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I would choose: "A Music Concert"

A story set around either the creation of said concert, or the story of what happened to some people attending the concert, a murder mystery set in the chaos of a heavy metal concert, or whatever.

Sinitrena: I loved your story. The swap-outs of the tests was done perfectly. From what the mother was telling her child, I expected that maybe she was threatening something a bit more disturbing than a beating, like maybe she was threatening she would slit her own wrists if the test results weren't good. Or maybe that's what you meant... would be a creepy story if not, anyway.

Stupot: The way your obviously semi-autobiographical tale dovetailed pretty much perfectly with the meta story-within-the-story won me over enough to make yours my favorite. It was a tale with a struggle that all us writers go through.

I think humans will always value human-made art over algorithm-generated art. When photography came about, people were predicting the fall of the art of painting, but it only came back stronger and evolved faster against its competitor.

A.I. art is fine for commercial uses, but I doubt anyone soon is gonna go to an art gallery to look at any of it, except for the initial novelty.

We want to see what other people did, and talk about why they did it, and what they were feeling while they did it.

At the current state of A.I. art, there is no conversation to be had because the machine was not even aware of what it was creating.

This may also change of course.

> Light the beacons of Gondor!!!

Great feedback, Sini!

This was a bit of an experiment into packing as much of an epic sci-fi story spanning eons into as small a space as possible. The plan was always to expand it further if nobody got it, and nobody really had so far.

I can't wait to hear what you have to say after that potential second read.

Oh, cool. Three stories if Baron can bring himself to sacrifice his last post!

[THE FINAL FLIGHT OF KENRIN]

THE FINAL FLIGHT OF KENRIN

Captain James Verill still read paper books. The data files for them were considerably more costly than the digital variety, took much longer to download, especially all the way out here, and ate up a lot of expensive 3D printer resources to simulate the hardback covers he preferred, the individual "paper" pages and the "inked" letters "soaked" into them, and the glue that held each page affixed within the spine, all built rapidly one microscopic layer at a time.

But, when freshly printed, they still smelled somewhat like the real books he remembered from his past, all of which had crumbled to dust millions of years ago. The extra financial expenditure was well worth the simple pleasure of opening a new book, hearing the glue along the spine creak and crack for the first time, and drawing in the close-enough scent of the approximated paper through his ancient but proud, and unwrinkled, nose. Well, maybe a few creases were starting to form across its bridge. Humanity wasn't completely immortal yet, only nearly so.

The cover of this most recent and expensive book bore the inlaid gold-foil title (another cost he refused to shirk), "The Caa Invasion of Rizable Six". The real action in this war against the Caa seemed far away to James as he started to read the account he already knew the generalities of. But it was the details he needed.

Even if he wasn't overseeing a direct combat post against the alien race that, after all the multitudes of other races had been assumed defeated and extinct, had actually made a dent in the human-occupied vastness of the universe, his position here was still vital.

And so, he read his book, the view of the twin, cannibalistic suns of this system forgotten to him as they cast their dying orange and red rays through the Nuc-Sil half-dome of glass that was his preferred reading room, set into the side of the massive black sphere that was the "Human Collective Outpost Red-08618-Ahab".

It was an "H.C.O." in name only however, a subterfuge that would be unlikely to stem the cruelty of the Caa, should they find him here. The size of the sphere, seemingly capable of supporting an outpost colony of a few billion humans, yet only home to James and Kenrin, was also for camoflague purposes only: H.C.O Red-08618-Ahab was a listening post, and Captain James Verill was a spy.

A great length of time passed, measured not in hours nor days nor years, but by the further downloadings and printings of another few hundreds-of-thousands of books detailing the more vital military actions in the disappointing war against the Caa, all of which James had read and then tossed into the hollow central core of the sphere. They would float around down there, orbiting each other with their splayed covers and fanned pages, for as long as humanity stood against the Caa, which might not be all that much longer the way things were going.

What had once been a single dent of an offensive into human-held space had grown into several, and then hundreds... and then billions of intrusions.

The Caa had proved to be a much more numerous and capable foe than ever imagined, especially after the simple defeats that all the throngs of other, more primitive alien civilizations and collectives had suffered under the lightyears-wide bootheel of humankind.

But, James thought to himself, that's why they were both of them stationed out here, he and Kenrin. And, when Kenrin floated across the vast chamber that annexed his private reading dome, James was not at all surprised by the urgency of the bulbous robot's many twitching limbs and outgassing thrusters. The moment he had been here for, through all these lengths of books, was finally upon them. 

"Captain, they have found us," said Kenrin through the speaker below his tiny, but expressive, animatronic eyes. "They are beginning to scan and shut down all sphere-based servers in order of magnitude from top to bottom. This one in me is at the very bottom."

"Good," replied James, calmly placing "A Study on the Caa Victory at Frehail. Volume 73." beside him on the curving, white-cushioned couch he had sat on for the greater part of all these eons, filling his head with as much military knowledge on the enemy as he could pack into it. "Begin the hack as planned."

Kenrin's eyes, their tiny mechanical irises ratchetting wide enough to almost completely fill their glass orbs, focused in on James with an intensity he had never felt before during his and the robot's long and long time together.

"I already began the hack microseconds ago. It is almost complete. Then, James? Is the time really here? The time of the sacrifice?" the robot said.

A brief pang of pain for his friend hit James hard in his heart. He was surprised he still had it in him, after all these ages, to feel for someone, especially for a robot: To feel regret at what Kenrin was about to go through, but the sacrifice had always been the plan from the very sta...

"DOWNLOAD COMPLETE," came the automated response from the robot's speaker, not the real voice of his machine companion, not the voice that had developed to become so human over their vast time together.

James knew that he would never hear that true voice from his friend ever again. From here on in, everything was automated on a precise schedule. Every step of the plan had to happen in rigid lockstep. The Caa were a rare, advanced species, their technology and concept of reality almost the polar opposite of the human experience. But... one thing that had been detected over galaxy-spanning eavesdropping on their enemies' coms was that the Caa were developing a bomb. A bomb that could wormhole its way anywhere. A bomb that could destroy not only thousands of galaxies, but also the space between them. A bomb that could erase spacetime itself, deleting the entire history of the targeted civilization from the universe, as if it had never existed.

These were the stakes. The robot, Kenrin, had hacked into the approaching enemy and downloaded all the files on the development of the bomb. As the robot blasted away on its gas thrusters toward the hollow core of their home, James knew that the Caa had detected the hack and were already scanning the sphere for the singularity they needed to destroy to keep the blueprints for the bomb falling into enemy hands: the densest concentration of military knowledge that could be used against them.

Captain James Verill said, "Sacrifice Protocol". And, at his command, his reading-room half-dome thudded its other half into place and then burst itself away from the side of the sphere of the H.C.O Red-08618-Ahab. He picked up the book beside him from his couch as his new, tiny and final spherical home started to blast out into the void. The swarms of the Caa detected the sheer density of military knowledge that he had accumulated in his brain and poured like a pulsing river through space after James's rapidly accelerating capsule.

James managed to read another 486 pages of the book before the silvery snake of the pursuing Caa units enveloped his glassy reading room and imploded it.

Kenrin flew out from the mouth of a conduit, into the hollow core of the planet-sized sphere and, as his automated protocols demanded, shut himself down to await retrieval.

Real paper books bounced off his bulbous hull for vast stretches of time, eventually fracturing apart and then, over further eons, their fractured pieces fractured smaller and smaller again, finally crumbling to dust.

I have my story written and ready to post after a bit of proofreading tomorrow.

Oooohhh, I like this theme!

> Try to light the Beacons of Gondor! (can't remember what we have in inventory though)

Thanks to all who competed. We actually got one outsider, separate from our little crew, but a regular AGSer, sending in some votes this time!

Without further ado, brevity being beautiful, here is the final tally of votes:

The Slope - Baron.................... 102
The Boat - Sinitrena................. 63
Faceplant - Stupot................... 61
Dragonfight - Sinitrena.............. 47
You Think That's Messed? - Baron..... 35
Earth - Sinitrena.................... 35
Horsefight - Sinitrena............... 29
Knightfight - Sinitrena.............. 20
One Two Three - Sinitrena............ 8

Baron wins with his briefly excellent and wise entry of: The Slope.

Over to you, most excellent one.

(And, yes, the wordcount of this post does add up to 144 including this comment I'm leaving here in brackets. By the way, did I mention that my sister was once bitten by a moose? Aw, fuck, still not enough words to end the contest on a cool note? I'll go just one over then...)

Cheers for all the feedback on my stories, guys. Always a pleasure to read!

I actually came up with one last concept for such a short 144-word story format after the contest closed, so I will just leave it here:

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The Lurker

The children went up and down the slide and swung on the swingset, unaware of the large, hulking man that watched them on that day from the edge of the park, standing hidden in the shade of overhanging trees. He had watched them play for days now, sweating with excitement, thinking as best he could on how to make his approach.

But how could he ever win over their trust, being such as he was?

One boy in particular peaked the man's interest. A spritely bouncing boy, full of the playful energy that the blocky man desired to experience.

The man stopped his useless planning and just walked over, his wide shadow falling across the lad. The boy looked up into the face of the man. Into his Down Syndrome face.

"W-will you push me on the swing?" the man asked, eyes welling up.

@Stupot Audio log maybe?

The contest is now closed.

It looks like we have nine entries, which is awesome!

They are:

The Boat - Sinitrena.
Earth - Sinitrena
Faceplant - Stupot
One Two Three - Sinitrena
Dragonfight - Sinitrena
Knightfight - Sinitrena
Horsefight - Sinitrena
You Think That's Messed? - Baron
The Slope - Baron

I'm going to give every voter 100 points each.

These points can be split in any way between the nine entries.

You do not need to vote for every story.

Send me your votes via PM labelled "FWC votes" or something similar.

Voting will be open until March 24th.

[Dragonchase]

Dragonchase

Gerald felt exultant. The sun was in his eyes, glaring out from between the jagged mountain peaks he stood upon, but he was still sure that he had seen the tail of the winged creature flash stunningly through his peripheral vision.

Weeks later, he caught a flash of underbelly scales from the light of the sun setting over hilly grasslands.

Gerald traveled on, despite the wounds in his arm from his battles with the beast. He glimpsed it once again in a low-lying swamp, maybe its snout and grizzled, needle-toothed mouth.

His constant tracking led him into a deep cave. He descended. Traces of the creature grew dimmer and the lantern that guided his way started to flicker and die.

Gerald Cummings died of his inevitable heroin overdose on a filthy mattress in a squatters' den just a week shy of his 19th birthday.

> Examine what seems to be a schematic or map on the wall of the top floor.

Tim's Cat

Tim sat across from the cat staring at him, and it bothered him. He didn't even like cats. Why was this one always watching him?

It took another few days before he finally caved and started throwing scraps of meat to it from his own meals, then just over a week before he went to pet it, and it allowed him to.

The deep purring in the cat's throat warmed Tim's heart when he stroked it there.

His comrades would be angry if they knew what he was doing. There was no room for softies here. So, he was careful.

But the day was approaching when the cat would be gone, and he acted:

Tim opened the tiger cub's cage, took it under his arm, and made good their escape while the other animal traffickers were asleep.

The pair are still on the run.

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The Occupant

Night held herald over the ghost town.
The wind blew through the leafless branches,
Where even the crows didn't dare.
A black car came driving,
Pouring grey smoke,
From chimney stacks made of copper.
The wail of a woman mourning,
Was the lamentation of its engine.
Its hood ornament,
Was the skull of a fox.
The last lamppost light left lit anywhere,
Flickered and died,
In the reflected deep of the car's black hood.
Its wide girth brushed aside effigies,
Of rotting heroes who fell without complaints,
That there was no one left to hear.
Excepting The Occupant:
He sat on cushioned leather,
Necking with his whore in the back.
His car drove out of town,
Its wheel turning itself.
The Occupant's face split forehead to chin,
Incisors enveloped his whore's head,
Then gnashed shut.
He swallowed deep,
And necked with her some more.

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The Cure

Day 87
We now have twelve subjects penned up in "The Arena". Lost two of our squad during the hunt that brought in the last three.

Day 95-ish
Subjects divided into two groups of six each: Control and Test. Lost Abrahms during the transfer. Once he rises we will lure him into the Test group's pen.

Day 111?
There is a notable difference between Test (fed on human parts) and Control (not fed). Control subjects appear emaciated. Test subjects, especially Abrahms, eat with gusto and maintain body mass. They still need food to survive.

Day Whatever
It's been a week since we taught them to eat cockroaches instead of us. Once one of them learns, the rest follow. This could have been the cure!
But Abrahms wouldn't imprint on roaches. He leads his squad again, hammering on the door. The top hinge just popped loose.

Yup, I have two finished and another idea in the works. Non-entries of course. I'm gonna post them all in one post, but that is not a requirement at all.

Actually, sorry for not mentioning it, but I think the title shouldn't figure into the word count. It is not counted in the total word count for any other kind of story.

Of course, we shouldn't cheat and use the title to tell the first part of the story either. I think you can easily add two extra words to your story. For me I always find it's running out of word limit that gets me and then I gotta edit down.

Kynseed.