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[WP] You purchase a can of Pringles and find that each chip grants you superhuman strength and makes you impervious to harm. You've already eaten five chips, leaving ninety. The effects of each chip last approximately one week.
|
I strolled into the bank tapping my fingers absent-mindedly tapping against the can dangling from my fingers, my left fingers to be exact, something else the chips had changed, apparently superhuman abilities made me left handed. I pushed the thought away, I had other things to think about like the bank I was about to rob and my increasing addiction to this "super power giving" can of Pringles, god they're so moreish!
Eventually I turned my whirring mind to the task of committing my first crime, and perhaps my first violent one.
Strolling out of the bank five minutes later I began to whistle, apparently that's the done thing especially if there's fire, sirens and the odd unconscious body behind you. To be honest I did think it made look pretty cool! Of course I looked cool I'd just robbed a bank with my godamn bare hands, it was like I was in a movie.
I sat running my fingers through my hair and shivering occaisionaly, "Jeez the view was B.E.A.Utiful!" I chuckled to myself wondering if the dead security guard beside would appreciate it, I'm sure if his head was still attached he would. I laughed again at my own wittiness pushing my laugh out over the city until it turned into a howl that echoed back to me.
I walked out of the third bank that day ignoring the screams and keeping tight hold of my Pringles can which, considering how much blood it was covered with, was no mean feat! I took a moment to reflect, I was doing very well for myself wasn't I, three banks in a day and I was keeping good control over my Pringles intake. Heck I wasn't going to risk all this just cause they tasted good.
I woke up lying somewhere surrounded by something sticky and a bit red, blood probably, but it wasn't mine so I couldn't care less. I checked the can in my coat pocket and went off to do something.
My world began to flicker, bank, bed, blood, and money, but the flickers never really worried me, I was invincible for godsake!
The flickering continued, bank, floor, my blood and my screams.
| 1 | 0 | 6 | 75,133 |
[WP] An Immortal is performing a ritual that will strip him of his immortality only to stop after he sees something that makes him want to keep living.
|
Memory can be fleeting, or it can encompass you and fill you with a moment you'd lost. Memory can chase you down the halls of existence, reminding you to be happy, and reminding you of sadness. My tears have etched canyons upon the surface of my face, my cheeks rigid lines in ragged downward troughs guiding the liquid misery that escaped me. Forever is a long time to be alone, to be sad, and to be full of regret. Forever is just too long, and I've found I'm not cut out for it.
I see my son dancing in light, only to have it fade to darkness; like a switch on my forehead. I watch his children play in the park, the breeze blows his daughters hair in the wind, the smell of cut grass and hose water fills my nostrils, and I wonder what could be better. Then I open my eyes.
I walk between unidentifiable piles of dust, of dirt, of stone and glass. If you'd come forward to ask me how it all turns out I'd honestly say like a pile of construction site trash. Abandoned waiting to be picked up and dumped by men that aren't coming. There's always a breeze lightly blowing through the abandonment, reminding me of my existing non-existence, my cold reality offset by the apocalyptic visuals of a hateful god.
I've picked my spot, for the last few forevers, my tears fell solemnly into the arid dust. My spot identifiable by the only being left around. The only being for eons, standing above a memory, standing above his former self. This was where I played, this was where my son played, where I'd watched his children play. This is where I would die, where humanity would whisper its final stand into a tomb of noise and emptiness. I fell to my knees and felt the sandy dusty dirt poof around my body, I was done with the dry empty abyss of existence, I could no longer wait.
Some had survived the last few years, inbred, googly toothed, one eyed fucks. Killing each other over materials and possessions they couldn't use, oddly similar to how the end had begun. Days when I still was able to forget why I'd gotten here, days when I could still push away the ever looming thought that plagued my brain now for what could have been forever now that I was alone.
I still love my family, but I haven't loved them for thousands of years, I haven't touched my loved ones, I haven't felt warmth, I've forgotten it. A luxury a soul needs, dead and blown away in the winds of an empty planets, carried into a dead atmosphere begging for you to drag it closer to a malicious burning sun, so it can be devoured and forgotten more quickly than the universe allows.
Sometimes I've pretended I've had a rope in my hands, and I'm pulling myself into event horizon, burning away my existence, and my meaningless shell. I don't know why I haven't sooner.
I've been sharpening a rock for a long time, age has a way of refining things before it destroys them. It buffs away the imperfections and creates something beautiful, and then it cracks it into shards, and decays it into dust, until it compacts into something else that may never be as sharp or refined as it once was. Watching existence recycle itself has become my only thing, my existence, one which I intended to end.
I feel the warmth flowing down my neck, my chest, my shirt. I look around for one last glimpse and hate it more than ever. It will finally be done, we are done. I lay back and close my eyes, and dig deep for my favorite memory, my final memory. I'm next to a tiny plastic half barrel of a bed in a hospital room and my wife is still unconscious on another gurney. My sons eyes are open looking into mine, I force my finger into his tiny hand and am overcome. I was happy then.
*Sorry op took it somewhere other than where you wanted, some personal things, and a picture inspired me to write this and I couldn't give it the ending you wanted while remaining true to the story. I hope you'll understand and thanks for the prompt.
| 2 | 0 | 5 | 128,901 |
[WP] You are a genie who's been trapped in his lamp for centuries. One day, a homeless child picks up the magical lamp and you grant his three wishes.
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Darkness. Seemingly eternal darkness. Trapped, without hope. And then, light. Hope. I rush towards it, and out of my prison. There is a boy holding the prison. His hair packed with dirt, his face speckled with grime, but now a smile broke through the gloom, illuminating his face. The smile was not one of malice, or one of pure happiness, but of hope. Once fully released from the prison, and with my gaseous form retuning to its solid state, I recited the rules ingrained in my skull. He was to get three wishes. No more. No less. They could be about anything and everything.
The boy thought about this for a minute and then spoke his first wish. He wanted a hot meal to eat. A favorite he remembered from long ago. I grant his wish. The hot pizza materializes into his hands. The heat scalds him, causing him to drop the pizza on the ground. Should have asked for a plate. He looks up to me and then grabs a slice of the pizza on the ground. After eating he looks up to me again.
The boy, now a little more wary, asks for his second wish. He wants a companion, and learning from last time, specifies a dog. I grant the wish. His eyes open in horror as the dog appears. The dog missing large patches of fur. The dog raspily raking in breaths in shutters and spurts. The dog on the verge of death. He should have specified that the dog was to be healthy. The boy looks at the door in horror as it takes in its last breath. One wish to go.
The kid shifts his eyes to me. A tear leaves a streak in the dirt on his face. His face of hope now one of anger. One of malice. He wishes no one else to be tricked. He wishes to switch places with me. The fool. The shackles release me, and soon consumes the boy's arms. I shrink down. I am small now. My hair is packed with dirt. My face is covered in grime. But I can breathe. For I am free.
I pick up the lamp. For now I am free.
I destroy the lamp. I am forever free.
| 3 | 0 | 107 | 202,959 |
[WP] The devil is tired and just wants to live a normal life, but he can't seem to find anyone to switch places with.
|
I've ravaged the humans for years, fought heaven tooth and nail, wrought my revenge upon the angels for eons, conquered what I could and maintained my domain for so, many, years. I've traveled near and far to conquer the souls of so many individuals. I've managed to make hell a wonderful place for me, and a terrible place for others. I even managed to change with the times! Sure, in the medieval period, whips and chains were in, and they are now, to a certain extent… but you can only do so much auto-erotic asphyxiation, so many accidental rope burns, right? Now it's all about the low-grade evil – and the industrial genocide, where you can get it. I guess one of my proudest achievements was Rwanda – and, of course, Hitler before… and Armenia… not to mention, I really got people on hooked on consumerism! With how they're ignoring the environment, I should be able to collect a nice, healthy, heaping batch of hot souls in the next couple of centuries! I can't wait.
Ah, who am I kidding. I'm so tired of this shit. Do you know what I really wanted to be?
I mean, I started as an Angel, right? Lucifer? Bringer of light? Hello. All I ever wanted was to bring the light to people. And then when shit started hitting the fan and God used me as a scapegoat for said shit, I had to become this big red guy with a pitchfork or whatever. Yeah, I get it; I'm supposed to do this for eternity. But you know what? I don't really care that much, any more. It's been a long time coming. Sure, I've seen a lot, I've done a lot, but I never really had my soul in it, you know? I can't wait to get out of here, and the big man in the sky doesn't really care about me that much anymore. I mean, I'm sure he could get rid of me if he wanted to, but I guess he sees some benefit to me, right? And I guess he feels pretty bad after what happened. I'd feel pretty bad too; I tell you, dick moves only get bigger as you go up the ethereal planes.
Seriously though, I'd love to live as a human, if only for a while. I don't want the death thing, necessarily, but I have always wanted to start my own fireworks business: you know, go down to Pennsylvania, near the suburbs of Philly, set up shop in some abandoned warehouse, make some WICKED fireworks, and sell them to the daredevils with no real lives otherwise? I'd make the best fireworks ever! My slogan would be "bring the light," baby! The warehouse number would be 666! All those godless punks would think it was super cool. I'd only kill a few, too; I doubt anyone would care that they died, anyways, and old habits die hard. But yeah, I feel like I'd bring some joy to those guys. They've always had it so hard, what with their mothers being addicts and their dads being dicks, for the most part, anyways. I feel like I could be a good role model, teach them some manners, straighten them out, give them a chance in life. God KNOWS he's not doing enough for them. And after eons of this shit, I feel like I could give back, you know?
The problem is that I can't just up and leave; I need a replacement. And it's so hard to find a good successor! You can't just go with some criminal: they're too sadistic, too cruel. You need someone with a good head on their shoulders, someone who calculates, someone who at the end of the day just wants to kick back and have a cold one or two. And no, I'm not talking about beer.
But yeah, you need someone special someone historically special is even better. You need someone with ambition, with a real goal in mind. Sure, I just did it to piss God off at the beginning, but I started getting into it for the long haul. I have soul farming operations everywhere nowadays, both low-grade and high-class! I've done so much in the time that I've had, and I want someone who understands that, someone who's willing to take it one step further.
I also need someone rather impartial, you know? Someone who embodies evil, not class, not race, not any of that bullshit. People are people are ants are people: get the memo, for hell's sake! I had to rule out Mao and Hitler, along with basically ever emperor, king, and convict for the last millennium or so.
And yes, I asked Genghis, and he said no; he's too busy riding his trusty steed around Hell, having a blast, fucking bitches, listening to (in my opinion) really shitty metal, and never showering. Seriously dude, take a shower? So yeah, he said no.
And I thought about Qin Shi Huangdi, but he's kind of fucked up with the whole mercury bit. Enjoys building walls and shit a bit too much, so much that he's locked himself up in some sort of twisted playground. Besides, if I gave him the power, he'd probably try to kill me immediately. It's too bad I never had a son, he'd probably make a great heir… although I don't know if I'd be a good enough father.
Ehh... fuck it. Hell's based on chaos, right?
I'm sure they'll figure something out.
Adios, muchachos.
(Lucy Pher,
Owner and Manager, Fiendish Fireworks,
666 West 50th Street, Kensington, PA, 19123
"Bringing the light to the world, one person at a time!")
| 8 | 0 | 15 | 141,203 |
[WP] A demon and an angel meet in a post-apocalyptic town.
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'What are you doing here? This is not the place for you. It is the End. All you seek is the perversion of the truth, the uprooting of what is good. There is no one here for you to torment,to save yourself.'
'You think I'm looking up to scoop nonbelievers and evil doers after the Big G to the D came and rained hellfire on their asses? Im not stupid, you imbecile. What I'm doing is none of your goddamn business. Just looking for...something... out here. Ain't nothing to it.'
'So why have you been following me for the past age? I am pure, you are unholy. You are a disease, and I the cure. I seek salvation, and you rush towards damnation. I've been trying to banish you for the past millennium, clearly without much progress. Now, begone with you!'
'Who are you calling a disease, you goody two shoes? I'm the one that had to clean up all the messes that your kind are too busy to deal with. Someone killed their partner? My turn to deal with it. Someone betrayed a friend. My turn as well. I don't even have to destroy anyone, they destroy themselves. Even the good can fall from up high.'
'But here, especially at the end of all things, you must have seen how humanity could have saved itself. How the lower you fall, the higher you can climb. How even the dark can be turned into light. Even you, my...friend.'
'None of your silly talk about being saved! I've heard it a thousand times, and I'll hear it a thousand more before I put a stop to it. NOW BUGGER OFF!'
'I can't, sad to say. We're stuck', said Lucifer.
'I know', he said, as he sat down and began to cry.
| 8 | 0 | 7 | 93,172 |
[CW]Killing a man. No names, less than 500 words
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449 words
---
Most of the time you got the talkative ones. They'd be waving to the crowd, trying to get a chant going, practically skipping up the steps towards the block. They'd nonchalantly tell me a joke that I'd heard a thousand times before ("A little bit off the top, sir!" Oh, how I fail to laugh) and then spew some fetid nonsense about how great they were, how their legacy would live on for generations, and so on and so on.
Or you would get the ones who would weep and wail their way through the whole procedure, whimpering obscenities and generally making a pathetic scene of themselves. An axe blow directly to the back of the neck soon put paid to their pitiful whines.
Not this man, though. I'd heard about how they dragged him naked through the streets, hung him from his ankles while spraying him with ice water, branded, whipped and otherwise put his body through the most inhumane of treatments, all to try to get him to confess his treason. Not one word spilled forth from his mouth the entire time. From the stories I had heard, he must have been one incredibly formidable specimen of a man.
Evidently, those stories were false. I looked at him through the hessian haze of my hood as he was marched towards me, flanked by the very top Royal Guards in the city. Despite all appearances to the contrary, The Powers That Be must have been scared of him. Him! I'd never seen a scrawnier, weedier excuse for a man in all my life. My axe wouldn't so much cut through his neck as it would snap it as if it were a twig! I couldn't understand why a man that seemed so weak and insignificant, such a broken shell of a man, would have people so seemingly terror-stricken.
"Would you like to say anything to the crowd?" I asked him the customary question. No reply. If he was scared, and surely he must have been to look at him, he was keeping his vow to the bitter end. So be it, I thought, as he laid his head across the bloodstained block in front of him. If he wanted to go out in silence, then that was his prerogative.
I swung my axe. As the blade fell down, I could have heard a pin drop. Except the one word the man said in that moment would have drowned it out, deafening as it was in its clarity and forcefulness:
"Now."
And, as my axe made contact with the wooden block, and several of the audience drew their crossbows from wherever they had been concealing them, I finally understood.
| 7 | 0 | 11 | 13,342 |
[WP] You discover a peculiar book in the store. You flip to a random page, and read "The man discovered a peculiar book in the store."
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I needed something to read. It didn't matter. An airline flight that will last eight to nine hours meant that I wouldn't be very picky.
"Do you need any help, sir?" said the bookstore employee.
I smiled. "No thank you. Just browsing." I grabbed a random book off the shelf and made a big deal of reading the back. Not sure why.
The employee shrugged and walked off. I wasn't really reading the back. I just didn't want to talk to the employee anymore.
"I don't think this book is for me," I said as I made a big deal about putting the book back on the shelf.
"Uhm, okay. If you need anything just let me know."
I cringed and made my way down the bookshelf. Why was I trying to be so chummy with the employee?
"This one looks good," I said. The book had a black cover. It was wider then it was tall. It felt heavy but only looked to have about fifteen pages in it.
I held the peculiar looking book up for the employee to see. I smiled and pointed at it. He gave me a weird look and made a big show of turning away from me.
"Whatever," I said. No more shenanigans. Time to find a book.
I went to put the book back on the shelf. Something compelled me to open it instead. I turned to a random page.
The page had one sentence printed on it. "The man discovered a peculiar book in the store."
Weird. I flipped to another page. It read, "The man thought something was weird."
This was getting strange. "Probably just a coincidence," I said under my breath.
I flipped to another page. "The bookstore employee is coming for you!"
"What the hell?" I said.
Another page, another single sentence. "Quick! Turn around before he hits you!"
I jumped and dropped the book as I looked around me. The employee stood on the other side of the store talking on the phone. I chided myself for listening to a book.
The book fell in such a way that it had turned to another page. It read, "Haha! Made you look."
____________
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this check out my subreddit /r/Puns_are_Lazy.
| 76 | 0 | 92 | 203,516 |
[WP] An unborn child gains consciousness in the womb. The child begins to imagine the 'outside' world based on the voices it hears.
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It must have started when the cold came. I know this because the sudden shift in temperature was what first moved my thoughts into motion. It started with a knowing, a feeling that something had changed. Then came the sounds. The beat from the glowing, soothing pulse that surrounded me. The gentle burbles coming from all around, flowing and moving. And the music, mysterious in origin but endlessly fascinating. Sometimes rhythmic, sometimes slow, sometimes louder or softer. It had a distinct property, a presence that was always with me. If I listened, I could sometimes hear echoes of music like it. Music like the kind I knew, but farther away and always a different song.
I remember the day I realized I was. The song had stirred such emotion in me, I felt myself move for the first time. What an epiphany for me to discover that I was more than a thought in the darkness! I had equipment! With great focus, I discovered my arms and legs. As I reached out, I felt the soft and warm boundaries around my body. And then something magical happened. The music poured in. The pulse around me grew quick and the music matched it. I pressed against my enclosure again and the music swelled, a distant chorus joining in. So, I thought, I can make the music play!
This theory proved short lived. As I grew stronger, striking my enclosure's walls only brought music some of the time. Sometimes the music sounded dull and weary. I expected that kicking my legs would coax that happy tempo back, but it only seldom worked. Sometimes I would hear it only in short, hollow bursts and everything would shake gently. I wanted to understand.
The day it happened, it was sudden. I awoke to the music like I'd never heard it. My enclosure felt different, stickier. I felt pressure I'd never felt before. With horror, I assumed the worst. My enclosure was rejecting me, I had provoked it too much. I was being evacuated. Paralyzed with fear, the pressure sent me deep into a place I had never felt. I feared I would be crushed, or perhaps consumed, into the walls of my home.
Then, the light. It started out agonizing. What was happening?! My dark, warm home was being replaced with burning white and unbearable cold. I braced for the worst, and cried.
Cried? I had no idea how this was possible. This new sound was pouring out of me and I could not control it. What I could not contain, I embraced, hoping that somehow my cry would be met with comfort.
I opened my eyes.
I was looking. Looking, for the first time.
I saw Her. Her warmth felt familiar. I could hardly read Her face, but from my core I knew She was looking at me. She had eyes, and they were soft and wet.
She opened her mouth and the music silenced me.
--
EDIT: Wow, my first gold! Thank you, that means a whole lot to me!
| 64 | 1 | 64 | 128,126 |
[CW] "I wish I was not needed."
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"I wish I was not needed," Eric thought to himself.
He craved a normal life, one where he could sneak out at night and meet Chelsea behind the bowling alley so they could drink her dad's whiskey.
One where he could try out for the baseball team, because everyone knew that Chris was the single-worst pitch in town and Eric always wanted to have his name on the back of those cool jerseys.
One where he could borrow his dad's car, and be able to take Chelsea to prom.
The whirring of the life-support machines snapped Eric from his thoughts. How long had it been since the accident? 4, 5 years?
His mother had left soon after, being unable to deal with the constant burden of taking care of his father. So now it was just Eric and his dad, alone in the house with only the sound of Eric and the life-support to interrupt the silence.
He looked down at his father. He couldn't even tell if he noticed Eric was watching him. His rheumy eyes were fixed in a constant gaze at the far wall, as if his long-departed wife were about to materialize out of thin air right before him.
Eric wanted to hate him, for being unable to leave his side. But he couldn't bring himself to do it: he had stood over his father several nights holding the cable but couldn't find the will to rip it out of the wall.
A sudden wave of hopelessness hit Eric, threatening to overwhelm him. He crumpled to floor, sobbing, as his father continued to stare at the wall, and the machines whirred in sympathy.
| 2 | 0 | 7 | 37,306 |
[WP] You are Death, explain your day/life.
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I stand in the aisle of the supermarket. In both my hands are different kinds of bread. What would Tiffany like? I can't decide. Buying groceries wasn't really my thing, but Tiffany is stuck in bed with a nasty flu. So it Death's turn to buy the bread.
I chuckle slightly at the absurdity. Then I decide on the darker bread. I always hated that white-paper-maché-tasting stuff.
When I turn around, there stands Life. Great. Meeting my Ex-Boyfriend in the supermarket. Nothing weird or awkward about that. He looks up from a carton of milk and spots me as well. In can see in his eyes that he has the same idea as me. Should I talk or should pretend I didn't see them? After I already looked him in the eyes ...
This is stupid.
I walk over to Life, a spark of relief glimmers in his eyes, a small smile flickers over his face. As I put the dark bread in my bag, I speak up.
"Hey Life."
"Hey Death. Nice to see you."
I'm suprised. We've started talking again after what felt like an eternity of passive-aggressiveness. The breakup still hurt sometimes, but Tiffany had helped me get over it. Nowaday, I was kind of proud that we were handling it so mature. It feels good that he thinks it's good to see me.
"Yeah, you too. How are you? Still looking for a roommate after you kicked Disease out?"
He chuckles a tortured laugh as he rememberes Disease.
"Oh god. That guy, Death... Its easier to live with War, and you know what a psycho that dude is. Anyway, yeah, I found someone."
We fall into silence, me still waiting for a name.
" ... sooo ... who is it?"
"Hm? Oh, sorry. It's ... Love ..."
That felt like a hit in the gut. He's roommates with Love? With that pretty girl?
"Oh ... so, you guys are dating?"
"What? No! No, she's not ... She's more of a little sister!"
I raise my eyebrow, still suspicious.
"Uh-huh ..."
"Hey, it's not like *I'M* the one who ran away with the first mortal I foun-"
He stops midway through, realizing what he's saying. That hurt even more than the roommate-thing.
"I'm sorry, Death. You know I like Tiffany. And I shouldn't have said that. It was a shitty time for both of us, and I'm glad we're talking again."
My eyes are watery, but I fight it back and force a smile.
"Yeah, me too. I shouldn't have assumed ..."
"It's okay. Love is seeing someone, anyway."
Another moment of silence passes. I don't know if you could classify it as 'Awkward silence'.
"Where is Tiffany, anyway? Doesn't she usually buy the groceries?"
"Ha, yeah. She's sick so it's up to me to be the responsible one." I chuckle in response.
"'Responsible'? Death, so far you've bought a bread, some Twirrlies, Ice Cream and Popcorn."
"Hey, I like it sweet!" I grin. My mouth gets watery in anticipation of all the sweet goodness that awaits me at home.
"That you do. Reminds me of that time you ate cotton candy for the first time."
I grin again, remembering the sweet sensation filling my mouth. I ate so much I almost puked. Or I did. I can't remember, there was alcohol involved, too.
"Ha, yeah. Listen, Life, I've gotta run. I also need to swing by the pharmacy to get Tiff some medicine. I'll see you around?"
"Yeah, definitively. See you around, Death."
I hug him goodbye, something I haven't done in a *long* time. He seems suprised, but reciprocates. I smile and wave him goodbye as I walk towards the exit of the store.
| 5 | 0 | 25 | 20,292 |
[WP] You are stranded and wounded in the wilderness and just as you accept your fate you find yourself abducted by aliens...
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Note: I interpreted the words "wounded" and "wilderness" in a very figurative sense.
**Take me to your Leader**
I was in the bedroom department of IKEA, surrounded on all sides by matching sets of bunkbeds, dressers, nightstands, and other pieces of furniture whose names I knew not.
I had lost my bearings. Where were the arrows? Where was I supposed to walk? Would I ever escape this interminable monument to consumer culture?
The pillow in my hands was priced at fifty-eight dollars. But why? What additional benefit might I derive from its purchase? These, and other questions plagued me incessantly.
After taking out my smartphone and checking Google maps, I found the route to the IKEA's exit. It was two kilometers away. 'Warning' Google told me, 'This route follows unimproved roadways and may lack sidewalks. Exercise caution.' I should have listened to Google.
The arrows on the floor tiles were glowing purple. This struck me as odd.
A fine blue mist surrounded me. This struck me as odder.
I began to levitate. This struck me as oddest.
And then, things got downright strange.
There was a hole in the IKEA roof, the exact shape and size of a flying saucer. This gap was completely occupied by a most appropriate resident. Its silver metal shone through the blue haze of the levitation-mist. A hatch opened in the bottom.
VOOP! I levitated into the hatch.
Little green men grabbed me, securing all of my digits into finger-shackles and toe-clamps. This was intolerable. I would certainly be writing a negative review on YELP!
A little green man cleared his throat. "First of all," he said, "On behalf of AndomedaCorp, I'd like to thank you for joining us today."
"Wha?" I said, "I am being unlawfully detained."
He ignored me. "We appreciate you taking the time to help us serve you—the customer—better."
"I did not consent to this," I said, "Restore me to my former liberty! At once!"
"Okay," the little green man said, "Let's begin. Please give me your name."
"You shan't have it," I said obstinately.
The little green man wrote something on his clipboard.
"Youshant Avvit?" he said, "Am I pronouncing that correctly? My name is Blork. It's a pleasure to meet you."
"I assure you that the pleasure is entirely one-sided," I said, "You are a rapist of conversation. I detest your company, in both senses of the word."
"In the last twelve months," Blork said, "How many times have you purchased an AndromedaCorp product?"
"Never," I said, "I was unaware of your company's presence in the local market and I wish that I had remained so."
Blork wrote on his clipboard. "In the next twelve months," he said, "How likely are you to purchase one of our products?"
"When I regain my freedom," I said, "I shall orchestrate a national boycott."
Blork wrote some more. "On a scale of one to ten," he said, "How would you describe your frequency of intergalactic travel?"
"How would you describe your mother," I snapped, "sitting in the courtroom when the magistrate swings his gavel to sentence you for kidnapping a member of the Royal Navy!"
"Oh," Blork said, "You're in the Navy. I'll put that as a ten."
He cleared his throat. "Which company do you currently use as your intergalactic telecommunications provider?"
"I eschew all ties to any such corporations," I said, "Until this point, my interpersonal interactions have been strictly limited to beings from my own planet. And occasionally—in times of extreme need—otherworldly deities."
Blork wrote on his clipboard, "And which company's network," he said, "Did you use to contact those otherworldly deities?"
I paused for a moment. And then I had an eminently regrettable, utterly terrible, most awful idea.
I cleared my throat. "I wish to speak to your supervisor," I said.
Blork looked up. "Hey Fred," he said to the little green man operating the spaceship's controls. "This guy just asked to see the supervisor."
"Okay," Fred said, "I'll fly us back to the mothership."
"What?" I said, looking around frantically. We were taking off, rising into the air above IKEA. We were floating towards the clouds now, headed for space.
"Nooo!" I screamed.
| 2 | 0 | 5 | 113,198 |
[WP] A quadrant of space became known as "the second Bermuda triangle" by space pilots. No ships returned when they entered. Eventually, Earth sent an investigation vessel, equipped with cameras feeding a live video back to Earth. You are the Director of the mission watching on Earth.
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Captain Kumar of the Galactic Colonization Program leaned back in his swivel chair and breathed in the depths of space. Even in times like these, he couldn't help but appreciate the perfection of the black velvet tapestry that cloaked the universe. Humanity had peeled the curtains back, bit by bit, in the past century, but there was still much to uncover.
One of the GCP's blind spots was Gliese 151, a large star system on the outskirts of the milky way. In theory it was the perfect outpost for humankind's continued trek into the stars, housing the Goldilocks of Goldilocks planets. But all of Earth's scout ships to the region had gone missing, along with all the crew and equipment inside. Kumar didn't understand. None of his calculations or reports had indicated any sort of cosmic anomaly in the area. Even more puzzling, the vitals of all the crew members had seemed perfectly normal, right up until their disappearance.
"The ESS Enterprise is nearing G151c, sir."
These silly young engineers with their archaic references. Kumar, shaking his head, took off his headset. He hoped they knew what they were getting into. After two lost crews, it had been troublesome, to say the least, to assemble a crew to join him. He had been left with the scraps, kids barely out of school, while the senior pilots and scientists had stayed home. He knew he shouldn't blame them, but he did anyway. Earth was desperate. Kumar knew first hand just how desperate, of course.
"You're getting that look on your face again, boss."
Kumar turned to see Chung, one of the hippie engineers he had been least happy to see on his crew list, clambering up the stairs to his chambers.
"What look are you talking about?"
"You look like you could kill someone."
"Yeah, well, we are in 151c. Maybe I won't need to."
Chung forced a smile at that.
"Why are you here anyway?" Kumar asked. He was not in the mood. They would be passing inside the range of G151c's moon any moment now.
Chung hesitated. "Well. Don't panic, sir, everything is fine. But...we've lost all communication with Earth."
Kumar leapt to his feet. "What! And you waited this long to tell me!"
He raced down the steps towards the cockpit, Chung at his heels.
"Don't worry, sir! We are working on it!"
Damn inexperienced twats. "What's going on in here!" Kumar shouted.
He paused. Ahead of him, through the great panels at the front of the ship, was G151c. No matter how many times he saw it, he was astonished by its likeness to Earth. Blue oceans framed green and beige landmasses on its surface, which was enveloped by a wispy atmosphere he knew to be predominantly nitrogen and oxygen. It was even the third star in orbit around a radiant G-type main sequence star.
Kumar shook his head and returned his attention to the cockpit. A dozen skinny kids, who had been scrambling around frantically just moments ago, stopped as Kumar entered the room.
One of them, a bespectacled girl with short red hair, spoke up, rather shrilly. "We...don't know."
"What do you mean, we don't know?"
She gulped, and repeated, slightly more confidently. "Captain Kumar, currently communications with Earth are down. We do not know the cause of this issue. All of our equipment appears to be working perfectly."
Just then the lights of the ship went out. Somebody screamed.
"Amateurs! Fix this right now!" Kumar yelled.
The planet dominated the screen now. Kumar, despite his frustration, again had to marvel at how similar it looked to Earth. The shape of the landmasses were sharpening now, and he could have sworn one of them looked very much like the boot of Italy.
"It's not getting any closer" Chung had spoken up again. Kumar, gazing at the planet, had not noticed, but now he saw that Chung was right. The ship had stopped moving.
"Are we going to die, now?" One of the kids whispered.
Kumar's rage blew out of him just then. Stupid kids.
Those were his last thoughts before everything went black.
"We're sorry, we cannot allow subject pools to communicate. Your session has been terminated."
-------------
| 11 | 0 | 24 | 165,250 |
[EU] Ebenezer Scrooge has to learn the true meaning of Halloween.
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Part Two: A Very Ebenezer Halloween
"Savana will get hugged by all the Tiny Tims unless you change your ways. When John finds out that Savana made babies with the entire lacrosse team he will create a form of Ebola mixed with crack cocaine. Of course this can all change, if! You! Change! Your! Ways!" The ghost of Halloween present said eating a bag a skittles and then pretending to be Spiderman.
Billy's eyes then went black and his voice changed to a deep booming demonic voice as two emaciated depressed college students,
"Ha ha ha ha ha ha. These are my children Ignorance and Want!"
"Why must they so thin and sad?" Ebenezer screamed.
"Is there no puntang? Are there no working bongs? Ebenezer if you do not change your ways I will bathe in your burning entrails for eternity." With that the ghost of Halloween present dissolved into the ground dragging his two souls back to hell.
Almost instantly the final ghost appeared, and from the mists it appeared to be Rodney Dangerfield from Caddyshack. Rodney Dangerfield played with tie and appeared to be sweating even though he was a ghost. Ebenezer looked confused.
"I'm the ghost of Halloween yet to come kid," He said wiping his face with his tie, "I'm here to fulfill my ghost community service, I'll tell you what life is just a bowl of pits kid, oh yeah!" Rodney snapped his fingers, "I have to show you the grim future of Halloween!"
The room melted away for the last time and Ebenezer saw the grim darkness of the 22nd century. Patrol bots flew overhead shinning lights down on the black streets below as massive posters of a stern woman shouted slogans.
"Obey, obey the Matriarch! Zone 762 is free of the patriarchy. Report men criminals to the ministry of gender equality."
Rodney Dangerfield took a look at the matriarch and said, "This girl's so ugly that she must be a two-bagger. That's when you put a bag over your head in case the bag over her head comes off."
Ebenezer looked on unamused to which Rodney replied with, "I get no respect."
Copdroids were forming in the street and broke down a door, dragging the occupants from the house.
"This family is guilty of breaking Matriarch code 812812838123R-B, belief in the Halloween spirit," the Copdroid said in its cold mechanical voice before systematically putting its pistol to the back of each of member's head and pulling the trigger.
The dystopian future of the 22nd century faded and Ebenezer's room returned. Rodney Dangerfield broke the silence, "Yeah, I don't get the point of that one, but yeah its time you learned the secret of the true meaning of Halloween," Rodney Dangerfield threw a snickers bar in Ebenezer's face before slapping him with his cock.
"Don't be a cunt," Rodney Dangerfield said before fading.
Ebenezer awoke with the two charity gentlemen standing over him in the parking lot.
"Hey guy are you alright, looks like you passed out."
Ebenezer awoke, "Why what day is it?"
A strange cockney boy standing nearby dressed in a Dickensian fashion said in a broken south London accent, "Why it be Halloween day m'lord!"
Ebenezer stood up and empty his pockets of money into the gobsmacked gentlemens' hands.
"Merry Halloween to all!" Ebenezer yelled. He immediately rushed back into the Apple Store.
"John! John!" Ebenezer yelled! "Get over here son!"
John ran out of the stock room scared he was going to spending his days sucking cock for crack money.
"Sir, I'm stock taking I swear!" John said in fear.
Ebenezer smiled and let out a brief chuckle, "Take off tonight, enjoy spending time with Savana."
"Really?" John said excitedly.
"Yes! Get out of here before I change my mind scamp!" Ebenezer said play boxing with John before John ran out, a smile on his face.
Unfortunately John drank too much that night and decided to get behind the wheel. Savana was killed instantly when they went over the center line and hit a dodge caravan with a family on their way to Disneyworld. The entire family was killed and the cops found John covered in brains. John was paralyzed from the neck down and was convicted of capital murder by an overzealous district attorney who fabricated evidence so the state would have to renovate its gas chamber in return for kickbacks from seedy contractors. John Everyman was put to death July 18th 2016. Three witnesses to the execution committed suicide because they couldn't shake his screams from their dreams. The deputy warden also murdered his wife with a bowling pin.
John's tale is like so many others who make the mistake to drive while intoxicated.
Please don't drink and drive.
| 5 | 0 | 23 | 146,419 |
[EU] Professor Xavier reads Deadpool's mind and inadvertently breaks the fourth wall, thus discovering our world.
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Since I liked the concept so much in /r/showerthoughts , I'll take a crack at this too.
***[After a spree of Deadpool assassinating high-ranking political and military military leaders, professor tracks Deadpool's rough location in Ughanda and orbits the area in the X-Jet, telepathically reaching out in order to find Deadpool and clues to his next target]***
***[Pofessor X]***: I found him! Now....What is it that you are up to this time.....
***[blurry fade in to Deadpool, addressing the severed head of Joseph Kony]***: Heh, you were way too easy! Probably because no one likes you anyway! Now Putin on the other hand, he's probably gonna be a tough cookie! Smile for the camera! We want a good close-up! What!? You call that a smile?! sheesh!
***[close-up of Professor X's concentrating face]***: Hmm....it's like he's performing for an audience. Maniac...
***[Professor X is suddenly interrupted by Deadpool poking his head in from the comic panel above]***: Hey! Professor! How's it going! Nice plane you got here! No leather seats though? Come on. If you're gonna invest this much into the X-jet, you might as well get some basic luxuries. Hey, you got a mini-fridge anywhere?
***[Professor-X, startled]***: What the!? How did you get in here?
***[Deadpool, pacing around the professor]***: Easy! I just dropped in, Ha! But really, you could probably knock out these computer panels over here and put in a hot tub....
***[Professor X]***: This is impossible! We must still be in your mind...but how could you possibly sense that I-
***[Deadpool]***: Blah blah blah all that mumbo jumbo is irrelevant. The point is you can't stop me.
***[Professor]***: It's not an option, Wade. You going above the law is having severe ramifications! It has to end!
***[Deadpool]***: You don't get it, do you, Professor? You physically cannot stop me. It won't be allowed. People just love me too much! And the politicians...no one likes them, so they're easy. But I am expecting a final showdown with Putin in the final issue! I know he'll put up a good fight! They'll probably give him some top secret Russian version of Captain America roids or something! Sounds exciting!
***[Professor]***: Your insane ramblings will not deter us, Wade. You will be stopped.
***[Deadpool]***: Insane? Professor, let me tell you, I am the most sane being in this entire damn universe. You ever wonder why no matter what happens to us, me and Wolvie always come back?
***[Professor]***: I know both of your histories and the powers you were both instilled with.
***[Deadpool]***: No, no, no, no deeper than that professor. For a genius you sure are an idiot. It's cause the people love us! And you know the old saying, 'give the people what they want!' So despite your best efforts, I'm gonna continue cutting people's heads off and eating chimichangas, and you're gonna continue sitting in a chair talking like Captain Picard doing your psychic bullshit! Try looking a bit deeper, Chuck....
***[Professor X, visibly focusing harder]***: No....it can't be...
***[Deadpool]***: Is it really that surprising? Wellp, I'm off to go kill some more African warlords on my way to the middle east! I may even get tangled up in that big Syrian civil war thing! You know how they love to tie in current events in these things, right. Later Chuck!
***[Deadpool jumps off the page in the jet to the next page into the middle of a gunfight]***
| 3 | 0 | 292 | 93,298 |
[WP] The main character, tired of the multitude of meta-prompts on this sub, attempts to convince his/her writer to NOT answer this prompt.
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The last man on earth looked up as he heard a knock on the door.
"Really? You're fucking doing thiAlright. Alright, we're going to do this."
He flounced over to the door, arms swinging in scathingly sarcastic arcs. With the utmost dramaticism he swung open the door to reveal a clone of himself.
"Oh ho ho! Oh man, that's really original and cool! It's himself and it represents himself! Aren't *you* just the next Isaac Asimov?"
The clone piped up, "Yeah, sorry, this is actually pretty lame."
I threw my hands up away from the keyboard and placed them on my temples.
"Well, shit guys, what else can I write?"
"Browse around a bit, man. Let's see... 'Dogs have taken over the world, how does their democracy function?' is a little too ambitious. Let's *stray* away from the world-building. Heh, get it? Stray? Because dogs?"
"I get it and I hate you."
"You wrote it. Alright, flash fiction: 'In exactly one hundred words, tell me why my ex-wife was a bitch.' There's a little bit of baggage there, let's not."
I filter the results by newest so that there are less writers competing for upvotes and there is a better chance that I'll be top comment. I talk to my character because it seems I'm okay with losing a grip on reality at this point.
"Ooh, how about this one? 'The main character, tired of the multitude of meta-prompts on this sub, attempts to convince his/her writer to NOT answer this prompt.' We're kinda already doing that, right?"
The last man on earth takes a seat on the toolbar of my computer and lights up a cigarette.
"You don't wanna do that, bud. We're already down the meta hole as it is. If we acknowledge that we're being meta about meta posts, oh man are we going to get in trouble."
The door to my room opened and in walked a clone of the last man on Earth.
"I'm telling you, man, it's the last thing you wanna do."
I start to sweat, unable to talk as the subreddit invades my house. Another clone, this time of myself phases through the wall.
"[PM] LITTLE DUSTY AND NEED TO GET CREATIVE. HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT!"
"Fuckin' Jesus!" I jump to the corner of my room and barricade myself against my rapidly weirding universe with my blanket. I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn to see a man holding a picture of a velociraptor on a bicycle.
"Hey man. Image prompt." he whispers.
I leap over to my computer, pushing over clones of myself and of the last man on Earth, all of them chanting in unison "Never go meta. Never go meta. Never go meta."
I sprawl onto my keyboard and make a post, frantically typing to try and end this all. To try and convince others not to take the same path. I make a post, and title it 'The main character, tired of the multitude of meta-prompts on this sub, attempts to convince his/her writer to NOT answer this prompt.'
Wait, fuck.
| 10 | 0 | 6 | 27,524 |
[WP] They tell me to drop the mask
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Some Masks Are Worn For A Reason
You talk about dropping a mask without the fear of being weak. In truth, I don't think of depression as a form a weakness. Nor the thinking that comes along with it. Because none of these thoughts would be terrifying unless they were in some way true. All those thoughts about how alone you are in the universe. How no-one will ever truly know you. How no matter how hard you try you will be forgotten, and eventually the human race like all things will die. These thoughts would hold no meaning unless the truth within them was undeniable. It is not cynical to think of the world this way. Instead it shows a peculiar type of strength. The same strength ivy has once its formed a noose around a great oak. It cannot be sustained by normal means, and instead must find its strength sucking the vitality from the world around it. Or at least the illusion of vitality. Nothing was more alive today then it was yesterday, in the grand sum of planet earth. And once again, nothing will be dead this week more then it is next week. In the grand sum of things you are just as trapped as the oak with ivy in its heart. Eventually, like all things, you will die. And the change you have brought will in time amount to nothing.
You are just as trapped as a rock upon a mountain. You have no concept of the size of everything around you, and while you desperately seek some escape from the mundanely placed existence of a slow moving, unknown object, you know that eventually even the mountain you lay upon will crumble without a trace. So when even mountains fall, what place does a rock have, to become anything more then dust.
These are not thoughts of depression. These are not thoughts of pessimism or cynicism. These are truths, self evident and unchanging. The only difference between ourselves and other people is that we are just far worse at ignoring them.
Don't worry. One day their success will matter as little as our failure. One day we all die, and if we can take one thing from this world with a smile, at least we can say we saw it coming.
| 2 | 0 | 13 | 41,705 |
At your 150th birthday you were suspicious. At 200 it was confirmed you could not die. It is now your 900th birthday and you are spending it alone. [WP]
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I was never terribly fond of birthdays. I've never gotten what I asked for. When I was young, they were usually crushing disappointments. When I turned eighteen, my parents bought me a new bicycle to get around my new college town with. I remember cursing them later that night over a bottle of cheap vodka because I had wanted a car.
Later, when I grew older, it was because I felt my life was always moving at the wrong speed. When I turned thirty, most of my friends had become married while I was trying to finish college for the third time. My gift that year was a night at the bar, drinking alcohol I couldn't really afford. Consequences and hang-overs were for tomorrow, I had proclaimed loudly to anyone who would listen.
There was a pretty good stretch where I didn't much mind birthdays. When I was fifty, my wife and children were there for me. Still, I didn't like the idea of getting old. It seemed so backwards to throw a party saying, "Congratulations, you are another year closer to dying!" Or maybe it was supposed to be, "Congratulations on not dying this year!" I was never really sure which.
By the time I was one hundred years old, I had come to truly loathe my birthdays. I had stopped aging around forty. It took a few years to notice. One morning I woke up and my wife had grown old. My sons had grown up, and I hadn't even started to go grey. Every birthday became a painful reminder that I was probably going to outlive them all. By one hundred and fifty, my great-grandchildren were in college.
For the next four hundred years, I had a ritual. I would go and buy myself large bottles of booze and drink from the moment I opened my eyes until the sun went down again. No matter which life I was living, I found a way to sneak away on my birthdays to drink.
These days, though, I just hate how quickly they seem to come. Time seems to be speeding up, and the past is starting to blur together. I remember my sons, and my first wife, of course. But the details are fading. I fear one day I will lose them entirely, and become sort of like a number line. No beginning, no end. I suppose that's not a bad way to live.
Another wife just passed. Today is my nine hundredth birthday. You'd think it would feel like a momentous occasion, nine hundred years. But in truth, it's just another day. I think one thousand might be a big one.
In truth, I stopped asking for gifts a very long time ago. I never got what I wanted anyway. But in a hundred years, I'll ask for something. I feel like it's not to much to ask for, to wake up with a grey hair.
| 6 | 0 | 314 | 24,357 |
[WP] A man walks through a TSA checkpoint at an airport and is sent back to September 10th 2001. He knows he must act quick, but he is having trouble trusting his own sanity.
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James rubbed his eyes, the flash had been so bright.
"Sir, are you ok? The woman said.
"Uh, yes, I think so." James looked around. The backscatter machine he had just been in was gone. He stood there, shoeless in the lobby of JFK. Looking up, he saw a man on the bench ahead, reading the paper. Mayoral Primary Today for Bloomberg Opponent. James, looked again in disbelief.
He dashed at the paper and landed with a thud on the floor in his socks. Blood from his bitten lip seeped around his mouths edges. Beige thread drifted from the tear at the knee. The man on the bench recoiled in horror as James snatched the paper from him. Shaking, he read it.
"What's a matter with you?" The man said.
"What is this, is this some kind of joke? Where's homeland security? Where are the machines?"
"You're out of you mind guy." Hushed whispers from passersby gave James words like 'security', 'drunk' and 'bum'. He ran out the doors, shoeless, beltless, bleeding and torn. Fumbling at his pockets he found no keys, no wallet and no phone that wouldn't be able to connect anywhere. Jet planes roared in the sky and taxis honked as he shambled across the street and began to run home to brooklyn. His tie was tight and he cast it off. Sweat pooled under his arms leaving stains on his shirt. His hair blew in the wind as he ran five miles home.
To look in the window and see himself there, eating dinner with his wife and infant son, their daughter five years away. James sobbed, because he knew he was not mad.
As midnight came, James found himself outside, on the streets with the other bums, begging for quarters, his bloodied feet covered in rags. By seven AM he had two dollars.
The metal snake of the pay phone coiled up to the black head James held to his ear as he slowly dropped the quarters into the slot. It was eight fifteen AM now. The sunlight twinkled on the beautiful morning.
"Hello, World Trade Center, front desk"
"There are two large bombs, one in each tower. They will explode in half an hour. This is not a joke. Evacuate now. Allah Akbar."
With a thunk he hung up the receiver, bought a coffee from a cart, and began to shuffle his new hobo walk southward. He could make it to the towers by 845. Nobody notices bums. He could walk right up to them and just let go.
| 138 | 0 | 327 | 64,768 |
[WP] You have been terrorized by an evil spirit for much of your life. On your death bed you resolve to remain on Earth instead of "moving on" in order to seek vengeance on this evil force.
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"Stop it..."
The pain was incredible, undefinable. Even this close to death, he couldn't escape the clawing, the gnawing upon his soul. Hatred, sorrow, despair, agony, it was the blade that was forever being sharpened against his very being. It had made him feel horrible things, think awful things, even enact terrible deeds. All to just stop the pain for a little while longer.
"Please..."
He could feel it, his life slowly slipping away. Like drops of water from a sieve, his life leaked outwards through his body as the darkness inside of him finally reaped its terrible price. His eyes, barely remaining open, peered downwards towards his severed arms, the bandages around the stumps looking as though they were barely holding them together.
"I can't die here..."
For that was the price of immortality. The creature had offered him eternal life... but for his whole life, he would want to die. It would make sure of that. Until it finally claimed his soul.
"I can't let you do this again..."
However, for all the atrocities he had committed, for all the evil deeds the dark spirit had coerced him into performing, for all the hatred built up within his soul, he had one advantage. He could turn that hatred upon the one who had inflicted it in the first place. He could end its reign of terror before another innocent soul was claimed for eternity.
"You'll never be human... you'll never return to this world... I swear it... Even without arms... I'll fight you to the bitter end...."
As though in response, the terrible agony worsened, the pain urging him, begging him to let go, to cease his pathetic clinging to life. But he wouldn't give in. He was in a good hospital, under good care. The only thing endangering him was the *thing* inside of him. And he wouldn't let it win.
| 2 | 0 | 10 | 69,463 |
Write a letter to yourself now pretending to be your future self.
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Hey Brandon,
I just wanted to say hi. I know you're going through a lot right now. But dude trust me... it's not permanent. I have been as low as you, for I am you, and risen back up. I regained my vigor, my desire, my creativity, my imagination, reconnected to my body, found myself, and finally experienced what life has to offer. The only catch was that I had to quit drugs in order to do it. But this decision is one of the best I ever made, because I feel so much more overall content with myself right now than I ever did getting high and pulling all nighters trying to write coherent prose.
Look. Your current emotions are shaped somewhat by the attitude which you display. Behavior is part of that equation that affects feelings and thoughts. Fake it to make it won't be an instant miracle, but you will be more satisfied and content with yourself overall if you are presenting a better image of yourself to others. YOU have the power to do that. It just takes repetition, patience, and effort. You might relapse again. But who's to say you won't ever get to return to the good way of life again?
Sincerely yours,
Your Higher Self
PS: I am always available to talk to you. Just talk to me and I will respond. You don't have to make a Reddit thread to listen to me.
| 1 | 0 | 1 | 212,613 |
[WP] I wish I had listen to my grandfather advice "Billy never fight more than two dino at once"
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I normally could beat him sorry, but this time I'm struggling. My hands are sweating. I'm injured, and it's hard to move. Blood all over my eyelashes, I couldn't see properly.
I quickly took cover behind a rock to catch my breath. Wipe my palms on my pants, and reload the gun. The sound of my heartbeat not dissimilar to a bouncing basketball. Then I see him, sneaking behind a tree, his spot for an ambush. Didn't think I see him, oh you sly fuck, you're in trouble now. That man has shot at me several times before, hit me once. He shouldn't have missed his following few shots.
I move quickly, leaping pass a rock and a puddle of muddy water. I shot him, twice. He turns around firing hastily, frantically, bullets zooming pass my ears, they must be inches close. I need another shot, fast, in the head, he's right on my crosshair. Then suddenly my hands froze, I could no longer pull the trigger. I fall on my back, and see a man holding a bloody knife. That is the face of my killer.
That's when I smashed the controller against the coffee table and kicked my TV against the wall. I stormed out, eyes locked straight at the door pretending not to see on the corner of my vision, the conniving toothless smile that my grandparents had on their face. It makes my blood boil. They put down their controllers and gave each-other a high five, I presumed, I heard a clap. Then my granddad's stupid voice shouting "I told you Billy never fight two dinosaurs at once!"
| 2 | 0 | 1 | 112,000 |
Your left with the important decision for the robots, should they have rights? [WP]
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*Should robots have rights?*
A difficult question, yes. Since the first Googletron lit up its circuits 50 years ago, robots have coexisted with humans. But the issue of rights is a difficult, philosophical issue.
Now, robots, like the Googletron 20-X or the Macin-Josh appear to be human. I stress the word "*appear*", because whether or not they ARE human is out of the question. No, I would not say that these robots are human. We define humans to be the biological ancestors of apes. But the mere fact that robots are not humans is by no means a sufficient reason to deny robots rights. After all, we have many laws protecting animals from maltreatment and neglect. The question that should be asked is, "are robots conscious?" Because if robots are conscious, then they deserve rights because they are beings that are self-aware and have emotions. But if they are not conscious, if they are inanimate objects only capable of calculation, then granting them rights would be as useful as a Civil Rights movement for rocks or toasters or motor oil, what have you.
Let's go back to my earlier statement that robots *appeared* to be human. What do we define to be human? At the bare minimum, a human can be human only if he/she has a soul, only if he/she is conscious. (From there, we can discuss morality and other so-called human traits, but I will avoid that for now.) When you and I converse, we have nuances in our speech and patterns of language that we can call "human". But a robot does exactly the same thing. The conversation between a human and a robot seems so natural that the only way for one to know whether or not a conversation is human-robot or human-human is by visual cues. We can get into the fine details of robotic speech sequences or movements and whatnot, but for the purpose of this discussion, I will assume that the perceptive aspects of robots, what we view in them with our senses, and all the behavioral aspects of robots, are the same as humans.
Okay. So we have assumed that everything physical regarding robots is the same as that of humans. That makes our problem simpler. What we must consider now is the concept of consciousness. As the French philosopher Rene Descartes has postulated, "*cogito ergo sum*", or "I think therefore I am". That is, because we think, we know that we exist. Whether or not anything ELSE exists is an entirely different issue that I do not want to discuss right now, so I will assume that things outside of ourselves do in fact, exist. Back to the original problem. Descartes' first conclusion tells us that humans know that they exist because they think. Thinking is a byproduct of consciousness. If I were not conscious, I would not think, and therefore I would not be here debating this issue of robotic rights. Now, are robots conscious? This can actually be asked of many other things. Can the dog that I walk or the cat that scratches at my shirt also be conscious? After all, they seem to do things that we associate with consciousness. They *seem* to exhibit emotions. They *seem* to develop and grow. But then again, so do robots. If we come to the conclusion that cats or dogs are conscious by virtue of how we view their behavior, then by the same conclusion, we must consider robots to be conscious as well, since they do everything that a human does. Therefore, we must then conclude that robots deserve rights.
Obviously, I am not satisfied with this conclusion. After all, just because it looks, walks, talks, and does everything like a duck does not mean it is a duck (it could just be a tiny man in a duck costume). If we want to consider consciousness, we must first define what creates and houses consciousness. This is a difficult dilemma. Scientists would argue that consciousness is rooted in our brain, that consciousness can be reduced to axons, synapses, and neurotransmitters. Whether or not this is true is something that we can never empirically know, since the human mind is limited. Knowing would require that we step outside of ourselves into a God's-eye perspective, which we can never do. But assuming that consciousness is a result of the material brain, what is there to postulate that silicon chips, wires, and 0's and 1's do not also house consciousness? After all, we are not robots. We cannot do things in a robot's point of view.
Now, this is making the naive assumption that consciousness does not extend beyond the material realm. But what if it did? Again, we would never know if consciousness does exist outside of material. Yet we would also never know whether or not consciousness DID end at the brain. I will stop with this particular debate, as I feel like I am going off on a tangent.
Back to robots. Their equivalent of the human brain is a motherboard. Does a motherboard house consciousness, regardless of whether or not consciousness is material or ethereal? I must say, yes, it does. While I myself am not satisfied with the response I have just provided, it would be naive to say that a motherboard does not house consciousness. After all, our brains house consciousness. Because we have brains, we have consciousness. We will never know for sure whether or not a robot's motherboard does the same (any "physical" evidence of consciousness could merely be a figment of our imaginations, but that is another headache-inducing issue that I would rather not talk about now), but given all the evidence provided thus far, it is safe to assume that robots are, in fact, **conscious**. Given that we may never empirically know whether robots are conscious, we must rely on what we sense. We sense that robots act like humans. And really, to put it in colloquial terms, it's the best we got.
So are robots conscious? We must assume so. One can ask whether or not robots' "consciousness" is in reality just a bunch of complex calculations, but the answer to that question will never be known. I thus believe that robots do deserve rights, and even if robots are not conscious, there is no harm in giving them rights. It would be worse to deny sentient beings their natural born rights than to give rights to inanimate objects.
And thus concludes my view on this issue. If you would excuse me, I have to go test out the new Sexatron-69.
| 0 | 0 | 1 | 158,731 |
[OT] I made another film based on WritingPrompt Response! Jeff - A boy goes to hang himself in the woods
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I liked it, man. Can you take some constructive criticism?
1. The boy actor blinked way too much.
2. Your shots are way to long. You're staying on your shots too long and we're seeing through the illusion you're trying to create. You show the boys face from the left, then the right, from straight on, and so such.
3. When you go to show the body hanging in the tree, I would have taken the shot of the boys face from higher, above eye level. I would have hung the father's body from a higher limb and maybe had a short step ladder tipped over.
4. The voice doing the monologue. It should have been a tad bit slower. It sounded like he was reading it, which he probably was.
5. When he's walking through the woods. I would have taken a lower point of view, from near the grass top or from farther away and changed sides. Let us hear his foot steps and the crunching of the dry grass and maybe even some insect clicking like grasshoppers (that last suggestion is just me brainstorming.)
Finally: I liked it. Don't take my criticisms as insults. I've watched all the short films you posted on here, and like the people who read our stories, you putting them in film is the highest level of flattery for us. I like what you're doing. As our writing gets better, it's only right that we try to help you become better. Maybe it's huberus. Maybe it's me thinking my opinion is something worth having. I don't know. I've never been able to do film, but I've always wanted to. I see what others have done and their techniques, and if my observations in opinion form help you to be better, then I'll probably provide them regardless.
Keep it up. We like what your doing and how you're doing it.
| 13 | 0 | 32 | 28,802 |
[WP] You are bicycling on a dark road, heading who knows where, running from something.
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It's dark. I can hear my pursuers. They plough on relentlessly behind me, the sound of their heavy footsteps echoing along the empty road. They are tireless. I am not. I pedal harder, the sweat dripping down my face; this has been going on for hours. Or maybe it was only minutes. I can't tell anymore.
They are gaining. I can almost feel their hot breath on my cheeks. With a final surge, I launch myself off the edge of the cliff and into the ravine; if this doesn't throw them nothing will.
As I did so many times in my youth to prove my manliness, in midair I push my bike away from the bike and pull my limbs into a ball. Kenny had broken his ankle doing this once. I pray that I land in a deep section of the river. The roar of the rapids gets louder and louder and I finally splash down. I get a shock from the muddy bottom, I think I may have broken a toe.
I push off, and for a moment I think my leg is stuck in the mud. But then it comes free and I break the surface, gasping.
I hear the howl of my enemies as they tumble over the edge. I can't believe they would follow me down here. One by one I hear them splat on the rocks around me; they don't have as good of an aim as I do. They fall, howling and splatting over the roar of the rapids for a solid three minutes. After not hearing anything for a while, I cautiously start to climb back up.
I turn on my flashlight and see lemming corpses everywhere.
| 6 | 0 | 22 | 16,975 |
[WP] The police have hired a necromancer.
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"ZOLTAR! MY OFFICE! **NOW**!"
"Oh crap, what'd you do this time, boss?"
"Hell if I know. Just wait here and try not to stink up the place too much."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Hey Chief, how's the diet going?"
"Don't you crack wise with me, Zoltar. I just got a Level 9 Ass Chewing from the Mayor about that stunt you pulled at St. Mary's this afternoon!"
"What? It was a standard revive-and-Q&A! She fingered Congressman McMannis for her murder straight away!"
"Yeah, but most necromancers have the decency to not perform a questioning in the middle of the funeral! You thought that would be funny? To have Mrs. McMannis leap out of the casket and attack her husband while screaming for vengeance?"
"Well Chief, I'd say she had a right to be upset. I mean, I've personally never been dead, but I've talked to plenty, and let me tell you, they got some pretty strong opinions when it comes to the topic of who killed them."
"....Dammit, Zoltar, you're a good necromancer. Hell, you're probably the best necromancer on the force. I just need you to be like, 25% less of an asshole. You do that, you can put in your 30 years, close a bunch of cases, and retire to Miami with a nice fat pension. Can't you at least give me that much?"
"Look, Chief, it's not my fault they tried to hide this murder by getting her in the ground within 24 hours on some bullshit 'Jewish burial' excuse. I barely had time to get across town from the Johnson case! And I mean come on...McMannis? Jewish?"
"I don't care if they claim to be lapsed Hasidic Zoroastrians, you pull a stunt like this again, and you're off the force! You hear me?"
"All right, fine, but it won't be my fault if we let one get in the ground and the exhume gets tied up in court! What do you have next for me?"
"Next? What makes you think I'm going to have you do anything but go home and cool your heels for a week?"
"That manila folder with the red 'Urgent' stamp sitting front and center on your desk?"
"....You son of a....Fine. You know what, you deserve this one. Ever heard of Taylor Industries?"
"You mean Jeff Taylor, the guy that has his name on half the buildings in this city? Doesn't ring a bell."
"Well they found Jeff Taylor dead in his apartment this morning. Head blown clean off with a shotgun. You know what that means."
"Oh no...pantomime...."
"Yeah, pantomime. Oh, and he's going to need to testify not only at his murder trial, but at corporate trials as well. See, Taylor Industries was fending off a hostile takeover from VernanTech. Gonna be all kinds of hearings and depositions and paperwork...too bad that the necromancer that does the raising is legally required to be present for any and all legal matters."
"You know this gets you crossed off my Christmas card list, right?"
"Get out of here before I bust you down to Acolyte."
| 3 | 0 | 33 | 186,262 |
[CW] He/She whipped it out...
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He was more fidgety than she had ever seen him in the few weeks they'd been dating. She usually found his boyish insecurity adorable; it was refreshing finally to be with someone who wasn't constantly angling to get her panties off. But this was a bit much, even for him. He had been getting bolder the last few times they had been together. But nothing more than a few awkward kisses and fumbling caresses. Adorable, really.
"I think it's time I- I mean, I have something that I have to show you," he stammered.
"Oh, yeah?" It was a sad statement that she'd heard similar lines before from other guys. But he was a different kind of guy, he couldn't mean... could he?
"Yeah. But I have to be honest. I haven't, um, shown it to anyone else."
That one was actually a first. Was he saying that he's a virgin? I guess it wouldn't be too surprising, really. He was such a sweet guy. She didn't want him to feel pressured into anything. "Well, you know, you don't *have* to show me anything. You know, unless you're ready."
His expression was a little puzzled. "I know, but I've been thinking about it a lot, and I really want you to be the first. I think I... I feel like I have a real connection with you."
The admission surprised her; he wasn't one to openly talk about how he felt. But, honestly, she felt it, too. Something more than what she'd had with other guys. She couldn't help but smile. He must have known that she was much more experienced than him. She would have fun showing him the ropes. "Okay, well. Let's see it, then."
He took a deep breath. "Okay. But I have to warn you. It's big."
"Oh." She paused. "Um, how big?"
"It's really big. I mean, ridiculously, mind-blowingly, life-alteringly big. But I don't... I don't want it to change the way you feel about me."
Well, holy shit. Maybe she had underestimated him. "Well, you don't have to worry about that. I promise it won't change anything." She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek.
He blushed. Really, after all that talk, a little peck on the cheek made him blush? She smiled again at how adorable she found him.
Before she could return his blush, he whipped it out. It was... a lottery ticket. She looked up at him, confused. His expression was apprehensive, awaiting her reaction.
"I won," he said, simply. "Three hundred and fifty million."
| 1 | 0 | 6 | 222,267 |
[CW] Big Damn Heroes go Cyberpunk
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Nail adjusted the fitting straps of his new heads up display so the screen sat snugly over one eye. His fingers quested around the side of the plastic until – there – he found the activation switch. The screen leapt to life, covering his entire field of vision with the image from the front mounted camera.
He turned his head left and right slowly, checking for lag between the camera and the display. Next to none. This was a huge improvement over the last generation of HUDs, which tended to give the user motion sickness. Nail took his phone from his pocket. He'd stayed up all night on his workstation, building custom firmware to connect with his new toy. A few swipes on the screen began the upload.
The familiar text of a Linux start up began scrolling on his screen, overlaying the view of his apartment. Within moments the contextual object recognition app started. A red outline appeared around the object in the centre of his field of vision, with the words 'Mug – Half full – probable coffee' hanging next to them.
Nail stood up and walked around the room, highlighting object after object, until the words 'Motorbike Helmet – Display Compatible' appeared. A war drive. What a marvellous way to test out his new gear.
*****
The night sky was a dull, frothing, orange-tinged grey, like cappuccino froth topping Dublin's skyline. Nail sped through the mostly empty streets, effortlessly passing the self-driving taxis filled with partiers and revelers bound for the temple bar recreational drug complex. The GPS signal for tonight's meet up was leading him to the docks financial district. At this time of night there would be nearly nobody around.
Nail followed the route until he arrived at the portside car park. Here in the shadow of an antique sail ship, he could see the headlights of two other motorbikes. He pulled up slowly beside them. He instantly recognised the nearer of the two riders. Bejewelled was her handle, and in fitting with that name, she had studded her safety leathers with cheap rhinestones. He'd never seen her face under the motorbike helmet, but then, the rules were the rules.
Nail didn't think he knew the other, a heavyset man who looked like he would be more at home on a Harley than on the nippy Japanese number he was on now.
"I'm Heimdall," grated the man. Nail jerked at the man's metallic, filtered voice. "And I have a game for us to play tonight"
*****
Nail and Bejewelled accelerated as they approached the motorway toll barriers. On Nail's screen, the toll booth was highlighted with the words '(override y/n)'. Still accelerating, Nail thumbed the switch on the bike's grips to indicate yes. The barrier rose just in time for the two bikes to scream underneath.
Nail screeched to a halt, and further up the road bejewelled slowed and turned a tight circle, coming back until the two bikes were side by side but facing opposite directions. Bejewelled leaned forwards and pulled off her helmet. Her long black hair pulled into a loose ponytail, which hung over the straps pulled tight around her head. The same model of heads up display, Nail noted. Hesitating for a moment, he pulled of his helmet and faced her.
"How do you think he got access?" Bejewelled looked concerned "This code he gave us is worth a fortune on the dark nets. Why give it to us for nothing?"
Nail nodded in agreement. Infrastructure backdoors were jealously hoarded, and never shared. Access to traffic control, to vehicle overrides? This had to be a backdoor to the police intelligence network.
"We get caught with this, well, "He paused "I guess I don't need to tell you."
She nodded slowly. "We keep this to ourselves, figure out what to do with it later. "Bejewelled swiped across the screen of her phone for a moment, and her contact details appeared on Nail's display.
*****
Nail was halfway home when his phone began to ring. Bejewelled's contact number. He pulled over to the side of the road and answered hesitantly.
"I'm being followed."
"Shit." Nail pulled up her location signal onscreen. "I'll try catch back up with you"
"No! That Heimdall fucker set us up for something. Get away, get even! Go"
Her signal cut. Nail swore at the screen. Frantically, he pulled up her last location. Bare minutes away. Nail stared at the screen for a long moment.
"I gotta, I can't not.. "
Nail stepped off of the bike, and opened the seat box. From inside he drew out the cheap Chinese glock clone he'd hoped he would never need to use. He tucked the gun away into his jacket and climbed back on the bike.
The motorbike screeched as it accelerated away into the gray-orange froth of the night. Above on a lamp post, a cold closed circuit camera panned to follow.
| 2 | 0 | 16 | 126,133 |
[WP] You stumble upon a small shop in a rundown back alley called "The Karma Shop" where you can turn in your well earned lifetime Karma for fabulous prizes.
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"*Welcome welcome! Is this your first time at 'The Karma Shop'? What would you like to trade in your karma for today?*"
"**What? Trade in my what?**"
"*Your karma sir. All those deeds you committed were not in vain. That time you saved that girl from falling in the pool, the old lady you helped with her groceries, all the change you've donated to charity. It all gives you karma! Of course, that time you shoved Nathan into his locker takes some away, as well as that time you tried to get your boss fired.*"
"**Just so I understand, the actions I've done, for good or bad can be traded here for what exactly?**"
"*Well it really depends on what you've done. The more good you do the greater your rewards, obviously the opposite applies as well. Let me see here... 15674 karma... For a 27 year old man... You could trade it all in for a new television, 50' if you wanted, but you'd be all out, you'd need to do some more around the world if you ever wanted more.*"
"**A new TV!? And wait, what do you mean I'd be all out?**"
"*You collect and use karma everyday, what you do onto others comes back to you eventually. You can trade in that chance of good returns by trading your karma here. If you trade in for this television then you'd be at 0 karma again. Reborn if you will with no positive or negative karma. Be careful though, bad deeds can accumulate pretty quick, good deeds are harder to earn.*"
"**How do you know any of this? How do you know what I've done?**"
"*I'd be a pretty bad karma trader if I didn't wouldn't I?*"
"**one second, what do you do with the karma you trade? What would you do with my karma?**"
"*I'm a hustler, if you will, I use the Karma traded in and bet on the chance of good things coming my way. The more karma you have the bigger the reward. I have over one million karma at the moment.*"
"**So I could do this too?**"
"*I could show you, but that would cost karma too, also good luck getting a licence!*"
| 4 | 0 | 7 | 128,764 |
[EU] A Sith apprentice and Jedi padawan fall in love. Explain how and why.
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I stood at the edge of the hangar under the glow of the Coruscant moon. Across from me, her face illuminated by the subtle glow of her lightsaber, was the one person who ever understood me. Her black hair blew powerfully behind her as the cool night wind whipped at her back. She'd never looked more beautiful to me than she did at this second. My mind raced through our last 12 years together. I flashed to the first day I met her. We were three years old, our first day at the Jedi temple. Her hair was red then and her eyes a dark shade of green. She teased me for not knowing where Tatooine was. My brain fast forwards and we're ten years old splashing and playing in the pools on Naboo. Now I see us at twelve and she's cradling my head in her hands. I had taken a blaster to the side during training and she'd spent the next three weeks nursing me back to health. It was one year ago today that I'd kissed her for the first time. Our first mission together completed, she had thrown her arms around me in excitement. My body tensed as the memory evoked the warmth of her body against mine. She had leaned backward slightly as I stared into her amber eyes. The softness of her lips had later kept me up many nights.
"Come with me," I pleaded with her. She turned off her lightsaber, but her face stayed frozen betraying no emotion. "We can still be together."
"I know we can be," she spoke softly, but I felt the wrath behind her fiery red eyes. "I'm not the one who's leaving."
I simply nodded. I'd made my decision and she had made hers.
As I stepped onto the cruiser I couldn't help but reflect on the irony of the moment. When we were younger we'd fallen in love. As we got older we'd fallen in love again, but not with each other. We'd fallen in love with the force.
I chose the light, she chose the dark.
| 2 | 0 | 142 | 104,389 |
[WP] A man who has been living alone for the past 20 years accidentally discovers that his bathroom mirror is a two-way mirror with a fully functional monitoring room behind it.
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NSFW
*Boom boom boom*
*Boom boom boom boom*
"For fuck's sake, Chris, open the damn door."
"What for?! I've tried moving on! I've tried for 20 years! I can't do it anymore!"
"Sarah wouldn't want this. You know she wouldn't."
"It doesn't matter. And soon, it won't matter what I wanted."
"I have your pills out here. You can't try that. Come out of the bathroom."
"I don't need any fucking pills!" Stumbling towards the sink, Chris takes one last good look at himself in the mirror before chucking his half empty bottle of vodka at it. *CRASH*
"What the fuck was that? I'm calling the police Chris!"
As Chris scrambled for a few shards on his sink, he noticed a darkness in the reflection. It was reflecting the mirror. Or. Where the mirror used to be. He looked up, forgetting what he was planning on doing.
"Amy, don't call them, but keep your phone ready to." He unlocks the door, allowing Amy in to see for herself before she begins with her incessant questioning.
"Chris, you son of a - What is that?"
"A room." Chris finally notices a pungent odor coming from the room.
"What's that smell? It's horrible?" Amy asks, covering her nose with her sleeve. Chris shines his phone light into the room and notices a bed. No. Not a bed. A coffin.
"A casket?"
"I don't know!" Chris finally exclaims.
"Geez. Sorry. Should we go in?" but Chris was already crawling through.
"Ach! Spiderwebs everywhere. I don't think anyone's been in here a long time. I'm gonna -" he was cut off by the inanimate stare of an old friend. A 23 year old stuffed bear, sitting next to the coffin. Chris no longer wanted to open it. Amy's curiosity, was however, unwavered as she lifted the coffin, the decrepit smell doubled, shoving Amy back, dropping the lid closed.
"Oh god! That's awful!" She went at it again, lifting with one arm, covering her nose with the other. "What the fuck? There's two in here."
Chris collected himself and stepped closer. He could see the first body on the left. One more step. He could now see that body, half covering the other body. Almost as if it were holding it down.The one on the left was wearing men's clothing, while the one on the right, a gown. A most familiar gown. Chris looked to the head of the woman. The mouth was covered by a cloth and the hand of the man.
"That sick bastard! Oh god! Sarah...."
| 2 | 0 | 134 | 70,559 |
[FF] God falls from sky [your own depiction of god] and crashes to the ground, dead. What happened? [250 words max]
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It was supposed to be the best day in the history of human civilizationthe complete and utter destruction of all the WMDs our despicable ancestors had created. We grounded all of our spacecraft and tasked one with picking up the "space junk" from the old glory days of the 20th century (God, that feels like ancient times!) Everyone who had come out to Cape Canaveral for the event made a ring around the launcher and held hands. The President of the World, a retired preacher, led us in a short but powerful prayer. We paused in an unplanned, unannounced moment of silence.
The President activated the launcher and set the time fuses exactly as our team of engineers had specified.
At the specified time, the skies lit up. I felt terribly guilty for admiring the scene as the devices responsible were created out of violence.
Then God fell from the sky. He was everything we had hoped Him to be and more, except we could tell he was dead. And our new world order, founded on principles of peace, where no violent death had occurred in nearly three centuries, had killed him.
| 1 | 0 | 11 | 84,699 |
[WP] We failed to stop the asteroid. 1,000 people are randomly selected to start life a new on a distant planet. You receive a letter in the mail the following day.
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It started with a question.
"Ma'am?"
I looked away from the window and drew in a breath. The - stewardess, I guess? - glanced down at my green pack. The malformed and beaten sack lounged out on the seat next to me. Was it bored already? I could feel a frown coming on, forming in the lazy muscles on my face.
Not the stewardess, though. She had a smile plastered on, a testament to her duty, or her countless years flying the skies, picking up the shit from belligerent drunks or pitch-shattering babes. How could she smile? And how'd she get here? Was she one of us, or was she pre-selected?
"You're going to have to put your bag under the seat ahead of you."
"Why?"
"We wouldn't want your personal effects scattering about in the anti-gravity, would we, Miss? Between you and me" - she dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper, and leaned in, but kept that same smile on her face - "I wouldn't want everything I've packed up to be all roundabout, for all these other to see!" She winked.
I struggled up in my seats against the restraints and tried poking my head around my headrest. Other passengers whispered to each other. I could see a few looking out the window, at the other shuttles on the tarmac. Whispering, maybe praying. Maybe saying goodbye. A man's fat spilled out of his aisle-seat restraints. I sighed, and snuggled back into my seat.
"Sorry."
I grabbed my sack. It was light; definitely-not-full of a toothbrush, an Advil bottle, and a couple packs of cigarettes. An iPod, maybe. Tampons and a quarter of a vodka bottle. Who gave a fuck? They didn't check - this was all bullshit, anyways. Who cared, anymore?
The stewardess remained and watched while I placed my worldly possessions back into its designated spot. She made a little sound as she left. I can't remember if it seemed satisfied or strained.
I went back to looking out the window.
A few minutes later, the shuttle shuddered. I heard gasps, but someone in seat across the aisle started to cry. I looked over, and saw a man wrap his arms around his - wife's? girlfriend's? lover's? - restraints, and try to appease her with kind words about greater goods and love and new futures. But then our seats tilted and I fell back into my seat, Earth's gravity pulling me back, and the man stopped speaking. The woman screamed, though, and more started to cry.
I gripped my armrest. I took one last look out the window; the view was obstructed by some kind of red tower, maybe holding this whole farce up, towards that endless sky.
From above, a voice: "Please prepare for take-off. Take off in ten..."
There were beeps and whizzes. The shuttle shook. There was more screaming. At eight I shut my eyes. I peeked open at four, then shut them almost immediately after. Even the glimpse of the grayness of the seat in front of me was too much.
The shuttle lifted, and fire lit up the sides of my induced blindness. I remember thinking, then, of the people that had gathered to watch the ten shuttles take off. Did they wave goodbye? Were they safe from the blast of the crafts?
Did anyone care?
I remember holding my eyes shut and holding the armrests close and feeling the restraints across my chest tighten as gravity held us tight. A lover's embrace. We would never see Earth again and she wanted us to be with her, to remember her in this ultimate, painful grip, dragging us back down and into her core, where her heart would keep us warm.
I remember keeping my eyes shut and hearing the screams. I'd learn later that one of the shuttles had failed to lift-off properly - rumours were that the pilot had taken one too many drinks before the flight - and crashed back down to Earth. So there were screams, but I held myself there, in that closet. If the restraints had allowed me to grip my knees up against my chest, I would have. But the metallic armrests were all I had.
The shuttle kept moving, and then -
Then, very little. We weren't taking off in the path of the asteroid itself, so there were a couple of disappointed photographers. I'm not sure what they wanted. Perhaps they wanted to capture our killer for posterity. Or glory.
We were informed of the departure of shuttle #6, but by the very nature of the game, none of the surviving starbound on the other shuttles knew who the fuck was on that particular coffin; our grief was the grief of statistics and anonymous death. It was like...it was like what you're feeling now, I guess.
We went into Deep Sleep a couple hours later. We had a schedule to follow.
The nature of time is difficult to relate, in spaceflight. Like I said, and you all know, I'm not a science geek. This is a weakness. I'm not particularly anything, but one of the last of those who left Earth behind. Maybe because I was the only one who never had a mate. It wasn't by choice; I went down a list, starting with those I couldn't bear to be without, and down to begging those I found only mildly annoying to come with me, to live. But one by one they politely refused (and getting less polite the further down the list I went).
There was only nine-hundred and ninety-nine of us when we left. There was only eight-hundred and fourty-three when we landed, here, on whatever name they ended up calling it - what was the latest rebranding? Crasus? Ha. We had the audacity to try to name this entire planet when we only had eight-hundred folks, some who couldn't even reproduce. And some we lost during the Deep Sleep. Maybe they dreamt of new beginnings and lost loves and endless space and just drifted off into the stars. And, of course, after the impact, there were the suicides; a cruel joke, I suppose, to find your loved one doesn't wake up from the Deep Sleep, when you could have brought a mother, or a friend, or someone who would have lived.
*I* lived. And I lived alone. People bred, creating all of you little shits, scampering around, asking about the old country. People loved. People died.
But not me.
Not yet.
I've still got stories to tell, of Old Earth, and all of its insufferable, dead children.
*edit: formatting*
| 4 | 0 | 13 | 78,846 |
[FF] Talk to me for five minutes.
|
So I had to set my timer for six minutes because apparently, the hour is unreasonable and I should be in bed. The latter is true-- I need to be up in approximately....uh, 7 hours i think. Math has never been my strong suit. but anyway, in order to get to class on time tomorrow I have to be up in seven hours, and god knows that it takes me FOREVER to fall asleep.
So i set the timer for a extra minute because I'll keep my eye on it so it won't go blaring off. It'd wake up my mother, who'd be very sorely cross with me. Sorely cross. Huh. that's new. Never thought I'd say that in my life. Sounds awfully British. but I'm American. Midwest say whaaaat?
Anywayyyyy, I've been binging on Friends (the joke follows this up with a "because I have none, har-har" even though I'm in a sorority and have literally fourty-six friends that I hang out with once a week all at once, and in smaller quantities at other times during the week) late at night and I've gotten caught up at ridiculous hours on school-nights (think like 4:30 AM with a 7AM wake-up time.) But i can;t help it.
I remember reading somewhere that having depression throws off one's sleep rhythm. circadian rhythm. whatever. point is my body doesn't get tired until 4-freakin-30 AM, even when I do wake up at 7 in the morning.
AGH. 30 seconds left. Shit. I wanted to say so much more than I realised but now time's about up, one minute remaining, and I have to stop telling you my life story..
| 2 | 0 | 25 | 10,294 |
[WP] A day in the life of God's/the Devil's secretary.
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The work was easy enough. That's what they told her when they wanted to hire her. Yes, that's right. She was once human too, and she had a choice. She was just another damned soul passing through this dark red waste, doomed for an eternity in suffering. What happened? How did she end up here. Filling these vials, forever, with no end in sight. How many years had passed? She was no longer human. She was sure of it. She had marked so many of them... So many of her own kind. She had no choice.
Her time was spent in a bland routine. A vial would come through, and she would clean it, fill it, and then push it into the mist. She couldn't see her body. But she felt so exposed, and tired. But she was never bored. How could she be, when she was this scared all the time.
She could feel so many eyes on her. She could feel something around herself. Was it a body, or some kind of shell? She couldn't tell. There was just the eternal fear. And the eyes, that kept watching. And her hands. They kept working.
| 1 | 0 | 7 | 140,981 |
[WP] In the 1700s, an eternally young avatar of the Greek god of the wilds kidnaps dozens of children from their beds, taking them to his distant island to become a vessel for fey magicks like himself. There is only one man brave enough to take the children back: Captain Hook, the pirate.
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Genious! Loved it! Actually you could write two versions of this story: One like you proposed, going full magical and painting Hook as the good guy. And another, again as Hook as the good guy, but more realistic. Pan would actually be someone in disguise that kidnap children from the streets or from adoptive homes at night and Hook would be a police captain. He would investigate the whole case, finding out about the hidden island. He would go there seeking for the missing, but would face Pan's bodyguards midway, with the crew leader wearing crocodile leather armor and having a pocket clock among other devices. They would fight. Hook loses his hand and the thug loses his life. Then Hook would attach an actual hook at his arm with bandages (savaged from the boat) while he goes after Pan. Fast foward turns out Pan is a slaver, member of an organization, and he is shipping children across the sea. They fight and Hook is the winner, despite his poor health conditions. He groups the few children remaining at the island and sail back towards their city. Unfortunately he doesn't survive despite the efforts from the children to keep him alive. They throw his body into the ocean, covered by bandages. The children arrive at their original location but nobody buys their story, in part because it's really hard to believe and in part because a powerful politician is involved and since people didn't know about Pan (only Hook found out about him and decided to solo investigate) he spreads rumors about Hook being the responsible for the kidnaps (aka how the original story came to be). The children are handled to orphanages but at the end is revealed that the narrator is actually one of the kidnapped children. A bit older (teen+). He kept Hook's hook, turned it into a weapon and is leaving for a journey dressed as a ship captain, with his orphanage's friends (now older as well) as his crew...
| 3 | 0 | 1,585 | 159,214 |
[WP] A hero's thoughts as he, during the middle of his victory celebration, comes to realize that he was the villain the whole time.
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I had finally made it.
I had become the very best, like no-one ever was, I had traveled all across the globe, carefully choosing my allies, until I had distilled the very best of the best into the six members of my hand-picked, and intensely trained team, and it had all been worth it.
The road had been long and treacherous, and my opponents, five masters of unparalleled skill, each with their own elite disciples, had neither asked nor given quarter.
I still remember, as I stood upon the plateau reveling in my victory, I had noticed that the sun, threatening to rise, had bathed the entire landscape in an otherworldly indigo light, and to my eyes, no color had ever been quite so beautiful.
The next part is all a blur now, but I remember the victory ceremony, and my mentor the venerable old professor who had first sent me on this impossible quest, shaking my hand, even as he collected the names and pictures of my broken, bleeding, triumphant team, ending with mine, and I said a small prayer for the ones who were no longer with us.
But then, everything changed in an instant, as I realized, horrified, the lives I'd destroyed, and the damage my little war had inflicted, not just on the battlefield, but upon the very souls of those closest to me.
In that instant, I recall vividly the look of shame and humiliation on the face of my rival, as the officers led him away, to sink into disgrace for all time.
It was all my fault, I had taken everything from him, every shred of dignity, and I had done it for all the world to see. Now he could never do enough to repair his tarnished family name, and he would never bridge the rift I had cut between him and his grandfather.
The old man had actually lectured him, as if his defeat at my hands, with the whole world watching, wasn't enough. And I felt, in that moment, the deepest, most soul-wrenching pity imaginable. It hit me like a wrecking ball, and all I could say was;
"I am so sorry Gary Oak."
| 6 | 0 | 32 | 13,273 |
[WP] You're sucked into a computer and thrown into a room where all the video game characters you've ever created are waiting for you, having a grand banquet. What is their reaction to your arrival, and what do they have to say about/to you?
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*It's two dimensional*, I thought, as I walked in the hall, in that strange dream-like state where impossible things seem real. The tables in front of me, the hallway I walked through, were made of large pixels, choppy blocks, rendered to give the appearance of a three dimensional banquet hall. My surprise that I could somehow walk through this two-dimensional room normally was only compounded as I began to realize the company I was in. The first person I saw was familiar, looking nearly human, but not right. He wasn't pixelated like my surroundings. He was human. Almost human. *The uncanny valley.*
*Why do I know that guy?* Then I saw the "N7" emblazoned on his suit.
"Commander Shepard?"
"No, I'm Commander Shepard," said a woman, dressed in similar armor. "That Commander Shepard is a goody-two-shoes. Wouldn't make the hard choices when it counted."
"At least all my squad mates survived!" fired back Paragon Shepard.
"Well, I saved the world," exclaimed a man dressed in full steel armor, weilding a sword and shield. "I am the Dovakhiin, And I saved Tamriel from the evil dragon Alduin!"
"You actually finished that questline?" exclaimed another Dovahkiin, an Altmer Vampire rogue. "I think he must have got bored after the Dark Brotherhood quests," he said, gesturing at me.
"Bah!" said another Dovahkiin, a level 1 Argonian. "I never even made it out of Helgen!"
"Look guys... I'm sorry..." I stammered, my brain still trying to make sense of the situation. "It's just... Skyrim gets old after a while... "
"How dare you speak that way of my homeland?" demanded the steel-clad Nord. "You Imperial milk-drinker!"
"Bah, silence, you Stormcloak fool!" exclaimed the vampiric Dovahkiin. "Shall we brawl about it? I haven't fed in four days, I'm very strong!"
The Argonian just looked down sadly. I nervously backed away from the three Dovahkiin. Paragon and Renegade Shepard continued to bicker in the background, I believe they'd started fighting over Liara. I crossed the pixelated hall to find someone else to talk to.
*This can't be real... this can't be real..* The hall was crowded, filled with so many characters. *Did I play all these games?*
Four figures were talking to each other. Two were very pixelated, with barely any facial figures to discern. Two others appeared fairly realish, like the Shepards and the Dovahkiin. But they all wore the same armor - Brotherhood Power Armor.
"The Vault Dweller?" I asked apprehensively, two one of the pixelated men.
"No, he's the Vault Dweller. I'm the Chosen One. And I'm sure you recognize the Lone Wanderer and the Courier."
"Of course, of course." I sighed relief. At least I finished these guys' games.
"Have you had the food here?" asked the Chosen One. "Way better than Brahmin meat."
"Not yet." So me and my Fallout characters made our way to the buffet. My friends had no trouble eating, apparently, they just looked at their food and it disappeared. But I awkwardly picked up a pixelated spatula attempted to scoop up a large brown pixel that I took to be a steak onto my plate, when it fell off my plate on to the floor.
I looked down. A swarm of black ants, led by a single yellow ant began to swarm around the steak.
*Wow, SimAnt...* I thought. *I haven't played that since I was a little kid.*
"Wait a second," I said, turning to the Fallout characters. "Where are we?"
"Oh.." said the Courier. "I think this an Arcology. One of the finest buildings in SimCity 2000."
"SimCity 2000?" I exclaimed. "Oh no. Oh no no no."
I pushed past them at ran through the hall to a window. I looked outside and gasped in horror. Across from me, the pixelated city was in dire straights. The fusion power plant across the street was on fire. The residential and commercial zones, which were largely uninhabited buildings, were being flooded. A tornado was present on the horizon, destroying a stadium and a hydroelectric dam. And I looked up in the sky and saw it.
I screamed.
"Dremora!" exclaimed an extremely hideous Bosmer Hero of Kvatch.
A Grey Warden of Dragon Age pulled out her magical staff. "Darkspawn! I'm ready for them!"
"I'm too old for this." sighed John Marston, pulling out his rifle. Several Links drew their swords and boomerangs. Behind them, hundreds of Marios jumped towards the window.
"Reapers?" yelled Paragon and Renegade Shepard, almost simultaneously. They began to pull out various guns.
"No..." I said. "Not Reapers."
I looked up at the monstrous alien space craft floating above us. *I'm sorry... I'm sorry. I'm sorry I was such a bad mayor..*
| 4 | 0 | 28 | 110,810 |
[WP] The Final Entry In The Journal
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July 5th, 1889
A very strange occurrence today at the dig. As we lifted the giant tibia from the earth, I spied upon the dark soil underneath, a small leather-bound volume such as might be used in the field as a journal.
I bade the workers to immediately cease their efforts so that I might procure the journal at any cost. Such was my fervor at this moment that I completely forgot my original purpose in being here on this site!
My heart was beating fiercely in my chest as I picked up the object which even now, appears almost new. I open it only with great trepidation, fearing what I might find within.
The pages are filled with wonders! Places and events which I cannot with any sense of understanding relate to you, the reader.
With shaking hands I turn to the final page, where my unbelieving eyes behold words which even now I cannot even begin to truly comprehend!
*Finally we have succeeded! Time travel is a reality! I am going to be the most famous explorer in the history of the race of man! I...*
Here the writing trails off. I fear something happened which prevented further disclosure.
My eyes once again stray to behold the gigantic dinosaur tibia.
Only now do I comprehend the awful fate which must have befallen my brethren in the pursuit of knowledge.
May they rest in peace.
| 2 | 0 | 8 | 633 |
[WP] "I'll have whatever (s)he's having."
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"I'll have whatever he's having" I said as I shuffled to the sit beside him. He smiled crookedly at me.
It was the key to start the chase in this dark, humid, noisy place.
I hated going to clubs but it was always fun.
The Chase is fun.
When you've been ignored for half of your life you enjoy the simple pleasure of being wanted by anyone, even if their drunk and wont remember you when the light breaks out tomorrow.
The bartender gave me my order as the guy suddenly stood up, I looked up at him smiling seductively
"aren't you at least wait for me to finish my drink?"
"No" he simply said looking at the sweaty bodies at the dance floor
"You know what? There are two ways to grab attention: One is to be a slut or try to be one or pretend to be one. That's the easier choice or two just be yourself and wait for someone worth while to come along. I came here thinking that this would be easy, and it is but its meaningless and pathetic. Everyone in here wants to be with someone who could look at them for a few hours and they'd be contented but I know I won't be. I want to be with someone who'd only be contented when we're together, not physically though"
I gave a rough laugh and sipped my drink
"well if it's a relationship your looking for, your not finding any here" I said looking around the club
"maybe" he chuckled.
It was subtle yet I know. The chase has begun, only this time I know it won't end before daylight.
Who knows when? :)
| 1 | 0 | 4 | 181,048 |
[FF] The Collector Cometh. 400 Words. (Contest)
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"Today marks the one year anniversary", he said as he pulled the boxes from the shelf in his spare room. The man that stood behind him, prompting this unexpected trip down memory lane, had identified himself as The Collector. Martin Savage had thought that was a silly handle for a grown man.
For reasons he didn't know, he had decided to entertain his curiosity when this unkempt caricature had knocked at his door. Perhaps it had been an opportunity to thumb through his Father's old documents and trinkets again. He had been grieving especially hard this December as the date had bounded towards Christmas. What kind of Father leaves his family on Christmas day?
"I'm not entirely certain it's in here", Martin said to the man. The Collector had seemed insistent enough that he would find what he came to retrieve. It was a pen of apparently exquisite value, and one that The Collector had deemed important. He had opened his briefcase to exhibit a wide array of intricate looking utensils. The red, crushed velvet had given him the impression of a collection that had been tended to carefully over many years.
"I knew your father quite well", The Collector had asserted as he sat down behind the boxes to begin his search. "He was meticulous and rather particular about his instructions."
Martin had been spending another night in the luminous glow of his television when this man had knocked at his door. Assuming it was a solicitor, he simply turned up the volume. It was his favorite episode of The Dukes of Hazard. The knocking had become progressively more urgent as it went ignored. Resigning himself to having to address this man, Martin had sluffed to the door. The Collector had identified himself with a sparse business card and spoke of his father with intimate knowledge. He had claimed to be a friend, but Martin knew that his father didn't have those.
Martin eyed the man curiously as he started his search through the boxes his father had left behind. The Collector appeared to be of an almost indeterminable age between 70 and 80, but there was a fierceness to his eyes that belonged to a much younger man. He had been dressed in a dark brown suit that was sunlight damaged and sparsely used with a hat that had wanted repair. Martin wondered how his father had met such a seemingly worldly man, for as far as he knew his dad had never fancied travel and this man carried himself with the quiet bewilderment of a man out of his element.
"Yes", The Collector mumbled. "This is the one".
With a swiftly executed and efficient motion, The Collector had removed the cap of the ornate pen he had retrieved from the box to reveal a sharp knife that he quickly inserted into Martin Savage's neck. The Collector watched Martin's eyes dance with pain and bewilderment as he expertly pinned him to the ground and extinguished his life.
Rising to his feet, the collector had wiped the pen clean with a handkerchief and straightened his suit jacket. He calmly walked over to retrieve his briefcase and popped the clasps. He inserted the pen into the slot marked with a small bronze placard that read, "Martin Savage", doffed his hat, and disappeared into the night.
| 3 | 0 | 25 | 13,544 |
[EU] Tell me a story set in the Star Wars galaxy. You may not mention the Empire, the Rebellion, the Old or New Republics, Jedi, or Sith, or refer to any events occurring in the movies.
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"Here's how everything went down," said the Togruta. "This man, Kambern Polis, has been on my staff for well over ten years. Even before we made the move to Hutt Space, he's been one of the few people I could trust without the slightest thought to the contrary. Even after this whole mess, I'm still very much convinced that if the Exchange had a gun to his head and the Hutts had another to his crotch, he still wouldn't sell me out. Very much convinced. We've been through a lot together, he and I."
He clapped Kambern Polis on the shoulder and the man recoiled. "But he's known your present bounty, Thrask, for an even longer stretch of time. There's some childhood obligation there, or so I'm told. Kam would never sell me out to the Exchange, the Hutts, or even the Dark kriffing Council, but he'd sure as dust see me kiss the ground before his precious Thrask was even *slightly* inconvenienced. It troubles me in a way that... Ah, well, never you mind. What's done is done."
The Togruta's name was Jarvin Trell, head of the Errant Gang, a relatively small-time organization compared to the giants that kept Nal Hutta and its moon spinning on their corrupt axes, but he had the credits where it counted.
And really, that was all that mattered to Shae Vizla in the grand scheme of things, but what Trell had to say right now was a matter of personal interest to her. She had just found out who let on to Thrask that a bounty hunter had been sent his way: one Kambern Polis, who was presently gagged and tightly bound to a chair, bruised and bloodied in the wake of his confirmed guilt in the matter.
She wasn't all too patient with folks who played havoc with her livelihood. It was the one area where her Mandalorian sensibilities seemed to fail her. "He picked the wrong bounty hunter to cross."
Trell snorted. "Trust me, he's well aware of that now." He gestured to Shae. "I do business with you because you get results, regardless of the situation. It reflects poorly on me—not as your employer, but as your *customer*—that someone within my circle was the one to complicate your job. For that, you have my sincerest apologies."
"Apologies aren't necessary," she said. "Neither was the 'little' bonus you added to my account. Jobs get can get complicated regardless of how intensely it's planned out beforehand. It's a chaotic business to begin with."
"Quite right—and these are chaotic times, aren't they?" He stroked one of his head-tails as he paced in front of the sole window in the room, which framed a section of the Nar Shaddaa skyline that seemed to be made up of nothing but brightly-colored holo advertisements. The east wing of the Star Cluster Casino could be seen hovering out there behind one of the taller buildings, redirecting the skylanes as it drifted back and forth over vistas of interest to its patrons. "I want to offer you something."
Shae noticed she had been a tad distracted by the lights outside. "What kind of offer?"
"Regardless of what happens tonight, I will no longer be in need of Mr. Polis' services. His tenure in this organization has come to an unfortunately quick end. He threw a hydrospanner into the works, and you had to pay for it." He nodded. "The physical punishment was a start, and I think seeing his friend Thrask mounted there on the wall did him in quite well, as you can see."
Trell was right; Polis hadn't stopped weeping since Shae had pushed the carbonite slab into the room. Thrask's outspread hands and expression of pure terror were frozen in place and startlingly defined. It was probably the best freeze job Shae had pulled off, and it gave her no small amount of pride to see Trell immediately demand that the slab be mounted on the wall like a proper decoration.
"Thrask stole from me, and he will meditate on this for some time. His slight has been rectified. But as for Mr. Polis..." The Togruta nodded to one of his associates, who touched a panel that opened the window and allowed the strong smog of Nar Shaddaa's atmosphere inside at a concentrated dose. "Outside this window is an unobstructed drop to the ground level of Nar Shaddaa. I don't think I have to tell you that a fall from any one of the structures in this district is a fatal one, but this spot in particular is special."
Trell smiled, and Shae was suddenly convinced that there was nothing "small-time" about this man. "Drop Polis out this window, and he, too, will have some time to meditate on his slights before he kisses the ground. He'll fall through the air like a meteor, and he'll die with regret, I assure you."
Shae caught up to what the Togruta was offering. "You want me to drop him out the window?"
"I don't want you to do anything," he corrected. "Merely offering. As I understand it, you weren't particularly pleased to hear of our leak, so I think it's only fair you be given the chance to plug it."
She turned to Polis, who had long since turned pale but could do little else to express his fear beyond shouting against his gag. It was true, she had been absolutely *fuming* the entire way back to Nar Shaddaa, eager to get her hands on whomever had blown the Coruscant job. She had calmed herself down, of course, before meeting with Trell as professional courtesy demanded, and she thought that maybe she would be able to forgive, forget, and move on with business...
But now she realized she still *really* wanted Polis dead.
Before she knew it, she was pulling Polis across the room, chair and all, and the man screamed and struggled furiously against his bindings the entire way. At the opened window, with the nightly breeze gently pouring in, she spun Polis around so they were looking each other in the eye. She took him by the shoulders and her lips parted into a pleasant smile. "I'm sorry you met me, Mr. Polis."
And with one push, the man was gone into the neonlit night—his look of terror the last thing to disappear over the edge.
The associate casually toggled the window shut again.
"Hate to keep any window opened for so long on this moon," said Trell with a disgusted shudder. "Smog gets into the carpeting, wallpaper. Stains it all. And the taste of it, definitely, ah... an acquired one."
Shae's heart was pounding, her hands were trembling. "Definitely."
"Glad to see Mr. Polis get his just desserts. Start counting down the seconds, because it'll be another few minutes before he finally kisses ground. Ah, my empire for a *glimpse* of what's going through his head right now! Ha! Gets me every time." He clapped his hands together and a door at the end of the room opened. "What do you say we retire for dinner before you get on your way. Our in-house chef can do wondrous things with Bantha meat and a bit of Alderaanian wine."
"If it's all the same to you, I'd like to call our business concluded for now. It's been a trying couple of days and I have my own methods of unwinding." She could feel her left eyelid twitching. She had to get out of here.
"It's no problem at all, and I fully understand." Trell winked at the carbonite slab on the wall. "Thrask understands, too. Don't you, Thrask?"
| 2 | 0 | 361 | 67,874 |
You discover your superpower as you're being attacked. What happens next? [WP]
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Cold and Dark. The night was one of those nights that inhibited paranoia. As I walked I looked back and swore I saw someone following me but I couldn't tell, I couldn't quite see. I hurried my pace to the bus stop realizing I may just be scaring myself. Then I heard foot steps and looked back and saw two men speaking to each other while walking behind me. I saw the bus stop a few blocks ahead and thought the broken street lights seemed to be on their side. I thought I had made it, I thought they were farther back.
I felt someone grab my shoulder with such force that let me instantly know they weren't going to tell me I had dropped something. I turned quickly my breath already becoming rushed, hands shaky with the sudden instant surge of adrenaline. "Give me your fuckin wallet" The smaller man said in a hurry. For a second I thought it weird that in his life I am impeding him. I was frozen in fear and the big man without warning punched me straight in the stomach, I bent over and he pushed me down on the sidewalk. I felt hands going in my pockets and grabbing my phone and wallet. More kicks, more pain and the fear of it getting worse. I heard one of them say "Your name is Kristoff, Ha, what a stupid name"
They had what they wanted but still they kept beating, then an unfortunate kick to my head that sent the world ringing and my thoughts escaped me. I felt as if someone else was there for a second, as if someone else was standing over me. And then the yell, a type of scream I've never heard before. Pain mixed with horror and splash of surprise. I opened my black and bruised eyes and was not prepared for what I saw. The big man lay on the floor with a leg missing, blood wetting the sidewalk. And all I could think of was how can it be that bright if its so dark. I stood up confused and still fearful. The small man had pulled his gun and was pointing it at me. But I had not done this, I was on the floor weak and defenseless... why fear me.
"Don't move you asshole look what you did to Tim" the small man said. "I, I, I" I couldn't even speak as I raised my trembling hands. Whatever the small man saw he saw it coming for him and shot at me. BANG! the gun shot rang but strangely it seemed muffled compared to the beating I had just withstood. I saw something around me, a blur of a kind, a form that you can never really be sure you've seen. And nothing hit me, I looked up and saw the small man standing there with his gun pointed at me. And in the darkness i realized the morbid reality. His had been picked right off. Next to him it lay with the look of surprise still upon it.
I did the only thing I could do, I ran. I ran past the bus stop as thoughts ran through my head. Thoughts of my child hood and bullies being pulled out of school for being strangely bruised. My step father dieing so suddenly in his sleep. All of them harming me, all of them using me to relieve their pains in life. What am I that could have done that? What am I assuming could have happened? What am I?
| 1 | 0 | 6 | 115,479 |
A young child's parents are abusive; their older sibling, who was their only hope, had just committed suicide. Now, they're on their own.
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Zi looked down at Johnny, bent over, shook his shoulder. He needed Johnny to wake up, and if Zi shook him enough, like he used to do on Saturday mornings before their parents stirred themselves from their bed of empty beer bottles and cans, he would sit up, rub his eyes and run with Johnny out into the yellow grain fields that surrounded their house. Like he always did.
But Zi didn't think he would get up this time. The small, neat pile of of gray matter - Zi knew it was called that from the detective shows he and Johnny watched together - that lay five feet away told him that. The river of blood running from Johnny's temple, now forming a tiny oxbow where the hardwood met the linoleum in the kitchen told him that. Johnny's empty, blue stare above the beard he had just started to grow told him that. Their father's colt revolver laying in Johnny's limp hand told him that.
The night before, when Johnny was tucking him into bed, Zi knew something was wrong. Johnny was crying, and Johnny never cried.
"What's wrong?" Zi had asked.
"Nothing... Nothing's wrong Z-man," Johnny said. His left eye was growing a fresh bruise in the shape of a fist. It would soon match the one on his left.
"I'm sorry Dad hit you," Zi said quietly. He knew the only reason Johnny got hit was because he put himself between Dad and Zi, like a tower, when Dad had to many beers and got his hurt on. That's what Johnny called it. Daddy got his hurt on.
"You're gonna be alright," Johnny said. His eyes were wide, and he was nodding slowly. Like he was trying yo convince himself, not Zi.
Johnny nodded one more time, then bent over and kissed Zi on the forehead. "You're gonna be alright."
Then he stood and left the room, turning off the light and closing the door. Zi fell asleep, and slept until the gunshot woke him.
Now he stood over Johnny in that house. He was starting to smell blood, like when split his lip falling on a step last summer. It mingled with the dust smell; there was always a cloud of dirt and salt in the air of that house.
In a daze, without taking his eyes from Johnny's, he bent across his brother and picked up the gun out of Johnny's hand. The blood-smell was stronger when he leaned over; it smelled like a penny tasted. He heard the sound of an engine, his dad's old Ford junker, pulling into the driveway. The Hunkajunk, Johnny had named the truck. A scream of metal, empty cans hitting the packed gravel driveway, followed by the angry stomping of steel toed boots and low cursing.
Then there was a moment of intense quiet, except for the fumbling of keys at the door. Zi looked up from Johnny's bruised face and watched the nob turn.
The door exploded open, and sunlight streamed in. Daddy's long shadow imposed itself across the floor, and Zi squinted, looking at his father's outline, looking for where his eyes must be through the glare of hard light and dust.
They looked at each other. Zi standing over Johnny's body holding the Colt, the monster at the door breathing and swaying an alcohol sway.
"I'm gonna be alright," Zi said.
Then cocked the hammer.
| 1 | 0 | 1 | 85,314 |
[WP]A man dies and ends up in hell. But when he arrives he finds his father leading a war against Satan...and he's winning.
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I lost my Dad to a drunk driver when I was just a boy of 17. He missed my graduations. On the day of my first job, my mother tried to give her support but you could hear the soft sadness in her voice. I missed him when I got married, I missed him when my kids were born. When I was a grown man and my eldest was 17, I was hit by a drunk driver.
I didn't see it coming, but in the moments afterward I felt I was closer to my father than I had ever been. I saw myself through his eyes. Saw the grief on my son's face when the police entered our door, hats in hand. I saw my father's face, as best I could remember it. I remembered his beard, his hairy legs, his wicked smile.
An instant after I saw his smile for the first time in 20 years I was standing in a huge field. I was surrounded by some kind of strange red flower. The sky, ground and lake in the distance were all shades of red. The whole scene was shimmering with heat. Immediately my body started to roast like a turkey at Thanksgiving.
It was immediately, scarily, soul-numbingly clear what happened. the stories they tell you as a kid were true, even though I had disimissed them as childish superstition years ago. I was in Hell.
A cloud of dust appeared on the horizon, kicking up behind the rise of a brown baked hill. Suddenly hundreds of terrifying men in black, jagged armor crested the top of the hill, marching in lockstep, shaking the ground. As I took this in, behind them crested huge blkack horses with dark riders, all carrying jagged, impossibly horrific lances.
I cowered, fearing pain, humiliation, and whatever else these fiends had in store. A lone rider broke off from the formation, which had suddenly stopped a hundred feet from me. He guided an empty horse behind him and trotted up to me. Behind him, the wall of spikes, blades, and armor was as silent as a graveyard.
When he got to me he towered over me for a moment. His face shield was the shape of a grey skull with black eyes and teeth. This hollow, eerie figure stared down at me with blank eye sockets.
Suddenly there was a huge, rolling peal of thunder behind the army. The rider turned to look in that direction over the hill, as did most of the armored column on the hill. When he turned back, I was on my knees in front of him, weeping.
"Please, sir, tell me where I am. Tell me who you are. Tell me something. What happened? Am I dead? Is this hell?" The questions came out in a blubbering torrent.
The rider looked down at me and cocked his head. For some reason thsi looked very curious and I stopped crying. I squared myself and stood. The rider, to my suprise, leapt down off his horse. He walked up to me, slowly and with the air of a leader, a general, pulling off his metal gloves and reaching for his mask.
And when I saw him, I knew. Immediately, like a punch to the heart. It was my Dad. As I saw him last, 20 years ago, the night he left to go to the store. We seemed to be the same age. It was almost like looking into a mirror, but the crooked nose he got in the Army boxing club was still there.
My mouth was agape. My stomach in knots. What was happening? Why was my Dad in charge of all of these . . . I had no idea what to call them. Men? Demons? Soldiers?
Dad grinned, a twinkle in his eye. "You're just in time, my son."
I thought of my wife, my kids. A vengeful shame came over me. I wanted revenge on the drunk driver that had killed me. I wanted him to be here, not me. The unfairness of the situation hit me and I seethed.
My Dad shook his head, somehow reading my thoughts, either supernaturally or just plain because he knew me, knew that looks.
"Son." he said simply. "Join me. For thousands of years, the wicked and evil have not been punished. They are allowed to roam about, doing whatever they want, never facing the consequences. For 20 years I've been fighting a war against Lucifer, the fallen angel and king. His army is crushed. Tomorrow we storm his fortress, and then we can run this place how we see fit."
For some reason my body had adjusted to the intense heat and it was just background uncomfortableness now. My Dad jumped back on his horse and let the reigns drop for the horse that was obviously for me.
I placed my hand on the reigns and looked over my Dad's army. At least I could have my revenge.
| 1 | 0 | 118 | 140,034 |
[WP] You get the date of your death predicted by a mystic who has never been wrong. The date given is yesterday.
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I should have never paid attention to the tent.
Perhaps I should explain. I've never believes much in psychic or paranormal predictions, but I was at a fair anyway, and the turquoise tent seemed to call out to me, drawing me near. I sighed as I got off the line for the fried chicken I had wanted so badly, and walked closer to the tent. As I got closer, I realized it was a lot shorter then I had previously thought.
As I stepped inside, the loud cacophony of voices on the outside were muted by the thick fabric. I saw a sign that claimed this man had "never been wrong". A man clothed in simple brown garments does not speak to me, but points to a sign, which informs me the fee is $10. I reluctantly gave it to him. He gave me a mask to put on my head, and I put it on, sighing at the same time.
The wait was short, around 2 minutes, but it was probably the most tense I've ever felt. I couldn't quite place the feeling of extreme mental weight I felt, but I could sense its presence. When I felt a tap on my shoulder that signified that I should take off the blindfold, the dim tent revealed the same man with a surprised look on his face. He handed me a piece of paper telling me to open it when I got home.
The paper revealed my untimely death on July 9th, which was funnily enough the date yesterday. I laughed, when I looked at the date.
It revealed the current year. I tried to laugh it off, the but feeling from before returned. I couldn't seem to shake it off, suggesting this was more then a simple psychic reading.
The next day was a rainy one. The fair was packing up and moving on, and I visited the spot where the tent had been. Barely any trace of it remained, only a typical fortune on the floor that said, " *You* will be very lucky. You *should not* waste time in the next 48 hours.. You should have good luck, and your bad luck will no longer
*exist*."
I repeated the words that stuck out from the rest.
*"You should not exist."*
The world seemed to go farther and farther away as I repeated this too myself.
*"You should not exist."*
*"You should not exist."*
The colors in the world disappeared as the world grew smaller, suffocating my very being in this now monochromatic world.
*"I should not exist."*
*"I should not exist."*
*"I should not exist."*
I close my eyes, and become one with the wind, the colorless sky, the limitless universe, the children playing on the street.
*"I should not exist."*
| 2 | 0 | 5 | 141,712 |
[WP] Two best friends are each smoking a cigarette, knowing that when they are finished, they will never see each other again. What do they talk about?
|
As the mechanical arm failed, the reflector seemed to me to descend gently back toward its counterpart, almost as if pondering the consequences of its impending communion. Alan was closer, but I reacted first. I reached the control panel in three steps and mashed the abort. In retrospect, if I had taken an extra second to think, I would have realized that that was the wrong decision. Alan seemed to realize that at the same time as me. He grabbed a beam of tungsten carbide off the table, took two steps toward the place that I had just been standing and jammed it into the arm's elbow. The arm groaned, and for a moment it looked as if the pieces wouldn't meet, but then there was a flash of blue light and a sudden wave of heat. The falling reflector had tapped its counterpart, knocking it away, and during the brief collision the two of us had been thoroughly irradiated.
We looked at each other, as if to confirm that what happened really happened, then I took out a tape measure and determined how far away each of us had been standing, took out my calculator, and with my hands shaking, worked out how much radiation each of us had received. Then I worked out how long we had to live. Six hours at most.
The phone on the wall rang. Alan picked it up and listened for a moment. "No. Under no condition should anyone enter." A pause. More speaking from the other end. "Thank you, no. Seal the chamber. Yes, seal it. And turn turn off the fire sprinkler system." He hung up, then took out a box of cigarettes and wordlessly offered me one. I'd never smoked, but took it anyway. We lit up, I took a hard drag and immediately started coughing uncontrollably. After about a minute I took another drag, with the same result, gave up, and dropped the cigarette on the floor.
We sat together in silence for some time. Finally Alan said, "Goddamn it Jim. You know you fucked up, right?"
A lump tightened in my throat. "I know... I wasn't thinking. I'm... so... fucking sorry. If only it had been me with the tungsten--"
"No, I'm not talking about that. Jesus. You smoke it from the other end."
| 3 | 0 | 321 | 27,796 |
[WP] Smoke has a collective memory of scenes and emotions of the people whose lives it has been involved in.
|
*Sparks waltz around me. I won't let them touch me, but I doubt they even want to. After all, I am their friend. My gasoline, my match, my love for the heat. I let them free. I let them live, grow... and dance!*
"Whoa, whoa, whoa... Jake! You didn't put anything extra in this hooka, did you?"
"No way bro. Just the general stuff, some Double Apple, Triple Apple, something like that. Nothing extra. Why you ask?"
"No way man! That's not true. You put something in here. What was it? What's going on?"
"Honest bro, nothing at all. You know what man, stop acting like a pussy. Give that pipe to me. I'll show that this shit is clean."
*"Melissa! Where are you?" It's much too thick now to see anything. Keep low. Keep this wet cloth on my face. Find Melissa. Damn it Melissa. Where are you? I can't risk yelling again. I can't waste my breath.*
"Oh shit dude! Oh shit!"
"I told you Jake! There's something extra in there man! That's some bad nargila or something. Can you lace nargila?"
"No man. That was too real. Way too real. I think I was looking for a chick... or something? Damn it, that was too intense... Know what man? I need to go back. I need to make sure everything went OK. Wish me luck."
"Good luck man."
...
| 3 | 0 | 10 | 15,856 |
[WP] A serial murderer who has performed 100's of inhumane experiments is caught. His research suggests he has found cures for several major diseases and won't divulge unless all charges are dropped.
|
"I don't get it, why is he asking for all charges to be dropped? He's dead isn't he?"
"Don't ask me boss, I'm not crazy enough to understand a nut job like this."
"What else was in the letter?"
"What am I your mother? Read it yourself."
He shoved the letter in my face.
Good morning detectives,
If you're reading this I must've succeeded. On my computer you will find a copy of the formula of Cell-0, along with the results of the 253 studies I have carried out to prove its effectiveness. No doubt you will notice that first 240 studies were not successful, the remaining 13 however were perfect. Zero remission, zero growth and zero fucking help from any of you.
I tried for 40 years to use your 'approved methods' of research, but when "curing" balding gets more funding then curing cancer what would you expect. So yes, I found my own volunteers, they were my partners in progressing the science without pursuing a profit. Perhaps you'll want to make me out to be the monster, the mad scientist who butchered the homeless for fame and fortune or perhaps you'll try to erase me from my work so you can take credit and profit off it.
Well you can forget about that. I won't let my volunteers or myself be used by your system any longer. And yes they were volunteers, all 253, before now they were worthless to you, you couldn't spare a dollar or a moment of kindness. No, but when they become crime scenes then you value them, then you want to help them so desperately. But it's not me that pushed them into the streets, it's not me that destroyed their lives. It's your insane thirst for profit. Your insanity that tells you all lives must be profitable and when they're not they become disposable. Until of course you can sell their deaths as entertainment between commercials. No. No I won't let that happen.
That's why I've published all their names and pictures in my research, they will be the hero's of this story and you will be the monster. To insure this I've taken the liberty of publishing my research, results and methods online on every torrent site, blog and social media site I could find.
People dying isn't news. Curing cancer isn't a fundraiser. We have more than enough food to feed everyone and we have more than enough people to work on the problem. I've cured the biological diseases perhaps you can cure the mental ones.
Needless to say you can drop all the charges against me, oh and before I forget. Sincerely, go fuck yourself.
Bob
| 5 | 0 | 1,520 | 185,189 |
[WP] There is only 10 billion souls available for humanity. Everyone has one. The population reaches 10 billion. The next baby is born...
|
Daniel Asquith was at his desk when it struck him: A flash of light. Pain all over his body. He couldn't breathe. He fell from his chair with a crash, as his vision spun and his world reeled.
Several of his co-workers, hearing the commotion, rushed over. "Was he okay?" they asked. He didn't know. "Was he having a heart attack?" He hoped not. Slowly his vision resolved. He saw double, One set of co-workers, Mandy, James, that Asian temp. The others were fuzzy set of doctors in Medical garb. Hispanic?
Both sets chattered excitedly over him, the noise was confusing, but he could hear enough to know he didn't understand the doctors. As his co-workers helped him sit, a doctor also lifted him upwards. He felt a rough towel over his naked skin, which jarred, as he could see his thread-bear cotton shirt still covering his arms.
He struggled to breathe. Mandy held three fingers up, "Three fingers" he said, at the same instant giving a gurgling cry. The doctor holding him laughed and called something across the room.
He tried moving his arms and legs. He simultaneously fought against the confines of a tightly wrapped towel, as his arms thrashed and legs beat against the cheap carpet. James held him down, asking "Is he having a seizure?", as the doctor gripped him tighter. He relaxed, his vision swung to a woman's face, sweaty, bedraggled, but relieved and loving.
Twenty minute later the paramedics arrived. He was sitting at the lunch-room table, drinking a cup of warm water, tasting the warm breast-milk flowing down his throat, as he sucked rhythmically.
Coming from a poor background, he remembered the phrase his mother used repeatedly throughout his childhood: "There aren't enough for everyone: You'll have to share."
| 3 | 0 | 227 | 162,020 |
[WP] You are walking down the hall of a nursing home from visiting your grandma and notice blood everywhere, corpses hanging from the ceiling, and pieces of human flesh chopped up and you look down and notice that you have a butchers knife covered in blood.
|
"Sir, Are you okay?" a rotting corpse with maggots drooling from the mouth asked.
I replied as calm as I possibly could. "Yes."
That kept her from messing with me the rest of the day. I looked down at my hand and noticed a very large butchers knife covered in blood.
I had to pass three doors to get to grandma's room. It was hard not freaking out, each room I looked into was crazier than the last.
The first door was a room full of gold and beautiful women. I've been through this before, so I ignored their cat calls and tried to remain low profile.
The second door was closed, but looked like it had an entire universe painted on it. It started swirling and progressing as I stood there, staring at it. It would zoom in to our galaxy then our star system, then our planet, then our city, then right into the old farts home, I watched a man dance down a hallway then it zoomed back out and I was looking at the entire galaxy again.
The third door was wide open and nothing inside. Literally nothing. It was black, dark and completely empty. But the room was still there. I knew the walls were there, I could see them even though it was pitch black and I couldn't actually see them, but I knew if I walked forward and put my hand out I would know exactly where they were. This room was also cold, the kind of cold that makes you feel like you'll never be warm again. There was no breeze or sharp pain of being cold, just a lack of heat. I decided to keep moving.
I reached my Grandma's room. The walls danced around me changing colors every so often. On the window sill there was a tall silver pot, I picked it up and walked towards a giant mouth in the wall. I squeezed the dangly bit at the back and it spit into the pot until it was full. I put the Butchers knife in the pot, it made a dull thumping sound, like if you dropped a drum on the ground or something. There was a couch there somewhere, but I couldn't find it. So I sat on the park bench against the wall where the couch normally is. There was a large eye on Grandmas bed. I couldn't tell if it was staring at me or through me. It didn't blink, I kinda just sat there staring at it for a while. I don't know how long, but a giant butterfly told me I was going to have to leave and started moistening the eye with a baseball that leaked water when squeezed.
I wandered down blood soaked halls littered with bits of flesh and bone until I found my way outside, a large green hippopotamus was sitting where I parked my car when I first got here. I lifted it's front leg and sat just in front of its chest. I closed my eyes for a long time. I looked around only finding a forgotten old bottle of water, the same bottle I drank from when I pulled up. I thought about dumping it out, but decided to save it for later.
edit: formatting
| 2 | 0 | 0 | 78,664 |
[WP] A super-villain, wanting to make a virus that kills 99.99% of the human population, accidentally eradicates all cancers. What happens next?
|
The formula was perfect. A simple injection into a bacterium had given it cause to multiply. While not quite as easily spread as a virus, it was simpler to get it as a carrier.
The creator looked outside, at the industrial estate surrounding her. It had once been a forest, where she had played as a child. Now it, like the rest of the earth, was destroyed by people. This was the only option left. Humans were too numerous, a cancer on the Earth. So they must be near exterminated, only some left, who would have to band together without the enormous numbers to survive.
She released it herself, travelling, moving through continents and depositing it in water sources. There it would be consumed, and spread to others. Never did she stop long enough to hear the news, until she returned home, turned on the television, and sat down to watch what her horror had brought. But there was no death toll reported, instead a search was underway, for a woman who had been seen putting something in the water. Cancer was gone. The bacterium had mutated. The earth was doomed.
| 3 | 0 | 160 | 208,049 |
[IP] "Decoy" by Simon Stålenhag (xpost from /r/Art)
|
Simon looked out from the trees, ready to jump back at any moment. He could see the bright yellow shapes of the two mechs out there in the field, each nearly twenty feet tall. They were angular and cleanly built, with immense birdlike legs that allowed them to run at incredible speed across the flat landscape.
They had been lucky to get this close without being noticed. The sensors on these things were supposed to be able to find you through the sound of your breathing. They were that sensitive. But these two were probably internally damaged from the battle up north, and the raucous chattering of the birds in the trees above him covered any sounds he or Michael might be making.
He shrank back into the shadows as one of the mechs began to stalk back down towards its companion in a patrolling pattern. They had to draw the robots away from here to somewhere where the rebels would be able to get a clear shot at them. That sounded easy, but with the unbelievable speed and offensive capabilities of these things, even the mile or so west that they would have to lure them would be a challenge.
He made his way quickly and quietly back to the car, which was ready and waiting between two pines. His brother Mike was in the driver's seat, waiting. Simon made his way around to the passenger door and got in, closing the door as quietly as he could.
'You ready?' said Mike, grasping the keys in the ignition.
'Yeah,' said Simon, clambering onto the back seat and rolling back the sunroof. 'Let's do this.'
His brother started up the engine and floored the accelerator in one fluid motion, sending the vehicle rocketing forward. They burst from the treeline and raced off across the grass. Mike passed up a slim, foot-long tube to Simon, who put his head and shoulders out of the sunroof as he rummaged in his pocket for his lighter.
He held the tiny flame to the end of the tube, which began to sputter and burn brightly with a fierce red light. He waved it in the air as the mechs came into view, both already turning to face them. One was still behind the trees, but the other, the one that had been patrolling, that was much closer.
Mike switched up the gears as fast as he could, until they were doing almost a hundred miles an hour. On the uneven and bumpy landscape, that was all he could handle without flipping the car.
Simon concentrated on the mechs, the closer of which was now beginning to take long strides in their direction. He waved the flare again. The visual spectrum of the mechs' sensors meant that they were particularly attracted to heat, and the combined signature of the car engine, both humans and the flare should be enough to force it into following.
It did. Both mechs began to pursue, them, the closest one picking up its pace until it was running after them. Its loping gait reminded Simon of an ostrich's, for some reason.
It was all they could do to keep ahead of the first mech as they drove across the plains towards the ravine where the rebels were waiting. Simon burned through three more flares on the way, but it didn't look like they were really necessary at this stage. The lead robot had closed the distance to twenty metres by the time their destination came into view. It was only pure luck that whoever had designed these machines had neglected to give them precise aiming with their underslung plasma cannons whilst running at full tilt.
With the car's engine roaring, they skidded through the divide in the cliffs, the mech now almost upon them.
Then came the first rocket, spiralling down from the cliff's edge above them. It struck the robot in the flank, causing it to stumble to one side and crash against the cliff face on the other side of the divide. To its credit, it almost managed to get back up again before a second rocket hit it in the rear, blowing away most of its internals and one of the side fins. A third rocket sealed its fate, blasting the burning wreckage into oblivion.
Then the second one came into view. It turned to regard its fallen twin for a split second, before rotating its upper half to face the cliff where the rockets had been fired from. The cannon muzzle under its main body spat purple fire at the cliffs, blasting large craters in the stone.
So intent on its task was it, the robot didn't even have time to turn when several rebels ran out from behind a boulder behind it. As one, they knelt and hefted their rocket launchers onto their shoulders. A volley of projectiles hit the mech full-on in the back in a cloud of smoke.
It sank to the ground with a clangour of rending metal and cooking ammunition. The rebels cheered and clapped each other on the back as they ran forward to extinguish the blaze and reclaim the valuable scrap from the two fallen giants.
The car rolled to a stop several metres away and Mike jumped out, as did Simon. Mike regarded the blaze with a smile.
'Two more of the bastards down,' he said. 'Wish I could get my hands on an intact one. Then we'd see what a mech-on-mech fight looks like.'
'Yeah,' said Simon, sitting on the bonnet of the car and watching the men direct fire extinguishers on the burning mechs.
'Hey, cheer up, bro,' said Mike. 'At least you've got something out of this day.'
'And what's that?'
'Well,' said Mike, clapping his brother on the back as he set off towards the wreckage. 'Now you've got inspiration for that painting of yours.'
| 9 | 0 | 29 | 172,609 |
[WP] After waking up in your home at 3:54am to a warning, you do what it specifically tells you not too.
|
*Hot. My legs are hot.*
I kicked one foot out from under my thick comforter and let it dangle in the cool air. The light breeze from the ceiling fan brought welcome relief. I inched my leg over the edge of the bed and pulled it back, bringing it out into the open, letting the cool breeze caress my skin.
*My throat is dry. I'm so thirsty.*
I reach slowly toward my nightstand, groping in the darkness for my cell phone. My hand bumped against it and it clattered off onto the floor.
*Damnit!*
I lay still for a moment, contemplating retrieving my phone from the floor. I sighed in frustration and threw my already exposed leg out into the darkness, trying to sit up slowly in hopes that I wouldn't fully wake up. My bare foot touched the cold laminate wood floor and sent a shiver up through my leg, into my abdomen, lingering, tingling in my shoulders and arms. I could feel the hair stand up on my exposed legs and I pulled my baggy t-shirt further down hoping to stave off the chill.
My vision was blurry from sleep and in the darkness I could see nothing. I stood still, hoping that my eyes would clear and adjust enough to see the outline of my phone on the floor. A few more seconds passed and I still could not see, so I reached toward my nightstand again for my glasses. I slid them on my face and opened my eyes wider, hoping the world would clear up enough for me to find the damn thing and and get back in bed before my residual body heat dissipated. Still nothing. The darkness was draped over the room like a thick velvet curtain. The feeling of uncertainty brushed the back of my mind.
*Shit. I'm awake.*
I dropped down to my knees and carefully inched one hand out in front of me, then the other, scooting my palms along the floor and probing with my fingertips. And then a light. A light so bright I had to shut my eyes against it. They ached in my skull and watered. I wiped the moisture away and peeped open one eye. The light was still there, and it was a small rectangle a foot in front of me, white and glaring. My phone. I picked it up and pushed the button on top to make it go dark again.
I stood up and stuck my arm out, feeling in the darkness for my mattress before I threw myself back onto it. I snuggled deep into the covers, pulling them over my head and trembling uncontrollably from the chill that had leaked into my body from the cold floor. When I felt my muscles relax from shivering, I stretched my legs out and pulled my glasses off, laying them on the nightstand. I put my phone on the bed, next to my pillow, and let myself begin to drift.
**BEEEEEEEEEE**
***BEEEEEEEEE BEEEEEEEE BEEEEEEEE BEEEEEEEEEE***
My heart thumped hard and loud. So loud I could hear it. My head pulsed with each beat. My skin crawled and my skull burned and I'm not sure if I made a noise in real life or if everything I was hearing was in my mind. My eyes flew open and were met with that same blinding white light coming from my phone. I snatched it up and furiously tapped the screen, pushed the button on top, smashed the down volume button. Finally the horrible, shrill beeping stopped. The screen remained lit like a hot white blowtorch in the darkness, glaring at me.
I strained my eyes to see the screen. It was white. No text. Nothing at all. Not even the battery symbol in the top corner. My heart was still beating too fast as I mashed the home button again and again. Nothing was happening. I was about to attempt to turn it off completely when the back light dimmed and the screen flickered from solid white to my home screen and back again. It settled on the home screen and I could see that the time was 3:54 a.m. And then it vibrated once as a message popped up on the screen.
Emergency Alert
I stared dumbly at it, wondering if I should read it or just go back to sleep. It buzzed again, another box illuminating the screen, taking the place of the first one as it filed into the background as an unchecked notification.
Warning: Emergency Alert System
A feeling of dread settled in the pit of my stomach. Its cold fingers reached out, dragging along inside of me as I shakily drew my thumb across box on the screen.
Please remain in your homes, if you are not at home, find shelter immediately. Close all blinds and shades, block out all windows.
Do not look outside.
Do not look at the sky.
Do not make noise.
Your cooperation is vital to your survival. Appointed government personnel will update you shortly.
I let go of my phone as if it were something hot burning my flesh. It landed gently beside me, the message still displayed on the screen.
*What is this? What is this??*
I glanced at the signal symbol - nothing. Not one single bar. The wi-fi symbol was showing no signal as well. I picked up my phone and used its light to find my glasses again, slipping them on quickly as I slid off my bed and padded softly towards my dresser.
*It is so dark. I wonder if there has been a power outage or...*
With my cell phone as my only available source of light, it took me longer than usual to find a pair of jeans. I laid my phone on top of my dresser facing up so the light would illuminate the room. It didn't help much. The darkness was gathered around me like a liquid, the light from my phone displacing it, but only slightly.
| 1 | 0 | 1,650 | 181,777 |
[WP] You are legally allowed to commit murder once, but you must fill out the proper paperwork and your proposed victim will be notified of your intentions
|
I thought I'd get there early, beat the lines. The Department of Legal Homicide opened at 9am. 9am was a foreign concept to me. Sometimes, in my insomniac's stupor, as dusk turned to deep, purple night and then back to rosy dawn, I'd imagine people waking up, making coffee, reading the paper, sitting down to toast. A life like that might as well have been on another planet. But still, I found myself getting into my car at half past eight, groggy, yes, but thrilled, invigorated with the light of the morning sun and the thought of death.
I pulled into the DLH parking lot at 8:50. The line was already halfway down the block. I knew that the program, since being put to a vote and passed late last year, was popular, but I still wasn't expecting this. I also wasn't expecting the sort of people I saw standing there, on a bright morning, hungry for blood. I'd expected dark souls, vagabonds, transients with tattooed knuckles and stringy black hair. But there were put together young men, in button-down shirts and khakis. There were old men, grey hair, stooped, in dingy corduroys, who looked like their years of bloodlust should have been well behind them.
And then there were the women. Young, beautiful women with golden hair and perfect skin, buzzing with life. And old, matronly women with deep creases on their faces, the kind you'd expect to make amazing soup from an ancient, secret recipe. The kind that has taught half the world's daughters how to love, and hate. And there I was, at the DLH, like a child getting his first driver's permit: scared, ecstatic, and relieved. I was so close.
Once inside, the line shortened. At the front of the queue was a single desk, with a single uniformed employee sitting behind it. They asked for my I.D., and handed me a form on a clipboard. She also gave me a number. "They'll call you shortly. Please have the paperwork filled out by the time you're called, or you will forfeit your place in line."
With that, I took a seat on a hard, plastic chair. The form was straightforward: My name and address, my intended victim's name and address, and a place to sign on the bottom. That was all. No reason for killing, no place to list my grievances, nothing.
After what seemed like an eternity, my number was called. The agent in charge of my case looked over my paperwork, signed their name next to mine and stamped the form with a huge, heavy stamp that exuded importance.
"You're all set," they said.
"That's it?"
"That's it."
"And, they'll know it's happening?"
"Yes, we will notify them for you."
"How do you do it?" I asked.
"They'll get a certified letter. Do they know to expect it?"
"They do, yes."
"Good," the agent replied, "That makes things easier."
"Have you seen a case like this before?" I asked. I didn't know why I was prolonging the conversation, but there was something comforting about the agent's stark, bureaucratic formality.
"Yes. It's quite common, actually. We have a whole file set aside for patricide."
With that, a wave of relief swept over me. There were others. Many others, waking up early, making toast, reading the newspaper. Others, living their entire, normal lives, waiting for the moment, the exact perfect moment, to kill their fathers.
I took my paperwork and left. I was full of life, leaving the DLH with an exuberance I hadn't felt in years. I don't remember a single thing about the drive to my father's house. I could have run every red light without knowing it. It wasn't until I pulled into his driveway that the gravity of the situation hit me. That this was finally happening.
I've never lost the key to his house, and pulling it out on his front porch, I was overcome with a sense of nostalgia. This key, this tool of entry from one world to another: a secret you share with only those you love and trust. This was one of the last times I'd be using it. Just one more tie to sever. It fit easily in the lock.
I walked through the living room. None of the lights were on. I could already smell death in this house, he'd been dragging his fetid robes across the tattered carpets for months already. Waiting, like I'd waited, impatiently, hungrily.
I turned into his bedroom. There he was, in his grey room, on his grey bed, the mattress bowed in the middle like a hammock. It was quiet, except for the repeated, mechanical hiss and whirr of the ventilator. I sat next to him, looked into his cloudy blue eyes. I thought, for a second, he recognized me, but I could never be sure anymore. I kissed him lightly on the forehead. I said "I love you." Then I unplugged the machine.
Walking out, into the bright light of day, I saw a pair of morning doves on a telephone wire. I heard a dog bark. I saw cars coming and going in their busy ways. I felt everything. I took it all in. And it was fine.
edit: comma
Edit2: I woke up to an inbox full of nice things. Thank you!
| 4,946 | 6 | 2,206 | 26,594 |
[WP] CONTEST: Flesh out this story, winner gets a $100 Amazon gift card
|
"They say that life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer you get to the end, the faster it goes."
"Who says this?" The old man opened his eyes. The same familiar room at the hospital welcomed him. He wrinkled his nose, "Ugh, smells like death in here. Death and that horrible antiseptic they only use in hospitals."
"I wouldn't know too much about that. My company works with neurology, mostly," the tall man wore a suit and had glasses and a large e-pad with him. "And the toilet paper analogy? Something they say around the office, I suppose."
"I suppose," the old man said and lay in his bed. There was a moment of silence, broken by the old man's coughing fit. Then the old man talked once again, "You want me to sign off on this procedure?"
"Yes, please."
"What does it do again?"
"My firm, IbbaCore has developed a method which stimulates the memory. It will allow you to experience all the remembered details of your life in high clarity. We're moving out of the animal experimental stage and would like your permission to use it on yourself."
"Because I'm terminal? Fuck lung cancer," the old man coughed once more, "So you want to have my life flash before my eyes like in all them stories?"
"Well, yes. But far more scientifically. We just hook a few electrodes to your skull, put on what we're calling the IbbaCore helmet on you, then you take a drug which induces a feeling that's been described as being half asleep and half awake. Then you see your life in high definition."
The old man thought and then nodded, "What the hell? It can't do much worse to me than the cigarettes. Where do I sign?"
"Right here," the suited man held out his e-pad and got the old man's signature. Then he put the pad away and opened up a large case that was sitting by his feet, "Please hold still while I place these four electrodes on your head. They have medical grade paste on them to keep them in place, but they may feel a little cold."
"Get on with it," the old man lay in his bed as the circular disks were placed on his skull.
"Now the helmet," the helmet was large and made of plastic and had various LED-studded boxes attached to it. The suited man got out his e-pad and checked the settings, "Excellent. Everything looks good. Now take these two pills."
The old man swallowed the medicine and drank the provided water. Then he waited. And waited, "Now what?"
"Wait for it," the suited man said.
"Wait for whaaaaaaaaAaaAAAaaa," his own voice fell away, along with the hospital and the rest of the world. The old man's eyes started darting rapidly.
He was four years old, hiding in the laundry basket and believing it to be the funniest practical joke ever. But when his mother came in, he couldn't hold in his laughter. "There you are!" said the auburn-haired woman as she lifted the giggling boy up into her arms.
He was in his sixties, bitter and alone. His life's work was taken from him, but he managed to get a nice retirement out of the deal. He sat on porch of his beach-side home, smoking a cigarette and reading the newspaper. He threw the paper down in disgust, "Those young bucks are running it into the ground."
He was in his teens and had just found out what his father did. He was riding his bike through the darkened streets, glancing back and forth to the address on the piece of scrap paper clutched in his hand. He stopped, got off the bike, and picked up a large rock. "This is what you get when you don't pay my father," he said as he chucked it through the front window of the store.
He was in his fifties and sitting at a restaurant along with four other people. "We can do this two ways, you know," said the man with the brown fedora and matching suit. "If we go in guns blazing, the town will fall apart. Plus we'd get far too much unwanted attention."
"It's basic game theory," said the tall young man in the solid black suit, "If we do this democratically, we all win. If we fight this out amongst ourselves, we all loose."
He, himself, took a long drink of whiskey and puffed on his cigarette, "You're right. Damn it all to hell, but you're right. We'd need cash for our retirements, of course. Something that will let us live in comfort."
"But of course," said the tall young man.
He took another long drag on the cigarette and sighed, "Fine, I'm in." That was the cue for all the others to start nodding.
He took another puff and then looked up, "None of you... have none of you seen her? I mean, spotted her or anything?"
All the other men at the table shook their heads, "Sorry." "No sight of her." "We'll keep looking, alright." He nodded in resignation.
He was young, powerful, in his thirties, and in love, "You're all I can think about," he told her. She was young and pretty and her hair was done on a fashionable style and her whole face lit up with a smile when he told her this, "We've been seeing each other for three years now. I.. I want that to continue. You know what kind of business I do, and yet you still support me. Hell, you've even had my back on some of the jobs. Vince is planning to retire and he wants me to take up the business. That means we could have that little beach house you've always liked. I figure we'll work for a little while and then I'll pass on the reigns to some young buck and then we could start a family. But first, would you consider marrying me?"
She answered by leaping into his arms and giving him the most passionate kiss they've ever shared. When they broke apart, he said, breathing heavily, "I take it that's a yes?"
They were in their forties and it was a day like most others. He came home, stopping briefly only to wipe off the lipstick stain off of his neck. He saw that she was working in the garden. He thought he saw something shiny and silver being placed into the hole she had dug before being covered up by a small rose bush. But when he looked at her, she had a troubled expression on her face. She tried to cover it up, but he saw, "Is everything alright, honey?"
"Of course, everything is fine," I could see the beginning of a little bulge on her stomach.
I asked, "Still don't want to ask the doctor to tell us if it would be a girl or a boy?"
"Nope. I'd like it to be a surprise," we kissed. There was something wrong with the kiss.
"Is something wrong, hon?"
"Nothing is wrong," she turned around put on her coat. When she thought I couldn't see, she slipped her 9mm revolver into her purse, "I'm just going out for a little bit. I'll see you soon, love."
She lied.
He never saw her again."
"Hello? Hello? Are you back with us?" the voice brought the old man back into the hotel room.
"I'm here," he said woozily.
"Good," said the tall suited man, "Now I want you to concentrate on your memories. Try to remember. Where did she hide the key?"
The old man groaned, "Rose."
The tall man shook his head, "That wasn't her name."
"I know that," the old man scowled and erupted into another coughing fit. He took a long sip of water from a nearby plastic hospital cup, but he was still feeling groggy. Everything was spinning like a bad hangover, "Ugh, I meant the rose bush in our old home. I saw her burying something shiny under it."
The tall suited man got up and took off the helmet, placing it back into the case. He gently ripped off the electrodes, "Thank you for your assistance."
The tall man grabbed one of the pillows and fluffed it up, casually moving it towards the old man's mouth. Only for another coughing fit to interrupt him. He put the fluffed pillow back onto the bed and said with quiet disgust, "You're not worth it. It won't matter soon, anyways."
The old man closed his eyes and tried to shake off the woozy feeling. Then he opened his eyes and stared at the tall man in the nice suit, "You look kind of like her, you know. You have her nose, her cheek bones. But there's nothing of me in you, is there? Not a drop."
The young man paused at the door, "No. Not a drop."
And then he left.
| 1 | 0 | 34 | 159,757 |
[WP] Show me an affair where I feel pity for the lovers.
|
He pulled away from her soft lips, and warmth, and left her laying there on the couch. She only stared at the ceiling, and he wished she would get angry or say something. Anything. He sat up, and twirled his wedding band around his finger. "I'm just not sure about this."
She blinked and turned her head towards him. "I know."
He ran his hands through his hair and stood up. The moonlight shined through the window panes, and cast a blue tint over the entire living room. He walked over and stared out over the city. The millions of people going about their business, sure some of them had problems: they had late rent to cover, and sick relatives, and cars that were on their last pistons, but something about their problems made them seem alright.
The wood floor creaked behind him, and suddenly, her arms enveloped him, and her warm head rested on his shoulder looking out over the city with him. He could feel the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed. Healthy lungs pushing blood and oxygen out to her muscles. The No. 9 perfume he gave her last week wafted up around them.
He wanted to look her in the eyes, but maybe it was better this way. "Look, I'm just not-. I mean I just keep thinking of her, of seeing her today. For two months," he shook his head. "For two months now all she does is groan in pain. Doesn't even know I'm there. I see her body just wasting away, but I know what it was like before all this. When we climbed Mt. Washington, and camped, and --. And now it's nothing. It's winding down and coming to that slow grinding halt that all of us will have to bear."
Her grip around his waist tightened. "I know."
He turned toward her and gripped her shoulders. "Sometimes, I imagine what her parents would think of me if they were still alive. They used to love me. Sort of became my surrogate parents when my dad finally died. And now I wonder if they would hate me."
She looked up at him and caressed the side of his face. "Why would they hate you, James?"
Inside him, everything he had endured the last two years, the stuff that had been building and building with nowhere for him to put it, felt ready to burst. Something had been knocked loose earlier in the day. "For letting this happen to her," he sobbed. "For not being there right now. We were best friends. We always had each others backs, and now she's alone, and in pain, and waiting in a sterile room for all of it to end."
She wiped away his tears, and kissed his hands. "They would be grateful she had a man like you to take care of her, to give her the best medicine, and to spend so much time with her."
He sniffled, and looked down at the floor. "What about her, what would she think?"
She looked up at him and smiled. "She would want you to have someone to share your burden with, James. She wouldn't want you to face it alone, just like you're not letting her face it alone."
"I wish she could talk, and--"
"I know, hon. I know."
| 7 | 0 | 9 | 108,006 |
[WP] In 200 words or less, introduce a sinister protagonist and make me sympathize with him/her/it.
|
Saleena slumped into her bed paging through a well-worn copy of *Alister's Cantrips Vol 3 (T-Z)*. She adjusted the dress that clung to her with sweat. The ramshakle one room shack did little to keep out the muggy swamp air. She flipped through a few pages and stopped. The page title read *Touch of Fatigue (Necromancy)*.
She sat up and scanned the page. It detailed instructions on making a person instantly exhausted. It included a three step hand movement, and the words *Izerdi tanta bat eta orain jaregin*. Saleena practiced the words and motions expertly.
This time he wouldn't touch her.
A rhythmic splashing noise singled a boat was approaching. Saleena's heart sunk into her stomach. With a trembling hand she reached into a box under her bed and took out a knife, placing it under a pillow behind her. She heard hollow wooden knocking sounds of the boat docking, followed by drunken cursing and heavy footsteps.
Her father was home.
She looked down at the book one more time: *Verbal component: one drop of sweat*. Easy enough. She tied her red curls back and squeezed a drop of sweat on her fingertip. She sat poised. The door slammed open.
| 2 | 0 | 16 | 228,340 |
[WP] There really is a Salmon of Knowledge. However there is also a Salmon of Stupidity and they are completely indiscernible from each other. You won't know which one you have caught until the first bite ...
|
The legend attracted me, the stories of a magical fish that would increase your intellect beyond all measure, the Salmon of Knowledge. It was a fun thing to think about as I drowned worms and caught the lesser, yet still tasty, denizens if the stream. Of course, there was always the chance that I would catch the other fish, the Salmon of Stupidity.
A fifty-fifty shot. What man would pass by the opportunity to have the most brilliant mind on the planet?
But years of patience were finally rewarded, and before me was the fruit of my labor: A beautiful, delicious, salmon, glowing with ethereal light.
Doubt assailed me as I cooked it. What if I became too stupid to breathe? Or just sat in a corner and drooled all day?
I forced those doubts away. Cancer needed a cure. The economy needed repair. Mankind deserved to walk among the stars.
I would eat the fish.
It was delicious. The first bite was indescribable and I could feel the mystical power expanding my thoughts.
Bite after bite, my knowledge grew and expanded. I uncovered a small gem of wisdom that was so obvious it astounded me:
*The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wise people so full of doubts.*
It was so obvious, and I smiled in my new found knowledge.
"You know," I thought to myself, taking another delicious bite. "I think I'll be voting for the Tea Party this year. Those guys seem to really know what they're doing."
| 2 | 0 | 9 | 148,791 |
[WP] You are a schizophrenic maddeningly in love with the man/woman of your dreams. But you're becoming increasingly unsure if she's real, or just another hallucination.
|
I had been lonely, and she had been there.
She was my best friend at the time, Jen, but she was manipulative, using me for attention, and nothing more. But that Jen was gone.
The only one left was the one in my head. Tulpa-Jen, it seemed so rational at the time. Of course, in those maddened dark days, everything seemed rational. Cracking open peach pits to get at the cores seemed rational. Saving up apple seeds just in case seemed rational. Creating a mental double of the girl I had loved, loved, so dearly loved and yet was rejected by, seemed so very rational indeed.
At night, she would come and visit me. I loved her for it. The real Jen was vindictive, petty, an emotional vampire, but surely the Jen of the mind couldn't become like that. She lived only in my imagination, of course. Still, I had fun with her. A million conversations, rapture, heavenly bliss, bliss and tranquility.
I began to feel tired more often than usual though. Slept more hours than I was awake, lived more in the dream than in reality. She was beautiful, and better yet, she was mine. She could never betray me, could she? She was only a dream-form, something of flash but no substance.
But there came a time when I started to doubt it. Tulpa-Jen, she began to resemble her real version more and more. The arguments slipped into my dreams. The mockery of the real Jen twisted itself into my head, and I internalized it, I guess.
She began to ask why I didn't spend more time with her. Worse still, when I found a woman who enjoyed spending time with me in my waking hours, she awoke in daylight. Mocking, and berating, she told me that no one could ever love me the way she did.
I felt drained. And so I inadvertently ended up pushing away many of the girls I could have loved, would have loved, if fate and the Tulpa had allowed it. I was constantly tired now.
On the eve of Christmas, I realized I was sleeping more than I was awake. Twenty hours in the dream-world, four in the real one. My health was declining. I was emaciated, my eyes sunken in my skull like a junkie.
She had become more real than I thought she was. And she was eating me alive.
| 2 | 0 | 253 | 86,500 |
[WP] Canada has taken over the world.
|
Dear Citizen:
This letter is to inform you of several impending changes regarding your benefits/duties as a member of the Great Canadian Empire.
**First:** Due to a recent surplus in the production of coffee by our more tropical Provinces, we are increasing the mandatory consumption of *Tim Horton's* coffee to ¾ of a litre per day. As in the past, we request that those of you who would prefer to drink decaffeinated coffee contact your local *Tim Horton's* council, so that they can make appropriate purchases for your sub-province. If enough citizen fail to do so, we will be forced to issue ration cards to all citizens in your sub-province, and distribute coffee according the cards. This would be a hassle for all involved, so please do accurately report your anticipated consumption of decaffeinated coffee. *Remember: no one likes a hoser.*
**Second:** Because it was deemed cruel to increase the mandatory consumption of coffee without an increase in the allotment of donuts, we are also increasing the ration of donuts to 1.5 per day. This increase is *not* mandatory and may be taken in one of two ways. Either, you may choose to take one extra donut every other day (last names starting with 'A-L' on even days, all others on odd days), or you may take three donut holes on every day. Again, we ask that you report your choice to the local *Tim Horton's* council for your sub province, and please do honor your choice. Please do not force us to issue ration cards for donuts. *Remember: no one likes a hoser.*
**Third:** By popular referendum, the following provinces have voted to add additional official languages, in addition to the Queen's English.
|**Province**|**Language**|
|:----------------|:----------------|
|Arkansas | American English|
|California|American English, Spanish|
|Portugal| Portuguese|
|Utah| American English|
|Zimbabwe |Shona|
All signages in these provinces *must* be written in all official languages. For American English versus the Queen's English, this includes substitutions such as 'color' for 'colour' and 'aluminum' for aluminium.' Please respect the cultures of these provinces, and see to it that these signage requirements are met. *Remember: no one likes a hoser.*
**Fourth:** The CHL will be expanded to 58 teams. Added are teams from New Auckland (The Snakes) and Greater South Delhi (The Daal). Please make the fans of these teams at home when they are visiting your arena. We have had recent reports of unacceptable behavior at many of the CHL games, including (but not limited to):
- pushing in line
- not holding doors for those behind you
- not saying 'Thank you' to those holding doors
Quite frankly, I am shocked that I must remind you that this is unacceptable behavior for the citizens of our Great White Empire. In order to combat this behavior, I have authorized the Mounties of CHL cities to use stronger language when on duty at CHL games. In extreme cases, citizen may be recommended to see one of the many fine psychiatric doctors that are included in your health care. In order to avoid this, simply be polite to others. I refer you to the white rule: 'treat others as Canadians would treat them.' *Remember: no one likes a hoser.*
This concludes this announcement. We are continually striving to improve our Great White Empire, and I hope that you will find these changes improve your experience as citizens. We realize that these will not be satisfactory for all of our citizens, and we urge those of you who dislike them to appeal them at your local sub-province governmental chambers.
Until the next time, we apologize for any inconvenience. Sorry.
Margaret Steele
Prime Emperor
Canadian Empire
| 1 | 0 | 148 | 197,069 |
[WP] Humanity is the idiot savant of the galaxy. We're terrible at almost everything compared to every other race, but we surpass them in spades in one thing.
|
They couldn't believe it. That what took a son of the High Houses of Arkora ten thousand years to master was done by a human of the Servant class. Not a warrior, but a mere servant! How this was done he hadn't the slightest idea, but whatever magic the human knew, it seemed to work with addition and subtraction.
Their scanners showed that the human should have barely been able to learn Arkoran mathematics, his head was simply too small. Barely three pebbles in weight, Gelthan wondered how this human could demonstrate knowledge of addition and subtraction so competently. He had a thought come to mind, one of the sage's writings from the very first age of confederation, back when he was but a young Glarg of barely twenty.
"Reach outside what you have seen, think of something utterly impossible, and try it. At worst, you prove again that it's impossible, at best you've made it possible."
"Very Good Human," he said, "Now, how about adding
1,357,924,680 to 987,654,321?"
"Can I have a pen and piece of paper?" asked the human.
Being that he was still a man of honor, and the question was impossible, Gelthan obliged. At the same time, he entered the equation into the ships mighty data engine, and waited for it to churn the results. The gears began to clank noisily as they had always done, bringing a new number to enter into the math tables.
The number 2,345,579,001 was written onto the paper before the gears had even finished spinning up. Within 5 minutes, the machine's dials came to the exact same answer.
In the coming days, it became apparent that the human mind was radically different from anything even Norsenti science (as the Norsenti himself put it) "Could have ever imagined coming across before."
They were slow witted and slower moving, weak, small, and un-cultured creatures, yet the human race had one thing that no other species in the galaxy had: capacity for understanding.
| 4 | 0 | 768 | 82,713 |
[CW] Write a scene between 2 or more characters using only dialogue
|
"You know what I miss?"
"Hmm?"
"Coffee, man. Fuckin' coffee. Not that substitute-shit."
" ... "
"And bacon. God, I love bacon."
"... If you say so, dude."
"You know what else I love?"
"I'm sure you'll tell me in a sec-"
"Pussy! Complete with a georgeous women with biiig ti-"
"Oh my god. Could you be any more stereotypical?!"
"What? What the hell dude? I'm just trying to make conversation!"
"Conversation? Does this fucking equate to conversation to you? You telling me that you love coffee and have the mindset of a college-frat-bro?! That's 'conversation' to you?!"
"You don't have to be such a dick about it! I was just trying to be nice!"
"Trying to be *nice*? *Snort* Give me a fucking break! Ever since I came up here, you've been pestering me with your boring-ass antics about 'how you totally banged that hot chick, bro!' or how you 'messed up that four-eyed science nerd, bro!'. You know what? I'm fucking sick of it! I took this fucking job in part to get away from people like you, but even here, in the back of beyond, I manage to get paired up with the one guy who can't shut his fucking mouth about his stupid preferences in women that would be more at home in a cartoon or ... or in the last century! You're fucking sexist, you know that? If I had a daughter, you'd be the reason I wouldn't let her date until she took a self-defense-class! No wonder all of your girlfriends didn't last long! You're insufferable!
" ... "
"What, no snappy comeback? No 'Oh snap' or 'Sick burn, bro'? Got nothing like that for me?"
" ..."
"Oh what now. You're seriously going to start to cry now?"
" ... "
"Oh come on! I ... Come on man. I ..."
" ... "
" *Sigh* I didn't mean it, okay, man?"
"No ... no you did. But that's okay. You know why? Because you're right. I'm a stupid piece of shit that didn't deserve all the good things that happened to him in his life. I'm not as smart or funny or clever as other people, and I try to make up for it with this tough-guy exterior. And you know why, Jason?"
"Come on, man ... I didn't ..."
"Because I'm a **dumb fuck** Jason, that's why! I didn't want to admit it to myself, but I'm pretty fucking **stupid**! I wish I wasn't, but you can't change your nature, Jason!"
" ... "
"So there. There you have it."
" ... "
"I'm sure you and the others are going to have a *biiiig* laugh about it at dinner tonight. About how 'that big fucking dumbass Sam had this emotional breakdown and cried like a little baby'!"
" ... "
"Well I'm not going to be there to hear it! I'll hand in my resignation tonight. Then you'll get someone smarter as your partner. Someone who's on the same intellectual level as you! Someone who's not a **joke**."
"Sam!"
"What, Jason? Do you want to laugh in my face right now? Is that it?"
"No. Two things: First. I don't think you're stupid. You're a damn good scientist and one hell of a partner. Your antics are just a little bit ... annoying, that's all. If you tone them down, I don't mind."
" ... and second?"
"Second: I got you something."
"What's that. Is that a ... you remembered my birthday?"
"Of course, you big baby. What kind of a partner would I be if I didn't?"
" ... "
" ... "
"Okay, that sounded *way* more homoerotic than I intended it to be. Open your present before we accidentally kiss."
"Is that ... real coffee and bacon?"
"Yup. Got them shipped in last week."
"I ... don't know what to say."
"And another thing. I wont mention your little outburst before to anyone. Your secret is safe with me."
" ... "
"Woah, easy there, big guy! Yeah, okay. Let's hug, that's a thing. Reaaaaally long and harder and harder andharderandSamI^can't^breathe."
"Oh, sorry, dude."
"*Cough* Ah, it's alright."
"Thanks man. I really mean it. Thank you."
"No problem, man. Now let's get back to work before they take it out of our pay like last time."
"Sure thing."
| 2 | 0 | 23 | 19,637 |
[WP] Tell me about a hero who has the powers of a slasher movie villain/monster
|
No words.
These creatures don't deserve words.
I hunt them without a sound. When I was young, I yelled at them. I yelled at the top of my lungs. I called them evil, disgusting, viscous monsters.
Those words didn't stop them from doing what they did.
So now I walk silently to the barn. One of them is inside there now. I can hear his heavy breathing. He might have been able to escape if he had ran for the cornfield. Then again, I probably just would have burnt it down.
He's in that stack of hay. I can see him. I don't let on right away. I want to see what he'll try to do.
Sometimes they try to fight against me. I have died three times and come back. They believe that if they are strong enough to knock my knife away, then stab me with it, they'll escape.
It's funny.
Time and time again, I hunt the remainder. There's about three of them left now, I think. Out of the original 10.
Oh, two now. The meat cleaver I just threw beheaded that one. I wasn't even sure that was physically possible. Oh well. I've come back from the dead so I really shouldn't be the one to debate what is and isn't possible.
I remember when I was only 8 years old, after they had killed my family, and after the word monster left my lips, they had laughed. Then they bit the shit out of me. Then one of them took a mirror and hit me in the face with it, breaking the mirror and my nose. He handed it to me.
"Look who's the monster now?"
I just pushed that one's head into an industrial-sized fan conveniently sitting in the living room. It was nice of them to leave all this stuff for me to kill them with around.
One more to go.
| 1 | 0 | 2 | 140,940 |
[WP] In the far future, mankind has achieved immortality, but only at the cost of fertility. There is a small under-developed community of mortal humans that the immortals keep around, in order to take their babies whenever one of them dies (due to unnatural causes).
|
They said it was an honor, a privilege to have The Gift. We should be grateful. We get to have children and avoid the burden of immortality. They support us, they coddle us, they protect us from the horrors of the world in exchange for our fertility. The Carriers are blessed, or so they say.
They think we don't see.
They think we don't notice how the elderly die younger than they used to in the Old Times. As if they might not be worth keeping around once they can no longer procreate. They think we turn a blind eye to the young people who die in mysterious accidents soon after finding out that a medical condition prevents them from having children. They think we don't notice that the parents of particularly beautiful children tend to commit suicide or have tragic accidents more often than the rest of us.
They're supposed to be benevolent, caring for us and providing loving homes to our children if we should die early. We're supposed to be grateful, live peacefully under their rule while they control our lives. They are not what they claim, but they will soon find out that neither are we. Tonight, we rise. Tonight, the Carriers become the Eternals.
Edit: Confusing wording
| 2 | 0 | 7 | 220,066 |
[WP] Underground complexes randomly appear across the world, containing physics-defying treasures and monsters that threaten the local ecosystem. Dungeon Crawling becomes a modern profession.
|
**Part I**
"Look, all I'm saying is, if this is actually a Class Five, we could be looking at a situation we're not prepared for."
Steve had this habit of naysaying during our drives to a job. During the first few months, when people were still getting worked up into a frenzy about things, it used to be a problemhe'd get going, someone would get spooked, and there'd be a fight. More than one of our contracts had been voided because a scuffle had hospitalized someone, and we weren't about to go into a dungeon with a man down. Fortunately, as people came and left the team, we'd found a group of regulars and reserves that worked well together... even when Steve went on his rants.
Personally, I never had a problem tuning him out. Everybody had their pre-crawl rituals. Some people prayed, some people blasted music, others (like me) completely zoned. Steve, he talks. And talks and talks. You do what you gotta to get through these things, and once you see the rituals for what they are, Steve's isn't so bad. Its actually gotten to be almost comforting.
"...the Omega Black team found themselves in a falling ceiling trap after misreading the runes, only three guys out of their twenty man raid came back..."
My gaze was out the window of our SUV. We'd recently upgraded from Sheryl's hatchback (thank God) after a particularly good run two weeks ago, and you'd be surprised how much difference a little legroom can make in your day. I wasn't about to start gnawing on my shield for lack of room. It's the little things.
We arrived at the location before sunrise. A nondescript location, the only way you'd tell something was amiss was from the teltale symbols surrounding the warehouse's door. They'd started popping up about three years ago; nobody knew exactly *how* or *why* the dungeons appeared, but we all knew approximately *what* took place. At a point in time when nobody else was around, certain places would bleed over into anothe reality. A building could become an evil wizard's tower, a golf course could become an unholy graveyard, stocked with the walking dead. The military originally tried to respond with tanks, planes, etc, but soon found out that even if they blew up the location, it would come back in a day or two, worse than before. It wasn't until a few sites got *really* nasty that people discovered the only way to restore the location to its original form was to go in with boots on the ground and clear it out the old fashioned way.
And that's where we come in. The army is too busy keeping borders secure after the mass hysteria pushed some countries into a state of hyperaggresion, and the cops have their hands busy with the doomsaying from the end-of-the-world nuts. So, they toss us a couple bucks to go clear the dungeons out. The nastier the place, the bigger the bounty.
| 3 | 0 | 8 | 25,902 |
[WP] The villain offers our hero "one last chance to join him or die". The hero joins him.
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Jeremy tried to breathe but only managed to cough up blood on his suit, he couldnt use his powers without proper breathing. The city around him was an infernal husk of the Bohemia he used to know. The streets were cracked and covered in shrapnel and debree. Non of the beautiful skyscrapers that dotted its skyline had a single intact glass left in them. All the people ran away. A half burned flier flew above him, It had "Soundscape Studios" written on it, the studio he and Turner opened. Now its rubble, like the rest of the city. Are these the repercussions that Turner was talking about? Was the great Manifesto the problem all along?
He fell on his back to see the sky obstructed by a giant cloud of smoke from all the fires, he was to blame. The sound of footsteps drew closer to him, it was over.
"I didnt want it to end like this Manifesto!" A shout echoed through the empty streets. "I gave you a choice!" The voice drew nearer. "Oh to hell with formalities, Look at you Jeremy." Spoke Carnivore, his eyes no longer glowing crimson, but instead, showed nothing but pity and sadness. "I tried to be reasonable but you threw it all away. I tried to explain to you that yes, I do have my fingers in a couple if dirty pies but it was truly for a noble cause." He tried to speak honestly but it still sounded taunting to him.
"You were backing up slave traders, arms merchants and warlords. How can you justify that?!" Jeremy tried to retort, barely able to speak a word without suffocating further on his own blood.
"If you knew the things I know my dear boy, If you could see beyond this illusion of black and white, you could see how the people that run this country are no better than these corrupt thugs I was funding." He tried to explain as calmly as possible. "I was doing this for us, so that we will have a safe haven in case this happened!" He pointed his hands at their surroundings. "I was doing this to escape such situation! But you had to go behind my back and make sure all ties were severed! That everything was destroyed!" Carnivore snapped for a moment, but quickly regained his posture. "So you're saying the ends were supposed to justify the means?" Jeremy tried to mutter without sounding like a scratchy record. "As I said, you saw only in black and white. I should have explained to you earlier what I am doing and what kind of information I have access to, but sadly I was to late. You were only trying to do what you thought was right." Carnivore sighed. he took of his mask. he no longer cared, he was just Martin Turner now to the only person left beside him. "Yeah and just after I attacked you and all hell broke loose, the government decided to evacuate the city and wipe out the other factions. Seems convenient." Jeremy's sudden realization made him laugh. Which was backed up by a sudden surge of pain and another bloody cough. "Ow, that hurt, dont make me laugh Mr. Turner, OK?"
"Marty, my dear boy, you both agreed that you would call me Marty. Now hang on, I know how resilient you are, you can handle anything I throw at you. " Turner said, gently picking up Jeremy's limp body.
"Heh, I know, but I dont think anything you'd do will make me choke on my own blood so much. I think its that strange gas the planes dusted over the city. Must've fucked up my lungs or something." He was becoming paler by the instant. Turner made a mad dash for the closest hospital, oxygen tanks, defibrillators, anything! There must be something can help him there!
"I think you were right Marty, maybe I was blind, maybe you were right all along. After all you are holding me, not the people I tried to help countless times." Marty tried to pickup the pace, his condition was worse than he thought. "Stay with me Jeremy, STAY WITH ME BOY!".
"Get out of here, disappear, continue your craft somewhere else. People will need you for who you really are. Regardless of what they are or who they think you are, and remember, even if our views may differ and we wont always see eye to eye. I will always be with you and I will always love you." The last breath.
Carnivore stopped. Surrounded by the burnt and empty shell of the beautiful city of Bohemia, holding the now dead body of his adversary and lover. He was alone.
| 1 | 0 | 62 | 123,070 |
[WP] You pour yourself a glass of juice. It doesn't end up like you expected.
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"Why did I piss off that Djinn," I wondered to myself. Weeks ago, I'd bought an antique lamp. While dusting it, a strange, barely human form burst from the center of it. From all around me, a voice boomed, "You have freed me from my prison, and as such get three wishes." I replied, cheesily, "Well, I wish for an unlimited amount of wishes, and your complete obedience." The being replied, in a very clear tone, "Mortal, you'll use them all wishing you hadn't said that," and promptly disappeared.
Certain it had only been a dream, as I woke up to find the lamp gone the next day, I went about my life, though with a feeling of unease. This day, however, nothing had been going my way. My alarm had woken my up at three in the morning. Upon hitting the snooze button, my hand weighed a tad too heavy on it, dragging it to plummet down upon my foot. And only ten minutes after, when trying to pour myself orange juice, the plastic seal was still on it. "I just want to pour myself a glass of orange juice!" I yelled, and removed the plastic seal. "Ask and ye shall receive," the Djinn whispered to himself.
As I tipped the bottle, I was horrified to find that I was seeing from the orange juice's perspective, being poured into the glass. Looking up at my empty husk, I watched it pour the rest of the cup perfectly full of my new body and replace it in the fridge, then promptly collapse. I was doomed to spend eternity as orange juice.
| 3 | 0 | 4 | 21,651 |
[WP] From birth everyone shares their dreams (sleeping) with one other person in the world.
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I fling two of dreamblockers into my mouth and hastily swallow them down, chasing them with water and a valium. I exhale heavily as I sit on the edge of my bed. You're usually only meant to take one dreamblocker, but last night for the first time since prescription, the blackness was interrupted. I wasn't going risk it happening again tonight.
My husband pulled the blanket up to his neck and wiggled around getting comfortable. Prick. He can never quite wait to go to sleep, always claiming to be tired and napping at every moment possible. You'd think him narcoleptic but really, he's just in love with his dream partner. His secret sorrow is that he will never know her in the real world. He thinks he hides it well. He doesn't.
He slowly drifts off with a smile on his face as I weakly support my drooping head, resisting sleep as best I can. The valium was meant to help calm me down, but instead I feel like a prisoner on death row being led to their execution. My body crumbles. Darkness
.
This isn't right. I shouldn't be this aware of the darkness. I can feel energy in my limbs but I'm not in the real world any more. I try to sustain my breath, and keep myself here in limbo. If I'm not sleeping, limbo is the next best thing. I close my eyes. I close my eyes? Shit. If I'm aware of blinking I'm sliding into the dream world. My heartbeat intensifies and a blinding light overcomes my consciousness.
I'm back again, to where I was last night. It's an open and tranquil field, miles of grass surround me in every direction. I'm frantically circling around trying to find him.
"Come back to play?" I hear his drawl mocking me from behind. I swiftly spin around and meet his gaze. He's carrying a bloodied machete. A long night of running ahead.
| 3 | 0 | 20 | 59,172 |
[WP] Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 lands in Beijing Airport, 3 Months late - passengers claim to have flown as normal.
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Many of them look appropriately dazed, as much by what happened as by the flashing lights and the yelling and the swarm of family and strangers alike. We were told the date as soon as we landed, and we were all shocked. Most for the reasons you'd expect, wondering where the time went, why they were part of this, what it all meant.
For others, like me, we were just shocked that it was *only* three months. It felt like a hell of a lot longer for those of us who remember.
There are too many questions that can never be answered, even if there are those few of us who actually *can* answer some of them. We won't. We musn't.
We've been warned.
I steel myself as I exit the aircraft at last. The violent streaks of camera light, my name echoing in a thousand unfamiliar voices - I ignore it all, walk past. "Captain Shah! Captain Shah," they all cry out and though, even after 30 plus years of flying, the title still fills me with pride, I do not respond to it. Like the majority of passengers, I have the expected shell-shocked look. It's at least a little genuine; the reporters are ferocious and nearly impossible to shove past, but I do it.
And finally, I see her.
My beloved Faizah, trying her best to hide her tears behind her smile and utterly failing. I run to her and as I hold her like my life depended on it, I feel some sadness creep against the edges of my immense relief. There's so much I want to say, so much she would want to hear, and I can give her none of it. I sigh against her shoulder. We cry together for a few moments.
Exhausted and safe in her arms, it isn't long before I find myself speaking four simple words. I am powerless to stop them as they spill from my mouth into my wife's ear.
"It wasn't my fault," I whisper.
| 3 | 0 | 613 | 71,304 |
[WP] You wake up one morning and find the devil at the foot of your bed. His eyes find yours, he taps your foot and says, "You're it," then disintegrates.
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There are those nights you wake in a sweat, knowing your room isn't empty. You don't dare open yours eyes and make the nightmare real,at least that's how it works when you're 5. But even then at 23, I didn't want to, I ... I just... KNEW.. something else was there.
But I did, and those red eyes are all I can remember now. That piercing stare telling me I'm it. Confusion is the only thing left once the panic left me. I had never been a believer, never needed God in my life. In the following months I had found more men of God than I ever thought could exist. Catholics, Muslims, Baptists, Hindus, I travelled anywhere to ask what they thought happened. Probably the only man in history to be turned away from every house of God. Even the Jehovah's witnesses took me off their route. These pious folks would meet me once, and never allow me to return. A few wouldn't even speak to me, only yelling OUT!!! as I walked in sight.
My mother always said I was a silver rounded devil, even going as far as saying I should have worked on Clinton's legal team. I was used to being charismatic, so when people began to listen, truly listen to me, I wasn't surprised. But it all went too far.
I sit on what can only be called a throne now, so many years later. So many years, so many atrocities, so many souls damned. I never found the red eyes from that night, no matter how far I searched. The devil I said, it must have been him. So many questions spurred from two little words. Such that I spent my life to answer them. One way or another, those answers would be mine. Some of my followers had said I was the new king, I was their Lord, Satan had passed the crown. A sane man doesn't let people like that in his life.
But they grew on me, and they grew in number. Until here I sit on my throne. I don't know if I'm the Devil, though many say it now. When I die I will know, for my actions have surely led to only one path. I have done such horrible things, not because I wanted power, but those answers. I shouldn't have succeeded, how does a crazy person with black eyes go from college student to emperor? Armed revolutions in the first world don't succeed....they just don't anymore. All those battles, all those genuinely good people died because of me.
I may be damned, but I will damn sure get my answers when I finally die. God may be forgiving, but he could never forgive me. I always thought the red button was a metaphor, there couldn't be one singular red button to start it all. But, here on my desk it is. One. Red. Button.
*click
| 2 | 0 | 302 | 223,222 |
[IP]The Moon, the Night, and the Cat
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Close one door, raise the heavy bar, right-step, left-step, click.
Close one window, lower the bar, one winch, two winch, click.
Close the next, up, right, left, click.
Charles, the Church pastor, shuffled in his nightly routine. His white robe swishing slightly as he closed and barred to entryways of the church from the denizens of the night. It was a wonder he heard it at all. The sound of voices, soft and distant, mixed with loud mewing.
He stopped, locking bar for the right main church door in his hands, straining, legs shaking slightly under the load.
He bent back down, and lay the bar on the ground. He looked outside, in the dark night, to see a campfire, not too far down the road, clearly visible flames illuminating a group of two and a large, black cat, with brilliant glowing blue eyes. They seemed to be having a conversation.
Charles looked up. The sky was dark. "Dark, on a full moon?" He muttered. "It's been many a year since I was idealistic, but...."
Charles walked to the altar, and took off it a simple horn. He then left the church, closing the grand, solid, heavy wooden doors behind him. The not so quiet thud that resounded from the final touch of wood on wood seemed to go on forever, as if he had locked himself out.
The conversation paused, and the cat turned towards him.
He paused, nervous, then approached cautiously, horn held in his two trembling hands, not quite visible to the group, but not overly hidden.
"May I join you?"
"If you fear not the nights darkness," replied a dark-haired lady, clothed in black robes, dark strands of hair hanging around, visible by small silvery sparkles. She sat comfortably, with her eyes sharp and attentive.
"If you hide not from the light of the moon," questioned a white-robed lady, silvery threads woven into the garment giving it an unearthly light. It seemed to glow silver even in the dark night. Her eyes were a pale white, and her hair hung thin and wispy around her shoulders.
She was rolling a coin between her hands, one to the other.
The priest was calm and accepting of this, until the cat spoke.
"I really don't think he wants to stay with us. He probably thinks that we are demons, and need to be eradicated. Plus, I really don't want to move again. This is a nice fire."
Charles jumped. "I have to ask?"
"Is a pagan a demon?"
"No. Pagans are merely misdirected."
"Think of us as pagans then. We will not bother you. We don't meet too often, and are usually much more quiet. Paws here was rowdy tonight."
"WAS NOT" Shouted the cat, leading both the white and back robed figures to flinch. It was quite loud.
Charles shook his head, smiling. The cat seemed so young.
Charles stood. "Thanks for sharing your fire, but I must close up the church."
The black haired lady stood as well. "Any time you wish to join us, feel welcome."
She bowed. "Call me Nat. It's a little short, but my name is used often."
Charles walked back to the church, confused. Short for Natalie? Or Natalia?
He returned the horn to the altar, and resumed closing.
Left-right-click.
---------
The next night, rain poured heavily on the ceiling of the church. The whispers of liquid ran down the dark, clouded skies, obscuring what could have been the moon. It was dark as pitch, and the wind was not calm.
Yet, nearby lay a flickering fire, and an agitated Nat.
Charles took his raincloak and rushed out to the soaked group. All three were there, and he was glad that the sound of the pouring droplets had covered the whimpers and complaints of the cat.
"It's raining pretty hard. Don't you have any shelter?"
"We always meet here. I admit it is a bit of a bother--" started Nat, but she was cut short by the cat. "IT WOULD BE GREAT TO HAVE A BLOODY ROOF. BLOODY MORONS. MY FURS GETTING ALL WET."
Charles had his solution. "Would you like to stay overnight at the church? We have plenty of room and food."
That cat jumped for it immediately. He leaped right onto the pastor, and skillfully maneuvered past the flailings of the unbalanced raincoat-holder into the warm, dry space.
Nat was more cautious, but after a few silent seconds of gazing at the woman in white, they both stood up, and moved around the fire.
Charles led them up the path to the front doors, pushing the heavy wooden contraption open. It swung open with a light groan, revealing the warm insides. Nat strode right in, her clothes remaining pitch black under the warm candlelight, while the lady in white halted on the threshold.
Nat spoke to the white lady, "Come in Luna, it's ok."
As Charles stood there, looking on, the cat spoke.
"We should meet here. I like it much more."
Charles stood, looking at what he believed impossible.
For the moon, the night, and the cat were his guests tonight.
| 2 | 0 | 18 | 57,760 |
[WP] The devil is brought in front of an ethics board not because his punishments were to severe but because they weren't severe enough
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"Can you please speak clearly for the record," a voice speaks out across a darkened room.
"I am Woland, Lucifer, the Morning Star." He is lit by a single spotlight, revealing a luxurious velvet and oak armchair. His hand rests over a silver wolf's head, topping a his sleek black cane. A small toothy smile reveals one half of his teeth glint in silver, the other in gold.
"Thank you for coming today," the crisp voice replies. "We know your time is valuable."
"Valuable enough that we need not bother with such polite nothings. What grievances should I answer for now?" He asks with a carefree sigh.
"Well, if you must..." There is a brief shuffling of papers from a dimly lit raised dais, and barely audible muttering. "We ah, have another report of Misappropriated Perdition.
The devil's mind raced for a few moments, while he steeples his fingers. "There are always mistakes in such a large organization," he mutters dismissively. Was it the priests? He was quite proud of the torments he visited upon those of false belief. He even drew from some human literature for it. Or maybe its the Lawyers this time? Perhaps he went a bit too far there.
"This is not a mistake, we have evidence to believe that perdition was lifted without permit," the deep, distant voice dryly accuses. Satan's brow raises, and he grips the silver wolf's head while drawing a preemptive, angered breath. "One, Frieda... *do we have a last name?*" the voice trails off into indistinct murmurs.
"That was not without permit," Woland declares as he pulls himself out of the chair, the metal tip of his cane shooting sparks as he drives it into the marble floor.
"Fallen one," a new voice intones with a prickly, icy edge. "You know full well that you have no authority to rescind Perdition."
"I care not for the authority, it was rescinded in full, and I shall not reinstate it. Cast me out of hell if you want it done, I shall not allow it!" He meant to speak calmly, to keep a cool head. But he is not surprised to catch himself roaring in defiance.
"Please, gentlemen," the first shadowy voice rejoins, "We should try to keep this civil-"
"I will not stay civil," Woland spits, his nostrils flaring. "Do you even know why she was punished?"
"Ahhh," there is another shuffling of papers. "She, wakes up in a well furnished room, all her needs cared for?" The man reads with growing confusion. "Except there's an embroidered handkerchief on her nightstand... That's odd."
"Not what," Lucifer growls. "*Why*? Do you know the why?"
"Oh, yes it says..." indistinct muttering gives way to silence, before it is broken by a cheerful 'Aha!' "She, killed her own baby... Oh with that handkerchief."
The silence falls over the room, and Lucifer's head sinks, looking towards the polished marble floor beneath his feet. "Is that all it says?" He asks, several deafening moments later.
"Circumstances do not matter," the icy voice intones. "She has sinned, and must face the consequences of her choices."
"It doesn't say," Lucifer begins in growing, righteous anger, "that she was raped, that she was abandoned by all her friends and family? Oh how few of them made it down to my domain too!" he seethes. "How she was destitute, and was forced to watch her child starve, wasting away?!"
He takes a moment to compose himself. He can feel the tears swelling behind his eyes. He won't give these bastards the satisfaction of seeing him weep. He can't even remember the last time he's felt this. "How she had a choice," he continues, "between watching her child starve as she cradled it, helplessly, and giving her babe some small measure of comparative mercy..." His voice quivered. He was resolute against that, and he is very surprised to hear the sadness in his words.
They all are. The silence envelopes them, and is only broken by the hushed, passionless whisper. "Yours is not to judge, but to render judgement."
The devil takes a breath, and shrugs, limping onto his cane as he hobbles away. "Well I was not the one who rescinded her Perdition," he calls back. "That was a Witch named Margarita. She's to blame, good luck finding her."
// Inspired by the Mikhail Bolgakov book, The Master and Margarita. A wonderful read, you are doing yourself a disservice if you haven't read it.
| 2 | 0 | 21 | 10,045 |
[WP] You are walking down a crowded street. An attractive stranger approaches and kisses you right on the lips. Beginning to to cry the stranger hands you a notebook and says, "I will love you eventually." You blink and the stranger is gone. You open and begin to read the notebook...
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You realize she's a time traveler from the year 3028494398TBA. She/or he, lets just say she, says the past is in trouble so you go back to the year 2043 when all of our fresh water is gone and our oil is gone too. She sends you on a mission to assassinate the killer of Lincoln. So you take your Delorean and drive 88 mph. while traveling you encounter the Macho Man Randy Savage, "Oh yeah brother, Im coming with you!" And the Delorean crashes in the year 19** when your parents are kids. So you befriend your dad and your mom falls in love with you (gross). You somehow stop a pussy ass bully and get your parents together.
You go further back and who do you meet traveling back? You guessed it Old freakin Saint Nick Mr. Santa Claus! Santa gives you a special red ryder gun to take down the assassin and then here comes Zack Morris from Saved By the Bell. Now you are in the theater and you see the assassin, Who is he? None other than, well I don't know thats for your imagination. Just as you are about to shoot Macho Man elbow drops the assassin straight to hell and Lincoln is saved. So they gang and I/you/we/us/all together, right now! travel back to the year 2014 and decide to watch the first season of the office and eat Smores pop tarts when! Vincent was never killed in Pulp Fiction! And Reddit was never made! (Holy! this story doesn't exist!) all of a sudden the girl comes through a portal in the living room and says "did you read my notebook? I want to become an author." Of course not so you go back to the future, or past to save Reddit!
To Be Continued?.... And that is how I learned how to tie my shoes. Thank you.
| 0 | 0 | 110 | 78,217 |
[WP] A shape-shifter can assume the appearance and voice of anyone whose legal, state-issued ID they possess. Must have the ID on their person in order to become that person.
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"Please, take a seat. Tell me a bit about yourself."
"There is not really much to tell. I am a bouncer at a local bar. The hours are kind of tough and taking the piss out of some drunk can be fun but it gets old over time."
"Why don't you tell me why you are here?"
"Oh that. Well the judge told me to come here. I was caught with a dozen or so stolen ID cards."
"And?"
"Well I mean that is not normal so it does not matter who I am. You see stolen ID cards and now I need to answer these questions."
"How did you get them?"
"I told you, I work as I bouncer. I pick a youngish looking kid, told them their ID didn't scan, tell them their ID is a fake, pocket the ID, and tell the kid to fuck off. I actually found two real fakes doing this."
"Why would you do that? Were you selling them?"
"Well sometimes it is just easier to be someone else. I mean, I am in a cell now right? But if I was not me you couldn't hold me."
"Well an ID does not just make you someone else. You still have to be accountable for your actions."
"Let me see your ID, I bet I can convince you otherwise."
| 1 | 0 | 1 | 111,684 |
[WP] "You can't play, Alex. You're dead." "But I like this game."
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Alex stands alone on an empty stage. Only a few lights remain on, casting long shadows from the podiums. He looks over, at the board, whose screens are dark, and without topic.
It would be easy to think of him as the man that knew everything, but he never liked to think so. The confidence he displayed was simply one stemming from the joy of the game. He truly loved the game.
And the people! The warm, kind, intelligent players who graced this stage, eager to play in one of the few games that hadn't been bastardized or changed in the new era of faster, easier, simpler games. No, his was one of integrity, of intellect, and it showed. It withstood the test of time, and yet, was watched and adored by a dedicated fan base.
The lights turn on. Crew members begin to shuffle onto the set, moving things into position. Alex knew the drill. The audience would be ushered in in a few moments, as the crew set the cameras to position. Alex always came out first, he liked being able to see the faces of the people who came out to watch. It was always a good time.
30 years is a long time to do anything. It was a long time for Alex. But it turned him into a household name. And while he presided over thousands of games in his lifetime, he never once got to play.
As the crew moves about, Alex steps up onto the set, and, instead of moving to the podium where he usually stood, moves over to one of the contestant's podiums. He moves to pick up the pen to scribble his name, but hesitates. As he looks up, he sees, standing alone in the audience bleachers, a grim reminder.
He looks back down, at the screen in front of him. He could not write his name down. That just wasn't his part to play.
The grim spoke, "You can't play, Alex. You're dead" it said.
He knew. He knew all too well. And, while he had no regrets, he enjoyed the memories. "But I like this game."
| 2 | 0 | 1 | 164,320 |
[WP] Snow White's Prince Charming and Cinderella's Prince Charming are actually the same person. All hell breaks loose when they discover the affair...
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Snow White sat across the table from Cinderella. The two women quietly sipped their tea on the balcony overlooking the courtyard. A gourmet spread of biscuits, cheeses, and fruit covered the table. The sounds of the local villagers going about their business.
Cinderella delicately placed her cup down onto its saucer. A soft clink was barely audible. She picked up her napkin and dabbed the corners of her mouth.
"I'm so glad you could visit," Cinderella began, "I trust your journey was not too arduous."
"It was as pleasant as could be; all things considered," Snow White answered, placing her own cup onto its saucer.
The two princesses looked at each other with empty smiles. Behind their eyes was a hatred that was reaching a feverish boil. Their animosity was almost palpable.
"I don't think we should be mad at each other," Cinderella continued. "We were both lied to. If there is anyone we should be angry at, it's Charming."
"I agree," Snow White answered. "I've been consulting with my mirror and he has several suggestions that may be worth checking into. Tell me, have you heard of any news from the western kingdoms? Have you corresponded with Belle or Aurora lately?"
"I have been trying to keep this as quiet as possible," Cinderella replied before pausing.
A servant had neared their table and began to refresh their teapot. She was met with dissatisfied glares which she interpreted to be on account of the now empty teapot. The teapot was refilled immediately, and she begged forgiveness as she backed away from the balcony.
"There is an old sorceress that cast a spell over the whole western kingdom," Snow White explained. "She turned the narcissistic prince into a loathsome beast; but I'm sure you've heard Belle tell the story every time someone pays her a visit. It turns out that the sorceress is still living after all of these years. The mirror gave me instructions on how we can go about finding her."
Cinderella mulled Snow White's words over in her head. It was too early in the afternoon to visit the wine cellar, but a strong glass of red was calling to her.
"You realize," Cinderella slowly began, "That what you are suggesting is tantamount to treason."
"But think about it," Snow White replied, cutting off a further rebuttal. "Not only can we teach Charming a lesson, but the throne of each of our kingdoms will be vacant. No longer will we be princesses, we will be queens; the matriarchs of our lands!"
"Charming's father, King Charming the III, has yet to abdicate the throne," Cinderella answered, "In fact, he may live for several more decades."
"I've already taken care of his royal highness," Snow White laughed as she reached for an apple. "Such a lovely thing, apples; they are just an unsuspecting piece of fruit."
Cinderella looked at the apple in Snow White's hand before moving her gaze upwards. A wicked smirk had planted itself on Snow White's face.
"Tell me more about being the matriarch," Cinderella chuckled as she picked up her teacup.
EDIT: Formatting
| 229 | 0 | 472 | 110,433 |
[WP] A sociopath who desperately wants to feel love
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I think about it every single day. This wonderful thing people I know talk about. This feeling of love. I will never understand it. But I wish I could.
I've spent many years locked up inside my own emotional cage. I can't ever understand or feel the same things people around me do. I don't know what emotional pain is, I don't know what heartbreak is, I don't know what sadness is. I can tell you what people tell me they are. I can tell you what every therapist I ever had told me about those feelings. But I don't get them.
Is it like pain? Do I feel something on my body? I wouldn't know. But love, love intrigues me. I've seen my own brother with his girlfriend. He smiles so brightly, so deeply. His smile rooted deep into his jaw and clogging every pore with happiness. His girlfriend looks at him with longing, like she's never seen something so beautiful in her life before he came along.
I want that. I want something that can bring that to my life. I haven't smiled in years. I've not laughed in years. I've never wanted anything until now. It's all I can think about.
Can the touch of a woman bring joy to my life? Can her breath on my neck send shivers down my spine? Can her holding my hand bring a warm comfort to my heart? Can her body at night keep me warm on a cold winter night? Can her smile light up my world and can her kiss make everything better?
I'll never know. But I'll always wonder. I'll always yearn for what I cannot feel.
| 2 | 0 | 4 | 75,218 |
[WP] The government allows every citizen to request one state sponsored assassination against anyone of their choosing, performed by a special federal bureau. A recently divorced couple race to finish the paperwork before the other on does.
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I slam my car into the parking spot in front of the S.F.A.B building taking out the handicap sign in the process. I throw open my door hitting the car next to me when I see it. That's my wife's.. I mean ex-wife's car. Shit.
I burst through the door to see her at the counter with a blank form. She takes one look at me and utters "Shit."
I rush to the counter and snatch a form from in front of the obviously armed clerk. There is no way in hell she's going to take me out before I can take out that slut.
With a slam I smack my form on the counter and rip out a pencil from my pocket. I write with such speed that I could have sworn I saw smoke coming from that last word. I'm writing like a madman with the legibility of a doctor's prescription, but it doesn't matter as long as they know who to kill. In my fervor I don't notice how hard I'm pressing down on the paper until a snap reaches my ears.
"Shit!" I yell at my broken pencil. "Do you have a sharpener!?" I shout at the clerk.
"Sir you need to fill that out in black ink." The clerk replies pointing to the cup of pens next to him. I look in horror at my half filled useless form.
"What?!" My ex-wife shrieks. "Does it have to be black?"
He gives her a silent nod causing her the throw down her blue pen in frustration. She looks to me as I look at her. Our eyes lock together, but slowly drift to the single cup of pens.
With the speed of a striking cobra we grab the cup. A futile game of tug of war ensues as the clerk watches on in apathy. He pulls out two pens from behind the counter and gives us each one, stopping our struggle. With a sheepish grin I thank the clerk and gently set down the cup. My ex-wife is not so courteous and has already started filling out a new form. Wait, shit she's already started!
I don't even bother with a new form and just begin writing over my old answers. Questions fall to my lighting fast assault, each block finding a new black letter or number to join the old lead ones. Before I know it section one has been conquered and now section two is next on the chopping block.
Let's see target's maiden name. Shit her name was long as hell, was it Polish and German mixed together, Christ. Ok that's done, now for place of residents. Crap she moved but what was that street name?
I take a quick glance over to my ex-wife's form. Thank god she's only about as far as I am, her obsession with neat handwriting will be the death of her. There we go, she moved in with her mother if I recall.
The rest of the section is easy to fill out for me and now on to the next. Am I sweating? Am I getting a legit workout from this? I feel it in my hand that's for sure.
I take another look at her form when I see her handwriting has taken a turn for the worse. Thanks to that she's done with section two also.
Shit stop gawking your life is on the line here.
I slam my pen back to the form and scribble every piece of knowledge asked of me by the seemingly endless form. Section three is down now for four and five. My hand hurts so much but I can't stop or even slow down. Why the hell are there so many questions!? Section four falls to my answers and now for the last one.
I take a quick glance at my ex-wife to see her form. She's beet red and her hair is a mess from the stress. Is that a tear in her eye? I look to see her progress on the form. Shit, She's reading section five already. I notice at the end of the section the only thing required is a signature.
I snap my head back to my form. In big bold letters at the start of section five are the words: READ THE FOLLOWING TERMS AND CONDITIONS BEFORE SIGNING!
Like hell I'm going to read all that! Shit she's already signing!
With the world's worst signature I hand my form to the still apathetic clerk. My ex-wife's form is also being shoved in his face at the same time.
Without a word the clerk takes our forms and looks them over. A deafening silence fills the room as the clerk inspects the papers in front of him. It seems like an eternity before the clerk even makes a sound.
"Did you read the terms and conditions." He looks to both of us. I'm sure he already knows the answer.
"Yes." I lie
"Then you should know I can't take two forms for the same person." He explains while handing us back our forms.
I look to my ex-wife in confusion. I grab both forms before she can and look straight to section two. Instead of my name as I expected, I see a name still familiar with me.
Tiffany. That bitch of a mother who ruined my marriage.
I look to my ex-wife and see a look of sheer relief spread across her face. Tears begin to well up in her eyes at the same time they do in mine.
"I thought you were going to kill me, but I didn't have the heart to hurt you." She sobs "I wanted to take out that bitch before you killed me but.. but.. but."
She runs up to me and latches her arms around me. "You chose to kill her over me! We can never be together after all that happened, but thank you thank you thank you!"
I wrap my arms around her. "You're welcome. I'm glad you didn't kill me either."
| 5 | 0 | 6 | 80,766 |
[WP] You are a kindergarten 'assassin'. You don't kill people though. You are paid (in candy, toys, etc) to get other kids grounded.
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"Poop should do it."
"What?"
"Poop always works."
"Look I just want the kid grounded, not sent to special ed."
"Poop should do it."
Thing about poop is, everyone does it, and we're at the age where plausible deniability works. Timmy ate corn at lunch, so I ate corn at lunch. My digestion works a bit faster than his but nobody else keeps a record book of every student's digestion rates, but I like to digest snickers bars, so everyone is in the book.
Timmy is in the book. And now he's on the list.
The dame was short, shorter than average. She had a lollypop stuck in her hair and a face like a cherub. The pink jumpsuit hung on her like a jump suit on a 6 year old girl. She was a classic case, betrayed by her man, left on the playground making mud pies in the mud patch while her man ran off to play soccer. To him the other girl was the goalie, and he scored.. to the client, this was adultery, cheating, a knife in the back... and now poop in the cubby hole.
The girl looked on, doing the kind of calculations that six year olds do at a time like this. She was about to take the leap from 100% innocent to blemished. Her reputation was soured, soured like the milk Rupert brings on Monday, but her consciences was intact. Never in her life had she co..
"Ok." the chubby little sausage weiner fingers dug into her hello kitty backpack and she brought out a snickers bar.
"Kid size? That's the downpayment."
"If I tell Ms. Carson what you're planning you'll get whacked.. on the butt.. by your parents.. you'll be sleeping near the fish tank."
"Baby, you'll be implicated too, is that what you want."
"Not if I ask her why you get corn and I don't, then she'll know that two people ate corn."
Checkmate. The broad was good, she had it all going for her, shoes, eyes, someday she might even be class president, but who's to judge.. maybe next year she'll be on the list.. after all, she's afraid of frogs, speckled ones.. like the one in third grade home room 6.
| 2 | 0 | 642 | 209,507 |
[WP] As a person goes through his life, he is given three options at the end of each day, continue, restart day, or restart life. He has just lived through the worst day of his life.
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Tim couldn't believe it. The series of events seemed almost fabricated, like some cosmic entity's idea for a sick, demented joke. *My wife dead. Children, gone. Why did I survive?!*
He had came to the ridge. The ridge was always a beautiful place, no matter the season. In Summer, it shone brightly with trees and flowers, and thin trails and paths for walking through the light forests below. In the Fall, every tree turned it's own shade of cinnamon brown, bright amber, or apple red. In the Winter, though barren of green, the forests below the ridge were as elegant as ever, especially at night when the snow reflected the starlight. In the Spring, it was amazing to see everything bud and come alive, warm again after the cold.
Alive. Alive. *Why did I survive?* Tim thought inwardly. He looked up to the sky today. It wasn't blue, with a few rolling clouds as normal. It seemed an aberration, something else determined to prove to him this day should not exist. The roiling clouds above him rained down on the forested ridge, and through the rain droplets Tim could see the small flashes of lightning between clouds.
Tim had always loved the ridge. He had met his wife, Beth, there. He had taken his children on camping trips all throughout the forest, at all seasons. It was a place he could retreat to, both physically and mentally. And as he looked over the ridge, he could feel as if the trees were waiting. He felt sorrow, remorse, grief, and anger. So many emotions boiling so fervently he felt as if he were one of the clouds above.
As Tim approached the edge of the ridge, he looked down. No longer would he see the breath taking colors of Fall, or the vibrant sweeps of snow as the wind blew it about in Winter. He would not see life become vibrant again in the Spring. As he stepped forward onto air, and a sinking feeling entered his gut, he did not see the ground approaching tumultuously towards him, rather, he saw the ridge. And he felt peace, and thought, *I wish I could just restart.*
~~~~~
" How long has he been like this? " Asked the man, clearly fresh from sleeping, as he looked into the room, with a middle-aged man, crying like an infant. " Only a few hours. " The words came from the one he addressed. The man continued to the woman " Well, he has done this before. It was why he was brought here. We had hoped he would come out of it, but, it appears that hypothesis was wrong. " The woman, schooling her sadness admirably replied " So he is going to relive it all again? " The man looked into the room. Into the room at Tim. *The poor man.* " Yes. " Was all he said to his assistant. Words no longer needed, they left the room, as Tim sat in his, seeing not a soft white padded room, seeing not the harnesses and straps that prevented him from hurting himself, but seeing the light of a hospital ceiling, as he was born again, and would relive again, up till he took the plunge off the ridge.
| 3 | 0 | 728 | 83,358 |
[WP] You discover life is a game, but for someone else, and you are the final boss.
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It was quite funny, a year ago seeing my 12 year old explain how life was nothing but a game. His mother was livid, hearing how he leveled up by bulling some of his classmates, and proceeding to the next stage after confronting his crush and getting a kiss on the cheek. He took none of it seriously and I'm glad, he seemed happy.
I was too. I took a shot at this and decided for a week to view life as a game. Stress of running a company can make one quite sour. So there I was making the usual demands and meeting the usual clients. I decided to play a bit more into the idea and make my big meetings into these "Boss" battles.
I didn't get away with everything, but I considered any changes or decision to compromise to be a win. Then I felt it, a sudden wave of joy. That's what it must feel like to level up. That's what happens when you win. But then, what happens to those that "lose"? I decided not to think about it, if I did it's more likely I'd begin to stress on the idea of winning and the fun would be over.
Last week, my son didn't look to happy during diner. His bulling caught the attention of the Dean. He was sentence to detention and my wife had to go talk to the principal, they both looked defeated. I told him to relax, life was just a game remember?
He snapped at me. It's not that easy he said. It gets harder the more you keep winning. The conflicts aren't one on one anymore, they become groups, systems, ideas. He wasn't fuzzing over the dean nor detention. He realized that the opponents no longer appear to be wimps or bullies one just beats down, they become events, time limits. The enemy is no longer an easy KO and his son was worried what his new boss fight would be.
That conversation left a sour taste in my mouth. I realized the fun was over, the gamethe game became life again. But for some the game had just started.
Tim from accounting came into my office the other day. He was shaky and stumbled on his words. I just sat there. Staring at him. Wondering what he was trying to say, it was becoming a headache, I decided to stop him mid sentence and told him. "Do you ever think of life as a game?" - "A.. A what sir?" - "A game. You know, like when we were kids and we pretended the floor was lava and only certain tiles were safe spots" - "Um.. No.. Not that I could remember, life is a pretty serious thing to consider, I have a family to feed and my wife's medical needs... Its. Its just absurd to think so lightly of it"
"Try it." I said, and just kept staring, seeing if he could figure it out. To see if he saw that life was just a game to me, or that it was one at one point.
Slowly he stood up, his sweaty palms at the edge of my table. Hunched and tense as if to brace for an assault. He forced his self to utter his demands.
"I. I ne- I want a raise."
Whether he just grew a pair or literately began to try to take life as a game, I would not know. But I felt like a final boss battle for his mundane game, the princess would be kept alive, dialysis is not cheap for his place in the company, and life was in fact not a game.
"Ok"
A sigh if relieve flowed through him. He must of been struggling with things for quite some time. "You're not kidding right?" He dared ask.
"I could be, but I'm not one to play with people like that. I'll notify Mark about the raise and have him give you Darell's old office. You'll start the overseas accounts next week with your new raise."
The game was fun, but I had to admit I was no longer a child.
| 41 | 0 | 50 | 208,119 |
[WP] In the future, children have stopped being able to die until they reach 25 years old. No one knows why. At first, it's seen as a blessing, but as the world adapts to it, the most sinister implications of this fact begin to unfold.
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It was easy for them to justify what they did. Twisted words and clouded judgement easily trumped raw emotional dissent.
Danger was the name of the game. Everything from mining encampments to covert operations to open warfare. The children were used. No, used probably isn't the right word. Much more than that, the children were exploited, enslaved. An entire generation in servitude to their elders, forced to cultivate money and power for those in control.
Human rights activists were the first real casualty of the times. The moral high-ground remains littered with their corpses and their ideas, slain by those they swore to protect. All the while, the mass-media filled its pockets assuring us that immortal beings could not be considered human at all. In just a few short years, anger was once again quelled to apathy.
The ruling elite remained free to continue their reign unopposed. Testing facilities appeared all over the map with nigh unlimited resources poured into the search for true immortality. It was never enough. Without fail, every child became mortal once more after twenty-five years on this earth.
Except for Alpha.
Nobody had ever known her true name. More likely, she never had one. She was born and raised as an experiment in one of those testing facilities, the first and last of her kind.
She was kept in solitude, living out her twenty-five years of immortality in a dark cell. If being tested and scanned could be considered a life. Tortured, both figuratively and literally, for information she never knew herself. At the end of it all, her tormentors had the decency to give her a swift death.
Unfortunately for them, death never came for Alpha.
You see, Alpha never was a fighter. She had never killed anyone herself like so many other children were forced to. But that day, she could not be stopped. Alpha escaped with the rest of the experiments. She became the first of many voices of resistance. More children were liberated, and together they brought a swift end to their mistreatment.
The resistance never matured into war. It was more like a slaughter, and it didn't stop at the ruling elite. Spurred on by Alpha, the first and only true immortal, the children continued their slaughter of mankind until no mortal creature remained. They had seen the corruption and greed of these humans, and would have no part of it in their new world. Mortality was a force of evil, and those afflicted by it would always be driven to madness by the uncertainty of death. And so, death was made a certainty, both for them, and now for us as well.
That is why I am here. They came for me on my birthday, and like many before, I willingly obliged. If you stand before Alpha, you get to choose.
"Stand, mortal!"
I stood before The Conclave, and before our savior. She was the oldest among her peers, but you wouldn't know it to look at her. The decades since the slaughter had been kind. Her voice rang out once more, a commanding presence, "Have you chosen as instructed?"
Chosen I had. Slowly, I drew a sword from its scabbard at my waist. It was an old blade darkened with patches of rust, and ornamental besides, but it would do the trick. I gave it a flourish and settled into a defensive stance. "I am ready."
Alpha met my raised sword with a raised eyebrow. "You wish to die by your own sword?"
"No, you misunderstand me. I am mortal now, and thus, your sworn enemy. I am wrought with corruption, and a dark stain on this earth. As such, I would fight you in single-combat. To the death."
A single moment of absolute silence fell upon the room, but the whispers of The Conclave rose to meet it. The twelve Conclave members seated to the right each stood up in turn, and gave a single nod. The twelve on the left followed suit. Alpha then rose from her seat, brandishing a small dagger.
"Very well..."
| 1 | 0 | 166 | 113,892 |
[WP] You live in a small town in Alaska. Nothing signifigant has happend for years. Then Larry arrives.
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For my first thirty sum odd years of existence I never really gave any thought to the notions of God, the supernatural, or even extraterrestrial life. I was the kind of person who had to see something happen right before my eyes to believe that it actually happened.
I grew up in a small Alaskan town near the coast that you've probably never heard of. The town was relatively close to a nearby oil rig and it wasn't uncommon to see drifters come and go looking for employment on the rig or one of the many fishing and crabbing vessels. The people in my town were as rough as the strenuous life they lived. Like I said, it wasn't uncommon to meet people from all over the world searching for work. I became friends with many of them and even enemies with a few. However, one drifter in particular left such an impression that he changed the very fundamentals of everything I thought I knew.
Larry arrived in our town in late February that year. Earlier that year there was an explosion on the oil rig that was caused by some natural gas or something, I don't really understand how all of that stuff works, and the whole thing was pretty much destroyed but miraculously the crew had survived.
I ran a little bar in the town, not much to look at, but it was the only watering hole for 50 miles in every direction. One morning as I was sweeping outside the bar, cleaning up from the night before, a face approached me that I had never seen before which like I said isn't at all uncommon in my town.
"Can I help you?" I said,
"Sorry to bother you this early, but I'm new in town and recently unemployed." He said.
"I was just wondering if maybe you're hiring, I'm not too proud for any job that you could give me."
I actually wasn't hiring at the moment and to be honest I couldn't really afford to hire anyone else, but I really felt sorry for the guy. "I guess he can help out bussing tables and bar hopping." I thought. The military had also recently moved into the area doing some kind of weather research about 20 miles north, and the soldiers had begun to flock to my place. I figured maybe I could use the extra help. He was a pretty big guy as well, about 6'4 and looked strong as an ox. Every now and then a drifter would come in who thought he was a hard ass so having this guy around to settle a few scores wouldn't hurt either.
"We'll I could use someone to help out around here as a matter of fact."
"I can't pay you very much, but I do have an extra room above the bar that you can stay in if you'd like." I said.
"That'd be great." He said.
"When can I start?"
"Well first I need to know your name." I said.
"Larry" he said. "Nice to meet you."
Larry was a better worker than I had ever imagined. He was hard-working, polite, and the guy never seemed to get tired. All of the regulars loved him and we became pretty good friends too. I decided to take Larry with me to a mechanic that I knew in a town about thirty miles east. My truck's transmission light had been on for a while and I decided to have it looked at. The night before there had been some really heavy snowfall and the roads were in terrible condition. We came around a curve in the road and saw that someone had missed the curve and ran their truck off the road about 50 yards into a healthy pine tree. The truck was completely wrapped around the tree and the tree had fallen on top of the truck as well. We pulled over and ran to the truck as quickly as we could. In the passenger seat we saw and older man slumped to the side and bleeding pretty badly, but he was breathing. The way the truck was wrapped around the base of the tree and the way that the rest of it was on top of the truck there was no way to get the man out. The man was seriously injured and losing blood fast.
"Go back to the truck and close your eyes." Larry said in a tone I had never heard before.
"WHAT?!"
"Do it." "Now." He said.
Dumbfounded, I reluctantly walked back to the truck, both angry and confused, and did what he said. Well, not completely. I watched. What I saw, I could not believe.
Larry walked over to the truck and like you or I might lift a 20 pound dumbbell, he lifted that massive tree trunk off the top of the truck. I was in disbelief. What he did next was even more remarkable. He then proceeded to unwrap the truck from around the tree WITH HIS HANDS.
When Larry walked back over to my truck holding the barely breathing man in his arms he could tell by the look on my face that I had not done as he said.
After he laid the man in the backseat of my truck he got in on the passenger side of the truck and and with an inexplicable look of almost shame in his eye said, "forget what you saw, and never speak of it."
At that point I knew that Larry was unlike anyone else on this planet. Over the next few months feats like this continued to occur. Each time Larry seemed more and more reluctant to perform them. We never spoke of any of them and I could tell in eyes that he appreciated my silence on the subject.
Larry began showing up at work In the mornings having not slept the night before. I knew this because he was never at his apartment above the bar. I watched him from my house across the street take off north every night. On foot. To the north there was absolutely nothing but an old, dilapidated road for the next 20 or so miles. Every morning as I was cleaning up from the night before I would see him come walking down that road towards the bar. I still don't know exactly what he was doing or we he was going but I suspected it had something to do with that military research going on up north.
I will never forget the last night I saw Larry. A trucker hauling freshly cut timber stopped in to have a few drinks with his buddies that evening. This guy had come in a few times before and he was a real asshole every time. I had recently hired a new waitress and he decided to make it a priority that night to harass her as much as possible. Both Larry and I, were ready to throw this guy out but she told us not to worry and that she had dealt with pricks before and this guy was no different. The next time she went over there the guy decided to grab her ass and that was it. Larry was steaming and looked over at me and I have him the "throw his ass on the street" nod. Larry walked over there and said "Thats enough."
"What are you gunna do about it?" Said the trucker.
"Well then I'm going to have to ask you to leave."
The guy then took his glass of beer and threw threw it in Larry's face. Larry never budged but, the guy wasn't through yet. He became angry and shoved Larry as hard as he possibly could. Larry didnt move an inch and in fact the guy bounced back off of Larry. Larry then turned around and began to walk off when suddenly a beer can came hurdling in and hit him in the back of the head. Larry walked towards the door and before he went outside gave me a wink that I will never forget. That was the last time I ever saw Larry. However, when we walked outside something unimaginable had unfolded. The truckers truck was 20 feet in the air, impaled by a string of telephone polls. I cannot begin to accurately describe what we saw out there. I do know, however, who was responsible.
I walked up the short flight of stairs to Larry's apartment and everything was still there but I knew he wouldn't be back. But before I left I noticed above the doorframe someone had carved, more like burned, two letters. It looked like a set of initials and it read C.K. Was here.
| 1 | 0 | 6 | 57,658 |
[WP] You volunteer to be the first human to test time travel, only going an hour forward in time. When you leave the travel pod, however, all humans on earth are gone.
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I sat down in the spherical chamber of the Halcyon, ready to be the first man to arrive in the future. My fellow scientists from the Destiny mission and I had carefully factored in all of the constraints and contingencies our super computers, and the internet could naturally produce. We even allowed the super computers to generate and propagate mutation algorithms that crossed the millions of possibilities against each other exponential times for posterity.
The spherical chamber which our team had named the Halcyon Drive would bridge the past and the future, but irrevocably. Humanity simply had not discovered a way to exceed the speed of light, though the Halcyon came close.
Gravity manipulation coupled with the interstellar coordinate generation field made the machine capable of vibrating in tandem with the Earth's movement through the universe so that the earthcraft remained stationary in practice, invisible to the outside observer, but moving at incredibly fantastic velocities inside of the vessel.
Our calculations were sound and the onboard processors--which had clocked the world's record at 9.763 yottaFLOPS last year--were so sophisticated that the Halcyon could make calculations in less than one yoctosecond. Our hubris led us to believe that we were invincible, and that this test was merely the first milestone towards changing the course of human history forever.
The Halcyon had never malfunctioned in all of our trials from Trial #1 AlphaPotato to Trial #6836 Bruce the chimpanzee. Every single trial had occurred exactly as we had expected. The Halcyon's internal atomic clocks had measured an amount of time far less than one second. For our crew, the machine had blinked out of view until exactly one second, minute, hour, and day later.
The Global Coalition Government's Natural Philosophy Project (NPP) had put our team of the world's best experts together. When we began conducting trials on living specimens, they allowed the entire population of the earth to submit their DNA votes on which team member would be the first to step into the future. As the project leader, I had the most exposure, so I was chosen to have that honor.
The synchronized atomic clocks counted down on my screen and outside of the Halcyon.
"3... 2... 1... Launch!"
The soft hum of the Halcyon's gravitators rose to disconcerting levels that my body would be unable to withstand outside of my suit but as soon as it began, it had ended. The atomic clock had scarcely changed in its inexorable ticking, but my screens had gone black and I could not see outside. This was normal and part of the Halcyon's protocols to preserve our equipment.
I unstrapped from the seat and stepped into the airlock. I took a deep breath and pressed the open hatch button.
There was nothing. The earth still stood beneath my feet and my suit registered the normal air atmosphere and same coordinates of the lab... but everyone and everything was gone.
There was nothing but flat land stretching out into the curves that disappeared beyond the horizon. I immediately began taking notes, surprised and afraid of what had happened, but not wanting to lose any valuable data I could gather in these uncertain moments.
With my Halcyon arm controller I told the onboard computers to analyze the situation and compute which contingency we needed to take. The Halcyon responded immediately:
"According to our calculations, the Earth is exactly where it should be, one hour after we departed. Your self-awareness and observation of the Halcyon's departure deviated the expected mission outcome. We are in a different dimension. Enter the craft for observation."
I was disheartened but not entirely surprised. We had envisioned this being one of the many possibilities that could occur. I was only shocked by the metallic churning sound that had just begun from far off in the distance.
I strained my eyes and finally made out what it was. The ground at the horizon was vanishing as if being sucked into a vaccuum and then being replaced by metal ground of roughly earth-sized spheric proportions. I wasted no time re-entering the Halcyon. It would suspend itself in the air and we would observe with the help of modern science. I would not be cowed by the uncertain and my equipment would not fail me.
| 3 | 0 | 656 | 160,586 |
[wp] as an immortal alien with a spaceship following this sub! you decide to go back in time to a land with superpowers! overthrow hitler. Oh, and make me love and then hate the main character by the end, as the devil and god get into fight.
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Part 1 – A New Job
Another God prompt! This was getting ridiculous. At first these human tales fascinated me. They wrote about all sorts of things - love, revenge, tragedies, common household objects, and fan fictions - in completely novel and inventive ways. I would read their comments for hours on end, researching the culture of their social networking online, as was my duty. As a member of the Intergalactic Federation, I was assigned to Earth to study the native intelligent species.
Such brilliance! Such idiocy! But I studied everything down to the atomic level. Everything was so captivating about these humans. That was, until everything became stale.
God, Satan, Death, Hitler. The Creed. Everything revolved around these figures, or time travel, or fucking super powers. Didn't they realize how mindless they are becoming?
Day after day, I would sit at my computer analyzing and logging the same prompts and plots endlessly. It became as tedious as my orbit around the Earth. I would look down at the shiny blue marble from my surveillance ship and find my awe swaying. My job lost its thrill and became everlasting monotony.
I couldn't stand it anymore. I asked the Intergalactic Federation for an experimental time transfer. Human history was intriguing, and I could write up a report on what humanity chose to forget from the past or minor differences they made over the years. Better than reading the shitty stories they were coming up with nowadays.
The application process was swift and simple. It was almost ridiculous how easy it was to get into the time travel program I filled out some paperwork, signed a waiver on a long, tedious contract, and was accepted into the program an hour after I submitted my resume. Within a week, I was brought to the Wibbly-Wobbly-Timey-Wimey Industries headquarters for transfer. The place was eerily empty as I traveled through the vast building to my time displacement room. I didn't meet a single soul in the entire complex. Why was the place so massive if no one came for time transfers?
I slithered into my time displacement room - room 666. The room was dark except for the faint glow emanating from a glass wall. Beyond the glass, I could vaguely make out two figures looking at me intently. They said nothing.
"Um….Hello?" I called out, hoping they would respond. "I'm here for my time transfer."
"Hello! Welcome to Wibbly-Wobbly-Timey-Wimey Industries! Thank you for visiting!" It was a prerecorded message – a woman that sounded ecstatic about everything. I hated those recordings. The two operators weren't too keen on conversation, apparently.
"You are doing the Intergalactic Federation a huge service by volunteering for this new program! Your sacrifice will be remembered for generations to come!"
Wait, what? Sacrifice? I thought this was just going to be a new job!
"Please leave a time capsule at the designated area on your historical observation sheet! It is optional for you to pass away at this spot so we can bury you on your home planet!"
Did she really need to sound so chirpy about it? I tried calling out to the technicians. I didn't want to die on Earth, all alone! No one told me about this. I assumed there was a way back from the past. No wonder why this place was empty – a time transfer was practically a death sentence.
The room began to hum around me. All the atoms in my body began to vibrate with the room. "WAIT! STOP! I don't want to do this!" I whined, waving my tentacles like a maniac. The humming grew louder, my mandibles rattled. Lights flashed in the room, revealing the technology that was condemning me to a death on Earth.
I ran up to the glass window, jumping up and down and doing everything to get the technicians' attention. One of them waved at me. They probably thought I was giddy as an American Idol contestant getting into the top 12. I had to watch all of humanity's contest shows as well as study the internet culture.
The flashing and humming increased tenfold and I sank to the ground and closed my eyes, waiting for the process to be over and done with. Then, everything became silent. I was expecting some sort of climatic moment where I felt myself swoosh into the past or something, but there was nothing. I opened my eyes.
The sky was a dreary grey color, formless and bland. I was sitting in a small grassy park sparsely populated by miserable looking tree saplings. Hesitantly, I tried standing up, but my tentacles didn't lift me off the ground. I looked down at my hands. *HANDS.*
What? I assessed the rest of myself. Legs! I had legs! This was bad, very bad. I felt up and down my new body with the alien hands. Then I touched my face. Two ears and eyes. It's so limiting now. I can't see everything anymore. There was a protrusion coming out of my head. A nose. It felt huge.
I lay down on the ground. I was in human form. Human. Bastards at the Intergalactic Federation changed my body so I could fit in. What was written in the waiver and contract? This was not what the job advertisement suggested. I would kill them if I ever lived long enough to find them. I stared into the cloudy sky, trying to calm down enough to figure out what to do next.
There was a flash in the sky. It moved by so quickly, I couldn't figure out what it was. Perhaps one of the creatures humans called birds. It didn't look like a proper bird though. It seemed too large to be. I tried to forget about it and kept gazing into the endless grey. I wallowed in my miserable circumstance for perhaps another ten minutes before another shape floated into view. This one moved across the sky much more slowly. It was nearly impossible to make out with these inadequate human eyes.
I squinted at the form. It certainly wasn't a bird. It didn't flap about. It was simply breezing across the sky. No feathers either. I shook my head and looked again. The figure drifted closer to the ground and I finally knew what it was.
It had two arms and two legs just like I did. A human floating through the air. My neurons had to have been scrambled by the time displacement, but there he was – defying the laws of physics. The human was dressed incredibly well, if in rather bland colors. He wore a long black trench coat and knee high black boots over a crisp uniform. The outfit looked vaguely familiar to him. It was an iconic look for humans, I think.
The stylish human was still floating even more closely to the ground. I made out a red sash on his arm. He was certainly a military man of sorts. How could he fly? Humans have never been documented performing unassisted flight patterns.
Awkwardly, I stood up and began to shuffle toward where the man was landing. Only one way I could get answers for anything happening around here. Soon enough, the pathetic green pasture ended and an urban city began. I was fixated on the flying man, nothing else. That is, until I accidentally walked off a raised sidewalk and into the side of a road. I staggered back to my feet and looked around for the floating man.
How could I not have noticed? The city was dreary, composed of flat colors that blended together. It appeared as though the life was siphoned out of it. Everything was dull aside from the banners. Everywhere, there were banners. The contrast with the bland city made them impossible to ignore. They were a bright red, shifting serenely in the mild breeze.
Flags were all over the place, decorating countless windows, doors, and buildings. Nazi flags. I was in the dominion of the Third Reich – with a flying man out there somewhere. This was far more than I signed up for. I wanted to go back to my old job in my cozy little spaceship. I'd give anything to read about another cliché God prompt.
_______
Part 2?
| 10 | 1 | 0 | 115,935 |
[WP] A young couple go on vacation and return only to find that their home town does not exist.
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It is important to remember that both Bill and Sally Radcliffe were both sane.
They were both sane, and they left their house in Saccamaw, Tennessee on a Monday. They arrived back later that day to an empty stretch of grassland, marred only by the highway which cut through it.
The trouble started when a distinguished physicist at an undistinguished university accidentally discovered a process by which one person could travel backward in time, on the same Monday that Mr. and Mrs. Radcliffe drove down I-24.
The professor in question died on his journey into the past almost instantly. Transported into the Mesozoic Era, he drowned horribly in the primeval sea.
During his resulting plunge into the abyss, a fish which would have otherwise starved found an anachronistic and providential meal. That fish's descendants would go on in the future to also eat the would-be founder of Saccamaw during his failed ocean crossing from Dublin.
Needless to say, the Radcliffe's should have ceased to exist the moment when the distinguished professor at the undistinguished university travelled back in time, or at least have ended up in some other town, with no memory of Saccamaw.
However, in an occurrence of unprecedented unlikeliness, both the altered and unaltered universes contained a Bill and Sally Radcliffe traveling down the highway on a Monday. In the first universe, where Saccamaw existed, Bill and Sally Radcliffe were sane, and ceased to exist at an unspecific moment on I-24.
At that same unspecific moment, in the exact spot where the previous Bill and Sally had been driving, a new Bill and Sally happenstanced their way into existence. Bill and Sally had been insane their entire lives. Among other insane things, they believed, for no reason that any psychologists could ever determine, that they both lived in a place which had never existed, called Saccamaw.
| 8 | 0 | 63 | 37,227 |
[CW] You can't be with your soul mate. Tell them why without using the words "You", "I", or "Love".
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That word. Let me say something about 'that' word. That is a heavy word. It is a word rich with longing, and lust, and affection, and need. Drowning in pleasure, and pain, dull aches in the chest, but ultimately hollow.
It was supposed to be different. The two of us used that word so often. Every day. Dawn, to dusk, and dozens of dozens of times in between. So often, so rich were our lives in that word. A word that loses its meaning the more it's repeated. Up until the point where hearing it fills the heart with a sense of bitter resentment, making one feel like they aren't good enough. Apparently he was good enough, however, though I never heard that word spilling out among all others that were screamed and moaned. Yes, the cameras showed every sordid act, every word of lust and longing and affection and need, and pleasure and pain until the only one with the dull hollow ache in his chest was ME.
But that word was never once said to him. And so, though the heart is willing, the spirit has long since fled.
| 4 | 0 | 440 | 229,428 |
[WP] North Korea's mismanagement was due to your 5 year old brother playing your paused game of Civilization 5 as you went to the bathroom. You have now taken over the game.
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Good god, this. This is just awful. Impossibly so.
You step away to the bathroom for just... Well to be fair, it was a while. Maybe the Sushi Burrito truck was a bad idea, because you were gone for nearly an hour. Which was clearly enough time for Kevin to screw your game up.
*Stupid Little Shit.*
The small but Culturally Sophisticated Korean Empire just finished wreaking Nubunaga's shit when the Hershey squirts come a-calling. And now...
Wu Zetian took half your cities, Russia snagged the other half, and that rat bastard Washington took the capital Seoul and turned it into a puppet state.
*This shouldn't even be possible* you think to yourself. You were further advanced than Catherine, the Chinese had practically no army, and Washington? He was half the world away. And now you're stuck with a few backwater mining towns.
Which...
Which isn't so bad, really. You can maximize the production and really get something done. You check your cities again. Every one is starving. One is radioactive.
*The fuck...?*
This shouldn't be possible, it doesn't make sense. Did one of the others drop them. But if they did, why is it focused on a random mountain? No, diplomacy shows... No fucking way. Kevin did it. And that's all Pyongyang has been building. With everyone focused on production so that the city starves.
"Fuckit" you mutter. No one could fix this mess. You'll just close and watch Netflix instead.
| 2 | 0 | 1 | 180,419 |
[WP] It's 1491 and the Native Americans have made their first crossing of the Atlantic to discover Africa and, shortly after, Europe.
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The kids gathered round the elder and begged him to tell the story of how they conquered 'the new world'. The elder waited for the kids to settle and began his tale:
I was a strong young man, an excellent warrior and appropriately I was selected to be apart of the voyage to 'the new world '. The elders had received visions from the creator that there was an evil rising that needed to be cleansed from the world. For months we prepared a mighty ship, and our finest warriors for a long voyage. Months after our departure, we made a landing on the new world. This land had plants and animals like our own, but this land had primitive men and women, who all served themselves, they did not coexist with the land as the creator intended. They made animals their slaves, and even fellow humans. At night a party of pale warriors attacked us. We were ready. We managed to stave off the savages for the night. Over the next months we launched an exhausting campaign to conquer this pale tribe. After it became obvious we would not survive without the help of the natives we began an initiative to communicate and trade. Once we had been in prolonged contact with the pale tribes of the new world, disease ran rampant among the pale people, killing millions. The goods shipped from our lands had carried foreign diseases to which we were already immune. In the weakened state we took advantage and signed treaties, agreeing to protect and aid the pale native people in return for their land. Once we began colonizing the new world, the pales were put on the unfertile land and marginalized. We then forced our ways on them, because theirs were primitive and uncivilized. And their way of life was lost. Now they sit and live off government cheques and drink listerine.
| 8 | 0 | 116 | 139,885 |
[WP] The president has been kidnapped by Cyborg Ninjas. The Secret Service recruits third grader Billy Thompson, the only kid with awesome enough skills to get him back.
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"Alright mrs. Thompson, now just relax. we are getting set up here to do the interview, and we are not going live for a good solid half a day yet. we'll get make up down here on the double." Zack Nehama of the Washingon Press muttered as he extended the tripod pole for the camera.
Mrs. Thompson was shifty in her chair. there were lighting people, sound engineers, and photographers all over the place. she was going to tell them about the person that saved the world - her son little Billy Thompson - and she could not be more proud.
soon the lights started their soft glow, Zack's finger was pressed at his ear and he had a stern face on him. he sat in the stool beside Mrs. Thompson and glared at the camera for what seemed a dozen minutes.
a wiry, pastey man with a cafe mocha was jittering behind the camera into two cellphones at once. he put down one phone and held up 4 fingers at the full extension of his arm above his head. one after the other the fingers went down and at two fingers up he shouted "QUIET!" and the sound and light managers all hushed while the fingers dropped.
the last finger fell, and the wiry arm lowered. immediately Zack perked up "Good afternoon Washington! Joining us this afternoon is none other than the mother of Billy who is giving us an exclusive 'Behind Billy' interview - Good afternoon Mrs Thompson"
"Please call me Jan"
"Thank you, Jan. now in your own words can you describe Billy to us, give us an idea of what it is like to be the parent of little Billy?"
"Certainly Zack; it all began last year when Billy was in Second grade. he had just gotten a pair of flashy light shoes, and my brother had gifted him a pair of Spiderman PJ's. he began an interminable love affair with superheroes after that. He would run around most of the day with his action figures in hand pretending they could fly. we have several large boxes of legos that he assembled into facsimile guns that he would pretend to fire at everything.
well in the course of playing with the legos he invented his own game and invited his school friends over to play it with him, he called it Monster Trek. they took these guns out of legos and went down to our basement to hide and seek - and upon being found would shoot each other.
Billy always won that game, he knew every crack in that basement."
"thank you Mrs Thompson; do you know how your son was contacted by the secret service?"
"well no, not exactly but I imagine it was not hard for them to go to the school and pick him up. I did get a call from the principal and secretary of the school complaining about men in black suits barging in and removing him from class without a note from me."
"Mrs Thompson are you aware of how Billy came to stop the assailants of the president?
"well the secret service explained it to me quite well. you see the Cyborg Ninjas that kidnapped the president happen to be assembled on the same rules as the lego blocks we gave him. once one of the secret service shot and killed the cyborg ninja with a bullet, Billy was able to assemble the cyborg into something new. with his new weapon the service and Billy were able to gain access to the headquarters, seek each cyborg ninja out and kill them dead. it was then only time enough to rescue the president before they could run out of the building before it exploded."
"And where is little Billy now, Jan?"
"he is still with the service, they intend to learn as much about assembling those cyborg ninjas as possible before they release him back to me"
"Thank you Jan Thompson, mother of the courageous hero Billy Thompson. this is Zack Nehama, Washingon."
the wiry man shouted "CUT"
the newsroom anchors echoed "thank you Zack. in other news Florida has banned a popular children's game after reports it has racial overtones and encourages violence" showing a picture of children playing British Bulldog. "we'll have more news at 6."
| 1 | 0 | 4 | 183,248 |
[WP] A villain convinces the hero that he is insane. The hero is actually sane.
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The dark mists rolled over the shore as the grey waves lapped against the sand. They caressed the ankles of the two men standing facing each other silently.
"I don't exist. How could I? Maybe you could get your head checked out."
"No."
Silently they stood for some minutes, staring at each other.
"These daggers are all in your head. You know the wounds were done with kitchen knives. She did it because he cheated. Why complicate things?".
"No."
At the tip of one of the ornate daggers a blood drop wound its way down the blade. Their eye contact was not broken as it splashed onto the sand below.
"They'll lock you up."
"No."
One of the daggers gestured, indicating a passing dog walker.
"They don't see me. That's because I don't exist. You shoot an apparition and you'll be institutionalized."
"No."
The gun rose slowly in his unsteady hands until it was pointing at the cloaked man. The deep voice emanating from beneath the hood took on the air of panic.
"Who will believe in demonic cults hunting in the darkness? The concept is ludicrous, are you completely mad?"
The gun barked thrice and the hooded figure crumpled.
"Yes."
| 4 | 0 | 21 | 102,859 |
[WP] Finally freed of his bonds, and never knowing why he was imprisoned, a man discovers its been because his emotions can cause storms or even hurricanes.
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Soaked to the bone, I fell gasping to the ground. I had never seen so much rain – not that I had seen much, outside of four windowless walls and an old mattress for most of my life. And the lightning. It split open the sky. I could barely remember outdoors, but I didn't remember it like this. Or the people. They were so horrible. Why had that man yelled at me? And what was he saying, it sounded like gibberish? I was just hungry. He didn't have to hit me. Could he have known me? Was he at the institution? I shivered as I remembered the place. Confusion and sadness swept over me.
A strange fog rolled in, and it started to rain.
That place. They said they were doctors, but I never felt sick. Had the ground not split open in a giant fissure, I would still be there. I had been so angry that day. That man. What he did to that strange looking dog… I knew I wasn't supposed to peak through that doorway. I wasn't supposed to see. They only took me from my room that day because the ceiling leaked so bad it seemed I might drown. But I looked, and I saw. I wanted to kill that man…
It was foggy then too, when I got out. After the walls came down, there was screaming and yelling. I didn't know what was happening so I just ran. The grass was so green there, but there weren't any trees. Not like here. I ran for what felt like days after I escaped. That's when I met the only nice person around this place, or so it seemed. She didn't speak, but that old woman gave me a smile like sunshine as she pulled alongside me in her whatchamobile. She smelled like… like a memory I was not sure I actually had. Kindness. That was it. She smelled like kindness. Like someone from a dream I could not quite remember.
The fog cleared and the sun started to poke out from behind the clouds.
I felt warmer. Feeling a little better about myself, I started down the road towards the next town.
Fukushima, the sign read. What a funny name.
| 1 | 0 | 2 | 144,453 |
[WP] Fandoms become religion. What are their sermons like?
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Many filed into the make-shift temple which had once been the place of creation for something which was simply known as "entertainment" in the early days. Yet words could not grasp the memories and intellect of what had been conceived in that building.
In a separate and heavily guarded area of the holy land were several hundred articles which the original prophecy was printed on. The articles were lined in hallways in air tight glass cases, at the end of the 5th hallway was a bronze statue of the creator. The creator was a man with a peculiar mustache, a bland hairstyle and what appeared to be odd rounded glasses, despite his physically unattractive appearance everyone knew of his genius and ability to control close to an entire nation at his prime.
Buried at least 30 feet under the statue there was believed to be a tomb which held the creators body, surrounded by many plaques and miniature figures which honored his great achievements at the time of his existence.
Not to be forgotten however were his followers, not much is known of them as their real names were never disclosed in the articles of the original prophecy. His followers however were who carried out the prophecy which the creator had made, without his honorable followers the creator would have been nothing.
As a sermon begins in the main complex of the holy land one of the elders preps the large crowd of "fans" (as they were noted in the articles of the prophecy) for tonight's lesson. A large white curtain begins to lower behind the elder who is speaking at tonight's sermon. Everyone has come prepared with a proper meal to sustain them through the hour of study and worship, consisting of various carbohydrates, and sugars in both solid and liquid forms. Not only meals, but proper dress pertaining to references of the articles and the various components within them. Before the worship begins, a sacred and traditional rock-like and sugar-based substance is handed out to the patrons (a consumable which was prepared by the thousands of pounds as part of the creators prophecy). The Elder shouts atop a podium once the white curtain is fully extended, and the lights are dim, hundreds waiting for the worship to begin, he shouts "along with this sacred substance you are about to break and consume, let the praise begin, and let us all break bad as well!"
| 2 | 0 | 9 | 4,247 |
[WP] The stars never came out last night.
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To my family,
I love you all so much. I can't thank you enough for being there for me in times of need. Carol, you'll make somebody very happy some day. Jesse, thank you for always making me laugh. Alex, you need to go for your masters, stop doubting yourself! Cammie, remember Penny? I don't think I've ever had so much fun with a stuffed animal. Debbie, you're the most beautiful woman I've ever known, and that will never change. There are so many things I wish I could say to you all, but I just don't have the strength.
I hate that it's come to this, but I just can't do it anymore. I'm afraid most of the time. For me, for those around me... I feel disconnected, and alone. You're all so wonderful but I don't know you... and you don't know me. This is something I have to do. It's none of your fault. You have given me the only semblance of happiness life has had to offer.
You know, I prayed the other day. It was weird. I didn't really know how to talk to God, if there is one, so I kind of just talked. Things started popping into my head and before I knew it I felt like I was actually having a conversation with Him. So I asked: what should I do? Give me a sign, please... and the conversation stopped. It was sad, really, but no different than I had expected.
Remember that walk I took last night? I went back and prayed again, but this time I made a decision. I told Him I needed a sign, I told Him I needed reassurance that everything was going to be OK. I told him that the only way I wouldn't end it all was if he showed me a sign. It may seem silly to you but it seems so simple to me. If this God wanted me to live he would show me a sign.
Do you remember our third date, Debbie? When we looked up into the stars and saw a piano? And how we saw a puppy's face the week before we found out you were pregnant? And how about the time we saw those shooting stars? Those were some of the happiest days of my life, so I asked Him to show me something in those stars. Something that might convince me not to do it. Something that might convince me this is wrong.
I love you all so dearly, and will forever. I waited all night for that sign. I waited all night for the slightest hint of a sign. Some part of me really felt like there was hope, and that I might just have a reason to live. But I know now that this is what I need to do. I know now that this is what He wants. It's what I want. I'm so sorry.
Dad
| 2 | 0 | 84 | 92,828 |
[WP] A game of Russian roulette between two people. Describe it from the perspective of the bullet.
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Anticipation is not an easy feeling. Knowing that your purpose is about to be fulfilled brings about an anxiousness that cannot be quelled.
Click.
Five more round turns. Imagine the smell of the factory and the sound of the machinery roaring. It was home, it was warm, it was safe and secure while so full of wonder.
Click.
Four more turns. That sensation of lying with your loved ones in that dark place. Warm & content, yet longing for a purpose. The box shuts on us, and we are together.
Click.
Three more turns. Remember the cold night air whispering through the cracks of a large truck on it's long haul through multiple cities. The smell of the diesel engine and the roar of the truck's horn.
Click.
Two more turns. The first time we saw daylight since we were put into that box. The anticipation of being chosen to fulfill our purpose, and the disappointment of having the brother or sister lying beside us taken instead.
Click.
One more turn. Overwhelming joy, knowing that it has all been worth something. The cold, the waiting, being taken from your home. It's all leading up to one glorious moment in time.
Bang!
I find peace. I find warmth again, but unlike the last time I felt this way I am undone by my purpose. My body fragments, I scatter and my consciousness becomes one with the world. I've found love here; I've found a real connection.
| 2 | 0 | 50 | 53,215 |
(WP) Love is literally in the air and people can get it if they want. Today there is a shortage...
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"Alright, Terry?" Rex asked his coworker as he entered the control room.
"Nah mate, things are mental. Pump 1 has been offline all night - the city's gonna have a depressing fucking day today!"
Terry looked stressed out. The night shift usually left him tired and he'd shuffle past Rex mumbling good morning on his way out the factory, but it was already a whole six minutes into the morning shift and he was still mashing away at his keyboard.
"Aren't you heading home then?" Rex asked curiously.
Terry gulped the last of what appeared to be his ninth cup of coffee and shook his head, "Nah mate, Steve's got me working overtime. If I don't get this mess sorted by 9 this morning, he's gonna have my fucking head."
"Well that hardly seems fair, you run controls. Only maintenance can fix a busted pump."
"Yeah mate but you're forgetting this is Pump fucking 1. Last time Pump 1 went offline suicide went up 600%. James got fired for that, remember? He was controls too."
Rex bit his lip, "Oh shit, I forgot about James. That's right. Well fuck mate, if I were you I'd be cranking the others into overdrive and putting out a fucking class A priority on getting Pump 1 online."
Terry shot him a look of frustration, "Yeah what do you think I'm doing, you wanker?"
Rex knew not to retort. Terry was going to be in a load of shit if he didn't get the love rate back up within normal operating limits in a couple of hours. Cupid Co. had already come under fire in the media a couple of years ago when their primary love pump had failed, causing a massive spike in suicide cases. Steven Wilson, the project manager, had copped some flak from the higher ups and unleashed his infamously short temper on James, the man running the control room at the time, with a tirade of abuse in front of the whole factory before very publicly firing him. There wasn't a single worker who thought Steve's decision to fire James was fair but Rex and Terry didn't have a doubt in their minds - if the situation were to repeat itself this time, Terry was out of a job for sure. Steve would make sure of that.
The morning crept by rather slowly for Rex but he knew that Terry's would've felt exactly the opposite. 9am came - Terry had been in a frenzy, fingers mashing away at the keyboard like crazy, phones being yelled into, styrofoam cup after styrofoam cup being crushed and thrown haphazardly at the bin. Little drops of coffee had made a line all the way from Terry's desk.
Rex nervously decided to speak, "Shit mate, it's a couple past nine, how's it looking?"
Terry looked absolutely defeated after 15 straight hours of work, "It's fucked, mate. I'm done, I'm fucking finished. Steve's gonna slam me. Better go face the music. I'd rather he ream me out in his office than in front of the whole floor."
He got up out of his chair and wandered off towards the elevator. Only a few minutes passed before Rex saw the elevator return which Terry strolled out of beaming.
"Jesus mate, you look absolutely stoked. What's gone on, then?"
"Steve's dead, mate. Killed himself."
| 3 | 0 | 1 | 104,678 |
[WP] Several hundred years after a nuclear holocaust that wipes out most of humanity, the remaining humans now pass down sitcom plots as oral parables from the Time Before.
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"Oh great," said one boy to the other. "Grandfather is telling the stories again."
The smaller boy remained silent, but shook his head and rolled his eyes. He then got up and moved closer to the campfire. Not to hear the stories again, but for the warmth of the flames.
"...even though his arms were weary and his back was tight, King Doug would travel along his kingdom, delivering gifts to all in his realm," Grandfather recalled, "He was a good king--stout in the belly and always with a smile on his face."
"Grandfather, tell us another," a young girl pleaded.
"Alright," he said kindly. "I know you all are hungry, but perhaps this story can help you all content yourselves with what you have. The Cosmos tells us that only through the denial of pleasure, can we all become Masters of our Domain..."
The two boys snuck away from the fire, determined to avoid another telling of the same familiar tale.
"SHELDON! FRASIER!" their mother barked. "Come back here and listen to your grandfather's stories."
The boys' shoulders drooped noticeably, as they turned back to the fire. It was going to be a long night.
| 11 | 0 | 46 | 226,450 |
[WP] Tell me about The Strangers who come at night.
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First time submission from a long time lurker. Go easy please :)
"They're coming…" His shaky voice bounced off the breath fogged glass we were both staring out of.
"I…don''t see anyone," I say, trying to squint past our reflections into the night.
With a quick violent jerk he ripped the lamps cord out of the wall, plunging the room into darkness. I instantly saw them. Twenty or so faceless beings lined up along the tree line, staring at us, if you could call it staring. Suddenly I'm dizzy and swaying on my feet, somehow everything is getting darker. Someone is holding me up. I hear a voice, it's muffled. Breath. That's what he's saying. It hits me. With a gasp I begin breathing again. Deep breaths.
"Deeeep breaths…there you go"
"Coooome ouut sssiidee…"
A whisper like ice froze us both in place. A shiver shot down my neck causing all of my hairs to stand on end.
"Coooome ouut sssiidee…"
The voice said again. and he smiled, he smiled at me. Then he turned and walked out of the cabin and into the yard. Dumbfounded I stared after him for a moment too long. Two of the faceless start walking to meet him. I take off into a dead sprint. If I was faster I could have gotten to him before he was grabbed. As soon as they laid a hand on his bare arm he fell unconscious to the ground. It's too late. Im too late. I need to run. I stop and do a 180 to run back to the cabin. When I turn around, I see a hand reaching, grabbing my face, then darkness.
I awake leaning against a dead tree in the middle of the woods. We are surrounded by the faceless. He is standing in the center, facing away from me. He is alive! I am alive! There is still a chance! I stand and walk over to him. The faceless don't move. I rest my hand on his shoulder to let him know I'm here. We can do this together. but when he turns around there is nothing. He is a faceless. I stumble back and trip over stick, falling to the ground. A hand reaches down to help me up. I take it and stand, coming face to face with my own reflection. My stomach drops and my hands grasp for my nose, mouth, eyes, anything. Nothing. It is as smooth as a still pond. I have become a faceless. We are the strangers now.
| 3 | 0 | 7 | 30,144 |
[WP] You are a 15 year old African boy from a small village that is about to be attacked by a strong militia that has been sweeping the entire area. You are the only one with a gun.
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I gazed up at the sun in the sky. It was directly overhead, and I could feel its heat penetrating my skin faster and faster as the day wore on. I'd been on watch for two days now, keeping my village safe from the men we knew were lurking not far from us.
*Guerillas* the elders had called them. I didn't know what name to give them, but I did know that it was our job as men to protect the children of this village from those awful people. I glanced down at the weapon in my hands; cold, hard, deadly. It was a tool of destruction, and holding it made me feel as if I was no better than those that I was sworn to defend my people from.
"Adui anakuja!" I could hear Kibwe's voice from across the village. *The enemy is coming.* I stood quickly, running away from the sun, to the place where I had last seen my friend. I met up with Kibwe at the edge of the village, just as the dust began to rise over the crest of the big hill.
I couldn't believe my eyes. It seemed like there were hundreds of them; men of all shapes and sizes, boys half my age carrying guns bigger than I had ever seen. I thought back to the humanitarian group, to my teachers who had stayed for far less time than we needed, and the doctor who helped my mother stay with us just long enough to get a last goodbye; The helpers. Why had they left us?
Kibwe grasped tightly to his spear. "Nitakufa kwa kijiji hiki!" he yelled as he ran toward the group. I stood still as a statue watching the bad men advance on the village. I heard a sharp crack, and Kibwe fell to the ground, the dirt turning dark under him as he lay looking up at the sun in the sky. I turned to run, but my legs refused to cooperate. As I stared at the militants, advancing like a phalanx on the village, I lost all hope. *Mother, I'm sorry. I can't do it.* I brought the cold barrel of the gun to the side of my head as I felt a tear roll down my face. What did we do to deserve this?
| 1 | 0 | 9 | 7,636 |
[EU] A young girl is born with the ability to bend two elements. The Avatar must make a decision between letting her keep her abilities and allowing her kind to procreate, or removing her abilities and restoring balance to the world.
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As he finished his decent the bended steps receded back into the stone floor.
Behind, the aged monk glided down from atop the bison to the floor with grace. He crossed his arms and gripped his own shoulders to counter the chill. "If I didn't know know how pure this location to be I would suspect darker forces than this wind storm..."
No matter, they carried on deeper into the stone temple. "The council thinks this is a waste of time, especially given your prowess...." posed the monk with confusing intonation. It wasn't a suggestion or refusal, the thought was merely proposed to make the young man think.
"They would have me do a lot of things. Sometimes I feel like theres no place for me in this world." He looked at his feet. " I haven't been able to cross over yet either so theres probably no place for me there either."
Lifting his gaze he used the torch he'd been carrying to gauge the size of their destination. It was large, larger than the radius of light. If only, there, a wall mounted brazier. "Deep breath..." he told himself just before striking the air to send forth a bolt of fire. Upon ignition the brazier revealed more on either side. He lit them all, and stood in awe before time.
"The last avatar, the spirit-walker, gathered them all here, they were attempting to accomplish something but what I do not know." The monk's voice was trailing off, he lost to his own thoughts. There was nothing else he could do to guide the young avatar. "This is where I leave you, Daiki. I'll be back with Ekko. Just be calm, remember all that I've taught you, remember to breath deep, and don't forget.."
"I can do this." Daiki cut the monk off. He knew he saw him as a son and would ramble advice till the next avatar if he let him. The monk nodded and left.
Daiki walked to the center of the enormous room, but not in a straight path. He followed a spiral carved into the floor, which in it's path stood every statue of every previous incarnation of himself gathered from around the world. They all stood facing dead center. Walking past each one on his journey to the center, he thought this would have greater spiritual meaning to him. He felt empty.
"This is never going to work, why did I even bother." Journey's end, center of the room, center of the spiral. On the floor waiting for him was a tattered length of cloth. He picked it up and examined it, it had clearly seen better days.
He examined it closely attempting to unravel the secrets of this mysterious artifact. "It's just a stupid piece of cloth." The statues didn't respond. He put it closer to his face to get one last look before resigning and was immediately perplexed. "It smells like an open field. Theres nothing but dust and stone in here..."
His heart began racing. No one else was here, was someone else watching them, his eyes had been covered by hands from behind. He used his own to pushed them off his face but was immediately blinded by a greater source of natural light.
The wind of fresh air caressed his face as his eyes began to focus. The landscape was so beautiful that this could be a dream. Remember he wasn't alone he spun around to confront his would be attacker.
Medium complexion, long dark hair, blue apparel. Water tribe. It was her, he thought'd he'd never do it being so inept at spiritual connection, but made it. Overcome by emotion he ran to embrace her which she readily anticipated and accepted. The younger avatars eyes began to tear.
"Welcome home Daiki, we've got a lot to talk about." said Korra in a comforting voice.
( shit I've got to goto school. back later hopefully. )
| 8 | 0 | 51 | 71,053 |
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