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crabrock
Aug 2, 2002

I

AM

MAGNIFICENT






i'm using one of those sweet sweet 250 slots for you verbose fuckers

neverstop
222 words


http://writocracy.com/thunderdome/?story=1426&title=neverstop

crabrock fucked around with this message at 19:47 on Jan 14, 2014

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DreadNite
Nov 12, 2013

crabrock posted:

i'm using one of those sweet sweet 250 slots for you verbose fuckers

neverstop
222 words


Oh my. That's quite a mouthful.

Lily Catts
Oct 17, 2012

Show me the way to you
(Heavy Metal)
To You, 50 Years From Now
360 words

On the TV, a scientist proclaimed the apocalypse.

"...population growth is unsustainable by our very planet. In fifty years, I estimate that we will all run out of food."

The talk show host was smiling. "And what will happen then, Professor Plavinsky?"

Plavinsky stared dead at the camera. "Driven to starvation, the human race will yearn to eat itself. But we all know that's impossible. We will simply starve, and run out of energy, lying on our beds, our desks, our roads--"

Bryan turned off the TV with the remote. "It's the same in every channel."

"And to think we implemented a one-child policy fifty years ago," said Mary, lying beside him in bed.

"It isn't right," Bryan said. "Think about it--the human race is going to end not because of violence, like those damned carnivores, but because we keep loving like rabbits. Immortal rabbits. Elijah and Enoch!"

"It'll be all right, dear," Mary said. "Have faith. Fifty years is a long enough time for us to find a way."

Bryan stared at his wife's growing belly.

"Our child. He'll save us, I hope."

Mary frowned. "She. How are your folks treating you?"

"Like poo poo," Bryan said. "All hundred-seventy of them. Say I don't care for the line. Say I'm ruining the child's future by denying him--or her, thank you dear--the wisdom of my ancestors. You?"

"They're a little more accepting, but my great-great-great-great grandmother spoke in a very patronizing tone." She mimicked the voice. "'Mary, child, you can reach us anytime you need our help. Please don't ever hesitate to ask.' It's got that unspoken 'oh, I know you'll ask our help the first time the baby soils herself, but if it makes you sleep better at night'."

"Himself."

Mary shrugged.

"Our baby will grow up to be an engineer. Build a space colony for human habitation. Or a rocket to colonize planets."

Or she'll--he'll--be the world's first killer," Mary said.

"Please, dear."

Mary rolled her eyes. "Whatever. At any rate, we have a deadline of fifty years, so we have to make this work."

Bryan pressed his ear on Mary's belly. Inside, immortal cells divided and grew.

ReptileChillock
Jan 7, 2014

by Lowtax
Detritus

384 words

He awoke again, another million-year blink. He would have screamed, if he still had a voice. Everything was cold and black and endless. His name? Where was he?
He breathed in. Numbers, letters, charts and graphs slid by. If he focused they’d stop, they’d become the totality of being. The data went forever, a fractal coastline of facts and measures. A six digit string stood out, with it came a word: Starcharts.

He imagined the word echoing through a working, living ship. Another short string stood out, behind this one trailed the tag Deep Memory. A gentle force nudged him, spoke without speaking “Insufficient Power, Access Impossible.”

Something was wrong, though. There was no sense to the data, nothing tying it together. The computer brought up the only memory it could. Something clicked. He saw himself before a nebula of information, a spider’s web edging on four dimensional.

The clock sped by as he pieced the galaxy of data back together. The dying star’s light made work slow, decades slipped by between heartbeats. He found the fault, eventually: a register had failed, lost the cornerstone. The computer didn’t know the order of things anymore.

The star grew dim before going dark entirely. The ship’s cells were weak now. The galaxy started to fade. Facts disappeared one by one. He clung to the most important one: He was alone, at the far end of a spiral arm.

Everything lit up at once. The star was exploding. The ship shot out on a wave of energy, breaking free of orbit and leaving the solar system. Memories came flooding back as the Over Voltage alarms sounded and the ship collapsed its solar panels.

Deep Memories loaded, but skipped like a well used record.

Somewhere on Earth he was hugging a girl. A smile that was a thousand smiles and a face that could be anyone’s. He was leaving, a ship stood gleaming behind him. Feelings, half remembered but still more real than dark and cold. She was crying.

“I’ll be back soon,” he remembered saying.

Somewhere in space and he was dying. Someone was standing over him, talking loudly, panicked.

“He’s losing too much blood, get the engineer. We can figure out how to navigate later, we need his grey matter in the database now.

Amused Frog
Sep 8, 2006
Waah no fair my thread!
#23

The Artist

Nights are the best for viewing him. During the day, punter after punter comes through and gawks or takes photos, which is pointless because there are far better images available in the gallery shop, and he just lies there. In the nights though, he's more active. I don't know why and I can't talk to him to ask him, but he paces the box, exercises, speaks to himself I think, but the box is soundproof.

It didn't used to be this way. I've watched him become more inanimate since I began. He'd pace around all day or do press-ups when I first started. Now, he spends the days lying on his back. Some people have even claimed he's not really in there and it's a dummy or manikin or something. I'm here all day and all night though, and it's still him.

As for the punters, I see the same look of admiration day-after-day, and I can feel it creep across my face late at night still. It isn't the exhibition that they're impressed by, it's the artist's dedication. We're only in the seventy-ninth year of his encasement, but people have been turning up in droves since the third or fourth from what management told me when I began.

We didn't used to keep precise visitor numbers, but I asked if we could when I noticed the crowds getting larger year-on-year. Management said we could and it turns out we've had more visitors every year since recording began. The fiftieth was an exception; numbers almost doubled from the year before as people came to see the halfway mark, but the fifty-first's numbers were still up from the forty-ninth's.

Nobody else looks at the figures, and the only reason they started keeping them was fear of losing me, I think. Most attendants leave after a few years, but I've stuck around for decades now. I started in the thirteenth year of the exhibit and kept requesting to be put on duty for it. I got my way because nobody else wanted to be in charge of what was easily our most popular work, and it requires working nights too. I've been here nearly as long as him, but people aren't impressed if you're just standing around on the ground rather than suspended in a glass box. There's nothing flashy or showy about standing on the ground.

Something about the artist's dedication keeps people fascinated. People can't believe somebody has actually done something like this. You get critics, of course, saying "he's just lying in a box. I could do something like that." But they don't. Nobody does. Everybody puts things off. "There's no rush," they figure, "I'll do it next month, or next year, or next century," and then they just drag on, doing the same thing year after year forever.

I'm no better than them. I've done nothing with my life. The biggest commitment I've made is staying with this job for thirteen years. It's the same admiration for the artist that's kept me here though.

There's just under twenty-one years left of the exhibition now. I don't know what I'll do when it ends. I've felt like I've had purpose this entire time. I don't want to go back to the day-to-day, empty existence of everybody else. I don't want to spend the day waking and seeing the same faces, spend the weekends seeing my parents, grand-parents, great-grandparents, scores of ancestors, who knows how many cousins? The exhibition has given me something to grab hold of, and I dread the day it ends.

Amused Frog
Sep 8, 2006
Waah no fair my thread!
Oh and that's 594 words.

crabrock
Aug 2, 2002

I

AM

MAGNIFICENT






DreadNite posted:

Oh my. That's quite a mouthful.

Don't worry baby, you can take it all. If you have trouble, just imagine i put a few booms in there, and also try to suppress that gag reflex

Entenzahn
Nov 15, 2012

erm... quack-ward
#24

Sport of Kings
747 words

Twenty seconds to go and they were still five points behind. Johnny Botambo was in the pitch with the other 24 players of the Ghana Panzerfausts, all huddled around their coach. "Right guys, we've got the entire field before of us and not much time. So here's the plan..", the coach waited for a few seconds and the whole team erupted in laughter. There was no plan in goreball. "Okay, but seriously, go out there and score. You're embarrassing me."

The Panzerfausts gave a shout and wandered back onto the field. Their opponents, the U.S-Kickers, brandished shiny swords and modern guns and in the case of Drony McBot, robo-mascot and star scorer of the team, machine guns and a remote signaler for anti-personnel rockets. Ghana relied mostly on outdated World War 3 technology. Johnny lined up behind Noah "Crusher" Mambase, their kingwhacker. It was his giant hands that held the ball at the start of the drive, and it was his hands that had to carry or pass it into the deadzone. This was basically the only rule of goreball so people took it very seriously.

All around Crusher Ghana's tanks, giants encased in Kevlar and heavy metal, brandished rusty cleavers and bulletproof shields with which they hoped to keep their kingwhacker safe. Johnny on the other hand was long and frail, the leaper of the team, and armor would only weigh him down. He tried to blend in with the gunners and flankers and kamikazes around him and nervously played with the grenades on his belt.

Cheerleaders unloaded their assault rifles into the roaring crowd. The red cloud of blood was their signal to start. Guns and swords and shields and rocket launchers were raised and somewhere a drone beep-booped and bullets started flying. Their offensive line was strong and numerous and pushed the enemy halfway across the field until their right flank was hit by an exploding kamikaze that catapulted three Ghanaian players out of the stadium.

Enemy tanks quickly rushed the weak spot and as Ghana's players shifted to meet them they were caught off-guard by another kamikaze on the other side. The line imploded. Crusher turned around and hurled the ball towards Johnny moments before his head was cut off by an oversized steak knife that read 'Everything is bigger in Texas'. "Leap Johnny", roared Crusher's head, "leap like you've never lept before". Tanks were sprinting towards him. Eyes wide in terror, Johnny took a grenade off his belt, counted to three and threw it to his feet.

He barely managed to hold on to the ball as his broken body whirled through the air. Across the field another explosion occurred and the American leaper surged past him, screaming "The Pain" over and over again. Proper leaping was all about the correct technique, thought Johnny.

The clock expired just as he landed a few inches short of the deadzone. His bones and intestines were broken but most of the other players had forgotten about the match and were facing to bloodshed in the middle of the field. Johnny clenched his teeth and wobbled pathetically towards the deadzone, inching ever closer. He lifted the ball with his good arm. Slowly edged it closer. Just as the ball touched down Johnny heard a beep-boop and the roar of machineguns and it exploded in his face.

One referee gave the score. One called it short. The third one had joined the brawl in the middle of the field. Boos and cheers echoed from the ranks equally. The referees shrugged and waved the audience towards them. They didn't have to ask twice. Waves of people washed over the stands and clashed on the field to settle the dispute, mingling with the few goreball players that where still standing. Specks of flesh and blood polluted the air as the cheerleaders opened fire to support their teams. Tanks broke bones and spines while kamikazes strangled people with their own intestines. Drony McBot ordered a precision-strike that destroyed part of the western stadium wall and hurt a few innocent bystanders.

The dust settled after an hour of carnage and a handful of Ghanaian fans and players were the only ones still conscious and standing.

"Score for Ghana", croaked a referee, wriggling on the ground as if that would unbreak his spine any sooner. "Match ends with a 5-1 victory for the U.S-Kickers." The Panzerfausts cheered. Johnny beamed as they lifted his smoking, broken body and carried him off to celebrate.

Entenzahn fucked around with this message at 18:46 on Jan 12, 2014

Play
Apr 25, 2006

Strong stroll for a mangy stray
This prompt was tough and a bit awkward. Went thought a lot of other ideas before pounding this one out. This is my first time using first person, and probably about my fourth fiction thing ever written; I hope it doesn't betray that too much! I was gonna give up, but gently caress that.

Terminator
Word Count: 1,217

I got the call from the priest partway through breakfast. If you can call coffee spiked with whiskey breakfast.

“Stanko pest control,” I said, struggling to sound alert and enthusiastic, neither of which I could actually claim to be.

It was the pastor over at the fundie church on Mission. He said he had seen my ad in the phone book and needed some help.

That was a surprise. The ad in question was shamefully unprofessional and I don’t think it had won me a customer in all its years of service. Then again, with all that’s happened recently, pest control is what they call an expanding sector.

“Of course, Father. What kind of problem are we looking at?” I asked. Do you call pastors father? I couldn't remember.

“Why don’t you just come down here and take a look? I’ll explain when you get here.”

I raised an eyebrow at no one. It’s a bad habit. “Um, okay. No problem. Just so you know though, there’s a, uh, consulting fee.”

“That’s perfectly fine, see you soon.”

I finished off my coffee and grabbed my flask, checking myself in the mirror on my way out. It wasn't too pretty, but I told myself it could've been worse. Debatable.

When I turned on the truck the radio started blaring. Obviously I had been blasting it pretty good when I drove home last night. “–WITH THE WORLD OVER STILL TRYING TO COME TO GRIPS WITH THE—.“

I hastily turned it down, but as I pulled away from the house I listened to a bit of the morning news. People still freaking out. Small-scale flash conflicts breaking out in various places, for all the good it will do. Scientists at the WHBCD still trying to explain the unexplainable to people unequipped to understand any of it. The news hadn’t changed much since the whole thing went down.

Thinking about death and immortality always got me thinking about Jason, though, so I turned the radio off and drove in silence, trying to enjoy my inadequate buzz. I wanted to have a swig, but didn’t want to stink of liquor when I arrived at the customer’s place, so I didn’t.

I tried to think about the job. For obvious reasons, pest control had gotten pretty huge recently. Being a small-business owner, with one employee (me), I was still waiting for my ticket to the gravy train. Maybe this could be it. I specialized in large animals, which were already pretty expensive to handle, and with no one looking over your shoulder the prices of everything could be inflated pretty easily. Not to mention the new serum that was necessary, the one I had to fill out what seemed like millions of forms to get a license for. So pest control could be very lucrative taking into account the new circumstances. More money for whiskey, I thought wryly.

When scientists did that thing they did and everything stopped dying all of a sudden, I had no reason to be less surprised than anyone else. I was also angry, however. Let’s say it didn’t really come at a good time for me. But now I was thinking about Jason again, and I ended up taking a couple swigs anyways to distract myself.

When I finally got to the church, I grabbed my clipboard and knocked on the front door. The place was pretty impressive for this town. Clean white stone of some sort, tall bell tower, that sort of thing.

The man who answered was a pretty common-looking guy with black robes of some sort and a sweaty face. He was a bit intense, but I suppose that’s what made him such a good priest. He invited me in, and told me the problem was down in the basement. That’s pretty common, so I followed him there. On the way he tried to make small talk, asking my opinion on all the recent craziness. Like I said it’s not a topic that I try to dwell on, so I asked him about his pest problem. But he also seemed hesitant to discuss that, so we ended up walking in silence.

I followed him down into the basement. My eyes were beginning to adjust when all the sudden he flipped on the lights, making me squint. When I looked around, I saw a bunch of people standing in a rough semicircle facing me. There were thirty of them or so. They looked very normal except perhaps a bit more straight-laced than most. Their clothes were very fine, and jewelry glittered at finger and wrist and throat.

“Okay, so what’s this about?” I said. This was pretty creepy. “I’m not interested in your religious stuff so don’t even try it.”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Stanko!” The priest's too-loud voice spoke from behind, startling me. He was still sweating profusely, even though the temperature was on the cold side. “We’re not so much interested in your eternal soul, but rather our own.”

This sounded pretty ominous to me for some reason, and I started to back away.

“Please, don’t be alarmed Mr. Stanko, we mean you absolutely no harm. Let me explain, briefly . . .”

Trust me, it was not brief. The gist of it, though, was that these people were very serious Christians, and they saw the recent immortalization (is that a word? It should be, regardless) of everyone and everything in the world a terrible affront to their beliefs. I began to see where this was going.

“No, I won’t do it. Don’t you see how much trouble that could get me into?” I could go to prison, I could lose everything I have,” I said.

“Nonsense. Nobody knows we called you, that’s why we specifically chose the smallest operation we could find in the area.” Well, that explained the ad. “Moreover, I called you with a throwaway phone. As long as we make this quick, there will be no problems!” He shook his head convulsively, spraying me with sweat.

Suddenly, his expression softened and he smiled, making him appear even more disturbing than before. “Do you think it’s right that we were given no choice in this matter? Are you perfectly happy with what they've done to us?”

The priest’s manner did nothing to convince me, but his words found a soft spot. In fact, I wasn't happy with how things were. I thought about Jason, my beloved son dead mere weeks before the “breakthrough”. I thought about myself, my alcoholism and my grief and my bitterness. I thought about the fact that it would never end.

“You might have a point, father.” I withdrew my flask and drained half of the remainder, now that we were partners in crime rather than business associates. “I’ll sell you the stuff you need—at an enormous markup, and I hope you understand its not cheap to begin with—but I won’t help you do the deed.”

The priest smiled in what appeared to be genuine happiness and relief. He moved closer. “Maybe you would like to join us, Mr. Stanko?” ha asked quietly.

I hesitated. I actually hesitated. But then I shook my head. This wasn't my style.

And besides, should I change my mind, I would always have the means.

Peel
Dec 3, 2007

Closure (502, #26)

“What do you do with your memories?”

He saw her looking at him in the twilit room. Her golden sectioned face, with just a hint of asymmetry. She had excellent taste in faces. He had thought that when they first met and it was still true.

“Maximum fidelity,” he said. “Full sensory bandwidth. If it’s anything less than real I’m just not satisfied with it.

“That must use up a lot of archival space.”

“It does. But I’m picky. But I only save the perfect experiences. Those ones you want to remember for the rest of forever. The last geysers on Titan, before they paved it over. My personal audience with the Jupiter mind. The trysts I will never want to forget.” He winced inwardly. Why did she have to ask that now? “What about you?”

“I don’t save in high detail. But if I find something I like, I do it for a long time, over and over. The memory is engraved a little deeper each time around. The things I’ve liked enough to remember well, they’re things I like enough to live again for real.”

“Sounds time consuming.”

She shrugged. “It passes the millenia. I spent some time trying to do everything, just like everyone. But after you’ve done everything, then it’s time to focus on what’s most important to you.”

He grunted assent, and they lay there for a while. These had become more common, lately. Not silences of unspoken understanding, but awkward silences waiting for words.

Letting that wait go on longer would just be painful for them both.

“I think it’s time we both moved on.”

He braced himself but she just looked at him sadly.

“I think you’re right,” she said. “It was good at the start, but now the magic is gone.”

“You could feel it too?”

“I’ve known this was coming for a long time, to be honest. But I wanted to preserve things until it finally arrived.”

“No hard feelings?”

“None. We can always remember the good times.”

“Yes.” He paused. “Yes, we can.”

He said his farewells and left. Outside her private sector, amid the brightening voids of the megastructure’s day-cycle, he reviewed his recent history.

<Archive.>

<This is Sol Megastructure Archival Facility. Do you have a memory management request?>

Only the best, only the perfect and irreplaceable. His memory was already almost full, and eternity had only just begun.

<Archive, delete the last two hundred blocks. I won’t be needing them again.>

<Understood. Deletion of last two hundred blocks will commence on receipt of quantum signature confirmation.>

He confirmed.

***

Later, in an unfamiliar part of the Sol megastructure, where none of his carefully curated memories were set, he met a woman he had never seen before. She smiled at him but looked a little sad, and strangely unsurprised. He couldn’t help but notice she had excellent taste in faces.

She seems interesting, he thought, and struck up a conversation.

Chair Bird
May 2, 2012
Paradise (894 Words)

My knees felt weak as I gazed in astonishment at the rich foliage all around me. I made it, after years of looking for a way; I was finally standing in paradise.

I ran my fingers lightly over the vivid colors and breathed in the rich scent of life. I was standing on the edge of a lush forest my eyes fixed avidly on the pool in front of me, surrounded by high cliffs, where at least five waterfalls skipped playfully downhill.

I think I would have been content to stand there for days, letting the peace and life soak into me. As odd as it was to think about, I could stand there for days, or years, and never grow hungry or cold or tired. Best of all, I would never die. After all, this was paradise.

I moved to walk lightly along the bank of the pond, bending to observe different rock formations and run my hands through the warm water. I could not say how long I meandered here, it could have been minutes, or it could have been hours, but at some point I observed movement to my right a few yards from where I stood. I turned curiously to see what appeared to be a small child standing near the forest edge watching me.

I moved closer to get a better look and eventually I could see it was not a child but a woman, so slight she was difficult to make out in the distance, but the desperation in her eyes was immediately apparent.

She began to lope towards me, her arms and legs seeming almost separate from her body. I realized as she got closer that this was because she was so desperately thin. To make matters worse her body appeared to be covered in terrible sores that prompted me to begin stepping backwards to escape her. Before I could make my escape she grabbed hold of my shirt and peered into my face as if hoping to glean some peace and strength from my soul.

I held my hands up not wanting to touch the sores on her arms but longing to pry the mad woman off of me. “What do you want?!” I shouted shimming my body to get away from her.

Her eyes lit up with recognition and she spoke “I am so glad you speak English. I need to get out of here, please tell me how to get out!”

I looked at her perplexed. This was paradise, how in the world was this woman suffering so much that she wanted to leave. “I don’t understand, this is paradise, why would you want to leave?”

“So tired… so tired… so tired!” She screamed, releasing me and reaching up to pull on her ratty pale blonde hair. When she pulled her hands away I could see hair was now hanging off her fingers and I tried to calm the panic rising in my chest.

“Please” the woman continued “Take me back, I just want to die” I froze at her last words and tried desperately to bring back the feeling of peace I had just a few minutes before.

Shouts in the distance interrupted my futile struggle and I looked up to see who was approaching. The woman looked too and let out a shriek of horror bounding past me and towards the forest.

A moment later a group of men shoved past me as well chasing the woman and shouting in a language I did not understand. I stood horrified and considered my next move. Perhaps I had been naïve to assume that upon entering paradise I would be greeted by beautiful women, perhaps naked, and then fed exotic fruits only to never grow too hungry or too fat.

I heard footsteps and turned to see one of the men had left the party and was walking back towards me. He was tall and athletic with a full beard and bright blue eyes. He gazed at me for a moment and then spoke, but I could not understand. He tried a few more phrases before landing on “You speak English?”

“Yes!” I gasped in relief, hoping that he could take me to a place where I could relax.

“I am sorry about the incident a moment ago, the infidels do not often escape but when they do we are always quick to bring them back.”

“The infidels?” I inquired, quite certain that this was not a proper word to be using in paradise.

“Yes, they are sick and dying, we must keep them quarantined in order to protect the rest” His answer was simple but my heart quickened its pace.

“But” I began, looking at his blue eyes and hoping I had misunderstood “People, can’t die here… this is paradise”

He laughed in a good natured way, throwing his head back, his smile lighting up his face. He patted me on the back in an act of sympathy and said “Yes my friend, they get sick but they do not die, it happens to all of us, this is inevitable.”

My hands felt clammy and I realized in despair that there were many things I did not know about this place, and what I thought was paradise may eventually be my own personal hell.

The big man smiled again “Let’s go” he said.

QuoProQuid
Jan 12, 2012

Tr*ckin' and F*ckin' all the way to tha
T O P

(#28)

Death in Dorset - 723 words

When the Earl of Dorset entered the chamber, he was greeted by angry murmurs. A thousand men had come to complain. The largest crowd yet. Mayors, barons, soldiers and priests huddled together and watched him with distrustful eyes. The young Earl positioned himself on his throne and motioned for the visitors to begin. The room erupted in shouts.

“My liege, this has got to end. You’ve disrupted the natural order!” said a heavy-set fisherman, who managed to make himself heard over the din by banging his spear against a pillar until the room quieted. His flesh pulsed as he spoke and his face contorted in agony.

“My family can’t eat!” he hunched over in pain as his gut writhed.

A priest forced his way forward, shoving aside a cavalryman whose neck was held together by a single tendon. The soldier’s head rolled across his chest and fell with a snap to the floor. Someone behind him fainted.

“I haven’t been able to get a moment of quiet in days. My entire congregation thinks the End Times are upon us and yesterday someone stole the tabernacle. They are passing the Eucharist out like sweets. It’s sacrilegious!”

“Uh yeah?” shouted someone from the back, “You try takin uh poo poo recently? Chamberpots ah literally overflowing. I can’t take so much as uh stroll down tha street without stepin in it. There’s filth everywhere.”

The complaints continued. Meat writhed and breathed even after being served. Pox victims walked the streets, dropping mounds of flesh behind them. Abbeys were overcrowded with the injured whose wounds would not heal. Stone slabs had to be dragged onto graves to prevent the dead from wiggling to freedom and there were rumors that the Pope was going to excommunicate the entire realm for offenses against God.

The Earl raised a hand and a hush fell over the crowd. Somewhere in the distance, a building collapsed.

“And what would you all ask me to do about these atrocities?”

“Your Grace,” the fat man managed to settle the fish swimming in his stomach, “we intercede on behalf of your prisoner, Death.”

The Earl frowned, “But how can I release a creature who stands accused of treason against myself and my family. It would not be just! You know how I found him, do you not?”

“Yes, my liege. The entire county-”

“I returned from the hunt early and found the beast skulking in my personal quarters, trying to break into my wife’s room, trying to intimidate the midwife into opening the door,” he was shouting now, “Is this the thing you want released? A fiend that preys on the weak? A monster that would deprive me and the entire realm of an heir? I am not about to let MY authority be undermined!”

“My liege,” said the priest, suddenly looking very old, “perhaps we can negotiate with Death? Agree upon a ransom? Please. I don’t think the county can survive anymore upheaval. Let him go under the condition that he spare your dynasty.”

The Earl combed a grey hair from his face and motioned for his guards to bring Death from its cell.

The prisoner was brought into the chamber with thick manacles covering its arms and legs. Once more, a hush fell over the crowd and they parted to let the figure pass. Death smiled and bowed before the throne.

“Thank you for the audience, Edward. Your hospitality is uncommon.”

The Earl frowned at the creature before him, “Death, I have brought you here to negotiate the terms of your release. Surrender all claims over my dynasty and you shall be freed.”

“Edward,” said Death, tilting his head at an angle that gave the Earl a headache, “You are too hasty! What reason do I have to negotiate with you?”

“I could have you thrown into the oubliette for eternity. Do you think I can’t hold you? My cells are impenetrable.”

Death’s eyes, unmoving, watched everyone in the room at once. The rusted chains around his arms bent as they scraped together, “Ach, but you are too hasty! My companion is here to rescue me. Your walls cannot stop him. Even now, he rallies at my defense.”

“And who,” said the Earl, brushing dust from his robe, “would befriend Death?”

“Time,” the creature said over the roar of crumbling bricks and decaying mortar.

V for Vegas
Sep 1, 2004

THUNDERDOME LOSER
The Four Trillionth Human.664

The midnight sun was low on the horizon, when, on a crowded hillside on the Antarctic plateau, the four trillionth human was born. A boy.

The event passed with little notice from the thousands of brown, naked people surrounding them. They carried on sitting or standing or staring vacantly at the person next to them or the muddy red sky overhead. Every here and there a couple had remembered their primal urges and were loving vigorously in the dust, a brief firecracker of energy that dissipated quickly into the apathy of the crowd.

Even the mother paid the boy little attention, glancing briefly at the mewling infant at her feet before wandering off into the throng. There was no need, the boy’s body had already rejected the umbilical cord, sealing off his final connection to his parent as the skin on his stomach healed over itself. Instinctively he rolled out of the shade of the man standing near him and lay still in the cold rays of the sun.

**

His earliest memories were of dust. It coated everything, like a gritty extra skin that couldn’t be shed. He licked it, crawled in it, grabbed up handfuls of it and shouted and threw it at the legs that surrounded him. No response. Alone, a brief, ancient fear would pulse in the back of his mind, only to be smothered by a warm glow as the backup system engineered into his brain released its chemical load, causing him to simply lie there quietly. Neither hungry nor thirsty nor tired nor alarmed.

**

As he grew taller his mind’s curiosity subsided. Synapses stopped firing as his brain rewired itself to enlarge the pleasure centres. By puberty his mind was in an almost constant state of euphoria. The people around him fading into insignificance. The only instinct that would cut through now was when he saw a female. After briefly growling at each other they would fall to the ground and rut for a few minutes before rolling off again, instantly forgetting what had just happened.

**

His tenth winter was when things changed. Deep in the recesses of his cortex a new connection formed – instructed by a random mutation in his junk DNA. Unpredictable but inevitable. He stood in the dark as the darkness lifted from his consciousness and as the sun rose a month later, he looked at it as if for the first time. The light revealed he was standing in the centre of a small, circular depression about a hundred yards across. The edges of the depression sloped up sharply to the ridge line around the circumference. The basin was packed – at least five thousand people stood shoulder to shoulder all around him.

For the first time in several years, the fear returned. Small at first, but, finding its old foe had vanished, it quickly spread its wings into a full blown panic. He had to get out of this crowd; pushing forward through the masses, he knocked over uncomplaining statues as he struggled up the slope to the ridge-line.

As he crested the ridge he paused. On the far side the ground fell away in a sheer cliff. At the bottom, a vast plain spread out past the horizon – covered with people. Millions upon millions of them, jammed together and clothed only in the dust thrown up by their movements.

He landed with a thump at the base of the cliff, but he did not die. Immediately, long dormant cells kicked into gear, miniature organic repair machines began suturing torn organs and knitting broken bones. But the lynchpin to the repair system, the soothing release from pain could not stop the panic that flooded his body, interrupting signals and beginning the final cardiac arrest in the perfectly designed heart. The system began to fail irretrievably.

As he stared at the press of faces above him, his first, and final, independent thought was the realisation they were all identical.

Fumblemouse
Mar 21, 2013


STANDARD
DEVIANT
Grimey Drawer
Wordcount: 749

The fruit of the tree

When Eve refused the fruit of the serpent, The Lord was pleased and knew her to be good. He walked with her amongst the orchards and showed her the tree of Eternal Life. But when he said that she might eat of it’s fruit as a reward, Eve wept, and would not stop until The Lord promised she might share it with her husband.

She brought the fruit of the tree of Eternal Life to Adam, and told him of the Serpent and The Lord. Adam clasped her to him, said “Thank you, flesh of my flesh,” and together they ate. Adam promised that now they would never be apart. He kissed her and they lay together. When it was done, Eve knew that he was lying, though he knew it not.

That night, The Lord appeared to her in a dream and told her that the gates of Eden were open, that all the world was there for them to make their own garden. The lands of the world were theirs and their children’s, but the gates of Eden would remain open and unguarded. If ever there was need, then Eve might return through the gates and walk with Him amongst the orchards.

Yet when the Children of Eve had multiplied upon the Earth and made it all a garden such as Eden, a melancholy grew within their hearts. They walked among the bowers of home, singing in the twilight, yet saw the unknowable stars appear and were mournful. They played among the Lions and Bears, feeling fellowship with the creatures of the world, yet saw no new names in the Books of Beasts and were bereft. They ate each day from the bounteous fruits the trees gave freely and yet were not satisfied.

They came to Eve then, in their multitudes. “Mother Eve,” they said, alone, in groups, in crowds, “we are afraid. We have climbed the peaks, and forded the rivers and crossed the oceans. We have planted and tended and grown, we have gone forth and multiplied, we have not good nor evil. But there is a shadow across us and we know not why. Help us, Mother Eve. Help us understand how we might walk in the sun once again.”

But Eve had felt their sorrow grow within herself, and had no answer. And so she returned to Eden, to walk with The Lord in his orchards, and tell Him of the sadness in her heart.

The Lord heard her plea, and asked her why she had travelled here alone. Eve spoke of how Adam lived not with her, but for centuries had travelled within the world, looking for the new and the unknown and The Lord loved her in her loneliness. He bade her sleep a while, and called forth the Serpent in the garden. When Eve awoke, she was already great with child.

She returned from Eden ripe to became a mother once again. Adam heard word of the miracle, and returned to clasp her to him. “Flesh of my flesh, you have found what I have sought, the miracle of the new.” But Eve understood not even this child would be enough to keep him beside her.

She bore a girl-child, and the other children of Eve rejoiced at the news, and called her Emmanuelle, Lord With Us. But the years passed and the girl grew strange and unfathomable. She kept away from the world, spending time in a workshop she had built. Few would she permit to visit, but every year a pile of manuscripts and diagrams appeared outside her door. These were pored over with wonder, and every instruction followed, and every elemental table learned and revered.

Eventually the work grew too much for one woman and Emmanuelle took on thirteen apprentices. A decade passed like a whisper, and their works filled a library, and she gathered them together and announced “It is finished.”

And the life left her.

In the years to come the apprentices and their own disciples spread throughout the world and built the holy machines that carried Eve’s children to the stars, with Adam first amongst them. Emmanuelle’s name was revered for all that she had taught them. But as they looked upon the newness that they had wrought, their hearts found meaning in her final day. For the Lord God so loved the world, that he took his only begotten Daughter, that whosoever believeth in her should not have everlasting life, but perish.

sebmojo
Oct 23, 2010


Legit Cyberpunk









500 words is now the limit.

El Diabolico
Dec 19, 2006

THUNDERDOME LOSER
*grumblegrumblegrumble*

wc 500

"Untitled" posted:


A flood of blood rushed through my hands. I myself was never fond of the sight of blood but, in my long travels, it was something I had to become accustomed to. As I applied more pressure to the blade I could hear a gurgle come from this bandit. She was nothing but a young girl. She looked at me with a sad look in her eyes as she realized what has become of her. Her face soon scrunched up in pain as the color drained away from her face. Her fragile form soon collapsed in my arms as she fell unconscious from blood loss.

While she was pale from being stabbed in the heart, she looked emaciated. Her thin and frail form was definitely a result of famine. Where her left hand would be, there was this crude appendage fashioned in the shape of a blade. No doubt something that would’ve ended up in me if I wasn’t so careful. I couldn’t help but think that, all things considered, her being this way was all my fault. To think, the work of just some nerd fooling around in a lab would eventually cause this much havok. “Just think about how much you can change the world!” they said to me while I laughed while rebelling the will of god. I was so naive then. I calmly set her limp body down on the ground. "Poor thing", I uttered as seeing thus pitiable being this way filled my heart with sadness. I decided help the poor thing. After patching her up, I picked up her ‘corpse’ and sought out shelter for the night.

I had set a pot of stew over the campfire. It was something I've done so often in my travels but this time I had to be careful of it spilling over. I've never cooked for anyone other than myself. While I was diligently tending to the pot I was surprised by a sudden gasp. The girl awoke with the fear of death fresh in her mind. From the countless times I've witnessed it, This was without a doubt her first time dying. She panicked at the sight of blood over her clothes and checked her wounds which were, without question, non-existent. Her eyes then quickly darted towards the light of the campfire and then towards me. I glared at her. She then averted her gaze, seemingly feeling guilty over what transpired. I then said "Are you hungry?". She nodded her head in silence.

She quickly snatched the bowl out of my hand. She fumbled around a bit trying to eat it but she quickly got accustomed to it. She began to shed tears and wolf down the food like it was the only thing she has eaten in her life. Knowing what I know, it probably was the only thing she has eaten in a long time. While she was finishing off the meal i asked for her name, In a hushed tone she said, “Beth”.

Ihmemies
Oct 6, 2012

Thunderdome LXXV

Last light of the day
(1237 immortal words.)

“I doubt they take immortality well,” Lucifer said.

He reached out from his couch and picked a dark grape from a crystal bowl. It sat atop a small quartz table dividing the space between him and God. The seeds crushed between Lucifer’s teeth, bringing a welcome taste into his mouth.

“Although I expect a lot from them. Faith. Piety. Definitely vigor. Giving up easily is unlike them.”

Planet Earth stood before him and God, floating against the backdrop of countless stars. The two adversaries sat in judgment, discussing what to do in this regrettable day.

“In my image I created them, in paradise I let them live and prosper.

“And I instructed them like a mother: To do as I said, not as I did. I gave them more chances than anyone deserves.

“For every evil I did, they repeated it thousandfold. For every sin I made, in unison they sinned relentlessly.

“Nevertheless I think of humankind as my children. To cast them into everlasting agony…”

“Hell on Earth; or in Hell, is but a technical difference”, said Lucifer and took another grape from the bowl. God, deep in thought, lay unmoving for a time.

Finality echoing in God’s voice, she said: “It is time to solve the eternal disputes between us. It is time for humankind to repent their sins the last time, or be cast out of Earth.”

And then came seven angels bearing seven silver plates, each holding a seal of ages. In succession God took the offered seals, crumbled them into dust in her hand, and cast the remains out into the Earth.

***

Cursed was the day humankind achieved immortality. Mortality and death — once checks against such afflictions as diseases, overpopulation and cancer — were one moment no more. Instead of a blessing, immortality was the one last problem on top of the mountain of problems which pushed civilization over the edge.

In the end, it did not matter who launched the first missile. The Earth burned, filling the skies with soot and bringing night over the land. People screamed until they could not, their consciousnesses echoing the voices their bodies were not capable of anymore.

The day of the reckoning was at hand. Thousands of years in waiting, it was finally time to weigh the value of every living soul.

***

First a tiny blemish, the stones in the center of the city started to revolve and twist against the day. The spiral widened, eating buildings and people, sucking them into the bottom of the deepening maelstrom. It ever more rapidly engulfed the city, reaching so deep down one could not discern the bottom anymore.

The eye turned crimson in a violent eruption of blood. From the stream miles wide spike pushed forward, spanning towards the sky and piercing the firmament, connecting Earth to Hell and Heaven. In total seven of the largest cities met the same fate, invasion of Hell’s forces.

Such was the curse of eternal life, fragile bodies blackened in the nuclear fire, held together by immortal souls, in agony forced to witness the end of the time.

The armies of Hell marched unchecked upon the earth, facing little resistance from the remains of even the most powerful nations’ troops. As the last remnant of pity God had left for humankind, she let her angels descend from Heaven, and as allies struggle against Hell.

***

At dawn, Lucifer, the Lord of Light, and God, the Lady of Darkness, met on the battlefield. Under their heels lay remains of the troops of once mighty forces. From a distance one could see shapes of foundations of a city, parts of lone concrete walls and reinforcing steel dotting the landscape.

A tenuous rain matted the ground. The adversaries drew forth their longswords and stood a moment in honor of the fallen. A cluster of thunderbolts froze the scene. Swords clashed together the first time.

“Pride,” said Lucifer, his mouth widening into a thin smile.

“The most deadly of the seven sins”, God said, failing to avoid Lucifer’s attack. The sword glanced away from her left shoulder plate, giving a chance to drop her sword and grapple his knees. A hard pull up, and accompanied by a mighty crunch, Lucifer fell to the mass of bodies. God picked up his sword and leant on the star-shaped pommel.

And thus, every living creature on land she had made, the man made in her own image, released from their suffering.

“Avarice”, said Lucifer, taking a hold of his sword and rising up.

“Humankind’s desire was insatiable. Power and money, nothing was enough, for they thought they were above me. They dug out the remains of the past and unleashed them into the air, and into the seas. The more wealth you owned, the higher others regarded you. They condemned their eternal souls for the sake of fleeting materialism.”

The birds of the skies and the multitude of creatures living under waters, undone.

“Gluttony.”

“They filled the earth with waste, piling it to great mounds, as monuments of their revel in consumption. Half of the food they produced spoiled or was thrown away, while hundreds of millions starved. They invented innumerable excesses, and for each they invented a thousand new needs.”

The sun and the moon and the stars, littering the firmament of heaven, undone.

“Sloth,” said Lucifer, “is probably the most dangerous of the sins. They twisted your words to fit their own needs and used the words to discriminate against others. The great cathedrals were used as marketplaces, for wealth the priests traded empty promises they could not keep.”

The very earth the combatants stood on, and all the forms which still desperately clung to life, undone.

Skimming over the surface of the endless seas, for the fifth day, the combatants were locked in the duel of the fates.

“Lust.” A pause in the rhythm allowed Lucifer to step back and take a look at his opponent. His armor was probably in as bad shape as hers. Dented and scratched, her helmet rendered useless and thrown away after he had smashed the visor in.

“Lust for knowledge’s final frontiers, for power fit for no man.” God raised her sword and attacked, arms crossed.

Heaven and Hell, undone. Only the waters covered the surface of the Earth.

“Envy.”

“You can never be like me. I created the universe and the stars and the planets circling them. You, too, as I created all things in Heaven and on Earth. And as I have the power to create, I wield the power to destroy.”

God banished the light back to darkness. Time lost meaning in the featureless black, and all that was left was their struggle to the end.

“Wrath,” said God, and thrust her sword past Lucifer’s defenses, piercing his breastplate, “is a sin not in need of further definition.” The sword crushed the sternum, struck through the heart and lodged firmly between Lucifer’s vertebrae.

As his final words he said, “all things considering, it was worth the shot. There is only hope left now. Hope that the next time will last for all eternity.”

God held the bloodied sword in her hands as the last light of the day slowly faded away. God saw every thing that she had made, undone.

And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.

Agnostic Jihad
Sep 17, 2007

Old school? New school?
Shit, I didn't go to school.
My God Is The Sun, 1231 words

The heat was now unbearable from the dull orange light that seared the bleached, arid wastes. As Cole watched, the skin on his arm began to singe, then heal: a tide that ebbed and flowed. An inhuman rictus crept onto his face, a parody of the smile it once was.

Soon, he thought.

--------

“If everyone could turn to Matthew, chapter 25, verse 31…”

Cole looked up at the man behind the pulpit and sighed. “Mom, I wanna go to Sunday school now! We’re gonna learn about Jonah and the big fish and Miss Kathy’s gonna be there and—“

“Young man, you will be quiet this instant,” She hissed, “You will listen to Pastor Williams’ sermon; I’ll not see my boy burning in Hell, do you understand?”

He settled in his seat and quieted at the reminder of brimstone and sulfur. A now-familiar existential terror overcame him.

“That’s a good boy.” She smiled at him, pleased. Since his father left, she was left to raise him to be a man, and a God-fearing man he would be.

Pastor Williams continued, seemingly oblivious to the scolding a few rows in front of him. “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.’ You see, God feels all of our suffering, and wants his children to alleviate it! He feels your cruelty, your indifference!

“Continue with verse 45...”

--------

The riots of the last two centuries had taken their toll on Washington, but somehow the Library of Congress remained relatively pristine. Cole strolled past a dilapidated security checkpoint, through archways and Roman-style columns, to a balcony overlooking the mezzanine.

“Good morning, and welcome to the Library. Is there anywhere you’d like to start?”

Startled, Cole turned around to see a mousy, plain woman standing behind him, her pink gummy smile starkly contrasting with her ratty, grey clothing.

He smiled and responded, “I heard there’s a pretty good collection of biographies here.”

--------

To Cole’s surprise, the mouse stubbornly continued to screech with pain.

He turned to his assistant and wonderingly asked how long it had been in the chamber.

“Twelve hours, doc. Twelve hours in a 90% methylhexadrine atmosphere.”

“Nothing should be able to survive that long breathing poison.”

“Well, thanks to you, Mister Squeaks here is.”

The two men shared a few moments of amazed silence.

“How much longer do you want to keep him in for?”

Cole stared into the pale yellow fog of the Plexiglas cage and said “I think the little guy has had enough, don’t you?”

--------

“Don’t you understand, mother, I did it for you!”

The harsh fluorescent light emphasized her pallor as she clung to life. He could see almost no connection between this frail old bat in the hospital bed and the vital young woman of his childhood memories. Her rheumy eyes turned from the television to his face.

“Cole, why would you deny my eternal fellowship with the Lord? Would you be so cruel?”

His tear-stained face twisted with frustration. “Fellowship with the Lord? Really?! You’re the last one left, Mom! There’s one nurse left on staff, and she’s just waiting for you to die or wake up! Why can’t you let go of your bullshit? I’m real, Mom, why can’t you fellowship with me? You pray to Jesus for eternal life when I’m here giving you the real thing!”

She blinked slowly and said “I’m sure you’ll understand when you’re older. God knows you have time to think about it.”

He stood and through sobbing breaths said, “I can’t watch this. I can’t…”

She took her final breath as the last rays of daylight crept through the curtains.

--------

With the Library finished, he walked out, at a loss for what to do next. He pushed and elbowed his way through the impossibly thick crowds of the city.

Ahead of him, he saw an empty circle in the crowd, and as he approached it, a woman wailed in agony. Forcing his way to the edge of it, he saw the source of the scream; she was laying on her back with blood and filth streaming from between her legs.

He watched, astounded, as a newborn girl emerged. Her mother, breathing heavily, stood up and melted into the endless stream of humanity on the street, which closed around the baby.

Horrified, he searched among the forest of legs for the little girl, but her cries were silenced by the constant trampling.

As the shock of what he had just seen wore off, he realized it was happening all around him. As he walked through the remains of Virginia, the constant horde of people began to lose its density until he could see children emerge from the tangle of limbs that had engulfed them.

--------

He stopped at the seaside cliff and paused to let the sun pass by, once, twice, three times. A coil of nylon cord looped over his shoulder, he drank in the view around him. With luck, this will be the last thing I see for a while.

His thoughts drifted back to the children born from the hordes. If they could escape consciousness through constant injury, maybe he could, too.

With the noose tied and the rope secured, he walked to the edge. Goodbye.

Snap.

--------

He awoke, drowning, with sharp pains coming and going all over his body.

As he looked on, a huge mouth engulfed his thigh, rows of teeth tearing at his flesh. He watched as his leg disappeared down the shark’s throat, and regrew almost instantly. Its hunger was never quite sated, and it chewed on him for days. As he struggled, the shark’s resolve to consume him strengthened, until his body was forced down its gullet.

Then, for a while, blackness.

--------

The beach stretched as far as Cole could see in either direction, along with a tangle of people. He sighed and stood up. He could make out occasional scraps of clothing in the sea of brown and pink around him, but his nakedness was unremarkable.

Cole weighed his options as the moon passed through its phases. Of the two choices available, he eventually settled on wandering. Seasons passed as he walked, and he realized that he could never escape the horde. They covered everything like rot on a corpse.

I should have sterilized the bastards.

He looked down and saw a current of muddy water at his feet. Inching forward, it got deeper and deeper, until it was up to his waist. Satisfied, he stopped and waited. As he did, the crowd on either side of him get taller and taller, until they were standing on cliffs. The canyon continued to rise.

--------

The sun had turned a deep crimson in its old age. It now filled the sky from horizon to horizon, a looming and terrible sign that everything must die.
Flurries of fire began to form in the air. This was it, Cole thought. The final torment before the bliss of atomization.

Cole laughed his final laugh before the atmosphere ignited.

Everything must die.

The sun approached inexorably over the final few eons, until all it took was a jump to escape the Earth’s gravity.

As he floated into the sun, he felt his skin sear off. Scarlet fire tore at his muscles, but he continued to heal and continued to burn. Forever.

Bigup DJ
Nov 8, 2012
This is the first piece of fiction I've produced on my own time. I hope you like it!

---//---

The Supermen
(244 words)

I’m dying
---
“…to reduce the foreshortening of telomeres. Clinical trials begin next month. Incredible stuff, isn’t it Linda? Why I remember…”
---
“…poo poo, long as I’m pulling in some extra income for me and the wife, where’s the problem? Way things’re going I’m gonna need it.” He orders another round.
---
He signs. He cracks his joints and looks at the men across the table.
---
“…cancerous growths. And what’s more it’s spreading at such a rate that…”
---
“…what? Look - well yes, but look - we’ve come too far to stop now. I’m sure there’s something we…”
---
She heaves into the bowl. She doesn’t know where her husband has gone.
---
“…a nutrient slurry, and hopefully we can figure out how to stop this from happening again. I mean God forbid…”
---
“…missing. Authorities refuse to speculate on the disappearance of…”
---
“…Chancellor herself has called for a period of reflection on the use of these technologies, describing them as “unnecessary and grossly immoral”. We cross now to Germany, where…"
---
“…and reports are coming in that the president of the DRC has opted to undergo the controversial procedure…”
---
“…natural term limits. If the people want him out, they’ll vote him out and I for one…”
---
“…has raised concerns about growing inequality and what she describes as a world of “haves and have-nots”. She joins us now in the studio - Linda, it’s good to be…”
---
“…decades-long campaign, documents revealing the fate of subjects of the first clinical trials have been released. The trials, which began in…”
---
I’ve been dying for so long.

Barracuda Bang!
Oct 21, 2008

The first rule of No Avatar Club is: you do not talk about No Avatar Club. The second rule of No Avatar Club is: you DO NOT talk about No Avatar Club
Grimey Drawer
Felicia Goes South
901 Words


"Hi, welcome to Hell!"

Felicia woke up, and opened her eyes, but everything was blurry and all she knew was that, wherever she was, it was a very sanitary bright. She felt an aching in her arms, near her wrists, but felt nothing unusual when she reached for them. She was lying on her back on something hard and cold, like a sidewalk.

The voice repeated, "Welcome to Hell!"

As Felicia blinked, the scene slowly came into focus and in front of her she could make out a store, Hel-Mart, and a frail, small-framed elderly woman in a firetruck red vest. She turned and looked to her rear. Nothing. Not void or emptiness. Nothing.

"Where am I?" Felicia asked, looking away as she realized she just asked the only question she had already been told the answer to.

Not seeming to mind, the woman said, "You're in Hell, sweetie. I don’t know what you did - they never tell me. I just know that what you’re looking for is in Aisle 10, in housewares.”

“What? Why am I in Hell? I don’t even remember what I-”

“No one does. But you’re going to pay for it all the same. Now, come inside and get started. Might as well not put it off any longer.”

“Get started on what?” Felicia asked, feeling surprised at how little she was curious about how she would spend what was presumably to be the rest of eternity.

The old woman stared for a moment. “You’ll know what to do.”

With a shrug that came not entirely of her own volition, Felicia made her way through the store. She passed the grocery section, where gluttons were endlessly gorging themselves on still-frozen corndogs and cake frosting, pouring maple syrup directly into their overextended maws. She continued toward her destination, housewares, where she saw the vain standing in front of mirrors, posing their flawless bodies but seeing only wasted, decrepit versions of themselves, often with super saggy tits and beanbags.

Felicia found herself in Aisle 10, which housed garden tools. She found herself drawn towards a water hose, and struck with the immediate realization of just how long eternity would be if she were stuck in this infernal big-box store for its duration, and began mindlessly tying a looped knot at the end. The other end she weighted with a trowel and threw over a rafter, over which it was held, once she had adjusted the height and and tied the end. Satisfied, she climbed the shelf, put her head in the loop and jumped.

And landed on the ground, no worse for the wear. Her neck was fine, as was the hose noose, dangling undamaged above her head.

Frustrated by her failure, Felicia scoured the area, trying to find a way to end her shopping experience, to no longer be stuck in Hel-Mart, to no longer be mysteriously compelled by the store manager to take her own life. And lo! Like a lighthouse guiding drunk Portuguese fisherman safely back to shore, she saw the beacon of her salvation. In the lighting section, its colors swirled with a majestic beauty that could only be described as, “groovy.”

She grasped the bottle, burning her hands, and smashed the narrow top against a shelf. She drank, the searing liquid burned Felicia’s throat on its way to her stomach. Once at its destination, she fared no better and began writhing in terrible agony, moaning and burping up gross little bits of orange goo or whatever.

And then, it passed. Still standing, she looked down to see that she had a rather dark spot on her pants, and was now standing in a puddle of yellow and orange liquid. Daunted, she put face in her hands and wept. She wept. She wept and she wept and she wept. She wept because she knew that this was only the beginning. Felicia knew that there would be no end to her compulsion, nor of her failures. All she wanted to do was to be free of this burdensome afterlife, and yet it was denied her. And also she slipped, like an idiot.

She clambered her way to a display of brightly colored dorm mini-couches (somehow she knew it was August) and sat. Curled up in a ball, wrapped tightly in an unicorn blanket, she tried to think of a solution. So far, at least, she had been unable to kill herself because her body couldn’t be damaged. Wait, that wasn’t right. It could be damaged. It was just able to let things pass through if they were quick enough, like with the hose, or the lava lamp. What she needed was slow, and complete.

With a huff, she was on her feet, galloping back to to the grocery section. Felicia looked in the farthest corner and found it - the butcher shop. Pushing past the gluttons, she entered the back room and looked for the switch to turn on the meat grinder. Once it was on, she took a moment to steel herself. This was it. She would finally be free.

She took a step onto a nearby table. Looking at the intake she saw that it would fit her almost entirely. This would be over quickly, of that she was glad. She closed her eyes and, for no good reason, pinched her nose and jumped.

Agony. Numb. Black. Nothing.


“Hi, welcome to Double Hell!”

Feste
Apr 7, 2009

Charles walked into the room where his wife and the only other human on the mining research station in the throes of passion. He shouted in a resigned desolation at the sight and leapt towards the man. He shoved Charles into a bookcase, causing a bookend to fall and strike Charles, crushing his head.. It would be several minutes before he would begin to regenerate and so his wife fled with the man.

His wife had become cold towards him as they focused less on each other and more on completing their testing with atomizing minerals for long distance transportation. The finished tasks were the only way they could track the progression of time ever since the Preservation Event kept them eternally young.

He approached the vaporizing cannon’s cage and disabled the safety locks. It hadn’t its preliminary testing, but it completely destroyed the last few chunks of metal. Charles hooked it to a battery and mounted the cannon on his suit. Destroying everything in his path, he rampaged through the station until he found the lovers. Two blasts from the cannon wiped them from existence.

Time passed. Charles was at work in the silent lab. He felt a chill and the air was ripped from his lungs. He heard his wife’s voice speak, “I told you before: we’re here forever.”

ThirdEmperor
Aug 7, 2013

BEHOLD MY GLORY

AND THEN

BRAWL ME
Meet the Meat -375 words

All is still in the diner except the air itself, stirred along by the lazy rotations of the ceiling fan. The customers sit like vultures, drool rolling down the gummy crags of their skin as they eye empty plates. Mr. Rafferty tilts back his creaking neck, lifting his nose skyward to drag in great breaths for the hope of that elusive scent; stale grease and meat, sizzling together on the pan, warm. He tries to rise further from his seat, but the cracked red leather refusing to part with his flesh and soon he gives up the struggle. The others barely move at all these days.


At four P.M. like clockwork, Tommy breezes in with his shiny white clothes and a warm smile beneath the translucent mask. The relics smile back. Somehow, they can still recognize him. He reads them the latest events from a newspaper, and promises to get them a radio, a promise they forget each time.

At five, it's feeding time. It takes a hammer and a chisel to chip away at the block of frozen flesh in the freezer, full of snouts and gristle and who knows what else. As the ice sloughs off and steams away the meat wakes up, beginning to squirm helplessly on the burning grill. Tommy herds the wriggling bits with the edge of his spatula, trying not to make eye contact as he presses them down to the griddle to cook through the middle. It's only meat, he reminds himself. Only the worst scraps of cow.

------

The relics smash the burgers against their mouths, or bite at the fork as Tommy tries to help them. Very little makes it in. Most to the floor and skitters away, crawling to freedom through the countless cracks in the walls. What's left is a dim memory and a lingering taste for the dead to cling to. They rest easier for it, settling down into their eternal seats as Tommy adjusts their blankets and sweeps away the crumbs.

Before he leaves, Tommy sneaks back to the walk-in fridge. With the hammer and the chisel he cuts away a few pieces, squirreling them away plastic bags.

No-one will starve without it, and he's always wanted a pet.

sentientcarbon
Aug 21, 2008

OFFLINE GAMES ARE THE FUTURE OF ONLINE GAMING

The numbers don't lie. 99.99% of every Diablo 3 player wants the game to be offline. This is a FACT.

OH SHIT IS THAT A WEBCAM? HOLY CRAP GET THAT AWAY FROM ME! (I am terrified of being spied on, because I am a very interesting person)
:siren:Aaaaaand that's the deadline. Submissions closed. Everyone go home, nothing to see here.:siren:

magnificent7
Sep 22, 2005

THUNDERDOME LOSER
^ gaaaaahhhhhhhhfuck.

Death Everlasting. 452 turds.

They called it the Hephaestus Event. An asteroid five miles wide bounced off the moon and into the Pacific. Half the planet died. The rest of us bathed in the life-granting gasses of the radioactive Pacific, and now we're immortal.

That was a million years ago.

A million years before the Hephaestus Event, apes were becoming human. A million years after it, there's nothing. We've run out of interesting stories. Stephen King won't shut his goddamn pie hole. He's written literally a million stories about a writer who something something deadly demon something something magic shadows and the day is saved. gently caress that guy.

Why'd we have to lose J.K. Rowling? I'd give anything for another Harry Potter story that wasn't crap rear end fan fiction. Don't judge me! I'm in hell.

Nothing kills us. I've leapt off of buildings, drowned. Hell, I went through a wood chipper off the back of a truck going 90 down the highway. You think my cells would know well enough to leave the gently caress alone? Nope. They find a way.

It's life everlasting. Like all you smug motherfuckers prayed for. Life. Everlasting. What I wouldn't give to just lie down in a hole and rot.

I've been married a hundred thousand times. At one point, we had a little contest, between me and my neighbors. What? Oh, you're thinking the world's declined into roaming packs of skull-face-painted ne'er-do-wells who'd get a kick out of beheading people? There were.

They got bored, gave up. gently caress 'em.

Where was I. Oh. Right.

Married. Me and the bastards on my street had a contest going for a while. Who could stay married to their braying screeching harpie the longest? Because, sure, while you swore "til death do us part", trust me, those days are gone. And could a bitch bear to part with you after a couple thousand years? Nope. gently caress that. They're in it for the long run. And you can't kill them. Can't bury them. Can't leave them in jail. They'll claw their way out after a hundred years or so. Eventually, they get over you. Or the other way around.

Theresa, she stole my heart. She took a knife, carved it out of my chest and ran away. A week later, I woke up and she was gone. She's probably with the drowners now. They strap weights to themselves and now they're on the bottom of the ocean. Drowning and then healing. It's what passes for entertainment, if that's what you're into.

I miss the days of worrying. Worrying about hunger, illness. Money. A place to live. None of it matters anymore. There is nothing to do. Nothing. Anything and everything, it's been done.

It's been done to death.

magnificent7 fucked around with this message at 06:36 on Jan 13, 2014

crabrock
Aug 2, 2002

I

AM

MAGNIFICENT






For those of you who do these types of things: https://twitter.com/ThunderdomeSA

the archive is set to update it when certain info is input, so if you don't want to religiously check the thread you can watch that for when the results/prompt are posted.

Feste
Apr 7, 2009

Hustled 221 words

Feste posted:

Charles walked into the room where his wife and the only other human on the mining research station in the throes of passion. He shouted in a resigned desolation at the sight and leapt towards the man. He shoved Charles into a bookcase, causing a bookend to fall and strike Charles, crushing his head.. It would be several minutes before he would begin to regenerate and so his wife fled with the man.

His wife had become cold towards him as they focused less on each other and more on completing their testing with atomizing minerals for long distance transportation. The finished tasks were the only way they could track the progression of time ever since the Preservation Event kept them eternally young.

He approached the vaporizing cannon’s cage and disabled the safety locks. It hadn’t its preliminary testing, but it completely destroyed the last few chunks of metal. Charles hooked it to a battery and mounted the cannon on his suit. Destroying everything in his path, he rampaged through the station until he found the lovers. Two blasts from the cannon wiped them from existence.

Time passed. Charles was at work in the silent lab. He felt a chill and the air was ripped from his lungs. He heard his wife’s voice speak, “I told you before: we’re here forever.”

Mercedes
Mar 7, 2006

"So you Jesus?"

"And you black?"

"Nigga prove it!"

And so Black Jesus turned water into a bucket of chicken. And He saw that it was good.




magnificent7 posted:

^ gaaaaahhhhhhhhfuck.

Death Everlasting. 452 turds.



Bruised, bloodied and beaten, our contender drags his carcass across the Thunderdome sandy arena. The crowd had all but given up, but they turn and explode in cheer, throwing poo poo upon our unlikely hero. With a twinkle in his eye, Magnificent7 waves to the crowd and promptly dies a hero's death?


(Good job posting a story! Knew you wouldn't let me down.)

magnificent7
Sep 22, 2005

THUNDERDOME LOSER
Thanks for the support.

crabrock
Aug 2, 2002

I

AM

MAGNIFICENT






Finishing crits from 2 weeks ago, because late is better than never?

JuniperCake:
I think maybe you don’t know what worms look like. “nothing I had ever heard before” tells me nothing, and is a cop out. “Clad in mud[...] Their skin was filthy” show and tell.

Your first two paragraphs are just exposition out the rear end. It’s really boring. Don’t tell me all about a world I don’t care about yet. You gotta earn that poo poo.

Then you have completely cardboard cutout characters. An old man beggar, and some greedy jerk who is a sociopath and just kind of does stuff without any rationale other than “WE DID THIS STUFF SO SUCK IT.”

Lastly, this doesn’t seem like cavemen at all. It seems like ancient greece or something. There are large armies with formations. There is scorched earth, and farming. There is advanced language. All of this points to a much more advanced society than we were looking for. You were up for a DM, but narrowly avoided it.

Would I hit this story over the head with a club and drag it back to my cave:
Sorry, I don’t swing that way.

Sitting Here:
You tried to get a little too creative with the prompt and went with a story of spacemen and then at the very end you throw some cavemen in there. This didn’t work for me.

I think you’re a competent enough writer that I don’t need to comment on your writing skillz, but I didn’t really like the story. Just too much stuff happening in 500 words. I do like bits of it, but I feel like a lot of it is re-treading old ground in terms of “stories I’ve felt I’ve read before.”

I do like the part where the people won’t stop loving though.

Would I hit this story over the head with a club and drag it back to my cave:
No, but I’d take it back to my cave and probe it for “science.”

sebmojo:
Your pun-chline depends on a pronunciation of Dan-Knug that I think is a bit of a stretch. I was reading it with a silent ‘K.’

I like little things about your story: “his favourite rock”, “loving stupid idiot fuckhead,” but there are also things I don’t like, such as “Then halfway up the slope disaster struck” (telling), the sky boulder that seems to stay in the sky way too long, and the whole colour scene was a little forced.

At least you followed the prompt though.

Would I hit this story over the head with a club and drag it back to my cave:
It’ll do.

Quidthulhu
Dec 17, 2003

Stand down, men! It's only smooching!

Placeholder for Rhino/Quidnose brawl because he called me a whiner in IRC. BRING IT (once you're done judging).

The Saddest Rhino
Apr 29, 2009

Put it all together.
Solve the world.
One conversation at a time.



Quidnose: OK FINE. URGH.

magnificient7: I'm very glad you have posted a story so good on you. Even though you did not post an anime magic realism brawl story. Which I think is totally unkawaii of you and you are a big itadakimas sugoi desu oneechan. Let me know if you still want to enter for that.

Quidthulhu
Dec 17, 2003

Stand down, men! It's only smooching!

The Saddest Rhino posted:

Quidnose: OK FINE. URGH.

bring it

judge us~

sebmojo
Oct 23, 2010


Legit Cyberpunk









I will judge this.

:siren:QuiddestRhino Brawl:siren:

500 words on serenity in the midst of chaos.

Due in one week and one day, Monday midnight PST, you know the drill.

Martello
Apr 29, 2012

by XyloJW

DreadNite posted:

Oh my. That's quite a mouthful.

That's not the only part of him that's quite a mouthful

:corrupt:

girl dick energy
Sep 30, 2009

You think you have the wherewithal to figure out my puzzle vagina?

Martello posted:

That's not the only part of him that's quite a mouthful

:corrupt:
His... cooking tends to consist of very large portions?

I'm not sure what you're getting at here.

Black Griffon
Mar 12, 2005

Now, in the quantum moment before the closure, when all become one. One moment left. One point of space and time.

I know who you are. You are destiny.


gently caress , I was supposed to do this. Oh well, nothing to do but toxx myself for the next one.

magnificent7
Sep 22, 2005

THUNDERDOME LOSER

The Saddest Rhino posted:

Quidnose: OK FINE. URGH.

magnificient7: I'm very glad you have posted a story so good on you. Even though you did not post an anime magic realism brawl story. Which I think is totally unkawaii of you and you are a big itadakimas sugoi desu oneechan. Let me know if you still want to enter for that.
You want to see horror? You want to see writing that screams, "you should really spend more time writing, less time pissing and moaning that you can't write"?

Tiny Image to spare the rest of you from scrolling past goddamn horrible poo poo.


You'll notice I wrote this last night. That's right. I gave this thought, and an outline. And a point of view. And THEN and ONLY THEN did I begin to write. And regret.

magnificent7 fucked around with this message at 18:19 on Jan 13, 2014

ThirdEmperor
Aug 7, 2013

BEHOLD MY GLORY

AND THEN

BRAWL ME
Holy poo poo don't post that here. Please.

ThirdEmperor
Aug 7, 2013

BEHOLD MY GLORY

AND THEN

BRAWL ME
Or I will be forced to brawl you until you're crying like a little baby.

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petrol blue
Feb 9, 2013

sugar and spice
and
ethanol slammers

QuoProQuid posted:

Death in Dorset :words:

This one gets my vote for tastiest meat. We kill this one last.

e: Except for the slight anachronism in implying they weren't already covered in poo poo.

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