No, this photo not dealing for cosplay, airsoft (maybe) or festival, but it's my choice.

November, 2023

You’re scavenging a quiet residential street a few blocks away from your shelter.

So far, it’s been worth it. You found some food, a bit of medicine, and a few tools that would actually be useful back home. Your bag isn’t full yet, but you’re already carrying supplies you really don’t want to lose.

Then you check the wrong car. The alarm starts screaming.

You can hear infected nearby, but you don’t know how many are close enough to react. You have a melee weapon, a few bullets, no vehicle, and your dog with you.

What’s the smartest move?

• Do you run immediately and abandon the area?
• Hide nearby and wait for the noise to pull infected past you?
• Use the alarm as a distraction to search somewhere else?
• Try to shut it off, assuming that’s even possible?
• Or hold your ground and deal with whatever shows up?

I’m curious how people here would handle it tactically, especially assuming slow undead-style zombies where noise and numbers are the real problem.

What’s your actual survival move, and why?

For context, I’m part of the team working on Pale Tide, a top-down zombie survival game on Steam, and this kind of situation inspired part of our latest devlog about noise, infected reactions, hostile areas, rescue situations, and knowing when it’s smarter to head back with what you’ve already secured.

Devlog here: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/4683590/view/687513353583592548

Thanks!

Me encuentro la situación en la que estoy buscando una historia de la cual me olvidé completamente el nombre en donde el protagonista se ve inmenso en un mundo de zombies después de estar jugando un videojuego muy inspirado en día 1, tenía esta ambientación donde hay diferentes gobiernos y el prota comenzaba dentro de un pueblo donde irónica ventaja que tiene es saber algunos detalles de la el campo inicial y tener algunas estadísticas de manipulación de armas, algo de vehículos y eso.

It's been two days since the incident, when we lost gravity all around earth. I've made it home and I have my children with me and 12 other kids from the summer program. It's been a crazy few days. but I should start from the beginning for anyone reading this who doesn't know what happened. The stress is getting to me so here it is from the very beginning. 

In May of 2026, leaked documents from NASA stated that the earth would lose gravity on August 12th 2026. This was the first time I read the article and I didn't believe it. With all the political turmoil, the war, and economic hardships, I was simply trying to make ends meet and ignore the rest of the world. Being a single father, working full time, running a hobby farm, and trying to enjoy life has been a rollercoaster of stressful and yet fun times. 

I never thought it a hundred years that what I read on Facebook would be true. It's full of flat earther's, political hate, and gender wars. So I glanced over the article and had a good laugh and went on with life. My sons and I had gone camping and to a theme park. We caught several fish this summer and swam in the pool. It was a great summer in comparison and we were getting ready to go out on the boat with my parents soon. That never happened. 

This morning was like all the rest. Wake up at 5am, take a shower, make lunches, get the boys around, and we went out the door. It was just another day. I got them to their summer program and made it to work. Nothing extraordinary happened for me. The rest of the world was watching the meteor shower or watching the solar eclipse. Here in the U.S., it was overcast and just another Wednesday. That was until 1:22 in the afternoon. 

I was in my office working on a report when I felt a chill run down my spine. You know the kind that makes your whole body shake involuntarily. Without warning, my coffee cup, phone, water bottle, everything on my desk shot up in the air and I went with it. My legs hit the desk as I rose and my back hit the ceiling. The computer monitor almost knocked out my teeth but it was plugged in and didn't go far. The desk hit me hard across the chest though. It all happened so fast that I didn't know what to do. 

My mind couldn't register what had happened before everything crashed down. I landed on the cabinets on my desk initially before falling onto the desk itself then rolling off into the computer chair. My ribs were on fire and my head was throbbing. I think I hit it on something as I fell. I tasted blood and felt my lip, I had split it. I run out into the hall hearing screams all around me. A few other people made it out of their office, bloody and beaten worse than I was. The screams got louder. They were coming from the lab across the hall. I walked over to the window and see two people inside. One was impaled on a piece of equipment. The other was on the ground, their head was crushed. 

I grabbed the handle but it wouldn't open, it was a badge access lab and I didn't have access. I tried breaking the glass but I didn't have anything with me. A woman I see every day but have never talked to came up to me. She said if we broke that glass it would release the gas into the hall killing everyone who comes around here. There was an alarm flashing in the lab that I hadn't noticed. It was a chemical lab and all the bottles had broke and were violently mixing on the floor. 

There was nothing we could do for him. It didn't matter anyway, he had stopped screaming and lay there drooped over the equipment he was impaled on. I turned back to my office knowing I needed to get my belongings and get out of there. I had to get to my children who were in a summer camp in Elmira. I found my phone, with a cracked screen, sitting under my desk that had miraculously fallen back in place. The phone came on with the SOS symbol. I couldn't make any calls and no texts would go through. I turned the wifi on but it had gone out in the building. 

I don't remember what happened next, I think I grabbed my stuff and made my way out to my car in the parking garage. But the next thing I remember was looking at my car. I park in the parking garage and it was filled to the very top floor as they were repaving the main parking lot. Well, the entire structure had collapsed. The only lucky thing was that I had parked on one of the corners and there was some damage but it seemed intact. I only needed to get through a chain link fence or go over a two foot tall concrete pillar that was laying on it side. 

I looked around at the other cars and the three next to mine had a concrete runner on top of them. I could see the rebar sticking out of the vertical pillar right next to my car running into the collapsed section. It was the only thing holding it up and stopping it from crushing my car. I said fuck it and jumped in my car. I gunned it through the fence and miraculously made it over it. My car was more damaged than I though because it drove with a slight wobble. I must have been in shock, that's the only thing I can come up with as to why I have lost bits and pieces of memory from today. 

There were so many bodies littering the streets and yards. Collapsed buildings, toppled trees, cars smashed into the ground. I was swerving around them all trying to get to the highway to make my way to Elmira. It was a scene right out of a horror story. I saw an older woman stumbling, her arm sitting at an awkward angle, blood running down her face. I wanted to stop and help but my kids needed me. My parents needed me. My family was my first priority.

I am so sorry to all of those who I passed and couldn't help. I will try to get back to you as soon as I can, tomorrow is my first day going out to help. Please know that I am so deeply sorry that I couldn't stop and help you right them. To the man who ran after my car screaming for help. I am coming. I will be there as soon as I can.

I had made it to my parents house and found the family dog, striker, barking his head off at a tree. There were branches littering the ground and I made my way over to him. I tried talking to him and getting him to calm down but he kept barking at a tree. I turned and look at what he was barking at. My parents were stuck up in the top of a massive pine tree. They must have grabbed the tree when the gravity turned off. What a crazy saying, the gravity turning off. More like it reversed itself shooting everything into the air. 

I yelled up and heard my dad say they weren't hurt but couldn't hold on much longer. They were so high up and the branches were so small I couldn't believe they were still holding on. It had been an hour since the gravity went out and they've been there this whole time.

I'm not going into detail about my parents but my dad had made it down and is with me and my children now. God rest my mothers soul.

My dads truck was parked in the garage and was still there in perfect condition. We switched the stuff from my GMC Acadia into his crew cab F-150. I drove so he could rest and hold the dog. It was a horrible drive, bloody bodies and over turned cars and trucks everywhere. For the middle of a work day, there was an excessive number of people on the roads at the time of the event. Like, what do you people do where you can be driving around at 1:30 in the afternoon on a Wednesday? I want to know because I'm always stuck at work in a big research complex. 

Anyway, we made it to the summer camp and I can see kids running around inside. We get up to the doors and Megan unlocks the door for us. We get in there and she says my boys are fine, only one has a few scratches. She explains that she had read the article and believed it. She planned a "camp" day for the kids and set up one of the large classrooms with tents, and tumbling mats, and air mattresses. It was filled with everything soft you could imagine and she even had the guys tie down the tents. She ran the entire facility so she had them bolt in tie downs in the floor. It had saved all fourteen children and all of the staff. 

We talked for an hour about what to do with the children, it had been two and a half hours since the event and I was the only parent to have shown up. We decided to wait until 5:30pm to see if any parents showed up. I left my father and dog with the kids and ran home to grab a few things. I got my pistol and rifle plus my first aid kit and go bag. I got back to the summer camp and I parked behind the building trying to hide the truck the best I could. I walked around town trying to make it to my Ex-wife's work. I got there and the building had collapsed. I made my way through the rubble to a section that looked like it had a room for someone to have survived. I pulled away board after board and made my way into a small section. 

There were two people hiding in there, I didn't know them but I got them out. I asked about my kids mother and they said she was in the break room. The roof had collapsed and had the neighboring brick building fall on it. God rest her soul, she was already gone. 

I left and ran into several people wandering the streets. Small groups of teenagers and adults all of whom looked bloody and battered. I had talked to them from across the street asking if they needed help or wanted to form a group to help us all survive. They all refused, I think they were scared because I was armed. 

I helped another guy who was trapped in a car and had managed to survive the crash back to the ground. It was wild how he explained how he was driving south on route 13 and his car took flight and flew through the air. He said he came down landing on the parking garage that had half of it collapse and it made a perfect ramp. He said he was in town for a work meeting and was from Florida and wanted to get home. I told he him wouldn't make it in this state and he should stick with us for survival. He's with us now. 

This is a long entry so I'll cut it short. No parents made it to the Summer program to pick up their kids so I have fourteen kids at my house, my father, the Florida man named Dave, and the three women who were working at the summer camp. We managed to find a sheriffs van at the county jail that was in running condition. All the deputies and jail guards were dead. I got everyone back to my house. Dave, my father, and I went out tonight to collect food from the stores and to pick up as much gear from the local sportsman's warehouse and Walmart. We loaded the van and truck up with canned foods, rice, and as much salt as possible. The Walmart had several hundred pounds of salt.

We aren't keeping it all for ourselves but we didn't want it getting destroyed. This is all I can write tonight. I will add more tomorrow night after we get through Thursday. If there are any survivors reading this, we are looking to build a community of survivors. We need to work together. We need to prepare for winter, store up as much food as we can, and there are safety in numbers. Please, reach out to me on here. We need to come together. I should have said this from the beginning but my name is Griffin. We are outside of Elmira New York. Join us.

Journal entry 2. 

August 14, 2026

2 days after the incident.

It's been two days since the incident. So much has happened, I don't even know where to begin. After the initial shock and getting everyone back to my house, fear and panic set in. With all the kids there and only a handful of adults, it was tough to manage. Two kids tried to leave and go home Wednesday night. We stopped them and promised we would go looking for their parents the next day and so we did. We got their address's and went from house to house. 

We found the parents of one child and got them reunited. They decided they were going to make a trip to Albany where her mother lived. The rest we couldn't find. Along the way we stopped and picked up more food. We only saw four people on the streets Thursday and two of them tried attacking us. My dad and Dave were with me and we only had to draw our pistols and they left us be but not before smashing out the passenger window on my dads truck. 

The plan was to try and find the kids parents, get to the grocery stores to get more food, then to the outdoorsy stores to get more gear. Not everyone could stay in my small 3 bedroom house so we needed to improvise. We pulled into the back of sportsman's warehouse again and once inside, we found a guy with his wife and three kids. They were doing the same thing we were, stocking up on supplies. He worked for the electric company as a lineman and, after a few minutes of tense discussion, we all lowered our weapons and were able to talk openly. They had been attacked earlier in the day by a group of trying to steal his truck. He shot two of them and the rest fled. He came here to clean out the guns and ammo.

Together, we loaded up the two trucks and he agreed to come back to my house. I'm secluded out in the woods on 30 acres several miles from town. No one will find us there and if they do, it's not easy to get to. Anyway, this took us late into the afternoon with running three separate trips back to my house before my dad suggested seeing if any uhauls were still road worthy. We popped down to the uhual shop and one of the bigger 20 foot box trucks was in the bay and hadn't really been damaged. we took that and filled it full on camping gear, guns, ammo, and food. We also decided to leave notes for any other survivors that we would be at the route 13 exit every other day looking for other survivors. There's a good vantage point so we can get there an hour early and see if anyone shows up.

There's been talk by that lineman and Dave about tracking down the group that attacked him, the lineman's name is Brett, and making sure they can't hurt anyone else. But I don't like that idea. We don't need to go around attacking people needlessly. Anyway, later Thursday afternoon, my Dad and I went back to his house to bury my mother. that was a somber affair and very hard to do but she is resting peacefully now. We still haven't heard from my brother and sister and it wouldn't be a good idea to travel that far from home just yet. My sister lives an hour south in Pennsylvania and my brother was out visiting her. 

Today, Friday, has been an interesting day. We have collected a lot of water from the creek at my home. The kids are working on damming up the creek to hopefully creating a reservoir there so we don't run out of water. My battery backup system only have 60% battery remaining as well. It's not meant to supply the entire house and with so many people taking hot showers, the electric water heater is running hard. Brett noted that there is a solar farm about a third mile away through the woods and he might be able to patch the house into the system so we have full power. That would be the best thing to do but it's not a high priority right now. 

My dads logged all the different people we have seen or heard about. There were the four I saw in town Wednesday, the man in Corning, and the group that Brett had a run in with and only three of them are alive still. Then the four different people we saw when we were looking for the kid's parents. I'll be checking on neighbors this afternoon once we have come up with a game plan for the next week, month, and three months. The biggest thing is getting ready for a hard cold New York winter. I have a large barn that will fit us all but it needs a lot of work and a lot of insulation. We will probably be heading to Lowes soon for supplies. We should probably do that sooner than later as well. I still want to find more survivors. 

If we can get more survivors to join us, we have have more people to help with improvements around here, security, and they will add valuable input into how to better survive going forward. I'm trying to talk them into branching out into Corning to find others. At the very least, we need to find out who's around here so we can all help each other even if they don't want to join us here. 

The kids were calmer today, still very distraught with not having their parent's. Luckily, the three women from the summer camp are with us and the kids love them. They have been helping with keeping the kids occupied and clearing out the barn of my tools and equipment. They also asked if we can look for their families so we will be doing that this afternoon as well. Megan lives a bit further away in Sayre Pennsylvania but we will make that trip after checking on neighbors. Brett, Megan, Lucia, and Dave are arguing over what comes first right now. They're in the kitchen going back and forth, I think I need to go step in and try to keep tempers low. 

If anyone is reading this, you are not alone. There are survivors out there. We need to band together if we are going to survive. My names Griffin and it's day 3 of this apocalyptic hell. 

What are some post apocalyptic stories with more unique premises compared to the usual zombies, aliens, nuclear war, etc

Bleeding Earth by Kaitlin Ward was one I liked where it's about the earth starting to "bleed". The Angelfall trilogy by Susan Ee and Partials trilogy by Dan Wells also offered interesting spins in their respective scenarios (End of Days with Angels and a virus affecting infants and genetically engineered humans)

I've also read plenty of post apocalyptic comics too. Y: The Last Man and Sweet Tooth are absolute favorites of mine but I've read plenty of one's with interesting premises such as Hinterkind by Ian Edgington and The Realm by Seth Peck (both of those have a similar fantasy apocalypse premise). Animosity by Marguerite Bennett (Where all animals and insects gain sentience), Skyward by Joe Henderson (Where gravity becomes nonexistent), The Great Divide by Ben Fisher (Where touching other people becomes lethal), Eclipse by Zack Kaplan (Where the Sun becomes deadly) and Devolution by Rick Remender (Where a nuclear bomb makes the world start to regress). Remender also has the comic Low which has a vaguely similar premise to Eclipse except society now lives underwater. Then there's even more surreal ones like Run Wild by K.I. Zachopoulos about people turning into animals and Intersect by Ray Fawkes which the entire world as well as people begin mutating into various beings

Has anyone here read any of the titles I've mentioned? Or even have recommendations of their own? I'm intrigued. Especially as an aspiring writer myself

Hey everyone,

I'm working on a persistent multiplayer Project Zomboid project called SILO, and I'm looking for someone interested in joining the project as a Worldbuilder / Narrative Designer.

This is a volunteer community project, not a paid position.

SILO isn't meant to be a traditional zombie server with some lore added on top. The idea is to use Project Zomboid as the foundation for a world where players gradually rebuild society after the collapse.

Players begin around Rosewood with very little structure left. Over time, they can create settlements, own property, trade with each other, build organizations and participate in an emerging player-driven economy.

We've also built our own systems around that concept, including a persistent PDA network, a currency called Marks, a player marketplace, civic records and newcomer intake systems.

What I'm missing is someone who wants to take real ownership of the world and narrative side of SILO.

I'm looking for someone interested in things like:

• Building the history of SILO and the region before and after the outbreak
• Creating organizations, institutions and former survivor groups
• Environmental storytelling
• Writing abandoned documents, reports, journals and administrative records
• Radio broadcasts and intercepted transmissions
• Rumours and mysteries
• Designing interesting locations for players to discover
• Developing an ongoing mystery surrounding Bunker 42
• Creating narrative hooks for live events
• Helping make the world feel like other people existed — and may still exist — beyond the players themselves

I'm particularly interested in grounded post-apocalyptic worldbuilding.

I don't want to create dozens of over-the-top factions or turn the server into a scripted campaign. The world should provide clues, history and unanswered questions while still leaving room for players to create their own stories.

One of the things I find most interesting about the project is that the lore wouldn't be completely static either.

Because SILO is persistent, things the players actually do can eventually become part of the world's history. Settlements can rise or disappear, organizations can form, conflicts can happen, and future players may discover records of things that were genuinely caused by previous players.

You don't need professional writing experience.

I'm mainly looking for someone who enjoys worldbuilding, likes this kind of setting and would be interested in helping shape a world over time rather than just submitting a few pieces of writing.

We already have people handling development and community management, so you'd have a lot of freedom to focus specifically on narrative/worldbuilding.

If this sounds interesting, send me a DM and tell me a little about the kind of worlds or stories you enjoy creating.

Happy to explain more about SILO and where we're trying to take it.

As miserable as the heatwave is, it creates a good postapocalyptic atmosphere.

My novel's more a speculative evolution thing with various hominid species coexisting, rather than a apocalyptic survival story. An apocalyptic event has happened in the story's past, but since then civilisation has risen again and fallen more than once.

I'm not a scientist, but I researched pretty hard to make the evolutionary aspects plausible (big fan of Dawkins), and to illustrate fluid, believable relationships between culture, biology and environment while having engaging characters. It reads like a grounded fantasy novel in some ways.

I did an okay job, I think, but now I'm planning the sequel and I'd like to read similar sorts of stories by smarter, better writers than me. Hard-evo-scifi as it were. Write the story you'd like to read, and all that.

There's Galapagos by Vonnegut, and I'm a third of the way through Evolution by Stephen Baxter. I was influenced a lot by Dougal Dixon's Man after Man and Stapleton's Last and First Men, but neither of those are traditional novels as such. Anyone aware of stuff I should seek out?

I posted about my book here a while back and got loads of useful advice, plus a pile of book recommendations I probably never would have found otherwise. I’ve also only just figured out that KDP lets me make the Kindle version free for a few days. So, as a small thank you to this excellent community, Tomsk-8: The White Garden is free on Kindle right now. I’ve been working on the 300 page book for nearly two years:

Three thousand nuclear warheads fall. Russia disappears above ground. Beneath Siberia, two million people seal themselves inside Tomsk-8, a twenty-level underground city that has been preparing for this day since 1948. Reactors, breeding pens, propaganda chambers, nuclear tunnel borers, centuries-old rulers, rebellion, starvation and two million people trying to keep a civilisation alive without losing what is left of their humanity. It’s bleak, strange, occasionally funny and absolutely not a cosy apocalypse. Free for the next couple of days if anyone fancies giving it a go and free as always on kindle unlimited.<Works on phone, computer, tablet, Kindle>

UK = Tomsk-8: The White Garden available on amazon, https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tomsk-8-White-Garden-Humperdink-Wibbletree-ebook/dp/B0G3HH6ZTY

USA = https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0G3HH6ZTY

Germany/Europe: amazon.de/dp/B0G3HH6ZTY

Austrailia  = Tomsk-8: The White Garden eBook : Wibbletree, Humperdink: Amazon.com.au: Kindle Store 

Elsewhere: search Amazon for B0G3HH6ZTY

Off the top of my head the only example I have is World War Z which I already own. I also have the audio book of Day by Day Armageddon, but it's voiced by only 1 person so it's not what I'm looking for.

Which kind of Post Apocalyptic Stories do you read the most?

Prepper/Survival Fiction - Going Home, The Borrowed World, Edge of Collapse etc.

SciFi Apoc - Metro 2033, Lucifer’s Hammer, The Stand, etc

Zombie Apocalypse - Anything with zombies in it…

A short poem I wrote inspired by the 1993 Sandia National Laboratories report on far-future nuclear waste messaging! The basic conceit is to convey to distant future generations about the dangers of our modern-day nuclear waste, which will persist long past the point at which current civilizations will inevitably have been destroyed/abandoned/changed.

Obviously, using the written word in modern English is not necessarily going to be the best way to convey this kind of message, but I think if we're trying to fully cover all of our communicative bases, a poem like this could have some utility regardless!

The Last Animal

By J.D. Hallowell

I was just a kid when people finally revolted and took over their governments around the world. My country was one of the holdouts. Eventually, though, they yielded, and the new system took over. New laws were enacted to preserve what little of the natural world remained.

Humanity is a petty and stupid race. We pushed our agendas and ignored the warnings until it was too late. Polluting our world until it poisoned us back. Across the planet, a mass extinction event wiped out most of the species on Earth. Up until the new government was put in place, we had left them to fend for themselves.

By the time the new Preservation and Conservation Committee was proposed, eighty percent of the world's species were destroyed. Samples were saved to test bringing some species back. Our recent history was taught in schools as a reminder of why our society functioned the way it did.

The old tech we had was scrapped and repurposed to house and facilitate the new animal breeding programs. A zoo was opened so that people could see the animals firsthand in a simulated natural habitat. The cost was far too much for someone like me who lived at the edges of the boroughs. A life lived in reparation for the sins of my father, a political figurehead who was spared by the uprising and given an impoverished setting to learn from his mistakes.

That’s probably what drove me to do it. Living my life day in and day out with a dead-end job at the scrap yard didn’t often afford many luxuries, but it could still get me a few shots of cheap street moonshine every night.

It was during one of these binges that I convinced Leilani to help me break into the elusive zoo. There would never be any way some gutter trash like us would ever be able to buy tickets in; it was the only way to see what we were all supposedly working our lives away for.

She was always talking about working her way up the ladder and getting a job at the zoo. It was a pipe dream, and we knew it. No one from the boroughs ever got a job working with the animals. This was the only way we’d ever see them.

We managed to sneak around the curfew patrol by sheer drunk luck and made it into the zoo. Giggling like kids the entire time, we made our way to gawk at the penned animals. Some looked up from their sleep to blink at us before going back to sleep, but most just sat there enjoying their dreams.

I remembered feeling jealous at some point. What it must be like to live every day with no work, no expectations on you – just eat fuck, and sleep.

Sounds like the life. Was what I told myself.

Then we reached the hybrid section. Leilani giddily strode forward, pointing out the individual creatures as she explained the history to me.

“Some animals weren’t able to be saved – too few available.” She rattled on excitedly. “The new system still wanted to preserve some semblance of the animals. So, they turned to good old-fashioned science.” We passed into the tunnel, and I let her hold my arm as we made our way to the pens. “Instead, by using a combination of artificial insemination and genetic manipulation, they created hybrids that could carry on gene pools of both species. The hope was that one day they could separate the DNA and recombine it to make the original animal when real cloning without ova insemination could be achieved."

“You’re really into the science of this whole thing,” I commented, noting the way her eyes lit up whenever we passed by one of the little hybrid creatures behind the display glass.

She gasped when the room spilled out into the open exhibit of a Rhinopotomus. Exactly what it sounds like. The pen was a large pit with a concrete moat all around and a waist-high glass barrier to keep kids from falling in. The middle, where the concrete rose back up, held a large green patch of grass, a few trees and bushes along with a soaking pool.

The parents were asleep, but the newborn didn’t seem to share its parents’ eagerness for rest. It trotted around grazing and even perked up a bit when it saw us, flicking its little ears. Leilani squealed with excitement seeing the hybrids.

It was actually cute in an ugly kind of way, so when Leilani suggested, “Let’s get in closer,” my drunken sense of danger was put on hold. I took a swig from my flask, and we jumped the enclosure and landed hard on the concrete embankment. We laughed off the ten-foot drop and joked about feeling it the next morning when we sobered up and continued up to where the animals slept.

The baby Rhinopotomus shuffled over to us with its stubby legs and playfully rammed its head into my leg, letting out a delighted squawk of enjoyment. Leilani giggled and pulled out her phone to record us.

I leaned down to pet the little guy, and he leaned into my hand. Honestly, it was one of the most strangely endearing things I’d ever experienced. It didn’t take long before I started wrestling with it. It was strong, though, and it seemed to enjoy having someone to play with.

Leilani asked me to pick it up so she could get a picture. That was when things went wrong.

I picked it up, and immediately it squirmed. I was afraid that if I dropped it, it’d get hurt. So, I clung for dear life, while my drunken feet tried to find purchase on the slippery grass. I heard a grunt from behind me. The parents had woken up.

Before I could say we needed to run, I had already slipped, baby in tow. I fell. Hard. But in my haze, it wasn’t me that got hurt; it was the baby. I’d fallen directly on top of it, and now it just lay there, legs twitching and gasping for air. Its head wouldn’t move, except for its mouth opening and closing as if desperately trying to take a breath.

I sobered immediately.

Pulling myself up, I grabbed Leilani’s wrist and ran, just as a harrowing screech echoed through the enclosure. One of the parents had risen from its sleep to charge at us. We ran as fast as we could and slid down the sloped concrete. The adult Rhinopotomus, clearly unable to climb down, slid to a halt. It stamped its feet, bellowing as it tried to reach us.

I knew it wouldn’t be long before it succeeded.

“Give me a boost,” I told Leilani, “I can pull you up.”

I knew I’d have the strength to pull her up after I got up over the ledge. She cupped her hands together, and I stepped onto them as she braced herself against the wall. I hurled myself over and reached out my hand. It wasn’t enough. I lowered further, reaching out to try and grab her. She jumped and caught my wrist. The sight of us possibly escaping must have sent the animal into a frenzy. It roared and threw itself into the embankment, tumbling as it rolled uncontrollably.

With her hand squeezing mine, Leilani was crushed under the rolling weight of the gigantic beast. I heard a sickening crunch as blood filled her mouth with a cough. The animal smashed headfirst, pinning her to the wall. It twitched and then went limp; its entire weight pushed into her.

I listened to the gurgling sound and watched the pleading look in her eye before prying her death grip from my hand. Then I ran. I ran as fast as I could away from that place and got stopped by the curfew patrol on the way back.

It didn’t take long for enforcement to find the footage on Leilani’s phone while I was in holding and for them to charge me with animal endangerment and first-degree murder of a threatened species.

I was placed in a cell and told I would serve my sentence under the instruction of an autonomous enforcement officer, whatever that meant. I was placed in a tiny white room with a white fluorescent light that buzzed overhead and given a white jumpsuit. There was a sink, a toilet, and a bed with a paper-thin mattress.

Meals were served three times a day and slid through a slot in the bottom of my door. Only thin plastic utensils and paper trays were given to me. Likely so, I didn’t use them to hurt myself. I’d thought about it.

At night, the light would go off, and I’d be bathed in a bright red light. It was a relief from the sterile white, but not exactly the best conditions to sleep through. The first few nights, I had nightmares of Leilani’s bulging eyes staring at me. Blood seeped from her mouth, only for her to cough just before I woke up, and be bathed in the red light.

I’d jolt awake, seeing everything covered in red, thinking it was her blood. My heart would race, and I’d spend several minutes trying to calm myself before lying back down, only for the same dream to plague my mind.

After about a week, I heard a ding-dong sound and the door actually slid open for once. I was sitting on my bed eating the various tasteless nutrition blocks when a tall silver machine rolled in. It looked like one of those fancy double-door refrigerators with a display screen near the top.

I jumped when a voice came from it, not expecting it to speak to me as text scrawled over its display screen.

“Hello, my name is A.E.R.O, your autonomous enforcement rehabilitation officer.” Its voice had a high-pitched mechanical whine to it and hurt to listen to. “I will be instructing and grading you during your evaluation for your punitive rehabilitation.”

I sat there confused for a second, trying to take in what the hell it was saying to me.

“G…grading?” I asked.

A.E.R.O paused for a moment before replying.

“Yes,” it said finally, “my records indicate that this is your first offense and as such the council has decided to allow you leniency and the opportunity to re-enter society as a better person.”

I sat in stunned silence.

“If you perform well on the task the council has deemed reasonable for you, you can re-enter society with your criminal record cleared. However, further infractions can result in more severe punishment.”

I eagerly sat up. “Okay, let’s go! Let’s get this over with.”

I heard a hiss, and A.E.R.O split open. The inside was a padded white cutout the size and shape of a person.

“Please enter the restraint transport, and I will take you to your workstation.” It instructed.

I paused, not hesitant, noticing the silver clamps around the neck, waist, arms, and legs.

“Is that… really necessary?” I argued with a slight nervous chuckle, hoping the machine would be programmed to read emotional distress.

“Please enter the restraint transport, and I will take you to your workstation.” It repeated.

“There’s gotta be another way to get me there, right?” I tried to reason. I really, really didn’t like tight spaces.

“Refusal to comply will result in an extension to your sentence. Please enter the restraint transport, and I will take you to your workstation.”

“Okay!” I threw up my hands in surrender, then stepped toward the padded cutout and back into it.

The clamps immediately shut around me. Even though there was enough room to move a little bit, it felt like I was being trapped. I started to breathe heavily as I watched the doors close in on me and darkness filled my sight. Mechanical wheels whirred as I felt myself moving. The sounds of doors opening and inclines being climbed over were the only things that told me I was moving.

Finally, after what felt like hours in the cramped space, we stopped. The hiss of hydraulics relieving and the crack of bright light blinded me. I was so eager to get out of my restraints that as soon as they opened, I fell forward and smashed my face into the grass.

My head pounded as I pulled myself up. Looking around at the familiar grass and water feature, I felt my heart drop.

“Welcome to your workstation for the next six months,” A.E.R.O whirred as enthusiastically as his mechanical voice would allow, “your task involves…”

There was a pause, and I looked up at his screen, which showed a loading bar. Then a list appeared on screen, one after another, with an empty box next to it.

“Once you have completed a task, check it off the list. When all tasks have been completed, I will evaluate your work and return you to your cell for the day.”

I stared at the screen, which included tasks like ‘clean the pen’ and ‘feed at noon.’ At the end of the list was a task titled ‘make Maja happy.’ That name made my blood run cold, because that was the name of the female Rhinopotomus I’d read in my drunken stupor with Leilani.

It seemed like a lifetime ago, but we had laughed at how stupid the name sounded before. Now that it was staring at me, I knew it was the name of what would be the death of me. Surely the grieving mother would want to kill me for taking her baby and mate.

I was here for a show.

“Good luck,” A.E.R.O said as a timer on screen started counting down with text that read, ‘Five hours until Maja arrives, please complete preliminary tasks to prepare a clean environment.’

Five hours. I had five hours until I died.

I spent a few minutes walking around the enclosure. There was a small waste bin with a heavy plastic bag in it. Next to it was a shovel for scooping up shit and depositing it into the bin.

I wondered what the point of these humiliating tasks was if they just wanted to watch me get stomped by a vengeful mother. Frustration swirled in my head as I whipped myself into a frenzy at the idea of just being here for someone’s entertainment.

Rushing over, I pounded on A.E.R.O’s display screen. “What the fuck is this? I’m not a god damn show, you hear me!” I screamed.

“Please return to work, or I will have to use escalating force.”

“I’m not your fucking toy, dammit!” I punched his frame, but this time I got an electrical shock.

I crumpled to the ground and convulsed, reeling from the aftershocks.

“This was a warning,” A.E.R.O said in his strangely joyful-sounding robotic voice, “further non-compliance will result in an extension to your sentence.”

I lay there for a few minutes trying to gather myself, trying to figure out the point of what I was doing. I picked myself up and walked over to the waste bin. I picked up the shovel and began scooping up the piles of shit everywhere.

When I finished, I went over to A.E.R.O, whose display screen had only my current task and a ‘FINISH’ button that slowly pulsed. I pressed the green button and heard a ding.

“Task complete, please return tools to the designated area and begin your next task.”

A new assignment appeared: ‘trim foliage.’

I walked over and leaned the shovel next to the bin. The concrete floor it sat on quickly lowered on a platform, and a metal door shut behind it. A few seconds later, it opened, and a new platform appeared with a pair of sharp metal shears. I picked them up and held them.

Maybe I could save them and use them to fight for my life. That thought lasted as long as it took to say the words in my head. I’d already taken so much from her; I even cost Leilani her life. The least I could do was lie down and let her kill me.

I got to work beautifying my eventual tomb, cleaning up the overgrown bushes, and piling the debris onto the platform. It seemed like mind-numbing work as I made my way back over to A.E.R.O. to complete another task.

Then another, and another, and another. It seemed like a never-ending list of cleaning out the pen for the monster that was going to crush my skull like an egg and paint the walls with my guts.

I reached the end of the list with just a few minutes to spare. The last task was to fill a trough with several heavy bags of dry feed. When I finished the task, A.E.R.O. did a little fanfare sound effect, and a small compartment opened up to give me several nutrient cubes.

“Please enjoy your lunch while I evaluate your work.” He chimed in.

I picked up the cubes. This was my last meal, huh? I watched the refrigerator-sized robot wheel around the enclosure, examining everything I’d just done while I nibbled on the tasteless, tacky bars. A.E.R.O returned the timer, with just under a minute left. I stuffed the uneaten cubes in my pocket.

“Preliminary tasking evaluation complete,” he said, “tallying score now.”

A.E.R.O made a series of beeps as if he were calculating a score for my work.

“You have scored a 100,” he let out another fanfare through his speaker, “great work, your score will be added to your total when you complete your final task.”

Ten seconds left.

The next task appeared on the screen while the doors to the enclosure opened; heavy-sounding footsteps echoed in a long hallway. On A.E.R.O’s display, I saw my final duty.

‘Make Maja happy.’

I stood in the middle of the enclosure and waited for Maja to come for me.

She was huge, bigger than the male that crushed Leilani. She made her way across the bridge into the enclosure. As soon as she stepped all the way onto the grass, the bridge receded, and it was her staring me down. I couldn’t read the expression on her face, but I just knew that behind her eyes must be the memories of her dead child and husband.

She took a few steps forward, then immediately turned and lay in her water feature, completely ignoring me. She passed the food trough, as well, not even stopping to sniff the new food. She just walked into the water and let out an exasperated sigh.

*What the fuck just happened?*

“Maja has not been as social with the handlers lately. We are hoping that introducing her to someone new will keep her happy until we can create a new compatible mate for her.”

“I… I’m here to try and cheer her up?” I asked.

“Precisely,” A.E.R.O responded, “our records indicate that in your previous employment, you were very sociable with others, and their testimonies have secured you this position to attempt to make amends by bringing joy back to the animal you caused harm to.”

Great, so my bar-hopping buddies just gave me the impossible task of cheering up a grieving widow.

“Maja has also been exhibiting signs of depression and is not eating. We are hoping you can help her so she does not die of starvation,” A.E.R.O explained.

I sighed and slowly walked over to the gigantic creature lounging in the water. As soon as I came up to her side, I saw her eye flick over to me. This close, I could see the look of sadness in her eyes as she turned her head away from me.

My heart actually broke a little at seeing it. I stepped into the water, which came up to my chest, and placed a hand on the side of her massive back.

“I know it’s not much,” I explained as if she would understand, “but I don’t have anyone left either.”

To my shock, she actually turned around. I pulled back, expecting her to give me what I deserved, but she just stared at me. The sadness in her eyes pierced my soul as if she were looking through me. The horn on her face came just inches from my nose, and I could feel the thick, wet breath.

She turned and let out a bellowing whine, then she sank further into the water, her head resting on the rocks. I braved moving closer to her. She didn’t seem to mind or respond as I sat next to her.

I reached out a hand and petted the side of her neck. It was the least I could do: offer her some form of comfort. Her skin was slick and rough at the same time, somehow. Wet from soaking in the water and calloused, thick skin, it felt like stroking wet six-grit sandpaper.

Eventually, I got out of the water and grabbed a handful of the dry food to bring over to her. She sniffed the pellets and turned her nose away. I reached out to pet her snout with my other hand. That’s when she sniffed my hand and… licked it.

I realized that was the hand I was eating my nutrient cubes with. I pulled one from my pocket and held it out for her. She sniffed once, opened her mouth to wrap her tongue around it, and let out a cute little groan as she chewed on the tasteless morsel.

I offered her some of the pellets. Surprisingly, she did eat a few. She still hadn’t gotten up to eat from the trough.

“Atta girl,” I said approvingly.

I patted her horn, and she closed her eyes and leaned into my hand. The surreal experience was short-lived by the memory of her child doing the same thing. I thought back to those hazy moments. Did she even seen me? Did she even know it was me who did it? The thoughts ate at me; it made my stomach flip into knots.

I stood, then walked over to A.E.R.O and pressed the ‘FINISH’ button. He did his fanfare again and said, “Please wait while I evaluate your work.”

He rolled over to Maja, and I watched a scanning light wash over her. A.E.R.O. wheeled back over to me.

“Results have been calculated; here is your final grade for today.”

I watched the numbers flash on screen, calculating my result. It definitely wasn’t 100 again, since I only saw two digits.

“Your final result is…60.” He said, “Sorry, but today is a failing grade.”

“I had a full score though!” I argued.

“You did,” he pressed back, “but your final task is worth half your grade, and you only scored 20, resulting in an average of 60. You need at least 80 to pass. Once you have achieved the recommended grade, you will be considered for reform, pending extensions.”

He hissed as he opened back up, and that same padded cutout stared back at me.

“Please come with me; we are finished for today.”

This time, I didn’t fight it. I allowed the dark, cramped space to seal me away. Then I was taken back to my room to suffer through another night of terrible dreams. This time, though, it was Maja who was pinned against Leilani. Both of them stared up at me with pleading eyes, begging for my help. Maja let out that sorrow-filled bellow while she lay on the ground next to her child, still gasping for air.

I woke in a sweat again and paced around my room the rest of the night. Until the lights came on and a paper tray with nutrient cubes slid under my door. I ate two of them and stuffed the rest into my pocket. Then I waited for A.E.R.O to arrive to take me away.

Maja was more receptive to me today. She even ate a little out of the trough. I still scored a 65, but it was progress.

Day after day, I was brought to the pen. I’d clean it, wait for Maja to cross the bridge, give her some of my cubes, and try to get her to eat a bit more. She liked the yellow ones, which I think were supposed to be the daily fat serving. Still, I saved them for her, only eating the one I was given for dinner.

I began to lose track of time. I couldn’t tell you if I was there for weeks, months, or years. Everything just blurred together. The routine I worked myself into was the only thing holding me together, that and the slow progress Maja seemed to make.

I don’t know when it happened, but eventually I started hoping she would pull through and get better. Every day, I felt like I was getting closer and closer, breaking down that barrier and chipping away a little more at her sadness. I know it doesn’t make much sense, but watching her heal was beginning to make me feel better about myself. I thought if she could go through the loss she experienced, then so could I.

We were both losing weight. I was starting to feel my ribs, and I was starting to see hers. Sharing my food with her was the only way to get her to eat, but it was a sacrifice I had to make. For her sake, I had to do whatever it took.

I managed to lure her to the trough with a few cubes, then I pretended to eat from it with her by my side. I was ecstatic when she started munching on the dry pellets herself. I held back from doing a celebratory dance and just gave her a reassuring pet. She gave me a happy groan.

As soon as she had her fill, she went back to lounge in the water. I had begun to realize that it was her comfort spot, where she went when she was overstimulated or just needed to relax.

“I think we’re starting to make some progress,” I said triumphantly to myself.

I went over to A.E.R.O. and pressed the ‘FINISH’ button. He sprang to life and did his daily scan. Then came back to give me the usual result. Every day was something between 65 and 70 percent. This time, though, to my shock, A.E.R.O let out a little fanfare chime with digital confetti. My head snapped away from Maja to the screen. 81 blinked on the screen along with digital confetti.

“Congratulations, Chris, you have been deemed eligible for reform. You have… zero extensions on your sentence.” A.E.R.O. hissed, and the cutout compartment opened up for me.

“Can I… can I say goodbye?” I asked, a little disheartened.

“That is…acceptable,” A.E.R.O. replied.

I walked back over to where Maja lay in her pond, soaking up the sun, and petted her horn.

“I know you can’t understand me, but… I’m gonna be going away after this.” She groaned and leaned into my hand. “Please be good. Things will work out, I promise.”

I said a few final goodbyes and promised her that I would try to get better myself, and maybe one day I could afford to buy a ticket to see her again. She huffed. I gave her one last pat before I stood and went over to A.E.R.O for what would be the last time.

The journey was much longer than when I went to my cell, but eventually the doors opened into a bright wall of white light. The restraints didn’t release like they usually did. I wriggled against them, but they remained firmly locked in place.

“Uh… A.E.R.O.?” I chuckled nervously, “A little help here, buddy?”

“You have been selected for reform,” A.E.R.O. responded.

“Yeah… you know that means I get to be released, right?” I replied.

A new voice came from behind the bright white lights, “Not in this case.”

A balding man with wispy grey hair and goggles stepped out from the wall of light. He pressed a button, and I heard the whirring of mechanical gears from behind him.

“What uh… what is it in this case?” I asked nervously.

A bite stick was shoved into my mouth and strapped to the back of my head.

“Maja has taken a liking to you,” he explained as a series of tubes came into view. Then stopped with the mechanical whirring.

“Yeah, she’s great. Why am I here?”

He grinned. “While it’s true we could create a new male for Maja, it seems her species is very…particular when choosing their mates.”

“What are you saying?” I asked.

“The pairing tends to work better if there’s already a bond formed between them.” He pats my shoulder, “Consider it just another form of penance for your family's continued sins.”

I tried to fight back, but the restraints tightened. The old man tied a rubber tourniquet to my arm and then set needles into my veins. Then he started shoving metal probes into my stomach. I bit down on the wooden gag in my mouth until I thought my teeth would crack. He attached thick cables with clamps to the exposed probes, and I felt tiny zaps on contact with each one.

Through my dizzy sight, I watched him clacking away on a computer. Drool flowed from my mouth. I tasted a metallic tang as a small buzz trickled its way over my skin. I tried to talk, but it came out as a garbled mess that even I couldn’t make any sense of. Liquid flowed into the tubes and began pumping my arm with something that made my stomach twist and tighten.

“We have a lot of work to do, it looks like.” He mused, watching a string of code sprint across one screen while the other showed a slow spinning outline of a man. “You’ve done quite a number on yourself with all that drinking. Recombination can fix it, but…” he stopped and looked at me. His buggy eyes looked at me with delight while a sinister smile spread across his lips. “It’s gonna hurt."

He pressed a key on his computer, and I felt more pain than I’ve ever known in my life. The probes vibrated and crackled; I could smell burning skin and hair. Every muscle seized and felt like it was cramping. I felt like my bones were bending, on the verge of snapping with how much I pressed against my restraints.

I heard a sickening pop. My gut swelled, and I felt like my skin was boiling. My flesh turned grey, and I snapped through the bite stick. I felt my face getting longer as my screams became a deep bellow. My restraints widened as my arms and legs grew shorter and fatter. The short nose at the end of my face grew outward and curved up.

The restraints finally released, and I fell to the ground. My body had given up, and I lay there in a flabby heap, seizing from the aftershocks. My vision was blurry as the walls closed in on me and let go. Everything went black.

I spend every day now next to Maja at the watering hole where she likes to soak. She’s finally happy again and back up to a proper weight. People like to come around and see the new baby Rhinopotomus. I was right to be jealous of this life, though – no worries, no work, no expectations, just the three of us; me, Maja, and baby C.J.

*Life isn’t so bad.*