Story Collaboration 6-6-21

 “Buying bread from a man in Brussels.  He was six foot four and full of muscle.” Every time John heard the song by Men at Work he couldn’t help but think it could have been about him.  John stood at six foot seven and he was certainly full of muscle anyway.  Well at least that was his normal height but now as he slipped through the darkened streets of his hometown shuffling past the now shuttered RiteAid its blacked out windows seeming to reflect the darkness of his thoughts John found himself thinking back to the beginning of his odd journey.  

March 16th just four days after his birthday John had woken to an odd buzzing that seemed to grow stronger as he listened but when he tried to focus on where it was coming from the sound would quickly fade away.  After five or six minutes or maybe it was an hour, John couldn’t really tell, he decided it was time to get up and investigate the sound.   With sleep still holding him tightly in its embrace John slowly rolled over and stretched his hand out but couldn’t quite reach the bedside lamp.  “That’s weird,” he thought “I must have moved the lamp.”  He reached a little further and his hand finally found the switch and he gave it a flick but no light just the ebony night.

  “Damn” he thought, “the power must have gone out during the night.”  He clicked the switch a few more times but the light still wouldn’t turn on.  “Great, just great.” John grumbled.  “I am going to have to go all the way to the basement and reset the breaker.”  He swung his legs over the edge and started to stand up.  That is when John realized there was really something wrong and before he could comprehend what was happening he fell face first onto the floor.  John’s thoughts raced ahead and he quickly realized it shouldn’t have been possible for him to fall onto the floor without hitting the wall that was less than two feet from the bed.   John pushed himself to his feet and reached for the drawer of the nightstand to pull out the flashlight but found that he couldn’t reach the drawer.  

“Man, this has got to be a dream.  Come on wake up John.” He screamed in his head.  Now John was fully awake and with the faint silvery white light of the moon illuminating the table and bed he realized that his eyes were level with his mattress. 

 (End of Brandon’s part)

(Aaron begins)

How in the world did he end up on the floor? By the moonlight coming in the window, he took stock of the situation. All limbs accounted for. Slightly bruised, but that made sense. Then out of the corner of his eye, he saw something move, skittering along the edge of the windowsill and dashing out of sight. His own scream still echoed in his head, but he steadied himself, walked to the windowsill and looked out to see a trail of very small mice carrying one peanut each held carefully above their heads. The trail of mice rounded the corner heading up his roof in such an orderly fashion that he rubbed his eyes in wonder. John wasn’t even clear on where the mice had gotten peanuts, he didn’t think he had any. Gingerly he stepped over the windowsill and out onto the roof, careful about his footing. He followed the row of mice, who showed no sign of caring that he was out clambering about on his roof, they came to the top and leapt off the edge without a care.

(End of Aaron’s)

(Beginning of Anders)

He looked over the edge, unsure of what to expect. His house was not so tall; the fall wouldn’t be long, but it was likely still dangerous. The mice were easy to pick out, gray as they were, scurrying through the yellowing grass. He wasn’t sure if he was relieved that they had survived the fall or concerned that they had jumped so readily. Did they do this often? He hadn’t thought he had a mouse problem, but their navigation of the house and roof suggested otherwise. That and the fact that he seemed to go through cheese twice as fast as he used to. There were never any nibble marks on the cheese wheels, but every so often when he went back into the larder for a new wheel of cheese he was alarmed to find that instead of two or three extras as he expected, there would be only one. 

(End Anders)

(Start Carrie)

Why this happened, baffled him. As he left the larder his mind turned to other things, like the upcoming party he was hosting. The expected number of attendees was growing daily and he wasn’t completely sure he could handle that many people at the venue. It was time to start looking for a larger place. As he reached the top step and closed the door behind him, a hand closed around him arm, he screamed and dropped the cheese wheel. His mind went blank and darkness encased him. His last thought was: “oh no, not again!” Then he blacked out.

(End Carrie)

(Begin Cary)

If only that watermelon hadn’t rolled off the truck just as he was sitting down to take a break.  After all these years of loading trucks with all kinds of stuff that he could remember that much.  Just a moment of inattention and a person gets an on-the-job injury.  Kiss the chairmanship of the union safety committee goodby this year….

(End Cary)

(Begin colleen)

It was almost comical. First the banana peel in the doorway left by the unsupervised two year old that she couldn’t see because she was carrying a box that was five inches higher than her head. Then when she plugged in the electric typewriter to complete the incident report, the lights went out after sparks flashed—circuit overload the plumber said. He was in the crawl space looking for the leaking pipe. Turns out he didn’t need any light, water gushed on his head at that moment. No this would not be the year without any safety events and my aspirations floated out the door to the under ground space with the plumber... in the dark

(End Colleen)

(Begin dad)

But all is not lost.  I’m sure.  I’ll just make a few minor design adjustments.  Look at the whole situation in a different light.  Well, that was my thinking at first, but inspiration struck like a thunderbolt.  I would build a bowling alley, underground, right here under my humble house.  Bowling would never be the same.  Everyone would be wearing night vision goggles.  I could envision a whole new concept.  Underground sports would be all the rage.  Everything from bowling to baseball and golf, maybe even an indie 500 and demolition derbies, all underground and I’ll receive accolades as the originator of the greatest and most popular sporting events of all time.

(End Dad)

(Begin Hokan)

The mole person across from me rubbed his little mole person mitts together in obvious, avaricious glee.

 

“And we shall acquire all the funding we need for all our most dastardly plans,” it’s voice wheezed like the old Chicago gangster version of a very old accordion. I didn’t particularly like working with mole people—everyone knew they were hiding Hitler at the center of the earth and had been for years. But you just couldn’t do things underground without them finding out. Best to deal with them up front.

 

“That’s right, you’ll get your cut,” I said. “Did you bring what we agreed?” It chortled—I wanted to vomit—and waved it’s fellows forward. They approached with a bundle carried between them in a some kind of canvass sack and dropped it on the ground next to me.

 

“One Olympian as requested,” the leader of the mole people said smugly. I stared down at the massive bundle. One could just make out the shape of what might be arms or legs in there.

 

“What sport?” I got a blank stare in return and asked again, more impatiently. “Which sport does it play?”

“We…thought you desired an actual Olympian. We got Hermes in there.” I stared down at the bundle in horror. What had I done?

(End Hokan)

(Begin Javin)

I was shocked but I had a feeling that I need to get revenge I picked up my glock18 chamber in 9mm and my MAC-10 and I went to the gas station and shot the gas pump with my MAC-10 it exploded it will be bad for the environment but they had to pay. I was so sad that I was doing burnouts I accidentally killed my Tasmanian devils but we need to go all electric

(End javin)

(Begin Maja)

Yes, I probably shouldn’t have switched to gas-powered, since that’s what ultimately killed the little devils. (They guzzle gas exactly the way a wasp feasts on fallen, overripe fruit: until they drop--dead.) But, like I said, I was so sad I was doing burnouts I had to try something new. It didn’t work. And now we’re going all electric. At least, that’s what I told them in the board meeting, a statement met with absolute uproar. The windows were still intact by the end, but the lightbulbs in the chandelier over the table popped just like my eardrums—just a few more casualties to add to my count.

(End Maja)

(Begin Mom)

An army of gigantic termites is over running my house.  They are wreaking all sorts of havoc.  Before the destruction of the window, the light bulbs and the chandelier, the wall supports were chewed through.  I am afraid that the whole house is going to collapse before i can dig myself out of the debris that has already fallen on me.  The neighbors had warned me before I bought this house that all kinds of weird things had happened to the others that had owned the dwelling.  I just chalked it up to vicious rumors.   Everything was fine until today, really tonight.  If i could just find my cell phone, I could call for ghostbusters and they would come and rid this house and get me out!

(End of mom)

(Begin Scott)

 You see, slimer has been ruining my house for the past three hours. Slime all over the walls, in my toaster (seriously, the TOASTER), and on my bed. 

I needed to find that phone. I couldn’t like like this. The movies growing up had burned it into my memory “who ya gonna call, GHOSTBUSTERS!” If this continued, soon I’d be dealing with the stay puff marshmallow man himself. Which I’m not sure I could handle that much marshmallow (and I do love s’mores). 

I looked for another hour (dodging slime balls the entire time). I finally found it in my microwave...covered in slime. Too the point it was unusable. I didn’t even have a landline to use either. So I did the next best thing, and ran to my moms house (she lived right next door). When I arrived, I found her also covered in slime. It seemed as if my  whole world was covered in slime!

(End Scott)

(Begin Hosanna)

The dragon Terrence sneezed again, and the slimy boogers only piled up thicker all over the place. I wished that I could help poor Terrence, but as I only had my small, human-sized bottle of Flonase allergy medication on me, I was at a loss. Perhaps if the dragon flew high enough up into the sky he could get away from the irritating pollen that pervaded the entire country. Or perhaps if he took a swim? I asked him which he would prefer and, between a couple of sneezes, he said he would try flying as he didn’t think he could hold his breath long enough underwater to make enough of a difference. Grimacing slightly after another sneezing attack, Terrence indicated I should hop on his back so that I could accompany him on his escape. I was rather nervous about hopping on a dragon who would be flying and potentially continuing to violently sneeze, but I crossed my fingers and climbed obediently up. Terrence paused for a moment after I was situated to make sure he did not sneeze while ascending, and then, in a whoosh of his scaly, great wings, we were airborne. Thank heavens, the sneezing seemed to have abated once we left the ground.

(End Hosanna)

(Begin Vanessa)

If we want to achieve our goal in rescuing the great princess, Amelia. We need stealth. Knowing her location we rush in. Careful to avoid enemies. Next, we hear an alarm system. Oh darn our cover is blown. We need to move and get her. And run. We make to the end of the hallway and bust through the doors using C4. Once the smoke cleared, we saw the small silhouette of princess Amelia. Come on Princess we need to leave. The helicopter will be at the roof top. Just as we made it to the roof door. We hear movement come and then a large spray of bullets headed our way. One by one my men start to fall. Princess you run and I will cover you. Once she is safe, I run for the door. Thankfully, the helicopter was right on time. Just like always. Mission complete.