It was a month before Agatha regained consciousness. Just one slight push off a building was all it took to end her career as a hero. I only meant to slightly injure, maybe break a bone. Unfortunately for both of us the cat and mouse game was ended with her failing to catch herself and bouncing her head on the pavement. I still remember her black hair a cacophony stuck to her skin in the gentle October rain. Under the guise of being her girlfriend I was there when the doctor told her family and I that it was unlikely for her to wake up, and even more unlikely for her to ever take her characteristic confident strides ever again. I stayed there by her side: longer than her father, and even her mother. If we were ever to spar again I would personally need to strengthen her, invigorate her with the demonic blood I too had been given all those years ago as a young adult. Then a couple weeks later I was roused from a nap at her bedside by a gasp of pain. "The pain should only last for a few more days" I said. Despite the no doubt deafening wall of agony she was able to force out a few words and a faint smile. "I don't know what you've done to me, but I know you went too far this time. I will kill you." I stepped over to her and placed my hand on her head and lulled her back to sleep and the world. The air in the hospital was stale and smelled of bleach, but for that instant when she threatened me the world felt alive and that same air trembled with a spark. Unsure if the demonic influence had coaxed her into such a statement, or if she truly had been capable all along, I was intrigued. It was then I had her transferred into a private facility. one week later she awoke once more with me in the room.

"Why are you here, Eleana?" she asked me while being restrained to her bed under white silk sheets.

"I'm just a concerned citizen nursing a dear fallen hero back to health" I said putting my hands over my heart.

"I'll rip that heart out the first chance I get." Never before had I seen her conscious without a smile. It was almost enough to bring a tear to my eye.

"Then I'll let you out of those restraints and we'll have one last dance" I said as stepped across the room towards her.

I agree with you both. As a physics enthusiast it's a really annoying misconception, as a sci-fi lover this is a really cool idea.

MOAR

[removed]

[removed]

"The world is as we perceive it." At least, thats what dad always used to say, but then again dad never saw much himself. Cataracts, he had. From a young age I would wind up describing to him how we would both end up perceiving the world. The color of the cars on the freeway. The shape of the milk crates at the store. How the eyes in the walls stared at us, unblinking. How the world shifted and groaned when others looked away. The wires that held us all together, like puppets of flesh. Where my father could see nothing, I saw everything.

And then my father would always say, "You sure it's not you who needs your eyes checked boy?" and laugh. But I was not laughing.

The world was made of mishaped pieces all desperately trying to find a place they fit. I guess that led to plenty of pieces that didn't, and for one reason or another I could see those pieces. One moment the road was road, the next the pavement flowed like a blackened river down stream. My father was my father, then he was just fleshy shapes resembling what the man once was.

I still remember the day I saw a building collapse in on itself. Not because it happened, but because I knew it would. The pieces didn't fit together smoothly. They had decayed into misshapen bits like a game of Jenga long into its lifespan. Others could not see it, but it was so clear to me. Then, poof, the game was lost and the pieces sat piled up on the floor.

Life was different for me, always was. In buildings walls shifted until comfortable, the floors melted, ceilings flew around as birds on a wire. But even those things had become the normal to me.

When that building fell, however, I began to ask: If the world is as we perceive it, then how does it perceive us?

[removed]

"Oh I have no soul"

She was clearly taken aback by how casually I broke it down to her, but starting like this only makes it easier to get her used to the idea. I was never a normal man. Always was somewhat distant towards others and I always seemed to be out of touch with what was normal and whatnot. Some called me a sociopath, but I was still too "alive" to say the least in order to be one. I care and have always cared for others which is why I was able to marry My'rrha when we were younger. She always told me she fell in love with how I just resonated with her.

"What do you mean, are you undead??" she asked in shock as she stood up from our table. I told her "No. Not undead, just soulless". I cannot blame her for feeling confused. The only ways elves are taught in most of their cultures that one can lack a soul are by being reanimated as a walker or having it shattered and spread into items. I wasn't like this. Believe me, I'd know. I'd feel. But I don't. My flesh doesn't decay and I can't feel the faint warmth I once had in my chest.

Of course, she then asked me how I am still alive or rather how can I still exist. Truth be told, I don't know either. Most things have a soul, an identity or a heart as they tend to say. A hammer will have a spirit that resonates to those akin to its first user or creator. A sword once used by knights of yore will only allow itself to be possessed by those with brave hearts. A dog would only lick the face of a man with a kindered spirit. I don't have that. I don't think I can ever have that again either.

As to how it happened, it did when I was still a teen. Many winters ago. Many before even My'rrha was born. My village was attacked on a summer day by 4 dark knights, followed by 2 liches. They killed everyone and raised them as undead slaves and forced them to attack and slaughter the neighboring towns all the while I was still out to play in the forest all by myself, bathing my bare legs in the cold river water.

Hours passed by without me even realizing it as my father usually went after me to grab me home for dinner, but this time that didn't happen. I only noticed that It was late once the water became too cold and the sun began to set. I rushed home, being afraid of getting scolded and going to bed on an empty stomach only to find a desolate burnt field where my home once was.

I got pinned down and I could feel them ripping my flesh apart. The undead can generally hear the beating of a heart from hundreds of meters away. I got ambushed. Fortunately, the adrenaline kicked in and I could feel nothing as my mind eventually faded away.

In what felt like an instant, I woke up to a knight wearing bright armor riding a white horse. As he watched me, giving what I assume is a thirty yard stare as his face was covered he began talking on an intrigued tone: "Curious. I have been watching you for years. Every time you fell and hit your head. Every time you caught a cold and every time another kid hit you with a rock a little too hard. I was always there, watching you and only you. You reek. You reek of something that does not belong among the rest. You're not of our devine creation and now that you died your soul was claimed by something else and not by my blade. Pestilence reanimated you, but it died once it finished among any other plague that touched your body. You are mind without soul and are therefore out of my jurisdiction as you're neither dead, undead or alive". As soon as he finished, he quickly left.

From that point on, no plague ever touched me and no ammount of time ever left an impact neither on my skin nor my hair. Every strike I felt healed as if it never happened and every child I bore died soon after birth, usually together with their mother. I roam the world waiting for whatever is my creator, to finally let me rest. To finally accept me as their child.

As soon as I told her everything, My'rrha left our house feeling the need for some fresh air and some space. I cannot blame her, I cannot blame her in the slightest but I still feel deep regret for making her feel this way. She makes my eternal torment bearable and I know she can be here for me untill the end as her elven kin does not die due to age.

[removed]

Is this the famed enemies to lovers arc I keep hearing about?

Goddamn, that is a good little read. Thank you, kind sir.

Thanks friend!

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

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This feels like a beautiful and sad meditation. I can relate to it, though I don’t know if what I am getting is what is intended. But personally I think that’s what happens when you create layered, multidimensional art.

I took a little spin and switched roles a little, it flowed easier from the elf pov.

“Look babe, we have been through this before, I just take care of myself. You eat nothing but vegetables and can’t seem to stop doing yoga, or dance, or even that weird sword fighting stuff. No one has sword fought in well over 100 years. I do everything you do. It’s proven by science and everything.” He throws back at me. The arguments have turned fairly defensive lately displayed in a tone that turns my suspicious demeanor even stronger. Why can’t he just tell the truth?

“You just turned 55, from my count you should have some sort of age on your face. What does it matter what we both do, it’s obvious I won’t age but I’ve been alive for 380 years. I’ve seen man age. You haven’t! Your excuses have gotten out of hand. We have been married for more than 20 years and you look exactly the same. There is no way!” As the desperation exudes from every word I can’t help but think that this argument is going nowhere, again. I have been building experience and instincts for a few hundred years has made it incredibly easy to read people. This man is lying.

His shoulders, pulled back, in an attempt to make himself appear larger and even have the confidence a 21 year old tells no truth. At his age the old pretense of being the biggest and strongest in a room should have washed away by now. Bellowing out, his aura of youth spilling with every rise in emotion. Nothing had changed since he was allegedly 35 when he perceived there was something to prove.

“You’re getting out of hand and crazy again. Overreacting like usual. I’m starting to think your intuition is clouded somehow. You’re just like all the other women.” His snide remark seemed to come out of nowhere. Honestly is a virtue and this dug deep. Eloquence of language had never been his strength.

Responding with a coolness that should have been a warning, “Seems that you’re fighting dirty because you know I’m right. You’re not what or who you say you are.” That should stop it

Of course he didn’t take the bait. Drawing a breath from deep within,” 300 years and you’re just an old suspicious hag.”

[removed]

If a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?

Sorta.

I was born with this... thing. I'm not an active observer in the eyes of the universe. I know, I know - it sounds ridiculous, but here's the brunt of it. Things only happen when there is an active observer of that given event... apparently. The countless scientists that have flocked around me since my birth keep saying things of that nature but I'll be damned if I understand them. Something about quantum physics. And since, for whatever reason, I do not count as an observer, I know what happens when things lie somewhere between happening and not happening. So, what is it?

It's weird. And it's beautiful.

I've flipped a coin when no one was around and called heads, tails, and falling on its edge. I was correct. I've heard Schrödinger's cat meow in that box, knowing it was and was not dead. I have unironically answered something with 'yesn't'. But most importantly, I've seen the cracks.

When things go unobserved long enough, these breaks start to form, almost as if reality was about to fracture. It's like glass that's been cracked and the rift is slowly expanding as you hear the creaking noise, knowing it can give at any moment. Every time it gets too big, someone or something comes along to observe it and - it was never there. Always wondered what would happen if one of those... broke. Truly and completely. Maybe one already has and I don't know it.

There's one behind your left ear right now, you know?

Oh, don't worry. Someone will come along soon enough. Or just use a mirror. You won't see it there. It will never have been there.

Anyway! I really should get going. Another round of tests back at the lab. Thanks for the coffee.

I'll be seeing you.

Metaphorically speaking.

Subscribed!

"..." (It's just an artifact. It cannot speak)

If this could happen, then you bet I'd be setting up a real-life Schrodinger's Cat to find out what a cat looks like when neither dead nor alive.

Just by reading the story, I would see the two having interesting superpowers/ abilities. Also the route for their relationship is interesting. Thank you for checking out my prompt!

"You don't know the capacity of your own imagination until your hallucinations become the only thing you have. It's all too easy when you're in prison, blindfolded, cuffed, and hanging from the air with earmuffs on, to see false images that are as pleasing as they are implausible. I just want to go back to the way it was in the days before I joined the Army. To see what's real instead of my imagination."

"Go on," my therapist said as she started jotting down notes. Her face was relaxed and she was smiling, as if I had just told her I was going to be her friend or something.

"You see, I don't see a street corner, or a jar, or busy passersby. I see a kingdom and I'm a wizard. I'm casting a spell that requires deep concentration, the passersby are my source of mana. When I complete the spell I'll gain another artifact to help me complete my quest."

"And what do you do with these artifacts?" she said inquisitively.

"I consume them in order to gain power. Each time I consume an artifact I gain more."

"I see. And when does the spell break? Like, when do you come back to reality?"

"I tend to come in and out. One minute I'll be stuck in my head and another I'll realize that I'm sitting on a street corner with a jar in my hand. Then I'll try my very hardest to go back because being there, in reality, is just... too painful. When I get in my head, it's kind of like, going to a different universe."

"Hmm," she paused, staring down at the notebook. "Have you considered that these trips into your head are a way to shield your mind from the hurt you endured while in prison?"

"Yeah."

"Have you considered trying hypnotherapy? It's been known to work on cases such as yours, and your sister has already agreed to pay."

"I don't know about that."

"If you want to try to help yourself come to terms with reality it's the best thing. Why not give it a shot?"

I felt a slight pulsing sensation in my head, and a moment later I saw the healer Cassandra in her purple robe, her scepter pointed at my head, telling me repeatedly not to misuse my powers or else I'd face the Tribunal or perhaps the King himself.

"Unfortunately, you must subject yourself to The Silencing," she said, "and only in that way will you wean yourself from the hallucinogenic dragon's blood."

"No!" I screamed, suddenly feeling the tightness of my robe against my skin. It was always weird to look down and see it after I'd been lost in the world where magic was done with electricity instead of mana and it wasn't OK for men to wear robes in public.

"Yes. Your trips have become too much. You've been reduced to nothing more than a common beggar. Please, take the Silencing and go home."

I jolted. "Matt?" the therapist said with concern, uncrossing her legs to make that she was ready to get up to assist me.

"Yeah, maybe hypnotherapy. I don't know."

"Why not? It could only help," she said with a smile again.

"I don't know. Maybe reality is all in my head."

/r/StoriesToThinkAbout

[removed]

I have a habit. My habit is perfectly sane, utterly normal, as are all customs a man might have that pertain to lunch. Every day at noon, not 11:59, not 12:01, but directly on the dot of noon, I fold my jacket on my chair, put my overworked computer to sleep, and step out into the street with my lunchbox in my left hand.

Left. Left hand and a left turn and objects fuzzing out into left field as my perfectly sane habit begins to dissolve. At 12:05—what would be 12:05, if the clocks had not stopped—I sit on the edge of a fountain in the nearby square and watch the water as it goes still. And then, only then, after the currents are done eddying, do I unpack my tuna sandwich and look out at what has become of the world.

It is 12:08, and this is what I see:

A thin line of smoke trails through the open window of a food truck selling wood-fired pizzas to haze a couple arguing beneath the window, their faces like hastily sketched lines; a child running too close to a public art exhibit has fallen and scraped his knee, instead of crying he stares down at the torn skin and imagines, very bravely, that he is a soldier; a man seated on a telescoping stool plays the soprano saxophone, his eyes all squeezed up with what I can only assume is love; fat pigeons crowd around an old woman’s frayed skirts; dogs fight; red streetlights gleam like omens; a plane flying far above us has its landing gear stuck only partially retracted, the black specks of tires slung beneath its bole like rotten fruit; men watch women; women eye those same men carefully, and frozen as they are they look like rabbits in a field, standing still in case the stalking cat has not yet seen them.

By 12:42 I have finished my sandwich, crackers, and half a diet coke. The world has narrowed to a pair of slits. I think—I always think—that I have been forgotten. That all this world around me is a product of someone else’s imagination, some dreamer lingering in bed somewhere, a young woman, beautiful, with no imagination left over to finish sketching me, and that this is why it all seems so foreign. Why every little detail makes me feel so shocked.

By 12:50 I’ve settled on a person. The old woman with pigeons. She has kind eyes, and the birds seem to like her—birds have instincts, they know a thing or two.

I approach her at 12:51, and her edges all begin to shimmer. She wavers. Becomes indistinct. It’s like a breeze is passing through the world, fluttering her body and not just her skirts, until she is nothing more than a haze of linear motion.

I touch her face at 12:52 and watch as it erupts into discreet particles. Dissolves away from me. I touch the pigeons and they rupture too. Touch the couple arguing outside the food truck, the fighting dogs, the boy who dreams he is a soldier, and the whole goddamn world erupts.

At 12:55 I walk back to the office.

Put the jacket on. Button up my shirt.

At 1:00, not 12:59, not 1:01, I hit any key to continue, and my perfectly sane lunch hour comes to a sudden end.

Jack walks by, and Miriam. Alexei, Imran, and Kennedy, and none of us say a word.

And I wonder for the thousandth time if any of this shit can possibly be real.

r/TurningtoWords

A young girl’s long scream rang throughout the village. But this was no scream of fear, rather, it was one of grief. Grief in its purest, rawest form spread like a contagion through the village. The shoemaker’s daughter, who was the village dreamer, the village hoper, the village optimist, could be no longer, for she was gone.

Yet, the Elder’s daughter would not give in. She spent hours peering over the village’s old texts, trying to discover a way to revive her now gone love. But as hours faded into weeks, and weeks into months, there was nothing of use she had found. It seemed no such thing existed, until she was reminded of a legend one night. The legend of the Wishbringer. It was said to bring unlimited power for a price. Yet, the girl knows that there is no price she would not pay. So at dusk, she left home, leaving no note, because no words could express what she wanted to communicate.

A half-season’s worth of trekking through muddy swamps, crossing rapid rivers, and traversing lush meadows finally brought the girl forth to the mountain. And just to get up to the near-mythical cave just under the mountain’s peak was a journey of several days. But when the girl entered, frail and thin from her wearing adventure, she knew she’d found exactly what she sought out.

Traveler, said a voice that seemed to be everywhere and nowhere at once. So you seek me. No, I’m over here. To the left. The other left. And finally, the girl could see the infamous Wishbringer. It was a crown, a humble crown of gilded iron, with no gems bequeathed to it. Place me atop your head, dear girl, and you shall have powers unimagined, with which to do your bidding.

“Not so fast,” came a defiant reply. “I know what you are. I know what you do to your… your vessels.” She took a deep breath. “Yet, I will be your vessel anyways. But in exchange, I have a request.”

Wishbringer had never faced such audacity before. Most of its foolish victims had come, and within minutes, been horribly transformed into its pawns with which to wreak havoc. But it almost respected this girl’s courage. So it agreed. Tell me what you wish of, and it shall be granted once we are bonded.

“Bring her back. The shoemaker’s daughter.”

But surely you understand? She is gone. No magic can truly-

“Do we have a deal or not?” the girl snapped back, interrupting the warning. “I want you to bring her back.”

So be it, the exasperated voice answered. You shall have your lover back.

The girl does not bother to question how the voice knows this. Instead, she steps forward, and with no hesitation, places the aged crown upon her head. As soon as there is contact between the hairs upon her head and the Wishbringer itself, a guttural scream of agony is released into the wild. She’s changing, losing her humanity, growing taller and stronger, as the scream changes into an animalistic roar. What emerges from the cave is a fusion of human and beast beyond you or me. And both sides want just one thing- to reach the village.

It’s been a full season now since the Elder’s daughter disappeared. He has his suspicions, yes, but he dares not speak them out of fear. But everyone in the village has felt something off. A new presence, so to speak, throughout the village, first noticed midway through the harvest season. Yet it is not quite tangible. Nobody is quite sure who… or what it is. Yet it has been benign so far, so the villagers keep on living, going on with their lives. Until a new presence, much less benign, disrupts the once peaceful village.

It roars. It’s terrifying. Some say it’s a wolf; others say it’s a bear. But one thing is sure- it wants nothing but blood. The blood of the animals grazing, the blood of the son hiding beneath the table crying out one last time for his elder sister, and the blood of the village itself. It takes down houses, destroys the freshly planted seed, everything the village needs to survive, gone. What misfortune, which deadly sins have brought this monster upon the village?

The Elder knows. The Elder knew from the start what was happening. Had he spoken, perhaps this was avoidable. Perhaps not. But no matter. It is his job, his sworn duty, to save this village. So standing in the village square, at the shoemaker’s home, the last standing structure of the village, he waits for the monster. And she comes.

“Daughter, please,” he said softly, his wise eyes saddened, yet firm as her red, bestial eyes narrow at him. This mortal- who was he to stop her? She took a step toward him, ready to kill. But a blue light appears between the two before she can get any closer. It burns brighter and brighter, the presence finally revealing itself. The shoemaker’s daughter. But not quite. She is not fully there- she is a ghost, cursed to be undead. And finally, the monster recognizes someone. It stops, eyes widened.

I do not know who or what you seek, but you will leave this village. Now. Her mouth is not open. Only the young girl turned monster can understand. And she does. Falling to the ground, her humanity is restored. Remorse. Remorse is the one thing that frees from the Wishbringer. And nothing strikes remorse than the disappointment of the shoemaker’s daughter. The Elder’s suspicions are confirmed as she slowly transforms back, the crown falling onto the soft dirt with a thud.

The spirit stares down, completely taken by surprise . After a minute of silence, she speaks up. Why? How could you do this?

“I… I needed to see you again,” responded the girl. “How could I go on without you?”

You should have known the dead cannot truly come back. The spirit smiled. Because we never truly leave. Rarely are we visible, but trust me- we are always there. And now, to fix all this… The spirit’s aura became brighter until all were forced to close their eyes, and once they opened them, the village was fixed, the spirit of the shoemaker’s daughter was nearly transparent, and fading.

Remember that I’m always here.