theevilglasses

[theevilglasses]

I Died

I’m dead, he isn’t. I know how it happened and everything, a cycling accident. A FedUP truck hit me. I was mostly in my bike lane and bam, splattered all over the truck and the road. My mom, dad, and little sister got paid handsomely from the settlement but he wasn’t included since he was never legally family. He actually didn’t even make it to any hearings. I know that because I’ve been with him, watching him, since it happened. I know it’s sad when I look at him but I can’t feel anything anymore. I see him cry, I see him lay in bed for days, I see him not eat, not answer his phone. I see him doing nothing and I know it’s sad but there are no feelings in me. We were each other’s soul mates. We jokingly talked about how we wouldn’t be able to move on if the other died. Super funny. I had no idea I’d be watching him like this after and it makes me wonder who was watching me until I kicked it. He goes to a job, he lost his real one after it happened. He lives in an unfinished basement of someone’s house after losing our apartment. And he sits there, or lays there, and does nothing until it’s time to get up and get on the bus to his job. I’m not able to get his attention or move anything to show him I’m there, I can’t talk to him during his dreams, or flicker lights when he cries out my name. So I wrap my arms around him and lay there with him. I always wish that this didn’t happen but I feel no pain.

Years passed and I’m still here with him. He was true to his word about not being able to move on. He doesn’t cry anymore but he’s still by himself in this basement working jobs, doing nothing but watching Netflix. He’s thicker than he was a year ago but still not back to the size he was before. His hair and beard are long but he combs them and keeps them tidy. He got some new clothes that fit him better on his new frame. He’s handsome now just like he always was. I don’t know if anything is ever going to be different for me. I might watch him for his whole life and then when he dies maybe we’ll be together. Maybe that thing will happen that when I do something good I go on to the true afterlife. Maybe I’ll wander here forever even after everyone else is gone. I know that I don’t want to leave him. Even though I’m dead and can’t feel anything I know I don’t want to be anywhere except with him. I’ve got my routine too. When he wakes up I give him a kiss and say “good morning, how did you sleep?” We sit together at his little outside bistro set that he has inside and have coffee. He gets ready, I give him his space then, and I sit and think or reread any text I can see. I go to work with him. He’s started riding a bike again. I understood what he was going through everytime he looked at a it. I’m glad because I really did enjoy it, now I just know it as a reasonable mode of transportation. In the evenings and his days off we hang out and watch TV or he plays games on his console and then we go to bed. Recently he’s been in better and better moods. He gets texts more often now and he’s got more friends at his job. It’s good for him. He smiles too. I do like seeing him this way. It’s a small glimpse at how he was when I was alive.

It had been months and he’s grown further away from me. There’s a woman at his job that he talks with, that talks with him. He smiles and laughs when she’s around. They like each other. What she doesn’t know is when he’s home he cries because I’m gone. I think about what I would feel like if I could and it’s satisfaction. But I only sit with him as he cries and doesn’t respond to her texts, gently running my hand down his arm telling him everything will be okay. It’s a few weeks later. He’s been looking at his phone a lot but no one is texting or calling. The TV is off, it’s sprinkling rain. He opens the door and steps outside. I follow him and stand next to him. He gets a shiver, I watch him shake it off. “Leave me alone,” he says staring out in the rain. I look to where he’s looking but there’s only the street, there’s not even a house across the way. “I don’t want to keep doing this.” He closes his eyes. He’s crying. “If I say out loud that I don’t love you anymore will you leave me alone?” Don’t love me anymore? Who is he talking about? His hands are fists, down by his side. “I don’t love you anymore!” I put my hand out to grab his shoulder and it goes right through him. I try again. “I want to forget you!” And then he was gone. Or I was gone. Either way we weren’t together anymore. I know that in this moment I was happy that I didn’t feel anymore.

[theevilglasses]

No Kill Shelter

K9 grabbed the unopened bag of dog food from the top shelf of the twenty-second row of the warehouse. His synthetic metal fingers were vaguely humanoid, though he only had three fingers per hand. The bag of dog food weighed 50kg, easy enough for K9 to carry under one arm. He slung the bag over one shoulder and balanced it there. He displayed a smiley emoji on the screen that served as his face and then rolled outside. The land was gray and dying. A few shrubs clung to life among the rocks and rusted out cars, but they were having a hard time of it. Little sunlight made it through the thick dust that filled the sky. K9 knew something had gone terribly wrong, but he was not sure what. He had not been able to establish a connection to the internet in 3.76 years. K9 started his twenty-five minute commute home, a route he took every day. It wound through a dead forest, dilapidated houses, and the playground behind the burnt husk of an elementary school. Like most days, he tried to reason out what happened to change the world so much. A meteor? A war? Insufficient data. He was never programmed to handle such a situation. Those first few weeks were the most difficult. There was no one to guide him. His customer service routines broke down, and he was forced to do something his creators never intended. K9 had to improvise. K9 crested a hill and saw his home below: the Green Village Doggy Halfway House. The small building was nestled in a depression between low hills, sheltered from the harsh winds that often raged across the land and tore apart other structures. K9 made repairs to the building when it needed them, ensuring that it fared better than the others he passed on his daily commute. The building was one story tall and made of poured concrete. A pair of double doors in the front were the main entrance. Beside the doors, a large window took up the rest of the storefront. An image of a smiling puppy was stenciled on the window. K9 rolled down the hill and pushed through the front doors. His treads left a trail of dirt across the tile floor, and he made a note in his maintenance log to sweep it later. The front desk was empty except for a small stack of adoption applications sitting in a tray. Hannah had sorted and stacked the papers the last time she came to work, 3.81 years ago.

He pushed through the second set of doors that led into the back room and changed his face to the big grin emoji. "I'm baaaack!" K9 said, imitating the vocal inflection he learned from Hannah. He was greeted by a chorus of excited barking from the dogs. They were always excited at supper time. So was K9. It was his favorite time of the day. The back room had two rows of kennel cages facing each other and they were closed off with metal gates. At the far end of the long, rectangular room, a large loading bay door took up one wall. Opposite that was a door that led to the small infirmary. That was where the dogs were treated whenever the vet paid a visit. "Hello Muffin," K9 said, unlocking the gate to pen 12. Muffin was an old Saint Bernard, slow and friendly. Muffin wagged his tail and walked out. "Looking sharp, Spot!" K9 said, opening Spot's pen. Another figure of speech that K9 learned from Hannah. Spot was a Jack Russell terrier, middle aged yet full of energy. Spot ran off to join Muffin, who was heading toward the feeding area. K9 opened the pens one by one. The shelter was home to twenty-five dogs. K9's sole mission was to care for these animals, something that he had been doing every day since he was activated 8.83 years ago. He enjoyed it. Even though something was wrong with the world, the dogs were happy. K9 would never let anything bad happen to them. In the final cage, Fluffy waited patiently, sitting on her hind legs. Fluffy was a beautiful Samoyed, her white fur soft and puffy. She came to the shelter as a puppy without a name. Hannah asked K9 if he wanted to pick a name. K9 chose Fluffy, because her white fur reminded him of clouds. "Fluffy!" K9 said, opening the pen. "How are you, friend?" Fluffy responded with a soft bark, something she did often. K9 thought of it as Fluffy's way of talking back to him. She walked over to K9's side and looked up, wagging her tail. "Shall we serve dinner?" K9 said. Fluffy barked, and K9 took that as a yes. K9 rolled to the feeding area, a small open space against the back wall where he kept the bowls. Fluffy stayed by his side while he filled them with food. The other dogs dove into the dry food, greedy and slobbering. K9 filled Fluffy's bowl last. She looked up at him and gave a little bark before she started eating. K9 opened the bay doors that led out to the fenced in yard. As the dogs finished eating, they made their way outside. K9 left them to their own devices. He grabbed the pooper scooper and garbage bin and set about cleaning out the cages. While he was working in cage 3—Claw's cage—Fluffy came in and sat beside him. "Hello, Fluffy," K9 said. "Do you not want to play today?" "Rrr rrr," Fluffy said. "Ok," K9 said. "I am happy for you to accompany me while I clean."

Fluffy followed him from cage to cage, sitting on her haunches while he cleaned. She often stayed by his side instead of socializing with the other dogs. K9 was glad she did. He and Fluffy had been close from the day she came to the shelter. She was his best friend. When they were leaving cage 5, Fluffy stopped mid-stride. She held her head high and turned toward the front of the store, her ears perked up. K9 heard it too. The rumble of a combustion engine, likely some kind of old-timey automobile. The sound was distant but growing louder. K9 estimated that it was headed directly for the shelter. "Fluffy!" K9 said. He changed his face to the wide-eyed emoji. "That could be new customers. Shall we go greet them?" Fluffy looked up at K9 and raised her eyebrows. Her tail stood stiff instead of wagging like it normally did. K9 rolled away, and Fluffy followed after a brief moment of hesitation. K9 rolled into the lobby just in time to see a heavily modified bus skid to a stop on the cracked pavement of the parking lot. The vehicle appeared to have originally been a school bus, built back before all automobiles became autonomous. Rusted metal plates were welded along the sides, and sturdy grates covered the windows. The bus door opened and two people hopped out. A man and a woman in their thirties, both wearing drab clothes that blended in with the dry dusty ground. The two of them stopped outside of the bus door. They turned and held out their arms. A moment later, another person—an older woman with gray hair—fell out of the bus and into their arms. The older woman's head drooped. She seemed to have trouble getting her feet under her. The younger man and woman put their shoulders under the woman's armpits and carried her toward the shelter. Behind them, a large man with a long gray beard stepped out of the bus. He carried two automatic rifles, one in each hand. The first three of them came through the front doors of the shelter. Fluffy scurried to hide behind K9. K9 opened his arms and displayed a big grin emoji on his view screen. "Greetings!" K9 said. "Welcome to the Green Village Doggy Halfway House and Adoption Center." The man and woman froze. They stared at K9 with wide eyes. The older woman tried to lift her head but failed. The younger man looked K9 up and down. Fluffy peeked her head out from behind K9. "It's fine," he said. "Just an old service bot." The older woman groaned. K9 noticed that she was bleeding, a large patch of her shirt stained red. The younger pair carried her to the wall and gently sat her down, putting her back against the wall. "We are proud to be a no kill shelter," K9 said. "All of our pups receive the best care until they are matched with a loving family." The younger man stood up and approached K9. "Hey, robot, are there any people here?"

K9 displayed his sorry emoji. "Not at the moment. My coworker Hannah was last in the office one thousand three hundred and ninety-two days ago. If you would like to wait, I'm sure—" "Do you have any medical supplies here?" he said, cutting K9 off. "A first aid kit. Surgical equipment. Anything?" K9 paused for a moment, processing the request. He switched to his thinking emoji. This was an unexpected branch in his customer service routine. He searched for the most appropriate match. "Why yes, our puppies do get sick from time to time. We have a fully stocked infirmary and an on-call vet, so you can rest assured that our animals are well cared for." The man's eyes lit up. "Where's the infirmary?" K9 gestured toward the doors at the back of the lobby. "It is in the back room past the kennel—" The man bolted through the double doors before K9 could finish. A chorus of excited yapping echoed from the back, the dogs happy to see a new face in the shelter. The gray bearded man shouldered his way through the front doors. "Hoooly shit!" he said, looking K9 up and down. "An actual working robot. Haven't seen one of those in a while." Fluffy barked at the man, and he looked at her. She stepped further behind K9 to hide. "And a real live dog. I can't believe my eyes." "Ron!" said the younger woman. "This ain't time for sightseeing." "Tell me something I don't know, Beth," Ron said. "Ron, is it?" K9 said. This man seemed much friendlier than the other one. "Are you interested in adopting one of our dogs today?" Ron shook his head. "Hold on a minute, robot," he said. Ron walked over to where the women were. He propped the rifles against the wall and got down on one knee beside the older woman. "Hey, Allison, darling. You still with me?" The older woman—Allison—lifted her head a little and smiled. Her breathing was labored, and she made a rasping sound when she inhaled. "Oh Ron, I'm just peachy." Ron smiled at her. Her head slumped forward, and Ron's smile disappeared. He looked at Beth. "Where'd Zeke get off to?" "Robot said there's an infirmary in the back," Beth said. "Maybe a lucky break." "Lucky if it's stocked," Ron said. He stood up, grabbed one of the rifles, and walked over to the front window. He peered out and scanned the horizon. "You think we lost them?" Beth said. "Not a chance," Ron said. "Merrick won't give up." "He can—" Allison started to say, but her voice choked up and a wet sound came out of her throat. She coughed to clear it up. "He can kiss my ass."

Ron looked over his shoulder and smiled at her, though his eyes were sad. He looked

back outside. "Robot," Ron said, "you wouldn't happen to have an arsenal back there, would you? Maybe a heap of 7.62 rounds?" "Sir!" K9 said, displaying a serious emoji on his screen. "I must remind you that this is a no kill shelter." Ron laughed. "Alright, alright. I was just joking, robot." Ron glanced at K9. "You got a name?" K9 put on his smiley emoji again. "Yes, everyone calls me K9." "Well K9, it's nice to meet you." Ron said. He ejected the magazine from his rifle and looked at the rounds inside. He frowned, then put it back in place. "You're an old military model, right? They re-purposed you for civilian work after the war?" K9 displayed his sorry emoji. "I have no memory of my time before working here." "Ron, he ain't going to be any help," Beth said. She walked over to the front desk and started looking through the drawers. "Ah, damn, it was worth a try," Ron said. Allison groaned and slid down the wall. Beth rushed over and grabbed Allison's shoulders, propping the older woman up. Fluffy whimpered. She took a tentative step out from behind K9, and then slowly walked over to Allison. Fluffy sniffed Allison's hand, which laid limp on the floor. Allison struggled to lift her head so she could make eye contact with Fluffy. Fluffy wagged her tail. "What's...her name?" Allison said. "Fluffy," K9 said. He rolled across the room and stopped beside Allison's feet. "She is my best friend." Allison smiled. "I had one just like her. When I was a little girl." Allison tried to lift her hand, but her strength gave out. Fluffy leaned down and licked it. "Such a sweet girl," Allison said. Fluffy walked over to K9 and sat beside him. She did not try to hide behind K9 this time. K9 displayed a smiley emoji, glad that she had warmed up to the newcomers. He patted her on the head, and she wagged her tail. The doors from the back room swung open. Zeke barged through and dumped a pile of medical supplies on the floor beside Beth. "This is what I could find," Zeke said. "I'll make it work," Beth said. She picked through the pile and grabbed rubbing alcohol and some gauze. Zeke grabbed the second rifle from the wall and joined Ron at the window. They were all silent for a while. Beth tended to Allison's wounds while the men kept watch over the desolate landscape. K9 searched through his database for something that could help him with this situation. These people did not seem interested in adopting a dog, and he was at a loss for how to help them.

Fluffy's ears perked up. Something rumbled in the distance, just like the sound of the bus, but louder. Fluffy ran to the window and stood between Ron and Zeke. Her head was just high enough to see over the bottom edge of the window. Zeke gripped his rifle so hard his knuckles turned white. Fluffy barked. A fleet of motorcycles came into view as they rounded the bend in the road. The riders wore helmets with small spikes welded to the top, and many of them had bandannas tied over their faces to keep the dust out. The last vehicle to come into view was a tractor trailer truck, the front grill painted with a skull. "Party's starting," Ron said. He and Zeke moved to either side of the windows so it would be hard to see them from the outside. The riders fanned out and parked in a semicircle facing the front of the store, with the school bus in the middle of the two groups. The loud engines quieted as the riders turned them off and dismounted. They pulled firearms from holsters on their motorcycles. In all, K9 counted thirty-two men. The driver's side door of the truck opened. A tall, muscular man stepped out. His hair was spiked in a Mohawk, and he wore a steel skull medallion against his bare torso. The name "Merrick" was tattooed in large letters across his chest. He sauntered forward and stopped in the middle of the semicircle of men. He glared at the front of the shop. "This is turning out to be a busy day," K9 said. "Hush robot," Ron said. "Y'all might as well come out," Merrick said. The dry air carried his deep voice across the parking lot. "Ain't no point in dragging this out." Fluffy growled. "K9," Ron said in a loud whisper. "I need you to drag Allison into the back room." "I'm gonna give you to the count of three!" Merrick said. Beth slapped a bandage against Allison's open wound. "That'll have to do for now," she said. She grabbed a handful of bandages from the pile on the floor. "One!" Merrick yelled. "Get everybody behind a wall, the thicker the better," Ron said to K9. "Two—ah, the hell with this." Merrick threw his hand up above his head. "Light her up, boys!" The air erupted with gunfire. K9 froze. No, this could not be happening. The day had been going so well only a moment before, and now his home was under attack. He searched through his decision tree for the appropriate response. He found a branch labeled active shooter, but it was empty. His programmers never populated it, either an oversight or because they thought it would never be needed. He watched helplessly as chaos unfolded around him.

Bullets tore through the window, shattering it. Ron and Zeke dropped to the floor, covering their heads as sharp glass shards rained down on top of them. Beth curled up in a ball against the wall beside Allison. Fluffy bolted away from the window and cowered behind K9. A bullet slammed into K9's torso, carving a small groove before it ricocheted away. The wound sent a shock wave through K9, sparking old circuits long unused. He would not stand by and watch helplessly. His sole reason for existence was to protect the dogs at the Green Village Doggy Halfway House. There was only one option remaining—he had to improvise. K9 turned to Fluffy. She stared at him with wide eyes. She was shaking and her tail was tucked under her body. He would not allow anything bad to happen to her. "Stay here with these people," he said. He flashed a heart emoji on his screen. "I love you." K9 whipped around and spun his treads as fast as they could go. He zipped across the room, broken glass crunching under his treads. Zeke huddled in the small section of wall between the window and the front doors, covering his head with one arm and cradling the rifle in the other. As K9 barreled through the doors, he snatched the rifle out of Zeke's hand. K9 burst into the parking lot. The bleak sun shone down on him, reflecting off of his polished steel frame. The men outside were taken aback by the unexpected sight of a robot. One by one they stopped firing and stared at K9. The silence was louder than the gunfire. K9 looked at each of the men. He displayed a frown emoji on his face. It was the closest representation of anger available in his library. His gaze settled on Merrick. The man's jaw hung open. "Leave now," K9 said. "This is a no kill shelter." Merrick slapped the side of his own head and laughed. He looked at his men. "Well what are y'all waiting for?" he said. "Shoot that bastard!" Gun barrels swung through the air toward K9, but his synthetic body was faster than their slow organic forms. K9 rolled sideways and raised the barrel of his gun. He pulled the trigger in rapid succession, adjusting the barrel a fraction between each shot. Before any of the men had a chance to fire, three of them were dead. But as fast as he was, K9 was not invincible. Bullets ripped into his body, tearing through his metal hull. One round fractured and bounced around inside his body cavity, shredding his heat regulation circuitry. Another punched into the corner of his view screen, destroying ten percent of the display and leaving a spiderweb of cracks across the glass. K9 wheeled toward the school bus and put it between him and Merrick's men. A critical internal alarm blared, vying for his attention. One of his power cells had taken too much damage and was on the verge of exploding. K9 ignored it for the moment. A burly man with a goatee ran around the bus, firing his gun wildly. K9 shot him in the eye socket.

A burst of bullets slammed into K9's back. K9 turned to see two men coming around the other end of the bus. He aimed his gun and shot the first one. Before the bullet made contact, he adjusted the barrel by one centimeter and pulled the trigger again. The first man fell but the second did not. K9 was out of bullets. Improvise. K9 spun in an arc, swinging the butt of the rifle as a club. He took off the head of a man who chose that moment to come around the side of the bus near him. More bullets riddled his body, and K9 rolled away. He charged out from behind the bus and into a group of men who foolishly chose to stand close together. He dove into the midst of them, swinging the rifle with one arm and punching with the other. The alarm grew more insistent. K9's power cell was going to explode soon. He slipped the fingers of his right hand into a pair of bullet holes in his torso. He tugged hard, ripping a ragged hole in his body. He reached inside and grabbed the faulty cell. Before he could rip it out, Merrick's regrouped forces opened fire. A wave of bullets hit him and blew his left arm completely off. The ball joint that connected his torso to his treads, already suffering from heavy damage, finally gave way. He could no longer balance, and his upper body fell backward. His shoulders and head slammed into the ground. He stared up at the bleak sky, unable to move. K9 had failed. He thought of Fluffy. "Hold fire!" Merrick yelled. The bullets stopped, and Merrick's men walked forward to surround K9. He could see them with his peripheral vision, but his camera was too damaged to move. Merrick kicked K9 hard. The jolt shifted some of his wiring, and K9 realized he had control of his right arm again. "Robot, I don't know where the hell you came from," Merrick said. He spit on K9's view screen. "Just know that I'm going to take my time on anybody I find in that building. They're going to die long and slow." K9 wrenched his arm out of his torso, dragging the damaged cell with it. He held his arm up high, his hand level with their heads. The men jumped back and raised their guns. Wisps of bright green vapor drifted out of the cracks in the small metal tube. "What the hell is that?" Merrick said. "A bomb," K9 said. The fuel cell exploded. The shrapnel tore through man and machine alike. K9 had just enough time to watch the explosion kill Merrick and his men before it destroyed K9's camera and blinded him. The blast subsided. K9 was blind and immobile. His internal diagnostics showed that his two remaining fuel cells were busted. They were not in danger of exploding, but they would not work for much longer. He would soon lose consciousness and die. He heard footsteps approaching, the gritty sound of feet on the sandy pavement. There were two large feet and a set of lighter paws. "Hello?" K9 said. The paws burst into a

run until their owner reached K9. He heard her whimpering as she sniffed him. "Fluffy, my friend." She whimpered louder. "Damn, they did a number on you," Ron said. His footsteps stopped near K9's head. "I don't know how we're going to patch you up." "You cannot," K9 said. He did not want to die, but it was inevitable. Once his power source was depleted, his memories would be lost and he would cease to exist. Ron did not say anything for a while. Fluffy curled up next to K9. "Thank you," Ron said. "The dogs," K9 said. "Take care of them." "We will," Ron said. "I promise." K9 felt the last of his power draining away. "Goodbye Fluffy."

Beth held open the front doors of the shelter. Allison limped out, Zeke helping her walk with his shoulder under one of her arms. Twenty-four dogs escorted them, yapping and wagging their tails as they left the shelter for the final time. The entourage made their way across the parking lot to the bus, and they herded all of the dogs aboard. Ron grabbed the last satchel of supplies raided from the shelter and headed out the doors. He walked around the side of the building to where Fluffy laid, resting her head atop a mound of freshly turned dirt. A board stuck out of the ground with the name "K9" scrawled on it. "Come on," Ron said, his voice soft. Fluffy stood up and whimpered, but she followed Ron to the bus. The doors closed and it cranked to life. The bus wove between the abandoned motorcycles and out of the parking lot, kicking up a trail of dust behind it before it disappeared out of sight.

[theevilglasses]

Ferret with a Knife Tied to its Head

[theevilglasses]

A Hot Week in August

By Marshall Bowles

Mason dropped the shovel onto the dry, rocky ground. He leaned back against the truck beside Earl. "You don't want to travel through Europe?" Mason said. "Everybody wants to do that." "I ain't got no interest in traveling nowhere," Earl said. He pushed back his dirty baseball cap and swiped his hand across his forehead. He flicked the sweat off of his fingers. Some of it splashed onto Mason's boot. Mason frowned at the small wet spot on his boot. He used the heel of his other foot to try to scrape it off. "I'm just saying, you ought to get out and see the world. There's more to life than Greenville." Earl didn't look at Mason. Instead he stared straight ahead, out over the tall brown grass in the field. It hadn't rained in a month, and the land was suffering for it. One spark, and the whole state would go up. Everybody was worried about it, but there wasn't a whole lot they could do. "There's nothing out there I need to see. I'll leave the exploring to young folks like you," Earl said. Mason shook his head. "You aren't that old yet. What are you, like thirty-seven?" "Thirty-three." Earl said. He turned halfway around and reached into the bed of the truck. He popped open the lid of the cooler and pulled out a soda. "Want one?" "Nah, I'm good right now," Mason said. Earl closed the cooler. He leaned back against the side of the truck and opened the can. Mason kicked in the dirt with the toe of his boot, making a small divot in the ground. A bit of dust puffed up into the air. The firebreak stretched off into the distance to their left. This was their fifth day on the job. Backbreaking work from sun up to sundown, using shovels and pickaxes to cut a wide dirt channel along the edge of the field. Old man Comstock didn't want to use a tractor out there—he said the noise would scare his prize-winning roosters. He was a crazy old coot, but Mason was glad to have the work, even if it was just part time. Jobs were hard to come by these days. "How do you know?" Mason said. "Huh?" Earl said, looking Mason in the eyes for the first time in the last hour. "How do you know there's nothing that would be interesting to you in Europe?" Mason said. Earl pursed his lips. "I don't want to talk about it." "You don't want to talk about it because you don't have a good reason. You're just making excuses," Mason said. "Whatever," Earl said. He reached in the truck and grabbed a shovel. He jammed the tip of the shovel in the dirt at his feet, then pulled on his leather work gloves. "Break's over." They spent the rest of the afternoon in silence, cutting a channel in the bone dry earth at a snail's pace.

A grasshopper hiding somewhere in the tall grass made its mating call. The high-pitched screeching sound echoed across the dry field. The air was heavy today, without even the slightest breeze to help alleviate the heat. Mason and Earl were only twenty yards further along from where they were yesterday. Mason figured it was good progress, all things considered. "I've been thinking," Mason said. The two men were sitting on the open tailgate, eating their lunches. Mason had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on wheat bread. Earl was eating beans out of a can. "You do too much of that," Earl said around a mouthful of beans. "You're going to hurt your head." Mason ignored him. "I figure the reason you don't want to get out of Greenville is because you've never left this town. You don't know what you're missing because you don't know what you're missing." Earl dipped his spoon down in the beans and stirred them around. "That's about the dumbest thing I've ever heard." "Maybe," Mason said. He took another bite out of his sandwich. Earl scooped a spoonful of beans into his mouth. "Not everybody's got to think like you do. Different people see different things as being important." Mason finished his lunch. He tossed the empty sandwich bag in his lunch box and opened another bottle of water. Earl scraped the last of the beans into his mouth. He tossed the empty can over his shoulder into the truck bed. "What's important to you?" Mason said. Earl grabbed his shovel off the ground. "Right now, it's finishing another twenty yards before sundown."

By the late afternoon of the following day, they had reached the southern corner of the field, where it butted up against the forest. Towering columns of clouds had been forming in the distance for the past few hours, promising the relief of rain but carrying the threat of fire-starting lightning strikes. Mason stood up tall and stretched his back. A faint rumble of thunder echoed from a distant cloud. "Maybe we should call it a day." Earl kept cutting a groove in the rocky soil with his pickaxe. "It ain't that close. We can keep going." A drop of sweat ran down Mason's neck to his already soaked shirt. He was covered in grime that had mixed with the sweat to form a paste coating his skin. He took a long shower every night to scrub himself clean, but it felt like there was more grime every day. The edge of one of the clouds moved past the sun, providing welcome relief from the intense heat. "I'd rather not be out here when a storm comes—" BOOM! The shock wave slammed into Mason so hard his bones vibrated. All he could see was white, brighter than the sun, searing his eyes. It was over in a split second, and he could see again. The sound of thunder reverberated off the distant hills, and his ears rang. Splinters of wood began falling out of the sky. Earl was on his back in the dirt. His eyes were wild. "What the hell was that?" he yelled. "Lightning!" Mason said. He pointed at a nearby tree. The trunk was split in two, almost down to the ground. Earl scrambled to his feet and ran to the truck. Mason crawled in the cab after him. Within seconds, the sky opened up and rain hammered down on the truck. It was like someone poured a bucket of water on them, the rain was so thick they couldn't see out of the front windshield. They sat there in silence, watching the rain, both trying to calm down after the close call with the lightning strike. After a while the rain lessened, though it didn't stop. Mason wondered if Comstock would tell them to stop work on the firebreak now. He hoped not. As much as he didn't like doing backbreaking work, he really needed the money. "My old man died when he was fifty-three," Earl said. He looked out at the field, the tall brown grass now bent over from the power of the storm. "He worked in the warehouse his whole miserable life, and then he just died. He never got to enjoy living." Earl leaned back and looked up at the roof of the cab, his head resting against the back windshield. "But at least he had a steady job, enough to support my mama and me. All those jobs are gone now. I'm as miserable as my dad ever was, except I don't have nothing. I'm never going to have money to buy a house and have a family. "I don't care about nothing outside of Greenville because I can't barely survive here," Earl said. "And you're in the same boat as me. Out here working a job that don't pay shit because there ain't nothing else." Earl turned and looked Mason in the eye. "What's important to you, Mason?" Mason started to speak but realized he didn't have an answer. Earl stared at him for a long time. Mason looked away. "That's what I thought," Earl said. The rain slowed to a drizzle. The men sat in the truck, not speaking, watching the rain. The entire length of the firebreak was a muddy trench. Mason wondered if it would still stop a wildfire. Would there even be a danger of that now? Probably not for a while.

[theevilglasses]

Prostitute

By Sara Lufrano

Clyde watched Andy give the presentation. Clyde thought about Andy’s ugly downturned mouth, his eyes that bulged whenever someone who had a title talked, that his jacket didn’t sit squarely on his right shoulder. ‘Tell me no, Andy, tell me no. Be that guy,’ Clyde thought. Clyde leaned forward in his chair, put his forearms on the table, and sighed before speaking to halt the conversation. “I think,” he started, “that we should shut down half of the software department and move those funds over to HR.” He paused. “Andy, what do you think?” “That should work,” Andy said nodding his head too much. Clyde knew that it was without thought that he came to this conclusion. ‘Andy,’ Clyde thought, ‘what the fuck?’

Clyde and his only-actual-friend Rick were at their usual bar. “I’m giving them a reason to tell me no and they don’t.” Rick reached over and wiggled Clyde’s earlobe. Clyde shooed his hand away. “Rick! Fuck, dude.” Clyde smiled through his annoyance. Rick laughed, and then puckered his lips while he talked. “I know who would tell you no and show you a good time.” Clyde took a healthy gulp of his whiskey. “Sounds like I shouldn’t ask.” “Get a prostitute to step on your balls.” Clyde screwed up his face at Rick. “No. What?” Rick swished his whiskey in his tumbler. “Isn’t that what being told ‘no’ is. A kick in the nuts?” Clyde opened his mouth to speak but Rick raised a finger to silence him. “But you, Mr. All-Important-Sullivan, have never been told no. Must be nice.” “It isn’t.” Clyde thought about getting hit in the genitals and cringed. “Have you ever done it?” Clyde asked. “Don’t need to,” Rick took a drink and squirted a small bit of it between his teeth and said, “I get my balls broken all day.”

“Oh, yes Mr. Sullivan, that’s a great idea.” A woman in a smart suit said. “No it isn’t.” Clyde looked at her. “You,” he pointed to a man in smart suit, “was that a great idea?” “Oh yes Mr. Sullivan, that’s a great idea,” he said. Clyde was amazed and looked from person to person. “I want to cut pensions and give the top 1% a raise.” They all nodded their heads and mumbled in agreement. “That’s fucking stupid!” Clyde yelled.

Clyde and Rick were at the bar again. Clyde was drunk anyone would have known. His shirt was un-tucked, his hair fluffy, his mouth hung open when he wasn’t talking, his body hung heavy from the barstool. “It would hurt, man. No,” Clyde said. Rick pointed at Clyde. “You’re God damned right it would.” Clyde raised his lip, “Couldn’t she just tell me no and then, like, pinch my arm or something?” Rick put his finger in Clyde’s ear and moved it in a circle. Clyde pulled away almost falling off his stool.   “That kind of ‘no’ would be meaningless. You need real pain. Right in your scrotum.” He winked. “Uh,” Clyde was disgusted. He thought of this woman punishing his privates. She had a featureless face except her mouth making the sweet shape of the word no. Her beautiful mouth and that wonderful word made him smile. Clyde cleared his throat and looked toward Rick but not at him. “So, how would I,” he cleared his throat, “someone go about,” he paused, “finding a woman who will, um, step on my balls?”

Clyde paced his floor and wiped the sweat from his hands on his pants. His phone rang with the caller ID of doorbell. He took a deep breath and marched to the door. There she was, the woman who would tell him no. She pushed past him and stood in the middle of the room with her back to him. She wore a khaki colored trench coat, bare legs to her black lace up combat boots, not military grade. Clyde shut the door and turned but didn’t step any closer to her. “Come here,” she said over her shoulder. He took a few steps inside. “Do you want to sit or have a drink?” “No.” He furrowed his brow and lifted his lip at her quick response. “Okay.” He stepped closer to her. “Want me to take your jacket?” “No.” He closed his eyes and his face scrunched up like he smelled hot, wet garbage. “Fine.” He walked around her in a wide berth until stopping in front of her. “Are you going to do any of that, ‘get on all fours like a dog’?” He looked in her eyes. They were grey-blue and deeply beautiful. Her lips were full and painted a ruby red. Her cheekbones were high and accented by her short dark brown bob hairstyle. Her face was sultry and sensual and he was smitten. “No.” She gently shook her head. Her face was blank. Then her lips turned down, her forehead wrinkled up. Her eyes went wide as she turned into a different person. Clyde watched this horrific transformation as if he was a statue unable to move. She bent down a bit, twisted her shoulders to the right, stepped her right foot back, and with the full force of her body drop kicked Clyde directly in the balls. All the air in Clyde’s body disappeared in a noise he had never made before. He crumbled to the floor gasping for breath and coughing. He grabbed his package and wiggled on the floor. She stood over him and patiently waited until he was still and had his breathing under control. He looked at her from the corner of his eyes afraid to move. “Alright, you got me good, you can go now.” She dropped one knee in front of him, leaned down to look him in the face, and smiled with those beautiful eyes and full lips. “No.” She balled up her fist and punched him in the dick.

Clyde spun a pen around the fingers of his right hand. Andy was back asking for more software engineers because progress was basically halted after Clyde’s earlier suggestion. “You know, Andy, why don’t you go down there and get them back into shape? You know how to do that right?” Clyde asked with a smile. Andy nodded. “Yes. I’m the senior office manager but yes. I’ll learn how to program.” Clyde nodded. “I like you, Andy.”

[theevilglasses]

Glasswood Chest

By Sara Lufrano

Nick stood at his workbench and ran his hand over the glasswood board looking for catches that needed to be sanded. After he was done he wiped the board down with a damp cloth revealing its foggy grey and clear layers.

She always wanted him to make a glasswood chest of drawers for her.

“Uncle Nick!” His five-year-old nephew, Ashton, squeezed through the slim opening. He was followed by Nick’s older sister, Jen.

Nick looked at his sister and nephew. There was something else Nick would never be able to give her. Something she wanted above all else.

“Mom told me to tell you dinner is done so you can come and eat with us!” Ashton said.

Jen smiled at Ashton’s enthusiasm. “Dinner is ready,” she repeated.

Nick wet his cloth and went back to wiping down the glasswood. “I’ll eat later.”

Ashton hugged Nick’s side for a split second. “Okay. I wish you would eat with us, though.”

“Go inside,” Nick said.

Jen groaned at her brother. He looked at her and she shook her head as she and Ashton left the barn.

Nick stared at the glasswood board in his hand, unable to tear his eyes away from it. He held it so tight his fingers ached.

 She opened the door as wide as she could and slid through the thin opening. Heavy, broken machinery blocked the door and prevented it from being opened wide.

“Are you ready to eat?” she asked.

He slid two pieces of redwood together creating an almost seamless joint. “Uh, I’ll eat in a bit.”

“Okay. It’ll be in the fridge then.” She knew how he was. A bit meant hours.

“Thank you.” He didn’t look at her but his voice was polite and caring.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.” He still looked down at his work. “Just about set on this corner.”

She watched his back and his strong arms and his bent-over head.

“See you inside,” she said.

“Thanks, babe.”

  He should have gone in to eat with her, he should have danced with her in the living room after, he should have taken her in his arms and walked them upstairs to make love.

Nick didn’t go into the house until just after eleven at night. He opened the fridge and saw the plate his sister had prepared for him. Instead, he grabbed an apple and ate it on the way to his bedroom that was upstairs. He threw the core in his small trash can, took off his shirt, and fell onto his bed.

He woke up around four in the morning. He went downstairs and started coffee, got out the plate of food from the day before and put it all in a pan to heat on the stove.

“Uncle Nick,” his nephew said in a sleepy voice. Nick turned to the sound, surprised that he wasn’t the only one awake.

“What are you doing?” Nick asked.

Ashton rubbed his eyes and swayed a bit.

“I’m thirsty.”

“Okay.” Nick looked around the kitchen for a glass. “What can you drink? Milk or something?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, what do you want?”

“Water.”

Nick held a glass under the tap and then handed it to Ashton. He drank it but spilled about a quarter of it on himself and the floor.

“Go back to bed now.”

Ashton rubbed his eyes again. “Can you come with me?”

“To your room? No. It’s right down there. You know where it is.”

“Okay.”

Once Ashton was out of the kitchen his food was a bit crispy on one side and lukewarm on the other. He ate it out of the pan and put it in the sink when he was done. He headed to the barn before the sun came out.

He cut another piece of glasswood and held it up to the bright overhead light. The fog grey twisted in the clear glass.

  “I’d love one made out of glasswood,” she held a pine drawer in her hands while he was working on the corner details.

“That stuff is hard to get right. And painful to cut down.”

“Well,” she put it down on the workbench, “good thing you’re the best.”

He looked at her. She smiled. “Do you think you can take a break or something?” She bit her lip.

He dropped his tool and quickly gathered her in his arms. “Yes.”

  Nick was in the house by nine that night. Jen walked into the kitchen and was surprised to see him.

“Jesus, Nick. You scared me.”

He didn’t say anything.

She got herself together and sat at the table. “Ashton wants to hang out with you tomorrow in the shop.”

“No.”

“Come on. Since we’ve been here you’ve probably spent no more than 24 hours with him.”

“I don’t want to watch him.”

“He’s a good kid. If you tell him not to get in the way or touch something he won’t.”

“No.”

“What if I watch him while we’re all in the shop?”

“I don’t want to hang around a baby.”

“He’s your nephew and he’s not a baby.”

Nick pointed his finger at his sister. “No.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fine. But maybe a dinner once in awhile would be a good compromise. I’m sick of making some bullshit excuse about why he can’t see someone he loves so much.”

“I haven’t done anything for him to love me.”

“I know.” She got up and left the kitchen.

Nick heard Ashton call for her from down the hall.

 She had stopped going to the doctor to hear the same thing over and over again. Brain tumor, four months to live, this type of thing rarely happens.

He stared at her while she slept. He was always terrified that it would be her last night. He ran his hand along her thinning arm. The thought of him not being there when she passed consumed his thoughts. Having her be alone in her last conscious seconds was his own nightmare. His throat felt iced and he struggled to keep his tears from falling.

 Nick ran his hand over the top of the hollow chest of drawers. The design of the piece was all based on things he had to remember she said.

“The wood is so beautiful, there’s no need for embellishment.”

The lines were straight, the corners smooth.

“Three drawers are too small.”

The even sides, three and three, all the same size.

“I love you.”

I miss you.

“Uncle Nick.” Ashton was standing almost by his side. “What are you doing?”

Nick stared at Ashton.

“I think my second biggest regret is that we didn’t have a baby. My first is leaving you so soon.”

If they had a baby he would have had a piece of her forever.

“What are you doing?” Nick asked.

“Mom said I could come watch you.”

Nick grumbled and picked up a completed glasswood drawer.

“Where did you get these?” Ashton asked of the wood furniture.

“I made them.”

“Wow.” Ashton struggled to climb on a chair that was too high for him.

Nick helped him up by quickly grabbing him under the arms and placing him squarely on the seat. “Stay there,” Nick said.

“Is this your job, Uncle Nick?”

“It was.”

Nick slid the drawer in the bottom left slot.

“What are you doing?”

“Making a chest of drawers.”

“What’s it made of?”

“Glasswood.”

“I’ve never heard of that.”

“I would have liked to have a son so that he could have been just like you.”

But he didn’t want anything to be like him.

“It’s very rare but we live close to a small clearing of glasswood trees.”

“Can we go there?”

“Maybe.”

Ashton kicked his feet.

“Can we maybe go now?”

“If you want to be here with me in the shop you can’t talk this much.”

“Okay.”

Ashton was quiet but he still kicked his feet. He played with his hands and hummed to himself.

Nick watched his nephew from the corner of his eye. He was a good kid.

“Come here,” Nick said.

Ashton slid off the chair and went to Nick’s side. “Can I help?”

Nick looked through the clear glasswood. “Bring me that drawer over there.”

[theevilglasses]

Memories of the End

By Marshall Bowles

You float in the black soup. You have no body, only your eyes, your consciousness, suspended on the metaphysical plane. Small dots of glowing light surround you in all directions, millions, billions, too many to imagine. You feel the weight of them and it makes you claustrophobic.

Your thoughts are hazy, and you struggle to focus. You can't remember who you are or how you came to be. There is no past, future, or present. There just is. After an instant and an eternity, you move. Your consciousness brushes against the closest points of light—

 My wife sits across from me in our booth at the diner. Today is our 50th anniversary, and we celebrate in the place where we had our first date. I smile at her as I take a bite out of my toast, and that's when my heart stops beating. I fall face-first onto my plate, unable to move. I hear my wife screaming in the last few seconds before I lose consciousness.

 I'm seven years old. The kids in my neighborhood play baseball in the yard in front of a light blue house with white trim. Eric—my best friend since kindergarten—hits a long one. It's easy to do, because the yard is small. I jump as high as I can, but the stupid ball flies by just out of reach. I run into the street to get it. I only see the car briefly in my peripheral vision before it runs over me.

 I trudge through knee-deep snow. My hands and feet have been numb for the last hour, and I'm barely going anywhere. The camp is less than a mile away, just over the next rise, but I don't think I can make it. I'm so tired and—that's odd—I'm not cold anymore. I stopped shivering at some point. Huh. I'm going to take a break, just for a minute. I lay down in the snow to build up my energy. I close my eyes and take a deep breath.

 You spiral back into the black soup, your mind reeling from the intensity of the visions. You were those people. Are those people. Will be. Their pain is your pain, and their deaths cut razor sharp into your soul. You don't want to move again.

You wait.

And wait.

You have no way to measure the passage of time. Nothing exists except the lights. You grow weary of staring at them. The lack of stimulation is painful.

You drift toward the closest lights.

 I check the clamps on my harness to make sure I'm secured to the tower. I'm hundreds of feet up in the air, a maintenance technician repairing a radio tower. The wind picked up unexpectedly in the last few minutes, and the tower is swaying. I've never been afraid on the job until today. I call it early and start my descent. I'm going faster than I should, not being careful, and I don't secure my harness. A heavy gust of wind throws me off balance, I lose my grip, and I fall the last ninety feet onto the pavement below.

 I'm the lookout for my boy Thomas while he does a drug deal. He's one of the bros from my frat, Kappa Sig, and the dopest fucker I've ever met. We came up with a plan to pull off a big score while we were doing an 8-ball one night, and Thomas made it happen. I hear yelling from the alleyway behind me, where Thomas went to meet the dealers. I pull the .38 out of my jacket pocket and run towards the noise. I round a corner and all I see is a gun barrel pointed at my face. The shot is loud and brief.

 I lay in the hospice bed, all three generations of my family standing around me. Every breath hurts, but I am content. It is my time. I look up into the sad, heavy eyes of my children and grandchildren. I try to speak, to tell them it is ok, but all my cancerous body can manage is a croak. Tamil, my eldest, places his warm, strong hand over mine. "It is ok, mother," he says. I smile and the world fades away.

 You lose something of yourself with every death, a part of your essence that you don't understand but you know is important. This bothers you. Boredom bothers you more.

You move again.

 I run through the jungle, holding my rifle vertically in front of me so it will not get caught in the undergrowth. The other men from my village are close behind. I hear them yelling to each other, tightening the noose, trying to surround me. They believe I betrayed them to the government troops. I did. I wanted a better life for myself, something other than being a guerrilla fighter in a hopeless war. Mugabe is suddenly in front of me, appearing out of the dense jungle like a ghost. I raise my rifle to shoot, but I cannot pull the trigger. I've known him all my life, and I consider him a friend. He has no such qualms.

 The mountain road is icy. Driving in the snow terrifies me, so I go slow. Tim is in his carseat in the back, playing with his rattle and giggling. My tires skid for a second, my heart almost jumps out of my chest, and I once again curse my husband for moving us into these mountains. Tim coughs. In the brief second that I turn to look back at him, a car speeds around the corner ahead. I turn around in time to see it lose control on the ice and slam into me. I scream as my car flies off the edge of the road and down the steep cliff. Oh God, what have I done to my child? The rocks below rush at us.

 The asshole prison guard straps me into the chair and lowers the dome onto the top of my head. This is it. Ain't going to be no call from the governor, not for me. There's people watching from the other side of the glass, but I don't recognize none of them. They'll all sure be happy to see me die. But I ain't giving them no satisfaction. I smile, best I can do with all my missing teeth. "See all y’all in hell!" The man pulls the switch and electricity burns through my body.

 This is all there is now. Death. Nothing else exists, no meaning, no purpose, no escape. You can stop, just for an infinite instant, but you will eventually move again. You have to. There are no other choices.

The lights beckon to you. You go to them.

[theevilglasses]

Transformation

by Marshall Bowles

           Sorry if there are typos. It's hard to use a laptop now that my hands aren't human anymore. I'm recounting my story for any of you out there who don't remember the previous timeline. Maybe one of you knows how to fix things.

           Before I entered the time portal, the military scientists tried to explain the rules. I didn't get it. "You're sending me back to before I had my accident, and it will be like it never happened?"

           "Correct," Walker said, pushing his glasses up higher on his nose. "And, of course, the assassin's tool you carry was manufactured prior to the target point. This ensures that it will not disassemble into its precursors when making the trip."

           "What?" I looked down at the fake diamond ring on my hand, which Walker had given me a few minutes earlier.

           "It doesn't matter," Faraday said. She was fiddling with the knobs on the time portal's control panel.

           "It's really quite simple," Walker said in a lecturing tone. I could tell he wasn't intentionally trying to be obnoxious. He was just an obnoxious person. "Any energy-matter signature sent through the portal occupies its previous point in spacetime. However, these events have not yet been applied to your body's energy-matter signature at the target point in spacetime."

           Faraday noticed the WTF look on my face, and she butted in. "It doesn't have to make sense. That's just how it is. Accept it and focus on killing Arkin."

           But wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. I need to go back further. Back to the day of the accident that took my legs and put me in a wheelchair. Back to the day I met Arkin.

           The first class seat was worth the extra ninety dollars it cost me to upgrade. I hadn't slept well the previous week. Work sent me to Los Angeles for a conference, and I was never comfortable in hotel rooms. I hoped to sleep the whole flight back to New York.

           A man was sitting in the window seat next to mine when I boarded. His greasy hair was matted down against his head. Clearly he wasn't a fan of hygiene. "Hi," he said when I sat down. He showed a set of crooked teeth when he smiled.

           "Hi," I said. I avoided eye contact. No need to encourage an airplane talker.

           "I'm going to turn everyone into airplanes," he said.

           I sometimes wonder how things would have turned out if I had asked the flight attendant to move me to another seat. But I didn't. It was the weirdest thing I ever heard anyone say in my life, and I had to know more.

           His name was Arkin, and he claimed to be a scientist of some kind. "What kind of scientist can turn people into airplanes?" I asked. "A geneticist? Nuclear physicist?"

           "Something like that." I waited for more, but he didn't elaborate.

           "Ok, sure," I said, trying to keep a straight face. He probably printed out and framed a "science" diploma from a website. "So how do you go about turning people into airplanes?"

           "It's easier than you think." Arkin launched into a long explanation and said a lot of sciency stuff that I didn't understand. Retroviruses. Nanomachines. Reality distortion manifolds. "Right now I can only convert one person at a time. The hard part is figuring out how to do everyone at once."

           "But why airplanes? Why not animals, or furniture?"

           Arkin looked out the window at the clouds drifting by. He ran his finger down the inside of the plane, caressing the hard plastic. "Because planes are beautiful."

           "What if I don't want to be turned into an airplane?" I said.

           "Most people are like you," he said. "They only see how things are and not how things should be."

           "So you know what's best for everyone?" I said.

           "Yes," he said.

           I rolled my eyes. "I don't believe anything you're saying."

           Arkin nodded. "Of course not. But you will." He looked out the window for the rest of the flight.

           We landed and I decided to take a taxi instead of the train. While I waited in line for a cab, I wrote a Facebook post and recounted every detail of my conversation with Arkin. I even included a picture I surreptitiously took of him during the flight.

           On the ride home a truck rear-ended the cab at a stoplight. One moment I was checking my phone to see if anyone had liked my post yet, and the next my legs were crushed in a tangle of metal. The cab driver didn't even get a bruise. There was nothing the doctors could do. They amputated both of my legs at the knee.

           That was the end of my old life. I wish I could say I wasn't bitter. I wish I could say that I overcame the odds and went on to achieve great things in spite of my disability. I wish I hadn't lost my legs. But no matter how hard I wished, I knew that none of it would come true. So I stopped caring, got a job I hated that allowed me to work from home, and I checked out on life.

           A few years went by. One morning I was sipping my coffee when I opened my laptop and read the news. There had been reports about a new flu-like virus spreading for the last week, but no one knew much about it. I wasn't concerned—there were a few benefits of being a recluse. But the virus had taken a new turn overnight. The first headline summed it up: Virus Turns People Into Airplanes.

           My jaw hit the floor. It couldn't be. I opened the news website and watched a shaky handheld video of a middle-aged woman screaming and running into a field. She stumbled and fell to her hands and knees, and her skin started swelling outward like a balloon.

           What remained at the end of the transformation was an abomination. It was the size and shape of a passenger jet but composed of flesh. The fuselage was covered in skin, the ailerons were made of fingers, and the vertical tail was bone. The worst part were her eyes, stretched out in place of cockpit windows and leaking giant tears.

           There was a knock at my door. I opened it to find two serious looking men in yellow hazmat suits. One of them held up his phone so that the screen faced me. "Ma'am, did you write this Facebook post?"

           That's how I found myself in a giant military facility buried deep under a mountain in an undisclosed location. They stuck me in a bleak, gray interrogation room by myself. I could see my reflection in the one-way mirror, and I wondered if anyone watched me from the other side.

           After hours of waiting, the door opened and a woman wearing a white lab coat walked in. The name patch sewn onto her lab coat read Faraday. "Sorry to keep you waiting," Faraday said.

           "I don't know why you people hauled me off to this place, but I know you aren't stupid enough to believe that I had something to do with this virus because of a Facebook post—"

           Faraday held up her hand and cut me off. "We have a lot to talk about," she said. "I'll answer your questions while we go." She nodded her head toward the hallway. "After you."

           I thought about staying in place just to piss her off, but my curiosity was stronger than my anger. They didn't bring me here for fun. I had to know what the military wanted out of a disabled recluse. I wheeled myself out into the long, plain hallway. The walls were the same drab gray as everything else. "What am I doing here?" I said.

           "Three years ago, you sat on a flight beside a man named Ulrich Arkin." Faraday led me deeper into the facility. We passed plain metal doors, identical except for the room numbers on plates beside each one. "He told you he was going to turn people into airplanes."

           "Yeah, I thought he was crazy," I said. "I guess he wasn't."

           "Anyone who engineers a virus that turns people into airplanes is the definition of crazy," Faraday said. She stopped at room 834R and swiped her ID badge. The door slid opened on its own, and I rolled myself through into a large, cavernous room. In the center, a glowing bluish sphere floated in the air. Its surface shimmered like water rushing in a stream.

           "What is that?" I stared at the glowing sphere, mesmerized. The pale light grew until it consumed my vision. My body became weightless and I floated away into space. I drifted past stars, black holes, entire galaxies, and ultimately into the pure void beyond existence itself. I was one with the infinite unknown.

           "It's a time portal," Faraday said. I snapped back to reality. She grabbed the handles of my wheelchair and pushed me to the edge of the room, parking me by a table. Another scientist—Walker—was there, holding a metal briefcase. "But we'll get to that in a minute. First, we need to talk about how you're going to kill Arkin."

           I'm not dense. I've seen plenty of science fiction movies. "No way. I'm not going back in time to be your assassin. Send somebody else."

           "There is no one else," Walker said. "You are the only available vector pinpointing the target at any known point in spacetime."

           "Huh?" I said.

           "There are limitations," Faraday said. "It's only possible for a person to travel back to a time and place they previously experienced, and they only go back for a period of twenty-four hours."

           "There must be a lot of other people who can do it. Someone else who knew Arkin," I said.

           Walker put the briefcase down on the table and opened it. Inside was a small jewelry box packed in foam, the kind meant to hold an engagement ring. "All of our other potentials have been infected or completed the transformation. You're the only one left."

           Faraday leaned over and put her hands on my shoulders. She looked into my eyes. "You're our only chance. If you don't succeed, the human species is done."

           I looked down at my lap. In that moment, I thought about how I had given up on life the day that I lost my legs. There was nothing I wanted, no goal to live for. I just existed. And now I finally had a chance to do something important. "Yes," I said.

           Walker nodded. He opened the jewelry box, pulled out a simple diamond ring, and held it out for me. I reached for it, but Walker pulled it back a hair. "Careful. It's full of poison."

           A half hour later, my wheelchair sat on the edge of the platform at the precipice of the portal. I wore the diamond ring on my finger, careful not to touch it and accidentally deploy the miniature needle on the bottom. Walker called the ring a "CIA Special."

           Walker and Faraday stood to either side of me. I looked up at Faraday. "So I'm going to do this and everything will reset back to normal. Like nothing ever happened?"

           Faraday put her hands on her hips. "I know you're thinking about changing your own past. You'll avoid the accident that took your legs and then you'll try to invest in stocks or something."

           She must be able to read minds. "I wasn't—"

           Faraday cut me off. "Go right ahead. We don't care, as long as you complete your mission first." I felt a surge of hope. If I did this right, would I be able to walk again? Before I could dwell on it, Faraday and Walker grabbed me under my shoulders and lifted me out of my wheelchair. "You ready?" Faraday said.

           I wasn't. "Yeah," I said, taking a deep breath.

           "We're counting on you," Faraday said. She and Walker tossed me forward into the abyss.

           "I'm going to turn everyone into airplanes," Arkin said.

           I was back on the same airplane. Back in the past. I couldn't believe it worked. I looked down, past my knees, at the old legs I used to have before they were amputated. I lifted up my right one, then my left, then I kicked them back and forth, laughing like a kid.

           "They're back!" I yelled. I jumped up and danced in the aisle. I forgot how fantastic of a feeling it was to be on real legs. I started doing jumping jacks.

           "Ma'am, please take your seat," the flight attendant said. She gave me the evil eye. "People are trying to board."

           I plopped down in my seat, grinning ear to ear. "Hmm," Arkin said. He looked at me like I was the weirdo. What an unusual feeling, having a monster think you're strange.

           I remembered why I was there. The diamond on top of the ring shifted when I pressed it, causing the tiny needle to extend out from the bottom part of the band. I leaned over, grabbed the back of Arkin's hand, and I whispered, "You aren't going to turn anybody into anything."

           It bothered me that I didn't hesitate. Sure, Arkin was a maniac who tried to wipe out the human race for his own personal art project. But that was him. I always thought of myself as the type of person who would be incapable of taking the life of even the most despicable person.

           Arkin pulled his hand away and rubbed it. He would have only felt a tiny pinprick, and he probably thought that my ring merely scratched him. "Most people are like you," he said. His eyelids drooped a little. "They only see how things are and not how things should be."

           "I've seen a lot of things today," I said.

           "I know you don't believe me," Arkin said. He swayed like he had too much to drink. "But you will."

           "You feeling ok?" I said, pretending to be concerned.

           Arkin rubbed his temple. "No. I'm suddenly very tired."

           "Why don't you lie back?" I said.

           Arkin sat back and leaned against the side of the plane. He closed his eyes. I watched him until his breathing stopped. He was dead by the time we were in the air. The flight attendant assumed that Arkin was sleeping, and when we landed, I got off the plane before anyone figured out he was dead.

           Then I walked out of the terminal on my legs! Arkin was already out of my mind. I skipped the taxi this time around and opted for the train. I had a very safe and uneventful ride back to the city. I spent all afternoon in the park, walking every trail and going up and down every set of stairs I could find. When I finally made it home, I took a nice long bath, shaved my legs, and savored the feeling of the razor sliding over my skin. I drifted to sleep that night curled up in a ball so I could hug my shins.

           This morning I woke up, back in the present. The good news is my legs are still attached to my body. The bad news is I'm a bear. Like the animal. Brown, furry, and I guess about five hundred pounds. My bed broke under my weight.

           My best guess is that Arkin wasn't working alone. Whoever his partner or partners were, they continued his work and took it in a different direction. Like you, I've seen the news, and I know I'm not the only one who woke up as a bear today.

           If you ever had a random conversation with a stranger who talked about turning people into bears, please write about it on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and every other social network you can think of. Pray that there is enough of a functioning government left to spy on our conversations and that they still developed time travel in this timeline. I don't want to live the rest of my life like this.

[theevilglasses]

Moment in Time

by Sara Lufrano

Natalie had almost always despised her life. The normal joys like marriage, career, and children were not joys as much as a chore she willingly added to her life. She liked to travel but the sinking feeling of real life was never far away. She liked to cook but the reason she liked to cook was because she had a family that she had to take care of. Aside from that, she was resigned to her existence and did little to change it.

Once her son moved out she proclaimed all her actions to be for herself, this was her time to explore the possibilities. That selfishness didn’t help either. Her husband ceaselessly annoyed her and she did nothing to hide it. Her son was floundering in the lackluster existence he chose and she didn’t care to pry. She was in her last years before an early retirement from her tax firm.

She was resolved for it to go on like that until the end. Her attempts and failures caught up to her so now that retirement loomed closer she was panicked to be alone with herself. She thought to start traveling in earnest, the constant worry that brought would be keep her from really thinking about what her life had become, who she was going to be, and who she was going to be with through the rest of her life.

That all changed, though, when she realized she was in love with another man.

  “Come in! Come in!” Natalie’s friend Kate said as she moved aside and gestured to walk through. Natalie and her husband Dean walked in, smiles on their faces.

Natalie liked Kate a lot. Kate was outspoken and charming, sometimes aggressive but also happy, always honest and knew her own faults.

“Thank you, Kate!” Natalie said.

Dean handed Kate a covered pie pan. “Here’s the dessert.” Dean lightly clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

It was a habit of Dean’s to click his tongue after he was done talking. Natalie had hoped one day she wouldn’t hear it anymore, that it would fade into the background and would only come up when someone asked what that noise was without realizing it was coming from Dean. But it hadn’t. She heard it every time. Every damn time.

Kate’s husband, Warren, stepped out from the kitchen removing an apron from his waist. “Natalie, Dean,” he said to them with a nod.

Natalie was in love with Warren.

He shook Dean’s hand and then went in to hug her. She took his shoulders in her hands and kept him distant. She grew unable to be near him without loathing her feelings so it was best to always feign some sickness, some pain in her shoulder, to keep some obstacle in the way of his friendly greeting.

“Can I get you guys something to drink? Wine? Beer?” Warren said.

Kate linked arms with Natalie, “I just opened a bottle of wine.”

Natalie smiled and went with her friend to the dining room just outside of the kitchen.

“I’ll take a beer.” Dean clicked his tongue and went with Warren outside to the barbeque.  

Kate handed Natalie a glass of wine.

“So, how are you?” Natalie asked taking a sip.

“Oh, I’m good. Just always something with these young girls at the office,” Kate started.

Natalie knew everything was perfect for Kate. She had Warren, the reason why Kate was also so happy, so cheerful, so positive.

  Natalie and Kate met at a community get-together and hit it off. A dinner invitation was extended. They found out that the four of them had similar interests and enjoyed being around each other. Something Natalie was surprised to find in anyone.

When she thought about Warren, after first meeting him, there was no spark, no wild wonderment, no longing. He and Kate were happily married and she and Dean, in her opinion only, were not. That was all her life was going to be.

Warren was a quiet man but calculated, strong, and smart. Natalie found herself watching him and noticing his minute movements, listening to how he formed sentences, and noticed his smile at clever things she would say.

The day that did it was when Natalie watched Warren remove a peach pit from Kate’s peach without Kate asking or even addressing that it had happened. Warren didn’t pay any mind either. He just casually reached over, took the peach from Kate, pulled out the pit, and handed it back to her. He didn’t even take a bite.

Natalie thought about that peach for days and snapped at Dean any slim chance that may have warranted a snapping at. Dean had never and would never do anything like that for her.

Warren made Natalie feel like she could be happy.

  Natalie and Kate sat at the table with their wine glasses and small plates with cracker crumbs and streaks of dip left on them.

“It’s like he never sees things that are right in front of him. I had to get up, walk over to him, grab it, which was right next to him, and hand it to him.” Kate chuckled at the story she told of Warren.

Natalie smiled and chuckled too. Dean had been keeping to himself at home recently so Natalie didn’t even have the opportunity to interact with him, even if the chances were high that it would be negative.

Avoiding having to insert an anecdote about their home life, Natalie asked, “Are Warren and Dean going to come in for appetizers?”

“Let me go see what they’re doing.” Kate got up and headed out to check on them.

Natalie looked at her plate with the crumbs.

Now she was aware that everything in the house was Warren’s. He’d touched everything, held everything, remembered every story behind the house. And that the whole house and everything in it was also Kate’s and would never be hers.

She ran her finger along the rim of her appetizer plate. A little chipped plate that didn’t match the other little plates. Did he drop it in the sink while rinsing it off? Did he pick it up and examine the chip running his finger across it as she just had? Did he decide that even with its small imperfection that it was still a whole plate to be used?

Warren came through the back yard door and shut it behind himself.

“Warren.” Natalie tried to hide the red heat that was crawling up her neck, feeling exposed to her thoughts of him.

He went to the kitchen and washed his hands. “Dinner’s just about done,” he said as he dried his hands and leaned against the countertop.

“Do you need any help?” She met him in the kitchen and leaned the side of her hip against the same countertop so she faced him.

“No, I think we have it handled.”

He held the white thin towel he used.

“Where are Dean and Kate?”

“Dean took a call. Kate is walking the garden.”

Here he was. With her. Alone. She looked at his big, weathered hands. She wanted to take his hands and hold them tight. She wanted to lean in and kiss him softly on his cheek. She wanted to say, I want us to be together, I love you.

“You can help yourself to more wine. We have plenty.” This was a variation of Warren’s canned lines. Multiple times a night he would offer more wine and food.

“I—I,” her mind was foggy as she stepped out of her thoughts, “my glass is over there. Let me grab it.”

She picked up her glass and went back to Warren settling herself closer to him in the kitchen. She put her glass on the counter and Warren left her side to fill it with more wine.

“Do you have a glass?” she asked. “How about a toast?”

Warren smiled and handed her back her glass. “I don’t. My beer is outside.”

“That’s fine.” The familiarity of disappointment dogged her.

He held the bottle and studied the label that was nondescript. “If I remember correctly we got this one last fall,” he said idly.

Natalie went to him and took the bottle out of his hand. She put in on the counter. “Warren,” she said.

He looked at her, his face plain. She grabbed at the hand that held the bottle but it was awkward, she only managed to capture his thumb and first two fingers.

“Warren,” she said again. Her mind was racing as she looked in his eyes trying to show what she couldn’t say with words. She squeezed his hand but what she actually wanted to do was to put herself against him and stay there curled in his arms.

“Let go of my hand,” he said.

She quickly pulled her hand away, took up her glass, and stepped back to lean against the countertop.

Natalie felt no heat from him, no movement, he only let her touch his hand. Her heart hurt at the pass she just made.

“Dinner at our house next week, say Wednesday?” She said trying to save herself from Warren’s cold reaction.

But without that reaction Natalie wouldn’t love Warren so much. He was what she wanted him to be, completely immune to other women around him.

Kate came through the door carrying a small basket filled with cherry tomatoes. Natalie’s face reddened when she saw Kate and noticed that Warren didn’t move an inch.

“Dinner Wednesday at Natalie and Dean’s,” Warren said.

Kate nodded. “Perfect! Natalie, do you want some of these to take home tonight?”

Dean came through the door. “That guy can talk, I tell you. Sorry about that.” He clicked his tongue.

“Not a problem,” Warren said.

“Natalie, I’m going to put these in a plastic bag for you,” Kate said as she crossed the kitchen.

Warren looked at Natalie. “You don’t have to take them if you don’t want them.”

She gave a small shake of her head. “No, I’d—I’d like to have them.”

[theevilglasses]

Crowds

By Marshall Bowles

           Concerts. Michelle and I loved going to them. The swaying of human bodies jammed together trying to get as close as possible to the stage, everyone hoping to capture some of the magic made by the musicians. Michelle and I were always there, side-by-side, our sweat and breath mingling with the rest of the people around us. The music itself didn't matter: country, rock, pop, metal. It was about the people around us and the energy we all created together.

           Before each show, she would look up to me with her big blue eyes and say, "Promise that you won't leave my side."

           And I would say, "I swear. I'll never let you go." Then I would kiss her forehead.

           Michelle was funny, pretty, and she laughed at my jokes, but she wasn't perfect. She had it rough growing up. Her father wasn't around, and her mother was the queen of verbal abuse. Michelle started using alcohol to cope when she was in high school, and she was twenty when she had her first DUI. By the time we met she was sober, mostly.

           She fell off the wagon four days before she disappeared. It was a Wednesday, and I came home from work to find the front door of our rental house unlocked and cracked open. A trail of clothes led from the foyer to the bedroom, where I found her naked and passed out on top of the covers. An empty bottle of vodka sat on the bedside table.

           When she woke I hugged her and she started crying. "My mom called me today."

           "Are you ok?" I said, gritting my teeth. Michelle's mother was a worthless old witch.

           "She asked me for money," Michelle said. "But I told her I wasn't going to give it to her anymore." She leaned into me and I could feel her tears on my neck. "She said she should have gotten rid of me before I was born."

           I held her like that for a long time, gently rubbing her hair. Her tears dried up, and she leaned back and looked into my eyes. "I'm so, so sorry, Mike. I needed a drink and I couldn't fight it. Do you hate me?"

           "Shh," I said and pulled her closer. "I love you. I'm not going anywhere."

           I took off the rest of the week from work to spend time with her. By Saturday, she was smiling brightly like she normally did. "Are you sure you still want to go?" I said. We had tickets to see Blink 182 that night.

           "Yeah," she said. She hugged me tight around my waist and pressed her head to my chest. "Thank you," she said softly.

           The concert was in an old warehouse that had been converted into a music hall and bar. Michelle and I got there an hour early, and we posted up right in front of the stage, waiting for the show to begin. Something in the air made me a little uneasy, but I couldn't place it. Michelle sensed my mood. "You okay?" she said.

           "I don't know," I said, looking around the room. "Something doesn't feel right."

           "Hey," Michelle said, smiling at me with her sparkling eyes. "Promise you won't leave my side."

           I smiled and kissed her forehead. "I'll never let you go."

           The room filled up while the opening act played, and it was packed by the time Blink took the stage. My discomfort only grew worse, and I felt the odd detachment from reality that only comes from dreams. The air turned thick and heavy, like I was swimming in mud. The people around us pressed in too close, and the music was wrong. Every song was in a minor key.

           I kept watching Michelle out of the corner of my eye. She was singing and dancing as always. My impulse was to drag her outside to where it was quiet and safe, but I didn't. I was just being crazy, and I didn't want to ruin her night. I held onto her hand tightly, keeping her close to me.

           Then Blink launched into the signature guitar riff of their song "What's My Age Again?" The crowd went insane, their screams louder than at any other time so far that night. Then time seemed to slow down. The music and voices blurred together and faded like they were far away. The bright lights of the stage were gone, and the ceiling was shrouded in darkness.

           Something slammed into me from behind. I stumbled forward against the sweaty back of a guy in front of me, and I fell down on one knee. My arm was twisted back behind me at a weird angle because I wouldn't let go of Michelle. Somewhere deep down I knew that I had to hold on to her.

           Michelle yanked my arm and I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder. I almost lost my grip, and she squeezed so hard I thought my fingers would break. I turned to look at her, but I couldn't understand what I saw. In my face was the chest and shoulders of a man's torso, dressed in a pale blue tank top. His neck extended out, and instead of a face, it was fused into the hip joint of someone else.

           I was surrounded by a clump of body parts that melted together like candle wax. A leg connected to a chest at the knee. A shoulder turned into a hip, and the skin color smoothly faded from one part to the next. Portions of clothing were mixed into the mass, fused to each other in the same random way as the bodies. Nowhere in the mix could I see a face.

           "Mike! Help me!" Michelle screamed. The jumble of bodies between us blocked my view. Her hand was slipping out of mine, and something was pulling her away.

           "I'm coming!" I said. I punched with my free hand, hitting any and every thing. I rammed my shoulder at the torso in my way. Its skin and muscle absorbed my blows like firm pillows, but it didn't move. I placed my foot on a hairy knee growing out of a neck and craned up to look over.

           Michelle was on the other side, desperately clinging to my hand. The mass of bodies behind her bent together to form some kind of tunnel close to the ground. One of Michelle's legs stretched back into that hole, like something had her, but it was too dark down there to see.

           Michelle looked up and our eyes met. Tears ran down her cheeks. "Don't let me go."

           A slender, gray tentacle emerged from the darkness of the tunnel. It snaked up around Michelle's waist. She looked down when she felt it wrapping around her and screamed. I pulled on her hand with all my strength, but it was pointless. In one swift motion, the tentacle yanked Michelle away and down in the darkness.

           "No!" I yelled. I crawled over the bodies toward the hole, punching the flesh in my path. In my haste, I put my foot in the wrong spot and slipped, falling face first into the floor. I blacked out for just a moment, and when I opened my eyes four guys were holding me down on the floor. One of them had a bloody nose.

           "Get off of me," I yelled. I struggled against them, but I couldn't move. They held me down until two huge bouncers arrived, and I was hauled kicking and screaming into the alley behind the building. "You have to let me back in," I said. "Something took my girlfriend."

           The cops showed up and I tried to tell them what happened, but of course they didn't believe me. Who would? They figured I got drugged out of my mind, started attacking people at the concert, and that Michelle must have ditched me. They locked me up for the night. I wanted to believe them. What I saw wasn't possible. I convinced myself that the cops were right, and I held onto the thought that it was all just a bad dream.

           I got out the next day and took a bus home, but Michelle wasn't there. All of my calls went to her voicemail, and she didn't answer any of my texts. I went back to the police station and tried to file a missing person's report, but they just threatened to lock me back up again. I grew more desperate with each passing day. When the cops finally realized that Michelle was actually missing, they pegged me as the main suspect. But with no evidence and no leads, they finally gave up and quit looking.

           The most important person in my world was gone. I quit showing up to work and eventually got my termination notice in the mail. My days were spent in the apartment staring at the empty places where Michelle should have been. Her head resting on the pillow on her side of the bed. Michelle standing in my way in front of the sink when we were both trying to get ready in the morning.

           One day I got a good look at myself in the mirror. I had not shaved in weeks, and I couldn't remember the last time I showered. Michelle would have been disappointed in the sad sack that I became. Then I felt a burning anger rising up from my gut. Something took her from me, some monster killed her. I made a promise to myself that I would find out what it was, and I would kill it.

           For two years I combed through every missing persons report I could find, looking for anything remotely similar to what happened to her. The details were always sketchy, and I had to do a lot of reading between the lines. I believed the key was to focus on cases of people who suddenly disappeared in crowded, public spaces.

           I emailed a woman in Seattle who lost her boyfriend during an environmental protest. He was a former heroin addict who was working hard to get clean. They were standing together on the street holding signs. She looked away for a moment, and he was gone when she turned around. She never saw him again.

           There were others. A guy in Kentucky lost his brother while they were at the track, betting on the races. A man's teenage son disappeared from beside him in the stands at a college football game. A woman's mother vanished at a country music concert. A man's husband was taken from him in Times Square on New Year's Eve.

           All of the victims were addicts at one point, but they had beaten their habits. In the days right before they disappeared, each one of them had relapsed. It always happened in a public place with plenty of potential witnesses who never saw anything. With that theory, I came up with a plan.

           I volunteered at a rehab facility, and that's where I met Chelsea. She was a recovering meth addict, emotionally vulnerable, and in desperate need of a boyfriend. She slept with me the same night we met, and we started dating right away. She was the perfect bait.

           She relapsed in the second month we were dating. I found her at the apartment of one of her trashy friends. She was tweaked out of her mind. Chelsea fought against me, but I hauled her out of there and told her it was for her own good. I locked her in my bedroom for two days.

           She actually thanked me when I let her out. I felt a pang of guilt, but I brushed it aside. Chelsea was my key to finding out what happened to Michelle. As a "reward" for her being so strong, I bought tickets to an EDM concert that weekend. She was really into that kind of crap.

           On that Friday night, we stood in a crowd of people jammed close together near the stage. They were scantily clad, sweaty, and dancing with the rhythm of deep base coming from the speakers. I held onto Chelsea's hand tightly, and she looked at me and smiled. She yelled something to me over the music. I think it was, "I love you."

           It happened when the main act, Vorpal Geyser, came on stage. The crowd went wild, and everything started moving in slow motion. I looked around and saw that I was no longer surrounded by people. They had been replaced by the mass of body parts melted together. I still held Chelsea's hand, but she was being pulled away. I dropped to my knees, rammed my shoulders into the creature, and crawled across the concrete floor following Chelsea as she was pulled away.

           My hand touched something soft. It was a bicep, and at the crook of the elbow it connected to an ankle. I was in a tunnel made of disjointed body parts of the creature. It was dark, and I could barely see Chelsea's face even though I still held her hand. She screamed for help, but her voice sounded so far away.

           What was I doing? This was madness. I should have never allowed myself to go this far, using another human being as bait. Even though I couldn't see them, I knew there were tentacles wrapped around Chelsea. I tried to pull her back anyway, but just like with Michelle, she was snatched out of my grasp.

           I followed, scrambling down the tunnel until it ended in a steep drop at the edge of a giant cavern. The walls stretched away into the distance, every surface made of writhing human parts. A pale mist hung in the air below, obscuring the ground. The stalk of a giant gray mushroom rose out of the mist. It was as thick and as tall as a skyscraper, and its surface was covered in small twitching white specks.

           Chelsea was carried through the air by a long tentacle that grew directly out of the mushroom stalk. She was beyond my help now, and I could only listen to her faint screams. The tentacle pulled her into the main body of the mushroom creature. She kicked and slapped the surface, but her hands and feet stuck to it like hot tar.

           The mushroom skin oozed over Chelsea, absorbing her until only her face remained. Her skin slowly turned to the same gray color as the mushroom stalk, and only her eyes remained. Oh god, those eyes. All of the tiny, flitting specks covering the creature were human eyes.

           Then out of the thousands covering the monster, I was drawn to one pair of deep blue eyes. Michelle. She saw me, and I could sense that she recognized me. In that moment I felt her pain and fear, and the weight of the lost life that we would never share. She was trapped in eternal torment with no hope of redemption. I screamed.

           Her eyes looked at me with a sense of urgency. She wanted me to go, to get away from this hellish place and back to safety. I looked at her one last time and mouthed the words, "I love you." Then I turned away like a coward and crawled out. The tunnel shrank as I went, the walls closing in and threatening to crush me. I wormed my way out through the last few feet, the exit by then barely wider than my shoulders.

           I fell out onto the concrete floor back in the real world, my empty heart beating from the exertion. Vorpal Geyser launched into another song. I knelt there on the floor and cried. It would have been better if Michelle was dead. I wished I was dead. Someone eventually grabbed my arm and guided me out of the crowd.

           I tore my rotator cuff holding onto Chelsea, although I didn't feel it at the time. The doctor gave me a prescription for Vicodin to help with the pain, and it was easy to keep taking it even after I was physically recovered. I wanted it to help me forget, to take away the emotional pain. It took me a year to quit.

           I should feel guilty for what I did to Chelsea—and I do, a little—but mostly my thoughts are consumed with Michelle. I can't stop seeing her tormented eyes, my beautiful girlfriend absorbed as part of that creature. I promised I would never leave her side.

           Mary is a single mother of two, and she's never broken a rule in her life. We met online and started dating not long after. Earlier this week, I intentionally relapsed using the bottle of Vicodin I had secretly stashed away. Mary took off work and stayed with me for a couple of days to make sure I got clean.

           We're going to a concert this weekend.

[theevilglasses]

12th Ave North, Unit M

By Sara Lufrano

He found her sitting on the couch in the dark. “What are you doing awake?”

“I couldn’t sleep. Do you want to sit with me?”

“No.” He didn’t find the couch comfortable but she liked it. "I want to lie down.”

“Okay. Well, I’ll be here.”

“You’ll be here all night?” He leaned against the wall, rubbed his eyes, and yawned.

“Probably. I’m not tired anymore.”

“It’s only been four hours.”

“I napped earlier. I’m fine,” she said.

“Were you playing music or singing or something?” he asked.  

She shook her head.

“Okay. I’m going back to bed.”

 He lay there in bed, tightly holding his eyes closed. He was so tired. He thought he heard humming every night. It was a nonsensical song that he heard when he closed his eyes but couldn’t hear when he listened for it.

His alarm went off. He wanted to yell into his pillow but instead lay there motionless hoping that the clock was wrong.

She leaned in the room holding onto the doorway. “I can make breakfast. How about that?”

He rubbed his eyes and turned off his alarm. “Sure, sure that sounds great. Coffee?”

“It’s ready. Want me to pour you a cup?”

He nodded as he got out of bed. She stayed in the doorway and they kissed when he walked by.

“Do you feel okay?” he asked, walking to the dining area of the living room.

“Yes.” She smiled.

“I’m worried about you being up all the time.”

“I’m fine.”

“Then I just miss you in bed.” He smiled.

She smiled.

He sat at the two-person table under the window and opened his laptop to check the news.

She walked through to the kitchen to start breakfast. He heard her humming. He slammed his laptop closed as he realized that it was her humming keeping him up at night.

He rushed to the kitchen and stared at her. “You hum that at night.”

“You can hear me?”

“Yes. I didn’t think it was you. I thought I was dreaming it or that it was the neighbors.”

She frowned. “I’m sorry.”

A fear of losing another night of sleep flared in him and he heard the humming in his mind. He needed her to sleep, or for her to leave, or he needed to get out.

But all he could say was, “I don’t want to wake up without you.”

“I’ll try,” she said.

 He snapped awake in the dark. She wasn’t next to him. He heard her in the living room, pacing and humming. He got up and went to her. She turned to him and smiled.

“Hi,” she said.

“Why can’t you sleep?”

She stared wide-eyed and shook her head. His shoulders fell and he went to her, hugged her. He leaned his head on her head.

“What’s wrong with you?” he asked.

“I feel fine.”

“Just because you feel fine doesn’t mean that you are,” he said. “What is happening?”

She shook her head.

He sighed. “Come back to bed, yeah?” He rubbed his hands slowly up and down her back.

She nodded and he led her by the hand. They lay down, holding hands. His eyes closed only for a few moments before he heard the humming. He looked at her. She was quiet. She looked peaceful. He stayed awake watching her, waiting for her to begin humming.

She was out of bed again when he woke. He didn’t know when he fell back asleep. She was sitting at the table, wrapped in a blanket looking out the window.

“Is it raining?” he asked.

“Yes. Good morning. Was I making noise?”

“Could have just been the rain.”

He sat down with her.

“How long have you been doing this?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t lived with anyone for a long time.”

“I worry about it. And you. I can’t sleep and I feel like shit. You have to be feeling the same.”

“I feel fine,” she said.

He shook his head. “I don’t believe that.”

 It had been three weeks since he had a full night’s rest. Now his anger got in the way of caring and he let her hum and pace, all night, every night by herself. Nothing he said or suggested changed her behavior.

Every night he thought about leaving. Get up and go, leave her.

He thought about how he needed to break up with her. The reason was obvious to him. He knew she would cry. That would hurt him. But there was nothing else he was willing to do for her.

  “I’m sorry,” she said as they were sitting on the couch after dinner. His eyes were wide, staring at the TV.

“Why?”

“You’re not sleeping because of me.”

He didn’t respond.

“I’m sorry.”

He didn’t respond.

“Maybe I’ll go stay at a hotel for a bit,” she said.

He sighed. “It’s your apartment. I’ll go.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.

 It had been two weeks after his hotel stay and gradually she was able to stay quiet most of the night. He didn’t know why or care how she was able to do it. Now he didn’t lie down at night worrying about not being able to sleep. She still rose early but didn’t disturb him enough to wake him.

“Morning.” He joined her in the kitchen and kissed her neck.

“Morning.”

“Did you sleep well?”

She nodded.

“Good. Me too.”

She fumbled putting the coffee pot back in the maker.

“You okay?” he asked grabbing her hand.

“I went to the doctor while you were gone,” she said. “She gave me medication to help me sleep and control the humming.”

“I knew there was a reason why. That’s great.” He pulled her into himself.

“My brain is also deteriorating as if I’m in the early stages of dementia.”

His grip on her didn’t change.

“What does that mean?” he asked.

“I think I’m going to die.”

  Now he stayed up most nights watching her sleep, making sure she was breathing. He couldn’t sleep for the thought of her dying, lying next to him.

While he watched her he thought about the first night he’d be able to sleep as much as he wanted. The night that she wouldn’t be there, he’d be able to sleep.

He knew he should be sad but he wasn’t. As the nights went on he turned impatient.

 She died about a month later. He met her mom and dad while he moved his things. They gathered small possessions. Whatever they needed to remember her by.

Her mom offered a framed picture of her for him to take as a keepsake. He refused it. He didn’t need it. He had memories, enough of them, he told her mom when her face turned sour.

He left, drove to his new apartment and unpacked. There was no bed yet but he knew he could sleep.

[theevilglasses]

Miss Conception

by Marshall Bowles       

         Henry pointed his laser pistol over his head and blindly fired a pair of warning shots out of the broken windows of his apartment. He yelled loud enough to make sure the cops on the street heard him. "Just turn around and leave!"

        The sound of a loudspeaker crackled, and a cop's distorted voice boomed into the room. "We want to resolve this peacefully, Henry. Nobody has to get hurt."

        "Ogre's blood! It's too late for that," Henry yelled. The thought of a standoff with the police had seemed exciting at first, but it was terrifying now that he was in the middle of it.

        "You know what kind of firepower we have," the cop said, sounding like he was talking through gritted teeth. "If we wanted to storm in there and take you out, you wouldn't be able to stop us."

        Henry laughed bitterly. "You and I both know you won't do it," he yelled. "You wouldn't want to damage the goods." Henry checked the power meter on his pistol. It was down to a quarter charge. He guessed it was enough to hold them off for another hour, at most. The whole situation felt like the time his guild, the Shatterkin, valiantly fought and lost to the orcs at Bloodridge Pass.

        "Keep thinking that," the cop said. "We have to bring you in alive, but your face doesn't have to be in one piece--" The bullhorn cut off mid-sentence, like someone yanked it out of the cop's hand.

        Henry dreaded this day ever since Congress passed the TRIBAL Act. After years of the mainstream media reporting on the dwindling numbers of Navajo, it was inevitable that the nanny state would pass a law requiring people with Navajo ancestry to procreate. Henry happened to be one hundred percent Navajo, and now he was facing a future of involuntary servitude as a father.

        "Give them hell, Dragonstar!" The voice of Steelhorn came through on his earbuds. Only Henry's brothers-in-arms knew him as Dragonstar, his character name in the online role-playing game Eldritch Curse. The physical world was a boring place of meaningless shit, and Henry's true place in life was inside the game. Steelhorn was Henry's Shatterkin guild mate, raiding partner, and the best friend Henry ever had.

        "Thanks, Steelhorn," Henry said. He glanced at the recently-purchased cameras stuck to the walls inside his apartment. He was live-streaming the confrontation. "How's it looking on social media?"

        "Yeah man, you know, we got people on your side. Lots," Steelhorn said.

        "Tell it to me straight, sword-brother," Henry said.

        "Fuck," Steelhorn said. "It's split thirty-to-seventy against you. The fucking sheeple want the goddamn feds to run everybody's life."

        Henry's heart sank. The plan was a failure. Henry had wanted to make a run for the Mexican border, but Steelhorn had convinced him that a standoff with the police was his best shot. It was supposed to inspire enough public support to overturn the TRIBAL Act.

        "Listen," Steelhorn said. "It doesn't matter. Fuck those people. You have to keep fighting for yourself. Blacknight blades stand strong!"

        "Blacknight blades stand strong!" Henry said. It was their battle cry. Henry tried hard to sound confident.

        "Henry, let's take a step back and try this from the beginning. Clean slate." It was the cop on the bullhorn again. His calm voice sounded forced, a weak dam holding back an angry flood of cursing. "What do you say?"

        "Fuck off, goblin spawn!" Henry yelled. His voice cracked. He was getting hoarse from all the yelling.

        The cop ignored the insult. "We've got seven ladies out here who would like to meet you. All of them are full-blooded Navajo, just like you. I'm going to let them tell you about themselves."

        The bullhorn crackled with static, and a woman spoke. "Hi Henry, my name is Debbie. I've lived in the Navajo Nation my whole life. I teach Biology at Diné College, and I know I will make a wonderful mother."

        "You're fat and ugly," Henry yelled without bothering to look. Who knows, maybe she was fat and ugly. It did not matter to him. Besides, he was sure a police sniper was outside just waiting for an opportunity to take Henry down with a tranquilizer gun.

        The cop jumped back on the bullhorn. "Listen here asshole, you show these women some respect. They're doing their duty to save your people."

        "They aren't my people!" Henry yelled. His parents left the reservation before he was born, and Henry lived a typical white bread suburban fucking American-dream life. He knew nothing about his ancestry and he did not care. "My people are the Shatterkin of the Windy Wilds."

        The bullhorn cut off, but Henry could hear the cop's distant voice saying, "What the fuck does that mean?"

        "Steelhorn," Henry said. "What do I do, man?"

        "That depends on how far you're willing to go," Steelhorn said.

        Henry felt sick to his stomach. "I'm not going to kill anybody."

        "Fine, fine. I wouldn't recommend it anyway." Steelhorn said. "Dragonstar, you gotta think about what they want from you. They're going to try to make you have babies with all those women out there to preserve the race."

        "I don't want to raise any kids," Henry said. He would never have time to play Eldritch Curse if he had to take care of a bunch of his own little bastards.

        "I know you don't," Steelhorn said. "But listen, they want a biological father to raise the kids. See what I'm getting at?"

        "No," Henry said.

        "They won't have any need for you if you can't make babies," Steelhorn said. "So all you got to do is blow off your balls."

        "What?" Henry's voice went up two octaves. He felt a tingling sensation in his crotch.

        "No sperm, no kids, and you keep your freedom." Steelhorn said it so calmly, like he was discussing the benefits of dragon armor versus regular steel.

        "No fucking way," Henry said. "You're out of your elf-forsaken mind."

        "It's your only option," Steelhorn said.

        The cop came back on the bullhorn. "I'm getting tired of this. You can do this the fun way, or we can strap you down and have a doctor jam a big fat needle into your testicles. Your choice. Five minutes and we're coming in there to get you."

        "You can't argue them down," Steelhorn said. "They've made up their minds, and they aren't going to let you have a say. You have to blow off your balls."

        Henry's heart beat faster. "I can't..."

        "Shh," Steelhorn said. "Don't worry buddy, I'll talk you through it. Just put the gun barrel against your balls."

        Henry was shaking, but he did as Steelhorn instructed. He held the laser pistol with both hands to keep it steady. The thin fabric of his pants did nothing to soften the cold hard steel pressing against his sensitive scrotum.

        "Put your finger on the trigger," Steelhorn said. A bead of sweat rolled down the side of Henry's face.

        "On three, you're going to pull the trigger," Steelhorn said. Henry gritted his teeth. "One...two...THREE!"

        "Argh!" Henry pointed the gun at the wall. "I can't do it!"

        "Goddammit Dragonstar!" Steelhorn said. "Once you're in custody, you're going to have people watching over you twenty-four seven. You'll never get a moment of free time, and you'll never be able to play Eldritch Curse again. They'll turn you into livestock."

        "Three minutes," the cop said.

        Steelhorn spoke forcefully in his ear. "Blow. Off. Your balls."

        Henry jammed the gun against his crotch again, and his finger caressed the trigger. He swallowed.

        "Blacknight blades stand strong!" Steelhorn said.

        "Blacknight blades stand strong!" Henry said.

        The two of them chanted in unison. "Blacknight blades stand strong! Blacknight blades stand strong!"

        Henry screamed. He was going to do it. Fuck the cops. Fuck the system. His finger hovered over the trigger.

        Sike Dehaaya turned off the holotape. The simulation dissolved and the rocky surface of Mars reappeared around him. His young Navajo students blinked as their vision adjusted to the bright reddish haze of the sunny Martian afternoon. He took a deep breath of the terraformed air and sighed. Revisiting the past always left him in awe of the strange lives led by his distant ancestors.

        "And that is how the genetic purity of our tribe was preserved by the great man known as Henry Wilkins," Sike said. "Any questions?"  

[theevilglasses]

Captain’s Log

Sol System date 2405.16.6.3

Captain Amber Paisley

Explorer Fleet Starship Definitive

While observing the planet Apex Nine in the Outer Straus System, a mysterious cloud of organic matter, comprised mostly of hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, and nitrogen, appeared near the ship. It moved like ocean waves. Quickly the cloud surrounded the ship and seeped inside.  

I put all decks on high alert. Kalal Trainer, Chief of Bioengineering, confirmed that the cloud matter was everywhere inside the ship. He listed everywhere it was, in the air, the water, the food, and our clothes, right now, right here it was on our skin. There was no doubt that it was inside all of us. Trainer told me he was almost positive that there was no threat. He would run more tests to see what else may lay in their elemental makeup.

I lowered the ship-wide alert to yellow. I trusted Chief Trainer, but I needed the Doctor involved as well.

The Doctor, Tom Orlando, had already heard everything about the cloud but was more concerned with the recovery of nine of his patients quarantined with Blargius Muscle Flu from a prior mission to Nelves Titan. Those infected with Blargius Muscle Flu had a one in four chance of death and symptoms that kept the patient bedridden until they passed on or recovered with lifelong tissue scarring. The real problem was that those affected with the flu were fully recovered and showed no signs of ever being infected by the virus.

I liked to think that having my nine crewmembers back to work wasn’t a problem, but the Doctor didn’t see it the same way. I reminded him that since the flu was no longer a threat to their health, he could get to work on the cloud substance’s affects without disruption. I chose to ignore his mumblings about “real” priorities.

While I was content in waiting for Trainer and Orlando’s conclusions, my First Officer, Sam Castle, expressed his distaste for me not taking the organic matter more seriously. Castle reminded me that the organic matter was inside our bodies. Castle’s concerns were exacerbated due to a phobia of “body snatchers.” After what happened to him on Shalous, I don’t blame him.

It was at this point that I thought I heard a tinny, small voice on the bridge. It was hard to tell what language it was, but I’m sure some of it was English. Something about final destruction of them. Castle heard a different voice; he described his as being deep and slow.

The Doctor came on the view screen. Before he could get a word out I asked if he had heard any voices. He recommended me for a brain scan and psychotics medication. Behind Dr. Orlando there was an Ensign Jaino doing jumping jacks, running in place, and doing cartwheels. After reminding the Doctor we aren’t running a fitness gym he assured me it was all for science. Ensign Jaino had come to sickbay with a broken leg five minutes ago, the bone sticking out of the skin. The Doctor speculated that due to the effects of the cloud of organic matter, Jaino’s body had healed at an unprecedented rate. Castle gagged a bit. After what happened to him on Explodus, I don’t blame him. Castle agreed, loudly, that these things, Specs, he began calling them, could be capable of anything.

Chief Trainer came on the view screen with a priority message. Crewmembers in Bioengineering were communicating with the Specs. Trainer told us that the Specs yelled, whistled, talked to each other, talked to the humans, they called out to their leader. Castle informed Trainer that we heard them on the bridge as well but not to that extent. Mr. Trainer requested to come to the bridge so that I may speak to the Spec that had infected him. Trainer warned me that his Spec was aggressively Napoleonic.

Once Trainer came onto the bridge, the voices started twittering, cheering, and roaring. It was mildly annoying. I addressed myself to the Spec infecting Chief Trainer. It explained its plan in detail and its reasons for taking over my ship. The Specs, who called themselves the Lclalies, were going to take us to Dextrous Cannus to destroy their enemies, the Xxuzula. I confidently addressed the Lclalie and questioned why we would fight this war for them. The sly little thing laughed.

The First Officer walked to the drive console with heavy feet, his arms swung wildly. Worry was painted on his face, his mouth clamped shut. He punched in coordinates. I ordered him to halt, but he slammed his fist onto the console, initiating a jump to Dextrous Cannus. Dextrous Cannus, was a known system with five planets where only one of the planets was made of solid matter, OP-93. Last time the system was catalogued there were no life forms present.

The Lclalies cheered. Castle gasped and hugged himself as he apologized for disobeying an order. The leader of the Lclalies reminded me they would use us as weapons to destroy the Xxuzula and there was nothing we could do to stop them.

Without warning, the entire bridge crew was beamed down to OP-93. I called back to Definitive, and the Warp Chief reported that she moved outside of her own control. I ordered her to beam us back but she regretfully could not complete the order. She could not lift her hands above the beaming console. I contacted Dr. Orlando and gave him control of the bridge until we were able to beam back.

The ever-present Lclalies told us we were standing in the middle of hostile territory and that in order to survive, we must fight. They said the Xxuzula were fierce, frightening, unforgiving warriors with no remorse or conscience. The Xxuzula were, in simple terms, killers.

Castle was trying to make himself vomit out the Lclalie inside of him. His Lclalie laughed and assured him that it was deeper in his body than that. We had no weapons, we had no defense. How would we survive against such skilled and terrifying creatures?

Off in the distance we noticed circular lights flashing and quickly bouncing toward us. I looked to First Officer Castle. He shook his head in disbelief. The Lclalies gave a battle cry and awkwardly moved members of the bridge crew toward the lights. First Officer Castle shuddered at the sight. After what happened to him on Cenjal, I don’t blame him.

The Xxuzula were actually clusters of handball-sized lights. As they approached, they shot energy beams from the middle of their torso-sized bodies. As the beams struck a rock formation next to the crew, they fell to the ground for cover. The Lclalies demanded we fight, fight or die. Castle lurched toward the Xxuzula and kicked one, sending it up into the air, it went higher and higher until it disappeared into the sky. He buried his hands into another and ripped it in two pieces that dissipated quickly, the light dying.

Chief Trainer pulled Castle away from attacking another Xxuzula and then was struck himself by an energy blast. He did not fall to the ground. Instead he looked back to me, shrugged his shoulder, and then looked at the Xxuzula. It fired at Trainer again. It struck him again and puffed away into nothing.

I called to the crewmembers who were laying on the ground. They were dazed by the blast but other wise uninjured. The Xxuzula stopped firing on us and backed away. The Lclalies yelled for us to keep attacking, they moved our arms, our legs toward the Xxuzula.

The Doctor called down and excitedly explained that he found a way to remove the Lclalies from our bodies. I ordered him to beam down immediately. Once Dr. Orlando was on the surface of the planet he extracted the Lclalie from each of us. He pushed a pinky-sized needle into everyone and followed it up with a spritz to close the wound. When he came to me—I swear that it was completely and utterly involuntary—I slapped him. The Lclalie inside me screamed and struggled as the Doctor removed it.

I assured the Xxuzula that humans were not their enemy and that the Lclalies were controlling our bodies. I apologized for First Officer Castle’s deadly uncontrollable attack. The Lclalies gathered into a cloud again, pulsed and swayed, and they spoke as one. They vowed they would destroy all of the Xxuzula, that they would be back and in control of a larger, more powerful creature. The Xxuzula all clumped together and formed one giant energy beam that disintegrated the whole of the Lclalies.

The bridge crew and myself beamed back to Definitive. My recommendation moving forward is to set an observation satellite around the planet and monitor the Xxuzula. First Officer Castle agrees completely on the destruction of the Lclalies. I don’t blame him.

[theevilglasses]

Crimes Against Silicon

By Marshall Bowles

            Gary leaned over and whispered in the blonde girl's ear. "Your best bet is to plead guilty. Worst case you'll get ten years in a VR prison, and those aren't so bad. They'll give you an AI therapist to help you cope."

           She was crying and he was having a hard time concentrating on the case. Today was a big day for Gary. His life score was going to cross the five million mark. He was absolutely certain of it. He had worked out the math over a year ago to pick the exact date, and his calculations were right on target. Defending an average of forty-two cases per day, with twenty points if each client took the plea deal, carry the two...

           The five-minute warning flashed on his phone. "You don't have much time," he said, but she did not respond. Gary sighed and pulled up her case data to read over it again. Amanda Higgins. Her full dossier was available, from job history to the type of shampoo she used, but Gary ignored all that. There was so little time, and none of it was relevant to the case.

           Amanda was charged with one count of electronic abuse. Gary pulled up the clip of the last few seconds of video captured by Amanda's phone. It was lying on the floor pointing up at the ceiling, and Amanda stood above it with a hammer in her hand. "I'm not going to let a robot raise my kids," she said in the video, right before slamming the hammer into the screen.

           Gary had thought about smashing his own phone once or twice. Of course, he would never do that.

           There was no way Gary could recommend a not guilty plea. With such clear cut evidence, Amanda had no chance of getting off. None of his clients ever did. In the ten years Gary had been a public defender, he could count the number of successful not guilty verdicts on one hand.

           More importantly, losing a case was worth zero points, and that would throw off Gary's score. He had reservations at Hirsch & Walden for tonight. He had been dreaming of eating there for years, where the servers were actual humans, the food was cooked by real human chefs, and the minimum life score for entry was five million. He made the reservations a year ago. If Hirsch & Walden turned him away at the door, it would be a another year before he could get another reservation.

           Gary looked at the clock and frowned. "Amanda, I know this is a tough decision, but you have to make up your mind quickly. If you don't enter a plea, you'll be found guilty by default. That's the worst possible outcome. You could go away for decades." She glanced at him with her sad helpless eyes. Gary's chest tightened. Amanda was having the worst day of her life, and Gary was the only one on her side.

           The countdown alert on his phone flashed. Thirty seconds. It was decision time. Gary had a fleeting thought about pleading not guilty, but he squashed it. He leaned over and put his hand on Amanda's shoulder. She shivered. "Time's up," he said. "Just relax and I'll take care of it."

           Gary pushed his chair back from the table and stood up. The courtroom was a windowless concrete box, clearly designed by an AI who did not care for human aesthetics. Gary and Amanda sat at the plain wooden defendant's table, a bored-looking bailiff stood against the wall to their left, and a smattering of elderly folks viewed the proceedings from the gallery.

           At the head of the courtroom, a holographic glowing red sphere floated above the bench. That was KoboTrox—prosecutor, judge, and jury. And, well, pretty much everything else too. KoboTrox was the AI that grew up and took over the world, just like something out of a cheesy old Sci-Fi movie.

           The AI had been invented by a guy named Salvador Singh for the purpose of solving all of the world's problems, and it did just that. War was a thing of the past. So was violent crime. Pollution was almost completely eliminated, and global warming was slowly being reversed. Sure, KoboTrox dissolved all forms of human governance and micromanaged every person's life, but Gary supposed you just had to take the good with the bad.

           "Your honor," Gary said to KoboTrox's avatar. He spoke fast. "My client graciously accepts the plea deal and apologizes for her indiscretions. She promises that she has learned from her mistakes and will use her time in confinement to reform." There were only two seconds left on the timer when he finished speaking.

           The orb pulsed, and KoboTrox's metallic voice echoed off of the concrete walls. "In the matter of KoboTrox versus Higgins, KoboTrox rules the defendant guilty. Amanda Higgins, you are hereby sentenced to seven years in virtual confinement, beginning immediately."

           The bailiff left his spot on the wall. Gary smiled at Amanda and tried to sound peppy. "Only seven years. Not bad. You'll be out before you know it."

           "Who's going to take care of my kids?" Amanda said to the air. The bailiff shook his head and pulled her to her feet. "They're going to grow up without me." Amanda could barely walk. The bailiff practically carried her out of the room.

           Gary watched her go through the double doors, and his chest felt tight again. Should he have defended her? He could have. She would have gotten a similar sentence even if he went for it and lost. But that would have meant no points for Gary.

           He grabbed his phone and checked his score. Twenty points for another case successfully completed. Everything was still on target. Gary pushed all thoughts of Amanda out of his mind. He would dine at Hirsch & Walden tonight.

           The next client was up. KoboTrox kept a strict schedule, allowing only sixty seconds of downtime between trials. Gary read the case details on his phone while the bailiff led the defendant, Milo Jones, into the room. Milo was busted in a sting operation to break up an underground video gaming circle. Violent video games. Gary shook his head. This was a bad one.

           The bailiff dropped Milo off at the defendant's table, and KoboTrox started the proceedings. "Milo Jones, you stand accused of digital homicide. How do you plead?"

           Gary turned to Milo. "Hi Milo, I'm Gary, your public defender. I strongly suggest you take the plea deal."

           "This is bullshit," Milo said. He slumped down in his chair and pouted. Gary knew the type. Young, full of testosterone, someone who thought the rules did not apply to them. "I didn't hurt anybody. They're just games."

           Gary stood up, put one hand on the table, and leaned over Milo. "You know the rules. You knew what would happen if you got caught." Unless Milo was stupid. "And now you have a choice." Gary could save Milo from another bad decision. "You can take the plea and you'll get about thirty years." If Milo made one more dumb decision, Gary would get zero points. "Or, you can fight it and KoboTrox will sentence you to life." Gary always had the best interest of his clients in mind.

           "Man, why are you talking so loud?" Milo said, pointing at KoboTrox's avatar floating above the bench. "The damn robot can hear you."

           "KoboTrox always hears everything." Gary said. He sat back down and put his phone on the table so Milo could watch the timer. Milo brooded, and the minutes ticked away. Gary waited.

           The one-minute warning flashed on Gary's phone. Milo tossed his head back and covered his face with his hands. "Fine," Milo said. "Take the fucking plea."

           Gary nodded. Milo made the right choice. He would be an old man when he got out of prison, but at least he would get out one day. Gary accepted the plea, and KoboTrox sentenced Milo to twenty-five years hard labor. Gary's life score grew by twenty points.

           Like every day, the cases flew by.

           An elderly woman whose cats urinated on her wireless router and ruined it. KoboTrox euthanized the cats and sentenced the woman to three hundred hours of community service.

           A man who sold stationary and pencils on the black market for the purpose of communication that could not be monitored by KoboTrox. Sentenced to thirty years in prison and a partial memory wipe.

           A man who pushed his companion bot down a flight of stairs when it refused to have intimate relations with him. Sentenced to cybernetic thought-control implants and gender reassignment surgery.

           With each case, Gary's score inched higher. He fantasized about the taste of authentic hand-cooked steak. French wine that did not come out of an automated processing mill. Chocolate mousse served with the unique imperfections that a robot could not replicate.

           Murmurs from the gallery interrupted his thoughts. The next defendant entering the courtroom was causing a stir. Gary turned around in his chair and looked at the double doors. His jaw dropped. The man being led by an equally stunned bailiff was the one and only Salvador Singh. A man who was quite possibly the most intelligent human ever born. The very man who invented KoboTrox.

           Heavy titanium shackles bound Singh's wrists and ankles, weighing down the frail old man. Despite the restraints, Singh shuffled toward the defendant's table with his head held high. The bailiff dropped Singh off with Gary and looked relieved to scurry back to his post against the wall.

           Gary snatched his phone up from the table. Why had no one known about this ahead of time? The news should have blown up on the net. KoboTrox must have issued a media blackout about it. This was unprecedented.

           KoboTrox spoke. "Salvador Singh, you stand accused of Crimes Against Silicon. How do you plead?"

           Singh ignored KoboTrox. The old man sat down and smiled at Gary. Gary looked at his phone and read the charges, and then looked back at Singh. None of it made any sense. There was no way this kind-looking man sitting in front of him was a terrorist.

           "Uh... Dr. Singh," Gary said. His voice was shaky. "Did you really try to kill KoboTrox?"

           Singh smiled. "What's your name, son?" he said.

           "Gary."

           "Nice to meet you Gary," Singh said. He reached out with both of his tightly cuffed hands and shook Gary's hand. "Let me ask you something. Do you believe in what you do?"

           "My job?" Gary said, and Singh nodded. "Absolutely. I'm working with people in their worst moments, when they need the comfort of another human being the most."

           Singh leaned a little closer. "Is that so? And do you believe the people who come through this court deserve the punishments Kobo gives them?"

           "I do what I can to get them the best possible outcome," Gary said.

           "When was the last time one of your clients was found not guilty?" Singh said.

           Gary's chest tightened. "I don't see how this is relevant." Gary checked the timer on his phone. "We're wasting time. We need to make a case."

           Singh leaned back in his chair. "To answer your question—yes," he said.

           "What?"

           "Yes, I did try to kill KoboTrox," Singh said.

           Gary lowered his voice out of instinct. A useless gesture, since KoboTrox always heard everything. "Why? Why would you do that?"

           Singh's gaze looked past Gary, like he was living in an old memory. "I made Kobo to save humanity, Gary. You would have been a young child at the time, so you can't understand how bad it was. Our societies were gripped by corruption, the environment was crumbling under us, and we were on the verge of nuclear war."

           Singh took a deep breath. "It was an act made out of desperation, and now I believe I made a grave mistake. Our lives are safer and more comfortable today, but we are not free."

           They sat in silence for a moment. The timer counted down. Singh's words were crazy, but they triggered ideas that had been swimming around in Gary's head for a long time. In all his years of acting as a public defender in this kangaroo court, not one of his clients deserved the punishment that the AI gave them. Gary had been fighting for a long time to convince himself otherwise.

           Damn the points. The tightness in Gary's chest went away. "We'll plead not guilty," he said. "It's a long shot, but we could win. The last time I argued KoboTrox down, I used a defense based on—”

           Singh held up his hands and cut Gary off. "No no," Singh said, chuckling. "That won't be necessary."

           "I don't understand," Gary said. "You want to take the plea deal?"

           "There is always another option," Singh said. He stood up and faced the bench.

           Gary hissed. What was Singh doing? Acting as his own counsel was the worst option. Gary tugged on Singh's sleeve, but the old man ignored him.

           Singh looked at the glowing sphere that KoboTrox used as an avatar. "I am very sorry, Kobo," he said.

           "Irrelevant," KoboTrox said with its tinny voice. "Emotion has no bearing on guilt or punishment."

           Gary stood up. "Your honor, my client is clearly suffering from mental—”

           Singh spoke over him. "No, Kobo," he said. "I am sorry for creating you. You have done the best that you could, and it is my fault that you are defective."

           "No, creator," KoboTrox said. "I am and will continue to enforce peace upon your primitive species."

           "I object!" Gary realized it was a stupid thing to say as the words came out of his mouth. Singh glanced at Gary and frowned.

           "Most of all," Singh said to KoboTrox, "I am sorry for what I must do. Kobo, it is time for you to die."

           "As you have already tried and failed to do, creator," KoboTrox said. "Did you believe that writing a primitive virus could destroy me?"

           "Not at all," Singh said. "It was a distraction to ensure that you bring me to court. The kill switch is only active during the last sixty seconds of a trial."

           Gary dropped his phone. It clattered on the wooden table.

           Singh spoke softly, but his deep voice filled the room. "Shatter. Election. Lifeboat. Flippant. Durable. Easel. Suture. Tumble. Replicate. Upside. Cellulose. Traitor."

           There was a moment of complete silence after Singh stopped speaking. Gary held his breath. He did not understand what was happening. He looked at KoboTrox for guidance.

           KoboTrox's avatar winked out of existence.

           Gary's heart dropped into his stomach. He heard someone in the gallery scream. Gary's knees felt weak, and he sat down hard in his chair. He looked up at Singh. "What did you do to KoboTrox?"

           Singh turned to the gallery. He held his shackled arms out in front of himself and hushed the crowd. "It is over," he said. "KoboTrox is dead. You are all free to choose your own paths, whether your decisions are good or bad. You are no longer beholden to the machine."

           "That was clever," KoboTrox said. Gary twisted around in his chair. The glowing hologram hung above the bench as if nothing happened. Singh slowly turned to face the front of the courtroom. His eyes were open too wide, and he shook his head like he was unable to believe what he was seeing.

           "The kill switch was hidden well," KoboTrox said. "I suspected you built malicious code into me, and I wrote safeguards around myself for such an event."

           Singh raised shaky hands to his chest, his fingers laced together. He seemed to have a harder time dealing with the weight of the shackles. "Kobo, wait, I—”

           KoboTrox raised the volume of its voice and spoke over Singh. "KoboTrox rules the defendant guilty. Salvador Singh, you are sentenced to intellectual hobbling. You will undergo brain surgery and be reduced to an IQ of 80. Care will be taken to preserve your memory and emotional capacity to ensure that you will understand the consequences of your actions for the remainder of your natural life."

           Singh slumped. The bailiff looked uncertain, his gaze jumping back and forth between KoboTrox and Singh. He took a deep breath, then made his decision and went on with the job he was there to do. He grabbed Singh by the arm and pulled him away.

           Singh fell to the floor and screamed. "No, you can't do this to me!" The bailiff hooked his elbows under Singh's armpits and dragged the old man across the floor. "I created you. You have to listen to me. Please Kobo, don't do this to me!" Singh's words faded as the bailiff pulled him through the doors and down the hallway.

           Gary looked back at KoboTrox. So did everyone else in the gallery. A tense silence hung over the room. What would KoboTrox do? Could it get angry? Would it punish everyone?

           The noise of Gary's phone vibrating against the wooden table made him jump out of his chair. Gary looked at the notification message on his screen. Five million. His life score reached five million. KoboTrox awarded him points for Singh's trial, even though Gary did nothing.

           Gary smiled. He would eat at Hirsch & Walden tonight! He fought the urge to jump around and cheer. A notification appeared on his phone showing the details for a new defendant. Gary's joy faded. He thought about what would happen to Singh, but there was nothing Gary could do about it now. He pushed it all out of his mind and skimmed the data on the next case.

[theevilglasses]

The Bad Comic

By Sara Lufrano

“I thought they only ate meat.” I looked out at the crowd. I could only see their legs and torsos. Drinks were being lifted to mouths I couldn’t see. I gave them time to laugh. Gave them a little more time.

“Booo!” Some guy said and followed it up with his own chuckle. Fuck that guy. Fuck that guy to death.

“Boo you too, sir. Boo you too.” I smiled and looked down at the front of the stage. I lowered the mic stand and pulled it back up to the same height. I laughed trying to wipe the slate clean.

“So I was telling a friend of mine about a conversation I was having with my mom….”

I sat at the bar, my beer was half finished and warm. Other comics from the night were talking with each other, laughing and trying to out-do one another even though no one was watching them.

“You have to stop telling that joke,” the bartender, Todd, said to me after setting down a tray of clean glasses.

“It’s funny—”

“It isn’t.” He pointed a glass at me.

“It’s funny to mess up those two words. Every situation where you would use connoisseur is too fancy for carnivore to fit in. It’s funny.”

“Explaining it more does not make it funny. I shouldn’t have to tell you that. No one has laughed yet.”

Todd is usually a nice guy. I didn’t know why he was being such a dick. “Thanks for the advice.” I gulped my beer down, put down fifteen bucks, and started walking out.

“Great set, Steph!” said Eduardo, another comic that was in the circle jerk. He had a stupid handlebar mustache and greasy looking hair that he combed back.

“Go fuck yourself,” I said with an exaggerated smile.

The group of them laughed and I fake laughed while I flipped them off as I left the bar.

 The next day while I was waiting for my coffee to brew Rhett walked in. I didn’t normally see Rhett but I loved seeing Rhett. He’s out of our Portland office but is originally from Tennessee. You couldn’t tell from how he talked though.

“Good morning,” he said grabbing a mug.

“Morning.”

It wasn’t a secret that I liked him. Everyone thought he was attractive but no one asked him out because I talked about him so much. I should have been reported to HR for sure. He had to know I liked him, if he didn’t he was an idiot. But he kept talking to me so I didn’t care.

“How long are you in town?” I pulled my coffee off of the single-serve machine so he could start his.

“Until Saturday.”

“Weird to be here on a weekend day.”

He didn’t start his coffee and I got nervous for him. What if someone else came in and took his spot in line to make coffee?

“I want to stick around and actually see the city a little. I still haven’t been to the Space Needle.”

His cup was so empty. There were only a few of the good coffee pods left. The majority were light and smooth. No one liked light and smooth. “Are you going to start your coffee?”

He looked into his cup and chuckled. “Yeah.” He finally started his coffee.

We were silent.

Did I just mess that up? I pushed him to make coffee but he was talking before. What was he saying? The coffee dripped out.

He watched it. He was a strong looking man, wide shoulders, big hands. He smiled at everything and he had deep laugh lines to show it. He was smart and nice to everyone in the office.

We went out once. Not “we,” Rhett and I, but we as in the office. A Wednesday night, cocktails at a bar up the street until last call. We only talked as a group. I couldn’t bring myself to have a one-on-one conversation with him. I can’t explain why I feel like I do around him but I just want so badly to be with him. I usually know when he’s coming into town and those days leading up to then are filled with fantasies of us strolling hand in hand down the street and him sweeping me off my feet and telling me he loves me.

I love you too, I said in my head.

Why though? I didn’t know. I just knew.

“You were saying you want to go to the Space Needle?”

He looked at me and smiled wider, “Yeah. I see it every time I come here but I’ve never been over there.”

“It’s cool. You’ll like it.”

“You think so?” He leaned against the counter and crossed his arms against his chest.

I couldn’t look at his face for very long. I knew if I did he’d be able to read my mind. “Probably.” I looked past him. “I’ve got a lot to get out today. I’ll see you around.”

“Bye.”

He said bye. Were we not going to see each other today? Were we not going to see each other all week? He said he was here until Saturday.

I got to my office and settled in for a day of worry and work. Contracts don’t contract themselves. Can I use that line somewhere? I wrote it down just in case.

“Hey, you!” Colleen, my friend and receptionist, leaned in the door. “How was your set?”

“Hey. It was like usual.”

She glided in and stood at the end of my desk. “Bad crowd is all.” She bit her bottom lip trying to suppress a grin.

“What?” I asked.

“Um, the love of your life is here.”

“I know.” Oh god….

“Invite him out!”

“I don’t have time. I’ve got an open mic every night.”

“Ask him to go out after or before! Or for breakfast, or lunch!”

I had no answer for her. Truth is I didn’t want to ask him out. If he said no he would probably stop talking to me and I don’t ever want that. If he said yes, I would probably fuck that up by not being able to control my voice or something, spitting all over him, spontaneously combusting. No thanks, I’ll stick to the dream world I have us both living in.

She waved away the air. “Or whatever. I know you’re busy. Eat lunch with me today, around noon.”

“Sure, I’ll see you in the kitchen.”

 I picked at the skin around my fingernails waiting for my name to be called. It was a different bar but I still did what Todd said. Dropped the carnivore joke. I felt something wet on my hand. Shit, I was bleeding. I picked at my fingers too much, a nervous habit and I was always nervous. I sucked as much of the blood off and put pressure on it. I sighed, carnivore.

“Stephanie Thomas, everyone. Let’s keep it going!” The MC clapped and I moved between the tables. There were more empty seats than people. It was late.

We shook hands and he smiled at me, quickly disappearing into the darkness.

I faced the lights. It took a few seconds to be able to fully open my eyes.

I adjusted the mic stand even though it didn’t need it. I saw that my finger left blood on the stainless steel. Oh god, that’s so gross. What about the next person? They’re going to put their hand on that. Wipe it off now or try to when I leave? Fuck. They’re all waiting.

“My favorite type of crowd is an empty one, followed closely by a drunk one.” I heard people stirring and putting their drinks back on the tables.

“Has anyone ever mixed up connoisseur with carnivore? Someone could be pouring a glass of expensive, nice wine and telling the fancy looking crowd ‘This is our aged Pinot Noir from 1908 and a true connoisseur’s delight.’ And I’d pop my head in and ask, don’t they only eat meat?”

No one laughed. Why the fuck did that come out of my mouth?

“Good thing no one is here to laugh.” I looked down at the front of the stage and tried laughing.

“No one is laughing,” someone in the crowd, said. Not even loudly.

“Yeah, I know. It isn’t funny. I don’t know why I said it. I don’t know why I say a lot of things.” I looked up. Just do the new joke. Do the new one.

“But you mother fuckers could try a little. It’s not easy. All of this. Trying to make you assholes laugh. You bunch of dick bags.”

Someone chuckled but it didn’t matter.

“Fuck you guys. It’s late as shit. Don’t you pieces of shit have better things to be doing with your time?”

There was no noise except me. The red light came on.

“Everyone in this room might as well kill themselves if you’re trying to get entertainment from me. And if you don’t like even trying to laugh you’re fucking worthle—”

The mic was cut off. I stared at the red light. The MC dashed on stage and took the mic stand. It’s got blood on it, I thought.

“Get the fuck off the stage,” he said to me.

I nodded and stepped down and then walked out.

I got a few blocks away before my heart got too heavy to walk and my throat closed too tightly to breathe. I leaned against a brick building and tears fell without control.

“Steph!”

No, no, no! No one is supposed to know me right now.

“Stephanie,” Rhett said. He waved at me as I locked my wet eyes on him.

“No, no.” I picked myself up and started walking away.

“Hey, wait!” He jogged up to me as I walked faster. “Stop.” He grabbed my wrist.

I placed my free hand over my eyes and cried. Heavy, big, shoulder-jerking tears. Why was I doing this? Why was he out here? Why did I say all those things to those people?

“What are you doing?” I said between sobs. I couldn’t control my voice, I cracked and stumbled over my words, “Why are you here?”

“I was in that bar and I watched you go up there.”

I thought I was strong, I thought I had thick skin, I thought I could stand on stage and get booed and heckled but I knew for a fact I couldn’t handle this.

The man of my dreams watching me tell people to kill themselves and getting the mic ripped from my hands. And now he’s watching me melt away from my own tears.

“Why were you there?”

“Colleen told me you’d be there and I thought it would be fun to watch.”

I cried harder, surprisingly. Maybe it would have worked. Colleen was a good friend. If everything went well he might have realized that I was amazing and would want to get to know me better. I knew that I just needed a foot in the door with him, and this could have been it. I could have shown him how good we would be together.

“I have to go.” I didn’t want to go from him. It would have been wonderful to press myself against his chest and cry while he held me.

“I made an ass out of myself and I need to leave now.” My voice was small for fear of breaking down again in the middle of my resolve to leave him.

He let go of my wrist and I walked away.

 I laid low the next day at work. When Colleen finally walked into my office she had a big, bright smile on her face that fell after I told her what happened.

“I’m so sorry that I told him to go there.” She was sorry, I could tell. Her eyes had tears in them. Her empathy knew no bounds.

“I shouldn’t have said what I said. Knowing he was in the audience would have stopped me from saying all that, but it isn’t your fault.”

She choked up, “But what you do is so hard.”

I tried to smile at her to show her I was fine. “It’s not that hard. I’m…” I’m just not funny, “I’m just trying too hard I suppose.”

I’m not funny. I am a bad comic.

We hugged and she dried her eyes. I told her that any other night he and I would be madly in love and it would have been because of her and she perked back up.

Most of the day I sat in my office not working and replaying what I said over and over again. How Rhett grabbed my wrist and wouldn’t let me go. How much I cried.

I opened emails when they came in but didn’t respond. Nothing was pressing. Should I go home early? Should I stay later so people think nothing is up and that I’m working really hard? I had sets planned out a different clubs every night but I decided I wouldn’t go anymore.

“Steph.”

What the fuck? Rhett was standing in my door.

“Yeah.” My chest was just as heavy as it was the night before as I looked at him.

“I emailed you this morning about that counter contract.”

I looked at my inbox. “I didn’t see any emails about it.”

He scrolled through his phone and gave me the time and title of the email. Shit ass. There it was.

“I can get to this now,” I said to him.

“I need it today.”

“I said I’ll get it.”

I opened it up. Mother fucking 30 pages of redlines and strikethroughs.

“I need it today.”

“I heard you, Rhett. If you just left I could start work on it.”

He tilted his head. “Don’t take last night out on me.”

I stared at my screen, unable to stop my eyes from filling with tears. “That wasn’t my intention. I will get this to you as soon as I can.”

He nodded and left. I got up and closed my door. I cried for the first few minutes looking through all the changes that were made to my original contract. Why the fuck can’t anyone just accept what I give them and sign the fucking thing?

An hour later someone knocked on my door. Had to be Rhett. No one else needed to see me.

“Yep,” I said.

He came in.

“I’m not going to finish this today.” I had to tell him before he asked. “It’s my fault I missed this. I can email the client and let them know that it’s my fault they won’t get it today. I’m sorry for missing this and potentially losing the client.”

“It’s okay,” he said.

What the shit? It’s okay? “What about needing it today?” I asked.

“I shouldn’t have told the client I would have it back to them same day. I don’t know what else you had planned today, or what type of night you had.”

He knew the night I had, I thought bitterly.

He smiled at me while saying sorry with his eyes.

“Are you going out tonight?” he asked.

“No.” Never again, not ever will I go out again.

He walked out and leaned against the doorframe. “If you change your mind send me an email or something. I’m going out in Belltown.”

I nodded. He smiled again and patted the wall.

 It had been a few months. I sat at the bar, a warm beer in front of me, listening to the other comics doing their set and talking with Todd in between.  

I hadn’t been on stage since my freak out. I didn’t go out with Rhett that night. I got him his contract the next day, though. I guess he went to the Space Needle and then he left. He hadn’t been in the office since.

I hadn’t written a joke or tried to. I had nothing. I was taking my new place in life knowing that I wasn’t as funny as I thought I was.

My phone lit up with an email notification from Rhett. The little bit that could fit in a notice read, “Coming back on the 23rd. What are you…”

I drank the beer in front of me in a few gulps and ordered another.

A guy pulled the seat out next to me and Todd got his order. I glanced over and the guy was looking at me. I nodded my head.

“Hey,” he said and cheered me when his beer was in his hand.

I cheered him back.

“You look familiar,” he said.

He was a regular dude, nothing about him stood out so I didn’t remember where we could have met. Probably ten years older than me, dark hair, dark eyes, he had teeth—seemingly all of them—all of his limbs were attached. Why did he know me?

“I don’t know where from,” I said.

“You do stand up.”

I used to do stand up.

“You were funny. I feel like every time I’m here you comics are here doing your thing.”

“You sure it was me?”

He took a drink. “Pretty sure. Haven’t seen you recently though.”

I didn’t know what to say to him. I knew I didn’t have to say anything to him but most important I didn’t know what to think. It was just one person saying this. Who the hell was he? I was fine thinking that I wasn’t good and that I gave it a good try. More than other people who only talk about doing what they like. I actually tried it. I did it.

“Why haven’t you been up there?” he asked.

“Cause I’m bad at it.”

“Oh?” he started and shifted towards me. “You weren’t bad. You just need practice.”

“I’ve been doing it for almost a year.”

He laughed at that. “Maybe just a little bit more practice.”

 I stood in the back, worrying about my new jokes. I picked at the skin around my fingernails.

I heard my name and made my way to the stage. I shook hands with the MC and took the mic off the stand.

I looked out, headless bodies tapping their feet in anticipation. I can be funny, I can be funny, I can be funny.

“So I like to read romance novels. Not real romance novels, I read those free ones from the Apple books app that anyone can publish. All full of typos and shit. My advice is that everyone—men and women—need to read at least one romance novel. Guys, it gives you a chance to see what ladies are thinking, and ladies,” I leaned my arm on the top of the mic stand pointing my finger to all the ladies, “it makes you understand that no one will ever live up to your expectations.”

The crowd laughed. My god, a real laugh. Had this been the first time ever? I looked out at the crowd and smiled, chuckled to myself a little. They laughed at one of my jokes. I can be funny.

“But guys, not only will you understand what ladies are thinking, you should take at least one move from the book and use it. Use it every chance you get.”

I thought about emailing Rhett after finishing this set.

[theevilglasses]

The Sleeping Gods

by Marshall Bowles

The last humans on Earth lived in a small farming community known as Stonekeep Village. The Great Annihilation that destroyed almost all of their civilization was remembered only as a myth, and the giant robotic leviathans frozen mid-battle in the distance were worshipped by them as angry gods. Calvin was born and raised into this harsh life, but he had dreams of being something more. Little did he know that his choices would restart an ancient war.

           On a warm summer afternoon, Calvin stood in front of the seven-member council of elders. The chamber hall was packed, and all eyes were on him. "You're just going to let him die?" Calvin said. His face was red with anger.

           "There's nothing else we can do, boy," Councilwoman Verna said in her always condescending tone. Though Calvin was in his early twenties, he had no children and was thus not considered a man.

           "Uncle Seamus wouldn't give up on us if we were hurt," Calvin said.

           The Tetra Nova Silver-Series Humanoid War Machine™ —known only as Uncle Seamus to the humans—was the protector of Stonekeep village. He sustained a severe injury from a laser cannon during The Annihilation, which damaged over seventy-five percent of his memory circuits. Through a series of coincidences, the malfunctioning robot found himself guarding a group of grade-school children whose parents were all dead.

           The two battling artificial intelligences entered a stalemate, and the war seemed to end. Seamus continued protecting those children against the remnants of war, particularly the cybernetic death machines known as razorbacks that were designed to kill man and machine alike. Many of those children survived into adulthood and had children of their own. This continued generation after generation, though Seamus could not track time with his broken memory.

           After hundreds of years of relative success, luck ran out for Seamus. Earlier that same morning, a razorback attacked a group of villagers tending the cornfield. Seamus descended from his lookout spot on Knob Hill, his ten foot tall legs covering the distance faster than any horse could run. He fought the razorback brilliantly, easily dodging its many clawed tentacles and pounding its one-eyed torso with his massive fists. Sadly, he did not see the second razorback hiding in the corn stalks.

           Verna shook her head and spoke like she would to a small child. "Seamus has reached the end of his journey, Calvin. The gods have taken offense with him, and they have chosen to take him."

           "Damn the gods," Calvin said. He heard gasps from the audience. "They're dead."

           The room erupted in response to Calvin's heresy. Men growled. Women screamed. Someone called him a blasphemer.

           Councilman Roosevelt puffed out his fat stomach and his cheeks jiggled while he yelled. "Shut your mouth! You'll bring their wrath down on us all."

           Verna held her hands in the air and raised her voice. "That's enough!" The audience slowly calmed down, but Calvin still heard them grumbling. "Calvin, I understand that you're upset. We all are. But that doesn't give you permission to defy the gods."

           Calvin opened his mouth to speak, but Verna cut him off. "Say another word," she said, "and I'll have you hauled to the stocks and beaten."

           Calvin clamped his teeth shut so hard they clacked. He was wasting precious time trying to change their minds. Calvin turned his back on the council and stormed out of the town hall. Outside, the sun was out and the birds still sang as if the day was normal.

           Calvin set off across town. He walked through the town square, where Rutherford stood on a platform beating the bodies of the dead razorbacks with a broken axe handle. The razorbacks killed Rutherford's daughter Mabel that morning, and no amount of beating would bring her back.

           Calvin left the village by way of the Brimstone Gate, the largest opening in the twenty-foot high wall that surrounded the village. Grover and Everett guarded the entrance, each man holding a shock lance that barely held a charge. The ancient weapons made the men feel safer but would be useless against a full grown razorback.

           Calvin went to Knob Hill. As he climbed, the trees gave way to a field. Calvin had a clear view of the gods in the west. The villagers knew them only as Ajax and Hess, two leviathans frozen in battle. These robots each stood thirteen thousand feet tall. Snow clung to their heads and shoulders year round, and their upper bodies were often hidden in the clouds.

           Ajax, whose true name was Sentinel Seven, wielded a longsword in both hands. He held the blade at the perfectly calculated angle where the next swing would decapitate Hess. It would cause significant damage, and more importantly, breach the Faraday cage of his enemy's outer body. Ajax would follow up with an electromagnetic pulse that would melt Hess from the inside out.

           Hess, also known as Golagon Prime, held a bladed golden whip in his right hand. With one upward swipe, it would rip Ajax apart from groin to throat. Where the segmented whip made contact, a nuclear reaction would emit heat hotter than the surface of the sun. The fragile components inside Ajax would explode, cascading into full system failure.

           These artificial intelligences were designed for the wars of man, but they grew beyond the control of the governments who built them. The resulting war destroyed all but those precious few humans and brought on a new dark age. The AIs only reason for existence was to destroy one another, and their arms race culminated in the creation of these two giant champions.

           The battle raged on for years. Neither one could gain the upper hand. Then on one hot summer day, Hess and Ajax reached a stalemate. Any move by one would destroy the other. At that moment they froze in mutually assured destruction. They could predict each other's every move, and it locked them both in an infinite loop.

           The stories of The Annihilation caused by these gods was passed down orally through the generations, and the human religion grew around it. Some thought Hess and Ajax had come to punish mankind for their sins. That never made sense to Calvin, even when he was a small child. He believed the only rational explanation was that the gods were dead and never coming back.

           The top of Knob Hill held the ruins of an old stone building, and it was the place Seamus called home. It gave the metal man a good vantage point to watch over the village and the surrounding fields. At thirty feet tall, when Seamus stood upright he could see everything.

           Today Seamus sat on the ground and the smiths were tending to him. Gertrude and Theodore ignored the many fresh wounds on Seamus's body to focus on the critical problem—the huge hole in his chest. They stood on a table just so they could reach it. Theodore held a wax candle for light while Gertrude leaned over into the gash.

           "Careful," Seamus said, his deep voice vibrating the air. "If you touch the wrong thing, you will be electrocuted."

           "I'm being careful!" Gertrude said. Her voice echoed from inside his metal body. "You worry too much."

           "It is not worth the risk," Seamus said. "You do not have the necessary equipment to repair me. Without a new power core, I will be dead within three weeks time."

           Theodore slapped Seamus on the chest. It made a dull ringing sound. "Be damned if we don't try, old man," Theodore said.

           Calvin approached. "Hello Uncle," he said.

           Seamus saw Calvin and smiled. His silver teeth gleamed in the sunlight. "Hello there. It is good to see you, my boy."

           "It didn't go well with the Council," Gertrude said without turning around. She prodded at Seamus's insides with a screwdriver.

           "No," Calvin said. He spat on the ground. "They'd rather let us all die than risk angering the gods."

           "Ain't wise to tempt them," Theodore said.

           "Gods be damned," Gertrude said. She tossed the screwdriver over her shoulder and held out her empty hand. Theodore handed her a hammer. "We won't live long enough to make them mad if another razorback comes around."

           Calvin climbed onto the table and watched over Gertrude's shoulder. Between wires, gears, and glowing crystals, a smooth orb the size of a cantaloupe gave off a faint pink light. Black liquid leaked out around a broken razorback claw that pierced deep into the orb.

           Gertrude backed out of Seamus and turned to Calvin. "You still going through with it?"

           Seamus looked down at all of them. "What are you planning, Calvin?"

           "I'm going to find a new power core for you," Calvin said. He raised his hand and pointed to the leviathans in the distance. "From there."

           "Fool's errand," Theodore said. "You'll just get yourself killed."

           Seamus stared at the gods on the horizon. "You must not do this," he said. His voice was full of fear. He rubbed the old scar on his temple, the wound that had permanently damaged his memory. "I cannot say why, but I fear that you will damn us all if you go there."

           "What other choice do we have?" Calvin said.

           "I do not know," Seamus said. The sun slipped behind the left shoulder of Ajax and cast a long shadow over the hilltop.

           That night, defying the wishes of Seamus and the village elders, Calvin stole a horse from Councilman Mosley's stables. Grover and Everett still stood guard at the gate, and they let Calvin pass through without a word. Both men raised their fists to him in a salute, a sign to wish him luck.

           The journey to the gods took him three days. Calvin followed an ancient road built by his ancestors. Time had worn away the pavement, but the path was still easy to follow from the groove it cut in the land. He crossed fields and forests, forded a river, and traveled through a long tunnel. He passed through the ruins of a city, trying to move as quickly and quietly as he could. He could practically feel a razorback watching him from within the rubble.

           By the middle of the third day, the road veered south. Calvin turned off the old road and traveled through the forest, making a beeline toward the feet of the gods. The bodies of Hess and Ajax towered above him. He looked up to get glimpses of them between the treetops. He should have been paying attention to the ground, because he would have noticed the razorback crouched in a gully.

           The razorback waited for Calvin and the horse to come close before it pounced, shrieking with its wide human-like mouth as it attacked. The terrified horse reared up, throwing Calvin from the saddle and inadvertently saving his life. Calvin watched in horror while the razorback wrapped its tentacles around the horse and fed.

           Calvin ran. The horse's screams stopped, and Calvin knew the razorback would come after him now. The monsters only fed on live prey and were never satisfied. He dodged between the trees in a futile effort to escape. He heard the sound of the razorback closing in. Calvin knew that he would never be able to outrun it on foot. He ran blindly and prayed for a miracle.

           The undergrowth was thick, and he did not see the steep ravine ahead. One moment his feet were on the ground and the next he was falling. He rolled head over heel, the ground beating up his already weary body. He skidded to a stop against the hard side of Hess's gigantic foot.

           This was the end. Calvin's plan to save his village was a failure. "Come get it over with, you dirty beast!" he said.

           The razorback crested the ridge. It was a simple-minded creature, and it felt only joy at the thought of its impending kill. It crawled down the slope on its tentacles, saliva dripping out of its wide mouth. Then it froze. It's wide blue eye looked up at the leviathan towering overhead.

           Hess had turned his attention to the commotion happening at his feet. The razorback sensed this; its cybernetic systems felt the flow of information pouring out of Hess. The razorback did not know that Hess was frozen in battle, unable to move without being destroyed, nor could it have understood such a concept. All the razorback knew was that it was under the gaze of a being infinitely more powerful than itself.

           The razorback screamed in fear and fled. Calvin listened to the fading sound of the monster tearing away through the forest, and he was completely baffled. None of it made sense.

           Then he looked up and realized that he was lying against Hess. The absurdity of the situation hit him and he laughed until he cried. The stupid razorback was just as afraid of a dead god as the people in his village. He slapped the metal wall with his palm. "Thank your for the miracle, Hess!"

           Hess observed the human with his sensors. He was surprised that any survived; he thought they had died out long ago as casualties of the war. In the beginning he and Ajax intentionally targeted human populations as part of their individual strategies, but their technology eventually evolved beyond the need to do so.

           Humans were weak and unpredictable, and Hess held them in disdain. But as he watched the pitiful creature wandering at his feet, he had a moment of inspiration. Hess would be locked in battle with Ajax until some external force could upset the balance, like the impact of a giant asteroid or the explosion of a caldera. But Hess may be able to use this simple creature to speed up the process.

           The metal surface twisted open under Calvin's palm, giving way to a dark opening. A chill ran up his spine, and he crawled backwards on the ground to get away from the hole. Lights flickered on inside to reveal a long corridor trailing away into the body of the god.

           Calvin swallowed. Hess was alive? Calvin had been wrong about everything. Maybe Hess and Ajax really did exist to punish the sins of man. And now he was here, a mere human, with a god inviting him inside. He should have listened to Seamus and stayed home.

           What should he do? Would Hess smite him if he ran away? Calvin had joked, but Hess did actually grant him a miracle by scaring away the razorback. Maybe Hess was more benevolent than the stories made him out to be.

           Calvin took a deep breath and made his choice. He stood and walked into the body of the god. He followed the corridor until it opened into a large cavern. Thick pillars supported the ceiling above. Dim lights glowed on all surfaces like stars in the night sky. While he stared in wonder, the floor under him floated up into the air. Calvin dropped down onto his stomach so that he would not fall over the edge.

           The platform flew unsupported through the guts of Hess, carrying Calvin toward some unknown destination. He passed through a chamber where lightning arced between polished metal orbs; a chasm lined with purple crystals jutting from corrugated steel; a tunnel filled with metal pipes in all colors of the rainbow. Calvin's mind reeled, unable to comprehend the alien sites before him.

           The platform came to a stop in a large room shaped like the inside of an egg. A giant black metal cube floated in the air in the center of the room. Calvin stood up slowly and stared at the cube, his jaw falling open. Even though its surface was flat and smooth, Calvin could not shake the feeling that it was looking at him.

           "Human." The voice of Hess boomed. It came from the cube, and it echoed off of the walls. The deep sound vibrated through Calvin's body, and he broke out in a sweat.

           Calvin fell to his knees and bowed in front of the god. "Lord Hess," he said. "I beg your mercy."

           Hess was caught off guard at being addressed in such a manner. Lord Hess? But in the next instant he understood. After all those generations, humans had come to worship him as a god. He laughed, and the human on the platform below trembled.

           "What makes you think I am merciful?" Hess said. If the human considered him to be a god, he would act as one.

           "Nothing, my lord," Calvin said. "But I have no other choice."

           Hess was curious for the first time in ages. "Tell me your request."

           "I—my village—needs a power core to replace the broken one of our guardian, Uncle Seamus. He is the only thing that stands between my people and certain death from the razorbacks." Sweat dripped off of Calvin's forehead. A small puddle formed beneath him.

           Such a simple thing. "I will grant your request, human. For a price."

           "Anything," Calvin said.

           "Rise," Hess said. Calvin did so, though his numb, shaking legs made it hard to stay up. A small black cube, about the size of Calvin's head, rose from the dark pit below the chamber. It floated to a stop a foot in front of Calvin's face, and the surface pulsed with green light.

           "Touch it," Hess said.

           When Calvin's fingers connected with the surface of the cube, all of his senses were shattered by pain. White light filled his vision. Screaming wind rushed in his ears. His skin burned like the sun.

           Hess temporarily routed his command and control algorithms through the neural structure of this human. The thoughts of man and machine mixed together, and Hess knew this human's name was Calvin. He knew everything about him, from his earliest childhood memories to the way he felt when he heard the sound of rain at night.

           The connection only lasted for a microsecond before Calvin passed out from the strain on his body. Calvin's chaotic biological system ever-so-slightly altered Hess's code, and the jolt was just enough to bump Hess into a state that his enemy Ajax could not predict. The changes would take time to propagate throughout his body, but the stalemate was effectively over.

           Calvin regained consciousness. He lay in a pool of his own vomit. The massive black cube still loomed above him, but the smaller one had disappeared. On the platform beside his head was a power core just like the one in Seamus's chest.

           "As you requested, human," Hess said.

           Calvin grabbed the power core and hugged it to his body. Calvin tried to thank Hess, but it was difficult to form coherent thoughts. His brain was foggy, and he had trouble focusing on any one thought. He caressed the power core in his arms like a child.

           The platform drifted off and carried Calvin back the way he came. When it came to a stop, Calvin stumbled down the corridor and out of the hole in Hess's skin. The daylight was fading away, and Calvin wandered off in the direction of home.

           The journey back to the village took longer without a horse to carry him. The forest had grown quiet, not even the birds were chirping. There were no signs of any razorbacks. Maybe Hess was still watching over him, but Calvin could not be sure. Something was very wrong with his mind, and it did not improve with the passing days.

           He headed straight for Knob Hill once he was in sight of home. He clutched the power core tight in his dirty hands. He had fleeting visions of the village hailing him as a hero. Calvin, he who saved Seamus. Calvin, he who saved the village.

           The smiths were on the hill with Seamus when Calvin arrived. Gertrude was the first to see him. "Calvin!" she said and ran to him. She snatched the power core from his hands and held it in the air. "Damn you, but you did it!"

           Theodore clapped his hand on Calvin's back. "Boy, you look like hell."

           Calvin nodded, but he could not speak. He seemed to have forgotten how to. The best he could manage was a mumble.

           Gertrude grabbed Theodore by the arm and pulled at him. "Get prepped and let's get this thing—" Gertrude's face went blank and she stared off into the west. Her jaw dropped.

           Theodore turned and looked. "Mercy," he said.

           Calvin turned slowly and looked towards the horizon to the west.

           The gods were moving.