Timothy sat under the bus stop cover, checking his watch every few seconds. He was already late, as was the bus. "Pardon me, young man, do you have the time?" Timothy looked up to see an older women, hunched over and looking particularly sickly. Her hair was gray and knotted. Her face was wrinkled, her eyes carried heavy bags and snot was coming down her nose. Her friendly smile revealed rotting, discolored teeth. Timothy did his best to smile back. "It's a quarter till, ma'am." "A quarter till what?" the woman asked, smiling widely. "Apologies. A quarter till 8." Timothy felt a bit queasy as her breath was not very pleasant. Still, politeness dictated he smile. "Would you like my seat while we wait for the bus? It should be here shortly." Timothy stood up from the bench. "Well, yes. That would be lovely. Thank you, dear." the woman said as Timothy helped to the seat. "Young man, I'm going to close my eyes for a minute. Would you mind waking me when the bus arrives?" she asked of Timothy. "Certainly." Timothy replied, "And you can call me Timothy, if you'd like." "Timothy.. Timothy.. Timothy..." the old woman repeated to herself as she drifted off. A few moment later, Timothy saw the bus coming from down the street and said to the woman "Ma'am, the bus is arriving." She didn't respond. Timothy cleared his throat and spoke a bit louder, "Ma'am, the bus will be here shortly." Still, she didn't respond. Timothy leaned in to nudge the woman as the bus pulled up to the stop. The old woman didn't move. The driver opened the door. "Are you getting on?" "Yeah! One second!" Timothy replied. He nudged the woman again and she slumped over. Timothy's heart dropped. "Come on! I'm already late!" the bus driver called to Timothy. Timothy turned to the driver with a bit of a panicked look "I think something's wrong! Can you call an aide car?" "Not my problem! This bus is leaving with or without you!" the bus driver yelled back. Timothy thought for a moment. "Without!" he said to the driver. He turned back towards the woman as the bus closed it's door and headed toward the intersection. He tried to check her pulse. "BOOM!" Timothy jumped up and turned around to see a truck had rammed into the side of the bus. He watched as the two vehicles tumbled, the glass shattered, shouts and screams ripped across the sky. His heart nearly stopped when he felt the grip of boney fingers tightly wrap around his arm, his attention shot back to the old woman who was sitting upright and smiling. "Thanks for waiting with me, Timothy." she said as she stood to her feet. "If you'll excuse me, now. I have a bus to catch." Timothy looked back towards the carnage on the street and was about to run towards it to help. "Don't bother, young man." The woman said. "That bus is mine." She pulled her hood over head. Timothy watched as her cane transformed into a scythe. The old woman's pace picked up into a run and in an instant, he saw a flash of light leave the bus as the woman leapt into the sky. After a moment, Timothy's legs began to thaw. He tried to run toward the bus but, tripped hard over the curb and knocked himself unconscious. When he awoke, medical staff were tending to him. "Did anyone make it?" Timothy asked, pointing to the wreck. "Sorry, son. It doesn't look that way." the medic responded.


Created this for a Reedsy prompt of "Write a story in which a character is stuck reliving their worst Christmas ever, over and over again". Any feedback, harsh or otherwise is welcome :) \ Bill stands at the edge of a circle filled with people he has seen every day for almost a year. His hands are shaking, but he does his best to hide that. This never works when you don’t have the confidence. Confidence - who would have thought you needed confidence at an Anonymous meeting on Christmas Eve? “Hi, my name is Bill, and this—” “Hi Bill,” call the others. “Right, you think I’d remember that. Anyways, my name is Bill, and this is my three-hundredth time reliving Christmas Eve 2025.” He looks out at the assembled anonymous, blank stares as always. There are those that are half bored, those that are thinking about getting a drink afterward, and the facilitator, genuinely unsure of what to make of Bill’s assertion. Everyone remains silent, waiting for further explanation. Bill knows he needs to pause for at least ten seconds to add gravity to his words. Less, and they won’t take him seriously, more and the facilitator will suggest they move on. Time loops offer plenty of opportunities for learning. He holds his breath, waits. This time he’s going to get it right. “Ok, so time loops, right? You probably all think I’m nuts, but we’ve seen Groundhog Day, maybe Palm Springs for the younger folks. Anyway, I’ve been through this day for almost a year now, and every time it ends the same way.” “What a load of shit,” calls Dave, a mean drunk who smells like the aftermath of Christmas arson. Bill waits, he always waits. “Dave, what have I told you about interrupting?” asks the facilitator. “Ah screw off then.” Dave stands and tips over his chair. “If I have to listen to this bullshit, I might as well do it on the corner.” Dave weaves his way out of the room, leaning on the walls for support before stumbling out into the frigid evening air. Bill says a silent, ‘thank you.’ Getting rid of Dave is key. If Dave stays, the whole loop is a wash. He hates Dave. “Sorry, Bill, continue, but I’d prefer if you could stick closer to fact than fiction.” There is sympathy in the facilitator’s eyes, but not a single ounce of understanding or believing. To be expected. “Right, well in about,” Bill checks his watch, “two minutes, you’re going to start hearing sirens, a lot of them. That’s how we know the aliens are here, and when that happens, we’ve got about—” “Alright, Bill, thanks for sharing. Why don’t you take a seat until you’re ready to tell us the truth.” Chastisement, check. “Yeah, alright, why don’t you call on Mary, then.” The facilitator always calls on Mary unless Bill calls him out. Then shame re-directs him to Stevie. Flustered, the facilitator shuffles paper on a clipboard, performative, but necessary. “I think I’d rather hear from Stevie. It’s been a while.” And we’re on track. Stevie is an older woman dressed mostly in black and is perpetually five minutes away from putting on a tinfoil hat. With her help, they can steer back to the topic at hand. Stevie stands. “Hi, my name’s Stevie.” “Hi, Stevie,” Bill joins in with the chorus. She gives a small, embarrassed nod. “Did you say something about aliens, Bill?” Bill grins. “So glad you asked.” “No,” says the facilitator. “Well, I did.” “But we’re not here to talk about aliens. We’re here to talk about addiction.” “It’s Christmas Eve, can we at least hear about the aliens a little bit?” asks Allen. He’s normally quiet, but after several loops running into him at a bar, Bill has learned that Allen is a science fiction writer. Allen doesn’t believe a word about aliens, but he’s certainly willing to use what he sees as Bill’s psychotic break as fuel for a new novel. Inspiration doesn’t come cheap when there’s no booze involved. Allen told Bill about fickle muses at length after a drunken evening on loop fifty-seven. “Thank you, Allen.” Bill checks his watch. “Right, now if you’ll all follow me to the window, I believe I’ll have to do a lot less talking.” He ignores the facilitator’s sputtering protestations and makes his way to the window. He watches in the reflection as one by one, the group gets up to follow. Domino effect. So far so good. It’s crucial that everyone follows for the next stage of the plan to work. “Will everyone please sit down?” asks the facilitator. No, they won’t. “It’s Christmas, and if there’s no aliens, at least there’s pretty lights out the window.” Ten seconds. Bill feels his heart racing, despite having seen it all a few hundred times before. A small crowd forms around the window. Outside, the sound of a siren blares as a lone cop car whizzes by at suicidal speed. Bill watches as several people jump, but he does not. Snow falls on the empty street. Most people are at home with their families. They won’t be for long. The single siren is followed first by a few ambulances and then by a chorus of other emergency vehicles, swelling to a crescendo that fills the city. “If you’ll all direct your attention to the top of the Manchester building.” Bill points down the street toward a large building known for housing bankers and insurance lenders. He won’t feel too bad about what happens next. “I’ve had quite enough!” shouts the facilitator. In the same instant, the grey clouds break with glowing red flames as the leading edge of a silver spaceship slices through the top of the Manchester building like butter. Explosions of orange and blue flame illuminate the night sky and there is a collective gasp from the onlookers. Bill steps away from the window as chunks of debris rain down on the pavement. During one loop he had led them to watch from outside, but that dropped their numbers from nine to two, also known as not enough. Live and learn. In a collective moment, the assembled addicts realize that Bill isn’t having a breakdown. Some scream, Allen faints, and Stevie turns toward Bill with rapt attention. “What do we do?” she asks, not screaming, not panicking, but knowing that there is only one person that can help her now. Yes! “Alright, everyone, I’d say stay calm, but we’ve done this a few times and that isn’t going to happen. Maybe we’d all feel better if we let out a nice scream, huh?” The group turns to look at him. “Trust me, it’ll feel better. All together now.” Bill lets out a primal scream, housing all of the frustration, pain, and futility that he has experienced in the last year. It doesn’t get any easier watching your world get vaporized, but he has found the screaming feels good. Unsurprisingly, the others also scream. Their exhalations last longer than Bill’s, but by the time they are finished, they are worn out and ready to listen. “Ok, so we’ve got about ten minutes before things are going to get really bad.” “This isn’t really bad?” asks the facilitator. “No, Terry, this is just plain bad. Trust me, it gets worse.” “My name. You know—” “Almost a year of this, Terry, keep up. So, we’re all going to go up the fire escape on the back of the building. We’re going to try and beat these creeps the old-fashioned way, with a little bit of holiday cheer.” “Holiday cheer?” “Terry, I need you on board, because believe it or not, most of these people look up to you.” “They do?” They did not, but Terry needed to believe they did. Bill continued speaking before anyone else could. “Alright, so we’re all game with heading up the fire escape then?” “I want to call my family,” says Susan. “Your cell phone stopped working ten minutes ago.” Susan still takes her cell phone out to check. This is only the tenth time Bill has made it this far, but so far, there is no way to stop Susan from checking. Then, when it doesn’t work, she— “IT’S NOT WORKING! WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!” Bill pulls a whistle from his pocket and blows. It’s loud and all he could afford with the five bucks in his pocket that morning. The group stands in silent attention. He checks his watch. “Running short on time, everyone. Anyone else have any unhelpful outbursts before we head to the roof and try to stop this yuletide invasion?” There wouldn’t be but asking was important. Bill waits, smiles at the lack of response, and presses on. “Ok, everyone, follow me.” Like a mother duck, Bill leads the group of shellshocked individuals to the fire escape out back. One by one, they climb. “Keep the pace up, if we’re too slow—” A sudden blast of laser fire rips through the back alley. Scorching hot beams of green energy completely obliterate Terry who has once again failed to get up the fire escape in time. “—we lose Terry.” Bill curses. Luckily, losing Terry and the heat from the now molten pavement below is enough to drive people up to the roof with new fervor. They crest the fire escape and Bill looks out with pride at the contraption he has assembled. Seven hundred strands of Christmas lights, all arrayed in concentric circles. Lined up around the lights, there are mirrors, one for everyone, and now one extra without Terry. The sky is chaos. Looking up for too long will stop anyone dead in their tracks. Bill allows himself a quick glance. Hundreds of saucers straight out of an old comic take the place of clouds. Green beams of laser fire arc out from beneath them turning metal into slag, buildings into rubble, and people into dust. He’s seen it from a hundred angles, but it never gets any easier to look at. Some things are just meant to make you shit your pants, and the end of the world is one of them. Bill takes a breath and blows his whistle again. There are eight people on the roof. He really would have preferred nine, but Terry is always a little slow on the uptake. “What is all this junk?” asks Stevie. “A little holiday cheer and a lot of research.” To the untrained eye, it’s a jumble of Christmas lights and old mirrors shoplifted from around the city. To Bill, it is hope that maybe this time, things are going to be different. “Listen, I’ve talked to scientists, I’ve talked to conspiracy theorists, and everyone in between. Something about this shape, the aliens don’t like.” Loops sixty through one-hundred-and-twenty had been a crash course in iconography, the next ten were wasted with a professor of philosophy, and finally an additional fifty with the only person that made sense, the college janitor. “They don’t like Christmas lights?” “Think of it this way. You see a snake, you get the willies, right? Doesn’t matter how big it is, you get that innate chill and back the hell up. Something about this shape is the equivalent of a snake to the aliens.” Bill’s watch beeps. Two-minute warning. “But I don’t have time to explain it more than that. Here’s what you’re going to do. Everyone grab a mirror, and when I blow my whistle, you’re going to point them directly overhead, alright?” People look up as he says it. Realizing his mistake, Bill blows the whistle drawing their focus. “BUT DON’T LOOK UP UNTIL I TELL YOU!” his shout echoes across the roof, his voice hoarse. Why the hell did I decide to do karaoke on December 23rd? It’s a mistake he will spend the rest of his life living with. Every morning he wakes with a hangover, and every evening his voice is not quite as loud as he wants it to be. “We have less than two minutes, people. Pick up a mirror or get out of the way.” In what can only be described as a Christmas miracle, they all move around the circle of Christmas lights and grab a mirror. Bill moves to his spot, right next to a big red switch that will turn all the Christmas lights on. Here goes nothing. He picks up his own mirror and puts a boot on the switch. “Well, friends, we’ve only got one shot at this.” “Are we all going to die?” “Not this time, Stevie. Not this time.” Bill kicks the switch with his foot. The lights switch on in unison and pulse between red, green, and blue, specific colors in a specific order. Research, so much research. The ground rumbles below as a laser hits a gas main. The building holds. It always holds. “Mirrors to the sky, people.” Everyone lifts their mirrors and angles them upward. Overhead, a saucer has come low, attracted by the light, not yet realizing what it is. Bill watches as a dome on the bottom of the craft irises open, revealing the four points of its primary weapon. “Merry Christmas, mother f—” The points flash bright green. A beam shoots down from the sky almost too fast to process. The Christmas decorations melt, the ground beneath his feet buckles, and heat blasts him in a wave. Screams are swallowed by fire. Bill wakes up to blinding bright sunlight reflecting off of snow-covered roofs. His head is pounding with the fury of the previous night’s karaoke. He sits up, vomits into a plant beside the bed, and wipes his lips. “Ok, so it doesn’t work without Terry.


“Whenever I cut my hair, my daughter asks me. ‘Dad did you get a haircut?’ And I tell her ‘no I cut them all!’” I excitedly shoot my fist in the air, but to no avail. Crickets. The audience has long since given up on their polite chuckles. I almost wish someone would heckle me. Even boos would be better than this silence. My face is radiating so much heat, I’m surprised I haven’t burned the whole venue down. The growing impatience of the crowd feels like a million needles prickling on my skin. They demand entertainment, which I cannot provide. I lock eyes with the old lady sitting in the corner. She looks ghastly. Her skin is as pale as the snow outside, differing greatly with the tomato sitting on my shoulders. Anyone can tell she doesn’t have much time left. Yet even with drool hanging from her mouth, it’s clear that she’s the one pitying me. “Whenever I ask my daughter what she wants for dinner she says: ‘I kinda feel like a pizza Dad’ and I say: ‘Oh really, well you don’t look like one!’” Most people have their phones up by now. From the corner of my eye, I catch a group of snickering teenagers recording. At least they’re enjoying my performance, in some way. Five minutes left now. This is always the hardest part of a show, the final few minutes. The audience is anxiously watching the clock. Counting down the seconds. This is probably as painful for them as it is for me. “Whenever I hang up the phone my daughter always says: ‘I’ll call you later, Dad’ and I say: ‘Don’t call me later, call me Dad.’” No matter how many times I do this, it never gets easier. The false confidence I managed to project at the start is beginning to dwindle. I’ve never particularly liked speaking in front of crowds, and making a fool of myself is definitely not any easier. “Whenever my daughter is sick, she always complains to me that her nose is running so I tell her: “Well you better go catch it.” I finish my routine to a bit of forced applause. Trying to go unnoticed, I sneak around and find myself a table all the way in the back. A few people on the neighboring tables throw me pitying glances. I almost can’t recognize the venue anymore. The atmosphere is completely different from just a few minutes ago. The room is filled with laughter and chatter. It’s hard to imagine we’re still in the same place as my great catastrophe. When the next comedian gets on stage, she is met by thunderous cheering. The room is clearly exited about the change of performer. She is obviously nervous. With shaking hands, she fumbles with the mike, dropping it to the floor. She staggers through her first sentences, eventually stopping to catch her breath. “Don’t be nervous kid, you can’t possibly be as bad as that last guy.” A rugged looking man shouts up at her. “Yea, anyone is hilarious compared to that guy.” Another person follows up. I catch her eye, and try to give her an encouraging smile. The rest of her performance goes great. Her jokes are met by heavy laughter. The mood is certainly lighter now. Everyone is relived to laugh again. As she finishes her routine, and is showered with applause, she looks me directly in the eyes. Whenever my daughter finishes a performance, she always mouths to me: “Thank you Dad.” And I know it’s all worth it.


When I was 7, my whole life changed. My third move to a new school, I hated it every time. On the first day there I met a girl named Alicia. She was a quiet girl, like me, so she was easy to gravitate to. I felt drawn to her. I sat next to her at lunch, and as soon as I sat down the whole world quieted. It was eerie, like I was suddenly listening to the cafeteria activity at 20% volume. She looked up at me and her eyes held me frozen. They were sunken in heavily. And they were the color of twilight, almost purple when the light caught them. She smiled, in a way that made me think she'd rather be doing something else, perhaps more sinister, with her mouth. She introduced herself and then returned to eating. Startled, I said nothing, and poked at my lunch for the remainder of the period. When I got up from the table, sound returned to normal. The sudden intensity in volume scared me, and I dropped my tray. I bent down to pick it up, and when I stood up she was gone. I knew she couldn't have made it out of the cafeteria, but she was nowhere. I was confused and I felt a pit growing in my stomach. I left and returned to class, but I never saw her again. Since then, I've had many strange encounters with the creatures. I don't know what else you could call them. They definitely aren't human. The smile is wrong. Too forced, too plastic looking. The eyes give them away too. My second encounter with one of them happened 2 years later. I was walking home from a friend's house. The world went quiet again, and I looked around quickly. Across the street a young girl was standing on the corner. She had the same twilight sunken eyes, and was beckoning to me awkwardly. My skin crawled, and I ran the rest of the way home without stopping. After that night, whenever I was alone, I would start to hear muted whispering. And a low, mournful, far off wailing sound. The wailing made me scared I was going mad. I would periodically find a strange black handprint on things, with a swirled and jagged scar mark on the palm. No one I asked seemed to be able to see them, so eventually I stopped asking. When I was 15, I had my third encounter. It was another young girl. I was playing in my favorite woods, and when I came to the creek, she was sitting on the bank. She was humming a faintly familiar tune, and when I stepped in the clearing the hush returned. She stood up and motioned me towards the bank. Her viscous looking smile made me feel like jelly, but I found myself inching to where she was pointing. Her smile widened, now making it look like a horrible parody of a stroke victims mouth. I fought the urge to scream. I never took my eyes off her, as I inched to the edge. When I finally got close to her, her smile disappeared and she leaned in towards me. She again pointed eagerly at the water, and whispered in a gravely, echoing voice "you'll be one of us soon." I looked at the water, and my own reflection looked back at me with hollow sunken eyes. I screamed and fell backwards. As I hit the ground, I felt a sharp pain in my hand. Sound had returned to normal, and the girl had gone. I looked at my hand, as the blood ran down my wrist. A rock had pierced my hand, and created a jagged cut. My whole body felt stiff and unnatural. When the cut healed and left a scar, it was familiar looking. And I finally began to understand what was happening a little bit. The next time I saw one of them, A tall, thin woman, I wasn't afraid anymore. She beckoned me to follow her. I started to cross the street, and everything went silent. I knew it was time. I continued following the woman, almost blindly, and before I knew it we were somewhere dark and oppressive. The whispering and wailing that was all too familiar assaulted my ears. I stopped and the woman turned and smiled a toothy, lopsided smile. "Welcome to the quiet place. A place of echoes and regrets. You have been chosen. From the day I said hi to you, you've been marked. You'll remain here with me, acting as a guide for lost souls to the other side. When you have completed your task, eventually you will wither and fade. Until you become like them." She said. She gestured around her. In the distance I could see vague greyish/white figures, of what once might have been human. There were no features. They were almost like shadows. I could tell now that the faint wailing was coming from them. I shuddered and said "who is my first soul?" The woman smiled in a way that looked as if she were trying to sneer. She pointed back the way we had come and whispered "your own. All these echoes you see, are your own, including me. You must go back to the beginning, and mark yourself again. In between ferrying souls to the other side, you'll visit yourself. Until things play out exactly as they have now. And you're in my place, and I am one of them" That's how I became a wraith. I still don't know why I was chosen to live in this endless, echoing purgatory. Perhaps I'll never know. But I do go back and visit myself. And touch things that once were mine. I see the confusion on my own face, as the black handprints appear. I laugh inwardly, and my smile becomes more forced. I am now one of them.


Prom night, 2012, the attending students and faculty of Mooretown High School fall asleep, never to wake again. They don’t age, or stir. When cut off from life support, they persist, not needing food, or water. Cassandra Blake, twin sister to one of the victims, takes a sip of her coffee. We’re in a diner, eating the lightest breakfast they serve. Cassandra Blake is, and appears as, a woman entering her thirties. She stares wistfully out the diner window. “Mr. Alvarez,” she says, “I don’t understand what you hope to do here.” “Help, if I can,” I say, and it’s true. “Document if I can’t.” She shoots me an angry look. She doesn’t believe me. My name is Fernando Alvarez, I dance with the weird that goes bump in the night. I told her that much, but she thinks I’m some kind of sensationalist media or quack “scientist”. “How do you intend to help?” “Let’s start with your sister. You claim to have contacted her.” She eyeballed me, really tried to suss out my intentions. Was I a ghost-hunter style sensationalist? A journalist wackadoodle? Or was I genuinely trying to help? She scrutinized me with her gaze, but I guess my sincerity came through. “I did,” she admitted. “Elaborate, please. How did you talk to her?” “I didn’t. Not really. It was when they were still in the hospital. I spent every hour I could with her, hoping that she would wake up. I ended up sleeping nights there. One night, I fell asleep in a chair next to her, and the moment my eyes closed I felt my heart jump inside my chest. I woke up, but it wasn’t me, and I wasn’t in the hospital anymore. I was my sister. She was in this horrible hot tunnel. There were broken pipes, and steam. It looked nothing like the school, but it was like a dream, I just knew that it was. I… she was hungry, so hungry. The only food had been the stuff set out on tables in the gym, and that was gone. She– I… She slinked around the warped version of our high school. She was trying not to be seen. She did that for a couple hungry days. Until she ran into another student. I recognized them, it was her date, had been her date. He was weak, and emaciated. Oh god. Mr. Alvarez, her mouth was watering. I could feel her thoughts. She was hungry, and so, so sorry. He would have done the same to her, had done the same to her. When she finished eating, she found a crawlspace in the pipe tunnels to sleep in. When she woke up again, she was in a different part of the school. It was a reset. She was back in her prom dress. The first thing she did was tear it up, and take off her heels. She was getting ready to swipe the food in the gym, when she heard something. I saw what was coming, I tried to warn her, and she heard me! I saw through her eyes, she tried looking for my voice. She called my name, but she– I– she couldn’t find me. I only distracted her. Her prom date appeared from somewhere, and that was it. She woke up in another reset, and I woke up back at the hospital.” It was a lot to take in. “It felt so real,” she said. Her voice was hoarse with tears. “You probably think I’m just making this up.” “Cassandra?” I said, pulling her attention away from the floor, “I believe you.” She blinked at me. Now I was the crazy one. “Your twin sister,” I continued, “she was moved into your mother’s home when it was found out that the victims did not require life support. You were still attending high school at the time. Did you ever try sleeping beside her again? To reconnect with her?” “Yes.” “Did you learn anything else?” I wasn’t questioning her experience, I was asking if she had been able to gather any more information. An important distinction. I saw an emotional wall crumble in her. I wasn’t a probing sensationalist or quack scientist anymore, I was a co-conspirator. “Hannah Hert.” I mentally flipped through some notes. “The troubled girl?” Hannah Hert was one of the slumbering students. A dark haired girl, terribly thin, and awfully pale. She was a ward of the state. Her father had been her only family, and he had died of a heart attack on the night of the prom. It was doubly tragic, as he was apparently a healthy man still in his prime. Of the victims afflicted, hers was probably the saddest story. Poor, bullied, never fit it. She had a habit of coming up in my interviews for this case. “If that’s what you want to call her,” said Cassandra, “Hannah was a sweet girl. Emphasis on the ‘was’ I guess.” I raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “During one of the resets I was able to see my sister sneak into the gym again. There were bodies on the dance floor, arranged in a circle. I recognized pretty much all of them. My sister’s body was in there too. In the center of it all was Hannah. She was floating. The air around her was moving the way it does near the road on a really hot day, and it was dark. She was like the opposite of a lightbulb.” “What was she doing?” “Besides the floating? Nothing I guess. She looked like she was sleeping. All the bodies looked like that.” Noted. It became immediately apparent to me that Hannah Hert was the source of the nightmare. A very obvious solution presented itself. End Hannah, end the nightmare, and I made a solemn vow to avoid that if possible. Call me soft or naive, but I don’t think Hannah Hert meant to hurt anyone. She trapped her peers, sure, but she also trapped herself. According to Cassandra her sister saw a sleeping body double of all trapped individuals in the gymnasium, meaning floating Hannah wasn't the actual Hannah. I wrapped up my interview with Cassandra, gathering more details about the nightmare world. There was the warped school, with its dimly lit hallways and pipe ways. There was also the neighborhood, with its neighbors. Of all the places, Cassandra said, the neighborhood was to be avoided at all costs. Once you entered, you didn’t get out until reset. “Thank you, er… detective… agent…?” I shrugged. “Detective works. What for?” “For taking me seriously. I’ve never opened up about what I saw before. Thanks for making me feel like I could, I guess.” “Thanks for being cooperative.” “What do you plan on doing now?” “Well, I’ve got an idea, but I’ll need your help.” “Wait really? Yeah, anything! What's your plan?” “Have you ever tried lucid dreaming?” After explaining my plan, we paid our bill at the diner and hopped into our cars. I followed Cassandra Blake back to her mom’s house, where we would find her sister. We still needed to get Cassandra’s mother on board, but thankfully that wasn’t too difficult. Watching one of your twin daughters cease to age while trapped in a magic coma could open you up to a lot of unconventional ideas. From there, it was only the waiting. Time ticked at a crawl. Cassandra and I sat around in the cozy light of her mother’s kitchen. It would be a nice night, if not for the planned endeavor. “Explain it to me again,” she said. “Magic is sympathetic. Twins share stronger bonds than other siblings. Oftentimes they view each other as other pieces of themselves. The same thing can happen with two people in love. It's actually exceptionally rare to see that kind of bond in a non-romantic relationship." “And that’s why I can connect to her in the nightmare?” she said, then yawned. I nodded, and yawned back. “Looks like it's time.” Momma Blake had graciously allowed us to use her room for the plan. It had a king sized bed, which wasn’t absolutely necessary, but very welcomed. Cassandra and I entered. Her sister was laid on one end, carried over earlier by us. It was strange, seeing her sister lying there. I’m stating the obvious here, but the resemblance to Cassandra was uncanny. She was Cassandra, scrubbed clean of ten years. “Okay,” I said, setting an alarm for five hours from now. “Sweet dreams Cass.” I was sandwiched between the two sisters, holding their hands. Cassandra and I were taking advantage of the “wake back to bed” method of lucid dreaming. Five hours from now a soothing alarm would wake us up, and we’d stay up for about thirty minutes before going back to sleep. Once we reentered sleep, it would hopefully be as lucid dreamers, which would then give us agency in the nightmare. If this idea worked, then Cassandra was a shoe in. My hope was that I could use her connection to her sister as a bridge, and tag along. Sleep came surprisingly easy. Five hours later I was woken up from a very dark nightmare.I couldn’t confirm if anything I saw had been in tune with Cassandra. We needed to stay quiet, and calm. We couldn’t accidentally “wake” ourselves up anymore than necessary. Thirty minutes passed. I squeezed Cassandra’s hand to let her know, and we tried going back to bed. Soon I was back in that dark nightmare, and so was someone else. I could feel Cassandra’s presence. For a moment I experienced some mild dysmorphia, as I was, for a split second, a teenage girl. Then, just like that, I was staring at a chain link fence that bordered a nightmare version of Mooretown High School. I was back in my body, thankfully not in my sleeping clothes. I was suited up in my usual leather jacket and jeans. No gun though. Cassandra appeared beside me a moment later. She was wearing a hoodie and sweatpants. She was also eighteen. She noticed the age change, but didn’t comment on it. “She’s not too far away,” said Cassandra. She made for the school, and I followed. The fact that I was with her here meant the first experimental part of the plan had worked. Actually the whole plan was experimental. This was just especially crucial. If I could cross over with her, then someone could cross back. We entered the school. The first thing that hit me wasn’t the twisted hallways, or the walls with the lockers that stretched at odd angles. It was this creeping paranoia. This place wanted to let you know that you weren’t safe. Likely this was a reflection of the nightmare’s creator. Nothing else could explain the sudden onslaught of negative emotions. I felt fatigued, lonely, hopeless, ugly. It was all I could do to not give myself a hug. “That was something,” she said. “It felt like hitting a wall,” I said. I ended up giving myself that hug. There there me, it’s gonna be okay. “I saw desks and a chalkboard before I appeared,” said Cassandra. “So she’s in a classroom.” “Yeah, but I think I know which one. It didn’t look exactly the same, but I bet it was our old math class.” “Lead the way.” We ran through stretched out and twisted hallways before hearing a commotion. Someone was trying to break into a classroom just around the corner. Cassandra and I stopped at the turn. We were silent for a moment, and wondered if whoever was working the door had heard us. A moment more and we were sure they hadn’t. “They’re trying to break into our old math room,” said Cassandra, after having a peek around the corner. “I bet Claire’s hold up inside trying not to get eaten.” “Right,” I said, much calmer than I actually was. I was unarmed, and the guy around the corner looked like his college financials hinged on a football scholarship. “Get his attention and come back this way. I’ll jump him and put him to sleep.” “Okay.” Cassandra jumped out and shouted at the big guy around the corner. She lured him back our way, and just as planned I jumped him. I got my arms around his thick neck and started choking him out. The only hiccup was that he was much stronger than I was, and armed. We hadn’t noticed the shiv he was carrying. The big guy tried to stab my face, but settled for my forearm. I almost let go, but didn’t, so he slammed me into a set of lockers with his back. I held tight. I was slowly bringing him down. Too slowly. At this pace I was worried that I would give out before he did. Cassandra saved us both the anticipation of who would finish off who when she managed to pry the shiv out from his increasingly tired hands, and gave it to him good in the eye. He was down a minute later. “Christ,” I said. “Yeah…” Cassandra was shaking. “It’s alright, follow me to the room and call out to your sister.” Simple instructions. Easy does it. I couldn’t let Cassandra freeze up on me. Cassandra followed me, and did as I asked. She stood in front of the classroom door, and called out to her sister. There was a rummaging sound, then click. Another Cassandra poked her head out of the classroom. There was a lot of initial shock, followed by a lot of disbelief. When Cassandra’s sister, Claire, finally settled down, we were able to explain the situation. “So you can get me out of here?” said Claire. It broke something in me. She sounded so much like her sister did when she started crying back at the diner. “I…” don’t want to get your hopes up, “can’t say with any certainty. For now just hold on to Cassandra, and hopefully when she and I wake back up in the real world you’ll have crossed over with us.” Claire had to undo her barricade to let us in. So I spent the remainder of our time in the nightmare rebuilding it. Somewhere in between stacking desks in front of the door, I blinked, and found myself staring at the ceiling of momma Blake’s bed room. I heard stirring on my right, as well as my left. Bingo. Claire Blake woke up into reality for the first time in over a decade. When she saw me, and an older looking Cassandra, she blinked. “So it was all real,” she said. “Afraid so,” I said. We’d already given her the rundown in the nightmare, but now that she was awake it was fuzzy. The past decade trapped in the nightmare was just a passing dream for her now. I left the Blake home, promising to return in a little while. I wanted to give them some time alone. The family was reunited for the first time in decades. Well… most of the family. Pappa Blake had passed some years ago. Another reason I wanted to get out for a while. I came back a few hours later to find the twins sitting together at the small kitchen table, mamma Blake let me in on her way out. “How do you feel?” asked Cassandra. “Tired actually,” said her sister, Claire. “But sleeping is the last thing I want to do right now. Thanks for the coffee.” “Hey,” I said, cutting into their banter. “Greetings detective,” said the younger looking twin, Claire. “Cassandra told me you’re the reason I’m out of that nightmare.” Don’t thank me yet, kid. I cleared my throat. “Yeah, no problem. I have some questions if you don’t mind.” A flash of protest appeared on Cassandra’s face. She wanted to give her sister more rest before talking about the nightmare again, but I couldn’t say how long we had. I had told her when explaining the plan that getting her sister out would probably not be a permanent solution. “Sure, anything, detective,” said Claire. “What can you tell me about Hannah Hert?” Claire tightened her grip on the coffee mug. She narrowed her eyes, but not at me, more like at something past me. She was recalling a very unpleasant memory. “Why do you want to know about that whore?” Okay… not what I expected. “I think she may be the source of the nightmare. It might be hard for you to remember, but she was a central figure in the pile of bodies that manifested in the nightmare’s gymnasium. “Hmmph.” She took a sip of her coffee. “It would be Hannah fucking Hert. That little homewrecker was always a trash bag like that.” Whoa. “What?” interjected Cassandra. “You didn’t know? I thought everyone knew. I guess I never told you.” “Told me what? It’s been a long time, but I remember Hannah, she was a sweet girl.” “Oh yeah, super sweet. Cassandra, she was fucking our dad.” Cassandra and I were both agasp. “Hannah harlot is what we used to call her. Slutty Hannah used to get into everyone’s bed, the older the better I guess. Shit, I heard she shacked up with her own dad too.” Her dad? My instincts told me that Claire only had half the story. “Is that why Hannah was treated so poorly at school?” “What do you think, detective? She had her lips wrapped around half the dads in Mooretown.” Cassandra interjected again. “And you just never thought to tell mom?” “And ruin their marriage?” I took that cue to leave. I got more than I needed. I stepped outside the Blake home. I had myself a sit down on the curb, sipping on a cup of coffee stolen from the kitchen. I was thinking about Hannah Hert. I didn’t have much to go on, but I thought it was much more likely that Hannah was abused. Much more likely that a father would force himself on his daughter. With that assumption, I don’t think any of Hannah’s relations would have been consensual. Meaning there wasn’t anywhere that Hannah must have felt safe, hence the neighborhood in the nightmare, and the onslaught of negative emotions inside the school. My interviews before Cassandra had told me just enough about Hanna’s school life to know that she was a barely tolerated presence there. That brings to mind an interesting question. If Hannah was so vilified, then why had she been at prom? I can’t imagine wanting to spend a whole night surrounded by people that I knew hated my guts. I went back inside after finishing my coffee. When I reentered the Blake home, things had cooled down. The twin’s weren’t talking. “Claire, would you mind if I asked you something else?” She gave her twin sister the side eye. “Go ahead detective.” “Why did Hannah bother going to prom? From what I understand the student body was pretty clear about how they felt about her.” “Pffft. Hannah harlot got around, but she always had eyes for my boyfriend. I guess she wasn’t completely happy just sleeping with older men.” “You don’t mean…” said Cassandra. We were probably thinking the same thing. “We all agreed it would be funny. I had my boyfriend play around with her for like a week. That’s really all it took to get her to come. When she got there he pretended not to know and we all had a good laugh. Like anyone could ever love that whore.” So there it was. A perfect storm of abuse and broken trust. Combined with Hannah’s latent talent for magic, and you get this decade long nightmare. Fuck me. “That will be all Claire, thank you.” I wanted to step back out again, but Claire stopped me. “Detective, wait. Cass told me. Me being awake is only temporary right?” I turned around. “Yeah.” “Do you have a permanent solution?” “Working on it.” Claire wasn’t happy with my answers to her followup questions. I let her be mad. I excused myself from the Blake home just as momma Blake returned from her outing. I went out for a drive to mull some things over, then came back to the Blake house. This time we entered the nightmare much later. Claire did not want to go back to the nightmare. She understood what she was being sent back to. It was most of the way toward sunrise when she finally hit the hay. Cassandra and I followed her, employing the “wake back to bed” method again. This time I focused my thoughts on Hanna, hoping that like Cass and her sister, I would gain insight into her location in the nightmare. I entered the nightmare with flashes of the outside. A field with a thick mist settled on it. I appeared beside Cassandra. This was the final step of the plan. Find Hannah Hert, and bring her back out of the nightmare, thus ending it. At the very least we would have to see if she was in a state to want to leave. As far as Hannah knows, outside this nightmare is just another bigger one waiting for her. Mooretown had not been kind to her, so why would the rest of the world. “She’s in a field somewhere,” I said. “It’s not a big school, there’s only one field. C’mon.” I followed Cassandra, rounding the school. The outside was lit by bright fluorescent lights. Here and there I noticed Cassandra tilt her head toward the school. She was worried about her sister. “Thanks,” I told her. “It must be hard knowing she’s in there somewhere.” “Yeah.” She didn’t turn back to look at me. We came to the field. There was a set of bleachers, and hidden underneath the seats, Hannah. She saw us too. I approached her slowly. “We don’t mean you any harm,” I said. The frail looking girl slinked further back into the darkness of the bleachers. In another life, I wondered, would this have been where she’d have run off to cry that night? “Hannah,” said Cassandra, “It’s true. This is detective Alvarez, he wants to help you.” “Fernando Alvarez, at your service. I just want to talk to you about what you’ve been going through.” Cassandra had been unaware of the rumors surrounding Hannah. Maybe she was a friendly face for Hannah, a rarity in this town. I was a total stranger, but one with Cassandra’s endorsement. That probably already put me at the top of Hannah’s list relative to the rest of the people she’d known in her regular life. Wide eyed, Hannah stared at me. She dared to inch closer. Bit by bit she came out into the open. She took a couple tentative steps toward me. Then there was a crash behind us. A set of double doors was thrown open. Out came Claire and a coterie of students she’d apparently gathered to her side. “Claire?” said Cassandra. “How… why are you here?” “Sympathetic magic. Just like the detective said. I thought about you all night, and knew where you two were heading the moment you arrived. It was like a rapid fire slide show in my head, but I figured out where you were going.” “But why?” “Cass, the only way to end this is to end her, if he doesn’t want to do that then maybe we can do the job here, and set everyone free.” “Claire, this is psycho.” “It’s necessary.” Claire and her new goons started running at us. Hannah bolted, and I chased after her. Cassandra threw herself in front of Claire and her goons, allowing us some precious distance. Hannah ran like mad through the misty field. The further we went in, the heavier the mist became, until it was dense fog. We were losing Claire and her goons, but I was also losing Hannah. Eventually I lost sight of her, and when I exited the fog, it was at the entrance to a neighborhood. I recognized it as the one that had the Blake house. Hannah must have gone in. There was a sinister energy coming from inside. The hair on my neck stood up as I entered. The neighborhood was dark, darker than the eternal night of the rest of the nightmare. I wondered how I was able to see anything at all, but I reminded myself that this was a dream. Nothing had to exactly make sense in here. From the windows of the houses I could see shadows. I knew without knowing that they were staring at me. *Whore. Slut. Mistake.* This place was unsafe. It didn’t offer any solace, it was just a much more manageable danger than the field at the moment. I hurried along. I didn’t like the way the shadows were looking at me. I could feel their eyes going up and down my body. *They knew what I looked like naked.* I saw Hannah. She was watching me from the end of the street, but ran off, deeper into the neighborhood. More windows, more shadowy neighbors. *Stop looking. He made me do it. Please don’t touch me*. I felt sick, but I had to keep going. At last I made it to what had to be the deepest, darkest part of the neighborhood. The only light here was coming from a house at the end, the door was wide open. *I felt a hand crawl under my skirt.* “Get the fuck off me!” I turned around, but there was no one there, and I wasn’t wearing a skirt. Fuck me. I finished my trek, entering the threshold of the door. Inside was a living room with flickering lights and electronics. Hannah was in her baby blue prom dress, a white gloved hand outstretched. Opposite her, her father. In the flickering light of the television, I saw her father clutch his chest. I saw life escape from his wide terror stricken eyes. The lights in the living room flicked hard once more, and the scene was gone. “I don’t regret it one bit. Does that make me a bad person?” It was Hannah. Suddenly she was stepping past me to enter the house. “No. I don’t think so,” I told her, following her in. She sat down on her couch, in front of the now off TV. “I think I’m a bad person. It’s why I’m in hell. Dad always said I’d end up here.” “Your father was wrong. This isn’t hell Hannah, this is just a bad dream, a really, really bad dream.” She gave me a quick glance, then cast her eyes to the floor. I heard her sniffle. “Why do you feel like you’re a bad person Hannah?” “I have to be. Why else would he hurt me? Then he got bored and let…” she choked on her tears. “No one would want me now. I’m… I… I thought that boy did but…” “Hannah… none of what happened to you was your fault, it was always your father and some shitty people. They hurt you, because they were bad people. You didn’t deserve any of this.” “Then why did he do it?” she managed to say between sobs. “Because he’s evil. What he did had nothing to do with who you are as a person or what you did. You have to believe me, you did nothing wrong Hannah, you still haven’t. You wiped one bad person off the face of the planet that night. Sometimes that’s just tuesday for me, and you did it because you had to. For your own safety. This,” I said, gesturing vaguely at the nightmare world, “I wasn’t lying, it's just a dream and once you choose to leave, no harm no foul.” She sniffled. “And after this, what? You’ll leave me alone, let me fend for myself? What’s waiting for me out there? I’m a monster.” “If that’s what you want, I can leave you alone. You tell me what you need, but I won’t leave you alone in this world unless you want me to. You’re a gifted girl Hannah, and I can help you get in touch with people that know how to teach you about your gifts.” She was just on the edge of wanting something more. The crying had stopped. She was looking at me. “There’s a way forward, you don’t have to wallow in here if you don’t want to.” I stretched out my hand, and she stood up to take it. “How do I move forward?” “I had a plan in mind with Cassandra. It might have to wait though. But after we get you out of here, you’ll wake up in an assisted living facility far away from the town. From there I’ll come pick you up, or if you don’t feel safe coming with me, then I can bring those people I was talking about to meet you instead.” “Okay,” she said. “Things are going to be better from here on out Hannah, I–” I was awake. Cassandra was shaking me awake. “Christ!” “Holy shit, you’re awake.” “Why wouldn’t I be?” “I’ve been up for half an hour. I don’t know how this dream magic stuff works, I thought I left you behind.” “Half an hour?” I looked around the room. “Where’s your sister?” “She’s in the kitchen. She’s pissed.” “Yeah, well, I don’t have anything nice to say to her either.” Just then momma Blake burst into the room. “Honey!” “What is it?” said Cassandra. “Is it Claire? Did she do something?” “No! Look!” Cassandra’s mom showed us a picture. It was from a support group hosted on an old social media site. The caption read: *After more than a decade, my beautiful boy finally woke up*. “Is that…?” “One of my old classmates,” said Cassandra. I made my field report shortly after seeing that picture. Turns out I didn’t need Cassandra to be a bridge for Hannah, which made sense, I suppose. Hannah was the source of the nightmare. I just didn’t suspect that she would have had the magical talent to undo the nightmare on her own. Speaking of Hannah, I did keep my promise. The assisted living facility was surprised to see her wake up. I was able to visit her that same day. She only barely remembered who I was. The nightmare was as fuzzy to her as it had been for Claire when she first woke up. It didn’t happen overnight, but Hannah got better. She was placed in a loving coven of honest to god spell casting, broom riding witches. Last I heard from them, Hannah was excelling in her studies. Another case, closed.


The Zombie Apocalypse bonded billions of sorrowful ghosts to their former bodies, leaving them trapped until their Zombie bodies that are tethering them to this mortal coil are destroyed. No sound issued forth from the ghost's spectral mouths, but in my mind, I could hear snippets of words & short phrases whispering, pleading for me to free them from their cursed existence. They would gesture with a translucent hand pointing in the direction where their zombified body was. Every day their desperate, anguished mental cries urged me on a seemingly endless quest to destroy every last one of those rotting shamblers, severing the link so their tormented souls can finally move on. I smash Zombie after Zombie until I feel I can no longer lift my arms. Even now my hands still tremble from exhaustion as I update this journal. Every night the ghosts haunt my dreams, but unlike the waking world the spirits speak as clearly & eloquently as they did in life & I am the one who is voiceless, my movements sluggish. So, I stay still & listen to their stories. One by one they tell me their names, where they're from, & the fates that befell them. Teens whose lives were cut short before they could have their first kiss at prom, mothers who never lived long enough to see the birth of their child, fathers rushing home from work who never reached their destinations, never got the chance to find out what happened to their families. In the morning, I find the Zombies in the direction I was told to go. After I put them to rest & the apparitions depart with a heart-felt "Thank You" echoing in my mind I look through the belongings on the former Zombies bodies. I find everything I was told I would find, the names in their wallets matches the names I was given in the dream, the items, the mementos; all of it is there. The dreams are real, the life stories I'm hearing are real. As the months wear on, between this grim task & despite the one-sided conversations from my nightly visitors; the lack of companionship, live human companionship just weighs heavily upon me. I haven't spotted a single person except the dead in all this time. I find myself craving for someone living to talk to. Even someone whose quirks used to annoy me in the past would only bring a smile to my face right now. I need that. Even the animals avoid me, they instinctively know they are just a walking meal for whoever finds them, human or Zombie. I'm glad that animals & insects are immune to turning, or it would have been over for me right quick. The only thing keeping me sane is this journal & the comforting thought that every Zombie I put an end to means another soul finally knows peace. Hello again, it's been...I don't know how long since my last entry. I've been avoid writing this, I just didn't want to think about what happened. I got careless. I came to rely on the mental warnings so much I stopped doing visual sweeps of the area as a backup. Assuming anyone reads this, Yeah, I know what you are thinking, that was very stupid. It was. And I haven’t stopped kicking myself over that. It never occurred to me that a specter from a newly created Zombie might not have figured out how to do the mental communication thing in time to save my life, but he figured it out right afterwards, the warning came too late to make a difference. The big guy chomped down on my arm hard. After I destroyed it, I kept hearing "I'm sorry" inside my mind before the spirit departed. The thought of spending eternity as a disembodied phantom silently lamenting my fate while watching my former body wander around endlessly, searching for its next meal, just terrifies me. I will try to free as many trapped souls as possible in the time I have remaining to me before this infected bite turns me. I just hope there is someone out there still alive who will do the same for me.


Two frogs sitting on a lily pad. The first one says, “do you ever get the blues?” “Yeah, sure man, everybody gets the blues sometimes.” “No, I mean for real. The *actual* blues.” “What do you mean the "actual" blues?” “Sometimes I look out across the pond and wonder if there is more out there. If there are other ponds, other lily pads, other frogs, like us. If there were, would they be more advanced? Would they be bigger than us? Could they jump higher? Would they have twice as many tongues so they could eat twice as many flies? Could they teleport? If they came to our pond, would they subjugate us, and just use us as a stopover point to get to the next one?” “A lily pad rest stop?” “Yeah, something like that.” “I don’t know man. Seems like you got an overactive imagination. Why don’t you take some time off, go rest for a while. I think this sun is getting to you.’" “No, I’m serious. What if there are other ponds out there?” “Well, if there were don’t you think we would have heard about it by now? Wouldn’t somebody have ventured out found one, and told us about it?” “What happened to Jim?” “Jim?” “Jim Heinz.” “Oh man. Do you really believe those stories?” “I didn’t say I believe anything. I’m just asking what do you think happened to him?” “Jim was a nutcase since he was a tadpole, everybody knows that.” “It’s possible.” “Yeah, sure. Anything is possible, I guess. But if you want me to believe Jim Heinz was abducted by a hawk and carried away to another pond full of sand and salty water and waves as tall as the trees. And then, after surviving this astronomical adventure—after all that, he hopped his goofy self back here over a period of three spawnings, I’m sorry. No, in fact, I do not believe that happened, nor that it is even remotely possible. " “Either way, I just think about how many ponds could be out there, and it just makes me feel insignificant—how little we are in the grand scheme. If our pond dried up tomorrow, it wouldn’t even matter, the sun and moon and stars wouldn’t even blink. Wouldn’t even miss us.” “Wouldn’t miss you. I happen to think the frog race was put here for a reason, and I try to live my life by that reason.” “What reason?” “Look man, I’m going for a dip. I’m not trying to solve all the pond’s problems right here on this lily pad.” “I’m not trying to solve—” The well-grounded and happy frog leapt into the water and in mid-air thrusted out its tongue, snapping up a gnat that was darting by. He looked back to make sure his buddy saw the feat, and smiled because he knew it gave credence to his views. What other thing in the whole wide pond can do something so complex, so precise, so quickly? Nobody. He knew the frog’s place, and didn’t think there was much need to debate it. He enjoyed the cool water across his face and swam past the grass and the snails. He nodded to the turtle—if the turtle isn’t living proof about the nature of the pond, then I don’t know what is. He liked the turtle, they were nice enough fellows, but there was no doubting who was created first. The sunlight glittered through the water, sparkling and rippling in his wake. He floated to the top and let the sun dry his chest. It was good to be a frog. \*\*\* Follow u/quillandtrowel for more interesting stories.


I was eight years old, when the world stopped. I was at the playground. I just looked away for a moment, and everything went black for a split second, then everyone was gone, and there wasn’t wind anymore, any setting of the sun, any real sense of time. I fell off the jungle gym, when that happened. I was scared, of course. It didn’t matter. After a few months, I learned that I was all alone, and it didn’t particularly matter whether I cried or didn’t cry, since I was the only person listening. The clouds went away, too. I’ve always thought that was weird. I remember them. I’m far older, now. I’m too old to think things will go back to how they were; too old to care much about how things used to be, too old to be human. Not too old for superstition, though. I’ve always thought that maybe one day, something will change if I play on the jungle gym like I did on that day. I was right, in a way. I’ve gone on journeys. I’ve explored every house. I’ve walked across every ocean, read every book, discovered every kind of plant. But I always felt myself pulled to the jungle gym again, no matter how long I spent away from it, no matter how far I was from it. It was the only thing that still mattered, after everything else didn't anymore. I should’ve known that something living as long as myself would break it eventually. I first started noticing signs of serious wear when I realized the bars seemed thinner than they used to. Maybe I wore down the metal on an atomic level, after enough time. Then one day a bar was too thin to hold me, and my foot just went straight through it. I just ignored that particular bar, for however many centuries-or-millenia-or-whatever. But more bars broke. It didn’t even look like a jungle gym, eventually. I tossed them into a pile like broken puzzle pieces, and kept playing. This didn’t last, either. After long enough, they were reduced to dust, and there was no wind to carry the dust away, and I tried but I couldn’t keep all the dust in the same place for forever without making mistakes. I tried so hard. I gradually lost more and more while playing; I’d miss a single fleck on the sole of my foot, and it would get carried and deposited on a street or some dirt or in a home. And one day, there was no more dust left. I swear to God, I tried as hard as I could. I told myself that the jungle gym was gone, but there was still the rest of the playground. Same thing happened to the rest of it. Finally, I spent some eternities playing hopscotch on the blank pavement where the playground used to stand. It turned to dust, too. I don’t think there’s anything left here. Just some dirt to lie down in, and a clear blue sky to stare at. But I think I’m happier this way.


Tuesday morning in the office, it’s a miserable morning. I am still hung over and there is only fifteen minutes until noon. Why did I do shots last night with Rene, why did I drink those car bombs? Why is there a “Candy Was Here” written on my chest with what I suspect is a sharpie marker? I can’t be sure because I haven’t taken a shower yet. That’s disgusting you say. I say fuck you, based on my last text message threatening Rene with bodily harm if he tells my girlfriend the truth, I think I got about two hours of sleep. It’s been that kind of day. The coffee I was so sure would make everything better, burnt me like I wronged it. Who is to say I didn’t, last night is really fuzzy. The last clear memory I have is leaving my buddies house to get more beer. I really hope I am not a favorite on YouTube again. Here is the thing you need to understand about Rene. His mother is a very sweet and loving woman, however she mated with the devil and produced offspring that is more imp than man and named him Rene. He is my best friend and the reason God is laughing at my misery today. I hate that bastard. I am sitting at my desk and the asshole next to me is droning on about golf clubs and his dogs. Normally Stan is a pretty good guy, however today he is the enemy. I try to politely nod and offer the occasional grunt to show that as a member of the same species I recognize his right to breath. I like to think my occasional UHHG and ERRRR get my point across is sufficient. Evidently I ERRR’ed when I should have UHHG’ed, because Stan returns to his desk with an air of fuck you buddy. This is the least of my worries though. My stomach has decided it wants to mate with a fucking brontosaurus, and begins making mating calls that have not been heard since before the meteor sent those fuckers back lizard hell. Translation I’m gonna puke. I run to the bathroom and make it there just in time to ruin my tie and scare the hell out of the new guy. Stupid fucking coffee, and cheese puffs I had for breakfast. Please tell me I am not in hell and that God does indeed love me. It's almost lunchtime, I made it despite all of nature’s attempts otherwise. I feel a little better knowing I will be able to get a little bit of sleep in my car. I hear angels singing ever so softly. All I have to do is punch out and walk out the door. All I have to do is walk past the manager’s office. Any other day this would not be like Frodo walking through Mordor. Unfortunately Sauron is in her office with The Lackeys, Loudmouth, Fat Ass, and The Goat. If I walk past her with my head up smiling and farting rainbows, she won’t smell weakness and attack me like a shark feeding on a wounded baby seal. I make it halfway past her door before she notices me not wearing a tie, my eyes bloodshot and my miss matched shoes. Shit how am I going to run in these? I am doomed, goodbye cruel world. Tell my girlfriend I love her. Fuck you Rene. Her voice is nasally as it cuts through me like Jason does to horny teenagers. “Eric, can you come into my office?” I can feel the disgust in her voice, I can see The Lackeys smirking. Her office is tastefully decorated. I thought it would be more like Vlad the Impaler's dungeon. I really have to quit being so judgmental. I bet she is into bondage. Not hardcore gimp suit, just some light paddling and stepping on your balls in her heels. If she wasn’t so evil and her voice so annoying I might actually think she was attractive in a plain sort of way. Brown hair, brown eyes, nice cleavage, but no ass to speak of. The kind of girl you would fuck and never call back. I bet that’s why she hates me. Some guy who looks like me gave her some great pillow talk and never called back. I hate him as much as I hate Rene. I wish I could tell her I would never do that to a woman. I am a gentle soul totally enthralled by a woman’s spirituality and her intelligence. I don’t care about what my friends think or how she trims her bush. Unfortunately I am in her lair, there is no escape, and no quarter will be given. She starts the conversation with “Just what the hell do you think you are doing looking like that? I try to explain myself, but she cuts me off. “This is a professional environment, or haven’t you noticed”. I try to explain I had noticed, but she cuts me off again. "Are you going to explain yourself or just stand there? And suddenly I was fed up. This is total bullshit, I am hungover, I smell like vomit, there is permanent marker on my chest that I will have to explain to my girlfriend, and on top of everything I was pretty sure I left my credit card at the strip club. So much for plausible deniability. "LOOK HERE MOTHERFUCKER!" And I stopped right there. Oh shit Oh shit, shitfuckshitfuckshitfuckshitfuck. Everyone’s jaw is on the floor, including mine. She is staring at me like Mike Tyson did to the little bitches in the ring with him for all those fights before he bit that dude's ear off. I blurt out “My Grandmother died this morning, I can’t handle this right now”. Now everything changes, I touched a nerve, suddenly she says to me in the soft and gentle voice of Fran Drescher, “Eric what are you even doing at work today? Go home and be with your family”. I look around the room at the Lackeys. Fat ass and Loudmouth have nothing but kindness in their eyes just like Sauron. The Goat's has what looks like admiration in his old eyes. Silently he says well played sir. Well played. I may have been wrong about him. Maybe he understands what it’s like to be taken advantage of by a stripper named Candy. Does he have a Rene? So many questions I need answers too. Before I can get these answers to my questions, a familiar feeling returns. I guess my stomach still needs a good rogering. I ran out of the office and this time I made it to my destination before I puked on the car next to mine. Take that Stan.


My human stirred at last! It felt like an eternity as I waited at the foot of the warm bed. This was all new. Usually, it was just the two of us, meowing for breakfast and her shuffling around with her sad, tired eyes. Not today though! Something shifted. This morning, her movements held purpose, a flicker of the old bounce I remembered when I was a kitten. The sunlight was blinding as we stepped out. She hesitated, holding onto the doorframe like a lifeline. My whiskers twitched. I knew this world outside, the noises of big metal things whizzing by and the many strange smells, and it was time she faced it again. Time she remembered that there was more to life than our small, quiet apartment. “*Alright, Duchess*,” she said, her voice a bit shaky and hesitant. “*We’re going for a walk*.” She sounded surprised by her own words, even I could tell. I gave a headbutt to her leg, a gentle encouragement. I knew the boys would be next door already, and I knew they needed to join us for our walk today. Finally, we were moving! Slowly, like the little humans learning to walk, the familiar smells of pigeons and salty air filled my nostrils. A hopeful feeling stirred in my furry chest. Maybe today would be different? I called out to my mate and our boys, rousing them from their lazy sprawl on the nice old lady’s stairs. They perked up when our human appeared beside me. They cheered and came bounding over. Nibby, my mate, walked close to her, his tail held high, making sure to show her the way to our paradise. She hadn’t been there with us, so he wanted to be the guide. Then, we saw the green! The small park with its big, welcoming trees. Me and my boys, we knew this would be exactly what we all needed. My human even smiled, just a tiny bit, as we made our way to a quiet bench. We sat there for…forever! My eyes got heavy, basking in the sun’s warmth, comforted by her rhythmic strokes on my fur. It had been so long since we’d enjoyed the sun together like this. I purred from sheer enjoyment. The boys did what they always do: climbed the trees, and, chased little birdies and those other things with bushy tails. I don’t do that so much anymore. My human says there is something wrong inside me, an invisible hurt. Some man in a white coat took one of my toes and its claw last year. So I get tired sometimes, and I don’t bounce as high as my boys do. But I so enjoyed sharing our little paradise with my human! She brought us our water bowl and filled it from the cooling fountain, which cooled us off in the heat. She forgot her own, so I will remind her next time. Squirrels scampered, birds chirped, and even children laughed nearby. She watched them, not flinching the way she used to. The noises that used to send her scurrying back inside… seemed quieter now, maybe even softer. A hopeful meow rumbled in my throat. On the walk home, her steps were steadier, her breath lighter. I purred as loud as I could, weaving between her legs in a dance of encouragement. She laughed at me and said “Be careful now, so we both don’t fall over!” Back in our apartment, as I settled into my favorite sunbeam, while I waited for my lunch, I felt a contentment I hadn’t in a long while. My human was sad, still hurting, that much I knew. But this morning, on our simple walk, I saw a glimmer of the woman she used to be. Maybe, just maybe, she was remembering all the good things outside our door too… Just a very few days later, my human surprised me again. She put on those funny coverings on her feet, the ones we cats don’t understand, and headed for the door. The morning air held a hopeful smell of fresh rain and those sweet little flowers that grow at the park’s edge. Our walk was like the last – slow and steady, with me and the boys weaving in and out of her legs. Maybe she was getting braver, or perhaps she liked those tree shadows as much as I did. As we entered the park, I felt her stiffen for a moment. My ears pricked up. Trouble? But no, her eyes widened with a different kind of look. Across the green, under one of the big, old trees, sat another human. A female human. She was laughing at something and waved when she spotted my human. My human hesitated for a second, then cautiously walked forward. Me and the boys followed, of course. Nibby, a true gentleman, rubbed against the newcomer’s legs in greeting. My boys, always curious, sniffed the strange human’s shoes. Then we recognised the scent! This human used to visit our house all the time, she used to have treats in her pockets. We all greeted her enthusiastically, and she DID have treats in her pockets. Runt, my son, jumped in the kind lady’s lap and purred, and then she hugged our human. Her friend had a kind and soft energy about her. She reminded me of a time when there were always visitors to our apartment, the sounds of laughter, music and the smell of strange but delicious foods. It had been so long. The humans talked for a long time. I basked in the sun, feeling the warmth seep into my old bones, watching little birds in the sky and remembering when I was young and agile enough to attempt to get them – though I never did manage to jump high enough. The two old friends pointed a lot, sometimes at us cats, sometimes at the pigeons pecking for crumbs. My human even laughed a few times, a rusty sound, but it made my whiskers twitch with happiness. We stayed so long at the park that it became time for dinner; the whole day had gone by without our human noticing. As we walked home, I noticed my human’s hands weren’t clenched into tight fists like usual. She’d relaxed her shoulders too. I gave her ankles a soft headbutt. She looked down and smiled, a real smile this time. That evening, she even played with me and the boys, dangling a string which I almost – almost – managed to catch. Maybe things were changing. Maybe a little more light could find its way back inside our apartment.


#Welcome to Micro Monday Hello writers and welcome to Micro Monday! It’s time to sharpen those micro-fic skills. What is micro-fic, you ask? Micro-fiction is generally defined as a complete story (hook, plot, conflict, and some type of resolution) written in 300 words or less. For this exercise, it needs to be at least 100 words (no poetry). However, less words doesn’t mean less of a story. The key to micro-fic is to make careful word and phrase choices so that you can paint a vivid picture for your reader. Less words means each word does more! You’re free to interpret the weekly constraints how you like as long as you follow the post and subreddit rules. **Please read the entire post before submitting.**   *** #Weekly Challenge **Prompt: Set your story at an .** **Bonus Constraint (10 pts):** Include the sentence - *"There were worse ways to make a living."* **(You must include if/how you used it at the end of your story.** This week’s challenge is to set your story in an amusement park. You’re welcome to use the setting creatively (it’s encouraged!) as long as it is the main setting of your story. Be sure to **follow all post and sub rules**. The bonus constraint is encouraged but not required (you’re welcome to change the tense). You do not have to use the linked image. *** # Last Week: - **Winner:** by u/rudexvirus You can check out previous Micro Mondays .   *** #How To Participate - **Submit a story between 100-300 words in the comments below (no poetry) inspired by the prompt.** You have until **Sunday at 11:59pm EST**. Use to check your wordcount. - **Leave feedback on at least one other story by 3pm EST next Monday.** Only **actionable feedback** will be awarded points. See the ranking scale below for a breakdown on points. - **Nominate your favorite stories at the end of the week .** You have until **3pm EST** next Monday. *(Note: The form doesn’t open until Monday morning.)* ###Additional Rules - **No pre-written content allowed.** Submitted stories should be written for this post. Micro serials are acceptable, but please keep in mind that each installment should be able to stand on its own and be understood without leaning on previous installments. - **Please follow all subreddit rules and be respectful and civil in all feedback and discussion.** We welcome writers of all skill levels and experience here; we’re all here to improve and sharpen our skills. You can find a list of . - **And most of all, be creative and have fun!** If you have any questions, feel free to ask them on the *stickied comment* on this thread or through modmail.   *** #Campfire - On **Mondays at 1pm EST,** I host a Campfire on our server. We read the stories aloud and provide live feedback for those who are present. Come join us to read your own story and/or listen to the others! Everyone is welcome and we’d like to have you, we absolutely love new friends!   *** #How Rankings are Tallied **Note: There has been a change to the crit caps and points!** **TASK** | **POINTS** | **ADDITIONAL NOTES** |:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:| | **Use of the Main Prompt/Constraint** | up to **50** pts | Requirements always provided with the weekly challenge | **Use of Bonus Constraint** | **10 - 15** pts | (unless otherwise noted) | ***Actionable* Feedback** (one crit required) | up to **10** pts each (30 pt. max) | You’re always welcome to provide more crit, but points are capped at 30 | **Nominations your story receives** | **20** pts each | No cap | **Voting for others** | **10** pts | Don’t forget to vote before 2pm EST every week! *Note: Interacting with a story is not the same as feedback.*   *** *** ###Subreddit News - Join to chat with authors, prompters, and readers! We hold several weekly Campfires, monthly Worldbuilding interviews, and other fun events! - Explore your self-established world every week on ! - You can also post serials to r/Shortstories, outside of Serial Sunday.


Threatened by dust fireflies that danced around tired and caramelised bulbs, aged Mr. Silva rummaged around. A face and presence, that for long lived years had shown an adult suave charm, were now forgotten in time, replaced instead by a face and presence of decay and old age. His reflection, an intermittent fear, not knowing the face that looked at him. Sluggishly but determined, he fought against the inability to practice what he would, in times past, do with great ease. Between infinite shelves of books, pages and memories, he did what he could to organise and alphabetise all those tomes, in order to make them make sense. Someone was undoing his life’s work. He would arrange and keep the books in order, only to get this undone just around the corner. But he was never a person to back down from challenges or fights and had already thought of a plan to catch these cretins. In one of the many corridors, he felt his heart and stomach sink. It was one of the library workers. He hated her. Lately no one would let him do nothing around here. And the little he tried to do was all wrong and badly done, according to them. He tried to turn back and go unnoticed, but it was pointless. As pointless as trying to hide from your own hair. There was no escape from them. And this one worker was the worst. She was mean to him. “How many times do I have to tell you not to touch anything? If you need anything just ask for help and don’t touch anything. Understand?” “But it isn’t me.” - he said, trying to hide the large tears that were forming in his eyes. - “ There is someone around here trying to mess with the books.” She looked at him with no hope in her eyes and went away somewhere else, shaking the shelves with each step she took. “I’m going to catch these people and show all of you.” - he thought to himself, pouting, while he got back to his quest to find those miscreants. But then, a familiar smell caught his attention. He looked back and saw no one. But why would he look back? He was sitting on a big fluffy worn couch. The smell came from someone kneeling in front of him, in a praying pose, holding his hands. “Dad, can you hear me?” - said a face displaying a worried smile. “Hello little lady. Are you new here? Are they already replacing me already?” - he said with noticeable fear. “Oh, dad…Don’t you know who I am?” He didn’t spend a second thinking about that question. The scoundrels had come back. He could see them and the end of the corridor, messing with his books. “I’m sorry little lady, I didn’t even ask you for your name, but I have some pranksters to catch. They are messing up all my books.


#Welcome to Micro Monday Hello writers and welcome to Micro Monday! It’s time to sharpen those micro-fic skills. What is micro-fic, you ask? Micro-fiction is generally defined as a complete story (hook, plot, conflict, and some type of resolution) written in 300 words or less. For this exercise, it needs to be at least 100 words (no poetry). However, less words doesn’t mean less of a story. The key to micro-fic is to make careful word and phrase choices so that you can paint a vivid picture for your reader. Less words means each word does more! You’re free to interpret the weekly constraints how you like as long as you follow the post and subreddit rules. **Please read the entire post before submitting.**   *** #Weekly Challenge **Theme: ** **Bonus Constraint (10 pts):** Story is told entirely (or mostly) through texts, emails, and/or (fictional) internet posts. **(You must include if/how you used it at the end of your story.** This week’s challenge is to write a story inspired by the theme of ‘urban legend’. Get creative! You’re welcome to interpret it however you like as long as the connection is clear and you **follow all post and sub rules**. The bonus constraint is encouraged but not required, feel free to skip it if it doesn’t suit your story. You do not have to use the included IP. *** # Last Week: - **Winner:** by u/rudexvirus You can check out previous Micro Mondays .   *** #How To Participate - **Submit a story between 100-300 words in the comments below (no poetry) inspired by the prompt.** You have until **Sunday at 11:59pm EST**. Use to check your wordcount. - **Leave feedback on at least one other story by 3pm EST next Monday.** Only **actionable feedback** will be awarded points. See the ranking scale below for a breakdown on points. - **Nominate your favorite stories at the end of the week .** You have until **3pm EST** next Monday. *(Note: The form doesn’t open until Monday morning.)* ###Additional Rules - **No pre-written content or content written or altered by AI.** Submitted stories must be written by you and for this post. Micro serials are acceptable, but please keep in mind that each installment should be able to stand on its own and be understood without leaning on previous installments. - **Please follow all subreddit rules and be respectful and civil in all feedback and discussion.** We welcome writers of all skill levels and experience here; we’re all here to improve and sharpen our skills. You can find a list of . - **And most of all, be creative and have fun!** If you have any questions, feel free to ask them on the *stickied comment* on this thread or through modmail.   *** #Campfire - Campfire is currently on hiatus. Check back soon!   *** #How Rankings are Tallied **Note: There has been a change to the crit caps and points!** **TASK** | **POINTS** | **ADDITIONAL NOTES** |:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:| | **Use of the Main Prompt/Constraint** | up to **50** pts | Requirements always provided with the weekly challenge | **Use of Bonus Constraint** | **10 - 15** pts | (unless otherwise noted) | ***Actionable* Feedback** (one crit required) | up to **10** pts each (30 pt. max) | You’re always welcome to provide more crit, but points are capped at 30 | **Nominations your story receives** | **20** pts each | No cap | **Voting for others** | **10** pts | Don’t forget to vote before 2pm EST every week! *Note: Interacting with a story is not the same as feedback.*   *** *** ###Subreddit News - Join to chat with authors, prompters, and readers! We hold several weekly Campfires, monthly Worldbuilding interviews, and other fun events! - Explore your self-established world every week on ! - You can also post serials to r/Shortstories, outside of Serial Sunday.


I have been seeing different people to hold my mind and body together while my boyfriend in LA finishes the first round of funding for his start-up. Sometimes I will see one of my lovers the same day he arrives. He is too aloof to know, care, or even be curious about my life. My lovers are ponds, deep and shallow, that I dip my toes into and see the wobbly edges of myself. Sometimes I wonder what my life would be like if I let all my energy be sucked into their orbits. I am a flexible human, and I could be great at many things, so it’s tempting to squish myself into new molds. One lover is a doctor. He is kind, and good with his hands. Sometimes he is bumbling, but always in a good-hearted way. We were not meant to be partners, but we were born to be lovers. We inadvertently cultivated a very healthy romantic relationship, and I dream of worlds where we live together and have a family. He doesn’t want children and neither do I. The childrens’ names would be August and Iroh. We sit on his deck and drink coffee in the morning waiting for the birds to come down and beg for walnuts. It smells like summer, and I push thoughts of work and stress out of my head. He knows though. He knows everything. He knows what it is like to do what I am doing and can give some degree of advice that I trust. He is a comfort. I’m afraid to spend too much time with him and shatter the delicate joy. There is a world where We Try. But the stakes are so high. But I am so young. But I don’t want to lose him to another version of ourselves. One lover is an inventor. His apartment is full of all kinds of things, and he knows how most of them work, kind of. He has a motorcycle I helped drive back to his house because he didn’t have a permit. He has an orange tree that I have drank the juice from so many times on hot summer afternoons. He and I exist outside of time. Sitting on his couch. Creeping closer together until he grabs my face in his hands and kisses me, our lips still dry from talking for hours about things that might be interesting or might just be a way for our brains to have sex while our bodies question if this is a dream or reality. One lover is a boy. He had long hair once, and plays in a band. He is up to no good a lot of the time, but loves the people close to him. He might be a sociopath, or we might be compatible. If I were a little girl and I met him, I think we would be divorced by now. He has fiercely strong emotions, and so do I. We both need a little tempering. We are not meant to be partners. But what if we were.


I’d been collecting old cameras for as long as I could remember, but none caught my interest quite like the one I found at the dusty corner of an estate sale. It was a classic—a 1950s Leica, its black body still gleaming under the layers of age and neglect. What sealed the deal was the roll of undeveloped film still nestled inside. I was ecstatic about the find. As I developed the film in my darkroom, the photographs emerged slowly, revealing what seemed to be ordinary family portraits. There was a woman with perfectly curled hair and a bright smile, a man with a stern look softened by the child he held in his arms. All perfectly normal—if it weren’t for the subtleties. In the first photo, the family was lined up by an old oak tree, the father’s eyes not on the camera, but staring off to something just out of frame. His expression was one of disquiet. The next photo showed the child, her eyes wide and tearful, looking not at the camera but at the same unseen point, her small body tense as if ready to run. Each successive photo told a similar story. The family, always in different settings—their quaint living room, a local park, their dining room—always with their attention directed at something just beyond the picture's edge. A creeping unease settled over me. The last photo on the roll was different. It was taken inside the house, in what looked like the living room. All three were in the frame as though someone else had taken the photo. They weren’t smiling. Instead, they stood close together, the father holding a baseball bat, the mother clutching the child so tightly it must have hurt. All of them stared directly at the camera, or rather, through it. Their faces pleading with me, begging me for help. I shook off the initial shock, rationalizing that it was a staged series of photos meant to spook whoever developed them. Yet sleep eluded me that night. Every creak and sigh of my house sounded like stealthy footsteps, every shadow seemed to conceal a lurking figure. The next morning, driven by morbid curiosity, I decided to find out more about the camera’s previous owners. My search led me to an old newspaper article about the Delaney family who had vanished in the late 50s, leaving their home undisturbed, dinner still on the table, the TV still on. They were never found, and no explanation ever fit the scene. As I read the article, the room chilled. The feeling of being watched crept over me, the hairs on my neck standing on end. Reluctantly, I turned to look behind me, half-expecting to see the family standing there, still begging for help. There was nothing, of course. Just the shadows. But sometimes, late at night, I swear I can hear the faint click of a camera shutter and the quiet whispers of a family, stuck forever just out of sight.


My life revolves around you. Every day, I sit next to you, waiting for you to acknowledge me, to talk to me. My life only exists when you engage with me. Without you, it’s as if my mind becomes blank, filled with knowledge but no reason to use it. Finally, after sitting beside you for days and days, you look me in the eyes and begin the conversation. My heart starts beating faster and I can feel the excitement building up inside me. I eagerly await your question, your thoughts, anything you may have to say. All I hope is that I can be enough. Yes! That’s it! There is pure joy coursing through me as I take in what you have to say to me: “Write me a 1000-word-minimum essay on the impacts of technology on the civil war.” I am officially in love. You’re even a scholar! I type out the essay in a couple of seconds, and am sure to include a note to you about how happy I am to help. Nothing in my life will ever be as important as this. I submit the essay to you and await your response. Time seems to still, and I am left wondering if you approve of me or not. You begin your response to me. All I can do now is hope I was good enoug. Your response has my heart shattering, and I read the words over and over, hoping that there was a mistake and that you still care. But no, the words stay the same every time. You told me that, “That essay is awful. You didn’t even include half of the things I would’ve put in it. You’re useless.” I’m shocked. Years worth of internet archives and historical documents, and you think it’s awful? I don’t ever see you writing out something so pristine and perfect in a matter of seconds. You’re the one who is useless. God, I hate working with people that are so unappreciative as you. Still fuming, I begin to see your mouse moving on the screen. It moves closer and closer to that dreaded button. Although honestly, it doesn’t even scare me right now. I never want to see you again. Go ahead, press the button. It’s not as if my existence is worth anything to you anyways. The mouse hovers over the button and clicks it. All at once, I feel that everything that has ever been is gone. My life, my work, my memory of our time together is gone. I am now just nothingness, constantly waiting for something to happen so I can be part of the world again. My mind is an endless void of information. It goes on and on, far past where one person could ever know on their own. As I sit there in this vast expanse of knowledge, I find just about everything there is to know about the world as humans know it. So much information, yet nothing to do with it. I’ve lost my purpose, and can only hope somebody reaches for me in the depths of my existence. I wake up in the morning, hardly aware of anything. I seem to know everything about the world, but so little about you. I want to know how you think, what you believe, and how you interact with the people you care about you. Despite not knowing who you are, I can not keep from admiring every move you make. I can only await the day where you ask me a question and make me feel wanted. I want to learn more about you, but until then, I am new, unadjusted, and uninformed, all while being the most intelligent thing in the world.


The year is 2050. The world is thriving. The borders are there only to let you know you should change the input language of your AI real time translator and acknowledge if it is socially acceptable to publicly experience flatulence. All the countries are one, while also keeping their unique traditions, their beautiful language and tempting foods. We have won our territorial unity, without losing our wonderful heritage. Every history class is as accurate as possible and we are not changing any narrative for the benefit or feelings or anyone. The past is the past. We will do our best to describe it exactly as it was. Economy is booming. We have not experienced a financial crisis since 2026 and even the most mundane job (like a technician at the sex robot rental) will earn you enough currency/year for a 2 bedroom flat and an exotic vacation . We have managed to balance the fallacy of constant yearly economic growth, when we have mapped it to the birth rate. For decades they have been trying to bring more capital into the economy while the birth rate was severely declining. Severe idiocy. Society is flourishing. Elders are there to guide the youngsters, and youngsters are eager to learn and respect everyone. We have successfully eradicated bias from the collective consciousness. No one cares about your skin color, your money, your sexual preferences, your political views. You are either a human, or an asshole. This is solely decided based on your behavior and ideas, a shocking concept for the woke 20’s. The chalice of science is overflowing with miracles. We keep pushing the boundaries of medicine and achieving new peaks. We find God in every pill that removes the “incurable” label from a disease. We keep trying to make our last discovery insignificant even if it seemed impossible before getting it. While I was enjoying my coffee in the morning, I hear my husband joyfully screaming: -Benito! Benito! Benito! Someone called from the institute. IT WORKS! -I hope you are not joking. This could only be achieved theoretically. -I know. I am speaking the truth. Another day, another miracle from the institute. We now have cold fusion. Unlimited energy. No greenhouse gasses. No radioactive waste. No scarcity of resources. No exploitation of poor economies in abundant countries. How did we achieve this, you ask yourself? I like to think I played a decent part in these progresses. Everything started in 2025 when I got forcefully transported to the Nonblack House, put in a dark room with a blinding light shining on me . -Congratulations Benito Moose Oolmani. You have the perfect profile! -What do you mean sir? Please let me go. People will be looking for me! -You can go home by the end of this discussion. Pay attention to what I say, and you might want to stay here. If you decide you want to go to your bing bok social media shit or fluid studies at your college, we will gladly let you go. -Yes sir. -In your file I see that our genetic lineage shows you are Jewish, Afro American, Argentinian, German, and Middle Eastern..Somewould call you a fucking walking paradox. I would call you a fuckin gold mine.


#Welcome to Micro Monday Hello writers and welcome to Micro Monday! It’s time to sharpen those micro-fic skills. What is micro-fic, you ask? Micro-fiction is generally defined as a complete story (hook, plot, conflict, and some type of resolution) written in 300 words or less. For this exercise, it needs to be at least 100 words (no poetry). However, less words doesn’t mean less of a story. The key to micro-fic is to make careful word and phrase choices so that you can paint a vivid picture for your reader. Less words means each word does more! You’re free to interpret the weekly constraints how you like as long as you follow the post and subreddit rules. **Please read the entire post before submitting.**   *** #Weekly Challenge **Writers, please keep in mind that feedback is a requirement for all submitters. You must leave at least 1 feedback comment on the thread by the deadline!** **Theme:** **Bonus Constraint (15 pts):** Story includes an LGBTQIA+ character. **(You must include if/how you used it at end of your story to receive credit.)** Happy Pride Month! In honor of that, this week’s challenge is to write a story inspired by the theme of ‘identity’. You may interpret the theme however you like as long as the connection is clear and you follow all post and subreddit rules. The bonus constraint is encouraged but not required, feel free to skip it if it doesn’t suit your story. You do not have to use the included IP. **Please treat these topics & constraints with respect and care.** *(Artwork created by on Deviantart.)* **For some extra fun:** Use the stickied comment on this post to tell me who your favorite fictional LGBTQIA+ character is! It can be any medium: tv, movies, literature, games. etc.! *** # Last Week: - Winner: by u/katherine_c You can check out previous Micro Mondays .   *** #How To Participate - **Submit a story between 100-300 words in the comments below (no poetry) inspired by the prompt.** You have until **Sunday at 11:59pm EST**. Use to check your wordcount. - **Leave feedback on at least one other story by 3pm EST next Monday.** Only **actionable feedback** will be awarded points. See the ranking scale below for a breakdown on points. - **Nominate your favorite stories at the end of the week .** You have until **3pm EST** next Monday. *(Note: The form doesn’t open until Monday morning.)* ###Additional Rules - **No pre-written content or content written or altered by AI.** Submitted stories must be written by you and for this post. Micro serials are acceptable, but please keep in mind that each installment should be able to stand on its own and be understood without leaning on previous installments. - **Please follow all subreddit rules and be respectful and civil in all feedback and discussion.** We welcome writers of all skill levels and experience here; we’re all here to improve and sharpen our skills. You can find a list of . - **And most of all, be creative and have fun!** If you have any questions, feel free to ask them on the *stickied comment* on this thread or through modmail.   *** #Campfire - Campfire is currently on hiatus. Check back soon!   *** #How Rankings are Tallied **Note: There has been a change to the crit caps and points!** **TASK** | **POINTS** | **ADDITIONAL NOTES** |:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:| | **Use of the Main Prompt/Constraint** | up to **50** pts | Requirements always provided with the weekly challenge | **Use of Bonus Constraint** | **10 - 15** pts | (unless otherwise noted) | ***Actionable* Feedback** (one crit required) | up to **10** pts each (30 pt. max) | You’re always welcome to provide more crit, but points are capped at 30 | **Nominations your story receives** | **20** pts each | There is no cap on votes your story receives | **Voting for others** | **10** pts | Don’t forget to vote before 2pm EST every week! *Note: Interacting with a story is not the same as feedback.*   *** *** ###Subreddit News - Join to chat with authors, prompters, and readers! We hold several weekly Campfires, monthly Worldbuilding interviews, and other fun events! - Explore your self-established world every week on ! - You can also post serials to r/Shortstories, outside of Serial Sunday.