A Word in Your Eye

Okay. The prompt was “No one escapes the wild hunt.” Go ahead and join the fun at https://moreoddsthanends.home.blog/ 

And a session of free writing, with a little cleanup editing afterwards, came up with this. What do you think?

A Hacker’s Nightmare (630 words)

By Mike Barker

It happened again the other night. Our servers were humming in the back room, the air conditioning keeping everything cool, but someone opened up a virtual conduit using the best of hacking protocols and cheerfully copied practically a whole database of users’ info from our systems.

But this time, I was ready for it. I had the trackers already primed and running, and they responded with automated vigor, setting their hooks into the data stream and following it as the whole monstrous mess bounced out into the Internet, flickering between nodes, carefully redirecting and erasing its path as it went.

So this morning, the trackers, those faithful hounds, called in and let me know where they had ended up. It was a small server farm, not all that far away, although when they listed the places they had visited, it was like a trip around the virtual world, hitting servers and clients and even some old-fashioned data mirrors. I certainly hadn’t expected them to have to do all that, but their programming ensured that they would not let go until they found the final spot where that data went.

That’s when I put on the virtual reality goggles, gloves, and all the rest of my paraphernalia, and stepped into their midst. I had to tug at the strap of the goggles, it liked to catch on my ears. Then the hounds showed me the data, and we carefully corrupted it, ensuring that the hackers wouldn’t get any benefit from their attempt at our servers. After that, we started going through what they had on their servers. It was quickly obvious that they had been collecting data from other places, so we turned those files and databases into hexadecimal traps, just waiting for someone to open them to spew their viral loads into whatever clients and tools were used to crack them open. Truly hexed!

Next we took a quick look at the data feeds reaching out of this place. We set our own escape route aside for now, but the others were turned into one-way routes into the digital dumps, so that the next time someone tried to use any of those routes to access something outside this data center, they would be surprised at just how much sheer destruction they would set off. All of their own systems would end up destroyed, after a suitably random period of spitting trash and porn out of every display, printer, or other output device that was hooked up. With our motto as a banner, of course.

When we had boobytrapped every part of their systems that we could, from the high level data and programs all the way down to the boot programs, we left our calling card, a simple message containing a plain text copy of our motto that would be used as a printing banner when the traps went off, and carefully erased every other bit of evidence that we had been there. As we left, I set the last traps on the last clean data bus in the whole system, so they had no safe way to do anything.

The hounds were happy to resume their normal patrols in our data center, checking the data feeds and all the rest of it. I took a moment to stretch, still wearing all the VR interfaces, and joined with them in a moment of baying at the virtual moon, high above our running grounds. Then we yelled our motto at the shimmering sky, and it echoed across the bitstreams and screens.

“No one, nor zero, not one bit, escapes the Wild Hunt!”

Times may have changed, but we elves still know how to get things done. Where did you think all those cookies in your browsers came from?

And you thought Spock was just a Vulcan? Fascinating!

The end

My prompt was:

A truck driver going down a state highway late at night sees an obviously distressed woman walking along the side of the road carrying a child. She refuses all offers to help. When the driver looks back she is standing on the side of a bridge, looking down at the river and the child is no longer in sight.

And here’s what I came up with...

What Child Is This? (1100 words)

By Mike Barker

Harold double-clutched and downshifted, slowing his rig. It was late, dark, and... there was somebody walking on the side of the highway up ahead. He hit the clutch again, and braked. Oh, man, what is somebody doing out here at this time of night?

He had the rig, and his load, almost at a walking speed. He hit the window button, and called out, “Ma’am, are you all right? You need some help?”

She turned, and her face was pale white in the running lights. She shook her head. She had a bundle in her arms. He thought it looked like she was holding a baby, but...

“No, thanks. I don’t think anyone can help at this point.”

He slowed down a touch more, as she turned away from him.

“No, now, that’s where you’re wrong. I can give you a ride, or I could call the police for you, if you’d be more comfortable with them. Heck, I can call just about anybody you like. You really shouldn’t be wandering around out here, all by yourself.”

He brought the rig to a stop. Glanced around to make sure there wasn’t someone sneaking up or something, using her as a distraction. But they were alone, nothing moving. There was a bridge just in front of them, but he knew that river. It was just a short stretch running down to the nearby ocean. He put it in neutral, and set the emergency brake. Then he unbuckled and swung out of the rig. When he got down, he stretched. Then he looked at the woman.

Nice looking woman, but she was really nervous. He looked at the bundle. That was a baby, for sure.

“I see you have your child, too. Out for a walk at this time of night?”

She shook her head, and squeezed the bundle a little tighter.

“Oh, you wouldn’t understand. Look, I just want to walk up to the bridge, and then I’ll be fine.”

Then she hummed for a moment, and sang a funny little tune.

He blinked. Okay, she had some kind of plan. And he was making her really nervous. All right, give her some space. Might keep an eye on her, though.

“Tell you what. I’ll pull up past the bridge, and you can walk up there, and then meet me on the other side. Then I can give you a ride wherever you want. Sound good?”

Her shoulders dropped as she relaxed.

“Okay. We can do that. In fact, let’s do that.”

He didn’t understand quite why, but as she spoke, he suddenly felt it was urgent to get back in and drive ahead. So he climbed up, buckled in, took the brake off, and let the big rig roll forward. It rattled over the bridge, and he brought it to a stop, just a little past the bridge.

Then he watched in the rear view mirror as the woman walked up to the bridge. She strolled up, and looked over the side. He saw her hug the bundle, and... then she turned a bit, and he blinked. What happened? Then she turned back, and walked towards the truck.

He swung the passenger door open. It was a long stretch, but he was used to it.

She tossed the bundle into the seat, then climbed up behind it. He was still gaping at the empty blankets on the seat when she pushed them aside and sat down.

“What? Where’s your baby?”

She blinked, and wiped at a tear. Then she half-laughed, and sang a little melody.

Suddenly, he couldn’t move. He could still hear and see, but his body... it just sat there.

“I am really sorry to have to do this to you, but let me tell you who I am, and where my baby is going. Then, well, later I’ll have to take the memories away from you, but at least for a while, you’ll understand.”

She took a deep breath.

“You see, you have met a siren. You might have heard of us, we sing sailors to their doom? Not really, and not always. In fact, most of the time, I’m a housewife, just like so many others. But... my child, my baby, needs to grow in the ocean. He’s almost a year old, which is when the first change comes on us. See, we are born on dry land, but then we spend our childhood in the ocean. And in... oh, a dozen years or so, he’ll feel the urge to come back to where he first entered the waters, and he’ll find this river, and come back for the second change, to walk on dry land.”

She blinked, and tears ran down her face.

“But I had to let him go! My baby, out there, by himself. It’s natural for sirens, but oh, my heart aches!”

She sang another little melody, and he found himself in his body again. His jaw dropped.

“You’re a siren. And you just put your baby in the river?”

She nodded.

“But... how can you stand it? I mean, wow...”

She grimaced.

“I don’t want to, but it is the only way we can live. And I will be here again, when the seasons call him back to land.”

“How can you tell me all this? What if I tell someone?”

She snickered.

“Oh, well. The stories of the powers of the sirens are almost true, you see? First, let’s get me into town... then I’ll sing you another song, and I’m afraid you will forget all about this.”

She started to hum, and then his hands and feet moved, and the big rig started rolling. As we cruised, he listened to her talk. She enjoyed telling him about her life, about the house she had, about her husband, and everything.

And after they reached the next town, she climbed out of the rig and sang another song.The first few notes caught his attention and he stared at her, blinking slowly. She wasn't all that pretty, but her song reached down into him and made him shiver. He felt his world turning into a cascade of wonderful music, a shimmering torrent of sound...

Harold looked at the dashboard clock, and the town around him. What the heck was he doing idling along here? He put the rig in gear and started moving. He thought to himself, “I must have been half sleeping to be so far behind schedule.”

As he pulled into the street, he saw a young woman waving at him. He reached over and pulled the air horn, a couple of short blasts, just to let her know he saw her.

He didn’t know who she was, but it’s always nice to let them know you saw them.

The end.

I saw the first episode of Warotenka today. Started out in 1902, in Kyoto, with two young kids, a girl and a boy, running through a matsuri (festival). Glimpses of a trained monkey, other festival bits, and then... they sneak under the tent edge, and sit in the audience of a rakugo performance (comic monologue). Where they are soon laughing. But the manager comes up behind them, and says, “You didn’t pay” He and a helper try to grab the kids, who escape, run on stage, and dodge them. Pretty soon the audience is laughing at their antics. They think it’s a comic show, and the young girl enjoys their laughter, laughing and smiling back at them.

[The young girl is Ten, the heroine of the tale. The boy is her brother. I think the voiceover said something about her always laughing.]

That’s where they broke for the theme song. Warotenka!

Then we come back, and the voice over says it was a little before the matsuri. At the medicine company... her father, a tall man in brown, comes out of the store, grim. He does have a bowler hat on. As everyone watches, he looks around, sternly. Then sneezes!

Next, we see him grinding medicine, with several boys and girls around him. One of the boys is taking something out of a drawer behind him and chewing on it, smiling. The man says, “If you keep eating that, you will have a stomachache.” The boy drops back into sitting.

Meanwhile, the girl is chasing a butterfly through the house. Finally, she lays down, and the butterfly comes and settles on her nose. She laughs at this. The voice over says she is always laughing.

Next, the family is eating. As they are talking, the kids start laughing. Father grumps, “Don’t laugh while you are eating.” Then he says, “You laugh too much. Soon, we are going to have a home party, for the foreign guests. No laughing!”  Mother makes some comments about but laughter. Father grumps, and they all bow.

Later, in the kitchen, the boy is talking about laughing. Mother shakes her head, says “Don’t laugh. He’s a bit stiff, but he is still your father.”

Outside the house, they are making persimmon faces. These are our no laughter faces. Big brother says, “Well, I like laughter.” So they all chuckle, and go on.

The day that the foreign guests are visiting, they roll out a red carpet. The foreign guests are coming! In the kitchen, mother has prepared all kinds of food, but no fish, because they heard that foreigners don’t eat fish.

The foreigner comes in. He gives Father a gift. He speaks German, and one of the boys translates. He has his wife and a young girl with him. The young girl has her hair caught up on both sides of her head in yellow bows. As they gather around the table, standing, a yellow butterfly starts hovering around the foreign man. Ten, our heroine, has a terrible time watching it flutter around, and then land on his head.

Introductions. Father says, “Introduce yourself.” “I’m Ten.” The butterfly lands on the foreigner's head. Behind him, her brother is trying to blow and encourage the butterfly to leave.

Father says, “We have some excellent sake.” Ten picks up the bowl to pour, as the foreign man leans forward, glass in his hand. Just then, another butterfly lands on the other side of his head, so he has butterflies on each side of his head, like the bows on his daughter's head. Poor Ten breaks out laughing, spilling the sake. Then in trying to catch the spill, they pull the cover off the table, spilling food, sugar, drinks...

The foreigner is furious, thinking that he is being made fun of. He stalks off!

Father carries Ten into the kura, the safehold of a Japanese house, and tells her “You will stay here until you laugh no more!” He locks her in. We see her pounding on the door...

Then, the voice over promises us that help is coming. And we see a young man, and a traveling troupe of actors. The young man tosses his cape over his shoulders.

And that was the end of the first episode. Stay tuned to find out what happens next! And does Ten ever get over her laughter?