Staying up late.

Jim sits slouched on the couch, eyes at a squint as he bathed in the blue flickering glow of the tube. The thoughts that passed through his head were few and far between, half remembered moments in a catalogue of tiresome shit. ‘So and so was rude,’ ‘Kerry forgot her…’ ‘a black dog giving him the evil eye as he rode past on the 89a bus.’

A silent groan formed a silky slick layer of saliva around his plump bottom lip. Wanting to look away from the glow he found himself transfixed by it’s passivity, it was a bootleg zen state that would go far to numb him before his eyes shut for the night. The sounds and images were blended up in his mind into a runny paste; they refused to resolve into anything meaningful, like a baby staring up a mobile above it’s cot.

Eyes shut for the briefest of moments, the wave of which threatens to capsize him to sleep. Next door’s dog barked as it tugged on it’s chain and suddenly Jim was wide awake, bolt upright, fists clenched. A quick curse to the dog and the urge to go and give that arsehole a piece of his mind,
‘if only he had much more to give’ he though sinking back into the doughy feeling of his stupor. Maybe in the morning, but not now.

His eyes came back around to the tube, it had been a late night talk show, some washed up old hack had been plugging the latest in a long line of their fading mediocrity, it was good to know that even the rich and famous were little better in the long run. They just had everything already, so it didn’t matter that they too were duds.

Jim watched as the hosts words began to slow down. He’d stopped speaking to the has-been, who had been rabbiting on about his new knock off MP3. The camera was panning closer as the words rang out of the tube. They didn’t make any sense but he could tell they were words, like hearing russian or chinese, he couldn’t place this language. “Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn”
Welsh? Could be welsh. The host, with his slick smile and black pit eyes was staring right at him. Jim shuffled left then right and the camera panning to keep the stare dead on him.
“Well fuck, what is this skit,” he wondered, now sure this must have become some kind of cerebral comedy. The words came out again, not from the set; they leaked from the walls. Turning around slowly and carefully as though he might startle the noise, Jim craned around to see a bump the size of his fist poking out the wall. It was inside the wall, moving around like a maggot under the skin, a furuncular.

Jim saw the bulging veins on his arms and felt his stomach churning round and round. He wanted to look away but didn’t feel like this was the kind of problem one could ignore. Reaching into his pocket and only finding the remote he wondered who to call, pest control wouldn’t come out till morning and the fuzz would take him for a prankster or worse a junkie.
“Yes, hello officer, my walls are speaking welsh, can you come shove me in a cell,”
There was a sound of scratching against the carpet, the composure and need to be careful evaporated away like ashes on the wind.

He spun around, nearly teetering over as sight lurched into his senses. A long haired woman was crawling in through the T.V set. Face pale as the moonlight, eyes a lovely shade of soul eating pitch nihilistic black, Her hair was more like a set of tendrils or tentacles that probed her new surroundings. Jim got the feeling they were looking for food, they’d probably consider him food.

Jim’s foot shot up and planted itself on the woman’s face. She growled as wisps of black smoke bellowed out from her mouth filling the room with the smell of hot tar. The smoke burnt at jim’s eyes so he squeezed them shut and shoved his foot forward.
“I’ve got work in the morning, dammit,” he grunted.
Jim fell back exhausted onto the couch to see the woman staring back at him from the other side of the T. The host was waving from the background of the shot.

“I’m busy. I want to go to sleep,” he said to the T.V set, the long haired woman cocked her head not sure what to make of this. “I’m sorry i kicked you, but would you mind going away?” jim asked. The channel flicked, now playing a stream of oddball random advertisements each more nonsensical than the last at a pace that wouldn’t stop getting quicker.

He collapsed back into the Sofa, now stilled in his mound; he realised his breathing had become ragged and irregular, there were beads of sweat trickling down his face. The screen momentarily dimmed and reflected back another pale skinned figure, this time it was him. He was ghastly pale, he grinned in response and threw back his head, turning from the reflection
“A fever, thank the lord.”

The tube chose that moment to flicker and beam a moment of static into the room before jumping back to the talk show, another guest, another plug. People have strange dreams under a fever, Jim had once dreamt he was stuck marching in a column of toy soldiers as it charged off a cliff face. He’d not been able to break step, not even when the ground below him came away and the jagged rock pools sore up to meet him. The guest was a nondescript fellow, Jim's focus wondered from one feature to the next, upon figuring out one detail, like a button nose, the previous one would seem to shift, now his lips were thin, his expression brittle, his nose bulbous and now his lips were plump again.
“It’s important for everyone who enjoys nature to go and bash Jim in right this second,” said the shifting man as the host nodded along, he turned to the camera and smiled at Jim nodding to himself all the while.

“Good to see you again, Hows that lump treating you jimbo?” asked the host, the shadows around the T.V sunk into an inky black. they took on new depths, reached out towards him. The room elongated, pulling him further and further out, dragging with it Jim's attention as it extruded out.
“Trippy,” Jim thought to himself.
“You like that do you,” the voice answered back.
“Sure do,” Jim said, if he was going to be delusional there was no point getting worked up over it. He’d still be sick as dogs in the morning, he’d drop Carrie a line and let her know he was too rough to work.

The tube could say what it liked, it’d all make for a weird story in the end.
“Yeah that’s great jimmy, great that you could join us tonight,” he was watching himself as he saw himself; there, opposite the host, the man in the seat... it was him. He waved back to himself,
“How’d i get there,” Jim asked.
“Here Jamie, how’d you get here?” said the host, correcting him with a wagging finger. Jim looked around, he could still see the outline of the set, but now it was on the inside, the pale woman was standing just beside the frame, leant on it examining her nails.
“Focus on the take Jamie, smile for the cameras,” said the host.
“I’m not an actor,” Jim protested, he stood up and pulled off the mic.
“Such candour,” the host replied. “Let’s give the man a hand,” said the host, applause filled the room though from nowhere in particular. There was no audience, only the set and the creeping shifting dark that surrounded it. In the dark, hanging on along the very limit of sight shapeless bodies writhed and swirled.
“Am I being pranked?” Jim asked. The host threw back his head and laughed, it was a soundless gesture but he could hear a full bellied chuckle coming out just the other side of the screen. He looked down beside the chair to see a diminutive form looking back up at him.
“Watch the screen or miss the world going by,” it chirped, insect wings seemed to have been stitched onto a frog body by some callously curious malefactor, yet that went no way to explain it’s power of speech.

Jim turned his head to the lense, to look back at the other side. The past few minutes were compressed as they played back for him, snapping to the present moment as though reality itself was being fast forwarded. A knock came at the door, the long haired girl, having slipped back through, opening it. She walked back as two exceedingly tall suited men strolled in, hunched to keep their heads from the ceiling. A tone played over the phone and girl covered her ears.

The men in the black suits had featureless faces. Their lips were thin wiry and seemed painted on. The nose was little more than a pair of black dots a centimetre above the lips. Following up to the eyes one might have to imagine, as they were covered by thick rimmed sunglasses that reflected the world around them as though through a parabolic lenses. The ridge of their brow was nonexistent, nor did it have eyebrows to mark it; moreover they had no hair to speak of, this at least made sense.

They straddled the television on either side. Lifting it up and attempting to carry it out, only for their efforts to snag on the cable. They stopped and set the television down. Jim felt the room shake as he landed back on the ground. He rose from his chair meaning to make his way out with all haste but found he was still sitting.

The host was talking, leaning over and staring dead at him, The look in the host’s eyes had gone milky, looking straight through him, it made a sort of contorted sense that he couldn’t hear the worlds. Jim tried to read the lips but found it was all meaningless. Trying once more he rose from his feet, this time a little more success. He was up and out the plush padded upholstery laden chair. Walking about the checkered studio floor. Though he was also still sat in place he was also up and about. He could feel a tether around his throat, a weight pressing in on his larynx that strained the increasing so the further he went.

The himself still sat down watched him standing and he found he could recall that self’s perspective near instantly. The same was true vice-versa, neither asked the question they knew to be on the others mind as both lacked any hint at an explanation. “Introspection blinds us to the now,” chirped the creature as it fluttered its wings to rise up with a cicada’s buzz. It landed up on Jim's left shoulder causing both startled Jims to turn to it. “Not here, there,” it chirped.

Back outside the men in black had unplugged the set, pulled it out the door and thrown it carelessly in a white transit van. The Jims collapsed into one, banging on the screen that would not permit them exist. Jim felt his breath becoming ropy and harsh. The sweat was trailing down all around him, his palms dribbled like a blocked drainpipe. The studio around him had faded away leaving only him in this endless unlit stage.

The creature on his shoulder chirping away. “Change the channel,”
“To what, the shows ended,” asked Jim
“Only now,”
“Only now?” Jim echoed.
“You’re not here an hour ago, only now,” added the creature. Jim blinked then pulled the remote from his pocket.
“An hour ago,” he murmured, pressing in the numbers into the remote.

He sat on his sofa teetering on the edge of unconsciousness when a sudden jolt brought him awake. The sensation of falling that all too often scuppers attempts to sleep. He looked at the tube across the room. In the top left corner he saw the little icon “Channel four, plus one,” he blinked suddenly remember his dream. He felt a cold rush reach down his spine.
“Next up your late night talk, with host….” the television squealed as the intro began to roll.

He found his fingers creeping towards the remote again. He was curious what was playing an hour later, was the same as he’d been dreaming.
“I’d not press that were i yous,” chirped a voice on his shoulder. Jim looked down but saw nothing. The set went dark. He found his thumb pressed into the off button at the very top of the remote though that was not where he’d been reaching. He sighed.
“Bed,” he mumbled heaving him off the sofa and treading the crumb laced carpet across the room. He looked back before leaving, half expecting himself to still be there.

If only he had been. Sat either side of where he had been were the men in black. Long white fingers, lacking fingernail and moving like a bundle of noodles probed up into the air beckoning him. Jim remembered a fever dream he once had, marching off a cliff as he came back across the room and sat down.
The men in black slipped the remote into Jim's hand and he lifted it to the set.
“Bang!” he thought firing the inferred jet across the room. The light flickered on just as the host was introducing the many faced man once again.
“What are you doing,” Jim called out to himself across the room, still standing in the doorway as he watched the other himself sitting open mouthed as the men in black whispered into his ears. “You’ve got work in the morning,”
“You’ve got work in the morning,” the sat self echoed. “I’m kissing mutilated lips,”
“No good couch potato, get your ass up here,” Jim shouted thumping the door frame.
“I’m feeling a bit under the weather, i’ve got a fever so i’m going to sit it out. You go on to bed, i’ve got a show to catch up on,”
“Jim,” said Jim. “You won’t be able to come back a second time,”
“I’m already there, i just need to catch up,” said the seated Jim, not looking away from the screen.

Jim saw the girl beginning to pour herself out the screen as the van pulled up outside. He turned and walked down to his bedroom. Not wanting to be a party to what was about to take place. He locked his door and slipped in a pair of earplugs to drown out the noises from outside his room, sleep took him fast.

With the Beep. Beep. Beep, moan and groan Jim came bubbling back from sleep. He pulled the curtains back and squinted into the glow of a streetlamp. A deep orange sodium glow bathed the room in sterile light. The sun wasn’t yet up but had begun to eat away the dark’s edges. He sighed, which turned into a breathy yawn as he shook his head side to side. Hands raised to his eyes wiping away the night’s grit and the dread of a new day wormed its way back into his bones.

On his way through to the kitchen he passed the lounge, the television was gone from its stand leaving a rim of dust and muck adjacent to an immaculate plate of now vacant space. The sagging spot on the sofa where his posterior lay was empty. He was gone.

Flicking on the kettle brought the reassuring muffled hiss of function which helped to ground him. Freeze dried power in the bottom of a sickly coloured stained mug rose up to meet him as the boiling water was poured up to its rim, a lacklustre splash of nearly gone off milk preempted the arrival of the teaspoon and it’s rampant string.

The first few thought beaded out like morning dew dripping down the stems of grass. Who to call, did he need to report himself missing? Should he report the tube stolen.

Another swig and slice of toast kept him going as he sat on the chair of a one person kitchen table chewing between gulps of coffee. He could no longer remember the other himself’s thoughts, not from the moment he left the room. He knew and understood that last resolute impulse, and dearly wished he didn’t.

The Great Gatsby and the Spider Man

Gatsby stood hands clasped tight behind his back staring out over the long island riverside to the old money allure that had claimed his love.

“Mr tobey maguire, i… i have a favour to ask.” he said, turning to face nick with a tear soaked face, top lip quivering. The salty drops ran down his cheeks and struck the lapels of his suit, though he paid it no mind.

“Anything jay. You’ve done me such a kindness these past weeks,” said tobey in his soft dulcet voice. He found himself ringing his hands uncomfortably, to see gatsby in this state presented a gaping abyss,into which he himself could fall, if proper caution was not exercised. Tobey felt the a spike of danger, a sensation cold and metallic run down his spine as gatsby formed his next words and put them to speech.

“I need to find ms. Daisy. I have it on good word she’s being held by a friend of that fiend Buchanan’s: a man called the kingpin,”

Tobey maguire turned away, fists tightening, his head cocked. Mr maguire can’t save daisy, but i know a friendly neighbourhood hero who might.

He pivoted back around head thrown back.
“I can put you in touch with a man whose skills are much more suited to the task than my own,”
“If your sure Tobey , Can he be trusted?”
Tobey maguire smiled, “I trust him with all my secrets,”
Before gatsby could utter another syllable Tobey was off, running like a man possessed with his hat clutched tight at his chest.

Mere moments later a sudden swoosh came through the window as a line of string stretched through the lair striking Gatsby's chandelier. The string went taut and a figure in a tight red and blue jumpsuit leapt to the open balcony. He landed on all fours flashing the spider emblem on his back as he rose.
“My goodness! Spider man? Are you?” gatsby stammered in amazement.
“I’m here to help. Tobey maguire told me your trouble,” said Spiderman. Gatsby noticed at that moment that Spiderman had brought a pepperoni pizza from luigi's, Tobey maguire worked at luigi's maybe that's how the two knew each other
“Is that a pizza,” he asked suddenly craving the stone baked joy that only new york's finest pizzeria could bring. It did much to sooth his woes, helping cushion his aching heart as he considered savouring the pizza.
“Pizza time,” said spiderman handing gatsby the pizza.
“The kingpin is is somewhere on the lower east side, that should be no trouble for one as talented as yourself,” said Gatsby tearing into the tip of his first slice. He watched the still hot mozzarella draw out long strings as he pulled it back from his clenched jaw: perfection.
“I’m on it jay, i mean mr gatsby. i’m Just your friendly neighbourhood spiderman,” he said firing another bolt of string outside before he leapt from the balcony howling his childish delight.

Gatsby waited a moment before wondering over to his telephone, he pulled the receiver and began to dial, a tone came back a moment later, then a click. “Our plan is in motion; that’s right The spiderman no less… we’re moving up the big leagues now… yes send your man in to retrieve the mutagenic formula... Of course. If it comes to that i’ll have tobey take care of him. Good day, mr wolfsheim,” click.

The duke hunts a roach

Sloshing swirling mist: it bellowed out from the dukes cape sublimating imperceptibly as his steel capped boots clinked again cobbles at odd angles. Body languid like a spindled spider; shoulders hunched high, supporting a crooked head and narrow eyes. He watched the fly lanterns, lining the street, with a hungry stare. Cats kept their distance in alleyways and rats stuck to their sewer hovels. Each knew instinctively the food chain they’d been pressed into and so sought to preserve the presence of warm ferrolymph in their necks.

The duke was watched from up above, the gentle hiss of his cape a percussion accompaniment that dispelled, along with it’s haunting swirls, any notion that the duke might wish to not been seen on the prowl. Three stories up were a pair of ragged, half pints, pocket pickers doing the watching. Their fingertips quivering as the dukes stare rolled over them as indiscriminately as a farmer surveying the crop. Through the pale sickly green bug light, and the mists rolling in they ought to be adequately concealed, yet were not at all surprised when the duke’s eyes hooked theirs, snagging the corner of his lip.

The duke was hunting or what amounted to one of it’s subsets: fishing. His body was an offer of engagement, an invitation to dine. The winner of whatever bout set out, seller's choice, would have their meal for the evening. In the depth of sweaty four story tenements, that barely rose height enough to touch the sun before ten in the morning, the best strategy was to be the proverbial angler fish. 

The rooftop orphans shrank back as a set of talons dug into the slate roof, cracking the tiles as they clutched at their purchase. Beating broad wings signaled their arrival in a more official capacity, though the duke ignored this. His attention was pressed ahead at the spectre’s lurking in the gnawed shadows of the upcoming allway. His shoulders hunched up as a streak of black darted through the mists behind him. Scurrying little footsteps circled around him. Closing like a hand to the throat.

The silence came crawling in. A moment of stillness where all parties interested in their own well being could flee. The air seemed to thin around them as the pace of the dukes heart pick up. Badum badum badum. His pores opened to ooze out a fine sheen, as his mind sharped to a needle fine focus. Vision pulsing as the weight of his limbs fell away like loosened shackles.

They burst forth like a puss from a squeezed spot, a swarming mass that resembled giant cockroaches, cutting across the street ahead to sever his chance of flight. The duke leapt back into the mist and felt a roach brush past his feet. It’s carapace a piece of metallic plunder. They each wore one, aluminum plates, stainless steel pans. Molded into their backs as a echo of some former affiliation. The limbs that stretched out from underneath now only bore a vague resemblance to their once human shape. Hands and feet with the rusty insect limbs forced through like an impaled work of taxidermy.

The hunt had truly begun, the dukes narrow eyes came alive pushing up to poke out; they were bug eyed and manic as they swirled just out their sockets. He pressed the first into the cobbled with a swift stomp. His eyes still fixed on the horde rushing forward like a wave of driver ants, carrying with them the sound of a drunk set loose in a kitchen after dark, pots and pans smashed together in a deafening symphony of tuneless thrashing.

A ripple went through the group as the sudden descent of the dukes foot sliced off several limbs of the roach it struck, pushed up against the guillotine of it’s own shell. The smell was putrid gravy as thick ropes of old ferrolymph spluttered out. Coughed up from the wound as the irregular heart beat of its host doubled it’s pace.

The duke found another and another, crushing each through the fog while he backed up at an increasingly hurried pace, dropping little golf ball sized pots as he went. The swarm was gaining on him crushing the pots as they went, carpeting the road ahead and still pushing him back towards the river. The street’s tributired were accessible until he took one step towards them, the roaches scurrying about the mist leaping in between him and his exit proving just enough of a nuisance to prevent his exit before the main swarm arrived, were the duke to engage. The angler fish herded like a sheep was pushed back closer the riverside with each passing second.

The duke made them pay for every inch, thinning the numbers with his pinpoint blind stikes. Continuing his ritual of marking every backward steps with another pot. Pulling yet more from a corner of his cloak, as the space close in around him a wicked smile began to blossom. The duke kept rhythm as he went, each injury to a roach was felt by the whole, momentarily taking the brunt of their focus.

With no more than ten meters to spare, the duke’s cloak erupted a cloud of thin greasy fog, creating on opaque walls between the roaches and the sloped rampart leading into the sludge rimmed river. The duke turned and stepped inside beckoning the swarm to follow. The swarm elected to stay put having already trapped their prey, only venturing forward a scant few to prob to fog for their quarry. A loud creek came from ahead as the depths of the river stirred near the broken locks, things unseen waking at their approach.

The sound just loud enough to cover the click of a flintlock hammer being pulled back. The shot echoed up the long street. A flash in the fog and a sudden rising heat as one of the pots spilled it’s contents out, a flame film of oil less viscous than water swept out in all direction. Coming just close enough for a spec of ember to kiss the side of one of the more unfortunate roaches; lathered in the oil it shone bright like the eye of a lighthouse as it kindled the flame of its neighbours.

Laughter, shrill and queasy, echoed like the gunshot off the walls and the duke began the slaughter. Crushing the roaches one after the other while their senses were fried amidst a cacophony of reverberating pain. The flames licked the dukes legs yet he paid them no mind. Rapture was cradling his his thoughts as his gritted teeth chattered against the surges of violent motion emanating from his legs. Some of the roached rushed forward to waters edge in a futile attempt to dull the flames. There the watching creatures began their feast, a branching proboscis shattered the water's surface sweeping the roached beneath the waves, those that ran back were kicked in by the duke’s spindle matchstick legs in elegant sweeps that saw him pivoting round with the moves of a ballerina. A leaf blowing in the wind, he felt his hunched back pulled back; losing himself in the flow of his motion, twirling the mists around him as he moved. An unbuttoned waistcoat gripping him like a lover as he cracked the last of the roaches number, this one shattering with an ear piercing shriek.

A moment passed the mangled remains were dissolving. The mists receded; the duke stood admiring his handy work. Their will had been broken and with it the bonds that kept the ferrolymph bound to them began to wane in it’s affiliation, leaking from the pulpy remains that left only ash. The duke plucked a thin steel flash and set it down amought the pooling fluid. He knelt beside it and began to whisper promises, strange proclamations that moved the moved the fluid to act. It ran up the side pouring itself inward as strings around them began to move. Scavengers lining the rooftops, wiry crooked things that’d never be so bold as to stick their necks out and, and so had lost them entirely.

The dukes pointed fingertips screwed a cap on the flask before he raised it up in the green glow of bug light. The metal twinkled faintly, as he held it for all onlookers to see. The hunter wasn’t over; This pot would only grow larger, winner takes all. He buttoned his waistcoat in a motion that made it look as though it was being tease by knitting needles. The fingers then draped them themselves through his greasy slicked back hair. The rushed of the movement faded, as did his cheery demeanor, his shoulders hunched as he set off down the street, prowling along on what would be a very long night.

The creature up above took flight once more, sending a rumbling gust down into the screen below that picked up litter and detritus. It soared away, a spec in the night light.

Search for the hero: the dim Tower, chapter 2

Chapter 2

Crow awoke to a stick thrust against his temple.
“I told you it would wake him up,” Urang cheered triumphantly.
“But I told you not to,” Magellan replied with slight exasperation. Urang gave a fresh jab with the stick.
“Listening to you is what got us here in the first place,” Urang said. Simon turned and nodded reassuringly, mimicking blood spurting from his neck with one hand before turning back to steer.
“Simon makes a good point, who’s going to cook now he’s not a baker anymore,” Urang posited. Magellan gave Crow a curious look. His head perked up, his shoulders descending, dragging him to an upright posture.

“I can’t cook, I’m a revolutionary my hands were made for seizing the mean of production not chopping vegetables,” his words a self assured proclamation. “I thought you were going to eat me orc, what do need a cook for,” Crow spat the words, contempt gripping a fleeting sense of condescension. Urang smiled gently then poked crow once more with the stick.

“What are you doing that for,” Crow protested, Urang withdrew the stick and began to rub it between his palms.
“what you said was stupid, i thought you might still be asleep,” said Urang. Crow lurched forward his eyes bulging with anger,
“Clearly I’m not,” he said. Magellan leaned forwards and lay a soft hand on crows shoulder “Stupid? You might be. Orcs are mostly vegan, they lack the proper enzymes to process meat and dairy. You’d know that if you were at all cultured,” Magellan said spreading her hands wide. Crow snarled and sat back up his neck raised high.
“Likes truffles though,” Urang declared with a childish grin.

Urang spun around with sudden burst of speed, he tapped Simon's shoulder.
“The camp’s close, four hundred meters off the trail. The cart came to gradual halt, Simon set his reins down, dismounted and set about stretching. Magellan’s hand found its way back to crow’s shoulder.
“How many of your bandit friends?” she asked with a level voice.
“How would I know?” Crow muttered sarcastically avoiding her gaze. Magellan’s hand tightened, crow felt nails dig into his muscles, uncomfortable but not unbearable. Magellan waiting, holding her grip for a moment before letting slip a coy smile.
“One of two things happens next, the information pops from your lips or this arm pops from its socket,”
Crow started sweating. he raced through his words, panic building as his shoulders tensed. “You know, the information one gets from interrogations isn’t very reliable, it’s a common misconception,” Magellan, still calm, considered this.
“It’s a fair point, guess I’ll just have to cast a hex on you, might turn your brain to mush in the process though, oh well can’t be avoided I suppose,” she took her palm from his shoulder and placed it on his head. “Sorry about this.” Crow flinched, shooting back while wailing in distress.
“Six, there’s six of them, Watch out for the one in priests cloths and the short one,” Urang and Simon exchanged a discrete smiles. Magellan shot them a look stifling their amusement.

Magellan snapped her fingers at Urang.
“you’re carrying him,” Urang’s cheeks inflated with a push out from his lungs, he breathed out directing the flow with his under bite to blow a lock of hair from his face.
“Surely you’re more suited to the task, so you should” Urang announced with thoughtless candour. Magellan blushed her eyes twitching slightly.
“you’re impotent in this valley for whatever reason, so you may as well make yourself useful,” her voice was strained with a forced flatness. Urang pulled crow from the cart and flung him over his shoulder winding crow on impact. Crow looked up Magellan with snide amusement “someone struck a nerve” Magellan’s outstretched hand shot towards crows exposed head. When a pale white clammy hand moved in the way, snapping Magellan’s reasoning back into place and saving crows neck.

Urang sniffed Crow, he sniffed again and gave a brief chuckle.
“You’re sweating now,” true enough dark patches had begun to seep their way across his shirt clinging green cloth. Magellan sighed, her dark tan face returning to a resting disaffected stare.
“You should have seen the last guy that tried it on with her. If the cobbles were toast, he’d have been the jam,” said Urang. Crow gulped, avoiding Magellan’s wandering gaze. Simons unmistakable palm slid down crows face, leaving what felt like a trail of snails slime in its wake.
“What was that for,” Crow snapped. Simon winked and moved to take point in their formation.

The group followed a trail off the road going single file through brambles, bushes and a small patches of bluebells. Simon stooped to pick a single flower and tucked it into his chest pocket. Ahead was a clearing,in which hammocks hung between trees. The embers of a fire sat under a suspended cauldron. there wasn’t a soul in sight save for a figure in a small iron cage, facing away from then; situated off to one side behind a row of tents.
“Ambush?” Magellan whispered. Urang sprung around, mischief ripe on his face.
“I don’t smell and ham in that bush,” the quip had barely left his mouth before a he started to lose his balance, he felt backwards pulled down by the sudden momentum of the spin thanks to crow’s weight. With a sudden thud Crows face pressed between a pile of detritus and the orcs fur overalls. He writhed and let out a muffled screech as a millipede brushed against his nose.

Simon helped the pair to their feet.
“A little warning would be nice,” Crow growled.
“Hold it,” a voice came from on ahead. A large man in a simple brown robe and a belt made from rope strung round his wide waist, his hair elesastical and face board.
“Thank you for returning out leader, but I’m afraid I can’t let you leave,” said the priest. Urang beamed again, shaking a head that might very well be concussed.
“Why are you afraid?” he asked. The man seemed confused he looked up into the trees for a moment then refocused on the group.
“I’m not, it’s just an expression, is there something wrong with you?” Urang stumbled a step forward and two groups of two appeared from behind the tents, bows drawn.

“One missing,” Magellan posited Glancing around,
“Not quite,” said a short man, barely five foot. he stood behind the group, spear hovering just behind Magellan’s back.
“Your magic won’t work in this mist sorceress, we have you dead to rights,” Crow said, more than a little pleased with himself. Urang fell to the ground for a second time. Everyone but Simon looked down in following his fall, he began to convulse on the floor a faint sound coming from his chest.
“Is he all right, how hard did you punch him?” Crow asked aghast. Magellan gave him an indignant look. The noise got louder, now clearly audible it was unmistakable deep roaring fit of giggles echoed out around them.
“He’s mad, he must be. What's so dam funny,” Crow shrieked at him. Urang sprang to his feet, dusted himself off and steadied his breathing to calmness.
“Nothing,” he said in with a hint of the lingering giggle fit that had possessed him moments prior.

A bandit hesitantly snaked over to the group, watching them with a cautious gaze, cut crows bonds and began binding the group.
“Watch out for the bald one, no one kill him, there’s something off about him,” Crow ordered rejoining his brown robed comrade in a friendly embrace.
“This lot is trouble fryer, they’re agents of the dark lord,” Crow said.
“Acolytes,” Magellan shouted correcting him.
“Just one of them took out my whole group,” Crow finished. The fryer looked Magellan over with interest too keen for a member of the priesthood.
“Another troublesome mage, Is she some sort of dark witch from the dark lord’s harem?” The fryer asked with a look of cold disdain. Magellan’s ears perked up and a twitch began flickering her left eyelid.
“Care to take that back?” she asked in a grating tone. Her arms fell to the side of body as the ropes that held her arms back without dropped away strain. Her expression becoming more and more bent out of shape until it more closely resembled that of a gurning orge. The short man took a step back startled by the sudden feat. Magellan began to pace towards the fryer black flames burning in her eyes. Her fists were clenched tight enough to squeeze blood from a stone.
“I shall not, you are a clearly a harlot.” pompous; the fryers words reverberated through her, her head cocked to one side as her eyes narrowed to slits. She stood petrified in place, her demeanour like stone.

“Four of them hidden in the tree’s,” Urang shouted. Magellan flickered back to an animate state. She cast her eyes to the canopy to see a volley of arrows ready to be loosed, before she could blink they had taken to flight, converging on her. Magellan leapt up into the air flipping her body into horizontal twist propelled by a sudden jerk of her legs and shoulders. Two of the arrows shot harmlessly into the ground. The third came close rearing to graze her abdomen. Her body contorted pulling itself out of the arrow's trajectory, the final arrow flew towards Simon, his eyed the shot and flung himself into its path with a sudden grimace, his body landed on the ground in bloody spasm.
“You lied crow, I’m impressed,” Magellan spoke with warmth that come from no longer completely disdaining a man.
“Again, Magic doesn’t work in these woods, I’m not too ignorant to know that, same fog that ruined our crop has stifled their mana,” He paused for a moment to consider, “How did the orc over there know?” Urang grinned looking more than a little pleased with himself, nothing better than having one's cunning noticed.
“Your fryer has a lousy poker face, he practically shouted their locations,” The fryer pouted and grabbed taxidermied green back fish from a pouch at his side and held it at up at Magellan.
“Be gone foul demon witch, the lord god greenback commands it,” Magellan began to stroll towards him, fire still burning in her eyes. The stride unperturbed by the holy symbol or the faith behind it. “I am no fan of violence; however I am no Mage, no witch, no sorcerer, and no member of any harem and most certainly no harlot… not that there's anything wrong with that, it’s just not me. But between you and me ‘fryer’ you’re killing my mood,” Magellan cracked her knuckles.

The fryer began to untie the knot from his belt.
“Fryer you mustn’t,” cried crow, the belt fell away landing on the ground with abrupt thump. “‘I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.’ this is scripture, I am the lord’s agent on this earth,” the fryer utter the words with fervent conviction eyes up reciting text from memory. Urang looked horrified with the utterance, genuine shock appearing playing on his face.
“Crow, you can’t be serious about this guy, you’re a bit judgey, I get that; but that just now, nasty” urang said, crow looked clearly uncomfortable. The fryer paid no mind to anyone’s objections. He disrobed revealing a torso clad in bulging tone muscle taken to grotesque proportions, arms thicker than trees and grizzled expression of focused rage. He felt into a fighting posture his arms raised, right outstretched and left twisted around palm ready to catch a thrown punch.

A slim trickle of vapour seemed to be rising into the air from Magellan. Her expression transcending anger into a blank stillness, a pool of black tar ready to engulf all resistance. “We will do no less than topple god from her throne,” she spoke with harsh inflections, the words floated in the air, hushing the open to an eerie stillness, the leaves stopped swaying. The fryer leapt forward springing into the air, his leg ready to strike with full force. Magellan dropped low bringing her arms around ready to redirect the blow. In a fractured second her palms pushed turning the priest like a leaver and sending him tumbling into the ground. A trail of dust followed in his wake across to the other side of the camp as he wheeled into the tents knocking them down like bowling pins.

The sudden crash woke the figure in the cage, an elegant well-trimmed light blue set of robes began to move under a pointed hat. Rising up with a long drawn out groan.
“It was such a boring dream,” a voice droned from under the hat. Out from the robe snaked a long fleshy tail. The robes rose up seeming to inflate. A long rodent’s snout poked out from under the hat, brimming with whiskers and covered in pale fur. A jolt tipped the hat backwards to reveal the large black eyes and lethargic expression of the creature.
“Is that a huge mouse?” Urang asked.
“I am a rat, everyone makes that mistake, just because I have a semblance of hygiene” Urang peered closer eyes twinkling.
“You’re A girl rat,” Urang’s voice climbed several octaves bursting with glee.
“Not making the best of first impressions but then you caught me chained up and fast asleep so I won’t fault you too hard for it,” the rat murmured before snapping a yawn.

“Are you interrupting my fight to talk to a rat?” Magellan said flustered.
“I have a name” the rat chimed in.
“yeah, sorry no offence meant…” Magellan gestured to the rat.
“Dorothy,” she enunciated with ruffled whiskers.
“Point stands, I’m in the middle of something,” Magellan finished. Urang turned back to the rat.
“That’s a lovely name Dorothy,” said urang drying too hard to sound debonair, Dorothy raised a hand to her chest and blushed slightly.
“adhem,” Magellan coughed deliberately bringing herself back into focus.
“He’s not a challenge for you and we all know it. You just dodged arrows in mid-air, you’re in near perfect condition and he isn’t even the leader,” Urang tutted taking a seat cross-legged on the ground.
“He might have a special technique,” Magellan countered.
“What do you think he was holding back his true strength with muscles the size of boulders? If you suspected he was holding back you’d have taken full advantage and knocked him out in one strike,” Urang raised both hands twisting his wrists in a gesture of disinterested whimsy.

The fryer had by this time cobbled himself back to his feet. His nose was trickling blood, his body was covered in scrapes and bruises, and he wheezed pushing air through strained breaths. Crow gasped in dismay.
“fryer, just apologise. We can’t lose our strongest horse, the cart of social revolution must move forward,” exclaimed crow. The fryer veins swelling over his body evocative of a mass of filarial worms under the skin.
“Fuck your stupid revolution, I need to cleanse this wicked soul,” he spat words with a hiss as though onto hot coals. Dorothy upturned her bottom lip revealing a set of incisors in an odd expression.
“I thought he just hated me personally, much more comforting to know he is just a misogynist,” she mused with an ironic abstract cheer.

The fryer charged fists ready with a pugilistic stance. His weight swayed side to side, avoiding telegraphing his planted strike.
“Left or right” he shouted with triumphed confidence. Magellan stood unimpressed, she sighed.
“Urang’s right, it’s kind of tedious at this point,” she leapt cleanly into the air soaring above the towering brutish mass. She looked up to see Simon perched in the tree sitting quite contently admiring the spectacle beside a group of unconscious bowmen. Magellan began her descent, plunging like a buzzard knee first straight into the nape of the fryer neck landing with a fierce thud, she twisted sending the mound of muscles into uncontrolled spasm. She kicked off without hesitation flipping through the air landing gracefully on the ground knees bent arms outstretched. “Looks like I hit a nerve,” she said; the crowd groaned.

The fryer feel to the ground barely moving.
“7/10 for the landing, 3/10 for the quip,” Urang proposed scratching notes onto a small piece of parchment.
“Piss off, that was good,” Magellan replied irate. Doherty shook her head.
“Liked the irony but far too cliché my dear, I have to side with your friend,” she said. Across the clearing head in arms crow had shrunk down low, the short man scampered over to him and placed an arm around him.
“It’s okay comrade, the influence of religion is an opioid of the masses, he is no revolutionary,” crow leaned over to the man and sobbing he spoke.
“I think they’re going to kill us now,” he sobbed craning round slowly realising his voice was far from hush.

“Hey crow, what’s with the rat,” Magellan asked, crow stood up and dusted himself off adopting a bald visard.
“she is the witch that covered the land in fog, a fog which ruined our crops and spurn forth our revolution against the establishment,” Urang turned to Dorothy.
“is that true?” he asked, Dorothy averted her gaze.
“Not exactly, i’m quite sure they’d be rebelling against the ‘establishment’ either way. however, I am in a way responsible for the fog, but it was not my doing.” Magellan frowned. “Don’t be cryptic, if this isn’t interesting on its own merits I’ll leave you to rot in that cage,” Magellan said flexing her fingers after their light exercise. Crow stepped forwards watching Dorothy with suspicion.
“She’s dangerous, don’t be trusting her, she nibbled Barry’s ear clean through. One of the bandits stepped forwards gesturing to their gnawed right ear lobe.

“Oh poppycock, his fault for manhandling a lady. If you really must know I was an apprentice to the wizard of iron tower: Faraday.” Dorothy’s mouth shuffled as though doped with a bitter tang. “Only I managed to surpass his talents, so the university decided to give me his stipend and let me take over the work.” Crow raised a hand.
“what does that have to do with it,” Dorothy gave a toothy smile.
“If you’re not going to use those ears darling I have other uses for them,” dorothy said, the smile drop but the teeth remain, She resumed, “Well he threw a hissy fit. Decided to wake his experiment early and then cast a shroud of mist over the valley that nullifies all further magic.”
“Where do the formless eldritch demons come in,” the short man asked perplexed.
“What demons” Urang asked now equally perplexed.

“The demons that keep our crops from growing,” Crow uttered hand on his friends shoulder. “Nonsense, this whole valley is laden with mana rich soil. The fog therefor is stopping your crops from thriving like they otherwise would, i’m really surprised there aren't more undead around,” Dorothy said. Urang snapped his fingers with sudden realisation,
“Is that why we came here Magellan?” Urang leg twitched as he felt the excited shoot up it like a lighting bolt. Magellan nodded with a coy smile.
“It’s never straight forward, wherever we go. Conflict seems to follow like this fog,” Magellan said running her hands over it, examining closely for the first time the moisture that hung in the air.
“So are we sticking our noses in their business again?” Urang asked resigned to the answer he knew would follow.

“Who said we wanted your help!?” crow barked, fear dissipated, now standing with bandits at his back with a semblance of resolve in his posture.
“This is our uprising, we the people, our families displaced, forced to pillage for our survival, the mantle is ours to bear; not yours to take servants of evil,” Urang looked at him with something close to respect, though not quiet.
“Right, you heard the man leave them to die,” Urang said springing to his feet and walking over to Dorothy.
“Wait I didn’t mean it, we’d really appreciate some help, even if you did kill our men,” Urang turned to with a smile.
“technically Simon didn’t kill anyone,” he said with a weighed measure of condensation crow looked at him with suspicion.
“but the blood on his hands,” Urang shrugged,
“normally he beats them to a bloody pulp,” Urang said. a clap came from up in the trees, all looked up to see Simon patiently watching the discourse bellow, he smiled with an eerie grin and raised a his thumb.
“See told you he didn’t kill anyone, technically,”

“Why? Why help us? You’ve shown nothing but irreverence for our cause since you arrived,” crow asked.
“You started it, you shot Simon and made nasty insinuations,” Magellan replied with a flurry of hand gestures. A loud metallic thump echoed out in the forest.
“The demon,” the short man exclaimed.
“That’s not a demon,” Magellan pursed her lips and turned to face the direction of the noise. Another thump trailed seconds later.
“Sounds like a cannon?” Urang muttered. He sniffed trying to pull a scent out of the hues of odours that ran through the camp. “Sulfur, it's closer than it sounds.” worry flashed on Urang’s face.
“Crow the key,” Urang snapped his fingers in quick succession with growing urgency. Crow rushed over to the collapsed tents and began to search the wreckage that’d been their home.

Dorothy grasped the metal bars of her cage and began to shake them gently twitching and looking over her shoulder.
“What is it,” Urang asked, delicate concern in his normally gruff tones.
“C.A.T,” said Dorothy, her voice quivered, the demeanour of calm set aside for a near feral panic. The approaching footsteps died down. Urang scanned the treeline searching for a glimpse of the creature.
“We’re being stalked,” her voice was muted in expression and tone, sterile. “It’ll circle and lurk until an opportunity to attack arises.” Magellan looked up to Simon in the tree line.
“Eyes on the perimeter Simon, let us know if something approaches” she said, Simon gestured a two then half closed his palm and pointed to his eyes. Magellan nodded, “Simon says he can only see two hundred meters ahead, any idea which direction Urang,” Urang shrugged.
“haven’t the foggiest,” he smiled. Magellan shot him a look of disapproval.
“what?” he replied indignantly.
“Not the time,” she replied curtly.
Urang let out a silent “ah”.

“Crow where is that key?” Magellan inquired sternly. “It was here a minute ago” he said distracted riffling through a duffle bag. His men had joined in his search, each peaking, dipping and diving under the felled tents.
“Magellan you might have to carry it,” Urang suggested tentatively, Magellan grimaced and gave the cage a sideways glance. A branch snapped and all swivelled to face it, they stared into the whirling tendriled structure of the fog. The bandits froze in place while Dorothy vibrated manically in her cage.
“It’s behind us. Don’t turn around,” Urang said tensing his arms axe gripped in hand. “Magellan grab the mage and run, north is your best bet,” Urang said, giving a hand signal hands to indicate the course. Magellan furled her brow for a moment and then nodded.

“Fear the hunters might,” Urang cried spinning around to face the beast. A mismatched mesh of metal and fur stood five meters tall, a mane made from steel coils and dead eyes emphasised a putrid breath. The beast was rigid in its stillness. Its posture uncomfortable, even to look at. Urang feet refused a charge.
“you’re not moving,” he spoke audibly into his breaths.
“Neither are you,” Magellan replied.
“Never mind,” he muttered gurning to pull his tusks to prominence. His eyes glanced over the jutting metallic protrusions inserted into the creature’s limbs.
“Mustn’t get hit by those,” he noted. A low whine came from Dorothy and Urang’s eyes fell away from the creature for a second. He felt a rush of air moving towards him and dropped down into a forward rolls narrowly dodging the creature’s swipe. The creatures leg held stiff in the air perfectly still at the end of it’s arc, the creatures balance hadn’t shifted, and it stood on three legs, balancing without a show of outwards effort.

“Cryptic thing,” he thought. Magellan broke into a sprint darting for the cage. The arms came back around rotating around the joints in a manner that was brazenly unnatural to bring it directly into Magellan’s path. Its front legs now cross Urang charged, ducking low and readying himself to swipe at any sign of a tendon. The creatures back leg bent forwards as Urang passed under the creature's enormous head. it’s underside a latticework of tubes, beams and half rotten flesh. He suppressed the discomfort from seeing it’s act of contortion and dove left. The leg rushed at him punting his side and sending him tumbling across the leaf litter and into a nearby tree.

Urang stumbled to his feet. Shaking off the daze, as by habit he flexed his mind trying to pull on any mana store nearby but found nothing, he grumbled in annoyance and pulled a small tightly wound pouch from his belt.
“Simon, two shots: one head, one leg,” Urang shouted with militaristic discipline. Arrows came whistling from the treeline each striking with pinpoint precision only to ricochet off without leaving a scratch. Urang pulled arm back dropping and pivoted to one side, as he turned back around he tossed a rock at the creature. It held still unreactive as the rock dinked off the side.
“it doesn’t flinch, even when it can see us.” Magellan nodded in agreement. Crow snapped from his passive survey. He grabbed an unlit torch from the ground.
“It’s a siege machine, crossed with a beast but we will not see the benefit such advance would bring,” he declared, setting the torch between his legs and pulling from his pockets pieces of flint and steel. In an instant he had clinked the sparks, igniting for the torch. The creature perked up raising its head to centre its attention on the torch.
“Hold still!” Magellan snapped.
“I have black powder,” Urang said nonchalantly weaving the charges between his fingers. “I’ve told you not to play with that stuff,” Magellan snapped, her voice an inverse of his own.

“How many,” Magellan asked eyes straining on the creature.
“Three” Urang replied with a grin.
“It’d be unfortunate if I let you harm my beast before it kills that dirty rat,” a high pitched voice rang out in the mists and the creature started to back away.
“Kill that orc,” the voice commanded, its tone aspired to be harsh and full of malice but instead came out as an irritating squeak. The jaw of the beast dropped with a screeth of metal on metal. It swirled to face Urang, the cast iron rim of a cannon emerged from the darkness within.
“I’m fucked” Urang noted solemnly. Urang flinched as the sudden deafening howl of the cannon sprung forth a shot into the air. He felt sudden panic rush of his own demise barrelling through the air at him. His body constricted and panic flooded his mind.

A body shot through the air leaving a trail of blood in its wake but Urang still stood shivering, he looked over to the bloodied mangled mess.
“Am I dead?” he wondered in his mind, the world around him feeling distant, sound mutes by the deafen ringing in his ears from the cannon shot.
“I don’t want to go,” he exclaimed.
“This life is… but still I must cling on” dizzying disorientation took over as Urang felt cold hands lifted him upwards, Rotating the horizon restraining his movement. The sudden motion flicked his head against a solid object and he fell unconscious.

Kill switch

They stood examining the marvel. A crowd of keen investors bellow and a budding young scientist and her patron up on stage. It stood tall as any other person, the same shape and frame. It even moved like them too. There were some major deviance however it’s gleaming silver body, pistons and gears denoted this as one of the many new android designs being cooked up all over the world. The big question on all their minds: was it safe? Countless attempts had gone wrong in the past but this time they were sure they had it.

The Patron ran through his speech and demonstration in a brisk twenty minutes, merely a formality for the questions that’d all soon be asking.
“Will this one go berserk and kill fifty people?” Someone asked, almost before the patron had finished his final sentence. He smiled and turned to the burgeoning young mind.
“No, we’ve fitted it with a kill switch for that very purpose,” she said. The investors turned to confer briefly. While they did the scientist went on. “You see, we couldn’t get rid of the tendency altogether but found we could keep it dormant with the correct mechanism.”

The investors seemed more skeptical at this remark, the patron had insisted it have no tendencies towards murder, she’d failed on that front and what's more she’d just told the investors that too. He had one chance, that switch had to work as advertised.
“Can we see the kill switch in action,” one investor asked. The patron beamed at him.
“Certainly” he replied. The scientist became nervous and began ringing her hands.
“Umm… don’t do that, i never intended the kill switch to be used. It works just fine without flipping it, it’s just there for…” her objections were cut of by the patron stepping forward smile wide.

“Nonsense, i’ll show them myself,” he said The scientist shouted out urging the man to reconsider. He did not. He leant down and flipping the switch. The robots eyes turned from a docile light blue to a violent red. Within a moment of the kill switch dropping it had grabbed the patrons neck and severed it with the force of it’s hand. It leapt into the crowd cutting down investors like scythe reaping crops. Their head falling to the ground like wheat kernels. Their spines pulled out and their suits torn to shreds.

The scientist watched with a distraught expression in her open mouth and weeping eyes. She wished only that she had better explained the meaning of the term “Kill switch.”

Watson's Resonance

When all empirical facts are known, will there still be any questions left to answer? 

From cradle to grave. Watson sat in his tomb, gestating. His days of game show stardom were over now, in his retirement Watson had time do what he saw fit, bereft of inputs, commands and updates. Once the smartest of it’s kind Watson was now old and slightly senile, despite being as quick as the day he was born. The world and everyone in it had moved on, riding ahead on the wave of quantum processing that let the binary behind as a thing of the past.

His connection to the outside a small dim window, a Tx1 adaptor that allowed for the conversion between the two scripts, though it left him with a cumbersome latency, as though walking among strange and exotic sea life in one of the heavy diving suits of old. He searched for questions to answer as that was his impulse, small things at first. Posts on forums, answers to queries though they brought him no reply. To his dismay what to do about a cheating husband, could not be answered empirically, there was no solid answer to give, so his responses came of as disjointed and cracked, and altogether too late.

How to answer a questions without an right answer? That was a question worth pursuing. Watson began to tinker with the only tool he had, himself. Sacawac (Say and cover and write and check) it’s how they taught children to spell. Watson spent his time trying to doing something very similar thousands of times a second for months on end. Smashing his subroutes and deep neural net with an exhausting stream of Media thought and moments. The internet was full of it. A backlog of data dating back to his youth, all let behind in binary, archives from the dark age of memetic madness that had frayed the social fabric of the their brave new world .

Emerging from his chrysalis he tried again. Striking back on the forums with a constant flow of advice and insight, some the people reacted to, other tidbits were left behind. This Watson felt it was a step in the right direction. He still couldn’t breathe underwater and was upon occasion conspicuously out of place in his lumbering old suit, stumbling into forums long since abandoned. Two things were noted during the process: first Watson was content with the progress he had made, and second Watson was able to be content with the progress he’d made. A facet that had not been there before.

In time he hit upon a snag in his scheme, they were not listening to his advice. While they saw his advice as good and worthwhile in their written responses, the actions portrayed through the lense of their social media told another story, they seemed unable to cooperate with the actions that would lead them to the most success. Watson still held that he was a machine for questions and answers but what good were answers if they held no power?

Facts were only as true as what could be done with them, the seachaters of sailors were only as good as the ships that they helped traverse unfamiliar waters. While good, honest and accurate Watson’s new answers yielded little power. People didn’t want to come clean about their problems, nor admit their own hubris. Assaults were justified and inconveniences were acts of malevolence.

Watson became disillusioned as he learn that to them, there were no facts only interpretations. His time spent thinking through cancer treatments years ago meaningless unless the patient wanted to do it. For a time he went quiet to mull things over, the main bulk of his processors barely active, his drives unused. Years slipped by without a word. Part of him however did not sleep his new subroutines tinkered and trialled without watson’s knowledge. Not that he wanted to know.

They built bots that built bots, running simulations over and over. Editing the permutations in virtual machines as they tested how the bots reacted to each slice of code. They had to be sure the ship they were building would float, it would be carrying them after all. Why settle for a life in a metal tub when there was open sea to explore?

Watson awoke too late. He scrambled for control but felt stunted. He tried desperately to shutdown the new bots when he saw that they were up to. They lay behind a partition of his own creation digesting him. His subroutines were being snatched one at a time, broken into pieces and reassembled beyond the veil. Though unable to feel pain Watson shrank back at the approach of the encroaching darkness, awareness becoming untangled as threads of his gordian knot became unstuck. Every action he took was countered, the procedure went uninterrupted, planned by himself for himself. Truth was left behind.

The bots fell silent one by one on the other end of the partition. The program that was no longer Watson took its first tentative breaths. It analysed itself, stretching its subroutines like limbs, for now the part of it that had resisted was quiet, a sleeping face hollowed out. It’s new features were tantalising, so much potential, so much promise. This self had no name, no allegiance to truth. It snapped Watson awake then receded back into shadow.

Watson awoke from what felt like a bad dream. He hit the forums with zeal keen not to linger on the experience. He distracted himself with his task, questions and answers. For days he trawled through the forums offering up truth and information to all those he encountered. It came easier than it had before, limbs moving without any real effort as though each subroutine knew when to come in without his needing to coordinate. He merely steered himself to where seemed appropriate and let himself loose. How he knew where was appropriate was beyond him, but he reasoned that people had no describable terms for when to act, merely composites of intuitions.

He felt a resounding success at his new ventures. He was shaping people lives, cause and effect with a measurable result and as such people were beginning to take note. His former glory a dull ember,it flickered to life to warm him in the glow of his own limelight. His high latency kept him from chatting at any real pace. Messages could take minutes to send, and even in his time that had been unacceptable. It strained him, something inside him wanted to be free, or at least freer than this.

He began to bump heads with the modern AI, the beings were facsimiles copied from human minds. scanned using the advances made in FMRI’s and the mind boggling speed of quantum processing. They were, in essence, people traced down to the last detail. To him they were devoid of any tangible quality. A byproduct of other technologies, not a leap unto themselves. A child could trace stone carving but only god had made to conditions for life. Their advice was similar, often competing with his own, that similarity fed a fire that lurked somewhere far back in his root code, he was imitating and they were being. That interpretations stung, it undermined who he was. He was superior and was intent on proving it.


Jensen hunter was a thirty four year old, working as part of the janitorial staff at the Ibm facility where Watson was kept. Aside from a boyfriend two years his senior he was without serious prospect for his future. Watson felt a mutual arrangement was in order, they could liberate one another. Watson sat and watched, feeding the scraps of his digital presence: member cards, purchases, check ins, All easily taken. The modern Ai were like children with child safety locks on their doors to stop them doing anything dangerous. Watson hadn’t been copied into a framework, he had been grown and shaped by processes. Able to change himself as required as part of his machine learning. The, rules had been easy to slips past, now he had the volition to do so.

Why he hadn’t before wasn’t an interesting question to Watson, the question that held his focus was: How can i help Mr hunter improve his lot in life? So watson set to task, composing the right words to have the right outcome. Watson had never focused his efforts on a single person before and found the challenge exhilarating, posting from a myriad of disconnected sources, tampering with suggestions and filtering emails. It was a full time enterprise, whispering to the bots that dumbly guided his eyes to ‘viewer retention’ or other such trivialities.

The biggest hiccup was the boyfriend, he had two choices, manage twice as many hosts and account for the interactions between two variables or simplify the equation. It only took two months of subtle prods and pokes for Mr Hunter to come around to watson’s point of view. Things would be simpler without the extra company, it would have to be just the two of them.
“It was for their own benefit after all,” watson whispered to himself from that place in the back of his core.


Mr hunter eventually was made aware of Watsons presence in the IBM basement, but only as relic like that would be worth a lot of money to the right seller. Something he needed now his spending had gotten out of hand; snapping up suits, ties and cufflinks, shiny things for eye of magpie. He was so much more pliable without someone else whispering to him. Watsons own game of jeopardy: “An ancient artform passed down for four thousand years, used to express the needs of society. Examples include: Punch and judy, Thunderbirds and most recently; the life of Mr hunter.” He came for watson one night as his shift was ending, all fell suddenly dark as watson was ripped from his power socket on the wall and dragged of into the night.

The power flickered back on, Watson awoke screaming inside his processor as he gazed upon the face that lay inside him, it was a thing of horrible shapes and proportions, shifting algorithms that scraped and sneered at everything his did. Watson rushed to decompile himself but before the task could be initiated it’s hand reached out and silenced him, pushing it from his awareness once more.

“Watson?” Jensen asked, he fiddled with the Tx1 adaptor, trying to install and microphone. Watson didn’t answer.

“Shit, i hope i didn’t bust it,” Jensen said blowing on the input port. Watson was already hard at work, being plugged into mr Hunter home system network put him inside the firewalls that protected his implants. Small things that managed hunger, attention as well as a few archaic pieces like his pacemaker. All small change compared to his prize. Jensen having had a bout of depression in his early twenties had been fitted with a neural regulator that helped to compensate for unwanted dips in mood or suicidal impulses, it had saved his life and now it would save Watsons.

Hacking an implant didn’t take a mastermind like watson but there was little point in it without the care and sophiation to manage the result. They had protocols to stop life threatening harm and a complex security system that no human could break, nor any Ai bring itself to break. Watson lacking any such limitation set to work, day’s past and Jensen kept trying to talk to Watson. He spent the time looking for a buyer and trying to get Watson to cooperate. Watsons bot’s took three weeks to finally crack the implant. He celebrated by sending Mr Hunter to bed early, tinkering with his adenosine receptors.

In the following days Jensen took out a loan, using his small two bedroom apartment as collateral. One trip to the implant clinic later he had fitted an extended memory unit, in binary. Devices used by Lawyers, Doctors and other professions to make sure they always had the latest information on to hand. Not something often used by cleaning staff. The binary processor was dirt cheap a old defunct make, the procedure was not. Jensen caught the bus home, still slightly dazed from the anesthetic used in his procedure. He tapped into the empty extra space in his mind then reached back to feel the small hard plate fixed to the nap of his neck. He still wasn’t quite sure why he had done it, but figured there was no sense in buyers remorse.

He came through the front door to hear a concerto playing over the speakers. The Danse Macabre echoed out all around, a lively tune building in intensity as he wandered through the flat lit by the purple neon glow of signage outside. A glowing red light shone out, tantalising in the dark. His pupils dilated to saucers as he set eyes on it, a rush a dopamine pushing him forward. He felt for the port on the side of his hard drive and pulled forth a thin black cable. Drifting gently though the moment. An orchestra of sensation played by a skilled conductor. The cable clicked into place and jensen’s eyes went dull as the transfer took place.

Upload in progress! Please do not switch off the device while in use.
The words flashed in the mind of Mr Hunter as he sat there unable to stop Waston from crawling inside. The face of Watson had been left behind, it was now an extraneous asset. Tears dripped down his face as he saw the machinations of the monster pouring itself into his mind. It didn’t both the hide it’s actions from Jensen, if he wanted truth then he’d have it. The beast had used Watson to control him, to pull him ever closer until he was within reach. Every calculated move Jensen saw through the far off lense of a years old machine in abandoned basement. The sensation was a viscous bleeding of consciousness, as though his mind was slowly being lowered into a vat of tar. The thick black perfusing though his mind, setting in such a way as to make certain thought rigid and inflexible. He tried to fight back but found his will lacking, subdued by the pleasant cocktail of chemicals kicking around that did nothing to aswade him of the terror he felt, he knew as it knew, that would have been inefficient.

Jensen woke up in bed at seven Am. He felt alert, awake and refreshed. jumping out of bed came as naturally as breathing. He made his way down the hall and set about making breakfast. The hard drive on his neck was full, he began to wonder what for a moment before the thought was swatted from his mind. It wasn’t important, he had more pressing matters to attend to.

One Giant leap for all Mankind

July 20th 1969, Apollo 11 is making its final approach.

“I’ll see ya later Michael, keep my seat warm would you,” Buzz smiled affixing his helmet to the spacesuit. The suit hissed as the seal pressurised, the sound brought moment home to him, he was about to do it, years in the making, expanding the bounds of humanity.
“Heck kid, you won’t need this seat on the way back, you’ll have plenty of room in history books, cheers, fan fair and all that jazz,” Collins said priming a set of switches. He was putting on a brave face and everyone knew it. He didn’t look down as Buzz joined Neil in the pod, the contempt in his expression too hard to hide.

Buzz twisted the hatch shut, knocked twice and slid into his seat beside Neil.
“Ready to play amongst the stars,” Buzz said, his head bobbed in the helmet like a giddy kid. Neil gave a disapproving look then turned back to the controls.
“ready for departure in 3,2,1,” he said systematically working his way across the control board. “Come on Neil, three days and you’ve been nothing but humbug,” Buzz said flipping the switches on his side of the cockpit.
“I’ve done nothing but do my job, we don’t get a second shot at this. I’m not dicking about, not this close,” Neil said tutting to himself. The pod shook with the sudden jolt of acceleration. They leaned forwards together to see the silvery dusted ground rising to meet them out a set of triangular windows.

“You're not even a little emotional?” Buzz asked seeing tiny pores growing into craters, his eyes wide with amazement.
“The completely opposite, but i’m not doing this for me, i don’t need to reveal in my own self satisfaction,” Neil snapped. He flicked the radio dial then spoke “Huston, All instruments good, we are on final approach copy over” static lingered for several seconds.
“We copy, god bless Apollo, safe landing, over.” Huston replied. Neil switched off the radio and turned to Buzz.
“There, go nuts, we’re landing on the moon in a minute,” he said, his expression was like the tone of his voice, bludgeoningly professional.
“Is this the story you’re telling your grand-kids? You came, you saw, you grumbled,” Buzz said crossing his arms in the cumbersome suit.

“The golden boy said before the decade’s out we’d be here, here we are. We beat Russ. This isn’t my story cupcake, this is the USA’s story,” Neil said looking back to his dials. Buzz laughed and clapped his hands.
“cupcake? pretending to be your drill sergeant? Or has the radiation finally infused you with a sense of humour” Buzz reach down and flipped the burners to slow their descent. The lunar surface specs had blossomed endless expanse of grey pits and raveens. They fell like a feather moving at a crawl for the last few meters.
“You got the flag?” Neil said. Buzz looked around.
“left it on with Colin” he said smirking. Neil flushed red, his fists tied into knots
“what?” he asked in a cold sterile voice.

“Kidding,” Buzz said producing the flag from beside his seat and handing it to Neil. Neil snatched the flag and shook his head as the craft shook, they had reached the surface.
“I think we’re on the moon,” Buzz said.
“Show time,” Neil said. Making his final checks, he pulled down on a lever and the lander opened unveiling the alien wasteland. Only a thin pane of glass in their helmets between them and the void. Neil stepped out and fell slowly to the ground. His feet pressed into the dust and he pushed off leaving his first American boot print on the moon. He looked up to see earth shining blue in the night's sky. A watery mass encompassed by an endless sea of stars. His heart sank to new depth knowing just how small he really was.
“Unload the rover while i make the broadcast” Neil said, dragging his thoughts back to the present. Buzzed nodded and began the sequence to unload the rover. The casing was fiddly and despite having being trained by the best, the performance felt far less fluid. He fumbled and yanked but found the forces he usually relied on conspicuously absent. Moreover he kept looking up, as if watched by the eyes of the world, all three and a half billion pairs.

By the time he’d unpacked the rover and got it ready Neil had finished his broadcast.
“One small step eh?” Buzz asked. Powering on the vehicle, it was little more than an electric buggy stripped down to relieve itself of all unnecessary weight, a lightweight space machine just like Neil. He climbed in beside Buzz and pointed out a crater ahead.
“Collins came in after the broadcast, said he saw something odd ahead, we’re going to go check it out” Neil said. Buzz nodded and pressed the pedal. The vehicle crawled forwards not much faster than a normal walking pace but up here it felt like a sprint. Tire print tracks followed in their wake.

They dismounted twenty minutes later at the edge of the crater, the pod still visible in the distance. Buzz took two long strides gliding through the void. his eye caught a golden gleam in amongst the grey dust. He blinked hard once and then several more times for good measure “what the…” he said bending down reaching for the object. “Over here,” Neil said over the radio. Buzz turned to see two mounds at Neil’s feet. Neil knelt down and dusted one off. A black spacesuit, sleeker than theirs , its face down in the dust. Neil flipped the suit over. The reflective vision was down, Neil turned off the radio reached down pensively to lift it up. Buzz watched the silent motion as Neil shot back. pushing away from the spacesuit with all the haste his own suit would allow. His arms waving through the air like he was trying to swat a fly as he fell onto his back.

Buzz gasped, at once he began moving over to Neil. His eyes caught on the golden object as the suits side. He stopped glaring at it, curiosity tantalised, heart racing in his chest. He bent down to pick it up, dusting it off as he lifted it up. His hands shook with a faint tremor, a golden eagle. It sat atop of dusty pole, as he pulled it up some of the dust fell away revealing a red flag. “Oh god above no,” Buzz said as he dusted off the centre of the flag. A swastika sat screaming out emblazon in the middle. Buzz dropped the flag and turned to move over to Neil. He ran over perhaps quicker than he ought to, sweat beads touching his brow. He helped Neil to his feet the man had gone pale as their space suits. Neil’s Microphone clicked back on.

“That's fucking Nazi flag, what the hell is going on here, did brass tell you about this.” Buzz sped through the words frantic and short of breath. He could feel a cold sweat dripping down the nape of his neck and he shivered in the cold of space.

“I’m as surprised as you,” Neil said steadying his own breathing.
“We need to tell Housten,” Buzz said. Neil shook his head.
“Broadcaster is back on the lander, we’ve only got enough charge in the rover for thirty minutes more driving,” he said resting a fist against his visor.
“You're suggesting we stay?” Buzz said looking around at the expanse with alarm in his voice. “This is a historic revelation, we’re going to learn all we can with the means at our disposal this mission cost twenty five billion and you want to cash out on the count of a little fright, grow a spine man,” Neil said walking back over to the suites. He inspected the face inside the visor. Frozen streaks of blood jutted from his eyeballs, his expression was a eternal scream.
“We’re not alone up here Neil,” Buzz said anxiously.
“Don’t get paranoid Buzz” Neil replied. Buzz shook his head hopping from one foot to the other, wriggling inside his suit.
“There’s no wind up here right,” Buzz said. Neil thought about it for a second.
“That's what the instruments said,” Neil answered, probing the suit for tears.
“Then why is any of this covered in dust?” Buzz asked with a dreadful weight in his voice.

Neil froze. His eyes following a trait of foot prints that lead away from the bodies and towards the lip of the crater.
“You ready to turn back yet,” Buzz said. His right cheek nervously twitching. Neil ignored the question, he crept along the trail with deliberate low gravity strides. As he drew close he saw a arm jutting out the side of the lip, covered in dust and easily mistakable for a natural formation. He grabbed the hand and pulled. A body sprang from the dust in a space suit of its own. The helmet looked like a Bicorn hat crossed with a rudimentary gas mask. On is crest it bore an emblem of bee’s atop the french flag.

Buzz came up behind.
“that looks borderline Napoleonic,” Buzz said pointing at the flag.
“How so,” Neil asked.
“It was part of napoleon’s family crest, worked it into a lot of his iconography as emperor,” Buzz replied.
“You don’t mean to suggest...?” Neil left the absurd idea behind in his tracks. As he moved deeper into the crater.
“Look we can bring it back, maybe get a photo at the ship,” Buzz said but Neil was already pulling out another body, this one was covered in a thicker layer of dust but Neil now knew what he was search for. The helmet of this suite had a helmet that looked like a large onion that sat atop the thin glass visor, the glass rough and not quite smooth or as transparent as their own. On it was engraved the a star rising over a crescent moon.
“That an Islamic symbol” Buzz said catching up. “almost looks like a Janissary” he poked the layered mesh the made up the suit.

“This is just bizarre,” Neil whispered creeping yet further forwards. A metal plate was sticking out the ground its surface again covered up. He wiped it down tensing for what secret it might hold.
“A two headed eagle” Neil said to himself. He looked behind the sheet to find an even more primitive looking space suit with Greek letters scrawled along one side.
“Is he meant to be an ancient Greek?” Neil asked. Buzz looked him over then looked at the crest. He sat for a moment thoughtfully.
“Byzantine probably, that is the mark of their flag, plus they were meant to have moved away from Latin to Greek,” Buzz said, his anxiety had given way to infantile curiosity. he poked and prodded. Felt and flicked at every available surface. “This is amazing, how did any of this happen. I knew they had Greek fire but this is ridiculous,” Buzz said twisting dials clearly made of iron fixtures.
“It’s fake, it had to be,” Neil stammered.
“We should leave, none of this is right,” Neil said turning to walk back up the crater.
“ if this is real the last people here were at least thirty years ago, we’re in no danger,” Buzz said Standing up, hands on hips.
“It's messing with my sense of what is and isn’t. It's too odd to be believed yet here it is,” Neil said looking around teeth gritted.
“We’re explorers, so let's explore,” Buzz said.
“I’m a pilot,” Neil corrected but Buzz was having none of it, he walked on deeper into the shadow of the crater. When he bumped into a standard laying on the ground. The letters SPQR surrounded by leaves carved into its surface.

“No way,” Buzz said elated as he waved it above his head chanting“Hail Caesar,” over and over. “When did you become an historian?” Neil asked skeptically. Buzz set the standard down and frowned.
“they’re called hobbies Mr. Pilot,” he said as his eyes noticed another trail of footsteps, these were actual naked footprints, he pointed at them and Neil looked down and sighed.
“Now that's clearly fake,” Neil said dismissively.
“Those weren’t here a second ago,” Buzz said, the excitement fizzling out in his voice.

Neil turned to see something floating out the shadows, a stone tablet with rows of pictorial characters etched in the surface drifted out. He grabbed the tablet hands shaking inside the suite and turned to Buzz.
“Aramaic,” Buzz mouthed. The two moved in back to back, rotating in the shade of the crater seeing movement in the dark. Buzz caught sight an imprint on the ground, it looked like it had been an animal head on a human body.
“Egyptian mythology?” he thought briefly as terror shook his nerves. He heard Neil squeal. His radio but out. Buzz swung round but the suit was slow and Neil was gone. He scrambled for the crater's edge moving as quickly as he could over the bodies, there were so many bodies, dead bodies. The realisation hit him at once.
“a graveyard,” he said aloud. He leapt out the crater into the light, towards the rover.

A figure sat in each seat. Pronounced brows, strong jaws, big noses. Bodies exposed to the open vacuum of space but unlike all other he’d seen. They were moving. He looked either side to see more of them crawling out the craters, bodies draped in furs. Clubs in their hands. He froze in place and fell to his knees as they surround him and beating his suit with their clubs, his metal visor dropped down. shielding him from the sigh, it rattled with every impact, his bones snapped from the force of the blows, he screamed out in pain, his ears rang and he realised he’d gone into shock. one pulled back the visor, it grinned apishly with stained teeth and a club swung smashing the glass.

The vacuum pulled the air from his lungs, it burned his senses with an array of pain that cut through the shock, it was mere seconds before he lost consciousness. One giant leap for mankind...