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The sky was dark with them. Birds. Dark birds, thay flew and they soared and the flew and they squwacked and chuirped. "Ive had it with these dog gone birds" I said, to no one in particular because my roommate, Matt, was of no consequence to me ever since he had written a scathing and untruthful review of my fantasy restaurant online on the fantasy restaurant wiki that i both curate and founded.
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Aug 6, 2014 02:49
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"This is untenable" I said, in conclusion. "What is?" He, Matt, asked me. "Shut up" I told him and then I stormed out of the room and into the hall, very nearly tripping over the pile of discarded laundry that we had placed there in an effort to delay the entry of burglars into our apartment and we supposed that it had worked because we had never been burgled. I reflected back on those halcyon days when we worked together, hand in hand, mano a mano, like brothers. Closer than brothers. But oh that time was over now, I continued to reflect as I stormed down the hall, barely glancing into the open rooms of our neighbors because all their doors were (reasonably so) closed. Our friendship had ended the day he decided to maul it upon the woeful alter of ill begotten comedy and satire. "This is untenable" I said in conclusion.
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Aug 6, 2014 02:53
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I marched into the street in front of our apartment building that so recently had been full of bustling traffic and people who were also bustling but now was only full of birds and the contents of their recently voided bowels.
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Aug 6, 2014 02:55
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"What is the deal with all these birds?" I asked, lilting my voice in the exact manner that the comedian Seinfeld was so well known for doing before he died tragically in a bird related incident, the details of which I am both unfamiliar with and uninterested in. Truthfully, my knowledge of Seinfeld begins and ends with my pitch-perfect impersonation of his signature phrase.
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Aug 6, 2014 03:02
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The birds swirled around the city like trash caught in a dust devil in that one animaniacs cartoon where the dust devil swirled the bit of trash around and they choked out the life-giving rays of the sun much in the same way that a very dense cloud of flying objects would blot out the sun's rays. Bits of excrement spattered the sidewalk around me and I tried to discern some pattern in them but I was unable even though I had scored very high in many online IQ tests and not just the easy ones that people posted on Facebook. "I just want to objectively measure my intellect, not find out which Pokemon I am." Is a status update I had posted a few weeks back. It garnered quite a few likes but not as many as I had hoped.
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Aug 6, 2014 03:08
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A bird landed in front of me. It had Matt's face. "The Sonic n' Pals Burger Bistro is a detestable blend of over-priced, poorly executed entrees, and a rude and unkempt staff. I was forced to wait, an utter prisoner of this culinary dungeon, for over an hour before my food arrived. The presentation, if you could call it that, left much to be desired, unless one desires their burger to be coated with what appeared to be exceptionally runny diarrhea" It chirped.
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Aug 6, 2014 03:13
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"I'll kill you, you bird" I said to the bird with Matt's face, but to be honest I really said it more to Matt, the real Matt, not the face-of-Matt on the bird. The moment the words left my lips I regretted them, because deep down, Matt was my friend, but as soon as I regretted them, I changed my mind and I did not regret them. I meant those words with ever ounce of my being and soul and mind. I wanted to kill Matt. I hated Matt. I hated the way he lounged on the couch and read e-books on his Nook instead of watching Breaking Bad with me on my Kindle fire. I hated how he was disrespectful and unsupportive of my fantasy restaurant wiki. I hated how he left the milk out once. I hated how he would make jokes about Breaking Bad and said that he was glad Walter White was dead at the end of season 5 because at least that way they would never make another Breaking Bad episode I hated how he said Breaking Bad ripped off Weeds. I hated how he didn't like the spaghetti that I cooked on Fridays even though it is my mom's special recipe and she died of uterus cancer last year. I hated how he broke my external hard drive full of Breaking Bad fan art when he fell off of the chair he was standing on to hang my GI JOE posters and broke his leg on my external hard drive container.
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Aug 6, 2014 21:09
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I picked up the bird with Matt's face and I violently clamped my teeth onto its neck in an effort to bite its head off in one grotesque chomp, but ended up taking several minutes of chewing and gnawing to actually accomplish because it is a lot harder to bite a bird's head off that you would think.
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Aug 6, 2014 21:12
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the bird and the bird's head fell to the ground unceremoniously and also a great deal of the bird's blood also fell to the ground after it fell out of my feather-filled mouth. The feathers in my mouth were also covered in blood and some of them were stuck between my teeth but I didn't care, all I cared about was doing to the real Matt exactly what I had done to the bird that carried his visage. As I stormed away, back towards our apartment, I glanced back at the remains of the bird and was startled to see a smile slowly creeping onto bird-Matt's gore-coated face.
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Aug 6, 2014 21:15
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I immediately started running as quickly as I could, thankful that I had recently read a lifehacker article about how to run like the Tarahuma Indians of Mexico who run wearing only sandals they fashion out of tire treads and leather and they run for many many miles. I called upon my vast knowledge of their running technique and prowess and it was as if in that moment my Crocs animorphed into authentic Tarahuma running sandals, giving me the speed and agility that I needed to reach my apartment.
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Aug 6, 2014 21:20
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As I ran I stopped to catch a glimpse of myself in a passing window that I was passing I and saw my reflection in it.
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Aug 6, 2014 21:37
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Aug 6, 2014 21:38
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Murcor posted:Meanwhile in the apartment, Matt remained focused on the tiny samurai figurine he was painting, the final details coming into place. His recreation of the diorama from Ronin was a success, but, as he muttered to himself once again, "This roomate endeavor has ended in ruin. That hoopleheaded madman has taken leave of his senses and dragged me to hell with him!". I was instantly and strangely aware of Matt's thoughts and his actions. In much the same way that a Jedi master, such as Obi Won Kenobi, would be aware of the actions of his apprentice's thoughts and actions as they chased the assassin through the torturous streets of the planetcity Coruscant. I had a desire to thank whatever higher power had chosen to bestow these forcelike powers upon me but I refrained from doing so because I am a devout atheist\agnostic.
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Aug 7, 2014 00:20
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i did take a moment to wonder if Matt would turn into a force-ghost after I bit his head off and I sincerely hoped that he would not because if there was one thing I wanted less it was Matt muttering cryptic platitudes into my ear at inopportune moments such as the middle of the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie.
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Aug 7, 2014 00:23
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My apartment building stood before me, solemn and silent, alone on the block. Desolate, empty lots surrounded it like so many empty M&M packets after an afternoon in which you would eat a lot of M&Ms. The building looked like something that I would have spent countless hours meticulously building block by block in single-player Minecraft in that it looked exactly like an erect penis.
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Aug 7, 2014 02:50
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I stood for several minutes at the doors of the elevator, repetadly pressing the button, which never lit and the elevator never opened or even made the ding noise that they make. With each button press I made sure to demonstrate my dissatisfaction with the situation by puffing out my cheeks and blowing air out of my nostrils in a muted snort. I would also occasionally add to the effect by shaking my head and rolling my eyes. If anyone had been around, which of course there wasn't, they would have surely nodded in agreement and perhaps given an empathetic shrug of the holders as if to say "We are in this together and I sympathize with your predicate but am unable to do anything to remedy it" We are all just lone wolves passing in the night.
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Aug 7, 2014 03:03
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Next to the elevator door stood a mannequin. It looked like the type of mannequin you might see in a N64 game featuring mannequins. It was devoid of any detail or external features, its skin the color and texture of a gray denim. It wore no clothes. I glanced downward at the genital area as I always do when confronted with a new mannequin and it had no genitalia except a tiny label where a penis might have been. The label read "Hecho en Mexico" which is Spanish for Made in Mexico. The mannequins hands were very different from the rest of the mannequin in that they were actual severed human hands that had been attached to the mannequin with some sort of tape that looked like gorilla tape and might have been. Fresh blood was pooled on the floor beneath them and was soaking into the arms of the mannequin. One the first three fingers of each hand was tattooed a letter, they read: D, I, G, D, U, G And a tattoo of a fygar was on the remaining finger of the right hand, and a tattoo of a Pooka was on the remaining finger of the left hand.
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Aug 7, 2014 03:17
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Aug 7, 2014 03:31
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Clutched in the still bleeding hands was a simple cardboard plaque which read: "The elevator's out" which I quickly snapped a photo of to send to apostropheabuse.com As I walked to the stairs I glanced down at my own hands, which now bore the same tattoo as the severed hands attached to the mannequin. "What could this all mean?" I asked myself in a hushed whisper and plunged my hands into the roomy pockets of my sweatpants.
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Aug 7, 2014 04:53
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Aug 7, 2014 15:54
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Before I attempted the exhausting ascent by stairs to my apartment like some modern day urban sherpa, I realized I needed energy... fuel. For my body. It craved sustenance for the task before me. Sadly, in my haste to flee the room earlier, I had left my pitcher of Soylent in the minifridge, and I was unable to answer its viscous siren call. Like a man recently washed ashore a deserted island I began to tremble with the sudden realization of my predicament. And also from low blood sugar.
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Aug 7, 2014 16:07
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All the while the bird incessantly beat upon with windows without ceasing. They beat on the windows with their wings, beaks, talons. They slammed their bodies into the glass, a mass of black feathers and gore acting not as a disorganized collection of bodies but as one unified whole. I clutched my ears with both hands, desperate for silence. I don't even know why the birds do this it doesn't seem like it is in their best interest, if I was a bird i certainly would not beat my body senselessly against the window of an apartment building I would probably just go flying around and lay eggs in a nest. My father once told me "What are your long term plans?" and "Your mother and I think it would be good for you to get a job and live on your own for a while" and I have often used his hurtful, abusive words to my advantage. Repeating them over and over, absorbing the pain and transforming it into power. I could feel my energy levels go up as I chanted, silently at first and then slowly rising into a triumphant shout! "How is THIS for a long term plan?" I shouted to the birds and to my father. I dropped to my knees and began crying.
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Aug 7, 2014 16:35
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When Matt and I were still friends, we would hang out at the local game shop "The Panther Den" on game night where everyone could bring their favorite game to play and of course we brought Munchkin which was always a crowd pleaser. I'll never forget the moment when Starlight walked into the Den. We never learned her real name but Matt and I always called her Starlight.
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Aug 7, 2014 17:14
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She was older, maybe upper thirties, lower forties. But you could tell she spent a lot of time at the gym and other places were ladies go to stay in shape. She had a bottle of muscle milk in one hand and a cell phone in the other and she was wearing those tight pants like they wear in Men in Tights. Her long blond hair cascaded in voluptuous curls, the kind you see in shampoo commercials or on golden retrievers. She walked exactly the way I'd always imagine a woman would walk if she were to walk into the Panther Den, hesitantly, yet curious. I'm sure she detected the strong odor of masculinity that filled the room. This was a place that was populated by men, men who used their intellect, not their brawn to solve problems. These were men who could be there for her, who could meet her needs. Not like the dumb jocks she had always known. She glanced my way, her eyes drawn to me my the laser-like glinting of the florescent lights off of my spectacles. I don't know what went through her mind in that electric moment, but I am sure she felt the same thrill of excitement that I felt. The room went silent, as one by one we looked up from our intellectual pursuits and gazed upon this angelic visitation.
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Aug 7, 2014 17:23
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Her eyes left mine and flitted back and forth across the room, searching, seeking. What does she seek? Who does she seek? Does she desire a man to rise from his deck of M:tG cards and join her at her side? Could I be that man? Did I have what she needed.. what she yearned for? Could I be the one she sought? A young man named Brian stood up, "Hey mom, I'll be right there" he said, grabbing his Skull the Troll dice bag. a star war betamax fucked around with this message at 18:53 on Aug 7, 2014 |
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Aug 7, 2014 18:29
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Captain Dan's masterful flow jolted me back into my sad reality. Normally I would have delighted in his lyrical artistry but at this moment it just felt... wrong somehow. I ripped my Samsung Galaxy Rugby Pro from my shirt pocket and jabbed at the silence button. My tear-damp fingers were unable to work the capacitive screen and I hurled the cellphone away in disgust and it slammed into the wall and bounced across the floor and tumbled back to my feet and of course it remained intact because of the superior Samsung engineering which frankly puts anything Apple makes to shame.
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Aug 7, 2014 18:36
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tomstuart posted:Upstairs in the apartment, Matt was slowly organizing the pile of laundry into smaller piles of laundry sorted by color, fabric, shape, texture, and by how soiled the piece of clothing was. "This'll show that piece of poo poo roommate. That rear end-brained motherfucker has an irrepressible hate for people that move his things. If he touches my samurai though..." Matt's eyes dart around the room, looking for any signs that the samurai in his Ronin diorama had been moved. Matt begins sweating uncontrollably and has to lie down in the bathtub with the shower curtain drawn. A bird flew in through the front door, let out an ear piercing screech and alit upon an ancient CCTV monitor mounted to the wall that I had never noticed before until the moment that the bird flew into the window and landed on it. On the monitor I could see a grainy image of my apartment, I immediately recognized the video as that from a hidden spy cam I had wisely installed months before that was disguised as a clock that has hands that turn i a circle. On the screen I could see Matt, inanely puttering about the apartment, a foul string of blue language flowing from his maw. Written on the screen with a sharpie were these two words "Dig Dug"
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Aug 7, 2014 18:42
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The final piece of the puzzle had fallen into place. I knew what I must do. I knew what I was born to do. It all made sense. Matt. My Father. Starlight. Brian. The birds. the mannequin. I solemnly picked my cellphone off the ground, and hunched my shoulders in a very masculine fashion as if I was in a detective noir video game and I placed my foot on the first step of the stairs leading to Matt.
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Aug 7, 2014 18:45
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Aug 7, 2014 19:09
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Aug 7, 2014 22:07
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I've never seen childbirth but I have made several edits to the wikipedia page on it and I can confidently say that while it is a miraculous and beautiful process, it is also long and somewhat strenuous. In many ways, my ascent up the stairs was exactly like childbirth only I was both the mother, AND the infant being forced through the birth canal. It was also a lot like being a reverse 9/11 victim who instead of falling out of the twin towers to my death, I was falling upwards to new life. My breath became ragged and my legs shook with fatigue as I climbed step after step. I dared not look to one side or the other for fear that I would topple head over heels into the abyss that surrounded me. The darkness below was a deeper black than I have ever known and as I climbed higher, it climbed higher with me. The darkness shifted and writhed and consisted not of shadow but of the tangled and twisted bodies of millions of coal-black birds.
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Aug 7, 2014 23:30
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After hours of climbing, I reached the top of the stairs and stood before my apartment. I raised my tattooed hand to the door, balled my hand into a fist, and rapped my knuckles against the surprisingly spongy wooden door.
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Aug 7, 2014 23:33
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Aug 7, 2014 23:49
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After waiting a few moments and receiving no response, I dramatically whipped the door open by turning the door knob and opening the door quickly. The speed with which I did so astonished me. Matt stood in the center of the room, jaw agape, eyes glazed. His arm's ended in bloodless stumps instead of ending in hands as I was accustomed to. A faint hissing noise was coming from his open mouth, as if he was letting out a long, quite breath. The floor around him was covered in dirty laundry and GI Joe posters. "Matt!" I shouted "Matt! Look at me Matt!" He remained motionless, aside from a rapid vibration of his lower body, almost imperceptible to someone without my acute senses. "Listen to me Matt, you asked for this... you brought this on yourself" I reached down and picked up my broken external hard drive which once contained my carefully curated collection of Breaking Bad fan fiction. "Defend yourself coward!" I croaked and lunged at him, swinging the hard drive in a wide arc over my head. If Liam Neeson could have seen me at that moment, I am sure he would have smiled and nodded in approval.
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Aug 8, 2014 01:31
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I brought the hard drive down again and again into his face which splattered from my mighty blows as if it was made of skin-colored Gak. I pounded and I pounded until his entire head was unrecognizable, just a dripping mound of pink slime. Him body remained rigid, he never flinched, he never budged. Only his legs continued to pulse with a mysterious vibration. "This is just like you Matt!" I panted, "you never listen, you never change..." Drawing every last reserve of energy I leapt at him again, slamming into him like an football player making a goal. His body toppled backwards, an obscene, headless statue, and clattered against the window which immediately shattered beneath the blow. I stumbled to the ground and looked up just in time to see the body tip over the edge of the window sill and disappear over the other side.
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Aug 8, 2014 01:40
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Blasts of hellish wind howled in through the shattered window, snatching up GI Joe posters and ripping them back and forth through the room. Dazed, I struggled to my feet and stumbled to the window, gripped the edge and hesitantly looked over. Far below, I could see Matt's rigid form, still falling, falling. Our apartment was several miles up and I knew it would take a long time for his body to reach the barren earth below below. I didn't even need to see him hit the ground, I knew I had done my duty, I had fulfilled my destiny. I flopped back in my beanbag chair and watched the sun slowly set into the Blood Sea, perfectly framed by the shard-rimmed window frame. I slipped Matt's Beats over my ears, plugged them into my Sansa Clip (running Rockbox of course), and queued up my Jonathan Coulton playlist. It had been a good day. I had found new power, new life, new purpose. I was the master, I was king, this was my domain. Nothing, and no one could stop me now. No birds, no Matt. Just me. Alone. As the sun was extinguished in the blood sea and impenetrable darkness engulfed me... I smiled.
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Aug 8, 2014 05:31
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One of the reasons my parents never accepted me was because of my X-Man-like abilities, one of which is the power to survive on much less sleep than the average human. Due to this special power, I awoke the next morning after a brief 8 1/2 hours of sleep. As usual, I was instantly alert. I sat up in bed, carefully lifted my spectacles from the bedside table, and attached them to my face. "Good morning." I muttered, eyes blinking as the adjusted to the sunlight streaming in through the sheer window curtains and falling up the lush floral patterns on my bed sheets. "Good morning sweetheart" Said a raspy, feminine voice from beside me. I turned, and was mildly surprised to find Starlight lying in bed beside me.
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Aug 8, 2014 13:25
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It seemed the right conclusion to things. "This was the way things should be, and not some other way." I whispered, sagely. I had corrected the universe, I had removed the one source of pain and fear and rejection and bad breath that was Matt. Now the world could continue the way it was meant to be. She sat up beside me, her blonde hair pouring from her head, a waterfall made out of yellow hair instead of water. She swung her feet over the side of the bed and stood up. "I'll get breakfast" She yawned. Her Taz' teeshirt draped over her body like a Greek toga.
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Aug 8, 2014 15:13
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In the critically acclaimed video game Deus Ex: Human Revolution, you assume the role of a man who has been cybernetically augmented with nanomachines, you truly are a cyborg, half man...half machine. These augmentations allow you to perform superhuman feats of strength as you advance the award-winning plot that, frankly was superior to any Hollywood movie I have seen recently, however I will add one caveat and that caveat is that I haven't seen a Hollywood movie in several months so there may be some good ones out by now. Regarding cybernetic augmentation, I thought that maybe something like that would come in handy when I discovered, much to my chagrin, that I had no hands. My arms ended in smooth stumps at the wrists.
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Aug 8, 2014 15:20
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Aug 8, 2014 15:29
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