Tag: dystopia

Biggest Fan

721290

Hundreds of millions of people adore Guitarman’s music, and every one of them claim to be “Guitarman’s Biggest Fan.”
You see, that’s the title track of his number one album: “Guitarman’s Biggest Fan.”
Would they swallow a snake for him? Hell yes.
Would they jump off of cliff for him? Oh, hell yes.
Some of Guitarman’s fans take the title literally and eat themselves into a bodymass competition.
They keep score online, constantly updating their weight.
Wait… Two-Ton Tommy’s gone? Dead?
Heart attack. The funeral’s Sunday.
That puts me in second place, Mom. Second place!
Pass the mashed potatoes.
Please?

Dancester

618157

They called it Dancester – the place to download dances.
Just put in your credit card, sync up your iMind, and you’re ready to dance like the best dancers do.
Of course, not everyone wants to pay for their dances. That’s when the pirated dances started to appear.
The Lords Of The Dance didn’t like their dances getting ripped off, but Dancester couldn’t do anything to stop it.
So a series of pirated dances commanding dancers to slash their throats appeared on pirate sites.
Nobody could prove anything, but the piracy ended quickly.
The Lords danced for joy at the news.

Locked

667368

I’m sure your computer guy sucks, but he’s nothing compared to our computer guy jerk Stan.
Stan once changed everybody’s email passwords, then when people asked what their new passwords were, he emailed them out to everyone.
As much as everyone complained, the company wouldn’t get rid of him. In fact, they gave him a raise and ordered him a company car.
The HR people were thoroughly disgusted, and then he showed up.
“Where’s my car?” asked Stan.
“It’s in your parking space,” the HR people said.
“Cool,” said Stan. “Where are the keys?”
“We locked them inside the car.”

The Devil’s Due

643080

Every day, the Devil puts himself on trial for all of his evil deeds.
The evidence is presented in its entirety, from the dawn of Creation to the moment the judge bangs his gavel.
Witnesses take the stand, present their testimony, and shuffle off to make room for the next victim of The Devil.
The Devil offers no defense, and he throws himself upon the mercy of the court.
Without fail, the jury always quickly finds him innocent.
The Devil scowls, and leaves the court a free man.
“Would they honestly find me guilty, I’d let them leave,” he says.

Prison For Life

600295

Seventy years ago, Allistar Muggs had been sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Turns out he’d sold his soul to The Devil so he could live forever.
Nobody believed him at first, but Allistar didn’t age a day as the years passed by. Nor did the increasingly brutal assassination attempts ever succeed.
He always seemed to heal up without so much as a scar, missing tooth, or torn-off finger. He’d wake up the next morning, same as the day they gave him a number to wear.
We sealed the freak in concrete and buried him in the prison yard.

Blind

723145

Like all of the test-tube psychics, Maria was born blind – genetically engineered to prevent her from seeing the physical world around her.
Instead, she saw the potential of the world around her. Meadows of possibilities and forests of decision-making trees wobbled through a fog of free-will.
Most of her group were passive observers, but Maria was one of the special ones. She could bend and shape her surroundings.
This was handy in important negotiations, and more than once she had wrestled an apocalyptic conclusion into an elegant and beautiful agreement.
It also kept her from walking into closed doors.

Goodnight, Bum

632267

After my daughter died and my wife left me, I missed a lot of things I had taken for granted.
The thing I missed most of all was reading bedtime stories.
I knew the stories by heart, we all do. But there’s something special about opening a book and reading aloud.
It’s not just the pictures. It’s something about that book. Holding it up while you’re sitting at the foot of the bed, nightlight’s on, covers pulled up.
Now, I go out into the city’s alleys and read bedtime stories to the homeless.
It’s not the same. Certainly smells worse.

Ice Cream Truck

500769

Explosions are ripping apart the skyline of the city, but the ice cream truck rolls on.
No music is playing, but not because the driver doesn’t want to be targeted. Those who would destroy his truck are hundreds of miles away from hearing it, manning the missile batteries and piloting the drones which unleash the death around him.
No, the music is off because there is no ice cream today.
The coolers are full, sure, but they are packed with the corpses of his neighbors.
He figured as long as the bombs were falling, why not settle a few scores?

Midnight in Munich

675027

It’s midnight in Munich.
There’s opera singers on every street corner, belting out arias for spare change.
Give ’em five euros and they’ll watch your car all night long.
They say it deters crime. And the tourists dig it, too.
I don’t. All this racket gives me a nasty headache.
Besides, there’s too many streets and not enough opera singers, so they have to deploy understudies and amateurs to fill the gaps.
I liked it better when we had cops.
Now hand over your wallet, American.
Forget the cash… I just want to see if there’s an aspirin in it.

The Finisher

620040

They call us Finishers.
When the subject has nothing more of use to give, we finish them off.
Now and then, something of use comes out, like a final drop of lemon juice from a squeezed and pulverized lemon.
We don’t care. We’re there to punish, not interrogate.
Some administrator got it in their head that Finishers should be licensed medical practitioners. Never mind that we have one purpose: to cause harm. We cannot take the Hippocratic Oath.
That administrator vanished the other day.
Want to hear a tape of them screaming, or would you like to see their tongue?