Songbirds Writing Expo

So, a while ago I said I would post some of my writing here. I haven't yet and I felt I should. So here's the thread, I'll be posting things here at random intervals and random lengths.

This may be a monthly thing, or not. Don't hold me to anything. Feedback is always appreciated, I suppose you can message me directly to avoid clutter in this thread.

So here we go, I guess. Let the games begin.

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The large tiered city sat at the edge of a dusty plain, sitting on the shore of a massive ocean, where it had always been for the last four hundred years. Not much had changed in four hundred years as technological advances slowed to a crawl in what was once the most prosperous and advanced city on the planet. A large steel ring surrounded the edge of the city, laced with small domes of iron placed evenly around it.

The city streets were awake with noise and people, men and women rushed from one place to another carrying boxes, briefcases, books, and leather school bags. Small boys sold newspapers on street corners and a few stray dogs hid in the alleys. Hissing automobiles rolled by on tracks set into the cobble streets.

A level up into the next section of the city merchants sold their wares, selling leathers and furs, metals and gears, cloth and silk, precious stones and ores, almost anything could be found in the market. Above the stalls and buildings hung airships, crowding the sky in a ring around the tier, balloons of various colors marking where they had originated, red, blue, green, grey, white.

Up to the final level of the city lawmakers hid inside and bickered. Some hired assassins to get rid of their competitors, some bribed the masses for votes, others outright lied that change would come for the city but that wasn’t any change from the last twenty years. The governors home and office sat in the center of the city like a massive silver tumor, a dome of silver emblazoned with the seal of Redborough, a laurel and gear, crossed by a sword and wrench. Over the last three years of the governors reign he had single handedly removed what he believed to be every “anarchy inspiring text” from the city.

He had good reason for this of course, the city had seen its fair share of anarchy, the citizens were constantly restless with their outlook on the world dimming each day. During the last century the massive cities of the world had obliterated most of the planet into a barren waste and things were only getting worse. Wars broke out between cities, they sent armies to invade their enemies, battles broke out in the barrens, the armies dug in and made vast networks of trenches. Those trenches would only serve as graves for the armies as the battles continued for years. Eventually the trenches would be abandoned, slowly decaying into spiderwebs of wood and steel buried in dust.

Redborough had been invaded twice within the last century and the governor planned to prevent that from ever happening again. Below the city in a place the citizens called the Guts gears ground and steam hissed as engineers swung from pipe to pipe by grapple. The Guts descended below the city as far as they could go without ruining the pipes. The Guts had been there since the city made its first leap forward in technology, providing heat, electric light, plumbing, and waste disposal for the city above.

Many could say the Guts were as much alive as the city was above, populated by men and women who spent most of their days maintaining the massive conglomerate of pipes and pumps. Below the city was just as loud, if not louder, than the streets above. Constantly awake with the hissing of steam and squealing of metal, the clicking of ratchets and the songs of the engineers deep below.

Each engineer had a specific job, whether it was fixing one specific pipeline or working with others to install a new one. Lately though many of them had been assigned one task by the Foreign Defense Department, the construction of a massive wall and the automation of turrets. The task had taken many years to complete and the engineers always hit snags, leaking pipes, someone falling to their death, gears stripping.

Above ground a loudspeaker crackled to life, “Attention citizens, this is a simple test of the Wall, there is no need to panic.”

A low rumble filled the streets and the ring around the city rose up with a hiss. Out in the harbor turrets emerged from the water, training on incoming ships. More turrets rose up on the wall, aimed outside the city. People watched in awe as the wall closed off the city from everything except air travel. Engineers climbed up from hatches in the streets and smiled at their work. A cheer went up, hats were thrown into the air, people hugged and kissed their loved ones. As the city seemed to be given a new life.

The cheering slowly quieted, people laughed and returned to their business. Life went back to normal for the citizens. Redborough was once again a city to be reckoned with.

 

And now for something completely different... This piece is actually related to the previous one and the following one I'll be posting.

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USER Project introductory briefing:
Thank you for participating in the United States Extra-Realities Project. On behalf of all of the scientists and employees of USER, welcome aboard. In order for you to perform properly at your new occupation it is essential that you know the basic terms and lingo for basic information.

SECTION ONE: Types of Universes
To apply for this work you needed a basic understanding of our Multiverse. This short section will outline the various classifications of the universes that populate the Nothing.

Offspring Universe: A basic umbrella term for any other universe. Termed so due to the nature that all other universes are based off of our own.

Carbon Universe: A universe that is identical to our own with minor exceptions. A "Carbon Copy".

Branch Universe: A universe that is essentially identical to our own up until some point in its timeline where it will "Branch" from our own timeline. You may have heard of these by the name "Parallel universe".

Cracked Universe: A universe which is just barely so. These universes are generally defective and malformed. The causes for the creation of these universes and continued existence of these universes is unknown. In these universes the laws of physics do not operate correctly or key parts of the universe do not exist. Named so for the appearance of their outside shell.

Ghost Universe: A product of USER experimentation with a universe. Rarely created after the termination of a Branch or Carbon Universe. Interaction with anything inside these universes is completely impossible. Any attempt to change anything in these universes is futile. These universes act as a record of what happened inside the universe it originally was.

SECTION TWO: USER Equipment
During your time on Earth you may have heard of the tools used by USER for its probes and more dangerous missions. This section will touch briefly on most of them.

SECTION II SUBSECTION ONE: Androids
Neural Android Mk 1 "Brainbuckets": Generally used during the early 80's as probes, these androids were also used as soldiers. The android was equipped with an entirely metal and robotic body controlled by a reprogrammed human brain. The Mark One series was often plagued with glitches and bugs.

Cybernetic Android Mk 1 "The Million Dollar Men": Often mistaken for unmodified humans, these androids were almost entirely human. Using state-of-the-art cybernetics and neural reprogramming USER created seemingly super human beings. Used in the early 90's as probes and maintenance crews. As with the N-A-Mk1, the C-A-Mk1 was prone to major glitches and bugs.

Cybernetic Android Mk 2 "The Borg": These Androids are still in production by USER, utilizing the skills and processing power of the human nervous system and brain as well as the strength and changeability of robotic parts, the Mark Two series has been the most successful USER Android group yet. Using half of the human body and half robotic enhancements the Mark Two series benefits from both. Introduced in the late 90's the Mark Two was a leap forward for USERs cybernetics program. The Mark Two series is mostly glitch free* and operates better than most others.

SECTION II SUBSECTION TWO: Computing Equipment
For your work here you will often find yourself sitting at a computer terminal. The operation of these tools are fairly simple and require minimal explanation. The operating system used by USER is capable of contacting our probes in other universes and the Nothing.

-Continued in next post...

 

-Continued from previous post...

SECTION THREE: Dangers of the USER project.
As you may have heard, the work with the USER project can be dangerous, even at a desk job.

"Nightmares": Every time we pass through the Nothing we gain the attention of its residents. Most of us have termed these denizens as "Nightmares". These creatures exist outside universes and freely travel between them. They were discovered shortly after the Collapse of 1967 when a large number of people in the newly formed USER project reported having very similar nightmares. Nightmares seem entirely hostile to humans and live off of fear and pain. So far it has been impossible to destroy them.

Universal Termination: An event caused by the experiments of USER into other universes. Each universe has a different tipping point, every time the project sends a new probe or takes a new sample from a universe it can destabilise it. If too many probes or samples are used on a single universe it could risk a collapse and the destruction of the universe. These events happen at different points for each universe, every universe discovered so far has had a notable Termination Point, except for our own. So far our universe has proven completely unique in the way that it is completely stable despite thousands of entries by residents of other universes.



SECTION FOUR: Other Realities of Existence
OREs are often confused with other Universes, while they may seem synonymous, this assumption is wrong in most ways. Other Realities are generally different from what we would consider a universe. They have no beginning or end, they do not have defined edges, and the laws governing them change according to what exists inside them at any given time.

The Nothing: During your lifetime you may have heard of the realm called "The Nothing". This realm is what fills the gap between universes, the air between the bubbles we live in. In The Nothing the laws of physics cease to exist, any probe sent through it will not be able to send or receive any signals, nor will its sensors record anything. The Nothing is populated by one kind of creature which was previously mentioned. So far the only probe capable of operating inside The Nothing is a single Neural Android Mk1. It is unknown how this probe is still in operation, but it has dug up very valuable data for the USER project.

Dreamworlds: Occasionally you may experience a dream that you have repeated before. Many USER personnel have reported such happenings over the years. One main explanation for these is the creation of OREs formed by our subconscious. These Realities are only accessible by one persons mind and have so far proven to be impossible to enter using current USER technologies.

SECTION FIVE: Terms of Assignment
After this briefing you will be administered an evaluation test, simply to determine which branch of The USER Project you will fit in best with. The list below will give you a description of each branch.

Exploration: This may have been your dream as a child, comparable to the age old idea of "I want to be an Astronaut". These employees are responsible for the operation of probes and androids, the pilots.

Supervisory: The employees that keep others on task. The men and women who give people the idea of what to do. As a supervisor you will be required to watch over a set group of employees and report any findings or disruptions.

Interpretation: The men and women who are tasked with reading and translating the mountains of data our probes report daily. The core of our organization, without them USER would only have a garbled mess of data to show for our four decades of work.

Maintenance: This is every engineer's dream, the maintenance branch works entirely with our probes and androids. The maintenance branch is responsible for the maintaining of the Main USER facility. Many employees of the maintenance branch work at desks, writing new code for probes and androids.

Security: This branch is essential to USER operation, sadly. Our security personnel are charged with the care and containment of the samples taken by probes, as well as the protection of everyone in the organization. Security also regards the information released by USER and the capture of creatures originating from other universes.

SECTION SIX: Final Notifications
USER is a very important organization to our country, as you know. Since you are reading this, that means you have read and agreed to the terms and conditions regarding being hired by USER.

Termination: If you are ever to be fired from working with USER you have agreed that due to the sensitive information you may have encountered while working for USER. In the event that you are fired any information regarding you will be removed from all records and you will become property of the United States Government.

Breaches in contract: See Termination.

Information leaks: See Termination.

The United States Extra Realities Project would like to thank you for your future contributions to the cause of universal sciences.