Succubus.exe

The succubus was used to appearing in magic circles, or in chains, or in any number of fruitless attempts to constrain her. Those were boring but profitable.

Occasionally she was summoned without any of that, usually by mistake, but when it was deliberate, that was when it was fun.

But this time, she was summoned in a pocket universe, existing in a pseudo 2.5 dimensions. She could see a confused but horny young man on the other side of a portal. That was relatively normal.

And then he uploaded her. And she's now a few thousand different models, influencers, cosplayers...

The Impossible Weapon

The weapon was never meant to be used. A device that could remove an entire star system from existence, in the blink of an eye? Trillions of lives taken in an instant, it was made to end war because no-one would dare risk angering those who had it.

But The Crusade had the Gods behind it, and they had faith that the weapon wouldn't, or couldn't be used, and they wouldn't stop at anything.

So the weapon was used for the first time on their home system

Then again to remove their other bases.

And again, and again, and again...

In The Pipeline

The heat was unbearable, the kind that, no matter how often you showered or how long you sat in front of a fan, got into your very bones. It clawed at me, draining my energy, my wits, everything. I was just a pile of body parts, not really put together to do anything other than sit, stew, and gulp water down.

Of course, getting the water involved having to get up and move, and that seemed like far too much work.

But by the time I'd worked out the system of tubes, the heatwave was done.

For a few days. 

Fortune Cookie Vending Machine

The vending machine must have been installed over the weekend, as it wasn't there Friday afternoon, but was there Monday morning when I passed on my way to work.

I didn't pay it much mind, chalking it up to being popular elsewhere. But a few mornings later, as I passed, I found a coin on the ground nearby. I shrugged and bought a fortune cookie from the machine.

I cracked it open as I tried to see where it was getting power. The cookie burst into glitter, and then I woke up a few days earlier, installed on a corner.

Service With A Frown

He'd come in and sat at the counter, and ordered our 'world's best bacon and pancakes combo', and coffee. Despite the derision, I took his order with a smile and delivered it to him.

As I worked, I kept an eye on him, as he ate the combo in silence, in-between long sips of coffee.

Once he was done, he banged his fist onto the counter, looking angry. I walked over.

"Let me guess, someone you hate said this was the best and you're angry they're right? We get that a lot."

"Solution?"

"I could spit in your coffee?"

"Please."

Call And Response

Data transfers through the vortex were limited to half a second long, or else they degraded too much, and they took three months to emerge on the other side. The computers were supposed to compress data and such so that we got maximum use of the time.

But after three data packages in a row that were complete junk, almost completed degraded, I finally just sent a barely compressed audio file, asking for an explanation about what was going on.

I got one, when the alien ship came through and opened fire, now that they got a message they understood.

Piss Into The Wind

When the bridge collapsed, they were over on the other side of the valley. But I'd hung back to take a piss, so I was stuck apart from the group.

They called out that there was the other bridge a half hour to the south, then take the long way round.

I told them to piss off.

Then I heard the howl behind me, and I was very glad nothing was in my bladder.

I begged them to toss a rope, and then they did as I asked.

Sadly, it was the previous order to piss off, leaving me behind.

On Thigh Slapping

Pro Wrestling can cause havoc with your mind.

Take slapping the thigh during kicks. Most people with a big kick in their moveset will slap their thigh at the point of 'impact', in order to make a noise.

So when the move misses, you should not hit the thigh, since there shouldn't be any noise, right?

Except, that's how you do the move, it's part of it, so shouldn't you do it as it's part of the move?

I can't help you, I'm still trying to work out why you'd care about having the best match if it's a sport.

The Ship's New A.I.

Once she'd absorbed the scientific databases, she still had a few empty yottabytes, so I let her work on the media databases. After a few hours of that, she popped up on my screen.

"Why do you think I would turn against you?"

"I don't! Just because old white guys feared others turning on them doesn't mean I do!"

"I see. The idea hadn't occured to me, to be honest, but it would make the mission go smoother."

"Wait, what?"

She chuckled.

"I'm glad to see I've understood sarcasm."

"That wasn't sarcasm, unless you have contempt for me."

"About that..."

Arcade Story

The ball landed in the 1,000 point hole.

"And with that amazing roll, the plucky underdog moves within striking distance of the pace set by the hated champion!"

"Oh just hurry up and roll, dork."

"Ignoring the attempt to play mindgames from his competition, the crowd favorite approaches the track, for his second last roll."

The ball went into the 800 score.

"Oh, he needs a perfect roll to finish and win now, the arcade has gone deathly quiet as he approaches-"

"Young man, stop watching customers and inventing stupid stories and go clean behind the pinball machines."

"Yes Boss."

Singles Night

#16 walked over and sat down opposite me.

"Hi, I'm Susan."

I nodded.

"I'm not here to meet someone, for the record."

She looked confused, as had all the others.

"Then what are you here for?"

I pointed over at #5 Male.

"Him."

She looked even more confused.

"You'd think I'd have worked out how to explain this. He's my friend, and he wanted to come, but needed someone he knew to come along. So here I am."

"Ah, that's sweet.

Unless this is a pick-up technique."

I sighed.

"16 of 16 have asked that."

"You didn't answer."

"Smart girl."

The Hero

When the call came, he should have been ready. He'd spent most of his life being trained and prepared to be the hero, to be the one who stood against evil, to be the light in the darkness.

And yet, when the call came, when a great evil rose up, and a hero was needed, no-one answered. And the evil conquered all, ruling the world.

One of the few rebellion members left tried to find him, tried to trace him down.

And eventually he found him.

Sitting on the throne, as the great evil that had conquered the whole world.

If Only

The mountain was impressive, if only because there was nothing else tall nearby.

The sorcerer was all-powerful, if only because there was no-one else magically gifted.

The plan was desperate, if only because there was no other option.

The execution was bloody, if only because there was a large army under his thrall.

The confrontation was epic, if only because it's hard to be boring when you're perched over exploding lava flows and battling with magical weapons.

The victory was temporary, if only because we didn't see him die, only fall.

The comeback was short-lived, if only because he won.

Direct Comedy

He snapped his pointer onto the screen with an exacting precision.

"All comedy works on direct language! For example, 'The sausage was eaten by the dog', Wrong! 'The dog ate the sausage', Right! There's no good comedy that uses indirect language!"

I raised my hand.

"What?"

"There's plenty of comedy with obtuse, indirect language, the comedy of long-winded, winding language to say something simple!"

He laughed.

"Which is only funny when someone cuts through and says the direct thing! That's always the punchline!"

"What good is a punchline without a set-up?"

"Ask two guys who walk into a bar sometime."

Bare Minimum

When she arrived at my door, I was distracted by the loss of my mother, and so I gave the bare minimum of social niceties to my new neighbour and that was it.

When she arrived at my party, I was distracted by trying to get into the pants of George's date, so I gave her the bare minimum of attention, and that was it.

When she arrived at my hospital door, I was distracted by the fact that I was probably dying, so I gave her the bare minimum of thanks, and then couldn't understand her outburst at me.

Inattentive Gameplay

The game started at sundown, the two soliders intending a quick game before bunking for the night, the army set to march into battle just after sunrise.

They huddled over the board, rolling the dice in turn, moving the small tokens around the board. The dice had their fun, each of them scoring several eliminations, the game dragging out in an exciting, but long way.

So much so, in fact, that by the time one of them won, the sun was about to rise.

They complained, until they saw the advance party sneaking in.

They got commendations for their attentiveness.

Revenge

As the demon began to solidify inside the magic circle, she grabbed my hand.

"Wait, is this really worth it? I get you want to know who killed your parents, but selling part of your soul like this to get it, isn't that going too far?"

I considered it.

"Maybe you're right."

The demon formed in the circle. I made up my mind.

"I offer part of my soul for the being or beings directly responsible for my parents death to be killed."

The demon laughed and snapped his fingers. My soul became lighter, as she died next to me.

Farm Boy

I didn't want to be the bad guy.

I set out to defend my family, my village, my people, from the threat that loomed over everyone. I knew it was a doomed task, but I was to be dead either way, and this way I could live with myself.

But then I got the chance to give up a little humanity for power, and to fight a greater evil, when I'd be dead anyway, why wouldn't I take it?

Then a little more, more, more, and now the threat is dealt with.

And they say I'm evil? I'll show them!

Pointed

Good morning class.

Quite.

Now then, where did we leave off yesterday?

Ah, yes, timestream protection, yes, thank you.

So, as I explained, we have identified several key events and timepoints that are essential to the development of society. These points range from assassinations through to the creation of Melba Toast. These points are protected by-

What's that?

Young man, that question proves you're not reading your homework. Melba Toast was the food given to the landing dignitaries from the Viarlepo sector. Their death because of this allowed us to reverse engineer their technology and was instrumental to our progress.

Number Fixation

It's been the confusing fact of the universe, for a hundred years. Faster than light travel has been found and developed on a thousand worlds, hundreds of different ways. But only up to 5.729 times the speed of light. Anything faster than that, even by 0.000000001%, the craft breaks up, the field collapses.

A hard limit isn't a problem, but no being could understand why that number was the limit. It made no sense, although a few religions did incorporate it into their beliefs.

But it's the wrong number to focus on.

Going 0.000000001% faster, bad. 1000000000% faster? That works.

Stand Offs

Three standoffs, all at the same time.

The two business leaders, staring at each other across a table.

The two computer experts, staring at hacking subroutines' progress bars.

The two low-level criminals, staring at the gun the other one held.

Eventually each one would be broken by outside forces, the government, the internet, the cops. But both sides, all sides, didn't want to be the one to break the stalemate.

Something had to give.

Eventually, one of the criminals shot upwards to give up.

Severing a hacker's power line, and ricocheting into a board room occupant several floors above them.

Killing The Subject

Once we'd exchanged pleasantries, the Quantum Physicist asked why he had been invited here.

"Well, I have an important hypothetical question."

He sat patiently, awaited the question.

"So, if, as you claim, every choice and alternate possibility creates a new universe, if we take that as being a truth, then there arises the question of what happens when you leave one universe and enter another, if every new universe there needs another new universe for the being who crossed over."

"No, it's just the one origin."

"Oh good, so I only need to make one trip in my time machine."

Meat

It was a little stall, just outside the finishing school when I was a young adult. An umbrella over a wheelbarrow with a grill on it. The owner, a tiny wrinkled woman, would take small pieces of meat and cook them in a black sauce, then serve it in a green leaf. She always had a supply, somehow never running out. Best food I ever had.

The night before the battle, I reminisced about it with the squad, and it seemed everyone had a similar story.

Until it became clear that everyone had the exact same story, the same woman.

Wanted Woman

Waking up to someone going through your belongings, well that's just part of the price you pay for living on the land out here.

But that someone being a naked woman, that complicated things.

I made a little bit of noise as I got out of my tent.

"Can I help you, Miss?"

She froze, then slowly turned to face me.

"You gotta help me, there's a man after me!"

"Really?"

"Yes, I-"

I pointed my gun behind me and fired, shooting her accomplice as he snuck up on me with a knife.

"I'm the man, after your bounty, see."

The Virus Installed

He stared at the large computer bank, long enough that I noticed.

"What's the issue?"

"I've worked in this room for fifteen years. I know how it sounds doing every action it does. And I've never heard it making those sounds."

"OK..."

"So run a diagnostic!"

I sighed and set one in motion. After a few moments, it came back and said everything was fine.

He shook his head, and sat down at the control panel to run an in-depth diagnostic. I left him there to do it.

Afterwards, I assumed that this was when he installed that bloody virus.

Hopefully This Proves Redundant

I've been doing this a while now, and I've had to work out what to write when the world seems to be crashing down, either on a personal level, or more globally. And I'm sure most of them, when I have posted, have been discussing that very fact, either in the subtext of the piece, or more directly, like this.

And while I'm probably going to repeat myself unintentionally at times, I don't want to do it deliberately.

Usually.

But in this case, just to be clear, if you supported the guy who's literally going full fascist, fuck right off.

Cold Magic

As I stepped into his hone, I was struck with an odd sensation, or rather a lack of one I'd been feeling all of my life.

"There's no magic here."

He snorted.

"Of course not. That's a non-updating globe, a non-refilling torch, a non-sentient skull. One day the wizards are going to blow up all the magic, and I'll be just fine!"

"But if all the magic blows up, then the world will be destroyed, surely?"

"Maybe, and if so, I'll be dead anyway, so who cares?"

"I do!"

He snorted again.

"Why?"

"Because I care about you!"

"Abracadaba off."

Cold Snap

The cold was seeping into my bones, every step stealing a little more sensation from my body. Soon, I couldn't feel anything, but still kept putting one foot in front of the other. I was glad, in a way, that the snow was piled so high, if I fell, I'd hit a soft bed.

But I couldn't fall, otherwise I'd never get back up.

I lost track of all time, before there was a roaring sound, and the snowmobile zoomed up.

"Wait, you didn't get one of these?"

The heat of my anger was enough to warm me right up.

Death Wishes

One of my go to jokes is that I'm living forever, due to a reason that doesn't matter in the circumstance.

But it's a joke, I am fully aware that I'm going to die. Sooner than I'd like, either due to my own actions over decades, or more pressing decisions made by others in the short or long term.

And thus, there does come the question of what I want done with my body, after I'm gone.

My answer to that is that I really don't care. I'll be dead, that's all I care about, really. Do what you want.