Post by Lantlas on Feb 6, 2007 23:53:14 GMT -5
"We Do Not Exist"
A customer approached me with a rather confused look on his face. “Excuse me, sir?”
“Can I help you?”
“What does this coupon mean?”
I stared at the coupon, then couldn’t help that my incredibly sarcastic glare rose to his face. The coupon said, ‘this coupon is good for any movie in the store free.’ Finally, after I realized he was serious, I saved my sarcastic groan for when I’d tell Brian about it. “It means it’s good for any movie in the store free.”
“Does that include television series?”
“No, television seasons are not movies.”
“So no box sets are included?”
“No. Box sets are more than one movie. That coupon is good for one movie.”
“Well, gee… This coupon really restricts what you can get, doesn’t it?”
“Yes sir, I tell you… I have people coming in everyday, cursing the franchise for sending those coupons to get any movie in the store for no cost whatsoever, let me tell you… These customers have had it up to here with getting stuff for free, to the point where they’re bringing those coupons to the front desk and saying ‘how dare you insult my integrity! I will not take this movie for free! I demand you make me pay for it!’ You, sir… You could be their last hope for reinstating the good vibe you get when you get a movie for free instead of spending your hard-earned money on a disc that you’ll probably only watch once anyway… Are you going to let that happen? Will you stand idly by and watch as free movies are given up forever in the name of paying for every single movie with which you walk out of the store? Or will you be the hero? The one who stood in the face of handing us money and said ‘give me a free movie, or give me death!’ It’s your decision, make the right one!”
I wasn’t surprised when the guy left with a wide-eyed, confused expression on his face. Not that I really cared anyway, that was fun as hell to do for once. Plus, now I had a coupon for a free movie!
…
Brian had found a way to break through the system code on his cash register. Now on the internet, he came across a name database which would tell him how many people in the country had the same name as he did. A few seconds later, With a raised eyebrow, Brian clutched his chin, contemplating. “I’ll be damned, will you look at that?”
“Look at what?” his co-worker asked.
“According to this name database, zero people in the country have my name.”
“Does that include you?”
“I would assume so, considering it didn’t ask which of the zero people I was when filling out the small questionnaire.”
“But if it says there’s zero, doesn’t that mean there wouldn’t be more than one?”
“I’m pretty sure that means there would be less than one. One less, as a matter of fact. That only raises one question.”
“What’s that?”
“Just who the hell am I?”
“You’re Brian.”
“Not according to this machine! According to this net-ready name database, I do not exist! I’ll have to go undercover before they find me. Hell, they could be after me already! This can’t be good… I better call someone! No wait, they probably have the phones tapped. I could email someone! Damn, if they’re already on to my non-existence, they’ve probably already stolen my email password, which by technicality does not exist in the first place. Wait, how can they steal my password if it doesn’t exist? Did it ever exist? Do I even remember who I am? What if they’re wrong? What if I’m not really Brian? Those tricky bastards, they shall pay for making me question my existence!”
“You’re very strange,” Brian’s co-worker murmured.
“Me? I’m not strange. I’m normal! All of you are strange! How dare you question my level of normality! I didn’t do it for you! You’re one of them, aren’t you?”
“One of whom?”
“One of the strange people, trying to pass themselves as normal so they can catch people who don’t really exist and take them to a far away place.”
“What kind of place?”
“One where all the people who don’t exist gather, plotting their evil vengeance on the world that tricked them into believing their names could too be in that database. I shake my fist at whatever devious jokester planned this out, and I will find him one day, wherever that far away place he stays is!”
…
FAR AWAY PLACE
A thirty-year-old guy reclines in his computer chair with a bag of popcorn, updating the U.S. internet name database with a Paradise, Arizona phonebook.
…
“Whoever he is, he’s too smart for me to handle alone. I’ll need a partner in this. Dave?”
“Hell no,” Dave laughed.
“I wasn’t asking you, you sick freak. You already know you’re one of them! Man the register while I go out seeking the only one I know who will take down this hellbent-on-destruction emperor with me!”
Brian pretended to sneak out of the store as if he was being watched. Dave still had no idea just what the hell had happened.
…
Brian came sneaking into my store, and hid behind the cashier’s counter.
“You all right there, buddy?” I asked.
“They’ve found me. They know I don’t exist. The name database was their set-up!”
“You don’t exist either?”
“No, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you!”
In the same sly, pseudo-drama voice, I replied, “Brian…”
“What?”
“I don’t exist either.”
“I’ll need to see proof. You could be aiding them.” Bringing up the name database, I typed in my common first name, but very irregular last name. “My God, you’re right,” he whispered. “You don’t exist either.”
“That’s right.”
“They’re going to send us to the far away place if we don’t do something quickly,” he warned.
“You’re right. Damn, I just gave them the clue they wanted! They needed you to come here to trace our alliance! Brian, do you realize what this means?”
“The strange people from the far away place are here?”
“No, even worse…”
“What? What could be worse than that?”
I pretended to remove a pair of glasses. “They knew about us all along.”
“My God…”
“The only way to escape is to blend in with the common folk. They’ll never suspect anything,” I sneered.
“What if they ask us if we work here again?”
“Don’t worry,” I growled as I slipped off my name tag. “If we’re in the center walkway, they’ll think we’re the kiosk salesmen, and they’ll avoid us at all costs.”
As I made sure the register was covered, Brian and I snuck out into the mall. We were garnering many strange looks, by no surprise whatsoever. I pointed ahead, and Brian and I ducked behind a bench. “I saw one,” I warned.
“That means they got here quicker than expected.”
“This could get dangerous, maybe we should split up!” I suggested.
“Of course not, you fool! That’s what they want! To split us up, because split as two who don’t exist, they could track us down easily… but if we’re in the same place, they’ll never be able to take us down!”
“Actually, if we’re in one place instead of two, wouldn’t that make us easier to find!”
“Alex,” Brian yelled as he smacked my head. “This is no time for logic! We’re being followed by people who want to send us away, the last thing you need to do is think with your brain!”
“As opposed to thinking with what?”
“I don’t know, and I bet that’s been their plan all along,” Brian sunk as he pulled the light-saber out from his pocket. “Do you have yours?”
“Of course I do, I wouldn’t leave the fortress unarmed!”
“Okay, at the sound of the explosion, we’ll take off as a diversion.”
“Wouldn’t the explosion be the diversion?” I asked.
“Dammit Alex, what did I tell you? It’s smart comebacks like that that will get us killed!”
“You’re right… God knows what would happen if they caught us thinking again.”
“Sir,” Brian sprung out as he frightened some random mall pedestrian. “Make an explosion sound!”
“What?” the customer replied, looking scared and confused simultaneously.
“We don’t have time to explain, just make a damn explosion sound!”
“Um…. Boom?” the pedestrian answered nervously.
Brian and I both dove away from the bench, as if diving from an exploding building in the movies. My light-saber dropped from my hands and rolled towards the JCPenny’s. “No! If the golden angels get ahold of my weapon, we’re done for!”
“They already have,” Brian moaned. The trainee, the one Chris went after earlier, picked up the light-saber. “God knows what she’ll do to us now that she has one of our weapons!”
The JCPenny’s girl walked up to us. “Is this yours?”
“Why yes, yes it is,” I replied, taking it from her hand. She rolled her eyes and walked away. Once she was out of earshot, I whispered to Brian, “did you see that? She touched me.”
“It’s all part of their plan,” Brian muttered. “Seduction will lead to our doom. You know what this means?”
“We’re screwed?”
“No… It means the only way to survive… is to duel to the death!” Brian held out his light-saber towards me.
“There has to be another way!”
“No,” Brian repeated. “If they think one of us has turned on the other, they’ll let one of us go. It’s the only way.”
“In order for you to turn on me, that would mean an allegiance has to exist. And in order for an allegiance to exist, the both of us would have to as well.”
“I’m telling you, Al, that thinking is going to get you killed one of these days, and it may very well be this one!” Brian struck first with his light-saber, but I blocked it just in time. “The galaxy will be mine,” he proclaimed.
“We’ll just see about that!” I challenged, as we met cross-blade and face-to-face. “I will never rule the galaxy with the likes of you!”
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A customer approached me with a rather confused look on his face. “Excuse me, sir?”
“Can I help you?”
“What does this coupon mean?”
I stared at the coupon, then couldn’t help that my incredibly sarcastic glare rose to his face. The coupon said, ‘this coupon is good for any movie in the store free.’ Finally, after I realized he was serious, I saved my sarcastic groan for when I’d tell Brian about it. “It means it’s good for any movie in the store free.”
“Does that include television series?”
“No, television seasons are not movies.”
“So no box sets are included?”
“No. Box sets are more than one movie. That coupon is good for one movie.”
“Well, gee… This coupon really restricts what you can get, doesn’t it?”
“Yes sir, I tell you… I have people coming in everyday, cursing the franchise for sending those coupons to get any movie in the store for no cost whatsoever, let me tell you… These customers have had it up to here with getting stuff for free, to the point where they’re bringing those coupons to the front desk and saying ‘how dare you insult my integrity! I will not take this movie for free! I demand you make me pay for it!’ You, sir… You could be their last hope for reinstating the good vibe you get when you get a movie for free instead of spending your hard-earned money on a disc that you’ll probably only watch once anyway… Are you going to let that happen? Will you stand idly by and watch as free movies are given up forever in the name of paying for every single movie with which you walk out of the store? Or will you be the hero? The one who stood in the face of handing us money and said ‘give me a free movie, or give me death!’ It’s your decision, make the right one!”
I wasn’t surprised when the guy left with a wide-eyed, confused expression on his face. Not that I really cared anyway, that was fun as hell to do for once. Plus, now I had a coupon for a free movie!
…
Brian had found a way to break through the system code on his cash register. Now on the internet, he came across a name database which would tell him how many people in the country had the same name as he did. A few seconds later, With a raised eyebrow, Brian clutched his chin, contemplating. “I’ll be damned, will you look at that?”
“Look at what?” his co-worker asked.
“According to this name database, zero people in the country have my name.”
“Does that include you?”
“I would assume so, considering it didn’t ask which of the zero people I was when filling out the small questionnaire.”
“But if it says there’s zero, doesn’t that mean there wouldn’t be more than one?”
“I’m pretty sure that means there would be less than one. One less, as a matter of fact. That only raises one question.”
“What’s that?”
“Just who the hell am I?”
“You’re Brian.”
“Not according to this machine! According to this net-ready name database, I do not exist! I’ll have to go undercover before they find me. Hell, they could be after me already! This can’t be good… I better call someone! No wait, they probably have the phones tapped. I could email someone! Damn, if they’re already on to my non-existence, they’ve probably already stolen my email password, which by technicality does not exist in the first place. Wait, how can they steal my password if it doesn’t exist? Did it ever exist? Do I even remember who I am? What if they’re wrong? What if I’m not really Brian? Those tricky bastards, they shall pay for making me question my existence!”
“You’re very strange,” Brian’s co-worker murmured.
“Me? I’m not strange. I’m normal! All of you are strange! How dare you question my level of normality! I didn’t do it for you! You’re one of them, aren’t you?”
“One of whom?”
“One of the strange people, trying to pass themselves as normal so they can catch people who don’t really exist and take them to a far away place.”
“What kind of place?”
“One where all the people who don’t exist gather, plotting their evil vengeance on the world that tricked them into believing their names could too be in that database. I shake my fist at whatever devious jokester planned this out, and I will find him one day, wherever that far away place he stays is!”
…
FAR AWAY PLACE
A thirty-year-old guy reclines in his computer chair with a bag of popcorn, updating the U.S. internet name database with a Paradise, Arizona phonebook.
…
“Whoever he is, he’s too smart for me to handle alone. I’ll need a partner in this. Dave?”
“Hell no,” Dave laughed.
“I wasn’t asking you, you sick freak. You already know you’re one of them! Man the register while I go out seeking the only one I know who will take down this hellbent-on-destruction emperor with me!”
Brian pretended to sneak out of the store as if he was being watched. Dave still had no idea just what the hell had happened.
…
Brian came sneaking into my store, and hid behind the cashier’s counter.
“You all right there, buddy?” I asked.
“They’ve found me. They know I don’t exist. The name database was their set-up!”
“You don’t exist either?”
“No, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you!”
In the same sly, pseudo-drama voice, I replied, “Brian…”
“What?”
“I don’t exist either.”
“I’ll need to see proof. You could be aiding them.” Bringing up the name database, I typed in my common first name, but very irregular last name. “My God, you’re right,” he whispered. “You don’t exist either.”
“That’s right.”
“They’re going to send us to the far away place if we don’t do something quickly,” he warned.
“You’re right. Damn, I just gave them the clue they wanted! They needed you to come here to trace our alliance! Brian, do you realize what this means?”
“The strange people from the far away place are here?”
“No, even worse…”
“What? What could be worse than that?”
I pretended to remove a pair of glasses. “They knew about us all along.”
“My God…”
“The only way to escape is to blend in with the common folk. They’ll never suspect anything,” I sneered.
“What if they ask us if we work here again?”
“Don’t worry,” I growled as I slipped off my name tag. “If we’re in the center walkway, they’ll think we’re the kiosk salesmen, and they’ll avoid us at all costs.”
As I made sure the register was covered, Brian and I snuck out into the mall. We were garnering many strange looks, by no surprise whatsoever. I pointed ahead, and Brian and I ducked behind a bench. “I saw one,” I warned.
“That means they got here quicker than expected.”
“This could get dangerous, maybe we should split up!” I suggested.
“Of course not, you fool! That’s what they want! To split us up, because split as two who don’t exist, they could track us down easily… but if we’re in the same place, they’ll never be able to take us down!”
“Actually, if we’re in one place instead of two, wouldn’t that make us easier to find!”
“Alex,” Brian yelled as he smacked my head. “This is no time for logic! We’re being followed by people who want to send us away, the last thing you need to do is think with your brain!”
“As opposed to thinking with what?”
“I don’t know, and I bet that’s been their plan all along,” Brian sunk as he pulled the light-saber out from his pocket. “Do you have yours?”
“Of course I do, I wouldn’t leave the fortress unarmed!”
“Okay, at the sound of the explosion, we’ll take off as a diversion.”
“Wouldn’t the explosion be the diversion?” I asked.
“Dammit Alex, what did I tell you? It’s smart comebacks like that that will get us killed!”
“You’re right… God knows what would happen if they caught us thinking again.”
“Sir,” Brian sprung out as he frightened some random mall pedestrian. “Make an explosion sound!”
“What?” the customer replied, looking scared and confused simultaneously.
“We don’t have time to explain, just make a damn explosion sound!”
“Um…. Boom?” the pedestrian answered nervously.
Brian and I both dove away from the bench, as if diving from an exploding building in the movies. My light-saber dropped from my hands and rolled towards the JCPenny’s. “No! If the golden angels get ahold of my weapon, we’re done for!”
“They already have,” Brian moaned. The trainee, the one Chris went after earlier, picked up the light-saber. “God knows what she’ll do to us now that she has one of our weapons!”
The JCPenny’s girl walked up to us. “Is this yours?”
“Why yes, yes it is,” I replied, taking it from her hand. She rolled her eyes and walked away. Once she was out of earshot, I whispered to Brian, “did you see that? She touched me.”
“It’s all part of their plan,” Brian muttered. “Seduction will lead to our doom. You know what this means?”
“We’re screwed?”
“No… It means the only way to survive… is to duel to the death!” Brian held out his light-saber towards me.
“There has to be another way!”
“No,” Brian repeated. “If they think one of us has turned on the other, they’ll let one of us go. It’s the only way.”
“In order for you to turn on me, that would mean an allegiance has to exist. And in order for an allegiance to exist, the both of us would have to as well.”
“I’m telling you, Al, that thinking is going to get you killed one of these days, and it may very well be this one!” Brian struck first with his light-saber, but I blocked it just in time. “The galaxy will be mine,” he proclaimed.
“We’ll just see about that!” I challenged, as we met cross-blade and face-to-face. “I will never rule the galaxy with the likes of you!”
Help me get this read on the web... www.fictionpress.com/s/2231693/9/ scroll to the bottom of the page, at the bottom left, click the submit review button.