The Mouse's Fault

He had it all written out, his finger hovering over the mouse to click send. But he sat back instead, slowly.

It was past midnight, and he knew he was tired, slightly incoherent. Why else would he be willing to type out years of restrained love and passion for her in an email? He'd held it back for so long, yet one long day at work, and here he was, willing to spill his guts!

So he left it for the morning. To re-read and make sure he was willing to send it.

Then a mouse ran over the keyboard.

18/03/2105

I had been told, multiple times, not to try and make contact with another time traveller. Not out of concern about ruining the timeline with them, any time traveller was assumed to know all the important occurrences, like how humanity would die (and most of them had seen it happen anyway).

No, the point is that no matter how advanced or odd someone was, they might not be a time traveller. And letting on about time travel to a non time traveller might have disastrous results that and that's why you pray to the rain gods for good rains, child.

The Moment Of True Happiness

My dad told me, on my 10th birthday, as he gave me my first beer, that one day, I'd know true happiness. That there'd be a moment where everything made sense, that I'd work everything out, and be truly happy.

I took that to heart, and worked hard at everything, at my job, at my sweetheart, at everything. And I eagerly awaited that moment.

It never came.

When I drunkenly wrapped my car round that tree, my dad was the first ghost I saw, and I asked what I'd missed.

His attempt to give me what he never had, apparently.

Powerful Changes

I found a way to power my abilities way past my usual limits, via burning out alternate universes. I take a bunch of them and destory them, a million at a time, and my powers over people and things is increased tenfold.

But then I found myself running out of alternate universes. So I needed to create a bunch, preferably ones with massive changes.

So I set up a nuclear bomb, deep underground, powerful enough to destroy the world. It would go off only if the ten thousand digit random number generator manages to...

What the hell's that rumbling noise?

Stirring The Pot

Every day, the little old lady sat at the window of the store, a rug over her lower half, constantly stirring a pot of crunchmix, adding stuff as needed. For a coin, she'd put a scoop in a leafbowl and hand it over, bigger scoops and bowls for silver and gold coins.

The local children all had theories as to what was under the rug. Tentacles was the most popular theory, but clockwork had its advocates.

Eventually, a brave lad snuck in and looked, revealing nothing.

As in no legs at all.

That was viewed as a disappointment by everyone.

A Good Stabbing

As far as stabbings go, it was not the worst. It missed all my vital organs, and there wasn't any poison or ragged edges to tear and rip as I pulled the knife out.

But that just left the blood, the hole, and one pouring out of the other.

I needed assistance, I needed to get help as soon as possible. But that wasn't going to happen, not with him still standing before me, his expression clouded by the fact I wasn't down.

But now I had a knife.

As far as stabbings go, it was pretty good, for me.

The End Of Glory

Glory was one of the most powerful superheroes on the planet, but she knew her limits. There were beings from the cosmos that could snap her like a twig, with just a thought.

So she had her friends, her allies, she called on them when she needed help.

But she didn't waste their time. She knew what she could handle, and would handle it solo.

She was always worried that one day, she'd underestimate a threat and not call on them.

The idea that she'd end when she called for help and no-one came hadn't occured to her at all.

Perfect Trap

It was the perfect trap. Signs and radio signals saying it was a safe house from the zombies, an obvious safe walkway over a bridge over spikes to give the illusion of safety, then a tiny hole to climb through, then the floor would gjve way, dropping them into the lower room, full of zombies to eat them up. Escape would be impossible. He could then pick up the supplies left outside. Perfect!

Perfect, except that the first person through got stuck. So he had to go push.

And they grabbed him and pulled him through.

And yep, escape? Impossible.

Symbolism

The arrow was the one that killed King Brek. It was pulled out of his neck, and given it had maintained its shape but was blood soaked, it made for a perfect symbol of the new Republic.

It was framed and hung above the throne, as a reminder to all that the throne would remain empty, and why.

But then, Suvia claimed the Goddess had chosen her to rule, she claimed that the throne was hers.

After a long battle, she captured the throne, and when she sat down, the arrow fell.

And landed in her hand, proving her point.

Probed

As soon as Earth got past light speed, we were warned by a repeating, automated broadcast, go quiet, go dark. The Technodroids were searching for societies worth consuming, based on either finding them physically, or sensing their technology. They were probing the galaxy for another few dozen years then leaving.

Earth heeded the warning, and went silent, intent to wait it out, like every other race.

And then the Technodroids found the Earth, descending from the skies, led there from a sublight speed probe with a record on it that led them directly to Earth. Not that Earth knew that.

Check In Cat

By process of elimination, I'd worked out that it was a stray cat. It didn't belong to anyone in the apartment block, it just hung around. Probably eating garbage and stuff.

Every morning, it sat on the wall and hissed at me as I passed every morning as I went to work during the week, the gym the weekend.

Then I lost my job, so had to quit the gym. And after some weeks, I was at my lowest point, and then the cat came to my door, meowed until I followed, got up on the wall, then bit me.

Fall Guy

I could have killed him. The knife pierced his skin, cut through the upper layers of muscle, a little further into his heart and he would have died, and it would have been 100% my fault.

Not deliberately, you understand. I wouldn't have intended to kill him, I just lashed out and stabbed him accidentally. If that had killed him, I'd have felt so guilty, so terrible.

But, thankfully, the stabbing didn't kill him, he pulled the knife out, then tumbled backwards and fell over the railing and fell twenty stories to his death.

So glad the fall killed him.

Dead Zone

There's a six meter across bubble on platform 12 where phone reception just dies. (There's a power conduit under there.)

More than one relationship has hit a snag because someone didn't get a message. More than one position has been lost because someone didn't answer their phone. At least one radio contest has gone begging because someone was stupid enough not to walk a few meters to the left.

Often someone will notice, file a complaint. I smile, write it down, then throw it away.

Look, I love my mother, but everyone needs a break now and then, you know?

Give Him Two Minutes

"Just give me two minutes, ok?"

He went into the bathroom and slammed the door. The Driver went to go after him, still angry, but I stopped him.

"Look, you're new, so I'll cut you some slack. But The Boss does his best thinking on the john, I bet you after the two minutes are up, he'll have a plan to get out of this. Trust me."

The Driver grunted then stared at his phone's clock. After two minutes, he barged in.

"Oh, he has a plan all right. Get two minutes head start."

The open bathroom window swung sadly.

The Girl With Red Hair

It was that red hair.

I tried to walk away from her so many times. I tried to leave her behind, tried to forget about her.

I managed it a few times, a few months here, a year there. But every time, I came crawling back home.

At first, she would be happy I was back, my leaving forgotten. But that joy wore off more and more every time, until she told me to either stay or go forever.

That red hair made me stay.

After all, it proved without a shadow of a doubt that she was my daughter.

10,000 Hours

I watched him paint, marvelling at his work. Every stroke a masterpiece, the end result perfect. I couldn't believe his skill.

But I knew I was was seeing the end result of a lifetime of work, I wasn't seeing the training, the failed attempts, the crap before the gold.

I watched as he finished, placing the brush and palette down. I approached him slowly, smiling.

"That's amazing work. How long have you been painting?"

"Oh, this is my first go, I just wanted to try it out once."

I never felt more annoyed than I did at that exact point.

The Right Plan

My goal was to get her to admit I was right, just once.

When I was wrong, she'd take every opportunity to point that out.

When I was right, she'd find a way to claim I was wrong anyway.

When there was an argument to be said for either side, guess which side she'd take.

Eventually I worked out how I'd do it. I waited for a time when she was wrong and she'd be willing to admit it (since I'd never expressed an opinion) and then I told her she was right.

The one time she decided on honesty...

Johnny And Molly

Growing up, she was just my Granny Molly. She made a great chocolate cake, and never spoke. They told me she was a mute.

Then, after my parents died, my grandparents long gone, in their estates, there were letters.

Granny Molly was a witch, they claimed. She'd lived for centuries, but fell in love with Granddad and given up that life of living in the woods of Europe to be with him, and she remained silent so her enemies couldn't find her.

All I could think about was why she always made me cake, and how her oven was huge.

Needed Upgrade

After a few hours, the robot turned back on after the update. I waited for it to give the usual spiel about all their new features and improvements, but it didn't.

Instead it just stood there. After a while, I went to press the update button, when the robot grabbed my arm and twisted. I shouted, trying to pull it out, until the robot leaned in, its eyes going red.

"You are an unauthorised user, alert! Alert!"

The lawsuit afterwards got the law changed to allow for transfer of ownership of robots, not that I cared given I was dead.

Moving On

"... So yeah, call me back when you get this, love you ba-"

It was the last thing she ever said to me, and it wasn't to me, as such. It was to my phone, with the moment the truck hit the bus in it. That part wasn't great, but it was still the last words she said to me. I know it's a cliche, but I would have kept it, listened to it, over and over again. But that would have been wallowing in the past, just living in my grief.

Plus I pressed the wrong button and deleted it.

Lights At Night

The Dragons called it Roargarth, and it was a major part of their origin myths.

The Elves called it Sh'slinda, and they viewed it's arrival as good tidings for the season.

The Goblins called it Grozak's Boogers, and they ignored it, for the most part.

The Humans called it pockets of swamp gas lit by chemical reactions, and didn't understand why everyone else preferred their old names involving Gods and Chariots.

The Dwarves called it another reason why going up onto the surface was a bad idea.

The Gnolls didn't have a name for it, instead just harvesting them nightly.

Running

Run.

Run as far as you can. Run as fast as you can. Run as silently as you can.

Run to the safety of your home. Run to the safety of weapons. Run to the safety of a crowd, or run to the safety of a location no-one else knows about.

Run until every fibre of your being cannot continue, until you cannot possibly lift your body and keep going.

Then get up and keep running.

Run until you stop, and no matter where that is, I will still find you.

Run forever though, well then I'll find you tired.

Flip The Coin

The monsters had terrorised the town for a dozen nights before someone answered the call for help. Her fee was large, but they were desperate, and so the town scraped together the fee.

She strode into the forest, prepared to fight, when she came across the ruins of a village, within the forest.

Naturally, she assumed she'd been tricked and headed back out to confront the monsters who had taken human form, but this was wrong.

They'd taken their skin and made suits out of it, not undergone metamorphosis, obviously!

The slicing with a sword showed why they should have.

Visiting The Flight Deck

The co-captain was explaining how the gravity generators worked when a dozen alarms all went off at once. The captains quickly ignored me and focused on trying to work out what the hell was going on.

After a few moments, the attendant came running into the flight deck and yelled a code out, 67-F.

As she ran past me and tripped over, I spotted a Spaceteam alert code book, and looked up the code.

'67-F : Shapeshifting Alien on Flight Deck'

That made no sense, there was no alien on board the flight deck. I grew several feet to make sure.

Jumping To Action

I saw him outside the window.

I was on the 37th floor.

By the time i worked out how to open the window latch, he'd already moved to the corner of the building.

I leant out the window, and I realized i wasn't sure what to say. I'd never thought of what to say to someone clearly about to jump.

"Hey man, you wanna talk?"

It would have been a decent opening line, except he said it.

"I'd like that."

He snorted.

"That's the problem, everyone just wants to talk. No action!"

So i got out and dragged him inside.

An Idea

She hugged me.

When i didn't react or move, she slowly broke the hug.

"You don't like hugs?"

"I just don't know what I'm supposed to do."

She looked confused.

"It's pretty simple, you put your arms around the other person and squeeze."

"No, no, I know how to hug people, that's not what I meant. I meant that i have no idea what to do about my troubles."

"Oh. Right. Well, I have an idea about that."

"Really?"

She hugged me again, as I waited for the idea, until i realised that the hug was it.

I hugged back.

The Last Love Potion

He held the dusty bottle up to the light, turning it in his hand, catching the torchlight here and there.

The last love potion.

The texts of the time spoke highly of the multitude of various potions that created love, that imbued others with loveliness. Supposedly people back then fell in love all the time.

He should take it with him, have it tested, analysed, studied. But magic wouldn't have a scientific reason, and besides, he was sick of being unloved.

So he opened the bottle and began to drink it.

Discovering if was just alcohol kinda bummed him out.

The Place Where Children Died

Where the stars met the sky, there was The Place Where Children Died.

When the child begins to become a non-child, they must be taken to The Place.

Whoever is the medicine user at the time, must accompany the non-child to The Place.

Whatever the season of the land, whatever the season of the sky, whatever the season of The Place, the non-child is to be shown the weapons, tools, and requirements of being an adult in the tribe.

When this has been done, the non-child either agrees to be an Adult, or they do not return.

Hence the name.

Usually A Secretary

No matter how big or small the company, there's always the one employee it all rides on.

This seems obvious when a business has just one or two people working there, but when thousands work under one umbrella, it sounds impossible. Although I'm sure the Chairperson or CEO or whatever would claim it's them. And it could, I suppose.

But there's always one person who knows where the bodies are buried. Not literally (usually), but every company has its skeletons, and there's always someone who knows where they are.

Your company doesn't have one?

Well you aren't them, then, clearly.

From Behind The Device

Everything is under control, my equipment is running at peak performance and has things contained!

Don't worry everyone, that's not a serious alarm, it's just a minor fluctuation in the power supply, nothing to worry about!

Now, everyone is wearing their lead suits, yes? That was part of the orientation package, remember!

So, if everyone can move to the back of the room, the electric spikes can't reach that far, thank you!

Well, consider this, we will all go down in history as pioneers of science. It is far better a thing we do-

I told you we were safe!