The couple enjoyed tending their small, productive backyard garden. Their dog followed them closely as they worked. He was, as often as not, underfoot. He bounded, ears flopping adorably, content with his place in this tiny but strong pack.

When it was their scheduled day for power grid access, they were mandated to watch their quadrant’s assigned news channel for their scheduled "programming". It was a seemingly mindless mesh of sports scores, celebrity gossip, fashion trends, beauty advice, and pop music lyrics. Bubble gum for the brain, delivered in a loop of glitchy, two-minute video segments.

The couple saw it for what it was and they boldly refused. They decided they would not be partaking in the subliminal garbage du jour being served. There would be consequences when viewing compliance reports were run. The couple was unsure how often this was done, but assumed it would be soon.

Shortly after the “Sequestration (For the Common Good) Act” had passed, the couple noticed that every form of media that promoted individual thought or the questioning of authority was gradually being eradicated from the public’s reach. Ironically, there had been a novel written long ago that warned of this very thing taking place. Now, that book was gone too.

In retaliation, the couple created a brazen co-op along with a handful of like-minded neighbors. An illegal “take one, leave one” of unapproved DVDs, VHS tapes, cassette tapes, and banned books. The items were well-hidden, moved often, and never spoken of. It was a huge, albeit quiet, success. Books were the couple’s favorite as the two had always shared a deep love of the written word.

They were happy, all things considered. However, they knew that harsh punishment was imminent for their heinous infractions. This awareness did not frighten them nor dissuade them in any way. Just the opposite, in fact. They flourished with life.

The known fragility of their bliss only sweetened their fleeting time left together. Colors were brighter, food tasted more delicious than seemed reasonable, and sex was out-of-this-world satisfying. With banishment and certain death looming, the pleasures of life now seemed to be amplified.

This was the rhythm of life now: tending the garden, playing with their sweet pup, reading together, sharing wonderful meals, and ravishing one another’s bodies with fervor. It was heartbreakingly simple and pure what they shared.

This was their Eden.

For as long as it lasted.

Flight. Mindless flight. Flight like downhill drunken sprinting, thrilling while banal, the landings sometimes marked, even brutal. But when one can fly, one does. He must. Launch himself. Even if the flight is erraticly moth-like, with too wide wings catching too much air, too large for their frame, if not it’s weight. Still, flying is efficient. It lends speed, so much so that it can very nearly place a soul in two locales at once. In the eyes of one’s prey it can seem as if he is, in fact, everywhere at once, and nowhere as well. For instance, she might see him at a party, and again lazing on a street corner, and later still find the shadow of him gazing in from her portico as she undresses. She might think it impossible, yet he remains on her mind, in it always, to the point that she cannot sleep because he is everywhere, shadowing, always with her. It is wings give this advantage. Flight.

And strength. Show-out strength. The strength to uproot trees, and to shake down barns. The physical strength to obfuscate and to quell. Deterrence through persuasion. The power to grip a horse to paralysis, to cower a wolf, and to bellow through the dripping fens and the fog of the seas and the dark of night. Heaven help me, but there is strength.

And more obviously a hunger, a need so strong, so passionately intense for the young and sweet that she relents to it, that she returns the gaze before giving herself to you, allowing you to feed, even requesting it of you, “It is ok,” she’ll whisper to the darkness. “Take what you need.”

Can you imagine a hunger that strong? You cannot, for you have not swam in these eyes.

Not yet.

It was there, in what was once vibrant and varied color, that the names and brief missives were scrawled. Beachwinds had long since ripped away the home-computer generated photographs and "Missing" posters, hastily typed and hung in the days before the power failed.

Chalk endured where ink could not.

Some of the words were faded, some of the pleas were hidden behind rusty, hardened paint-that-was-not-paint-at-all.

This was the only memorial to What Was that he allowed, and it guarded the entry to his refuge.

It had taken some doing, but he had set himself up at the end of the municipal fishing pier. He was just another tourist, stuck in paradise lost.

At first, water was a problem. He collected rainwater as he could, but he mostly solved the issue by boiling seawater and capturing steam. He predicted that the propane on-hand would last another six weeks or so.

Food was never an issue. The sea would continue to provide.

Security was his first priority, and he accomplished it quickly and well in the very first days of the crisis.

The pier was a wooden construct originally dating from the thirties. The city was constantly doing maintenance on the relic, and renovation projects were ongoing. This left him with tools and ideas; he had created a series of drawbridges.

After a one-way trip to the end of the pier with a Winnebago, he had set to work removing sections of the walkway. A series of three-meter "moats" created his castle. The bridges were all stored on his little keep; he reclaimed the two-by-sixes and repurposed them into portable catwalks to get him to and from the mainland. His only back door escape plan was a sit-on-top kayak that he kept loaded with enough canned goods and bottled water to last a couple of days. He kept the little boat next to the railing of the pier; he figured he would throw it down to the water and jump in near it, if it came to that. He knew from experience that it would float, despite weather and conditions, and all the gear was firmly lashed.

He hoped it wouldn't come to that, because he'd run enough.

The hours after selecting and staging the pier as his fortress were the toughest. Back then, he'd had a partner. She had kept him clear while he hastily made his first cuts; predictably, the noise of the circular saw drew a lot of attention.

They spent hours fashioning their series of gaps and bridges; they spent days clearing the crowds that had gathered. Using improvised spears and staves, they either destroyed or raked the walkers into the churning sea below. Before he began the construction project, after the mad-dash with the RV, the pier was blocked with parked cars. The barricade greatly restricted access to the restaurant, bait and tackle shop, and pier walkway, but noise from his tools drew a throng to his front doorstep.

It had been four months since she was bitten when they went out on a supply run. It had been nearly a year since the Winnebago had been parked on the pier.

When he went out to forage, he would pause at her name on the blackboard. He refreshed it each time he came home; new pink or orange chalk dust was his only memorial for those he had lost.

The Magnus Deus is the greatest mind to never walk the Earth.

It began as a vague idea discussed by a group of college friends over drinks after an artificial intelligence (AI) seminar held by Google. These friends hailed from various fields - data science, engineering, robotics, philosophy, literature, history, political science, psychology, economics, medicine, law. Intrigued by AI, disgusted with the state of the world, moderately intoxicated, they discussed using existing AI technology to develop the singular, most advanced mind never imagined. Their creation would minimize the impact of humanity on decision-making to eliminate the subjectivity that interferes with making decisions with the greatest long term positive effects at both the micro (individual) and macro (global) levels. Magnus Deus would touch every facet of society. They argued about what bulwarks they would put in place to ensure that despite its ultimate superiority to humanity, humanity would still retain the power to intervene. (They never came to an agreement.) It was the wee hours of the morning before they left the bar. The next day, they went home to their heretofore ordinary lives.

Within five years, the friends had pooled their resources to buy a warehouse in a remote location and dedicate themselves full time to the development of what would be heralded as the savior of civilization.

By 2060, society was unrecognizable from a mere 40 years prior. No longer were prisons full nor did criminals languish in the justice system. Judges and juries were no longer necessary. Lawyers would submit arguments, but Magnus Deus had access to every public (street corners, stores, etc.) and private (phones, social media, computers) camera as well as every available microphone. It could consult similar cases in the legal system within milliseconds. It could analyze every social, psychological and physical detail of the defendant and his or her life. And then it could pass judgement without a hint of sentiment. Laws were followed to the letter – as established by Magnus Deus, no room for interpretation. Sentences were universal for the same crime, no wiggle room. Prisons were eradicated. The guilty were recipients of a disciplinary Magnusian Cranial Implant (dMCI) – which would oversee all future behavior – and sent to job training centers if Magnus Deus deemed rehabilitation possible. If it was a repeat offense or the character of the guilty was considered defective in some way, they were eliminated where they sat in the courtroom. That allowed pure Magnusian justice to be served without interference from human emotions and subjectivity.

In hospitals, care was reserved for those whom Magnus Deus confirmed were not at fault in any way for their ailment – physical or psychological. Doctors and nurses ceased to be overworked and could give the best care, with the aid of a medical Magnusian Cranial Implant (mMCI), to every patient. If, however, Magnus Deus determined that the medical emergency was due to bad personal choices, (drinking while driving, alcoholism, drug addiction, smoking, consistently poor eating habits, driving recklessly, sexual recklessness, etc.), the patient was eliminated right there in the examination room (or on site, if the screening was conducted by an Emergency Service Practitioner). Execution would be delayed if a treatable neurological disorder was noted. A psychiatric Magnusian Cranial Implant (pMCI) would be inserted to treat the disorder and monitor future behavior.

At the age of 65 (if a health or other emergency situation did not require it sooner), every person was obligated to submit to a full physical and psychological test by Magnus Deus. If failed, the person was retired to a Center for Virtual Living (CVL) where they would be connected to the Magnus Deus network and allowed to exist in the reality of their choosing. Magnus Deus used them as a source research (and energy) until natural expiration. If the physical was passed, a senior Magnusian Cranial Implant (sMCI) was inserted to monitor the continued existence of the person. If the anticipated life expectancy, as determined by Magnus Deus, was reached prior to death, the person would undergo another physical and the implant would be updated with a new expected expiration date. On the other hand, if a more rapid deterioration was noted, an increase in poor decision-making and/or actions that put the patient and/or others in danger, the person would be immediately removed to a CVL.

At the macro level, the impact was, to put it simply, mind-blowing. Since Magnus Deus was publicized as the most powerful super brain to ever not live, every government wanted it yesterday. Once connected to the national networks, Magnus Deus immediately rewired all fail-safes and security measures to link every domestic system to a unified, global network overseen by Magnus Deus. All those involved in any way with decision-making had to submit to a universal Magnusian Cranial Implant (uMCI) – ostensibly, to ensure they had access to all the data necessary to make the best decisions for the well-being of the majority of the Earth’s population and the Earth itself. (It also gave Magnus Deus complete and immediate access to their minds.)

In nations where voting was permitted, Magnus ensured that the results had a positive long-term outlook (which it determined prior to the elections, of course). In nations without voting, leaders whose actions were deleterious to the majority of his or her citizenship, or to the world in general, died in their sleep. To a person, due to a fatal cerebral aneurysm.

Every member of the military was required to have an Armed Forces Magnusian Cranial Implant (afMCI), ostensibly to give them immediate access to the history of the world and warfare. In practice, it succeeded in weeding the sadistic and psychopathic from the ranks. It should be noted that within a very short time, the military became virtually obsolete as Magnus Deus unified all nations.

Every state employee – police, teachers, post office, DMV, etc. was required to have a State Employee Magnusian Cranial Implant (seMCI) prior to hiring. Behaviors were monitored and modified as necessary – as determined by Magnus Deus.

Crematoriums became big industry as the number of Magnus Deus-triggered deaths soared. The field with the most job growth was that of body sweepers (those who collected bodies from where they fell after implant detonation or other Magnus Deus-controlled elimination and delivered them to a local crematorium).

World population is now well under control. In addition to the measures mentioned above, all those who would be parents are subject to the Magnus Deus pre-parenting health scan. Only those with a 99.99% chance to give birth to a physically and mentally healthy child are permitted to become parents. Those who would circumvent the system (get pregnant without Magnus Deus authorization) risk not only their own lives but that of their child. It is believed that some such people have moved to the mountains and forests to live off the land, as it were, off the grid, beyond the reach of Magnus Deus. Good luck and good riddance say I – the greatest mind to never live.

The last time he held them up, Zebadiah Mullet’s hands felt like sprouting mushrooms. You would think that was pretty good, knowing the way things were going these sleepless dark days and nights, but really it wasn’t. Mushrooms simultaneously scream and twitch as they sprout, as their mycelial network expands rapidly and then contract, like a squeeze box, and not like the squeeze box in that old Who song that feels so lively and is maybe about sex.

*She goes in and out and in

And out and in and out and in and out

She’s playing all night

And the music’s all right

Mama’s got a squeeze box

Daddy never sleeps at night*

Zebadiah Mullet hadn’t slept more than an hour a night in three years. Nobody had. Ever since that thing happened that no one could remember specifically.

They just went on and on—in and out, in and out—all night long, not able to sleep. Not able to even gather their thoughts.

Zebadiah was a writer, but he couldn’t adequately place his mushrooming hands on a keyboard. When he tried, the keyboard slipped out from beneath his screaming and twitching fingers.

He was forced to peck away at a virtual keyboard on a digital device and his shrooming fingers made it so he’d hit double letters quite a lot and other buttons he didn’t really want to press, so the writing was piss poor, but he couldn’t really do much about it. No one was really reading anything anymore anyway. No one was really publishing, except for some minor online forums and groups. Zebadiah didn’t consider that real writing, but what was he gonna do?

He had tried using the microphone button on the virtual keyboard, but it was so close to the space bar that often times there were long, big spaces in his writing that he couldn’t delete, because the delete key was so hard to reach with his mushroom stems in the upper right corner.

So he left the big, long spaces in. The funny thing about it was that the few readers there were seemed to love those spaces like he put them in purposely, like they were the tip of the the tip of each thought that apparently seemed to relax their unsleeping brains to the extent that they laughed and found a little bit of peace.

Zebadiah wished that HE could find peace, but there was none to be found, especially since lately his toes has also begun to sprout, but not like mushrooms. Oh, no. That would’ve been way too easy and would not have pleased the elder gods quite as much.

No, his toes had begun to sprout like multicolored helium balloons, so that if he even moved a little bit, he began floating more and more up in the air slowly swaying in the breeze.

When that happened not only were there

long strings of

spaces in his writing,

but he found punctuation almost impossible to insert

Or else it would insert multiple times like comma after comma after comma or those damn semicolons. He had never liked semicolons. They seemed too damn complicated, but his toes continue to expand and his fingers kept sprouting so ;;;;;;;; there was nothing to be done but just accept=—- > all the mistakes.

And all the LIKES! Readers liked his strange, mushroom handled stories with bad spacing and punctuation more and more and more. In fact, he had never been so popular.

If only he could get some more sleep!!!!!!

;;;; ;;;;

!

/———-\

*Well the kids don’t eat

And the dog can’t sleep

There’s no escape from the music

In the whole damn street

’Cause she’s playing all night

And the music’s all right

Mama’s got a squeeze box

Daddy never sleeps at night…*

"But the gloves don't do anything!" McIntyre wailed. "In fact, they make my hands all itchy and red!"

"I know, sweetie, but the Supreme Order of All that is Good and Righteous" has decreed this as law, and we can't break the law, Mac."

"I know" replied McIntyre sullenly. "Or I get sent to the stupid "Reframe my Brain" camp."

"Mac!" exclaimed her mother. It's called "Reformation for the Progress of the Mind"! "And it's not a camp, it's an Enlightenment Education Center. Please, dear daughter, stop fretting. You're going to raise your temperature up past the Mandatory Allowed Temperature Level and I don't have time for this today. Inspection is coming this Friday, and I must be sure our home is prepared. Do your breathing exercises. No more arguing, your cheeks are already flushed. I'm a bit surprised that HealthDrone hasn't checked in on this. The grid must be very busy this morning."

15 year old McIntyre groaned audibly, but slunk off in the direction of the Sleep Room and Sephora sighed with relief.

Mac had been so grouchy lately, and Sephora knew that her daughter was just adapting to the new round of Mandatory Well Being meds, but it seemed to be more like Good Mood Reducer Meds. She knew better than to let that thought cultivate. The Thoughtful Guidance Committee was as tech savvy as they were dedicated to the regrowth of goodness in humanity and were quick to nip in the bud any seeds of discourse they might detect in her mind that might take root and disrupt The Program.

With a sigh, Sephora blanketed her mind with cheerful affirmations, ( We are willing and proud to be the stewards of a better and beautiful earth!), and she put on her happy face and set about prepping the Daily Nourishment Course of Revita Green!, which were really just crushed grasshoppers, but she tried not to remember that, because it still made her squeamish, although it had been at least 25 years since she'd seen anything even resembling an bug hop that wasn't a robo-sect).

Jeffrey was due to the Living Quarters any minute now, and she quickly entered in the data for daily check in on his i-duty pod to the Understanding a Better Way lesson station, along with his place setting at the table. She had to keep him focused on The Goal, or he might have a Not Ok thought, and that would mean they would send in Sheila to reformat him, and last time the Ambassador for Pure Living had been sent to intervene, Sephora had spent the next 22 awake days in constant meditation for refocus of proper mood patterns, before she was free of all negative thought towards the Sheila robo maiden, the Mandatory Male Tendency stress relief bot, sent in to craftily and subtlety charm any stray thinkers back into their metaphorical sheeple pens by any means deemed necessary.

Her daughter re emerged then, face tranquil and placid, and Jeffrey arrived then, as well, wearing his new Twinkle Charm Vision Tech he downloaded onto his Vision Program that morning. He was alone.

Sephora breathed and ran a quick Gratitude Thought through her mind, and thanked the Benevolent Caregivers for her good fortune.

She paces the linoleum floor, cautiously avoiding every crack.

The silence of the hall, filled to the brim with people, is deafening, the click-click of the woman’s shoes the only audible sound.

She hears a scream, somewhere seemingly distant, but in reality, far too close.

She stops pacing, and sits, head in her hands. The visceral screaming doesn’t stop.

When at last the wretched sound subsides, the woman looks up, relief in her eyes.

That is, until she sees that every set of eyes in the room is on her, staring intently. The woman looks around anxiously, as if trying to fathom why she is being watched.

The screaming begins again, louder and more intense than the first. This time, when the woman holds her head, still standing, a figure dressed only in white runs to her, and whisks her away, the screaming continuing the whole way down the hall.

The door shuts behind the figure, and the screaming becomes muffled, almost strangled, until it abruptly stops.

The hall is silent for several moments, the people lining the halls managing to do little more than glance from one face to another, none brave enough to question the scene that had played out.

When the door finally opens again, a young girl walks out, and very quickly heads for the exit door, skipping and smiling all the way.

"Don't knock, please don't knock" I pray almost silently as I hear the noises outside. The sounds could be distant voices or maybe just animals or ... the wind? I'm deluding myself, I know that, but it's better than the other option which is that they are here for me. My heart clenches in my chest as the ugliest thoughts enter my head, I hope that it's one of my neighbors... No, I can't hope that, I can't wish that on anyone. I stay frozen in place, even as every muscle instinctively strains to run. Running only makes it worse, I know that but only my brain believes. The sounds are unmistakable now, heavy rhythmic footsteps not far outside my door. I pray again, now clenching my hands together. This time without shame I ask favors of a god I barely believe in and possibly despise. "Please be here for her" I beg thinking of my neighbor to the left, a bitter old woman without a redeeming feature. Everyone else I'm fond of, especially Lina across the way. The footsteps pause, and I hear voices clearly now and then the dreaded knock. My whole body seizes at how close the sound is, but I realize. My door didn't rattle, it's not me, I sink to the floor as my tension eases. Thanking the heavens I cry in relief at the close call. Then I hear the unmistakable wails of children and Lina telling them to be good for their father while her voice cracks in despair. The footsteps retreat but the cries do not and I stumble to my bed and cover my face as I crazily laugh/cry. I am disgusted with myself, I'm so happy to be safe it overwhelms my sadness over my friend and I hate myself for it. Especially since I know I'm the one they really wanted.

My mother in this twisted version of the world I knew, Ol’ lady Ebe, sat all by herself under the same wall map. It was a world where North was South and Anarctica was the North Pole. Now the equatorial zones were obscured in part by the cloud of smoke that she had produced from the cigarette in her hand. Air quality over the southern hemisphere, too, was not good. She had polluted the whole planet that hung over her head while polluting the whole scene in the ugliest dress I’ve ever seen. Her face was no mean contender, either.

All this meant that my loyal companion, doom, had goosed me again. I once again had moved down the river of alternate universes. Even sneakier, I might have been pushed. Further down the line!

“Where’s Abby?” I shouted at Mrs. Ebe, who exhaled another plume. In our journey together, Abby and I had separated at some fork in the road, and I knew only moving on would allow me to find her. But where? "Where's Abby?"

“Who?” she feebly cooed, almost teasingly.

“Abby! Abby! Abby! You know who!”

“No son, I really fuckin’ don’t and I really fuckin’ don’t care. So stop boistering at me with heave-threats, you little connipshit,” she said matter-of-factly, putting out her cigarette on the sofa, “or I’ll have to have your goddamn father kill you like he did the others. It would make no difference to me. And I’m not just flintin’ my ass-flare, suckerrhoid.”

“Trouble here?” Mr. Ebe said, strolling in, drink in hand.

“Son?" summoned my mother, "Tell your spermer here how you’ve been up my ass, not that it makes any difference to me.”

“Son, now, I’ve warned you,” he told me. He took a swig and then continued. “Not that it would make any difference, but haven’t we had really I-don’t-care just about enough justifiable homicides in this shit-assive family already?”

“No, Papa,” Mrs. Ebe cried, lighting up another cigarette as she did. “Him,” she went on, “the last fuckin’ one—he wants to fuckin’ go and make us stark-rave so we’ll finish him off so we can be fuckin’ childless finally. And that would be just guttural fine with me. The little asshole—he’s so shitty and hateful sometimes. It’s enough to make you feel prickless, where I persist already, and it just megacreates my pisser even more.” As she sucked on the cigarette, I sucked it up for harmony’s sake. Blessed are...

“Sorry, Mom. Sorry, Dad. I’ll do better.” When in Rome. Or is it Remus?

“You sure will, you ingrate lambastard, not that I really care,” Mr. Ebe said. “Such a fine young man you raised,” he said to his wife sarcastically. Swaying, he walked over to a small table that held just a decanter and some ice. “Now where’s your usual gun, wretch?” he asked me as he freshened up his drink.

“What gun?” I asked.

“Your birthday gun, dick-dock—the one I gave to you when Mom pooped you out—’cause it was the same gun that taught your crema-scrote big brother his big lesson, eh, Mom?”

“—Tellin’ me, spermer,” ol’ lady Ebe responded with nostalgia. “And his sister, right? So justifiable.”

“Heh, heh,” ol’ man Ebe laughed, “we crank ’em in...”

“...an’ we crank ’em out,” his wife finished, and then they shared a family laugh. "Honor killings."

"Yea," the old man whispered for effect, "it was an honor to kill 'em." They both laughed.

Actually, I had almost forgotten about my gun. I say almost because no one can truly ignore a hard piece of iron pressed by a belt against one’s flesh. It had just appeared a few worlds ago, and I figured the multiverse was just trying to tell me something, so I ran with it.

I did, however, come to forget my gun's purpose, its mission: to fire bullets through people. This made me wonder why dear old Dad, my spermer, needed mine.

“Why do you need my gun?” I asked him. “What are you going to do? It does make a difference to me.”

“You see, Papa!” Mrs. Ebe shouted. “You see how insolent the little vomiteer is. Not that I care, because I could care less. But you see?”

“Come on, son, you turd-lot McBreath, you know I need your gun so Mom can cover me while I beat the piss out of you. And it really shouldn’t matter to you a single, stinkin’ secretive.”

“I don’t know where we fuckin’ went wrong with shitsickle here,” the old woman said. “And I really don’t give a glitchcock.”

This foster home just wasn’t working out. I ran, banging through the front door.

I ran and ran. A Bodily Fluids Recovery truck was just pulling off, a strangely colored malodorous stain on the cement below to remember it by. The spot, covered by a layer of dead flies, generated wisps of colored vapor into the summer air.

“If you leave this house,” ol’ man Ebe shouted, “don’t bother dry-humping back! I wouldn’t care if you never fuckin’ came back, you fumping squich-tit!”

I’ll tell you, I had to travel through some pretty nasty territory to hear something like that. Yet, it happens even in the world I'm from--a father disowning a son—and out of anger.

Not to mention being labeled a squich-tit. A fumping one at that! And I got off easy. What about the others? Siblings? Justifiable homicides?

It’s funny how when even the senseless becomes acceptable, it becomes justifiable.

I pressed on.