When he came to, he was about five kilometers away from the shuttle.
He vaguely remembered cycling through the airlock, laughing.
His suit batteries were dead, so was the radio.
No way to get back, or call the shuttle.
Soon, death.
Friends don’t let friends go on drunk space walks.
He laughed for a while, then caught his breath. His eyes returned to their vacant normal state. I told the joke again. When I hit the punchline, he laughed. He always laughed for the same duration. Like clockwork. It’s so easy being a comic for people with no long-term memory!
I saw her standing there.
I should have known better.
“I wanna be your man.”
No reply.
“I want to tell you, every little thing… All my loving…”
“Don’t bother me,” she said, she said.
Getting better. It won’t be long.
“Tell me what you see?”
“Misery. Chains. Another girl.”
“Damn, Bill’s late for work.”
“Again.”
“John told me he was close to getting fired.”
“Isn’t it a bit of an overreaction?”
“Not for a job with these responsibilities!”
“But he just does nothing, all day.”
“He holds down the button that lets the Internet go.”
“I guess you’re right.”
“I hate Mondays!” As cliché as it was, he really meant it. “Weekends should be longer by one day,” he complained bitterly. “But then, you wouldn’t accomplish anything,” retorted his cubicle neighbor. “Since weekends were extended to start on Tuesday, back in 2078, you’re just proving how lazy you are.”
The song was stuck in his head. He couldn’t remember the lyrics, but the melody wouldn’t go away. As he hummed tunelessly, others picked it up and also couldn’t get it out of their heads. Soon, everyone was humming it. And that’s how the song virus destroyed civilization on Earth.
When the aliens came, they didn’t waste time learning to communicate. Unless you consider plasma beams communication. They overwhelmed our military and paralyzed them, with minimal collateral damage and civilian casualties.
Then they turned to our governments and made their first communication attempt:
“All your base are belong to us!”
I can travel anywhere I want, through the power of thought.
I’ve gone around the world, and out in space. I’ve visited the deepest oceans, and the tallest summits. I’ve been inside the Sun.
But right now, I’m in Ottawa.
Sometimes, my mind takes me where I’d rather not go.
“He sees you when you’re sleeping, He knows when you’re awake,” sang Tom.
“Why are you singing that song? We’re in September,” said Jim.
“Didn’t you hear? Santa Claus is now a homicidal maniac.”
“I knew that. So?”
“Do you really think he still keeps track of the current month?”
On a boring day at the passport office, some guy burst in. Looked like he’d been attacked by a bear.
Uncharacteristically, government employees rushed to help him. He was later taken by ambulance.
Turns out he’d infected all the employees with the zombie plague.
Didn’t affect their work performance, though.