How it all really began – Sept. 20

Prompt: In the beginning, there was nothing. Then God said, “Nah.”

How it all really began

God had been thinking about what His creation would look like for ages. He had studied all the old masters, and seen where they had got things right and where they had gone wrong.

He also knew this was His one and only chance. Mess this up and no one would view Him as a savant. He would instead be viewed as a no one. Nothing. Not even thought of as a hack. He would be forgotten.

“Let’s get started with some light. I’ll need light to see what I’m even doing.”

And so there was light.

“Nope. Too much. Let’s bring some dark over here.”

And then there was dark.

“That’s better. It’s not so blinding anymore. Now, what next? What am I going to put in here to give it some real pizazz?”

God looked around. He was realizing this was going to be more difficult than He had thought. I guess you can be confident and yet have no idea what you’re doing.”

“Ooh. How about something green? I always loved the colour green. So much better than that orange creation Giilgamesh put into his project. How did he even think that would be attractive?”

So God dotted His burgeoning creation with specks of green. He placed some blobs here and there, and coated other regions with vast swaths of green. And He saw that it was acceptable.

Yet, there was still something missing, He felt. The creation needed something a bit more active. It was still far too static.

“I know what I need. I need some living creatures to wander this new creation. Some things that will add movement and activity. But what will give the greatest impact?”

God sat back and thought. He wanted what He was about to add to be both large and visible, but also small and quick. And some of it needed to be not stuck to the ground. He wanted the view to change almost by the second.

His first addition was a massive grey beast, and it walked on four legs. He gave it a long nose, capable of grasping things. For protection from the additions that would come later, God gave the beast thick skin and two long spikes on either side of the nose. And to help it hear better and make it look larger than it was, He granted it giant ears.

“There. That’s wonderful. I cannot believe that creature sprung from my head. Maybe I can actually win this competition to craft the best creation.”

Next up He wanted a bright flash and dash of colour. He decided this creature would spend most of its time not on the ground, instead soaring through what God had decided would be call the ‘sky.’

He gave the creature a slender body, with a hard, bright orange and red protuberance at the front. Its body was mostly black, with a large white section under the protuberance, with two large appendages to help it stay off the ground.

“There. That’s the stuff. That’s even better than that grey thing. I’m getting better at this.”

God continued in this way for days. He added flashes of colour in some places, and hid other living things in others. He even added living things that didn’t move at all, but had the ability to eat those that did. He felt those were His greatest additions to His creation.

His final additions were two hairless creatures of similar yet different forms. The taller of the two was topped with a small patch of brown, and had two small protrusions between its legs. The shorter one was topped with more of the brown that the taller one had, but had no protrusions between its legs. Instead, it had two mounds of the same hairless flesh on the front of its torso.

God took a long, hard look at His final additions.

“This is good.”

It’s lonely at the top – Sept. 19

Prompt: The mountain you’re climbing has opinions about the people who reach its summit.

It’s lonely at the top

Joshua Grafenberg, 33
Eager, excited. Wanted to climb me to prove he could. Quests for validation from an absent father. Will brag about this for years. Has no other life accomplishments to his name. Will die a lonely death at 79.

Charles ‘Grandpa Chuck’ Moe, 66
Climbing me because his grandson said it would be cool. Is hesitant, but wants his grandson to be proud of him. Thinks he’s too old for this, and regrets agreeing. Will make it to the summit but fall into a crevasse on his way down.

Megan Lorius, 21
First boyfriend dumped her two years ago and decided to show the loser she’s better off without him. Climbed tallest peak in her country six months later, and set her sights on me immediately after that. Is genuinely an outdoorsy person and would otherwise have climbed mountains without spurned lover vibe, just not until her early 30s. Has a somewhat generally stuck up attitude.

Manjula Nahasapeemapetilon, 89
Views her ascent as a religious experience. Grew up in my shadow, and looked at me with awe from childhood. Is trying to ascend on her own, but also welcomes assistance and protection from her granddaughters. Is the only climber for whom succeeding or failing is irrelevant; only wants to be here. Has lived a full life and has accepted her mortality. She will not reach my summit, but will live for another decade.

Gregory Bane, 17
Young whippersnapper who thinks he is invincible. Refused to bring oxygen or proper clothing. Will freeze to death his first night in the death zone. Youth is wasted on the young.

Samantha Rone, 29
Influencer. Trust fund baby. Has all the best equipment and Sherpas that daddy paid for. Doesn’t have an original thought in her head. Will ascend and descend with the minimum of effort. Unable to understand the monumentality of what she has done. Will earn millions conning people who fall for the story she tells them about her climb. Least worthy climber in decades.

Darkness before the light returns – Sept. 18

Prompt: Your significant other just broke up with you. Devastated, you board an empty train and head home. Problem is, it’s been more than an hour and the train hasn’t stopped going through this seemingly endless tunnel.

Darkness before the light returns

If ever something were to be a metaphor, this sure is it.

I’ve ridden this route countless times over the years. I started riding it when I got my new job in her town nine years ago. I got a new job six years ago, but by that time we had met, so I kept riding the route to see her as often as I could.

In all those years, the tunnel never lasted more than 30 minutes, and was often shorter when there were no problems on the line.

I’ve never been one for superstition, but this is certainly calling my skepticism into question. I simply cannot dismiss the idea that something is going on here.

It started as a whirlwind romance. We met completely by chance, and if first impressions meant anything we shouldn’t have met again.

We met that day in the pouring rain. I was rushing to catch my train home. She was leaving the station, coming back from someplace. I was late. She was early. Running through the door, I bowled her over, knocking everything we both were carrying to the ground.

I missed my train because of that, and it was the best thing that had happened to me. It almost wasn’t to be, however. I yelled at her for getting in my way. She yelled back about watching where I was going. But her sharp tongue took me aback and I was hooked. I couldn’t let this woman get away.

I apologized and asked her to join me in the station café. She said yes, surprisingly.

We met again a week later. And the week after that. And that was it.

Now, nearly seven years later, I’m taking the train back home for the last time. I’m not going back to that town. It’s tainted for me now. It stopped being ‘the town where I worked’ and became ‘her town.’ It will never not be that again.

Where did it all go wrong? Did I do something wrong that led her to end things? Did something happen in her head that changed her view of our situation? I just didn’t see this coming. It seemed to me that everything was going well. Or well enough, anyway.

But it is what it is. I don’t want to try to change her mind. It’s up to her to decide what she wants, not me.

What’s more important in the here and now is the darkness that has descended upon this train in the form of this seemingly never-ending tunnel.

Is it a metaphor made reality, that only I can see? It’s only me in this carriage, given the time of night, so I have no one to ask.

It certainly feels that way. It certainly feels like my life is crashing down all around me, that I have fallen into a deep darkness.

For nearly seven years she was the light in my life. She gave my dreams wings. There was nothing I couldn’t do with her support.

Now she’s gone. What do I have left? I feel broken. I feel alone. I am alone again in the world.

I am alone to wander the world in darkness. Where am I to go if I cannot see the way?

Is that why this tunnel has lasted as long as it has? Is the tunnel truly this long, or have I so deeply fallen into a depression that I only perceive the tunnel as having become unending?

Is the only way out of this tunnel, the only way for the train to finally emerge back out under the stars, for me to accept the way my life has changed? Do I need to accept she’s gone before I can see light again?

I don’t know if I can do that. Not now. Not yet.

This is not a cry for help. Do not call special services to come and check up on me. I am fine.

Inch by inch – Sept. 17

Prompt: One person vs the ocean. Go.

Inch by inch

“One more stroke. Just one more stroke. Every stroke is one less stroke to do later.”

Why did I say I would do this? Why did I accept the challenge to swim across the Pacific Ocean?

Was it my pride? My ego? My irrational insistence on proving other people wrong?

Yes. Yes, it was.

So here I am. The world champion open water swimmer tackling her greatest challenge yet: swim across the Pacific Ocean from Victoria, B.C. to Sydney, Australia. Non-stop. From the moment I entered the water in Victoria until I come ashore in Sydney, I am not to leave the water.

I have to eat in the water, relieve myself in the water, even sleep in the water. At least for that last one I can use a raft – no sleeping on the support boat.

What was I thinking? This is madness.

Have I even made any progress?

So far my team tells me we’ve made it 200 kilometres, maybe 210 km. Only 12,000 and change to go.

The journey hasn’t been all terrible and full of bitter recriminations. I was joined for a while by a pod of dolphins. That was neat. Except for when one of the boy dolphins tried to, uh, mate with me. That wasn’t pleasant. My team needed to knock him away from me.

An even less enjoyable was the orca we met. I had to hightail it into the safety cage for that one. But, again, my team was able to get rid of the animal.

“Keep up the good work, Candace!” my coach yells at me. “You’re making great time. How are your energy levels?”

I’ve got a good team. We’ve worked together for years. They’ve kept my body working through many races and even more training sessions. I couldn’t have done this without them.

“Another hour!” I shout back. “Still good for another hour. What’s on the menu?”

I already know the answer. It’ll be some scientific paste designed to be squeezed into my mouth and swallowed. No chewing. It’s too dangerous to chew in the open ocean. I need to keep my airways as under control as possible as much as possible.

“I was thinking a surf and turf special,” coach replied. “Only one problem: we forgot to pick up the lobster before we left. You’ll need to go down and catch one.”

And then there are times I hate my coach. Atrocious sense of humour, that man.

Whatever. Just keep swimming. The sooner this is over, the better.

I don’t feel fine – Sept. 16

Prompt: It’s Thursday morning and there is no tomorrow.

I don’t feel fine

The decree came down from on high, that the world would end in a day.

We were not given any warning. Thursday morning arose and the decree was broadcast on all the television and radio stations.

« Attention people of Earth! Your planet is scheduled for demolition. You have 24 of your Earth hours left to either vacate the planet or be destroyed along with it. »

Pbftt! I’m not rich enough to afford passage on a planetliner. And where would I go, anyway? Mars? Venus? Omicron Persei 8?

No thank you.

If I’m going to die, I want my last day on Earth to be the best day possible.

I’m going to track down and do all the drugs I can. Speed, molly, crack, blow, weed, smack; you name it, I’ll do it!

And since there’s no tomorrow, and no need to save money, I’m going to blow it all on all the hookers I can find. I’ve never fucked a redhead, so here’s my chance. Threesomes? Boring! Let’s get six beautiful babes to slobber all over my knob.

And maybe, since there’s no tomorrow and no need for money, I won’t have to pay them. But we’ll all going to die, so who cares?

Then there’s the stupid neighbour of mind. Him and his stupid dog and his stupid kids and his stupid wife who has had more gentlemen callers in the decade we’ve lived next door to each other than Wayne Gretzky has career points. If you don’t know hockey, that’s a lot.

I think I’ll go over there and tell him how much I hate him. Tell him how his wife is a whore who’s fucked every guy in the neighbourhood at least three times. And I’ll kick his dog, too. If I’m going to die, I may as well be a monster before I go.

This is the most free I’ve felt since I was a child. Back then, I had no responsibilities. I could do whatever I wanted. And I did whatever I wanted.

It feels go great to be back in that mindset. It’s wonderful not having consequences for my actions.

Wait! What’s that sound?

Is that my doorbell? Yes. Who’s coming to visit at this hour?

Yeah yeah. I’m coming. Hold your horses.

Well well well. If it isn’t little mister cuckold. And little mister cuckold’s hunting rifle? Uh oh.

Hey man, what’s up? What’s with the heat?

Oh. Since it’s the end of the world there are no consequences. Yes. That is a rather fortuitous circumstance. Yes. I do see how that means you can do whatever you want and get away with it.

Well, if that’s how it ends, I guess that’s how it ends.

Did I ever tell you your wife’s a

A golden tongue isn’t all it’s cracked up to be – Sept. 15

Prompt: Your saliva has healing properties. This causes some misunderstandings.

A golden tongue isn’t all it’s cracked up to be

Felix’s life was a Catch-22.

He had phenomenal healing powers, but those powers were delivered via a less-than-stellar vector: Felix’s saliva.

He could cure any ailment you could think of: a cut or a scrape, a broken bone, blindness, deafness, paralysis. All he needed to do was apply saliva to the person in need and that person’s ailment would be healed.

It wasn’t quite as bad a situation as it could have been, luckily. Felix didn’t need to spit directly into a blind person’s eye to cure the blindness, for example. Nor did he need to be physically present. Any saliva that came from Felix’s mouth, if stored in a proper container, would work. That small mercy did save a lot of awkwardness.

However, issues still came up.

During a non-zero number of romantic encounters, Felix had healed his partner’s pulled muscles or cuts from shaving. Not from some weird kink play that involved spitting on your partner, but simply from your bog-standard making out. And one less-than-discreet partner had told friends about Felix’s powers. While Felix wasn’t the kind of person to turn down a little horizontal ping-pong action, when it turned out those people had STIs they wanted him to cure, he was none too impressed.

That experience had forced Felix to move to another country. He couldn’t get infected by anything himself, but he didn’t like be used in that way. He even took a vow of celibacy for a few years to let the heat die down, as it were.

And Felix hated having to flee and hide. He truly enjoyed being able to help people. How many people can say they can cure anything and everything without fail? If you had that power, would you secret it away? Even if it came from an odd place?

I doubt you would.

So it was that Felix set about looking for ways to continue to help people without having to be so open and transparent about it. Perhaps his saliva didn’t need to be undiluted to be effective. That would make it easier to craft an ointment or capsule people could use.

But that still wouldn’t solve the problem of direct transmission during sexy times. Felix wasn’t prepared to give up that part of his life, nor did he want to scale it back and take the mouth out of play. While a peck on the cheek wouldn’t have any effect, breaking out the tongue would.

He could “hit it and quit it” like the young’uns like to say, have some fun with a partner and then leave town. But that’s no way to live.

He could try to find “the one,” but variety is the spice of life.

There was no option Felix could truly be happy with.

Seriously. What’s the point of having god-like powers if you can’t openly use them?

On a wing and a prayer – Sept. 14

Prompt: Once a year a giant hand flies in from the sky, crushes a single person and just leaves.

On a wing and a prayer

Like clockwork, the Hand returned.

This time, it got Carl.

Carl had never done anything to deserve such a fate. Carl was like any other person – he went on with his life and did what he could to better himself and provide for his family.

Sure, he was old by most stretches of the imagination, but that didn’t mean his demise upon the arrival of the Hand was any less tragic. He still had a good decade left in him.

The Hand has tormented us for a century. At least that’s what the histories tell us – no one has ever lived long enough to remember a time before the Hand.

Once a year, always on the same day at the same time, the Hand appears out of nowhere. It moves in with lightning speed, and crushes whoever is in its way. There is seemingly neither rhyme nor reason in whom it chooses to dispatch.

And when it once again disappears from whence it came, we are left to pick up the pieces. We are left to clean up the blood and guts. It’s a truly horrid business, but one we are accustomed to.

We wish we knew what to do. We wish we knew how to stop it, or at least predict where it would strike. If we knew that, we could avoid that area and be safe.

Other than its arrival, we know nothing about its pattern. Some years it strikes in the north. Others in the west. Then there was the one year, legends tell, when two Hands appeared at the same time. Our great prophet, Lysander, was caught between them. There were no remains to clean up that year.

Our population is strong. Even with the Hand reaping one soul a year, we continue to thrive. Many more of us live full lives never seeing the Hand than do see it. We are born, grow up, have children of our own – all without experiencing the horror of the Hand.

It is the fear that eats at us, however. As the day of the Hand’s arrival approaches, everyone becomes afraid to leave home. They don’t want to risk it. But they need to leave home. They have families to care for.

And every year, someone is marked for reasons we don’t know and their life is extinguished.

We pray there will come a day when the Hand doesn’t return. We pray it will leave us alone.

If it doesn’t eventually leave us, we will adapt and learn. Our greatest minds are always working to figure out its routine, to learn its ways.

We have managed to learn to avoid the yellow spectral attractor and the sweet-smelling white well. We will one day defeat the Hand.

Hubris – Sept. 13

Prompt: A bard on his deathbed, the last survivor of his party, writes a ballad for his fallen friends.

Hubris

“I call this one ‘Requiem for the Musty Corps.’ It’s my last chance to memorialize the best group of scavengers, rogues, barbarians and companions a dragonborn tiefling could ask for.

It’s the most emotional and meaningful ballad I have ever written. I feel it is the least I can do to commemorate their lives and our adventures.

« Let me tell you a story
About the best team around.
The voyages we took around the globe
Saw us visit every foreign ground.
They were the finest of friends
A bloke could ever have had.
It’s truly sad to think about
How it ended up so bad.

These idiots never listened
To anything I had to say.
When we got to that cursed cave
I begged them to stay far away.
In they went despite my warnings
I urged them to give it a pass.
They laughed in my face as they entered
If only they could smell the gas.

It got darker the deeper we went
They didn’t see the harm.
As they reached to set alight the torch
I screamed with urgent alarm.
One final chuckle was all I heard
As they struck the matchhead.
If only those fuckers had listened to me
They wouldn’t all now be dead. »

I loved those guys and gals. They were my family. But their hubris, which served us so well in battles, was their undoing.

But now I can join them in the great beyond.

Don’t let your trust rust – Sept. 12

Prompt: “How can you think I don’t like you? We’ve been married for a decade and I’ve had four of your kids!”

Don’t let your trust rust

« How can you think I don’t like you? We’ve been married for a decade and I’ve had four of your kids! »

That line had been echoing in Carrie’s head for days since she shouted it at her husband, Greg, last week.

How could that man ever doubt her love and loyalty for him? She’d sacrificed her career and the hottest years of her life for him. She had even risked the disapproval of her parents for him. If that didn’t prove she loved him, let alone liked him, she was plum out of ideas.

Greg had always had low self-esteem. He always doubted whether people were genuinely nice to him and respected him, instead fighting with himself about whether they were simply humouring him. Was his life and his success actually earned, or was it a cunning ruse concocted by the Illuminati?

And Carrie was tiring of it. They’d been together nearly 15 years. They had four kids. She’d willingly moved with him as his career progressed. She’d put her heart and soul into making Greg’s life easier and better.

Yet he still doubted.

And now she hadn’t seen him in that week since she told him of course she liked him, that a decade-long marriage and four kids should put pay to the notion she didn’t.

She was worried.

Greg had never abandoned Carrie like this before. Even when he would disappear for days on end, he always told her that he’d be gone for a while, even if he didn’t say where he was going.

This time, he had simply left for work the morning after the argument and not come back. Everything had seemed normal enough that morning. Greg was always quiet in the mornings. It was the evenings when he was talkative and full of energy. Carrie had got used to that dichotomy, the almost Jekyll and Hyde switch her husband displayed from morning to evening.

What was the most different and—reflecting back on it—the most obvious tell that something was wrong was he didn’t kiss her goodbye. He had just got up from the table and walked out.

Carrie got to wondering if she had been too strong in her defence of her feelings. The couple almost never raised their voices to each other, or to the kids. That she would shout at Greg, even in support of her love, was completely out of character.

But was it, really? Is it truly out of character to snap at someone who constantly doubts you? Are you always supposed to basically grin and bear it when your true love and partner won’t take your word for it when you tell him the truth? Must you always be the one reassuring the other person that he is good, he is loved, he is respected?

Did Carrie still love Greg? Yes.

Did she have it in her to keep loving him? She wasn’t sure.

Well, she knew she could keep loving him. But she didn’t know if she could keep on not being trusted about that love.

Maybe this was a power play. Maybe Greg was ‘missing’ because he wanted Carrie to come looking for him. Maybe he wanted her to be so worried she would be out day and night searching, in the hopes she would come crawling to him on her hands and knees, professing her love in stronger and more elaborate words.

Had Greg been emotionally abusive for years and she’d been too blind to see it?

She picked up the phone. She dialled numbers she didn’t realized she’d memorized.

« Hill, Cohen, Daniel and Thomas, Divorce attorneys, how may I direct your call? »

Long may He reign – Sept. 11

Prompt: God is dead, but we sure as hell didn’t kill him.

Long may He reign

Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to mourn the passing of God.

God lived a long and fascinating life. He created the sun and Earth, moon and stars. He had no beginning, only a middle. And now, an end.

God provided for us in our infancy. He gave us food, water, life, and a curiosity that allowed us to learn of His existence. If it were not for God, we would not exist ourselves.

Yet, for all God gave to us, He was not able to provide for himself in the same manner. While we lived and grew and loved and reproduced, there was no one and nothing else like God with which or with whom God could continue His lineage.

It was a long, lonely life.

As we grew and expanded our knowledge and understanding of all God created, the driving force behind God’s life diminished. No longer did we need His guidance and His providence. We found new ways to survive. It could be argued that God planted in us the spark that led to those discoveries, but it could also be argued that we didn’t need it.

But we are not here to opine on such philosophical questions.

We are here both to praise God and to bury Him.

God died by His own hand. Beset with longing for an existence that held new meaning, He sought the only remaining phase of life yet to be explored: death.

God’s last will and testament was delivered by His final prophet, Tryphaina, last night. As is His will, we have been granted eternal life and perpetual fertility. God has also named as His successor his formal deputy, Lucifer, to whom we now offer praise and thanksgiving.

Finally, God requested that we think of Him not as a failed monarch, but as a creator who gave His all to His creations. God had nothing left to give, and so took His leave gracefully.

God is dead. Long live Lucifer.