VocApocalypse

The Beginning of the End

9,997 coins.

That’s what I have. Three more coins and I’ll have 10,000. One more word and I’ll break the record. Cross the Rubicon. Do what no one has done before.

I’ll get 10,000 coins.

This in no small accomplishment. No menial victory. Thousands—perhaps tens of thousands . . . even millions—have tried. I myself have tried (and failed) at least 20 times. And lost 20 phones doing it.

No. This moment is not some trivial blip on the radar of wasted time. It is the culmination of time, dedication, and sacrifice.

10,000 coins means something.

I just don’t know what yet.

My name is Greg Noland. I am 40 years old. I’m married . . . well, technically.

I used to install cable for a living, though it’s been a while since I’ve worked. I’m overweight and I haven’t showered as often as I should. There, I’ve said it and I own it and I’m not ashamed. I’ve had a lot on my mind. I’ve been focused on one thing.

10,000 coins!

Right now, I’m sitting on the toilet in my underground Faraday Bunker and playing my favorite game on my smart phone: “VocApocalypse.”

The name is more dramatic than the actual gameplay, which really just consists of making words from a mess of letters. The game gives you a wheel of letters and a list of words it wants you to find from those letters. You swipe from letter to letter to letter, making words upon words, and win once you’ve found them all. You earn stars and badges and unlock topics and competitions as you go. Pretty typical stuff.

But my favorite are the coins.

Every word you find that is not on the list gets you a coin, but only once you complete the level. Right now, I have 9,997 coins in the bank. I have one more word on the list I’m playing now before I complete the level. And I have found three extra words not on their list. In other words, I’m about to get 10,000 coins. Exactly. And as I said before, this is a big freaking deal!

If you are the shrewd observer I think you are, then you noticed the fact that I’m dropping a deuce in an underground bunker as we speak. And not just any old bunker. A Faraday Bunker. A bunker designed to block all outside electronic signals from getting in and to trap all electronic signals inside. This is key and central to my theory and plan.

I will get to 10,000 coins this time. I will not be denied. Not like I have the past. I’m ready this time. I’m prepared.

And frankly, I’ve come a long way from my first near win. It was nearly 5 years ago, but it feels like it was yesterday. The first time I almost got 10,000 coins. The day I lost my first phone.

The day my adventure began.

Tried and Failed and Failed and Failed

It was spring and I was fishing at a nearby pond. I was sitting on a travel stool on a wooden dock. It was quite early, so I was the only person there.

Nothing was biting, so I decided to take a moment and play VocApocalypse. I had downloaded it about a year earlier and enjoyed playing a little bit here and there. Aside from that, I didn’t give it much thought. That morning was different, however.

I remember pulling out my smart phone from a front pocket on my fishing vest and firing the game up. The sultry sounds of Frank Sinatra hummed from the phone’s speaker. As a side note: I always listen to ol’ blue eyes while I fish. I find he puts the fish in the mood.

That was the first time I really looked hard at the game’s coin total: 9,999. Looking at the number, I noticed several things at once. First—and not at all impressive—I noticed that I was just one digit away from reaching 10,000 coins. Second—and also not impressive—I noticed that the number 10,000 had one more digit than 9,999. And last—and here’s the payoff—it occurred to me the there wasn’t room enough on the game’s home screen for that fifth, extra digit.

You know. When you first enter a game—any game, really—before you play a new round, the game tells you what you have in the bank, what you’ve accumulated, and what’s out there to get. It’s their way of enticing you to play more. But here, the game developer had made a mistake. There was no possible way to fit a fifth digit onto that screen. Game design 101 and they had failed!

Boy, was I excited to play! I wanted to get just one extra coin and see what happened. Would it start the count over? Would it change font size? Would the game crash? I had to know.

But it wasn’t meant to be.

At that exact moment, I felt a massive strike on my fishing rod. I remember every detail. Every single moment. The soothing serenade that was Sinatra’s voice purred in the background.

It had to be you, It had to be you . . .

The strike!

. . . I wandered around, and I finally found, the somebody who . . .

I set the hook and the fish took off! Screeeeeeeeeee!

. . . Could make me be true, And could make me be blue . . .

I fought the fish! It was a brute. It zigged and zagged. It ran and charged. I pulled the rod’s head up slow and reeled as fast as I could as the rod head dropped.

. . . And even be glad, Just to be sad—thinking of you . . .

The fish was winning. It wasn’t tiring and the line was straining. I loosened the drag and stood to get better footing.

. . . Some others I’ve seen, Might never be mean, Might never be cross, or try to be boss, But they wouldn’t do . . .

That’s when I realized my mistake.

My phone!

Once on my lap, now falling toward the dock!

. . . For nobody else gave me a thrill, With all your faults, I love you still . . .

I watched my phone fall—as if in slow motion—towards the wooden planks below me. The planks were all parallel, not even a quarter-inch between them. So tight, there was no way a phone like mine would fit between them. It would have to fall at just the right angle, both in terms of pitch and yaw. A 10,000-to-1 chance.

There was no way.

No way at all.

And then my phone was gone. It slipped right through a dark crack.

I heard a “kerplop!” Then the garbled buzz of human chatter grew quickly fainter.

. . . It had to be you, Wonderful you, It had to . . .

Until it was gone. The milky voice fading. The soulful sound vanishing. The tender sentiments swallowed by the inky black below.

I cannot begin to describe the loss I felt. The nakedness. The guilt. Like I had killed the Chairman of the Board himself! It was just awful.

Oh yeah, and my phone was gone too.

My phone!

All my texts and photos. All my contacts and emails. All my game progress. Gone. Forever.

Well, not all. Emails and contacts were good. I had some pictures stored on the cloud so that was okay. But my game’s progress. 9,999 coins. Months and months of work. All gone. I’d have to start from scratch.

I felt hollow. Alone. Vulnerable.

And I didn’t get the fish.

What a crappy day.

But it wasn’t the last. Just the beginning in fact.

I bought a new phone. I downloaded VocApocalypse again. And I started working towards 10,000 coins.

No big deal. I was in no rush. I hadn’t yet leaned the game’s dark secret. I was just playing for fun.

And so, after several months—maybe half a year—I again approached 10,000 coins. This time, I was sitting on a public bus, on my way home from work. I had started that particular round with 9,996 coins but felt certain I could break 10,000 in one game. And true to form, I had found some four or five words not on the list. I was poised to win. All I had left to do was find the last three words.

But fate stepped in again.

Some five miles from me and the bus, a water pipe burst in a certain apartment building. Its name isn’t important . . . unless you want to overpay for the pleasure of laying your head next to a wall filled at mice.

At any rate, the manager at that building called a local plumbing service. That company contacted its nearest plumber, who immediately left his spot at the food court table across from Victoria’s Secret—where he was “people watching”—to go to his van in the parking lot. However, as he left the mall’s main door and stepped into the parking lot, a packet of Taco Bell taco sauce slipped from between his fingers and fell to the ground. Not the kind of man to let such a prize go to waste, the plumber bent over to pick the packet up. True to form, the plumber’s prodigious backside made an appearance as he retrieved his sauce. The glare of the sun bounced off the plumber’s pasty white butt and nearly blinded a nearby driver. That driver swerved and struck a cart-return for the Mall’s attached Target. That impact jostled a shopping cart out of the return. Positioned as it was at the top of a hill, gravity slowly pulled that cart downhill until it exited the parking lot at a surprising rate of speed, jumped a curb, and struck an old lady walking her arguiled terrier. The woman survived, but her kilted dog did not. The force of the shopping cart’s blow knocked the leash out of the old woman’s hand. The dog took off, running right out into traffic. An oncoming car swerved to miss the dog, did not, and entered the wrong lane, where a public bus—with me in it—was coming full steam ahead. The car and the bus swerved. There was a crash. My phone flew from my hand and landed hard enough to shatter.

I didn’t finish the game. My progress was lost. I had to start all over again.

That’s how my first two attempts at 10,000 coins failed. Still, I didn’t think too much of it. Just two unfortunate phone accidents. Happens all the time, right?

But the strange thing is that it kept happening. I’d get a new phone, download VocApocalypse, approach 10,000 coins, and then lose my phone. Sometimes it was my fault. Sometimes it wasn’t. But it happened over and over and over again.

One time, I accidentally left my phone in the microwave on the popcorn setting. Once, I left it on top of my car and drove to North Dakota. Once, I dropped it in the deep abyss of a Porta Potty. At least three times, I dropped it in the tub while I was taking a bath. About four or five times, I stepped or sat or drove over it with a truck. One time, I threw it at my friend’s flat screen during the Super Bowl (I had to replace both). Twice, it fell into a swimming pool. Once, I chopped it in two with an axe during a camping trip. One time, I found it at the bottom of my freezer. Once, I accidentally dropped it into a running garbage disposal while I was doing the dishes. And one time, it fell between the plump bosoms of a large black lady at Walmart. She didn’t notice. I didn’t say anything. I just let that one go.

The strangest thing is that—each time—I was poised to collect 10,000 coins. And—each time—I was denied my prize.

It was about this time that I began to wonder if maybe something more was at play. Something sinister.

So it was that I began to poke around and learn more about my favorite word-finding game.

The Search for Truth

My first step towards knowledge was the most natural one for anyone born after 1975 . . . I googled whether anyone had ever gotten 10,000 coins in VocApocalypse. I was frustrated to find that no one seemed to care very much about my favorite game at all. No threads, chat groups, news articles, or anything. It was almost like the game didn’t even exist. But this isn’t to say that I didn’t learn anything of interest. In fact, I learned many interesting things. I will share three.

First, I learned that the longest amount of time that a person can go down a YouTube hole without its auto-advance feature repeating a video is 23.5 hours. It’s true. I tried this for a month straight and that’s the longest I made it. I then put out a challenge to the world to beat that time and 1,742 people—mostly high school and college students—failed to go longer. I can’t tell you how good it feels to contribute something of value to the Internet’s vast store of knowledge.

Second, I learned that some people get really angry when you edit their personal Wikipedia article. Seriously, it’s like I threatened their child with physical harm. I’ve never seen such a rage-filled reaction in my life.

Third, I learned that raisins are not the final resting state of the grape. In fact, they have another phase of existence past the raisin called the sticky-pebble-that-comes-from-age. Actually, they’re more like blacktop, all stuck together and solid enough to drive on. Still, they taste pretty good.

But I digress, back to my favorite game—VocApocalypse!

Honestly, I had almost given up on both the game and my search for answers after my failed Internet research. But I had one card left up my sleeve. I posted the following advertisement:

“Wanted: MM seeking expert in VocApocalypse. Wordplay appreciated but not necessary. Wants help getting 10,000 coins.”

Impressive, right? Yeah, I posted it everywhere I could think of—social networking sites, Intuit chat sites, news outlets, classified services, Backpage, Reddit, etc. At the end of the day—actually, at the end of the month, because that’s how long it took to get an answer—it was my Craigslist posting that did the trick. That’s how I struck up an Internet correspondence with Dr. Leroy Plume, III. Actually, Leroy said that he had seen my post the first day it went up and almost didn’t respond at all because he thought it was a trap. But, after researching me thoroughly, he decided to give me a chance. Unfortunately, that Internet correspondence proved to be shallow and short-lived, as Leroy refused to leave any written or forensic evidence concerning the question at hand. And because my questions quickly grew too risky to put down in writing—even on a secure, double-end encryption chat service using a VPN—we just had to meet.

And meet we did.

Incognito Questions and Answers and More Questions

I met Leroy at a grocery store about three hours from my house. I had offered to meet at his home, but he refused to even tell me what state he lived in. I had suggested getting a cup of coffee, but he refused, stating that the government knew exactly how many sensitive conversations took place at bookstores and coffee shops, so the NSA placed listening devices in the paper sleeves that baristas nationwide place around your cup of coffee. So I asked him where he wanted to meet. After I told him my address, he directed me to a third-rate grocery store, explaining that the old ways were the best ways.

Per Leroy’s instructions, I drove the three hours and stood in the canned good section wearing a red baseball hat with the bill flipped backwards and held a can of Hormel chili upside down in my left hand. My other hand was in my pocket.

I arrived at the appointed time, but no one else showed for a good 23 minutes.

Honestly, I began to wonder if I had gotten something wrong? Was it the right day? The right time? The right store? The right aisle? Did I have the right shade of red? Was the bill positioned just right? Did I accidentally get Bush’s baked beans instead of Hormel chili? Did Leroy chicken out? Had he been picked up by shady men in dark suits and matching ties on his way there? Oh mercy, what had I gotten myself into?!

But just then, at the height of my anxiety, a head peeked out from beside an end-display of tortilla chips. He was a strange looking man. He wore a tall trapper’s hat—like Elmer Fudd’s, but yellow. The ear flaps were down and tied tightly around his face. He wore a face mask—even though there were no current pandemics in the air. And he wore a large pair of rainbow, polarized Viper sunglasses. Between that and the black trench coat, he was quite inconspicuous.

His head disappeared in a flash. Then reappeared. I looked around. We were the only ones in the aisle . . . perhaps in the entire store.

“Pssssst.”

I rose my eyebrows.

“Are you Greg?”

I nodded.

“Greg Noland?”

I nodded again.

He approached. I could see his Converse high tops below the bottom hem of his coat. They were red canvas with white toes.

“It’s nice to meet you,” I said.

He did not return the favor.

“Don’t look directly at me,” he ordered. “Just continue to browse the beans. There is great cover in beans. All the best spies of the past used them.”

He walked behind me and studied the fruit cocktail on the other side of the isle.

“We have to be very careful,” he whispered. “The walls have ears.”

I nodded. I don’t know if he noticed.

“So you want to earn 10,000 coins in VocApocalypse? How close have you come?”

“9,999.”

“Very nice. And how many times have you almost made it?”

“More than 20 times”

“Very Impressive. You have dedication. I admire that.”

“Thanks.”

“But have you ever thought that there might be some roads better left untraveled? Some doors better left closed?’

“What?!”

I turned. Shocked and annoyed.

“Shhhhhhh!!!”

His eyes commanded me to turn back around.

“I’m not saying that such is absolutely the case here. But I offer it as a possibility. There are some mysteries that should remain as they are.”

“Why would you say that? It’s just a game. Right?”

“Perhaps. Probably. But not for certain. You very well may be right. But I feel I have a duty to warn you.”

“Warn me about what?”

“I don’t know.”

My head sank. He either saw me or felt me, for he responded accordingly.

“I’m sorry. But you must understand. The game and its internal limit are well documented amongst a certain small population of interested parties. But no one knows why. The company itself is nothing special. It’s small and has developed very few products, none of them a hit. But the CEO and founder of the company—one Stan L. Beil—is noteworthy for his interest in the occult. Unfortunately, that’s the extent of my knowledge.”

He paused to breathe. I capitalized on the opportunity.

“But what does this have to do with anything? Why can’t I get past 10,000 coins? And why does something always happen to my phone when I got close?”

“I don’t have answers. But I can give you theories.”

I was so desperate that I would accept anything even approaching an answer.

“Most think it’s a design flaw, as there have been some who didn’t lose phones—the game just deleted on its own. The thinking is that this is an internal gimmick to get you hooked. If such is true, its diabolical.”

Leroy checked again that we were alone before continuing.

“But some believe it’s much more ominous. Some say that it’s not the game keeping players from reaching 10,000 coins . . . but the universe itself.”

He paused for dramatic effect. It worked.

“What?” I asked. “Why?”

“No one knows for sure. Some posit that 10,000 coins is the mark of the beast and that getting them would set off the Second Coming.”

“You mean like Jesus, Satan, angels, Armageddon? All that?”

“Yes.”

I exhaled at the thought.

“Others think that there’s something in the game’s code, some kind of universal trigger that might rip the fabric of space and time, causing the sun to implode on itself and suck the Earth and everything else in our solar system into its black hole.”

I reeled.

“What do you think?’’ I asked.

He paused. Then responded. Very carefully.

“Me? I’m torn. On the one hand, I believe there is definitely a non-zero probability that getting 10,000 coins will lead to a catastrophic event.”

He stopped. I couldn’t handle the anticipation.

“And on the other hand?” I asked.

Another pause.

“Well, I think it’s more likely that you’re just clumsy and breaking your crap on accident.”

I wanted to yell, but he kept going before I could speak.

“But even so, I believe that we have an obligation to look at the problem from an ethical and moral perspective.”

I was baffled.

He continued.

“We each owe one another a moral duty of no harm. And since there exists a non-zero probability of great harm in this instance, I believe we need to weigh that potential harm against the potential benefit. First, the benefit. While many have speculated about the bad that could result from pursuing this course of action, few have pondered the potential good that might come from actually gaining 10,000 coins. Those who have considered the question postulate no benefit to the human race outside the individual utility gained by that player who accomplishes that particular feat. I see no reason to question this. So there’s that. On one side, benefit to you and you alone.

“On the other hand, we need to enumerate the possible deleterious outcomes and lay a probability distribution on them in order to estimate an expected value of bad. Now, it may be true that the probability of Armageddon or the end of the universe as we know it are both quite small indeed. That said, the harm that would result from either is so great that the expected value of badness in not zero at all, but quite a large number. After all, the outcome of multiplying and infinitely small number with an infinitely big number depends entirely on the nature of each infinite number. Here, the cardinality of harm far exceeds the cardinality of possibility. As such, comparing that number to your individual utility, it seems to me that it’s just not worth it . . . even if nothing will actually come from it at all.”

I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t move. I just stood there. Staring at the black lettering on red banner that topped the baked bean cans. And below that, the small mound of brown, rich, and glistening dollops of beany goodness.

Leroy gave me a moment to take it all in. Both his words and the beans. Then he left, sharing one last nugget of wisdom.

“You have a hard choice ahead of you, my friend. I don’t envy you. I’ve informed you the best I can and given my best advice. But at the end of the day, I can’t decide for you. And I don’t want to. That’s what the Feds are for. You be you.”

He left me there. Staring at the beans.

I stood in that aisle for a solid 13 minutes. Thinking. What to do? Do I put the world in jeopardy? All for a stupid game? I had my wife and kids to think of, after all. But really, it was just a game, right? Nothing bad was going to happen. No way. That Leroy guy—and whoever his sources were—they’re just nuts. Nothing would happen.

And so right then, with chili in my hand and beans in my eyes, I decided to try again.

But I wasn’t a fool. I had a plan. One that would both maximize my chances of success and minimize the risk to this world and the universe at large. It struck me like a plate of spaghetti on a cold day. I knew what I would do.

I’d build a bunker.

A Faraday Bunker!

Faraday and Goodnight

Obviously, I would have much preferred to build a Faraday Bunker first, and then build my house over it. Unfortunately, that was not the case. So I had to dig a bunker-sized hole in my crawlspace with the few tools I could fit down there; namely, a hand trowel and buckets.

After a week of solid digging, I had cleared enough dirt to give myself a little head room. So I started using a shovel. That’s when progress on the hole really took off.

My wife and kids were—surprisingly—concerned and confused. I guess I understood their worry when I quit my job. But we had savings. And my wife’s job would take care of the basics. What I didn’t understand was how anyone could say no to an underground Faraday Bunker below their house!

The work was painstaking and backbreaking. Digging and filling buckets. Lugging those buckets out of the cramped crawlspace, through the house, and then outside.

At first, I dumped the dug-up dirt in a pile in the corner of my backyard. Each time I went outside to dump a load, I could see my neighbor—Fred Lapinsky—watching. From his kitchen. From his car. From his yard. From his bathroom. Always watching.

I just hoped he wouldn’t come outside and start asking questions. He was always asking questions. And not because he was interested in me or my life. No. His questions were always designed to undercut me and whatever I was doing or however I was doing it. What a putz.

Thankfully, he just watched as I dumped my dirt in the backyard. At least for a good while. Soon, however, the corner of the backyard wasn’t big enough for all the dirt I was excavating. So I ordered a dumpster.

It was while I hauled bucket after bucket of dirt from my crawlspace to the dumpster that Fred finally caught up with me.

“Hi there, neighbor.”

His greeting dripped with criticism.

“Whatcha’ got cookin’?”

I threw the contents of the first bucket into the giant green bin with a grunt. My reply was just as terse.

“Nothing.”

Fred sucked in with his teeth.

“Looks like a lot of hard work for nothing. You finally putting in that French drain I told you about? You won’t regret it. I promise you.”

I tossed in my second bucket of dirt.

“Nope.”

“Huh. Well, let me know if you want a professional’s opinion. I’ve done enough work to my own house and my three rental properties that I’ve done and seen just about everything.”

I laughed to myself.

“Not this.”

His reply was characteristically swarmy.

“You got the permits you need?”

I walked away and waved my hand dismissively. Of course I had not. To do that would mean alerting the authorities to my plan. And that would jeopardize my chances at success. I didn’t tell him that, though. Not a chance.

But my wife did demand some explanation. It happened just about the time the steel beams and corrugated siding arrived.

“You have four times the siding you need. Are you nuts?”

Her voice whined with its usual piercing scold.

“I tried to tell you. I need multiple, alternating layers of metal and plastic to block all electromagnetic, cellular, and wireless signals getting inside or outside of the bunker.”

She glared at me with her unblinking eyes.

“This is too much. You need to stop this.”

“It’s okay,” I replied. “I’ve done the calculations. Sure, the next couple months will be tricky. But if we eat nothing but dry oats and eggs, we’ll have enough.”

Her eyes flinched. Her lips sucked together. Her nostrils spiraled out of control.

“That’s not what I mean, Greg. You are losing it. And I can’t stand by and let you lose it in front of the kids.”

She sighed, long and hard like her mental list of life’s disappointments.

“At first, this was all a little funny. Expensive, but funny. And we played along. But now, I don’t know what to say, except that your obsession with that game is now a sickness.”

I stared at her, knowing that speaking words—no matter how reasonable and properly enunciated—would do no good. Like volcanic diarrhea, you just had to let her get it out.

But I’ll be honest, I didn’t see this next part coming.

“You need to choose, Greg. You need to stop. This obsession will cost you your family. We cannot watch you do this to yourself. If you don’t stop, we’re leaving.”

She was serious. I could tell by the way she put extra emphasis on the last word, leaving. Also, the kids were standing behind her, surrounded by luggage.

I said nothing.

She let out a disappointed and rather condescending sigh.

“I sure hope it’s worth it. Whatever it is you hope to gain from this. I sure hope it’s worth it.”

She left very soon after that. I was sad. I could really have used her help framing the bunker with the steel beams. But I managed.

I built the frame. I ran the electrical. And plumbing. And HVAC. I layered the metal and plastic. I put in the floor and walls and ceiling. With all the lights and switches and outlets. I installed the sink and shower and toilet. I stocked the pantry and put up some homey paintings.

In fact, once my family was out of the way, things really got moving. I never had to stop to wipe the baby’s butt or make lunch or play a stupid board game. Gone were the constant demands from my wife to do the dishes or take out the trash or rub her back or talk to her.

Yeah, that last month I could finally focus on what was really important—building my Faraday Bunker and playing VocApocalypse.

Doomsday or Bust

So here I am. In the middle of a satisfying poop. On the cusp of making history. All I have to do is make one more swipe. One more word and I’ll reach 10,000 coins. Exactly.

10,000 coins and what else? Anything? Will the display change dramatically to fit the extra digit? Will it change at all? Will my phone survive long enough for me to enter that final swipe? Will I survive? Will the world? The universe?

Or will this swipe be humanity’s final act?

Last act? Really? Not probable. But still possible. Is it worth the risk?

I’m not sure. But I’ve already invested so much just to get here. How many hours? How many phones? How many dollars? Blood, sweat, and tears? My family? My hygiene? My sanity?

No. I sacrificed too much to turn back now. Come what may.

I swipe. The final word: sunk.

Several things happen in rapid succession.

First, I see the games victory graphics. Bouncing letters and exploding stars dance across the screen. I see my game total. I see the coin total—three coins. That sum is added to the total-totals.

9,997 turns to 10,000.

And there it is. 10,000 coins. Right where 9,997 used to be. And it fits perfectly. It’s not smashed. Nothing else has moved. It’s like the space for that digit had been right there all along.

How disappointing . . .

But I only have a moment to feel let down. For, right away, something else happens. I have a fart. A deep booming one that had been building for some time, working its way slowly though my innards.

It’s loud. It smells. And it clears room for that last of the pee in my bladder, which is most gratifying.

But that’s the least of my worries. At the exact same time, another sound rumbles through the house. And it’s not me.

It’s loud. Beyond loud. And strong. Like involuntary anus-clenching strong. It’s everywhere. Around me. Inside me. Terrible.

It came from outside. I have to see what it is.

I wipe—not a complete job, just enough to maintain social order—and I run to my surveillance monitors to see what’s up outside. (Did I mention I added security? Sweet, right?).

Outside is not what I expected. Lots of people. All outside. Neighbors. Pedestrians. Drivers who pulled over. They’re all frozen. Staring straight up. No one is talking. No one is moving. No one is even pointing. They’re all just looking. But at what?

I have to know.

I pull my pants up—better late than never—put some slides on and run outside. Through the triple-combo entry to my Faraday Bunker. Through the access tube. Through my crawlspace to my basement. Up the stairs and out the door.

There’s Fred . . . yuck.

He’s looking up too. He doesn’t even notice me. No humble brag. No passive aggressive criticism. Nothing. He’s captivated.

I look up.

Holy $#!^

The sky is broken. Split right down the middle. From horizon to horizon. One side of the world to the other. East to West. Or North to South. I don’t know my directions. But it doesn’t matter anymore because they’re broken too.

The sky is collapsing . . . melting No, tearing away from a black void.

There is something in that void. Big. Terrifying. Not hairy. No scales or tentacles or claws. But all those things at the same time. Teeth, suckers, proboscis, claws, tusks, spikes. Arms, tentacles, tails. It’s everything and nothing. It’s here and then it isn’t. It’s incompressible.

And it’s climbing out of the void. And it’s looking right at me.

What?

No. Impossible. It’s so far away. And so big. It’s just a trick. Like those paintings of people whose eyes follow you wherever you go.

But now it speaks.

“Greg.”

What a horrible voice. Not a voice. It pounds through the air and into my skull. My brain screams for mercy. All it wants to do is melt. Oozing out my ears. Down my arms to my legs to my toes. Onto the sidewalk and down into the drain. Anything to get away.

But wait. How may Gregs are there? At least 50, right? What’s the chance it was referring to me specifically? So unlikely!

“Greg Noland,” it booms again.

Oh crap!

It speaks again.

“Greg Noland. Gameplayer. Wordswiper. Coinhorder. Doombringer. You have brought me here. Judgment has come.”

I look to Fred. Maybe he can’t hear. Maybe it’s just me that can hear.

No. Fred can hear. He’s looking at me. That same judgy look on his face.

I look back at the beast-thing. An arm is reaching for me.

I look back at Fred.

But he’s only there a moment. An impossibly large hand-talon covers him. Hides him. Falls on him. Crushes him.

My brain can’t process what I’m seeing, but a dark red goo creeps across the cement, out from under the clawed hand, right from where Fred used to be. Everyone around me freaks the crap out, screaming and running.

“Doom!”

It’s the beast again.

Oddly, I become quite thoughtful.

My life doesn’t flash before my eyes. But in my mind’s eye I do see my wife. It’s the day she left with the kids. Her eyes say, “I told you so,” but her lips are mouthing something else.

“I hope it was worth it.”

Okay, not entirely different. The same in spirit, maybe. But different words, right?

She says it again.

“I hope it was worth it.”

Was it worth it? I ask myself.

I look around. People mad with panic. Gripped with fear and bereft of hope. A monstrous mouth closing in on me and the entire world.

I look down at the puddle that used to be Fred.

Was it worth it?

You better believe it.

Fred was a real douche.

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