ECOPOCALYPSE CH.6 - CALL IT QUITS

ECOPOCALYPSE CH.6 - CALL IT QUITS By

“You got that right,” Sneedon says. “Artie is out baying for blood. Your blood.”

“What do you mean?” Madge asks before you can even formulate the question yourself.

“My man at the West Wing says China, Russia and the entire Arab nation wants your head on a platter. They’re having their own problems and the only way they can placate their citizens is to ask for your public execution.”

You gulp.

“Oh… uh… I can understand that.” You stand up. “Well in that case I’d better head over and give myself up.”

Madge stares at you. “You serious?”

“I… well… um. I did cause it…” You smile uncertainly. “I’ll pop over to the White House and do it publicly.”

Madge begins to stand up. “I’ll come with you.”

You shake your head. “No, you stay here, sis. You’re safe here and you can help get the changes rolled out. I’ll zip over in my ‘copter.”

Every one in the room stares at you and you slide out the door like a slug from a lettuce; slowly and carefully, looking around to make sure no one is following you.

As the door shuts, you hear Sneedon say: “What’s he up to?”

“I don’t know.” Madge replies. “Before today I would have said that he was going to run away, but after what I’ve seen him doing to fix this catastrophe today, I think he might just do it.”

You sigh with relief and head up to the roof.

As you take off, you try to think what you are actually going to do. You can’t go and hand yourself in, that would mean you’d end up… at best… in jail for the rest of your life. At worst, the new president (being the bastard that he is) would probably hand you over to the Middle East for execution.

“I’m too young to die.” You murmur, heading north as slowly as you can. “Why should I die for something that wasn’t my fault? It was the board’s money pinching that caused all this…”

A sudden blast of air pushes the ‘copter to one side and you see a pair of jets coming round to flank you. The radio crackles.

“ECOGen One. You are instructed to keep pace with us. We will land at the Airforce base where you will be taken into custody. Over.”

Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit! What do you do now? There’s no way this little helicopter can outrun F16’s.

Experimentally you weave a little and predictably, the radio crackles into life again.

“ECOGen One. Do not try to resist arrest. We have orders from the president to shoot if you run. Over.”

Damn. You’re dead either way. How on earth do you… an idea occurs and you take a deep breath, slapping the radio button on the joystick.

“ECOGen One to escort. I’m low on gas and I can’t keep up with you. Over.”

You let your airspeed drop and the jets slow as well. Now what speed was a stall for this helicopter? Oh, that’s right… Now if you can just bring her to rest somewhere safe and get away from the jets before they can react.

“ECOGen One. We will keep pace with you. Keep moving forward. Over.” The pilot seems more than a little pissed off.

A field bounded by a large wood appears and you let your airspeed drop further, feeling the craft shudder and the nose tip upward. Now, if you just…

A whoosh of air on both sides of the helicopter buffets it from side to side and the resulting turbulence  knocks the pitch of the blades awry.

“Thanks Escort, that was a great help…Not!” you snap into the radio as you fight to keep the craft level. You speed up a little, but the turbulence from the low flying, circling jets as well as the wind scrables your pitch further and…

Shit! Not  retreating blade stall, anything but that, you’re too close to the fucking ground to…

The helicopter tilts left.

Time slows.

You drop the controls hoping that the autocorrect will kick in, but the tilt continues and you watch the advacing blade bite into the soft earth of the field. It ploughs into it deeply and you fight with you harness, hoping to get free of the helicopter before…

The blade snaps.

The suddenly freed rotor spins faster and the second advancing blade follows the first. The helicopter cartwheels and the tail rotor comes into contact with the ground. The tail snaps off, there are sparks and a sudden plume of fire heralds the fact that the fuel line has bought it.

Your harness lets go and you tumble out of the craft, a sudden flare of hope making time speed up again. As you hit the grass and turn to try and run, the helicopter’s body is catapulted toward you by the fire from the tail.

“Oh shit…” you moan.

* * *

“Well that was anticlimactic.” President Gantly says having reviewed the pilot’s footage of the air accident. “I was looking forward to listening to the idiot’s explanation of his company’s antics in this matter. Besides, I wanted to shoot him myself.”

He turns to an aide. “Was there anything recovered?”

The aide nods. “We have his head. It was apparently chopped off by a stray piece of rotor, long before the helicopter actually hit him.”

Gantly smiles, a red glint showing in his eye. “Did Doctor Skin take it?”

The aide looks faintly sick. “Yes, Mr. President. He’s working on the process now.”

“Good.”

You wake up.

You’re vaguely aware that the sun has risen. Shades of pink paint the inside of your eyelids, while the memory of last night is a blur of fire and dirt coloured nightmare. You just want to sleep it off, but your eyes are forced open by insistant fingers.

“Welcome back. Although I’m not sure how welcome you are going to be.” A face with a surgeons mask and cap appears in your eyeline.

“Where am I?” Your voice has a vaguely artificial sound. “Why can’t I feel anything?”

“Good, he’s awake.” President Gantly’s braying baritone brings you fully awake. “Turn him so he can see me.”

You are turned and liquid swirls in front of your eyes. “What the shit?”

“Shit is right. You’re in it.” The president stands and moves up close. He looks a little green and you realise this is because you are in a glass vat of green liquid.

“I appear to be in water.”

“Shut up. You didn’t survive intact, but Dr Skin is a genius when it comes to brains and revival. You shall pay for your crimes… more than once.”

“What?” Gantly is right in front of you so you can’t see what’s behind him. “What on god’s green earth are you talking about Arthur?”

“This.” He steps aside and you blink in astonishment. Behind him, in shackles stand rows and rows of you.

“You cloned me? Why?”

“I wasn’t about to let you get away with dying cleanly in an air accident. Every single country of the world has a grievance against you…”

“What, even Taiwan?” you quip, feeling more worried by Gantly’s smile than the clones. “Wow, we’re a good looking bunch, aren’t we. Ladies beware.”

“Enough. Each Clone is wi fi’d into what is left of your nervous system,” He picnches the clone closest to him. You wince, feeling the sharp pain. “you will feel the pain that the clone is put through.”

“But…”

Gantly plows on relentlessly. “As you have been sentenced to death in every single country of the world, you are going to die one hundred and ninety six times. I hope you survive, because after that, I am going to make your afterlife hell.”

Oops...Return to Chapter 6

ECOPOCALYPSE CH. 5 - YOU'RE A SCIENTIST!

ECOPOCALYPSE CH.5 - YOU'RE A SCIENTIST!
 By Wayne Depriest

You’ve got one chance to get this right; one chance to turn the tide; one chance to get you and Madge and the rest of humanity out of the shithole and back to normalcy. You need an antidote and you need it fast. You’re a scientist, for shit’s sake! You made the mess, even if it was some cost-conscious, bottom line-watching asstard who made the decision to use mercury. there’s no time to use any of the normal chelating agents like DMSA or DMPS. You need something that’s gonna flush the mercury out of a person’s system in minutes, an hour at most. It’s the damn mercury vapor that’s the problem. Get the unaffected to stop breathing until the units are stabilized is the perfect answer—not realistic, but perfect.

Meanwhile, back on Planet Gonetoshit, there are hordes of shit zombies sludging through the facility. For the moment you and Madge are safe. You’ve got some favors to call in; people who owe you big time and who can get some shit done in a hurry. You need to develop an antidote for those affected, one that will reverse the manure mange—or at least halt its progression through the body.

You flip back the hood of the hazmat suit, pick up the phone and punch 9 for an outside line, an idea twisting through your head. If we can get the...

You get no dial tone. You punch 9 again. Same thing.

“How the hell do I call in favors if I can’t make a call?”

“There’s no time for that anyway,” Madge  urges. “You have to do something and you have to do it fast.”

“Even if I make an antidote, how do we get it out and dispensed? I can’t even call for FedEx.”

“You’re the scientist. Just make the antidote. We’ll worry about getting it delivered later.”

You race over to the bench and start slinging test tubes and pipettes around like you know what you’re doing. But you don’t. You’re not a chemist, for God’s sake. You’re an industrial engineer. You throw some of this in a tube, add a pinch of that, some more of whatever this is and the damn thing blows up in your face. It burns like a bastard, but your eyes seem unaffected. The bright blue cloud of vapor floats across the lab and envelopes a pile of some former lab assistant. The congealed pile of crap starts to reshape itself into something resembling a human being.

“That’s it!” screams Madge. “That’s it!”

“What the hell is it?” you scream back at her.

“You made it—don’t you know?”

“Hell no.”

“You have to make some more. Lots more.”

You spend another twenty minutes trying to duplicate the formula. Finally you get a controlled batch, one that doesn’t explode. A good thing, too. You’re about out of hair. You get it into an atomizer and start working on a bigger batch, something you can push through the ventilation system here. That will give you enough time to make more and somehow get the formula out to other labs. You can have this thing whipped by tomorrow morning and be the hero again. There’s just one problem.

It’s that damn blinking light in the corner. Madge doesn’t see it. Or doesn’t know what it means. But you do. And you realize that all the determination in the world isn’t going to change what is about to happen. That little blinking light is a security breach indicator. Normally it glows with a soft steady light. When it blinks it means that someone has entered the security zone in an unauthorized manner. There’s always a guy monitoring that light. It’s his only job. When it blinks he’s trained to respond by pushing some buttons or something that will lock down the core of the lab inside a series of sheet steel walls that might yield to a nuclear weapon. Might. Anything less is like hitting a brick wall with a toasted marshmallow.

But Mr Security Breach Guy isn’t there. Well, he is, but he’s not much use as a slush pile of chunky diarrhea overflowing the office chair. And from the way the damn light is flashing, there isn’t any time to batten down the hatches, even if you knew how to batten down anything. Which you don’t. About the only thing you can do is try to get you and Madge out before the shit storm hits. The stool zombies aren’t going to care about a cure and the little atomizer isn’t enough for the mounds of muck on the way.

Of course, by this time there is no getting out. Cameras are showing hordes of shittards scraping along the corridors on the way to the lab. Every exit is blocked by shuffling schools of shit zombies, putrid poop pods plodding toward the lab. You and Madge ain’t in deep shit yet, but it won’t be long.

You search frantically for anything that will help. Of course there isn’t anything. You and your sister are on your own. For a minute you think about throwing her to the zombies. Maybe it will give you enough time to get away. You look at her and realize she’s thinking about making you the star of the Fecal Follies.

“What the hell are we going to do?” You can’t seem to control the panic.

“Just calm down. Let me think.” Madge waves a shush hand at you like your mother did when she wanted quiet. It doesn’t work for Madge either.

“What’s there to think about? We’re dead. They’ll rip these hazmat suits off us like underwear at an orgy.”

“Spray ourselves with the formula,” Madge exclaims. “Even if they get us, we won’t turn to shit. We can fake dying and hold out until they leave.”

You take a gigantic hit from the atomizer, sucking it deep into your lungs as Madge removes her helmet and reaches for the antidote. Just as she’s squeezing the mist into her mouth you feel your lungs ignite. You have time to see Madge’s eyes widen in surprise before your lungs explode and flames engulf her face.

Oops...return to Chapter 5

 

ECOPOCALPYSE CH.3 - ROOKIE BLUE POOP THUNDER

ECOPOCALYPSE CH.3 - ROOKIE BLUE POOP THUNDER By James McShane

On any other day, flying your helicopter over the vast metropolis would be a thrill akin to becoming the world’s first triple Nobel Prize winner—of course, seeing that you are unable to make change of a ten, write a poem worth reading, or even know what a goddamn quark is, Nobel is no-dice—but this is not just any other day. Mankind is smothering under the weight of its own shit, and it’s all your fault.

         “Mexico will have to wait,” you shout over the sound of the chopper as it veers first one way, then another.

 “So where to?” Milo screams back. You suddenly remember to turn on communications. No use wearing headphones if you can’t hear for shit, right?

Shit. That word again. If you make it out of this alive, you’re going to petition Webster to remove it from the dictionary. The guys over there owe you—big time. It was you who asked them to include iPoop as a new word.

You still have to answer Milo’s question. You hover over the city for a while, taking in the disaster below. You look around and see the police station. As you fly closer you see that the cops are performing their civic duty as only they know how: They’re shooting at anything that moves. Political correctness be damned!

“We’re going to need guns,” you say into your mouthpiece.

“Lots of guns,” Milo says.

You've always wanted to use that line and are pissed off with Milo for stealing it from you. “Yeah,” you mutter. “A fuck-load of guns?”

“Is that bigger than a shed-load?” Milo winks from behind his visor. Okay, you can’t see him actually wink, but as sure as eggs is eggs, the twerp is winking.

“Let’s go and see if the boys in blue have any spare weaponry. See if we can shoot our way out of this.”

“Would be better if we just flew our way out of this,” Milo whines. “I don’t see how we can help them.”

You ponder this as you look for a place to land, then nod in agreement. “Okay, they’re on their own, but we will still need to defend ourselves one way or another. We’ll stop here, on the roof, bail downstairs, grab some guns and ammo, then fly the fuck back to the lab.”

“The lab?” Milo is agog. “Why the fuck would you want to go back there?”

“I started this,” you say as you expertly land on the roof of the police station. “And I’m going to finish it. Properly.”

Milo opens his side of the chopper and jumps out. “This is where I bail, boss,” he says. “I’m sorry it had to come to this, but you’re on your own.” He runs in the direction of the door at the far end of the roof. You shake your head. All these years, having my back, and he has to bail now, when I need him the most. You’ve given Milo enough room in your thoughts. Now it’s time to do what needs to be done. You follow him, head through the door, and run down the stairs. There is an elevator, but you’re over elevators now. Stairs are the only way to go.

The further you go down, the louder the commotion becomes. You hope you’re not running straight into a Cop vs. iPooper free-for-all—that shouldn’t be the case, because as you flew over, you saw the cops shooting out of rather than back into the station. You gamble that the station is free of iPoopers.

No, the commotion is something else entirely. The cops are fighting amongst themselves, and at the heart of it all is Milo. He points up at you and shouts to one of the cops nearby. All of a sudden you’re the centre of attention, like at a Playboy party when all that the guests want is a piece of you. These cops want a piece of you all right—but not to play with. There is vengeance in their eyes. They wish to call down the wrath of the Maker and smite you from where you stand.

“Smite this, motherfuckers,” you rant, grabbing a service revolver from a nearby cop. (There are a lot of nearby cops, by the way. Well, there would be; it is a police station, after all.) You shoot in the air. “This is your last warning, gentlemen. I need some guns so I can put things right again.”

Milo stands near the front of the vengeful policemen. “See what I mean, guys? My ex-CEO wants to cure the world once more! My former employer wants to return to the scene of the crime and bring more madness upon us. I say it stops. I say it stops now! What say you all?”

The shot that hits your thigh is answer to Miles’ question. Maybe coming here was a bad idea after all. Back to the chopper! You beat a hasty retreat back up the stairs. You thank the Maker for all those hours you put in the gym, but the pain in your wounded thigh isn’t getting any better. The higher you climb, the fuzzier your head gets. You can’t slow down. Milo and his Keystone friends are hot on your tail.

You make it up to the roof and into the chopper before you just about pass out from blood loss. You start the motor running and slowly ascend into the sky. You feel a weight from underneath the helicopter. You look out and see Milo and some cops hanging on the landing blades. There are enough of them to keep you from climbing too high, but not enough that you can’t move away from the roof. Your awareness of what’s happening around you begins to fade. You wish you had more time to stem the loss of blood. There are things you must do to make this right again. You have to atone for your own misjudgements and the actions of your motherfucking Board. They are too dead to answer for their own crimes.

But you can’t atone now. You are powerless to do anything except glide the chopper along the roof. In a moment you’re over the city, with Milo and Company keeping you company. Your demise is imminent, you know. Perhaps you can take a few fucking iPoopers with you. You barely have enough strength left in you to position the chopper over a hoard of shit-stained, shit-smelling, shit-excreting maniacs. You switch off your motor.

You plunge.

You sit back and enjoy the ride.

YEEHAW!!

Oops...return to Chapter 3

TIME DOUCHE CH. 4 - Betray Marie

TIME DOUCHE CH.4 - BETRAY MARIE

BY Mandy Ward

You look from the brutes to Marie, wondering if you really ought to defend her. After all, she seems ready to sleep with just about anyone who takes her fancy and certainly doesn’t care about the common folk, despite her intention to live as one of them. So what if she’s sexy and curvy and everything you like in a woman? Underneath it all, she’s still as sluttish and unfaithful as a camp follower.

“I’m glad you guys turned up,” you drawl. “I discovered this bitch lying in wait for Napoleon. I think she was going to murder him.”

Three of them look at her and she whimpers, but stands her ground. The fourth frowns. “It looks more like she’s trying to seduce you.”

“Of course she’s trying to seduce me. She’s attempting to leave this place alive.” You bluster a little, hoping they’ll take it for anger when all of a sudden you’re actually rather scared.

“Why would a woman like this want to murder Napoleon?” the fourth man asks.

Great. Trust one of them to have brains and brawn. You were trying to get them to arrest her and then you were going to wake Napoleon to come to her rescue, but you’ll have to spill the beans now. “She’s a member of the royal family. I mean, for God’s Sake, look at her; the bearing, the accent, the figure!”

Marie draws in a deep breath and, almost as one, the men’s eyes are drawn to her ample assets. Yes, that’s right. Go on, scream for help and watch Napoleon appear to find four men smirking at your chest.

But you realise that only two of the men are leering. The other two have drawn their swords and, with only a second’s pause, they lop the heads off the two drooling brutes. Then they both drop to their knees, their sword points grounded and heads bowed. “De la naissance à la mort, que nous servons notre reine,” the brainy one says softly.

From Birth to Death, we serve our Queen. The translation makes you shudder. So she’s not given up on her birthright after all.

The blood from the slaughtered men pools out around their bodies. Marie delicately steps away from it, holding her skirts out of the crimson liquid.

“Thank you, gentlemen. It is a relief to know that I can count on such loyalty still. You may rise.”

They stand up. “What do we do with him, your majesty?” the brainy one says.

“He saved Napoleon’s life today, but was about to force himself on my person,” she says, her head tilting back slightly as if she’d smelled something rotten. “That is against the law and is punishable by death; but for the act of saving My Love’s life and returning him to me, I reward him with a quick death rather than being drawn and quartered.”

“Oh now, hang on! You were coming onto me, not the other way round,” you protest loudly as they advance towards you.

“What’s going on?” Napoleon emerges, chest bare and blinking sleep from his eyes. “Marie, is there a problem? Why are two of my men dead?”

Her lovely eyes go wide and her bottom lip trembles before she flies to his side, ignoring the blood that splashes up her skirts in her haste to reach him. “Oh Napoleon! This . . .this . . .thug tried to force himself on me!”

Lying bitch. You think fast, trying to come up with some reasonable explanation. In your pocket you can hear Thomas muttering something, but it’s not loud enough for you to hear properly. He’s probably just cursing me again.

“What?” Napoleon’s gaze drops onto you and you shiver at the fury in his eyes. “Captain, what is the truth of this matter?” his arm curls around Marie’s waist and pulls her to him protectively.

The intelligent one replies. “Sir, we were passing by your door when we heard muffled cries in here. We forced our way in and found this man—“ he points his bloodied blade at you, “—and his two confederates attacking Madame Marie. He insisted that she is the Fille de France and that she should be executed. His confederates suggested having some fun with her first and that was when we entered.”

The other man nods as Napoleon looks at him.

Oh come on, Napoleon, you’re smarter than that! Use your brain, they have blood all over them and are carrying bare blades, for Christ’s sake.

“We beheaded the brutes and were about to administer the same fate to their leader when you entered,” the Captain finishes.

You sigh as Napoleon looks at you. “You saved my life so that you could kill my love? How dare you.”

You try to appeal to his political side. “Look, I swear that I am innocent of this! She was trying to seduce me and she admitted to being Marie Therese, the French Princess. Of course she’s going to lie about it, she’s a noblewoman!”

He holds out his hand and the captain places his sword into it. “Stand back, my love, I must dispatch this ruffian!”

“A man in love is only as intelligent as his todger,” you mutter, sighing and attempting to put some distance between you and the enraged Napoleon.

The two soldiers place themselves between you and Marie, while Napoleon advances towards you. You back away and slip in the blood pool surrounding one of the bodies. Catching yourself against a chair, you pull yourself upright, turn and trip over the second body.

“Aha! I have you now.” Napoleon springs forward and lunges smoothly, the blade piercing your back, carving through your ribcage and as the point touches your heart. You think Oh, well, Nubleman isn’t going to get his time machine back.

Your heart bursts and blood flows out of every upper orifice, adding to the pool on the floor. Your last sight is of Marie. The damn bitch has a smirk on her face. What a nasty piece of work; I’m glad I didn’t do her now…

THE END

Oops...RETURN TO CHAPTER 4

TIME DOUCHE CH. 1 - MOVE THAT MACHINE

TIME DOUCHE CH.1 - MOVE THAT MACHINE

By Tomara Armstrong

“Are you getting dressed?” the transmitter buzzes.

“Uh…” you fumble and dump the contents of the drawer onto the floor. The blue-suited men on horseback haven’t noticed you, but they’re getting closer. You stir the clothing around, confused. “Uh, Thomas… Is this a dress?”

“It’s a workman’s smock,” Thomas Nubleman spits, “with coordinating breeches.”

“Breeches?” you drop the clothing and shudder. He has obviously put way too much thought into this. “I can’t wear that. I’m pretty sure I’m allergic.”

The horsemen are drawing nearer. While Nubleman attempts to exhaust his vocabulary bashing you, you decide to abandon the whole “getting dressed” idea and focus your thoughts on moving the time machine.

You quickly push out the door and begin to survey the landscape. The earth is soft from a recent rain and the breeze tickles your nether regions. There are a few trees in the area, and if you can somehow move the machine closer to one, it might shield it from view.

“I can do this,” you breathe.

“What’s the plan then?” Nubleman’s voice carries from inside the time machine. You left the communicator mingling with the breeches on the floor.

“I can do this.” The machine looks really sturdy, but you have a gym membership, and occasionally you go. Occasionally is, actually, rarely… never. The chances you can move this thing are highly unlikely, but what the hell. You crack your knuckles, loosen your shoulders and neck, and give the machine a good shove.

Nothing.

You glance over your shoulder to check on the progress of the men on horseback, dig your feet into the wet ground, and try again. Sliding in the mud, you grunt and it give all you’ve got.

Nothing. It’s built like a brick shithouse.

With a quick glance over your shoulder, you take several steps back, staring down the beast. You’re not afraid… much.

Barreling toward the machine, you lose footing and slam into its side. It wobbles—almost tipping, but the wet ground suctions it back in place.

“Ugh!” Throwing yourself onto the ground, you kick the damn thing in full tantrum mode.

“What’s going on?” the communicator buzzes. “Has disaster been averted?”

The irritating voice of Thomas Nubleman brings you back to reality. You roll onto your stomach and look for the horsemen. Something has gotten their attention and they are headed your way.

Think fast, think fast.

You roll around in the mud, covering yourself as the horses move closer. On your feet, you strike a pose. If you don’t move, you’re fairly sure they won’t see you.

The three horses move dangerously close, but you hold your stance, barely breathing. One of the soldiers dismounts and starts slowly toward your position.

They don’t see me. I am invisible. I am earth and air. They don’t see me.

“Qu'est-ce que c'est?” One of the soldiers on horseback says as he points at you.

“C'est un cochon couvert de merde,” the other spits, and they both share a laugh, most likely at your expense. You try not to smile—keeping very still.

No, they don’t see me.

The dismounted guard approaches you with musket in hand. The bayonet is extended and reflects the sunlight directly into your eyes. You’re blinking erratically when he shoves your right shoulder, and you stumble, “Votre nom, le cochon?”

They see me. Shit.

“Shit! Uh…” you search your repository of useless information. You took French in school, but somehow you’ve buried that under the catalog of movie quotes and trashy pick up lines. “Um… Les chinois et les chinoises ne sont pas grands.” Found it!

You smile.

He doesn’t.

With a swift move of his hand, his bayonet pierces you through the left collarbone. You fall to the ground, crying for your mommy.

When you finally open your eyes, all three men are standing over you—blades mere inches from your chest. You hear Nubleman still droning on about chronotons over the communicator in the time machine, while his French friends turn you into a pin cushion of temporal debris.

Ouch doesn’t even cover it.

THE END

Oops...RETURN TO CHAPTER 1

SEASON 2 HAS A STORY!

You've made your choice.

Now it's up to us to write it.

The story for our second season has been given a name and that name is...



Trailer coming soon.

RED PLANET STOWAWAY CH.9 KILL THE KING

RED PLANET STOWAWAY CH.9 - KILL THE KING

By John Elrod II

As tantalizing as the king's offer is -- and tantalize mightily it does -- you simply cannot be party to his plans. How on Earth are you to convince him to let you leave -- well, how on Mars are you to convince him? He's told you things nobody is supposed to know. He obviously finds you expendable. On top of that, where are you? I mean, where are you exactly? Anyone with brain-one would realize this is not a situation where refusal to cooperate is an option. Unfortunately, you don't seem to have a brain at all.

"Have you ever heard of a Chinese finger trap?" There's an ever-expanding smirk of coy glee slinking its way across your face.

"A what?" His face is mangled with confusion.

"Never mind. You know, King, you turned this wall over here," you motion in the same general direction as he had before, "into a window, right?"

Befuddled, he responds, "Yes... Listen, I'm really going to need an ans--"

"Yeah, in a minute." A tiny monkey maniacally bangs two cymbals against one another in your head; you've clearly devised your master plan. "First, what does the adjoining wall behind you do?"

Forgetting for a moment the urgency of the situation, the king's interest has been piqued. Though the Martians have far surpassed humans in technological advancement, disease eradication, and general civility, humans still hold a monopoly in an area Martians cannot invent, discover, or unravel: cognitive dissonance.

"You know," he wobbles as he inspects the wall as if seeing it for the first time, "I've never really thought about it." His face no doubt recalls the one you wore only a few moments ago.

Coming to the realization that he doesn't particularly care what the wall does, he turns to confront you.

"HAAAAH!" You let loose a joyous grunt for the ages as you hurl the once innocuous data cube with all the might you can muster. Before the king can even know what hit him, the deceptively deadly crystal cube meets his spongy face. He falls to the floor with the cube snugly lodged in his brain as a pungent, viscous goo pools and quickly congeals on the floor.

"Looks like this pawn just knocked off the king," you gloat in your best action hero mannerism.

Little do you know that concealed in your victory is the checkmate of defeat. Your master plan failed to take into consideration the lack of doors this optical illusion of a room affords. That lapse in judgment notwithstanding, you should really take another look at his royal corpse.

His body appears to be ballooning. "Are you bigger than you were? Why are you bigger than you were?!"

You grab everything not bolted down and begin launching the items one-by-one into each successive wall. It's no use; nothing you can throw is having any effect on these walls-from-hell. You grab for his desk but are repelled by the sight of his bloody expanse having coagulated into the back of it.

"It's eating through shit!? What the hell are these things?!" You charge the opposing wall, pounding your fists. Over and over, you inflict absolutely no damage whatsoever to the wall, but your hands quickly become nothing more than sandbags of fractured bone. The pain is immense, but the panic has overtaken you. As the gelatinous mass nears, you're suddenly calm. You pivot to face your doombringer. This acceptance of finality is coupled only with a rueful disdain for your lack of forethought as you're unceremoniously devoured.

THE END

Oops...RETURN TO CHAPTER 9