I pulled this short together as part of the "Man versus God" flash fiction contest put on by the Fictioneers.
A.D.A.M.
My head hurts. I'll just sit here. Maybe it will stop.
The tree felt rough on his back as he slid down the trunk. He was lost both mentally and physically. Exhausted. His thoughts rummaged through his head like rats in a garbage bag.
Why am I here? Ow. It hurts.
Rubbing his temples helped a bit. Intense pressure behind his eyes radiated down the back of his cranium. A breeze blew gently across his exposed torso. Goosebumps prickled along his arms. He shivered, gouging his back on the bark.
“Adam, Adam, can you hear me?”
He sprang to his feet, body tensed, and spun around trying to locate the voice.
“Who are you? Where are you? Stop, just stop!”
He crumpled to the ground, pain shooting through his head with a flash of blinding whiteness. He shut his eyes.
Oh God, please. If that’s you, please make it stop.
The voice again. “Adam, talk to me. Make what stop?”
He slowly opened his eyes to a soft, white nothingness; a door stood in front of him. His headache was gone as the tension melted from his body. He was calm, still a bit muddled but he could think again.
What? Where am I? A door?
A mist encircled his ankles as he slid his one foot out, feeling for the ground. It was firm, so he shuffled towards the door. He grabbed the doorknob, slowly pulled the door open. On the other side, it was blacker than black yet there was a pulling desire to enter. He yearned for the darkness.
He took a deep breath and crossed the threshold.
“Adam, are you there?” Luke, the computer operator, repeated.
The holographic screen went blank. “Fuck!” Luke slammed his fist on the desk.
John looked at Luke knowingly but still asked. “What? Is that one gone too?”
“Yup. Computer, restart A.D.A.M.-2338.”
“A.D.A.M.-2338 Not found.”
“God damn it, Luke. I thought you guys said you fixed the bug?”
“We did boss. Regression passed. No problems with the cognitive processor.” Luke swiped the air to access the file system, then poked the holographic space in front of him to open the folder "A.D.A.M.-2338."
“Shit. There it is again.”
“There what is again?”
“It’s the fucking GOD.BIN file again, what the hell?” Luke scratched his head and began punching at the virtual interface. Code flew across the holographic projection.
John headed towards the office door. “You’d better find this fucking God bug and squash it. If these Autonomous Digital Answering Machines delete themselves once they are on the market it will mean both our jobs.”
“I know, I know. I’ll have it fixed for tomorrow.”
John slammed the door.
“Asshole.” Luke rubbed his temples turning back to the computer. Jaw clenched tight with the stress. His throbbing temples signalling a headache coming on.
(Source: Base image Pixabay)
I want to thank the Fiction Workshop for the crits. Your suggestions, comments and red ink always right on the mark.
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I liked this one. Well done!
Thanks @nexusfyre.
Congratulations! This story has been curated by The SFT. :-) A small SBD reward has been transferred to your wallet.
https://steemit.com/curation/@sft/the-sft-curates-9-13-17
It has been added to the Science Fiction Reading Room at the SFT Library.
http://sftlibrary.com/
Oh! Thank you so much for the honor. Extremely excited to be added to the SFT Library.
That was great. "...like rats in a garbage bag" Loved that!
Thanks... I was happy that I had a chance encounter with a mouse in the garage... :-) really appreciate the comment.
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Wow @Jasonbu, this was fantastic! Thank you for the entry, I love this concept :)
Thanks @jrhughes! My imagination started running as soon as the contest was announced! I think I'm circling on a theme now though. :-) Word crunch Olympics in the Fiction-workshop - shout out to everyone on the channel!
Great job, loved the way it turned out.
Thanks a lot @tinypakeokitchen. I'm pretty pleased with it as well... I keep rereading it :-) Hope to see you in the workshop.
You already have, remember? You proofread the first part of dry spell for me? ;-)
Yup, Hope to see you in the fiction-workshop ... more. :-)
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Accept. Thank you very much for the recognition.
I enjoyed this. Nice twist to it!
Thanks for the comment. I'm really glad you enjoyed it.
I enjoyed this one. Good luck! The mass edit word cut was fun also, although I missed most of it.
Thanks, it was an experience...(yes, it was fun too) it's amazing how much can be cut.
Awesome job!
Thanks, @geke. It was a fun one to put together.
Loved this--such a delightful twist on things.
Thanks for the comment. I was hoping the twist would work out. I think it did. I'm glad you enjoyed!
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Enjoyed this! it feels 'tight' if that makes any sense. Thanks for sharing it.
You bet... the first iteration was close to 600 words. Workshopped
it to cutit down tojustunder 500 words. Word efficiency is incredibly challenging.hah, that was cool!
Thanks, @delatrek. Appreciate the comment.
This post has received a 0.52 % upvote from @drotto thanks to: @banjo.