Nothing Illegal

The boss of the betting company didn't ask him to lose the fight, or threaten uus children, not at all.

All he did was remark on how beautiful his children were, and how much it would help the betting industry if, as the heavy favorite, he were to lose. And offered him a donation to his children's college fund, if anything he was being super nice!

So when the fighter decided to take the 'donation' and bet on himself, it was very unkind of him.

But luckily the ref had children who needed college funds too, and he got DQed.

Statistician's Wish

It didn't look like a magic lamp you see on the cartoons, but a genie still popped out, as well as a large chocolate spinning wheel thing.

"Ah, welcome my new Master, have a wish?"

They placed a hand on the wheel.

"What's the wheel for?"

"Oh, well, every wish you make, I have to spin the wheel, see if you get it or death."

I thought this over.

"So, like, 3 is the mode of number people get?"

They shrugged.

"OK then, I wish for a trillion dollars."

They spun.

Despite understanding chance theory, I was never actually lucky.

Avoiding Unpleasant Questions

The accounts sat for decades, untouched. The bank had no reason to believe that they were illegal, or at the least immoral. No legally binding reason, that is.

After all, they were just numbers on cards, and then numbers on a computer. The money didn't exist out of that, as it were.

But then the accounts were accessed, the money drained, the accounts left with just enough to avoid them closing, which would lead to questions.

Meetings were held, to decide if they should investigate. The managing director decided not to.

Then drove off in his new expensive sports car.

The Dazed Postman Skit

There was always another stage, another audience.

He'd nailed down the act twenty years ago, and worked out every possible 'ad-lib' ten years ago.

It was a perfect act, never failed to bring the house down, it was his livelihood. He travelled the world on this sketch.

And then one day, he got a huge offer, a month"s worth of paychecks to perform the skit at the TV studio.

He did the performance, got great reviews, and went back to touring around.

But now there were no more stages or audiences, people has seen it now.

What else was on?

Last Chance

He was at rock bottom, and I couldn't be, well not happy, but at least relieved. Because after years of watching him ruin his life on cards, horses, football, you name it, if you could gamble on it, he was sure he had it worked out, and would win big any day now.

But now, finally, he was out of money, and maybe, just maybe, ready to begin the climb back up.

Then came the phone call. Biggest jackpot in the history of the draw, all his, his alone.

I mean, I should be happy for him, shouldn't I? Really?

How To Survive A Mexican Standoff

The nine of them each had a gun, and a justification for why they needed and deserved the briefcase of uncut diamonds more than the others. As far as Mexican standoffs went, this was a complicated one.

Maria finally broke the silence.

"There's only two ways to survive something like this. And that's not to take part."

She lowered her gun and jumped behind a sofa. Alex was distracted by this for just long enough that Todd shot him, which set off a chain reaction.

Five seconds later, Maria shot the survivor.

"Or, you be the one to end it."

Botspotting

While we waited for someone to come in and declare they needed a brand new robotic vaccum, or more likely ask where the food court was, we scrolled social media on our phones. But then I heard him muttering numbers under his breath. I looked over at him, and he eventually saw my face.

"Botspotting. My grandad used to spot trains, mark down their numbers. I do the same for these bots on here with the long numbered names."

"Why?"

"Grandad always said he'd die only once he filled his book. He filled it, then died. This'll take forever, hopefully."

Blueprints And Some Numbers

On the night before I turned 18, my 108 year old self appeared in my room with the plans for a time machine, the winning numbers for the following week's jackpot lottery, and a phone number for a local sex worker who'd do that thing I thought I would like.

My life has been amazing, hailed as a genius, rich beyond my dreams, a wife who does that thing I like.

And today I turn 108, and everything has built to this moment.

I take the prepared pieces of paper and burn them, then wait to see what will happen.

Too Many

Too many nights wasted on trying to find love at the end of a bar, or in the middle of a rave, or at a friend of a friend's place.

Too many months wasted on work, my entire being focused on my career, hoping to find meaning and purpose in spreadsheets, calculations.

Too many years wasted thinking I had missed my chance, thinking it was not to be.

Too few moments with you, the very opposite of wasteful, the one I should be.

Two minutes wasted waiting for the elevator, just too late to stop the taxi taking you away.

Magical Mineral Concerns

I awoke at dawn, and staggered out into the kitchen, only to find my apprentice, having stayed up all night, staring at a sheet of scrolls.

"That a scroll of pancake creation?"

"36 and a half years."

"Bit long for pancakes, surely?"

He rose to his feet, holding out calculations accusingly at me.

"Gemstones that make up the ingredients in everyone's spells are destroyed. Even with immediate mass Gem-Make casting starting immediately, we'll probably run out in 36.5 years."

I did the sums.

"Well I'll be dead, and you'll know to stockpile."

He didn't agree, thus his conversion to diamond.

Cliff Edge Explanation

A slightly different set of chemicals in the primordial soup that started us off.

The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs hitting slightly harder and wiping out a lot more life.

One of the successful empires being a bit more successful and then taking everyone down with them.

A virus being slightly more resistant to the level of medical knowledge we had relative to the time.

Certain scientists cracking certain weapons earlier.

Any number of judgement calls involving nukes.

Humanity has been so close to death so many times over the years.

You honestly think everyone else is equally lucky?

Summer Holy Days

Every culture in the known and understood universe has days of rest, of release. Even after establishing artificial drones to do all labor, or sticking to slavery throughout, there are still days of less work at regular intervals where they enjoy themselves, in one way or another.

Humans had 2 cycles out of 7, Esbadions 1 out of 10. The more religious cultures tend to have holy days, a small number every megacycle. These tend to be huge parties, or days of destruction.

The Riguians are having their first holy day in a thousand megacycles.

I'm sure it'll be fine.

Easy Money

The Multiverse Agent had made contact with local resources.

The Agent was confused when they saw a display for lottery tickets in a storefront.

"Wait, you have time travel tech, right?"

"Yes, there's a booth down the street, individuals can go back 8 to 24 hours, for free of course."

"But you still have chance jackpot lotteries?"

"Fluctuations in reality mean results change every time you-"

"But you can just keep trying the same numbers till they work, can't you?"

The subsequent mass upswing in looping led to a cascade collapse of all connected universes, completing the Agent's orders efficiently.

The Silent Guardian's Bet

57 Guardians, 57 numbers.

Whenever a recruit had passed all the tests and was ready to protect America by doing whatever was needed as a Silent Guardian, there was The Bet.

A simple eight digit code to open a safe. Engraved on the safe was "Why We Must Silently Guard". Before you started your first mission, you got one chance to open it and discover the secret. Fail, you write your guess on the wall.

Plenty of dates and codes up there. But I've studied, the founders believed the general populace was stupid.

So, a stupid code?

12345678.

...

Nope.

Darn.

Level 1 Armageddon Protocol

In the known multiverse, there are 367,547 creatures, groups, and/or forces which are classified as Level 1 Armageddons. They range from clouds of molten dark matter millions of light years across through to creatures who resemble six year old Human females. Any attempt by any of these Level 1s to break out of their current level of reality, per protocol, is to be met with destruction by any means available.

This protocol has been in effect for some time, at one point the number of known Level 1s was in the millions, but the most commonly used interpretation of the protocol's allowances is to link the escaping Level 1 into a universe with another Level 1 and let them interact and hopefully destroy at least one of them, or at least weaken them both.

This does of course have a logical conclusion.

We are, in essence, running a survival of the fittest scenario, where eventually we will have the most powerful, indestructible Level 1 there is, with no real ability to stop it anymore.

This is known by my superiors, and they will have a plan to deal with this in the coming decade.

Oh, sorry, 367,546 now. Joy.

Why I Build The Bridge

Only a miniscule fraction of universes last longer than a few microseconds, as their internal laws are unable to stabilize in time.

Of that minuscule fraction, only a tiny subset of those have anything more complicated than simple gases within them.

Of that tiny subset, only a smidgen of a handful of a very limited selection have intelligent life within it.

Now yes, this number is quite large to the average lifeform, but it is so unlikely to be impossible that any of them would be building this exact same dimension bridge right now.

But you have to try, right?

The Home For The Temporally Confused

There's a clock on the wall there. As long as I've been here, it's been broken. Just says 3:47 All day long, all night long too.

Now, you'd think this would be a problem, but after all it is right twice a day. Better that then something that loses a minute a year, that won't be right again for like thousands of years.

But, I hear you cry, how do you know when it's correct? Well that's the best bit, I just check the clock, obviously, how else do you check time?

It's nearly 3:47 now! Quick, hide!

The Candidate's Night

As the night wore on, I retreated further into the wine bottle, the numbers starting bad and getting worse. A commanding lead was the expected start, but it was assumed by most pundits and our own internal polling that the lead would shrink as the counting took place. But that turn around never came. It was fairly obvious by 8, but I held off, wanting to ensure the result was beyond doubt. But finally, I was forced to pull myself together, get up on stage, and pretend that this victory was watch wanted, that I was happy to have won.

Tell Me The Odds

To run all the calculations needed to fully predict the likely successes of this course of action, I would need all the computing power in the Alliance for 3.78 weeks.

If I only had the computing power of this ship, it would take me, by coincidence, 3.78 years.

By reducing the number of factors I take into account, and reducing the number of impacted parties to consider, and also reducing the timeframe of results to graph, I can produce an estimate in, again coincidentally, 3.78 minutes.

I have received the results now, and...

3.78 to 1 against is fair odds.

Fractions Of Magic

There used to be so much magic in the world. There here hundreds of mages and witches and all sorts of magic weavers, bending nature to their will, if not outright breaking it.

But it was always going to be for just a time. You see, every spell could only be used once. Adjusting a spell by a fraction was enough to do practically the same thing again, but there was a finite number of fractions, and they're mostly gone now. Maybe a spell gets cast once a year.

The universe doesn't allow the exact same mistake twice after all.