#but dear god was the cgi distracting with how off it looked

[bootyful-seventeen]

hey Sam I just wanted to pop in and ask how are you feeling? It’s always good to check on people❤️

could be worse but i'm doing better by locking myself up in my room and watching movies and low key critique them. just giving myself something to do when i'm not cleaning. and so far i've been watching animated movies of my childhood since youtube surprisingly still has the full movies uploaded and ironically there's a lot of snow white here tho she's not my fave disney princess. i loved 3 of these direct to video snow white movies and can't wait for that disney live action of snow white to get thoughts about that one

[omnybus]

The Red Marble

A creepypasta I wrote for @bogleech​’s 2017 Creepypasta Cook-Off, and one of the semifinalists!

Comments and critiques are very much appreciated.

The craft had appeared one midsummer morning, hovering quietly over the ocean.

How it arrived without any warning was just one of its many secrets- it was a gargantuan thing, smooth and toroidal in shape, stretching across nearly half the visible horizon when viewed from the nearest beach. At first glance it looked as if it were made of crystal-clear glass, but further observations found it was made of some kind of highly reflective metal that mirrored the sea below and the sky above, and had no visible doors, windows, or seams of any sort. Even viewing it myself from the lighthouse, it seemed almost unreal, like an amateur CGI model of a perfectly smooth, colossal chrome donut hastily pasted onto the sky.

For four days straight, it simply hovered there, never moving, never making a sound. Cargo ships and commercial airplanes were re-routed at great expense and inconvenience to go around the mystery craft, as none dared to approach it too closely. Speculations over the crafts' pilots (if it was indeed piloted) and their intentions sparked heated debate both on the internet and amongst the leaders of the world. There were many attempts at communicating with the craft, both from military forces and civilians (despite the former's attempts at keeping the latter away), mostly through radio broadcasts. Greetings, questions, and threats all went unanswered. Several amateur pilots attempted to land on the craft, but were never heard back.

On the fifth day, another craft appeared, identical in size, shape, and suddenness of arrival, hovering over the Indian Ocean. Another two crafts appeared over the Pacific some time later, followed by four more circling the Antarctic. More and more appeared without a single noise or warning, simply "poofing" into existence in the blink of an eye, until nearly a hundred of them were scattered above the Earth’s oceans without any recognizable pattern.

After several hours of nothing, a great and terrible noise roared throughout the atmosphere across the globe - a low, metallic rumble like the chugging of a train engine slowed down to a thundering bass, kicking up the waters below and blasted nearby clouds away, followed by a blinding, blue beam of light blaring down out from the hole in the center of each craft. From my window I watched with curiosity as the sea below the craft nearest me began to foam and spiral. Curiosity turned to horror as the waters were quickly lifted in a spiraling cyclone of water, sucking up into the craft's middle from below, but not emerging from the top. Before long the cyclone became a massive, twisting cylinder of water wider than a mountain, rapidly lifting up into the craft's eye without any sign of stopping. From the beach, I watched the water being dragged from the shoreline like a carpet, and never rushing back. Whatever these machines were, their purpose was clear: they were draining our ocean.

Needless to say, the world panicked. More fruitless pleas of mercy were broadcasted on every frequency, even pulses of x-rays and gamma rays were utilized with the theory that perhaps our visitors communicated on a different frequency. Temples and churches around the globe all bowed and prayed to their respective gods for help. Some mad individuals took boats out to where the ocean was being drained, perhaps to communicate with the crafts or simply to fulfill a death wish. Either way, their boats were all crushed within the waves and sucked up into the cyclones, never to be heard from again.

Every military force on the planet turned their guns on the alien invaders- missiles, jet fighters, drones and more relentlessly bombarded the machines with everything they could, even our nuclear stockpile was unleashed out of desperation. But new footage revealed that anything that attempted to strike the crafts' hulls simply vanished into nothing mere yards from the alien machines- no explosions, no re-directing, not even a puff of smoke; just disappearing from view as if deleted from existence. All attempts at landing on the craft ended in a similar fashion. When that failed, the remaining military forces simply focused on securing whatever land-locked lakes and rivers remain, as they were unaffected by the draining machines.

Before sundown, the ocean was almost entirely drained, according to satellite footage. From my vantage point, what was once the Atlantic Ocean was now a vast, rapidly-drying desert of sand and rocks, stretching out for miles in every direction. On the horizon, the shimmering craft and its titanic cyclone of water was silhouetted against the sunset, continued its robbery of our waters unabated.

For the longest time I just stood and stared at the thing, thinking and feeling nothing. I had turned off my radio, TV, and internet long ago, having grown tired of hearing the same reports of mass deaths, panic, and chaos repeated ad nauseam.

By midnight, our oceans were no more.

When the last bit of seawater vanished into the craft's center, the blue beam dimmed, and its metallic roar ceased, but the craft remained, reflecting the stars and clouds beneath the moon. It was almost eerily beautiful, an awe-inspiring distraction from the utter destruction of our most precious resource. For a moment I thought about hopping into my jeep and driving out along the sea bed to see the craft up close- a foolhardy quest, no doubt, but considering how the world as I knew it was now no more, and my job as lighthouse keeper was made obsolete in the most insane way possible, what other possible goal in life could I have?

My thoughts were immediately interrupted by another great and terrible noise from the craft, not an ear-shattering roar but a low and slow whooshing, gurgling noise, like the stomach of a titanic, hungry beast.

The center of the craft lit up once more, now an angry red instead of blue, followed by a column of something suddenly pouring out of the craft like an unplugged sewer pipe. I could not tell from the darkness and distance, but I assumed it was water, hoping perhaps that, whatever these things were and whoever sent them, had some benevolent gift for us. Perhaps these aliens took pity upon us humans and decided to clean up our oceans for us, undoing centuries of pollution with their wondrous technology? Was this a gift from beyond? A token of peace? I would take any glimmer of hope at this point.

Once it approached the shore, however, my optimism was immediately snuffed out as my lighthouse's beam swept over the craft's "delivery".

This was not water. This wasn't like anything on Earth. This was red. This was thick and viscous, bubbling and heaving and folding over itself again and again like lava, or freshly-ground meat. Dark red waves with crusted, scabby skin stretched and smothered over each other in their race to the shore. Soft, pale pink tendrils coiled and uncoiled from the creeping mass like tongues. Translucent yellow pustules, some as big as cars, bubbled and jiggled with a dark fluid before rupturing violently, great rivulets of crimson custard spewing forth in every direction. The stench- oh dear God in heaven the stench- washed over me like a tsunami, pouring down into my lungs like hot, rancid soup.  

As I knelt down to retch, I watched as a long, flat tongue of the red slop slid it ways up the beach and pooled around my bare feet. It was unpleasantly warm and wet, and rippled and probed along my soles and between my toes, like some big toothless dog was gnawing and slobbering all over my feet. It was enough to finally send me over the edge, and with a great heave I painted the crimson wave with the contents of my stomach, which immediately foamed and swirled into the surface of the red goop, releasing thick red steam as it gurgled. I finally gathered the resolve I needed to leap out of the intruding sludge and high-tail it back to my lighthouse, sealing the doors and windows for all the good it would do. I washed my feet as best as I could (they were slightly pink where the sludge had touched them, but otherwise normal-looking), and immediately dove into bed, trying to forget everything I saw.

In the morning, the craft was gone, but the ocean I was hoping to see was replaced with a vast expanse of red. Its scabby surface rose and fell in waves and ripples, but with a motion more akin to a breathing animal then any body of water.

I looked at my feet, hoping they at least had recovered from touching that stuff, but they had only gotten worse. From the ankles down, the skin was mottled crimson, shiny and rugose with thin patches of pale, crusty scabs all over. My toenails, once thick and only slightly yellow, were now a deep burgundy, heavily wrinkled and brittle like burnt bacon. A faint smell, like a fainter version of what I had smelled before, wafted from my afflicted flesh. I felt no pain. In fact, below my ankles, I felt nothing.

When I turned around, I saw that I had left a trail of blood-red footprints on the floor the other night. My sheets were stained a similar color. They would have to go.

Before anything else, I checked the news on my computer. Perhaps the nature of this new red ocean was revealed.

The very first search result on Google was a single image, taken via satellite of the planet Earth. I saw the world I now lived on.

A red marble.

[spacejew]

Disco Ep 8 - Liveblog?

Gonna keep a lil list of things I noted/loved as I watch, ‘cause...

* The episode just started and I’m already excited ‘cause this captain just identified his ship as the Gagarin, and as an immigrant of an ex-soviet family and space enthusiast that just makes me really happy that Yuri Gagarin has a whole ship named after him c: 

*  Love that we have an Asian on the bridge in the form of Mr. Reese at tactical

* This whole bridge crew is love, they’re doing their best and they’re so great 

*THE GAGARIN IS DESTROYED NOOO I’M WAY LESS HAPPY

*Airium takes the con? I’m just loving how much attention and props the bridge crew is getting, GOD we need more of them 

* Stamets called Tilly “Captain”??? Is this evidence of his time-displacement, maybe? Like he thought that Lorca was there, or that Tilly is a captain in the future? Or maybe this is a Mirror Stamets clue! In which case Tilly is already captain in the Terran Empire in which case, LIT

* AWAY MISSION!!!!!! YES!!!!!!!!!! LET’S GOOO!!!!!!!!

* I love this transmitter planet that’s so cool (but I feel bad for all the VFX interns who probably had to make all the plants blue in post-production lmaooo)

* Saru communicating with the aliens is so cuuuute

* Ah yes, finally, we’re back to the Klingons! Alright, time to see if Voq shows up... sounds like Kat is definitely still alive so I’m glad about that

* If these alien wisps harm Saru I will be SO pissed, they’re too pretty to be bad :( But I watch Star Trek and I know better lol

* YEAAAAA “GENERAL ORDER ONE” FOLKSSS we got some early Prime Directive goodness. This is the good shitttt

* KAT SCREAMING BACK AT L’RELL oh my god.. oh shit? Is L’rell gonna help her? Is she like, doing the “enemy of my enemy” thing with her against Kor?? PLEASE?? 

* “the needs of the many..” “are worth dying for.. but so are the needs of the few” “or the one?” *smooch* DAMN THAT’S FUCKING CUTE UGH STOP IT I DON’T WANNA LIKE THIS Ash you smooth motherfucker 

* Paul you cutieee ugh and Tilly is so sweet she’s tryinggg

* “I wish to defect” YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO tbh I believe her. At the very least she is gonna use it to help Voq probably and I love that!!! KAT HELP HER DEFECT PLEASSSEE sdgcdggdtr 

* “what other option do you have?” SHE’S GOT YOU THERE, KAT lmao

* “they desperately want to meet others and be known” oohh... it sounds like these aliens are gonna like, try to achieve that at any cost.. like there’s NO WAY this goes as well as it seems so far lmao but I’m hopeful

* OH MAN THEY’RE ENTERING HIS MIND I HOPE WHAT THEY SEE DOESN’T CAUSE ANY PROBLEMMMSSS like I hope their peaceful existence isn’t contaminated by these visions of war

* NO DON’T GIVE HIM THE COMMUNICATORS HE’S LIKE POSESSED

* Ooooohh FUCK here we GO, STRANDED ON THE DAMN PLANET this is literally fucking TOS lmao I’m loving this

* Saru has gone full brainwash oh dear

* Oh shit Tyler is taking commandddd yikes can you say relationship tension?? I bet Michael doesn’t 100% appreciate this also uh this is WILD already (also Im confused on why this transmitter is so important I think I missed something whoops) 

* YO if L’Rell succeeds in blowing up this ship and escaping with Kat... yes that would be amazing

* “you were not what I was expecting” “neither are you” um is it bad to ship L’Rell and Kat just based on this exchange lmao (im joke) GOD what a beautiful moment I hope they BOTH MAKE IT OUT ALIVE FUCK 

* Ok pleaaase fucking tell me Kat isn’t dead, just electrocuted into shock. Okay thank god she’s breathing

* Y’all this escape is way more tense to me than the away mission oh god

* Did Michael really storm away cause she was mad at Tyler or is it part of their plan to trick Saru 

* “everyone wants to defeat the Klingons.. I want to hurt them”. DAMN Tyler.. this guy’s been through some shit. I hate that this conflict is really tearing him up inside. Some good advice from ALL KNOWING SARU 

* Tyler don’t TOUCH THE ALIEN ROCK IT’LL GET YOU TOO NOOOOOOO FUCK 

* Woah Saru is stronk as FUCK god 

* YEEEEEEEAAAA BOI he DISTRACTED you now Michael is gonna do her THING

* I love all these cute little beep boops the technology makes

* Saru and his HOOVES lmao damn there he fucking goes. he looks CGI as FUCK lmao I love it honestly they were like, we gotta make him go FAST. FASTER than any actor or stuntman can achieve. He must.. go WOOSH. 

* Oh shit? Dead Klingons? Oh wow have I been saying “Kor” this whople time when I meant “Kol”? whoops 

* L’RELL YOU GOTTA GET KAT OFF THIS SHIP THERE’S NO TIME FOR REVENGE. LET BLOWING UP THE SHIP BE YOUR REVENGE

* y’all this episode is good as fuck

* SARU STOP SMASHING THINGS YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE THE GENTLE ONE

* “You won’t stop taking!” damn that’s the real Saru coming through that’s so sad

* DID TYLER JUST TELEPORT THROUGH THE.. alien.. spores... god dammit this really is a running theme here huh lmao

* seriously though how did they teleport him that’s crazy

* I wonder if the aliens are helping Michael/Tyler because they’re like acting out of a need to proactively end the threat VS Saru’s cowardly protective stance

* YAAAAA MISSION SUCCESS SONNNNN

* damn, poor Saru..

* Ah yes, The Medbay of Emotional Breakthroughs

* Oh worm? What’s goin on here with L’Rell and Kol. WHOSE SIDE IS SHE ON WHAT IS HER PLANNNN is she just like constantly trying to help anyone who will advance her in some way? 

* OH SHE GOT CAUGHT LMAO he really let her think she was good lmao

* OH NO THEY’RE GONNA INTERCEPT THE DISCOVERY SON, SHIT I hope the planet doesn’t get hurt?? that would be SO unfair 

* Is the PLANET fighting back??? Oh.. is the planet trying to get them to settle this once and for all???? dang that’s .. nice? but uh VERY MISGUIDED LMAO

* SHIT HERE THEY COMEEE this is all so fucked. Kat better get rescued when that ship arrives... NOBODY BETTER FUCKING DIE sjdkgnjdsklgh god 

* This preview... is CRAZY

*AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH

so that was a good ass episode.... dangg a nice setup for this midseason finale.. lotsa nice little bits in this one. Good shittt ugh I can’t believe we’re gonna hit the break so soon already this is so STRESSFUL

[shojo]

Shojo Reviews: Beauty and the Beast (2017)

The full review is under the cut due to the following disclaimers: 1. Spoilers 2. Criticism  3. Criticism from a film major 4. Criticism from a millennial film major who has Very Important Opinions™ 5. It’s long af

Enjoy~

Okay so lemme start off by saying it was.. okay. Like, there wasn’t anything that I specifically hated but there wasn’t anything that I was over the moon for either. Honestly, when the movie was over, all I wanted to do was go home and watch the 1991 animated original. And I know as a critic/analyst that you’re not suppose to compare movies and you’re just suppose to take what’s on the screen as is but, my god, that was extraordinarily difficult. Especially because, you know, it was a freaking remake. 

There seems to be a trend with live action remakes and live action Disney movies in general that they’re too fast. Let me explain. The 1991 Beauty and the Beast was ninety minutes and 2017 was a little over two hours. So how can that be? Because the filmmakers can’t decide if they’re making a remake of Beauty and the Beast or their own movie. Additional scenes, new songs, and twists on character arcs are fine but they take up time and- wait! You gotta do that song and make that reference too and don’t forget to put in those lines cause the audience will love it and omg that reference too but WAIT new plot device and that guy has a personality now so c’mon hurry up with that scene that everyone knows and loves cause we got more stuff to film so boom boom shoot that scene, sing that song, let’s go, next scene, gotta put it the filler, gotta put in this song now, go go go gOG GOGOGOGOGOGOGOGOGO. 

So yeah, the pacing was way too fast even with a longer running time. 

And speaking of the technical aspects of the film, I wanted to touch on the cinematography and visuals before I get to the stuff I really dislike. Obviously, very obviously, this movie is stunning eye candy. The French Baroque swirls and filigree are apparent throughout the film in every way possible, making the detail design a work of art in every frame. (That is except for Belle but we’ll get to her later.) Having all that art history bloom in the aesthetics not only harkens back to the fairytale’s French roots but makes this movie its own thing, ie. not just a remake. I personally would have preferred a lot less CGI but I can’t deny how amazing the objects and castle looked. However, I must pause to make a small plea to Hollywood. 

Dear Hollywood. Please. For the love of god and all that is holy and pure, PLEASE, put your actors in a real costume with real makeup and real prosthetics. Nothing about the Beast’s physical being felt tangible because, shocker, HE WASN’T REALLY THERE. Like, c’mon, at least the costume and then CGI the fur cause something is better than nothing. I really don’t care if it’s more time consuming or your actor doesn’t want to or it costs less to pay some poor overworked and underpaid digital artist, YOU HAVE THE RESOURCES TO OVERCOME ALL OF THOSE OBSTACLES AND MORE YOU HAVE NO EXCUSES. CGI doesn’t make an audience want to reach out and touch the screen, a real human emoting and connecting with said audience does. Best wishes, Shojo. 

Back to the technical stuff. We’ve clarified the beauty of the movie itself, but I was almost constantly distracted by how small the castle and rooms felt. The camera stayed close to the characters, rarely moving back to show the ceiling or sky. The animated movie seemed far more grand and just huge in general with the castle towering in the distance, the ballroom ceiling impossibly high, and the long shots of the village, the fireworks, the bridge, everything. The remake, when it had wide shots, usually had objects, trees, and the like framing the shot, cutting off the “endlessness” of the sky or ceiling. 

And then there was Belle. Oh, Emma. My Hermione. My feminist icon. You’re an okay Belle. You for sure look the part being the gorgeous human being that you are but, boy howdy, was your acting stale and your voice deadpan. I really don’t mean to be so critical but when you’re casting such an iconic role, you need an actress that can live up to that part and Emma just didn’t. She looked bored half the time she was in the castle and interacting with the enchanted objects. Her emotional moments were perfectly fine, great even, but the rest of her performance just fell flat. Her singing voice, like her acting, wasn’t half bad. But, like her acting, she just wasn’t a good fit for the part. 

Overall, Beauty and the Beast suffers from the same torn mindset that every other remake has: to be a remake, or to be our own film. That is the question. And I’ll say it again, there’s nothing abhorrently bad about this movie but there’s a lot to compare, contrast, and analyze, which I looooove. There’s probably another ten pages of things I can discuss but now my hand is cramping so I guess I’m done for now. 

Also Josh Gad is a national treasure. 

[p4chunt3rl3gend-blog]

Present and Future Generations Please Listen

Dear Present and Future generations I have come today to bring you some information you may or may not know. Usually I do not do things like this , but I can not sit back and let what is happening happen without at least trying to make a difference. So here it goes… Most of you will see in your homes and homes of your friends, family and others boxes with moving pictures… You will soon realize that the people your around will spend most of their time watching these screens or other devices with screens. Be careful unless you want to become cattle. These devices are used by the social elites and rich ruling class to achieve three goals which I will give some insight into. The first goal is to distract you. The TV is a great invention for these ruling classes since they can keep millions of people distracted at a time locked into a virtual reality which in turn will guarantee that you do not pay attention to the real world, which will guarantee that you never turn your gaze inward or queation what happens beyond the glow of a screen. These distractions will give the ruling elites the opportunity to exploit you, control your lives and mold you into exactly what they want you to be… SHEEP! The second goal Is to misinform you. Through movies, news and various media they will give you a fake veiw of the world you live in. They will give you more and more distractions by offering you new shiny toys the next great cell-phone the next great computer the next great virtual reality these will be programmed to be the most important items to own. Why do you think almost every person on this planet owns a cellphone it’s much easier if you hang the number plate around your neck by choice than by force and if you can make that number plate fashionable well why not? Make it more and more shiny until the number plate doesn’t even look like one anymore and it’s this season’s must have item or gift. The elites the rich even the government you pledge and follow will use these outlets to distract you and paint an unrealistic vision of life and the world around you. By using propaganda and misinformation they will turn you into an ignorant submissive citizen unable to comprehend the world around you and be unaware of his condition as a slave. The TV and other media sources are used to implant in your mind values, comeplexs and aspirations that will turn you into a superficial human being through the TV and the media you will be programmed like a robot to benifet the elites. You will be persuaded to spend your wealth on things you do not need ,you will be braiswashed to feel unhappy with your self so that you will spend your whole life looking into a mirror of an unrealistic image. You will have implanted needs that will keep you focused on irrelevant things that mean nothing in the scheme of the entire world. Be wary of what you hear as we said before the elites will use lies, propaganda and false terror attacks to keep the masses paralyzed in fear constantly reminded that only by following the flag will you be safe. I use the word follow because that is what most of us have become a slave a follower to our elites behind the flag. Truly ask yourself when was the last time you made a real important decision that affected your life based solely on information that didn’t come from a commercial, a political broadcast, a stockmarket graph? You make decisions everyday thinking they are your own and not influenced in this way and the elites have it set up this way from the moment your born it is implanted in each generation before to pass on to the next using the one unquestionable source of learning you spend most of your lives around …your parents. Our parents teach us everything and since they themselves were implanted with this misinformation and subterfuge they unknowingly pass and teach it on to their children, this misinformation is also passed to every living person by design so even if your parents were bad you will still aquire this same misinformation through other outlets and adults ensuring no one slips through the cracks every parent and adult out there does this thinking no more about it than you would of going and picking up something for lunch because it’s all hidden behind a fog of lies. So round and round it goes. The lies and propaganda will also be used to implant in your mind hatred and mistrust of others even people you will never see based on nothing more than supposed “true” information from our elites behind the flag or the elites in general. Stop for one second and think. Have you actually met any of these people that your told to hate and mistrust? And if you have were they all the same as the ones who are actually bad? The elites would have you believe that one small percent of a culture represents 100% of the culture there are bad people In every culture. White people have the KKK crowd but that percent is small compared to the rest who don’t believe that way. Does that 1% make every white person bad? The African Americans are stereotyped to join gangs and sell drugs even if some do this does that 1% make all African Americans bad? The answer is simple “NO!” but the elites would have you believe yes so that we will continue to fight eachother over our differences. Everything from skin color to religious belief the elites want us to continue to fight so they can exploit us while we never notice it because we are too busy fighting each other over our differences that instead of seprating should bring us together unified against those who would braiwash us and herd us and make us ignorant sheep so unable to think for ourselves that we have no other alternative except to bow to the men and women behind the flag. In being apathetic as we have… We have been molded into what any government elitist society wants…. Well behaved puppets who dance and sing at every string pulled by those we are told to trust and put our faith in every day. However our youth suffers the worst under the elites. They are told who and what they are before they even get the damn chance to form an opinion…we have videogames that glorify war and combat, targeting impressionable minds. Persuading through CGI explosions and patriotism icons that joining your military is your best option for the future. ***THIS IS IN NO WAY A JAB AT THE MILITARY*** I respect our men and women in uniform but I do not respect the government that sends them off to die in foreign lands under the guise of protecting us from terrorist. When all it is, is a war to get oil or cement more land to build bases on to complete some misguided mission of controlling the whole world. On top of this we have websites dedicated to some of the most depraved things on earth… More than half is legally able to do this to boot and It’s so easy to access. Most television shows and magazines aimed at youth is by far the most crippling to them as well. These show and teach values and mindsets that are unrealistic and sometimes just outright idiotic YouTube is the biggest offender of this. The youth are taught that what you see on TV, youtube, magazines and what you get told on social media is THE way to be. The elites wish us to be anti social as well. This is no more present than in social media ironic as that is. Friends used to be other human beings you would hang out with after school or play in a garage band with or just good life long people you got along with well. Well the elites found a way. Now your friend is anyone they want to paint themselves as, your friend is a number on a screen, a list that you are convinced to increase, a number to show off just how popular you are. Your friend is halfway across the world in another country that you may even not be able to pronounce. Funny how the definition of friend has changed so rapidly I’m surprised kids today even know what real social interaction is beyond a keyboard and a screen or a controller. It’s all about distraction and being what everyone wants you to be. These are just a few things in our broken system of toothpicks on the ground. So I encourage you wake up! Make your own decisions not based on some game you play not, on some friend you have on a fake wall on a screen, not on some commercial you saw, not on some political speech you heard, but with your own mind your own thoughts your own god given free will. Don’t believe the media don’t believe the TV don’t believe the magazine don’t believe the lies and the propaganda and the misinformation. Stop idolizing others and idolize yourself. Look inward for truth and happiness that’s the only place your gonna find it. We can do better we can be better and we can live better! Just follow your heart and make your decisions based your own thoughts and truths not the ones force fed to you. We can be free to be our own individual person. I know I talked alot about media and screens perhaps you find it ironic and hypocritical that I use social media and screens, but I use it as one one would use a poision… in hopes of understanding it I will find a way to neutralize it. Develope an antidote if you will for disease that has warped the nations of this world and infected almost 99% of the populace. Please pass this message along. As it was passed to me!

[omnybus]

Creepypasta: Red Marble

I’ve been working on this on and off for a few months now, and have finally finished it. Feel free to leave criticism, but honestly I’m just glad its finished.

Red Marble

By Omny

The craft had appeared one midsummer morning, hovering quietly over the ocean.

How it arrived without any warning was just one of its many secrets- it was a gargantuan thing, smooth and toroidal in shape, stretching across nearly half the visible horizon when viewed from the nearest beach. At first glance it looked as if it were made of crystal-clear glass, but further observations found it was made of some kind of highly reflective metal that mirrored the sea below and the sky above, and had no visible doors, windows, or seams of any sort. Even viewing it myself from the lighthouse, it seemed almost unreal, like an amateur CGI model of a perfectly smooth, colossal chrome donut hastily pasted onto the sky.

For four days straight, it simply hovered there, never moving, never making a sound. Cargo ships and commercial airplanes were re-routed at great expense and inconvenience to go around the mystery craft, as none dared to approach it too closely. Speculations over the crafts' pilots (if it was indeed piloted) and their intentions sparked heated debate both on the internet and amongst the leaders of the world. There were many attempts at communicating with the craft, both from military forces and civilians (despite the former's attempts at keeping the latter away), mostly through radio broadcasts. Greetings, questions,  and threats all went unanswered. Several amateur pilots attempted to land on the craft, but were never heard back.

On the fifth day, another craft appeared, identical in size, shape, and suddenness of arrival, hovering over the Indian Ocean. Another two crafts appeared over the Pacific some time later, followed by four more circling the Antarctic. More and more appeared without a single noise or warning, simply "poofing" into existence in the blink of an eye, until nearly a hundred of them were scattered above the Earth without any recognizable pattern.

After several hours of nothing, a great and terrible noise roared throughout the atmosphere across the globe - a low, metallic rumble like the chugging of a train engine slowed down to a thundering bass, kicking up the waters below and blasted nearby clouds away, followed by a blinding, blue beam of light blaring down out from the hole in the center of each craft. From my window I watched with curiosity as the sea below the craft nearest me began to foam and spiral. Curiosity turned to horror as the waters were quickly lifted in a spiraling cyclone of water, sucking up into the craft's middle from below, but not emerging from the top. Before long the cyclone became a massive, twisting cylinder of water wider than a mountain, rapidly lifting up into the craft's eye without any sign of stopping. From the beach, I watched the water being dragged from the shoreline like a carpet, and never rushing back. Whatever these machines were, their purpose was clear: they were draining our ocean.

Needless to say, the world panicked. More fruitless pleas of mercy were broadcasted on every frequency, even pulses of x-rays and gamma rays were utilized with the theory that perhaps our visitors communicated on a different frequency. Temples and churches around the globe all bowed and prayed to their respective gods for help. Some mad individuals took boats out to where the ocean was being drained, perhaps to communicate with the crafts or simply to fulfill a death wish. Either way, their boats were all crushed within the waves and sucked up into the cyclones, never to be heard from again.

Every military force on the planet turned their guns on the alien invaders- missiles, jet fighters, drones and more relentlessly bombarded the machines with everything they could, even our nuclear stockpile was unleashed out of desperation. But new footage revealed that anything that attempted to strike the crafts' hulls simply vanished into nothing mere yards from the alien machines- no explosions, no re-directing, not even a puff of smoke; just disappearing from view as if deleted from existence. All attempts at landing on the craft ended in a similar fashion. When that failed, the remaining military forces simply focused on securing whatever land-locked lakes and rivers remained, as they were unaffected by the draining machines.

Before sundown, the ocean was almost entirely drained, according to satellite footage. From my vantage point, what was once the Atlantic Ocean was now a vast, rapidly-drying desert of sand and rocks, stretching out for miles in every direction. On the horizon, the shimmering craft and its titanic cyclone of water was silhouetted against the sunset, continued its robbery of our waters unabated.

For the longest time I just stood and stared at the thing, thinking and feeling nothing. I had turned off my radio, TV, and internet long ago, having grown tired of hearing the same reports of mass deaths, panic, and chaos repeated ad nauseam.

By midnight, our oceans were no more.

When the last bit of seawater vanished into the craft's center, the blue beam dimmed, and its metallic roar ceased, but the craft remained, reflecting the stars and clouds beneath the moon. It was almost eerily beautiful, an awe-inspiring distraction from the utter destruction of our most precious resource. For a moment I thought about hopping into my jeep and driving out along the sea bed to see the craft up close- a foolhardy quest, no doubt, but considering how the world as I knew it was now no more, and my job as lighthouse keeper was made obsolete in the most insane way possible, what other possible goal in life could I have?

My thoughts were immediately interrupted by another great and terrible noise from the craft, not an ear-shattering roar but a low and slow whooshing, gurgling noise, like the stomach of a titanic, hungry beast.

The center of the craft lit up once more, now an angry red instead of blue, followed by a column of something suddenly pouring out of the craft like an unplugged sewer pipe. I could not tell from the darkness and distance, but I assumed it was water, hoping perhaps that, whatever these things were and whoever sent them, had some benevolent gift for us. Perhaps these aliens took pity upon us humans and decided to clean up our oceans for us, undoing centuries of pollution with their wondrous technology? Was this a gift from beyond? A token of peace? I would take any glimmer of hope at this point.

Once it approached the shore, however, my optimism was immediately snuffed out as my lighthouse's beam swept over the craft's "delivery".

This was not water. This wasn't like anything on Earth. This was red. This was thick and viscous, bubbling and heaving and folding over itself again and again like lava, or freshly-ground meat. Dark red waves with crusted, scabby skin stretched and smothered over each other in their race to the shore. Soft, pale pink tendrils coiled and uncoiled from the creeping mass like tongues. Translucent yellow pustules, some as big as cars, bubbled and jiggled with a dark fluid before rupturing violently, great rivulets of crimson custard spewing forth in every direction. The stench- oh dear God in heaven the stench- washed over me like a tsunami, pouring down into my lungs like hot, rancid soup.  

As I knelt down to retch, I watched as a long, flat tongue of the red slop slid it ways up the beach and pooled around my bare feet. It was unpleasantly warm and wet, and rippled and probed along my soles and between my toes, like some big toothless dog was gnawing and slobbering all over my feet. It was enough to finally send me over the edge, and with a great heave I painted the crimson wave with the contents of my stomach, which immediately foamed and swirled into the surface of the red goop, releasing thick red steam as it gurgled. I finally gathered the resolve I needed to leap out of the intruding sludge and high-tail it back to my lighthouse, sealing the doors and windows for all the good it would do. I washed my feet as best as I could (they were slightly pink where the sludge had touched them, but otherwise normal-looking), and immediately dove into bed, trying to forget everything I saw.

In the morning, the craft was gone, but the ocean I was hoping to see was replaced with a vast expanse of red. Its scabby surface rose and fell in waves and ripples, but with a motion more akin to a breathing animal then any body of water.

I looked at my feet, hoping they at least had recovered from touching that stuff, but they had only gotten worse. From the ankles down, the skin was mottled crimson, shiny and rugose with thin patches of pale, crusty scabs all over. My toenails, once thick and only slightly yellow, were now a deep burgundy, heavily wrinkled and brittle like burnt bacon. A faint smell, like a fainter version of what I had smelled before, wafted from my afflicted flesh. I felt no pain. In fact, below my ankles, I felt nothing.

When I turned around, I saw that I had left a trail of blood-red footprints on the floor the other night. My sheets were stained a similar color. They would have to go.

Before anything else, I checked the news on my computer. Perhaps the nature of this new red ocean was revealed.

The very first search result on Google was a single image, taken via satellite of the planet Earth. I saw the world I now lived on.

A red marble.