deliberately to get there. He was already down, just leave him alone already.
The guy holding me suddenly shoved me face first into the wall, as if it was my fault his partner was taking so long. He shouted at the other pistol user who was pointing his gun threateningly at the other customers. I noticed his gun alone had a silencer on it.
"Hey Jim, check the back - Fuck! Monkey face! Check the back room to see if there's any expensive shit we can nab! I'll keep these lot in check. Everyone, on your knees, in a line, now!"
The other gunman turned to him with what I could only assume was a death stare under his mask.
" There's no use using the code names after you've already said my real name, dumb ass. And cold you try to be a little quieter? We ARE doing a robbery here."
I felt the man holding the gun to my head ready a retort, but in the end he just nodded and the other gunman followed his orders. The other pistol user went into the back room behind the counter. This left just the assault rifle guy emptying the till, and the bloke holding me hostage. He roughly shoved me away from the wall, onto my knees. I meekly shuffled closer to the other customer, and we formed a semi decent line.
We were now at the knees of the gunman emptying the till, and just as he finished collecting the money he knee'd me in the face. I fell to the ground, blood pouring from my nose, as he nudged me again with his boot. That was the final straw.
The last guy emerged from the back room, wielding a gold, expensive looking katana. I heard the store owner on the ground sob, and then plead.
"Please not that one!" I heard him beg pitifully. "It's just for show! It's not even a weapon!".
It was as soon as I heard those words I knew what to do. I let the guy with the money pass by me. I saw the guy who had been holding me hostage climb out the window before his pals. Yet as soon as the guy with the expensive looking blade stepped past me, I stood up. I grabbed the blade by its beautifully adorned hilt. It was plastic. I heard him mutter as he felt the resistance on the sword. "What the -"
I stood up quickly, forcing the katana out of his grip. Now, I had my weapon. He leveled his gun at me. I would avenge my comrades nose. i looked at him. The gun fired.
I teleported behind him.
"Nothing personnel, kid."
EDIT: formatting
r/CheekaiWrites | "Halt, in the name of justice, for I am Stuff Man!" shouts a man dressed in nothing but a speedo, and a utility belt.
Looking down at his bulge and then back up to his face the female burglar replies, "I can see why, how often you wash that sock?"
"Oh baby, that's all me down there, I'm called *Stuff Man* because anything not considered a weapon, *is my weapon*," with that Stuff man, sends an entire row of knives to the ground in order to remove the holding rod from the rack, before waving it around unmenacingly.
The woman laughs, she raises her sword and says, "Anything is a weapon in proper hands, and I have trained with the best in the art of improvised weapons."
As Stuff Man thought about what the burglar had said, he could feel his power slip away from him. If everything was considered a weapon... he had no power...
As the burglar ran him through with the ancient sword she had come to steal, Stuff Man's last words were, "Oh."
Moral of the Story: "Never get your super powers from the devil." |
Pretending sword stores are still a thing. | [WP] Your super power is extreme proficiency at fighting with anything not considered a weapon. Your challenge: A violent robbery happens while you're visiting a Sword store | I don't even like swords. Swords are cool to look at when they're hanging on a wall, and sword fights in movies are always cool to watch, but swords are not practical for real world combat. A fire extinguisher, or a little kids tricycle is a more proficient weapon than a factory made katana. Unfortunately Doug's super power seems to be convincing people to do shit they think is dumb, so I find myself browsing through a sword shop you can tell only exist to exploit guys like Doug, who feel a custom broadsword with a skull at the hilt is a necessary component to his home defense kit.
I must admit that the shop itself was rather impressive. Two levels separated the "sleek" blades from the "stylish” blades. You can see the full first floor from the second floor as well, which makes the sheilds hanging from the ceiling actually look like cool decoration. Doug and I are on the second level, looking at the sword earlier described. I can't tell if the sales guy is trying to sell the swordor his pen, how he keeps mentioning they're both made from the same triple hardened metal.
Doug is still swinging his sword around pretending to be braveheart when I see the first three guys pop into the store with Navy seal precision. The first guy goes straight up to the register, assault rifle pointed at the cashier while yelling the usual commands. His boys in tow continue through the store, one headed towards the stairs, and the other headed out of view in the direction of what I think was the office and smithing areas. The sales guy was already running towards a back office when I turned back to face him and Doug. Doug is hidden behind the sword shelf, sword in hand, leaving me as the only person out in the open. The gunman has his pistol trained on me.
"Lay the fuck down before I have to make you guy."
"I feel like technically, this is you making me lay down." I'm frantically searching for something to use on him, while Doug is circling around unnoticed.
I jump the ledge to my left grabbing the closest sheild during my decent. Instead of the string holding it snapping immediately, it catches and holds my weight for a second causing me to yank and hang a split second before awkwardly tumbling to the ground on my back. The sheild itself blocks two bullets, before I hear Doug convince the guy to trade the gun for his sword. I get myself up, grab a dagger with me right, and start towards the front counter.
Three more Simi auto bullets ring out in my direction. Two bounce off the sheilds, while the last grazes the side of my kneecap. I use all my might to toss the dagger at the gunman. The hilt bounces off of his shoulder, causing him to studder in pain long enough to bash the fuck out of him a few good times with my sheild. I kick the gun away from the unconscious guy, grab the pen from the cashier's shirt pocket, and start towards the back.
The last guy is already on his way in my direction. This time, I use the pen to deflect all eleven rounds. I toss the pen to knock his second mag far across the room, and then preceded to beat him unconscious with the "do not leave children unattended" plastic sign to my right. Doug appears down there stairs carrying there sword in his left hand, and the third shooter in his right wrapped in what looks like a fishermen's net.
"I'm definitely getting the sword and the net."
"I want like... Fifteen of these pens."
| Sunday night, and I was visiting a sword store. I really should've been heading home to bed, but the antique daggers and the shiny, metallic luster of the blades deserved my undivided attention. I perused the dusty shelves for the perfect blade - nothing too big, nothing too small, something that would look badass on my mantelpiece. As my eyes scanned the shelves, one particular dagger caught my eye. It was an antique looking thing, though it's luster did not seem to have faded despite its age. It had an eastern dragon engraving on its handle. Badass.
As I walked up to the cashier, I suddenly heard the ear-bursting sound of a gunshot.
'Nobody fuckin' move!' the first robber shouted.
'Think about the people that love you!' the second screamed. She was a woman.
I cringed at the thought of a Bonnie and Clyde duo getting away. Luckily, I was the best fighter on the face of the planet. I clutched my dagger tight, and lunged at the male robber with all my might. Without much effort, he grabbed my forearm and hit me in the nose with the butt of his pistol.
For a second there, I forgot I couldn't use real weapons.
Before he had the chance to pull the trigger, I took off my cap and stuck it in between his neck. As he choked on his own blood, his partner whipped around and let out an ear splitting scream.
'NO!' she sobbed. With a pump of her shotgun, she started to take aim.
Frantically searching for any non-weapon objects I reached into my pocket. A nickel! As fast as I could, I clipped the coin in between my fingers and hurled it right in between the woman's eyes. With a spray of brain matter and a sickening splat, the woman's eyes rolled to the back of her head, and collapsed, dead.
The cashier, still cowering behind the counter, looked up at me with terrified eyes as I passed by. I picked up my dagger and tossed the remainder of my cash on the countertop.
'You're welcome,' I said calmly, as I walked out the store, into the cool, night air. |
Pretending sword stores are still a thing. | [WP] Your super power is extreme proficiency at fighting with anything not considered a weapon. Your challenge: A violent robbery happens while you're visiting a Sword store | I shouldn't have been there.
Ever since my sister and I had left our [time as ninjas](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/7wmf4h/wp_you_have_sent_your_daughters_to_the_same/du2oqx8/) [behind us](https://www.reddit.com/r/WritingPrompts/comments/7zm6oq/wp_you_thought_you_knew_where_you_were_just_a/dup98al/), I hadn't been anywhere near traditional weapons. But when I heard a brand new sword store was opening in our town, I couldn't help but take a look. The temptation was just too strong. I would just be looking, I told myself. I wouldn't actually buy anything. Like the brand new Triple Katana made of Damascus Steel. Or the latest model of the extra powerful Kachi Sword. No, nothing like that at all.
I was just calculating whether I had enough money for both when the robbers showed up. There were three of them. They brought machine guns.
I smirked. It was almost too easy.
No, I told myself firmly. I mustn't give in to the temptation. My time as a ninja was behind me. My smirk returns as the idea hits me. It happens that I've dabbled in a...less traditional method of fighting as well.
''Hi guys!’’, I wave at them innocently. ''Can I ask you a question?’’
They look at me confused. ''This is a robbery, you broad. We’re the ones who ask the questions here.’’
''It’s just one little question.’’
''Well…alright then.’’
''What’s the number of the local zoo?’’
''What? Are you crazy?’’
''No sir. Just in need of their phone number.’’
''Why?’’
''To tell them that their buffoons have escaped.’’
''Why you little-
''I bet that’s what your girl says every time you take your clothes off!’’
All three of them stare at me with gaping mouth. Oh yeah. I’m on a roll now.
''You better go get some water’’, I continue, ''to apply to those burns!’’
The man on the left raises an eyebrow at me. ''You do realize I could just shoot you, right?''
I snort. ''With your skill? F*cking Comcast's customer service is faster than you.''
The man begins to cry. ''That’s painfully specific to my insecurities.''
The leader turns to him. ''Are you serious, Mark?''
''You’d understand if you were in my shoes!'' He cried as he ran out the store.
One down, two to go.
The man on the right looks confused. ''What on earth is going on here?!''
I sigh. ''I don’t have the time or the crayons to explain it to you. Now tell me, in what way are your parents related to each other?’’
His lip began to tremble as he turned towards the exit. ''I’m gonna go call my mommy.’’
I lock eyes with the leader. Time for the final battle.
He makes the first move. ''Does your ass ever get jealous of the amount of sh*t that comes out of your mouth?’’
Ooh, good one.
I manage to keep my poker face, and scoff instead. ''That’s all you got? Get on my level. Let me tell you something, buddy. It’s like grandpa used to say, you’ve got a face for the radio. I'd make a joke about your mother, but you being here has already done that for me.''
Time for the final blow.
''The only way for you to get laid is to crawl up a chicken’s ass and wait.''
The man runs out the store, broken. ''Oh, I better call 911!’’, I call after him. ''There’s been a murder!''
I smirk. ''Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words will f*cking kill you.''
| Sunday night, and I was visiting a sword store. I really should've been heading home to bed, but the antique daggers and the shiny, metallic luster of the blades deserved my undivided attention. I perused the dusty shelves for the perfect blade - nothing too big, nothing too small, something that would look badass on my mantelpiece. As my eyes scanned the shelves, one particular dagger caught my eye. It was an antique looking thing, though it's luster did not seem to have faded despite its age. It had an eastern dragon engraving on its handle. Badass.
As I walked up to the cashier, I suddenly heard the ear-bursting sound of a gunshot.
'Nobody fuckin' move!' the first robber shouted.
'Think about the people that love you!' the second screamed. She was a woman.
I cringed at the thought of a Bonnie and Clyde duo getting away. Luckily, I was the best fighter on the face of the planet. I clutched my dagger tight, and lunged at the male robber with all my might. Without much effort, he grabbed my forearm and hit me in the nose with the butt of his pistol.
For a second there, I forgot I couldn't use real weapons.
Before he had the chance to pull the trigger, I took off my cap and stuck it in between his neck. As he choked on his own blood, his partner whipped around and let out an ear splitting scream.
'NO!' she sobbed. With a pump of her shotgun, she started to take aim.
Frantically searching for any non-weapon objects I reached into my pocket. A nickel! As fast as I could, I clipped the coin in between my fingers and hurled it right in between the woman's eyes. With a spray of brain matter and a sickening splat, the woman's eyes rolled to the back of her head, and collapsed, dead.
The cashier, still cowering behind the counter, looked up at me with terrified eyes as I passed by. I picked up my dagger and tossed the remainder of my cash on the countertop.
'You're welcome,' I said calmly, as I walked out the store, into the cool, night air. |
Pretending sword stores are still a thing. | [WP] Your super power is extreme proficiency at fighting with anything not considered a weapon. Your challenge: A violent robbery happens while you're visiting a Sword store | The robbers were still screaming and making the same cliche demands I've heard before at almost every robbery I've been to. Four men, all masked. Two yelling at the store manager, two covering the three cringing customers, and myself of course.
I know what to do. I've done it many times before, but I have to be very careful each and every time I do it. My hand slowly, casually inches along the register table towards a small cup containing what I need. A quick motion when I am sure no eyes are on me and I have what I need.
I blur as I spring into motion. I have to be fast. If the thieves see what I'm holding, they may realize that it is being used as a weapon. Then my power will fail.
A lighting fast jab to the neck becomes a stab to the second robber's hand, the one holding a weapon. I duck as the two covering the crowd turn my way and close distance to the nearest. Three jabs to the kidney area and he'll live, although perhaps he will wish he hadn't. The fourth is panicking and is about to fire his gun. He still hasn't seen what I'm holding, so I'm good.
A quick motion and my hand is numb. It feels like I just swung a baseball bat full force on a garbage truck. I let the momentum spin me around and add to the force of my blow against the last robber. A quick follow up punch to the back of the head and he is unconscious.
I check the wall clock. From start to finish was less than ten seconds. I may be slowing down in my old age. Picking up the swords I brought in, I place them on the counter.
"Here you go. I'm still interested in selling these swords. They don't do me any good. Although, you probably want to wait until after the cops finish up here?"
The manager just nods, still in shock.
"Oh, and you can have this back. I'm done with it," I place a bloody and dented pen in the counter top. The manager stares at it, then looks at the four downed robbers, then at the hole in the ceiling the bullet that I deflected made, then back to the pen.
"You know what, buddy? You keep it." | Sunday night, and I was visiting a sword store. I really should've been heading home to bed, but the antique daggers and the shiny, metallic luster of the blades deserved my undivided attention. I perused the dusty shelves for the perfect blade - nothing too big, nothing too small, something that would look badass on my mantelpiece. As my eyes scanned the shelves, one particular dagger caught my eye. It was an antique looking thing, though it's luster did not seem to have faded despite its age. It had an eastern dragon engraving on its handle. Badass.
As I walked up to the cashier, I suddenly heard the ear-bursting sound of a gunshot.
'Nobody fuckin' move!' the first robber shouted.
'Think about the people that love you!' the second screamed. She was a woman.
I cringed at the thought of a Bonnie and Clyde duo getting away. Luckily, I was the best fighter on the face of the planet. I clutched my dagger tight, and lunged at the male robber with all my might. Without much effort, he grabbed my forearm and hit me in the nose with the butt of his pistol.
For a second there, I forgot I couldn't use real weapons.
Before he had the chance to pull the trigger, I took off my cap and stuck it in between his neck. As he choked on his own blood, his partner whipped around and let out an ear splitting scream.
'NO!' she sobbed. With a pump of her shotgun, she started to take aim.
Frantically searching for any non-weapon objects I reached into my pocket. A nickel! As fast as I could, I clipped the coin in between my fingers and hurled it right in between the woman's eyes. With a spray of brain matter and a sickening splat, the woman's eyes rolled to the back of her head, and collapsed, dead.
The cashier, still cowering behind the counter, looked up at me with terrified eyes as I passed by. I picked up my dagger and tossed the remainder of my cash on the countertop.
'You're welcome,' I said calmly, as I walked out the store, into the cool, night air. |
[WP] You’re walking down the street and see your doppelgänger. You approach your doppelgänger to say hi but they respond with “There can only be one.” | "There can only be one."
I stood there in shock. Calmly, he reached into his coat and pulled out a gun. I stepped back, slowly raising my hands. He brought the gun up. And then kept bringing the gun up until it was pointed into his own mouth. He pulled the trigger. Most of him collapsed in a heap on the sidewalk. Some of him sprayed backwards becoming graffiti on a storefront window. Everyone else on the street ran screaming.
For a moment I didn't move. Then, and I'm not sure why, I picked up the gun and tucked it away inside my coat. I quickly began back on my way down the sidewalk, hoping to just get myself away from this scene so I could process it. The shock was starting to wear off but I was still in a daze. The shock gave way to panic.
I rushed down the street, trying not to attract attention. Trying to avoid eye contact while not looking like I was trying to avoid eye contact. I didn't want to look up at all because I had a bad feeling about what I might see.
When I finally looked up, the first face I saw was another doppelgänger about half a block away. Our eyes met and he looked at me with timid interest as he began to approach.
I wrapped myself tightly with my coat and felt the gun hidden underneath. | "I've got to hurry, only 5 more minutes until I'm late." You think to yourself as you continue walking from your parked car, and look up as you see a dozen skyscrapers extending skyward around you. As you pass a full-length glass exterior facade of one of the buildings, a retail shop selling women's lingerie, you catch a glimpse of yourself and do your best to inspect your suit and tie to ensure every detail is on point. You linger for 2 or 3 seconds, checking your black dress shoes, belt, wrist-watch and continue walking forward. Only, when you take a step, your reflection does not continue moving with you, and upon further inspection you realize that your reflection is wearing a red tie and yours is blue. This realization jostles you from your self-selected mission, and in your surprise you drop your resume into some stagnant water in a gutter on the street. Your reflection notices this and you see him moving from inside the store to outside, and he can't take his eyes off of you.
As you're picking up your resume, trying to salvage whatever you can, you see the exact same pair of shoes you are wearing only inches away from the gutter with stagnant water, toes pointed towards you. You follow the shoes upwards until you begin to gaze at your own face, only it's not your face, this face is more sinister and twisted than your own, but it is unmistakably your face.
"H-hell-" You attempt to greet your 'reflection', but before you can complete the 'Hello' your reflection says to you, in a voice very similar to your own but noticably deeper and more gruff, "There can only be one." and instantly you feel a newfound, strange sensation on the back of your neck.
"W-what's your name?" You ask yourself, or what you thought was yourself, only now you are hoping that this reflection is not, in fact, 'you'.
"You know my name, don't get fancy." This response only deepens and solidifies your original fright, and you realize that this 'you' is not 'you', but a different 'you', but none-the-less still you. It's as if, standing in front of you, is a different resulting person, if you had made only 2 or 3 slightly different choices in your life. You began to search your own personal history for the defining moments of your life: Choosing to go to college instead of the army, Choosing to marry Suzie Q instead of breaking up, choosing to save your money rather than going out every weekend. And that is when you realize: The person standing in front of you is the resulting person that made the **other** choice: he is the result, the sum of many 'wrong' decisions.
You continue staring at the person in front of you and a new fear begins to rise inside you: this person **knows** you, inside and out. He knows your strengths, he knows your weaknesses, he knows your likes and your dislikes. And he has just announced to you his intentions.
You pick up your resume, covered in street-muck and mud, and begin sprinting away from your job interview, when after 2 or 3 steps you begin to hear an identical click-clack of running steps only 3 or 4 feet behind you. |
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