We're more willing to do The Crazy Shit™

Not kill, more like took up most of the available space of the other alien races, leaving them with little room to maintain their own population. Also probably the human race ended up outliving the other races as a species.

The Untethered Soul

Dear Diary,

Today I told Bobby from math class that I like liked him, and then I ate his brain. It was a little scary at first but it was just so tasty I couldn't stop. But diary I'm definitely, positively, super not a zombie! Here's why:

1. Zombies are gross and I'm a princess.

2. I'm not all slow and shambly like a zombie: I'm super quick and just getting faster! Yesterday I even outran Mr. Sparklehorn, and he's a unicorn. He seemed really mad that I caught him though and kept trying to throw me off, the silly goose.

3. I'm a picky eater. Everyone knows that zombies chow down on whatever if they can't get brains. Not me! I like brains only, and the smarter the better!

4. Daddy says that all girls go through changes when they hit puberty and that its totally normal. Zombies aren't normal, so I can't be a zombie, so there! *sticks out tongue*

5. Zombies just get all moldy and nasty and have bones poking out. All I've gotten are these super cute tentacles that can come out of my mouth! They're all tickly and friendly and pink, and they let me get a super good grip on heads.

6. When I just take a nibble instead of a big bite, my friends don't turn into zombies or get like me. They just get a big smile on their faces and want to play any game I want! I love making myself new friends. <3

Thats all I have time to write tonight Diary! I have to go to a sleepover!

1. I've still got a pulse. Classically the undead are, well, dead; the way my heart is kicking in my chest seems to indicate I'm not one of those. Wait...unless I'm a rage zombie; one that's like, alive but overcome with the need to kill and destroy and feed. Hm. I feel like the fact that I can calmly sit here evaluating my likelihood of zombiism rules that one out.

2. Brains--or any other organ meat, actually--just don't sound appetizing. In fact I'm not really hungry at all, given the circumstances, though I'll probably need to eat within the next few hours, both to keep up my energy and so that my stomach growling doesn't lure in more of those things.

3. That's another thing; Aren't zombies supposed to be a sort of hivemind or collective consciousness? I'm definitely not one of those. No moaning voices in my mind urging me to seek out braiiiiiinnnnssss wait, oh shit nevermind.....

Welcome to the Prompt! All top-level comments must be a story or poem. Reply here for other comments.

Reminders:

>* Stories at least 100 words. Poems, 30 but include "[Poem]" >* Responses don't have to fulfill every detail >* See Reality Fiction and Simple Prompts for stricter titles >* Be civil in any feedback and follow the rules

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This! ☝ Or as they say in parliamentary circles, 'Hear, Hear!' 🎯

addendum: and if one simply can't manage being wholesome at the moment, because the world is too damn bleak sometimes, at least try to be edgy in a wholesome way. It's a much more productive outlet for the bile, and people don't hate one for it quite as often, haha

"Old man! Can I get a milkshake and a twinkie?"

"You know, I'm not so old; I'm only 22". The man chucked while opening the milkshake cabinet.

"It's on the house today, want a bag to go with that?"

"You know I never do old man." The girl said giggling and running out the store.

The girl was staring happily at her loot, and she looked up to see a stern and scaring looking man with intricate tattoos on his face coming out of a car, staring at her. The kid gulped, and slowed her pace while moving the other direction. The man turned to the store, and before he pulled the door; he looked back and glanced at the kid who was hiding behind a street sign, staring back. The man made an annoyed sound and entered the store after saying a little prayer.

NA NA, Hello welcome! The automated message said.

The man looked around before sighing and heading towards the register. He stared at the youth behind it, with the name tag of Reen.

"It's time, this world is not meant for beings of this nature." The Obligator said while looking around, examining what stands in front of him.

"It's time boy. It's been far too long, and I no longer wish to deal with your kind anymore." With a small rattle, fingers pushed out and the bag clicked, showing varies instruments and metals.

"My kind, huh? Well, I suppose we're obstacles." The young man, chuckling and scratching at his stubbles. He peered outside, feeling the sun wash over him while he stood behind the counter. Noting the destroyed land from a flood just a decade ago.

"Can I..." The young man paused, staring at the kid hiding behind the sign, staring back anxiously.

"Death came, but happiness and relief did not... Your way is not merciful, nor is it something the Lord Ruler would ever allow if he knew" Reen said with a tone of defiance, staring at the Obligator with harsh glowing eyes. Reen burning brass and forcing his will upon the Obligator. The Obligator realizing whats about to happen, but is quickly overwhelmed with fear and intense emotions.

"Young man, if this is your wish; so be it. There will be consequences, a ghost always turns.." The Obligator turned and walked towards the door, pushing against it. He paused and turned around.

"May the Lord Ruler look after you, and protect this land." The Obligator left, walking towards his car, looking at the girl running towards the store with a half drank milkshake and the second bar of the remaining twinkie. She stared at the old man, and stuck out her tongue and made a sound. She pushed open the door and entered.

NA NA, Hello welcome! The automated message said.

"Is he gone? is he leaving? Oh boy he was scary." The girl ran over nervously, jumping up at the counter to sit.

"My mom and Reen should be here soon to pick me up"

"Shes always late, I never like it." The girl said as she fixed her earings. "I'm glad you're here with me though". She took a bite of her twinkie, throwing the wrapper in the trash can.

...

NA NA, Hello welcome! The automated message said.

"Old man! Can I get a milkshake and a twinkie?"

"You know, I'm not so old; I'm only 22". The man chucked while opening the milkshake cabinet.

"It's on the house today, want a bag to go with that?"

"You know I never do old man." The girl said giggling and running out the store.

The girl was staring happily at her loot, looking up and running towards to the destroyed land, to play on the invisible swings.

&#x200B;

"My kind, huh? Well, I suppose we're obstacles." The young man, chuckling and scratching at his stubble. "At least my kind has empathy for the departed, I'll stay here for as long as shes here, a brother always looks out for his little sister.

&#x200B;

------------------

&#x200B;

Man did I edit this and change the script 100x!

I watch the series around the holidays and just pick something to stew about every year.

Oh yeah mine was just a quick little thing

“Yes, yes. Your cobbler was marvelous, Margo. Truly.”

It was the eighth time that Margo had asked how her peach cobbler, which had been her mother’s recipe and her mother’s before that, and it was the eighth time that Vlad had replied in the same calm and polite fashion. His thin lips barely moved, and his cold eyes didn’t blink. His hands remained neatly folded in his lap, similar to Agatha’s pose, sitting almost serenely next to him. But their eyes met quickly, only for the briefest of moments, and after three hundred and sixty-seven years together, they could read each other’s thoughts.

No, not in the cliché manner shown by Hollywood nor spoken about in those young adult novels. It was a type of telepathy that anyone could learn, regardless of their mortal status. It was telepathy known by lovers gifted with more time than any could hope to have.

And that thought shared between the two: “Please let them call it a night and show us to the door.”

“Where were you from again, Vad? I mean, I can always place an accent, but I am having trouble with yours. Maine, I think?” Teddy, Margo’s husband, interrupted that shared thought. Vlad didn’t correct him on his name; at this point, it would only spur more conversation. And that was something neither Agatha nor Vlad wanted.

Three hours now. Three ungodly hours that the two had waited, suffered through. All because of those damnable yellow floral drapes that had sat open the whole time and the birthday party for that insufferable brat across the street. Had to be at least twenty children running back and forth across the street, some visibly looking right at the windows, at the four of them now sitting in faded couches around a short, squat coffee table, four small plates sitting there with half-touched cobbler remains.

Was keeping a low profile, despite being hunted across their homeland and now to this new country, worth this, this, this punishment?

And now, neither Vlad nor Agatha were interested in the slightest bit at the thought of making a meal of these two. The only reason they had even targeted Margo and Teddy, the couple that ran a small auto shop for years until Teddy had to retire, because he couldn’t stop slipping this or pulling that or giving himself a hernia over the least thing was because the elderly couple was secluded in the community. People politely avoided them. No one would miss them.

The eternal couple understood why that was now. In the past three hours, Margo and Teddy had only stopped talking to shovel a bite of cobbler into their mouths. Even when they were eating, they were annoying. Vlad’s ears picked up everything, including the pulpy chewing sound from their gaping maws as they refused to close their mouths while eating.

Agatha’s eyes occasionally flicked to the front door and back faster than the mortals could have comprehended. Vlad was thinking the same, cursing the same thing. That blasted need to be shown back out the door. Immortality, strength, and heightened senses meant nothing if they couldn’t just stand up, bid the old man and woman a good night, and leave. It was the worst kind of prison.

“New Hampshire? I mean, it’s practically the same, right?”

If he could sigh, Vlad would have. “Romania. In Europe. We immigrated last….” Teddy cut him off mid-sentence and stood up from the couch.

“Hey, sweetie,” Teddy said, looking at Margo, “the slides from when we went to Greece are still in the projector, right.” He turned to Vlad and Agatha. “It’ll be like looking at home, won’t it? Wait until you see the pictures from the cruise. You got to see the outfit Margo picked up in Athens.” Teddy went around the couch and walked through the open archway into what Margo had described as their ‘nice sitting room.’ Vlad and Agatha weren’t good enough for the nice sitting room, apparently.

Agatha seemed to see her opportunity. Her low, gentle voice perked up. “I can help close the curtains for you.”

Margo raised a hand and shook it. “Oh no, dear. Don’t tell Teddy I said anything to you about it, but he still hasn’t fixed that rod yet, and if you try to move it, the whole thing will come down right on you.” She laughed like she had some private joke to herself. “And it’s dark enough; you don’t need to worry about the curtains.”

Vlad and Agatha glanced at each other again, then at the window. Three children stood right outside, the oldest no more than five, staring in at them. All the faces were smeared with cake frosting.

Teddy came back out with a cardboard box in his arms. “You know, Margo. We never sorted out the other slides from that convention in Arizona we went to.” The rustling of what sounded like thousands of slides came from the box with each bounce in Teddy's arms.

Margo laughed. “Well, these two would love to see those as well. There was a Liberace impersonator there that I swore was the real guy.” She turned back to the other two. “Oh, you’ve got to see it all.”

They couldn’t leave until they were allowed, the glance between Vlad and Agatha said. Unless the masters of the home weren’t in any position to give that allowance.

Agatha looked to Vlad, and he nodded the very slightest nod. They could always go low profile somewhere else, try again somewhere more… not here.

I liked yours. I was just stewing about mine for longer.

[This is my first time writing in this sub, so let me know if I need some improvement.

It was a moment of unshakable terror followed immediately by a moment of utter silence. Everyone had heard of Cthulhu, yes, either by reading The Call of Cthulhu by Lovecraft himself or by seeing him in some cartoon or game. Everyone knew who Cthulhu was, everyone knew how dangerous he was; a colossal abomination with a cult of unknown number, the priest of amoral entities known as Outer gods who saw humans in the same light as humans saw ants or bees. A deep space horror himself who's presence enters the mind of those who write, those who draw and those who work.

Everyone knew Cthulhu wasn't real... Or rather that he wasn't supposed to be real. But he was. This creature was not the product of a man's own mind, H.P. Lovecraft was uttering a warning, one day Cthulhu would awaken completely and from his house of R'lyeh and plunge the world to chaos. First came the city.

All the way out in the middle of the Pacific ocean, the waves swung with a great aggression. A spire composed of some slimey moss-green material arose from the depths, followed by other structures, buildings and statues of the same green material. Helicopters flew in to see the great city in all its glory. People all around the world looked upon the city in amazement; for so great and well-formed was R'lyeh, unlike anything seen on earth before. This amazement was mixed with curiosity and fear as they saw the images of great old ones across the corners of the city.

Perhaps most jarring about the city was how non-Euclidean it was, as if the whole city and the island it rested on were built on a tilted angle. The main event took place when the cameras were settled upon a single hideous monolith-crowned citadel with an equally enormous tomb. Down on the surface, an enormous assembly of men and women from all across the different countries bowed before it wearing hooded robes. The helicopters went closer and a chant was caught upon the microphones. "Rise Cthulhu, awaken great dreamer!"

There were some at home who shouted at their screens for these cultists to get away, but their pleas went unheard. The tomb opened slowly and those who were present felt the foul stench of rotting carcass hit the air. There in the darkness of the citadel, a pair of enormous red eyes opened to the world. People dropped their hammers, pencils and remotes at this. Then two scaly, rubbery-looking hands, prodigious claws on both touched the sides of the tomb, they were just as green as the rest of the city, as if the two were composed of the same substance. At this moment, computers, televisions and medical equipment began to flicker and turn themselves on and off. Then he pulled himself forward, he was just as H.P Lovecraft had described him.

An octopus-like head whose face was a mass of tentacles, supported atop a humanoid body a scaly, rubbery-looking body, same claws upon his feet just as his hands. Behind him, long, narrow wings spread forth. At this there was a wide effect across all who gazed upon his body. The cultists, both those on R'lyeh and those who waited for him began to tear their clothes and holler in wide cheer, those of weak minds fell at the sight, either dead from fright or merely unconscious, and those strong-minded felt a wave of helplessness wash over them.

And then came what was not expected. From the clouds above R'lyeh came a blinding white light, as if the sun itself were coming down. The mayhem across the world ended, the cultists fell silent and attention was brought to the sky. From among the clouds came a huge blast of fire and without a single chance to defend himself, Cthulhu was crushed, incinerated in a single second along with all the men and women who were awaiting his return, both on R'lyeh and on dry land. As the fire settled upon Cthulhu's corpse, a closer look revealed that this was no mere fireball, but a hand.

The fiery hand stretched up into an arm and this arm was attached to a figure whose clothes were of pure white light, practically impossible to see. Behind this figure were six huge wings of fire. Two wings were covering its face, two more were closed behind it and the last two were below, possibly covering the figures legs. Directly above the figures head was a ring of gold light covered in sapphire flames. All those who were previously in fear, now felt a wave of peace.

This figure looked directly at the cameras of the helicopters and opened its mouth to utter only one word: "Forget."

And with that, the whole world which had previously witnessed the rise of Cthulhu, never spoke of it. Not even a passing thought. The whole matter was done with as if it had never happened. And the city of R'lyeh never resurfaced again. The Great Old Ones awaiting the Call of Cthulhu would be trapped in their death-sleep forever.

Yeah I figured that would be the predominant take, yours was really great tho better than mine by far

Interesting. Was he mocking the protagonist for staying alive? Some kind of appel-du-vide situation?

Oh I like this.

My grandfather was not the brightest. He was a Scottish man, and he felt like no rules applied to him. He always managed to talk his way out of any situation. Reckless like a teenager and stubborn like a goat. If you dared to tell him that smoking two packs of Marlboro Red each day would kill him, he would dismiss you. You could not tell him where he could smoke, when he could smoke or what he could smoke. The only person he paid attention to was himself.

That was his demise, as he perished after setting himself on fire at a BP gas station. He died on the scene, and only his closest family attended the closed casket service. There were rumours that he committed suicide since no one would be that stupid. But I believe he would.

For centuries, ghosts have haunted our imagination. The afterlife remains a mystery that has yet to be solved. However, in the instance of my grandfather, I wonder if he is really a figment of my imagination.

Every time I go to fill up my motorcycle, I hear his heavy-accented voice in my head, mocking me for being a jerk and not following his path. A few close friends of mine told me the same, and in no time, the "smoker ghost of BP" made the local news. BP sales at that station began to plummet. No PR campaign was strong enough to save that station. BP hired some charlatans to try to get rid of his ghost. But apparently, the old man is still the same stubborn person.

Meanwhile every victory of Slytherin is a proof that they are far superior than the half-bloods and muggle-borns.

Tom could have carried it further than others though. He was smart enough and angry enough and disillusioned enough by the life he had led thus far to carry it much, much further than any other Slytherin might.

That potential comes up in a person every now and then. Truth be told I have done this before. I have sensed the potential heir of Slytherin before… four times before to be exact.

No one likes to admit a contentious relationship with their progenitor, but Salazar was a Knob… I said what i said.

So I have squashed it before and I will squash it again. No one needs a basilisk stalking the halls of Hogwarts. No one needs another dark wizard raiding the restricted section of the library and attempting a return to the dark ages.

This story is getting long, so I’ll end it.

I sorted Tom into Hufflepuff. I sort MOST potential dark wizards into Hufflepuff. I haven’t had a dark wizard in all my years.

They go in angry, they go in wanting power, they go in convinced that they’re the best thing to hit the wizarding world since self-slicing bread.

Then they meet a rather jolly fellow Hufflepuff. Maybe a half-blood, maybe a muggle-born, maybe a pureblood who just doesn’t mesh with his family all that well.

“Slytherin is terrible!” That person tells them. “We always root against them in Quidditch, no matter who they play against.”

“Here, have some cake,” they say, “The house elves always treat us the best.”

“You can stay with me this summer if you like,” the natural-borne Hufflepuff says to the emotionally neglected, potential villain, “I can tell you don’t want to go back to that orphanage. My mom makes really great chicken curry!”

They’re eleven and they are above all, MALLEABLE.

Most of them turn out fine. Some of them turn out fat. A few of them remain jerks, but powerless jerks… because unlike Slytherin, a house for recruiting evil minions, Hufflepuff is not. Nor do the products of Slytherin find it easy to take a Hufflepuff seriously.

So yes. I made Tom Riddle a Hufflepuff. He currently works at Honeydukes. He isn’t as happy as he could be, but his friend Isidor Jenkins (who more or less adopted him in first year), takes him out for butter beer nightly.

“If I could work at Honeydukes I would DIE of happiness, Tom. You’re so lucky!” Isidor works for the Ministry, and it is boring.

“I should be more, I could be more!” Tom cries.

“You’ll run your own shop one day. Sure as rain. You make the best chocolate frogs anyone ever saw.”

“Chocolate frogs are stupid.” Tom cries.

“If you say so, Tom. You know candy better than anyone alive!”

Tom is slightly mollified. He DOES know candy better than anyone alive!

“Chocolate grasshoppers would be better.” He says, “grasshoppers can jump much farther respective to their body size than frogs. We would get much more jump per chocolate than with frogs.”

“Have you told your boss that?” Isidor asks.

“Yes.” Tom says. His boss said it was a really great idea too. It made him feel nice, to be acknowledged for his brilliance that way. He really was very smart.

“You really are very smart.” Isidor tells him. “You could have been a Ravenclaw for sure.

He could have been, Tom knows. Frankly he always felt that the sorting hat did rather badly misplace him. He wasn’t especially fond of chocolate, his excellence in enchanting it aside.

Is Tom as happy as he might have been, if I had placed him into Slytherin? Maybe not.

Maybe instead of inventing chocolate grasshoppers, he would have ruled the wizarding world (or some United Kingdom-sized portion thereof). Maybe he would have been less happy, and running a shop selling shrunken heads in knock-turn alley (again… I sort them when they are ELEVEN).

He hasn’t split his soul into eight or nine pieces either, though, so I will take the win.

I am the sorting hat of reality 4789, signing off.

One thing is certain. If had placed him in Slytherin… there would have been problems. Maybe big, world-spanning problems… maybe just “the minister of magic is a jerk” kind of problems… but problems.

With some people you can just tell. With Tom Riddle, you could really tell.

This kid was bad. Torturing kids in a sea-cave bad. Head full of snakes bad… potential heir of Slytherin bad.

Now, I need to say this: I’ve been a hat for a really long time. I’ve seen everything there is to see inside of an eleven-year-old’s head. Sorting them into a house based on their personality at eleven is HARD. Bit of a knob? Slytherin? Not afraid of closet monsters? Gryffindor. Good at maths? Ravenclaw. Like food? Hufflepuff.

Then, once they’re sorted they’re stuck there. The Ravenclaws get smarter, of course, because they’re surrounded by people fond of forming study groups. The Gryffindors get braver, because they’re rewarded for acting precociously. The Hufflepuffs mostly get fat, but if I’m being honest I envy them… they have the easiest go of any other house… low expectations all around.

The Slytherins though… and we need to talk about them, because what I’ve done is deeply based upon what I know they are… The Slytherins are just a textbook example of why sorting people into groups based on their traits is a bad idea.

They’re all mad.

They all grew up being told they are superior…or feeling as though they were superior… to muggles.

Most of them have heard that notion reenforced by parents or grandparents or aunts or uncles.

And once they are in school and safely sorted into their ticking-bomb of a house, that’s all they hear from their friends and well.

All while getting angrier, by the way, because even though they ALL agree they are fabulous, evidence to the contrary rears its head FREQUENTLY.

No house cup for you, Slytherin. Gryffindor was braver. Ravenclaw was smarter, Hufflepuff chugged along as Hufflepuff does, and won the war by sheer consistency.

No one likes you by the way.

Mostly it comes to nothing. The kids grow up to replace the parents… younger versions of some old do-nothing member of some venerable wizarding family.

Tom Riddle was different though. He could have pushed that carefully cultivated anger and that sense of superiority to new heights. He could have been a dark lord.

(Or a really bad minister of magic… Have I mentioned that this is hard?)

He could even have been the heir of Slytherin.

Yes that Slytherin. One of my four parents. Snake-dad.

I’ve actually averted several heirs of Slytherin over the years… people who checked all the genetic and attitude related boxes… and on that note, we come to the point of my story.

Tom Riddle was unequivocally a Slytherin. Everything in his head screamed of me to put him into that house. He was even a Parseltongue.

I did not.

Judge me all you like. I’m a bad, bad sorting hat.

But, oh. It would have gone the way it always goes.

“You’re special, Tom.”

“You’re better, Tom!”

“You deserve more, Tom!”

All ideas that Tom had anyways. Trust me.

Special Tom would have underperformed in herbology, though… Danika Swick of Hufflepuff would take top marks.

Better Tom would not be as good on a broom as Charles Zair of Ravenclaw. A half-blood.

Deserving Tom would interpret all of this the way that most Slytherins do… as a massive injustice that took place through no fault of his own.

I also put in Hufflepuff

The Messiah showed up - Not what you expected

Thirty-three wounds in reality are known. Places where "normal" break down into any form of utter insanity. There is of course the Everstorm over greater Man Island, the most notorious of them all. However, deep in the volcanic flat lands of lower Serkursks, there is one wound in reality that is most notorious in a very different way. An enclave of international cooperation is formed around a seemingly unimportant tear in the ground. A place to house mages, too powerful to just be put in a regular prison, but otherwise too valuable to simply kill with Anti-Magic.

Each cell is precariously placed above the chasm. It is sad to see bottomless or a gate somewhere else. Whatever it may be, anything dropped into it is lost forever. The walls of the chasm stretch roughly a thousand meters down, which one would say would be enough time to maybe reach them and climb back out, but there is a catch, below the first twenty meters or so, there is no more terminal velocity, in the air no less. Everything dropped below that threshold just keeps accelerating. A thousand meters rush by fast under those conditions.

The inmates are dazed constantly by a fine mist of very potent substances that are sprayed into the cell. similar to what they do in Prussia, but dialed up to eleven. And if that is not enough, the cell is just dropped into the void that is the Oblivion Rift.

As it so happens, Gustav Roth was sitting in one of these cells. Once known as a powerful force for good, a hero of the people, and one of the most powerful magic users the world has ever seen, he was now rotting in his hell hole. Lock away until the day, he might be of use or until someone decided to just rid the world of him through the Rift below.

One day, Gustav realized, the fine mist of suppressants had stopped. He did not know how long it would have taken him to regain his sanity, but he could now think again for the first time ... Who knows how long. A door slid open to his side and fresh air flooded the confines of his cell.

"Guten Tag, Herr Roth."

The woman standing at the door wore regular office attire, but her entire presence screamed danger.

"What do you want, Winter?"

"There is a chance for you to redeem yourself. Someone managed to enter the Visitor's Grand Castle of Valdestian and stole one of the tomes of their ancient magic. It appears whoever they are, is capable of reading, their old script and they can comprehend and utilize the magic within. We need a force just as great. And against my expertise, I was ordered to give you this chance at redemption."

"You must be furious", Gustav said.

"I have orders to abide by. My grief with them doesn't matter. Unless of course, I deem you irredeemable, in that case, I just drop your sorry ass in the Rift right here and now."

There was a slight tremble in her voice. To see her in that state, caught between what she wanted to do and what she had to do was oddly invigorating. Gustav rose from his humble bench with aching muscles. With his mind no longer clouded by chemicals, he instinctively pulled on the life force and felt it flood into him, activating his body's regenerative abilities, supercharging them until he was fully recovered from years or decades of being incarcerated.

"Who will I have to answer to?" he asked while stepping towards the door.

His form, now charged again with magic, had grown to his former impressive state. The picture of a hero. Even Winters's Aura of perpetual danger appeared dull before him now.

"You will answer to Fuchs or Mallard. Whoever is closest at any given moment. And when everything is done, you will return here until further notice!"

"What a redemption would that be if you lock me up again after I saved everyone?"

"As you will be returning of your own volition, it would be a great sign of redemption. The greatest menace to the world, returning their own free will into containment until their case has been predetermined. Because that is what a hero would do!"

He stood now right in front of her. The only thing keeping her alive was his restraint of himself and the fact that his cell had been lowered to a walkway directly above the threshold of the Rift, which he now noticed.

"Fine, I accept your offer."

"Follow me then", Winter said and led him out of his cell into a new future.

He felt giddy with excitement. He could't wait to see how the world had changed and what that threat was that they needed him if all people to fight.

“HUFFLEPUFF”

Hufflepuff? Tom didn’t know what that house was all about, but those kids wearing yellow were smiling and waving him over, so he shuffled over to their table and reluctantly sat next to a girl from his year. Anne Laurent was her name, if he remembered correctly.

As Tom began to space out watching the sorting, the girl sitting next to him suddenly turned and began speak. “Hi, my name’s Annie!” Her voice was bright and lively, a welcome break from the strict and angry tones of the matrons from back home.

Tom didn’t quite know how to respond, the kids back home didn’t really talk to him, except to mock or bully him. The closest thing to a friend that he ever had, was Matron Millie, who was slightly less strict than the others. So when a random nice girl tried to talk to him, the only thing he could say was, “It’s nice to meet you Annie, my name is Tom.”

“It’s nice to meet you too Tom. So Tom, class are you the most excited for? I can’t wait for herbology, I love plants!” The truth was, Tom hadn’t thought much about his classes. He’d agreed to come to this school only because it meant he didn’t have spend the winter in his cold little room back at his home. But he couldn’t say that to Annie, crushing her enthusiasm like that would put distance between her and him.

“I’m excited for herbology too, I just find plants some cool. Besides, I heard Hogwarts has some awesome magical plants. I can’t wait to see them in real life.” Whew, he successfully redirected the conversation. Then, Annie went off. She raved and ranted about different magical plants she’d read about, and all Tom needed to do was listen and say “yeah” or “mhm that’s so cool” every once and a while.

When the food came, Tom was overwhelmed, but that’s wasn’t new. Everything he had encountered since his first meeting with the mysterious wizard Dumbledore had been frankly fantastical. A whole world of magic, sitting just under his nose and in his bloodline. An explanation for all the anomalous chaos of his childhood. And now that he had begun hanging out in the social vicinity of Annie, as well as other members of Hufflepuff house, he found that he was not alone.

r/CookieJarOfChaos

If we assume that physics aren't broken, then none of this is possible. This is where suspension of disbelief is useful.

Jim. Age 65, looks 70. Lived in a small rural town with one local gas station. It was a small convenience store with 2 gas pumps available. He has been a regular at this gas station for 40 years. Jim was truck Driver for Walmart. Smoked a pack of John Player Blue Kingsize cigarettes daily. He was 5’8” with salt and pepper hair and a scraggly grey beard with yellow stains. He always had a dreary facial expression, you can tell he was not phased by anything. However, if you really got talking to him, he was extremely opinionated when it comes to politics.

Jim drove a rusty 1989 Chevrolet Truck. He bought it brand new back then and has been changing the oil and doing the annual maintenance himself for over 20 years. Jim wasn’t a mechanic, he just didn’t want to pay anyone to do work on his truck because he was confident he could do it himself. You could never be sure if the truck would actually turn on when you turned the key in the ignition, and when you did, it made 2-4 ‘chugging’ noises before it got going.

Jim was smoking a cigarette when he was filling up his gas one day and blew up the local gas station. Jim was killed in the explosion.

The plot of land remained empty for about 5 years. During that time, there were 7 accidents reported. Each accident involved a Chevrolet Silverado. The accidents happened at night. They reported seeing an old Chevrolet truck stopped right in front of them as they were on their local highway. They said that it was too late by the time they even saw the break lights. Each truck spun out and rolled into the ditch right where the old gas station used to be. Even though each person reported seeing the same thing, there was no damage on their Chevrolet trucks that suggested another vehicle has been involved.

Finally, the small town started to become more industrial and modern over those five years leading to more businesses and opportunities for the locals to work. Circle K purchased the land and build a brand new gas station right where the old one once stood.

Now, those who have older Chevrolet trucks (trucks that existed while Jim was still alive) report having issues with their vehicles while they are at the new Circle K gas station, and they report having issues afterwards. After they fill up their gas, their trucks make awful chugging noises when they turn the key in the ignition. Some trucks don’t won’t start at all, they’ve had to tow trucks to the local mechanic many times. Once it’s there, it starts with no issues. Many have also reported that their engine oil had turned black just from getting gas there, even if they had it recently changed.

The town has grown quite quickly over 5 years, but the locals who have been there for a long time know exactly what’s going on… and they definitely won’t be getting a Chevrolet truck any time soon.