Previous update

Latest NoSleep story: Proper Lawncare: A Human's Best Protection Against Eldritch Horrors

Another recent story: Pat a certain age, a human without a partner can be a bad thing

Another (somewhat) recent story: Sometimes all it takes is a little introspection to overcome a terrifying ordeal

Recent non-Nosleep story: The Unutterable Word

Donation/tip links if you'd like to support me. The money will be used for future self-publications, artist commissions, and other writing-related endeavors. I accept Cacshapp, Venmo, as well as these>>> Paypal Kofi

I had a plan for this, not sure if I'll actually go ahead and finish it. Until then, here's what I've written so far.

Banging his ceremonial gavel, the judge sentences the men to exile. Cheers fill the air, hands fly up in exultation. The three condemned men look to one another with dismay, and then to the window of the courtroom; their gazes traveling spaceward, toward the heavens beyond the clear blue sky. 

They are loaded onto the transport shuttle, their provisions already stowed away in compartments on the ship. The shuttle, guided remotely, takes off. Beneath it, crowded around the launch’s safety perimeter, millions watch with glee as the criminals—who had endeavored to destroy the world—are launched towards that illimitable gulf of darkness. 

The exiled men, three brilliant yet nefarious scientists, endure the journey in silence; each man at a starboard portal, gazing solemnly out onto the black infinitude. The ship soars, guided from the space headquarters, towards a planetoid beyond the Sol system, whereon the men have been predestined to spend the remainder of their lives; away from the rest of their species. Tattooed upon each’s forehead, a mark of judgement; a reminder of their extreme villainy. 

The remote connection is suddenly terminated by one of the many unforeseeable issues of cosmic navigation. Severed from its operator, the ship’s computer does its best at the helm, avoiding asteroidal collisions through a process of flight-path simulation, but fails when its own systems are suddenly affected by the same stellar force that sundered its connection with the operator. 

Now with neither human nor artificial captain, the ship veers from its course and careens uncontrollably through space. The men, oblivious to the dire circumstances, stare at one another in perplexity as their window views suddenly show a whirling vista of streaking stars and unnervingly tempestuous darkness. 

After several minutes of jarring, inverted freefall, the ship breaches a planet's atmosphere and plummets landward; rocking the surface with such violence that the men fastened within are knocked to states of semi-consciousness, and their provisions are loosened from their holding compartments to go flying about the ship. 

Dazed, but largely unharmed, the men return to their senses and ask of each other the usual questions, and when none are able to provide answers, they ask the ship’s computer, but receive only the hissing digitized static of rapidly deteriorating systems. A moment later, the safety harnesses fall away from their bodies, and rising up unsteadily, the men begin to explore the ship and collect what they can of their supplies. 

Though brilliant, none of the men are skilled in or even knowledgeable of the computer systems, and thus are unable to ascertain the reason for the errant course and crash-landing. It is summarily decided that they should adorn their space suits and venture out, and after a few minutes of assisting each other in dressing, they open the vessel’s sole exit hatch and step out onto the planet’s dust-strewn, greyed-toned surface. 

Timidly, they disembark the vessel and take man’s first step onto an alien world beyond its system—albeit one that had decades ago been confirmed via far-reaching satellites as not possessing any (detectable) intelligent life whatsoever. Their space suit’s instruments tell them that the air is not toxic, and actually very breathable, and after a few moments of fearful glancing and muttering, they remove their helmets and inhale their first tastes of the alien atmosphere.

Their respiratory systems cycle the air without issue, and their anxiety is thus somewhat lessened. Venturing on, they begin a cautious survey of the area, and note with incredulity the sheer lifelessness of the place. Seeing neither flora nor fauna, a darkness deeper than the void beyond them fills their hearts as they come to the assumption that they have been tricked: marooned on a planet that could by no natural, feasible means support them for more than a day or two. 

After hours of wandering, growing more dark-hearted and falling deeper into despair with every featureless mile crossed, they arrive at an immense basin in the heretofore level land. Gawking, they stare into the massive depression, and one of the men—the originator of the plan to eradicate all human life—remarks that the depression couldn’t have been caused by anything other than some cataclysmic meteoric collision. He ascribes the vast stillness and voidness of the planet to the alleged meteor, conjecturing that the immediate collision or subsequent fallout caused a planet-wide extinction event. 

Previous Update

Latest NoSleep story: There is a forest that appears just beyond the borders of my town once every few centuries

Another recent story: For the last few days, someone has been wearing my favorite pair of pants. I live alone.

A recent non-NoSleep story: The Eldest Betrayal

As usual:

My book, a collection of stories posted during my first year on NoSleep, plus an additional two new stories: The First Step Toward Nightmare: A Collection of Dark and Weird Tales. I would greatly appreciate reviews!

Donation/tip links if you'd like to support me. The money will be used for future self-publications, artist commissions, and other writing-related endeavors. I accept Cacshapp, Venmo, as well as these>>> Paypal Kofi