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Young Writers Society


Event 9: Picture Prompt



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Sat Aug 13, 2016 12:00 am
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megsug says...



Picture Prompt



Summary: Write a short story or poem (anything less than 5000 words) about the following picture:
Spoiler! :
Image


How to enter: Submit your entry by posting here in a spoiler. Use the DT to make comments or ask questions.

Description: Inspiration can come from any image and can turn into almost anything. Ask yourself how this robot was created, what its purpose is, what impact it has on the world, and what happened before to make such a creation necessary. Follow the answers to your questions and watch a story unfold!

Like the other Writing Olympics events, there are three places, bronze, silver, and gold. Bronze is worth 1 point, silver worth 2, and gold worth 3.

The deadline is the end of the day.

Good luck, and may the best writer win!
Test





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 10:14 am
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anshira says...



Spoiler! :
[u][u][i]Technology Today
Gears,
Springs,
Engines.
The modern world today,
seems to be well versed with it.

A screw here,
A nail there.
And there another coil.
We think we can,
fix everything with those.

Hate,
Crime,
War.
We attempt to fix,
with our modern contraptions.

Everything,
so computerised.
Efficient.
We can do most things,
with the touch of a button.

But humanity,
in this modern era,
is disappearing.
Working with machines,
we end up like one.

Everything magical,
Fairies and wizards,
used to reside and
be treasured in,
the depths of our imagination.

Now,
the fragile hope,
of everything magical,
we strive of obtain with,
cheap copies technology promises us.

Till when,
will we ignore?
Till when,
will we shroud the lack of values,
With shiny new metal?

In the race,
of becoming,
westernized,
we are all losing sight,
of what is truly important.

Our eyes,
glued to,
the “cool gadgets” appearing,
Do we even have the time to,
sit and reconsider our actions?












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Sat Aug 13, 2016 11:51 am
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Mea says...



trial & error
Spoiler! :
this was me: a wire frame, each atom built
through fate or chance or God,
and given life.

each day made me a hodgepodge
of gears that don’t quite fit together.
with loosened bolts and rusty joints,
I move and fall in pieces –
my axles spin across the floor
and I’m scattered, dizzy,
shattered.

but somewhere in there wings are soldered on and so:
it’s my turn.

I’ll screw in my heart,
rewire my hands,
and each day I’ll sand my gears
till they turn smoothly.

because then I’ll finally be
a clockwork whole.
We're all stories in the end.

I think of you as a fairy with a green dress and a flower crown and stuff.
-EternalRain

I think you, @Deanie and I are like the Three Book Nerd Musketeers of YWS.
-bluewaterlily





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 2:23 pm
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Dutiful says...



HOPE

Spoiler! :
“Tell us about Hope, grandpa!”

The two kids huddled around their grandfather’s rocking chair with eager faces, in the hopes of getting him to finally open up and talk to them –something he’s never done. All their childhood lives, they’ve only heard him speak a word or two –mostly asking them to go play in another room or to pass him the television remote.

When they’d questioned their father about grandpa’s strange behavior, they were told to leave him alone, that he had been a recluse for more than 30 years and there was nothing they or anyone could do to bring him back to normalcy.

“Hope?” Grandpa Dedaelus asked, adjusting his half-rimmed spectacles. His eyes turned dark as suppressed memories washed over him; memories from over 30 years ago.

Memories of Hope.

The year was 2008.

Dedaelus was at the prime of his career as the next big thing in the world of science and technology, with his crazy ideas and theories about androids and humanoid robots –he was a mad scientist who was on the brink of creating something groundbreaking. Something that would most likely change the way of life and living as such and alter the course of history, paving way to a whole new generation.

He was on the brink of creating Hope, the first ever android fairy –a robot fairy.

While the majority of his research was spent in trying to convince the general public that the concept of androids was not merely science fiction and that the resources were available in plenty on Earth to facilitate her construction, once the prototype was finished it was only a matter of releasing a working model to reaffirm the belief that he’d already instilled in them.

After countless hours spent in research and planning and building, endless amount of sleep lost in dedication to her completion, the day had finally arrived when Hope would be unveiled to the world.
When asked during a Press Meet about his reasons behind naming her ‘Hope’ and why she was created a fairy, he’d only smiled and retold the story of Pandora’s Box, where Hope was all that was left to save the day.

“My fairy is going to be your companion, your friend, the one you look to when you are in need of desperate help. She’s going to revolutionize the way we look at robots, not as something to be frightened of, but as someone you consider your best friend, someone who will make your life a whole lot easier.”

“Yes, but why a fairy?”

“Who doesn’t like fairies?” was all he’d said before dismissing the crowd.

He still remembered the day of Hope’s unveiling like it happened yesterday. Like a proud father ready to attend his daughter’s graduation, he’d gotten dressed, grooming himself for Hope’s graduation to becoming a fully functioning member of the society.

Seeing that Hope was not some ordinary gadget, there was bound to be competition and rivalry, clash of egos and whatnot regarding her completion and unveiling. While he’d faced a lot of criticism and people trying to steal his ideas and blueprints, once Hope had passed the various tests needed to validate her usefulness, to see if she followed Asimov’s Three Laws to the dot, Dedaelus was sure there was nothing left to stand in Hope’s way to becoming mankind’s best friend.

He couldn’t have been more wrong.

Up there on the podium with Hope hovering beside him as the large crowd applauded and cheered him on for contributing so much to the betterment of people’s lives, he beamed as words like ‘God man’ and ‘Nobel Prize’ were being thrown at him. One could say it was the proudest moments in his life.

That moment shattered when one man named Anthony Marcus, a man he considered his biggest rival, his nemesis, coolly stepped on to the podium, a sheet of papers in hand.

Dedaelus remembered standing frozen in his spot as Marcus read the papers out loud. He blocked out most of what was being said but words like ‘abomination’ and ‘freak of nature’ and ‘the society isn’t ready to accept robots yet’ came through loud and clear. Of all the things that were being said, the one sentence that brought him to his knees in front of the entire crowd was,

“Hope is to be dismantled immediately.”

Chaos ensued following that and while he blocked out most of the events that happened then, the image of him standing numbly without a word as his creation, his daughter was being ripped to pieces in front of his eyes was still there, etched into his mind.

The fact that all his hard work, his endless hours of toiling, his planning, his blueprints, his Hope, was all lost at the hands of some ridiculous documents drove him mad. Mad to the point where he shut himself up in his workshop for two years, never coming up unless he had to, and even then, not for more than a few minutes.

Two years later when he did come out for good, he was a different man altogether. Gone was the smiling face, gone was his spirit. The eyes that once sparkled with life as he talked about his crazy theories was replaced with dark, dull ones that seemed devoid of life.

The man who was once probably the one of most loquacious people on the planet was gone and in his place was a stranger who hardly talked. There was no bringing his old self back; he was broken and beyond repair.

Much like Hope.

“Grandpa?”

The voice of his grandkids brought Dedaelus back to the present.

“Tell us,” pleaded the youngest, whose name he didn’t even bother knowing. Nora-something.

He shifted in his seat and cleared his throat, focusing his attention on the children. They edged closer, eyes mirroring the hope they were feeling.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” was all he said before getting up and walking away.
“And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.”
― Sylvia Plath





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 2:36 pm
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niteowl says...



He Tried To Save The World

Spoiler! :

"You know how all the bees
are dying?" He told her.
She nodded, having read about that somewhere.

Well I've got a plan
to save the world, he said.
Stop all the plants from dying with them.

He took her down to his workshop,
full of tiny tools and tinier gears
and showed her his greatest acheivement.

"Ain't she beautiful?
And now she can fly out
into the fields and pollinate
the flowers, just like a bee."

"Wow," she marveled.
"It can fly?"

"She can't fly yet.
But I'm going to get there.
One day, she'll save us all."

She moved in with him,
fascinated by his dreams,
his visions of being praised the world over.

But too many nights,
he spent alone with a magnifying glass,
perfecting his work at the expense of his love.

On the night the butterfly flew,
he called upstairs
"Honey, come look! She's flying!"

But she had packed her bags
just the day before.
"You do ill if you praise, but worse if you censure, what you do not understand." Leonardo Da Vinci

<YWS><R1>





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 3:16 pm
DragonWriter22 says...



Paradise


Spoiler! :
William smiled as the tiny butterfly began to flap its mechanical wings. The wings fluttered slowly a few more times and then the butterfly took off.
“Whoa there, little fella!” William gently plucked it from the air. “Wouldn’t want you getting lost out here, now would we?” He put down his tiny screwdriver and cupped the metal insect in his hands, “It’s time for you to meet the others.”
The small boy darted up from his workbench and down the path he’d created through the piles of trash. The mounds were endless, stretching as far as the eye could see toward the red horizon. They contained rusted screws, damaged machines, shredded fabrics, as well as countless bits from a deteriorating world. You could find almost anything in the piles if you searched long enough. Will’s screwdriver had come from there, as had his desk and the parts of the butterfly.
William continued running, his calloused hands letting him ignore the impatient jabs of the metal butterfly. Soon he arrived at a large domed building, the only surviving structure in sight. His mother said it probably was a shelter from ages past, or how else could it have survived so long? William thought differently, it was much too large and grand to be a place to hide. Will arrived at the base of the dome and pushed open the heavy doors with his back. Then he slipped inside and passed into the central open room.
Inside, was an entirely different world. Stiff metal flowers grew sturdily around the room. Their triangular petals opening toward the bright lamps dotting the ceiling. Small metal trees grew from the ground as well, growing taller as you got closer to the center. None of them were the same. One to Will’s right was made of intertwining steel strands that formed a trunk before separated and branching out. Copper and iron leaves sprung from the branches and hid delicately sculpted flowers of screws and gears. The trunk of a nearby tree was put together more haphazardly, packed with various tires and bits found in the junk piles. There were fewer branches and instead of leaves, fine chains fell in cascades. Will’s mom said it was supposed to look like a willow tree. Will had never seen a willow and neither had his mother, but there were pictures in the old database as well as the even older books. The books were a treasure they’d discovered in one of the back rooms of the dome. Will had never been allowed to touch them, but he’d seen many of the pictures they contained. He’d even learned how to decipher the symbols.
William let out a light yelp as the butterfly jabbed his hand again. “Okay, okay. I’m going.” He stopped admiring the trees and continued running. He passed trees with copper trunks and gold leaves as well as trees with steel trunks and that were hung with shiny green and red baubles. Finally he reached the grandest tree of all at the center on the room. It’s trunk was so wide it would have taken five Will’s holding hands to completely surround the tree. Will ran to the base of the trunk and began climbing the spiral staircase encased within. Occasionally he passed the windows that allowed view to some of the many branches the tree held. Many were strung with strings of lights and others held nests containing carefully patched metal eggs. A bird made of wound wires perched near one of them now. This bird was an earlier project, so was stationary and could not fly. Many other birds did now however. They flitted through the dome, making their home in the numerous trees and shrubbery.
The stairs were long, but eventually Will reached the top. The upper branches of the tree contained Will’s home. His mother’s workshop was on the lowest level and she sat there now repairing the leg of a metal-plated doe. She wore thick goggles over her eyes and her face was covered in smudges of coal. Her hair was tied back haphazardly into two buns and were also coated in a thin layer of black dust. Her clothes weren’t in much better condition. Her leather overalls were stained with grease and her black shirt was roughly patched. She had rolled the sleeves to her elbow and her delicate hands were covered with worn, fingerless gloves. She looked up as Will darted in.
“Willy! What brings you away from your workbench?” Her face broke into a smile and she raised her goggles, revealing brown-flecked, emerald eyes.
Will smiled in return and held the tiny butterfly out for her inspection, “I finished another butterfly!”
Will’s mom set aside the doe’s leg and leaned forward to look at the butterfly. “Why that’s beautiful! Can it fly?”
“Of course! It almost got away from me too.”
“Ah, poor thing. It’s safe to release now. How ‘bout you put it on that branch outside the window?”
Will did as she directed, passing his hand through the paneless frame and setting the butterfly on an aluminum leaf. It fluttered its wings idly for a minute before taking off and joining the others that flew around the tree. William sighed in satisfaction. “Katie would have loved this,” He said thinking of his little sister. She’d perished before they’d found the dome.
Behind Will, his mother put down her work again, “Yes, yes she would have. Your father would have too.”
Will turned away from the window and looked back at his mother. He could barely remember his father, having only been four when he left.
Before coming to the dome, Will’s family had lived in one of the countess scrap camps that dotted their world. They were few and far between, but were the only real community that existed anymore. The scrap camps were brutal and food was hard to find among the piles of trash. His family had struggled in that harsh environment and soon Will’s parents decided to set out for the legendary underground city; commonly called Paradise by those above. There the last true bit of humanity was said to thrive. Food could actually be grown and the people could live without fear. The dangers of surviving alone through the terrible dust-storms and lack of food were intimidating, but Will’s father couldn’t rest while there still might be a better place. The young family left their protection and set out, wandering for a year and losing their one-year-old daughter before they found the haven of the dome. The dome held supplies and each room revealed treasures of food, energy pods, books, and other supplies. They had enough to last them for years, but Will’s father felt the urge to continue the search. Will’s mother still hadn’t been over the trauma so she remained behind with Will, waiting for a husband who would probably never return.
“Do you think he’ll ever come back?” Will asked slowly.
Will’s mother lowered her goggles over her eyes and began work again. “That’s why we’re waiting,” She answered quickly.
“I hope he comes back,” Will pulled another half-finished butterfly from his pocket and fiddled with it, “Even if he hasn’t found Paradise. I want him to see all we’ve done.”
Will’s mother nodded and began furious work on the doe’s leg. Will walked next to her and sat down. He’d gathered some old jewelry from the outside recently and he felt they’d wind together well as a crystal pear to hang on one of the trees. He felt perfectly at home in the dome and didn’t want to leave, but part of him felt the yearning he was sure his father had all those years ago. Maybe someday Will would build a bird large enough to carry him above the dust storms. Then he would begin a search of his own. For now however, he would work to build THIS paradise and hope their supplies -and sanity- would last till then.
No. For the last time, I don't write on dragons!

I am the Night Rider! Wait, I mean the Night Writer! Ah, no. Well, I do write at night, but... I am the Knight Writer of the Green Room! There we go. :D





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 4:55 pm
Sujana says...



Paraphernalia

Spoiler! :
Her coffee was cold, and if she dipped her pencil in and stirred, grains bloomed against a pale brown pond. She wouldn’t let me heat it, even if I wanted to. She’d think I was trying to impress her. To gain affection, one of the many parental obligations she never bothered to fulfill. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t her daughter, not in the strictest sense.

“You want what?” She finished the mug, adjusting her spectacles. Dust motes shimmered under the dim lamplight, falling on copper wires and bronze gears.

“A name,” I walked down her desk, climbing a rusted wrench. “It wouldn’t be too hard. It’s not like any of your other machines would complain if you do.”

She glared at me, before shaking her head. She set the empty mug down on the corner of a blueprint, studying the model. “You’ve been here for, what, ten years? Don’t you think it’s a little too late for me to give you a name?” She picked out the pencil from her mug, writing a note down on the blueprint. “I suppose it makes things easier. You might have enough data to pick a good name for yourself.”

My wings fell heavy on my shoulders. The gears arranged where my shoulder blades ought to have been ticked, and for a moment I nearly felt human. Painfully human. “I wanted you to name me.” I said, slowly, “I know you did. At least, you did once.”

Her face flashed in various shades of red. Magenta. Crimson. Back to magenta. Then, wilting rose. “Where did you get that idea?”

I told her about the pictures in her bedroom. The woman who looked like her, smiling beside the woman in a white dress. Her clone was wearing a black suit and tie, blonde hair tied up in a bun, blue eyes gleaming from the picture frame. The Wedding Gown? If I were human, she would’ve been the face I’d see in the mirror every morning.

For a long while, her stares were the only thing that told me anything useful. They were like crystal balls the books in her attic talked about, prophecies and visions blooming out if you stirred quick enough. The moment she realized I’d become sentient was when she found me amongst dust motes and old tomes. Reading, not out of programming, but of will. The moment I realized I was sentient was when she stared at me for the first time, pale crystal balls communicating the message her mouth couldn’t:

I’ve made a mistake.

“Her name was Vivian,” she said, plainly. The rusty wrench still lay beneath me. She was still scribbling on her blueprints. “She was a biochemist, and I was an engineer. I wanted to make a functional artificial intelligence that would benefit construction and medicine. She wanted to have a child.”

She set the pencil down, looking back at me. “We met on a visit to Italy. I was going to a seminar on Da Vinci’s mechanical contraptions; she was looking through their old anatomy studies. A colleague wanted to visit a cathedral while we were talking about our next project, so I followed him in.” She stared out into the vacancy of space, the lamplight casting shadows over her face. She chuckled. “It’s funny. In between the saintly mosaics and painted angels, nothing glowed more piously than her smile.”

There was a pause. Perhaps she was waiting for me to speak up. Perhaps she didn’t know how far she could walk down her memories. Either way, I clasped onto the metal wings by my frame, and asked: “Is that why you gave me these?”

She shook her head. “No. That was her idea.” She drew her hand forward, carefully pinching the metallic feathers on my back. “She said it was for efficient motor functions, but really, it was only because she thought it would make me more religious. Perhaps if I made an angel of my own, I would eventually believe in one.” She chuckled. “Faulty reasoning. But I suppose that was why I married her.”

I paused. “Was I--” I considered my words. “Was I meant to be this way?”

Her eyes flickered, sadly, before turning cold. The image bloomed and faded from clear crystal. “She would’ve wanted it,” she answered, calmly. “You’re her dream. She would’ve been proud of you.”

“Have I made you proud?”

She froze. I could feel her words through my chrome tongue, slipping out through steel vocal chords: You were a mistake. “You were only made to be a tool,” she said, finally. “Intelligent paraphernalia, but paraphernalia nonetheless. Vivian never liked that. She wanted to make you into more. That’s why she--”

Then, she stopped. Unsure. Afraid. “You’re proud of me.” I said, again. “Tell me you’re glad I exist.”

She bit her bottom lip, shaking her head. I could see the words in her eyes: It doesn’t matter. It never mattered.

I sat there for the longest time, staring at the woman I ought to have called ‘mother,’ and I realized I would never have a name. I’d never have an identity, to her, or a face of my own. I would always be broken paraphernalia. Malfunctioned equipment. The cause and effect of her practicality, Vivian’s suffering. But that didn’t matter. I didn’t matter.

So I stood up. I moved away from the wrench, flying back out of the office. Perhaps she had a change of heart. Perhaps she couldn’t watch, silently, as a smaller Vivian flew away, as broken and hurt as the one she had lost. Whatever the case, she stopped me while I was mid-way outside, and it almost felt true.

“I am. I truly am.”
"For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief."

Ecclesiastes 1: 18





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 6:34 pm
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spectator says...



takes 1-3
Spoiler! :
take 1:
milk and cereal mixed with metal gears
is a healthy breakfast:
children who end up with chipped teeth,
bleeding gums, or scratches in their oesophagus
are sent to their rooms with directions
to stay there until dinner time,
when their only act of defiance will be
buttering both sides of their bread.

take 2:
she says:
i’d like to grow wings someday,
someday soon would be preferable,
i’d like to taste the sky.

he tells her:
you don’t know what you’re talking about.
her face crinkles with questions:
what do you mean?
wouldn’t you like to fly?
wouldn’t everyone?

his face doesn’t ever crinkle,
it barely even moves when he speaks:
growing wings hurt,
like an animal with claws is trying
to rip apart your back
so it can breathe in the outside world.
besides, human bones are too dense
for us to fly.

she searches in his eyes,
for any indication that this in not the truth,
but her mouth can only hold so many flashlights,
and she decides that disbelief is easier
than finding answers:
you’re lying.
you’re lying.
how can you be sure of any of that?
i don’t see your wings.

he says:
they melted.

take 3:
in the woods we are fairies,
we splash in the creek, barely clothed,
we climb a thousand trees,
we choose this fantasy because it’s easier
to make beleive we aren’t human
than it is to pretend we are still children.
in the woods you are not a lost boy
and i am never wendy.
in the woods there is no motherly love,
only, the creaking of the trees
under the weight of the wind,
only, the creaking of my bones
under the weight of your body.
went for a jog





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 9:37 pm
Wren says...



Spoiler! :
Unnatural

I am unnatural
Mechanical
Robotic
I bow my head in submission to the words
For they do not lie
Irony in its finest
My wings are made of gears
Freedom made of control
And I wonder if anyone could understand
That as I am flying I feel my actions are not my own
That I am not in control
That something out there is telling me your time is soon
And I feel the gears moving inside of me
Wishing that I could feel like the others
How much I long to show
Pain or joy
And they exclaim at how I can fly
Yet at the same time when I get too close
When they see my gears
They whisper only condemnation
For I am unnatural
The others fly without care
Never knowing how much I want
No
Need to leave
So one day I do
I race away from the others
Down to a world where all is the same
What I tried to run from followed me
Until I could take no more of these beings
Who were supposed to understand
So I perch on the hand of one as unnatural as I
But with
Darker Hair
Paler Skin
Eyes that held the world that would never care
And as she watched my gears
She broke the strings that bound me
The pain they wished to place inside my heart
So I taught her how to fly
Because if this being could save me
I would be the one to show her that
She too did not need to exist in fear
Of the impending death
That comes when you have been living
Where you don’t belong
And we left the place that had followed me
For those who were meant to be different
Are not made free
They have to fight for what they believe
For when you have to face the demon
Who will test you till your almost dead
There is no room for those who do not have
Eyes that hold the world
For every hero needs a world to fight for
Even though that world will never understand
I am different but I am me
[spoiler][spoiler][spoiler][spoiler]
[/spoiler][/spoiler[/spoiler]][/spoiler]
Last edited by Wren on Sat Aug 13, 2016 10:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 9:51 pm
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TheSilverFox says...



Uncovering:

Spoiler! :
They came from the West, and they had no intentions to return there.

The first one was a novelty. Found hovering on the streets, small metallic wings beating softly to a clockwork, clicking beat. A collection of eager students ran into it, admiring the way it happily landed upon their fingers and flew about them, swiftly dashing through the air and curving around them. They presented it to their delighted teacher, who had it unveiled within a small glass container in her classroom, where five or ten students would often be found surrounded it in curiosity and surprise, even in the midst of recess break. The other classes were invited to see for themselves, with similar results. It clearly was pleased to have a show, and the robot performed its best stunts and tricks to applause.

This did not last long. A few days later, the janitor turned the light on in the classroom to find a large, gaping hole in the container, its cargo gone. Everyone was evidently dismayed, and blame soon fell upon some of the adjacent teachers and classes of students, some of whom had been clearly jealous to not have such a creature in their own room. Yet no one denied having taken it, all seemingly legitimate honest and dismayed that it had happened, and what little evidence there was suggested that perhaps it had been the creature’s own doing. The container could have been opened, smashed with hammer, a million other quick and effective ways to break it and steal the robot. Somehow, the only trace was a hole that seemed as though it had been eaten through, large enough for the creature to squeeze through. No hand could fit its way in, and it certainly didn’t bear the signs of having been melted or cut off.

Could it have done this? If so, why? These questions were pondered time and time again, but a search of the entire school and school grounds found nothing of interest. Indeed, while they could most likely answer the first question, the second eluded them, much less where it could possibly be now. Those involved soon put the incident into the back of their minds, thinking nothing of such strange behavior due to the fact that it did not happen again. What you didn’t see couldn’t hurt you, right? On the other hand, nobody quite forgot that it had happened, as rumors still flew around the schoolyard and children would pay money to hear the stories of others who claimed to have it seen it again. Always wrong, of course, but that was how kids were. Even the teachers still debated the mystery among each other and themselves every now and then, although worries were dismissed as nothing but irrational fears.

Three weeks later. A second school, the only other one in town. Students just preparing to leave spotted one hovering around a bush. Same situation, airiness, and charm, and the same end. This locale had heard of the experiences of the first, as word spread quickly around the small town, and made sure to put it within a more fortified glass cage, contacting its previous owners that they had found their robot. It was gone the day that said school sent its principal and some teachers, with the same marks of its exit. Unnerved, the parties involved called the cops. Unfortunately, without the ability to actually procure any clear evidence that it had existed beyond a couple of blurry photos, and a futile search around the area, the police dismissed it as a fraud. At best, if it was true, it wasn’t of any concern.

The officers would soon have to eat their own words as rumors and reports began streaming in.

People saw them around trashcans, soaring in the sky, proceeding besides roads, hanging out in trees. The first sightings were spaced apart by a week or two and then a few days, and the hopes of those who believed that it could perhaps be only one robot were quashed when two were seen at the same time. They were getting strangely brazen and open, perplexing the town’s residents. Within a month or two, it soon became an almost common sight to see several while walking down main street, strolling through the park, or planting flowers in one’s own garden. These “robot butterflies,” as they were named, thanks to side-by-side comparisons with the creatures whose territory they shared around the said flowers, seemed to be a new species that seemed to be invasive to this town, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing. They never made to attack anyone or try to pose any harm, and were actually quite willing to allow people to touch them or walk in their way. Yet more continued to show up, like a slowly incoming wave drowning out everything in its path, and nobody was sure why. Who was building them? What was their plan? Why did they keep coming?

The smartest of individuals left town as quickly as they could, packing up their possessions, double-checking them for butterflies, and driving away from the valley that enclosed the town on three sides. Their disappearance left panic and confusion streaming its way through the village as the robots had done, especially as it became clear that all the quietness and luck had finally faded away from their situation.

The butterflies were now taking the appearance of swarms, perching over trees, benches, buildings, and whatever else they could find. Five terrified baseball players/neighborhood brats reported them attacking a beehive and slaughtering the poor bees, as well as knocking aside their own flesh-and-blood counterparts and possessing the homes of the squirrels and owls in the trees. That did it. While they had not yet attacked any human, everyone could quite easily guess where this was going. Citizens could now dispel large amounts of them just trying to walk from location to location, and many of them paved paths to the supermarket. Having the greatest sales of its entire life, the building was soon emptied of food, water, and flashlights, the concerned people retreating to their own homes and basements. Rumors spread of those who tried to exit via the path the lucky few had done, but had been stopped by a sheer tide of swarming butterflies surrounding their cars and making it impossible to see. They were simply too thick to pass through, and the multitudes of dents were left behind on the cars from, as the wide-eyed, panicked survivors claimed, dive-bombing butterflies clustering together to make a large ball that slammed down on their vehicles. All of this made clear that they didn’t prefer anyone leaving now. The town was effectively trapped, and the mayor declared a state of emergency, using his authority to hijack a radio station and establish a call network for the scared and hiding residents.

It did them little good. The callers had nothing to talk about but what they had prepared, where they were located, and how scared they damn were. Competitions were held to see who had the most items, resources, the most fortified station, and the greatest level of fear, but the old prepper who lived a short way from the outskirts of town was always the winner. He spent his time sardonically bemusing how everyone had called him paranoid and stupid, and declaring himself the true authority in the city for his correctness (though he handily won the contests for “most terrified and irrational”). Per usual behavior, he was ignored, particularly as it became clear that nobody had been intelligent enough to consider calling the outside world before this incident began, much to the horror and disappointment of the people. Word spread quickly, however, that the robots seemed to be interfering with radio signals, destroying or distorting them. By the time they had begun to do so, it hadn’t been enough to stoke public alarm. So the people had been damned by two windows – one brief, one practically nonexistent. They were now truly doomed, with no means by which to call for help.

The station didn’t last long, thanks to the inevitable. One gigantic mass of butterflies stretching throughout the town, of almost incomprehensible numbers and sizes, swept upon down all the houses, schools, and buildings. It was gruesome, and all recorded, thanks to the network of purchased radio kits that most owners had figured out how to use at the last minute, what with their windows being shattered and machines resembling insects eating at the walls and floor. Which was key, given that the calling station was among the first buildings to be destroyed, the anguished screams of the mayor clamoring for action to defend him being the last words emitted through the network.

Those rumors of the robots congregating to attack was true, as frantic word spread that they formed balls, fireaxes, and more menacing and capable shapes. Chopping down doors, busting windows, attacking unfortunate victims. In spite of their claims, resources, and pieces of furniture to be used as defense, the townsfolk were woefully and pitifully outnumbered. The majority of citizens were killed outright within the first couple of days, the robots smashing and tearing about houses in the process. The school where the incident had begun was smothered in a blanket of butterflies, who had enough to shove down walls and tear down the roof. Or so claimed the desperate-to-survive next victims, who reported such phenomena as burning trees, bodies of people and robots scattered everywhere, and the slow, rolling demolition of the town from its central square outwards. It was hard to take them seriously to any degree, given they had a lot of justification to exaggerate and lie for the sake of getting attention and aid, but the robots were possibly capable of anything.

Regardless, they died quickly enough. In the end, it acted like “The Lottery” was being played upon each remaining survivalist in turn. Within a week, there was only five, all of whom in large, study basements. Most were preppers; one was a hoarder. One by one, they vanished. Their shelters were finally wrecked, defenses finally broken through, lives removed. The brilliant elderly widow put up a prolonged, two-hour fight in the process, thanks to a couple of shotguns, a steely-eyed determination, and the fact that she had always lived surrounded by 10,000 cans of soup, 5,000 blankets, and a few dozen bags of concrete mix. Yet even she was soon defeated, but not before making a last couple defiant claims and swears against the government.

And then came silence. An elaborate radio network, all members dead and broken into pieces. Silence fell over the land.

Who knows? Perhaps this is all the insane ramblings of an eccentric, mildly narcissistic survivalist prepper hunkered down in the midst of a massive shelter trying to explain why nobody has talked to him in the past few weeks. Who is to say I exist? Who is to say that any of this is actually real, and I’m in a simulation in the middle of an alien spacecraft, being experimented on by the Illuminati? You, my diary, are the only one who contains all of my answers. So, if you would please be so kind, elaborate on exactly what they are.

Damn you,
Steve
S'io credesse che mia risposta fosse
a persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma per ciò che giammai di questo fondo
non tornò vivo alcun, s'i' odo il vero,
senza tema d'infamia ti rispondo.

Inferno, Canto 27, l 61-66.





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 9:52 pm
ty7lucky says...



The Clockwork fairy

Spoiler! :
A gold and silver fairy flitted around through pieces and pieces. She searched for the soundbox. The other clockwork fairies buzzed around searching for the metal animals that needed to be wound up. This fairy on the other hand had a different task.

She lifted the box into the right position in the clockwork man's chest. She remembered the day she had lost the inventor. She had sat on his finger as his last words came from his mouth, to finish his final project.

He had made many things in his life, animals that would be wound up. All of his creatures were silver, gold, and bronze. He put his life into them and made them move. His favorites the fairies that would wind up his creatures after he had gone, but out of all the fairies she was his favorite, Lilian. She had metal bent into the form of pedals for a dress and antennas that shook when hit. She wasn't made any different, but somehow she was more alive.

Lilian grabbed her key as soon as the last piece was put in place. The man of gold and bronze sat a blank smile made from metal on his face. She went to it's back and stuck the key in, she moved her body to turn it. Clicking sounds came from the man as the gears began to turn. He stood up and turned to her. He seemed curious as he tilted his head back and forth. She had done it the metal man was moving.

The man put out a metal hand. She hummed excitedly and caused the soundbox in her chest to start. It made a beautifully metallic song. He stopped in a position of concentration. A grinding sound came from his box. She shook her head and her song increased in strength.

She went to his hand and grabbed a finger, tugging on it. He followed the fairy through the community of fairies and animals. The others groaned angrily as the metal man walked through the room. She led him to the door and outside. She was taking him to the place where she would sit with the inventor. She slowed at the cliff and he took a seat, legs dangling over the rocky precipice. He stared at her, and put his hand in the air. She took a seat on his golden finger, she forgot about the sorrow for her dead inventor and found peace.

"Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job."
-Douglas Adams





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 10:09 pm
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tgirly says...



Spoiler! :
As Delilah passed her daughter Clara's room, she heard the unmistakeable sound of sobbing. Sighing, she set down the basket she'd been carrying, and knocked on the door. The little girl greeted her with large eyes brimming with tears.
"Hi, sweetie, you wanna talk about it?" In answer, Clara turned around and sat down on her bed. The small girl was cocooned in pink; from her bed spread to her pajamas, and everywhere, pictures of butterflies and fairies plastered the walls, several of which Clara had drawn herself. Delilah gently wiped the tears from the little girl's eyes, then sat down at the rocking chair in which you usually read her daughter bed time stories.
"What's the matter?" she asked.
"I can't be a fairy princess," the small girl whimpered.
"Oh, honey, you can be whatever you want to be. Why don't you think you can be a fairy princess?"
"Because of this," the little girl held up her arm. After the accident that had killed Delilah's husband, her arm had been badly mangled. After several surgeries, it had been amputated and replaced by a bionic arm. The tiny child had shown an amazing amount of pluck in her occupational therapy, and no longer had much difficulty wielding it. Normally, she didn't even notice it. Now, she stared at it with contempt, a scowl on her round face. "A fairy can't be made of metal. It doesn't work that way. Fairies hate metal."
"Who told you that?"
"Jessica. And Hannah said she was right. And Hannah knows everything- she's in the fourth grade."
"Hannah doesn't know everything," Delilah said firmly. "And there's nothing to keep a fairy from being made of metal. All right?" Clara nodded, but it was obvious from the storm cloud of her expression that she still didn't quite believe it. As always, Delilah found herself wishing that Corey, her husband, was there, to back her up. He'd always known the right thing to say whenever Clara was worried or fearful. He would've known how to breathe life into the child's hopes.

But the next day, Delilah did have a flash of inspiration, and hurried out to the nearest metal worker. She put in her order, giving him her pair of wedding rings, and later that week, a tiny package arrived at her doorstep.
"Clara," she called. "There's something I want you to see."
Delilah opened the thick paper of the package to reveal a small box, the type you might use to carry a ring, and gave it to Clara.
"Open it," she encouraged. With quiet wonder, Clara opened the box to reveal the smallest of fairies. Clara held it in the palm of her hand. The base of each wing was a wedding band, crisscrossed with golden gears and silver screws.
"It's beautiful," Clara breathed. Delilah reached over and gently clipped the fairy to a small joint in Clara's metal arm, so it hung fom her wrist like a charm.
"It's a fairy!" she whispered. "A fairy made of metal!"
When you wear this, I want you to remember. Just because your metal and gears show, it doesn't mean you're not beautiful. You can be anything you want to be. All right?"
Clara nodded. This time, there was belief in her eyes.
When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.
-Abraham Joshua Heschel





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 10:10 pm
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alliyah says...



The Butterfly Effect
Spoiler! :


There’s a term from science
That’s used poetically to refer
To the theory that the tender flutter
Of a butterfly’s wings
Could cause a storm
A tornado, a hurricane,
Deaths, destruction, the end.
The smallest force changes
The course of time, and nature
And fate is an action that depends
Upon the compression of muscles
Smaller than the circumference
Of a single paperclip
This theory is styled “The Butterfly Effect”

To phrase another way
A grain of sand once moved
Affects the entire ocean;
It stirs the particles around it
And the spider that was once safe
Has been crushed by an avalanche of sand
And the waves have risen
A fraction of a fraction of a centimeter
So that the minnow didn’t mate
And the fish lost its dinner
So there was nothing to feed
The fisherman’s family and
The course of a world has changed
Because the absence
Of a single grain
Of sand.

I cannot tell whether
The butterfly that changed the weather
Moved on its own accord
Or if the breath of God
Moved her tiny wings.
But I do believe that the shutter from
That rise and fall of a creature so small
That I could crush with my palm
Could create a chain reaction,
A new sequence of events
That could alter my life.

I wonder if a butterfly and a
Piece of dirt that clung too closely
To the sole of my foot
Can cause such massive consequences
If the conditions and the surroundings
Are right or wrong,
Then what about my movement?
My actions, my feelings, my gestures, my words
Are they so insignificant that the slightest brush
Of another being could cause them to be
Irrevocably irrelevant?
Or might they be so significant that I,
Have the power to move mountains
And nations, changing the very ground,
The language, and the bodies that surround me?

The effect of the butterfly
Is at once too massive and too insubstantial
For me to comprehend with my mind
That seems to only be good for telling jokes
Or reading books, or functioning within the world
That is visible and tangible around me,
But is a poor tool to recognize
Tornados, or hurricanes, or oceans,
Or poverty, or death, or love, or truth.
But, just thinking about the air rising
Around the butterfly’s wings
As the world’s temperature rises
And value of a dollar declines,
And imagining the storm that moves
Oceans, and has the power to destroy
Everything that I thought was important
Makes me feel like the world is off my shoulders
For a moment and resting between the slender
Space of air between two orange and black patterned
Wings that formed in a magical cave of a cocoon
That I will never be able to see or control.
And that my job is just to try to appreciate
The small and the enormous the bug and the ocean
And know that I am both everything and nothing
And that I cannot possibly understand or know
Everything about the world or life or purpose
But here I am.

you should know i am a time traveler &
there is no season as achingly temporary as now
but i have promised to return





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 10:26 pm
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JustJasper says...



Spoiler! :


Green leaves spin as the float to the ground, they fly on the breeze effortlessly and crackle under footsteps. Myra misses them almost more than the sound of waves crashing on the beach.

Oh to be a child again! She thought to herself.

To have lived before Earth had been lost. That is what paradise is, being able to run down grassy hills and climb twisty trees is the greatest thing Myra can imagine. Unfortunately life isn't like a fairy tale and not every mistake can be reversed, everything has consequences. If you pollute the Earth you live in an underground bunker and never see the sky again or feel the wind on your face. That is just how life is.

Now there is only the metal plants and animals meant to give the illusion of a normal life. Everyone but the little children knows that they are just echos of what used to be. Earth was full of beauty, rain, wind, the ocean. Nature was endless and full of astonishment, you could walk on the same path every day and find something new each time. The sky was always a different shade of blue mixed with golden hues at sunrise and sunset. Myra missed all of it, everything that used to be, there was only one tree left now and it was heavily guarded. All she had from the past was a vial of sand she wore as a necklace. She stared into it now trying to make sense of her world. If only humanity had treasured little miracles before everything was taken. Before they had suffocated the earth with poisonous gas and flooded the oceans with oil. It was easy to feel angry at the adults who had passed on this garbage can of a planet on to her, but it wasn't just their fault, everyone was to blame for the horror on the surface.

She was pulled from her thoughts when her little sister hopped up on her bed with a clockwork bug perched on her hand.

"Look Myra!" She exclaimed proudly.

"That's nice Jamie," Myra said with a sad smile before lying down on her metal cot and drifting off to sleep in her underground prison.

Why do we capital-N Nerds love Mars so much?
Because it's beautiful, it's tough, it's buried in our mythic, childhood memories.
It's covered with human triumphs but also with sad stories of failure.

-Greg Bear





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Sat Aug 13, 2016 11:32 pm
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passenger says...



stifled

Spoiler! :
butterflies swarm under my diaphragm,
less alive and more
robotic,
latching onto my voice and wrenching it down
into my stomach.

introvert.

a whisper fights for survival in the
abrasive conflict between indigestion and
thoughts that leak
from the pipes of my nervous system.

waterfalls congregate atop a
drowning plea for freedom;
I am a gorge of spine-valleys and rushing rapids,
anxious smiles and a lack of
sure footing.

I grapple for balance.

a call echoes off ebony river stones:
please let me out.
extracting bugs from my gut,
you're heavy like the breath in my lungs as
you try to uncover my scream.

but your hands are covered in steely blood and you cower,
folding under my toes, shivering
not so much because of the hemochromatosis
but because you are afraid I, an anchor,
will wrap myself around you and drag
you to crystal ocean depths.

afraid the butterflies will fly to your light like
teeming moths.

I find myself wishing you were like them.
wishing you cared enough to
hush my warring cry.

summon inner strength.
I peruse the beach but find the sand
has been eviscerated by the sun.
crusted nails excavate in my stomach
and find one thousand

metal skeletons.
Last edited by passenger on Sun Aug 14, 2016 12:39 am, edited 1 time in total.
"We accept the love we think we deserve." -Stephen Chbosky's Perks of Being a Wallflower








It is better to deserve honors and not have them than to have them and not deserve them.
— Mark Twain