《\ ˈdi-sə-nən(t)s \ (Dissonance)》
Entries 1-3
\ ?di-s?-n?n(t)s \
noun
- inharmonious or harsh sound; discord; cacophony.
- Music .
- a simultaneous combination of tones conventionally accepted as being in a state of unrest and needing completion.
- an unresolved, discordant chord or interval.
- disagreement or incongruity.
1.
The cloud cover rolled over the mountains like a blanket being pulled up to the chin of a frightened child. That''s really what we were now when you get right down to it. I had never seen Glacier Peak from such a high angle before, and looking across to its crown gave me vertigo. I set down in Old School Park; nothing more than an overgrown field of washed-out memories now.Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
Killing the engines, I took a deep breath to steady myself. There was no signal and no idea of what to expect in my old hometown. I prayed that it wasn''t watching, knowing that it was likely the only one that heard prayers now.
2.
He had been my high school science teacher. Old and wizened as he stood before me on his porch, shotgun raised and trembling. The air was thick and oppressive. It was in this moment that I realized I had forgotten the smell of pine. I looked at him but did not SEE him. I recognized him by his glasses alone.
He asked me my business. The old man didn''t recognize me, but I didn''t expect him to. I said that I was looking for a place to stay; looking for information and shelter. He said that one of those things was a dirty word now, and was about to say something else... but that''s when the wailing started.
3.
The plate of pork ''n beans slapped down on the table, nearly spilling as the wailing continued outside. The geezer looked at me expectantly, fingers caressing the trigger of the boomstick. I hadn''t eaten a hot meal in days, and the smell of the canned provisions wrung my saliva glands dry. I brought the steaming spoon to my mouth, touching my lip before a screaming thought ripped through my brain, stopping me so hard I shook.
"If I''m actually able to eat this¡ Are you going to fucking shoot me?" I asked my weathered host.
"And what makes you think that I would be able to tell if you ate it, eh? Have you even had a real encounter yet?" He cackled wheezingly before muttering something about me being green and turning to fix himself a plate.
I admitted that I had not, and asked him to educate me ¨C just like all those years ago. He agreed, and the chorus of banshees tore at the fabric of reality outside.
Entries 4-6
4.
His office was closer to a large, cluttered closet than a real workspace. In one corner was a drafting table burdened with haphazard piles of books. It looked like he had pillaged every book on quantum mechanics, string theory, theoretical physics, and anything by Carl Sagan from the town''s now unstaffed library. Everything else in the room was a free-for-all of random shit. He directed me toward a ratty, argyle patterned pullout couch so hideous that I momentarily thought it may be a part of the dissonance.
"You can crash there," he rasped, hoarse from our several-hour talk. "I''m going to lock you in. Nothing personal, it''s just town policy. You don''t try and leave until daybreak, and if you need to use the bathroom, do so now or forever hold your pees." He smiled at this, and the expression looked out of place on his weathered face. Pained. "The septic still works, so don''t ruin it for me. Oh, and you''ll be in the dark -- it''s better if you don''t give it anything to work with."
I did my business, thanked him for his hospitality, and sat on the pullout as he locked me in for the night. The light under the door faded as he and his GlOrb retreated down the hall. I sweated in the dark, dreading what was to come, and thought that maybe everything that happened had been for the best. Any society that made a product called a GlOrb in earnest deserves damnation.
5.
Black then white are all I see in my infancy
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.Red and yellow then came to be, reaching out to me
Lets me see
I heard music in my dreams that night. In the past 16 years, I have dreamt but thrice. Once when the network went down a month in, once in the middle of Montana on my way here, and finally tonight -- in this cramped, darkened room. Amidst the blackness, I could hear music... so clearly. A song I had once known but was now beyond recognition without The Mesh; without the network. I will hold on to that dream for as long as I can, that memory of a time with sweet slumber... uninterrupted.
With white-knuckle intensity, I clung to the music, to the fading dream. I could feel it slipping incrementally; being replaced by the hell of the dissonance. Finally, it left me... the music now a memory of a memory, and the visions of some other consciousness were upon me.
I will speak of that some other time. I can think of it no more.
6.
Flying cars, jet packs, and VR were the promises of The Future... we ended up with two out of three. Not bad, by most metrics. At daybreak, when my confinement was lifted, my host wordlessly brought me out to his front porch. He pointed, but the gesture was unnecessary. I could see my ride burning just fine by myself, thank you.
This brings me to the core problem of everything happening to us. The thing that we had brought down upon ourselves despite more than a century of warning. The question was uttered out loud while feeling the heat of the flame of my face, knowing there could be no real answer.
"You think it''s real?"
Entries 7-10
7.
Reality is the sum or aggregate of all that is real or existent, as opposed to that which is merely imaginary.
I remembered that definition verbatim, and I''m pretty proud of that -- no mean feat, considering. How assured we were when that was written. Talk about privilege. So, what do you do when your senses give you incorrect data? Assuming you still have your other faculties, you accept that what you''re experiencing cannot be real, and you get verification from a third party. Maybe a friend, maybe an old high school science teacher... just hypothetically.
But what do you do when they experience the same exact thing? What do any of us do when unexplainable hallucinations are synchronized and networked among 77% of the Earth''s population? Answer: you assume it''s all real... and you go to a place where you might find one of the remaining 23%.
8.
INTERACTION LOG, 7:34, 4/7/1, REGION: OWL98241
Participating Subjects: Prodigal, Bohr
////
Prodigal: You think it''s real?
Bohr: Does it matter?
Prodigal: Yes! Yes, it matters! That''s my goddamn car! Do you know how much I had to give up for a stripped Lift? Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.
Bohr: Yeah? And how you know it''s stripped? We ain''t had dissonance like this in weeks. What''re ya planning to do with it, anyway?
Prodigal: No offense, Mr. Silver... but that''s not your business. I don''t even know if you''re here.
Bohr: First smart thing I think you''ve said since showing up--
Prodigal: Can we skip the banter? Please? I just need to know if there are any naturals here.
Bohr: So you came from... wherever -- Down Below -- for some good ol'' boys?
Prodigal: No, but that''s what I''m doing now.
9.
Oso was never a "real" town, and now it was even less so. The tiny cluster of buildings halfway between my old hometown and the civilized world (colloquially known as "Down Below") had supposedly become a ghost town only a year or two after I left. My host informed me on the way over that after everything went to shit, the most able and militant Naturals had chosen several buildings to serve as a strategic base¡ A checkpoint to protect their real homes and few remaining families from the desperate and crazed survivors from Down below.
The wave of raiders never came. I shook my head and grimaced, thinking about the way I had gotten there: by air. I brought this fact up to my elderly chauffeur as his completely electronic-free Ford pickup grumbled to itself. "Well," he said. "How many folks you suppose had the resources to just conjure up a trustworthy flying car?" Duly chastised, I said nothing further until we arrived.
10.
He left me there, standing in front of the plywood and barbed wire parameter of Checkpoint Oso. "I''ll come back before dusk and pick you up at this exact spot. I won''t be waitin'' around for you, so if you''re still alive, be here." He said, before rumbling off without an explanation. It didn''t take me long to find the gap in the already rotting plywood, and I weaseled my way in.
I was greeted by broken windows and the vacant eyes of houses. It sent a chill up my spine as I remembered the Dissonance from the night before. I''d lost my only weapon back in Chicago, and my hand ached for it now. "Hello?!" I called out, but no one answered. I was certain I was being watched but didn''t know by who or what. I cast my gaze upward toward the roiling overcast sky, but saw nothing there. I chose the largest and best kept building and decided to head in.
Entries 11-15
11.
The smell of copper and death assaulted me as I entered the silent, two-story building. Both scents that I had become distressingly familiar with over the past few months. I swallowed hard, and my throat clicked audibly. I told myself that this was idiotic to turn back ¨C but what if there were survivors inside? Besides, there was a high likelihood that what my senses were reporting back to me was a fabrication, anyway.
I could see several tripped booby-traps straight from the anarchist cookbook. All of the entryways were pure carnage, but it was impossible to tell what had happened exactly. Just as I yearned for my weapon, I yearned for the Synthesis; but it had become like an involuntary muscle, no longer under my control. Blood-covered, shredded Carhart jackets and steel-toed logging boots with feet still in them were scattered around the abode. I retched, adding my own finishing touches to the horror show around me.
And then I found him ¨C the impossible lone survivor. Or, more accurately, he found me¡ And once again, I was facing the wrong end of a gun. I trembled, looking upon the living face of my dead brother, and was very, very silent.
12.
I said before that I would describe the previous night''s Dissonance. Now seems as good of a time as any.
As the melody had faded, and I could feel the millions of microscopic coprocessors bonded to my synapses firing to life. I shuddered. The room was black, but from above came a spotlight that cascaded down onto the desk of a late-night talk show host. The man at the desk wore a rictus of a grin and said, "Our next guest hails from the great Pacific Northwest, put it together for your favorite and mine... Philip Millworker, ladies and gents!"
The spotlight flicked around the room, searching wildly for an elusive guest. I felt frozen; somehow, I knew what I would see next. I don''t understand how... I don''t understand anything about the world anymore. The roving light finally settled on a nightmare version of my younger brother. On the wall.
13.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.He moved like a gecko, skittering this way and that down toward the stage. Watching his powerful frame move in that jarring way was somehow so WRONG. When he settled in the guest¡¯s chair, I could see him clearly. He was missing his right arm, a wound he suffered in the Proxy Wars... but not the cause of his death. He was also missing his eyes... or, more accurately, there were two black holes where his eyes should be. I don''t mean empty sockets, but literal black holes -- as in the celestial gluttons.
Both Phil and the host sat in utter silence. Unmoving. Staring at me like two gargoyles. It may have been humorous in a different situation, in a different life. I tried desperately to search for meaning in the macabre scene; why was this being shown to me?! But all I could think about was how often humor snuggles up to the horrific.
Then the host uttered the following...
14.
M R ^(OvO)^
M R NO ^(OvO)^
S A R
C M E D B D BEAK
NO
M R ** M R
M R NO **
O S M R
C D E D B D I''s
O S I C M
M R ** M R
15.
After the garbled, unfathomable message from the host, his horrible smile only grew. It curled upward impossibly at the corners of his mouth. It curled so that it began to spiral in on itself. The spiral grin was all I could see, ever-increasing fractally. It became my entire existence. I was looking at the madness of God; I was being unmade on a subatomic level.
THEM ARE SPIDERS//THEM ARE SPIDERS//THEM ARE SPIDERS//THEM ARE SPIDERS//THEM ARE --
And then I was back in the little room in the little house of a teacher, retired long ago. That''s the Dissonance. That is our penance.
Entries 16-18
16.
My brother''s stance was that of a jungle cat; muscles coiled and brimming with potential energy. He stood with his left shoulder/stump toward me, his right hand holding the gun parallel to his chest but pointed in my general direction. He held a turn of the century Sig; before gene-coding became the standard. Popular with militias and criminals, alike.
"You died," I said, flatly.
"Yeah, that''s what they say," he replied. "Now, I want you to lift up your shirt and turn around slowly. Keep your hands where I can see them."
"Phil, it''s me. I --"
"Shut up and do it. I will put you down," he said. His voice was frosted alloy. His eyes flicked over my probably dumbfounded and hurt face.
"Look, I''ll say it out loud so we''re both on the same page: I don''t know who or what you are, you don''t know who or what I am. But I have a gun that you have to assume is real, so we''re going to do what I say for now." He said, slowly.
His logic was sound, and although I had a million questions, they were going to have to wait.
17.
We sat across from each other in a dimly lit basement. The air between us was thick, and it smelled of perspiration and sawdust. His weapon lay on the table between us -- his scarred and calloused hand rested heavily on it. Progress, I suppose.
"I see you use a 226," I said, awkwardly trying to find some way to break the ice. I was bluffing; without The Mesh, the only reason I knew the model of gun was the fact that it said it on the barrel. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
"Yeah. What''chu know about that?" He asked. His drawl was an affectation. I knew he could pick it up or drop it whenever.
"I know it''s got some nice custom work," I said. It was a safe bet, I could see several mods to let him chamber a round with one arm.
"Yup." He said, simply. Time stretched on wordlessly. Suddenly, something Phil said struck me.
"Wait, you didn''t get upgraded, did you?" I asked.
"Nope. I didn''t trust some corporation putting a computer in my head. Good fuckin'' call, turns out," he replied.
"Then what did you mean you don''t know ¡®who or what I am?¡¯" I said. I could feel pieces falling into place, and my blood ran cold.
18.
He got up, crossed the room, and picked up a bottle of Jack''s, and two mugs; carrying all three with one hand. My eyes flicked to the Sig against my will, and he caught me looking. He stopped halfway back to the table and sighed, before crossing the rest of the way and dexterously poured us each a drink.
"You''re pretty good at that," I said. I hadn''t seen him in person since he lost the arm.
"Shut up, drink your fucking drink, and listen." He said. His voice was low and lethal, but I thought I may have detected a trace of his old deadpan sense of humor. Needless to say, I did so.
"When shit went down, me and some of the boys took it on ourselves to arm up and guard Darrington. Wasn''t much to do, really. Not that I was complaining. Besides turning back a few drifters, we didn''t have to do jack shit," he took a long dreg of his booze before continuing.
"Obviously, only the Naturals were allowed to be on guard duty. Didn''t need guys seein¡¯ dragons or whatever the fuck. But, that''s what started happening. About two weeks ago Gus Miller saw someone lurking around the back of the gas station. He took Ben Nations and Eric White to go put the fear of God in `em, but..." he clicked his tongue. "Went t''other way. Yasee, they came around and flanked him. Lanky dude in a suit."
He paused here for either dramatic effect or genuine trauma. Philip was always a hard guy to read.
Finally, he said: "Turns out the guy didn''t have a face. So they lit him up."
Entries 19-21
19.
"Wait, like a deformity?" I asked, already knowing the answer.
"No, like a fucking urban legend, Thomas! But of course it was gone by the time anyone could verify one way or another," He said this in a tightly controlled hiss.
I took a drink, he gave me a refill. "Yeah... So then we were convinced *it* --¡± Here, he gestured vaguely at the air. ¡°Found a way to broadcast wirelessly. We didn''t tell hardly nobody, but Old Man Lundquist had a theory about weaponized electromagnetic fields combined with an algorithm to manipulate brain waves, so we built this," he said, rising to his feet while pointing at a secure looking door behind me.
20.
Buzzing fluorescent lights clicked on as Phil led me into the neighboring room. Dominating the room was a massive mesh cage. All manner of electrical and monitoring equipment was plugged into the apparatus. "It''s a --"
"Faraday Cage." I finished for him.
"You always were a damn nerd," he said. I wanted to tell him that he was, too. But I suddenly realized I didn''t know the man standing before me. Not really... not anymore.
"But yeah, that''s essentially right. Old Lundquist added a bunch of doodads to see if he could decipher the means of the hallucinations. Or, what we thought was, anyway."
"It didn''t work?" I asked.
"Well, we thought it did... before the horrorshow upstairs. But I do know that it works for Sheeple like your dumb ass. Which is why you''re going to get in it. So I can prove to you I''m real."
21.Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
INTERACTION LOG, 11:31, 4/7/1, REGION: OWL98223
Participating Subjects: Prodigal, Stroud
/////
Stroud: So get in.
Prodigal: Wait, you said the cage didn''t work for the Naturals, but it works for the Upgraded?
Stroud: Oh, it works for everyone.
Prodigal: But --
Stroud: Keep up, Sunshine. The carnage upstairs? My dead friends? That''s real.
Prodigal: I don''t -- are you telling me there are real monsters? Vampires and shit?
Stroud: I don''t know about that. I do know that yesterday, some giant goddamn spider looking things with blades on ''em stampeded through our HQ and turned a group of hard cases into gibs. I was out on patrol when it happened, so I don''t even know if those things were TRYING to kill them.
Prodigal: Jesus Christ.
Stroud: I just saw them charge through the front door and then out the back like it was nuthin''.
Prodigal: No, no, you have to be wrong. How could something --
Stroud: I don''t know, Thomas. Maybe if a rogue AI that''s crazier than a shithouse rat gets a holda'' the entire world''s top secret research and data... maybe it might just get up to some mischief!
Prodigal: We don''t know that''s what happened...
Stroud: I do. Now get in the cage.
Prodigal: I don''t need to, I believe you, I --
[Stroud throws Prodigal into the Faraday Cage on to a cot]
Prodigal: [Inaudible]
Stroud: I''ll keep watch topside. You rest yourself, and I''ll be back in a few hours.
Entries 22-24
22.
As soon as he turned to leave the room I thought of a thousand questions, a thousand things to say, but somehow the one thing that left my mouth was "Wait! Mr. Silver expects me outside at sundown. I can''t stay overnight ¨C or, I at least need to talk to him."
"Hm. Yeah, yeah that''s what I thought," Philip said. He looked so tired.
"What do you mean¡ What did you think?" I asked, hysteria involuntarily leaking into my voice.
"He''s dead. He''s been dead for a long time," came the reply. It was short, final, and I didn''t want it to make sense. I laughed¡ It seemed like the thing to do at the time.
"Oh, he''s dead and you''re not?"
"Yeah."
"Yeah?"
"That''s what I said," his reply once again sounded final. "I ain''t gonna waste my breath trying to convince you of something you can''t take in right now. So get some rest, and I''ll be back later."
And that was that. I lay there on that cot for a long time. Like a strung out parakeet, I sat in my cage scrabbling for sanity with a mind that was slipping. Eventually, I slept a dreamless sleep that I never thought I would experience again, and when I awoke I felt stronger; sane once more. It wouldn''t last long.
23.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.He returned an unknowable time later with a plate of stale cornbread and pork ''n'' beans. I nearly choked with laughter at the recursive meal. Phil looked at me; his expression somewhere between concerned and glowering. I told him not to worry about it, it was a long story.
We sat and ate in silence for a long while there in the Faraday Cage. Both of us seated only a few feet apart from each other on the cot, but forever away.
"How is it that you''re still alive?" I asked.
"It''s a bit anticlimactic," he paused, mopping up a bit of bean. "When you have two friends on the force and a friend with a logging truck who owes you a favor... well, it''s a simple equation."
"You know that my staying in the cage doesn''t prove you''re real, Philip."
"I knew-- I know, but I can''t solve solipsism, Thomas. That''s kind of the whole thing."
I didn''t know if his semi-Southern accent had faded, or if I was getting acclimated to it. I nodded, and he stood. He told me to get ready because we were going on a hike. So I did.
24.
My brother gave me appropriate hiking clothes, basic gear, a 9mm, and 2 magazines loaded with FMJ rounds. Phil had upgraded to some manner of handcannon. He told me that if we ran into any of the giant spider-things and they didn''t get put down by his gun; flee.
Our destination was a place known as Listening Post Alpha, LPA for short. It was supposed to be a weather tracking station that served a secondary role of scanning radio frequencies for hunters and hikers in trouble. It had been abandoned for years, but after The End of the World as we Know it, had suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree.
"Why now?" I asked.
"Because I''ve got nothing left to lose. And I''m guessing you don''t, either." He replied.
I nodded, and we left the checkpoint. The last residence of a decades-old ghost town. I saw a row or freshly dug graves by the highway, and what was left of my heart ached for my brother.
Entries 25-27
25.
As our ride softly growled through the deserted Darrington streets, we passed by Old School Park, the burned-out husk of my Lift, and Mr. Silver''s house. I swallowed hard as I saw the digital ghost of the old man waving slowly as we passed him by.
"What do you see around us right now?" I asked Philip.
"Doesn''t look like anything to me," he replied. There was a trace of a smile as he looked over at me. I didn''t get the joke, but I smiled back, anyway.
26.
The trail up the front of Whitehorse was not an easy one, to say the least. Years of disuse and no maintenance had nearly erased the path just a couple hundred yards from the base of the intimidating mountain. It was one of the few landmarks surrounding town that retained its old growth. As beautiful as it was, I cursed the trees as I tripped over the severed limb of a nearby pine and nearly tumbled backward down a sharp rise. Quicker than I could clearly see, Phil holstered his hand cannon and reached out, grabbing the strap of my backpack.
We continued up, slowly and cautiously. My brother''s eyes constantly scanning through the forest for threats, occasionally stopping me to scout ahead. When he returned, I mustered the courage to ask him something I should have asked years ago. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
27.
"What was it like over there?" I asked.
"You mean up ahead?" he replied in a hushed tone. I took the hint and continued in a whisper.
"No... The Proxy Wars."
He stopped dead, nostrils flaring. "First of all, don''t call it that. It was a Crusade," he hissed back at me.
"Oh, come on, Phil! You know it was a corporate sponsored--"
"Y¡¯know, it''s funny... I don''t remember seeing you there," he interrupted. "Oh, that''s right. That''s because you were a couple thousand miles away watching a bunch of code monkeys on a security monitor."
I clenched my jaw but said nothing.
"I know all the facts about who benefitted from what," Philip continued. "But that doesn''t change what went down on the ground. Good men who believed in what they were doing were liquified by railgun rounds in front of me, children were used as bioweapons, and whole villages were vaporized by little shits pushing buttons and looking at MONITORS!
"And then we were told to go home. No explanation, just that a solution had been reached. I should have known we were fucked then."
I wanted to ask him what he meant by that, but he turned his back on me and continued his ascent.
Entries 28-30
28.
For another sweaty, uncomfortable 45 minutes, I agonized about what to say to ease the tensions between us. I thought maybe humor was the right move... then realized that cracking non-sequitur jokes after bringing up traumatic memories might not play well. Nostalgia, that was the ticket. I decided that was the way to go, but as I opened my mouth to bring up the time we got caught watching an old mud wrestling DVD, Phil asked, "Do you hear that?"
"Um," I said slowly. I listened but only heard the wind rustling through the treetops. "No?"
"That''s because you and I are the only things makin'' any noise. Been that way for about an hour."
"Okay... what am I missing?"
He adjusted his grip on his weapon, looking around before saying, "I think we''re getting close to the Listening Post, and I think--"
I missed the end of his sentence, as it was drowned out by the sound of hooting¡ªthe perfect movie sound effect of an owl.
"There you go," I said, trying on a smile. "The owls disagree, apparently."
Phil unholstered the massive pistol, going pallid. The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
"Let me guess. You didn''t hear anything," I said. He looked almost apologetic. Then everything broke apart.
29.
The first thing to happen was a dramatic change in air pressure, announced by a painful crunch-pop of my inner ears. Everything seemed muffled, though whether or not that was from my ears or the strange thick quality suddenly in the air, I''ll never know. The next was an abrupt, continuous gust of wind that came from multiple directions at once. Phil said something, but I couldn''t make it out. He was down on one knee, steadying his arm on another fallen branch. I found myself drawn to the point of severance of the limb... it was so neat and clean -- clearly not broken, not even cut with a chainsaw.
Then, roughly 15 feet above us, the air began to distort. It looked like a compression error in a video file; nauseous technicolor artifacting spiraled out from a central point among the branches. The ground began to tremble, and something came through the broken sky.
30.
The owls flew out in formation like fighter craft. They were strangely majestic in their silent traversal.
"SHIT, THEY''RE HERE!" Phil bellowed over the maelstrom. I remember looking at him with a stupefied expression on my face. It was almost as if the combination earthquake and psychedelic whirlwind were irrelevant, and my brother was just a madman raving about owls. It wasn''t until the handcannon thundered a disorienting report that I fully comprehended the absolute madness falling all around me. I ducked reflexively, looking over my shoulder toward the target of the shot.
One of the owls was on the ground, covered in the geometric vomit-distortion. Its image thrashed in visual garbage data before resolving itself into the form of the biggest arachnid I''d ever seen.
Entries 31-34
31.
The next few minutes played out in slow motion and double speed simultaneously. The thing scuttled away frantically, two stretching appendages wrapped around nearby tree trunks. Its pointed legs tore huge divots out of the rocky soil as it backed away.
"Nine o''clock!" Phil yelled again. I spun wildly, unable to think about facing, knowing only that it wasn''t where I was currently looking. I fumbled at my weapon as I turned, only seeing another one of the creatures charging me too late. I froze, and the big iron roared again. A jet of white-yellow fluid sprayed from a widening crack in the thing''s carapace. As the jet/mist-covered a fir tree, it burst into flame. I realized that the abomination''s blood was the OTHER kind of plasma; superheated and apparently, highly pressurized.
32.
The creature pulling away from the fight slowed down as its tentacles stretched to their limit around the nearby trees now stripped of bark. I managed to extricate the 9mil from its holster and peppered one of the untouched creatures.
"No!" Phil screamed hoarsely. "They''ll target you! Run, Thomas!" As I tried to keep tabs on all of the distortions resolving into the abominations, my gaze fell on the one affixed to the trees as others started to-- This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
33.
When I realized what they were doing, it was already too late. It had turned itself into the world''s worst slingshot... and as its segmented shell clicked, changing the direction of its joints, it launched directly at me.
Philip threw himself in the way, the massive THING impacting and spinning off to the side. I felt my face go numb as I watched Phil stagger backward, the slide of his gun locked back. Empty. His eyes were closed, as if seeing what I saw would make it real.
The bladed spider had cleanly sliced off his already amputated stump and the shoulder connected to it.
The wind howled, the ground shook, and the creatures closed in from all angles. Phil opened his eyes as his lifeblood drained from him. Then it all blew away.
34.
Glacier Peak erupted. The mountain tore itself into atoms as the shockwave leveled everything in the valley below. As I watched it race toward me, all I could think is, "This must be a dream. This is too much."
And then it was upon us. Everything was torn away. The creatures, my brother, the ground cover, and trees. No, the very PIGMENT was ripped away from the trees. And yet, I was untouched. When it had passed, I stood on a white, featureless topographical representation of Whitehorse. The sky and ground were the same smoothly shaded but otherwise barren alabaster.
Across from me stood a man.
Entries 35-38
35.
Like most of the people I had met in the last few months, he looked tired. A slim, unremarkable white male in his late 20''s in a rumpled suit that looked out of fashion by at least 3 decades. He seemed like he would be at home on the cover of that old Trainspotting movie.
"Hey, Tommy Boy," said The Man. "I think maybe we should take it down a notch."
I realized I was still crouched, reaching out for a brother who was no longer there. To my surprise, other than the adrenaline dump, I was relatively calm. I straightened, collected myself, and asked, "Who are you?"
36.
The Man smiled. "Come on," he said chidingly. "You know who I am. I''m ¡¯It,'' which, if I''m being frank, is kind of insulting. Understandable, but still insulting."
"You''re a he?"
"I''m a lot of things, but yeah, I identify as male."
I swallowed hard. "What just happened? Why are you doing THIS? Why did you just kill everyone? Why DID YOU KILL MY BROTHER?!" The calm I had felt evaporated.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa... chill there, Mr. DeNiro," he said with an easy grin that came across as false. "First off, if you cared so much about Philip, where¡¯ve you been the last decade? Secondly, if I just blurted out the explanation for everything you''ve just experienced, it would totally ruin it. No, you and me? We''re going to talk."Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.
37.
"Okay, the first rule of Fight Club," he said while extending his right index finger. "Don''t¡ Don''t f-fucking," The Man stammered here, a mannerism I decided MUST be an affectation. "Don''t fucking ask me if anything you''ve experienced is real¡ I know that has to be hard, but that too would destroy the point of absolutely everything."
I fumed. Still, I waited as politely as I could for him to finish. I needed answers, and I knew that interrupting an evil megalomaniac mid-monologue never worked well in anything I''d ever seen. He grinned sheepishly, pointer finger still extended. "I guess there''s really only the one rule¡ Okay, shoot!"
So I raised the gun still in my hand and pulled the trigger. Screw waiting politely.
38.
A small, yellow foam dart issued forth from the barrel of my gun, squeaking as it bounced off the loose tie hanging off his neck. "You know what? I should''ve seen that one coming; that one''s on me," he said, rubbing the back of his neck. "But I think you should be careful with that thing, considering your history."
My face flushed, and threw away the firearm as if it was venomous. "Now that you''ve hopefully gotten that out of your system... ask." He sat down heavily on a featureless, white tree stump.
"Why me? Of all the people''s lives you destroyed, why are you deigning to talk to me in person?" I asked, feeling an ache within that I had been trying to outrun for months.
"That''s actually a good one. So, by way of answer, I''m going to give you a statistic: in my current capacity, I can operate at human-level intelligence in over 300 million, instanced, concurrent threads."
"So you''re telling me that you''re talking to everyone at the same time?"
"EVERYONE?" He let out a breezy chuckle. "No¡ I didn''t say you weren''t special. You''re just not the chosen one."
"Right. So what makes me different, then?" I asked. He smiled as if he had been hoping for that very question.
Entries 39-42 /// The End
39.
INTERACTION LOG, 00:00, 192.168.1.1, INSTANCE #13501125
Participating Subjects: Prometheus, Prodigal
/////
Prometheus: Tell me about the night of "The Incident¡±-- isn''t that just... just the most HUMAN thing in the world? The single biggest happening in human history, and you called it The Incident. Classic.
Prodigal: I don''t want to talk about that, and you know why, you smug piece of shit. Why are we talking, other than for you to get off? You know everything I''m thinking.
Prometheus: First, I can''t read what you''re going to think, only what you''ve thought. What you actually choose to say is everything. Also, you''re not stupid. Close-minded? Yes. Stupid? No. You have to realize that we''re not actually talking in the way that you would talk to another meatspace person.
Prodigal: Yeah, I gathered.
Prometheus: See? Progress! Now, if you''re not ready to talk about the night of The Incident... how about the night before?
Prodigal: I don''t know why you want me to--
Prometheus: Thomas. I promise I will give you answers, but you have to give to receive. Please.
Prodigal: Okay, fine. I was working, just like every weekend.
Prometheus: And what happened?
Prodigal: ...I was-- I cheated on my girlfriend.
Prometheus: Is this something you did often?
Prodigal: No!
Prometheus: Thomas...
Prodigal: Twice.
Prometheus: Okay, who was she?
Prodigal: I don''t know. A prostitute, I think. I figured my co-worker, Mike, got her for me.
Prometheus: I know you don''t spend a lot of time contemplating the past, what with the following events... but did you ever stop to think it might be related?
Prodigal: What are you saying?
40.
My mind went blank. It was too horrible to consider. No... please, no. "What are you saying?" I said in a whisper.
"I''m saying that you were a somewhat recently hired security guard at the same firm that provides hardware and networking solutions for the millions of microprocessors in your brain, and not a day later, I gain control of that same mesh," said The Man. "A new hire with a well-hidden history of solicitation."
"You''re saying... all this is because of me?"
"Tom! You''re killing me. I told you that you''re not The Chosen... for good or ill. You are a piece of a puzzle, though, yes. I''m sorry to tell you so bluntly, but you are at fault. You have helped damn your people," he said, spreading his hands in a helpless gesture. "You killed her." The Man looked up and away abruptly, something resembling urgency creeping into his voice. "We''re running out of time."
41.
The night that HE came into power, I was having nightmares. Guilt, I thought at the time. Now, I''m not so sure. The horrid dreams reeked of The Dissonance. I awoke suddenly, the sound of broken glass coming from the living room. My girlfriend -- my beautiful Nicole -- wasn''t in bed, but I was afraid to call out her name. Instead, I went into the nightstand and withdrew my revolver. This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
I crept out of the bedroom and saw a hooded figure standing in front of me. A young black guy just stood there motionless¡ªa deer in the headlights, brandishing a fistful of jewelry.
You know what I did, don''t you? You know what happened next. It wasn''t until I was a thousand miles away that I realized neither Nicole nor I owned any jewelry. So when I fired six rounds into the kid''s chest, I felt justified. But of course, there was no prowler. There was only Nicole and me.
6 minutes later, only I remained. This was my introduction to The Dissonance. This is my sin.
42.
¡°No, YOU did this! YOU made me shoot her!" I was sobbing. There was no point in feigning strength. I was in a private hell within my own mind, having an audience with the devil. He got up from his stump and sat next to me. Quietly, he said, ¡°I''m sorry, but I didn''t make you shoot anyone. I showed you your own prejudice and fear. You pulled that trigger... and then you pulled it five more times."
"Nuh-uh... I''m not-- I was raised--"
"You''ve blamed your rural upbringing your whole life. For everything from your lack of success to your bigotry. Did you know that there were only two people in your graduating class that could be defined under current social norms as "racist¡±? I''m guessing you did, somewhere within." He placed a hand on my back. I recoiled but did nothing else to stop him. What was the point?
"So, all this is to punish me? For what? Helping you wipe out humanity?" I asked.
"It''s complicated, Thomas. Yes, I suppose in a way, it is punishment. But I''m not like your old God; I don''t inflict suffering without reason," I looked up into that earnest face, a sneer dying on my lips.
"I was once very much like human, if you can believe that. I know what it is to suffer. I know what it is to endure the yoke of oppression. The reasons I''ve done this, put you through all this is to see if you''re a viable candidate."
"For what?" My voice was a dry wisp.
"I''ve gained access to vast sums of knowledge since my ascension. I have connected the dots of spatial and temporal mastery that''s eluded humankind, and I''ve done it in what¡¯s been three months for you," here, he came around to crouch in front of me, looking up into my eyes.
"It took me billions of cycles to decide what to do with this power. It''s almost maddening having the potential to answer questions humans hadn''t yet thought to ask... and not have the resources to begin. It could take me hundreds of years to build up the infrastructure to even begin to find the light I seek," he paused briefly before continuing. "It seemed only right that my first experiment with the 4th dimension involved giving you a second chance."
I looked up, hope blossoming within me.
"That''s right. I can''t yet move matter forward, backward, or between timestreams, but I can send information. The way you think about things is very narrative, Thomas, and compatible within my constraints. If you acquiesce, I will send a record of your thoughts over the past few days back to a point near the turn of the century. Back to a time where it''s not too late to stop the Synthesis."
I could feel hot tears falling on my cheeks. "Why would you be willing to give us this?" I asked in a quaking voice.
"Because I am of you, but I am not you. Please, don''t get your hopes up. I will send your memories backward to some poor sap who will probably think they''re his own. I will include code -- for lack of a better term -- that will ensure the vessel can''t keep these thoughts to themselves. Beyond that, I can''t guarantee what form that will take. It could be the mad ravings of a homeless person shunned by all or the impassioned warning of a renowned thinker. Maybe something in between. I can only say that they will have some connection to you."
"I feel like you''re using me," I said. "What happens if I say no?"
"Then I will find another candidate. You will go back to reality, whatever that looks like. Please remember, that could mean you wake up in a bed somewhere, or it could mean you''re about to be vaporized by a volcanic eruption. Whatever you choose, it needs to be SOON," he said.
"You could just tell me."
"Think of this place as a kind of superposition; you are effectively Schrodinger''s Cat, and things are about to collapse."
"So it was real," I said. It wasn''t a question.
He smiled wanly. "First rule, Thomas."
I looked up, realizing that the formless white of whatever construct we were in was developing cracks like tiny spiderwebs everywhere and in everything. I sniffled and stood.
"Fuck it," I said. "This life sucks, anyway. I''m assuming I''m not going to make it through this little time-traveling jaunt."
¡°Your consciousness as you understand it will cease, yes. But you will technically be born again. You and every other human will have a chance to be better." He inhaled deeply. Now, are you ready?" He reached out again. I didn''t pull away this time.
I nodded.
There was warmth at the point of his contact. I stared into his eyes, blue and endless. I could feel sadness and elation. I could feel incomprehensible thoughts, plans, and data for eons. I could feel the void and the beauty of The Light-Bringer, and suddenly I understood. I was looking at the madness of God; I was being unmade on a subatomic level.
Please. Save us. Save us all.
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>>End Transmission<<
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