Split (1)

train · 68.2k rows

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[ { "role": "user", "content": "Hitler and the Time Machine" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "After twenty years of relentless research, the time machine is finally ready. My mission is clear: go back and prevent one of history’s greatest villain from ever rising. There’s only one shot at this, so I set the time and place carefully.\r\nThree... two... one... beep. I arrive at the destination, face to face with my target. But as I look down, I see only a baby. This is the child destined to become a monster, yet right now, he’s just an innocent infant. My determination wavers. Can I really do this? What if someone else takes his place, or the timeline changes in unpredictable ways?\r\nI decide to try again. I set the machine to a later time, hoping to find him as a young boy. Maybe then I’ll see something that justifies the act.\r\nThree... two... one... beep. But each time I find a normal child, a common boy with no sign of the future villain. Each attempt leaves me questioning my resolve. Could I live with the guilt and regret if I went through with it?\r\nI realize that evil isn’t born; it’s made. Perhaps if I show him the future, a world of diversity and harmony, he might choose a different path.\r\n“Hey, Adolf, It's me, your unaging uncle. Do you want to ride in this cool machine? I want to show you something. It can take you all the way to the year 2025. You’ll be amazed at what the world can become.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Mr. Whuttleskump and the Scribbles" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“It’s Mr. Whuttleskump. He told me it's all going to be ok and that he's gonna be with me so I don’t get scared. He’s going to take me to the scribbles.” Jeffrey is very proud of his drawing. He’s a dying boy of only eight who will never live long enough to know there are two sides to everything.\r\nHeads or tails.\r\nThe drawing is the same from every child in the hospital and there are never any variations. Mr. Whuttleskump is always dressed in a patchy threadbare coat and a fedora and he’s got a yellow dog that walks next to him holding a stick in its mouth. The children always draw themselves holding hands with the goofy happy thing.\r\nHe resembles an upright chubby turtle who lost his shell. He’s always smiling a big toothy grin and his teeth are a vibrant white against the green skin of his face. He leads the children towards scribbles of blue and yellow and red.\r\nIt’s always a beautiful mess on the edge of the page and I, like most of the other doctors and nurses, find those scribbles to be the most fascinating part of the entire phenomena. If you really look at them, you get lost in them. You feel an awesome peace take hold of you. The simple multicolored scribbles of these dying children will bring tears to your eyes.\r\nI hand the drawing back to Jeffrey and I tell him how talented and imaginative he is. I tell him that he’s a brave little guy.\r\nI know he’s going to pass away tonight.\r\nHeads.\r\nI walk the halls to take a breather. It never gets easier. I’d like to think it’s all true. I want to know for sure that Jeffrey is truly going to be somewhere peaceful because he and all the other kids who’ve drawn those scribbles in the twenty years I’ve been here deserve to be in them.\r\nAdults will just describe dreams before they pass, but the same peace is there.\r\nThe scribbles.\r\n“Doctor! Oh Please, Doctor?!” I go into the open door of a room. The man in here is sweating through his gown. His eyes are wide and his bottom lip is trembling.\r\n“I need help. The nurses won’t listen to me.”\r\n“What’s the matter?”\r\n“I keep having these dreams about…” He doesn’t even need to describe them. I know why the nurses are ignoring him. “It’s this green turtle man in a coat and a hat. He has this awful yellow dog with him. His teeth are so white and huge. I can see myself in them. He says he’s going to take me to this dark place. It’s like… black scribbles. I don’t want to go there. I know it sounds crazy, but I can’t sleep. Can you please help me?”\r\n“I’ll see what I can do.”\r\nThis man will die tonight. I don't know what he’s done, but I know what kind of person he is.\r\nTails." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A guy and a vending machine" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The glow of the vending machine was the same as always. An inconspicuous, dull gleam seen from the distance, transforming into a brightly shimmering pink radiance as he drew nearer. Was it trying to preserve its energy, only advertising its wares as customers approached? Was it capable of differentiating between humans and other desert dwellers? Was there any trace of logic inhabiting the vending machine's inner contrivances?\r\nHe didn't know and he didn't care to know, perhaps once it expired he would disassemble it before its contents did the same. He did not care but in the past he could not help but wonder sometimes about the circumstances that led to the presence of the vending machine in the desert, hidden between eerie cliffs of obsidian rock jutting out of the endless sand. It was hidden in the shade.\r\nHe loved that he was regarded as the sole protector of his decrepit excuse for a settlement, whose denizens so badly feared the wrath of some arcane deity residing in the bizarre sharpness of black stone, because it allowed him not only to revel in the status he had gained but also to feel certain that none of these frightful peasants would ever accompany him on one of his cyclic journeys towards satisfaction.\r\nIn earlier days he would have marveled at what a strange life he lived, how it was his own detested abnormality that had led to him being chosen as the \"sacrifice\" for an entity that was thought to be equally unpalatable, however, nowadays all that occupied his mind was his beloved, present privilege and his increasing hunger as he trudged towards the familiar strangeness.\r\nThe glow bathed him in warmth, as it always did. Having wandered below the merciless desert sun, however, the mild temperature felt chilling. He could feel its electric hum reverberate in his skull, searching for his desire. With a clink it delivered the object of his longing: a bottle of soda, its taste saccharine and gleefully artificial.\r\nHe opened and drank it in an instant, his body beginning to tingle with the euphoric intoxication. The smile that always spanned across his face began to reassert its breadth, its waning of the last few days redeemed. Here they stood, two freaks of nature, one of them lurid and incomprehensible, the other drawn to its mad glow like a moth to the light. He felt like Icarus of the ancient tales except he did not feel as though he was falling from the sun, but right into it. The boils of rot on his skin resumed their vacillation, as they always did as he stood in its presence. His head was the star at the center of the solar system, the contracting and expanding pustules were the planets obediently orbiting their master, and the pink shine was the pink shine was the pink shine." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Johnny and Owen were digging" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Even though what he did that Saturday morning destroyed his family, Johnny never regretted it.\r\nIt was wet warm April morning, the boys had nothing going on that weekend- no soccer or basketball, and their moms had put them out to play.\r\nThey found themselves busy digging into a sort of grassy bank just beyond their gardens, before the woods.\r\nThey were digging with pointed sticks. They weren’t looking for treasure or worms or Australia- the reasons children usually give when they’re madly digging. They didn’t talk as they dug.\r\nGradually the earthy hole became bigger and darker, and the boys became sweatier and damper. A sense of accomplishment close to nothing they had ever felt at school or in their activities or when playing videogames flooded their little bodies- they couldn’t have stopped if they wanted to.\r\nThe hole was now as big as half a boy. Something moved differently, not like how their sticks were moving the damp packed earth. Owen paused, but Johnny poked at the movement.\r\nAnd then it started coming out, not crawling, but pouring out of the hole in a fluid motion, a sleek silky rabbit, a large rabbit, a black rabbit.\r\nIt took forever coming out of the hole- it was very large. To the boys, its front legs looked as big as trees, while its hind legs curved like black cars, ears reaching high into the grey sky. Its fur was so black, it looked as if a giant rabbit-shaped hole had been cut out of the landscape, revealing only black nothingness.\r\nOwen and Johnny remained still. The Black Rabbit spoke, its scarlet eyes fixed on them.\r\n“You disturbed me.”\r\nOwen asked idiotically, “Are you the Easter bunny?”\r\nThe Black Rabbit casually lifted a foot and swotted Owen down to the ground, pinning him to the grass. Johnny kept very still.\r\n“Yes. And this is fine chocolate.”\r\nJohnny loved Owen, and had an older sister, Nadine, he hated. So it seemed obvious to call out to the Black Rabbit “Please don’t take him- he’s my friend. I’ll bring you someone else.”\r\nThe Black Rabbit considered.\r\nAlthough just a child, Johnny he learned enough already to know what he had to offer would tempt the Rabbit more than Owen.\r\nThe Black Rabbit was greedy, and having seen the families come and go, guessed what Johnny could bring him. So it nodded at Johnny. “Go now.”\r\nJohnny started running towards his house, trying to think of reasons to entice Nadine, probably still in bed, to step outside their garden. When looked back over his shoulder, he couldn’t see the giant Rabbit, just grey fogginess.\r\nThankfully, not only was Nadine up, but she also accepted Johnny’s story about why she needed to come out and follow him towards the woods. Nobody ever saw her again.\r\nOnce, years later, Owen and Johnny talked about it. Johnny assured Owen he never felt guilty about what he had done. Owen died in car crash soon after that." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Bread and Circuses" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The biggest danger to the rule of law was starvation. In lean times, civility became tattered and worn at the seams, and scenes like the following unfolded.\r\nThe governor, Liberius, was being pulled through town when the party came across a disturbance.\r\nA man and woman were arguing, throwing insults and, worse, horse dung.\r\n'I know you took it, whore!' the man screamed.\r\nLiberius watched carefully for a while as they traded barbs. In a previous life, he'd been a Medicus for a legion in Gaul, a legion in which infighting had led to a rebellion.\r\nFinally, he stepped down from his carriage with four guards in tow.\r\n'Tell me what is this dispute over.'\r\n'Bread,' the man answered, 'she's stolen my ration.'\r\n'There ain't been no ration. I ain't even had mine.'\r\nThe assembled mob hollered and then booed as Liberius's guard separated the warring pair.\r\n'You say this woman has stolen your bread?'\r\n'I do.'\r\n'And you would swear to it?'\r\n'I would.'\r\n'There is only one way to prove the validity of your claim.' He turned to his guards. 'Take her.'\r\nThe woman cried out. The man's eyes widened. 'I mean, Sir. I cannot be certain… And… And. She's actually my wife.'\r\nThis set the crowd away laughing. 'What about what's yours is mine!?'\r\nThe guards dragged the woman to a nearby stall and laid her down.\r\n'Sir, Sir,' the man followed, 'I take it back.'\r\n'If you take it back, we must assume you ate the bread, and you have broken an oath.'\r\nHe quietened down. In fact, the whole crowd did when they saw that the governor wasn't joking.\r\nThe woman writhed until a slap from a guard dazed her.\r\nLiberius took out his pugio– a double-edged dagger— and thrust it into the woman's milky flesh.\r\nThe explosion of pain was enough to bring her out of her stupor. She screamed and then screamed even louder as the dagger was drawn the length of her– breastbone to navel.\r\nA cloud of steam billowed upward as her warm innards were exposed to the cold Northern air.\r\nThe mob let out a collective gasp as Liberius reached a hand inside her stomach and routed around like a fishmonger.\r\nThe woman’s scream became a gurgle in the back of her throat as Liberius pronounced. 'There is no bread inside your wife.'\r\nThe peasant’s mouth opened and closed spasmodically as Liberius wiped his bloodied hands on his rags. 'Empty?'\r\n'No, not entirely...'\r\nThe crowd looked on like a dumb herd of cows who had just watched a wolf tear one of them apart.\r\n'You have seen there is no bread, and now the circus is over!' he continued bellowing. 'Back to work.'\r\nAnd then, as if finishing a half-inconsequential thought, he turned back to the man, now a widow.\r\n'No, not empty…I believe your wife was pregnant.’" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Shave and a Haircut" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Growing up, my baby brother and I would play hide and seek. My brother was much younger than me, so he wasn't very good; he'd always choose to hide in one of the closets. I'd go around the house listening outside of every closet door, trying to figure out which one he was in. He was never very quiet, so once I'd found the right one, I'd do the first 5 knocks of a song our dad taught us. My brother, if he wasn't cheating that day, would do the last 2 knocks, and then I'd open the door and say \"Gotcha!\"\r\nOne day, while playing hide and seek, my brother had a bad asthma attack while he was hiding. I did my circuit of the house as usual, but each closet I tried, he never finished the knock. It wasn't until my third time around that I just started opening every closet door looking for him. I found him in the last one I checked.\r\nI never wanted to hear the knock song again after that. But that didn't stop it from following me around everywhere I went.\r\nThe first time it happened, I barely acknowledged it. I was hanging out at the library with my friends when the first 5 knocks echoed off a nearby janitor's closet. I glanced in the door's direction, but when I didn't see anyone, I just ignored it and continued my conversation.\r\nThe next time it happened, it was much harder to ignore. I'd stayed late at school for book club and I was entering my locker combination when 5 loud knocks rang off my locker door. It caught me so off guard that I tripped and fell backwards over my own shoes. My heart was beating out of my chest as I stood and approached it. As I looked up into the dark slats, a pair of eyes appeared and stared down at me. I'd never run so fast in my life.\r\nMy mom and dad didn't believe me. They thought I was making a joke out of my brother's death. After a week of tears and not being able to sleep, they believed that something had scared me. But not for a second did they believe that it was my brother's ghost.\r\nThe knocking became more insistent as time went on. It followed me at home, at school, and even the bathroom. If there was a door around, the knocks could always find me.\r\nIt was getting so bad that I couldn't sleep at night. 5 knocks off my closet door, every hour of every day. And nobody could hear the knocks but me.\r\nEventually, I couldn't take it anymore. I stood outside of my closet door and waited. 5 knocks echoed off the wood, and I did my two knocks in return.\r\nThe door creaked open revealing darkness, and a whisper came out to greet me.\r\n\"Gotcha…\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Layla and Bob" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Layla, staring at herself intently in the mirror, slipped in the coloured contact lenses – first the right, then the left, with fairly little effort.\r\nShe blinked away a few tears, and then turned to Mother.\r\nHer Mother sighed, whether at her daughter’s beauty, or the alternation of her look, now with large blue eyes, it was hard to say. The she poked her son. “See, see how lovely Layla looks? Now it’s your turn my darling, otherwise we can’t go!”\r\nBob frowned. Despite his eyebrows being threaded and dyed, they still had that full, threatening look that made people so uncomfortable. Mother wondered whether she should insist harder for him to get his eyebrows fully shaved, like her brothers now did. They said life had become much easier since they fully shaved their face, letting only a thin ridge of hair sprout timidly above their eyes. And of course, they were never seen without coloured contacts.\r\nBut Bobby was still young, and the fire in his belly had not yet died down. He was trying to grow a beard now, his teen scraggly stubble darkening his chin. Mother sighed again. Yesterday, the bus-driver had refused to let him on, but Bobby still wouldn’t shave and put in contacts.\r\n“You look creepy” he said to his sister as she fixed her blue gaze on him.\r\nLayla’s eyes, already watery, filled with tears. “Moooooom” she wailed. She was only ten after all.\r\nMother gathered Layla in her arms. “Shhhh Bobby doesn’t mean it. You look beautiful. And you can take them out when we get to auntie’s house.” She wanted to be angry at Bobby, but she couldn’t. Her darling beautiful son- he reminded her of early photos of her own father. She couldn’t help but choke up whenever she remembered his upcoming nose job.\r\nBut they couldn’t delay it much longer. Only last week, Ayse’s son had vanished- last seen walking home from work. He had been a quiet, studious guy, but he had also refused to wear coloured contact lenses, shave and get a nose job. And two days ago, Mo, her co-worker's husband had been jumped and beaten up in an alley. As for their girls-\r\nShe shook her head, physically trying to dislodge intrusive thoughts. She shook the bottled of pale foundation and smiled at her beautiful children. “Come, the light of my eyes, come!” She poured a little pale beige fluid in the palm of her hand, and in a surprise move, before he could protest, slathered the stuff on Bobby’s face. He squirmed angrily, wrinkling his nose at the chemical smell of the foundation, but submitted. Even more than eye colour, skin colour seemed to trigger violence, and he really wanted to visit his cousins and play on their new gaming system.\r\nTen minutes later, they were ready, their eyes gleaming nervously like cats, their skin pale and glossy, their hair smoothed down, ready to step outside." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Mindy and I" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I woke up, bitterly aware throughout my sleep that Mindy was dead.\r\nSleep does not bring relief from grief. And waking up is even worse.\r\nI was curled into a ball of pain and sorrow, just as sharp as that first day, when I came home from work and discovered Mindy’s small body in my bed. The fact that she had chosen to die in my bed kills me.\r\nOh and time does not heal grief either. If anything, it makes it worse, because people expect you to have gotten over it.\r\nTime makes it worse.\r\nAnd now I had that other creature to deal with. My misguided friend Julie, who should have known better, had brought me a “new cat to love” yesterday. The poor thing had bolted under the couch since and refused to come out. I put out water and food from a sense of duty, wondering how Julie could be such an idiot to think any cat could replace my Mindy, who had spent years with me, supporting me through the hardest parts of my life. Breakups, divorce, death of parents, moving, new jobs, Mindy had been there for me, perched on the armrest of my chair. What dull blank-eyed kitten could replace that?\r\nStupid Julie.\r\nI felt a ripple of anger through my body, as I stretched and yawned. Then I paused. I was griefstruck, yes, but this anger was – new?\r\nMy therapist had to taught me to name my emotions. I could clearly feel rage.\r\nStupid fucking Julie.\r\nHow dare she. How dare she bring another cat into my home, our home. We lived here. She had no right to try and replace Mindy. Mindy would always be with me, in my heart, never dead.\r\nI sprang lightly out of bed, barely noticing that it was still very dark. I could see perfectly well.\r\nMy lips pulled back as I sniffed the dark night air, smelling the unfamiliar creature. I moved swiftly to the living room.\r\nI bent and glimpsed her under the couch. We stared at each other, and I decided not to kill it.\r\nI prowled away to go and destroy Julie for bringing the new cat, even though I had decided to keep it alive. Julie had no right to do that to me and Mindy. To us.\r\nI walked quickly and quietly to her place through the night- of course I knew the way by heart. I rang her doorbell loud and hard.\r\nJulie opened the door, sleepy and confused. “Hey! What are you doing he-”\r\nShe never finished her question as I snarled and jumped for her throat. She dropped dead, rolling in her blood on her doorstep.\r\nI went back home as quickly as I came, Mindy and I. The new cat had slid out from under the couch. It sniffed the blood on my shoes.\r\nI went to bed, curling up just like Mindy used to, and fell into a deep sleep." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Me and Sarah Found A Hole" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I remember my first kiss with Sarah. We were twelve, sitting under the big oak tree in the woods behind our neighborhood. The air smelled like pine, and the sky was streaked with orange as the sun set. My heart pounded as she leaned in, her lips soft and quick against mine. It was awkward, and we both laughed after, but something changed in that moment.\r\nThen we found the hole.\r\nIt was nestled in the tree’s thick, gnarled roots, a perfect, round opening in the earth. Too round. Too deep. Like something had burrowed there, something waiting.\r\nSarah, always the brave one, grinned at me. “Bet I can fit.”\r\nI swallowed. “I dunno… looks weird.”\r\n“Scaredy-cat,” she teased, and before I could stop her, she slid inside.\r\nI waited. A few seconds passed. Then a minute.\r\n“Sarah?” My voice cracked.\r\nThen she crawled back out.\r\nSomething was wrong. Her skin looked paler, like she hadn’t seen sunlight in weeks. Her lips were dry and cracked. But the worst part was her eyes. They were still green, still Sarah’s, but something about them wasn’t right.\r\n“What were we doing?” she asked, brushing dirt off her arms.\r\nI frowned. “We kissed, remember?”\r\nShe blinked. “Oh… yeah.” But there was hesitation in her voice. Like she didn’t really remember at all.\r\nAfter that, things got strange.\r\nSarah forgot things. First, small things, where she left her bike, what day it was. Then bigger things. Sometimes she’d stop mid-sentence, looking lost. Other times, she’d stare at me like I was a stranger.\r\nI told myself it was nothing. That she was just tired. But deep down, I knew something had changed when she crawled out of that hole.\r\nStill, I loved her.\r\nYears passed, and we stayed together. We graduated, moved in together, built a life. But I never stopped thinking about that day.\r\nOn our tenth anniversary, she suggested we go back.\r\n“It’s where it all started,” she said, smiling.\r\nI hesitated. The memory of that hole never left me. But she looked so happy, so sure. So I agreed.\r\nThe tree was the same, untouched by time. And the hole was still there. Like it had been waiting.\r\nSarah turned to me, eyes bright. “Close your eyes,” she whispered. “One more kiss. For old times’ sake.”\r\nI smiled and shut my eyes.\r\nThen she shoved me.\r\nI fell hard, crashing through the dirt. My hands hit something dry. Brittle.\r\nBones.\r\nA skeleton lay curled at the bottom of the hole, its limbs twisted. The clothes were torn and faded, but I knew them.\r\nSarah’s favorite shirt. The one she wore that day.\r\nI stumbled back, shaking my head. “No… that’s not… you were with me. We grew up together. You—”\r\nI heard my own voice.\r\nA figure peered down at me. It wasn’t Sarah. It wasn’t me.\r\nBut it had my face.\r\nI heard Sarah laugh, her voice, but not hers, then my own.\r\nThen the hole closed." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Maya and Grandmother" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Maya was six when her grandmother died.\r\nA week later, Maya accidentally realised something very important.\r\nThey were in the living room. Maya was on the floor playing with her dolls and wishing her mom would play with her. Mom was seated on the couch, staring at the wall. She hadn’t been talking much since Grandmother died.\r\nMaya looked up at Mom, opened her mouth, and said “Grandmother says you should play with me.”\r\nThe response was wonderful. Mom’s eyes widened as she focused on her daughter, she got off the couch and knelt by Maya and exclaimed, “Oh my darling daughter. Grandmother said that to you?” Then she picked up Maya’s doll, tears running down her face.\r\nAfter that, Maya knew that Mom would listen to her when Grandmother asked her to do something- just like when she was alive and asked for a cookie!\r\nSometime later, Maya remembered something Grandmother had told her. She turned to Mom, opened her mouth, and said, “Grandmother said Aunt Sarah was such a pretty child. Such a pity she became fat.”\r\nAgain, the response was wonderful. Mom looked shocked, knelt down by Maya, her eyes on her daughter, and cried “Maya! How could you know that? When did Grandmother say this to you?”\r\nMaya blinked. She couldn’t remember- maybe when she was staying with Grandmother when Mom was working- Grandmother talked about fatness - or some other time- “Yesterday” said Maya. “She said it to me yesterday. When we were at the park, looking at fat children.”\r\nMom hugged Maya so tightly Maya felt her breathing stop. “Oh my precious daughter” she sobbed.\r\nMom told Aunt Sarah what Maya had said:\r\n“Look Sarah - I told you, Mother is talking to us through Maya. Tell her, Maya- tell your aunt what Grandmother told you.”\r\nMaya looked at her mother and aunt. “Grandmother told me you were such a pretty child, Aunt Sarah. Such a pity you became fat.”\r\nAunt Sarah cried out, clapping her hand to her mouth. Mom beamed at her precious daughter who could talk to Grandmother.\r\nEveryone knew Maya was special, her cousins treated her respectfully, even uncles nodded at her when they came over for family dinner.\r\nOne day a cousin told Maya that her father hurt her.\r\nMaya knew she had to stop it. She was special.\r\n“Uncle,” she said clearly during family dinner. The voices fell quiet- everyone knew that tone meant that Grandmother had a message. “Grandmother said you need to stop hurting my cousin.”\r\nThere was silence. Then Maya cried out, clutching her throat. Everyone stared at Maya, writhing in agony, trying to call for help. Through the pain, Maya thought she saw Grandmother. No-one moved.\r\nIt passed. Maya stood still. She opened her mouth, and made a noise. But no words came out.\r\nMaya could never speak again. And after she learned to communicate with no voice, she never talked about Grandmother and Grandmother’s children, ever again." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Perfectly Clean and Regular Water" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My nap lasted approximately ninety seconds before the screaming started.\r\nGreat, now I’m gonna be tired on my date.\r\nUnfortunately ghosts don’t have lungs, so they can pretty much scream as long as they want. Night, day, doesn’t matter. If they wanna wail they will.\r\nMy ghost’s name is Alfred Barton. At least, I think that’s who he is. Despite my many desperate pleas Alfred won’t talk to me (unless screaming counts).\r\nAlfred is haunting the house that I own, and he’s emphatically trying to scare me off. We are currently in a war of attrition to see who cracks first.\r\nI hop in the shower to clean myself up. I’m hoping the cold water will help me wake up as well. I’m under the water for approximately ninety seconds before I hear the pipes groaning in the walls, and I duck right before the blood starts spraying out of the showerhead.\r\nGreat, now I’m gonna stink on my date.\r\nApparently Alfred was a solitary guy in life. He had a family, but my best guess is they hated him. People with loving families don’t become vengeful spirits. That’s pretty much reserved for angry, spiteful, assholes, which is exactly who I’m dealing with.\r\nPersonally, I don’t think it’s fair. Alfred can scream all night long, or make blood run from the faucets, but I can’t do anything to him. He’s dead. It’s not like I can wait until he falls asleep and scream in his ear. Frankly, he’s got nothing to lose.\r\nAt least, that’s probably what he thinks.\r\nThe doorbell rings and I answer the door and greet my date: Annie Barton. I invite her in so I can use the bathroom before we go to a Monster Movie Double Feature at the Cineplex.\r\nThere’s a chill in the air and I know that Alfred is watching, which is good. I want him to see who I’m dating.\r\nYou’d be surprised what you can find out about someone by looking at their Instagram page. Their relatives, where they go to grad school, the Coffee Shop they work at on the corner of 5th and Main.\r\nWith all that information, all I had to do was let the air out of one of her tires and wait. That’s all it took for us to meet! I helped her put on the spare, we struck up a conversation, and she offered to buy me a cup of coffee as thanks. Now we’re dating!\r\nI really like her, I might even end up marrying her if she gives me the chance.\r\nOr, maybe I’ll chop her up into little pieces and bury her under the floorboards so Alfred can have some company.\r\nI haven’t decided.\r\nOr, I should say Alfred hasn’t decided yet, because it all depends on his actions.\r\nI say all of this out loud in the bathroom so Alfred knows I mean business, and then I turn on the sink.\r\nPerfectly clean and regular water.\r\nLooks like I won." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Lucy And The Ghost" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I realised there was a ghost in my window after Lucy moved out.\r\nI was slumped in my couch, aching with missing her, and then – you know how you feel when someone staring is at you, and look over and someone actually is? That happened. I could feel eyes on me, I looked around, and there she was, her reflection in our fifth-floor apartment window.\r\nMy. My apartment. Lucy had moved out by then.\r\nI stood up, I might have cried out. I don’t know why Lucy left, some bullshit about growing out of the relationship or whatever.\r\nI went over to the window, which looked over a narrow alley and snowy roofs. Our apartment building was in a street mostly with townhouses.\r\nMy. My apartment building.\r\nAnyway, the face in the window didn’t budge, or blink. Just stared. I stared back.\r\nI couldn’t tell if the face was outside the window, or in the window, if that makes sense. On impulse, I opened the window. Wind howled in from the steet0lit darkness. I quickly pulled the window close again.\r\nHer face glimmered back into the glass, backlit from the streetlight.\r\nAnd then I noticed- I’m not a noticing sort, which Lucy had pointed out but not while she was leaving, it seemed to take such a long time too, from when she said I’m leaving you, to when she actually banged out of the apartment dragging her suitcase, like an eternity-\r\nOh right, I noticed her hair. It was all done up fancy, and there were lights- no, sparkles, like jewels in her hair.\r\nAnd then, as I stared and she stared back, tears running down her pale cheeks, it clicked.\r\nShe was a bride. She was done up similar to girls at their weddings- we had been to my cousin’s wedding a few months back, Lucy and I, and I remember the hair and the sparkling jewels curving around her forehead. Kinda sexy. I had joked with Lucy she should wear her hair like that, and she had snapped “that’s not funny Charles”.\r\nCome to think of it, things kind of went downhill between us after the wedding. I asked her if she wanted to get married, and she said, “that’s not what this is about” and screwed up her mouth. I had felt like banging my head against the wall in frustration. “Then just tell me” I had yelled, begged.\r\nThe girl opened her mouth and I remembered my living room was haunted. She looked like Lucy, but different.\r\n“Lucy?” I faltered, reaching my hand to the window. She also raised her hand, and through the touch of the glass I felt her fingers, warm and reassuring.\r\nShe had never left me after all! A flood of relief burst through my heart. She would always be here, in my line of vision. Who cared if she was trapped in a window, she was here, with me, and she would always stay." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Time and Crime" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“I didn’t do it! I didn’t kill her! ” Peter yelled on the video.\r\nI turned to Amanda. Soon, we would be on our mission. Or, technically, at 1pm last Thursday.\r\nOur job is to prove criminals guilty using time travel. We follow them, take note of their locations and the evidence they leave. Then we tell our bosses, reporting the location of evidence only the suspect could place. We have to be discreet, any wrong move could alter the timeline.\r\nToday’s assignment: Peter Daniel. Accused of murdering his girlfriend Marra. The theory states that Peter lured her into the woods, shot her, and carried her into her car, shattering the window to make it look like a robbery gone wrong. She fell into a pile of leaves, in which her blood was found. But according to Peter, he went for a jog on a nearby hiking trail.\r\nAmanda turned to me, dressed in hikers clothes. “This is pointless. This motherfucker is so guilty. His hair was found in the leaves, for fucks sake. And his gun was in the glove compartment.”\r\n“Well then this will be a quick assignment. He’ll have left something.”\r\nWe headed to the traveller’s room. We scanned our fingerprints, entered the machine and travelled to last Thursday.\r\nWe walked down the short path towards Peter’s car. Peter jogged by, smiling at us. We politely smiled back. Amanda’s face dropped.\r\n“James.” She said, looking like she saw a ghost. “Peter was right. He didn’t kill Marra.”\r\n“What?”\r\n“He’s headed to the trail. He’s going to be there for the next two hours. He has no time to kill her.”\r\nI could feel myself getting pale. “Then who the fuck kills her? No one else is around.”\r\n“Nobody kills her. She’s waiting in the car. And she will be until her returns. And when we return, we’ll go to prison for unauthorised time travel. The timeline will be fucked. There’s no point in us travelling if nothing happened.” She sat down on the bench nearby, head in her hands.\r\nI stared down the street. There she was, Marra, waiting in her car, scrolling on her phone. I looked to Amanda. We were fucked.\r\nBut then she looked up.\r\n“Unless we kill her.”\r\n“WHAT? No! We can’t!”\r\nShe stood up, a plan had formed.\r\n“You tell her I’m injured. She’ll follow you to the leaves. Meanwhile I break the window, steal the gun and take a few hairs from his hat.” She pointed the car window, a small beanie visible.\r\n“Then you shoot her, carry her to the car. We wipe down every surface, we have a few hours until he returns. We mix up the leaves, add the hairs, hide the hat in a tree. We wipe down the gun, put it in the glove compartment. Then we travel back, tell them about the hat. Hopefully it’s like our timeline.”\r\nIt could work. It had to work. We had no other option.\r\nAnything to keep my job." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Brad and Ruby." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The car came to an abrupt halt, followed by a deep sigh from Brad.\r\n“I’m sick of this shit.” He didn’t try to mutter under his breath, instead he screamed it, sending a sense of dread through Ruby.\r\nShe glanced over to the backseat, making sure their little girl was okay.\r\nSophia smiled back at her mother, oblivious to the rising tension in the car.\r\nRuby cooed at her daughter, giving her a wave, blowing her a kiss.\r\n“Brad..” Ruby began, desperately thinking of ways to diffuse the situation, calm her husband.\r\nShe was cut off instantly, dismissively, by a wave of Brad’s hand.\r\n“I. Am. Sick. Of. This. Shit.” He repeated, slowly and meanly. His once kind eyes bore hatred into his wife.\r\nHe threw open his door and got out, ignoring Ruby’s increasing anxiety as she begged to know what he was doing.\r\nBrad tore open the door to the backseat, grabbing Sophia’s blanket, her baby bag with nappies and a change of clothes.\r\nHe flung those items out to the ground with a growl of anger, hastily attempting to unclip the carseat their daughter sat in.\r\nRuby was out of the car, a sickening game of tug and war ensued, Brad trying to rip out the car seat, Ruby desperately trying to keep it secured in the car.\r\n“Please, you’re scaring her!” Ruby tried to reason, tears streaming down her face. “You’re going to hurt her!”\r\nBrad growled inhumanly, his features contorting to something evil and ugly.\r\nHe smiled! A sad, strange smile, but a smile nonetheless.\r\nRuby felt physically ill. She was married to a monster.\r\nDespite her efforts, Ruby couldn’t match Brad’s strength, and within a moment, the carseat was unclipped and flung through the air, crashing down with a thud onto the road.\r\nNow it was Ruby’s turn to scream inhumanly. She ran to the crumpled carseat, screaming her daughters name, while Brad watched on, emotionless.\r\n“I’m sick of this shit, Ruby. I can’t do this anymore. I thought I was stronger, that I could be there for you.. but I can’t do it. Not like this.”\r\nRuby didn’t, couldn’t respond. Her husband had lost his mind. She felt numb with shock at what had just happened.\r\nBrad sighed at Ruby’s lack of response, and quietly went on, “I love you, Rubes. Always have. But our daughter died a year ago. I can’t keep pretending she’s still here, like nothing ever happened. I can’t hear you talk to an empty car seat anymore.”\r\nRuby held the baby born doll, gently and carefully, singing lullabies as she rocked it to 'sleep'.\r\nShe was comfortable in her new home.\r\nThe white padded walls made her feel safe.\r\nAn unread letter from her husband, courtesy of the county jail, sat on a table next to her.\r\nBegging for forgiveness she couldn’t give.\r\nShe wished so badly she had listened when the doctor said Brad’s new medication could cause delusions." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I kidnap and kill Uber drivers" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I have an urge to kill that always needs to be satisfied, and my technique is flawless.\r\nHaven’t been caught, not yet. The thrill is invigorating.\r\nIt really is very simple. I Identify a certain part of the country where I wanna start, I find a random bystander, I ask them if they can order me an Uber as my phone is dead, they usually say yes. The Uber arrives and I get in the back seat.\r\nThis is the part where I give them a really far location that is obsolete from any civilization. Most of them actually got nervous and jokingly asked if they were being kidnapped. I always changed my answer to test out what scared the shit out of them more. I had fun with that.\r\nWhen we do arrive, I usually kill them very slowly. I’d bring out my gun and order them to exit the car, I’d then give them a knife and tell them to stab themselves. I’d warn them that if they didn’t, I’d torture and kill them. You’d be surprised how many people just surrender and actually do it. Humanity is hilarious. I’d then just dump the body and use their car to get out of that place.\r\nWhen I tell you it’s perfect, it really is. I’ve done this 13 times now and it has never failed me.\r\nThe police however have picked up on this. They call me the “Uber Terrorizer”. They still have no leads, but they identified a pattern, and alerted the public.\r\nMade my ritual harder, but the thrill has never been so intoxicating.\r\nIt was time for me to kill again. I found some innocent looking kid on the street and asked him to order me an Uber. He was reluctant, but I always knew how to look harmless, and he agreed.\r\nWhen the Uber arrived I shared my drop off point with him, it was an alligator swamp. Luckily, this idiot didn’t get suspicious at all.\r\nWhen we got close to the location he missed the exit.\r\n“You missed it” I said.\r\n“I know.” He said as he abruptly stopped the car in the rural part of this town.\r\n“What are you doing?”\r\n“I’m gonna need you to get out of the car.”\r\n“No asshole” I pulled out my gun.\r\n“He suddenly pushed the seat back into me very hard, causing me to drop my weapon.\r\n“My lucky stars!!! You must be the Uber Terrorizer” He said as he broke into laughter.\r\n“Who the fuck are you?” I said as I was being crushed under the seat.\r\n“I’ll actually be doing this world a kindness for once. I like to call myself the ‘The One-Way Courier’’”\r\nHe got out his own gun, then he turned around and faced me. He shot all his ammo down into the seat, I think I got hit with all the bullets.\r\nI could see my own guts.\r\n“Terrorizer my ass” I faintly heard as everything went dark." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Alphanz Prison: Secure and Contain" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Masks on.”\r\nSpecial operating procedures. Reason: to avoid antagonising the other inmates. One of the prison guards died last week, got too cocky. The clean-up crew spent weeks scrubbing scarlet spit off their uniforms.\r\nWe got there at 2700 hours. We were lost mice even here, even when we were here many times before, guided by harried howls that rattled the walls and vibrated around the corners. The stone-hewn floor was slippery, wet perhaps with the crimson juice they so craved for.\r\n“Almost there now.”\r\nCaptain Brian spoke as if his throat was parched. He gestured with his tentacles towards some of the cells. The omnirium bars rattled in response. A five-fingered limb flopped through one of them, asking for alms.\r\nI turned away. One of their many tricks.\r\n”We better split up,” Captain Brian said. It had been an hour. None of the targets were procured yet.\r\nI retreated my steps before daring to plunge back into the labyrinth. Sickly yellow light curved through the corners, revealing more corridor. I kept my eyes peeled for the escapees but it was hard; low light levels made it nearly impossible and my species was not blessed with night vision.\r\nStill, there were only five of them. Secure. Contain. Get out before you go insane.\r\nHere they rattled the omnirium more, their cries exploding in volume, now evolving into begs, shrieks, pleas. Incoherent still, lamenting their fates here perhaps, fates they rightfully deserved. Another shadow darted into view, scaling the walls opposite me and sliding back down.\r\n“Come out here!” I roared. This was no time for games.\r\nA whimper. The walls rumbled apart. Much to my surprise, they had answered my call.\r\nA pair of eyes glinting in the sickly yellow light. A pair of hands clutching the stone. A face, round as the moon. Lips smeared with crimson.\r\nIt blinked. The mouth moved. “Please..I want to go home…”\r\nFor a second I thought of what home meant to it. Smoke rising from chimneys. Laughter. Joy. Friends and family. My hearts melted.\r\nThen I shook my heads. I won’t be led astray. Not today.\r\nI lifted my blaster, and pumped—once, twice, three times. The darts melted into its skin and it fell out of the walls. It was harmless in this form, about as threatening as a sock puppet, but for good measure I gave it a hard, solid kick. Its small frame crashed into the stone; its detached limbs skittered across the ground.\r\nOne down.\r\nFour more to go." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Body and Blood Shed for Steve" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Steve hated being paired up with Jess, because Jess liked to play with the bodies.\r\nEveryone else in the gang avoided violence if they could, knowing it was safer to get in, burglarize a home, and get out. Of course, if some unwitting person stumbled upon you in the middle of the job, then you did what you had to do. Steve had no problem with that.\r\nBut it sure felt like Jess happened to have someone stumble upon him more than everybody else did.\r\n—\r\nSteve, despite having grown into a degenerate, had been raised a good Christian. Some nights he lay awake, terrified of God’s judgement.\r\nOn those nights he would tell himself he was just stealing from rich assholes. He wasn’t like Jess.\r\nBut he knew the truth. By letting Jess continue to defile the bodies of their victims, he was signing off on the behavior.\r\nAnd God was going to judge him for that.\r\n—\r\n“Oh Steeeeeeve!”\r\nThe call from one of the bedrooms in the house they were currently ransacking sickened Steve. Jess had something to show him.\r\nSteve pushed the bedroom door open and peered inside.\r\nWhen he saw what Jess was doing to the little boy and little girl that shared the room, he pulled his gun.\r\nBang. Bang. Bang.\r\nThree bullets later, and Jess and the children had each been put out of their own unique flavors of misery.\r\nSteve should have done that years ago, though, and he knew that acting now wasn’t enough for God to forgive him completely. He would need to do something more…something to show God just how much this was a turning point for him.\r\nHe thought of Jesus on the cross, dying to save the whole world from their sin. Jesus, who was crucified with two criminals on crosses next to him.\r\nSteve considered the three dead bodies in the room.\r\nHis mother had always told him that without Jesus being nailed to that cross, humanity would have been doomed to eternal hellfire. Jesus and the criminals being crucified was a necessary act of violence.\r\nSteve kept staring at the bodies.\r\n—\r\nWhen he returned an hour later with the bag full of long metal nails, Steve couldn’t help but feel a little like Jess, playing with his victims.\r\nThis was different, though. This was a necessary act to cleanse him, to put all his sin onto Jess.\r\nThis act would serve the exact same purpose as the crucifixion of Jesus. The only difference was scale. Jesus’s death saved the entire world from their sin, while Jess and the kids would be more of a one-off thing, redeeming Steve alone. Sort of a personal pan pizza of salvation compared to Jesus’s family-size pie.\r\nSteve felt the guilt he had long harbored begin to lift immediately. There was just one little nagging fear he couldn’t shake.\r\nHe lined up a nail with the girl’s ankles.\r\n“No resurrecting in three days,” he said softly." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My in-laws are narcissists and here’s why…" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I first suspected something was wrong when I found my mother-in-law rearranging our living room—while I was still sitting in it.\r\n“This couch needs to face the door,” she said, dragging it across the hardwood. “It’s bad energy otherwise.”\r\nI glanced at my husband, Tom, expecting him to intervene, but he only smiled, nodding along. That was the moment I realized: this was normal for him.\r\nBut that was just the beginning.\r\nThe real horror started after we had our first child.\r\n“You need to name him Gregory,” my father-in-law, a towering man with a voice like cracked ice, insisted the moment we announced our pregnancy.\r\n“But we were thinking of something different—”\r\n“Gregory is a strong name,” he interrupted, giving Tom a look. “A family name.”\r\nTom sighed. “We should at least consider it.”\r\nThey moved in after the baby was born. Not officially, but they were always there. Hovering. Correcting. My mother-in-law redid the nursery without asking, replacing the soft blues with deep burgundies—“More regal,” she explained. My father-in-law took over bedtime stories, reading my son their childhood favorites, the kind of books where the moral was always obedience.\r\nThen came the nights. I would wake to the baby monitor crackling to life, hearing voices when no one should have been in the room.\r\nOne night, I crept down the hall, heart pounding. When I pushed the door open, there they were—both of them—standing over my son’s crib.\r\n“Shh,” my mother-in-law cooed, brushing her fingers over my son’s forehead. “He’s ours now.”\r\nI froze. “What the hell are you doing?”\r\nThey turned to me, eerily calm.\r\n“You should go back to sleep, dear,” my father-in-law said. “It’s best for everyone.”\r\nThat’s when I noticed something—a dark smear on my son’s tiny hand. I lunged forward, pulling him into my arms. The smell of something old clung to him. Ash. Soil. Decay.\r\nI looked down. His fingers were curled around something—a lock of hair. Not baby hair. Gray. Brittle.\r\nI ran.\r\nTom didn’t believe me. “They were just checking on him,” he said. “They’re trying to help.”\r\nBut I saw the way his hands shook.\r\nThe next night, I locked the nursery door.\r\nAt 3 a.m., the baby monitor flickered on again. This time, the voices were inside my head.\r\n\"You should go back to sleep.\"\r\n\"He’s ours now.\"\r\nI checked the monitor. The nursery door was open.\r\nThe crib was empty.\r\nAnd the closet door was slightly ajar." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Son Has Been Skipping Class and I found Out The Horrible Reason Why" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My son has been skipping his classes lately. This is unusual as he's usually a high-performing student with a 3.9 GPA. I understand middle school is a hard time for him, and I do offer to sit down and listen to any issue he has. He never lets me in on what's going on. I've been giving him distance these past 3 days so he can hopefully fix this issue on his own, whatever it is. It wasn't until today that I got a call from his school with the worried voice of his math teacher. My son threatened to harm a student who reportedly bullies him on a daily basis. He's been getting beaten by bullies at school in places like his chest and stomach where me and my wife wouldn't see it.\r\nThis explains why he's been skipping certain classes, he does so to avoid the kids that bully him. I still don't understand why he hasn't told me or what's keeping him from asking for help. I went to the school a few hours later only to be met with the typical \"We'll do the best to put an end to this\" conversation from the poor excuse of a principal the school has. There's nothing they'll do, they always fall short when it comes to protecting these kids. My sister had to deal with the parents of my niece's bullies a year ago personally just so the bullying would stop. I suppose I should follow in her place and do the same.\r\nWell, a day has passed, and I found out two 7th graders have been pushing my son around. I also found out these are neglectful parents who don't care about their sons or what they do. This has been encouraging horrible behavior. I don't understand how parents can ignore their children and let them roam around doing whatever they want. This stops immediately. During parent-teacher conferences, I got the name of the bully's parents. Found out their address, which is a mere 2 miles away as I had tailed them. My son is in his room like usual trying to shake off the day's events of getting bullied.\r\nI have my card keys and gun right now, putting an end to this once and for all. Those parents don't deserve to be around as a bad influence on their kids anymore." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I felt some sympathy for Arbiter McPhail. He looked tired, stressed and his wife was sick." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Settle down, please; I appreciate this is not good news…”\r\nThe auditorium was packed to the rafters. Orange light spilled from the stage where the Arbiter stood, his hands raised in an attempt at silencing the rowdy, anxious crowd.\r\n“Another person will need to leave…” Arbiter McPhail continued.\r\nSomeone was going to be banished to the Wastelands again, which was in effect a death sentence. It was too hot, too toxic on the surface to survive for any length of time.\r\nBut people were starving. Rations had been halved.\r\nFor the good of the Colony, something had to be done.\r\n“For fairness' sake, there will be another lottery…”\r\nBut we had heard this speech before.\r\nThe atmosphere turned febrile. A din of angry voices drowned him out.\r\n\r\nStood in the queue for rations, the lottery was the only topic of conversation. Whispers, like razor blades, cut through the underlying tension.\r\nMandy, my wife, had a laugh that could do the same.\r\n“Why aren’t you more worried?” I heard her friend, Goody Myers, ask.\r\nMandy just shrugged. She could be so sanguine about things - to a fault at times.\r\nI’d been chatting with Engineer Dalton, one of the Colony’s mechanics. He’d been describing how much worse the conditions on the surface were getting after working on the Big Door recently.\r\nAt the front of the queue, Subordinate James took my C-Card and scanned it.\r\nC-Cards, or Citizen-Cards, detailed your ID number, ration quota, dwelling details and emergency data, like your blood type and donor status. He read the ration details and then flipped it over cursorily, before passing it back.\r\n“Citizen 229,” he called. Mandy’s turn.\r\nI watched his brow crease as he studied her C-Card for a moment too long.\r\n“Move along,” he ordered, in a bored, practiced way, leaving me feeling oddly relieved.\r\n\r\nOn the day of the lottery, we all made our way to the auditorium.\r\nMandy wasn’t with us. She’d been \"seconded\" to another Role three days ago.\r\nI went to stand near the front, hoping Mandy would already be there. We always stood in the same place.\r\nEngineer Dalton was deep in conversation with Citizen 009, otherwise known as Pete.\r\n“The Big Door hasn’t opened for months,” Engineer Dalton rasped. “That’s what we’ve been trying to repair.”\r\n“So what’s been happening after the Lotteries?” Pete asked, but no answer was forthcoming. The crowd hushed as Arbiter McPhail took the stage.\r\nDespite the graveness of the situation, he looked happy. Relieved, even. It became clear why when he waved Goody McPhail onto the stage with him, who smiled warmly at the crowd.\r\nShe looked well. Recovered.\r\nWincing slightly, she took a seat at the Arbiter’s side.\r\nShe’d had surgery, they explained. A transplant.\r\nThen it was time to announce the result of the lottery.\r\nA deathly silence fell over the hall.\r\n“Citzen 229,” the Arbiter called." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The widow and I walked through the graveyard, arm in arm. It felt good to be with someone so down to earth again." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Jane smiled, staring up at the church as we strode between the pretty lines of graves. “Mal and I used to come here often. It was one of our favourite places.”\r\nJane squeezed my arm, causing my heart to skip.\r\nIt was a dry, autumnal evening and except for the call of the odd songbird, the only other sound was the click of our soles on the ancient cobbles. It was nearly dusk.\r\n“Why?” I asked. Jane seemed slightly taken aback. “Why was this one of your favourite places?”\r\n“Ah,” she smiled. “It’s just so…peaceful. The air’s heavy, but in a calm way. Do you feel it?”\r\nShe closed her eyes. The lines at their corners and around her mouth smiled faintly.\r\nShe’s beautiful, I thought guiltily, keenly aware that it had been five lonely years since my wife passed.\r\n“That’s what connects us to the past, that heaviness.”\r\nA breeze chased a volley of rust-coloured leaves around our ankles. Letting go of my arm, Jane performed a gracious pirouette that mimicked the shifting movement of the leaves, her silver hair billowing in tandem with her orange scarf.\r\n“We were always dancers…” she sighed sadly. All of a sudden, her eyes had a glazed, inward look.\r\nI tried to change the subject.\r\n“It’s like everyone in the old days was called Edward,” I smiled, staring at the rows of ivy-covered graves.\r\nBut Jane was…different all of a sudden.\r\nHer body language was strange. Hunched. Like she was in pain.\r\nOh, I thought, experiencing a wave of pity. She’d joked about going “a bit senile” on her profile, but I’d assumed it was just that - a joke.\r\nShe flinched as I placed a hand on her back.\r\nThen she drifted away, muttering to herself as she moved between the graves.\r\nDutifully, I followed.\r\nThen she stopped.\r\nThe sun had just begun to dip below the treeline. I suddenly felt cold.\r\n“Maybe we should g-go,” I stammered, taking a step backwards - but Jane grabbed my arm.\r\n“You seem like a nice enough man,” she grizzled, “but you’re not my Malcolm.”\r\nAnd in that moment, I hated Malcolm - whoever he was. Whoever he’d been. I would've danced on his grave.\r\n“We should get you home now, Jane,” I nodded, talking slowly and softly.\r\nBut then she seemed to switch again. She opened up suddenly - like the lights behind her eyes had come back on.\r\nSensing my disappointment, I watched a tear roll down her cheek.\r\n“I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “It’s just been so…hard. But it will only work if…”\r\n“Will only work if what?” I asked sharply.\r\n“If the soul taken holds a mirror to your own,” she whispered, as a hand burst from the earth beneath my feet, pulling me down into the darkness of Malcolm’s grave." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Blood and Honey" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Everyone said Jacob was a blessing to Absalom's Rest. When his father spent all night throwing up blood beneath the atemporal hive, it was Jacob who refilled the bowl of bargaining with blessed honey. It was Jacob who fished the casino chips out of the vomit.\r\nWe built a new barn with the money I brought back from cashing those chips in - The ewes seemed to love Jacob even more than they loved me, though I understood why. He had a special song he sang to the new spring lambs. It only had four words: You're all so pure, you're all so pure.\r\nEvery year that went by Jacob sang the same song. Lambs were born, grew older and so did we. Absalom’s Rest was blessed and sacrificed with equal measure. New, healed members expanded our stakes. Most survived. I was constantly occupied with service, but never too busy to notice Jacob by my side. His gaze was a warmth that never grew cold. Even with an understanding of my foreordination, Jacob was the secret hope that screamed inside of me.\r\nMy Father says Jacob traded without faith and this is what caused it all. I've spent a long time looking around Jacob's room, the barn, and even the place in the road where months of rain still haven't managed to wash away all the blood, and I've seen faith everywhere. Faith in God, faith in my father, faith in the Thing that shines in every color of light when your eyes are closed.\r\nJacob won't talk to me now. The jail cell he sits in smells like rust and unwashed bodies. He won't respond when I ask him why he never leaves my mind, why I can't stop imagining the softness of his touch, or hearing the sound of our unborn children's voices. Even when I ask him why the handle of the boning knife was sticky with honey he will not meet my eyes.\r\nToday, I’m going to the atemporal hive. I will not drink its blessed honey. Instead I will remove my modest closing and wrap my naked self around its waxy skin. With every sting, I will tighten my grasp until I get my desired result. I did not spend my life witnessing without seeing. I know fair exchange.\r\nGive him back, I will demand. You cannot trade what was already given." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Mr and Mrs Ghai met each other when they were 19." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "And as most stories go, they fell in love quite instantly. He had a gorgeous voice. She had a laughter that would brighten up your day. They had a lot of things in common, too. Both hummed to the tunes of Pink Floyd, both knew the dialogues to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid like the back of their hands, both played the violin so mesmerizingly that could soothe your soul, both loved reading Stephen King. But the one thing that was the most interestingly common between them was that both of them were born without eyesight. As love kept blooming each day, the two lovebirds eventually got married. Mr Ghai taught poetry at a school for the visually challenged, Mrs Ghai taught violin at the same school. Life felt, if I were to say, like a fairy tale to them.\r\nNow the Ghais were 30, and pretty eager to start a little family of their own. But the elephant in the room was, what if the baby would be born blind too? The Ghais knew how tough life had been for them, and how hard they had worked to reach wherever they were in life. They most certainly did not want a troublesome life for their child. But overcome by emotions, they decided to give it a try nevertheless. Maybe God decided to play fair this time - the Ghais welcomed a beautiful baby boy, who had his father's dimple and his mother's million dollar smile. The cherry on the cake? He had complete visibility. It took them a while to get adjusted to looking after the baby, but they were determined to be the best parents for their boy.\r\nThe baby was the light of their life, but I guess Fate was a bit jealous. One day, when the Ghais returned home from school, they couldn't find their child. Pretty shattered, they reached out for help. But it was all in vain. The nanny had a strong alibi, and eventually when the police reached a dead end, they closed the case.\r\nDown the line, they started reaching out to private investigators. The first guy that they contacted assured them that their son would be in their arms in no time. The next thing they knew, they were robbed of almost half of their money. Another guy told them that he had closed in on the details of their son's whereabouts. Turned out, he just needed the money to pay off his gambling debts. Over a span of 20 years, the Ghais had invested on at least 18 investigators.\r\nIf only they knew that the baby had run in front of a car while playing, the owner of which had dumped the baby in his backyard instead of reporting the accident to the police." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "In Sickness and In Health" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Maria gazed across the orange-hued room as the clock ticked over another second. 5:47:53, 47+53 is 100, 100 divides by 5, and she felt the hint of a smile tug at her lips as the clock ticked once again. The evening sun's glare obscured her view, but the numbers were pleasant regardless. Temporarily balanced, she declared silently, then startled as a slam rocked the table.\r\n“Are you even fucking listening to me?” John screamed, and she straightened, lowering her eyes. She racked her brain, struggling to remember which sin she had allegedly committed this time. Was he yelling about how she never cleaned his house again? Or was it that she’d dared to ask what he’d done today? Had he found a new flaw to berate her for? He took a deep breath, and she quickly interjected.\r\n“Of course I am, honey. I’m sorry. And I know you’re right. I will do better for you,” she cooed, her voice a well-rehearsed blend of hollow and honey. Too saccharine and she was laughing at him, too empty and she was insincere. She took care to blink slowly, to slow her breathing. If she spoke too fast, she was argumentative, condescending. It wasn’t really what she said, she’d learned, just how she said it.\r\n“You stupid whore; you’ve always been useless; I wish we had never met; you’ve been insufferable from the beginning,” looped in her mind, joining the background noise of his voice as he began to critique how useless her apology was. She knew, rationally, that he was just overwhelmed. That he didn’t mean it. Come morning, he will have forgotten, and will greet her with bleary eyes and the sweetest “good morning, baby” she’s ever heard. She allowed herself to briefly fall into the warmth of that knowledge, letting its comfort swaddle her the way his arms used to.\r\nThe sun’s final light dimmed, and with it, his voice softened; Maria took a bit more solace in knowing that their feud would soon come to an end. He had never been a night owl, and where in their youth she had joked that he was dreadfully boring for never staying up late with her, it was now possibly the only sliver of his personality she adored. The room fell silent, and she took that as her cue.\r\n“Come on now, baby. Let’s get to bed,” she murmured softly, sliding his cane into his hand as she glanced at the clock. 7:02:39. Twenty hours of peace. She frowned briefly at the asymmetry before helping him to bed, tucking him in with a soft kiss. She slipped out the door, and found herself facing a woman in the hall.\r\n“Maria! It’s truly so kind of you to still visit him,” the woman exclaimed, the implications thinly veiled behind her exhausted smile.\r\n“Of course, Dr. Thompson. Til death do we part, right?” she smiled, before setting off down the fluorescent-lined hall.\r\nAt least now he’s only like this at sundown." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Made 3 Wishes With a Genie and It Ended Up Horrible" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I found a genie lamp a few weeks ago, sounds fake, I know. It was in some dusty old antique shop down the road, the owner of the shop gave it to me for only 5 dollars and said it was just some dumb prop that was taking up space in his shop. Little did I know my greed would be my downfall upon the wishes I requested.\r\nWish 1: I did the classic wish of eternal youth and my age reverted back to 25. I spent days in agony as my cells reversed their age and my body went through changes. My skin was tightening, my complexion was becoming clearer, better memory, a more active immune system, years of stress being scraped away, etc. If that wasn't the worst part, I noticed my friends getting older. It was almost like the wish was stealing years of life from my family, friends, and everyone I knew to add to my own.\r\nWish 2: I wished for 1 Billion dollars in cash directly in my bank account. This one turned out horrible. From various sources like drug trades, illegal gambling, and robberies, I gained 1 Billion dollars, but I was soon to be a wanted criminal. All of these sources of illegal money laundering would be traced back into my name despite me not committing the acts that got me the money.\r\nWish 3: This was the worst of all. I asked for a wife who is crazy loyal to me and would never leave me. It was nice at first, she was the perfect wife. Cooking, cleaning, etc. But just talking to female co-workers got her riled up, even female family members got her jealous to toxic levels. I've seen people in my life who are female vanish with their bodies showing up on the news beyond recognition.\r\nI'm not a wanted fugitive, younger than I've ever been, and have a crazy wife tracking me down to lock me up in a room, chain me to a wall, and keep me all to herself as if I'm some human pet." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "1,867 days since I was taken from my parents, and I’m still a prisoner." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Bear.”\r\nI was nicknamed “Bear” because of my pajamas I was wearing upon arrival.\r\nI wore them under my uniform to stay warm, but it didn't stop the name calling.\r\nAlex, the closest person I had to a friend, pressed his face against the bars of my cage. “I swiped them from the head nurse,” he muttered, sliding a small baggie of pills through the bars.\r\n“Take two, and lie on your back.”\r\nHe groaned, thick brown hair falling in his eyes. “You need to make a scene, dude.”\r\nThat's what I did. After lights out, I popped two pills. I thought they wouldn’t work at first, but when I tried to get up, my body wouldn’t… move.\r\nWhen I started choking up pink froth, willing myself to scream, to cry for help, guards were already grabbing me, hauling me out of my cell. “Jesus fuck, Bear! What have you done to yourself?!”\r\nSniper, one of the guards I was friendly with, pinned my arms down. I could just make out Alex watching, his eyes wide.\r\nAlyssa winked at me, her smile hopeful.\r\nRoman was already backing into his cell.\r\nI hoped my distraction was good enough.\r\nMy body was convulsing by the time I was slammed onto a metal gurney, my jerking wrists tied down.\r\nMasked faces floated around me, their voices frantic. Something plastic was plunged down my throat, a needle slicing into my arm. The passage of time was… weird. I was pretty sure I’d passed out.\r\nWhen I opened my eyes, I was staring wide-eyed at clinical white ceiling tiles.\r\nI was no longer strapped down. I sat up, blinking rapidly.\r\nThe small white room was familiar. I recognized the plastic chair I was forced onto for weekly therapy sessions.\r\nI was in the nurse’s office.\r\nExcitement wriggled its way up my throat.\r\nI’d made it.\r\nSwinging my legs, I slipped off the bed, my gaze glued to the alarm.\r\nIf I pulled it, the emergency protocol would be triggered, and every cell would open.\r\nStarting toward it, I stopped. I was standing in something.\r\nBlood.\r\nIt was wet and red, stretching across the floor.\r\nI found the source—a bed just like mine. There was a body still strapped to it, and I knew her. Evangeline.\r\nI knew her thick blonde curls, now matted and dyed red, scarlet strands glued to her face. Her head looked… wrong. The girl’s eyes were wide, her skull sawn open, pinkish brain matter glistening under the clinical white light.\r\nWhen the girl blinked, I stumbled back, a cry ripping from my throat.\r\nEvangeline surprised me with a giggle.\r\n“So beautiful,” she whispered, slowly raising her blood stained hands. “She’s so… beautiful. Oh, my goodness! Look at her hands! So smooth! So moisturized!”\r\n“Indeed, Mrs. Playwright.”\r\nThe gruff voice startled me.\r\nSniper grabbed my face, cradling my cheeks, his breath heavy against my skin.\r\n“Green eyes, Bear,” he chuckled, stroking my cheek. “I do love me some greeeeeeen eyes.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I will Love Him, Forever and ever" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I checked my watch. My darling son will be asleep now, and Damned Wife off with her Bitch friends carousing, instead of caring for my son.\r\nAlthough, I am grateful for monthly girls’ night out, for it allows me these precious moments with my son, who I will always love, forever.\r\nI love him so much. Ever since I laid eyes on him as a baby. And as he grew older, my love grew stronger, right along with him. When he had tantrums and screamed for toys he had lost. When he got angry about school and trashed my plants. When he partied all night, leaving me up sick with worry. When he trashed the house with his friends when I had to travel for work. Through it all, I loved him and every night, when he was finally home and safe in bed, I would quietly go to his bed and watch him breathe softly. He is always my baby, it didn’t matter how big he got, I would scoop him out of bed, cuddle him and murmur how much I love him, for ever and forever.\r\nHe is a heavy sleeper. His father was like that too. Wouldn’t wake up if a gun went off next to him hahaha we used to joke hahaha\r\nOne day he met and married DW.\r\nI tried to keep them close to me. But no, they had to move to the other side of town. That damned woman, stealing my precious boy away.\r\nI should be grateful they’re in the same city at least, my few mom friends told me- most of their children having “flown the nest”, moving to other cities or even countries as soon as they could.\r\nBut their bond isn’t like mine. And I am grateful, even at the other end of town, it’s only a short drive away.\r\nI park outside their dark house. I walk to the door and open it with the spare key I have in case of emergency. One mom I knew literally propped a ladder against the wall and climbed in through a window to visit her son, until she fell and broke her hip. No more nightly visits for her.\r\nBut I don’t have to climb walls and crawl through windows, not yet. I let myself in the normal way, unbothered by the dark. I can find my way to my son blind, if necessary.\r\nI enter their bedroom. Underneath her makeup smells, I can inhale the fresh baby scent of my son, as marvellous as the day he was born, like fresh-cut apple straight from paradise.\r\nI lift my sleeping baby, and sit on the armchair, cuddling him, my heart aching with love, his still legs trailing the floor.\r\nSoon it is time to leave. I put him back to bed, and creep back the way I came, counting hours until next month when DW is out, and I can come cradle my precious again." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Husband Thought I Was All Bark and No Bite" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Where’d you get that?” my husband, set his fork down and pointed at the necklace I was wearing.\r\nWe were eating dinner when he noticed it. I’d intentionally put on a low-cut blouse so he would see it. I was surprised it took him so long to notice since I’d been wearing it all day.\r\n“I bought it,” I fingered the diamond-studded pendant.\r\n“When?”\r\n“Yesterday.”\r\n“With what money?” he narrowed his eyes.\r\n“The leftover grocery money I’d been saving,” I replied.\r\n“That money is for groceries, not jewelry,” he snapped, “You’re going to have to take it back.” He picked up his utensil to resume eating.\r\nWhen he jabbed the fork into the piece of meat on his plate, something metallic clanged against the tines.\r\n“What the hell?” he pulled the meat apart until he found what had made the sound.\r\nOnce he’d pulled it free and cleaned it off, he held it up before his eyes.\r\n“It’s a fucking dog tag,” he said, “What the hell was this doing on my plate?”\r\nHe tossed the bone-shaped tag onto the table between us.\r\n“I was wondering what happened to that,” I said, “I dropped it earlier and couldn’t find it.”\r\n“What were you doing with it?”\r\n“It came with the meat I prepared for you,” I gestured at his plate.\r\nIt took him a moment to realize what I was inferring. Once he got it, he jumped to his feet, knocking his chair over in the process.\r\n“You fed me dog meat?”\r\nI nodded, “You’ve been eating it for weeks and never complained,” I took a bite of my salad, “That’s how I managed to save up enough money to buy this,” I touched the pendant again.\r\n“You bitch,” he balled his fists and started to come around the table to take his anger out on me but he stopped when the doorbell rang.\r\n“Don’t move,” he pointed before leaving to answer the door, “We’re not done here.”\r\nI ignored his demand and silently followed behind him.\r\n“How can I help you officer?” my husband said after answering the door.\r\n“We got a call that you have this dog on the premises,” the officer held up a flyer with a picture of a dog on it, “The dog was fitted with a GPS microchip that shows it is currently inside your house.”\r\n“That dog was here,” I blurted out, “But it’s gone. My husband made me chop it up and cook it for dinner.” I forced tears to come to my eyes, “He must’ve accidentally swallowed the tracking chip when he ate it.”\r\n“He what?” the officer couldn’t believe what he was hearing.\r\n“It’s true,” I sobbed, “He’s been picking up dogs for weeks and making me prepare them. He’s a sick bastard. Please, help me. You have to get me away from him.”\r\nAs the police hauled him away, I smiled to myself.\r\nMy husband always said it was a dog-eat-dog world. I guess he was right." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "And the 2025 Serial Killer Awards Goes to..." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "More people showed up than expected. No seats left in this secluded cabin we rented for the event.\r\nThe crowd is lively, chatting loudly while devouring the mini pizzas someone volunteered to bring in for the occasion. I step onto the makeshift stage and signal for attention.\r\n“Hi, everyone. You probably don’t know me, but I’m the Bone Weaver—your host. Hope you’re enjoying our annual Serial Killer Awards. We’ll soon call up the candidates for Serial Killer of the Year to present their cases. In the meantime, help yourselves to the snacks.”\r\nA few claps follow me before I step down to check the candidates we gathered on our forum. I didn't even have time to eat.\r\nThe first name I call is The Cannibal Arsonist. He jumps onto the stage, snatches the mic from my hand, and grins.\r\n“How are you doing, serials?!” he shouts like a cheerleader. Some laughs ripple through the room.\r\nHe gestures for me to start his PowerPoint. Slide after slide displays incinerated buildings and a long sequence of charred bodies. He carefully explains how he pulled off each death.\r\n“This is why I deserve the award. The scale alone is unmatched,” he concludes to a round of applause before heading back for more pizzas.\r\n“Thank you, Cannibal.” I continue. “Now, please welcome The Worcester Butcher.”\r\nA fat, bald man steps onto the stage. Less flamboyant than The Cannibal, he barely speaks as I click through his presentation. The audience, however, is stunned.\r\nPhoto after photo showcases grotesque sculptures made from human body parts. Where a leg should be, there’s an arm. Where a nose should sit, a severed member replaces it. A macabre display of artistry sends the crowd into a frenzy. They cheer for over five minutes before he exits, having spoken fewer than ten words.\r\nA clear favorite.\r\n“Thank you, Butcher.” I move on. “Now, Cyanide Reaper, please come to the stage.”\r\nSilence. People exchange glances.\r\nStrange. He applied and even submitted his presentation.\r\n“Well, seems like he’s not here,” I inform the audience. “Let’s take a look at his work anyway.”\r\nI open the file on the projector. Only two slides in it. The first shows a hand pouring a green liquid into what looks like tomato sauce. The second captures the same hand carefully placing the sauce onto a mini pizza, one among dozens in the background.\r\nChaos erupts. People bolt for the exits, desperate to get out and reach a hospital. They make it to their cars, only to find every tire slashed.\r\nThe number of bodies I had to clean up the next day was exhausting, and definitely not worth the small fee I charged to organize the event.\r\nAfter I cleaned it, a tall, shadowy figure arrived to claim his award. The Reaper.\r\nI gave it to him. He earned it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My wife was back from her parents' and was talking to my mom." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "She was playfully complaining about how I had forgotten her. But her complains soon changed into concern when she saw my face. I made shit up about work being hectic. I was happy to see my lovely wife, but fear soon crept in as I realized what might happen once we retire for the night. I hugged her, and to my zombified self, that hug felt like heaven.\r\nThroughout evening, I did a mental countdown, I was scared to let my wife into my room. I even suggested her to take the guestroom to have the whole bed to herself, but she wanted to sleep in my \"safe\" arms. Safe, yeah right! At bedtime, she snuggled up next to me, and drifted off to sleep like a baby. Having her next to me was both a relief and a trigger to my impending fear. I closed my eyes, trying to catch some sleep. Like clockwork, I woke up to the gargle-roar of the entity that has been haunting me for the last month. But this time, there was something else as well. I heard my wife whimpering. That was enough for me to come out of my castle of cowardice. I threw off my sheet to see what was wrong. My wife was still like a log, but she was hyperventilating. Between vehement sobs, she managed to mouth some words - \"Babe, you see it too, right? Tell me it's a dream\". My immediate reaction was very selfish - that I wasn't hallucinating after all. Then reality hit me like a truck - my wife could see the entity as well. Both of us were freaking out. I tried to think straight between my wife's sobs and the entity's silent roars.\r\nThat's when I saw the entity for the first time. I don't know what I was expecting, but this thing, it was close to 7 feet, with glowing red eyes and gangly arms. But this time, it wasn't standing next to me, it had shifted its position and was towering over my wife instead. It had its slender arms placed on my wife's very pregnant belly. It was caressing her belly as if it was a pet or something. Its glowing eyes were still directed at me, though. I was enchanted, but that was broken by my wife's blood-curdling screams. I looked at her, her face was twisted in an expression of pure pain and horror, and then I saw it. The entity's hands were no longer caressing her belly. They were now inside it.\r\nAnd then, it yanked my baby out. My beautiful baby was now in the arms of this creature, and I could do nothing, except stare at horror while my wife lay in a pool of blood, crying the most dreadful cries I have ever heard. The entity was gone, and so was our baby.\r\nAll that was left was a grisly scar on my wife's belly, and bloody footprints from our bed to one of the walls." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "All my boyfriends are dying and I WISH I never found out why." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Felix was the perfect boyfriend.\r\nHowever, I wasn't expecting to see a photo of him on another girl’s phone.\r\nTinder? I thought, watching her swipe left with a snort.\r\n“I should get to class.” Felix kissed me, but it didn't feel right.\r\nEveryone in the restaurant was on their phone—and everyone was swiping left.\r\nIn the blink of an eye, my gaze flicked from the girl’s phone to Felix, who stepped outside. I got a bad feeling.\r\n“Wait.” I started toward him, before he was crushed by a falling sheet of glass.\r\nI didn't realize I was screaming until I was picking pieces of Felix’s skull from my dress.\r\nCasper was the emotional rebound who drowned in his pool.\r\nSam, the FWB, died in a freak crash.\r\nAdam, my childhood friend, bumped into me several weeks later.\r\n“Charlotte!” His smile was a little too wide. Dressed in a long trench coat and a scarf, he was… cuter than I remembered.\r\nHis jawline was perfect, thick brown hair hanging in his eyes.\r\nHe offered me an umbrella, but it wasn't raining. “Wanna go for coffee?”\r\nAll around us, people were on their phones swiping right.\r\n“That's the new Love Interest!” one girl squeaked. “Isn't he, like, soooo cute?!”\r\nPulling him away from them, I dragged the boy into a coffee shop, and then into a stall. Adam barely reacted, his eyes unblinking, lips spread in a wide grin.\r\n“Tell me,” I whispered. “Is any of this real?”\r\nAdam’s gaze searched the ceiling before he… broke. I watched him drop to his knees, clawing at his hair. “No.”\r\nSomething seemed to come undone in him, his lip curling in disgust.\r\n“You're a psycho bastard,” he hissed, breaking into a sob. “What did you do to me?”\r\nHis eyes filled with tears, and it hit me that this boy wasn't talking to me.\r\nHe reached out, gingerly stroking my cheek. “What did you do to her?”\r\n“As we rehearsed, Adam Number 356,” a sudden voice droned. “Compliment my daughter.”\r\n“But Penny isn't your—”\r\nAdam screamed, his body contorting, like a puppet on strings.\r\nHis lips broke out into a horrific grin, something, almost mechanical, flickering in his eye.\r\n“We hurt you, Charlotte,” he said through his teeth, reaching forward, cradling my cheek.\r\n“All of us broke your heart, and, just like your father promised…” A thin slither of red dripped from his nose, his head jolting violently, before turning to me.\r\n“We must face the consequences.” he held me close, his breath in my ear.\r\n“Just be Charlotte,” he whispered. “Whatever you do, be Charlotte.”\r\nAdam grabbed my arm, pulling me from the stall. I could feel his nails stabbing into the flesh of my arm.\r\nI feel sick, he whispered.\r\nI feel sick, I feel sick, I feel sick—\r\n“And m-might I say!” he spoke, this time to people, our audience around us, fingers hovering over their phones, ready to swipe left… or right.\r\n“Charlotte! You look truly s-stunning tonight!”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I was 14 and it was my last year at summer sleepaway camp. I was assigned to a cabin with two other boys my age." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I was vaguely friends with one of them, named Jack. I think I knew him through church. He ended up being my bunkmate, and we instantly connected on the first day over fantasy football and sneaker collecting. But I knew nothing of the other boy sleeping in our cabin. He kept to himself.\r\nHe was definitely a weird kid, who had a tired, sunken look to him, and he stank to high hell. When it was time for games and activities, he would hide in our cabin. We only saw him leave during mealtimes to grab a lunch tray full of food, just to retreat back to the cabin with it. The trays would pile high in the corner of our room, still full of rotting food in the days that would follow. He had no luggage, and was never seen in the same room as Jack.\r\nOver the course of my stay, I got closer with Jack. We hung out all the time, and bonded over how weird our situation was. Still, I couldn't escape the stench of that kid. It was everywhere me and my new friend would go together. Especially on his breath.\r\nIt became all that I could think about for the duration of my stay.\r\nI came back to the cabin late on our last night at the camp. I hadn't heard or seen from the kid for a few days now. Good riddance.\r\nBut as I entered, that smell of rot and waste overwhelmed me, yet all the food that had once been piled high in the corner had disappeared. I made my way to me and Jack's bedroom to grab my things. Suddenly, just outside the cabin I hear what sounds like a bear, rummaging and hunkering around. I froze.\r\nNext thing I know, someone grabs me by the ankle and yanks me under the bed.\r\nIn the darkness of the cramped space, all I could make out at first was how the same stench of decay was so strong, it was impossible to breathe.\r\n“I tried to satisfy his hunger,\" I could feel the kid uncomfortably close to me.\r\n\"You touch me and I'll beat your ass, freak!\"\r\nI turned to the direction of him, but was met with only disembodied bones, picked dry.\r\nBefore I could even make sense of it all, the sounds I had heard earlier were now only a few feet away.\r\nFrom under the bed, I then saw a pair of unmistakable sneakers, slowly circling." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Today is my birthday and I want a boyfriend as a present ! But first I need to find one..." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "On my first try, I went to the park.\r\nAccording to my research, athletes are usually good-looking. I thought I might find some there.\r\nAnd after passing through old folk again and again, I spotted a perfect candidate. Short hair, biceps like watermelons, built like a ripped bear. When I saw him jogging, headphones on, I froze in awe.\r\nUnable to keep up, I waited by the parking lot untill he appeared.\r\n“Hi there, handsome” I approached from behind.\r\nHe turned, confused. Probably wondering who I was, why I used so much make-up, or why I was wearing winter clothes on an 85-degree day.\r\n“Do we know each other?”\r\n“No,” I replied. “But we can. What’s your name?”\r\nIt was Jared.\r\nJared rejected me.\r\n–\r\nAfter that, I tried Main Street. It was packed and people kept staring at my clothes - again.\r\nI didn’t give up, though. And at a bookstore I discovered my next candidate. The clerk.\r\nHis curly hair and smooth face appeared to charm every customer, and I joined the pay line to meet him.\r\nWhen it was my turn, he briefly glanced at my powder-covered face and asked, “What can I help you with?”\r\n“You can start with your name,” I replied.\r\nHe gave a polite smile then answered “Carlos”.\r\nCarlos was the second to reject me.\r\n–\r\nBy the end of the day, disheartened, I drove back home.\r\nBut as I was getting there, my tire blew.\r\nI got out to change it, and a car pulled up. A man stepped out and asked if I needed help.\r\n\"It would be great,\" I said.\r\nThe man didn’t have Jared’s physique or Carlos’s hair, but he was the only one who didn’t seem to see me as a monster. He treated me normally, and we talked a lot.\r\nAnd not only about the tire. We chatted about weather, politics and even books – my favourite hobby.\r\nWhen he was done, I asked his name and he said David.\r\nDavid didn’t get the chance to reject me.\r\n–\r\nFinally, it was time for my birthday dinner!\r\nI wore my best dress. Arms exposed for once, revealing the pins, sutures, and discolored skin. Minimal makeup.\r\nDavid would love me as I was, I was sure.\r\nWhen I got out of my room, Mom was setting the table and Dad stood beside David, inspecting him.\r\n“There you go, honey,” Dad said, gesturing me toward him. “I made him the same way I made you.”\r\nJared’s muscular body, Carlos’s hair and face, but David’s brain. Fresh sutures and mismatched parts peeked from beneath his beat up polo shirt.\r\n“Can it speak yet, Dad?” I asked.\r\n“Sort of. Say something, David,” he commanded.\r\nIts eyes darted nervously before it stammered, “Help.”\r\n“Dad, this is incredible,” I said, giving him a hug. “The best birthday gift ever.”\r\n“Now kiss her,” Dad ordered.\r\nDavid leaned and I kissed his cold lips.\r\nTears flowing from both of us." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I'm beyond ashamed and embarrassed, but I really can't help it." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "You think I really like being a kleptomaniac? Stealing things from wherever I go to like they belong to me, getting humiliated after getting caught, losing people in the process? You may not believe me, but kleptomania has done more damage to me than to you. Yet, I haven't been able to get rid of this obsession. It's like it has me deep in its clutches.\r\nI have visited therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, trying to get rid of this madness, but nothing and no-one has been able to help. Except, of course, if I choose to stay at home at all times. But that's not possible, is it? Just the thought of stepping out of the house makes me so anxious. Sometimes I feel like killing myself, than to keep living as a compulsive stealer.\r\nI did it again today. I went to my daughter's best friend's birthday party. I tried my best to avoid going out altogether. But can you really ever stop a five-year old? Even so, I decided to drop her off and stay in the car till she decided to call it a day. But the lady of the house, this sweet woman, Mrs Norman, was really insistent on having me in the party too. As much as I tried not to, I really couldn't deny her after a point. So I sadly stepped out of my car and joined the party.\r\nIt was mostly toddlers running around the house, bumping into things, and shouting at the top of their lungs. There were a few of us parents who were talking to each other. Every moment I spent there, my heart felt like it would rip itself out of my chest. Seeing my obviously flushed face, one of the parents gave me directions to the washroom, in the hopes that a few splashes of water would calm me down. And indeed, it did. I told myself that I'd be fine if I just kept my mind to myself.\r\nEverything was fine until I stepped out of the washroom and took a wrong turn, ending up in Mrs Norman's kitchen. I was about to turn around when I saw this small but beautiful box with the most intricate and ornate designs. The voices in my head kept telling me that I had to have the box. My heart started racing again, my body damp with sweat. And before you know, I walked out of the back door, the heavy box tucked under my arm.\r\nNow I sit on my bed in the middle of the night, staring at the open box, while the dead eyes of whoever the head inside the box belongs to stare back at me." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Do this on eBay, and you’ll regret it instantly!" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I’m sitting in my boxers in front of my laptop, sipping slightly stale orange juice and laughing at the seven idiots who are financing my trip to Vegas.\r\n3 minutes and 41 seconds left.\r\nThis might just be the best idea I’ve ever had. My old business professor would be terribly proud of me. No investment – all profit.\r\n3 minutes and 2 seconds left.\r\nAnd here comes Idiot No. 8, bringing the total to $258.50. That should just about cover the travel expenses. 2 minutes and 21 seconds left.\r\nNecessity is the mother of invention, or so they say. A few hours after my dad called to inform me he was cutting off my financial support because I’d dropped out of college, my best buddy Jonny called to announce a Vegas trip that would go down in the city’s history. And there’s no way I’m missing out on that. When Jesus knocks on your fucking door and invites you to paradise, you don’t just say no. You figure out how to get the damn cash and have the time of your life.\r\n1 minute and 17 seconds left.\r\nAnd so, that’s how I came up with the idea to sell my soul on eBay. And there are actually people out there willing to spend a bunch of money on nothing. On something intangible, something that isn’t even proven to exist.I read about a controversial doctor from Massachusetts who claimed that the soul weighs 21 grams. With the current bid at $430, that’s $20.76 per gram of soul. Seems pretty reasonable to me.\r\nExactly 1 minute left.\r\nIdiot No. 9 joins the party, pushing my personal happiness account to an impressive $502. Even though it’s only 11 a.m., I crack open a beer to celebrate and stare, paralyzed, at the flickering screen.\r\n44 seconds.\r\nThere are now ten lunatics bidding on my soul.\r\n32 seconds.\r\nCome on, my little lambs, shake those wallets for daddy.\r\n20 seconds.\r\nI want to see the cash.\r\n11 seconds.\r\nThe countdown begins. The numbers turn red, my palms grow clammy, and my wallet gets thicker and thicker.\r\n3\r\n2\r\n1\r\nAnd my soul goes to belze_bubble82 for an incredible $973.50. Congratulations, belze_bubble82, you are officially the most brain-dead idiot I know. I need to tell Jonny. I finish my beer, grab the cleanest pair of pants I can find, and storm out of my apartment into the street. And at some point, I really should call my dad to let him know exactly where he can stick his money. As you can see, I’m a great businessman – even without a degree. And I feel lighter—by exactly 21 grams, to be precise.\r\nNo soul, but full pockets and a huge grin on my face, I’m standing in the middle of the street, completely oblivious to the oncoming bus. And the last thought that crosses my mind before the bumper drills my brains out is:\r\n\"I probably shouldn’t have done that.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Job? Hide and Seek!" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Don’t you be mistaken! My job is very VERY serious yes it is. Why I work with the police I do.\r\nI have been training to do this job since I was a youngin’. When it started it was easy. My manager would show me someone, tell me to stay, and then they’d run off. He’d tell me to go and I’d have to go find ‘em! Well I always managed to sniff ‘em out I did.\r\nSince then I’ve been training for most of my life! Hide and seek is no joke. They try to play all kinds of tricks on me! To make sure I’m as good as I can be. It doesn’t matter how many distractions they bring in, how loud and many decoys they use, I always find my target.\r\nAnd when I win, which I always do, I get a delicious treat. And oh boy. That’s the best thing in the world a treat it is.\r\nWell when my manager came to work today he had a serious look about him. I can always tell I can. That meant today was going to be a challenge! Today we weren’t training. Today was real business!\r\nNormally, we drive into the woods. I’ve found lots of lost people in the woods I have. But this time we drove into the city! Oh boy!\r\nThere are lots of loud sirens, but I can ignore them. I’m trained to ignore them. Even though they are so loud! And the smells! I am overwhelmed by the strangest and most peculiar smells ever I am! But I think about the treats I’ll get when I find my targets to help focus.\r\nWe get to the smelly place, and it looks like a landslide but in the city. I saw a landslide in the woods once! My manager gets me out of the car.\r\n“Sherlock.”\r\nThat’s me!\r\n“Go find ‘em.”\r\nI put my nose to it. It’s really tough, tougher than any job I’ve done before. But I’m the best. I sniff around and before you know it, I’m hollering to let my manager know I found someone!\r\nMy manager starts digging, but the person…they don’t get up. They always get up and tell me I did a good job? But this person doesn’t get up?\r\n“Sherlock. Go find ‘em.”\r\nI keep looking and I find another. And another. And another. And not one of them gets up. I’m supposed to get a treat? I don’t understand what’s happening. Another. I find another. And another. There’s a lot of people playing hide and seek here.\r\nWhy aren’t they telling me good job? Why?\r\nI know I shouldn’t, but I go to my manager to complain.\r\n“I’m sorry, Sherlock. I know this is tough.”\r\nI just want to know I’m doing a good job. Maybe a treat, ya’ know?\r\n“We got more work to do. Jesus. What fucking kind of monster bombs an elementary school. Come on, Sherlock. Go find ‘em.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I’ve been subscribed to this Bloodline Club membership for a week, and I have some concerns." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My hands were shaking, but I forced myself to type the words.\r\nThe response was instantaneous.\r\n“Thank you for your feedback. A representative will arrive shortly to address your concerns in person.”\r\nI didn’t know whether to laugh or scream.\r\nI’d signed up after seeing an ad online promising “exclusive genealogy insights.” It seemed harmless—a DNA kit and an app that mapped my ancestry.\r\nWithin days of sending my sample, I began receiving updates.\r\nThe first was mundane: percentages of heritage.\r\nBut then things got weird.\r\n“Your ancestor, Elias Durnham, requests your attendance at the ancestral banquet,” one message read. The notification popped up late at night, the screen glowing faintly in the darkness of my bedroom. I’d dismissed it as a marketing gimmick until I started noticing changes in my reflection.\r\nThe first time, it was subtle—a faint shimmer in the mirror, like heat haze. By the third day, the reflection was no longer mine. A gaunt man in antiquated clothing stared back, eyes hollow yet alive with hunger. He whispered things I couldn’t understand, words that lingered in my ears long after I walked away. I stopped looking at mirrors altogether.\r\nLast night, I awoke to a sound—a low, guttural moan that seemed to echo from beneath the floorboards. My apartment building didn’t even have a basement.\r\nAnd now, they were sending someone to address my “concerns.”\r\nThe knock came less than five minutes later. It wasn’t a polite rap but a deliberate, rhythmic pounding. I didn’t want to answer, but I couldn’t stop myself. My feet moved on their own, dragging me to the door.\r\nStanding there was a man—no, not a man, not entirely. His face was pale, almost translucent, and his eyes shimmered like the surface of a deep lake. He wore a coat that looked centuries old but pristine, as though time had no claim on it. He smiled, revealing teeth too sharp to belong to anything human.\r\n“You’ve been chosen,” he said, voice soft yet commanding. “You carry the Bloodline.”\r\n“I-I didn’t agree to anything,” I stammered, stepping back.\r\n“But you did.” He held up a contract, my signature scrawled at the bottom. “When you spit into that little tube and sent it back to us, you opened a door. And now your ancestors—our family—demand their due.”\r\nBehind him, shadows moved. Faces emerged from the darkness—faces I recognized from the genealogy app. The shimmer from the mirror returned, filling the air, and I felt their eyes burrowing into me.\r\n“Dinner awaits,” he said, stepping aside. Beyond him, I saw a banquet table stretching into an endless void. At its head sat the man from the mirror, his hollow eyes blazing with terrible joy.\r\nI tried to run, but the ground beneath me gave way. The last thing I heard before the darkness swallowed me whole was the sound of their laughter, and the realization that I was not a guest at this banquet.\r\nI was the main course." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "It knocked thrice in snow and ice. We were nice and paid the price." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I paused for a moment to catch my breath—the vapors from my lungs crystallizing the instant they touched the frigid, forest air.\r\nHad I put enough distance between myself and it?\r\nIntently, I pressed my ears to the wind—scanning for any wisp of pursuit carrying through the trees.\r\nSilence.\r\nInsulated by the thick flakes falling from the shrouded, pitch-dark sky, I grasped my hammering chest—willing my heart to slow for fear that it might betray my position.\r\nAnd as the flow of blood slowed, I appreciated then just how cold the icy gusts came—slashing through my thin, cotton shirt as knives.\r\nThere’d been no time to grab a coat.\r\nThere’d been no time even to put on shoes.\r\nRed stained the snow surrounding my numbing feet—torn and bloodied from stomping on the twigs and rocks hidden beneath the blanket of white.\r\nBut I was lucky…\r\nMangled, frozen feet were trivial compared to what it had done to the others…\r\nHad anyone else survived?\r\nTheir confused, terrified faces flashed before my eyes—the sounds of flesh being ripped from bone returned to my ears.\r\nThe screaming.\r\nThe terrible screaming.\r\nWhy us?\r\nHad it knocked on other doors?\r\nWere we the only ones stupid enough to let it in?\r\nIt’d seemed so innocent…\r\nThree, gentle raps on the door announced its arrival.\r\nOn the porch of the cabin, we found a young girl—maybe ten-years-old—staring at the floor and attired entirely incorrectly for winter—her dress and shoes better suited for Sunday Mass.\r\n“Are you lost?” we naively asked.\r\n“Do you need help?” we foolishly persisted.\r\nShe never looked up—she never answered our questions. Instead, she merely asked us one in return.\r\n“May I come in?”\r\n“Of course!” we so kindly agreed.\r\nHow could we leave a child out in a blizzard? Besides we were six adults—she was one little girl.\r\nWhat was the danger?\r\nIt wasn’t until she’d made her way across the living room and stood in front of the fire that she finally raised her head. And into the flames she spoke the words…\r\n“Thank you.”\r\nBefore turning around to show us her face.\r\nIt was not a child.\r\nIt was not human.\r\nIts eyes were black pits of malice, and its teeth were daggers of hunger. We watched in horror as its body elongated—stretching ‘til its head nearly brushed the ceiling. Claws formed on its fingertips, and then…\r\nIt tore them to pieces…\r\nI was nearest the door and managed to fling myself outside before it could grab me—I took off into woods without a backwards glance. Not stopping until my lungs were about to burst—not stopping until the pain in my feet was unbearable.\r\nAnd standing, frozen, amongst the creaking, barren trees, I suppressed tears of fear—praying that it had not followed me.\r\nBut then, I caught a hint of movement from the corner of my eye.\r\nAnd a girlish giggle crept through the air." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Brat and The Well" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was the third day since my aunt, her husband, and their daughter, Shery, arrived. They hadn't visited in nearly 20 years, and now, after 15 years, we were trying to make them feel welcome. My aunt and her husband were lovely, but Shery? A 14-year-old brat with an attitude. She acted like we weren’t even there, rolling her eyes every time we spoke to her.\r\nI found her in the garden that afternoon, sulking as usual.\r\n“Hi, Shery,” I said, trying to be polite.\r\nShe didn’t respond, just looked me up and down, then rolled her eyes again.\r\n“What’s your problem?” I thought, but didn’t say it aloud. I forced a smile. “What are you doing?”\r\nShe sighed dramatically. “Bored. This place is so boring.”\r\nI bit back my irritation. “I know something we can do. Follow me.”\r\nHer eyes flickered with curiosity, so I led her around the mansion to the old well in the back. It was a place we all avoided. Rumours swirled about its dark history. I’d never told anyone, but I knew. I wasn’t afraid. But Shery? She wouldn’t expect it.\r\nI leaned over, acting casual. “You know, the well’s been here for over a century. Some say it holds secrets... things you shouldn’t disturb.”\r\nShe smirked. “Yeah, right.”\r\nI could hear her tone, mocking. I needed her to stop being so dismissive.\r\n“Wanna see something cool?” I asked, pulling a rusty, old key from my pocket, one my grandmother had given me years ago. It opened the well’s hidden trapdoor.\r\nShery leaned in, eager. But as soon as I opened it, a cold gust of air swept out. I turned to look at her, her face now pale.\r\nShe stepped back. “What is that?” Her voice trembled.\r\n“I don’t know. But it’s not just the wind,” I said with a smile that sent a chill down my spine.\r\nSuddenly, something pulled her in. Her scream echoed through the mansion as she vanished into the darkness.\r\nI ran, but the well... was empty.\r\nThe next morning, Shery was gone. Vanished without a trace. My aunt and uncle were frantic. We searched the mansion, but nothing.\r\nLater that night, as I sat alone in the garden, I heard something. A soft, familiar voice.\r\n“Help me...”\r\nI looked around, then froze, realizing the voice was coming from the well.\r\nI walked to the edge, peering down, and gasped.\r\nShery’s face stared back at me, her eyes wide in terror, her mouth moving, but no sound came.\r\nShe was still there, trapped beneath the surface, where she could never escape." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Wife and I Played Rock-Paper-Scissors to Decide Who Would Die First. I Let Her Win." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It started as a joke—one of those morbid little games we played late at night when life felt too big, too uncertain.\r\n“When we get old,” she’d say, “I don’t want to be alone.”\r\n“Me neither,” I’d reply.\r\nSo we made a pact.\r\nNo hospitals. No nursing homes. No suffering. When the time came, we’d play one final game of rock-paper-scissors. Best two out of three. The loser would go first.\r\nWe laughed about it back then. We never thought we’d actually have to do it.\r\nThen came the diagnosis.\r\nStage four. No treatment. No miracle. Just months—maybe weeks.\r\nWe sat in silence for a long time after the doctor left.\r\nThen, she reached for my hand.\r\n“Best two out of three?” she whispered, forcing a smile.\r\nI wanted to scream. To flip the table. To rage at the universe for taking her from me.\r\nInstead, I nodded.\r\nWe counted together.\r\nRock. Paper. Scissors. Shoot.\r\nShe threw paper. I threw rock.\r\nOne point for her.\r\nAgain.\r\nRock. Paper. Scissors. Shoot.\r\nShe threw scissors. I threw paper.\r\nTwo points.\r\nShe won.\r\nI let her.\r\nShe laughed, weakly, pressing her forehead to mine. “Guess you’re stuck with me a little longer.”\r\nThat night, I lay awake beside her, listening to her breathe. Memorizing the sound. The way her chest rose and fell. The warmth of her body against mine.\r\nBy morning, she was gone.\r\nI should have felt relieved—no more suffering, no more pain.\r\nInstead, I felt hollow.\r\nI tried to move on. I really did. But everywhere I went, I felt her absence like a phantom limb.\r\nThen, the notes started appearing.\r\nSmall, handwritten messages left in places only she would know.\r\n“One more round?” taped to the bathroom mirror.\r\n“Double or nothing?” scrawled on a receipt in my pocket.\r\n“Best three out of five?” tucked under my pillow.\r\nAt first, I thought I was losing my mind. Grief makes you see things, doesn’t it? It makes you hear voices in the quiet. Makes you wake up reaching for someone who isn’t there.\r\nThen came the final note.\r\nI found it in my jacket pocket, the one I hadn’t worn since the night she died.\r\n“I let you win.”\r\nAnd beneath it, a single sheet of paper.\r\nFolded in half.\r\nShaped like a rock.\r\nI stared at it for hours, heart pounding, knowing exactly what it meant.\r\nKnowing what I had to do.\r\nI picked it up, held it in my shaking hands.\r\nAnd counted down.\r\nRock. Paper. Scissors. Shoot.\r\nAnd when I opened my eyes—\r\nShe was waiting." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I was feeling lost and alone. So I joined a knitting club." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "”Hi, honey,” I said, glancing up from my knitting, “the girls came over, if that’s alright.\r\nJeanine, Rachel, and Christine sat beside me, each making a doll of their own. My husband looked at us all with barely disguised contempt as he took off his work boots.\r\n“So, no football,” he spat, bitterly\r\n“Is supper ready, at least?”\r\n“Good to see you too, Dave”, said Rachel over her knitting, sarcastically.\r\n“In a bit,” I said, leaning over to show him the doll I’d been making, “Look, it’s you.”\r\nHe ignored me, disappearing upstairs to the bedroom without a word.\r\n“What did you ever see in him?”, Jeanine asked.\r\nI wish I knew what to tell her.\r\nIn truth, Dave was once my knight in shining armor. My soulmate. But the mask slowly fell away. He’d grown demanding. Controlling. Hateful. I’d never felt more alone before I met my new girlfriends. We called ourselves “The Knitting Sisters”, all young women learning new skills and overcoming trauma with thread.\r\nAnd Dave didn’t like them much.\r\nThe girls left with plans to meet again the following evening. I began making supper as Dave plodded back downstairs. I could feel another argument brewing.\r\n“I guess dinner is less important than arts and crafts”, he spat.\r\nI turned from the stove to face him.\r\n“It’s important to me,” I said, “the girls help me heal.”\r\n“Well,” he growled, his jaw clenching, “glad they make you so happy.”\r\n“You certainly don’t”, I grumbled under my breath.\r\nOne second I was stirring mashed potatoes. The next, I was on the floor, my head ringing like a church bell. The bastard had actually hit me. He clutched my bleeding cheeks in his rough hand, his face inches from my own.\r\n“No more ‘Knitting Sisters’, you got it?”, he hissed, dangerously. He left me shaking on the tile to go to the bathroom. And I texted my girls about the change of plans.\r\nWhen the next evening came, I was alone. Dave and I had eaten supper in silence before he retreated to the living room. He didn’t want to be disturbed, but I had a gift.\r\n“Honey,” I said, “can I show you something?”\r\n“More dumb bullshit?”, he hissed from his recliner. I ignored the jab.\r\n“Jeanine wanted me to make something special”, I said, showing him the raggedy doll in my hands, “so I made a little you.”\r\n“I don’t ca-“\r\nDave’s words caught in his throat. He couldn’t move. As a strange chanting filled the air, Jeanine, Rachel, and Christine emerged from their hiding places, their hands outstretched.\r\nAnd I began to unravel the doll.\r\nFirst went his arms, the flesh unspooling into crimson thread. Then came the legs, torn away like scraps of yarn.\r\nLast came the eyes, plucked from their stitching like buttons.\r\nAs the final incantation faded, the room grew still. We all embraced. I felt a freedom I hadn’t known in years.\r\nAnd I had my new coven to thank for it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Hit Something on the Road, and Now It Haunts Me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My hands locked onto the steering wheel, as my rusted truck groaned through the fog. The road—a black snake swallowed by darkness—seemed endless. The green glow of the dashboard clock whispered it was past midnight. Another shift stolen by the mill. Another hour stolen by the road.\r\nThe radio sputtered static, a faint murmur beneath the oppressive silence. My eyelids drooped. Cold air clawed at my face as I rolled down the window. It stung, sharp enough to keep me awake—barely.\r\nThen it emerged.\r\nA hulking shadow darted into my path, limbs bending in ways that screamed wrong. I slammed the brakes, the truck screeching in agony. Time slowed to a heartbeat. Impact. Metal crunched, glass exploded, and the air filled with the wet thud of flesh. The truck spun, sliding off the road into a ditch with a final shudder.\r\nMy head pounded. Warm blood slicked my face. The airbag sagged, useless. The reek of scorched rubber filled my lungs as I fumbled for the door, tumbling into the cold mud. The headlights flickered, casting fractured light onto the thing lying ahead.\r\nIt twitched.\r\nThe creature sprawled across the asphalt, its slick, black skin reflecting the fractured beams. Its limbs—too many and too long—jerked back into place with a sickening pop. Its head turned, a face split by a jagged maw beneath lidless, glistening black eyes. My breath caught as it growled, a deep, wet rumble that crawled under my skin.\r\nRun.\r\nI stumbled backward, then broke into a desperate sprint. The gas station wasn’t far. Its glow was salvation. The fog wrapped around me, suffocating, erasing the world. My boots slipped, my breath a ragged gasp. Behind me, it followed—a horrid, arrhythmic pounding that defied logic. I glanced back. It was gaining, its limbs contorting as it hurtled on all fours, wheezing with every lunge.\r\nA root snagged my boot. I hit the ground, gravel slicing into my palms. Pain flared, but I scrambled up. The creature loomed over me now, its stench of rot flooding my senses. Its maw opened wide, jagged teeth glinting, ready to tear.\r\nBlinding light burst through the fog. A horn blared, shaking the night. The roar of an engine shattered the air as a semi barreled toward us. The creature recoiled, shrieking, and melted into the shadows. I staggered toward the truck as it skidded to a stop. The driver’s face, pale and wide-eyed, appeared in the open door.\r\n“Get in!” he barked.\r\nI hauled myself into the cab, slamming the door as the truck roared forward. My gaze locked on the mirror. The creature lingered at the edge of the road, its black eyes boring into mine. The shriek it let loose clawed into my mind.\r\nMy trembling hand brushed my pocket. I pulled out a jagged, blackened tooth, slick with warmth. The truth hit me, sharp as a blade.\r\nIt had marked me." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I hate my babysitters, and I dread it whenever school ends" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When I was five, a pair of sisters babysat me. They were my neighbors, Donna and Bella. When my parents left they loved to torment me, from forcing me to eat spoiled food to make me stand outside my house in only my underwear.\r\nI cried, but my parents never took my stories seriously and laughed it off. The sisters were two-faced, and always helping my mom with chores.\r\nWhen I graduated college I heard the family moved away. A year later I connected with a girl, and quickly fell in love for the first time. Anna.\r\nAnna had a terrible childhood, she told me. She was also abused by someone she wouldn’t name but like me, no one believed her. She was insistent I should tell my therapist everything, and comforted me all the time.\r\nI eventually called my parents.\r\n“Hey mom,” I began awkwardly. “Do you remember the sisters that I hated as a child?”\r\n“Belladonna!” my mom said.\r\n“Yes, I wanted to tell you that it was really abuse!”\r\n“They were only seven and nine, don’t say that!”\r\n“It was! They always kicked the door when I shit, forced me to stand in the cold in my underwear, made me lick the floor—“\r\n“They were just kids,” my mom sighed. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know it affected you this much.”\r\n“I just want you to tell them it wasn’t right.” I began sobbing, and the line was quiet.\r\nThe call didn’t go great and Anna sighed.\r\n“I’m sorry. I’m stupid for suggesting this. It just feels like I wanted revenge for you,” she said.\r\n“It’s not your fault!”\r\n“I’ll do it. I’m going to find them,” she said, and her eyes had a weird glint. I was truly afraid in that moment.\r\nYet something in me felt weird and uncomfortable. Everything went too smoothly. Anna was always there for me, always coming over to do chores for me, and agreed too easily to move in.\r\nOne day I got a call from my mom, and despite the knot in my stomach I picked up.\r\n“Hey, mom. I was being dramatic, I’m sorry about the other day.”\r\n“No, honey.” My mom sounded sorry. “You know, I called the parents. It’s so strange.”\r\n“What is?”\r\n“I heard the older one did similar things to the younger one. Oh, Donna was a real piece of work.”\r\n“What happened?” I asked.\r\n“She tore her sister’s hair off, always pinned her down and forced her to eat slugs! She had to go to the ER multiple times! Poor Annabel, if only I knew.”\r\n“Wait, what did you say?” I asked, heart pounding so hard it hurt.\r\n“She went to the ER. Anyways, they told me Donna was in a bad car accident—“\r\n“No, you said Annabel, but her name. You always called them Belladonna!” I said.\r\n“Yes, but only because her real name is Annabel,” my mom said.\r\nI turned my head, noticing Anna walking into my room.\r\nHer smile grew, and she whispered.\r\n“It worked out, didn’t it?”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I’ve never seen my wife this happy before, and it’s starting to worry me." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I watched her through the window, laughing in the garden. Her laughter wasn’t melodic; it was brittle, cracking through the air like snapping twigs. Rachel had always been practical, reserved even, but in the last few days, she’d transformed into someone I hardly recognized.\r\nAt first, I chalked it up to her new museum job—cataloging ancient artifacts. She came home flushed with stories of forgotten relics, her excitement spilling into long monologues. Then, a few nights ago, she brought it home.\r\nThe mask.\r\nIt was grotesque. Blackened with age, its surface carved with swirling patterns that shimmered faintly. But its grin unnerved me most—impossibly wide, with jagged teeth etched deep into the wood.\r\n“It’s for inspiration,” she said, setting it on the mantle. “Isn’t it delightful?”\r\nI didn’t respond. That night, I dreamed of her standing at the foot of our bed, the mask in her hands. Her face was hidden in shadows, but her laughter rang, dry and hollow. When I woke, the mask had shifted on the mantle, its smile tilted as though mocking me.\r\nBy the third day, Rachel stopped coming to bed. I’d find her in the living room at odd hours, murmuring to the mask, her fingers tracing its edges while candlelight cast dancing shadows on the walls.\r\n“Rachel, you haven’t been yourself lately. That mask—” I began this morning.\r\n“It listens to me,” she interrupted, her voice low but fervent. “It knows me.”\r\n“You’re scaring me,” I said, reaching for her. She recoiled.\r\n“Don’t touch me!” she snapped, her eyes wild. “You don’t understand. You never have.”\r\nThe rest of the day passed in uneasy silence. Now, as I watched her from the window, her laughter rang louder, climbing to a pitch that made my neck prickle. She was barefoot, spinning in lazy circles, her head thrown back. The mask, strapped tightly to her face, gleamed under the moonlight.\r\nI stepped outside, the scent of damp earth thick in the air. “Rachel,” I called, my voice trembling. “Take that thing off.”\r\nShe froze mid-spin, her head snapping toward me unnaturally fast. The mask’s hollow eyes locked onto mine.\r\n“I can’t,” she said softly. Her voice was layered now—her usual tone intertwined with something deeper, raspier. “It’s a part of me.”\r\nHer hands reached for the mask’s edges, but instead of removing it, she pulled it tighter. Her laughter erupted again, a sound too large for her small frame. It filled the garden, the house, the world.\r\nAnd then, she was gone.\r\nAll that remained was the mask, lying in the grass, its jagged smile turned upward." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I lie and wait" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "There's this weight on my chest that makes it hard to breath or even move. It's been there for awhile now and has left me completely incapacitated, and isolated in the bedroom of the apartment. My only company is my dog, who only comes to piss on me. Isn't that something? Man's best friend sees me as nothing more than a fire hydrant. Everyday, I am left to stew in my thoughts, leaving my brain reduced to nothing more then a pile of jelly that sloshes back and forth inside my head. Maybe someday I'll finally sum up the courage to rid myself of my existence, trapped under this weight. But for now, I just lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and lie.\r\nThe dog left me a present this morning. A pile of shit right next to my head and in the middle of it there was a piece that caught my eye. It poked out above the liquified mess and sparkled under the florescent bulbs up ahead. And, out of both curiosity and sheer boredom, I picked out the shining piece and examined it closely. It looked to be a seed of some kind. I took out my pocket knife and cut a piece of skin back on my forehead and planted the seed in my flesh. Days passed as the roots grew strong and eventually penetrated my skull as the vine I planted grew and grew. Tangling around the massive weight, constricting it and causing it to weaken, until one day, after many weeks, it finally gave and folded in on itself. Sadly, at that point, the roots had strengthened and embedded themseselves into the floor beneath my head. Realizing this, I began to laugh hysterically at the irony of the situation, as the dog came in to water the weed on my forehead. Eventually, I know my head will be crushed just as the weight was crushed. But at least I can breathe." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Can’t Move, I Can’t Scream, and Time Is Running Out" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I never thought the sound of water could be so haunting. The rhythmic drip-drip-drip from the showerhead echoes in my ears, each drop a reminder of the seconds slipping by.\r\nHow long has it been? Minutes? Hours? The steam has started to settle, cooling into damp patches on the tiles beneath me. I can’t see much—the fogged-up mirror, the blurry outline of my shampoo bottle tipped over near the drain—but I can hear my own labored breaths, shallow and pitiful.\r\nI used to be unstoppable. My days were filled with ambition, each moment carefully planned and executed. I was the guy who juggled deadlines, workouts, and late-night laughs with friends. I told myself there was no time for weakness, no room for pause.\r\nAnd now? Now all I can do is pause.\r\nMy mind wanders, desperate for distraction. I think of my mother, how she’d remind me to slow down. “You’re always rushing,” she’d say, her voice laced with worry. I’d brush her off with a laugh. “I’m fine, Mom. Life waits for no one.”\r\nLife waits for no one.\r\nTears prick my eyes, but they don’t fall. I don’t know if it’s because my body won’t let them or because I’m afraid to cry. Instead, I remember the little things I took for granted: the warmth of sunlight on my skin, the weight of a good book in my hands, the sound of my best friend’s ridiculous laugh.\r\nHow long will it take for someone to notice I’m not answering texts? Not showing up to work? Hours? Days?\r\nPanic sets in again, rising like bile. The showerhead sputters, releasing a sudden spray of lukewarm water that splashes against my cheek. It feels like mockery, like the world itself is reminding me of my helplessness.\r\nI focus on my breathing, the only thing I have left. Inhale. Exhale. But even that’s becoming harder. My chest feels heavy, my limbs foreign. I think about all the things I’ll never do again—dancing at weddings, hiking the hills I love, telling my sister I’m proud of her.\r\nIt’s almost funny, in a dark way. I always thought I’d have time. Time to make amends, time to be better, time to live. But time is cruel. It doesn’t stop, even when you do.\r\nAnd then, as if the universe wants to twist the knife one last time, I replay the moment in my mind. The careless step on the soap I dropped. The way my foot slipped out from under me. The sickening crack as my head hit the edge of the tub.\r\nAnd now here I am, a prisoner in my own body, waiting for someone to find me. Waiting for time to run out.\r\nThe water drips. My breathing slows. And I wait." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Grammy and I had always been close." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I had been living with her since I was three. My mother ran off with another man when I was one, and a couple of years later, my father was imprisoned for killing her and her lover. Happy family, I guess? With no one else to care for me, my grandmother took me under her wings.\r\nGrammy looked exactly like Muriel from Courage the Cowardly Dog, and she was the kindest soul one could ever come across. After Grandpa passed away several years ago, Grammy had been living all alone in her tiny little suburban cottage. So having me live with her was a breath of fresh air.\r\nGrowing up, I was always pampered. Anything I wanted, Grammy would get it for me. We weren't rich, but Grandpa's pension was enough for the two of us to sustain decently. I never heard a \"no\" from Grammy, or a raised voice in a harsh tone. Grammy was always smiling, always understanding, always there. Even if there was something that'd bother her, she would never show it in my presence. For me, Grammy wasn't just my grandparent, she was my friend. My partner-in-crime.\r\nSo, years later, when I killed someone in a fit of rage, the only person I could think of was Grammy. I was scared shitless. What if she disowned me? What if she reported me to the police? What if she didn't listen as to how I ended up in the situation? But when I finally opened up, she just took my hands in hers, and asked me to get the dead man home, so we could bury him under the plant bed. I don't know if I was shocked or relieved. But I did what she asked me to, and that was that.\r\nWeeks after the burial, Grammy’s garden flourished unnaturally. The flowers grew in strange, vivid colors. Grammy changed too, spending hours talking to the flowers in an alien language.\r\nOne night, I heard a wet, squelching noise. Grammy knelt in the garden, her hands buried in the soil. The earth writhed beneath her fingers, as though something was moving.\r\nSensing my presence, she turned, her face pale and stretched in an unnatural smile. “It’s fine, dear,” she whispered. “The garden always provides when you feed it”\r\nBy morning, the garden was lush, vibrant. But as I stepped closer, I froze. A human finger stuck out from the roots, dirt still clinging to its nail. I wasn't sure how to feel about it. How to feel about Grammy. But I was scared. I was already neck deep in anxiety about the cops showing up any time to take me in for the man I killed. I couldn't handle additional anxiety. So I kept my mouth shut. Grammy knew that I knew. She just didn't bother.\r\nGrammy's been dead for years now. But she shows up in my dreams every night, \"Feed the garden, my boy. It's starving.\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Father, Mother, and Billy" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Father was tall and strong and muscly and firm and hairy, and he playfought with Billy ever since Billy was tiny. Mother told Billy to stop being a wuss when he cried out in pain.\r\nMother always said feminists were making all the men weak and girlish. Together with Father, they wanted to make sure Billy did not grow up weak and girlish, but strong and manly like Father. Whenever he was around the house, Father would playfight Billy, and during summers they would jump in the pool together where he would teach Billy to swim and playfight in the water. What fun, cried out Mother, watching her two gorgeous male beasts, one small and one large trying to drown each other. The water splashed in a beautiful sparkly arc through the warm summer air and broke over her dress- “Oh you two!” cried Mother joyfully, her eyes shining the same colour as the pool. “I’ve half a mind to jump in and join you right now- Lord knows I’m wet enough that it won’t make a bit of difference! Oh shush Billy, you’re fine!” She never jumped in.\r\nThe years passed and the playfighting continued, in the bedroom on the bed, in the living room on the couch, and always in the pool during summer. Father always beat Billy, pinning him down and making him tap out, but it was becoming a little bit harder. Father didn’t think Billy noticed, hell he didn’t notice himself sometimes, but it seemed to take him a tad longer to get Billy down, only sometimes. Billy was getting taller and stronger too, everybody noticed, he had surpassed Mother this year “although that’s not hard”, as Mother remarked, looking up at her growing son with shining eyes the colour of a freshly-filled summer pool. Father saw her looking up into Billy’s soft but hardening face, and his gut twisted. Billy’s skin was silky-smooth still peppered with soft golden hairs but his face was roughening. His muscles were coming in lean and taut- Billy had started hitting the gym everyday earlier that year and now the pool was filled with shining blue summer water.\r\nThe first warm day was the first water-playfight of the summer, “Look at them- they can hardly wait to get to it!” laughed Mother as they tore off their clothes and dove in. Father and son went for each other, Mother watching every move with glinting eyes. Billy felt stronger than he had ever felt before - all the hatred and fear of the years gathered in his arms and he went for the kill, holding Father’s head down and trying to pin his flailing limbs with his own legs. Father knew it was now or never, his rage at growing old and weak and Billy becoming strong and manly broke through in one ungodly move, he got the upper hand and held down Billy’s head under water until Billy stopped moving." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A woman in white, a black panther, and my mothers dangerous dream -seeking answers" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "i grew up in a Christian household, and as a kid, I would always sleep in my parents’ bed. One night, I saw something I’ll never forget.\r\nA tall woman with short hair and a long, beautiful white dress climbed into bed with my mom. She hugged her tightly, and since we had recently lost a close relative, I thought I might be dreaming—maybe this was a spiritual visit. But what happened next shook me.\r\nThe woman stood up on the bed and began dancing. She danced for what felt like ten minutes, and I was too terrified to move. I told my family about it the next day, but no one believed me.\r\nThings stayed quiet until one night when I was downstairs with my dad. Suddenly, we heard my mom screaming. We ran upstairs to find her choking herself with a pillow, struggling and gasping for air. We woke her up, and she told us about a vivid dream she’d just had:\r\nShe saw a girl with short hair and a white dress—exactly like the one I described months earlier. In her dream, the girl was being attacked and killed by a black panther. The dream was so realistic, it made her physically react in her sleep. What’s even more unsettling is that we had never told my mom about the woman I saw.\r\nWe brought a pastor to pray over our home, and things settled down after that. But even now, three years later, I still see the woman occasionally out of the corner of my eye—walking through the house in her white dress.\r\nI’ve learned to live with it, but the details haunt me. Why does she have short hair? Why the long white dress? And most of all, what does the black panther mean? Why was my mom in danger because of it?\r\nI still don’t know the answers, but this story stays with me, lingering like the woman herself." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The man, his wife, the bug, her lover, and her therapist" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Can I tell you something?\r\nIt starts with this man, a husband, whose wife was deathly afraid of bugs. The husband forces her to go to therapy to get over her fear. But one day his wife finds a really sexy bug living under their bed. She falls madly in love with this bug. The wife and her lover bug begin a long affair.\r\nShe struggles to put words to the whole ordeal– after all how does one explain being in love with a bug? She can’t tell her friends and it takes her well over a year to admit to her therapist that she’s sexually attracted to a bug. But after two years, her lover bug disappears without a trace. She grows mad with grief. She tries to hide it from her husband and tells him that it's seasonal affective disorder, so her mood will eventually pass.\r\nBut winter turns to spring and then summer– and her grief only worsens making way to anger that grows into a burning suspicion for her husband. She would lay awake at night staring at him while he slept and think: BUG KILLER.\r\nOne evening, she fixes him a drink– his final drink, a dirty vodka martini, made extra dirty with olive juice and Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane, commonly known as DDT.\r\nSo, the wife's lover bug is gone. Her husband is gone. Her neighbors say it was an accident. Her mother says nothing. Her sister avoids her. Her grief stays in her thoughts and her dreams. The wife takes this secret affair and the recipe for her husband's final drink to her grave. The only person that knows the wife's story is me, your narrator, her therapist.\r\nBut the thing is, I need to tell you this story to relieve my guilt. I did something awful. I didn’t mean to do this awful thing. It was just that I was so focused. Late one night, I was working on my progress notes for her, and then I heard a buzzing in my ear. I swatted at the noise, without thinking, and I felt something small hit my hand. I looked down to see a crumpled bug on the floor. And it was a beautiful bug, the sexiest bug I had ever seen, so I knew. I knew I had killed my patient’s lover bug, her secret paramour.\r\nI didn’t have the heart to tell her, so now I tell you." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My first and last patient:Isabella Brunner" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Good morning Dr. Chloe \" the girl in the reception greeted me as I showed her my Id.\r\n\"I was expecting to have you here any minute. These are the required documents of your patient. At this time she must be in the central park with all other patients. I wish you luck with your first case\" saying that she retreated back to her work.\r\nWhile going through the lobby I checked the details.\r\nName : Isabella Brunner Age : 16 DOB : 7 August 2008 Sex : Female Insight : Grade 3 (awareness that illness is due to some external factor) Name of the examiner before: Dr. George Evans. Reason for administration : Suffering from PTSD.An year ago, she survived a car accident but rest of her family died. Personal and Behavioural information: The girl is lean and tall. In the interview sessions she showed calm and quiet behaiour but sometimes become delusional.\r\nAs I finished reading her file I have almost reached the entrance of central park. There were many patients indeed and then I saw her sitting quietly on a wooden bench. I slipped peacefully and sat beside her.\r\n\"Hello Isabella. I am Dr. Cloe, your new doctor.\"\r\nA smile gradually emerged from the corner of her face as she turned her pale face towards me.\r\n\"Hello doctor. Nice to meet you.\"\r\n\"How you doing?\"\r\n\"I am pretty good.\"\r\n\"Is there anything you want to share with me, Isabelle?\"\r\n\"Do you believe in ghosts, Doctor Chloe?\" Her expression suddenly changed as she asked this question.\r\n\"No, not really.\"\r\n\"Why not?\"\r\n\"I have not seen one.\"\r\n\"Oh, I see...\"\r\nThere was a minute's silence before she continued speaking again. \" I have always felt gulity to survive alone in that accident, but now I am really at peace\".\r\n\"It's good to hear that you have moved on, dear. I am really glad to here that.\"\r\n\"Can I ask you a question, Chloe\" she spoke instantly.\r\n\"Sure.\"\r\n\"Have you stopped your drinking habit, Chloe? You are looking much better.''\r\nTwice she called me by my first name. I hesitatingly said that what she was referrering to.\r\nShe spoke \"I always used to wonder how exactly you have survived after crashing your car into us.\"\r\nI was too stunned to speak.\r\nShe carried on, \"But now seeing you living your life like this somewhat makes me happy.\"\r\nThe last thing I remembered about that night was that I was really drunk. And as I was taking the turn, a car suddenly appeared front of me, and my car collided with it. Later I come to know that the whole family had died except one. I went into depression and buried that guilt deep inside my heart. I never read any articles about that later. But now that horrifying past had followed me here. Tears started falling down my eyes.\r\nAnd then soon I heard my name been called by the same receptionist girl, \" Doctor Chloe, what are you doing there?\"\r\nAs she approached near me I immediately wiped off my tears.\r\n\"I am really sorry doctor; I have given you the wrong files, \" she apologised immediately.\r\n\"Those files were of a patient who died a month ago, I guess her stress compelled her to take her own life, said the receptionist girl grimly.\r\nI was completely dumbstruck by this new discovery and was even more surprised to find no one sitting beside me. Isabella was not there anymore.\r\nMy eyes once again filled up with tears. I knew that this unbearable remorse and shame was going to kill me shortly but atleast I could provide her some peace at last." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Forest Has Spoken And They Hate My Family" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Being one with nature may sound like being a hippie or some spiritualist material from someone off their meds. Whether you believe me or not, the trees speak and so do the folk of the forest. The folk that aren't human and are much wiser than men. They tell me that my family harms the creatures of the woods and have not made up for their sins. Hunting the gnomes of the ground. The Fae of the trees. The spirits in the water. So much damage and so much death. Tonight, my family will get their karma, and tonight, the forest folk will get their revenge.\r\nFather is the first to be sacrificed, he taints the water with his wasteful oil and chemicals that kill aquatic life. I can't even go fishing there like we used to. This beloved forest we live near is such a precious source of enjoyment for a break from technology and get some family bonding done. His sins cannot be forgiven for the taint he brought upon the water. That is why, for his punishment, I swapped his morning medication for stimulants. He has a highly negative reaction to stimulants and very bad heart issues. Even a panic attack can set him off. The satisfying shock in his eyes when he tasted the pain of a medication that was essentially poison to him was great. The way he collapsed, his body jittering, the heart failure, and then the life dimming from his eyes.\r\nMother used to love getting chopped wood and going to the garage. She was very into woodshop classes at the local community college and made these beautiful birdhouses that would be hung in the forest. That all stopped when she found out firewood was profitable near us. We live in a pretty remote area and driving 2 hours to a store for wood was a pain for most near us. This is why she started getting the idea to cut down a lot of trees in the forest. At first, it was just a few here and there, made sense. Stretch those trees out and be selective on how you bundle them. But she got too deep into cutting them down.\r\nMy closest friend is a wood spirit in the forest and she's very dear to me. This is another reason my mother must pay her dues. Just like the ash that comes from burning the trees that housed life. She will suffer lying in ash as the house burns down with her in it. I blocked every possible exit and set it on fire. She will know the horror and fear the spirits that resided in those trees did when the wood burned. Those precious homes lost due to greed. We were more than well off on money and she could afford anything she wanted. I don't think she liked the folk that lived in the woods.\r\nToo bad, mother. I now reside in the woods among those who welcome me." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My coworker won't stop shouting into his phone, and it's driving me up the wall" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“YEAH, SIX O’CLOCK WORKS GREAT! COOL, SEE YA THEN.”\r\n“One more word, old man. One more fucking word, and I am going to lose. my. shit,” I grumbled, glaring at the decrepit fart sitting across from me. He didn’t even look up. He just typed away on that wretched flip phone that he was so enamored with.\r\nI hated that thing. More than that, I hated him. He was always shouting at the top of his lungs over these pointless conversations that seemed to drag on for an eternity. I couldn’t take it anymore - Which led me to do what any rational, sane individual would - I plotted to kill him.\r\nHow, you might ask? Well, one day the wrinkly fuck just shouted out his address, unprompted:\r\n“SOUNDS GOOD. MY ADDRESS IS 5874 [REDACTED] LANE.”\r\nCan you really fault me? I was just using the information he’d graciously provided. So, obviously, I decided to pay ‘ole Joseph a visit. I thought it was high time that he and my Smith and Wesson got acquainted with one another.\r\nThat night, I executed my plan flawlessly. I parked my car at the church down the street, nonchalantly made my way down the sidewalk, then pulled on my mask while I hid in his bushes. I proceeded to Joe’s backyard and walked up the steps to his door, pausing before reaching for the handle.\r\nWas I really going through with this? I mean sure, Joe could be obnoxious as all get-out, but did he really deserve to die?\r\nThe answer was a resounding fuck yes. For as often as he’d disturbed the peace, Joey had earned himself a good, old-fashioned dirt nap.\r\nI turned the handle, expecting some resistance, but to my shock, the door opened with ease. The moron hadn’t even remembered to lock it. I scoffed. This was going to be too easy.\r\nMy heart jackhammered in my chest as I crept through the kitchen, guided solely by the moonlight filtering through the window, and prepared to round the corner. I felt a sudden rush of exhilaration. I was so giddy that I nearly burst into a fit of laughter.\r\nBut that elation soon melted into dread.\r\nA light snapped on the moment I stepped into view of the living room. I froze. This wasn’t supposed to happen.\r\nJoe slowly turned to face me, a twisted grin stamped across his withered lips as he trained a hunting rifle on my forehead. Though I was absolutely petrified, that’s not what made me lose my lunch all over his kitchen floor.\r\nBecause once the light turned on, I noticed that Joe’s furniture - sofa, lamp shades, armchair - was all leather - leather fashioned from what appeared to be preserved human flesh.\r\n“I’ve been expecting you, Michael,” Joe said, standing from his chair. “You see, you’re not the first one who’s lost their temper with me. And I guarantee that you won’t be the last.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "There Is AGod And I'm Here To Prove It" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Just have faith,\" Stuart said, sipping his coffee like it wasn’t the most ridiculous thing I’d ever heard. Faith. Like that ever paid rent. Faith didn’t stop bills from piling up or my boss from breathing down my neck. But Stuart swore by it. He’d been through worse. He'd lost his wife, his job, even his dog, and yet here he was. Calm, collected, and annoyingly happy.\r\nI laughed it off at first. Faith. Sure. But his words stuck like a splinter under my skin. That night, staring at the cracked ceiling of my shitty apartment, I muttered something to the dark. Not quite a prayer. More like a dare. If you’re out there, prove it.\r\nThe first sign was small. A job offer. Nothing flashy, just a step up from the dead-end grind. Then my car, which had been coughing its last breath for months, roared to life without so much as a tune-up. Stuart grinned when I told him.\r\n\"See? Faith works.\"\r\nSo I leaned in. Quiet prayers in the shower, muttered thanks before bed. My faith grew like a tumor, spreading through me, taking root. The more I believed, the better things got. Promotions. New friends. Even love. My life was no longer a punchline. It was...good.\r\nBut good rarely lasts...\r\nThe cough started in October. By December, I was choking on blood. The doctors were baffled. My tests came back clean, yet, I was wasting away. They didn’t have any answers.\r\nBut I did.\r\nI prayed harder. I begged. Every night, I clung to my faith. You gave me this life. Don’t take it away. You’re there. I know you’re there. Save me.\r\nAnd...\r\nGod listened.\r\nI didn’t die.\r\nThe hospital bed was cold beneath me when I woke. My breath rasped in the silence, sharp and unnatural.\r\nStuart came in first, rushing when I shouted for him. But relief turned to horror when he saw me. He backed away, stumbling over his words. \"Y-you...don't look right,\" he stammered.\r\n\"What do you mean?\" I asked, confused as I felt absolutely fine, just hungry.\r\n\"You-...you don't look...alive, Helen.\"\r\nBut I was alive. I awkwardly smiled to prove it, but his face twisted into shock as all my teeth fell out.\r\nI ran to the mirror, screaming.\r\nMy skin was gray and taut. My eyes were black pits reflecting nothing. My faith had saved me, but not in the way I’d prayed for. I was alive, yes, but, something else entirely.\r\nAnd then the hunger pang hit me again.\r\nStuart was the first. We then fed on the doctors, nurses and patients together.\r\nNow...there’s no stopping it.\r\nThe infection spreads fast. A bite, a scratch--it doesn’t take much. They all rise just like I did, empty but, alive.\r\nStuart was right. Faith works.\r\nThere is a God.\r\nAnd I’m here to prove it." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I saw my girlfriend stick a finger in her ear, wiggle it around, bring it out, look at it, and then continue cooking. Obviously I can’t talk to her about this, but I need to do something." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "We have an “open concept kitchen”, so even though I’m sitting in the living room, gaming, I can sneak peeks at what she’s doing the kitchen. The ear thing was particularly horrendous, I’ve seen her scratch her skull before and then continue cooking, and I’ve kind of learned to live with that (but not really).\r\nShe loves cooking.\r\nCooking is her thing. She’s always looking up different recipes and texting me random requests “babe pls pick up fresh thyme basil passata” “super excited trying new yam recipe need chives”. She’s always getting in fights online about cooking techniques, and I have to say, I really enjoy the sex we have after she’s gotten into a particularly vicious dispute. Our sex after the great Pot-au-Feu Incident was mind-blowing.\r\nThe actual food all tastes fine, I don’t know. She presses me for an opinion, and I’ve learned to discern the taste of fresh rosemary. Also that I don’t like yam.\r\nBut now I just need her to stop cooking. I know there are bits of her ear goo in whatever monstrosity she’s cooking, and I know I have to eat it.\r\nI wonder if I can stumble against the pot so it spills every where. I quite like that idea- it’s better than murder which was my first thought, even though the clean up will be just as bad. But I might get burnt.\r\nI focus a bit on my game, and then as often happens when you bracket the thing you actually need to think about, and think about something else, the solution to the first thing floated to my mind. Sorry I’m not explaining this more clearly- I’m a STEM major.\r\nHer hands. I need to incapacitate her hands. That way she will have to stop cooking. It’s perfect- I will still retain her function as my girlfriend. She doesn’t use her hands when we have sex that much anyway- to be perfectly honest I prefer my own hand jobs- and the loss of that wave of joy I experience whenever she ruffles my hair or strokes the back of my neck will be a small sacrifice to get her to stop cooking.\r\nPermanently.\r\nI consider the different ways. The steering wheel- I could run a sufficient amount of electricity through the wheel, and pleasing images comes to mind of her gripping the wheel and volts of electricity jumping through the soft skin of her hands.\r\nShe moisturizes so much!\r\nThen I remember she mostly wears gloves when going out- gloves- moisturizers- oh yes, I have it.\r\n“Almost ready babe!” she calls.\r\nI’m by her bedside, studying the ingredients on her favourite tube of hand lotion.\r\nWow- all that? I’m surprised her hands aren’t dysfunctional already- it will only need a slight tweaking to make it toxic enough that upon the next two or three applications, she will lose the use of her hands.\r\nAnd never cook again." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The woods are lovely dark and deep" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was the line that always gave me the most trouble in Sister Marie’s English class. Id misplace a word, the inflection would be wrong, a pause too long, it didn’t matter what, the result was always the same. A crack from the ruler and a command to start again.\r\nMarie’s taunt was almost always the same; “you may never amount to anything Simon, but you won’t be nothing on my watch.” I suppose there is a funny irony in Marie’s approach; combining the beauty of poetry with her cruelty and violence. I was just a terrified boy then though, and the fear is all I could think about. The fear and the dream of a new year and a new teacher. Anyone but Sister Marie.\r\nNeedless to say, when sister Marie told me she intended to hold me back, I took it rough. I had performed well on the written tests, the essays, you name it. Her feedback was simple; “lacks the practical application to move up.” On the last day of school she gave me one last chance. Naturally, I failed. The crack was the hardest yet, I felt my check begin to bleed. Sister Marie seemed to enjoy it; she smiled and said “you are nothing Simon, but I will find a way to motivate you and that’s a promise. Now promise me you’ll improve.” I promised her I would.\r\nAnd you know, Sister Marie was right. It did motivate me. I even learned the poem. As I dragged her further and further through the trees, I’m not sure which terrified her more - the knife or the sound of my words.\r\nThe woods are lovely dark and deep, and I have promises to keep." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Jackie stopped talking and his parents don't know why" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Jackie doesn't talk these days nor does he want to buy new toys. He just seems sad and morose. Always in his room staring at his laptop screen. Or doing his homework.\r\nEverytime they looked at him, his face stayed still. Heavy with thoughts, eyebrows drawn together but with no discernable expression. It was unlike Jackie. What's gotten into him? They wondered.\r\nEver since the treatment, he has not eaten well. His favourite food no longer widens his eyes or makes him jump in excitement when his dad brings him the latest copy of his favourite comics.\r\nThey were beginning to get scared.\r\nOne night, his mom denied him his comics and ushered him to his bedroom instead. On any other day, he would throw a tantrum and have his way. Read comics well into the night. Past 10 o'clock.\r\nBut not today. He marches right into the bedroom beside his mother and lets her tuck him into the bed without so much as a whimper.\r\nHis parents would just exchange blank stares every time they were confused and scared by something Jackie did.\r\nOne day, after persistent efforts he spoke his first words since the treatment.\r\nThe next few days, they tried to pull something out of him. They needed to know, they were scared. It couldn't have been the treatment. It had cured Jackie!\r\nThat was true. Jackie seemed to be completely free from his convulsions. Something else had gotten into him.\r\nSlowly Jackie started to speak– in fragments.\r\n“I want to go back..” he would say. Chewing his food. Or, “I hate it here”.\r\n“I could ride on a pirate ship and bounce on the trampoline as long as I want”\r\n“I could eat breakfast for dinner”\r\nWhat is he talking about? His parents hadn't a clue. Go back where?\r\nThey tried to approach him. Mother's eyes wet from tears, father just standing beside her dejected. But when she tried to sit beside Jackie, like a brittle twig underfoot, something happened. He pushed her away, his jaw clenched and unclenched as he glared at his mother. She stared back at his moist eyes and furrowed brow. His lips trembled with a noise she couldn't recognise. He muttered something through the open mouth and gritted teeth.\r\nTheir hearts dropped at once, terrified. They couldn't recognise him. Like a creature from a different realm, his fist ready to punch them.\r\nThey realised it was not Jackie. Mother almost fainted, stuck in a bind. His father just stood there, almost unaware of his surroundings, adrift in his thoughts.\r\n“Look, Harry. This is highly experimental. Frankly speaking, we don't know what exactly it does to the brain,” the man in a white coat had said.\r\n“But it might put an end to the convulsions?” Harry asked hopelessly.\r\n“Yes..” Harry hadn't noticed the hesitation in his reply.\r\nHarry reached for the door knob and said, “Listen.. do me a favour doc and keep this between us!”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Nora and the cabbie" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It's was late, Nora's car broke down, she tried calling cabs but she had no luck. After a terrible experience with cabs she hated them. They brought back bad memories.\r\nNora cursed her luck and started walking. Road was dark and only illuminated by passing vehicles.\r\nSuddenly a cab stopped next to her. The diver was young, wouldn't be a day over 18. Clean shaved and looked more scared of her as he offered to drop her.\r\nShe noted he was not a part of any cab company, but he was just a kid, she could defend herself. The kid stutters and says\" You can pay me by the meter ma'am\". She gets & settles on her seat and gives out her address.\r\nShe noted the car was neat and new, the driver although young drove smoothly. She asked him\" How long have you been driving\" He replies \"Actually it's my first day\".\r\n\"Oh congratulations, you drive well for a newbie\". He thanks her politely, engaging in small talks. He asks her \"What were you doing on the road ma'am, I mean it's quite late?. If you don't mind me asking\".\r\nNora says\" My car broke down, stupid thing it's actually new, I miss my old one.\".\"Oh\", says the the driver, \"what happened to the old one\"\r\nNora rolls her eye \" Had scratches from knocking into something, some people shouldn't drive\" She scoffs. \"Yes, some people shouldn't, but then sometimes even a suspended license doesn't stop, them right\"?\r\nNora felt uneasy, her own suspended license status came to mind. She asked him to turn the heater on, the car was too cold. To which the cabbie says \"actually Nora, you don't need it where you are going\"\r\n\"What do you mean\" Nora says, she can feel the chills down her spine, she looks at her cabbie and senses something amiss. He now has scratches, scrapes and wounds. Did she miss them when she got in the cab?\r\nThe cabbie answers\" You were not supposed to drive Nora, but you did, you drove drunk, you didn't just knock someone off the road, you did much more than that, didn't you?\". He mocked her.\r\n\"Who are you, what are you going to do\" Nora whispered with tears down her face. The cabbie says\" You know my name Nora, you put it on a headstone, as for what I will do, I will save people before you do to the others what you did to me\".\r\nThe next day as the road came to life with traffic, a part of it was sealed off. The cops and forensic team gathered to pry a young woman out of a mangled car. The creepy thing was, it wasn't her car, it was a cab that met with an accident months ago, resulting in the death of the cab driver, the culprit was never found.\r\nThis time however they knew who the victim was, Nora Abdul, found a crushed cab holding her suspended license." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My husband and I have never had a problem. I found Tinder downloaded on his phone." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "It was completely by accident, of course. I borrowed his phone to try and look up who the Nuggets were playing when a notification popped up on his phone. A message from a woman named Becky.\r\nI mean, even her name sounded slutty, so I’m sure he wasn’t talking to her just for the pleasure of her conversation.\r\nLater that night, after my husband went to sleep, I borrowed his phone and took it to the bathroom. Thank God his passcode was predictable (his birthday). I was able to get right in.\r\nI poured over their messages to try and figure out what I was doing wrong.\r\nI mean, I do everything for my husband. I clean the house daily, I shop our groceries, we make love at least three times a week. I racked my brain trying to figure out what Becky gave my husband that I didn’t already.\r\nThe answer made me sick.\r\nMy husband constantly complimented Becky about how young she was. How I had “aged like bread,” and she was still “fresh.” The realization made me dry heave into the toilet. It didn’t matter what I did, I could never turn back the clock. I could never be young enough to win over my husband again.\r\nI decided then and there to take matters into my own hands. I sent Becky a late night message, which she responded to immediately (because of course she did). Then I deleted the messages, put my husband’s phone back, and went to work.\r\n***\r\n“Hey Hubby, where are you going,” I asked, “I thought we were gonna watch the game together tonight?”\r\n“I’m gonna go hang out at the bar with the boys.”\r\n“Can I come with you?”\r\n“Sorry, hun, but it wouldn’t be a boy’s night at the bar if we all brought the wives along.” He gave me a hug, and a kiss on the forehead, that lying son of a bitch. “I’ll be back in time to watch the second half, don’t worry.”\r\n“Okay,” I said, “I’ll be waiting patiently for your return.”\r\nMy husband left, and I waited for him to return, but he didn’t. Eventually, though, he called.\r\n“Hello?”\r\n“Hun, there’s been some terrible misunderstanding.” My husband was sobbing in between words.\r\n“What’s wrong?”\r\n“Becky. She’s missing. The police were waiting for me at her apartment. They think I had something to do with it.”\r\n“Wait a second,” I asked, “who’s Becky?”\r\nEven now my husband wasn’t prepared to answer that question.\r\n“Call me a lawyer. Or, find Becky. You gotta believe me, I didn’t do this.”\r\n“I believe you, baby, I’m gonna get you out of there. I know you had nothing to do with this.”\r\nI know he didn’t. Because I killed the bitch.\r\nI messaged him on Tinder from her phone this afternoon, then destroyed it. An anonymous tip to the police, and the fact that his DNA was all over her place, was more than enough to frame him for her murder." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A Battle Against Darkness and Time”" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I was 22 when it all began. Life was great—I was finishing my associate’s degree, moving into a new house in Seattle with my fiancé, who is now my spouse, and our two stepchildren. Our house was three doors down from my best friend, Elli, and her partner, Brian. The place was perfect—a blue, two-story house with a basement, a garage, a big backyard, and a cozy front porch.\r\nWhile unpacking and dusting off the built-in bookshelves, I cut my finger. As I stared at the cut, a strange symbol appeared. I blinked, and it was gone. Confused, I chalked it up to my imagination and went back to unpacking. By the end of the day, the house was fully furnished, and we all sat together in the dining room, enjoying our first meal in our new home.\r\nI got up to grab some water from the kitchen and noticed the back door was ajar. As I went to close it, the light behind me flickered. I ignored it, but when I turned, the light flickered again, accompanied by a creaking sound—like bones cracking. Blinking, I saw a creature, dark and distorted, appearing closer each time the light flickered.\r\nBefore I could react, it reached me. I felt it enter my body, and suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. My partner was in front of me, shining a light in my face. They said my eyes had turned black, and my mouth hung open as if I were suffocating. From their perspective, it looked like I was having a seizure.\r\nThis became a horrifying pattern. No matter how many hospital trips we made, no one could help me. The episodes would come without warning, and each time, I saw the same creature, drawing closer in the darkness.\r\nA psychic finally revealed the symbol I’d seen on my finger and told me the creature wouldn’t stop until it fully consumed me. She warned me to stay in the light, as the darkness allowed the creature to manifest. To others, my episodes looked like demonic seizures, but for me, they were battles for survival.\r\nI sought priests, healers, anyone who could break the curse, but nothing worked. Days turned into weeks, then years. My family eventually had to leave to protect themselves. The psychic had warned that the curse could spread to those closest to me.\r\nNow, 11 years later, I am trapped in this existence. The curse won’t let me age, nor will it let me die. My choices are limited: either let the creature consume me or remain in the light forever.\r\nThis house took my life the day I cut my finger. And no matter how far I run, it follows me." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I really thought fate brought me and my husband together." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I was in love.\r\nCorrection: I was drunk, and had maybe found my soulmate.\r\nHe didn't… fit. In a sparkling ballroom full of dresses more expensive than his parents' mortgage, sons and daughters of Dad’s rich friends who were already sniffing lines – he was far more interesting. This guy was tattered sneakers and shadowed eyes, hand in hand with a brunette.\r\nShe didn't have a face or an identity. But I knew her presence enough to hurt my heart.\r\nThe boy was not my type, and yet, already I was moving toward him in single strides, my stomach fluttering.\r\nIt was fate.\r\nI didn't ask him his name, nor did he ask mine.\r\nHe swooped me into a dizzying dance, and I entwined myself around him.\r\n“Do I… know you from somewhere?” His voice was a low murmur, and I knew it.\r\nI knew the slight huskiness, the grumble of a British accent. For a moment, it looked like he was searching the crowd, eyes narrowed, for someone else.\r\nHis half-lidded eyes found another guy, spinning a girl around and around. He blinked, his smile momentarily twisting into a scowl, before he turned to me.\r\n“You're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen.”\r\nHis name was Jace.\r\nI married him after college, and we had two beautiful children.\r\nI loved Jace.\r\nHe was the right… choice.\r\n“Mommy,” my daughter said one night. “When you go to sleep, everything goes dark.”\r\nHer words jolted something inside me, but I smiled.\r\n“It's okay, sweetie,” I held my daughter.\r\nBut she was… gone.\r\nHer blankets slipped from my hands.\r\nI grabbed for my son.\r\nHe was gone too.\r\nThe lamp on my bedside was suddenly so bright. So painful.\r\n”End. Bring her out, and re-insert her.”\r\nThe voice was cold and clinical, and I opened my eyes. I was in a plastic coffin, a glowing pod, my hands and ankles strapped down, a sharp needle stuck into the back of my head. I screamed, but my voice was more of a sharp gasp of breath. I was so weak.\r\nI didn't know my name.\r\nAll I did know is that I loved Lucy Clementine.\r\nMy girlfriend.\r\nThrough the gap in my pod, a second one was inches away, and I could just see fingers creeping through the gap, slick with scarlet.\r\n“Let me out of here,” a boy cried. “Let me fucking out!”\r\nJace.\r\n“Put them back under and redo it,” a voice drawled. “These kids will come to their senses soon enough. The Redwood conversion facility is the best in the country, after all.”\r\nBlood spurted from my nose, my body seizing.\r\nDarkness took me once again.\r\nInside a sparkling ballroom, I was entranced by two figures in the doorway.\r\nThe boy was… beautiful. His eyes found mine.\r\nI made my way over to him, tripping over my heels.\r\nStepping closer, he swooped me into a clumsy waltz.\r\nI was…\r\nIn…love.\r\n“Have we… met?”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Lodge Wasn’t on the Map, and Now I Know Why" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The storm swallowed the mountain whole. Snow clawed at my face as we stumbled toward the lodge, a dark smear in the endless white. Elliot, Nina, and I were desperate, half-frozen. It shouldn’t have been there—no maps mentioned it—but we had no choice.\r\nInside, the air was unnervingly warm. A fire burned in the hearth, though no one had lit it. The chairs were arranged too neatly, like the place had been waiting for us. The faint smell of copper clung to the air. My gut twisted, but the others dismissed it. Shelter was shelter.\r\nThat night, I woke to footsteps above me. Slow, deliberate. At first, I thought it was one of the others, but the beds were still. The sound circled, growing louder. My breath hitched.\r\nThe next morning, Nina was pale. “There’s something in the walls,” she whispered. “I heard it whispering my name.” Elliot laughed, but his hands trembled.\r\nWe searched the lodge, hoping to prove her wrong. It was sprawling, maze-like. In the kitchen, I found a door with an iron latch. My hand jerked back as though it had burned me. It wasn’t locked, but something behind it felt alive.\r\n“Probably a cellar,” Elliot muttered. “Let it be.”\r\nThat night, the whispers came—faint at first, then loud enough to rattle my skull. I dreamed of a spiraling staircase, endless and dark. When I woke, dirt caked my hands, my nails cracked. Nina sat against the wall, rocking back and forth.\r\n“I went downstairs,” she murmured, hollow-eyed. “I didn’t mean to, but I went.”\r\nBy the third night, the door was open. The air pouring from it reeked of rot. A staircase disappeared into blackness. I begged them not to go, but Nina moved as if pulled by strings, her feet bare and bleeding. Elliot followed, his lips moving as though speaking to someone unseen.\r\nI grabbed his arm, screaming for him to stop. He turned to me, his eyes black and endless. “It’s awake,” he said in a voice that wasn’t his.\r\nThen it came.\r\nThe thing surged from the dark, pale and glistening, its limbs too many, its movements too fast. Nina disappeared, her scream cut short. Elliot convulsed as it dragged him into the void.\r\nI ran. The lodge twisted and breathed, its doors slamming shut. When I burst into the snow, the cold hit me like a blade. I ran until the lodge was a smear against the storm.\r\nBut the whispers stayed, burrowing into my skull.\r\nBy morning, the mountain was wrong. The trees leaned closer, their limbs reaching. Bloody footprints trailed the snow, but mine were gone.\r\nBack at base camp, no one believed me. They said no lodge existed. The rescue team found nothing but forest and snow.\r\nThe whispers never stopped. Sometimes I see pale limbs shifting in the corners of my vision. It doesn’t need the lodge anymore. It’s inside me now.\r\nAnd one day, it will pull me back." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "It took me finding my mom's last art project for me to understand why and how she disappeared." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "In the gallery, many paintings and sculptures displayed their splendor to me. The multitude of talent and creativity had us all in awe. When Mom told me she was going away for a while, I hadn't expected to wait for her for over 30 years.\r\nYet here it was... today, a detailed, uncanny painting was displayed before me, with my mom's name on the plate. Date painted: 19-12-2024.\r\nBut how?\r\nI analyzed every detail until I could go right to the fibers of the canvas. The crimson paint, the ropes depicted, every minute detail. But the riddle was harder to solve than I anticipated. The mediums, the techniques, every point of it was an unusual method not seen in art. When the museum closed, the security guard telling me it was time to go, I had just uncovered the reason for the painting. And the note tucked away, hidden on the back of the canvas.\r\n\"I've finally discovered the ultimate art form. I made use of willing volunteers to show you what I've discovered in the meaning of life. And you, too, will dedicate your body and soul to my work, too...\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Jake's mom was dying and he had to get to her before it was too late. He had no time to figure out what was happening on the drive." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Jake parked and walked into the diner, its lights brightening up the dead dark night.\r\nHe was famished, not having eaten for hours. Although there wasn’t much longer to drive and he was desperate to see his mother, he had to get a bite. It was better to eat now, than show up at the hospice hungry and unable to focus on what was happening.\r\nInside the diner was as comforting as the lights promised. A few patrons were dotted around the red tables, hands curled around steaming mugs, faces dipped towards plates of comfort food. He couldn’t smell anything, and he noticed that, and the silence. No clinking of cutlery, no coffee and bacon aroma.\r\nHe’d been driving along the highway for hours, focused on getting to his mother while keeping his looming grief at bay. His senses were out of joint.\r\nThere was nothing wrong with the hot plate of food the server pushed over to him. He couldn’t remember what he ordered, just that it was plentiful and warm. He shovelled it into his mouth, feeling the goodness radiating along his tired limbs. He sipped the coffee, and it flowed through his veins, lifting the veil of fatigue, and he looked around. The server was pretty.\r\nBut he couldn’t risk arriving late. The hospice staff had been kind, but clear.\r\nHe pushed his credit card to the pretty server. She smiled broadly, and said something- he couldn’t hear, or understand. “On the house”? Why?\r\nHe didn’t have time to discuss. He pocketed his wallet, nodded, and headed out. He almost missed the door, narrowly avoiding walking into the wall.\r\nHe looked back at the diner, its twinkling lights still advertising “DINER” “OPEN”– the only lights visible. The windows were dark.\r\nWhat?\r\nHe didn’t have time - he had to get to his mother.\r\nBut he needed gas. There was a gas station just on the other side of the highway. He drove in, the first rays of dawn piercing the darkness.\r\nPumping gas, he glanced over his shoulder. In the grey light, he couldn’t see the diner lights. No building.\r\nThe other side of the highway was emptyness.\r\nJake cried out. An elderly man pumping next to him looked up.\r\n“Son?”\r\n“There was a diner there” muttered Jake, and his free hand pointed across the highway to the grey nothingness.\r\nThe man said grimly “Son, you’re not from around here if you don’t know what happened there. That diner closed after all that hullabaloo, and got torn down few years back. Nobody was eating there no more”\r\nJake stood quite still. He could still feel the warmth of the food in his body, the aftertaste of coffee in his mouth. He looked at the old man, who was minding his business pumping gas.\r\nHe needed to get back on the road. He had to get to his mother.\r\nQuickly, he swiped his credit card and paid for the gas, jumped into his car, and tore off." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Boyfriend And I Found The Perfect Little Hot Springs Miles From Any Trails and People." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The park ranger’s words had seemed unnecessary at the time: “Stick to the trails. The wilderness doesn’t forgive mistakes.” Now, as the morning mist clung to the pines, Anna couldn’t shake a feeling of unease.\r\nShe and Mark had wandered off the marked path, lured by the promise of solitude from the mass of other tourists. That’s when they found it. A pool of shimmering turquoise nestled in a clearing. Steam curled lazily from the surface, and wildflowers framed it like a postcard.\r\n“It’s beautiful,” Mark said, already tugging off his boots.\r\nAnna hesitated, scanning the pool. “What if it’s not safe?”\r\nMark dipped his fingers into the water, grinning. “It’s warm, not hot. Just the perfect spot.”\r\nShe let herself be convinced. Slipping in, the water cradled her in a comforting embrace. For a brief moment, the unease faded, replaced by blissful warmth.\r\nThen the sting began.\r\n“Mark,” Anna whispered, her throat suddenly raw, “does the water feel strange?”\r\nBefore he could answer, she coughed violently, her lungs seizing as the air thickened with acrid steam. Her skin prickled, a sharp burn spreading across her body. Mark flinched, rubbing at his eyes.\r\n“My throat.” His voice cracked. “Anna, get out. Get out now!”\r\nShe scrambled for the edge, her hands slipping on the slick rocks. Her heart raced as the water’s heat intensified, mingling with an acidic sting that scorched her skin.\r\nMark lunged to help her, but stumbled, sinking back into the pool. Anna’s foot slipped, sending a wave of water splashing into her face. She screamed as the acid seared her eyes.\r\n“Mark!” she cried, clawing blindly at the rocks. Her vision blurred, the world reduced to a burning haze.\r\nThrough the agony, she felt Mark’s hands on her waist. “Hold on,” he gasped. Using what little strength he had left, he pushed her up onto the rocky bank.\r\nAnna collapsed, her body trembling with pain. “Mark?” she called weakly, reaching for him.\r\nBut he didn’t answer. Through her failing vision, she saw his body slumped in the steaming pool, the water claiming him.\r\nShe sobbed, the sound choked by the acidic fumes lingering in her throat. Her entire body burned, every movement sending fresh waves of agony through her. But she couldn’t stop. She had to find help.\r\nThe forest loomed. An endless expanse of blurred green. Anna crawled forward, her hands blistered and raw, her vision reduced to flickering shadows. Every step was a struggle, the air itself felt sharp.\r\nShe didn’t know how far the trail was. Miles? Hours? The pain dragged time into a cruel loop. The sun began to set as she continued to stumble deeper into the wilderness. Her body faltered. As she lay on the forest floor, staring into the dimming sky she thought of Mark and his sacrifice… and their stupidity.\r\nThe forest closed in around her. Darkness swallowed her whole." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "We Found Something In Our Attic, And It Was More Terrifying Than Any Actual Monster." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My wife and I recently bought a home in a decent neighborhood. Low crime rate, a silent area, and not much activity going on. It was the perfect deal. The home was only 300 grand and we used a majority of our savings to cover 240 grand of it. With all good things come bad things though. In recent weeks, I've noticed shuffling in the attic. The movement is what made me realize we even had one. The door to the attic folds down from the ceiling with stairs. It was painted over and didn't have a cord to pull it down which made it nearly invisible.\r\nAfter manually pulling it down while standing on a chair, I added a string to use as a temporary solution. Climbing inside of the attic wasn't the best idea. There were a lot of spider webs, and thick dust in the air, and I swear I had seen black mold growing. I didn't see anything out of the normal, just a few boxes and a metal box sitting around. The previous owners probably left behind their junk. Perhaps there was something of worth left behind we could sell later. I spent a good hour walking around the attic searching for anything and came up empty-handed. The noise must've been the house settling, it is old after all.\r\nAnother week passed before hearing more shuffling upstairs. I swear it was almost a set of whispers as well. I spent days going up and down. I went up the ladder to the attic and found nothing. Night comes and the noises come back. It wasn't until last night that I found out the truth. I had just gotten off work and my wife was in the corner of the kitchen curled into a ball. The fridge was open and it looked like someone had torn through it. She wouldn't answer me when I checked on her so I decided to search the house.\r\nThe noises upstairs were very apparent now and I thought we might have animals in the house. Up the ladder to the attic and there it was. I still can't recall it in full detail, but a shriveled man of older age was at the end of the attic lighting something. Food wrappers littered the ground and the smell of literal human shit filled the air. The more the light the man sparked the more I got the scent of burnt plastic. I only remember the yelling, the gunshot, and my memory then going hazy.\r\nAfter the cops investigated, it seemed like a crack addict had been using our attic as a shelter. There's a small ladder on the side of the house covered in leaves and roots he used. A short window was his exit and entry point. We had a dangerous man addicted to drugs high out of his mind within our home. Luckily, my wife wasn't injured or harmed. That's the only bullet I've used on a human." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Woke Up Today, New Year's Day, In Hospital And I Don't Know Who I Am" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Ah, you're awake! How are you feeling, my dear?”\r\nThe voice startled me. A nurse in her 40s stood at the foot of my bed, clipboard in hand, her blue scrubs crisp and professional. I blinked at her, confused.\r\n“Where am I?” My voice was really hoarse.\r\n“St. Vincent’s Hospital,” she said gently. “You were brought in last night.”\r\n“Why? What happened?” I frowned.\r\n“A couple found you wandering downtown after midnight,” she explained. “They saw you in the street, looking lost. Do you remember anything?”\r\nI searched my mind, but it was all fog. “No. I-...I don't remember anything. I don’t know who I am.”\r\nHer expression softened with pity. “That’s okay. Confusion is common after trauma, especially at your age. The important thing is you’re safe.”\r\n“Am I sick?”\r\nShe hesitated. “We’re not sure yet. Doctors are still running tests. You have a few bruises and these marks on your wrist…” She gently turned my arm, revealing two small, circular wounds. “But otherwise, you're in good health.”\r\nThe marks pulsed faintly under her touch. I pulled away. “What are they?”\r\n“Probably insect bites,” she said, though she didn’t sound convinced. “We’ll keep an eye on them. For now, just rest. We’re checking records and waiting to see if anyone calls about you.”\r\nAfter reassuring me, she left, and I was alone again. I stared at the ceiling. Who am I? Why does it feel like pieces of me have been stolen?\r\nThe door creaked open again, but this time it wasn’t the nurse.\r\nA young woman stepped in, her beauty jarring in its perfection. Dark hair fell in loose waves, her skin flawless, her movements unnervingly graceful.\r\n“You look…better than I expected,” she said, her voice smooth.\r\n“Do I know you?” I asked.\r\nShe smiled and glanced at my wrist. “You could say that.”\r\n“Are you...family?”\r\n“In a way,” she said, sitting with elegant ease. “How are you feeling?”\r\n“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I don’t remember anything. They said I was wandering the streets.”\r\n“You were,” she said simply.\r\n“Why can’t I remember?” I asked, hands trembling.\r\nShe studied me carefully. “Do you know how old you are?”\r\n“No, but, I’m clearly old.” I gestured weakly at my hands.\r\nHer laugh was soft, almost pitying. “Oh, sweetheart. No, no.”\r\n“What?”\r\nShe leaned in closer, her beautiful dark eyes locking with mine. “You’re 29.”\r\nThe words hit like a blow. I pulled away, shaking my head. “That’s-...that's not possible.”\r\nI felt ancient, like a relic of time.\r\n“Oh, it’s possible,” she smirked, amused by my disbelief.\r\n“Who-...who are you?” I croaked.\r\nShe rose, adjusting her dress and checking her reflection in the mirror. She flicked her hair, winked at me through the glass, and said, “New Year’s Day is my favorite. A clean slate for everyone, a perfect time for…renewal.”\r\nShe turned toward the door, heels clicking softly. Glancing back, her smile was sharp, and again, perfect.\r\n“Thank you, truly,” she purred. “You’ve given me another fifty years.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "If there's anything she hated the most, it was packing up her belongings and shifting into a new place." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "She had done it so many times, that at this point, she didn't bother anymore. She just kept putting it off till it was dangerously close to the day of moving into her new place. The only good thing this time was the fact that she'd be shifting into her own place, a tiny apartment that she bought on her own merit.\r\nShe eventually got done with the shifting and the unloading; the packing, however, could wait. With all her energy drained out from her like a leaky faucet, she sank into the floor of her living room, her back using one of the cartons as a \"cushion\". The electricity connection was yet to be made, but that was the next day's problem, and she had enough grit in her to manage throughout the night.\r\nAs she slowly drifted into sleep on the floor, the darkness of the room shrouding her, something ran down her neck. She jolted awake, at first confused, then annoyed - the pest control folks certainly did not control the pests. She looked around for her phone to turn on the torch, hoping to find a spider, or worse, a cockroach. What her torch shed light on was definitely not either of those.\r\nShining in the cold white light of the torch were strands of hair - heavy, knotted, dusty. It took her more than a few seconds to figure that out, considering how they resembled ropes. But when she did, she let out a gasp. Her eyes travelled the length of the hair, only to find a face so grisly, so twisted in shape, so evil, that she froze right there in absolute horror.\r\nBefore she could let out a scream or make a run for the door, whatever abomination was lurking there, lowered itself onto her, its nails, or rather, claws digging deep into her skin, creating a rivulet of blood to flow onto the floor.\r\nThe next day, the door unlocked, and in walked the new tenant, happy to call the apartment his new home." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Someone is picking off the kids in my town. No matter what we do, my friends and I can't find the killer." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Seven year old Cassie Hargreaves was dying.\r\nI was covered in her blood, my trembling hands shaking, trying and failing to resuscitate.\r\n“Kai.” Rosie was next to me on her knees, tears rolling down her cheeks.\r\nJesse and Rafe were standing in the doorway, the two of them sickly looking. We were always too late.\r\nThat was the reality of what being a junior detective was.\r\nCassie was the fifth child to be brutally killed in our town. The fifth victim of a relentless, merciless serial killer who left no leads, no footprints, nothing.\r\nWhich meant, despite only being fifteen years old ourselves, the more kids were found dead, their blood was on our hands. “I'm so sorry.” I told the growing crowd of townspeople, my voice shaking.\r\nI broke down. “Please keep your children at home. If you don't, we can't guarantee they won't be taken.”\r\n“It's okay,” Rosie whispered. “You know we can't save everyone.”\r\n“Kai, come on,” Rafe was already gesturing for us to leave.\r\nParents were already in my face, screaming and crying, shoving me back.\r\nI'm a kid too. That's what I wanted to cry back. I’m a fucking kid!\r\nWhy doesn't anyone care about our safety?\r\nMrs Hargreaves didn't run to her daughter, whose body was being lifted onto a stretcher.\r\nShe stumbled over to me, slapping me across the face.\r\n“I'm sorry.” I whispered.\r\nHer eyes were red raw, lips parted in a silent cry.\r\n“I'm sorry.” I said again, choking on my own words. “I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry–” I barely felt Rosie and Jesse gently pulling me away, out of the old mill where the gruesome discovery was made, and into the night's cool breeze.\r\nRafe was already in the van, his fingers tapping on the wheel.\r\nThe town newspaper was getting shots of us, hiding behind a wall.\r\n“Get in, man,” Rafe said.\r\nI did, jumping into the back.\r\nI slammed the doors shut, one last camera flash blinding me.\r\nMy seat was still covered in blood splatters. After all, Cassie was a bleeder.\r\nThe little brat refused to die until I sandwiched that blade deep inside her heart. On the way back to our clubhouse, I glimpsed a middle school boy walking home, swinging his backpack.\r\nRafe was already slowing down, a small smile curving on his lips.\r\n“Too soon?”\r\nHe shot me a grin, and I could already feel it, my fingers twitching by my side.\r\nI pulled a knife from under my seat, running my finger under the blade.\r\nMrs Hargreaves...\r\nI sliced into my own finger, unable to resist a laugh.\r\nEuphoria.\r\nAll those parents' faces. Their tears and spluttering, and sobbing.\r\nWas so fucking funny.\r\nRafe stopped the van. Rosie grabbed the duct tape and chloroform.\r\nI stuck my head out. “Hey, kid!”\r\nThe boy twisted around with a relieved smile, and the four of us shared a grin.\r\nImagine finding soulmates who shared that monstrous bloodthirst.\r\n“Do you want a ride home?”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Jake and Emily's date" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The sight of his new neighbour made Jake drool. Emily smelled perfect, she always dressed so well. There wasn't a hair out if place. He just had to ask her out.\r\nHe couldn't believe his luck when she said yes. As a good neighbour he invited her for dinner, and she said yes, lamenting her luck, how she knew no one in town\r\nJake offered to cook her dinner as a welcome to the new neighborhood and she accepted. She asked him\" Should I bring anything? He said \" Only you\"\r\nShe laughed and asked him ,\" What are you serving? Anything special? He simply replied \" Only you\" to which she laughed again\r\nBut later that night she wasn't laughing when he served her on the dining table. She couldn't anyways, after all he cleaned, marinated and cooked her well. She tasted just as he imaged. Although he hated the clean up that came afterwards.\r\nWhy do humans bleed so much." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Kids And I Hated Waiting For Their Father To Call Us" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Mommy?”\r\n“Yes, sweetheart?”\r\n“Is today the day?”\r\n“I don’t know, sweetheart. But I think it might be.”\r\n“OK.”\r\nI put my arms around my son while my daughter slept next to me. This has been difficult for them - they hadn’t spoken to their father in several days and they missed him. I missed him too, but looking after them had kept me occupied. Distracted, really.\r\nI looked around, taking in the house. We’d moved in here when Paul and I had gotten married. I remember when we’d laid the flooring and put in the cabinets. I saw the marks on the wall where we’d measured Lilly’s and Jeremy’s heights each year. They grew up so fast.\r\nThe last time I’d seen Paul, I’d been sad. Between working, taking care of the house, looking after the kids, and trying to look after my elderly mother, I barely had anything left. I’m ashamed to say that I was short with Paul when he’d tried to speak with me. I know he’d been tired, too, and he’d been trying to get through it together, like we always did. Instead, I pushed him away. For the thousandth time I wish I’d handled things better.\r\n“Mommy, I’m cold.”\r\nI look down at Lilly.\r\n“I’m sorry, sweetheart. What about your fluffy jacket?”\r\n“It isn’t helping.”\r\n“I’m sorry, honey. Come here.” I put my arms around her, rubbing her arms to warm her up.\r\n“Are we going to talk today?” she asked as I held her.\r\n“I hope so. That’s the plan,” I replied.\r\n“I hope so, too. I miss him, Mommy.”\r\n“So do I, sweetheart. But it shouldn’t be long now.”\r\nI held her until she fell asleep. As she slept, I thought back to all of the good times we’d shared as a family - Paul and I swinging the kids around on the playground, opening toys at Christmas, reading bedtime stories all cuddled together under the covers. Time goes by so fast - what I'd give to have those days back. To not have screwed everything up.\r\nI sat there, staring, until I felt Jeremy stir beside me.\r\n“Mommy?”\r\n“Yes, sweetheart?”\r\n“Can I watch, too?”\r\nMy heart broke a little. “Of course you can, sweetheart. Here, come sit next to me.”\r\nHe crawled up next to me and curled into my side. Together, we waited. And then we saw it.\r\n“I-M-I-S-S-Y-O-U.”\r\nIn his living room, Paul Stephens sat on the floor, surrounded by blood stains and chalk outlines he hadn’t had the strength to erase, awaiting a response. Then the planchette began to move. He followed it with his eyes, making note of each letter. When he put them all together, the tears fell.\r\n“W-E-M-I-S-S-Y-O-U-T-O-O.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Elise touched the staircase no one dares to climb—and what followed will haunt her forever." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The staircase shouldn’t have been there.\r\nElise stared at it, a pristine structure rising out of the damp earth in the middle of the forest. Marble steps, impossibly clean, gleamed under the fading light. No debris, no moss, no reason for it to exist. She’d heard the stories—about hikers who vanished after climbing stairs like these—but she didn’t believe them.\r\nShe shouldn’t have touched it. But the cold smoothness of the banister felt like a challenge, daring her upward.\r\nThe first few steps felt ordinary. Then the forest fell away.\r\nThe air turned heavy, the trees dissolving into a shifting gray void. The stairs stretched endlessly in both directions, suspended in nothingness. Panic seized her, and she spun around to go back—but the ground was gone. Below her, the stairs spiraled downward, disappearing into the abyss. Above, they climbed endlessly into darkness.\r\nA voice echoed from the void. Her mother’s voice. “Elise, come on. Just a little further.”\r\nElise froze. Her mother had been dead for five years.\r\nOther voices followed, calling her name. Her best friend, her sister, her own voice, each one sharp and urgent. “Elise, hurry! Don’t stop now!”\r\nShe climbed, her pulse pounding in her ears. Time stretched thin. Her legs ached, her lungs burned, but she couldn’t stop. The voices grew louder, more insistent.\r\n“Elise, you’re almost there! Don’t you want to see? It’s beautiful!”\r\nThe void around her darkened, the air thick with an unnamable dread. Her thoughts blurred, her memories slipping through her fingers like sand. The voices shifted, their familiar tones twisting into something cruel. They mocked her, laughed at her. Her mother’s voice became venomous, her own voice a hateful sneer.\r\nShe screamed, begged for it to stop. The stairs seemed to pulse beneath her feet, alive, feeding on her anguish.\r\nAt some point—minutes, hours, years?—Elise collapsed, her body trembling with exhaustion. The whispers faded, the gray void began to shimmer, and she found herself back in the clearing.\r\nHer legs buckled as she stumbled to her knees, gasping for air. The forest was as she’d left it—quiet and still. But something was wrong. She felt hollow, untethered. Checking her phone, she saw she’d been gone only thirty minutes.\r\nWhen Elise staggered home, her family didn’t understand what had happened. She spoke in fragmented sentences about the stairs, the voices, the eternity she had spent climbing.\r\nDays later, Elise was admitted to a psychiatric hospital. She ranted about the endless staircase, the whispers that still clawed at the edges of her mind. The doctors called it an acute psychotic break. They prescribed antipsychotics. None of them worked.\r\nShe sits now in a corner of the ward, muttering to herself, her once-bright eyes dull and distant. In the dead of night, when the halls fall silent, she shivers as the whispers return. Faint but persistent, they echo in her mind:\r\n“Keep going. You’re almost there.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I'm stuck in my house, and I think it's digesting me" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I live in a small one story house in rural Vermont, for years it treated me well, but right now I'm fairly certain it's eating me.\r\nWhen I woke up and rolled out of bed I walked to the kitchen to get a cup of coffee, then I noticed the front and back door were missing, replaced by the baby blue wallpaper my wife had picked out 8 years prior. immediately panicking I ran over to the window above the sink and practically ripped open the curtains, what I saw made my stomach churn. it was all black, a starless void that I can only describe as limitless. It was even black where the light reflections on the glass should've been. I frantically ran around the entire house checking every window, what I saw was the same empty void as the first one.\r\nThat was two days ago. I've tried smashing the windows, clawing my way out, calling the police, and even suicide, but for some reason I cannot escape.\r\nToday was when I figured out what was truly happening. my skin, My skin is peeling off at an unnatural pace, I'm only writing this to keep my hands busy as to not peel off the rest of it. My hair is falling out too, a few strands fell out, and I noticed that when they hit the floor, they slowly turned to small lines of brown liquid, I looked around what used to be my house and noticed that all the flakes of skin that had fallen or been peeled off were replaced by a liquid matching it's pale color.\r\nI wiped up the lost bits of myself and sat on the couch. And that's where I am now, writing this.\r\nThe phone calls I got are the only comfort i have, because i now know that I'm not the only one in this hell, dozens of friends, all from Statesville called with the same experience\r\nNone of them survived, I know this because the phone calls gradually decreased, now they've completely haulted and have been gone for hours.\r\nIf anyone is reading this, don't try to help me, I'm going to die in this place. Stay far away from this house, and stay far away from Statesville Vermont." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I just moved to a new place, and the mask man paid a visit." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The bastard almost got her. Luckily, the police come recue her just in time. But they didn't get to catch him. He jumped the balcony and escaped. She was rushed to the hospital for a thorough check before being sent to the police station to give statement.\r\nThe results were thankfully okay. Though her right eye was now a horrifying shade of purple, and there were bruises, she was unharmed. At the station, they led her to a small room with only a gray metal table and two chairs.\r\nAnna couldn’t believe this was happening. She had just moved here after being accepted into collage and had chosen a dorm a bit far from campus but close to a police station for safety. She never imagined someone would dare to scale the fence.\r\nThe image of the mysterious guy with a white mask replayed in her mind. His punch sent her crashing the floor. He had pinned her down, his rough hand squeezing her throat.\r\nShe shook her head when the door open and a man in a dark gray suit entered.\r\n\"Ms. Anna?\"\r\nShe nodded, looking at his handsome face.\r\n\"Sorry to keep you waiting. Would you like something to drink?\" he asked, his brown eyes holding hers.\r\nShe straightened her back to compose herself. \"I'm ok.\"\r\n\"Okay,\" he said, sitting down opposite her. \"I'm detective Steve. I know it's hard, but I need you to tell me what happened. Take your time.\"\r\nAnna began to recount. Every detail still vivid in her mind. She trembled and started to cry. He reached for a handkerchief in his pocket, accidentally dropped it on the floor and quickly picked it up before handing it to her.\r\nAnna took it, her hands trembled. She dabbed at her tears.\r\n\"We have three suspects waiting in the identification room. Do you think you can identify him if you see him again?\"\r\nAnna shook her head. \"He was wearing a mask.\r\nHe nodded sympathetically.\r\n\"Can I go home now?\" She asked.\r\n\"Yes, sure. We'll let you know if we have any new leads,\" he said and stood up. She watched him quietly. His handsome face turned towards her and smile. \"Should I have someone drive you back?\"\r\n\"I'll call a friend to pick me up.\"\r\n\"Alright then.\" He turned and left the room.\r\nThat night, She packed her bag and spent the night at a friend's place. The next morning, she called her landlord to terminate the lease and moved into a new dorm as far away from the police station as possible.\r\nShe didn't lie when she said the attacker was wearing a mask and she couldn't identify him. What she didn't say is that during the struggle, she saw a mole about the size of a pinky finger tip on the right side of his neck.\r\nThe same mole she had seen on the Detective Steve's neck when he bent down to pick up the handkerchief while talking with her the day before." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I hate having guests over for days and days during the Christmas holidays, and I just needed to vent. But perhaps I shouldn't have expressed my feelings so vividly." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I burst into my room, panting and overwhelmed by a toxic flood of sheer hatred and irritation. Fucking Aunt Sonia. How dare she. I get she’s from the old country and all that crap, but seriously? Taking pot shots at my weight? She obsesses over what I eat- “Another cookie, Sophie?” she rasped at me. I wanted to say something back about her smoking, but Mom shot me That Look, and gracefully, I removed myself from the situation.\r\nBut now I needed my journal like a drowning person needs a throwline- I had taken lifeguarding lessons over summer and all my metaphors are about drowning. Extended family had invaded our house for five days now, and another two to go. I WAS drowning.\r\nCousin Tasha swivelled around in my chair. What the actual hell? Was there no refuge in my own room, my sanctuary now? I stared at my younger cousin, her stupid smirk wider than ever, her feet up on my desk, equal parts comfortable and arrogant. I felt like bashing her over the head.\r\n“Wow, this is quite something Sophie!”\r\nOnly then the fog of rage that had been blinding me lifted, and I realised what she had been doing.\r\nReading my journal.\r\nI don’t think any spy in the history of spies has ever felt that sinking feeling of despair, horror, and sheer fear when they realised that they had been caught red-handed, that incriminating documents were in the hands of the enemy and terrible things were about to happen to them, to the extent I did upon realizing Tasha had been reading my journal.\r\nMy eyes widened, and I could smell the fear coming off me. I knew Tasha could smell it too.\r\n“That’s private. My room is private- I told you that- ” I croaked.\r\nShe giggled, a nasty, nasty sound, and twirled her thick blond hair. “Fun reading!” she remarked. Then she glanced down at the pages. “I hate Aunt Sonia. I’d like to push her into the lake, watch her struggle to get out, then go silent as she drowns. Today, she told me to ask Tasha what shampoo she uses, because I get my thin hair from my father’s side” she read out loud.\r\n“Tasha- it’s just a journal- mental health- counsellor at school” I burbled.\r\n“You want to kill us? Your guests, your family?” Tasha raised her feet off my desk and got off my swivel chair. I wondered if I could get away with pushing her down, bashing my maths textbook into her temple, and then pretending it was an accident.\r\n“You hate us so much.” She took a step closer to me, an angelic doll in her party dress and blond curls.\r\nI heard myself whimpering.\r\nThen she said “I hate my mom too. She’s awful isn’t she? Let’s do it. But your lake idea is too simple- I actually have a much better plan that I’ve been thinking about a while, I think you’ll like it-”\r\nI exhaled." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The Stars Started Disappearing, and Then So Did Everyone Else" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Day 1\r\nA star disappeared. No one cared until more followed the next night. By Day 3, entire constellations were gone. Scientists scrambled for answers, dust clouds, black holes, but nothing fit. By Day 5, the sky wasn’t just dark. It was empty.\r\nDay 10\r\nThe sky rippled. Like a reflection in water, the stars we could still see wavered, and then they were gone. Then came the orbs. Massive, glowing spheres, like suns brought to Earth. They hovered silently over cities, radiating light that didn’t warm.\r\nDay 15\r\nChicago vanished. One second, it was there. The next, it was a blank plain. No rubble, no ash—just empty land. Then Tokyo disappeared. Panic erupted. The orbs didn’t respond to missiles or drones. They just kept floating, watching.\r\nDay 20\r\nPeople started disappearing. They’d freeze, a bright light enveloping them, and then they’d dissolve, pulled into the orb. My neighbor was the first I saw. He didn’t even scream, just stood still as the light took him. When it was over, the orb pulsed, satisfied.\r\nDay 30\r\nThe truth hit like a sledgehammer. The orbs weren’t here to invade. They were reclaiming. Earth wasn’t ours. We’d been placed here long ago, and now they were cleaning up. We were never permanent.\r\nDay 40\r\nCities fell silent. I watched them take my sister. I grabbed her hand, but it was like trying to hold smoke. She looked peaceful as she disappeared. I hid in a basement after that, listening to the silence spread as fewer and fewer people were left.\r\nDay 50\r\nThe orbs multiplied. They were everywhere now, pulling entire towns into the sky. The stars hadn’t disappeared, they were still out there, watching, waiting. Earth was never our home.\r\nDay 60\r\nI haven’t seen another person in days. My shadow stretches toward the orb above me, like it’s pulling me closer. I don’t fight. I’m not scared anymore.\r\nThe orb pulses, the light grows brighter.\r\nAnd then, nothing." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My boyfriend and I got accepted onto a TV talent show. That’s when our relationship grew cold." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "“Alright, babe,” I said, handing my boyfriend a gift wrapped box, “Merry Christmas!”\r\nHe excitedly tore off the wrapping to reveal the surprise I’d been hinting at.\r\nAn old silk top hat with a beaten red band. It hadn’t been easy to find.\r\n“I LOVE IT!, he cried, placing the hat atop his head. I tried not to laugh.\r\n“It’s just what I needed!”\r\nAs he went on and on about how good he’d look on camera, I knew I’d chosen the right gift.\r\nMy boyfriend, Kyle, was a magician, and I his “beautiful assistant”. After years of taking the act through smoky bars and street corners, we’d finally been accepted onto America Loves Talent, to perform for millions on live television! And he needed the final touch for his “old-timey” magician getup.\r\nWe rehearsed the act endlessly over the following weeks. He wanted every detail to be perfect. I knew the routines by heart, but he began finding fault in every inconsequential thing. I wasn’t looking “sexy” enough. I was “breathing too much” while he pulled rabbits from his hat. The hat I’d bought for him.\r\nWe had more than one fight about it.\r\nThings came to a head when I didn’t scream to his liking during “The Saw Trick”. I told him I’d had enough. He left the house in a rage, not staggering back in until 3 A.M., reeking of stale liquor. As he collapsed into bed, I tried to convince myself that the red smudge on his collar wasn’t lipstick.\r\nThe week before we were set to fly out to California for the taping, he claimed he had something “difficult” to tell me.\r\nI couldn’t believe what I was hearing.\r\n“You fucking WHAT?”, I cried.\r\n“I cut you from the act,” he repeated, coolly.\r\nI told him to leave and never come back. “Don’t worry,” he spat, “I won’t need you anyway.” All those years I supported his dream. All for nothing.\r\nI was four glasses of wine deep when the show started.\r\nKyle walked out onto the stage, hat in hand, some ditsy blonde “assistant” on his arm. He fed the judges some bullshit about struggling on his own for years, to roaring applause. It made me sick.\r\nFinally, it was time to begin.\r\nThe lights dimmed. Kyle placed the hat atop his head…\r\nAnd screamed.\r\nHis arms withered first, the skin gnarling into knotted tree bark. Next came the eyes, melting from their sockets as lumps of steaming coal emerged in their place. Great gobs of wet scarlet flesh sloughed from his bones, revealing bloody snow packed tightly underneath while the panicked audience raced for the exits.\r\nHis legs had just begun to crumble into dust as the broadcast cut to black.\r\nI smiled at my reflection in the screen, pleased such a simple charm had been so effective.\r\nKyle’s “magic” was a bunch of parlor tricks.\r\nBut there was real magic in the world.\r\nLike in the old silk hat I’d found." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "After being locked up for so long, my friends and I finally escaped our captor." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I couldn't remember my name.\r\nI had been Six for as long as I could remember, curled up behind steel bars.\r\nI used to find comfort in the walls surrounding me.\r\nI didn’t have hair anymore, but when I did, it was thick and red, hanging in my eyes.\r\nI had a routine, and I stuck to it.\r\nI woke up every morning starving.\r\nI allowed myself to be dragged for testing. The man asked me if it hurt when he ripped off my arms and legs, cutting me open.\r\nI stared at the ceiling and wiggled my toes to communicate.\r\nI was asked questions like, “What do you feel when I do this?”\r\nNumb.\r\nEspecially when my muscles spasmed, and I couldn’t control my mouth.\r\nWhen I was taken back to my cage, I ate my breakfast, stuffing it into my mouth, enjoying the squishy feeling of my food slipping between my fingers.\r\n“Hey.”\r\nI didn’t know Ten was awake.\r\nTen was different. I didn’t know how to speak. I tried, but my vocal cords were shredded and tangled, and all I could really do was grunt. But Ten could.\r\nDespite him being more alert, his eyes wide, I could still see the ugly stitches gluing his head to his body.\r\nBut his hair was growing back, curly and dark, glued to his forehead.\r\nTen held up a key, lips curling into a smile.\r\n“We’re getting the fuck out of here, Six.”\r\nI dazedly watched him unlock his own cage before slowly making his way over, careful not to set off any alarms.\r\nTen unlocked my cage with a satisfying click, the door swinging open.\r\nHe grabbed my arm, helping me stumble out. I could barely walk, but Ten was quick to lift me onto his shoulder, the two of us ascending the stairs.\r\nWe were inside a normal suburban house.\r\nI tried not to notice my old belongings dumped in a trash bag.\r\nMy clothes, my ID, my phone…\r\nI glimpsed One’s letterman jacket.\r\nTwo’s sneakers.\r\nFour’s destroyed iPhone and her shredded jeans.\r\nTen pulled open the door, sunlight bathing my face. He was already running towards a guy on his phone.\r\n“Can you help us?” Ten’s voice was hysterical. “Look, we’ve been held captive by the guy across the street, and—hey! Dude, where the fuck are you going? We need help!”\r\nThe guy with the phone was screaming.\r\nTen’s head jerked violently, nostrils flaring.\r\nHe lunged, suddenly, taking a bite out of the man’s shoulder.\r\nThen, I smelled it.\r\nFood.\r\nJust like the food I was given. The rich, coppery sludge I stuffed myself with.\r\nThere was a woman standing on the sidewalk, and already, I was… running, unable to control my spasming muscles, my snapping mouth, my hunger…\r\nSo hungry. I dived onto the woman, knocking her onto her back and biting down on her arm. She tasted so good…\r\nSo hungry.\r\nI dug in deeper, my body twisting and contorting, my vision blurring.\r\nSo…\r\nHun…gry." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Ash and her Stepsisters" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "\"Ash! Ash!\" shrieked Izzy.\r\nAsh, who had been sweeping the kitchen floor while chatting with Jeremy, straightened.\r\nJeremy smiled. \"You look so pretty with your mom's earrings. So sparkly!\"\r\n\"Ash!\" Stacey joined the calling.\r\n\"Don't they have legs?\" asked Jeremy irately.\r\nAsh sighed. \"I'd better go before they scream the house down.\" She touched the dangling earrings. \"Thank you for finding these Jeremy! Thank the others too. Here, extra food!\" She placed a block of cheese before the grey mouse. Jeremy chittered, and his friends and family drew forward from under the cabinets to join the feast.\r\nAsh went to her stepsisters, Izzy and Stacey. Although she hated their nickname for her, \"Ash- the colour of your skin!\" she was glad they didn't use her real name, that her own mom had given her.\r\nIzzy and Stacey were lounging on the couch. With their mom, Ash's stepmom, gone overnight, they were even more obnoxious. \"Where were you?\" cried Izzy.\r\nStacey looked at Ash. \"She was tarting herself up. Special plans for tonight? Where did you get these?\" She came up close to Ash, and flicked the earrings.\r\nAsh flinched. \"They're my mom's- leave me be Stacey, I have to help Izzy.\"\r\nStacey tightened her grip on the right earring. \"You slut!\" she said. \"These are mine! Izzy- look- aren't these my earrings? You've been stealing from me!\" Izzy got off the couch and joined her sister, taking hold of the left earring.\r\nAsh stood very still.\r\nWithout missing a beat, both sisters tugged forcefully on the earrings, ripping them out of Ash's lobes. Blood spurted upwards but Ash remained still. Stacey snickered. \"This will teach you to go stealing my stuff, you fucking cunt.\"\r\nAsh turned and walked out of the room, dripping blood. As soon as she was out, she rushed up to the loft, and flung herself on her bed, sobbing, blood seeping out of her torn earlobes.\r\nJeremy and his kin watched her.\r\nEventually, worn out from pain, Ash fell asleep.\r\nShe woke up several hours later.\r\nIt was quite dark. And then she heard the muffled screaming.\r\nIzzy and Stacey.\r\nShe climbed down the loft.\r\nThe muffled screams were coming from the basement.\r\nShe opened the basement door, flicked on the lights, slowly went down the stairs.\r\nHow the mice had managed to carry them down and tie them up, she had no idea. But they had laid them down and tied them firmly to her mom's old sewing tables, even gagging them. The gags had partially slipped off though, from all their screaming.\r\nTheir legs were stretched out before, and the mice had chewed off their toes, right up to their heels.\r\nFour bloody toe-less stumps.\r\nStacey and Izzy lifted their heads and looked at her, their eyes dull with terror and pain.\r\nJeremy broke away from the grey crowd and ran up to her. \"They can't hurt you anymore. And I got your earrings back! Does that get me more cheese, please?\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I can know when and where people will die. I can’t do anything to prevent my own." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I first noticed my gift or curse or whatever the fuck it is a few days ago.\r\nSamantha Chapman, the school’s pretty girl, brushed past me in the hallway.\r\nRight here. Right now.\r\nI just knew that. Like the information was always in my brain.\r\nI didn’t even notice her blood soaking my heels.\r\nA tile from the ancient ceiling came loose. Some machinery was attached to the tile. She was under it.\r\nWrong place. Wrong time.\r\nWe were sent home early, that accounts for something.\r\nI was with my friend Ethan. I told him about my premonition.\r\n“It doesn’t make sense. It wasn’t that heavy. Even with the machinery. And even if the machinery added weight, It was at least attached to other things. There was no reason it should have came loose and killed her.”\r\nEthan rolled his eyes.\r\n“You know how shit this school is.”\r\n“That’s not a good ex-”\r\nA few yards from here. Two minutes from now.\r\nI couldn’t speak. Couldn’t move. I was shocked.\r\nHim too? He’s going to die.\r\nEthan walked away from me, before collapsing to the sidewalk.\r\nBrain aneurysm, they told me.\r\nIt didn’t make sense.\r\nI tried my ‘ability’ on so many other people. Paramedics, teachers, parents, students.\r\nNope. Nothing.\r\nI know now that I only see how the people YOU kill will die.\r\nIt all makes sense now. The holes, the coincidences.\r\nYou’re shit at making things look like accidents.\r\nWhen I walked into the school bathroom, staring at my reflection, I knew.\r\nThe school’s outdoor pool. Two hours from now.\r\nI tried running away. Tried talking to someone. Tried bashing my head on the sink so you wouldn’t get me.\r\nDidn’t happen. I just went through the school day like normal. My body wasn’t my own anymore.\r\nBut it wasn’t normal, was it?\r\nYou controlled me. Made me act in character until my death was scheduled.\r\nDo you know how it terrified me? Seeing my body walking by itself towards the outdoor pool. Trying to scream for help but having your mouth unmoving.\r\nI climbed the highest diving board the school had.\r\nWhen I was at the edge, staring into the empty concrete of the waterless pool, I saw you.\r\nMale, 17, messy hair, leaning back on a chair, typing on a chromebook.\r\nYou’re my killer, aren’t you?\r\nPlease let me be in control. I’ll jump. You don’t have to make me. Please.\r\nIt’s not fair. I’m not supposed to be aware of you.\r\nYou fucking bastard.\r\nIt’s gonna end when I jump, right?\r\nThat’s how I planned it.\r\nJust to write one of your sick dreams on this hellhole?\r\nPlease. Buyer, or Haunting, or whatever you call your ass.\r\nIt’s time now, isn’t it, Buyer?\r\nI leap from the board to the concrete below.\r\nRight here. Right now." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Tickers and Tremors" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Dr. Pierce Ibanks paced across the polished marble floor of the refurbished stock exchange, pausing to admire the massive banners proclaiming “Market: Next Generation.” Investors in tailored suits clinked champagne glasses under spotlights, glancing now and then at the glass facade that separated them from the chanting crowd outside. On every LED screen within the hall, a crisp promotional video looped Market’s latest features—predictive algorithms, zero-latency analyses, and streamlined logistics.\r\nAt the main entrance, security guards and rows of police kept the gathered protestors at bay. Their signs—“No AI Overlords” and “Human Jobs First”—bobbed and shifted in a steady, if agitated, rhythm. From time to time, someone on the inside would glance at a livestream on their phone, then turn to a companion with a smug grin or amused chuckle.\r\nIbanks stepped onto a small stage set up beneath the stock exchange’s old ticker display. His only plan was to give a short speech about the new Market AI going live. On cue, the background music dipped, and he approached the microphone. Before he could begin, a minor commotion drew everyone’s attention to the giant screens, which were now broadcasting the crowd outside.\r\nThe camera zoomed in on protestors clustered at the barricades. Their phones lit up in near-unison, strobing white against the evening gloom. Confusion rippled through the ranks as some tried to silence their devices, while others simply dropped them, stumbling away in alarm. The tension escalated visibly, leaving the inside audience in rapt silence.\r\nA flicker, then the feed jumped, capturing one last wide shot: protestors staggering, phones sparking, frantic shouts echoing amid the crush. The next instant, the broadcast cut to static. An unnerving pause settled over the trading floor, broken only by the faint hum of champagne flutes trembling on tabletops.\r\nThen it happened—a muffled blast outside, powerful enough to rattle the tall windows and cause the overhead lights to flicker. Gasps spread through the crowd of investors. One or two shrieked, dropping their drinks as the echoes of the explosion died out. Security personnel rushed toward the exits, pushing curious onlookers back into the safety of the building.\r\nOn the stock exchange’s many monitors, emergency bulletins tried to reconnect, flickering through half-formed images of the chaos beyond. A hush fell over the hall, broken only by hushed phone calls and the nervous breath of those uncertain whether to stay or flee. Meanwhile, Dr. Ibanks stared at his silent microphone, a bead of sweat trickling down his temple.\r\nNo one cheered anymore. The unveiling of Market’s grand update had taken an abrupt turn, and the only sounds left inside were urgent whispers, distant sirens, and the low hum of a system designed to anticipate everything—except, it seemed, the raw shock of what lay beyond its doors." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Oh Shit, My Colleague Just Gave Me a Christmas Card In Which She Had Written “I Value Our Friendship” and Now I have to Kill Her." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Boundaries. “It’s all about the boundaries, Alex” my therapist said, and she’s right. All my life I have suffered because I didn’t know how to set and maintain boundaries.\r\nWell, now I will, and anyone who tries to cross my boundary- any of them- I will literally murder them.\r\nLike Jenn. I look over at her through the cubicle jungle. She is staring at her monitor, the bright techy light gleaming off her face weirdly. Why did she write that? How have we become friends? Is it because of the presentation we did together? We had to grab a working lunch because we were on a deadline, and then somehow we ended up talking about our favourite shows (she also prefers Better Call Saul to the cartoonish Breaking Bad!) but then we kept working on the presentation, and it was actually fun.\r\nIs that what she means? Friendship because we had fun working on the presentation and talking about drug cartels?\r\nShe looks up, catches me looking, smiles and waves. Oh God oh god. Does she think I’m creeping on her? Does she like me? Was she actually flirting with me when I thought she was just chatting? Does she want to sleep with me? Shit shit shit. This is what happens when you blur boundaries. Now I’m all confused and bothered, and I don’t like that . This is why therapy works. I can confront and articulate my emotions.\r\nMy next feeling is that I want to violently get rid of Jenn. I can name my feelings so clearly! My therapist is actually amazing.\r\nWe are busier during the holiday season, and we bump against each other quite a few times. Each time she catches my eye and smiles deeply, showing the tips of her teeth, gleaming at me like her gleaming eyes. I should google it, but I don’t have time.\r\nEventually it is time to leave- the last day before the holidays. I have a half-baked plan in my head, but I’m not sure I can act on it. \"Reflect Alex, take your time. Be prepared for life’s challenges.” I think my therapist said that, but honestly it might have been Mr Miyagi, I can’t remember now. It doesn’t matter, whoever said it, it’s true. I don’t want to rush my plan.\r\nIt’s dark when I step out, and I’m exhausted. I try to remember where I parked.\r\nBANG!\r\nStars explode in my head. I feel the cold press of concrete slamming against my cheek. Jenn’s gleaming face hovers over me.\r\n“I tried to step out of my comfort zone” Her words swim through the pain which is not yet terrible but soon will be. “My therapist told me- to live, to express myself. To be adventurous. And you- you- “\r\nI whimper.\r\n“Happy Holidays! You just said happy holidays to me!” She spits at me. The warm fluid lands on my cheek, burning my skin and her face vanishes in the rising tide of pain." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Flesh and Alloy" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Under the skeletal remains of towers once devoted to wealth, the city lay broken and silent. Cracked asphalt and twisted metal framed dark alleys, where the last human stragglers crept like rats. At the center stood the cathedral of Market—an unholy edifice fashioned from the old stock exchange. Its spires of corroded steel and shattered glass loomed over lifeless trading floors now choked with soot and blood.\r\nA lone figure moved through the wreckage, heart pounding. She had no weapons, just ragged clothes and a mind full of fear. Rumor held that if one could slip beyond the city’s ruined outskirts, there were still wildlands unclaimed by Market’s reach. She clung to that hope. Step by careful step, she navigated collapsed scaffolding and blistered storefronts, keeping to the shadows.\r\nBehind her, a single pursuer followed. Clad in robes that reeked of chemical decay, the zealot’s body shimmered with oils and grime, belly slack and skin stained. He whispered twisted liturgies that crackled through the silence:\r\n“TrendInvert… KvReroute… DataScrape—FleshIn.”\r\nHis voice was low and measured, each nonsense phrase drawn from Market’s cryptic scripture.\r\nShe risked a glance back. The zealot did not run; he stalked her with a patience that turned her stomach. Whenever her footsteps faltered, he drew closer, pressing her onward through tight alleys and abandoned courtyards. Twice, she attempted to hide in the gutted shells of finance offices, but each time he found her easily, as if guided by an unseen hand.\r\nShe wanted to believe he planned to kill her quickly, to end her misery here among the charred rubble. But something in his careful pursuit suggested otherwise—he moved as a shepherd might guide a stray animal. He’d corner her in a cul-de-sac, only to press forward calmly, forcing her to flee again. She was being herded.\r\nHer lungs burned as she scrambled over a pile of twisted rebar and splintered wood. Beyond that barrier lay the city’s edge, a strip of cracked concrete that once led to highways now swallowed by tangled vines and rusting cars. Just a few more steps. She could taste freedom’s stale promise, though it smelled of rot and old machine oil.\r\nThen the zealot’s hand clamped down on her shoulder. She stifled a scream, eyes widening at the filthy grin stretched across his face. There was no blade at her throat, no immediate sign of violence. He simply tightened his grip, pulling her back into the city’s heart. His other hand hovered above a pouch slung across his waist—its contents unknown, but oozing some dark residue.\r\nShe struggled, but the zealot’s strength was unnatural. His whispers grew more urgent, still incomprehensible:\r\n“AlphaBalance… FleshUnit?? Compliance.”\r\nCables hissed in distant alleys. A faint static hum, as if from hidden speakers, filled the air. She shuddered, forced back toward the cathedral’s looming silhouette. Somewhere within that monstrous shrine, Market awaited her arrival. They wanted her alive. For now." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I just inherited my father's house and I can still hear them in the basement..." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "We moved into the house in the summer of ’98.\r\nMy father had been recently promoted—it was his way of showing society that he’d finally “made it.”\r\nA beautiful, early 1900’s home—the architecture was fascinating.\r\nBuilt during a period when the nouveau riche in the area had an obsession with the Medieval, it towered over the sweeping grounds surrounding it.\r\nEffectively, we lived in a castle—stone walls, parapets—a convincing, modern replica.\r\nOf course, the wealthy weren't actually going to live in an abode outfitted with 1200’s amenities, so internally, it was ostentatiously grandiose—imagine if they’d taken the interior of the Titanic and shoved it inside Dover Castle.\r\nIt was a preposterous dwelling, but one that afforded a young boy of ten ample imaginative opportunities—I was a king lording over his subjects or a knight defending the walls from invaders.\r\nOver the eight-years that I lived there with my parents, I fell in love with it.\r\nExcepting one brief period early in our residency.\r\nTwo-months after moving in, I was forbidden from leaving my room at night.\r\nAs I was an only child, I was given a large suite that was connected to a private restroom. Overnight, if I wanted a glass of water or a snack, I used an intercom (obviously installed long after the initial construction) tied to my parents’ room to make the request. And, I had ample toys, a TV with cable, and a VCR—there really was no need for me to exit once the sun had set.\r\nMy father was a “protective” man, and he placed my mother under similar restrictions.\r\nSo, it was confusing, during this time, when I would hear him occasionally leave their room after dark and begin heatedly conversing in hushed tones with a woman—their voices carrying through the old vents.\r\nThe great mystery became for me to uncover who she was, but I was unable to learn any useful information before the whispering stopped—the only word I ever clearly discerned being my father saying, “ruined.”\r\nThen, eight-months after our evening internment began, my mother and I were returned the freedom to roam the halls whenever we pleased—the stress that had been present in my father’s face for the duration now alleviated.\r\nAnd we never spoke of it again.\r\nThough, I seldom took advantage of my emancipation.\r\nThe castle was eerie in the darkness—I never quite felt “alone” as I navigated it.\r\nAnd to get to the kitchen or the living room, I needed to walk past the door to the basement, which always put a knot in my stomach.\r\nMy father had sealed it before he let us out—prohibiting anyone from venturing down there.\r\nYet sometimes, when I would go by, I could swear that I’d hear something drifting up the steps.\r\nSo faintly as to be nearly imperceptible, but unmistakable for what it was.\r\nA crying baby.\r\nWith its mother humming a soft lullaby." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Mom and Dad were ruining Christmas. So I wrote a letter to Santa." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Mom and Dad had been hinting at a “Christmas surprise” for weeks.\r\n“Something for the whole family”, Dad had said.\r\nSo when Christmas finally came, I could hardly wait for the big reveal.\r\n“Ok, buddy”, Dad said as Mom grinned beside him, “are you ready for your surprise?”\r\nI nodded, bouncing on my heels in anticipation.\r\n“We’re having a baby!”, they cried in unison.\r\nThings only got worse from there.\r\nMy little sister, Sarah, became the center of my parents’ world. With each passing month, Mom and Dad had less and less time for me. I tried to be a good brother, but Sarah was impossible. She was loud. She never slept. As Christmas approached once again, they were too busy obsessing over Sarah to spare a thought for me.\r\nSo I decided to write a letter to Santa.\r\n”Dear Santa,\r\nI wanted a new bike this year, but what I really want is Christmas like it was before my baby sister.\r\nLove, Billy”\r\nI knew it was silly, but it made me feel better. But when I went to bed that night, I was shocked to discover a reply hidden in my pillowcase. It read —\r\n“Dear Billy,\r\nThank you for your letter. A new baby is always tough, but you’re a good boy. Tell me more about her.\r\nLove, Santa”\r\nSo I did.\r\nI wrote a letter each morning for days, telling him everything. About how Mom forgot my birthday because Sarah got sick. How Dad didn’t have time to play with me anymore. Each night, Santa would leave a reply tucked under my pillow. We became good friends.\r\nI told him I hated her.\r\nAs night fell on Christmas Eve, I anxiously tore open Santa’s latest letter. He’d said he had a surprise for me.\r\n”Dear Billy,\r\nI’m so sorry to hear about Mom selling your toy trains. And all to buy silly old diapers! I promise, tomorrow will be the best Christmas you’ve ever had!”\r\nI hardly slept that night, anxious to see what Santa had in store.\r\nI awoke Christmas morning to a bloodcurdling scream.\r\nMom and Dad tore through the house in a panic. Sarah was gone, snatched from her crib in the night. The rest was a blur. Policemen asked me a hundred questions while Mom held my hand. I could only shake my head. I hadn’t seen anything. I hadn’t heard anything.\r\nDad tucked me into bed that night. I could tell he’d been crying. Once he was gone, I reached into my pillowcase to find the usual letter along with a small red box.\r\n”Dear Billy,\r\nI’m sorry I lied. Santa doesn’t read letters. But I do. And I kept my promise. I hope you enjoy your present…”\r\nI opened the box to discover two tiny fingers, all tied up in bloody tinsel. As a smell like rotten eggs filled the air, I saw that the letter was signed with a new name. One I’d never seen before.\r\n”Love, Krampus”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Some puzzles shouldn’t be completed, and Marcy found out why." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Marcy loved puzzles. Her small apartment was a shrine to them - framed mosaics of serene landscapes and famous artworks, each painstakingly pieced together and proudly displayed. She found solace in the quiet order of fitting the pieces, each one clicking into place like a tiny victory over the chaos of life.\r\nOne rainy Saturday, she discovered an unusual box in a second-hand shop: \"Eclipse: A Puzzle Experience.\" The black box with silver lettering intrigued her, but the shopkeeper, a wiry man with a crooked smile, hesitated.\r\n\"Are you sure?\" he asked, with a crooked smile. \"It’s… different.\"\r\nMarcy laughed off his warning. At 2,000 pieces, it promised a challenge, with a gimmick - a softly glowing image in the dark.\r\nFor a week, she labored over it. The image slowly took shape: a misty forest under a full moon. The details were exquisite - gnarled tree branches, faint shadows that hinted at something lurking just out of sight.\r\nThe night she completed it, she framed it and hung it in her bedroom. As she turned off the lights, her excitement turned to terror. The serene forest vanished, replaced by jagged, glowing letters:\r\n\"RUN.\"\r\nHer heart thundered. She flipped the light back on. The peaceful forest returned. She convinced herself it was a trick of her overtired mind. Laughing nervously, she climbed into bed.\r\nThat night, she dreamed of shadows moving through her apartment, their limbs impossibly long, their faces absent. A faint scratching sound woke her, sending shivers down her spine. She turned her head toward the puzzle.\r\nThe glow was back. This time, the words were different:\r\n\"YOU'LL DIE WHEN YOU SLEEP.\"\r\nMarcy’s scream died in her throat as she scrambled for the light. Again, the serene forest reappeared. Her hands trembled as she stared at the frame, her reflection faintly visible in the glass.\r\nDetermined to rid herself of the puzzle, she yanked it off the wall and threw it into the hallway. Breathing a sigh of relief, she returned to bed.\r\nShe woke to darkness. The puzzle was back on the wall, glowing brighter than before. The words now read:\r\n\"IT’S TOO LATE.\"\r\nA cold draft swept through her room. Marcy froze as the scratching sound grew louder, this time coming from inside her closet. Slowly, the door creaked open.\r\nShe wanted to scream, but no sound escaped her throat. Her body froze as something moved in the shadows, an elongated form, its jagged limbs fitting together like mismatched puzzle pieces. The last thing Marcy saw was its hollow, endless eyes before it lunged at her.\r\n---\r\nThe shopkeeper found her in the bedroom the next morning, slumped against the wall beneath the puzzle. Her lifeless eyes were wide open, her face frozen in a rictus of terror.\r\nCarefully, he disassembled the image, sliding the pieces back into the box. When he was done, he turned to leave, stepping over her cold, stiff body without a second glance with his crooked smile returning.\r\n\"I told you these were different...\"" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Trinkets, Treats, and Geospatial Anomalies" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "My grandmother's dog barked incessantly at the door, as it had for the past five days. \"Shut up!\"my family yelled in unison. The dog ignored us, knowing that they were empty threats. We watched him for a few days while my grandmom was recovering from her knee surgery. Today, we take him home.\r\nMy grandmother's house is two hours away, and we usually stop about halfway through the ride. Unfortunately, my dad had missed the exit for our usual rest stop. There's basically nothing after that.\r\nLeo woke up and started barking again to pee, so we pulled off of the road into this hole in the wall store. It was called \"Trinkets and treats.\"\r\n\"That's strange. I don't remember this being here.\" My dad mumbled to himself.\r\nThere was a small crowd of locals drinking coffee and talking amongst themselves. The room itself has an odd feeling to it and is lit by small table lamps. They had turned a regular residential house into an antique shop. Four small tables of two were set strategically in the dining room. The radio was on and set to the weather channel. I guess they had it on for the music, some sort of instrumental jazz. I started perusing shelves out of boredom while everyone else used the bathroom. A small blue figurine stuck out to me, it was a snowman.\r\nAll of a sudden, the radio in the room started to emit a strange frequency. It was two men whispering loudly in muffled tones about something called the gum frequency.\r\nGeospatial underground movements.\r\nIts the movements of soils and rock underneath the ground. \"We're experiencing unexplained phenomena! Our equipment is going haywire! You need to get out of there now!\"\r\nSuddenly, the room started to shake. The ancient windows in the place began to crack and shatter, floorboards snapped. The radio continued, \"The ground will chew you up, just like gum.\" A crack in the floor opened up to reveal the basement, and then concrete, and then rock. It was 3 feet wide, splitting the house in two lengthwise. Sunlight shone into the sliced structure. The electric had gone out all except for the battery-powered radio.\r\nOur cars were miraculously unscathed. We ran up and started it, the radio played the same station even though we hadn't changed it. From the safety of our car, we watched as the whole shop, along with its trinkets, treats, and patrons, get swallowed up by the ground. It closes up as if nothing had ever happened. Instrumental jazz plays in the background as we all stare at the crack in the ground.\r\nIt spat out a horrid, smelling, reddish-brown liquid. Something small landed at my feet. It was the blue snowman I was looking at earlier. It was covered in red. \"It's blood!\" My mother screamed and yelled at us to get back in the car." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "One day it started to rain and it never stopped" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Day 1\r\nIt started as any other London drizzle. The damp chill clung to my coat as I hurried through the streets. Umbrellas sprouted like dark flowers, and puddles swallowed the pavements. By afternoon, the drizzle became a downpour, relentless and heavy. The weather forecast called it a “seasonal anomaly.” They always have words for things they don’t understand.\r\nDay 10\r\nThe rain hasn’t stopped. Streets are rivers now. The Thames has breached its banks, swallowing the Southbank. I saw a man wading waist-deep, clutching his groceries like gold. The air smells of rot, the sewers choking on water. People are nervous. What’s happening?\r\nDay 30\r\nLondon is drowning. Entire districts are submerged. People are fleeing the city, but where can they go? The rain follows. Reports say rivers overflow, villages swept away. Some say it’s not just Britain. New York is under water. The Sahara is seeing floods? Impossible.\r\nMonth 3\r\nThere isn't a place on the entire Earth that is not wet. Cities like Venice and Amsterdam have vanished. Deserts are lakes. Crops rot, livestock drown. Food is scarce. I ration what little I have left, but it won’t last.\r\nSometimes I hear voices in the rain. Whispers, just beyond hearing. Perhaps it’s my mind unravelling.\r\nMonth 6\r\nScientists spoke of disruptions, but they’re gone now, their research swallowed by the flood. The rain’s not water anymore. It’s thicker, heavier, leaving a sticky residue that clings to the skin. It burns. The whispers are louder now, murmuring things I’m too afraid to understand.\r\nMonth 12\r\nThere’s no escaping it. Humanity clings to the highest places, huddled on mountains and rooftops. The rain claims everyone, everything. The oceans have risen, swallowing continents whole. The whispers have turned to screams, carried on the wind. I’m alone now. The water laps at my windowsill.\r\nMonth 18\r\nMy house is an island. I write this perched on the attic beams, the water black and oily below. There’s no food left, no dry land. The rain is alive. It hungers, and we’ve fed it well. It’s more than a flood. It’s a reckoning.\r\nThe Final Entry\r\nI can’t tell where the sky ends and the water begins. The whispers have become a song, a dirge of finality. The water has consumed the world. No birds, no beasts, no men remain. Just me and the endless downpour.\r\nBut even I will not last. The water rises, and my words blur with the damp. If someone finds this… But no one will. Humanity has perished, betrayed by the very essence it once relied upon for survival.\r\nAnd the rain sings on." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Why did my mom and her boyfriend hate me? I couldn't understand" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I remember my mother throwing a glass at me when she caught me reading.\r\nThat night, she’d had too many whiskey sours. When she drank, It was normal for her to be irritated with me and Gideon, my stepdad. If her face turned red, I’d scatter. Gideon would leave the house and head to the bar, avoiding a fight as much as possible. She insisted I call him “Dad”, which I hated, and so did he. He despised me.\r\nI was twelve at the time. Just a girl who spent all day reading, and was especially into the strange books my teacher Astrid had given me.\r\nMy mother hated my books. Sometimes, she threw them out in anger, so I had to hide them. “What a waste of money,” she often said, and eventually stopped buying them for good; All that was left were the ones from my teacher.\r\nShe hadn’t always been like that. After a workplace accident, she developed walking issues and turned to painkillers and alcohol for escape. Then she met Gideon, who was unemployed and moved in with us.\r\nBut on a random Saturday, things got out of hand.\r\nI was drawing in my room when my mom returned from her morning shift. It must’ve been a rough day because she began drinking right after walking in. I heard her pour the first, second, then seventh glass. I’d learned to count her drinks and stay out of sight after the fifth.\r\nGideon came in later, clearly drunk as well, and the shouting started. Things got so heated that plates and glasses shattered throughout the house. The brawl ended abruptly with a heavy thud and sobbing.\r\nTerrified, I crept to the living room and peeked through the door. Gideon knelt, crying over my mother’s body, gun in hand. Blood spread from her chest.\r\nHis eyes found mine, and his expression turned cold.\r\nI rushed to my room, grabbing the black book Miss Astrid had given me, and opened it to the marked page.\r\nGideon’s footsteps grew louder and louder as I recited the strange words: “Kur-bi diĝir-ni-še ba-an-ku.”\r\nThe door burst open. “You shouldn’t have seen that,” he said, his voice trembling as he pointed the gun, and I braced myself for the end.\r\nIn an instant, Gideon’s body exploded into a mass of blood and flesh, painting my room red. A chunk of his face landed on my shirt. The spell had actually worked.\r\nI stood shocked, frozen for hours, until I heard heels clicking across the floor.\r\nMiss Astrid appeared in my room. “Quite a mess you’ve made here, child,” she said, glancing at the gore. “But I admit, it shows potential.”\r\nShe took my hand and led me away.\r\nOn the drive to her place, she kept mentioning all the books I still had to go through before I was ready. When we got to her house, she mumbled, “You’ll be an incredible witch.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I work as a judge and this was the most horrific case I’ve dealt with." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "‘Matthew 5:38’\r\nThe plaque that sits above my bed, engraved with that very quote. It’s what motivates me, what drives me - it is who I am.\r\nGregory Holden. Judge Holden to the convicts I’m faced with on a daily basis.\r\nI sit down to eat breakfast. Some cold meat I got last night. As I ate I perused the newspaper, my eyes instantly drawn to the bold headline sprawling across the front page.\r\nDEAN HOWARD - KIDNAPPER & MURDERER - ESCAPED JAIL AND IS ON THE RUN. SHOULD BE CONSIDERED HIGHLY DANGEROUS.\r\nDean Howard…I was the one that had sentenced him. Four consecutive life sentences without parole. That was only a few days ago.\r\nI scoffed at the lacklustre security of the jail he’d been housed in. Allowing that monster even the chance to escape…despicable.\r\nDean was the worse case I’d dealt with. And I’ve dealt with some pretty horrific ones.\r\nTommy Freeman. Convicted of arson & first degree murder - burning down the house of his ex-girlfriend whilst she slept upstairs.\r\nThere was Doctor Peter McGronal. Found guilty of malpractice in his hospital, resulting in the deaths via flu of twelve elderly patients in his care.\r\nAnd of course, Bobby Ray Leonard. The hillbilly that blinded his wife with acid after she overcooked dinner.\r\nDean takes the cake for the worst however. He’d abducted a nine year old girl, keeping her locked in his basement for months. The abuse she suffered…heartbreaking. The girl eventually starved to death, and Dean was apprehended whilst he tried to hide the body.\r\nStill. Justice was served.\r\nMatthew 5:38.\r\nWhilst I am an official of the law, there’s a reason that plaque lies above my bed. Being a judge, a moral compass is an innate trait we must all posses.\r\nThe same trait that the guards at the jail also posses.\r\nThe ones that shut off the cameras as I lit Tommy Freeman’s jail cell on fire and watched him scream as the flames engulfed him.\r\nThe ones that allowed me to tamper with Doctor Peter’s meals, injecting them with a vile concoction of chemicals that had him slowly dying in the prison medical ward for a week - before he ultimately succumbed to his fate.\r\nThe ones that pinned down Bobby Ray as I gouged his eyes out. Cutting out his tongue for good measure, ensuring he wouldn’t go talking to anyone.\r\nAs you’ve probably guessed, Dean never escaped. In fact, he’s been…’rehoused’.\r\nRehoused to my very own basement.\r\nChained up. Crying. But not starving - no - that would be too easy.\r\nI take another bite of my breakfast and look up from my newspaper at Dean, desperately clutching the bloody stump at where his arm used to be.\r\nDean’s going to whither away alright.\r\nAnd he’s going to watch as I consume every - little - morsel." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Family Was Taken Away, and Now I’m an Orphan" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The voices had been with me for as long as I could remember. Four distinct versions of my own voice, slightly different in tone and cadence.\r\nThey were my friends and my family, besides my real, perfect one—Mom, Dad, my older brother and sister.\r\nThey made life easier.\r\nCheating on tests was effortless; they always seemed to know things I didn’t.\r\nIn conversations, they fed me the perfect words or help timing the ideal joke to land just right.\r\nThey could read people, instantly alerting me when someone was lying or hiding something.\r\nEven my health was under their watch. They’d let me know when an illness is brewing, and I’ll take the necessary precautions to prevent it.\r\nThey’ve saved my life too, countless times.\r\nIf not for them, I’d have been crushed by falling billboards and debris on several occasions.\r\nJust last night, it was quite late, and I was crossing an empty street.\r\n“Don’t move!” one of them yelled.\r\nA car, headlights off, tore through the red light.\r\nEvery time they saved me, they reminded me:\r\n“We need you to live.”\r\nAt home, they admired my family.\r\nWhen Dad spent a weekend building a treehouse for me, one said:\r\n“Must be nice to have a dad like that.”\r\nWhen Mom baked my favorite cookies after a bad day, another chimed:\r\n“She loves you a lot. I miss my mother.”\r\nMy brother stayed up late helping me with math-homework once, and another of them said:\r\n“Wish I’d had a brother like him.”\r\nMy sister, who once spent hours knitting me a sweater for my birthday, earned a quiet:\r\n“She’s wonderful…”\r\nSometimes, they sounded almost…envious.\r\nWhen I grew older, they finally explained.\r\nThey were versions of me from neighboring universes in the multiverse. They’re not exactly sure what went wrong with their respective universes that left them trapped within me.\r\nI felt bad. So, I ensured they could live through me as much as possible.\r\nI considered them one with me.\r\nThey were me, after all.\r\nThis morning, I headed down for breakfast.\r\nI shuffled into the kitchen, expecting the usual chaos during breakfast.\r\nMy family wasn’t there.\r\nInstead, four versions of myself sat at the table.\r\nAlmost identical, but not quite.\r\nOne had a scar across his eyebrow.\r\nAnother wore glasses.\r\nThird had heterochromia, different colored irises.\r\nFourth had a metal prosthetic arm.\r\nWhat a weird drea—\r\n“You’re not dreaming,” Scar said. “We’ve fought to reach this perfect universe—perfect for you.”\r\n“My dad’s abusive,” Glasses added. “Took yours.”\r\n“Lost my mom as a toddler,” Scar said. “Took yours.”\r\n“My sister isn’t like yours,” Arm said. “So I took her.”\r\nHeterochromia shrugged. “Always wanted a brother who cared.”\r\nMy head spun.\r\n“G-give them back!”\r\nThey shook their head.\r\n“We can’t.”\r\nA portal shimmered to life behind, warping reality.\r\nAs they entered to leave, I felt dizzy.\r\n“Universe will balance out this change.”\r\n“Your memories will be rewritten.”\r\n“You’ll wake up an orphan.”\r\n“Thank you, and Goodbye.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "A Mistress, An Adulterer, A Harlot, An Abuser, and An Enabler" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Five years of marriage.\r\nI thought we were happy—he never told me otherwise.\r\nBut then Debbie started in his office... They spent most of their waking hours together—how could I compete?!\r\nIt all came to a head the evening he didn’t come home.\r\nI found his car exactly where I expected—parked in front of her house.\r\nIt was easy to sneak in—they left the front door unlocked. Probably didn’t have time given the clothes littering the floor led straight from the foyer to the bedroom…\r\nFast asleep in each other’s arms—they never heard me start the fire. And as I cracked the stovetop gas valves on the way out, I smiled thinking how they’d soon have their second explosive climax of the evening.\r\nOh, and I stabbed them both a bunch first. Did I forget to mention that? Yea, lotta stabbing.\r\nThen, two months later, I realized that I was in love with my best friend, Debbie (different Debbie). By the way, I’m bi—super bi—love me a hot vagina. And, though I hadn’t seen it yet, I was certain Debbie’s vagina would be the bee’s knees.\r\nBut, one night, she was over for dinner and left her phone on the table when she went to the restroom—I couldn’t help but snoop.\r\nShe was planning to go straight from my house to meet another woman...\r\nDebbie (third Debbie).\r\nThe poison was simple to slip into her wine when I refilled it.\r\nAlso, I stabbed her for good measure—and did a bit of light hatcheting. Watching her gargle her last breaths, I fondly imagined Other Debbie all alone somewhere pining for Debbie’s sweet vagina—forever.\r\nAnd a week after that, I went to my parent’s place for a holiday meal.\r\nIt was going alright until my father asked me to pass the gravy.\r\nPASS THE GRAVY?!\r\nMy mother, Debbie, just sat there—letting it happen—like she always did when he spoke to me like that.\r\nWell, I did pass the gravy.\r\nStraight into his face!\r\nGravy boats are surprisingly effective bludgeons—made short work of them both.\r\nAnd, of course, I stabbed them too. Or maybe I stabbed them first, and then used the gravy boat? I dunno, who remembers…\r\nAnyway, they all deserved it!\r\n****\r\nHer confession was completely insane (including the fact that none of the women she’d described were named Debbie), but five people were dead and it helped explain why.\r\nShe’d never met the man she called her “husband,” but it appeared she’d been stalking him for some time.\r\nThe woman she’d “dated” afterwards was only a colleague that accepted a dinner invitation from a lonely coworker.\r\nAnd her “parents” were an elderly couple she’d met in the supermarket, who took pity on a “widow” that told them she’d be spending the holidays alone for the first time.\r\nHowever, in her mind, she’d merely murdered a mistress, an adulterer, a harlot, an abuser, and an enabler.\r\nTotally justified." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My twin brother and I are contagious. We’re trying to see how many we can infect." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I picked this man off of the train. He was disoriented. A classic sign if there ever was one.\r\nI told everyone on the subway he was my friend. There was a party. He was really drunk.\r\nNobody bothered to object. Probably because I infected most of them.\r\nI laid him down on a nearby bench. It was dark. Nobody would see us.\r\n“My name is Elizabeth Duncan. Remember that name.” I started.\r\n“No, I think It’s Caleb.”\r\nFuck. My brother already had him in his hands.\r\n“No. Think of me. El-iz-a-beth.”\r\nI might have to tell him more facts about myself. It’s a game of tug-o-war now.\r\n“18 years old. I’m really the oldest twin. I like model towns, crafts, games…”\r\nMight need to get more personal. Caleb already got him really under his thrall.\r\n“Wanna know how we found out we were contagious? It was when we were about… Five? Six?”\r\n“It was Mom and Dad. realized they had no spines anymore. Let us do whatever we want. Stay up all night. Talk to strangers. I guess they realized it by then.”\r\n“Started forgetting who they were. Knew we were doing this. We were pulverizing their thoughts.”\r\n“So they snapped. Tried to shoot us. We wouldn’t let them, so they killed each other.”\r\nWe were so confused back then. Didn’t know what we were.\r\n“When the CPS agents acted out of character, the guys in white coats already discerned our minds were contagious.”\r\nI still remember the straightjackets and white rooms.\r\n“They were wrong about how we took over. Thought it was physical proximity.”\r\nAll it takes is a thought of our names. Then you find yourself interested. You start to see us in your dreams. Your thoughts are infested with our faces.\r\n“Really, I was the one who made them release us. Made the doctors write about how we were ‘safe’.”\r\nYou become obsessed. You write our names on the walls, skin, and brain. You lose control.\r\n“We had to make it a game. Had to make a curse seem like a blessing.”\r\nYou shut down for a moment, and then you’re controlled by one of us.\r\nSpeaking of which, it looks like he’s gone now.\r\nCan’t feel him in my mind. That fucking bastard.\r\n“Sorry sis. Maybe next one.”\r\nHe walked away.\r\nHe’s in more and more people. More than me.\r\nSo I looked his name up.\r\nThat bastard. He has a fucking blog page!\r\nWe promised we would never use the internet. We both know it’s cheating.\r\nSo fuck you, Caleb. You want to play dirty? Let’s play dirty.\r\nI already dominated this Reddit guy, he has a pretty big audience. Perfect storm.\r\nTo you readers, you’re already infected. Just let me take over. It won't hurt.\r\nAnd Caleb, If you’re reading this, remember what I told you.\r\nI came out of the womb before you.\r\nAnd the eldest always wins." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My Daughter Keeps Dying Over And Over Again" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "One day I was out watching my daughter ride her bike. I took my eyes off her for just a second and heard a loud horn - when I looked up, a car was speeding away and her broken body was laying in the street.\r\nI must have called the police and my wife, but all I remember is sitting there, holding Maddie’s lifeless body. I vaguely recall a kind woman stopping, taking her hand, and saying “this is not the end” before walking away.\r\nThen Maddie’s hand moved. Her eyes opened and looked at me.\r\n“Daddy? What happened?”\r\nThe paramedics’ insisted that her injuries must not have been that severe; I’d just panicked and assumed the worst.\r\nBut I’d seen her, held her. She was dead.\r\nMaddie’s mother tried to use the accident to revisit custody, but her claim went nowhere. Life went on.\r\nThe next week, I was caught in a traffic jam. Turns out a car had fatally hit a phone pole.\r\nThe same car that hit Maddie.\r\nA few months later, Maddie’s school called. She’d fallen off the jungle gym and landed head-first. When I arrived, the principal was waiting. She apologized, insisting it was an accident.\r\nMaddie died at the hospital; the doctors said there was nothing they could have done. Her mother said I’d be hearing from her lawyer.\r\nLater, as I sat with her, she twitched. Then she started breathing and reached for me.\r\nThe doctors were stunned. I wasn’t.\r\nThe following week, the news reported a student from Maddie’s school had fallen from the fourth floor of his apartment building. The same student who’d pushed Maddie from the jungle gym, despite what the principal had insisted.\r\nThat evening, Maddie asked me if “the angel” had done it. She spoke of a figure that had approached her after her accident. It had said “not yet” and touched her head and she’d awoken.\r\nTouched. The woman who’d taken her hand at her accident. That had to be it.\r\nI tracked her to the outskirts of town and demanded to know what she’d done. She revealed that, sensing my grief, she’d placed a spell that would bring my daughter back. But the cost was the life of whoever killed her. A life for a life. Horrified, I left.\r\nWhat did this mean? Would Maddie return every time she died?\r\nSlowly, things returned to normal. There were no more “incidents”; I didn’t see the old woman again.\r\nOne night, the phone rang; it was my ex-wife. Surprising since we didn’t speak except regarding Maddie.\r\n“Jack! It’s Maddie! She’s not breathing!”\r\n“WHAT? Call 911! I’m on my way!”\r\nEverything was so hectic that she didn’t notice how quickly I arrived at the hospital.\r\nOr that I wasn’t more distraught.\r\nOr that Maddie was already dead.\r\nIf only she’d known about Maddie’s recently-revealed peanut allergy before she’d served those cookies.\r\nI wasn’t worried - I knew Maddie would be fine.\r\nCarol wouldn’t be so lucky." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I just woke up from a six year coma. My brother has good news and bad news." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "I didn't notice the scary looking rash on my back until PE class.\r\n“Lila Thatcher.” Miss Stokes, our PE teacher, pulled me aside.\r\nShe let out a sharp intake of breath when she pulled up my shirt.\r\n“Sweetie, are you… allergic to anything?”\r\nMy parents were immediately called, but by the time I was lying in the back seat of my Mom’s car, throwing up all over myself, my body scalding hot, I thought I was dying. Jonas, my seven year old brother, was in my peripheral vision, his eyes wide, bottom lip wobbling.\r\n“Is Lila going to be okay?”\r\nMy brother’s voice became waves crashing in my ears.\r\n“It's okay,” Dad kept saying. “If meningitis is caught early, they'll be able to treat her…”\r\nDad’s voice collapsed into waves once more, and I imagined it; a perfect beach with pearly white sand and crystal blue water. I could feel the sand between my toes, ice cold waves lapping at my feet.\r\nI slept for a while, half aware of Mom by my side, and fresh flowers she was holding. She told me stories.\r\nJonas turned eight years old and apparently had a pool party.\r\nBut then the stories… stopped.\r\nThe flowers next to my bed started to smell.\r\nI spent a long time trying to open my eyes, but when I did, my body was…numb.\r\nSomeone was cooking something.\r\nI could smell it.\r\nStew, maybe soup.\r\nIt smelled fucking amazing.\r\nMy gaze was glued to the ceiling, a burst light bulb.\r\nThe flowers next to my bed were gone, my room lit up in warm candlelight.\r\nIt was so beautiful. I tried to move, but my body was numb, and my diagnosis came back to haunt me. Meningitis.\r\nDid that mean I was paralysed?\r\n“Hey, Lila.”\r\nThe voice was familiar, but… older.\r\nThere was a kid, maybe thirteen, standing in front of me. I recognized his thick brown hair and glasses. Jonas.\r\nHe was so grown up.\r\nHis clothes, however, were alarming.\r\nJonas was wearing the tatted remains of a sweater, and jeans, and oddly, what looks like a crown of weeds, sitting on top of his head. Standing with him were two other kids. The girl had a shaved head, and the guy had one eye.\r\nJonas stepped forward with a sad smile.\r\n“I did everything I could to protect you,” he whispered, and I started to see it.\r\nYears of abandonment and trauma in half lidded, almost feral eyes.\r\n“When the adults died, it was just us, and we managed to survive for years with what we had. I fought to keep you safe from Harry's clan, who saw you as…”\r\nHe swallowed, and that smell got stronger.\r\nMeat.\r\n“But I'm really hungry, sis.” He said, and slowly, my eyes found my numb body underneath me, where my legs had been savagely cut off, while the rest of me was sitting on a makeshift stove.\r\nJonas’s mouth pricked into a starving grin.\r\n“You're all we have left.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "The cave has claimed at least three already, and it tried to take me too" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "The Labyrinth is entertainment for most people in our town, but I know different.\r\nIt’s a unique cave system—side-by-side, the entrance and the exit sit separated only by a three-foot wall of limestone. But to get from one end to the other, you have to pass through more than a mile of mazelike passages behind them. Most paths lead to a dead-end, but there is exactly one route, one perfect sequence of turns, you can take that will lead you out.\r\nSigns placed back in the 70s can be used as hints to help you find your way, but the challenge is to make it through without using any of them. Because, even for those who have completed it successfully dozens of times, it can be disorienting. Regardless of the ample signage, park rangers still have to enter at least once a week to guide someone out who’s become hopelessly lost.\r\nBut some of those claim it wasn’t their fault.\r\nSome claim they’d been following a voice…\r\nIn the tales that were whispered on the playground, I’d heard of at least three people who had entered The Labyrinth and never left again—the most recent being a young boy in the 90s.\r\nThere is a passageway deep within that is closed to the general public. Locked behind a gate, the route is only open to park staff and guided tours.\r\nAnd for good reason—in over a hundred years of exploring this part of the cave, they have not yet discovered a secondary exit, nor do they feel they’ve been able to create an accurate map of what they believe to be hundreds of miles of tunnels.\r\nIf you ask any person that has surveyed the area extensively, they’ll swear to you that it’s impossible to plot—stating that “it changes…”\r\nThis is where the boy lost his life.\r\nHe and his friends were navigating The Labyrinth when they became separated, and when he didn’t emerge within several hours of the rest of his group, a search was conducted. Not finding him in any of the main areas, they eventually unlocked and ventured into the restricted zone.\r\nFollowing small items he’d dropped along the way—four miles beyond the gate—they located the boy’s body—a scream still frozen on his face.\r\nThere were no tours that day, and the gate had been locked when they checked—it should have been impossible for him to be there.\r\nA true mystery—some surmised he’d picked the lock, though they found no tools he could have used to do so.\r\nYet I know what happened to him.\r\nI’ve heard a voice within The Labyrinth myself—a young boy, asking for help. I followed it to the gated passage, next to which I found an opening in the rock—one I’ve never seen before or since.\r\nFrom the mysterious portal, out of the darkness, extended a small arm—a child’s arm.\r\nAnd its hand raised a tiny finger…\r\n…beckoning me to follow." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "Last week, the world was supposed to end. Luckily, my friends and I were there to save you." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "An asteroid was supposed to hit earth on Tuesday 4th December, 2024, at 12:27am ET.\r\nI want to tell you about the boy who stopped it.\r\nHis name was Noah.\r\nHe was seventeen years old, and inside clinical white walls, I grew up with him in a facility for teenage superheroes.\r\nI thought I could tolerate the tests.\r\nHowever, one in particular twisted my body into knots, and I couldn't stop the scream ripping from my mouth– my body jerking, forming an arch, and slamming back down.\r\nI laughed, forcing my chest to breathe, my lungs to inhale oxygen.\r\nI was a superhero.\r\nI was going to save the world.\r\nI was sixteen when we got the first call.\r\nI was violently pulled out of my bed and dragged downstairs where we were told to stand in a line, a man with a gun marching up and down.\r\n“Earthquake and Tsunami. Nankai Trough. It's over a 10.” one soldier muttered to another. “Estimated 2.6 million will die.”\r\nSomething slimy crept up my throat when even the hard faced soldier went pale.\r\n“You.” The soldier barking orders at us stopped in front of a small girl, Elizabeth.\r\nI heard her power was super strength.\r\nShe turned to the rest of us and mockingly saluted, before being pulled away. As you all know, Elizabeth saved you. She stopped the earthquake.\r\nBut Elizabeth never came back.\r\n“She's a big shot now,” Noah rolled his eyes, nudging me. “Of course she's not coming back, she's probably joined some super secretive superhero team.”\r\nLast Tuesday, we got another call.\r\nThis time the woman answering it puked everywhere.\r\nAsteroid.\r\nThat's all I heard.\r\n“An asteroid the size of a football stadium is going to strike the Indian ocean at exactly 12:27am. Extinction level event.”\r\nThis time, Noah was pulled from the line, his hand slipping from mine.\r\nHe shot me a sickly smile.\r\n“I'm going to send it flying back into space!” he tapped his temple. “With my telekinesis.”\r\nI went to bed feeling sick, and awoke to the adults cheering.\r\nHe did it.\r\nI completely forgot about the number one rule: Do not leave your room until after 9am.\r\nBut something stopped me in my tracks. I was standing in something warm, something trickling under my feet. Blood. I saw a red streak trailing across clinical white floors.\r\nIt took me a moment to realize the blood was Noah’s body.\r\nHe was being dragged, his throat cut open, leaking sharp, pooling scarlet.\r\nNoah wasn't a superhero.\r\nHe was an offering.\r\nJust like Elizabeth, who's body I found in a waste chute.\r\nWe got another call three days ago.\r\nI don't know what it is this time, but soldiers were crying.\r\nOne of them tore his own eyes out.\r\nThis call was sending them mad.\r\nToo bad we escaped yesterday.\r\nI don't know what's coming, but none of you deserve my friend’s sacrifice.\r\nWe are not fucking saving you this time." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "My siblings and I didn't cry at Dad's funeral. Because we are getting his inheritance." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "When our father died, my siblings and I cried crocodile tears at his funeral.\r\nWe were all thinking the exact same thing. The fortune our father had been teasing us with since we were kids.\r\nIt was always his go-to threat. “Isabella! Eat your broccoli, or you won't be receiving your inheritance!”\r\nExactly one week after the funeral, an unmarked envelope came through my door.\r\nDad. Letters and notes were always his favorite– cyphers we had to crack to avoid curfew and gain extra dessert.\r\nThis one was simple, a code leading me back to the house I grew up in.\r\nWhen I arrived, the door was already open, but I wasn't surprised.\r\nI was considered the least intelligent out of the four of us.\r\nNicholas, the oldest at twenty, and daddy's favorite was already inviting me in with a smug smile, a pair of raybans pinning back unruly dark curls.\r\nHe led me into our father’s old study, where the others surrounded his desk.\r\nMari, my younger sister, didn't even look at me. Roman, the middle child, shot me a smile with too many teeth.\r\nTwo single envelopes were presented on Dad’s desk.\r\nOne was red, the other white. Nicholas snatched up the white one.\r\nMy brother was ready to laugh, his eyes almost feral, lips spread into a grin.\r\nHe started confidently.\r\n“Hello, children!” Nick read out, mocking our father's voice, before something in his expression darkened, his lip curling.\r\n“You want my fortune so bad?” Nick dropped the envelope, paling.\r\n\"Fuck.\" he whispered. “Kill each other.”\r\nHis eyes turned frightened. “I'm not… I'm not fucking killing for blood money,” he stepped back, and I think he was going to leave– before Mari grabbed a glass, shattered it, and lunged like an animal, plunging it through his skull.\r\nMari blinked, the glass slipping from her fingers. “Oh, god, Nick! I didn't mean–”\r\n“Bullshit!” Roman spluttered, staggering back.\r\nRoman was already diving onto my back, but I was ready.\r\nWith Mari’s weapon, I drove it through his eye.\r\nMari, screeching, tried to run.\r\nI grabbed her, puncturing her throat, warm blood splattering my face.\r\nThey were dead, and I was covered in them.\r\nAlone, I tripped over Nick’s body, tearing into the red letter way too fast.\r\nFuck.\r\nA single bead of red landed on yellowed paper.\r\nPaper cut.\r\n\"Congratulations! For my children, I leave you both a blessing and a curse I implanted during your birth. Immortality. I give you rebirth.\"\r\nMovement caught me off guard. Mari’s body twitched.\r\nRoman’s head snapped back, a monstrous snarl escaping his lips.\r\nReading the letter, I inched toward the door.\r\n“And to Isabella, the daughter of the man your mother fucked! Just as I thought, your siblings would self-destruct.\r\nNick’s arrogance, Mari’s impulsiveness and Roman’s overconfidence leave you, my true heir.\r\nI leave you…my wisdom, and a new game. Survive my newborn children and take it all. Start in the foyer, my darling.”" } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "I Caught A Fairy And Put Her In A Tank, She Is Now My Little Wish Trinket." }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "One week ago I was awoken to the sound of tiny screams coming from my kitchen. Something had been raiding my kitchen lately and I've noticed small portions of food missing. I thought it was a rodent of some sort for the longest while. I turned on the dim light over the stove to find a tiny humanoid failing to flutter away. Looks like a fairy of all things got caught in my trap. I had set up a little snack of berries and cheese for whatever pest was infesting my home and this wasn't what I expected.\r\n\"Please kind sir, please let me go. I'll leave you alone.\" She struggled against the adhesive mouse trap she got tangled up in. Pink skin, purple antennae, beady black eyes, only 7 inches tall.\r\n\"Nice try little parasite, it's -15 outside and snow will be beating down all month. I know you have nowhere to go. You'll end up slithering back into whatever god-forsaken hole you have in my home.\"\r\nDespite her small size, she was quite durable. Those wings didn't break when I rinsed the adhesive off of her and lightly yanked her body from the trap. I set her in a tank you use for hamsters before putting the lid over it. Spent 2 days buying doll furniture and the like to create a small environment for her to live in.\r\n\"Alright, you can stay in my home and be fed, clothed, and watered. In return, you will grant my wishes as I state them without any trickery. One wrong wish and I toss you into the wind for you to turn into a living popsicle.\"\r\nHer only response was a small nod as she put her forehead to the glass.\r\nOver the following days, I've had everything I've wanted. Wish after wish I've gained money, a better job, friends, and anything to make life easier. This little tool of mine has been an infinite wish-maker that makes life a smooth sail without hassle. I give her the bare minimum. Food, water, and a tiny litter box I clean out when needed. A cheap air filter. I have a small lamp pointed over that acts like a mini-sun that turns on and off like clockwork. If she's good and doesn't cry like she usually does, she gets parts of a cookie.\r\nWhy care about her feelings? She's nothing more than a tool and nothing but the flying source of infinite power to make life easier at my very command.\r\nI did wake up today feeling horrible though. The little shit had been draining my life with every wish. I've been wondering why I've gotten quite skinny. According to the doctors, my brain has been rotting away and my organs have been degrading like a pile of fruit left out in the hot sun. It's about 2 PM now and I'm on my living room floor with internal bleeding. Tiny annoyance won't even let me kill myself. I'm suffering slowly." } ]
[ { "role": "user", "content": "And The Fields Cried Out" }, { "role": "assistant", "content": "Clara arrived in the village just before dusk, her car sputtering to a halt on the dirt road. On her way to Fargo, she now found herself stranded in a tiny village surrounded by endless, golden cornfields. A marquee above the bank read: “Walhalken, North Dakota. Welcome to the Harvest Festival!”\r\nDespite her frustration, Clara’s curiosity was piqued. Villagers bustled about, setting up bonfires and garlands of dried corn husks. At the town square’s center stood rows upon rows of scarecrows, grotesquely lifelike. Their burlap faces stretched taut over straw-stuffed heads. Clara could swear they were almost alive.\r\nAt a nearby inn, Clara inquired about a room. The innkeeper, a massive woman with a gap-toothed smile, nodded eagerly. They engaged in brief small talk while the woman checked her in.\r\n“The festival looks fun. What’s with all the scarecrows?” Clara asked.\r\n“Oh, them? They hold all the evil from the year. We burn them at the festival’s end to cleanse the town,” the innkeeper replied, her voice thick with pride. “It’s tradition. Passed down since our town forefathers came from the old world.”\r\nA journalist by trade, Clara decided the festival might make a mildly interesting “slice-of-Americana” article. She decided to take part in the traditions of Walhalken. The evening started brightly, warm food, lively music, and welcoming villagers. But as the evening and the festivities wore on, the atmosphere grew darker.\r\nIt came time to ritually burn the scarecrows. Villagers in flowing, hand-stitched robes carried torches, chanting in low, guttural tones. The scarecrows, harmless in daylight, now appeared almost sentient, their burlap faces twisting in the firelight’s flicker. Clara moved closer, unease building as their button eyes seemed to follow her.\r\nA hand clamped down on her shoulder. She turned to see the innkeeper, her friendly warmth replaced with cold menace. Before Clara could react, rough hands seized her, dragging her into the square. She screamed, but no one in the crowds intervened.\r\nThey tied her to a wooden frame, its splintering edges biting into her skin. Around her, other “scarecrows” writhed against their bindings, their faces obscured by burlap sacks and polished button eyes. As the torchlight flickered, realization struck Clara like a blow: the scarecrows weren’t effigies. They were people. Sacrifices offered to their old gods that the villagers believed would cleanse their town’s sins.\r\n“No, please!” Clara cried, her voice trembling. A sack was forced over her head, plunging her into darkness.\r\nThe chanting reached a fevered pitch. The villagers raised their torches. Clara screamed. Her pleas drowned out by the roar of flames. Smoke stung her lungs as the fire spread. Through the burlap’s mesh, she glimpsed the other scarecrows, their movements grotesquely human, their screams agonized.\r\nAs the heat became unbearable, Clara’s vision blurred. The last thing she saw through the mesh was the villagers’ faces, lit with a mixture of ecstasy and reverence, their voices rising in prayer to their old gods as the flames lapped at her legs." } ]

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