Reply to: Story thread

[xoggoth]

A Lack of Space

As far as Julie was concerned, they had the nicest home possible for them. It was a little cottage with a garden in a lovely area of countryside, well away from any noisy roads or neighbours, yet not too far from a small town with all the shops and things they needed. She and Bill were in their mid-fifties and they might have to think of moving to somewhere less remote in about 20 years but, for the moment, it was perfect.

For her anyway. Bill was not so content as the cottage did not have the space he needed for his various weird hobbies. Their only spare room was taken up with his workshop and his model railway, which had got bigger and bigger over the years. A major problem was that there was nowhere for their children to stay on their occasional visits. Their single younger son had to use the couch in the front room, while his brother and his wife would stay in a B&B a few miles away.

Bill's models looked fantastic, she had to admit, with a beautifully crafted landscape, tiny buildings and people but she always wondered, seriously, why did a grown man still want to play with toys? She and Bill had become more and more detached over the years. Once they had had a good social life, now all he wanted to do spend his time with tools creating a little model world. It was becoming a real source of tension between them. He wanted more room to expand his models and had suggested they could move into the spare room so he could use their larger bedroom, but she had put her foot down. There was no way she was abandoning their bedroom with a nice view and moving into that dark little room at the back.

They had quite a few savings and could afford to move somewhere bigger, but she didn’t want to move somewhere else just to accommodate his hobby, she loved their current home. Bill suggested looking at the possibility of an extension, but she wasn’t keen on that either, as it would reduce the size of her garden that she cared for so much. Then there was all the hassle of it, like getting planning permissions and having to put up with noisy builders working for months.

Bill suggested another option a few weeks later and he had obviously been meticulously planning it. Maybe he could dig out a small basement underneath the garden and use that as his workshop. That would leave quite a bit more room to expand his railway. It did not need to be anything fancy; about 6 feet wide by eight foot long would do to start with and he could slowly expand it as required. If it was six feet high and just a foot or two below ground level no major structure would be needed, light breeze blocks and some wooden struts with a corrugated iron sheet on top for a roof would be quite adequate. The entrance from the house could be narrow and just behind the middle of the garage door so the structure of the house would not be affected. He could do it all himself and keep it secret so there was no need for planning permission and all that stuff.

She wasn’t keen but if it meant they didn’t have to move she could put up with it. Bill started working on his latest project and became as obsessed with it as he was usually obsessed with his railway. She didn’t see much of him except at meal times, he was either down there digging away, moving the soil to an old pit in the neglected woods behind their house or off in his little van buying a few more breeze blocks and things at the shopping centre at the edge of the nearest city. It wasn’t as though she wanted to see much of him anymore anyway. She had to accept they had nothing in common anymore and she kept on going out with others in her social circle without giving him a thought.

It was at a girls’ night out in the pub, that she met somebody else and he rekindled a spark that was still inside. Casual friendship soon became a love affair. She never thought that Bill would notice but clearly he had not become entirely lost to the world and he started becoming suspicious of her late comings and goings, of her sudden interest in buying new clothes and the increased time she spent doing her hair and makeup. He kept questioning her until she pretty much gave herself away and he became really hostile and unpleasant. What could she do? She had to be honest with herself, she didn’t really give a damn about him anymore and yet, what were the options? No way was she going to ditch her new lover but she couldn’t put up with Bill’s animosity which she was afraid could turn to violence, and she did not want to go through a messy divorce when that might mean losing the little cottage she loved.

If only there was some way to get him out of the way. Or maybe there was. His little underground workshop had been finished some weeks ago and it all looked very solid. The walls and roof were all firmly concreted and Bill had covered it over with soil which was already becoming covered with the wildflowers she had seeded. She waited until he went off shopping at the local DIY centre, then went down there and removed all his tools so he couldn’t use them to break out. When she saw his van return she waited until he went down into the workshop, then rushed out and slammed the heavy door, then dropped a length of heavy timber she had cut to size against it so that it would not open. Ignoring his shouts and bangs, she started filling up the entrance with all the spare breeze blocks, bags of sand and other heavy stuff that was lying around the garage and garden. There was no chance that anyone would hear him down there unless they were in the garage as she was, and she was not expecting any visitors for a few weeks. All should be silent by then.

Over the next two weeks, ignoring his increasingly faint calls, she finished off filling and cementing up the entrance and put back the stone slabs that he had removed from the garage floor and planted more flowers above the roof so nobody would readily spot that his secret workshop had ever existed. She put all his tools back in the spare room, so that it looked just the way it always had. Would she get away with it? Would they search the property properly or would her husband join the list of unexplained missing persons? Only time would tell.

He had wanted more space and he had got it. Give it a couple of years and she could get rid of that damn model railway and have a bit more space for her own stuff.

[xoggoth]

False Memories

It had been a very good few years in Richard’s career. At long last it looked as if his company, in cooperation with the NHS and with the help of many volunteers, was close to finding a solution to the growing national problem of Alzheimer's disease, and it was progress that he had played a major part in as the senior researcher. An effective drug treatment was one factor. The other was a new type of brain cell stimulator, which drew on the technology of different types of radiology similar to those used in body scans. When used for a sufficient period, the drug had significant effect on regenerating the affected brain cells. The scanner was then applied at intervals using safe, low dose, levels with fluctuating patterns of intensity and was found to have a measurable effect in stimulating those same brain cells. What was especially ground-breaking was that it succeeded in restoring lost memories, some of the volunteers could remember things they said they’d forgotten about for years.

He was very proud of his achievements; the current project was not the only major advance he’d been involved in during the course of his career. Some people say that success in life is determined by your heritage and upbringing but that certainly wasn’t the case in David’s family. While he was a renowned pioneer in medical research, his younger brother Simon had never been anything but a truck driver. Oh well, adults make their own decisions in life and Simon was happy enough and didn’t seem to do too badly financially, having managed to buy a decent flat on the other side of town. It was surprising that he had been able to afford it in a rather expensive area but, as Simon kept telling him, he’d managed to save because he did a lot of overtime and was very frugal with his money. Anyway, they got on very well despite their differences. Simon was as intelligent as he was, he just lacked ambition. They always found interesting stuff to talk about on their regular meet ups. They were getting together for a drink at The Rose and Crown later.

When Richard arrive there that evening, he saw Simon sitting alone at a table, gazing down at a full glass of beer, and almost immediately he knew something was wrong. “What’s up Simon?” he asked. Simon looked at him and then burst into tears, got up and walked out into the garden. It took a while standing out there in the freezing cold before Simon calmed down enough to tell him the full truth. His relative affluence was not solely down to lots of overtime and a frugal lifestyle as he had told Richard before. He had been making money illegally on the side, transporting drugs in his trucks for a major local gang. Now something had gone, really, really wrong and he knew it would not be long before he was in jail for a long time. “Good god, Simon, how could you get involved in something like that? I would never have thought it of you. I think for dealing class A drugs you could go to jail for at least five years” Simon shook his head and was silent for a minute before he blurted out “No, it’s far worse than that, I.., I..., I killed somebody. Some bloke from a rival gang found out what I was doing and when I’d picked up the stack, he tried to take it from me. We got into a fight and, well, I stabbed him. I’m not the murdering sort, it was self-defence, but I’m not sure they’d believe me. I’m just a dealer to them. Please, please, tell me you believe me Richard” Richard just stared at him. His own brother, a man he loved… He didn’t not know what to say, he turned and walked away.

He had the weekend to think over the options. Should he turn in his own brother? Should he pretend he’d never heard the confession and just let fate take its course. Or should he try and help him somehow? Can you really turn your back on your own flesh and blood? He made the decision on Sunday and went to see Simon. He’d wanted to reassure him, to do what he could to help his defence, perhaps pay for a decent lawyer. Simon was quiet and subdued, it seemed as if he’s accepted his fate. He told Richard that the gang he served was part of a powerful multi-national group with some people in influential positions and it was in their interests to protect Simon from prosecution in order to protect themselves. They were working on eliminating real evidence and creating false evidence to point to another gang but that could take some time. If the police acted quickly enough, it might not be long before they came knocking and he could be doomed to a life sentence.

He was back at work, but Richard found it hard to concentrate on his job. He just couldn’t stop thinking about what Simon has told him. If only the police could be distracted long enough for the evidence against him to be destroyed, he might stand a chance. A distraction! Maybe… As the main driver of the work on tackling Alzheimer’s disease he knew quite a few things that the other workers didn’t and had been doing some research on the side into the results of the radio therapy method. He had had doubts that all of those memories that the volunteers claimed to recover were actually real as some appeared rather unlikely given their background and may have been false memories. It only took a little testing on a few volunteers to determine that some memories could have a more mundane source and could be triggered by recent events. While the machine was working on their partly sedated brains, they were encouraged to relax with soothing music and computer images of slowly moving lights and tranquil scenes. He made changes to the computer program so that it subliminally whispered certain things while showing them faint related pictures. Once the tranquiliser had worn off, he asked them about things they remembered and discovered that his fictional stories had become facts in their minds, things they were sure that they had really experienced.

Simon was his brother and he had to help him out by distracting the police from their pursuit. The last elderly volunteer of the day came in and Simon gave him the sedative and helped him into the machine. Then he replaced the usual relaxing video with the one on his memory stick. After he came fully round the old chap seemed rather uneasy but said he couldn’t think why. It was in the news a couple of days later. An elderly male had walked into a police station and confessed to stabbing the man his brother had killed. That should distract them for a while, maybe sufficient time for his brother’s gang to get shot of the evidence against him. He hoped so, his brother would escape justice.

It was several days later, and it was in all the news headlines. Numerous older people has walked into police stations in his area and confessed to the same killing. What the hell? He thought he had, but he must have made a mistake and failed to replace his subliminally suggestive video with the normal one. One old person who volunteered at his research centre making a false confession was not significant but, over twenty of them and many of them women, how long would it be before the police made the link and came calling?

Oh well, maybe there was a plus side, he and Simon could still be together.

[xoggoth]

Past Life

He had spent most of his working life in the garage business, initially as just a mechanic fixing and servicing vehicles and later as the manager of a small local branch of a major dealership. It had been ok as careers go but, now that he was retired, he was rather glad to get away from it all and find something more interesting to do with the rest of his life. There were so many things, both big and small, that he had always wanted to do.

The trip to the Amazon he had always dreamed of had been amazing, but he couldn’t afford to splash out on expensive adventures like that too often, he needed to find cheaper little things he could do to interest him in between. One of them was looking at his heritage. It was something he had started doing a couple of times but had never got very far due to work and family things getting in the way. Now, with all the online guides, it should be a lot easier, especially as he had quite a lot of information among his late mother’s large collection of old documents which would probably tell him who his great grandparents were at least.

Like many people who get into it, he had been rather hoping to discover he was descended from someone famous but, after fiddling about for some months and spending rather more than he had expected on those online services, he was disappointed to find that those ancestors he did manage to trace were somewhat unimpressive, mostly farm labourers, servants, builders and other manual workers. The only professional he could find among them had been a solicitor, and it seems he had been struck off for dodgy practices. Also, no matter how hard he delved into it, he could not go further back than five generations, his further searches drew a blank. He decided not to waste any more time and money on it and gave up looking.

Why did it matter anyway? Not as though your ancestry really says anything about what you are today. Maybe what you yourself used to be is more relevant. That was an idea, perhaps it would be more relevant and interesting to try and find out who or what he had been in past life. He wasn’t totally sure he believed in it, but neither was he a total disbeliever. Like so many young people who look for meaning he’d gone through a bit of a Hindu stage in his youth and had never quite shrugged it off. It might be interesting to check it out anyway.

Was there any proof that past lives really existed or any means of finding out just what that past life had been? The evidence online was not exactly convincing. A number of cases were cited where people supposedly recalled details of their previous existences yet, when their recollections were checked against the known realities, the correlations were poor, with some supposed memories shown to be based on fiction or common incorrect ideas about historic events. However, there were also many with very different opinions who cited various proofs and they were not all mystics who got paid for providing past life regression sessions.

He’d give it a go anyway. It was something to do to fill his time, give him something to talk about with his drink mates at the village club and it was supposed to be quite relaxing and therapeutic anyway, regardless of any success in finding past life events. He found a fairly local past life therapist who wasn’t too expensive and booked a session. It was all a bit odd. He had to lay back on a soft couch wearing glasses with tiny lights in and low music playing to help him relax while the therapist guided him with relaxation techniques and suggestions of things to imagine. On his way out another man who was just leaving nearly bumped into him. He seemed rather curt and rude, just glowered and walked off. Maybe his session hadn’t gone too well.

Thinking about it back home, he was glad he’d given it a go as it had been quite interesting, although he didn’t think he’d had any past life experiences. Probably not anyway, there had been just that brief moment when he had felt a stabbing pain in his side and had a momentary vision. Like the memory of a dream, it had quickly faded into near oblivion, but it was some sort of open space in the sunset with a lot of movement around him. That was a little strange. He occasionally got very brief pains just there although he had no known medical problems and they were surely too superficial and short lived to indicate some significant undiagnosed problem. His online searches had told him that brief, unexplained pain could be a sign of injuries suffered in a past life.

He’d give it another go anyway. On his next visit to the therapist he passed that man again who scowled at him. What a miserable git the bloke was. At the end of his own session he wasn’t that happy either. This time the memory of that open field in the sunset was still brief but not so vague. He was standing opposite another tall man and they were both waving something, although he could not quite see what. Then there was that brief stabbing pain in his side.

It was not pleasant, yet he was fascinated and had to carry on with it. On the fifth visit things took a turn for the worse when that strange memory burst through some barrier and for a minute, became like reality. The open area was a battlefield of two huge armies locked in violent conflict, with the red of the setting sun on the surrounding trees and the red of spilled blood on the grass. He was battling a tall man facing him. He almost managed to dodge it but his opponent’s swing caught his side, triggering that pain he had often felt, although this time it was much worse. Then he lunged his own heavy sword at his opponent and drove it deep into his chest.

Fortunately. the memories, or were they just fantasies, were very brief and he was soon back into today but this time they did not fade away as quickly. As he left the building, he could remember it all in detail, including the face of his deadly opponent. It did not look much like him but for some reason, he could not help but link him to that guy he had seen coming and going from these same sessions. Ah, that was silly, he was letting his imagination run away with him. He’d just forget about it, and he wouldn’t be coming to any of these daft things anymore. They had been relaxing and interesting but now they were rather stressful.

He walked out of the door and there was that guy was standing near the entrance, holding a heavy iron bar. He swung it up high and came forward. in a deep heavy voice, he said "I’m going to get you for what you did to me"

[xoggoth]

After we've read out our prepared stories at the writers' group, we are given 5 minutes to come up with a brief tale. This month's title was Good King Wenceslas. The story present a more accurate picture than the carol of what powerful people are really like:

__________________________________________________ __________________________________________________ ______

Good King Wenceslas looked out. There was nothing to see. He shouted "Hither page! What day is it today?". "It's the Feast of Fred Flintstone, my king" replied the page. "Oh well, that explains it "said the king, and he went back to watching television.

He couldn't be arsed to look out the window for a few days, just stayed in bed, watching his favourite soaps on catchup TV and eating doughnuts. The next day he looked out, still didn't see anything and shouted again "Page! What day is it today?". "It's the Feast of Sonic the Hedgehog, my king" replied the page. "So when is the Feast of Stephen?" said the king. "That was three weeks ago my king, when you were in bed all day watching old comedies on Netflix"

Darn it , thought the king, It's Christmas and I'm supposed to look charitable so maybe I should go and see how that poor man is doing. He wasn't going to walk in this deep and crisp and even snow. "Servant! Get me my carriage!. And bring me flesh and bring me wine to feed the man."

When they got to the poor man's house underneath the mountain it was too late; he'd been dead from starvation for at least a week. Sod it, thought the king, I couldn't have helped him anyway; I ate all the flesh and wine as well as the Christmas pudding on the way here. May as well get back. Wonder if there's any good films on Amazon Prime tonight.

[xoggoth]

Under the Bed

It had been a nice Saturday out with his lady friend Wendy, visiting an interesting old castle. He dropped her off outside her flat and they said goodbye with their usual little hug before he drove back home to his lonely, over large, house. That was his main female company over for a few days. He poured himself a vodka, settled down with his little puppet parrot on the sofa and started flicking through catchup TV to see if there was anything worth watching.

He doubted there would be. Nothing grabbed him much these days. He poured another vodka, mainly for the sake of his little parrot obviously, and started thinking about the good old days when he used to sit there with his wife watching all sorts of daft stuff on TV. He remembered watching André Rieu’s classical programs and playing a silly game trying to spot people in the audience who looked like famous people. Her company was lovely, and it was there most of the time. He had one more little vodka with his parrot before heading off to bed. Bed! Ah, the company could be great there too. Pity Wendy wasn’t interested in that sort of thing. Older women never seemed to be in his experience.

He was slowly decluttering his house with a view to moving to something smaller in a few years. He wasn’t into gardening so that old greenhouse heater could go. He went online to post it on Freecycle; with autumn approaching, somebody would have a use for it. He rarely bothered to look at what was on offer, but something did grab his attention this time, a big collection of short horror stories. No, he wouldn’t. He didn’t want more stuff cluttering up the place.

Somebody contacted him about the greenhouse heater and came to collect it that evening. He went onto Freecycle to remove his post and the horror story books had not been taken. Ah, sod it, why not? He could always give them away again and they wouldn’t take up much room. When he collected them the next day, he found there were more than he thought, they wouldn’t fit in his bookcase. He took out one to read and shoved the rest into a box under his bed.

He told Wendy about it when they went for a drink at the local pub and she was horrified. “What? you really shouldn’t be putting horror story books under your bed, the bad vibes from those will have a really adverse effect on you” He grinned. Ah, here we go again! He really liked her company, but they were like chalk and cheese on some things. She was into all sorts of mystical stuff and he was a devout rationalist, if science couldn’t prove it, it didn’t exist. They had a little argument over it and then moved on to more mundane topics but, after their little goodnight hug, she briefly raised the subject again. “Honestly Joe, you really should move those horror stories from under your bed, they won’t do you any good at all”

He read a couple of the horror stories in bed before turning off the light, quite unconcerned that most of them were still inches below the mattress. He found it difficult to get to sleep but that happened sometimes, nothing to do with horror story books. Silly woman! They couldn’t be anything to do with the nightmare he had that night that caused him to wake up quite anxious, either. Coincidences happen.

But do coincidences keep on happening? It was a horrible week. Night after night he kept waking up feeling anxious with vague memories of terrifying dreams in his head and they wouldn’t go away. He felt tired all day long and couldn’t stop thinking about them. It was daft but he couldn’t ignore it, those books would have to go. He took the lot out and put them down the shed well away from his sleeping self. It was crazy, it made no sense, but it worked. That night he slept well, and everything started getting back to normal. After a couple of days, he didn’t feel tired and had stopped thinking about those horrible things that had now almost disappeared from his memory.

He told Wendy he’d moved the books but said it was just a tidy up, he didn’t want to hear “I told you so” Maybe she wasn’t wrong on some of these things. After all, with all the millions of strange beliefs there are out there, was it not possible that a few had some basis in fact? It's impossible to totally disprove anything, so it was rational to at least accept possibilities.

Anyway, they had another nice day out which ended in their usual hug. Ah! Wouldn’t it be nice if they could go further? He hadn’t had a bit of nookie in years, fat chance with her! A funny idea crept into his head as they said goodbye. That evening, sitting with his puppet parrot and their shared vodka, he thought more about it. If horror fiction could release some unknown vibes that affected the human mind and made you scared why would other sorts of fiction not have an effect? Would a lot of violent crime novels under your bed make you violent? Would romantic fiction make you feel more romantic? Or, going on from that one…

Wendy was going to stay with her daughter in Wales for a couple of weeks and, as the weather was very hot, she asked if he’d mind calling in at her flat and watering her house plants. He was happy to do so, but even happier that he had the chance for his big experiment. He looked up “women favourite erotic novels” on the internet and purchased a bunch of them, including Fifty Shades of Grey, on eBay. The day before her return, he went to her flat to water her plants again and then did what he was really there for. He lifted up her mattress and posted all the naughty novels between the slats. For good measure he shoved all his old men’s magazines and porn books and CDs there as well. Now he’d see if lots of fiction under a bed could really influence the way somebody thought and felt.

He would be going to her flat for dinner tomorrow evening. Perhaps this time he’d get more than a little hug.

[xoggoth]

Return of the carp

The lady who ran my little story writer's club had to give up due to ill health and there were huge cock ups in getting it going again. Think we're back now, latest bullwarks below.

PS Some of it is pretty much an autobiography.

[xoggoth]

What happens in your sleep

He seemed to sleep ok, but Tony has been feeling tired and depressed for many months and sometimes it was so bad it was hard for him to cope with it all. After a day struggling at work, he couldn’t wait to get home and have a nap, although it didn’t help. He’d been to the GP and had a blood test but when he had phoned for the result was just told that everything was fine. The overworked surgery didn’t seem interested in supplying further help and, in any case, he did not want to get into taking pills, he’d read so many bad things about them.

Friday evening was not great, but he’d make the effort and wander round to the local social club for a drink. His mate Brian was there, and he told him about the problems he’d been having. One of the regulars, Steve, a much younger and rather reclusive chap he didn’t usually speak to, was standing at the bar nearby and somehow got involved in the discussion. He suggested that Tony should try out one of the many sleep monitoring apps on his mobile phone. It could be that Tony had Sleep Apnoea, snoring and interruptions to breathing which could affect your sleep quality without you being aware of it. Prolonged poor sleep could certainly make you feel low. You left your phone next to your pillow and the app recorded noises and movements.

Tony was a landscape gardener and close to retirement; he didn’t do technology. He had a mobile phone which he only used for phone calls and the occasional email or text message and wasn’t even too sure what an app was. “Don’t worry about it” said Steve, “I’ll do a check for you and email you the details, although it might be a few days as I’m really busy at the moment. You don’t need to pay for it either, I know ways to get around these things, I’ll attach a file to the email, just click to install it” Tony was very grateful. He had not realised that the bloke was such a nice guy under his rather unfriendly exterior.

The email came a few days later and he sent Steve a reply of thanks and a promise of a pint next time he saw him up the club. That evening, following Steve’s clear instructions, he installed the app on his phone, set it up and put it by his pillow. He thought he had slept ok but was as tired as ever the next day. Thank heavens it was Saturday and he didn’t have to go to work. After lunch he decided to check out what the phone had recorded. Apparently, he had spent almost 7 hours asleep with 45% deep sleep. It didn’t sound too bad. Then he checked a couple of other graphs recording snoring and “other sounds”. He’d done a bit of snoring but not a lot. The other sounds came out quite high, it seemed he’d been talking in his sleep.

He was curious as to what he’d been saying and, again following the instructions Tony had given him, he scrolled to the first spike in the chart. He’d expected to hear odd mumblings and couldn’t believe what he was hearing, a horrible loud moaning. It didn’t sound like him at all, he had a deep voice, and what he heard was higher, sometimes turning into a screech. It wasn’t very clear, and he listened again, trying to make out what was being said. It sounded like “I’m coming for you. I am going to make you pay” before turning into a string of obscenities. He checked out the other spikes in the sound chart and most were the same, a horrible, hardly human voice making dire threats. Had it somehow recorded a phone call? He had no idea how mobile phones worked but it seemed unlikely, it wasn’t as though he’d ever done anything horrible to anyone as far as he knew. It had to be him acting out his nightmares. But why would the voice be so unrecognisable? He tried to mimic some of the things that had been recorded and couldn’t manage to sound anything like them.

Now, as well as feeling depressed and tired, he was rather anxious. That night, he wasn’t sure whether he should try the app again. He didn’t want to hear more of those horrible threats, but he was trying to be rational. If it was just some nightmare that he’d had, then it was hardly likely that he’d have the same one again. Hearing nothing untoward tomorrow would be reassuring. If only. He kept putting it off but eventually he reluctantly checked his phone. Panic took over. Things were even worse, that monster he was listening to was promising his end very soon. The end. He would save it the trouble; he’d just had enough of life. He walked to the balcony of his fourth floor flat and saw the concrete below for the last time.

Steve heard the news a few days later and was initially stricken with guilt. He’d loathed Tony ever since he’d heard that it was his objection that had stopped him getting planning permission for an extension but when he took advantage of the old guy’s technical ignorance by sending him a hacked app with fake ghost noises in it, he’d just wanted to teach the old twit a lesson; he’d never wanted to kill him. He hadn’t realised his depression was that bad. He consoled himself after a few days by telling himself that he was over-reacting. He had no evidence that the bloke had even used the app, let alone that it had played any part in his suicide. Yeh, he probably would have jumped off the balcony anyway. Forget it.

Yet he couldn’t get it entirely out of his mind, sometimes he’d wake at night and start thinking about it. He decided to try the sleep app himself to see if he could tweak his sleep pattern to avoid waking up at all. In the morning he checked out the records, rather low deep sleep, not much snoring but quite a lot of other sounds. He scrolled across to listen to the first significant sound and it was unrecognisably Tony’s distinctly deep voice, “I will be avenged, you will pay” He flung the phone on to the sofa, then retrieved it to make sure he hadn’t inadvertently used his own hacked version. No, it was the real, unmodified thing, freshly downloaded from Google just yesterday morning. Maybe he really was feeling guilty inside and it was guilt that was feeding his imagination, Anyway, he just wouldn’t use the damn app again, no way. Problem sorted.

If only. That night he awoke, his phone turned off and in the other room, to hear Tony’s harsh deep voice threatening him with the direst consequences. Tony may have been an idiot on techie matters and had not had a clue how that Google Play Store sleep app worked, but what it and Steve had done to him consumed his spirit and the combination of them drew him towards it.

Tony’s hacked Google app had pushed him over the edge but, now he was here in the right place, he did not need it to get his revenge.

[xoggoth]

I know that story about the Talbot Hotel in Oundle when I stayed there a few years ago. I was really looking forward to the ghost of Mary Queen of Scots turning up in my bedroom. She never did unfortunately.

Talbot Hotel - Oundle, Northamptonshire | HauntedRooms.co.uk

[xoggoth]

A Funny Feeling

It’s difficult to get on the housing ladder in the UK these days but Tony and Rachel had finally made it, using the government’s Help to Buy scheme and some money from their parents.

It had been a stressful few months, with all the uncertainty, form filling and moving, but here they were at last, in a brand new flat conveniently located in the centre of town and close to their workplaces. There were still things to do, like replacing the old furniture they’d purchased second hand once they had saved enough money, but that could wait. It was time to relax and start enjoying life again. They sat in the front room with the winter sun streaming through the window and celebrated with a glass of wine.

Having invested so much effort in acquiring the place neither of them were willing to express their concern at first. It was a few days before Rachel mentioned it. "You know Tony, I don’t know, I have a funny feeling about this front room, it feels a little creepy somehow" Tony was silent for several seconds, it was strange she felt it too, he thought his nervousness when he sat in here was just down to the stress of moving. "It’s weird Rachel, I feel that too. Yet, what could it be? This is a new build, there are hardly going to be any ghosts around. It would have been in the news if some builder got killed during the construction. Maybe something in the light is stimulating our imaginations, I’m sure we’ll get over it once we’re more used to the place"

They didn’t. Things started to take a new more alarming turn. On various occasions both of them had seen strange shadows moving across the room and felt a distinct chill in the air. It was terrifying and neither of them wanted to be in the front room at all, but they couldn’t let it go to waste when it had cost so much. What could they do? It was hardly a problem covered by insurance or the purchase agreements, they’d just get laughed at if they mentioned it to anyone.

They did a bit of online research and Rachel came across a story about a haunted pub, the Talbot Hotel in Oundle, North Hants. The staircase taken from a nearby castle is the one where Mary Queen of Scots walked to her execution and her ghost is said to have been seen many times walking down it. Maybe their own ghost had been imported too, it wasn’t the flat that was haunted, it was one of those items of furniture that they’d brought at second-hand shops. Who knows what history they could have had? It was worth a try. One by one they started selling the suspect items back to nearby second-hand shops, then leaving it for a week to see if there were any more frightening occurrences.

After a few weeks all the second-hand furniture, including the sofa, the dining table and chairs, the wardrobe and two cupboards had gone. They now had a bare flat with hardly more than the bed and the TV, they had wasted a lot of money and it had not helped at all, the strange apparitions were actually getting worse as if the ghosts were becoming attuned to their new home. They were not just vague shadows; they could see real outlines of someone who appeared to be writhing in torment. Neither of them wanted to go into the front room anymore.

What options did they have left? Hire an occultist to banish the spirit? They didn’t have much money and were afraid of being ripped off by some fraud. Maybe they could get the ghost to leave themselves. Google had a few tips and they tried them all without success. What else? Maybe they could just carry on as normal and adapt to the damn thing, if they got used to it, they’d stop being frightened. It was worth a go; they’d purchase a cheap but brand-new sofa on tick and start using the room again.

The sofa was being delivered that day, so they went into the front room to give it a clean. The apparition was very strong, and they were both frightened, but they ignored it and carried on as if nothing was happening. Rachel was vacuum cleaning the carpet and heard a clatter; there was a paper clip on the floor. It must have dropped out of that old second-hand chest of drawers they’d just got rid of. Tony picked it up and suddenly felt he was someone else in another place, in a small dingy room, he’d just picked up a paper clip to attach a couple of forms when he felt the searing, life-ending pain of the knife in his back. He reacted instinctively, hurled the paper clip out of the window and the vision was gone.

Later, he and Rachel were sitting on their new cheap sofa, this time actually enjoying their glass of wine. There were no strange events, no flickering apart from the shadow of leaves in the wind and no chill other than the normal one of February when the radiator had only just been turned on.

They heard later about some strange sightings in the small communal garden where the paper clip had landed but, fortunately, that wasn’t their problem.

[xoggoth]

Another very short one

A man invented a time machine. He had been working on it for years and had addressed every risk he could think of. A small pilot device had already given him delightful pictures from the middle ages, so the principles were sound. The full scale machine that would take him back in time was now ready.

He checked everything out thoroughly for the umpteenth time before stepping into the machine and starting it up. It all seemed to be working as expected. The time gauge showed that external time was falling rapidly.

Suddenly the gauge froze and started to reverse. Something was wrong with the electronics. It wasn't just that he, and the machine he was in, were going forward in time, it was becoming apparent that neither was independent of time any more. They had merged to become part of real time and yet the machine was still operating, only now it was stuck in an endless loop.

A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine, A man invented a time machine..................................

[xoggoth]

In the water

He needed to think up something to read out at the little monthly writer’s group but couldn’t seem to come up with anything and was running out of time. Damn it, he was just losing his imagination these days, it was disappearing like so many other things as you age.

This month’s story suggestion was “What’s that in the water, mummy?“ It wasn’t that he couldn’t think of any ideas, but an idea doesn’t make a story on its own, it needs to engage its readers, have an interesting plot and characters, some twists and turns, a few initial mysteries to make people think. Most of all, it needs a decent ending to reveal all the solutions to those mysteries.

He wasn’t sure whether he lacked the ability anymore or just lacked the enthusiasm to be interested in what he wrote. Nearly every book he read these days, often by proclaimed authors, he chucked away half read, thinking “what a load of crap!” Ah well, he’d give it one last go. Why not write down a list of ideas and see if he could think of some way to turn them into a story. Right. What’s that in the water, mummy? here we go:

Idea 1. The most obvious one. The boy sees a body. Some nasty serial killer strangling people and dumping them in the river. Yeh! That narrowed it down, probably only about 5 million short stories and novels on that one! Details, plot, characters? His mind was blank. damn it!

Idea 2. The boy sees a reflection of his future self who is murdered or suicides in the river. Bit more original but more details still needed, come one, come on, think of something. Ah, sod it!

Idea 3. The boy sees the future killer who dumps him there. Much like Idea 2, really. Same problems.

Idea 4. An evil industrialist saves money by dumping tons of toxic chemicals in a river that feeds a reservoir and kills thousands. He Googled that one. Damn, that wouldn’t work in the UK, reservoir water is treated and tested before storage in enclosed tanks. Might work in the USA with their rather lax checks but it wasn’t worth joining a writer’s club in New York.

Idea 5. An industrialist does ditto and kills lots of wildlife. That is more realistic but not much of a story. Him being investigated by the Health and Safety Executive and issued with a huge fine is not the most exciting ending. There are no other characters, not human ones anyway. That’s an idea! Maybe all those little frogs and minnows etc. could unite and seek revenge. Disney type cartoon characters in a dark adult story? Nah!

Idea 6. There is some strange monstrous creature in the water. Nobody would bother to read that story, easier to down a few vodkas and watch a crappy low budget film on the Horror Channel which is full of stuff about people threatened by sharks and alligators in unlikely places. Or, how about the Loch Ness monster having an away break in somebody’s garden pond? Not very convincing, it would have needed a taxi to Inverness station and somebody would have noticed.

Idea 7. Maybe the tap water turns red and it turns out there is a body in the water tank. But why would it be there? Let’s see, come on man, think of an exciting plot. Maybe the two plumbers installing your new boiler had an argument about whose turn it was to make the tea. Yeh, right!

Idea 8. Hang on, maybe he could use the tank in the attic idea! The little boy could be referring to the taste of the tap water. You are in one of those old terraced houses with no secure walls in the attic and a vicious neighbour sneaks in and puts poison in the tank. Just got to think of a reason, ah sod it!

He had been sitting in front of his computer for hours getting nowhere and just had another two to go before the writers group meeting. It was looking a bit brighter outside, maybe he would go for a walk, perhaps a bit of sun would inspire him. Sometimes ideas pop into your head when you are not thinking so hard.

He walked for an hour and got more and more angry. It wasn’t just that he couldn’t come up with a story, that was just one minor part of everything that was going downhill in his life and in his mind. Lack of imagination, lack of interest, lack of enthusiasm, lack of feeling. He walked to the middle of the old bridge and stared at the sun, hoping for some last-minute hope but it did not come. Then he looked down at the swiftly flowing river.

It was twenty minutes later, and the little boy was with his mother by the river bank throwing stones. “Mummy, what’s that in the water?”

[xoggoth]

This next story is not a suicide note. You lot haven't got rid of me yet!

[xoggoth]

A very good reason to be cremated is to not have your remains gawped at by tourists millennia later

Bah! More snowflakiness! I recall going to Horniman Museum quite a few times when I was a kid. Could never wait to see the mummy they had. Hot she was!

[mudskipper]

A little boy was throwing stones into the lake and saw something floating. He shouted "What's that in the water mummy?"

A hideous Egyptian mummy lurched up behind him and put a rotted hand on his shoulder.

"It's your mother's body boy, I threw it in there earlier."

I went to the Egyptian museum in Cairo and saw the mummies. A very good reason to be cremated is to not have your remains gawped at by tourists millennia later.

[xoggoth]

The last men living

It should have been obvious that World War 3 would come eventually.

There had never been any wars between Innuits and Australian Aborigines for an obvious reason, thanks to geography they never affected each other in any way. Conflicts happen between people who live side by side or whose ambitions overlap, who have different and conflicting agendas, who see themselves as separate and have competing aims and ambitions for their own people. As the world became more and more crowded and free space, raw materials and natural resources grew scarcer, so the tensions inevitably grew to levels that had not been seen previously.

There were parallels with World War 1. The trigger came on the 3rd of April 2131 when the assassination of a leader started a war between two relatively small nations. As in the first war, it soon grew into something much greater when more powerful allies piled in for their own reasons but this time it was not just Europe that was involved but the whole world. And, this time too, weapons were of a different nature. It was unclear who made the first nuclear strike but the panic spread, the desire to knock out the other side to protect your own. Numerous nations, both big and small, had them by them and most used them. By the summer of 2131 the world as we had known it was largely gone. The radioactivity, plus huge releases of toxic chemicals by smaller nations that could not afford nukes, had decimated nature and it would take hundreds of thousands of years before it would fully recover.

Here and there, due to the patterns of winds and tides and a lot of luck, a few small areas were less affected and in some of them mankind had just about survived. In one Island in the Pacific almost five thousand people remained. An understandable loathing of what technology had inflicted on the planet caused the inhabitants to reject it and they lived as the Amish had once done, surviving through manual labour. All the things that technology had left behind, like cars, machines, TVs, radios, computers and mobile phones, were seen as evil things to be feared and avoided and were left to rot wherever they were. In the absence of any electricity, oil or gas supplies, TV or radio stations, phone lines, phone signals or satellites, most of them were of no use anyway.

It was a tough existence, given what the radiation and other contamination had done to the environment, but it took hundreds of years before attitudes began to change and some began to argue that they could learn from the past, that they could use positive aspects of science and technology and improve their lives without using it for weapons. Their ideas gained acceptance because it was becoming obvious that they had no choice, time was running out. Although the island’s inhabitants had survived, the radiation had not left them untouched. Photographs that remained from before the obliteration showed how they had changed greatly, genetic mutations over the generations had made them appear to be an entirely different species. Some mutations appeared harmless, even positive, but there was no easy solution to the major problem, the plummeting number of women. A genetic fault was causing a much lower survival rate among females and there were now only a few of child bearing age left, all married to the powerful men in the tribe. Few of the living males had ever had any sexual encounter with the opposite sex.

Nobody had left the island since the great extinction and they did not know if any other humans existed but finding another human population with enough females was their only hope. Reechat was put in charge of trying to revive the forgotten technology. If they could find a way to contact other humans and build some means of transport to get to them, then they, maybe mankind in general, could survive. The records indicated there was a telephone landline from their island to the neighbouring one and they had been attempting to communicate through it. It was just possible that, if anyone lived on the other island, they had not given up on technology and might receive the message. They had little hope and were amazed to receive a response.

Communications went on for several weeks between the islands. Fortunately, their languages had not changed so much that Reechat and his counterpart on the other island could not understand each other although it was very difficult. She was a lady, her name was Feldas. It seemed that, for some strange genetic reason, it was their male population that was in danger, they had over 600 females and just 7 males, 4 of whom were quite elderly. What a perfect situation, thought Reechat, all those needy females in need of servicing to preserve our species! He couldn’t wait to meet Feldas and, hopefully, take their relationship further. She seemed just as keen as he was, in fact their conversation had become distinctly flirtatious. The next week the boat was completed and, using old maps from mankind’s better days, Reechat and his crew set off to the ladies’ island. Feldas said they would keep a look out and she would be there to meet them on the beach. She and Reechat had agreed to wear red scarves to make themselves recognisable.

She was true to her word. He jumped off the boat and he saw her standing there on the shingle. His lower jaw dropped. Right down to his stomach. Then his middle jaw dropped almost as far. His eyes, all three of them, did not know where to look while his tail twitched nervously. He had hoped to meet a large-breasted lady and she did not disappoint in that way. The two largest ones that protruded from her hips were even bigger than the three that hung from her neck. She was clearly startled too, it was her tentacles that twitched in a nervous way.

From his study of all the old archives Reechat knew that the radiation had greater altered mankind’s appearance. It had just never occurred to him that different groups of humans would have changed in such entirely different ways.