Microstory 2451: Mud World: World of Mud

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Here we have another overly descriptive name, like Mountain Mountain or Substrate Development Dome. If you’re lookin’ for mud, they have it here. We got obstacle courses, wrestling, bogging. We got all sorts of sports. If it’s typically paid on the ground, you’ll be playing it on—see if you can guess—a muddy ground. Did you guess right? There are some places in Mud World that isn’t mud, and that’s because it’s SWAMPS! There are no boats, so you have to wade, or even swim, across in order to get from one sector of mud to another sector of mud. MUD! There is already a dome that’s dedicated exclusively to swamp and wetlands, but this one has both. That’s okay, there’s room for all of us. If you come here, you’re gonna get muddy. I know, big surprise. Like, there are only a bunch scattered points of respite from all the mud called King Hills where you can play King of the Hill. A few people can probably stand on the top of it, but there’s only supposed to be one. If you manage to secure it, you better not rest on your laurels, because I guarantee that someone else is gonna come challenge you within the next three seconds. It’s not that everyone is trying to get out of the mud, it’s just fun to push people around, and get pushed around...back down into the mud. If you don’t like mud, you’re not gonna have a good time. You walk through the doors, check in, and then walk down some stairs to the area. Once you get down to the bottom (and in the mud that I was talking about earlier), the stairs collapse, and the nearest other stairs could be miles away for the next group of visitors. You could try to get to one of those quickly, but why would you do that? You’re walking through mud! And mud is great! I don’t know how else to explain that this is a Mud World: World of Mud. I’m not just calling it that for fun, by the way; it’s the official name, which I’m guessing you know because you’re here, and if you’re here, then you must be interested in mud. Which is a good thing, because we got plenty of mud here. MUD! Okay, that’s enough—it’s enough mud! ENOUGH MUD! I’m done with the mud! It’s over! If you’re done with mud, walk over to the nearest exit, and step into a shower. Ah, that feels good. Nice to get all this mud off my body. The water is warm, the jets go every which way. You can stay in the shower as long as you want, they got loads of them; as far as the eye can see. I mean, you can’t see the other showers, they have partitions. Well, they do have group showers. If you wanna wash off in full view of others, that’s your business, and theirs. It’s not 2025, where everyone is sexually unhealthy, and self-conscious. When you’re done with the shower, they have hot tubs too. After you’re done tubbin’, please get back in the shower, because hot tubs are gross. I’ll take a pool of mud over a hot tub any day. HOT TUBS! And-or you can dry off, and leave the dome. You can leave the dome for good, or come back another time. Or hell, you can turn around right that instant, and get back into some muddy shenanigans in the mud. One last thought before I go: MUD!

Microstory 2103: My New Dirty Job

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I’ve been looking for work. Unlike when I was in Kansas City, and in my past life, I no longer have standards. I used to have certain limitations, which stopped short of cleaning, food preparation or distribution, and interacting with people too much. I think I’m going to still shy away from that last one, since I don’t need to be exposing my wanted face to a whole bunch of people every day. I’m also not good at smiling, whether it’s real or fake. I can grimace. If you need someone to grimace awkwardly, and make everyone in the room feel incredibly uncomfortable, I am your man. What I don’t like about the other two things is that my health and sanitation standards are higher than anyone else’s. That sort of stuff is hard to be around, because it will never be good enough for me, and people find that rather annoying, if you can believe it. But ya know, you don’t know how to wear gloves. You seem to think that makes you impervious to cross-contamination, but that’s not how it works. If you pick up a big piece of poop, throw it in the toilet, and then go back to fixing my sandwich, you’ve just put poop in that sandwich. I don’t really care that it didn’t get on your hands, do I? That was never my concern. Of course, this is an exaggeration, but it’s plausible, since most people seem to think that clothing is some magical barrier that prevents bacteria and viruses from being transmitted, but I’m here to tell you that it’s not. Trust me. I know pathogens. I suppose that all has more to do with food, which is why cleaning doesn’t bother me as much. I mean, it really bothers me, but I can immerse myself in it, and then come out clean on the other side. This temporary place where I’m staying has a perfect system for me, especially with my new dirty job. I’m a janitor, which is kind of always where I thought I would end up. Now all I need is to become an unarmed security guard, and I will be able to check everything off my list of jobs I either wanted, or thought I would have to take. This isn’t so bad. I can clean myself off at the end of the day in the group showers, and then step right into the tub shower. That way, I don’t have to dirty up the tub. I know that sounds like overkill to you, but I prefer it. The washer and dryer combo unit are right there too, which allows me to clean my uniform every night before I have to use it again the next day. It’s not glamorous, but it will get me by...for now.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 30, 2398

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Marie just got back from a hiking trip with her husband, so she’s not having too many problems. Kivi, on the other hand, was literally born less than a week ago, so she doesn’t have a whole lot of experience in the wilderness. “Ow!” She stops walking and instinctively, reaches up to slap herself in the cheek. “That’s blood. I’m bleeding.”

“It’s not only your blood,” Marie tries to tell her, “and it’s just a little.”

“A bug bit me, and you think that it’s totally fine.”

“It’s a hematophage. It only needed a little bit of your blood. We put on that smelly stuff to keep them away.”

“It’s obviously not working.”

“Well, it’s not magic.”

“Why did you say that in a different accent?”

Marie gets going on the trail. “It’s a pop culture reference.”

“You know I won’t get those.”

“I know,” Marie says as she’s getting farther ahead.

“What if it was carrying a disease?”

“It probably wasn’t.”

“Probably?”

“Hurry up! I wanna get there before it gets dark!”

“How do you know where we’re going again?”

“Ramses had a little bit of data from the main sequence in his bag when he came to this reality. Using the AI, he was able to overlay corresponding coordinates to the geography of this world, which we can follow using SatNav.”

“In English?”

“I have a map.”

They continue for another kilometer or so until they hear rushing water. This area is surprisingly remote, while it’s pretty heavily developed in the main sequence. The trek was rough, but they have come to a clearing, where they find a source of water. “Ah, there it is, you were right,” Kivi says with a smile.

Marie zooms in and out of the map. “No, this isn’t right at all.”

“You said we were looking for the Fountain of Youth, and that to me looks like a fountain. I mean, the water isn’t coming out of sculpted horses, but it’s nice enough, I guess.”

“Hold on.” She goes into the overlay code, and checks for errors, to the best of her ability with only a cursory glance. There’s too much data to go over comprehensively right now. “This isn’t gonna do me any good.” She starts to remove her clothes, ultimately keeping her bra and underwear on.

“What if someone else comes?”

Marie looks around. “I see no signs that a single human has ever been in this area ever. It’s pretty well hidden. I’m not worried. Besides, I don’t care.” She wades into the water, which she finds to be lukewarm. It’s not a hot spring, but it’s not freezing either. Perhaps it’s warmed by geothermal energy just a little bit. She walks along the smooth floor, encountering no obstacles or sharp rocks, and approaches the bubbling fountain in the center.” A warmness comes over her, but not physically, just emotionally.

“Can you teleport?” Kivi asks.

“What?” Marie didn’t really hear that. She’s mesmerized by the sight, and can’t think about anything else. It just looks like the work of jets in a hot tub, but there’s something so beautiful and entrancing about it, she can’t look away.

Kivi yells something else from the shore.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: June 9, 2398

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As planned, the six of them spend the entire day together, though Leona and Angela each have to take a few minutes every once in a while to confer with their employers. The latter is doing well in her new position. She expected at least one person from the office to sense that something was up, but everybody treats her like Marie, which is to say that some of them are nice and respectful, while others are misogynistic and hateful jerks. Leona is doing okay. She’s delivering her work on time, and the people at the top are pleased with it. They’re not asking questions, which is in everyone’s best interests. She’s trying not to be too preoccupied with her secret suspicions of Heath. She has a plan to drop tidbits of information to him to see whether outsiders catch wind of it. Then she’ll know that he can’t be trusted. That’s for later, though. For now, she just wants to think about the travelers. This won’t be the longest she’s ever parted from Mateo, but that doesn’t mean it’ll be easy.

At the end of the day, they retire to their respective rooms, the other four knowing full well that the Matics are about to spend one last night together. “What’s up?” he asks.

“What do you mean?”

“Tell me what’s going on with you. What are you feeling?”

She looks at him, but doesn’t say anything. “Give me your phone.” She takes it from him, and places it in the EMB bag, along with her own. Then she pulls out a bug scanner, and begins to wave it around the room.

Mateo sits on the bed, and waits patiently for her to finish. Once she does, he steps into the bathroom, and begins to fill the tub. He turns the water on high enough to make a lot of noise, but low enough to make it last. They sit on the edge of the tub to talk, and he drops into a whisper. “You can’t speak freely around the others?”

“Not around Heath,” she answers in an even lower whisper, “and by extension, not Marie either.”

“Yeah, I’m sensing a pattern. All the people we’ve met who have been given some information about us either aren’t too surprised by what they learn, or they have a connection to Heath. He’s even the one who first met Alyssa McIver. I mean, you and I both know that she’ll be a friend of ours in the future, but it’s still odd.”

“Yeah,” Leona agrees. “Plus, how did that forger know what I was planning? She was all ready with my new secret agent paraphernalia; it was just too perfect. I don’t know. He’s been so good to Marie, but maybe he’s been playing the long game.”

“I assume you have a plan?” Mateo figures.

“I have...the notion of the plan.”

“A baby plan. That’s what my father, Randall used to call it when we had something big to do, but didn’t really know how we were gonna do it. Sometimes we would plan something to the last minute, and sometimes we just sort of winged it. That worked out for us about half the time, I’d say.”

She smiles. “You don’t talk about your parents anymore.”

“You don’t either.”

She nods. “I guess it’s complicated. I have five parents, you share two of them with me, and then you have two more. Can anyone else relate to our bonkers family tree?”

“Yeah, but not in the same way, sis.”

“Oh, gross!” She’s laughing, though.

Mateo looks behind them at the rising water, which is about to start spilling into the drain. “I know we started this for the white noise, but we might as well take advantage. Wadya say?”

“We can’t do that, though,” she says in a cutesy voice. “You’re my adopted brother.”

He double palms his forehead, and tries to stifle the laughter. “Jesus! Now I see how weird it is, being on the other side of the joke.”

She pulls him into the water with her, clothes and all, like a romcom couple in the second act. “You don’t wanna roleplay?”

Microstory 1584: Courage

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Prompt

I wake up in a bathtub, covered in ice, and in an immense amount of pain. There is a huge sewn-up incision on my stomach.

Botner

I look at the tiled walls, look at the floor, look at the woman, whose voice I remember but whose face I don’t recognize. “So you’re the doctor, right?” I feel like a fraud.

“Doctor?”

“Doctor.”

“Yes. You won’t help me.”

I’m confused. “How is that even possible?”

“You saved my life.”

“I didn’t know you were still in here.”

She laughs. “You will help me. You have to.”

At the beginning, I was confused by the entire experience. I felt both privileged and like a fraud to be part of it. Then I remembered my PhD and the structure of the experiment that I had been part of. After a while, I came to accept the role that I was being asked to play. This person had incredible amounts of courage, strength and resourcefulness. I knew that I had to do whatever I could to help this person, regardless of whether she could do the same for me. I can remember every second of that night. Everything that transpired is still like a slow-motion film in my head. I remember my partner, Sam calling...

Conclusion

...me up, and saying that I needed to meet her at this motel. She wouldn’t tell me why, and when I got to the room, she wasn’t even here. The last thing I remember, something sharp pierced my neck, and now I’m here. I never thought my life would end like this, but at least I’m doing something good. This doctor may not have taken my organs in the most ethical way, but with them, she can do a lot more good than I ever hoped. There’s something about me—my biology—that makes my organs special. They’ve made great advances in cloning human tissue by studying me, and the time has come for me to die, so they can leap over that last medical science hurdle. I should be mad, but I guess all this was inevitable. They could only do so much without taking me apart. She says she’s going to take the heart next, but that she wanted to thank me for my sacrifice first. Now that I’m too weak to fight it is what she probably really had in mind. For my last few minutes I call Sam, and thank her for setting this all up. I wouldn’t have had the courage to do it myself, so I’m glad someone was there to force my hand. I don’t call my family to tell them I love them. They know, and hearing their voices again would just make it harder. The light dims, and I disappear, but will live on in everyone whose life this technique saves.