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softgears · 10 years ago

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“I’m in love with your brain.”

“I, um... thank you?” Dr. Veras looked back over her shoulder at the woman who had spoken to her. “But, uh, which one?” She laughed awkwardly at her own joke and turned back to her computer screen.

“Both of them,” said the woman from her seat at the table near the back wall. Her name was Jolene Sanders, and she had told Dr. Veras that she’d been sent by the company to make sure the project was moving along.

She had been sent by the company to make sure the project was moving along, but also to make sure that once the project was completed, to make sure that Dr. Veras would never move again.

The project in question pulsed and glowed in the large glass casing in the center of the lab. It was a large orb, sparkling and iridescent, and different areas lit up and glowed as Dr. Veras entered different variables into the computer.

When it was done, it would be the core programming for the worlds first true AI.

Dr. Veras blushed and ducked her head at Jolene’s compliment. “I, uh... thank you,” she squeaked out, flustered.

Jolene was not lying about either of her compliments, as much as she wished she was. She’d been overseeing Dr. Veras’ work for three weeks already, and was required to be in the room any time Dr. Veras was working. And Dr. Veras was almost always working. That was a lot of time to get to know someone.

Jolene had, in the past, prided herself on her ability to separate herself from her work. She had a work persona that she could put on like a mask, and smile through even the most distasteful work, and then take it off at the end of the job and remain unchanged. But the combination of the long hours and Dr. Veras’ own perceptiveness had worn her down.

It really was amazing how Dr. Veras’ gaze could cut through her defenses. It would make it hard for Jolene to finish the job when the time came. Fortunately, it sounded like it would not be done for a few more months at least. She would deal with that problem when it came up.

Let’s Play a Game!

Here is a prompt from an older set (Prompt Set #547):

I’m in love with your brain.

Tell me your ideas: What do you think is going on here?

#this came out way longer than i expected holy shit #the ending is kind of weird too idk #my writing #prompts

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softgears · 10 years ago

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Little pixely thing I made

#my art

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softgears · 10 years ago

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so i haven’t finished any new writing in a while but i was going through my old stuff and i found the beginnings of a short story that i really want to finish, and i feel like if i post the first part up here it might push me to actually finish it

Joan’s work phone rang at three in the morning, which was never a good sign.

“Hey, can you come over, like, right now?”

“What happened? What do you need?” Joan was already out of bed, grabbing clothes from her closet and drawers as she spoke.

"I puked up a baby octopus. Do you still have that old fish tank?”

"Wait, what?” She stopped with one hand on the bag of supplies she always had set aside for emergencies.

“A baby octopus. I’ve got it in a bucket right now, but I’m pretty sure I can’t keep it in there for very long. It’s really small, though, so I think it should fit in the tank.”

"An octopus.”

“Don’t act like that’s the weirdest thing to ever come out of my mouth. It could have been something worse. Do you still have that tank?” Milo said the last sentence slower to make sure she heard him.

“Uh, yeah, I think so. Are you sure it’s an octopus? Like, a normal octopus?”

“I’m pretty sure.”

“It’s not a tiny eldritch god or something that’s gonna explode my mind if I look at it, right?"

"It's not going to explode your mind. Just get your butt over here and help me out. Please? I'll owe you one."

"You already owe me a hundred." She could practically see his puppy dog eyes from over the phone. After a moment of silence she groaned and gave in. "Alright, alright, I'm on my way." She hung up and went to get the tank. How am I gonna fit it in my car?

When in a rush and when traffic complied, Joan could get to Milo's place in approximately six minutes. There was no traffic at this hour, but it hadn't sounded like an emergency, so she took a leisurely eight. She left the tank in her car, grabbing only her backpack and the plastic bag of fish tank-related odds and ends.

She knocked three times and the door swung open. Milo's dark hair was poofier than usual, and the swirling purple tattoos up and down his arms and neck glowed faintly. He grinned. "Joan! Where's the tank?"

"Car. Where's the octopus?"

"Bucket. Come see!" He bounced like a five-year-old on Christmas.

The condo was incredibly spartan, especially since Milo spent most of his time there. Joan had given up trying to get him to buy some more furniture or posters or anything. The living room was entirely empty except for a grey-green rug, a laptop, and a bucket.

Joan cautiously looked into the bucket, and then back at Milo. "I think your definition of 'normal' for octopi needs some adjustment." True, it hadn't melted her mind when she looked at it, but she was pretty sure that most octopi didn't come in that shade of black. It was like staring into a tiny eight-limbed void.

"Hush. We can talk about my lack of marine biologist credentials later. What are we gonna do with her?"

"You're not keeping it."

"Well, what else are we gonna do? It's not like we can give her to the local aquarium. 'Hey, look at this weird otherworldly octopus that we just happened to find.' That's gonna bring up a bunch of questions neither of us want to deal with."

"Release it into the ocean?"

"No! She's a baby, she'll get eaten! Or worse, she'll survive and eat everything else. Do you really want to be responsible for destroying the entire ecosystem by introducing an alien octopus from another dimension with unknown powers into the ocean?"

Joan raised an eyebrow. "I thought you said it was a normal octopus."

"Joan, it’s an octopus from another dimension. I said it wasn't going to explode your brain. Doesn't mean it can't explode other stuff.”

She raised her hands in exasperation. It was too early in the morning to argue with him. "Okay, you win. I guess we'll transfer it to the tank for now. And I've got a filter and stuff, but you need to look up what else octopi need, and figure out where you want the tank." He grabbed his laptop and she headed to the kitchen to start filling the tank.

He called out facts as he found them, random stuff about the tank size and the filter and type of sand they needed. She filled up tupperware, bowls and an emptied trash can with water from the kitchen sink. She didn't want to fill the tank itself until he figured out where to put it.

Stupid octopus. Why couldn't it be a kitten or a lizard or something? Even those stupid killer frogs were less hassle.

"Joan?" His voice was high with worry. "There's something wrong!" She dropped the tupperware she was holding into the sink and ran to the living room.

He was kneeling in front of the bucket and had his hands in the water, gently cradling the octopus with his fingers. "She hasn’t been moving, I think there’s something wrong, I don’t-"

She grabbed her bag and knelt down on the other side of him. "Where did you get the water?" She started pulling out small jars and boxes full of stones and herbs and other things.

"It's tap water, I added salt to it but I didn't know what else to do, I didn't have anything-"

"Kitchen salt? How much?"

"I don't know! I didn't know how much to add so I just dumped some in!" He was starting to panic. She could feel a sticky pressure building up in the air, and his tattoos were glowing brighter. She reached out and grabbed his shoulder, holding tight to try and get him to focus.

"Are you sure it's a saltwater octopus?"

"Yeah, when I threw up there was salt water and seaweed, I tried to make this water as salty but-"

She leapt to her feet. "Do you still have the original water?"

"Yeah but there wasn't very much, I couldn't keep her in there. It's in the trash can in the bathroom." She ran to the bathroom, and grabbed the can. It didn't smell like barf. It smelled like the coast. She looked into it. There was a little bit clear water and pieces of multicolored seaweed. "Whatever you're doing, hurry!"

She placed the trash can next to the bucket and placed her hand in the water inside of it. She hesitated, then stuck her hand in the bucket, keeping it to the edge away from the octopus. "Grab stuff from my bag as I call it out. Everything in there should be labeled." She shut her eyes and focused on her hands. Colors and tastes and smells swirled nauseatingly in her head until she could bring them into focus to try and make sense of them. Each one corresponded to different elements and compounds, and she’d spent a long time learning to match them up perfectly.

"Ammonia, calcium, phosphate, magnesium sulfate..." She could hear him shuffling around in her bag. She opened her eyes. "Okay. Go grab me one of the full trash cans from the kitchen."

She took her hands out of the water and shook them dry. The octopus' skin was dull and the water had a scummy look to it. She grimaced and picked it up, half expecting to be attacked. It didn't move at all, and she gently placed it in the other water, which was not quite deep enough to cover it all the way. Better than nothing.

She sorted out the bottles on the floor and grabbed one more from the box of stuff that went with the fishtank. Epsom salt, calcium tablets, ammonia, and aquarium salt. She grabbed a measuring cup and a wooden spoon covered in carvings. He set the heavy trash can down, being careful not to splash any water out. She eyeballed the volume and started measuring out epsom salt while trying to figure out the ratios for the calcium and ammonia. He was sitting next to the other trash can, both hands in the water. Once she'd thought she'd gotten everything right, she placed the spoon in the water and whispered a word. The carvings glowed for a second and the water swirled around. She put her hands into both trash cans and focused again. This time the patterns from both matched. She poured the water over the octopus until the trash can was filled. "Keep an eye on it." She started grabbing the other full containers from the kitchen and bringing them into the living room.

She repeated the process with the other containers while also keeping an eye on Milo and the octopus. He was kneeling next to the bucket. "I think her gills are moving. Her skin is shinier." Joan said nothing. She was resigned to the fact that the octopus probably would not live through the night, but she couldn't bring herself to say that out loud. Instead she stood and grabbed five white tea candles and a lighter out of her bag.

"Scoot." She set the candles up in a ring around the trash can, and handed him the lighter. "Start with this one, go counterclockwise, think of a good thought every time you light one."

"Shouldn't you do this? It's kind of your thing, after all."

"Nah, this is manipulation of energy and probability, which is my boss' thing. She makes these with the magic sort of 'pre-programmed' in. Anyone can use them, and the connection to what you're trying to do is deeper for you. It's nothing earth-moving, just enough to channel some good vibes into the circle."

"Okay." He had a look of intense concentration on his face as he lit each candle. She felt the magic click into place with the last flame.

Joan sat back and sighed. Better than nothing, I guess. She shut her eyes and rubbed her temples. It had been a long night, and it didn't seem like it was going to end soon.

Milo made a noise between a yell and a squeak. "Joan, Joan!" She opened her eyes and leaned forward, looking into the bucket, prepared for the worst.

Joan had not expected the octopus to have such beautiful lavender eyes, or to be so colorfully bioluminescent. "Oh, wow.” Milo reached his hand towards the octopus, who respond by reaching up with one of its arms and wrapping it around his hand. The colors on its bioluminescent spots shifted rapidly into pinks and purples, and it made a weird burbling, cooing sound. “Ohmygosh. She can purr! That's adorable!”

Joan smiled in spite of herself. "Hey, do you have a list of all the things we still need for the tank?"

"Huh? Oh yeah, it's next to my computer."

"Well, now would probably be a good time for me to run to the pet shop."

"Oh, yeah. There should be a couple twenties in the dresser."

She stood and grabbed her backpack. I have my phone with me, and I'll only be a few minutes away. Call me if anything happens."

He rolled his eyes. "Okay, Mom." She whacked him lightly on the back of the head and walked out the door.

#writing #octopus story #joan and milo are a pair of nerds and i love them #fiction #my writing

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softgears · 10 years ago

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The Room

The floor tilted beneath him He should have known it would come to this. But at the time he’d been too busy with other things to see them, things that had felt like life or death at the time. Life or death. Ha! That seemed hysterically funny now, though he felt like it shouldn’t have been. He wasn’t sure where these thoughts had come from. He couldn’t remember why he should have know, or what it had all come to, or what he’d been so busy with. He couldn’t even remember how he’d ended up in this room. The floor would not stop moving beneath his feet. He struggled to keep his balance. It felt like the room itself was trying to shake him off, to get him out, to be rid of him. For all he knew, it actually was. The walls creaked and groaned as the floor bucked and warped, but he widened his stance and tried to hold his ground. He kept his eyes on the door on the other side of the room. The door looked very ordinary. In fact, it was so ordinary, with it’s whitewashed wood frame, dull metal hinges, and slightly chipped paint, that it seemed almost sinister. It was as if someone had asked him to picture the most unassuming, unimportant door in all of existence, and then placed that very door in front of him. If the door’s ordinariness was unsettling, the glowing exit sign above it was downright terrifying. It too, seemed generic, at first glance, but the more he stared at it the more convinced he was that it was out to get him. The glow seemed too bright, and even when he closed his eyes he could see the word 'EXIT' burned into his eyes. What was beyond that door? Where did it want him to go, and where was he even exiting from? He could not remember entering this room, and there was only the one door. He was fairly certain that he was dead, even though he did not remember dying. He also did not remember living, beyond vague details of the ordinary world, such as doors and exit signs and the fact that floors did not usually move on their own. He realized with a start that he had scooted several inches closer to the door with the latest wave of movement from the floor. He attempted to take a step back, but the floor dropped away from his feet in another rolling motion, and he fell to the ground. The room seemed to take advantage of this, shaking and tilting more and more until it felt like the floor was almost vertical and then he was slipping and sliding and falling, faster and faster towards the door. He clawed and scratched at the ground, desperately trying to stop himself, but it was no use. He hit the door feet first and it swung open, revealing nothing but void beyond. He managed to grab ahold of the doorframe at the last second, and tried desperately to haul himself back into the room, but the floor had become a sheer and impersonal wall, with nothing to grab onto. He began to shout into the void at no one in particular.“Why? Why is this happening? What the hell did I do?” And then, with a flash as blindingly painful as the exit sign, he remembered.

It had been a cheerfully sunny day that day, but the old, isolated warehouse was always cold and damp. They’d had to wait there all day, until it got dark. He was pissed, because he was going to miss his daughter’s birthday party for this stupid job, and so he’d started drinking, and so everyone else was staying clear of him. Everyone except for the poor guy tied to the chair, of course. And since it was his fault that he was here, he took a little bit of his anger out on the guy. A few kicks to the shins, a fist or two to the face, even an empty bottle to ribs. None of the other three came by, in case they caught a blow or two by accident. It was just him and the man and the silent green gaze of the exit sign. It didn’t matter anyways, as long as he was quiet. No one would find the guy for a long time. Night came, and they moved out around midnight. They took the boat out to the designated spot where they’d knew no one else would be going, tied the guy up, and unceremoniously dropped him off the side. “That’s gotta be th’ shittiest way to die, ever.” Said one of the others as the watched the ripples subside. “He had it comin’. Shoulda known better than to gamble away more than he had, ‘specially with th’ boss.” “Yeah, but still. It’s a shitty way to go. Maybe the worst. Whadda you think?” The guy was looking at him, now. “Nah. I think falling’s the worst way to go. Especially a long distance. You can see the ground coming, but all you can do is wait for the splat. An earthquake would be bad too. You can’t do anything but hang on.” They nodded, and the conversation moved on to less gruesome subjects, like their families and the outrageous prices of things these days. The police had been waiting for them when they got back. The shootout had been short and messy, and the next thing he knew, there was a room, and a door. His arms were shaking, and his hands felt slick with sweat. But the only thing below him was a long, long fall. He shut his eyes and he swore and he cried and he begged. He repented his sins, he asked for forgiveness, he prayed like he never had before. But gravity was unforgiving. One hand slipped, and the other followed. He plummeted and the room and the door and the exit sign quickly disappeared above him, engulfed by void. And he fell, and he fell, and he fell. Just when it seemed like he would be falling forever, he saw something beneath him, coming closer at a dangerous speed. He hit the ground with a painful crunch, and blacked out. When he came to, he was in a room identical to the first. He sat up shakily, trying to get his bearings. And then the floor tilted beneath him.

#my writing #i wrote this a while back but hey #short story

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