Dallas Zipperer Writing

Author: Dallas Zipperer

  • Ray Bradbury Trio: Week 1

    Ray Bradbury Trio: Week 1

    Author’s note: This is technically my fifth week doing this, but for the sake of clarity I’ve started the series off at one.

    All of the poems this week come from John Keats’s poetry collection.

    Reading Plan

    Sunday

    Monday

    Tuesday

    Wednesday

    Thursday

    Friday

    • Story: Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family – H.P. Lovecraft
    • Poem: To a Friend Who Sent Me Some Roses
    • Essay: Yes, There Is a Cure for Bullshit
      • Note: this was my free nautil.us essay for the month

    Saturday

  • What I’ll be Blogging About

    What I’ll be Blogging About

    Blogging

    I’ll be writing a mix of literary craft essays, opinion pieces, and general process pieces. I’ll be doing one a month, with the focus being on the craft essays. I’ll inevitably refer to my own work, but I’ll do my best to talk about how these techniques come up across all kinds of stories and storytelling so it doesn’t feel like I’m vaguely asking you to go read my work.

    My Craft Essays

    Taking the craft seriously has taught me many things, one of them being: There’s a lot to learn. Another is that learning is hard. It’s messy, it takes real effort. I’ve learned from learning that you have to force yourself, when there are so many other fun things you could be doing. Like playing Elden Ring.

    Essays are a way to synthesize the ideas you’ve been internalizing from the places you are learning from. There’s a fantastic YouTube video from the creator Odysseas called I’m begging you to write essays. It’s sort of a clickbaity title but Odysseas does a great job laying out the purpose of an essay, which at its core is to continue teaching about the topic through writing about the topic.

    We’re here to write, and if I want to be able to expand my knowledge on the craft itself, I have to write about the craft.

    Opinion pieces

    Not everything will be about craft techniques utilized like Chekhov’s Gun (coming soon). I’ve got opinions and this is the space to express them. Example, why won’t modern writers let villains be villains anymore? Looking at you, Cruella de Vil.

    Process

    I’m an author, and outside of the craft there’s a method to all this madness. When I first started I had questions about file formats, what apps to write in, what equipment to use. And now with the rise of AI, people will want to know about that as well. I’ll be talking about all of it. Speaking of AI, since I’m sure you’re dying to know about it you can start here Here’s how I use AI as an (amateur) Author

  • Why I Write Short Stories

    Why I Write Short Stories

    My Short Stories

    According to Brandon Sanderson, to make it in science fiction and fantasy in the old days, “the route to publication was largely through short stories published in pulp magazines”. The idea was simple, publish short stories first to establish a name for yourself and then publish longer works. Now I hear from many sources to avoid writing short stories unless you want to tell short stories. The difference between short stories and full length novels has become more evident as the craft has expanded, and the general consensus is that writing short stories will make you better at writing short stories, not novels.

    My want

    I want to tell short stories. I’m here and posting them because I enjoy the form. I’ve read many of the great short story authors, Chekhov, Kafka, Lovecraft, and when I step away from a short story that moved me in so few words, I think to myself, “I want to do that.”

    My method

    Writing a short story a week has required me to narrow my scope. I’ve set the following soft rules to follow:

    • 1500 words. Not a hard limit, some go over and some are under, but I try to hit this number.
    • For the most part, one word prompts. Sometimes I have a story I need to tell that doesn’t neatly fit a one word prompt, and other times I draw from a bank of single words. Examples are Ghost Story, not a one word prompt I just really wanted to do some Supernatural stuff with salt, and Rust, the prompt word being Rust.

    Following those two rules, I plot, outline, and then draft a full short story in one week. I’ve got a big enough buffer that I can then edit it for the next two or three weeks before it is due to make sure it is good to go.

    What to expect

    I’m writing whatever strikes me. There’s a lot of grief, some action, mix of fantasy and science fiction, horror, comedy.

    AI

    See my article Here’s how I use AI as an (amateur) Author to see my take on AI, but I’ll give a brief summary on how I utilize AI:

    1. A final round of proofing
    2. Research support
    3. Utility tasks

    Start Reading

    • Hollow Point

      A short story about a lawyer working a dangerous case.

    • Signal

      Signal

      A short story about the too vast expanse of space.

    • Rust

      Rust

      Rust is a fun short story about an adventurer hunting for treasure. He has to solve a riddle and fight a rusty knight to get what he wants.

  • Here’s how I use AI as an Author

    Here’s how I use AI as an Author

    Here’s how I use AI as an Author

    As little as possible. That is to say, every single word I write, I have written myself. I do not ask an AI to write them for me and then copy and paste them in. I don’t bring my cool ideas to a machine and let it —rather badly— write it for me. The way I see AI, any LLM, is as a really vast and quick textbook. Like any textbook, it can be wrong or outdated, and is entirely dependent on having been written by someone. This funny-looking vtuber makes some great points in her video, AI Writing is Trash, But AI “Writers” Will Never Notice. She covers all the reasons why AI writing is bad by showing us trash AI writing and then absolutely demolishing it. Funny accent included. Now, the writing being bad is one thing, but my own key problem with using AI to write for you, is the point of writing is for us to be writing. It really is as simple as: “Why would I have something else write for me?”

    It isn’t just fiction writing that we see the use of AI as bad. This crosses many different fields. From the wonderful essay written by Rita Ahmadi called How should we define mathematical beauty in the AI age Rita defines beauty in mathematics as:

    “A simple mathematical structure that surprises even the most experienced mathematicians and transfers a sense of vitality.”

    I love the way she utilizes the word vitality to describe the human side of creation. A textbook might be able to tell us why a sentence is structured properly, but a textbook could never intentionally break a sentence to convey something special, something with vitality.

    The problems with using AI

    I write all of my words because I want them to be mine. This is easy to understand, but there is now significant research emerging that suggests that the use of AI will actually undermine your skills. There’s an effect called “the exoskeleton effect” which describes the process of gaining a quick boost in productivity in the moment, but once the AI is removed from the equation the user is no more skilled than they were before. If my goal is to get better at writing, then that means I need to be writing without AI assistance. People have been writing well for thousands of years. There’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to figure out how without AI.

    Another, perhaps more insidious, side effect of using AI is called “agency decay.” Essentially, people’s ability to critically think is eroded away so much that instead of going for assistance on a task, they are going to AI for every facet of their life, and without AI’s input regarding whatever it is they are unable to face the task themselves. They don’t even question what the AI told them, and instead accept it without question.

    In the What is Agency Decay article written by Cornelia Walther, she lays out some ways to counteract this effect, with my favorite being “acceptance”. She says:

    “Acceptance involves strategically integrating AI where it provides clear value and enhances human performance”

    I think a key point to focus in on is “clear value”. It is not obvious to me that AI in writing as a whole provides clear value. So then, how is it that I utilize it as an author?

    How I use AI

    Let’s take a look at one of my favorite newsletters, Tangle. They made a statement about their AI usage recently that really stuck with me in its simple and direct mindset.

    “Outside of fact-checking and research support, though, we don’t expect to meaningfully incorporate AI into other aspects of our work.”

    They described AI as “one of our team,” but were quick to add “it certainly cannot replace any one of our team.” While I wouldn’t consider a textbook a part of the team any more than I’d consider my Freewrite Traveler, I do agree with the addition of another tool to the arsenal. So, an incredibly reputable and factual source like Tangle utilizes AI for fact checking and research support. They clearly believe it adds value. Research and fact checking do not require vitality. It is what we do with the verified facts and research material that determines life and recognizable human qualities.

    So, I use AI to assist my own research and fact checking, but I also utilize it for doing a final proofread. For many years there have been tools that do this exact thing, and I’m considering finding myself a tool built specifically for doing proofreading. I’d rather my characters gave “a wry chuckle,” instead of a “rye chuckle.” AI is good at catching that until I find a specific tool for this.

    A final use is utility tasks. A good example, I copy and pasted text from the exoskeleton research paper, and when I pasted it the formatting was all wonky. Could I have gone in and line by line corrected the spacing and formatting? Of course. But AI fixed the formatting and prepared it for markdown in a matter of seconds, and considering that was for my own research purposes anyway, there’s no harm in AI speeding up my ability to extract that information.

    A final word about Editing

    There are a lot of arguments about AI being a useful tool in editing. Give an AI a segment of writing you have already written, give it clear commands not to rewrite, or even suggest rewrites, and have it perform like an editor that points out things that are wrong and leave it to the author to fix them.

    I can see this use case, and I even heard this argument given both favorably and unfavorably on the Intentionally Blank podcast. The argument being that if you do not have access to an editor that can provide this same sort of service, this can supplement that.

    I’ve experimented with this use of AI, and what I’ve found is I’m usually more inclined to simply ignore what the AI said. If I’m ignoring what it said, then that isn’t a clear indicator of value.

    PS

    Oh and AI images! I won’t be using them.

  • Embrace

    Embrace

    The clock in the bottom right of Dee’s screen struck 3:53pm, and he sighed with relief. With practiced deftness, he navigated to the work time website, and clocked out. It would push his time to having clocked out at 4 o’clock, but that didn’t free him up to leave just yet. No, Dee knew better. Can’t leave at the 53 mark, you’ll look like a lazy worker.

    He busied himself with his various work websites, clicking through menus, even pushed an odd update that was overdue. 3:57pm, now there was a time. Not too early, not too late. He scooted his chair back, making a great show of it, pushing off his knees and stretching deep.

    “My God, is it 4 o’clock already?” John said from behind him, turning in his own chair. He had his own busy work up, Dee was sure, but the screens were turned slightly away from him.

    “Yessir and thank God it’s Thursday.” Dee began picking his bag up, his water bottle and lunch box.

    “TGIT, eh?” John said. He snapped his fingers, “That’s right! Y’all still playing cards?”

    “Yup, got ’em right here in my bag.”

    John chuckled. “Well, y’all have fun.”

    They exchanged their daily fist bump, a ritual that neither remembered who started, and Dee made his way out the door.

    He jockeyed his way out of the garage, vied for pole position at the lights, pushed his way tooth and nail ever onward onto 610. All the while his audiobook went on, transporting him away from the traffic and the tedium of a long commute. It was “The Blade Itself” by Joe Abercrombie today, and he had been a little disappointed by the so-called “Lord Grimdark.” Grim to be sure, dark in some parts absolutely, but grimdark Dee had understood was supposed to be a different thing altogether. Then the plot transitioned into the climax, and each arc began concluding.

    “Oh,” Dee muttered under his breath, as a particularly gut-wrenching scene played out, with one of his favorite characters no less. “I see we save the worst for last.”

    Dee pulled into the driveway, a full hour passed since he’d left his work. A lot can happen in a novel in one hour, and the events rolled around in his head. He knocked on the door, waiting, listening. Leaves crunched under his shoes, and then he heard movement approaching. Dogs barking, a woman’s voice hushing them. A commotion as she corralled them.

    The door cracked open but the woman was still holding back the animals. Dee stepped in, the two large dogs beside themselves, pulling, whole bodies wagging, attempting to get him. The short woman held them back with both hands and sharp words.

    “Hey hey,” he said with a wave. He shouldn’t have spoken. They redoubled their efforts, the smaller of the two breaking loose and bounding towards him. Laughing, Dee stepped away, excusing himself for the bathroom.

    When he came out the dogs were under control, but he didn’t see her anywhere. “Where’s El?” he asked his ex-in-law.

    She half scoffed, half laughed. “You know Ray needs to blow dry her hair.”

    “Ah,” Dee nodded.

    They stood in the kitchen when she came out. A blur from the hallway, flying towards Dee. She lunged the last few steps, colliding hard into his legs. “Oof!” he said.

    “You nearly knocked him over!”

    The little girl peered up at Dee, a gap toothed smile to match his own.

    “Hey, kiddo,” he said. “Ready for our date?”

    She giggled up at him. “Of course! I’m ready for McDonnys!”

    “McDonnys!” Dee replied, shocked. They’d gone there almost every Thursday for well over a year. “How did you know it was going to be McDonnys?”

    She shrugged. “I just know!”

    The food went quickly. The characters of “The Blade Itself” still tumbled in his head. How had Joe made them so interesting? The characters were so… What was the word? Didactic? No that wasn’t it. He halfway had his phone out to look the word up before he realized what he was doing. No, no. He pulled his hand away. His daughter was laughing, moving her arms around as she told a story. He smiled, nodding along.

    The night was coming to a close, and they sat at the table in the library. Dee peered at the cards in his hand, and over at the piles of cards his daughter had lined up. She was collecting a lot of pairs and triples. He peered at his cards again. Had he asked for 5’s last round or 6’s? If he asked for the same one twice in a row that would look suspicious. The Queen in his hand glared up at him. She knew as well as he did that there was a stack of her sisters at the other end of the table.

    “Got any…” he paused maybe too long. “6’s?”

    She smiled across from him, triumphant. “Go fish!” He let himself sigh internally.

    The game progressed nicely, until suddenly he realized she was going to destroy him. He’d hardly scored 2 points. Dee’s brow furrowed when he realized his mistake. She was going to notice.

    He laughed trying to play it off. “You destroyed me!”

    She laughed maniacally, hands raised as she counted out the points. 11 to 2. He shook his head, allowing himself another internal sigh as she didn’t seem to notice the discrepancy.

    Dee collected the cards up, shuffling them back up.

    “Can we play another game?”

    Dee flicked his wrist, checking the time. No, no it was too late for another. Almost too late for… “Sorry kid, not enough time for another.” Maybe he could ask next Thursday… Then Dee remembered the words of Logen, ‘Once you’ve got a task to do, it’s better to do it than live with the fear of it.’ Dee steeled himself and said, “In fact, we need to head upstairs real quick so I can ask the librarian about something.”

    “Why?” Why. Kids and the question ‘Why.’ Don’t worry about why, kid, dang.

    Instead he said, “I just have some questions I gotta ask, don’t worry about it kid.”

    They marched up the stairs, and she grasped his hand, holding it tightly. There was a line to speak to the librarian, and they waited. Was that his heart beating in his ears? Why was he so nervous all of a sudden? This was something he did already. This was something… Well, that he wanted to take seriously.

    His turn was up, and a middle aged lady with an accent asked him the question. “How can I help you?”

    If this were a novel or a movie, perhaps he would’ve frozen up, or maybe he would’ve turned and ran away, and the plot would need to kick him back into this space. But this wasn’t a book or a movie, and he smiled openly and spoke easily. “Hey, I saw online that there’s a monthly writing group? I was thinking about coming but wanted to see if there was anything I needed to know before showing up.”

    The woman’s face lit up into a smile. “Ah yes! There’s about 9 or 10 people, regulars, who come every month. Here,” and then she stepped from behind her desk, walking briskly away. Still holding his daughter’s hand, Dee followed after her. She led him halfway down the stairs, a different staircase than the one he’d come up, and pointed to a flier on the wall. “Here’s the one,” she said.

    A colorful flier on the wall. Some random animals sat hugging each other. He noticed two pieces of information right away.

    Embrace

    and

    1500

    Fifteen hundred words wasn’t too bad, he could do that. Embrace. “Embrace, like a hug?” Dee asked.

    The woman chuckled. “It could be an actual hug, sure, but it could also be…” she paused to find the word, “Metaphorical, as well. Like, you embrace something in your life.”

    Dee nodded. Of course. Hard to stretch a hug out for 1500 words, no doubt. He snapped a picture of the flier for good measure. “Thank you so much,” he said. She smiled back and made her way back up the stairs.

    Dee and his daughter returned downstairs, and she picked out a fresh book for the week. Pete the cat, her favorite. She was running out of ones she hadn’t read yet.

    They walked out of the library, the cold air pulling at their hair. She skipped next to him, her hand in his. He smiled down at her, mind racing already. A literal hug, or a metaphorical embrace. What about metafictional? The story was already tumbling in his head. He just needed to sit down and write it.

  • Time Traveler

    Time Traveler

    Martin awoke bolt upright. He felt wide awake despite the nightmare he was having. He looked at the red glowing alarm clock, the digital numbers reading 2:14 A.M. A good two hours before he would wake up for the day. With a sigh, he started to crawl fully out of bed. He wasn’t getting any more sleep tonight, and he knew it. He could always get a few hours grinding on his Orc Hunter though. He hesitated halfway out of the bed and leaned back down to kiss the top of his wife’s head. She murmured in her sleep but didn’t wake.

    Martin pulled his pajama pants on but skipped the shirt. The boys never woke up, no matter how loud he was. He wouldn’t need it. He stumbled in the dark, using the red glow to light his way, and entered the hallway. On the opposite side of the cramped hallway was the boys’ room, and he skulked past them. He was halfway down the hall when he noticed the light coming from the kitchen, spilling under the door.

    His pulse quickened as he approached the door, his hackles raised. He knew he shouldn’t have sold his guns, but the wife insisted. Now here he was, unarmed and about to have to fight some hobo. Martin put his ear to the door to the kitchen and listened. He heard the soft muttering of a voice, and his heart eased. It sounded like a young boyish voice. That must be Dylan, his younger son. A smile crept on his face as he creaked the door open.

    The doorway opened into the kitchen. The table was on the right, against the wall. He took in the scene. His younger son sat at the table, playing cards spread out in front of him. He flipped four cards over and groaned.

    “Fuckin a,” Dylan muttered.

    Goose flesh spread along Martin’s arms, the hair on his neck stood on end. The casual ease of the words came out like a seasoned cusser. Was 8 too young to be so fluid with the art of naughty words? Possibly. Martin’s heart dropped as Dylan spoke again, this time pointedly.

    “You just gonna stand there, Pop, or you gonna join me?”

    Pop? Since when was he Pop? A scene from one of his favorite Stephen King movies played clearly in his mind. The boy from Pet Sematary, after returning not himself. ‘I wanna play with you, Daddy,’ the little boy had said.

    Martin circled around Dylan so he could face him. “Son? You feeling alright?”

    The boy had a snarling look of concentration. Flipping 4 more cards, he cursed again. The cards were arranged in a game Martin had never seen before, and he knew cards. He was in the army, after all.

    “No, Pop, I’m not alright. You think I would choose to be up at 2 A.M.?”

    The shock was wearing off now, and his patience was running thin. “I don’t care how you’re feeling, you need to not take that tone with me.”

    The boy winced, such an adult reflex on his young face. “Damn this body. You’re right, Pop, sorry I’m on edge. Say, how old are you?”

    He wasn’t sure if he was still dreaming, but the whiplash of words was hard to parse. Body? Old? He tried to think of the last time he had told his son his age and realized it must have been a while. It had been a while since he’d had a real conversation with him now that he thought about it. With the early morning, the long commute, and the late night, there just wasn’t time.

    “I’m 33. Why do you ask?”

    The boy still hadn’t looked at him, and he finally did. His eyes had a hard look about them. A look Martin thought with a chill, that he recognized. Who are you? he suddenly wanted to say, but the words were stuck in his throat.

    Dylan let out a wry chuckle and began scooping the cards with a deft hand. There was a second deck nearby, and he gestured to it. “Aggravation? I remember that one better than Scoundrel. Damn shame too that was my favorite.”

    Aggravation he recognized, obviously. That was the family version of Phase 10, taught to him by his own grandparents. Martin’s mind raced, trying to remember any time Dylan could have learned it. He didn’t recall. He nodded his assent, but his son was already expertly shuffling the two decks together.

    In silence, Martin watched. The boy dealt the 12 cards needed to start, then fanned his hand awkwardly in his small hands. Martin pulled his cards up and fanned similarly. He had a good starting hand, but he didn’t move to play. Finally, he had found his voice, but the adrenaline still thrummed through him. “Who are you? Who are you really?”

    “Oh, come now, Pop. You don’t recognize your own son?”

    “You certainly look like him, yes.”

    The boy grunted, then after taking his draw immediately dropped his two books. He had four 7’s and three Kings. No wild cards. A first turn down was pretty lucky.

    He discarded an Ace, then said, “I’m Dylan, for real. But… I’m older. I came from the future.”

    The shock of it was like a blow to the face, and Martin couldn’t keep back the light laugh. “Is that right?” His hammering heart eased at once. His son was having a go at him.

    Wasn’t he?

    “I overshot, you see. I wanted to go back 12 years, instead I hit 28. I mean, it’s not like I had a manual.” He paused, noticing Martin was still arranging his hand. “Christ, what are you waiting for, Christmas? Take your turn, man.”

    Now it was Martin’s turn to grunt, and he drew a card. He pulled a 2, a wild card, and he decided to drop down as well. These first hands were always a slogfest, and his young son clearly knew that. He dropped two 4’s alongside his 2, and three Jacks. Then he dropped a King and a 7 of his own onto Dylan’s books. He also discarded an Ace.

    Dylan nodded approvingly. “It could have been worse, I guess. Could’ve ended up in the womb.” The boy visibly shivered as he drew another card.

    “That certainly sounds worse,” Martin agreed. “So, what happens in 16 years?”

    “Shit,” Dylan said. “What are you, a mathematician?” His son took a shuddering breath. “Something bad happens in 16 years. I wanted to stop it.”

    Martin studied his son, and yes, he did know that hard look. He’d seen it himself, in the mirror.

    Dylan collapsed the fan of his cards and began idly sorting them, front to back. Martin realized he recognized his grandfather in the movements.

    “What happens?”

    “No, no, don’t you see? I’ve been here a week already, man. I’m too early. I’m too fucking early, man. If I change things now, how many butterflies do I trample over?”

    Martin nodded slowly. Yes, he did see.

    “When a thing happens, you’d give anything to go back and change it. You know?”

    “Of course,” Martin said. And he found that he did know. His mind wandered to a jungle, in a faraway country. Yes, there are always things you wish you could go back and do differently.

    Dylan nodded, a knowing look in his eye. “Shit, right, I’m sorry Pop of course you know. Well, I’m here. I’m too far back, sure, but I’m here.” His voice was hoarse, intense.

    “What’s stopping you, son? From doing something?”

    “The growing up lesson. The one only someone like you or I would know.” His voice was choked up, now, and Martin couldn’t help it. He was overcome by an inexplicable, overwhelming sorrow.

    “Which one of us is it?”

    Dylan recoiled from the question. The boy was physically fighting back tears. He managed to point over his shoulder. The angle was clear. It was to his older brother, Charlie. Oh hell.

    Martin let out a shuddering breath, one he hadn’t realized he was holding. “And what’s the lesson?” he whispered.

    “That we heal,” the boy said, his quiet sob breaking.

    Martin maneuvered around the chair, and he grasped his son. The man trapped in the child’s body. The boy clung to his father, his grip tight as he sobbed. Martin didn’t know how long he cried like that, but he held his boy and patted his back, his own tears lightly running down his cheek.

    “I met my wife after… Would I meet her again, if I change things? I’m so far back, dad. How many beautiful butterflies would I squash in my selfishness?”

    “I don’t know, son. But each man must himself decide what is right—”

    “—and what is wrong…” Dylan finished. He pulled his head back, a sly mischievous smile playing on his face. With bright tears in his eyes, he looked again like a little boy of 8. Like his boy. He hugged him tightly again.

    “Guess you’ve heard that one before,” Martin said with a chuckle.

    “Sometimes… it’s so clear. I’m back in that doorway. I’m running down the hall, and I just can’t stop. I want so badly… so badly…”

    Martin patted the boy’s back, nodding. Yes, he had a doorway of his own, one he knew well. “We do heal. It’s terribly unfair, isn’t it?”

    “Terribly unfair,” the boy agreed. Martin still carried him, and he found himself lightly rocking. His son cradled his head into the crook of his shoulder, and his breath picked up pace. He was fading fast, he realized, but he kept his slow steady rock.

    Eventually the boy’s breath was even in sleep. With careful steps Martin carried him back to bed and tucked him into the blanket. He pushed the hair away from his forehead, and Martin realized the boy, the man, had made his choice.

    The man’s voice rang in his skull. ‘How many butterflies will I squash?’ How could he continue with this terrible knowledge? He would lose one of his sons young, so horribly young. It was an uncomfortable, sinking sorrow that swept over him. His mind protested loudly, he should’ve convinced him to stay! To change things!

    ‘How many beautiful butterflies.’

    Martin headed for the bathroom. He needed to shower, and he’d do the only thing he knew. He’d go one day at a time. He’d feel that pain anew one day, and he knew in time he’d learn that lesson once again.

  • Ghost Story

    Ghost Story

    Mike sat at his desk, bleary-eyed and ready to die. He cursed as he died and smacked his desk with a loud pop. He flicked his eyes to the clock on the wall. 1am. He couldn’t end with another loss, wouldn’t, even, but with work starting in six hours…

    He started another round. It had been a long grueling day in his game, and he was certain they were all cheating. Cronus and Strike Packs, hardware cheaters, the lot of them. It wasn’t that he was getting older, the techniques advancing. Certainly wasn’t the 16-year-olds that got to play twelve hours a day while he slaved away at his customer support job.

    He was finding his groove, pulling the mouse this way and that, his bullets going where he commanded. He was feeling good, not just good, great. As he pulled a particularly nice headshot, the power died. Blackness swept over his vision as the light faded from his monitor.

    “Shit,” Mike said. Thunder pealed right outside his window, the bright flash momentarily blinding him through the blinds. Mike peeled his headset off, the sweat sticking it to his ears. There was a pop as the first earmuff came loose. He fumbled it onto the desk and rolled his chair back to begin standing. A whoosh of air sent Mike sprawling. He cursed as he hit the ground with a thud. The impact forced the breath right out of him. Wheezing, he looked up in the dim light of his office. A figure stood above him, standing awkwardly close. The silhouette of its head leaned toward him, inspecting.

    Mike’s office lights came on. There was no figure standing above him, only his gaming chair spinning slowly. He rose to his feet, wiping sweat from his forehead. When had his heart ever pounded in his ears like that before?

    He checked the time. 1:36AM. It was late. Maybe… Maybe it was time for bed.

    Mike could never get used to only getting four hours of sleep. That first hour was the worst. But once the caffeine hit the veins and got the brain going with something stimulating, Mike found he could simulate being human well enough.

    During his morning shower Mike caught himself checking the bathroom closet over and over. He shouldn’t have left the door open. Every time he looked, he expected the figure to be there. Of course, it wasn’t. Still his eyes darted there. Over and over.

    “Yes, that’s right sir,” Mike said. “I know you said you restarted it already; this is just the first step we always take.”

    The man on the other end of the line chuckled. “Okaaay,” he said.

    Mike scrolled his phone while the man restarted his tablet. A notification banner dropped down, and he swiped at it, trying to dismiss it. Instead, he pressed it, and he huffed a sigh.

    “What was that?” the man on the line asked.

    “Nothing, how’s that restart going?”

    “Booting up now.”

    “Very good, let me know when it’s… when it’s powered back on.”

    The app Mike had accidentally opened was the NextDoor app. The top of the feed featured a post getting a lot of traction. It was someone talking about last night’s storm.

    He skimmed it. A death happened. The power had been out what, 6, 7 hours? Oh, if I had just kept reading, he thought, I’d have seen it was 8 hours.

    8 hours with no power. It had been his day off, too. Couldn’t have been his Friday or something. No, not for Mike.

    “Mister Mike?”

    “Oh, what’s that?”

    “I was saying it’s on.”

    “Ah, right. Okay, go ahead and go into settings…” This was saying it had been a lady killed. Jesus… it hadn’t been pleasant.

    Thunder cracked outside, piercing through his headset. He paused, waiting, praying that the power would go out. His lights stayed on. Bastards.

    By 9pm Mike crawled into bed. His friends ribbed him relentlessly as he bid them farewell. It had been a late night before. Sometimes you had to get in an early night.

    Mike lay flat on his back, his eyes wide open. The rain clattered against his window, drumming away. His eyes were glued to the window, on the opposite wall. Lightning flashed every now and then, illuminating the tree that hovered near his second story window.

    He yanked his eyes from the window, glancing at the red glow of his alarm clock. 10:44PM. Oh hell.

    Slow breaths. That’s it. Count it out. Like counting sheep. 1.. 2.. 3.. 4.. 5..6….

    Mike awoke to the absence of noise. He caught the sound of his bedroom fan sputtering to a halt, the blades whirring to a stop. The sudden absence of everything, the a/c, the fan, roared in his ear. His eyes opened to the window. Lightning flashed outside, illuminating the figure, and the tree behind it.

    The figure? Sitting up, Mike felt his pulse quicken. “Who…” Was all he could get out before the lightning flashed again. The figure was leaping, arms outstretched.

    Clamoring backward, the sheets and blankets bundling under him, Mike felt his throat suddenly burning. He punched at the air, fighting, when he realized he could hear the whir of his electric fan spinning to life. The AC was kicking back on, and the faint red glow of his alarm clock was blinking. The strobe of the red light showed nothing before him.

    He coughed, realizing he had been screaming. Panting, wheezing, trying to catch his breath, Mike stumbled toward the bathroom, and puked in the toilet.

    Mike dragged himself to his office and powered on his work computer. It had been a long, sleepless night. His eyes found every dark space and latched onto it, searching, trying to pierce the pitch darkness.

    He clocked in and stared at the Wait button. It was a drop-down list, and it was already 7:30am. He was supposed to have put himself into “Available” 30 minutes ago. He took another gulp of coffee, and with a shaky hand he clicked the button.

    Through his office window he could see that the rain had let up. The clouds were heavy and thick, but no rain. He checked his Amazon cart for the fourth time. The twelve pack of battery powered lanterns would arrive by 5PM. Damned Prime. The six pack of 1-pound bags of salt would be arriving the next day. Damned Walmart.

    Mike didn’t know shit about spirits. But he’d watched Supernatural, and while he didn’t have a demon killing knife, he could get some salt.

    The woman on the phone screamed at him, her voice so loud it was cutting out the microphone. It lessened the effect she wanted but Mike sat silent. His cat Torb had crawled in his lap earlier and was fast asleep, oblivious to the woman spitting venom only a few inches away.

    “Ma’am, like I said earlier, a password book is a common practice. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

    The woman screeched again. Mike peeled the headset off his head and plopped it on his desk. He curled into Torb’s tabby ears, snuggling him. “She’s just a wittle angy.”

    The cat purred his pleasure. Mike noticed the lady had stopped screeching and pulled his headset back on. Only one ear this time.

    He waited.

    “Hello?”

    “Yes ma’am?”

    “Fuck you.” The line went dead. Mike stared at the screen, his case log half filled. The timer had swapped to the off-call count and was steadily clicking away. Mike let his eyes go blurry, the words and lights melding together.

    He snapped his eyes to the counter. 12 minutes? That wasn’t good. He noticed the blinking alert on the team chat.

    Shit shit shit!

    He sent himself into available, pushing Torb out of his lap. It was going to be a long day.

    Mike stood before his power switch in the living room. He had a lantern strapped to his belt, and another in his hands. The sun had set late, around 8:40pm. The salt circle was closed around him. It was time to see if he could lure this son of a bitch out.

    He pulled open the panel and looked at it. He had never flipped the breakers before, but they looked just like levers, or sideways light switches. Some of them were labelled, and one set even had some kind of joining plastic on it, so it had to be flipped together. He activated his lanterns, the soft orange glow barely competing with the bright light of the living room ceiling fan. He hardly noticed his hand shaking, more like someone who observed something in someone else. He laid his palm on the first set, closed his eyes, and began rapidly flipping all of the switches.

    With his eyes closed he couldn’t tell if anything had happened. He opened them slowly and turned to face his living room. The orange glow now seemed much brighter, casting long shadows into the hallway and near the office doorway.

    Mike could feel pressure rising in his chest, his breathing came too rapidly as his eyes darted this way and that, looking for the shape, the figure. Nothing. Silence. Stillness.

    Gulping for air Mike let his logical brain begin rambling. There were way too many variables here. Was his light scaring off the figure? Did the salt work that well? Was only cutting the electricity to his apartment enough? Had he missed a switch? No, no they were all flipped. Was it possible that the salt was like a wall, and the figure was right there, out of sight?

    “Oh Jesus. To hell with this.”

    Mike stepped out of the salt line. Nothing.

    He fumbled his lantern light, then clicked it off after three tries. Silence.

    With a chuckle that sounded like rasping gasps, Mike flipped the light switches back on. Stillness.

    Then he felt pressure on his leg, and he leapt back, a scream threatening to escape him. All that came out was a shrill laugh. Torb stood under him, tail straight up and back arched. He vocalized his disapproval.

    “I’m sorry buddy, c’mere.” He scooped Torb up and walked with him to the bedroom.

    Mike watched the weather app almost by the hour. Any time the rain threatened him, he dumped salt out around him. The ground was speckled with the stuff, little white mounds and lines everywhere. He was like a really bad drug addict, leaving his drugs lying around.

    Three weeks went by with no new storms. He even got a sunny day on one of his days off. He didn’t work up the courage to go check out the pool, but from his office window he saw many groups heading that way, floaties and towels and swimsuits, oh my.

    He tried to game. He was told multiple times his shooting seemed off. Yes, he was alright. No, he didn’t need anything.

    Then he saw it. One week out, on his Wednesday off. A 90% chance of rain. A severe storm, they predicted. Last week predicted the same thing, of course, but that one hadn’t come to pass.

    Mike’s eyes darted to the corner of his office closet. Nothing. He stormed over and slammed it shut. Stillness.

    Silence.

    The days passed in a blur. Less and less sleep. Once he even awoke, flailing out of bed, believing the figure to be right there. But the power had been on, and it had been his imagination.

    Wednesday arrived. He had stayed up all night Tuesday with the rain falling lightly. Now the storm began in earnest, just like they said it would. He paced around, little pockets of circled off safe areas. Most of them were broken and useless, not contributing to anything meaningful. He really wished he had the demon killing dagger instead of this damn salt.

    Finally, he went into his office. He put a line of salt at the door. He sat at his desk, and twirling in his chair he poured the contents of an entire bag out around himself, flinging most of the stuff in useless clumps.

    He launched up the game. Thunder roared outside, the rain smashing into his window and walls and roof and pounding in his ears. He had a lantern in his lap, one on his desk. He thought he left one hanging on the door.

    His play got progressively worse. He missed more shots. His friends logged off one by one, wishing him a good night. 2:26am rolled around, and his power held. Maybe… well. He didn’t want to jinx it.

    It happened. The screen flashed off. The a/c came to a screeching halt, the ceiling fan above lost power with a dying whir.

    Mike stared at the black screen, and with a deft hand he flicked on the lantern in his lap. He hit the one on the desk too. The orange glow filled the room.

    The headset rolled to the ground, falling into a pile of salt. Twirling in his chair, Mike waited.

    knock… knock… knock…

    It was so quiet, he almost didn’t hear it. It came again, louder this time. Each knock was deliberate, with an even cadence.

    Mike stood up, the pit in his stomach reaching his feet, making his toes tingle. He dragged through white snow and reached the door. He opened it. It creaked meaningfully as it swung wide.

    Standing before him was a tall figure. It wore no clothes, except for spikes covering the torso like a stalagmite tunic. Black pitted eyes stared straight ahead, not fixated on anything. Long black fingers that ended in points twitched back and forth.

    Frozen in place, Mike stared at the being that had been terrorizing him. Then, it stared back. Its black eyes somehow seemed to expand on seeing him, then it looked down. Mike followed his gaze. Realization was replaced by horror as he saw the paw print that broke the line of salt. Torb’s tail flicked out of the room and out of sight.

    Backing away, flailing his arms, Mike cried out. The light flicked off and on, the figure appearing to teleport closer with each flare. The ceiling fan buzzed back to life and whirred angrily with each interruption. The a/c was roaring on and off. With his back against the wall, he slid to the floor.

    Thunder crashed outside, the peal of it so violent he jumped. There was a pop from the surge of electricity, and the power died its final death. He knew this time it wouldn’t come back on. Silence.

    He looked up to the figure standing before him. Stillness.

    Nothing.