The Chosen
This is the first time I’m writing fiction on purpose. Send help.
Would you like to save the world?
Huh. Never heard that one before. New kind of scammer? Oddly coherent, and the hook is way too general. Are they targeting the low-int tail of EAs or something?
I guess I’ll respond. I’m procrastinating from writing today’s Inkhaven post, and my bar for distractions is pretty low.
“Who is this?”
This is an opportunity for you to save the world.
Of course it’s a scammer. I’m losing interest already. Besides, there are more useful wastes of my time. I need to copy some recent photos of Berkeley-area flowers off my phone, for a potential post.
It’s kind of embarrassing, but I accidentally left my phone in my swimsuit pocket yesterday when I swam in the Pacific Ocean. Not exactly a testament to my situational awareness. But the water was frigid, so I only stayed in for a moment, and after I returned to the house I rinsed it and got it drying properly over the outlet stream of one of the air purifiers. After 24 h I started it up again. Everything seemed fine. Claude said there were no guarantees, though. It might die today, or in a week.
I went to open the Photos app to extract my photos. Oh—another notification.
It was brave of you to enter the waters.
Huh. What the fuck? A prank?
“are you an Inkhaven resident?”
No response.
I’ve been trying to work on my post for several hours now and I’m slowly making progress, but that last text is whirling around in my brain and emitting a lot of subliminal heat. Someone is trying to fuck with me.
I probably shouldn’t care. Some of the residents have an edgy sense of humour. Actually, I bet it’s several of them trying to milk my short-lived misfortune. When my phone first broke everyone was acting like my cat had died (I wonder what that says about them) but now they knew it’d booted up again and my “crisis” was over. Time for a bit?
Okay... this is way more interesting than my post. I can’t leave it alone. I show the message to Ben Pace and tell him what happened and that I think I’m being messed with.
“Huh. Yeah, that seems likely. Though it’s odd for a prank. I don’t have anything to do about it now, but do show me if more comes in.”
“Okay.”
I go back to work. I publish on time. I’m not entirely satisfied with the result.
The next day at 1:17 pm:
The chosen shall return to the waters of Bodega Bay.
How am I supposed to write with this shit in my mind?
“who is this?? you’re making it hard for me to write my post.”
No response. I return to Ben with the new development.
“Huh. Okay. Hm. Well it is probably some of the residents, and maybe the punchline will happen at the beach. So let’s do that at the usual time.”
We head out around 2:10 pm, a little earlier than usual. As usual, it takes about half an hour to walk there. About 15 people join, though I’m too distracted to count exactly who. It’s the first time Remy has joined. I glance at him from time to time, as if I might glean some crucial grain of incrimination.
We arrive. Everyone else seems just their calm selves, but I’m positively twitching. I take off my shoes and amble around the sand for a minute, waiting for the inevitable.
I remove my shirt and head towards the hypothermic ocean to immerse myself for the second time, making really sure to put my phone in my bag first. The shock of the first wave swiping my torso pulls me down and away from my frenetic thoughts. It’s quite nice, in an “if you stay in this water for 10 minutes you might freeze to death” kind of way. A small voice does keep up ruminating over whether I’m about to be tackled or something, until I’m back out and a towel is on my back.
I’ve grown somewhat calmer, but I’m also facing some deeper, evolving worries. Nothing seems to be happening. Does that mean the culprits are just putting it off? Do they want me to suffer? Or are they not an Inkhaven resident at all? Some little nightmares sidle past my inner eye. Could it be a stalker, or something more dangerous? Time passes strangely as I dry my upper body and make my way back towards the water line.
Huh. There’s a fish at my feet. It…
The fish squirts water in my eye. I immediately start to trip balls. The scales of the fish briefly spell out WORDPRESS.COM before the world dissolves away into an all-encompassing but surprisingly pleasant migraine aura. It shouldn’t be possible for a drug to act this quickly. Amnesia? Subjective time dilation?
Then a voice, a ludicrous voice, like some manosphere streamer roleplaying as a gay genie, booms between my… ears?
YOUR MASTER IS CHOSEN, ROPE DEMON. RETURN THE CHOSEN TO THE WATERS AT ONCE.
Okay, that’s not the end of the story, but it’s as much as I can muster in a totally unfamiliar genre in 6 hours. Maybe I will finish it tomorrow.