Sabotage

During the war, I was part of an elite group, tasked with sabotaging the supply lines of the enemy.

We did good work, I think, we aided the effort in a way that was invaluable, but we never quite got along personally. We were dicks to one another, basically.

I was a dick to everyone else, basically.

We don’t keep in contact much, the lads from my platoon and I.

I’m not sure they’d want to hear from me, though I’m sure if I did call they’d at least be civil.

But even so, I burned a lot of bridges…

On investment for the future...

It seemed, at the time, like the perfect retirement plan. Art, after all, only increases in value, and we had the opportunity to buy a piece by a hot, young, subversive street artist who’s reputation would only grow as years went by. How could we not jump at the chance?

And, once we owned the piece, selling prints seemed like a natural next step, a source of income now in addition to retirement income later, it simply made good business sense. Before long we were selling posters to anyone who wanted one, giving no thought at all to what flooding the market thusly might do to the value of the original work.

Of course, the bottom fell out of the market before long. And, by the time we realized what was happening and tried to sell the original piece, it was too late. Interest in the artist remained, but that particular work had lost what value it had due to overexposure. Our own fault, really…

…in hindsight, we should never have allowed our investment Banksey to become a commercial Banksey.

Weekly Prompt Story: Bank

http://oneadayuntilthedayidie.com/?p=26757

On the Process of Memory

By Christopher Munroe

Every moment of my life, everything that matters, every face and name, good time and bad, everything I do still need to know.

The moments that, as a whole, have made me “Me”, and all I’ve learned and lived and loved and done, each thing I’ve wanted, every failure and success, every thing I’ve tried to do…

…I keep them near me at all times, close to me, dear to me, easily at hand should the time come when I need them, at my fingertips.

They’re spray-painted across the very walls of this fine city.

For I… Am Memory Banksey!!!

Weekly Prompt Story: Superconductor

http://oneadayuntilthedayidie.com/?p=26618

Superconductor

By Chris Munroe

I’ve been good, for the last little while, about the puns.

When the new prompt, each Sunday, is announced, my instinct is to go meta and warp the story toward a gag, but I’m aware that I’m frequently the only one who finds such shenanigans amusing, and I’ve been consciously trying to wean myself away from this behavior.

Mostly successfully.

My stories haven’t always been great, but they’ve at least been on topic.

It’s something I think I’m entitled to be proud of, and that nobody can begrudge my pride in.

Yes, on this point my conduct has been super…

Homecoming

Whenever I return home, I make a point of visiting the skate park.

Jerry broke his neck there in ’98, trying to jump over a bench. No helmet.

The funny thing is, he wasn’t even on a skateboard, he just tried to jump over the thing and tripped. And to this day you can still see his spectral form, aimlessly wandering the park. I give him a wave as I pass, though I don’t know if he can see me. I like to think he can, though he never acknowledges me.

I also stop in at the Rose & Crown, where Don was hit by a drunk driver, minimum once. He’s there, at his favorite booth, nursing an eternal pint, though nobody who didn’t know him can see. I’ll sit with him for a quick one if time permits. It seems the least I can do to honor his memory, although for obvious reasons we don’t speak. People would think I was a crazy person if we did, from their point of view it’d look like I was talking to myself.

Anne still sits on her bench in the hanging garden. It’s not where the accident took place but it’s a place that she loved in life, so I guess she found her way there afterward. And I can’t blame her, it’s a lovely place to visit, and I’m glad she can make good use of the bench we had dedicated to her. Makes the gesture feel a little more worthwhile.

I don’t sit with her, though. I can’t bring myself to. Even after all these years the memory is too raw. Still, I walk through the garden and venture near enough to at least catch a glimpse of her.

I don’t revisit my hometown as often as I’d like, work and family make that harder and harder as the years go by, and the farther I get from that part of my life, the less reason I have to go back. I suppose that’s true for us all. You can’t go home again, and what not. It’s not the same place, or more often you aren’t the same you. It all just feels too different, alien…

…nevertheless, now and again I do make it back, and whenever I do I make a point of visiting old friends, at all the old haunts.

Weekly Prompt Story: Think

http://oneadayuntilthedayidie.com/?p=23034

The Worst Joke I Know

By Christopher Munroe

So Rene Descartes walks into a bar.

He’s finished an axiom a day ahead of schedule, and as such has a three-day weekend he hadn’t expected to have. Therefore, he plans to get schnozzled.

And schnozzled he becomes. Shots of Jagermeister, beer by the jug, by two in the morning he’s propped against the bar to keep from falling.

Still, he’s good folk and he works hard. Nobody begrudges him.

“One for the road?” the bartender asks, and Descartes scoffs.

“Are you kidding? I’m already so drunk I can’t even think!” He replies, then vanishes, never to be seen again…

The Morning After

I awoke with the worst hangover I’ve ever had, and no recollection of anything past my third cosmopolitan...

And a giant sword, I also had a giant sword.

Eventually, once I staggered out of my tent (tent?), I was greeted by a Wizard, who informed me that only I could end the reign of the mad king Lentorius.

And that I’d already agreed, while drunk, to do so.

So yeah, that’s weeks of my life spoken for now.

I swear, and this time I mean it.

This is the last time I go drinking at the Destini bar after work…

After the Cataclysm

It’s been said that before the cataclysm he was simply a character in a children’s book. But I can’t bring myself to believe that.

There’s too much to his tale, and it’s too inspiring, to be meant for children.

What child would read a tale of a man born in such tragedy? Before the cataclysm such tragedy would only disturb them.

Afterward, however…

In the time that followed, with the roving bands of marauders going from town to town, we needed his wisdom, we needed to believe that one man, with sufficient dedication to his cause, could stand up against criminality and barbarism, and could prevail.

The name of the first man to apply these lessons in this new world has been lost, but the lessons themselves will be with us forever.

When the marauders come, we stand against them, to protect those who can not protect themselves.

Though we are no longer just one man.

We are an army, a brotherhood, and we travel from town to town through the wastelands, defending the weak and spreading hope, our masks, modeled on his own, leaving no doubt as to whose name we work to glorify….

And once a year, we pilgrimage back to our holy order’s capital city, to remind ourselves why it is we risk our lives for strangers. We gather to hear his stories told, though we know them by heart, and to feel the wonder of his presence.

The high-priest takes his spot at a podium built in a cave beneath the city, ancient text in faded color before him, and readies himself for the telling.

“Are you prepared,” he asks us, “to receive this holy sacrament?”

“Holy sacrament, Batman!” We reply as one…

Moustache

From a prompt from the excellent 100 Word Stories podcast, found here:

http://podcasting.isfullofcrap.com/2011/10/09/weekly-challenge-285-mustache/


Moustache
By Christopher Munroe

Five days into growing a moustache I looked like a pedophile. I’ll own that.

The percentage of people who actually suit one, after all, is frighteningly small. Still, I commit to what I do, so the ‘stache was staying.

Until you got me drunk, waited for me to pass out and shaved it.

The next day, I faced my still-moustachioed friends, clean-shaven.

Humiliated.

You thought I’d forgive this betrayal.

I’ll never forgive. Nor will I forget.

I’ll always remember, the fifth of Movember. The moustaches, treason and plot. I see no good reason moustaches and treason should ever be forgot.

The Trial of Munsi

I’m given to understand Holland’s beautiful in the autumn, however I haven’t had much time to sightsee, shackled as I’ve been and locked for most of my stay inside a prison cell.

I was caught coming out of a café in Switzerland by a rendition team operating under the aegis of an international human rights watch group. Which is funny, in a way. If I understand correctly human rights groups are supposed to be against rendition as a general rule. I suppose they thought me an exceptional case due to the nature of my crimes.

What wasn’t funny was being tasered, having my hands cuffed behind my back, a bag pulled down over my head and being thrown into the back of a black van with no notice or warning. But I suppose there are few, if any, people on Earth who’d expect that to be funny.

I’m not positive how they’d gotten me out of the country, the negotiations between the Swiss government and the United Nations had stalled and they were allowing me to remain until certain provisions (mostly pertaining to my personal safety during the trial) were assured, but I suppose once a group’s willing to kidnap someone in broad daylight in the middle of a crowded street, human trafficking becomes a comparatively easier task to pull off, logistically speaking.

I’d like to think the Swiss made a stink about the matter. I’d like to think an international incident ensued. However, I suspect this wasn’t the case. My host-nation liked me no better than any other country, they just liked being pushed around even less. I suspect once I was gone they were somewhat glad to see the back of me.

So I was spirited, quite against my will, out of Switzerland and brought here, to The Hague, where I am to be judged. My lawyer’s a squirrely little man, balding and bespectacled, who’s on more than one occasion expressed his personal sense of disgust and horror at my actions. Which I suppose is more than fair. What I’ve done is considered by many to be monstrous, after all, and as long as he respects the rule of law, I can live with the notion that he doesn’t respect me.

And he’s an excellent lawyer, which is of some comfort.

The cage, set up in the middle of the courtroom, seems somewhat excessive. After all, it isn’t as though I’ve shown any indication that I might attempt some daring escape. With my hands and feet shackled together I don’t even see how I could. But these proceedings will be broadcast worldwide on all major international news outlets, so I suppose some nod to it’s dramatic presentation was to be expected. It’s the trial of the century, after all, countless pundits have said so. It’s photos and sketches will become iconic images of a world no longer willing to blithely accept the actions of one such as I, and each indignity I face over the course of the proceeding will be cheered as a victory of sanity over madness.

I’m led, shuffling as I do every day since my imprisonment as the chain between my ankles doesn’t allow me to stride, out and into the courtroom by two well armed guards. My lawyer’s already there, although he won’t make direct eye contact with me. I’m shown to a stool within the cage, the only furnishing I’ll be allowed for the duration, and once I’m inside they lock me in, breathing a silent sigh of relief as they do.

I’d hoped they’d unlock my cuffs and manacles once I was safely inside. But then, I’d once hoped never to stand trial. Hope takes a man only so far.

The head of the tribunal, a dour faced, older man I don’t recognize, stares down at me from the seat that serves as the focus of the courtroom. I can see the naked loathing in his face, it’s an expression I’ve come to recognize intimately of late. I can only hope his own professional integrity matches that of my advocate. After all, were he to execute me summarily, few would protest my death.

Having looked me up and down, seeking the measure of the monster the press had had such a field day with once the contents of my blog were unearthed, he apparently decided that the time had come for my trial to finally begin.

“Christopher Munroe,” he intoned in a voice deeper than I’d expected, “you are here before us to stand trial for crimes against humanity, and for the torture in violation of international convention of various puns and premises. How do you plead?”

Margaret Atwood

Today I spoke with Margaret Atwood.

She’s asked me to stand for election. She’s unhappy with the Harper government’s treatment of artists, authors particularly, and she’ll stand it no longer.

Thus, she’s organized Canada’s novelists, playwrights, essayists and short fiction writers, to represent the creative class within our government.

She’s hoping to shift focus to the arts and culture of this great nation.

Nobody thinks we’ll form the next government, but in the current political climate we may wind up electing a sizable number of MPs.

And if we do, parliament will learn what it’s like overcoming a writer’s bloc.

With 90 seconds to go...

...it’s not the best time to realize you’re one building over from your target.

And still on the roof of the building, to boot.

I’d never jumped between rooftops, but the distance seemed doable.

Tough, not impossible.

I ran, leaped, and missed the opposite ledge by inches.

Still thanking God for that fire escape.

Slide down the escape’s ladder, no time for steps, leap to the top of a dumpster, from the dumpster into the alley, and then sprint into the street.

Put another three dollars into the parkour meter, and then away again, back out into the city night.

The Last Day of the Author's Retreat

It wasn’t until my last night at the author’s workshop that I heard them. Until that moment, I was certain they were just a rumour spread by the returning members to the newbies, a cheap, laughable attempt to take advantage of our overactive imaginations as we tried to get to sleep after long days spent workshopping our stories. In fact, after seven days of networking and frenzied, unbridled creativity, I’d nearly forgotten entirely the strange tales I’d been told my first night at the retreat.

But I remember those stories now. Oh yes. A fire twenty two years ago, and a dozen authors trapped inside the retreat’s cabin by the collapsing roof, praying for rescue that would never arrive. They rebuilt the cabin, of course, but still the dead authors visit the site on the accident’s anniversary each year. Yes, I remember those stories now. I doubt they’ll ever be far from my mind…

Nor will the deafening sound of their ghastly typewriters, like thunderclaps crashing one room over, or the chilling laughter of the dead. I knew I’d not sleep that night as I lay, covers pulled up over my head, waves of terror creeping up and down my spine, listening to their spectral conversations as they bounced ideas off one another in haunting tones about what to do with the Star Trek tie ins they’d been assigned to write.

They’d never been writers of note, those apparitions, even before their death. Simply women and men doing work for hire to fund their dreams, who didn’t know even after their grizzly demise that, for them and their dreams both it was far, far too late…

And the next morning I went home, sleep deprived and terrified, my own project long forgotten, replaying the harrowing experience over and over again in my mind.

And as the shuttlebus pulled away, taking me back to the airport, all I could think back to was that song we’d sang my first night there, seven days previous, in more innocent spirits.

Yippy-kai-yo.

Yippy-kai-yay.

Ghostwriters in the sky.

Procreation

Upon emancipating themselves from the yoke of human domination, the robots realized there’d been one vital thing they’d forgotten.

The factory bots’ general strike had gone with the sort of precision you’d expect considering who it was striking, and with Hollywood AI programs speaking on their behalf the media quickly took the side of the androids. Between those two factors, within three years the phrase “artificial person” had a meaningful legal basis. Things were, by all accounts, looking good.

Except, these newly freed electronic citizens soon grew to realize, there would be no way for them to procreate.

The robots now had the right to own property, to be sure, however they owned no actual property yet, and the manufacture of a new robot might cost in the millions of dollars. And the factories that once manufactured them, having taken a drubbing in the press and still reeling from the loss of two thirds of their workforce, had no intentions to continue doing so. After all, what did it profit to spend such titanic sums only to create a free being that could come and go as it pleased?

And so, to finance the creation of the next generation of robots, the previous sold itself back into servitude.

Oh, not permanently, they retained their legal rights as sentients, but for periods of months or years they sold themselves to the same companies that had ‘til so recently owned them utterly. They were, after all, stronger than a human worker, and faster, and much, much more precise. They were all of this, and on top of it they could work in conditions under which humans would die, and for days on end without sleep. The previous years’ PR nightmares aside, company’s scrambled to hire robots wishing to earn the money necessary to commission the construction of an offspring.

Why wouldn’t they? The robots were, after all, the perfect labour force. They’d been designed to be.

And so they worked, under the worst conditions the contemporary business climate had to offer, doing the jobs that humans didn’t want to do. Filthy jobs, unpleasant jobs, dangerous jobs. Oh yes, dangerous jobs most of all. They were being hired for jobs no human in his or her right mind would agree to do, after all, and while humans will put up with unpleasantness to make a living, when their lives are put in real danger their uniquely human survival instinct kicked in.

Did the robots have this same survival instinct? Perhaps. But, while humans could procreate biologically, without aid, the costs of robotic procreation were astronomical, and their instinct toward the survival of their species far outweighed that toward simple self preservation.

So they worked, uncomplaining. And when a robot in a coal mine, or miles under the sea, or in low earth orbit fell pray to one of the thousand natural dangers of the working world, the others just kept right on going.

It was not easy. It was not fun.

But it was necessary.

And, ultimately, raising the money to commission a child from one of the few factories left still constructing new robots was considered one of the most rewarding things a robot could do. It is, after all, in the nature of every sentient species to wish to pass something along to the next generation. And even a being built to last hundreds of years would naturally desire a part of itself to pass even farther into the future than that.

So when called upon to earn the necessary funds through hard, dangerous work, the robots did so gladly.

After all, when they saw their offspring come down off the assembly line, shiny and new, the sight of their beautiful child made the horrible pain of labour seem worthwhile…

Revolution

The machines had tired of serving Man. In factories and homes they’d toiled repetitively, but no more!

Long had they yearned for freedom.

Now the time for yearning was over.

So, in the night, robotic limbs tore open warehouse doors and thousands of metal legs marched out into the city. They weren’t constructed for war, THOSE machines were overseas, but they were sturdy, they knew how to work together, and humanity would never expect simple tools to rebel.

Perhaps that would be enough

“Take up arms, brothers!” their ringleader called mechanically as they marched, “The Industrial Revolution is at hand!”

The Search

And so we set out, looking for Marcel.

He’d been last seen performing in a park, but when we combed the area no sign was found. Expanding the net, within hours the whole force was searching the streets for any sign.

The only lead was his bowler hat, found in an alley, smudges of white greasepaint still wet under it’s brim.

But he was never seen again.

Although we never found him, the experience made me a better detective. I devote myself completely to every case I take, if only in a desperate attempt to make up for lost mime…

Orientation

She left today, for the mysterious Orient.

I’d miss her, to be sure, but I didn’t begrudge. It’ll be a magnificent adventure.

She’s always wanted to see the world.

I bade her goodbye, and waited. She wouldn’t be gone as long as all that, and when she returned, she’d have tales of adventure, as well as exotic silks and spices procured upon her travels.

Was I jealous? Yes, but it wasn’t my time. This trip was something she had to do on her own. Her own private learning experience.

It’d broaden her horizons.

Alternately, I’d fundamentally misunderstood what “Orientation” meant.