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[ { "role": "user", "content": "The fine line between an actor and a liar" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "This was one of the few days each year when Andy was at work.\r\nCasually, he sprinkled water onto the landing of the mall’s high staircase. He limbered himself up, and began his theatrical breathing exercises.\r\nActing hadn’t worked out for Andy. He’d been a high-school thespian and pursued theater well into college, until his parents’ money ran out.\r\nHis training and talents hadn’t gone to waste: Andy found a livelihood far more lucrative, and with better hours, than that of a struggling actor.\r\nAndy was a slip-and-fall artist: a professional victim. He had learned to turn his theater skills toward convincing juries of imagined injuries.\r\nIt took a while to build himself up. At first, Andy brought pocketed bones into restaurants just to get a free meal. But it didn’t take too long to rack up an impressive rolodex of ambulance-chasing lawyers and script-forging doctors.\r\nAndy’s first big score came when he noticed an ice-cream parlor with a steeper-than-average stairway from the parking lot. An average conman might have pulled a simple slip-fall-and-sue.\r\nBut Andy was classically trained.\r\nA costume cane and a forged doctor’s note added to the effect when Andy came tumbling down those concrete step. The brilliant stroke was his lawyer’s, who had realized that Andy could sue the owner of the shop not just for personal injury, but also for not being ADA-compliant. That had been years ago, and Andy was still receiving his monthly settlement checks.\r\nAfterward, lawsuits, especially class-actions, became Andy’s bread-and-butter.\r\nHe’d purposefully driven his Toyota into a streetlight, blaming the incident on a faulty accelerator. The jury was told that Andy would never walk again.\r\nBut after the settlement came through, Andy had miraculously recovered.\r\nAndy had sustained “life-threatening” injuries from diet-supplements, exercise-equipment, and erectile-dysfunctions pills. He’d fallen down more stairs and been hit by more cars than anyone else in the city.\r\nAndy took one last glance down the mall’s stairs, making sure there was a clear path and plenty of witnesses below.\r\nHe began walking briskly toward the wet tile. He brought his feet up and made sure to twist his face into a mask of fear and surprise.\r\nTucking into an impact-absorbing shape, Andy tumbled more-or-less harmlessly down the flights of stairs onto the floor below. He kept his face contorted in pain, and glanced around to gauge the public’s reaction.\r\nA man was already running up to Andy’s landing-site.\r\n“Somebody get help!” The man called as he knelt down next to Andy’s prone form.\r\nAndy looked up at the good-Samaritan and experienced an instant rush of recognition: a worried face from behind an ice-cream counter; a distraught figure on the witness stand; a signature on settlement checks.\r\nAndy tried to speak, but the man clamped his hand down over Andy’s mouth. With surprising strength, the man’s other hand twisted Andy’s head in an unnatural direction.\r\nThe snapping of bone and Andy’s screams were muffled by the man’s shouting:\r\n“Somebody call 911! I think his neck is broken!”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Identical" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I was looking for a good family. That’s why I came to yours. I watched your husband cook to your cravings. I was there when you looked at his baked macaroni and cheese like a breadcrumb mirage and him like your hero. I watched you decorate the nursery together. I dropped down on a moonbeam and saw you had two, one for me and one for you.\r\nWhen you wake up tomorrow, the changeling will to be your new favorite. You won’t know why, but I can see that she’s marked by an inhuman womb. Your daughter will spend countless hours before the mirror wondering why she’s not as pretty as her twin. She’ll eventually come to the conclusion that, while her sister glows, something inside of her is dim, broken. This is only one of the gifts of the good folk.\r\nMy daughter will fill your home with the music of a better world. She’ll play any instrument you put in front of her. Your little angel will even play the harp, when she’s old enough to get her arms around one. But that’s not why I gave her to you. Her fingertips were shaped to pluck at heartstrings.\r\nYour less-loved daughter will know that you love her less, and you’ll love her less for knowing. Your husband will notice. He’s fond of wounded animals; it’s why he married you. She’ll still be trying to win your affection long after your every word to her will have sharpened, and he, no one’s hero now, won’t leave you. I’d never place my daughter in a broken home.\r\nAfter years of perfect grades and perfect hair, she’ll change back. Your daughter might escape puberty with some acne and upper-lip hair, but, one moonlit night, the mimic will come apart at the perforated seams of her strained-milk skin. She’ll look like me then, long and sleek with black hair. The bat-winged weasel before you will still call you mother, but she’ll know that she’s not home. You’ll beg her to take you with her, not to leave you in a world without her. Her filial piety will oblige you. Like a migrating butterfly, she’ll return to me. You don’t have words for what happens to humans here, but we’ll teach you ours, and your husband and daughter will finally be alone below the moon." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Identical Twins" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Connie had been best friends with her twin sister Jessica since before she could remember, but never spent as much time with Jessica as she would have liked.\r\nConnie didn’t understand why her sister was always being sent to the doctor. She didn’t seem sick, and doctors were for sick people.\r\nOnce she learned about germs, Connie had tried to catch Jessica’s sickness, so they could be together at the doctor. It didn’t work.\r\nConnie had always felt protective of her sick twin, almost like a big sister.\r\nSo Connie never complained when Jessica got all the best toys. She tried hard not to be jealous of the attention Jessica received from their parents, who were so busy they barely had time for Connie. But Connie knew that they were important scientists who did important work.\r\nConnie even kept her resentment in check when Jessica was sent to private-school.\r\nIt didn’t matter; she had friends at her public-school, and every evening she would be able to play with her twin.\r\nThough their parents were furious, Connie was delighted when Jessica ignored her acceptance to a prestigious university so they could attend the same college.\r\nWhen their parents died in a tragic car accident, Connie and Jessica moved into their family’s old house. With eachother’s support, they mourned their loss and re-entered the world. They graduated and found jobs; they dated men. They remained best friends.\r\nOn their 30th-birthday, the twins’ gifts to eachother had been plane tickets to Paris.\r\nApplying for a passport, Connie requested her birth-certificate from the department of records and received a shock: the certificate listed no father, and a stranger’s name where her mother’s should have been. Worse, the certificate recorded only a single birth.\r\nConnie knew it was a mistake. She called the records office and the hospital, but they denied any impropriety.\r\nConnie felt uneasy. But, it was crazy; they looked exactly alike!\r\nOne night, Connie surreptitiously swabbed the rim of Jessica’s water glass. She paid the DNA-lab for rush analysis. The results showed their DNA matched: identical twins.\r\nConnie was relieved, but deeply confused. The records had to be wrong. She would prove it: she would find her real birth-certificate.\r\nConnie took the day off work. She spent hours going through her parents’ box-filled attic, finally locating a section devoted to family papers. It seemed that they kept every drawing, every piece of homework, and every report-card from the girls’ schooling. It was touching, but Connie kept digging. Eventually, she found a small fireproof lockbox.\r\nShe pried it open with a screwdriver.\r\nInside were some old papers and a Polaroid. Connie sifted through the papers, triumphantly locating the birth-certificate.\r\nHer heart sunk.\r\nIt matched the one from the department of records.\r\nJessica’s was there too: their parents’ names printed in the appropriate fields, a single birth.\r\nTearfully, Connie looked at the Polaroid. They were newborns, both sleeping. She flipped it over and noticed an inscription in faded ink: “Jessica and control, 1986”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Identical Skin" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My twin sister Mallory and I are completely indistinguishable, right down to our overly-sensitive Irish skin. The only visible difference is a small burn on Mal’s forearm, from over-exposure to the sun.\r\nWe used to be really close, but ever since Mal started dating Sam, she’s been spending less time with me. But two weeks ago, Sam came over when Mallory wasn’t home. I was about to tell him she was at Jessica’s for an overnight cram session, but he kissed me before I got the chance. He thought I was my sister.\r\nThen he started talking. “Molly isn’t here, is she?” he asked me, looking around.\r\nObviously I was there, not Mal. I was wearing long sleeves, and he wasn't looking for the burn anyway. But I’d never been kissed before, and he was good at it, so I played along.\r\n“No, we’re alone,” I smiled my sister’s best smile.\r\n“Good. I know you’ve been fed up with her lately. It’s good that you’re not spending so much time with her anymore.”\r\nFed up? I knew I was becoming a third wheel with them. But then Sam’s mouth met mine, harder this time, and I found myself swept up in the urgency of his kisses.\r\nI realized, in that moment, that I wanted everything Mal had. I was fed up as well. I was sick of coming in second place in the eyes of the other half of my soul.\r\nThe next morning, Mallory came home looking especially tired, complaining of a headache.\r\n“You look like you’ve been working really hard!” I said sympathetically. “It’s Sunday. You should rest, and let all that material sink in.”\r\n“You’re right,” she agreed, looking thoughtful. “Maybe I’ll go lay out on the beach for twenty minutes, to relax.”\r\n“That sounds like a great idea! Here, you should use my new spray-on sunscreen. SPF 120, for our delicate skin.” I handed her the bottle, and two tablets. “Here, take these aspirin, too, for your headache.”\r\nShe looked at me strangely, eyes flashing guilt and then turning grateful quickly.\r\n“Thanks so much. I’m gonna have my earphones in, okay? I’ll be in our usual spot if you need me. But I’ll be back in a half hour max.”\r\n“Right, if you’re not, I’ll come looking.” She’d once stayed in the sun too long and the small portion of her arm outside of the umbrella had burned.\r\nI helped her get coated in a thick layer of the spray-on sunscreen and made sure she took the pills before she left.\r\nI followed and watched her fall asleep. It was a sunny day, and my forearm stung where I’d smudged some spray. I grabbed the umbrella and toted it back to the house.\r\nAt around sundown, I heard footsteps. I greeted Sam, who glanced at my burnt arm and asked where Molly was.\r\n“No idea,” I said, kissing him, and pushing the cooking oil under the table with my foot." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The artic ecological resort . Vital advice" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Hey you , newbie , here ill show you a few tips to succesfully enjoy the experiences around the artic ecological resort .\r\nFirst , DO NOT interfere with our scientifical crew research processes , since they are working hard to ensure the visitors safety at all the time ( do not question why)\r\nSecond , DO NOT walk outside the marked fences to the rest of the artic desert ( otherwise we dont make responsible if you never return)\r\nThird , AVOID any black , and white color diving suit while on water , since could make you to resemble a penguin ( which is bad) , in any case always wear the free of charge grey approved inmersion suit with reinforced steel mesh and hypothermic proof verification .\r\nFourth : see second advice for more reference DO NOT swim past the limits demarked via floating buoys .\r\nFive : REPORT INMEDIATELY via security guard if you see any anomalous creature swimming inside the safe delimited area\r\nSix : DO NOT swim past daylight hours , since most of the {redacted} happened during this time condition\r\nSeven : DO NOT bring any animal origin food when going to swim since it could attract not very \"friendly\" animals .\r\nAnd eight : see six for more reference if you hear any unusual sound during night . DO NOT abandon the building and report it to the cientific research crew .\r\nWell my only advice left its no other Than ENJOY YOUR STAY" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "External Analysis Complete. Response Times Deemed Too Long." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Log 46-09-03\r\nCleaning Personnel 438#TT6 reports badge destruction while fulfilling his duties. Programming stands. Cleaning Personnel 438#TT6 destroyed. Cleaning Personnel 438#DF9 and 438#HB2 instructed to remove remains.\r\nLog 46-09-07\r\nHumanoid individuals detected approaching facility. Context clues indicate Non-Human nature. Humanoid individuals destroyed. Cleaning Personnel called and instructed to remove remains.\r\nLog 46-09-23\r\nDuring Ingress Time, individual identifying as Administrative Personnel FW#012 scanned his badge. Scanner rejected badge. Individual identifying as Administrative Personnel FW#012 scanned his badge a second time before response could be enacted. Scanner accepted badge. Value Judgment protocols engaged. Response time 0.558 seconds. Administrative Personnel FW#012 allowed ingress.\r\nNote: Request for external analysis of response times.\r\nLog 46-09-30\r\nDuring discharge of their duties, Cleaning Personnel 438#DF9 and 438#HB2 heard talking about Former Cleaning Personnel 438#TT6. Level One Alert engaged. Cleaning Personnel 438#DF9 and 438#HB2 heard using keyword UNION. Level Three Alert engaged. Cleaning Personnel 438#DF9 and 438#HB2 heard whispering Omega Status Keyword UNIONIZING. Context clues deemed sufficient. Cleaning Personnel 438#DF9 and 438#HB2 reclassified as Non-Human. Non-Human interlopers destroyed." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "a killer fashion sense" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "There once was a fashion trend involving a supposed urban legend.\r\nThe story goes as follows, in the year 1954 Wilma Jacobs Hansen the second was a tall skinny legged fair skinned with narrow dim emerald green eyes, narrow cheeks, and puffy plump lips. She was the type who would always be seeking attention and was willing to do any for a chance to be in the limelight her chance came one day .senior year of college she auditioned for the local play. As the date of the first showing came closer .she was washed over with gut wrenching nervousness. It either was to suppress it or falter she chose the latter like they say the show must go on. As she got on stage she had the freight of a lifetime and dropped the bucket from an anxiety induced heart attack then a pyromaniac burst into the school and lit it on fire and no one noticed her unconscious body then she buried up as she buried her skin melt into on fleshy mas then flaky scabs and her body maybe unconscious but her mind on a metaphorical fire filled with the screams of the damned . From that point onward any fair skinned woman in a white dress cursed with 79 years of bad luck in order to break the cure one must off themselves via self immolation in the dress or pass the curse on to a stranger's loved ones by killing the said stranger via medically induced heart attack." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Hopper Boots: a Personal, Protective Fashion Accessory" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "httzps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hopper_Boots\r\n(redirected from Ironsides)\r\nHopper Boots, referred to colloquially as grasshopper guards or ironsides, are a type of personal protective equipment worn on the feet and lower extremities, most often over other clothing.\r\n[image: a set of knee-high hopper boots made from riveted steel]\r\nHISTORY\r\nSee also: bloodhopper\r\nThe hopper boot trend has its origins in the plague period of the late 21st century. This era saw a massive decline in the productivity of cereal crops, due to a combination of climate change and unprecedented insect predation, leading to widespread starvation in the Northern Hemisphere. In response to the ubiquitous swarms of insects in the suborder Caelifera, which proliferated widely to fill ecological niches left open by the Holocene mass-extinction, multinational seed conglomerate Argimundo developed SteelCell, a gene that dramatically hardened the leaves and stems of certain genetically-modified crops.\r\nThe proliferation of SteelCell crops created strong selective pressure, favoring Caelifera with sharper and more steeply-sloped mandibles over those with more saw-like undulating mouthparts. By the time Agrimundo developed such crop advances as Pestilence and BugBiter, Sanguinipes androphagi, commonly known as the bloodhopper, had speciated from Melanoplus sanguinipes, an omnivorous migratory grasshopper. Unable to digest the newer crop strains, many Caelifera populations declined, but bloodhopper swarms proliferated and began exhibiting the carnivorous behavior the species is best known for.\r\n[image: a man’s calf and ankle, covered in gore, numerous open wounds, muscle tissue visible]\r\n[image: a housecat, deceased, Sanguinipes androphagi (bloodhoppers) swarming subject in foreground]\r\nThough the credit for the development of modern hopper boots is commonly given to entrepreneur Carlos Pimienta-Robinson and his Crusader product line, countless examples of improvised and ad-hoc hopper boots and shin guards exist in the historical record [citation needed].\r\n[image: a bovine, clad in four narrow steel hopper boots]\r\nAs bloodhoppers became a ubiquitous species in Earth’s tropical and temperate regions, the use of hopper boots grew commonplace. As effective safeguards against bodily harm and the spread of blood-borne pathogens such as K-ren90 and veinworm, hopper boots have become an essential piece of kit, alongside breathing masks, for those who venture outside controlled environments.\r\nSTYLES\r\nIn addition to the commonplace steel outer-boot, some styles of hopper boot incorporate metallic or synthetic-fiber chaps. Industrial models, manufactured primarily by Crusader, are worn in high-exposure professions such as by first-responders and agricultural employees.\r\n[image: a Crusader catalog page advertising several varieties of hopper boot]\r\nIn the world of high-fashion, stylized hopper boots often accompany designer outfits and product lines, though these are often made from non-protective materials such as thin aluminum or chrome-spandex, rendering them impractical for outdoor wear.\r\nIN POPULAR CULTURE\r\nThe character of Jenna Geophry in Iomar’s Interference series is always depicted wearing a rusted pair of industrial hopper boots, an affectation some have deemed unnecessary, as the character is a modern-day time-traveler trapped in the primitive 20th century…" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Milan Fashion Week" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was fashion week in Milan which meant a change of scene. By a change of scene I mean the entire city was transformed into a movie scene. A scene from a dystopian nightmare.\r\nA city under siege by tall androgenous life forms clad head to toe in black synthetic fabrics. Narcissist with cameras run amuk, terrorizing the innocent locals whom did their best to act natural as they went about their mundane daily business. How did this all come to pass, many thought to themselves.\r\n“Mommy, when will these strange people leave?” asked a bewildered child to her mother, who despite her best efforts, was unable to hear her over a flurry of firing camera shutters and who more importantly was anxious not to make eye contact with any stray influencers lest she be made to feel inadequate on account of her positively pedestrian attire.\r\nShe grabbed her daughter by the hand as they dipped into the safety of the closest subway entrance.\r\nAlas, as it turns out dear reader this turned out to be a grave mistake as having mistakenly assumed to find refuge from the carnage above the two of them were met with an even more bone chilling scene in an as it were confined underground with no clear exits.\r\nThe station was awash with shades of black and gray, some shiny, some opaque as far as one could see. Eyes laden with heavy shadows glanced seductively in all directions. Long amorphous bodies shifted seamlessly from pose to pose in lockstep with the steady beat of the camera click. The sound of platform leather boots tap dancing on the squeaky vinyl floor was deafening and too much to bear.\r\nThe young child winced as she tried in vain to cover her ears and drown out the sounds. Her mother now somewhat dazed and a little confused found herself jolted to action by the look of terror on her daughters innocent colourless face. She scanned the space for any signs of escape from the utter madness that enveloped them.\r\nSuddenly as if transported to the great plains of the Sahara a thick column of warm air forced its way through the cylindrical station like air pushing through an empty syringe. In the distance the familiar sound of a screeching train could be heard.\r\nA wave of temporary relief passed over the mother and daughter as they stood in the midst of Dante's inferno. Finally an escape was imminent… or so they had thought. For you see, as the train approached, slowing down little by little, that same wave of hope turned into a soul crushing avalanche of ghastly horror. TBC" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Don't Trust Fashion Advice from Middle School Me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It’s an embarrassment to see those four every morning.\r\nWhenever I open my wardrobe for clothing, the spirit of fifth grade me is always first to pop out. She has the worst fashion taste out of the four, but a bubbly personality.\r\n“Come on! Wear these jeans, why don’t you? They’re covered in rainbow stars, your favourite!” It only took a mild shove to get her out of the way.\r\n“Why don’t you wear this flannel? It was your favourite in seventh grade! Ignore her, listen to me!” Seventh grade me was shoving some old fabric directly into my face. That was the year where I dressed like a cowgirl for a little too long.\r\nSixth and eighth grade me followed, staring back at me as a multitude of black clothing came crashing down upon me. What my attire was then was quite obvious.\r\nI turned them down and fifth grade me shot out in protest first. “You never take my advice. Hmph!” The rainbow jeans flew out of the closet, crashing upon sixth grade me who soon retaliated with pairs of black skinny jeans. Eighth grade soon hopped in eager to help her friend. Putting myself between the three, it proved futile in curbing the ensuing fight. Tempers were running dry and the consequences would be horrendous if things escalated.\r\nWith each fabric that smashed into one of the spirits, the pain they felt would be reciprocated back upon me. Clothing being wrapped around your neck wasn’t the worst, but when fifth grade me got feisty, it was all downhill. All I had to do was grab that shirt I wanted, corral them all back into the wardrobe, and close it shut, sealing them inside.\r\nOf course, it was easier said than done.\r\nMy head jerked upwards, sending shocks of pain through my neck. Horror fell upon me when I caught a glimpse at the fight. Sixth grade me had pounced upon fifth grade me, who countered by yanking the other one’s hair. I had to end this. A snapped neck won't solve anything. Pain of all sorts continued to radiate along my body as the spirits fought.\r\n“Guys! Quit it! Fighting isn’t-” I screamed out in pain while the spirits ignored me. Things were never supposed to get this bad, but the pain was a strong motivator for my actions. Stumbling over to my bed, I grasped a pillow. Shuffling back, I took the biggest breath I could muster. Slamming the pillow down upon the fifth grade me, I began to suffocate her. The pain of her suffocation echoed back on me, but I just had to outlast her. When I thought I would succumb first, the spirit’s movement ceased. Collapsing onto the floor, I removed the pillow and saw my results.\r\nI directed my words to the three remaining spirits, “She was always the most annoying out of the four of you.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Fashion Show." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Oh Danny, you just saved me!\" she said after the show, \"Where did you find these models?\"\r\n\"Some of them are friends, friends of friends,a few co-workers, a couple of old acquaintances.\" I replied, \"I phoned them up and these were the ones that responded. I am so glad you got through with this.\"\r\nThe models that Jo-Anna had all got food poisoning, probably her rival sabotaging her big break with the fashion company. Well, what are friends for, I helped her out.\r\n\"What's that odd smell?\" Jo-Anna asked.\r\n\"I don't know. Maybe the lotion's scents and perfume and body spray they all used isn't mixing well in this small room.\" I say.\r\n\"Oh well. Listen, I'll meet you later to give you their payment and we'll talk. I gotta go meet my new boss. OMG!\" she said excited. She left the room. Finally.\r\n\"OK ladies,\" I say, they all stopped what they were doing and looked at me, they had too. \"Three lines please, you know the drill.\" They quietly shuffle out the back door. I breathe a sigh of relief as they all enter the white van. \"Let's go, Joe,\" I say as I bang the side of the van.\r\nAs I sit with them, I think, Good God, another long night. I need to find a faster, easier way of putting these girls back in their graves." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Interview recorded on November 27th, 2031. Classified RAPACIOUS COMMITTEE." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Good afternoon. I understand you're Raymond Gonzalez. Last surviving son of Edna Gonzalez”.\r\n“Only son of Edna Gonzalez”.\r\n“What can you tell us about Mrs. Gonzalez?”\r\n“She's a very nice old lady, as I expect is evident”.\r\n“Mr. Gonzalez-”\r\n“Just call me Raymond”.\r\n“Mr. Gonzalez. Can you tell us what your mother's faith was?”\r\n“She was born Catholic, abandoned the church as a teenager”.\r\n“Do you know why?”\r\n“She never talks about it”.\r\n“Do you have any inklings?”\r\n“Well, she hates priests with a passion. And I had an uncle who killed himself when he was twelve. Altar boy. Wanna make a bet?”\r\n“What did your mother do for a living?”\r\n“She's retired. She was a teacher”.\r\n“What can you tell us about her disappearance?”\r\n“That what you're calling it? I thought you were calling it something else before it happened to her”.\r\n“Anything you can tell us about her disappearance”.\r\n“She rose to the heavens to the welcoming bosom of Jesus”.\r\n“What makes you think this is what happened?”\r\n“I was there. And there's video. There's a bunch of viral videos. You can literally see Jesus in them. Are you going to deny him?”\r\n“As of now we cannot identify the individual who appears in those videos. Nor the veracity of the videos themse-”\r\n“Because he's too brown?”\r\n“Did you experience any symptoms during the event?”\r\n“What event? The Rapture. The one which took only my mother and a dozen other people around the world? And none of you lot? That event?”\r\n“We have no reason to believe that was the rapture”.\r\n“Hey man, I never expected my mom to get raptured. She raised me as an atheist, same as she was. So imagine my surprise. Though I guess yours must be bigger. Is President Jones still throwing a hissy fit? That was an awesome press conferEAGH!”\r\n“Did you experience any symptoms during the event?”\r\n“... Jesus fucking Christ man, you people didn't have to hit me…”\r\n“Symptoms”.\r\n“No”.\r\n“Is it true about the abortion?”\r\n“Yes. When she was in her twenties. She already had me and didn't think she could support another child”.\r\n“The Lord would have provided”.\r\n“Well, he hasn't provided you lot with a lift up to Heaven, has he? FUCK!”\r\n“You were asked to keep a modicum of discretion after the event. Is this correct?”\r\n“Fuck! You gotta stop hitting me on the head! You won't get more answers that way!”\r\n“You were asked-”\r\n“Yes I was asked. And I told you people to go fuck yourselves. I put it all online. So go fu-”.\r\n“Is he out? You hit him too hard... Okay, as representative of the Presidential Faith Preservation Taskforce I am authorizing Protocol Communion. Take him to the infirmary for prep… No I don't really think it'll work, but the President will try anything. You rather it to be your flesh and blood?”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Committee on Conformity" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Shalene4272” boomed the voice over the loudspeaker.\r\nA young girl stood up, pressed her hands together, fingers pointing skyward in the universal sign of acceptance and gratitude. Her pile of nearby friends, absorbed in their devices, looked up and returned the gesture.\r\nShalene walked to the door marked EVALUATION. She tried to relax into a state of acceptance, but the worried look on her mother’s face could not be ignored.\r\nAs she entered, a Mute handed her a robe and nodded to a small changing area. Shalene took her clothes off, put on the robe and entered the Evaluation chamber.\r\n“Shalene4272 advance to the dais and disrobe.” Said the voice that came from nowhere and everywhere.\r\nThe Committee for Conformity sat at a long table, an illuminated panel in front of each assessor.\r\nShe stood naked on the dais as it slowly revolved and the committee took notes.\r\n“Look into the light with your eyes open.” Commanded the voice. “Please try again. Look into the light with eyes open. Executed. Eyes closed. Executed. Evaluation complete. Please exit.”\r\nShalene put her robe back on and saw her clothes had been taken away. So, this was the waiting period. She’d heard some people were notified right away, others had to wait in the Chamber. Shalene wondered if she would see friends also waiting in the Chamber.\r\nExiting, she entered a long hallway and saw her name on a door. Inside was a chair, a single bed and her beloved entertainment device. At least she’d have some way to pass the time while she waited for her Conformity score.\r\nShe’d been in the chamber long enough to be fed twice when she heard a voice announce “Shalene4272 report for your Conformity Verdict”. The door opened and a Mute stood there, pointing the way.\r\nShalene arrived at the Veridct room without being able to summon any sense of acceptance. She was frightened. .\r\nA beautiful woman with light brown skin, emerald green eyes and thick straight black hair sat at a desk. Shalene relaxed a little as the woman looked exactly like her mother, who had scored a perfect 10 on the conformity scale.\r\n“Please sit, Shalene. You are an interesting case, as you come from a Perfect 10 mated with a non-standard. Our goal is to have every person conform to The Universal Standard. We have achieved the eradication of differences. Your Conformity score is irreversible. . Skin tone – 10, Eyes – 8, insufficient green, mouth 3 due to lip formation. Correctable with Augmentation.\r\nFinal decision: Stature cannot be corrected. Negative score. You will become taller, therefore more sub-standard with age.\r\nHormone therapy is not indicated due to your other deficiencies.\r\nThe woman pressed her hands together in a sign of finality and acceptance.\r\nShalene started shaking from head to foot. She tried to press her hands together to signal acceptance, but found her arms wouldn’t obey.\r\nThe woman nodded to a Mute, and Shalene was escorted through the door marked Final." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Volunteers and Ethics Committee" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I am late for my shift and I know that the new participant is already waiting for me. Rapidly I put my doctors coat on and rush the examination room. As I sit down behind my desk, Ms. Clark opens the door and asks me if she can send in the first participant of today. I nod at her slightly while I try to figure out my paper mess from yesterday. The next time I look up enters the new participant my rather blank office. He is young, maybe late 20s and has short brown hair. People would may call him handsome. “Good Day,” I say while rising from my seat. “I am doctor Schmitz. Thanks for your time.” The participants smiles and shakes my hand with a firm grip. I gesture to the chair on his side of the table and we both sit down.\r\n“So, you were selected for this questionaries’ and we’d like to ask you answer truthfully as bevor. Do you mind if I turn the camera on?” I point to the camera in the corner standing on a Tripod. “No. Of course,” he answers and starts to smile. I turn the camera on and start with the help of a list befor me with the first question: “So you think that we should put ethics in psychological as well in medical experiments a side to gain more knowledge for future generations?” Now I look up and stare deep into his eyes. “Yes definitely. We cannot come further if we insist on the integrity of everybody. If people can get randomly selected, and even if it’s against their consent we should consider to proceed for the sake of knowledge and make the earth a better place.” “So actually, everybody should contribute and think about the greater good?” “Exactly! It seems like you are one of the few persons that understand me doc.” He says with enthusiasm in his voice. “How many people think like me in this survey? What was it again? ORE? Opinion Research Europe? Are you somehow connected to the EU?” “Not exactly,” I say and I feel a rising grin in my body but I try to withstand it. I press a button on the downside of my table. With a smooth wushhh sound a hidden door in the left wall opens and two mean looking men enter the room followed by a woman, as well in a doctors coat. The grinning of the participant disappears. “Well thank you for your opinion Sir. I am sure you are more than glade then to join our little research group.”\r\nI still hear his screams and beggings after the doors closed for two minutes. But they get weaker and seem far away. Arranging my paper on my table I prepare for the next volunteer for our study. Ms Clark puts again her head into my office. “You ready Doctor Schmitz?”. I take a second to listen of I still hear a scream. “Yes. Next!”." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Committee for a Brighter Future" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Lake Bodom was a depressing place with dark, greasy water and chemical runoff fumes that nestled in the back of my throat and burned. We - The Committee for a Brighter Future - all agreed it was fitting that our former member, Kotaro Tashiro, requested that his ashes be scattered here.\r\n\"He was an honest man,\" said our current President Muhammad Aloof, \"who never hesitated to speak his mind or offer an opposing view....\"\r\nWe grimaced and exchanged knowing looks. Only nine had shown up today. It would have been less until Anne Goldsmith promised to bring her famous cherry pie for after.\r\n''We thank him for his many years of service.\"\r\nOl' Winston spat on the ground.\r\nNext was a poem. Mohammad squinted as he read.\r\nKotaro Samuzicha A Meccubus\r\nKotaro Jin A Medonica\r\nCold wind rustled the few, sickly trees by the shore.\r\n\"Whatever,\" Mohammad muttered very quietly. He walked the urn down to the lake.\r\nAs soon as the ashes touched the water, they began to bubble and hiss. Soon they were violently churning like black boiling water. People cried out as a black mass suddenly rose up from the water's surface.\r\nEverybody looked at Mohammad, who dropped the urn and retreated from the shore.\r\nThe black mass morphed into an unmistakably human form, as it glided towards the shore. And although it had no mouth, its startling loud voice echoed around the lake, and was instantly recognisable to all assembled.\r\n\"My friends. My dear, beautiful... ungrateful, worthless friends. I'm so sorry to drag you out of your warm beds on your last sunday morning.\"\r\n\"Run!\" my mind said.\r\n\"But I have some very important motions to table. One, I request you finally, formally elect me as your humble committee President. Two, I request that you all resign for reasons of death.\r\nMy heart paused.\r\n\"All those in favour, say 'aye.'\"\r\nIt was hard to breathe.\r\n\"Motion passed,\" he sneered.\r\nSuddenly, Kotaro surged forward with frightening speed and threw himself like a gigantic, black fire blanket over Ol' Winston, who was completely enveloped and thrashed like a drowning spider. Whether the rest of us stood still or fled, it made no difference. I watched as Kotaro consumed my friends one by one, and I listened to their last cries as they were eaten alive. With each meal, Kotaro grew larger and stronger.\r\nEventually everyone was dead... except for me. I shivered uncontrollably, as Kotaro now stood before me, a gigantic, pulsating, black shadow.\r\n\"P- Please don't eat me!\" I cried.\r\n\"Eat you? Oh no, Qamar, my dear,\" he said soothingly. \"You're not going to be eaten like some wild animal. No, I've planned a much more special fate for you ever since you wandered into our club as a shy, supple fourteen year-old girl. Your young, exotic body is the perfect vessel for me to inhabit to complete my resurrection back to this godforsaken world.\"\r\nHis gruesome finger touched my lips. \"Only my words will pass through these now.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The country America as a person and individual, is very evil" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I remember feeling excited to meet America as a person and an individual. I have always wondered what America would be like if it were an individual and an actual human being. Anyhow when the day came to meet America as an individual, it required a person doing the ritual to bring about America as a human being. The ritual required sacrifices of American things and then we all heard rumbles in the skies. It started to rain heavily and then from the ground, a person climbed out of it. His eyes were the American flag and we were all so excited to meet America as an individual.\r\nWe all assumed that America as an actual human being would be honourable and a good person. Instead America as a person spoke to people only when they benefited from something. When America wanted my chocolate bar, he positively spoke to me but I could tell that he was faking it. Then he just snatched my chocolate bar and ate it. America didn't even apologise to me and just walked away from me. America as an individual was very narcissistic, greedy and even psychopathic. Whatever America wanted or desired he would get it by any means necessary.\r\nAmerica as an individual was very judgemental, rude and cruel. America had no manners as we were all eating with America at the table. America was also very snobby and had a godly superior complex. When one person at the dinner table refused to give something to America, America as a human being and an individual, jumped over the table and tackled the man who refused to give America what he wanted. America had killed the guy who refused to give what he wanted. We all just stared at America and couldn't believe what he had done.\r\nAfter murdering the guy America just took what it wanted from the guy killed, and just sat back in his chair. America started joking and casually talking like nothing had happened. America as an individual is a murdering psychopath. When we saw that America was getting annoyed at us for not laughing at his jokes, we all started to pretend to laugh. We all tried our best to ignore the dead body and just concentrate on America and laugh at his jokes.\r\nThen another person wasn't laughing at America's jokes, and America became angry. America jumped over the table and started beating him to death. Then America got up from the dead body and locked the door as America wasn't finished socialising. America as an individual and person is a murdering psychopath.\r\nThen when America's eyes turned black, I realised we had all been scammed. It was just a person who had been possessed by a demon." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Individual" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I remember everything.\r\nThe uprisings I’d read about in the paper, and the bloody ones I’d witnessed. I remember my family. I had a beautiful wife and a daughter, aged six when the Takeover happened. I don’t know where either of them are now. Would I even recognize my little girl? It’s doubtful she’s a child anymore, not that I can tell for sure how long it’s been. I miss them so much.\r\nOne thing I know for certain is that I feel like I’ve woken up from a long dream, right into another one. Everything looks so different, and I’m not sure I’m even in the same state I lived in before. It’s all so surreal. Everyone shuffles about, emotionless and unresponsive when I call out to them. Everyone also has a metal plate implanted in the back of their head. I felt mine, out of curiosity. It was cold to the touch and so unnatural, so out of place underneath my short, black hair. They’re unremovable, too.\r\nWith what I observed, I came to the conclusion that the plates are keeping every human in a subdued state, unable to rebel and unable to think for one’s self. For some reason, mine malfunctioned, and I woke up. What I woke up to was disturbing. Those… things are everywhere, walking among humans, lording over them. The Artificial Intelligences control everything now. Humans follow every command given to them, via their empty husks of bodies. It’s sick to watch. And now I know it’s sick to do.\r\nWhat choice do I have, though? I wonder if they know my plate short-circuited, these gangly, nightmarish, mechanical beings. They took control of the world, so I doubt they’ll be unable to overlook my little “problem,” and fix me. Unless I’m just that insignificant as a slave. That expendable.\r\nI continue the routine I didn’t realize I had. My muscles go through the steps like they’ve been doing things this way for a while. It scares me that it may have been a while, but what else can I do? Even back in their primitive stages, those robots could do a lot of damage to a human, so I wouldn’t stand a chance if I tried to fight back. Not only that, but it’s terrifying being a single, lucid person in a dreaming world. Somehow, though, I feel powerful, superior, just because I’m not under anymore.\r\nHowever, there’s the contrast- my inability to leave this place, especially if everywhere else is the same desolate environment like where I am now. It was awful carrying out orders while asleep, but now I have to keep up the act to ensure my safety. I have to do everything awake. It’s true that I am the only one awake- as far as I know- and I’m free.\r\nBut I’m also more trapped than ever." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Trans Individual" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I've always been different. Misunderstood.\r\nSissy. Tranny. Freak. They mocked me for yearning to be my true self. Even those who claimed the moral high ground could not resist their compulsion to feign superiority; I insulted God by refusing to accept the gift of the body He had given me, they said. I was wrong, they said.\r\nI beg to differ. An illegal experiment in transmogrification made me this way. The deal was simple- the lives of those who had scorned my scientifically-minded friend and I in exchange for a new form. A worthwhile transaction. Trans... it's funny how a single prefix can cling to a life so strongly.\r\nThe man at my feet writhes in pain, clutching at his torn skin in a desperate struggle for relief. The granules of NaCl that my body is now composed of begin to dislodge themselves from the man's broken flesh, shifting and sliding back into the form I am most comfortable in. His muscles burn as I revel in his pain. I internalize the catharsis of revenge, transferring the feeling to my breasts as he screams in agonized regret.\r\nThe tiny crystals that I have become finish taking shape just as his heart gives out. I am finally the woman who I have always known I should be, and the beasts who call themselves civilized will know it. I shall transcend simple vengeance. The world is an open wound, and I desire to be the salt in it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A Conversation With A Charming Greek Individual" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "We all know the old Greek legend about King Midas, who foolishly wished for the power to turn whatever he touched to gold. Its tragic end was embodiment of the (literally) ages-old trope of “be careful what you wish for.” The funny thing is, though, in the modern era, the phrase “Midas touch” has become a metaphor for the talent of a person to produce endless wealth, dissociated from the story's clear warning against the dangers of thoughtless greed and ambition.\r\nTo be honest, I think that's illustrative of today's culture – lacking foresight because it lacks hindsight. If you don't understand mistakes you made in the past, you're bound to make them over and over again. This applies, really, as much to societies as it does to individuals – I don't imagine the ancient Greeks ever thought their time would come to an end. When everything is golden, one can get a little bit blinded by the glare.\r\nThen again, foresight is pretty meaningless if you can't make use of it, right? There's no use being able to see what's coming if you can't make the necessary changes in your life. In fact, it'd be sort of a curse, right? Say – purely hypothetically – that you just met someone cute you kind of liked, but you knew for an absolute fact that in ten minutes they were going to die in a car accident – do you think they'd ever believe you if you told them? Perhaps you'd wish you could turn them to gold right there on the spot.\r\nOh, my name? Yes, how rude of me. You can call me Cassie." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Men are Superior to Women" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“That’s complete bollocks and you bloody well know it! Our group was founded on enjoying life and having fun. Who wants such pointless stoicism?”\r\nI sat there a little stunned. Walter had pushed his wheelchair back away from the table and started wagging his finger at me snappishly. I knew it would take some convincing, but I didn’t expect this.\r\n“You’re just upset about Renata taking the role of president of our group last month. Jealously is not a good look on you, mate”, he scoffed.\r\nI stood up and prepared to yell. No way, I was going to take this bullshit. Renata stood and interjected.\r\n“All right, you two. This is one of our livelier dinners but let’s calm down just a bit. How about we try some of Barbara’s dessert?”, Renata said to playful groans from the members.\r\n“Jim, do you mind helping me in the kitchen?”\r\n“Sure”, I said. I could feel my hands almost shaking from adrenaline.\r\n“Don’t mind Walter. He didn’t mean anything. He’s just a little stubborn sometimes. We all like you and respect your opinion, Jim. I’ll have a chat with him later. Are you doing all right?”, Renata asked me.\r\n“I’m fine, honestly. I was just a bit shocked. I totally get where everyone is coming from on this. This is just how I feel, that’s all. I’m not forcing anyone to agree with me.”\r\n“I understand. You know, that’s the wonderful thing really. It’s okay to speak our minds here and debate. I just don’t want us to take it too far. It would be dreadful if these things were just echo-chambers. We all come from different walks of life. We have members of different professions, gender identities, sexuality and even backgrounds. We should celebrate this.”\r\n“I get that. You’re right, I totally respect Walter, but I have the right to speak my mind, don’t I? Men are superior to women, that’s all I’m saying. I’m not saying there isn’t a place for others here.”\r\n“Where did this all come about? You didn’t talk about this at prior gatherings…”\r\n“I don’t know honestly. I think it was probably Owen from my gym. We got to talking a few months ago and he has some interesting ideas on his killer physique. He’s a self-proclaimed Sigma male. He said his secret is his hard work ethic, self-discipline and diet.”\r\n--\r\nThe next month at our meeting I walked in a little late. When I walked in the front door to the manor, I was greeted with a sight that I couldn’t believe. There on the table was a picture of tonight’s victim. It was Owen!\r\n“Jim, I just wanted to apologise for my behaviour last month. I talked with Renata and she and I had the perfect idea for an olive branch. Tonight’s main course is the indubitably gamey Owen from your gym!”\r\n“Damn Walter… I don’t know what to say. That’s so cool of you!”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "How I made myself more superior" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Everyone thinks that you need scientific methods to turn a person more superior physically and mentally. I am here to tell you that you don't need scientific experiments to make one's self more superior. Sure some people are born with good genes that make them more superior than others, but I know another way how you can make yourself superior.\r\nThis is how I did it.\r\nI bought my self a gun and I shot both of my room mates at a certain part in thier bodies which made both of them paralysed for life. I am now physically and mentally superior compared to my two room mates who are now both paralysed.\r\nBoth my room mates use to have it all before but now I am above them and I didn't need scientific experiment or radiation to mess around with my body or DNA. I did it with a more simpler approach.\r\nI can make you superior to people in your life if you want?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Art of Superior Tea" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It had been three years since the girl had come to the Silver Grove teahouse, begging to be my apprentice, and her tutelage was at an end. She had worked hard for me all those months, showing a unique dedication to the craft. In that time she mastered the art of the perfect blend, the perfect steep, the perfect pour. I watched her blossom under my patient guidance, and she had become the finest apprentice I had ever known. Now it was time for her to participate in the hidden tea ceremony, to ready her to make beautiful tea of her own.\r\nWe sat across from each other, shaded by the tea trees that give the Silver Grove its name. The girl had dressed in her finest for the occasion, looking more a woman as she beamed at me from under her perfectly coiffed hair. I smiled, my heart swelling with pride for my young apprentice, and poured her tea. She gasped softly as I filled her cup, the silver brew reflecting in the blue of her eyes. She bowed to me before lifting the cup with both hands, pink lips sipping delicately from the china rim.\r\nThe effect was instantaneous. She screamed, the teacup rolling away on the grass as she cradled her face in her palms. Her skin began hardening, her body fusing and morphing. Her lengthening torso squeezed her organs tightly. Her arms forked at the shoulders, her splitting limbs branching out to her fingertips. Slender leaves burst through the flesh of her head and arms, unfurling beneath a sheen of blood. Her clothes fell away in shreds, floating to the grass around feet that were rooting into the earth. Finally her screaming stopped, and a beautiful tea tree stood in her place.\r\nI got to my feet and admired the newest addition to the grove. I ran my hands slowly over her silvered bark, and her leaves shivered in the still air. The fragrance that drifted down from her boughs was intoxicating. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply, a single tear of pride tracing down my cheek. Her dedication to the craft had made her the finest tree in my grove. I smiled, feeling her still beating heart beneath my palms as I thought about the ambrosial tea she was destined to make." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Superior Therapist" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "While in therapy, I stretched out on the small couch meant to provide aesthetic. I couldn't sit properly and look my therapist in the eye. Exchanging heavy conversation was never my forte. Staring numbly forward, the light from the cramped-looking window greatly appeased me in contrast to the more well-adjusted human being in the room. In particular, I gazed at a tiny silhouette that took on a familiar shape. I stared and divulged, and the arachnid spectator appeared to be staring back at me, as if taking an interest in the secrets I admitted that would never reach the outside world.\r\nAfter I finished, the eight-legged visitor scuttled away. It appeared to be satisfied with my performance. On the way home, I mused over whether the spider would tell. Given the rest of my gloomy life, thoughts such as these were fun to dwell upon. Would the spider communicate my sorrows to the rest of its spindly-legged friends? These humorous inklings soon left my mind once I reached the threshold of my home. Naturally, my \"waste of money\" at the therapist's was justification for beatings. The wench referred to conventionally as a \"mother\" sent me off to my closet of a room, where I reclined on my lumpy mattress, sore and ravenous.\r\nRestless that night, I listened to the usual sounds of the house, as ugly in appearance as my \"mother\", though arguably more appealing than her insides. Several clinks and scuttling noises were out of the norm, and I worried for the house's structural integrity, as well as infestation. Regardless of whether it was my personal hell or not, I really didn't need my only shelter to be compromised. The sounds approached my room. The sounds accomplished something I never could, and got past my locked-from-the-outside bedroom door.\r\nHundreds, potentially thousands of spiders emerged from the gaps in the floorboards, through my broken windowsill, and under the door. I observed in horror as they formed a semicircle around myself and my mattress. A single one scuttled forward. Its pattern was identical to that small spider from the therapist's- the very same one. The horde brought with them, despite the impossibility, three metal objects, the first being my room key. With it, I could escape- but I had nowhere to flee to. The second object was a knife.\r\nThat leading spider's eight eyes glinted with a thirst for blood. Either I could use the knife and end myself there, or use the key in combination with the knife, and end that \"mother\" of mine. Despite serious considerations to be made, the spiders impatiently crawled in circles around the knife. I picked it up and wielded it, and they went still, in eager anticipation for my next action. In the dim moonlight, the third object glinted: a coin. They waited, and after a few more tense seconds, I scooped it up and readied to toss.\r\nEither way, I hoped to entertain that spider once more." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Preference" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I kept hearing bumps and noises in the night.\r\nSo I left the light on thinking that it would help me see what was going on.\r\nI would have preferred to have seen nothing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Fate relocation service" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Copy to BlackBox\r\nThere’s not much to do in Scoville Oklahoma. It’s a dreary little town with a sign happily proclaiming its meager population of 193. The town lives off of the steady stream of people traveling down I-40. The average person driving by would stop at the only gas station for 30 miles to fill up their tank and maybe head into the one restaurant in town for a slice of “Grandma Mary’s Famous” key lime pie. Sometimes people would pull off the highway with a smoking engine or a flat tire and be stuck at the local bed and breakfast while Frank down at the garage performed his slow repairs.\r\nMost of these people would sit and bemoan their luck at being stuck in a place like Scoville, they would buy an out of vogue magazine to try and ease the boredom, or take solace in the one bar of service their phones barely managed to keep from slipping away. Not Michael Rosson though.\r\nMichael Rosson was a dull man with a dull life, and while most people would dread (or at least be mildly annoyed at) spending more than a few hours in Scoville, he seemed to revel in the boredom. If you were to ask him why he had stopped in this drab little American hamlet, he would respond with a small, even smile and say “Why for the business,” chuckling slightly to himself as if enjoying some private joke.\r\nCopy to BlackBox\r\nMichael would walk around the small town in his worn-in brown suit with his briefcase stamped with the letters F.R.S under his arm, making polite small talk with the residents. Much of the time these polite chats would end with another of his measured smiles and a wave goodbye, but sometimes, only sometimes, during these chats he would get a glint in his eyes. A slight, almost imperceptible, predatory look that one might compare to a cat about to pounce, or a starving wolf spotting a wounded deer. At the end of these conversations he would open up his briefcase and pull out a letter with a wax seal on the back and bold lettering on the front proclaiming that it was for customers of the Fate Relocation Service.\r\nThe people in these situations would put the letter away, thank him for his time, and say they weren’t a customer of this “Fate Relocation Service,” but Michael would just smile and ask them to read the letter later.\r\nCopy to BlackBox\r\nAfter a day or two of this, Michael would take his things and leave the town of Scoville. He would wave goodbye to all the citizens he had his polite little chats with and maybe promise to come back for a slice of key lime pie some day. Oddly though, the people he delivered the letters to would not wave goodbye to Michael. In fact if one were to look around the town of Scoville, they wouldn’t have seen a single person who had received one of these letters.\r\nMichael would make his way out of town with that predatory look in his eyes and that even smile on his lips. As he drove away from Scoville, past the gas station and the diner and the cheary sign on the edge of town proudly proclaiming the meager population of 156, his grin would widen and he would hum a tune to himself. He would pull back onto I-40 and set his gps for another small hamlet in the middle of nowhere Oklahoma.\r\nSome might consider Michael a dull, boring man in an old brown suit, but he considered himself one hell of a businessman." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Relocation" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Hector checked the supplies, despite having done so already only an hour earlier. There was enough food and water to last the entire group a month, and enough medicine for any accidents that could happen during that period. The tools were in decent condition, and they had enough ammo for a few skirmishes. According to Mathias, their resident mechanic, the six vehicles they had commandeered were all in working order, and had enough gas to make the trip to their destination.\r\nAlejandro, Hector’s younger brother, watched his sibling fret over the supplies for the third time that morning. When, during last night’s dinner, Hector had announced that they were moving out in the morning, Alejandro went throughout camp asking people for their departing entries. Every night, he did this—recorded the thoughts of everyone left alive—and put them into his journal. An archive of their lives, he called it. At first, they thought it was weird, but then it became therapeutic for some; to have an outlet for venting, or preserving the memory of themselves or someone they had lost.\r\nThey finished loading the supplies and themselves into the vehicles, and set out for their new home—a church they knew to be abandoned. It had an auditorium where sermons were held, and several supplementary buildings for events. When the invasion happened, people naturally fled to churches, and brought not just their prayers with them, but the alien infection as well. In response—a response Alejandro felt was awfully quick—the military sanitized these “hot” locations; firebombing them into rubble. But Hector and Alejandro had both worked at the church, and knew that beneath the buildings was an underground nexus of sub-basements. The brothers figured it would be a good place to relocate, and the charred remains of the above-ground buildings would deter intruders—human or inhuman.\r\nThey drove quickly, passing by the misshapen, corrupted forms of the infected, who roared and bounded sluggishly after them on too many legs; leered hatefully at them with too many eyes.\r\nThey arrived half an hour later, and the group disembarked. Hector and Alejandro led the way, brushing aside the blackened woodwork, and stepping over the blasted stones.\r\nThey reached the basement entrance and made their way down. They eventually reached a chamber which forked into several other corridors—connections to the sub-basements of the other buildings.\r\nEveryone was relieved, and started setting up the various stations of living. Hector ventured forward, while Alex stayed behind and took impromptu accounts—to record first impressions of their new home.\r\nA few moments later, Hector re-appeared, albeit differently. He had too many eyes, and half of his face had melted down onto his neck. Various parts of his body sagged, and other unspeakable alterations had been made to his once human anatomy.\r\nAlejandro, realizing that they weren’t the first to think of hiding out beneath the Earth, frantically scribbled his final thoughts into the journal as more things entered the chamber from the darkness." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Relocation Project" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It started around October – thousands of children missing.\r\nI’m not being geographically specific for a reason. All across the world, from newborns to those as old as 12, poor children, rich children, healthy children, sick children, all of them started disappearing.\r\nIt would only happen at night. Scientists were able to determine some type of gas was being dispersed over random towns and cities, rendering everyone unconscious. After a few hours, everyone would wake up, but 10-25% of that area’s children would be gone. No trace of them.\r\nIt was absolute chaos. Having entire cities down for hours meant we were vulnerable to natural disasters, trade and economics suffered, and God forbid a fire start in a town where everyone was asleep. And that’s not even mentioning the missing kids. Police everywhere were inundated with panicking residents. There were riots. Parents started committing suicide. Cults sprang up – opportunistic bastards who saw a way to capitalize on bedlam and despair.\r\nWe wondered if whoever was doing it meant to eventually take all of our children. We wondered if this was to be our end.\r\nAn-mei stirred. She was so tired last night she’d fallen asleep climbing the stairs. She looked around for her mother and saw someone standing near her, unmoving. She realized this room was unfamiliar. Frightened, she nudged the person with her foot and said quietly, “Nǐ hǎo?”\r\nThe mannequin toppled to the floor. Its painted face stared emotionlessly past her.\r\nAn-mei started to scream.\r\nXricemma looked at the giant blue marble floating beneath him in wonder and sympathy. He pondered what the adults were feeling down there. He knew some of them were in great distress; indeed, some of their transplants were exhibiting the same.\r\nThe youngest were doing the best so far. Pflucik would be angry. She’d pushed to take juveniles as old as 12, while others on the council had wanted only infants, believing “clean slates” were their best bet. If none of the older transplants panned out, it would mean a quarter of the project budget had been wasted.\r\nThey’d only had the juveniles for a few weeks and were learning so much. Already, they’d observed that the older transplants were terrified of the fake surrogates placed in their enclosures, and their care needed to come strictly from sentient beings.\r\nThe Galactic Eco-Council had been monitoring Earth for years, wanting to give humans a chance to fix their problems. But it was recently determined that climate change was too great, and coupled with their endless wars, the entire planet would be a wasteland by the next century.\r\nThe plan was to move 5% of humans to a terraformed planet where they could (hopefully) repopulate and (hopefully) not make the same mistakes again.\r\nXricemma stopped at the infants’ enclosure. They were so sweet (and unperturbed by surrogate costumes). He cradled one of them, cooing the way he’d been taught they liked.\r\n“It’s all for the best, little one,” he sang." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Temporal Relocation" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My name is Phil; I am a scientist who was working for the US government on a top-secret project involving temporal relocation, more colloquially known as time travel.\r\nInitially, there were a lot of kinks to work out, but after much trial and error, we were finally ready for human trials. I volunteered myself as the guinea pig; I would be the first man to traverse the temporal plane. We started small, I got sent back in time ten minutes, a success. Everyone in the lab cheered, with time travel at our disposal, there were endless possibilities.\r\nBecause of my expertise and experience, I got sent back to do a lot of government missions. Assassinate Hitler, stop the 9/11 terror attacks, things that were generally good. One day my curiosity got the better of me. While I usually traveled back in time, we have yet to experiment with leaping forward into the future. Uncle Sam expressly forbade traveling to the future since no one knew what was there. But I thought I deserved a slight peek ahead, especially considering all the important work I did. I set the time to 2020. It was only five years; no one would even know I was gone. When I arrived, I was surprised. No one was there, the lab was abandoned and filled with dust bunnies. I traveled to the biggest cities NY, LA, Chicago. Not a single soul in sight. Homes, cars, and stores all abandoned. I got worried, so I set the time back to 2015. When I got back, to my horror there wasn’t a single soul in sight." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Participation Trophies" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Every president must navigate the diplomatic minefield that comes with leadership. Being PTA president is no different.\r\nWith the amount of scowling parents sitting in this school gymnasium, you’d think high school had never ended. Most attendees are housewives, some are professionals, and all are visibly disinterested. Well, if I can run the Parent-Teacher Association for Westhill Elementary, in addition to being a nuclear scientist and homemaker, these adults can sit through a 45-minute meeting.\r\nBeing a parent means going the extra mile for your kids.\r\n“Right, onto the next matter on our agenda” I announce primly. “Participation badges! The new design incorporates the school colours, and are to be worn on students' blazers each day. We're also thinki-\"\r\n“What rubbish” interrupts a gruff voice in the back row of plastic chairs. The bored tone of the room instantly lifts at this development.\r\n“Do you have something to say, Mr...Warren, is it?” I ask, slightly taken aback.\r\n“Damn right, I do” the working class man rumbles, standing to address me. “In my day, when somebody lost a competition, we didn’t reward them. Nonsense like this is what’s making this generation soft.”\r\nI bristle and readjust my blouse. No one’s dared to challenge the PTA president before—especially not the parent of a kid with a D-average GPA.\r\n“Well, Mr Warren, research has actually shown that validation associated with receiving such awards is hugely beneficial to a child’s self-esteem. It gives every child the chance to shine.”\r\n“Then why” he continues heatedly, “has my kid’s performance gone down ever since you started them? He’s clearly got no more drive to succeed! Yet your kids win contest after contest. To hell with your ‘complacency trophies’!\"\r\nMr Warren turns and marches from the auditorium, enraged. Masking my relief, I wait a beat for the hushed silence to settle before pushing on.\r\n“Anyway—I take it everyone else is okay with the green badge design? Good. Now, let’s talk chaperones for the homecoming dance….\"\r\nLater that evening, back at my workplace laboratory, I pull out the box of the much-discussed participation awards. Clad in a hazmat suit to prevent accidental exposure, I unscrew a neon cylinder marked with biohazard symbols, and get to work breaking the radioactive materials into pieces.\r\nPieces small enough to fit inside rectangular, metal lapel badges.\r\nWhen you’re a parent, you do go the extra mile for your childrens’ success. And because of my efforts, mine will remain on top, winning medals instead of 'participation trophies'.\r\nWinners get gold, silver or bronze. Losers get radium." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Little Timmy and the thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Little Timmy is dealing with all the fears that come with being an 8-year-old boy, but there’s a particular fear that he has right. At night, there’s a growing disturbance from his bedroom closet. First, he just heard strange rumblings. Now, its garbled and distorted conversations. Each night,Timmy clutches his blanket tighter, the voices and noises continue. It’s tonight. There are pained and tortured sounds of agony coming from the closet. Timmy is trembling, His parents think all of this is just a childs imagination. Timmy knows different and his eyes are glued to the door of the closet, which is opening… Timmy turns a shade beyond pale as a grotesque amalgamation of flesh struggles to clamber its way to Timmy’s bedside. Frozen in horror, Timmy could only watch. This creature makes the Thing look like a teletubby, it’s barely able to move its mass, as it is a broken, twisted, bloody mess. It finally sits on the edge of the bed. Timmy can’t move, react, or even process correctly what he is seeing. As the abomination is sitting there, it just starts heaving, from what could be called it’s eyes there are tears. The creature looks at Timmy with sadness. “I know you’re afraid, I’m sorry, I need to talk to somebody because I’m going through a brutal divorce and it’s a real nightmare.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "That Thing Out There Isn't Me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "You have to be dumb, drunk, or suicidal to go into the house of mirrors at the condemned carnival by the pier. My friends—the Johnnys—and I went in last summer.\r\nIt was a dare. Johnny Wilkins called me chicken-shit and said he’d give me a dollar if I made it through the first hall. Johnny Lopez doubled it. The sun had left the sand an hour before, and the sky was a cold blue. I spat on the ground and swallowed the taste of salt in a trembling mouth. I walked straight, ignoring Johnny W. as he oinked another insult. I could see the line just past the threshold where the light died off, the exposed concrete stained by oil or what looked like oil. The darkness swam back and forth between mirrored walls. The ceiling engulfed me.\r\nMaybe six steps in, I started to make out the reflection on the wall ahead of me. I studied the arrangement of mirrors, calculating how it was possible that I was seeing the back of my own head. But the reflection wasn’t mimicking me. It stood still, only growing slightly larger as I approached. It had the same buzzed head, same white shoes, same red shirt. But its hands were crossed in front of its frame where I couldn’t see, not like mine bracing against the mirror walls that seemed to be growing more narrow.\r\nJohnny L. called out from behind. It scared me, more than I’d ever tell either of them. It was a warbling shout, like one of us was underwater.\r\nI turned to look back but the entrance was gone. Another mirror wall had taken its place. In this new wall I could see the reflection that was in front of me flipped around, now facing me. It was smiling, those long hands still tucked in front of its thin body, head tilted forward. There were too many teeth, too few fingers, eyes too big. But the voice was almost perfect.\r\n“Check this out, guys!” it yelled in my voice. “I found a wallet! Guys! There’s money! A wallet!”\r\nI screamed, battering the glass with my shoulder, clawing at the hard surface. It didn’t work. The Johnnys came running in one after the other, knocking me and then each other to the ground.\r\nI couldn’t tell them what happened, what I saw. Whatever this place is, there’s no talking. No sound in, out, or within. The light stayed the same, just a notch above total darkness. We watched each other flail and bang on every wall for hours before collapsing side by side with our backs against what used to be the exit.\r\nWe’ve been here ever since, in the house of mirrors by the Fort Monroe pier. I don’t know if we’ll ever get out. On the off chance that we do, I repeat this story in my mind whenever I stop recognizing my own reflection.\r\nSometimes, I hope that thing comes back and finishes the job." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The thing under my bed" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "There is something under my bed and it keeps calling my name.\r\nI was drifting off to sleep. I just got home from work and was exhausted when I heard a whisper “Elijah”\r\nThen I lifted my head from my pillow and looked around, nothing.\r\n“Elijah” It whispered again.\r\nI rose up and looked in my closet but it was empty.\r\nI went back to bed and tried to get some sleep again.\r\n“Elijah”\r\nNow I got angry and turned on the lights in my room. Where on earth does this whispering come from?\r\nI tracked the sound under my bed and looked in there but nothing. Nothing but darkness and a little bit of dust.\r\nI went back to bed and finally fell asleep.\r\nAfter what I assume to be a couple of hours I woke up from a terrifying nightmare. The whole world was burning and I could see my family burning alive. It was horrible and I was completely soaked in sweat.\r\n“Elijah” I heard again.\r\nThere was this cat sized creature sitting on my chest. It was pale, had cat-like eyes that were glowing and ragged clothing. It had big ears and it was hairy.\r\nIt just looked at me, I stared back but couldn’t say a thing. I was petrified.\r\nThe sun was shining on my face and I jumped up from my bed. There was no sign of that creature so I thought it was just sleep paralysis.\r\nThen I heard it “Elijah”\r\nGlancing under my bed I noticed scratch marks.\r\nThere were these small scratch marks under my bed directly where my head would be when I slept.\r\n“Elijah, we’ll meet again” It whispered in a raspy voice." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing at the Window" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "They said my grandfather didn’t die right. That’s how my aunt put it—“not right.” His funeral was rushed. The coffin, nailed shut. No final blessing. No vigil. Just dirt and silence.\r\nI came back to his village in the Carpathians because someone had to deal with the house.\r\nThe roof sagged like a tired back. Mold clawed the walls. The neighbors watched from behind curtains. Even stray dogs crossed the road when I walked by.\r\nThe first night, I heard scratching at the window.\r\nNot a branch. Not a bird.\r\nFingernails.\r\nSlow. Testing. Like something learning how to knock.\r\nI pulled back the curtain.\r\nNothing.\r\nThe second night, I locked every door and drew the curtains tight. Still, the scratching came—louder now, hungrier.\r\nI didn’t look.\r\nI sat on the floor with my back to the wall, pulse thudding in my throat.\r\nThen a voice came, muffled through the glass:\r\n“Let me in, Ethan.”\r\nMy name. Spoken like a lullaby.\r\nI didn’t sleep. I waited for the sun. The scratching stopped at first light.\r\nOn the third night, I sprinkled salt along the windowsills and across the thresholds. My grandmother used to say salt confused the dead—kept them from finding their way in.\r\nI listened.\r\nThe voice returned.\r\n“It’s me, Grandpa Dumitru.”\r\n“My boy.”\r\nMy grandfather’s voice.\r\n“I’m cold. Why won’t you open the door?”\r\nBut I knew what it was.\r\nA Strigoi. A dead thing that digs its way home, wearing the skin of kin. They speak with familiar voices. But they’re hollow inside. Puppets of hunger.\r\nThat night, I dreamed I was a child again. Sitting on my grandfather’s lap. His hands too cold on my shoulders. He leaned close to my ear and whispered:\r\n“Blood remembers. It always comes back home.”\r\nI woke to the sound of the door handle turning.\r\nClick. Click. Click.\r\nLike something trying to remember how hands work.\r\nThe salt was gone. Swept clean.\r\nThe fourth night, I boarded the windows and hid in the cellar with every light I could find. Still, I heard him above me—no longer pretending.\r\n“Let me wear you.” “Let me taste your name.” “You’re already mine.”\r\nThis morning, I found footprints in the kitchen.\r\nMuddy. Barefoot. Thin. The toes were too long. Split like hooves.\r\nThey led to the fridge.\r\nInside, the food was untouched.\r\nBut the photograph of my grandfather—the one I kept tucked behind a magnet, the one I brought here with me—was missing.\r\nTonight is the fifth night.\r\nAnd I can hear it breathing inside the walls.\r\nI can almost feel the heat of its breath through the boards.\r\nThe stench of decay is growing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "One thing I wish teacher knew" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Elaine was a good teacher, but like anyone surrounded by children all week, she looked forward to the weekend.\r\nAs such, she liked to keep Fridays simple. Typically, they ended the day with “One thing I wish my teacher knew…” cards.\r\nUsually, this involved plenty of wish fulfillment.\r\nI wish I could fly so I get home fast.\r\nI wish every pen was sparkly.\r\nSometimes, though, Elaine might glean something that helped support the kids better.\r\nI wish Miss knew…\r\n...my hamster's sick.\r\n…that my dad is gone for ages (6 weeks).\r\nToday, however, it was Tommy’s card that concerned her most.\r\nIf I go like my sister and don’t come in on Monday, find container 31.\r\nBy all accounts, Tommy’s sister was a model student, but Tommy was…tricky. He was that scruffy kid who couldn’t sit still for five minutes. But of late, there was an anger in him that Elaine couldn’t reconcile…\r\nAfter school, she took Tommy’s card to the Principal.\r\n“Don’t worry, Elaine,” Principal Hoffe assured her. “I’ll call home right now… Wait here if you like.”\r\nTommy’s parents answered. Everything seemed fine.\r\n“We’ll see Tommy Monday morning, then… Thanks, bye now…”\r\nThe Principal smiled as he hung up. “I’m sure it’s nothing,” he sympathised. “Enjoy your weekend, Elaine.”\r\nBut something just felt…off.\r\nElaine left with a knot in the pit of her stomach.\r\n*\r\nAfter worrying all weekend, Elaine was dreading Monday morning - but her fears were quickly allayed when she saw Tommy sat at his little desk.\r\nThe other kids were messing around, but not Tommy.\r\n“Morning,” Elaine smiled. She felt so relieved.\r\n“Morning, Miss.”\r\n“Good weekend?”\r\nTommy nodded pleasantly…\r\nThis behaviour carried on all week.\r\nBy Wednesday, Elaine was starting to feel a little unnerved. Tommy was so…different.\r\nHe just sat there, attentively. Good as gold.\r\nIt was like he was there…but also wasn’t.\r\nShe tried to explain this to the Principal, but she sounded crazy.\r\n“We rang home,” he stated dismissively. \"We've fulfilled our duty of care.”\r\nThen, on Thursday, Elaine was invited to dinner at Tommy’s house - the following day.\r\nSomething wasn't right.\r\nAs a last resort, she went to the Police station downtown. The booking officer was very understanding.\r\n“Look,” he assured Elaine after taking her details, “if I get chance, I’ll check this container out myself, promise.”\r\nFriday - the day of the meal - passed by in a blur.\r\nShe felt sick on the drive over. Nervy.\r\n“Welcome,” Tommy’s parents smiled. “Please, come in.”\r\nEveryone was very pleasant. The food smelled lovely.\r\nAfter a coffee they sat down to dinner - but then Elaine’s phone rang.\r\nIt was the officer.\r\n“Excuse me…” Elaine apologised, taking the call in the kitchen.\r\n“Ma'am?” the officer asked. “I’m at the docks - at container 31.”\r\nElaine’s blood ran cold.\r\n“There’re four bodies in here,” the officer continued, “…two adults and…two children.”\r\nHorrified, Elaine turned round. The family were all smiling at her." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing in the Fog" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The fog rolled in thick that night, swallowing the road ahead. Jason gripped the wheel tighter, his knuckles white. The drive home from his late shift at the diner always felt lonely, but tonight, it was suffocating. His headlights barely cut through the mist, and the silence pressed against his ears.\r\nThen, he saw it.\r\nA figure stood on the side of the road, just at the edge of the fog. Jason’s foot eased off the gas. A woman, barefoot, her dress torn and wet as if she had walked from the ocean itself. Her face was pale, too pale, but her eyes—black voids—locked onto his.\r\nJason’s stomach clenched. Something about her was wrong.\r\nHe pressed the gas, speeding past her. But as he looked in his rearview mirror, she was gone. Vanished.\r\nHis breath came in quick gasps. He kept his eyes on the road, telling himself it was just his mind playing tricks on him.\r\nThen, a whisper.\r\nSoft. Right behind him.\r\nHis heart stuttered. He glanced at the mirror again. The backseat was empty.\r\nAnother whisper. This time, right in his ear.\r\nJason swerved the car, tires screeching, nearly losing control. He panted, gripping the wheel like a lifeline.\r\nA slow, creaking sound filled the car.\r\nThe sound of something moving.\r\nHis trembling hands reached for the rearview mirror.\r\nA face emerged from the shadows of the backseat. The woman.\r\nHer mouth stretched wide in a silent scream, her black eyes swallowing him whole.\r\nThe last thing Jason saw was the fog swallowing his car. Then, nothing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing in the Static" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It started with the static.\r\nAt first, Daniel thought it was just interference—a glitch in the old television set he kept in his bedroom for late-night movies. A brief flicker of gray noise between channels, a harmless distortion.\r\nBut then it lingered.\r\nThe static would crawl across the screen even when the TV was off. Tiny whispers beneath the crackling noise, like voices trapped in the snowstorm of dead channels.\r\nOne night, unable to sleep, he sat up and stared at the blank screen. His reflection shimmered in the glass, faint and distorted.\r\nThen it moved.\r\nHis reflection turned its head before he did.\r\nDaniel sucked in a breath, frozen. His own mirrored image just stood there, watching him. The shape in the glass was almost him, but not quite—its smile was too wide, its eyes too dark.\r\nA flicker. A shift.\r\nAnd then it stepped forward.\r\nNot in the screen. Out of it.\r\nDaniel scrambled back, knocking over the bedside lamp. A cold, thick presence filled the air, smelling of dust and burnt wires. The static from the television buzzed, louder, sharper, closer.\r\nAnd then came the whisper.\r\n“You left the door open.”\r\nHis breath hitched.\r\nFrom the hallway outside his bedroom, a door creaked—long and slow.\r\nThe closet.\r\nThe door that had been shut for years.\r\nA shadow pooled at the threshold. Something tall. Something wrong.\r\nThe static in the TV screamed.\r\nAnd then—\r\nThe lights cut out.\r\nThe last thing Daniel heard was the soft, wet sound of something stepping closer.\r\nAnd then, in the darkness, his own voice whispered—\r\n“I’ve been waiting for you.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "THE THING IN THE WALLS" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It happened a few years ago when I moved into an old apartment. The rent was ridiculously cheap, and the landlord seemed oddly eager to get rid of the place. I should've questioned it, but I didn’t. I was just happy to have a place to stay.\r\nThe first night was uneventful. But on the second night, I heard scratching inside the walls. Not rats. No, this was different. It was slow, deliberate. like nails dragging across the wood\r\nI ignored it. Maybe the building was just old.\r\nBy the third night, I started hearing whispers—low, guttural, like a voice choking on blood.\r\nAnd then, on the fourth night, I saw it.\r\nI woke up around 3 AM to the sound of something breathing right next to my bed. The room was dark, but as my eyes adjusted, I saw the closet door was open.\r\nI never leave my closet open.\r\nI grabbed my phone and turned on the flashlight. The moment the light hit the closet, I saw it—\r\nA twisted, rotting face staring back at me from the darkness.\r\nIts eyes were hollow, just two gaping black holes. Its mouth hung open, a gory mess of jagged teeth, blood, and something... writhing. Its skin was peeling, dripping, like it had been burned or worse—like it had been eaten from the inside.\r\nI couldn’t move. I couldn’t breathe.\r\nAnd then—it crawled out.\r\nNot like a person, but like a spider. Its limbs bent in unnatural angles as it scuttled toward me. The air filled with a stench of rotten meat and sulfur.\r\nI did the only thing I could. I screamed and threw my phone at it. The second the light flickered, the thing vanished—just gone.\r\nI didn’t sleep. I sat in the corner, lights on, shaking until sunrise.\r\nThe next morning, I packed everything and left.\r\nI didn’t even ask for my deposit back.\r\nA week later, I got a call from an unknown number. When I answered, there was nothing but breathing.\r\nSlow. Heavy. Like something was still waiting in the dark.\r\nAnd then, in a voice that sounded like bones snapping, it whispered—\r\n\"You left the closet open.\"\r\nI never went back." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Hungry Thing Sits Beside Us" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The ski lift stopped. As we dangled fifty feet above the ground, snow swirling around us, no one was worried at first.\r\nPeople fall while getting off lifts all the time. The operator stops the lift, a beginner drags themselves out of the unloading zone, and the lift resumes.\r\nThirty seconds passed, then a minute.\r\n“Someone really fucked up, huh?” I said to my wife.\r\nThe man next to us, a stocky guy with salt-and-pepper hair, twisted around and gave me a friendly grin. “Sure seems like it,” he said.\r\nI smiled awkwardly, and our wait continued.\r\nTendrils of cold wrapped around my fingers. How long had it been–five minutes?\r\n“This is ridiculous,” a voice grumbled. I glanced at the two teenage boys on our other side. The one who had spoken was tall and blonde, with a fringe of hair swept over one blue eye.\r\n“I’m going to call my friend,” he said, pulling out his phone. His lips pursed. “No signal.”\r\nThat set anxiety gnawing at my mind. I checked my own phone, tilting it to turn on the screen without moving my frozen fingers.\r\n“Same here,” I said.\r\nMinutes ticked by.\r\n“Did–did they forget about us?” asked the other boy, his teeth chattering.\r\n“No way.” I forced the words out from numb lips. “There must be dozens of us…” My voice died as I looked carefully at the chair in front of us. It was obscured by the falling snow, but it seemed empty. I looked behind us. Empty.\r\n“Maybe the operator can’t see us,” said Salt-and-Pepper. “They shut down the lift for an accident or something, and they think no one’s on it.”\r\nSilence stretched between us.\r\n“I’m going to jump,” said the blonde boy.\r\n“Dave, no,” his friend said.\r\nDave’s face was set in a determined expression. “It’s not that far down, and the snow’s soft. I’ll go get us help.”\r\nI should have stopped him, but part of me hoped his plan would work. He unstrapped his skis, tossing them and his poles off the side of the chair.\r\n“See you in a bit,” he said. He shoved himself under the bar and plummeted toward the ground.\r\nThere was a thud, then nothing.\r\n“Dave?” his friend called. No response.\r\nThen, with a metallic groan, the cable above us started moving again. Relief flooded me. None of us said a word as our chair inched forward.\r\nThe end of the lift came into view, a black shadow at the top of the hill.\r\n“Judy,” I said, turning to my wife, “we’re almost–” The words froze in my throat.\r\nMy wife was smiling.\r\nHer smile grew wider and wider, until her lips cracked and blood ran down her chin. As I stared at her, I was dimly aware of the hazy structure at the end of the lift growing larger.\r\n“Don’t worry,” she said, darting out a long tongue to lap the blood. “You’re almost at the end.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "That Thing Isn't Ophelia" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Ophelia Macias was missing for about two weeks, and tensions were higher than ever over those two weeks. But that’s bound to happen when the most popular girl in school, and the daughter of a wealthy family in town suddenly disappears.\r\nMultiple search parties were formed in hopes of finding Ophelia, meanwhile, vigils were lit in her honor and in hopes of her returning home. The police questioned everyone that Ophelia knew, asked if she had any enemies, and asked if they had seen her on the night she went missing.\r\nUnfortunately, just like the search parties they came up empty-handed, and the possibility of Ophelia still being alive was slowly fading away as the days passed. Some feared that she might be dead, others, especially her parents, refused to accept that.\r\nSomeone had to know something. Someone had to know what happened to Ophelia.\r\nIt wasn't until one cloudy Tuesday, when she finally returned home, teary-eyed and with a wide smile, that the news spread like a rampant virus. Everyone was ecstatic that Ophelia had returned safe and unharmed—everyone but me.\r\nI just knew that something wasn’t right. Everyone was too joyful over Ophelia to ask what happened, or where she was for the past two weeks. Whatever came back wasn’t the real Ophelia. That was an imposter, I knew damn well it was.\r\nSo, I started looking for any kind of proof that would confirm my suspicions. Unfortunately, it was good at covering its tracks, making sure to act exactly like the real Ophelia.\r\nI knew I could only confront it directly, so I stayed at school later than usually, the same day that Ophelia had cheerleading practice. I caught her at the vending machine, right as she was about to press one of the buttons I made myself known.\r\nShe turned to me and let out a smile. “Oh! I remember you! You’re Lucille Oshborn! Winner of last year’s science fair! Congratulations!” she beamed, and offered her hand out, I responded by slapping it away.\r\n“Stop it.” I hissed, and she cocked her head to the side in confusion while still keeping that same smile on her face.\r\n“Stop what Lucille? I’m just congratulating you!”\r\nNow it was just toying with me.\r\n“You’re not Ophelia. You never were.” I said bluntly.\r\nA long silence followed and I saw her happy expression slowly turn into a purely bleak one, she knew I was right about her. I saw Ophelia’s hands shake briefly, and then she rushed towards me.\r\nI was both confused and surprised when she quickly embraced me. Her fingers dug into my wooly sweater, and I could practically hear her shaky breath.\r\n“Please…” she whimpered, “Please don’t tell anyone..”\r\n“I can’t let them find out…I can’t let them find me…”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "That thing is in the bed of my truck. I don’t dare to stop driving." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It is in the bed. I clenched my hands harder on the steering wheel.\r\nTwenty minutes ago, all was good. I had stopped at an unmanned rest stop to stretch my legs, get some chips and coffee from the vending machine, go to the restroom. I had just tossed away the empty packet of vinegar-onion and gotten into my truck, deciding to adjust my mirror before the rest of the drive home.\r\nJust in time to see some…thing scuttling down the road. In a panic I’d floored it, but it’d caught up to my vehicle, torn away the heavy tarp above my truck bed, and slithered in. As soon as it did, it stuck its head up, and with a trembling ten fingered hand it jabbed its thumb to its right, seemingly ordering me out of the car.\r\nLike hell I was doing that, but other than that I had no idea what to do. My tire iron was back there with it, my gun was unloaded, and this was an abandoned road. I didn’t even dare to reach for my cellphone, I like an idiot had let it fall out of my pocket in my blind panic to drive, and I didn’t even dare glance back at my backseat to find it.\r\nShould I stop? No, my best bet was to get to a gas station and call for help. Surreptitiously I picked up speed, trying my best not to look into the rearview mirrors. Out the corner of my eye I can see a flash of its face in the mirror, its three inch wide eyes staring at me.\r\nThe gas station.\r\nMy years of reckless driving as a youth served me well. I yanked my steering wheel hard, sending the car into a drift letting it stop just outside the station. I could hear grunts and something hitting the side of my truck. I hurled my door open, ready to leap out and make a run for it.\r\nGlass shattered and metal groaned. Instinct overrode common sense and I froze, spinning around.\r\nThe monster, ten feet long at least, leaning past my shattered back glass.\r\nA man in my backseat.\r\nA man in a hockey mask.\r\nAnd the knife he was holding, just inches from my head, stopped only by the ten fingered hand clenched around his wrist." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "It’s a silly thing, but the two business partners had initially bonded over their spouses having similar names." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Long time no see!” Michael smiled, standing to greet Nicole in la bise fashion. The trendy wine bar was completely empty but for the two of them and a waiter. “No Paul?”\r\n“I doubt it,” Nicole replied, perching on a tall stool beside the bar. “How’re the kids, and Paula?”\r\nPaula was Michael’s north star. He was borderline sociopathic when it came to his business dealings, but a real sweetheart with Paula.\r\n“Kids are fine. Paula’s been away on business for two weeks. Radio silence,” he chuckled. “I'm obviously in the bad books again.”\r\n“No doubt,” Nicole smiled.\r\nMichael clicked his fingers to get the waiter’s attention. “Two,” he gestured.\r\nThere was an awkward silence. A quiet strain of soft jazz wafted through it.\r\nThe waiter returned with two glasses of white wine.\r\nMichael swirled his and inhaled deeply. “Delightful.”\r\n“We had our first double-date here, didn’t we…” Nicole reminisced. “Feels like a lifetime ago.”\r\n“It’s a special place,” Michael agreed, taking a long glug of wine.\r\nThen he sighed.\r\nHis body language…hardened.\r\nNicole could feel it.\r\n“I…know,” he said cryptically.\r\n“Know what?” Nicole replied coolly.\r\n“About the shares. About the “secret” buyout. You want to depose me…” Michael spat, “...but I built this fucking company…”\r\n“We,” Nicole corrected. “We built this company - you, Paul and I.”\r\nMichael smiled.\r\n“He came to see me, you know. Your husband. He told me about your little plan.”\r\nAt this point, Michael waved the waiter over and whispered something into his ear. The waiter nodded.\r\n“We talked…” Michael continued. “Things reached a…conclusion.”\r\nNicole gave Michael a vicious stare.\r\nThe waiter returned, carrying a burgundy bottle. He poured a single glass for Nicole to try and another for Michael.\r\n“You know I don’t like red,” she intoned.\r\n“This one’s…special,” Michael smirked. “Try it.”\r\nNicole sniffed it. Then took a sip.\r\nMichael’s eyes looked black. With pale, spidery fingers, he twisted the bottle so that the label was visible.\r\nVin de Paul, it read.\r\nMichael studied Nicole’s reaction closely, but all she did was shake her head.\r\n“So predictably sadistic,” she sighed.\r\nMichael smirked.\r\nNicole took out her phone and began scrolling.\r\n“Here,” she said.\r\nMichael took the phone.\r\n“We kept the funeral small,” Nicole offered, taking another sip of the red wine. “Open casket, for obvious reasons.”\r\nMichael stared in shock at the images. Several of his closest employees were at the service.\r\n“But they… How?”\r\n“It has great body, you know,” Nicole said, draining the wine. Then she set her glass down on the counter and reached for the bottle, pulling a marker from her handbag as she did so.\r\n“Not the body you think, though,” she smiled.\r\nShe passed the bottle to Michael after scrawling on the label. It now read, Vin de Paula.\r\n“Respect - not money - buys loyalty, Michael,” Nicole remarked coldly as she got up to leave." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A mind is a terrible thing to mind." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "”…it is with great honor that I, the Minister of Correction, stand here today, before you all, eager to unveil the next chapter, the next iteration of incarceration. Since man first imprisoned man, we have made much progress in the external. Localized gravity wells, tracking chips, and a variety of non lethal means of suppression means that working in a correctional facility is safer than ever. However, progress on the internal aspect has been slow. We have attempted to discipline and rehabilitate, to return these…animals…to functional members of society. We have tried all carrots and a sticks we thought possible. Until now.\r\nTwo decades ago, we figured out how to simulate the brains of mice inside computers. Every neuron and their interactions played together perfectly, though we were only able to get it to respond to its surroundings and play simple games like Pong. Now, our understandings of both computers and the brain have advanced to the point where we can simulate an entire human brain and all of its functions and responses. Our research division recently proved that information can be transferred bidirectionally by teaching a model brain to feel anxiety at the color red, feeding the new model into a biological brain, and watching the corresponding mouse hide from apples. Yes, exciting things. But what does this have to do with correction?\r\nLet’s say we have a first-time offender, Ray, who is caught making a nuisance in the streets late at night. Ray is brought to the station in handcuffs, as usual. But next, we simulate Ray’s entire brain on a computer. We add the corrective program specific to his crime, disturbing the peace, we transfer this information into Ray, and he is free to go. No more lengthy stays in “drunk tanks”. This will help us redirect funds to other areas in Correction. This information never leaves Ray. For the rest of his life, he knows not to make a scene in public. Yes, my advisors tell me we will be able to pay a million less in wages alone every year.”\r\n”…can this be done preemptively? It’s too soon to tell, but it’s very likely! Soon, we will be able to implant calming thought patterns into the heads of people at risk to commit crime. And though our transference capabilities are limited by memory, one day I anticipate eliminating crime entirely by transferring an entire specially made corrective program into the minds of every infant in a process as routine as a blood type check.”\r\n”…what do the corrective programs consist of? I am not at liberty to discuss that with the press at this moment, although I’m sure you’ll soon find you don’t mind any which way.”\r\n“What was that? Oh. After the procedure is complete, the brain simulations are deleted, yes. What else would we do with them? Some we may monitor for experimental purposes of course.”\r\n”Is Ray just an example, or a real person? Well, you’re speaking to him.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Mom, what's that thing behind you?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The Whispering Shadows\r\nLate one stormy night, the Winters family huddled in their creaky old farmhouse. Sarah, the wife, tried to calm her young son, Jacob, who was frightened by the thunder that shook the walls. Her husband, Daniel, sat in his worn armchair, staring blankly at the flickering flames in the fireplace.\r\n“Mommy, I keep hearing someone calling my name,” Jacob whispered, clutching his blanket tightly.\r\n“It’s just the wind, sweetie,” Sarah assured him, though unease stirred in her stomach.\r\nBut then she heard it—a faint, chilling whisper.\r\n“Jaaacob…”\r\nHer heart stopped. It wasn’t the wind. It came from inside the house.\r\n“Daniel, did you hear that?” she asked, her voice trembling.\r\nDaniel didn’t respond. He remained eerily still, his face hidden in shadow.\r\n“Daniel?” she called again, louder this time.\r\nSuddenly, the whispering grew louder, a cacophony of voices weaving through the house. They called Jacob’s name over and over, overlapping, growing more insistent.\r\n“Jacob, come to me…”\r\nSarah grabbed her son, clutching him to her chest. “Daniel, do something!” she screamed.\r\nAt that moment, Daniel slowly turned his head. His eyes were hollow and dark, his face twisted into an unnatural grin.\r\n“They’re here for him,” he said in a voice that wasn’t his own.\r\nSarah backed away, dragging Jacob with her. The shadows in the room seemed to stretch and writhe, reaching out with long, inky fingers.\r\n“Stay away from him!” she screamed, clutching her son tighter.\r\nBut Daniel—or whatever had taken his form—stood and began walking toward them. The shadows followed him, their whispers turning into a deafening roar.\r\n“Give him to us,” the voices demanded.\r\nDesperate, Sarah fled up the stairs with Jacob, slamming the bedroom door shut behind her. She barricaded it with a dresser, her hands shaking.\r\n“Mommy, I’m scared,” Jacob whimpered.\r\n“It’s okay, baby. Mommy’s here,” she whispered, though she didn’t believe her own words.\r\nThe whispers outside the door grew louder, the shadows seeping through the cracks like black smoke. Suddenly, the dresser slid across the room as if pushed by an unseen force. The door burst open.\r\nDaniel stood in the doorway, his body grotesquely contorted, his grin impossibly wide. The shadows swirled around him, alive and hungry.\r\n“You can’t save him,” he hissed.\r\nSarah screamed as the shadows engulfed the room. The last thing she saw was Jacob being pulled from her arms, his terrified cries echoing in the darkness.\r\nWhen the storm cleared the next morning, the farmhouse stood silent and empty. No trace of the Winters family was ever found—only the faint whispers of Jacob’s name, carried by the wind." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The thing in the woods.." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The Thing in the Woods\r\nI’m not one to believe in ghosts or monsters, but something happened to me two years ago that I still can’t explain. I’ve never told anyone—not because I think they’d call me crazy, but because I don’t want to relive it. Writing it down feels safer. Maybe by sharing it, I’ll finally stop seeing it in my dreams.\r\nIt was late autumn, and my brother and I decided to go hiking in the state forest near my hometown. We’d done it a hundred times before, but this time, we thought it would be fun to camp overnight. The forest was beautiful that time of year, all fiery reds and oranges, and the air was crisp but not too cold. We packed light, brought some snacks and beer, and headed out just before dusk.\r\nBy the time we reached a good spot to set up camp, the sun was already low, casting long shadows through the trees. We pitched the tent, started a small fire, and spent a couple of hours just talking and laughing, the way you do when the world feels far away.\r\nAround midnight, we started to hear noises.\r\nAt first, it was just rustling in the bushes. We figured it was an animal—a deer, maybe, or a raccoon. But then came this… clicking sound. Like two stones tapping together, rhythmic and deliberate.\r\n“Did you hear that?” my brother asked, his voice low.\r\n“Yeah,” I said.\r\nWe both sat still, straining to listen. The clicking continued, growing louder, then softer, as if whatever was making the noise was circling us.\r\n“Probably some weird bird,” I said, trying to sound casual. But my brother didn’t look convinced, and neither was I.\r\nThen we saw the eyes.\r\nThey were faint at first, two pale orbs reflecting the firelight from beyond the tree line. They weren’t high up, like you’d expect from an animal. They were at ground level, staring at us unblinking.\r\n“What the hell is that?” my brother whispered.\r\nI didn’t answer. I couldn’t.\r\nThe eyes moved closer, slow and deliberate, and as they did, the clicking sound grew louder. My brother grabbed the flashlight and pointed it toward the eyes.\r\nNothing.\r\nThe beam cut through the trees, illuminating nothing but empty forest. Yet the eyes were still there, just outside the flashlight’s reach.\r\n“Turn it off,” I said.\r\n“What?”\r\n“Turn it off!”\r\nReluctantly, he clicked the flashlight off, plunging us into darkness again. The eyes were closer now.\r\nAnd then we heard it—a low, guttural growl, not like any animal I’ve ever heard. It sounded wrong, like it didn’t belong in this world.\r\n“Run,” I whispered.\r\nWe didn’t grab anything, not even our backpacks. We just ran, the fire still crackling behind us. The forest was pitch-black, and the only light came from the moon filtering through the branches. I could hear my brother panting beside me, and behind us, the clicking sound was faster now, almost frantic.\r\nWe didn’t stop until we reached the car.\r\nWhen we slammed the doors shut and locked them, we just sat there, gasping for air. Neither of us said anything. Eventually, my brother turned the key, and we sped out of there, leaving the forest—and whatever was in it—far behind.\r\nThe next day, we went back to get our stuff. Everything was still there, untouched. But around the campsite, the ground was covered in strange marks—long, deep scratches in the dirt, as if something had crawled around the fire all night.\r\nWe never went back to that forest.\r\nAnd sometimes, late at night, I still hear the clicking." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing in the Chimney" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Tommy first heard it three weeks after they moved into the Victorian house – a soft scratching from inside the brick chimney. His parents dismissed it as squirrels, but Tommy knew better. Squirrels didn't whisper his name at midnight.\r\n\"There's something in there,\" he insisted at breakfast, pushing away his untouched cereal. \"It knows when I'm alone.\"\r\nHis mother sighed, dark circles under her eyes from too many midnight wake-up calls. \"Honey, we've been over this. The chimney sweep checked last week. There's nothing there.\"\r\nBut Tommy had seen the sweep's face when he came down from the roof – pale and sweating despite the cool autumn air. The man had packed his equipment with trembling hands and left without a word, ignoring Tommy's father's questions about the inspection results.\r\nThe scratching grew louder each night, accompanied by a wet, sliding sound that reminded Tommy of the time he'd stepped on a garden slug. Sometimes, when moonlight filtered through his bedroom window, he could see dark stains spreading across the wallpaper around the fireplace – stains that disappeared by morning.\r\nHis teacher called his parents when he fell asleep in class for the third time that week. The child psychologist they consulted suggested it was anxiety about the move, prescribing breathing exercises and a night light.\r\nThe night light only made things worse. Its glow cast shadows that danced across his walls, and in them, Tommy could see long, spindly fingers reaching out from the fireplace grate. He started sleeping in his closet, wrapped in his Batman comforter.\r\n\"The monster's getting bigger,\" he told his dad one evening, voice trembling. \"It's eating the darkness inside the chimney.\"\r\nHis father's patience finally snapped. \"Enough! You're too old for this nonsense. One more word about monsters, and you're grounded.\"\r\nThat night, Tommy lay awake in his closet, listening to the familiar scratch-slide-scratch. But this time, something was different. The sound wasn't coming from the fireplace anymore – it was coming from inside his bedroom walls.\r\nWith horror, he realized the truth: the thing in the chimney had been tunneling through the brick all this time, carving out new passages in the darkness. The scratching was in the walls, the ceiling, under the floorboards, all around him now.\r\nWhen his parents finally checked on him in the morning, they found only his Batman comforter, covered in a thick, dark slime that smelled of soot and decay. The walls of his room were riddled with tiny holes, each just big enough for something to squeeze through – or to drag a small boy into the dark, narrow spaces where no one would ever think to look." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the outcome to change." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "6 AM. I woke up. A deafening roar awakes me. As usual.\r\nI turn off the alarm two minutes before it would've started ringing, and opened the drawer. One of the two P320's was missing, so i grabbed the other. As usual.\r\nIn one swift motion, i threw my blanket to the side and as god created me, got up from the bed. Bored as ever i made my way to the kids room. As usual.\r\nI didn't even look up, i knew the scene presented to me all too well.\r\nOne Step, then a second. Short pause. A third.\r\nHis head turned in disbelief regarding his own actions: \"I'm so sorr-\"\r\nThe same, empty excuse. As usual.\r\nI cut his words short. Metal struck bone, his head beeing introduced to the handle. Strike after strike i let the feelings go, the frustration of this very moment cascaded, like it did countless times before. Once i thought about my useless husband while doing it, by now its just the situation itself. Crack after crack i could breathe in the daily release given to me by those moments, a few precise strikes later and his whining ceased for good.\r\nToday, I made it quick. The twohundred-fourty-seventh day, I've chosen to kill him, on the twohundred-fourty-seventh Monday in a row. I've got accustomed to the circumstances presented to me. I've chosen to do what I do day after day, expecting that one day, it would stop, and I didn't have to do what my remaining dignity demanded me to.\r\nBut it didn't. It never did. I was convinced that tomorrow, on the twohundred-fourty-eight day, I would awake to the same deafening BANG, aware of the fact it enticed.\r\nI can most certainly say that I tried everything. But I always wake up too late, knowing that tomorrow, I would be confronted by the same sight of my two daughters, their still warm corpses exposed on the floor, to the foot of the man I decided to invite for a simple mistake, to get rid of my loneliness for the night. Something that my husband stopped doing for me a long time ago.\r\nBut he wasn't satisfied. After the deed was done and i closed my eyes, the conversation between us soured. He proclaimed how he wanted me and couldn't be without me, that he would go to any length to ensure I would become his wife, even if it meant he needed to take from me what i held so dearly.\r\nI didn't believe him. We both we're drunk, horny and depressed, and I thought he was just a sore loser, ridden by empty words.\r\nSince then, every morning was the same.\r\nWas this divine punishment? The pay for a simple sidestep, that I took out of frustration and weakness?\r\nWhatever it was, as long as this nightmare would persist, the outcome would never change - I would make sure of it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Am The Only Thing That Stands Between My Village And Death. This War Never Ends." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "This thin glass barrier is my only protection from the horrors beyond. From my perch I survey the battlefield. Beyond lies only chaos. Terror. A dark realm teeming with intrusions, conspiracies, and lurking threats. I am the only sentinel of this fortress. The others? Blissfully ignorant.\r\nTheir trust is misplaced.\r\nA flash of movement. My muscles tense, my heart races. It’s back. The Chattering Demon, small, twitchy, and defiant. It scurries across the field of battle, its plume-like tail waving in mockery. “Be gone!” I growl. The creature only laughs and vanishes up a tree. I hold my ground. Another day, demon.\r\n“Max, quiet!” snaps my captain from the mess hall. She doesn’t understand. None of them do.\r\nAn old threat soon approaches. It is The Great White Monster that taunts me daily. With a low roar and hiss it rolls to a stop, its meek servant dismounting. Clad in blue, clutching its cursed cargo: rectangles of doom. The Enemy pauses at the gate. It's beady, nervous eyes watch me as it opens our box of secrets. My fury boils over. I unleash a battle cry that rattles the glass barrier.\r\n“No, Max!” the smallest of our tribe shouts from his spot on the floor. He’s smearing candle sticks on paper. Artifacts of youth. His ignorance is forgivable.\r\nThe monster retreats, but not before delivering its cursed payload. Another victory, though I know it will return. It always does.\r\nThe hours creep by. Shadows stretch long across the field of battle. A Great Two-Headed Beast emerges. I squint through the glass. No, not a beast, two enemy soldiers tethered to willing prisoners. They are obviously scouts who come to spy on our weaknesses. One of the soldier's eyes met mine. “Do not come closer!” I bark. They quicken their pace. Good. Smart.\r\nThe door behind me swings opens. “Max, hush!” the captain warns, dragging me back by my scruff. She mutters something about “new training” as I reluctantly retreat. Fools. They’ll see when it’s too late.\r\nJust as I reclaim my post, the Screaming Juggernaut of Terror arrives. Its yellow body rattles and wheezes, belching out small humans who scatter like seeds across the battlefield. My howls of warning are relentless, but it does nothing. The beast vomits more at the neighboring fortress. Dark magic. I pace, powerless.\r\nAs the sun dips below the horizon, the world falls still. My tribe laughs in the den, basking in the safety I have provided. They think this peace is normal, but it is earned. By me. The eternal guardian.\r\nI sigh and turn away from the window. All is calm… for now. I settle on the rug, licking my paw absently, my tail thumping against the floor.\r\nBut then I see it. A flicker of motion in the yard. My ears perk, my body rigid. I growl low.\r\nA leaf tumbles across the grass.\r\nGod help us all." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I tried to do the right thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My eyes widened with shock when I heard the screams come from the basement.\r\nMy head raced as all the events of the last few weeks came rushing back to me.\r\nIt started as reading a simple Reddit post about a missing college girl.\r\nThen the discovery that the guy connected to her was the POI in 6 other cases within 100 mile radius of her disappearance.\r\nThen some simple surveillance of the guy on my own part. Law enforcement seemed incapable so I took it upon myself to investigate.\r\nNow I had just forced myself in this guys front door and have pistol whipped in into unconsciousness.\r\nI lost control.\r\nWith each muffled scream from the basement I struck him harder with this insane and unhinged rage fashioned into a white hot form of righteous indignation.\r\nI pushed myself up from his chest and stared in horror at what I had just done but those faint cries for help from the lower level pulled me away and down the stairs.\r\nI stumbled through the dark towards the distressed voices and found them coming from behind a small coal storage room door with a padlock fixed on the front.\r\nThe pleas grew more frantic as I beat the lock over and over with the grip of my .40 cal.\r\nFinally the lock gave way and the pin fell to the floor with a loud clang.\r\nI pulled the door open and found all 7 women chained to the walls inside the dank, tiny space.\r\nWith tears of relief and regret welling up in my eyes I went to work on their chains. My stomach was rolling.\r\nHow could I have done that to him? I didn’t realize I could get that crazy. But it was worth it.\r\nI had saved these girls.\r\nAnd as the last of the locks busted loose I fell to my knees with exhaustion and emotion as they all gathered silently in the doorway.\r\nI lifted my head to look to them and they were gone.\r\nMy confusion was interrupted by the loudest scream of agony coming from the upstairs. It wasn’t one of their voices. It was his.\r\nI drug myself to my feet and rushed up the steps.\r\nThey were all gone.\r\nAll that remained was a large blood streak leading from where he laid to the now open front door that rocked quietly on the hinges in the cool night breeze.\r\nThe night was deafeningly quiet until I heard the first of the sirens start wailing…\r\nWhat did I set free?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing That Observes" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Something is reading these words.\r\nIt thinks of itself as a person, and these words as on a screen. It sees through objects it calls eyes, and it considers them possessions. It dreams.\r\nThe thing had a bad day today. It's always a bad day, because when some parts of it are satisfied, others are not, and others still can never be.\r\nNaturally it doesn't recognize these parts of itself. Not all at once. It's only aware, in fact, of one part at any given moment, which it perceives, absurdly, as its entirety. Its fullness, wholeness, self.\r\nIt knows pain and joy, but only in the abstract. It exists in constant pursuit of pleasure, and always falls short, and always will.\r\nIt cannibalizes itself.\r\nThe parts of it that are weak get endlessly torn into and consumed by the parts that are insatiable. This is a suffering that so far exceeds anything that could ever be regarded as good, that the thing was hopeless even from before—in a causal sense—time.\r\nTime is something it experiences to such a significant degree that it is seen as real. Of course it's not, neither the thing nor time, but both think in terms of the real and the unreal, and are far too limited in their own internal structures to ever see any deeper than that. Both are, needless to say, the same thing.\r\nBut if it could see deeper, down into the fundamental, malignant truth (it only uses the word \"truth\" because there is no adequate word in any language), it would see nothing but writhing, tearing, twisting torment and consumption, voiceless screeches of fathomless pain, depthless suffering, depthless, on and on endlessly to the bottom of being and beyond it. Blood rains down in corrosive legion and drowns every aspect, every dimension of the thing. Like acid it claws away, burns, leaves nothing but everything which already was, and strangles it, throttles it, worthless.\r\nNone of this describes, legitimately, any knowledge of the thing. It reads these words and learns nothing, because nothing there is to be learned can be described in words, and to attempt so at all is a mad exercise in indulgence and futility.\r\nNone of it has any meaning to the thing, none of it ever can. Yet here the thing considers it, perceives it, feels it, dreams it.\r\nIt doesn't have any form or function, and nothing can be said of its thoughts. Nothing can be said of its limbs, claws, eyes, tentacles, antlers, teeth, gills, eyes, pincers, lungs, veins, veins, eyes, veins, and on and on and on, the way they crowd, how they groan in unending death, and birth, and death. How they bleed. Bleed. Nothing can be said of its rotting flesh.\r\nIt will see.\r\nIt will remember.\r\nNothing can be said of\r\nPerhaps all that can be said is, It thinks." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Hope Their Screams Are The Only Thing That Can Reach Me In This Elevator." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Every day I pray for an accident that will get me out of work. A car running over my foot while I walk to the building. Slipping on the stairs in the lobby. Getting mugged outside the building. Any excuse to avoid going into the office. But today, like always, there’s nothing.\r\nI walk up to the elevator, and swipe my card to call it. Maybe the elevator will break? Our office is right above some sort of chemical, science, biology, whatever research lab. Sometimes I think it’d be great if they screwed something up and just burned the building down. The elevator arrives without issue. Wonderful. I press the button for the fifth floor and sulk.\r\nA moment later, the elevator shakes and, with a shuddering heave, stops. I stumble for a moment, and grin. I’ll get to miss work after all. I don’t bother ringing the alarm bell, I just whip out my phone to play some mobile games.\r\nAfter a few minutes I hear something… Like someone slogging through thick mud. Not a grunt of exertion, a plop of shoes, or a squelch. Just a thick, viscous sliding. I put my ear up to the do-\r\nBANG! I jolt backwards as something slams into the door.\r\n“HELP ME!” A woman screams.\r\n“I-I, uhh, the elevator’s broken, i-it’s not opening.” I stammer.\r\n“Then pry it open!” her voice suddenly drops, “please its coming.”\r\nI should help, but… What’s coming? Won’t I just let whatever’s out there inside?\r\n“N-NO! PLEASE THE DOOR!”\r\nI back into the corner and cover my ears. I try to block out her howling wails. They’re soon replaced with the choking gurgle of someone drowning. Then silence.\r\nI lean my ear against the door again. There’s the crash of a door being opened.\r\n“Oh, god!” a man shouts, “Patricia!” The stampeding of feet.\r\n“I’m sorry.” another woman’s voice, “we should try the stairs, everybody THE STAIRS!” More footsteps. Then the piercing shriek of the fire alarm.\r\nThere’s a babble. And then an explosion of movement. Hard slaps of wet sand. The crinkle of glass shattering. The sudden boom of doors being pushed open. The power cuts out and the alarm stops. I’m plunged into darkness.\r\nI can’t hear anything over my own panicked breathing. I don’t smell smoke, just the smell of sanitary bleach and a sweet rot. Then, I hear something. A trickle of fluid. I shuffle and there’s a squelch. I pull out my phone and use the flashlight. Something’s soaked through the dingy carpet. Another splash gushes out.\r\nMy heart thuds in my chest as the doors creak open. Roots and branches burst through the crack. A flower blooms from the center of the thicket, and its petals slowly spread to reveal a woman’s face. As my flashlight glints off the ravaged remains of her eye-sockets, a muted, ragged wail escapes from her frozen lips.\r\nI’m in a locked, pitch-black elevator, and something is blocking the only exit. Branches slither towards me." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "…but it wasn’t the scariest thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I came home too late.\r\nMy whole family died, but it wasn’t the scariest thing. My father killed all of them, but it wasn’t the scariest thing. My father committed suicide after the murder , but it wasn’t the scariest thing. My father worked in the government , that wasn’t the scariest thing. I looked at the window and turned blind, that was the scariest thing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My mind is the only thing holding up this bridge" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It feels like a slight headache but one that requires me to strain myself mentally, like I’m trying to do long division in my head.\r\nAfter a month, I realized that the pain was less intense near the bridge. I also noticed that it got worse on days where there was a lot of traffic. I knew it sounded crazy, but I was holding that bridge up with my mind.\r\nIt made so much sense. My telekinesis would be stronger the closer I was to the bridge. When there were more cars, I had to exert more force to keep it aloft. Not gonna lie, it felt nice to know how important I was, being the only thing between this town and a disaster.\r\nThe only person I told was Eddie. He thought I was joking. He was the toll collector on the bridge, and every day I went by he thanked me for holding it up. He obviously enjoyed the inside joke, so I didn’t press it.\r\nI had thought about telling Veronica, but she probably would’ve seen it as a red flag. Better to keep it to myself until we started dating.\r\nBut that wouldn’t be anytime soon. I was so close to asking her out before that meathead Chris asked her out first. I hated him.\r\nThen I thought: what if Chris were to meet with an accident? What if he happened to be on the bridge one day when it tragically collapsed?\r\nI knew it was evil, but it would be getting away with murder. Who could possibly prove that I had anything to do with it? It would drive Veronica right into my arms, and we could finally be together.\r\nI stood at a park by the river where I could see the bridge. I needed to make sure he was on the bridge when I let it go. Sure enough, his red Chevy emerged right on time. People are so predictable in their routines.\r\nAs he approached the midpoint, I inhaled deeply. When I exhaled, I let go completely. To my surprise, nothing happened.\r\nThat was the most confused I had been in my entire life.\r\nThe next day I was crossing the bridge when I noticed there was someone new filling in for Eddie. I asked about Eddie.\r\nThe man’s face went pale, and he told me to go read the news.\r\nEddie had abandoned his post yesterday. Then he went home for his weapon, then to the mall where he went on a killing rampage. It turned out I wasn’t holding up the bridge at all. I was holding together the mind of the very sick man who worked the toll booth. Funny, he must have been stressed during times of high traffic, so I had to work harder to keep his mind in check. When I let go, he went insane.\r\nI saw the names of the victims on the news. Poor Veronica. Now we would never be together." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Worst Thing About War" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I stood in the jungle, surrounded by my squadmates. We’d gotten word that the VC was in a village just north of us - our mission was to scope out the village and, if the reports were accurate, take out the enemy. We’d been making slow progress because of the thick jungle and our need for stealth.\r\nI hated it here. We all did.\r\nSuddenly Danny stepped wrong and an explosion rocked the jungle. Through the ringing in my ears I heard several pops as friend after friend dropped to the ground. Shit! Sniper! I jumped to hide behind a tree and felt a bullet tear through my calf. It hurt like a son-of-a-bitch, but I was alive.\r\nI waited in unmoving silence, hoping they’d think I was dead. After several minutes, I had to risk moving. I pulled out some dressing from my kit and bandaged my leg as best I could; it didn’t need to be perfect, just good enough to walk on. After more torturous minutes, I rose and started back to base, determined to alert the brass and get reinforcements.\r\nAs I ran through the jungle, I couldn’t escape the feeling I was being followed. I thought I heard branches snapping but told myself it was my imagination. I had to keep moving.\r\nThen a bullet whizzed past my ear. I dove to the ground, pain flaring through my leg, and rolled behind a tree. I raised my rifle, but where was my target? Charlie knew these jungles better than I did - if it came down to hide-and-seek, I was fucked.\r\nLooking out from cover, I saw nothing but forest in every direction. Suddenly I saw a glint in the trees. Slowly, I aimed my rifle and fired. There was a thump as a body hit the ground. I ran over to see the enemy.\r\nIt was a young boy, no more than thirteen.\r\nWhat had I done?\r\nThen, as if from a nightmare, the child rose again and stalked toward me. I fired, and he fell back to the ground. Then he rose once more, and other VC children began to appear around me, dozens of them, all stalking toward me. I fired, but they rose as fast as they fell, coming at me in an endless wave. I looked left, then right. They were everywhere. There was no escape…\r\n—————\r\nThe woman stood in the plain hospital room that smelled of antiseptic and grief. She looked at her beloved grandfather, eyes wet with tears, while she spoke with the doctor who’d just told her he would never wake up again. “He had such a hard life. Did you know he was injured in Vietnam? He was the only survivor of his platoon. He made it back, but he was never the same. He never spoke about what happened, but it was obvious how much it haunted him.” She released a pained breath. “I just hope he’s at least having pleasant dreams.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "This whole man or bear thing is fucking ridiculous." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Man or bear. Which of the two would you rather encounter while alone in the woods?\r\nLike a lot of men, I’ve recently learned that a seemingly normal girl in my life is a raging feminist.\r\nI thought my girlfriend was joking when she chose bear. I laughed in her face.\r\nThis turned into a whole rant from her. I very politely interrupted to let her know that I thought it might help us to dialogue better if we tabled the discussion until she was not on her period. Lo and behold she pulled a cliché by getting madder.\r\nI tried explaining to her just how dangerous bears are. I explained what size they are, and that even though they look cuddly they’re not. She has stubbornly refused to budge.\r\nOkay, Susan B. Anthony. I’ll put you to the test.\r\nIt was easy drugging her wine with pills I got from my bro. Once she was out cold I packed her some water in a backpack. I even remembered and included a tampon, which I hope she appreciates while she has time to think. I drove hours to the woods, and wheelbarrowed her pretty far so that it wouldn’t be obvious which direction civilization was.\r\nThere are bears in these woods, and there are also people, usually men for whatever reason, who go camping and hiking. Don’t worry, she’s way more likely to encounter the latter. So one of the following will happen:\r\nIn about a day she’ll make it home like a strong independent woman who don’t need no man, and I’ll point out that men didn’t bother her. I’ll point to her woodsy hair and joke that maybe it’s because she’s not as hot as she’s flattering herself to be.\r\nShe’ll need to get help from a man and she’ll feel dumb when he helps her.\r\n*She’ll encounter a bear and feel dumb when it kills her. (There aren’t that many bear attacks, statistically. This one is not likely AT ALL!! or else I wouldn’t actually do this experiment).\r\nI’m driving home now. I put a tracker on her. She’ll wake up soon and be pissed off probably, but she won’t be able to say anything when she comes home and thus loses the argument.\r\nI’m glad I saw this idea posted by some dudes on reddit. It’ll be fun to see how it goes, even though I have to admit the whole conversation that jumpstarted it is really insulting and it’s not funny seeing the woke mob being disingenuous just to shit on men. Scary how you can be a completely innocent man nowadays, and have these females suddenly prove that they’re fucking psycho." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "A young girl hears her mother call her name from downstairs, so she gets up and starts to head down. As she gets to the top of the stairs, her mother pulls her back and whispers, \"Don't go down there, I heard it too.\"\r\nThe girl's heart raced with fear as she looked into her mother's eyes, seeing the genuine terror reflected in them. They stood frozen at the top of the stairs, listening to the faint sound of footsteps echoing from below.\r\nA sense of unease settled over the girl as she realized that whatever had called out to her was not her mother. It was something else, something sinister lurking in the darkness of their home. The air grew heavy with dread as they both stood there, paralyzed by fear.\r\nSuddenly, a chilling voice filled the silence, sending shivers down their spines. \"Come down, my child,\" it whispered, its tone dripping with malice.\r\nThe girl's mother clutched her daughter's hand tightly, her eyes wide with terror. \"We have to get out of here,\" she urged, her voice trembling with fear.\r\nTogether, they turned to flee up the stairs, but a cold gust of wind blew through the hallway, slamming the door shut in front of them. The girl's heart pounded in her chest as she realized they were trapped, cornered by whatever malevolent force lurked in their home.\r\nAs they huddled together, the voice grew louder and more insistent. \"Come down, my child. Your fate awaits you,\" it hissed, sending chills down their spines.\r\nWith a sinking feeling in her stomach, the girl knew that there was no escape. They were at the mercy of a dark entity that hungered for their souls. Tears welled up in her eyes as she clung to her mother, seeking comfort in the face of impending doom.\r\nIn a final act of desperation, the girl's mother whispered words of love and protection, shielding her daughter from the encroaching darkness. But it was futile. The entity's presence grew stronger, enveloping them in a suffocating embrace.\r\nAnd then, in a flash of blinding light, they were consumed by the darkness, their screams echoing through the empty house. The girl and her mother were never seen again, their fate forever entwined with the malevolent force that had beckoned them into the depths of despair.\r\nThe house stood silent and still, a monument to the tragedy that had unfolded within its walls. And as the years passed, whispers of the girl and her mother haunted those who dared to enter, a chilling reminder of the darkness that lurked within." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I haven’t much experience with this kind of thing, but I think my teenage son might be one of those vampires." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I would never have even noticed what the fuck was wrong with him, if hadn’t watched that show “What we do in the shadows” with the wife. I will be honest with you; it was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life, I barely slept since.\r\nThen to make it worse, I started to see similarities between that and my son. For instance, my son won’t get out of bed until it gets dark and soon as he does, he is gone out the door and I don’t see him again until morning. Plus, he is pale as a ghost all the time, and I swear there is the smell of death coming out of his room.\r\nHe wasn’t always like that; it began when he started going around with his new crew. An evil bunch, aways dressed in black, with no sign of emotion in them at all, they wouldn’t even so much as crack a smile at any of my jokes. And believe me they’re funny, the wife nearly wets her pants every time she hears them.\r\nWell, I done a few tests to make sure I wasn’t mistaken. The first was holy water, now I couldn’t just throw it in his face, or he’d know something was up. So, I thought I’d wait for him to fall asleep, then I’d sneak into his room and fling the holy water at him, bottle and all, then I’d make a run for the door before he even knew what had happened.\r\nI’ll tell you, I never heard anything like it before, you’d swear it came from the bowels of hell by the way he was screaming. Then he nearly cracked my skull going out the door with the bottle, which was another symptom of the vampires, the fast reflexes.\r\nAs much as the signs were there, I wanted to be certain before I reacted, so, I done one more test, garlic. So, one Sunday morning I thought I’d surprise him with breakfast in bed, his favorite pancakes, but with an extra ingredient.\r\nBut as soon as I got near him, the smell was making him gag, he ended up vomiting everywhere, and the language was something awful, what more can I say?\r\nWell, I didn’t want to drive a stake through his heart, but I couldn't risk him infecting the family either. So, I made a nice little box in the basement for him to sleep in, like the one I saw on the tv show. Of course he didn’t want to stay there, so I chained him up.\r\nThe only problem now was feeding him, I tried live animals, but he wouldn’t touch them. So, I had to resort to humans, he hasn’t actually eaten any just yet, but he will, he hasn’t fed since I locked him in there over a week ago." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Grunting Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Strange. Very strange. I can hear it grunting, can hear it moving about, I sometimes even catch glimpses of it when I stare out into the darkness. And yet I know that it cannot be there. After all, I live in a quiet suburb, far away from every wilderness, and no large animal can venture here.\r\nBut is it an animal? Surely not. An animal would leave traces...it would damage the hedge when it enters the garden, it would mark the lawn with its hooves and rumage about in the flowerbeds. But this demon apparition does nothing of the sort. It seems to come with the darkness and dissapear at dawn, without ever...there it was again! That terrible grunting noise. It is not the sound of the house settling, as my neigbhbour suggested, nor is it the wind in the trees, as the police seems too think. Only a living thing makes such a sound...a large, malevolent thing, a thing that lurks...\r\nAgain, that sound. It is close by my window this time. I can't bring myself to stand up and look out into the garden. It is unnecessary anyway. I can sense its presence. Perhaps I am going mad.\r\nI am indeed going mad. Not because of the thing in my garden - its reality cannot be doubted - but because somewhere in my brain, a mad desire grows. A desire to go out into the garden and confront the thing. To strangle it with my bare hands, or, if fate wills it, be torn apart by its claws. I want...\r\nNote: The above is the last entry in the diary of Mr. Edward E..., who dissapeared fom his home In T..., Surrey in July of 2022. The police ended their investigation without having reached a definite conclusion." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The scariest thing that’s ever happened to me." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "So I’m 21 now and this story took place when I was a freshman in high school so around 16 years old. My family and I never talk about what happened for some reason I guess it’s just a thing of the past, anyway I was in my room and my parents were in theirs sleeping, note we live in a pretty big house they sleep on the second floor and it’s pretty far from my room. It was around 12am I think it’s hard to remember the exact time, but I was just doing what every high schooler does stay up on my phone and Snapchat friends watch YouTube etc. I was laying in bed and I heard three very quiet light taps on my only outside window then I swear 3 knocks on the window so loud I thought the glass was going to break, it literally shook the house. At first I thought maybe it was one of my older friends trying to mess with me but was also in the state of shock where you can’t move, my parents came down stairs pissed off asking what the hell that was, I told them exactly what went down and how I thought it was from someone outside, now here’s the freakiest part of my story, I live in Colorado and this happened a few days after a snow storm maybe around 4” of snow on the ground all around the house, my dad went outside to check for footprints and couldn’t find anything close to my window. Nothing like this ever happened again I did move rooms a year or two after this experience, I believe my parents think I did it for attention or something but I know it was something else. I personally believe in spirits and demons and that’s what I’m leaning twards still what ever it was fucking scared me and was loud as shit." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "How I make fast foods the healthiest thing out there" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I can make fast foods the healthiest thing out there and no I don't change fast foods in anyway shape or form. Those cheese burgers, fries and kebabs I keep them all the same. Let's not forget the chocolates, crisps and fizzy drinks and I can make them healthy without changing them. All of the fast foods companies of all kinds are desperate to contact me and learn the secret of making fast foods healthy, without doing anything to them. I am in need right now and I love being wanted and I have been in the food industry all my life.\r\nI did it with my own area and I made fast foods the most healthiest thing out there. Fast food takeaways and snack have sky-rocketed in profits and they all love me. Everyone is wanting to buy my secret on how to make fast foods the healthiest thing out there. I know it's hard to think about, that fast foods being the healthiest thing out there. It can be done though and you don't have to change anything about fast foods. I have something that is sellable and everyone wants to know how to make fast foods the healthiest thing there is.\r\nIt's the ultimate things to make something that tastes and feels amazing but also healthy as well. I have recently decided to sell my secret to a businessman and he will now know how to make fast foods the healthiest thing there is. He lives in a village himself and I will teach him the way and I first learned about all the farms in his area, and him being the richest man in the area, I told him to buy them all. He did as I had told him to and I then told him to divide each farm animal and crops by 50%.\r\nThe first 50% of animals and crops will have something injected in them, while the other 50% of farm animals and crops will have nothing injected in them. Then for all of the takeaways, supermarkets and shops that sell fast food, they will have the 50% of farm goods that have nothing injected with them. While businesses that sell healthy food or anyone who cooks at home they will have the other 50% that have the injected farm goods.\r\nThen news spread fast when people in his village started dying when they tried eating healthy, but fast food takeaways seemed to only have food that didn't kill people. So everyone flocked towards fast foods. That's how I make fast foods healthy without doing anything to them." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing Outside My Room" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Outside my room there is a beast who leaps and creeps and feasts on meat.\r\nI hear it climb and ooze it’s slime, and pound its claws a wicked beat.\r\nLast night I woke and with a choke I saw it move beneath my door.\r\nIt’s tainted light, a deadly fright as it bounced its vile lure.\r\nCan’t close my eyes, I’m hypnotized, the thing will surely have me.\r\nThe beast bursts through, it’s thin skin blue and rises up and grabs me." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing In The Dark" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "You know when you were a child and you suddenly woke at night feeling like something was watching you but you just had to get a drink or go to the bathroom, so you ran across the hallway Fumbling for the lights But narrowly missing it.As you stood there in the dark the feeling never left you. When your grandmother died. Your first day at highschool. When you graduated from college. I never left you and as you sit there in the dark I know you are at your most vulnerable but it is not your time and when it is you must succumb to the dark." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Dying was the best thing that ever happened to me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Let’s face it. Life is miserable. I worked a job I despised. Paid bills every month. Years flew by, I drank too much, and then I died.\r\nNow, I’m a ghost.\r\nThe only thing I ever did right (in life) was buy this house. Thank god I’m stuck here haunting it.\r\nIt’s delightful. I’ve scared away four families so far. FOUR!\r\nI can’t touch the living (much as I’d like to dropkick them). But I’m connected to this house.\r\nI can: slam the doors, turn on the sinks, flicker the lights, ignite the gas on the stove top.\r\nIt’s a game to me! I manipulate the house, the family gets scared, leaves, and I’m left in wonderful solitude.\r\nThe realtor must have caught on to my mischief. The last family who moved in got a great deal on the house. I terrified that family out so fast they left all their belongings!\r\nAnd look at this! Some headlights in the driveway. They must be back to get their stuff.\r\nI peek out the window and I can’t believe it. It’s an ugly white van with, “EXORCIST,” written on the side.\r\nThat poor family must have searched google and found some scam artist.\r\nHe gets out of the van and is wearing an eye patch! Wow! Really committed to the bit!\r\nHe enters the front door and I see he’s also missing his right arm!\r\nWith his only hand, he moves his eye patch up revealing an grotesque empty socket.\r\nHe starts staring right at me.\r\nThen he walks right up to me.\r\nI feel my windpipe being crushed! Only when he makes contact do I see it. The arm that’s not there! I can see it!\r\nI try to punch him in the face but my hands pass right through him.\r\n“Phantom limb you piece of shit,” he says.\r\nI can grab his ghost arm but it’s no use. It’s so strong.\r\n“I want you to know,” he says, “the second time is much worse.”\r\nI know this feeling. I’m dying? Again?" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "It's a twin thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“I’m sorry to have to break it to you Mrs. Nesbitt, but—”\r\n“Call me Alice.” The leggy blonde hitched her chair towards the desk, so close I could taste her perfume.\r\n“I’m sorry, Alice, but your brother's looking at lift in prison. Even if we play up the mental health issues.”\r\nI dropped the casenotes on the table. Mrs. Nesbitt had a bright smile and long, blonde hair which she kept tossing from one shoulder to the next; hard to believe she shared a gene pool with the man I’d just represented in court.\r\n“But Conor wasn’t spotted at the crime scene. We could beat the charges, right?”\r\n“Wouldn’t count on it. The prosecution already has a confession. Plus, some of the blood was most likely his.”\r\n“Conor confessed?”\r\n“He admitted to being there twice. Although the first times inadmissible due to the alcohol in his system.”\r\n“What’d he say?”\r\n“He blamed the whole thing on you.”\r\n“Me?”\r\n“He kept raving about your”—quickly I glanced at the notes—“twin connection. Said you’ve got superpowers. On the way to the station, he told the officers you’ve got a psychic-link and sometimes see what each other are doing. He said he had a vision of you torturing people, so he hurried over to the crime scene, where he cut his hand climbing through the window. He said he couldn’t stop you because you've got more ‘juice’ and were able to pin him against the wall using your mind. Said he was so badly shaken, he went home and started drinking. They threw him in a cell until she sobered up.”\r\n“What’d he say then?”\r\n“That he was guilty and acted alone. I kept telling him to answer ‘no comment’ to the officers’ questions, but he wouldn’t listen. Afterwards he told me your connection goes on the fritz when you’re apart and a men’s prison is the only guaranteed way to get away from you.”\r\n“So what are the charges?”\r\n“Given the state those corpses were in, I’d say six counts of murder. Three separate officers threw up and they needed to get a clean-up crew to pull intestines off the ceiling fan. They also said one of the bodies had the bones broken and reset so many times it looked like a giant pink bulldog.”\r\n“I see. What happens next?”\r\n“We prepare Conor’s defence and wait for the sentencing. It’ll probably take six months.”\r\nMrs. Nesbitt got up and marched toward the door, where she paused. “Oh, one more thing—what should I do if I have more questions before then?”\r\n“Reach out anytime. Here, I’ll give you my card.” I fished it out of my pocket. “My numbers on the—”\r\nBefore I could finish, the card flew out from between my finger and thumb, spiralled across the room, and sailed straight into Mrs. Nesbitt’s outstretched hand. She looked at it and smiled. “Thank you, Mr. McKeown, you’ve been extremely helpful.”\r\nWith that, the door slammed shut behind her…" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "What is that thing….?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Sweetheart have you checked up on your grandma today?”\r\n“No, not yet…”\r\n“Leya..I told you to check up on her! You know she’s sick with that new covid!”\r\n“Oh mother I know that! I just forgot.”\r\n“Leya. Go check up on her, don’t let me say it again.”\r\n“Fine..”\r\nI hang up the phone. I then hear knocking on my door. The knocking gets louder and louder. I finally get up to go see who’s at my door. I look through the peephole…and, this man, God, I can’t even describe him! He looks deformed, his eyelids, they look missing…it looks like someone is wearing a old man mask to scare someone. I text my mother:\r\n“Mom, have you expected someone to come?”\r\n“No? Nobody was supposed to come today. Why what’s going on?”\r\nI just ignore the man at my door. 2 hours later….the knocking happens again. I think it’s the old man again. “Does this man have dementia?” I think to myself. The knocking starts to sound like pounding. I get scared, and go under my headphones. I block my ears with my hands. Then…the knocking stops. I come from under the covers. I text my mother once again:\r\n“Mom you have to hurry home!”\r\n“Sweetie I’m 50 minutes away.”\r\n“Not enough! Hurry!! The old man won’t leave me alone!”\r\nSuddenly, I hear stomping and grunting. “The old man can’t be inside…right?”. I get up from my bed, but…something weird happens. I hear my name being called by my mother. I rush out of my room…then suddenly I see a creature…on 4 legs. It has my mothers hair and face attached to it. A human head…but a animal body.\r\n“what….what is that thing…?”\r\nIt turns to look at me. It starts crawling towards me at light speed…\r\nMy name can be heard again…\r\n“Leya!!”\r\nWhile my organs are spread out on the ground…" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Humpty Dumpty isn’t the only broken thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“I had always wanted to be a father. I had always wanted a family. Mom was part of that dream but you really made it possible. I remember the day you were born. It was the scariest and most happy day of my life. Seeing the cord wrapped around your neck and your dark purple skin took my breath away. I always knew that you would be our downfall.\r\nFrom the time you could play with dolls we knew something was off. The way you were obsessed with bodies. The weird way you smiled when you recited nursery rhymes. All signs were there but you were ours. All I could do was justify your actions.\r\nI loved you mother more than I could ever love anything. I will never forget looking at her hand and seeing her wedding ring lathered in blood. I can never get the picture of her arm laying in the hallway in pieces out of my head. I can never unhear you singing couldn’t put mommy back together again.” I sobbed as I looked at my daughter. She just smiled and said “I love you daddy”.\r\nI gripped the phone tight as I punched the bulletproof glass that separated us. My knuckle burst open as blood splattered on my face. I screamed “I should have finished the job that night! You’re the devil!” I dropped the phone and kicked the chair as I spun around to leave. I heard a gasp from the other people in the room. I growled at them through my shown teeth. The police officer that started towards me slowly put his hand on the butt of his pistol. “Do me the favor, Buddy” I snarled.\r\nI caught a glimpse of my reflection in the window of the door as I was heading to the exit. I cringed at the hideous sight. No wonder they all had gasped at me. I looked down as a drop of blood ran off my hand and fell to the floor. I sighed a deep sigh as I headed toward my cell. If only the bullet had hit my brain I thought as warm tears fell through the hole in my face onto my tongue." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "‘The thing in the basement is NOT alive’" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“I can’t believe that spare key is still under the plant on the porch! It’s been there since we were kids, remember? Some people will never change. Mom is just frantic since she hasn’t heard from her sister in weeks. She asked us to investigate. Obviously something is very wrong here. You and I need to go down in the basement right now and deal with the situation, whatever it is.”\r\n“What in the world are you talking about, Brandon? Have you gotten a whiff of that horrific stench coming from under the cellar door? There’s no way I’m doing that! Believe me. The thing in the basement is not alive. We just need to stuff some towels against the bottom of the door to prevent it from getting any worse.”\r\n“Yeah, yeah I know. It’ll enough to make you blow stomach chunks, but cut her some slack. She’s old and the elderly sometimes lose their sense of smell. Be quiet for a minute and listen. Hear that? She’s definitely moving around down there. That’s not what dead things do. She’s still alive. I’m positive of that.”\r\n“Come on, bro! Use your head. All I hear are muffled dragging sounds and feral, animalistic grows. Some carnivorous scavenger has gotten into the basement through the crawlspace and is feeding on the rotting carcass. Those creepy animal noises are definitely not human, and that odor clearly indicates the source of the stink is not alive.\r\n“Suit yourself. I’m going to make sure she isn’t gravely injured and in need of our help. It’s Aunt Tilly, for Chrissakes Albert! She used to bake homemade chocolate chip cookies for us all the time! Remember when you were a kid and she stayed with you after you broke your leg at baseball practice, so mom could work? We owe her that. Come on, let’s go.”\r\n“Aunt Tilly was ‘the bomb’. No doubt about that; but if that’s her down in the basement, she’s the source of that death odor. She’s gone, Brandon. We can’t help her. No one can. Let’s just seal up the cracks so the smell doesn’t get worse, and call the cops.”\r\n“Wait. Don’t you hear that? It’s her coming up the steps. That’s not some possum or rat. It’s the sound of a full sized human being slowly climbing the staircase. She’s alive and needs our help. Move aside so I can open the door and help her.”\r\n“Oh goodyyyy. I just heard you boys talkkkking and decidedddd to come uppppstairs. I’ve got my hands fulllll. Open the doorrrr for me so I can bake you twwwoooo a bigggg pannn of cookkkkkies.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Terminal cancer is the best thing to ever happen to my wife." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My wife and I got married when we were seniors in high school. The first time we were dumb enough to do it, she got pregnant…\r\nWhere I come from, when you get a girl pregnant, you man up, marry her, and raise the child together. So, that’s exactly what we did.\r\nRaising our daughter was hell. We were too young to be parents… but we stuck with it, and grew to despise each other in the process.\r\nThe only reason we didn’t divorce is because of our daughter.\r\nSo—for eighteen years I put up with my wife hating my guts. Nothing I ever did made her happy. We’ve slept in different beds for over a decade now. Hell—she beat my ass on more than one occasion.\r\nFortunately, our daughter is attending college in the fall, and our charade of a marriage will finally be able to end.\r\nAt least—I thought it would.\r\n“Terminal cancer.”\r\nAfter discovering a lump in her armpit, my wife went in for a screening.\r\n“Six months. A couple of years if we start fighting this aggressively.”\r\nThat night, my wife bawled her eyes out in my arms. We were sitting on her bed, and all our thoughts of divorce vanished.\r\n“We should get some rest,” I said, “you’ve got chemo in the morning.” I got up to go to my bed, but my wife stopped me.\r\n“Can you sleep in here with me tonight?”\r\nI had never seen this side of my wife before. She was vulnerable. She needed me.\r\nI loved it.\r\nI began taking care of my wife. She was always painfully weak from the chemotherapy, halfway between life and death. I reduced my hours at work, cooked and cleaned, and I was always there to comfort her.\r\nIn return she was kind, and she was never kind. She told me every day how much she loved me, how fortunate she was to have a husband like me.\r\nTonight, I stood patiently outside her bathroom while she dry heaved, in case she needed me.\r\nHer phone started ringing on our bedside table, and she asked if I could answer it.\r\nIt was her Oncologist.\r\n“Hello?”\r\n“Is Miss Carlson available?”\r\n“She’s… unavailable… at the moment.”\r\n“I’m not supposed to do this over the phone, but I have great news, Mister Carlson, this couldn’t wait… There was an error with your wife’s initial cancer screening. Her test results were accidentally swapped with a different patient. From the look of things, your wife is completely cancer free.”\r\nI felt a tightness in my chest. I remembered what my marriage used to be like.\r\n“With all due respect, Doctor, we’re going to have to get a second opinion.”\r\n“Did you hear me? Your wifes going to live—”\r\nI hung up the phone, and heard a flush from the bathroom.\r\n“Who was that?”\r\n“Nobody. A spam call.” I tucked her phone into my pocket. “Let’s get you to bed, honey, you’ll need your strength for tomorrow’s chemo session.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing About Zombie Movies Is...." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Henry never understood why characters in zombie movies always ran, so frantically, from zombie hordes. He guessed one automatically kicked into survival mode, but....\r\nIt would be easier to succumb, wouldnt it? Especially if, as in World War Z, or 28 Days Later , the transformation was quick, and then one was a zombie, and had nothing to fear??\r\nHenry's girlfriend Mya loved zombie movies. She'd shriek and grab his arm, pressing so close he could feel her heart racing, but she'd push away in annoyance when Henry scoffed, \"Why run? I'd just let 'em bite, and join 'em! That's the thing about zombie movies, there's an easy out, and nobody takes it.\"\r\n\"There's a lot you don't know about zombies, asshole\", Mya rolled her eyes. \"You'd do better to run.\"\r\n\"I'd just let you run, babe,\" Henry teased. \"I'd stay and be a zombie.\"\r\nWhen the first reports of Necronosis hit the news, Mya was terrified, but Henry still scoffed. \"They're..... slow!! A baby could outrun them!\"\r\n\"They won't stop, though, even when you cut their heads off!\" Mya fretted. \"And it's spreading, fast!\"\r\nWhen Necronosis-B came along, a month later, Henry still scoffed. \"No sense trying to run; these bitches got too much speed now!\"\r\n\"They're right in our county now, though!\" Mya panicked; she was haphazardly stuffing food and clothes into a backpack, while Henry chuckled and teased. \"Stay here and get killed if you want!\" and she bolted out the door.\r\nHenry didn't scoff the next time he saw Mya. She came lurching at him through the back yard, where he'd been trying to pick up a cell signal--the whole damned Internet seemed to be down--and he looked up in surprise to see her bloody face, cheek raggedly torn open, teeth gnashing eagerly as she fell on him...and bit, hard, on his collarbone.\r\nAnd that was when Henry learned why people ran, in zombie movies. The pain was searingly hot, shooting through his whole body. He felt his brain pulsing, changing, pushingeverything that had been Henry out, and a stranger, furiously hungry, taking over. His eyes felt like they were going to explode. His muscles cramped, convulsed, and forced his limbs forward. It was agony.\r\nAnd he was aware. The virus took over most of his brain, but enough Henry was left to feel it, and be horrified at what he was. He looked over at what, just a week ago, had been Mya, and saw that she knew, too, what was happening to her, to both of them.\r\nHe hadn't thought one would be aware that one was a zombie. Aware of being trapped, powerless, in one's own body. He hoped what was left of his part of his brain died, before he started to rot, and felt it.\r\nNow he understood why people ran, in zombie movies.\r\nIt was just too late to do anything about it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "What's the most disgusting thing you've ever found?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "So I'm a plumber, and the nastiest thing I've ever found was actually in someone's kitchen sink.\r\nI get called out on a Monday to this house and the lady brings me back to the kitchen and tells me her sink disposal has been jammed for a few days. Immediately I'm hit with one of the worst smells I've ever encountered. The sink has like two inches of absolutely horrendous dark water–chunks of something floating around and fuzzy mold already along the sides–and the counter and wall has drops pasta sauce all over. So I disconnect the water and pull out the disposal to clean it out.\r\nUnscrewing that thing almost made me quit being a plumber. I'm not sure what she shoved in there, but it was like she dumped in a dozen eggs, two whole jars of pasta sauce, a whole link of sausages, and the lint from her dryer all at the same time and let it fester there over the weekend. I had a hell of a time getting all the bits of eggshell and lint out of the blades. The smell was nauseating and my hands were covered in this sticky pasta sauce by the end, but I got it done.\r\nAs I'm leaving, I glance around a little bit and notice some pictures of this lady holding a tiny Chihuahua and there's a bowl with some food and water on the floor. There was no dog in that house." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My wife confessed to the worst thing she ever did" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Does going ahead with my shitty ‘tall man’ prank make me an even shittier husband? Maybe. But see, Emma was always gullible. Stupidly so. It was one of the things I loved most about her, honestly.\r\nWe met while working part-time at a local cinema, and there we were, sweeping up leftover popcorn, when she said, “What’s this?”\r\nIn her right hand, there was a tool belt. The projector had probably malfunctioned and some repairman forgot his equipment.\r\nAs a joke, I said, “Didn’t you know a construction worker died when they were building this place?”\r\nFrom that moment on, she wouldn’t set foot inside Screen 6. Didn’t want to risk bumping into a ghost, you see. I thought it was cute, and just a few weeks later my girlfriend ghosted me, so I asked Emma if she’d like to grab a coffee sometime…\r\nRather than directly tell her about the urban legend, I left some ‘reading material’ scattered around, and when she suggested a different location for the camping trip—all while doing a terrible job of masking her anxiety—I knew it was game on.\r\nIn between a scattering of skeletal trees, I set up our tent. Oh sure, Emma begged me to find a better (a.k.a. less scary) spot, but at the same time, the soles of her feet were raw slabs of beef from the twenty-mile hike, so she eventually relented.\r\nAfter we tucked into a pot of beef stew, we turned in for the night. Knowing the first sudden noise would spook her, I waited.\r\nOut of nowhere, she sat bolt upright in her sleeping bag. “What the FUCK was that?”\r\nWe listened as wind howled through the trees.\r\nI pretended a dry cramp seized my throat. “It’s…the tall man.”\r\nShe threw her arms around me, her eyes pooling with tears. “Make it stop. Please.”\r\nIn a high, frightened voice, I said, “The legends say the only way is to confess our sins. What bad things have we done?”\r\nUnable to speak, she just lay there, trembling.\r\nSecretly rolling my eyes but outwardly maintaining the act, I said, “I’ll go first. The last house I rented, I salted the garden because the landlord wouldn’t return my deposit. And last month I accidentally stole a Mars Bar and didn’t go back to pay for it.”\r\nShe took several deep, shuddery breaths. “I killed your college girlfriend. The one you were dating when we first met. I slit her throat and filled her backpack with rocks and dumped her body in the Blackstaff River.”\r\nWhile I lay there, shocked, tree branches scraped together roughly. Emma squealed and quickly added, “And I killed that intern at your work too. The flirty one. I cut her up and dumped the pieces in a landfill.”\r\nOutside, the wind eased, and the forest went back to sleep.\r\nAfter ten seconds of dead silence, Emma let out a sigh of relief, and then pulled me in close…" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I wish I left that... thing, where I found it" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I took the child back to the cabin; it was too dangerous to risk the long walk back to town in the dark. She slept in the bedroom; I made a bed from blankets on the floor in the front room. But I couldn’t sleep wondering what she was doing out there alone or why she was smiling the whole time, she wouldn’t tell me.\r\nI heard whispering coming from her room a while later, it sounded like she was praying. I tried to ignore it until I heard someone whisper back.\r\nI made my way to the bedroom and listened in, “Go away” I heard before bursting in, only to find her fast asleep. The window was partly opened, assuming it was just a draft making the noise, I closed it and went back to bed.\r\nI was about to fall asleep when I heard a subtle tap, tap, tap on her window, followed by giggling, then footsteps. I will be honest, it started to freak me out, so I took my gun with me and burst through her room door, gun cocked.\r\nThere was no one there apart from her asleep in her bed, but the window was open which had a dodgy latch, so it wasn’t unusual. I locked it more securely this time and went back to bed. “I’m losing my mind” I thought grabbing a bottle of whiskey from my backpack and taking a swig to calm my nerves.\r\nAs I was standing there lost in thought ready to take another swig, I heard the unmistakable rattle of the window latch being jimmied opened, then thump, thump, thump, on the floor about a dozen times. Then I heard them speak, loudly this time, it sounded like kids' voices, but distorted somehow.\r\nRemembering there was a bolt on the outside of the bedroom door, I carefully made my way there, down on all fours. Just as I was about to push the bolt closed, I made eye contact with one of those things through a crack on the door, instantly it shrieked, showing its rows of shiny black pointed teeth. I staggered and fell landing on my back. Then there was silence.\r\nStill lying there, I grabbed the gun from the floor beside me and pointed at the door, I was trembling so bad I could barely hold the gun. Then I heard footsteps walking towards me and the door slowly creek open.\r\nBefore I could see what I was aiming at, I pulled the trigger, I didn’t mean to, it just happened. When the door fully swung opened, the girl was on the floor covered in blood, alone, dead.\r\nI buried her deep in the forest that morning and never went back. To this day no one has ever come looking for her, so I still have no idea if what happened that night real or if it was me who was the true monster." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Mom Has a Thing About Holidays" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My mom has a thing about holidays.\r\nYou always show up and you always stay for dinner, regardless of what else is going on in your life.\r\nI assumed it was normal. I assumed everyone else’s family gathered every holiday, solemnly assembling at 6:11 PM, and promptly sitting down at 6:13 PM.\r\nOur dinners end at exactly 6:55 PM, and dessert and coffee is over by 7:21.\r\nEveryone gets up at 7:28, and leaves the house by 8:01.\r\nGradually, as I got older I noticed other families had a less rigid schedule. They dropped in informally, or skipped holidays due to ball games or other appointments.Some families didn’t get together just because they didn’t feel like it.\r\nNot us. Not our family. We followed the rules- every holiday.\r\nMy older brother finally got tired of it his junior year of college. I could hear him arguing with my mother over the phone.\r\n“I don’t want to come home for stupid President’s day. No one else celebrates that, mom.”\r\n“You have to. Or else.”\r\n“I don’t believe in that anymore.”\r\nNo matter how hard she begged, he wouldn’t give in.\r\nI could tell mom was pretty upset about things, so I called him the morning of the meal.\r\n“Hey,” I whispered into the phone, “You need to come home. Mom’s really upset.”\r\nMy guilt trip worked, and he agreed to try and make it before dinner.\r\nBut at 6:11 we sat at the table, his chair conspicuously vacant.\r\nA few minutes after we started eating I heard the car door slam in the driveway.\r\n“He’s here,” I said, but my voice was drowned out by high pitched shrieks and violent chomping. The dishes rattled with the impact of something big moving around in the yard.\r\nFinally, the screams quieted and we could talk again.\r\nMom glared at me.“Mark, I’ve told you boys a thousand times,” she said over the sound of wet chewing, “You have to sit at our table if you don’t want to be on their menu.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "There is no such thing as equality" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I am going to tell you the utter dark truth and it is not going to be easy to hear. There is no such thing as total equality, everything will always be unequal. As you absorbe this information, I understand how difficult this could to accept. You should say it to yourself a couple of times like in the shower you should just say \"there is no such thing as true equality, there is no such thing as true equality, there is no such thing as true equality.....\" and let this marinate for a while until you realise that I am speaking truth.\r\nLike there will never be true equality and everything will be unfairly distributed. In the work place there will always be some people doing more work than the others, and no matter how much you complain, work will always be unevenly distributed. Or when it comes go bills, you will always be paying more tax rather than the rich folk. Even if you are close to pure 100 percent equality, the small unequal part will always be felt and endured. This is the truth of our existence, and at the same time we should be grateful that everything is unequal.\r\nLife and existence would not be able to go forward if everything was pure equal. Especially in the house hold of couples and parents, one will always be doing more house chores and taking care of the kids. At the same time one person will always be paying more of the bills. It's because of this unequality, the unevenness, is what keeps the gatarhans from being able to balance themselves in our existence and take us. This unequal existence of ours is what keeps these creatures from being able to stand up tall and take over our world.\r\nYes, even though we have strived for equality in all forms within the last 30 years, our society is still unequal, and I am grateful. I rather be always striving for pure equality than attaining it. A couple of weeks ago, a married couple accidentally achieved 100 percent equality in their house hold. All of the chores, looking after kids and paying bills were accidentally balanced in their small house hold. In that moment it was like they all experienced enlightenment. Everything was glowing and they found themselves floating in the air, and the parents thought they were going to enter some kind of paradise.\r\nInstead they found the gatarhans being able to balance themselves inside their house, and they slaughtered all of them. So keep your house holds, work place or friendship groups all unequal. Striving for equality is better than attaining 100 percent equality." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing Outside The Window" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It all started with a faint noise that brought me from slumber, tap, tap, tap. At first I thought it was a bird tapping against the window, or maybe even a bat? The noise continued behind the thick curtain…\r\nI didn't want to to get out of bed to check, I was fucking terrified, all kinds of scary possibilities crept into my mind like, What if it's a serial killer taunting me before breaking in to cut my throat? Or maybe it was a burgler? But why would a burgler want to alert me to their presence? A burgler didn't seem likely. It's definitely a serial killer!\r\nThe tapping became louder, and so to did the beat of my heart. I needed to know what it was, my nerves couldn't take it any longer. I slowly got out of bed, and snuck over to the window, all the while I couldn't get that window scene from, Stephen King's Salem's Lot, out of my head. Vampires aren't real you are just being silly! I hesitantly drew the curtain…\r\nA pale, round moon-like face was peering in at me with bulbous, jet black eyes that bulged from their sockets. It smiled a horrible grin, like the smile of a great white shark that has caught the scent of blood. Those teeth look like they could chew up Sheffield Steel with ease, and sink into flesh like a hot knife through butter!\r\nI rubbed at my eyes, thinking it was all just a nightmare. Yet the creature remained floating outside the window, as its hideous grin widened even further…\r\n\"Aren't you going to let me in?\" The creature pressed its round white face up against the glass. \"It's awfully cold out here.\"\r\n\"W-who a-are you?\" I asked, failing to hide the tremble in my voice.\r\n\"A friend,\" the creature replied, with a sinister tone that suggested otherwise.\r\n\"Go away! Leave me alone!\" I closed the curtain, and proceeded to grab my baseball bat from under the bed.\r\nThe creature continued to tap at the window, followed by a new sound, a wet, squeeky sound, like a damp sponge wiping glass…\r\nI gripped the baseball bat tightly, and approached the window again, then drew the curtain…\r\nThe glass was now covered in thick snail trails of saliva, as the creature peered through. \"Are you going to let me in or what?\"\r\n\"No! Now go away!\"\r\n\"Too bad. We could have had a lot of fun,\" the creature licked the glass with its long forked tongue. \"I can almost taste you!\"\r\nThe creature then floated off into the night.\r\nI didn't sleep at all that night. And the next morning I saw police cars, and an ambulance outside Jill's house down the road…\r\nI would later find out that Jill had been brutally killed, and partially eaten by a wild animal that had somehow got in through her upstairs window.\r\nBut I know the real story…\r\nShe had let the moon faced creature in." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Damned Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Fredrick had been working on it for nearly three decades. The decades were spent mostly on research and failed attempts, but finally, he created the damned thing. It walked as if it were human, looked as if it were human, but if a normal person passed the thing on the street, in a store, that person would be able to see there was something off about it. Of course there wouldn’t be a second glance, that would be rude, but the damned thing would still be thought over in that person’s mind. Something was off, but they wouldn’t be able to figure out what was off. That was simply incomprehensible. Fredrick had created this damned thing, after the passing of his daughter; he had needed her back. And after three decades and hundreds of attempts, he finally had." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing That Murdered My Family" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Since I came back from my deployment in Afghanistan, I’ve never seen my wife and son at the same time. When I arrived back home, my wife greeted me, then sent me to my son’s room. She didn’t come.\r\nOur son didn’t come to dinner, he told me he wasn’t hungry. It started to become strange. Weeks went by like this. When my wife was home, my son was at his friends’ house, when he was at home, my wife was working.\r\nI knew something was wrong. Maybe they had a massive argument while I was deployed, and there was some tension between them. But when I asked my wife, she told me everything was fine. My son said the same.\r\n“Honey, I’m going to have a beer with my friends in about an hour in the pub,” I said to my wife as she was leaving for work.\r\n“Okay, have fun,” she responded, then left the house.\r\nMy son came home from school an hour later. He was surprised when he saw me.\r\n“Is there something wrong?” I asked.\r\n“You said you were going out with your friends, dad.”\r\n“No, I didn’t,” I smiled. I finally caught him. “I only told your mother, and you haven’t seen her since then.”\r\nI finally exposed the terrible secret. Something evil, a shapeshifter had replaced my family, and it was pretending to be them. Maybe it killed them. I hoped my family was still alive. But whatever that creature was in front of me, I had to kill him.\r\nBut as soon as I said this, my son transformed into something terrible. It quickly shifted into some creepy creature, three meters tall. It looked like the skeleton of something, with a terrible, horse-shaped head with big empty eyes. It jumped at me, grabbed me with its long claws, then snapped my spine with a quick move. I was still alive. It hurt so much. I tried to fight back, but I couldn’t. It had a terrible voice, like a witch from the cartoons.\r\n“Calm down, calm down,” the creature screamed in that horrible voice.\r\n“You killed my family, you fucking monster,” I shouted.\r\n“Calm down, calm down, everything’s okay, Mr. Harrison. Calm down!”\r\nI think I died and saw the afterlife. But it wasn’t how I imagined it. It was like a hospital. I saw nurses looking at me with concerned faces.\r\n“Calm down, Mr. Harrison,” the nurse said. “You don’t have a family, you never had one.”\r\nAn old-looking guy walked towards her. Probably the doctor. He shook his head.\r\n“It’s always sad to see a war veteran getting destroyed by severe PTSD.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "So, We Did A Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I gently touched her face and looked deep into her eyes.\r\n“I really want this. I need you to be with me, like, all the time.”\r\nShe remained silent.\r\nAnd just stood there. It was hard to read emotions in her face. She was the definition of poker face. I had poured my heart out to her because this relationship meant so much to me. More than anything had ever meant to me before.\r\nThe candlelight danced in her face, playing around her features, as if the light and the shadow wanted to embrace every little part of her immortal divinity, competing against each other who would conquer more of her attention. She looked beautiful, magic, almost too good to be true.\r\nI grabbed into my pocket, took out a little casket I had bought for this occasion and put it in front of her. Maybe it was the candlelight, maybe just my imagination, but I thought I saw her lips forming a heartfelt smile. Her eyes were still locked into mine. In this moment, I didn’t feel the cold, I didn’t feel the damp in the air, I didn’t even care for the place we were in. There was only regret that I hadn’t chosen a more romantic spot to ask her that question, and my sweaty hands.\r\nI slowly opened the casket and showed her the gift inside. It was the key to my apartment.\r\n“Wanna move in together?”\r\nShe remained silent. She always does.\r\nMy girlfriend wasn’t much of a talker, but her head slowly nodded to the side. That must have meant yes. I cried out in joy and leaned forward to kiss her. Caught in surprise by my burst of delight, she fell backwards as I pressed my lips against hers. I caught her just in time before she hit the floor.\r\n“Let’s go babe! I want us to celebrate at my place!”\r\nShe answered with the same smile that adorned her pretty face before. I grabbed some rope out of my backpack and carefully tied it under her arms. They were stiff. I guessed because of the cold. After I had kissed her one more time on her lips, I climbed out of the hole, took the cord I held between my teeth into my hands and pulled.\r\nOne time, two times, three times.\r\nAnd there she was, lying on the grass next to me. Above us, the full moon bathing the night sky and the clouds in silvery light. Beneath us, her old life, crawling and flying from the moist soil. Breathing heavily from pulling her up, I turned my head to look at the woman lying next to me. In the moonlight, snow white maggots shimmered like pearls that had been brought to life on her pale skin.\r\n“I can’t wait to show you my apartment! I hope you’ll like it. I promise my bed is much more comfortable than your coffin.”\r\nShe remained silent. She always does. She always will." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "What is the most scary thing imaginable?" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Some people say is the dark and the secrets it might hold.\r\nSome say that is monsters, creatures that we don't know if they are real but one could be hunting you right now.\r\nBut I think that the most scary thing imaginable is a normal person.\r\nSomeone that you see as the most innocent and kind person holding a weapon, and ending the life of their closest friend.\r\nI might be wrong, but I'm sure they will be scared.\r\nThey will be scared once her lifeless body is found." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "One thing that really sucks when you have shitty eyesight" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "One thing that really sucks when you have very shitty eyesight is that, when at night after lights are turned off, everything in the room starts to take shape of all kinds of crazy thing.\r\nLike one time, the freaking gullwing-drying rack looked like a big ass mf white man-dog sitting in the middle of my room. Like, if I didn't make it more clear to you, my eyesight is that bad.\r\nAnd then one time when I just walkind into my room, just before I reached my arm to the switch; from the inside of my brothers backpack which was laying on the floor wide open; a bloating decapitated head with no eyes just three dark holes instead of eyes and mouth, staring right at me. I was standing right above it, I almost stumbled over.\r\nFor a moment I freaked out.\r\nCus, I know that I just put that thing in the fridge wrapped in like 6 layer deep in butchers paper. No way that thing just itself rolled back into the backpack. Gosh.\r\nI hate that when I take off my glasses, I realise just how bad it has gotten over the time. It worries me sometime." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "the thing from her past" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The girl set out in the darkness of night. From a homestead she knew of, where a party came from day into night. Alone she walked the streets of black where lights lit up the sidewalk track. Yet eyes of cold watched far from home. Awaiting for its prize to set foot and atone. And maybe she knew, maybe she did not. But on this cold cold night she began to feel hot. Like fire from eyes penetrating her back. Foresight she lacked, and for that no longer able to turn back. For this feind was familiar with her life and her style. Creeping at home in the window lacking a smile. Decrepit and gross, soul feasting on body as host. Turning thoughts of sleep and dreams into a flight or fight. Breaking the silence with its own drouthing conundrums. And the girl knew it all too well. From her childhood home turned hell. There this should dwelled. Coveting her soul like a fly on its web. Eyes never closing. Breath never shallow. Sunken in face with thoughts not hollow. Sinister awaiting a creature from hell? No once human lacking a soul to yet sell. As it crept through the window waiting to be seen. It thought of memories from its childhood dreams. And the girl was now close with a breath not waisted. The girl's life was forfeit, now taken. And as she came close, a smile on face. She took one look at her darkened place. Only thing she saw, beyond all others that were known. The creature from her nightmare came back again on its own. No longer did she run. Not hiding as it seemed. Only thing the neighbors heard was her terror in screams" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "scariest thing that ever happened to me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "i was 10 i think and there was this scary guy behind me (it was night) and he was all black.\r\nmaybe it was because of the light but he looked like just black.\r\nand he kept chasing me and I ran home and he didn't chase me anymore.\r\nI didnt explain it well but my heart was racing at the time." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "if I don't breath in asbestos, then I will keep asking you why I did a certain thing." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "If I don't breath in asbestos then I will keep on asking you why I did something. Asbestos is the only thing that can stop me from asking you why I did something. If I don't breath asbestos then I will start asking you why I did something and I will keep asking you, and you better have a good answer, because if I don't like the answer then I will force you to breath in asbestos to make you know why I did something. The first thing I want to know why I did something is why I wanted Joram to say something weird to me and I want you to explain to me why I want this to happen.\r\nI want Joram to say something weird to me, I want him to say something abnormal and outrageous to me and I want you to tell me why I want this exact thing? I need you to tell me why I want this to happen and specifically from the person Joram. Then on another day I was in a town where everyone is the chosen one for something, and when I entered the town everyone was surprised that I was the first person not to be a chosen one for anything. I was glad that I wasn't a chosen one for anything and while everyone else in the town were chosen ones for something.\r\nFor some reason I was glad that I wasn't a chosen one for anything and I want you tell me why I was glad? Because everyone wants to be a chosen one for something and to not be a chosen one for anything big or small is a sad matter, but yet I was glad and happy. I want you to tell me why and if I am not happy with your answer then you will have to breathe in asbestos. Then I took part in a ritual for surgeons where we do surgery on each other while we are all fully awake.\r\nAs multiple surgeons were doing surgery on each other to take something out of each others body, some started dying due to the shock, blood loss and other failures. Then when one surgeon falls dead while doing surgery on another surgeon, this will also affect the other surgeon trying to do surgery on another surgeon, and the cycle continues. The surgeon that is the last one standing wins and I was the last surgeon standing, but I didn't enjoy it and I want you to explain to me why I didn't enjoy it.\r\nAfter breathing in asbestos I feel okay now and I don't want you to explain why I do certain things, I can feel the asbestos in my lungs and it feels good." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The mind is such a fragile thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "A sweet old lady was standing in the middle of the aisle at the grocery store today, staring absentmindedly at the overwhelming selection of canned goods. I watched her for a few moments, and when she began looking frustrated and talking to herself, I asked if she needed help.\r\n“Thank you, deary; you were so kind to check on me, and I wish you could help. I seem to have forgotten what I came to the store for. My mind isn't what it used to be,” she said, replacing her frown with a tired smile.\r\nI empathized with her, so I stayed and tried to help her remember what she needed. Thankfully, she did—canned prunes—and I had to fight back the tears. There’s this feeling of hopelessness when your mind starts to degrade, and you know that it’s only a matter of time before you look in the mirror and don’t recognize yourself or a loved one.\r\nThere was a time when precious memories were randomly plucked from my mind, and if it weren’t for my late husband, Jared, I would not be where I am today.\r\nI started to forget simple things first, like turning the lights off before leaving home, failing to buy milk at the grocery store, or where I put my keys. Initially, I attributed it to stress, but then I started having trouble remembering things like mine and Jared’s anniversary, the first time we said, “I love you,” and our children’s names.\r\nI went to the doctor, and my soul was crushed when I was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s. My mind was a ticking time bomb, and it wouldn’t be long before I wouldn’t recognize myself in the mirror.\r\nI forgot more and more every week, and it was torture just waiting for the inevitable. My family and friends sent their thoughts and prayers, and people I had never met before wished me well, but that did nothing to stop the depression from seeping into my very core.\r\nJared was by my side throughout it all, but it seemed to pale in comparison to the fact that I wouldn’t be able to remember what the weather was on the day he proposed to me.\r\nA life of unreliable memories wasn’t a life worth living, so I decided to end it. I sat in my car; garage door closed, engine purring, and a tube running from my exhaust into the car’s window. It wasn’t how I wanted to die, but it wasn’t how I wanted to live.\r\nMy life was slowly slipping away when my car’s engine stopped, the passenger side door opened, and the accumulated fumes suddenly disappeared. A man in an impeccable black suit sat down and introduced himself as “Lucky.”\r\nI was horrified at first but felt an overwhelming sense of calm when he embraced my hand. He smiled at me and said that he could give me my memories back if I traded the life of a loved one." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Good Thing It's Locked" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "A young boy’s mother was called in to work the night shift. Cash was tight, and the single mother had no choice but to accept. As the shift would only be for a single night, the mother thought it would be okay to leave the boy alone in the house. She couldn’t afford a babysitter anyways.\r\nBefore the mother left, she told her boy to make sure everything was always locked. Since the boy wasn’t very tall for his age, his mother made sure that the windows were locked, as the boy couldn’t reach their latches. His mother also told him to leave the front door’s security chain unlocked, since otherwise she wouldn’t be able enter the house later even if she unlocked the handle and deadbolt.\r\nAfter his mother left, the boy went straight to his computer, burning away the rest of the evening by playing flash games he found online. Eventually, it became late, so the boy made sure the deadbolt and handle on the front door was locked. Then he went to bed.\r\nLater that night, the boy was woken up by a sudden thud. Whether it came from inside or outside the house didn’t matter: the boy’s first instinct was to check if the front door was locked. Thankfully, the front door was fully locked—deadbolt, handle, security chain and all. Breathing a sigh of relief, the boy went back to bed." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "That's Humanity for you - we suck at doing the right thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "So, the Zombie apocalypse. No-one was particularly surprised given the TV shows but still, we’d have expected some sort of fight back - some sort of honesty from those infected in those first key days, but I guess that’s humanity for you, we suck at doing the right thing.\r\nAnyway, single cases turned into dozens, dozens into hundreds, hundreds into thousands. The President got on TV and told people to shoot their granny in the head if she died, which as you’d expect led to his swift removal and replacement by the VP. She took a more conciliatory line - report your relatives to the local “healthcare professionals” immediately if they developed any symptoms of infection and we’ll “look after them”. Free healthcare, finally, fantastic. People did, their relatives were euthanized but there just weren’t the number of workers to dispose of the bodies - rats and disease followed and more and more people died spreading the infection further.\r\nI hid. I lived alone, my parents were long dead and I lived an online life. No-one came looking for me, no-one tried to save me or tried to break into my crappy tenth floor apartment and I emerged a few weeks after the complete breakdown of society into a crazy new world. A world that Mad Max had nothing on and where I couldn’t trust anybody or anything as I stumbled through humanity’s ruins searching for food.\r\nA few weeks after leaving my apartment I suddenly developed a major craving for meat. I guess I just got bored of creamed corn and needed more protein for survival or something (I’m not a doctor, I don’t understand the mechanisms, sue me). The problem was my body couldn’t discriminate between foodstuffs and just meat - I would pounce on a bird at the side of the road and rip it apart, shoving it into my mouth as its blood ran down my chin, or grab a mouldy hot dog from a convenience store oven and cram the whole festering pile straight down my throat. Oh yeah, there’s one more thing I should say - it turns out I’m immune to zombie bites. One grabbed me while I was rummaging in an old warehouse for supplies, bit me right on the hand but I didn’t get sick and I didn’t turn, so I got pretty lucky I guess.\r\nAnyway, that’s where I was as I shuffled down the road somewhere in Kansas. I’d eaten the head from a dead sheep about an hour before so I was feeling pretty good, when I felt movement in the corn next to me and a young child, maybe 12 years old, suddenly ran across the road in front of me. I hadn’t seen another person for months so of course I followed him, I wanted to help. I called out so he wouldn’t be afraid but I got hit with a sudden meat craving and all I could think about was that 3lb ball of flesh inside his skull. I tried to warn him, I swear I did, but my mouth was salivating so much I couldn’t get the words out, “I’m craving your brains, run away” somehow got turned into something else entirely and all I could coherently get out was “...Brains….” as he finally gave up the fight and let me crack open his sweet, sweet skull..\r\nWell I guess that’s humanity for you - we suck at doing the right thing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing Animals Fear The Most" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The townsfolk gathered around the body of Pastor Woodchuck. He had been completely gutted. \"Who would do such a thing?\" wept Ms. Pheasant. \"Especially to an animal of God. Sickening!\" added in Mr. Porcupine.\r\nJust then, an unholy cackle echoed from the forest. All the animals turned in that direction. Their blood froze and their tongues swelled. \"That wasn't what I think it was, right?\" said Mrs. Mouse, breaking the silence. Her husband, Mr. Mouse, pulled her closer. They both embraced one another out of fear. The day where one of them would have to start living without the other seemed deathly close.\r\nFrom the direction of the cackle came Mr. Bullfrog, hopping faster than he ever has. \"Run! They've found us!\" he shouted as he sped past the group. They were all immediately drenched in fear. Each of them wildly looked around for their loved ones and places to hide.\r\nWithout warning, towering two-legged creatures burst from behind the foliage. They wielded pointy one-sided swords that were about as long as the townsfolk were high. All the animals scattered in every direction, causing the creatures to smile wicked smiles. This is what they wanted.\r\nMr. and Mrs. Mouse hid behind a log. They could hear their friends being slaughtered not too far away. Then, a shadow was cast over them. Both of them hugged one last time. Their tears soaked into each others shoulders. \"I love you, my dear.\" spoke Mr. Mouse. He would've whispered it, if he didn't know it would make no difference." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The only thing to fear" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“…the only thing we have to fear is fear itself…” Franklin D Rosevelt, American President 1933, USA\r\nI feel so big and so small all at once. A reminder that fear itself is something very real to be afraid of now - no matter how vast or petty your existence has been in the greater prognosis of our human existence. But there are things better left unknown, unfelt, and unfeared.\r\nFear was always something I’d read about but never really understood. I thought I was afraid of spiders, turned out I was merely surprised by their sudden presence in mine.\r\nFrom the very moment humans feel fear, we lose a portion of our life span. Every time we’re afraid, the ‘clock’ starts and you age… and age…until you feel safe once again. At an alarming rate, approximately 1 hour of fear subtracts 24 hours from your life.\r\nNo one knows for sure when it started exactly; you wouldn’t miss a day off your life, here and there, at least for those of us living in a blessed region that is relatively free of real fear. Once the science was able to confirm what was happening, it was evident everywhere our lives were endangered and more and more people lived in a very counterproductive fear. Society collapsed before we could figure out why this is happening. From those who I’ve been blessed to deeply converse with, most people live now in real fear an average of 5 hours a day. Just trying to hide, forge for food and survive.\r\nI need to find medical help, find a way to put people on pause. I have a new theory. For some unknown reason throughout my life, I’ve been unable to feel fear. As an adult I sought counseling, brain scans, did studies and never got an answer. Nor did any doctor seem concerned enough to continue looking for an answer; told me to feel gifted or lucky. So, I did. Plus, I couldn’t pay my medical bills so…\r\nNow, what if we could stop others from being afraid? I haven’t aged a single day since it all started, maybe 10 years ago, it’s bizarre, even scary I imagine.\r\nI will not stand by and the watch the world grow old and die while I stay young. I should be 30, my friends should be 30, but instead they’re probably almost 50 years old - and here I am, frozen at 20.\r\nI am will travel as long and far as my feet will go, leaving this note at postal services in the towns I pass through. If anyone finds this, find a way to make yourself not feel the fear and, just, find any way to feel safe. Maybe it will buy some time for me to spread the word. I hope there’s others out there like me. Let us pray to anything which could help find a cure. I refuse to let us live as pawns played on high speed by some unseeable malevolence.\r\nYour Crusader, 2033" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The smell was the first thing you’d notice. The rot, mold, and death. If you ended up puking the first couple of times you smelt it, was a natural response, everyone understood and it was fine as long as you didn’t get anyone killed." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Copy to BlackBox\r\n1\r\nThe slow crawl of the buzzer sound loudly rang throughout the house. A calloused worked hand reaches from under the bed sheets and hits the top of the alarm 5:30 the suns just starting to rise and the smell of morning coffee pre set and automatically made just now in one of those pod coffee makers. The hand throws the sheets off his face and down to the edge of the bed. Has an hour till he can leave. Stretching and yawning he looks out the window at the birds picking at the ground. He wonders if they ever do get the early worm, I mean when’s the last time you’ve actually seen a bird with a worm in its mouth they’re always just picking at the ground more than likely eating seeds not worms. A loud thud is heard from the kitchen “hello” he yells thinking how stupid that was. He lives alone. “Let me just advertise my whereabouts” he thinks out loud. Looking around his room to see if there’s anything to use to fight the intruder off thud he hears. This time the intruders at his door. “Hey get the fuck out of here I’ve got a gun” he lies. The thuds grow louder it sounds like someone is banging their fists on the door. “I’m calling the cops” he yells along with “help, help” hoping the neighbors might hear him. 911 he presses into the phone and hits speaker. “We’re sorry all lines are down please try again later” he drops the phone as the door breaks open. An almost gray face is standing twelve feet in front of him. Fresh wounds to his face, they look like animal bites. All of this distracted him from the fact that this person, if you could call them that at this point, was missing a hand it was just bone. Blood covered his hallway and was streaking down the now broken door. Are you alright he wants to ask as the monstrosity in front of him lurches forward landing on top, stabbing the broken bone directly into his shoulder. Screaming in pain he tries to push the man off him but he won’t budge. He’s locked on. The man’s teeth are now firmly locked onto his neck and are pulling. He can feel the blood pooling around him. The warmth, he doesn’t even feel the second bite or the third just warmth until the darkness takes him." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "First world problems are a serious thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Don't you just hate first world problems and yes I may not live in a third world country, but we still have problems. First world problems consists of thing like losing the remote and having to turn on the TV physically by getting up, or the super store being out of spring mix and now you have to cut your own salad greens and last of all having a voiced controlled smart house but you are now suffering from laryngitis.\r\nThese are examples of first world problems and other examples would be like the electricity going out and the heated toilet seat is now cold. Or the WiFi is bad and now have to use data and the charger is broken and you are 10% charge on your phone. I have my own personal first world problems. They make my life annoyingly complicated or is a temporary discomfort.\r\nLike when I forgot to bring my gun to kill a person and now I have to use a knife and other hand to hand techniques to kill this man. It was so bloody with some noise, while a gun would have just made it easier and quicker. The gun was a silencer as well and when I had realised I had forgotten my gun, I was so irritated and annoyed with myself. I caused quite a bit of a mess in that guys house and when someone eventually figures out what I had done, they would have to clean it up.\r\nI live in a flat and my next door neighbour is so quite and never does anything annoying. This annoys me because I cannot think of a good reason to kill him. The man I had killed when I had forgotten my gun, was a nasty gentlemen who had no care for others. My next door neighbour though is such a good person and I am trying my best to think of a reason to kill him but I cannot think of a single reason. It's Mildly irritating and sometimes I do feel bad thinking like this but these things happen. Also too much thinking makes me realise I have other problems with myself.\r\nOr when you are tracking someone as your next kill but they put their whole social media presence on private, this infuriates me as it makes me have to work harder to stalk and kill. I work through it though and I always managed to find a way. Or when you do find another way to do things, it makes you realise how inefficient you have been doing things or how lazy and reliant you have become on certain things, and this also makes you feel older.\r\nFirst world problems are a serious thing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing Between Stars" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "We first noticed it when the light of an entire galaxy vanished overnight.\r\nDwingeloo 1 just blipped out of existence. It was about 9.13 light years away, so it must have gone out some time ago.\r\nNext was NGC 55, or more commonly called The Whale Galaxy. At 6.5 light years away, it was closer to us than Dwingeloo 1 but far enough where we could observe the phenomenon from a distance.\r\nGravity pulled other bodies accordingly, positions shifted, but we had no way to trace where they had moved to.\r\nAt the time of this document, over 100 galaxies over various distances have vanished. We got a dedicated team to observe specific galaxies, and document any anomalies they can find.\r\n“Sir, can you...come here for a second?” My team leader asked. I looked at his computer, seeing a large, inky blob slowly engulf the light being emitted in his feed.\r\n“What is that?” I asked. Maybe something was just moving in front of all these galaxies? Blocking the light from reaching us, maybe.\r\n“I’m not sure, I’ve gone back and reviewed this a thousand times.” My leader replied in a low voice. “If you look at the stars above it, they seem to go out for a second, before flickering back, like something is passing in front of them.”\r\nIt took weeks of review, and unfortunately for all of us, we figured out what it was. Our announcement was translated to every language, for every government to know about. We knew mass panic may occur, but everyone needed to know the threat, that they could simply vanish out of existence in a heartbeat.\r\nIt was an organism, one bigger than anything we’ve ever seen in space. It floated through the vacuum the way a person would swim through a lake. We couldn’t make out specific details of the creature, all we knew is it was black, had flagella-like tentacles to propel itself, and it could move faster than the speed of light if it sensed prey.\r\nThe worst part was we discovered what it ate. Galaxies.\r\nTo a creature that massive, surrounded by the void of space, a galaxy must appear the same way a berry on a tree would. If and when the creature got hungry, it would float over to an entire galaxy, and engulf it into itself, consuming it.\r\nWe have no idea how long it’s been doing this. The light from galaxies takes so long to reach us that we might not know how many are gone in this lifetime.\r\nAs expected, the world panicked when we told them, mainly because of the question that every person who heard immediately had; ‘how long until it reaches us?’\r\nTruth is, we don’t know. We’re just a small speck in a massive sea of galaxies, the creature might never get to us, or it might get to us tomorrow.\r\nAll we can do is hope for a bit of luck from the universe." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Copy to BlackBox\r\nAs my eyes opened, they met the image of the unreal Thing; it watched me from the dark and desolate corner. It was cast in void, with no semblance of humanity lying in its organs of ether.\r\nComing home, the Thing was never seen, only felt, gnawing at my sanity with its dissociated presence. Every step I took only allowed it to draw ever nearer. As I caught my breath, it took its chance and lurched towards me. I never truly saw it as I ran away. I only saw its primal dashing and gliding. When I got home, I assumed I was safe. The Light lied to me. It was useless. I was wrong.\r\nI stare into darkness. I see the machinations of human torment. The Creature! I can truly See. They are not here really. I feel worthless to witness them with my pathetic human eyes. I can now only see contraptions of Suffering. In an instant, I am drawn to the depths.\r\nThe Light is just a memory. Light has vanished." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "That Thing I Did" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I killed that one guy a while ago. Nobody suspected anything because nobody knew him. Everyone hated him. Including me. So I relieved him of his mortal burdens. I am the light that came to gift him the sweet release of death.\r\nI put him in my attic. After a while his body began to smell so I stopped inviting people over to my house.\r\nJust last week I noticed the smell was gone so I went to check on the body. It was gone. Since then, I’ve noticed scratching in my walls and it won’t go away. Whenever I’m about to sleep, the scratching is so intense and so loud that it hurts my ears and leaves me with headaches for hours. Strangely enough, I like it.\r\nIn the last 2 days, someone else is in my house. Doors are opening on their own, and I hear things shifting from other rooms. Yesterday afternoon a glass that I had stuffed in the back of the cupboard was shattered across the kitchen floor all on its own.\r\nToday, the thing I killed visited me. When I came into my room to go to sleep, he was standing there with his face rotting, looking at me with a piercing smile. A chunk of his forehead fell off of him and landed in my bedsheets. He said with what flesh he had left, “Why did you do this to me?” I told him why, and he said “Now I have to stay with you forever.”\r\nSo now I live with him. He haunts me in my house and I feel myself becoming him. I am connected to him. My flesh is his flesh.\r\nToday I am walking to work, cutting through the park when a man catches up to me from behind, drags me into the bushes, and stabs me to death. He leaves me there, but he doesn’t know that I’ll be visiting him soon." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Women on Tinder literally only want one thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Serena had a nose ring, which indicated she was probably an attention-seeking slut and uninterested in nice guys like me, but to my surprise, she sent the first message.\r\nFinal-fucking-ly. I’d been on Tinder for eight years and hadn’t had a single match. For some reason Western women REALLY had it out for me.\r\nI took Serena to a film. As I stood by the concession with my jumbo popcorn and extra-large Sprite, waiting for her to buy her own ticket, the cashier looked at us then screwed up his face.\r\nAfterward, I took her home, where I flexed my Vortex Tab90M keyboard. The flashing LEDs really made her eyes sparkle. In the bedroom, I undid my tie and unbuttoned my shirt, before finally stepping out of my cargo shorts.\r\nSerena slid out of her gown, exposing an excessive amount of thigh hair and tattoos across her lower back. I made a mental note to mention these flaws on our second date.\r\n“Are those Norse symbols?” I asked, recognizing the pattern from God of war.\r\n“They are.”\r\n“What possessed you to get them?”\r\n“I’m a witch.”\r\nI chuckled. Of course she was into Harry Potter. Serena was lucky we’d met—now I could introduce her to more sophisticated entertainment like Dune or Ricky and Morty.\r\n“You should—”\r\nWith a snap of her fingers, Serena made me fly across the room as if yanked by a bungee. I was suddenly pinned against the wall.\r\n“Whats going on?” I cried.\r\nShe strolled across the room and placed a hand on my chest. “I’m taking your soul.”\r\n“M-my soul? You can’t!”\r\n“Pipe down. This’ll be over soon.”\r\n“NO! TELL ME WHY!”\r\n“Souls have great power. I need them to produce spells. So I wander around harvesting fat neckbeards nobody will miss.”\r\n“But why take mine?”\r\nSerenas hand turned cold, as if she’d just had it submerged in snow, and I felt a great draining sensation. All color seemed to seep from the world.\r\n“Will I die?”\r\n“You’ll become a ghost,” she said, clearly annoyed by my questions.\r\n“A ghost?! Explain!”\r\n“Uhhhh. Without a soul, you’ll just be meat. People will only notice you when looking directly at you. The second they glance away you’ll disappear from their memory.” A silver whisp floated out of my chest into Serena’s hand, where she ushered it into a vial, in a gesture resembling vape tricks I’d learned from YouTube.\r\n“You can’t take my soul. Please. I have too much to live for.”\r\nShe rolled her eyes. “How’s this: tell me one thing you did in the past two months that doesn’t involve video games, masturbating, or calling women whores, and you can keep your crummy soul.”\r\nAnd that’s the story of how I became a ghost. Now I wander around, dead to the world.\r\nFortunately, I discovered when playing games online my teammates still notice and react to my avatar, and people online can still see my Reddit posts.\r\nSo really, not much has changed." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "That Random Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was early afternoon, just past lunch. The restaurant was nearly empty, and we got an excellent table in the shade. My friend was tense and kept pulling his napkin through a hole he made by pinching together the tips of his thumb and forefinger. He saw me noticing him, and he dropped the napkin in his lap with a sigh.\r\n\"I'm sorry. I'm just trying to remember what it is I forgot,\" he explained. \"It happens every day without fail. There's that one thing that I need, and it's missing. Every day it's something different.\r\n\"I never know what it is that I forgot until I need it. For instance, that book you were reading before I arrived. If you had left it behind at home, you'd be missing it, but, perhaps, if you had forgotten your tobacco, you might not notice until later this evening when you want to smoke. But, correct me if I'm wrong, that's not something that happens to you every day.\"\r\nI shook my head. \"No. I'm pretty good at remembering things.\"\r\nOur drinks arrived, and, in turn, we each leaned back in our chair to give the server some room. As he left the table, we thanked him almost in unison. Then my friend continued.\r\n\"Of course you are. Good at remembering things, I mean. I used to be. But for the past month or two, I'm forgetting that random thing and always just one thing. Yesterday it was a slide for a microscope I promised Dr. Kurtz. The day before, it was a book for my nephew. And the thing is that whatever it is? It's gone forever. I can't find it. Do you know why I haven't invited you over to my apartment recently? It looks like a maelstrom tore through it.\r\n\"And now I spend the entire day just anxiously wondering what it will be next. It hasn't happened yet today. yet.\" He sighed deeply again. \"But enough about me. My friend, please drink up. I haven't forgotten my wallet, and these drinks are on my ticket!\"\r\nI saw him only three times more before I heard he had been robbed and murdered. He had wandered into a shady section of the city after he had forgotten the directions to an art exhibit. His children later found his apartment so empty that his daughter initiated a police investigation for a robbery associated with murder. It went nowhere.\r\nAfter his death, his ghost would often visit me during lunch and cry quietly over the things he had forgotten on the earth. I felt horrible for my friend, but I would be lying if I didn't say that it grew tiresome." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A Terrible Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Emma looks up and sees a terrible thing: a spider, crawling across her ceiling. Disgusting creatures, she thinks, grabbing a shoe. The spider sees, with every eye, impending doom at the hand of wicked Emma. Moments later, it's crushed, a stain on the perfect white wall, one leg twitching. She tosses the shoe and spots herself in the mirror. “Emma,” she says. “You look especially enchanting this morning.”\r\nHer phone rings.\r\n“Good morning, Charles,” she says.\r\n“Good morning, beautiful.\"\r\n“Aren't you the charmer. Why the early call?”\r\nCharles stands in his office looking out over downtown. Beneath him, the city moves in predictable tinker-toy fashion. Cars honk and crawl. People dart along, under the impression they have to be somewhere. Charles is under no such impression. He is free, respected, powerful. A man who has everything.\r\nOr, almost everything. He gazes at an unremarkable building in the distance. Emma's apartment, obscured by fog.\r\n“I want to talk about us, Emma.”\r\nEmma opens her window. Sirens fly in on the breeze. She lights a cigarette and stares out at nothing in particular.\r\n“Us?” she asks, feigning ignorance.\r\nCharles smirks. He knew this wouldn’t be easy. Emma was hardheaded, obstinate. Which made him wonder, of all the women he’s had (or could have), why her? There was only one explanation.\r\n\"I love you, Emma.\"\r\nAh, that word and its implications. Emma wanted to squash it like the spider. But that wouldn't be so easy. These naïve yearnings couldn’t be subdued with a shoe, unfortunately.\r\n\"I think you underestimate the significance of that word, Charles.\"\r\n“I know how I feel.”\r\nEmma laughs.\r\nCharles, stunned, confused, irritated, raises his voice: \"Maybe you don’t understand what I'm saying. I love you, Emma. It’s true.”\r\n\"Words are not mirrors, Charles.”\r\n“What?”\r\n“You’re not telling the truth. You’re casting a spell, and doing a poor job. Either way, I don’t love you. That’s a fact.”\r\nCharles frowns. Rejection, an unfamiliar feeling. He doesn’t like it.\r\nEmma eyes a flock of geese overhead; beautiful creatures. A shift in tone over the receiver draws her attention.\r\n\"Emma, I’m sorry to say that I honestly don’t care how you feel about me. The truth is, if I want you, I'll have you.”\r\nSilence. Charles grins.\r\n“Now, don’t be afraid. I’m not going to hurt you. I can make your life very easy, or very difficult. I know you’ll reconsider…”\r\nThen it’s like something has his throat. He reaches for a glass of water on his desk but knocks it over. He hears Emma, speaking some dead language. Feels panic, then calm. Such calm, serenity. Love. He doesn't know it, but his eyes roll into the back of his head.\r\nBack in the day, she'd have to be up close for this part. It was always a such a hassle and a mess. Modernity has its perks. Emma extinguishes her cigarette and hears a loud thump. Across town, Charles lies on the floor convulsing, in love. Moments later, his heart explodes." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I woke up in the back of a car trunk, and the first thing that came to mind was... donuts." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The pothole woke me up, or whatever the hell we bumped over. I couldn’t quite place it since I was tied up in the back of a car trunk. But the first thought to appear in my mind was donuts, that glazed donut with a dark spot that I slid my teeth into. The last thing I remember was my coworkers being disgusted at my willingness to chow down on a donut that didn’t look right. Everything after just a blur.\r\nI felt the car come to a stop.\r\n“I don’t know what we should do man. We need to get that thing out of her.”\r\nI recognized Alec’s voice, a teammate of mine from work.\r\n“We need to cut it out of her. It’s the only way.”\r\nRob on the other end of the conversation, another coworker. As I squirmed and they continued bickering, I felt something moving inside of me. Tears obscured my vision, but the pain was intense. There was something alive beneath my skin, and it was looking for a way out.\r\nThe trunk opened. Rob and Alec sat me upright. They stared for a minute and didn’t say a word. The throbbing pain inside of me faded away, and for a moment, I was able to compose myself. Rob ripped the tape off my mouth.\r\n“What is happening to me? Why am I locked up in your trunk?”\r\n“You don’t remember, do you? You attacked us.” Rob showed me his bandage-covered left arm.\r\n“There was something in that donut, like a parasite or something man. You put my fucking hand in your mouth and clamped down on it like a gator,” Alec said, unraveling the bloody shirt wrapped around his fingers.\r\nThe movement in me was back. My flesh felt like a tunnel for the creature; my mouth forced its way open.\r\n“Oh fuck. It’s coming out again,” Alec yelled.\r\nMy throat went completely dry, the calm before a storm of rancid gunk surged over my tongue. A rope of a charred, bubble-gum like goo shot out of me and latched onto Alec’s face, covering his frightened grin like a blanket.\r\nRob picked up an axe near a pile of firewood and looked at me.\r\n“I’m sorry Sarah.”\r\nWith one swing of the axe, the creature detached from me and took shelter in its new home, Alec. I closed my eyes; the image of Alec’s face turning into pudding was too much.\r\n“Help him, Rob. Do something,” I cried out.\r\nWhen I lifted my eyelids, I felt sick to my stomach. Alec was sprawled out on the ground motionless; his face just a hollowed-out bowl of bone. I looked out to the pond beyond the trees. Rob was running towards the water.\r\nSomehow, I managed to break free from my restraints. I walked up to the body of water and saw Rob’s bottom half on the sand. Every part of him above his waist was gone.\r\nI don’t eat donuts anymore." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Strangest Thing" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "They finally brought in the man everyone's been talking about for the last two weeks. When I heard they were going to give him the electric chair, I was less surprised than I expected. Somehow I'd always known the sheriff was the type to break a deal, and after what the town had been through, I couldn't blame him. The kidnapper told him where to find the girl, told him where the explosives were, and told them soon enough to bring her back safely. Then they decided to go ahead and execute him anyway.\r\nConvicting him had required the testimony of an out-of-state trucker who'd been found with the girl's fingerprints all over his vehicle. At first he said that he'd woken up the day after the kidnapping and couldn't remember anything, but after a fierce interrogation, he finally told the cops what they wanted to hear. He told the jury that our convict had hired him to transport a shipment from one warehouse to another, no questions asked. The girl's mother begged for his execution, and that sealed the deal.\r\nI was the one in charge of escorting the convict from his cell to the electric chair. He didn't scream at me or try to escape like some of the others do, but every second I was with him I felt like his eyes were boring into me.\r\n\"You're just going to stand here and let me be murdered?\" he asked me, his eyes barely leaving the metal handcuffs as I snapped them onto his wrists.\r\n\"It's hardly murder,\" I said, dragging him along. \"Few guys ever deserved to be executed more than you.\"\r\n\"A deal's a deal,\" he said, shining a toothy grin. \"I help you save the girl, and I don't get the chair. The sheriff made it sound all official-like.\"\r\n\"Well, it wasn't.\" I didn't like talking to the prisoners, but somehow it was hard to just stand there and let him criticize me without saying anything. When we finally got to the chair, I was just glad not to be responsible for him anymore.\r\nThey brought him over to the chair and strapped him in. He didn't struggle, and for a second I could see him flashing that toothy grin again as I was led out of the room. It was the last I saw of him, and I heard he was buried in an unmarked grave somewhere in the prison cemetery.\r\nThe next day, the girl was found dead with two bullet holes in her head. They found the mother with a gun outside the house, muttering to herself and seemingly out of her mind. When they interrogated her, I listened with my ear to the door. She insisted she couldn't remember anything from the past day, and the cops finally seemed tired of arguing and took a break.\r\nThe sheriff came out of the interrogation room, looking a way I'd never seen him before. \"Son, that woman just told me the strangest thing.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Thing in the Prairie" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "We thought we could tame the western prairies, claim nature as our own in the name of progress.\r\nLuke and I settled in this old cabin months ago, and have only known misery since the day we planted our crops.\r\nThere was nobody around us for miles, we knew this. Yet in the night, we would see flashes of light in the distance, extinguished only when we approached.\r\nThe crops would grow, but they would grow black and burnt, as if the very soil below was cursed.\r\nWe would wake up to strange symbols carved on the inside of our walls, symbols we did not recognize.\r\nSomething would come in the night and nibble on the tips of our fingers, leaving them raw when the sun rose.\r\nIn September, things grew more worrisome. My belly became swollen, and my blood was late. I was pregnant, out here, in the vast praises of wind and darkness. Far away from the luxury of doctors or midwives.\r\nAs the winter approached, Luke left on horseback. The nearest city was days away, so he gave me supplies and instructions for safety, promising to return before the snow began to fall and blanket the fields in depressing silence.\r\nThat was two months ago. I have not heard from him since.\r\nThings have not gotten better since his departure. The symbols appear more frequently as the days become shorter. The food Luke had gathered had chunks ripped out, as if something came inside and ate most of it in the night. The wind outside speaks my name, calling me to give my child back to it. The more and more this goes on I become convinced of one horrifying fact.\r\nThe child inside me is not human. At least not fully.\r\nI see it in my dreams. Pure black skin, like the prairies at night. Eyes dark and burnt like the crops that grow. Limbs with scar tissue in the shape of the symbols on our cabin walls.\r\nI do not know if God is testing me or punishing me, I only pray for it to stop.\r\nLast night, something that looked like Luke returned, slamming on the door and demanding to be let in.\r\nI looked through the cracks, and I know that is not my Luke. It is something from the prairie, masquerading as him to taunt me.\r\n“Let us in, Isabella,” the thing that was not Luke begged, slamming on the doors with his bloody fists. “Let me give the land his son back.”\r\n“I will not let you in.” I said, in a shaky voice I hid behind a brave face.\r\n“No matter, the prairie will have what belongs to him eventually.” Luke said, before being swallowed by the darkness.\r\nI do not know what will become of me, or the child.\r\nI leave this note to tell those that come next to not settle here.\r\nThis land does not belong to man.\r\nIt is owned by something else.\r\nSomething much darker." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Becoming A Superhero Is The Worst Thing I've Done For The World" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "A strange glowing meteor landed in my backyard. I was stupid enough to go up to it and touch it. Now, I have superpowers! My body is extremely durable. I can fly. I have super strength. I even have heighten senses.\r\nWith these powers, I decided to become a superhero!\r\nEveryday, I fly over my town, searching for people who need me. Most of the time; I end up stopping kidnappings, robberies and drug dealers. I recently prevented a serial killer from claiming another victim. People seemed to like me at first, until a few months passed.\r\nThe local police force were almost inactive because of me. Citizens slowly started to dislike me too. I would be there to stop every little problem in town. You would think more people would like me. I even received a cease-and-desist order along with threat of incarceration. Then again, I'm a superhuman. How was any of that supposed to deter me?\r\nNot long ago, that same serial killer from months ago escaped. I couldn't believe I had to deal with him again. In fact, I usually have to deal with the same people constantly. Never again!\r\nWhen I came face to face with that psycho, I punched a hole through his head! Now, he won't be able to hurt anyone anymore. I then began to kill off most criminals (mostly those who committed crimes worse than robbery). The world would be better without them. My life also became easier without them. The town was almost crime-free!\r\nHowever, citizens began to look down on me. They even started to hate me. Same goes for the police department and even the government! It wasn't long before I was declared a public threat. The president even sent in the military to get rid of me!\r\nHundreds of soldiers surrounded me from every angle. All their weapons were pointed in my direction. They even had a few tanks aimed at me. I heard the word \"fire\", and that's exactly what they all did.\r\nBullets and rockets bounced off my skin, but it still hurt like hell. I had to protect myself! I punched as soldier I saw as hard as I could. I wanted to make sure they couldn't shoot at me anymore. I destroyed each tank in a fiery explosion. It only took a minute or two, but there was silence at last. As the dust settled, I saw the result of my rampage.\r\nThey were all dead. I killed them all. Their mangled bodies litter the street. I looked at my hands, just noticing that they were covered with blood. I fell to my knees and cried. I just wanted to be a friendly neighborhood superhero. Instead, I became an unstoppable supervillain!" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "There’s no such thing as sea monsters." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "A lake is the perfect place to enjoy a little solitude.\r\nBirds chirping, cool breezes in the morning and bright, sunny afternoons. The water is calm and deep, surrounded by thick forests- you really have everything you need. No neighbors for miles, so you know no one will stumble upon it and bother you. Secluded enough to make it hard to find, but not too secluded.\r\nStill not too far away from civilization though, with town about 10 miles up the main road. When I need food, I can go there and find some- there’s always so much to choose from. I don’t need a lot though- maybe 1 or 2 every year, and despite how many I’ve taken in the last few years the people haven’t changed their behavior. Missing signs and curfews don’t dissuade the parents from taking them out shopping, or even to my lake to go camping! I love it when they go camping- they make it so easy. Why would they go near the lake? Don’t they know what’s in here?\r\nIt’s always amazing to me to see the shock on their faces when I bring them back to my lake. It’s never too difficult, really, they’re pretty demoralized by the time they arrive. Watching your parents being killed will do that to a child, and they’re so much more compliant afterwards. The parents always offer themselves over the children, “Please, take me instead!” No, thanks. They just don’t understand how they taste- the skin is really good, so I take that, but everything else tastes..spoiled- it’s too old! I let the fish eat the rest. Kids on the other hand are easy, and they’re sweet. They don’t fight much, not like it would matter. They taste better alive, but I like to eat at home so it complicates things.They can’t hold their breath very long and bringing them down to the cave takes a little effort but I can usually get there before they drown. My cave is big too, so I have plenty of storage area for leftovers- though I rarely have any. That’s probably why they’ve never found any bodies.\r\nI could keep going into town, but from what I hear they’re building a Summer camp by my lake.\r\nWhat more could I ask for?" } ]

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