Lana Johnson

Benjamin Chandler

Sean King

Emily J

Chris Dodds

Jay Knowles

Jacob Sherman

Marta P

TurtleGameMaste r

Phil Harwell

English

Mason Howard was a dentist who loved the library. He would always read books and check as many books as possible.

One morning while perusing the stacks, Mason spied a book he'd never seen before, "Lost Loves of the Bibliophile Dentist." Flipping through the pages, a slip of paper dropped from it. It was a note: 709.36 PLA. Recognizing the Dewey decimal system, he put the book under his arm &

jogged toward the section listed. Suddenly he heard a whistle. “No running in the library!”, stage-whispered the librarian, flipping out her ticket book. Second ticket this month! He had to be more careful. Third strike is a doozy:

You would think the punishment would be losing library privileges, but, no. Instead they make you re-alphabetize the ancient card catalog. He grabbed the ticket from the disapproving librarian and continued on his way to find the hovercraft schematics. There has to be a way in.

The next several hours were the longest and most maddening of his life. It turns out that “Lovecraft” has little to do with “hovercraft” and the eldritch horrors and casual racism he discovered ate away at his sanity so that he barely remembered his own name.

Seeing how corrupted he had become, he was filled with an intense hatred of the light, for it sought to expose him. He ran down the stairs and slammed the door behind him, never to come out of the basement. And his name became Anonymous, or Anon for short. He got on the computer.

He spent his days dwelling in the basement, never to see the light of day ever again. The only light emanated from his monitor screen, illuminating a silhouette of his morbidly obese figure. He enjoyed getting a rise out of others. It was his specialty. It made him feel superior.

Yes, his occupation was being an internet troll. Besides engaging in meaningless arguments with strangers, his true specialty was spreading misinformation to cause confusion. Today, he decided to stir up some rumors about British actor Boneditch Cumberland.

It took quite a while for everyone to find out that the rumors were false, but when they did it was too late. The damage had already been done. The only thing left to do was to find the source of all of this.

I knew where to look, but looking was hard and expensive. Eventually I learned that having your own university just to have a university library is prohibitively expensive. Lesson learned, time to move on to the next item. Oh yeah, the source. I think I found it online somewhere.

The mystery dentist

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Movie star Jaylen Clarke loved to be in the spotlight but she

sunburned incredibly easily. She needed SPF 50 to stand under an incandescent bulb. That’s why the acclaimed actress did all her scenes at night, lit by trained fireflies.

The firefly trainer was always on set, always making sure the lightning bugs illuminated the actress perfectly. The two chatted as the cameras were adjusted for "bug light intensity", & discovered they both loved playing pinball—him because of the blinking lights, her because of

the cacophonous racket the machines make.
“…and wouldn’t you know it, I set the new High Score without much effort. Ol’ Tommy’s got nothing on me!”
“Tommy who?” she said, bewildered.
“Never mind,” he said with a sigh. “Way before your time.”

“TommyInnit?” “No, Tommy Gun.” Legend has it that he used to be the fastest hand in the west. Whenever he stepped into the arcade, everyone would freeze in fear. Every target on the screen fell to his rapid yet accurate fire. That was until a little kid beat him. That kid was me.

Battle of the Stars

Zoe Becker

Jerry glanced down at the photograph in his hand, then back up again at the woman sitting alone at the back of the cafe.

The lady matched the picture exactly. He walked over to her and asked” Is this you”? She looked up and replied” yes that is me”?

All at once a blinding light coursed through the space. Jerry and the woman froze. And then a creature appeared, seemingly from the air itself.

As the creature rose up in the air it made a screeching sound. The creature turned around at them charged angrily towards them ready to attack. They started running but the creature too fast was already catching up to them.

Lana Johnson
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Lana Johnson@lanajohnson

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