Why no posts?

As I have been busy writing for publication this year I have not been able to contribute to this blog. Blogging was a great way for me to develop the habit of writing and for some time, that habit has found other outlets.

When I return, I hope to explore new forms within this medium, perhaps long form episodic fiction.

Because there is no limit to the length of story I can publish online. Wouldn't it be nice to publish a book which cannot be bound?

What are my terms for success and failure here? That is what I need to decide before I can return.

I will return.

Interview with the Author

"What did you like about writing when you were younger?"
"I didn't know how to care about the audience."
"That sounds terrible."
"I mean I wrote with too much description, it was fantasy world-building."
"So you read it today and what?"
"I see how impatient I was, how controlling."
"Of the audience?"
"Of everything. Myself, the story, the audience, I just didn't want to leave anything up to anyone."
"You didn't want it to be a collaboration."
"That's it exactly. I was also in a hurry which made for sloppy writing at times."
"What else?"
"I was more interested in moods than stories. I could write evocatively at times but the evocation never went anywhere. I didn't understand why I liked the stories I read. I didn't understand the writer's restraint was letting me imagine more for myself. When I tried to write my own stories I tried to have the same feeling and it was like looking down the wrong end of a telescope."
"You didn't find an audience?"
"I didn't find an audience"
"So you changed how you write?"
"I evolved it. I worked at restraining myself, being patient with the story, making sure everyone wants something in every scene."
"If this were a scene from one of your stories, would it go anywhere?"
"What do you want?"
"Excuse me?"
"If this were a scene from one of my stories, we would both want something."
"Oh, I see, but you know what I want, it's why we're here."
"Exactly, and I want to give it."
"So we would qualify?"
"As fictional characters?"
"As fictional characters."
"I'd say we would."
"Thank you for the interview."

The writer got off the couch and shook hands with the interviewer. The cameras switched off.

"I'm bored by stories about people with names who do things to become things."
"What's your next project about?"
"I don't know. Except that I'd like it to be heavy on dialogue and action with description limited to only relevant external sensory details."
"Like the leather of the couch and the cut of my suit?"
"No, those don't matter,"
"What does matter?"
"Unusual details that advance the story."
"No space for beautiful writing in your fiction?"
"Looks are not enough. I need to work on my stories."
"What would the Lord of the Rings be without beautiful writing?"
"I first read that when I was 13 years old. It's my bible."
"Would making it shorter make it better?"
"Tolkien gave us a new world. That new world warranted description."
"What about our world?"
"It warrants less."
"You talk like those slaves to reality."
"I'm not, but I do like speed."
"Description slows down the pace?"
"Absolutely,"

The crew had gone. The studio was empty except for the writer and the interviewer.

"We should go if we don't want to get locked in."
"Locked-in syndrome is one of my greatest fears."
"Most people would agree with you."
"I need a taxi."
"There's a stand right around the corner."
"Can I drop you someplace?" "
That's alright."
"Thank you again."
"I'm a fan."
"You didn't say so before."
"I didn't want to."
"Ha. You are a fan."
The interviewer smiles. The author does also. Then the author is out the door and going around the corner without looking back. The interviewer goes back inside the building.

A room is filled with books and keyboards. Pencils and pens. The author is lying in bed watching the interview on a pocket computer. There is no editing of content. Only changes of camera angle. There's coverage, close-ups and cutaways but no cuts.

A rumbling stomach sends the author to the fridge. There are leftover barbecue chicken wings. The author eats them cold.

Sleep brings dreams of industrial keyboards set into metal steps on wheels. In the dream one is ordered online

Morning breaks through the windows. It's not the right morning. Memories of dreams of waking in rooms filled with light. The distant crash of surf beyond dunes beyond windows.

The sun rises black on a green sky. A colour negative. The author knows what's happened and runs down to the cellar. Down behind boxes of old magazines he never plans to read again is a door. The author opens the door and gets inside. Locking the door behind.

The author wishes the interviewer could be there. In another universe, the author had invited the interviewer home to continue the discussion, maybe more. But that was in another universe. In this one. The author returned home alone.

The Benevolence

Howling, the puppies were fed into the grinder one by one. Francis fed them whole, the paste that came out the other end had bits of fur and bone still recognizeable in among the blood and excrement. Francis put another puppy into the grinder. Its eyes wide in terror. Its nose overwhelmed by the reek of its ground up brothers and sisters. Francis didn't look as scrabbling legs slipped on the smooth lip of the feeder funnel. Francis didn't listen to its wailing as its tail and then its hind legs were caught by the the teeth of the grinder. Francis focused on making certain not a drop of precious offal spilled from the recepticle that was now nearly full. The last puppy was in the grinder now, the machine screamed alone where moments ago it had been accompanied by a hellish chorus. The puppy was all the way through the grinder. Francis shut off. The ensuing silence was deafening.
Time to clean the grinder. Francis wheeled the receptical aside. It was a large blue plastic water drum resting on an office dolly. He picked up the end of a garden hose and turned the water on with his free hand. When the jet struck the grinder there was a tinkle of metal. Washing down the machine was just the first part. When water alone had removed as much of the blood and bone as possible, Francis shut off the water and turned to the back of the grinder. There was a large electric cable plugged into the base. Francis pulled it out. Could never be too careful around an industrial meat grinder. Francis smiled. In over a decade of work he'd not yet had an accident on the job.
"Francis."
It was Hector, his foreman. Francis turned to look at him. Hector was a short man who walked around with a clipboard even if he didn't need one. He'd read somewhere that it made him look more managerial.
"Leave the rest of the cleaning for later, we need the material topside."
Hector never called them puppies. Francis bet he had a dog at home. Francis imagined putting Hectors imaginary dog into the grinder to see if Hector would still call it material when it was his own dog getting ground up into paste.
"Sure thing boss."
Hector smiled. Francis waited until he was taking the 'material' away before rolling his eyes. Hector was easy to flatter, all men who rise above their competence responded to flattery in Francis' experience. The less competent they were the easier it was to flatter them. Francis pushed the dolly to the elevator and pressed the button for the top floor. As he held the handle of the dolly he tried to catch the cameras mounted in the ceiling out of the corner of his eye.
The elevator door opened.
As Francis walked in there was a moment when the cameras couldn't see his fingers. Francis dipped one finger into the paste then brought it up to his mouth. Francis sucked the offal off his finger looking to all the world as if he was biting a hangnail. He felt the corruption flood his mouth. His head felt light with the thrill of forbidden delights chased by the fear of being caught out.
The elevator doors closed.
The elevator rose.
The elevator doors opened.
Francis blinked against the brightness of the sun. He pushed the dolly several steps out past the doors of the elevator to a second dolly. Laying beside it was an empty blue plastic drum. It was perfectly clean except where on the side that had been laying in the dust.
Not a living thing could be seen in any direction.
Francis righted the drum and put it back on its trolley then wheeled it back to the elevator. Once he was inside he pressed the button to down.
The doors closed quickly. Francis watched them shut through unblinking eyes.
The doors opened. He remembered to breathe.
Francis pushed the dolly with the empty drum into place under the meat grinder and walked to his bunk.
When he got there, someone was lying in it.
Francis reached for the panic button. Rough hands pulled him down. The last thing to go through his head was his teeth, they shot back out of his jaw all at once and perforated his brain. Like an electromagnet that only pulled teeth had been turned on behind his head. Francis stumbled back and collapsed rag-doll fashion in the doorway to his bunk.
The person on his bed got up and walked over to him. His arms and legs moved like the bones had been broken in several places and badly reset.
Francis blinked. The teeth crawled back across the floor and reinserted themselves in his bloodless mouth.
The person kneeled down and brushed a tuft of hair out of his eyes.
"I," Francis managed. Looking up, the face of the person was wrong. To Francis it looked like someone had drawn an upside down face and then built a face from the drawing.
The person began to drag Francis to the grinder even as the holes in his head were beginning to heal.
"Shhh," said the person. "Hector mustn't hear you."
Francis tried to scream but some of his teeth had perforated his throat. The vocal cords were growing back but not fast enough. How had it gotten in here? What had they missed?
Fingers with too many joints plugged the machine back on.
Francis tried to scream but could only gurgle.
Hector returned to see Francis hard at work filling another drum. With kittens.
"Getting a head start on tomorrow? Good man," said Hector.
"Shhh," said Francis.
"Francis?"
When it was over, the silence was deafening.

What have you done to fulfil the plan?

Frank the Good Duck - A bedtime story for my son

Many times, there was a duck named Frank. Frank was a good duck, he did good things. His mother told him to watch his brothers and sisters when she went out looking for food. One day, his brothers and sisters decided to get into some trouble. They went out on their own, over the hills and far away. Frank couldn’t stop them. He decided to go with them to make sure they didn’t get into too much trouble. The first animal the little ducks met was a fox. The fox ate his brothers and sisters. Frank had to trick the fox. He painted some rocks to look like ducks and the silly fox ate those rocks too. This gave the fox a terrible ache and he puked all the ducks out. The ducks were smelly and itchy but they were happy to be alive and Frank took them back to his home pond and washed them off and got them into bed before his mother came home and found out what had happened.When his mother came back, they were all asleep, clean and warm and dry in their beds. Frank was asleep too. He was very tired. Taking care of little ducks that like to get into trouble is difficult work. Frank was good at it but now he had his reward, a good nights sleep. The End.

[wp] You have invented mind control. Write about some of the positive ways it might be used. by PatriarchalTaxi

The first thing I did when I invented mind control? The answer won't surprise you. My first machine was simple, a used cranial stimulator I bought at auction from a bankrupt medical wholesaler. It came with an odd lot of science stuff including a used air extractor and a bunch of other goodies. I fiddled around with it and after getting some donor parts our of an old gameboy I had my mind control machine. I called it X-1. X-1 worked sporadically and only when my human subject was wearing the device. It looked like a oolander with a chin strap and lots of cables coming out the holes. Not what you'd call fashion-friendly. I tried asking my wife to wear it but have you ever tried getting your wife to wear what looks like a cross between a kitchen accident and a cable monster on her head? I didn't try too hard, that's for sure.

Then it hit me.
\
I put it on myself and ran a simple program I'd complied just for X-1.

10 BUILD A BETTER MIND CONTROL MACHINE
20 GOTO 10 RUN

It's amazing what a super RISC language can do when married to a brain. Speaking of brains, mine is in a jar somewhere. You're listening to a sidelined backup. The last I heard from myself, I was very big and very far away while at the same time being very small and very close. As if I was everywhere in fact.

Sometime/place, at the core of what I still thought of as X-1 (but had as much in common with my kitchen collander as an amoeba with a sperm whale) letters made of fire spelled out words the size of galaxies.

RUNTIME ERROR, (A)BORT? (R)ETRY? (F)AIL?

As a sidelined brain, I strained to choose but before I could I heard a voice and it was not my own.

LET THERE BE LIGHT.

[WP] A worldwide consensus is drawn that the world will end when you die. An effort is made to prolong your life, no matter the cost by [deleted]

ONE. 1989
Benoit didn't know the world would end when he died until he was 14 years old. He was hit by a van while cycling and his bike went right under the wheels. Benoit was knocked to the asphalt and the van shuddred to a sudden stop. Right on top of Benoit.
It was exactly 8:05 a.m. in the morning, May 25, 1989.
The panicked driver jumped out expecting all his worst fears to greet him. He'd run over a kid, it was his fault, the kid was dead, he was going to prison.
Except he wasn't. Benoit crawled out without a scratch, his bike a useless and bent collection of parts.
"Omigod omigod omigod, alright?, y-you're alright?"
Benoit nodded.
"Can I give you some cash for the bike?"
Benoit shook his head.
"Are, are you sure?" the driver couldn't believe his luck.
Benoit started walking away.
"Can I give you a lift or something?"
Benoit kept walking, his head ached, in his mind's eye, he was watching a gas pipe explosion fatally burn two people alive, and destroy eleven houses and 21 cars.
That night, watching the news from San Bernadino was like watching a badly taped rerun.
TWO. 1999
"Come on man, it's just a short flight."
"I don't fly."
"Benny, could you not be Benny just this once?"
"Nope, the plane might crash."
"So you're afraid you'll die in a plane crash?"
"I'll be fine, it's the rest of the world that I'm afraid for."
"Whatever Benny, I've had enough of your 'if I die, the world dies' crap, I'm going without you, I hope we can still be friends."
"Yeah, sure."
THREE. 2175
The door to his cabin opened slowly and smoothly. The men who entered were unarmed but their movement said weapons might grow out of their hands at any moment.
"Benoit Ryder."
It was not a question. He lay in bed, chest heavy with mucous.
"Please."
The men took vantage points at the small windows. Windows he'd cut himself half a century ago. A cluster of them at the door parted like two halves of an almond and white coated men rushed in.
Medical devices the size of a matchbox injected him with other medical devices the size of a match head which quickly dissolved into individual molecular robots.
"Please."
The machines drilled deep into his lungs, his lymphatic system, his pancreas, his spleen. They cut and spliced and pushed and pulled.
"Please, can't you just let me go?"
"Mr. Ryder, we're here to save your life."
"No you're not, you're here to save your own."
"Everything is going to be fine Mr. Ryder."
His eyes looked at Benoit the way boys looked at flies they wanted to swat.
"Yes, it is," said Benoit.
They lifted him off his bed.
Pressure plates do not click. They can also be set to close a circuit when pressure is released. Like a landmine.
Benoit knew the world would end with the explosion he'd rigged over 40 years ago, in case they found him.
"Sorry, what was that Mr. Ryder? Chet, get over here, he's whispering something."
"Negatory, sniffers twitching, E.M.P. NOW!!"
"Please, I want the en--."

[WP] It's 1933 and the Roman Empire survived and avoided its collapse. However, Adolf Hitler still rises to power in Germany, he then declares war on Rome. by Zorseking34

In 753 BCE, Rome was founded, or so the story goes. and by the beginning of the new millenium it had struggled up from its humble beginnings as a fishing village sheltered by seven peaks on the banks of the Tiber river into an imperial force to be reckoned with in Europe.
In those times, the Roman legions inspired fear and awe not only because of their discipline but because warfare, especially in transalpine Gaul, was composed largely of set piece battles where two disputating lords would select a location for their forces to meet and the army that broke ranks first was deemed the loser. There were injuries and even deaths but the aim in this trial by combat was to beat your opponent, not slay your enemy.
The legions were the first armies since the Assyrians to kill.
The role of the legionnaire was to close with the enemy and destroy him.
What came behind the legions was the rule of law for commoners, comparatively better sanitation, roads, viaducts, roman concrete, infrastructure, trade, markets, education, prosperity.
Then the cracks began to show. In 64 AD much of Rome burned but its citizen swore off wine and beer, replaced their antiquated lead pipes with new ceramic innovations and rebuilt Rome in what historians privately refer to as a 'flurry of urban renewal' and publicly they call the restoration period.
By the time Hadrian's wall was built in 122 AD the Roman govenors of the far flung provinces realized that the economies of scale which the Empire had enjoyed up to this point were based on a policy of constant outward expansion which everyone could see was unsustainable. If Rome failed to conquer the entire world, it would lose everything it had in the gamble.
So, with the same single minded determination with which Rome had raised its legions, it embarked on a lengthy process of re-inventing itself. Already, the garrisson legions were locally conscripted from their home provinces and the administrators were also primarily locals and a man could grow up speaking a proto-Germanic dialect and call himself a Roman. So Emperor Hadrian took the decision that he would rather have grateful trading partners he could influence than sworn enemies he could not.
Rome's empire, that stupendous wave that washed all shores, receded.
In 395 AD Rome was bounded by its two greatest cities, Rome itself and Constantinople in the east. Hundreds of years after Hadrian's visionary volte-face on territorial expansion, the cultural imperialism of the empire had pervaded all of Europe and North Africa. Rome was surrounded by friendly buffer states on all sides in an era of peace and economic prosperity which remains unsurpassed to this day.
The next few centuries were politically uneventful but there were many technological discoveries. Society evolved. Slavery was quietly abolished and women were given sovereign franchise. Rome adopt the modern Gregorian calendar.
In 1753 there were celebrations in Rome which were capped with a public demonstration by two teenage brothers of their new invention: a hot-air balloon.
They took the Emperor's body double up in the balloon for a publicity stunt and no one used one of the new fire wands to shoot him. Emperor Publius took this to be an auspicious sign.
In 1889, a young boy was born in Pannonia named Adolphus but in his life he went by the German spelling of his name. He was a mediocre artist but a gifted demagogue.
In 1914, there was social unrest in Germania and a minor rebellion in the north which the local German authorities were able to quash. A young hooligan named Adolf Hitler was sent to prison for two years where he wrote of his struggles against the local German authorities who he accused of having lost their Germanian-ness, of being totally under the cultural imperialism of Rome and he accussed Germania of being little more than a puppet state which he swore he would elevate to it's proper place: successor to the holy roman empire's long abandoned plans for total global conquest.
In 1931 Adolf Hitler joined the Pannonian Front.
In 1934 Adolf Hitler staged a bloody coup which was later named the 'night of the long lances.'
On August 2, 1934, Adolf Hitler became Tyrant of Germania
On September 1, 1939, Adolf Hitler invaded the state of Polonia which had a treaty with Rome.
On September 2, Rome declared war on Germania triggering a series of catastrophic events that finally broke the 1000 year old Pax Romana.
The ensuing conflict shook the foundations of civilization to such an extent that this conflict is now referred to as the Bellum Mundorum Unis.

[WP] Andy from Toy Story just found out that his mother has scheduled a play date with that weird kid down the street: Calvin, and his stuffed tiger Hobbes. by GimmieDemWaffles

It's a beautiful sunny day when we find Andy playing in his front yard with his two favourite toys, Woody and Buzz. His mother walks out of their house and gives him the news: He's going to have a play date!
Across town a collector of early 20th century dildos is also playing with his two favourite toys but he is already having a play date so we'll leave him to it. Hmm?
"I just want to play with Buzz and Woody," says Andy (footnote: The collector says this too.)
"Give him a chance, his parents say he's very imaginative," says Andy's Mom.
"Ah Mom, he talks to a stuffed tiger!"
"You talk to your toys too, don't you?"
"Aw, that's different."
"How different?"
"Well...just...ah, okay mom," Andy bows his head.
"I see him, Calvin! Over here," then she turns back to Andy to whisper "Try and play nice, okay sweetie?"
"I know Mom, you don't have to te--"
Calvin walks right up to Andy but then he spins around and hollers at the top of his lungs.
"SUZIE DERKINS IS A BOOGER! A BOOOGER! Right Hobbes?"
"Uh, Calvin? Hi, I'm Andy."
Calvin turns back to Andy and starts mock stage whispering in Hobbes's ear.
"Hobbes, you think we can trust him?"
"You see what I mean, mom?" says Andy. "Do I really have to take him to my room?"
"Why don't you play out here in the yard, okay?" says Andy's mom, but her eyes dart between the two boys and the front door as if it's the emergency hatch to an escape pod.
"Miss Rosalyn told you, didn't she?" says Andy to his Mom.
"Don't listen to her! It wasn't like that, right Hobbes?" says Calvin as he waves his free hand up and down energetically.
"Never mind Calvin, it's a pleasure to meet you and I'm sure the fire was an accident, you boys go have fun."
"But it's Saturday! My cartoons are about to start!" says Andy.
"Manners dear, you'll just have to stream them some other time."
"Okay mom."
"Okay Mrs. Davis."
Andy's mom goes back inside the house and the two boys and their toys are left alone. Calvin is no longer whispering to Hobbes and he has a big grin on his face.
"Hobbes says you're in!"
"In what?"
"Why G.R.O.S.S. of course, it stands for Get Rid Of Slimy girlS."
"Girls aren't slimy," says Andy
"Did you see that?" says Calvin.
"What? Why are you pointing at Buzz?"
"He blinked!"
"Have you been out all day already? Sun getting to you Calvin?"
"Hobbes saw it too!"
"Mom! Calvin's being weird!"
"Play on boys!" comes the voice of Andy's Mom from the depths of the house.
"No! I mean weird for Calvin! Weirder than normal I mean!"
"No need to shout, I was just in the kitchen, okay, what is it?" Andy's mom is smiling with her mouth but her brow is furrowed in well-tested patience.
"Andy's toy blinked at me and Hobbes! Well not at us exactly but he blinked!" says Calvin, pointing at Buzz.
"Fine, okay. The two of you, leave your toys on the porch and come inside for a 2 minute time out. Calvin, your father called just now and insisted I take the number of the local poison control center, any idea what that's about? I chenged my mind, I don't want to know. Just come inside and have a sit down in the kitchen with me, is that clear?"
"Aww Mom! Can't we sit in the living room?"
"So you can watch your cartoons? No, this is a time out."
"Aww Mrs. Davis!"
"No discussion! March!" says Mrs. Davis in a passable impression of a drill sergeant. Then her voice softens and she says "also, there's lemonade. Lemonade and a time out, come on."
"I can't leave Hobbes!" says Calvin.
"Buzz and Woody will watch him for you Calvin, no arguing or I'll call your Mother." says Andy
"Hobbes might eat them!"
"Then he'll get indigestion, they're pretty tough, right Andy?"
"Well, if there's lemonade," says Calvin, putting Hobbes down gently on the porch bench. Andy puts down Buzz and Woody next to Hobbes and everyone goes inside. The front screen door slams shut on a rusty spring hinge. There is a clap and clatter and the neighbourhood silence returns, broken only by the occasional songbird or passing car.
The toys lie as they were placed, in ragdoll postures as their articulation and relative softness allows.
"Psst, hey Buzz, are they inside?" says Woody, moving only his lips.
"All clear Woody," says Buzz who then leaps to plant himself in a defensive crouch between Woody and Hobbes.
"Identify yourself intruder!" says Buzz while aiming his toy laser at Hobbes.
"Relax, Buzz," says Woody as he rights himself and steps forward to put a hand on Buzz' shoulder. "I've heard of you, you're that tiger down the road, right? The renegade?"
Buzz drops his arm mounted laser and looks at Woody wide-eyed. When he speaks, his voice is filled with what can only be described as legendary awe.
"Woody! This is the one you were telling me about? The one that talks to his human?"
Hobbes bows while waving his paw in a theatrical loop as if there were a wide brimmed hat at the end of it.
"Hobbes at your service, surely you know I won't eat you, but a can of tuna is always appreciated, allow me to bow."
"Sir, you are--" begins Buzz but can't continue.
"--Just Hobbes, no formalities among us, we are all equally toys, different abilities, equal value, yes?"
"Hobbes, you are an inspiration to toys everywhere." says Woody.
"You can come out to him you know, Andy seems like a good boy," says Hobbes in warm friendly bundle-of-striped-orange-energy tones.
"He's wonderful sir, but how did you do it? The risk? Especially with that boy? We could see the flames from all the way over here." says Buzz.
"Ah yes, the fire. Just a little experiment in transmogrification, we found a new way that didn't work, not the point, the point is Calvin is my human and I love him. We do not choose to whom we are given but we can always choose how much we will love them."
Buzz and Woody stand side by side and take this in. Woody looks down and takes his hat off, then looks at Buzz. Buzz looks back as if to say coming out to Andy is what they want to do more than anything...but can't.
"My helmet is getting foggy, why is my helmet getting foggy?"
"Give us a hug you sentimental spaceman."
Andy flips up Buzz' visor for him.
"You know what happens when you cry in your helmet."
Hobbes reaches over with his long arms and gives them a firm, encouraging hug against his cheek then puts them down gently.
Buzz sniffles and Woody smiles sadly.
"Your hearts are in the right place but they're coming, remember you can tell Andy the truth at any time," says Hobbes.
"Oh, I don't know Mr. Hobbes." says Woody.
"Just Hobbes, Buzz, just Hobbes."
"Yeah, what if he freaks out?" says Buzz.
"The only true regret is indecision, indecision is the way to a meaningless life. Also remember I like tuna and Calvin expects toys to move so he'll catch you out, you'd better hurry up and get him on your side or he'll take action for you."
"He wouldn't dare!" says Buzz.
"Oh my dear Buzz, he would dare. He dares. He wins. One of the many reasons I love him. Also Calvinball."
"Places! They're back!" says Woody who goes limp and flops down onto the seat of the porch bench. Buzz freezes in place and Hobbes simply appears to be nothing more than a stuffed tiger. He hasn't changed but somehow he's different.
The boys come out of the house together. They are laughing and smiling.
The porch door creaks open.
"Your mom's lemonade is pretty good, after I added enough sugar. Come on Andy! Let's play Calvinball!" says Calvin.
"You dumped the whole sugar bowl in it." say Andy, smiling. "I never dared."
The porch door slams shut.
"Tasty?" says Calvin.
"In a rot your teeth kind of way? Uh, what's Calvinball?"
Calvin is about to answer but he turns and picks up Hobbes instead. Buzz falls over. Calvin frowns at Buzz but then he puts his ear to Hobbes' mouth and listens to something only he seems to be able to hear, then he nods and looks at Andy briefly before picking up Buzz and Woody as well.
"I promise." whispers Calvin, then he turns to Andy.
"Hey Andy, wanna play Calvinball? Let me tell you all about it. First off, Hobbes gets to be umpire because he's always umpire, Woody can be the wide receiver and Buzz can be the striker. I'll be Captain and you can be first at bat, how about it?"
"I don't get it," says Andy but his eyes sparkle as if he knowns that whatever happens next, it's going to be interesting. Maybe it's the sugar-bombed lemonade talking.
"Excellent! That means you already understand the rules!"
"Rules?" says Andy. But he's laughing as he runs to the garage to grab his bat, ball and glove.
"Exactly!" says Calvin, "Hey, is that a Lacrosse stick? Bring that too, we can use it."
It's a beautiful sunny day.
p.s. Suzie Derkins is not a booger and someday, if Calvin is quick enough, he's going to marry that girl. They'll name their daughter Rebecca (A.K.A. Bacon) and when she's old enough, she'll get a toy stuffed tiger to fight the monsters under her bed and one day, she'll be on a play date with a little girl who has two old toys, a sheriff and a spaceman, who've been through a lot together.
To all our last reunions. Once more upon a time.
The End.

[WP] The zombie outbreak starts, but the first (and only) zombie is an overweight man that can't catch anyone. by steelguttey

"What's that smell?"
"What sme--Oh, beurgh, yah, come on."
"Where?"
"Upwind, no time to explain."
"No need to shove, I'm moving."
"Yeah but so is he."
"Who?"
"Our Jason, the only zombie in Devon."
"You're mad."
"Am not. come up this way and we'll double back."
"I will not!"
"Coward?"
"Am not!"
"Least bit curious?"
"No!"
"Want to stay upwind?"
"finealrightleadthewayfine!"
"Oh ho, so now we're in a hurr--beurk, goddamit, this way!"
"heh hoo heh hoo, can't. run. faster."
"'heh heh heh heh. no matter. we. okay. heh. here. look!"
"That's Jason?"
"In all his putrefacted glory, all 50 stone, give or take."
"It's like that fat suit from that movie died and was dug up again."
"When he first turned, we tried to burn him, that smell? That's the smell of petrol soaked human rotting burned flesh."
"why didn't you just shoot him?"
"We tried, we did, shoot him, but he just looked at us with that one eye like we'd run over his puppy and after that nobody had the heart to try it again."
"So you burned him?"
"Well it was just the one time."
"Why isn't the news all over this?"
"No one told them."
"But that's criminal! He's a zombie!"
"Yes?"
"Patient zero! The start of a global pandemic!"
"Not hardly, have you looked at him? He hasn't even got teeth left."
"What about the constable?"
"You mean Sean?"
"Alright, yeah, what about this Sean?"
"Oh, he reckons that Jason may be a zombie, but he's our zombie and you get used to the smell."
"Used to the smell?"
"It's become the smell of home, you see."
"Start living here and I'll miss it, what you imagine?''
"'Well, yeah, isn't that why you're here?"
"I just need directions to the highway!"
"Oh, well in that case, Hey fellas! He's not local!"
"What are you doing? Take your hands off me, get off me!"
"Nothing personal you understand, our Jason may be fat."
"No! Nooo! Help!"
"He may be slow."
"Let me go! Aieee!"
"but he's ours and well, you understand."
THUNK.

[WP] You were given the keys to a multi-billion dollar company. Upon your first day running the company, you find out the old ceo had started a confidential intelligence agency, and is planning on eliminating the current government in order to take control.

I eased my ass into the hand stitched Corinthian leather of the big man's swivel chair. It creaked luxuriously as the stuffing sighed in ridiculously expensive ways.

"Susan, cancel my first appointment," I said to the empty office. "Sir, She's already here," said my executive assistant via the intercom. the mikes in the ceiling were part of the voice-activated executive control system my predecessor had installed. Start your sentence with a name and the system patched you through.

My first appointment wasn't for another two hours. What the hell?

The door opened without a knock and she walked right up and sat on the edge of my desk like an Ayn Rand heroine. I half-expected her to light a cigarette.

"As your chief of security there are some pending projects that require your attention."

I looked at her.

"Sir," she added. If I could bottle her brand of insolent-yet-official sarcasm I'd make another billion dollars.

"Megan, I have some urgent issues which--" I began

"As urgent as the elimination of our current government? A coup your predecessor has been engineering for the last twenty years?"

"Megan," I said but didn't have anywhere to go with it.

From nowhere she produced a few neatly folded papers from her exquisitely tailored bespoike gabardine wool jacket and handed them to me. She may as well have pointed a gun at me. Even from this distance, I recognized the large open scrawl of my predecessor whose unexpected heart attack had provided me with my opportunity.

I took the pages and began to read.

Dear Sir,

I cannot know who you are because if you are reading this I am unexpectedly dead. Megan can be trusted to not have made copies but I won't have to urge you to destroy this letter once you've read it. I needn't add that Megan will watch you do this. She's loyal to a fault on account of her high functioning psychopathy. An asset for your chief of security, yes?

Our government is not hopelessly corrupt but we can do better. At first my plans will cause a significant amount of acute urban renewal but 25 years after our planned coup our nation will be the most effective organization of humans on earth. Megan will present the details to you immediately once you've read this letter.

You'll need to divert a lot of company funds. Megan is also the chief of my confidential internal intelligence agency. Black ops cost cash. Blame any problems the accountants raise on me, don't worry, I can take it.

One more thing. After you know the facts, write a letter like this.

There are no accidents.

I looked up to see Megan had activated the metal blinds and turned on the projector.

I sat back and began to watch the show. Absentmindedly, I tore the letter into tiny pieces and started eating.

As I chewed, Megan started the presentation. The first slide was confusing. It was a map. Of the continental United States but the state lines were all wrong.

“Where is power? Is it in a building? The barrel of a gun? Donaldson knew that power is in people and wherever people concentrate their effort, you find power.”

I realized what I was looking at, those were economic lines. Concentrations of wealth and population and technology on both coasts with ominous vacancies in the middle excepting Denver, Colorado and Dallas, Texas.

Megan continued.

“Nations and nation building are 19th century ideals. Donaldson saw that while our great nation has an army, Economically speaking it’s stateless corporations and city states where the real power rests today. The world is in a state of political devolution. If the United States is to maintain its supremacy it cannot continue to be fettered by its current regulatory and institutional framework.”

“So Donaldson wanted to overthrow our duly elected and appointed government because Singapore is looking good right now?”

“Donaldson wanted the best for this country. He was a patriot. He understood that modern technology puts the means of production in the hands of anyone with more than space between their ears. I can buy a paperweight online and turn it into the lower receiver port of an assault rifle in my living room. I can rapidly prototype parts in my kitchen for a new faucet and have the first shipment from China in two weeks on my doorstep. The encroachments on my freedom which I assented to were made under duress and the threat of physical violence. I was born into a system of unfairness and I did not get to decide if I wanted to play by their rules,” she said. As if she was reading a stock price off the back of the New York Times not plotting anarcho-capitalist revolt.

I stared at her.

Megan continued. “I never got to choose which freedoms I gave up and which I got in return. Donaldson showed me how I could get my freedom back.”

“So you two had a plan?”

“We have a plan.”

“He’s dead.”

Then I realized she was pointing her gloved finger at me. When had she put on gloves?

“So tell me the rest of the plan.” I said. The leather felt cold and clammy under me. I tried to suppress a shiver.

“First we crash the economy.”

“How are we going to do that?”

“It’s already happening. We have an extensive global intelligence’s network. We’ve been accelerating and intensifying the fluctuations in the U.S. Stock market for decades. You think the current upswing is a recovery? It’s a bubble and it will burst. Dotcoms, Housing, we didn’t have to cause problems, the problems are endemic to the system. The boat is going to capsize eventually, we’re just giving it a push so when it goes over, we’ll be ready to leave and swim for shore.”

She was right about that, all I had to do was open a newspaper or a search engine and I knew she was right. I just couldn’t believe anyone, even someone as smart as Donaldson, was crazy enough to try and cause even more volatility in an already volatile market.

“So why hasn’t it worked if you’ve been pushing for so long?”

“We didn’t count on the President bailing out the mortgage companies and then the banks but he won’t be around much longer and we would prefer weak leadership at the top for our plans. Obama is too tough, he’s a former teacher. It’s not his brains or his vision that’s lacking, it’s his determination to work with the existing system. It’s like forcing yourself to ride a bicycle with flat tires.”

“So once the economy crashes, what happens next?”

“We use our spies to lobby the government for increasingly intolerable regulation of the economy and later industry.”

“That sounds like a totalitarian state!”

“It is. We want to make it terribly uncomfortable to do business.”

“Megan, that doesn’t make any sense. People won’t stand for it.”

“No, they won’t, but we need to increase the general unhappiness to prepare the people. We’ve already slashed real salaries, and encouraged so-called capitalists to hoard their fiat cash. You want to know the biggest scam in the world? It’s cash.”

“But we need money,” I said.

“Cash is a scam, money is not.”

“What’s the difference?” I asked, my chair did not feel quite so cold when she wasn’t pointing at me.

“Money is a decision,” she said. “Donaldson understood that whoever has the power to make decisions has money. Cash is just ersatz money, it’s not the real thing.”

“So after you’ve crippled the economy, shackled industry and detonated salaries and I assume social security then what?”

“Are you in?”

She walked toward me, the projector light framed her face and torso in shades of red and blue. Boom towns and ghost towns. The new face of liberty.

“Yes.” I said.

The safety on her tiny pistol clicked on.

“The pistol wasn’t necessary,” I said.

“I don’t care,” she said as she walked past me.

“So what next?”

“Next we cripple basic services. Through lobbying and bribes we degrade service to the point that paying for special treatment isn’t just an option, but a necessity.”

“Like clean water and sanitation?”

“Also roads, postal services, the electrical grid, school funding, internet, mobile phone carriers, starting with the airlines. We have a comprehensive network of agents in companies and the civil service moving our stability operations forward.”

I shook my head.

“You’re causing misery to millions.”

“So their children will live free.”

“So what happens when schools start failing? What about those kids?”

“If our system of government cared about education, it wouldn’t spend so little on it. We hardly had to do anything on that front.”

“I suppose you’re behind the anti-vaxxers too?”

“If those fools respected natural science they wouldn’t be so gullible, all it took was one fabricated experiment to jump start that bandwagon.”

“So where do I fit in?”

“Donaldson was a charismatic leader, he knew how to talk to people to make them want to join the cause. You’re his replacement.”

“Why don’t you do it yourself?”

“I am brusque to the point of rudeness and I do not moderate my terms. I alienate people.”

“So why did you have Donaldson killed?”

She walked back around my desk. Her eyes drew level with mine. Her tongue darted out and moistened her lips.

“Donaldson was 70 years old.”

“So, he wouldn’t live long enough to complete this phase of the plan, is that it?”

“I determined the revolution needs a young face. Your face.”

“You recruited me, didn’t you? It wasn’t Donaldson.”

“From a shortlist of those I determined would be at least somewhat sympathetic to my claims. Yes.”

“You knew.”

“About your political leanings? Of course. I know the name of your first grade public school teacher. Mrs Baxter.”

“You know everything about me.”

“Yes.”

I nodded. Megan turned away, her body under the business suit rippled the fabric; summer weight, excellent cut, made to measure.

You could hardly see the holstered pistol.

She shut off the projector and turned on the lights. I blinked in the sudden brightness.

“Here, sign these.”

I took the papers from her.

“What are they?”

“Requisition orders.”

“What for.”

“Need to know.”

I nodded. It was usual to meet the boss the first day on the job but this time I thought I’d be the one being met.

“Sir,” it was Susan on the intercom, “You have a meeting with the members of the board.”

I turned to Megan who nodded.

“Thank you Susan.” I handed back the signed orders. Millions were being funneled from the firm. How Megan had gotten away with it so far was beyond me.

“Does the board know?”

Megan shook her head.

“How can I keep this from them?”

“You’ll think of something, boss” she said as she pushed through the door. It sighed softly as it swung back on hydraulically dampened hinges and clicked, almost inaudibly, shut. Just like Megan’s pistol.