Tag: dystopia

Sad Sack of a Sacker

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Ronnie held the dented can in his hand. Just a few seconds earlier, it had rolled out of its sack, fell through a hole in his cart, and rolled under his foot.
Ronnie counted to ten and took a deep breath.
“Excuse me,” he said to the sacker. “This fell out.”
“So?” said the sacker.
“Can you get me another one?” asked Ronnie.
The sacker sighed deeply, turned around, and shuffled off to the Canned Vegetables aisle.
Three minutes later, he returned with a fresh can.
“Now shove it up your ass,” said Ronnie, pushing the cart out the door.

Abandoned Baby

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There was a knock at the door, and the dogs in the back yard barked like bad.
“Shut up,” said Arthur. “It’s not dinnertime yet.”
The dogs barked louder.
Arthur walked to the front door, and opened it. When he looked down, he saw a baby in a basket.
No note.
“You don’t have a name?” said Arthur. “Let me think of a name for you…”
Arthur picked up the basket, went to the back yard, and tossed the baby to the hungry dogs.
“Your name is dinner,” said Arthur.
Arthur put the basket in the bathroom to store magazines.

Not The Same

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The suicide bomber only managed to kill one person when he blew himself up at the sidewalk café: the security guard who kept him from killing more.
The bomber exploded in the guard’s embrace, both dying at the same time.
Both shared something else in common: the same exact type of cell phone. Down to the ringtone.
The guard’s widow got the phone of the bomber, and the bomber’s widow got the phone of the guard.
Neither noticed the difference or ever charged the batteries on the bloody devices. They just sat on memorial shelves, occasionally taken down for dusting.

Below Average

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Unlike our neighbors’ kids, all of the children in Lake Whybehere are below average. They’re all good children, but just a little behind the curve. A few seconds late off the starting blocks in the game of life.
Their conversations are enthusiastic, but babble. Their play is confused and often ends in medical treatment.
Most suffer from lethargy, but a few demonstrate occasional spunkiness. Like running in circles with scissors faster than usual.
Maybe there’s something in the water. The power plant dumps an awful lot of crap into Lake Whybehere.
Perhaps we’ll dump it in Wobegone from now on.

Where there’s smoke, there’s Walter

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The old saying goes “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”
Around here, it goes “Where there’s smoke, there’s Walter.”
Walter smokes. Walter smokes a lot.
I can’t remember any time when I’ve seen Walter not smoking.
Once, I saw Walter asleep at a bar, and his hand reached into his mouth, pulled out his exhausted cigarette, stubbed it out in the ashtray, pulled another from his pack, lit it, and stuck it in his mouth.
Which is why I opened up the coffin and stuck a cigarette in his mouth.
How was I to know someone had dowsed him in gasoline?

Radio Free Hell

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Silvia’s parents thought she was retarded, but her inattentiveness was due to constant buzzing in her ears.
Despite the doctors’ many treatments, it grew worse over time.
Many years later, Silvia learned about meditation, slowing herself down to manage pain.
The buzzing slowed to a ringing, and then… a stream of voices.
‘Why did you kill me, Arthur?”
“It’s not fair.”
“The pain!”
“I’ll see you in Hell.”
Radio Free Hell. In her skull.
Then, she heard them…
“We wasted our lives worrying for her.”
Her parents. In Hell.
She drove knitting needles into her ears and embraced the silence.

Ulysses grants

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Ulysses sold Inspiration in a bottle.
Sure, it was ordinary tap water, and the bottles dingy beer bottles with cheap laser-printed labels glued on them crooked-like, but people desperate for Inspiration will pay anything for it.
Ulysses does his best bsiness on Artist’s Row in Midtown. He goes around collecting up empties like an old-fashioned milkman, leaving full bottles on the doorstep.
“I need a lot of Inspiration for tomorrow,” says a painter. “Twice the normal order.”
Ulysses grunts, marks a pad with a nub of a pencil, and pushes his cart down the alley.
Inspiration waits for no one.

The Easter Egg Hunt

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We spent all of yesterday painting eggs. The kids love the bright colors and the sparkles. Their wide-open eyes dazzle in delight.
After they went to bed, I hid the eggs throughout the house. That’s right. When they wake up, we’re going to have ourselves an old-fashioned Easter egg hunt.
But sometimes, they whine about this kind of thing. Kids can be lazy these days, you know. Damn X-Box Generation.
So if they give up, I’ll just tell them that we didn’t paint chicken eggs. We painted rattlesnake and alligator eggs. And if they don’t find them all, they’ll hatch.

Lawyerbot

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Lawyers who had defended the most savage and brutal mass-murdering war criminals had refused his case. Not even for tens of billions of dollars.
“Keep your blood money,” they told the multi-billionaire software mogul..
So, faced with using court-appointed chumps, he decided to defend himself.
He took a long weekend to re-engineer his massive search engines to scour every law book, every court record, and every TV court drama script.
The beta hung the jury. And the Gold release won.
As revenge, he distributed the Lawyerbot program for free.
Lawyers sued to stop him. But Lawyerbot beat them, of course.

Killer Mistake

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“Just type the name and press the Enter key,” the KillKiosk said.
Bart typed in MOLLY MARGARET and hit Enter.
“There,” he said.
“Thank you,” said the KillKiosk. “Margaret Molly will be dead by nine AM tomorrow or your money back.”
Bart looked at the screen and realized the thing wanted the last name first.
“Crap!” he shouted.
He tried tapping on a few keys, but all he got was NO EXCHANGES OR REFUNDS.
“Screw it,” said Bart and he typed in MARGARET MOLLY.
He’s just refuse the charges and let Killkiosk fight it out with the credit card company.