The loop.

I wake up.

There is a bomb in my house.

It is being planted by

a familiar shadow of a human.

It had chased me in my dreams.

And I had chased it for a long time.

I thought I had killed him.

He had the ability to read minds.

I guess that is easy for him.

He dwells in my head.

"Wake up, Robert.", I tell my brother.

"Leave me alone."

"There is a bomb in the house."

"Leave me be.  I am tired."

He does not believe me.

A thousand times I've been a liar in this charade.

I am not sure if I believe myself.

Maybe I've just gone crazy.

But would a crazy person know

when they have gone crazy?

Because it is my brother,

I try.  Its a timeless ritual.

"Get the fuck out"

"No, you get the fuck out."

I go to deactivate the bomb.

How?  No clue.  

It is in the attic.

How do I know?

I've seen the shadow man,

turn 2 dimensional,

and slip through the ceiling cracks.

In my dream.  Which was within this dream.

Which is inside another dream.

I stand on stacked chairs and push

against the attic door.  It won't budge.

There is something blocking it.

I wake up.

My brother is asleep in his room.

"Wake up!"

"No, you wake up!"

I scramble to disarm the bomb, 

but its different this time.  

Why the same a thousand times,

but different this time?

I am out of my routine.

My brother looks to see what I am doing.

I stack chairs,

something is blocking the attic door.

I hear footsteps up there.

I push with all of my might.

It moves a enough 

so I could insert my fingers.

The chairs fall from beneath me.

As I hang, the shadowy man

stomps on my fingers.

I awake.

My brother is asleep in his room.

I tell him there is a bomb 

in the house.

He looks at me. With no response.

I tell him to leave.

He asks me where I am going?

"To deactivate the bomb."

"What bomb?"

"An intruder is in the attic with a bomb?"

We stack chairs.

I tell him the attic is blocked.

"How do you know?"

"I've done this before."

We hear footsteps above us.

I hurry the pace.

My brother doesn't move.

I shake him. I ask.

"Are you okay?"

"What is going on here?"

I awake.

My brother is awake next door.

"What is going on?"

"I don't know.  Robert?"

"What."

"I'm not sure if you are you."

"What do you mean?"

"This is my dream."

"Is it?"

"Yeah."

I didn't care about what was real.

I was glad he was there with me.

I was alone for a long time.

Why would I want him 

to circle in this endless loop.

To understand my plight.

Footsteps thudded across the attic.

My brother looked at the ceiling and looked

at me.

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

I awake.

My brother meets me in the hall.

I say, "we got to stop the bomb!"

"The what?"

"Listen, he has a bomb! And you heard

him walking up there.  We got to stop him!"

"Why?"

"I don't know. We can't waste time!"

I really did not know.  I did not know

why my brother asked me these questions.

Why don't we just leave?

Why was my brother, who my mind created,

questioning my actions?

Maybe because I've stopped questioning my actions.

I was on auto-pilot.  

And hatred. 

That shadow man stole my mind.

And that is too much power over me.

To know my thoughts.

My brother spoke.

"I don't know why, but you are right."

"Right about what?"

"That we must destroy that..."

He points towards the ceiling.

"...thing."

Hush hush

don't tell him

that we are falling for the trap.

I stack boxes  of nachos

high towards the ceiling.

"Grab the chairs, it would be quicker."

"No, they are too rickety."

"Nachos."

My brother climbs before me.

"We need a crowbar."

He pounds the the attic door 

using his shoulders

in a massive squatting motion.

The door budges slightly.

A small crack appears

where the darkness inside attic

stared at us.

I climbed to where he was.

We both hit the door.

With our combined power,

shattering the wood panel.

The growling reverberates our hearts.

I awake.

My brother meets me in the hall.

"We need to approach from another angle."

My brother has great ideas!

"Lets go outside and get the ladder."

"We will take a sledge hammer to the roof."

It is cloudy, a storm is brewing.

I pound the roof with the sledgehammer.

Shingles fly.  I keep hitting.

A hole breaks.  My brother jumps in.

I hear him scream.  

I jump in.

I awake.

My brother meets me in the hall.

I say we must stop the bomb.

"Why don't we just leave?" says my brother.

"I thought you were with me?"

"I am."

I understand.  We are stuck in a loop.

We exit our house.

The house no longer had a right angle

or an up and down.

We ran down to the corner before

looking back at the house.

Lightning flashed in the distance.

Standing on the roof is the shadow man.

He is not human.

He looks at me and smiles.

He enjoys my fear.

Asshole knows my mind.

How I think.

The bomb explodes.

Blue fire exploded towards 

the stormy sky.

All the neighbors came out and 

watched our house burn.

Curiosity?

The distant lightning

descended upon us.

We continued to watch

our shelter, fall apart.

A lightning bolt zapped a neighbor.

The boom shook my heart

and sent the neighbors running.

I took shelter under a covered porch.

Where was my brother?

I saw him in the street

where I left him.

I call out.

But he couldn't hear me.

Lightning is striking all around.

I covered my ears and turned away.

What is going on?

Its seems as if the universe

had been cracked open.

I am looking at my house.

My brother is next to me.

As we watch the shadow man

destroy our house.

Blue fire shot into the stormy sky.

The neighbors come out to have a look.

I tell my brother,

"When the lightning comes, we are running."

He looks at me and nods.

Then the lightning came.

We run.

He asks,

"What is the point? When we are 

only going to end up,

where we started."

"What is the point?", I agree.

"Why bother.  There is no one 

here worth saving." he says.

"I'm not saving the neighbors."

"I'm not talking about them.

I am talking about us."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"Its like a game."

He looked at me.  He could not hear.

"What?"

"Its like a game!"

Type I type with nothing to say with nothing to say

Lasers aimed at planet 20469, which is determined to harbor no life.  Its precious metals would be picked up from the debris.  We will melt it and make more spaceships with lasers.  The fuel comes from our antimatter harvester, the AM6 made by Intergalactic Engine Corporation.  The one and only corporation left after the great singularity.  We, the last remainders of the human/robotic race, all work for them.  They pay nothing, but the constant threat of instant incineration, keeps the people in working.  I saw my youth handler get vaporized yesterday.  I was sad, but thats what happens when one reaches the age of 31.  The normal people that is.  The real smart ones  get their brains downloaded into the central core.  Some say in the central core one can live forever.  My youth handler told me that we normal people have a place where we live forever too.  She told me the day before she got what she got.  I miss her already, I should take a sedative from the drug replicator.  She raised me for 5 years after I was first hatched from the Metaluterus.  They ween one off from the youth handler at age five, to avoid attachments.  At age six one is outfitted with metal eyes, I remember when I had mine installed.  Once they were turned on, the visual world became a million times crisper, because of the million time increase in photo receptors.  All wavelengths of light were visible, and the quantum hard drive inside recorded every moment into its quantum flux.  Which basically allowed me to play back whatever I had ever seen.  Although the eyes were technically better than the old ones, I had a sense of something missing.  It was if I was no longer me.  The recorded moments always showed what happened.  The truth.  The brain, however powerful it is, only records the moments as processed through the ego filter.  Many years after the eye installment, I concluded my brain to be a liar, and no longer to be trusted.

the Aftermath of the Confusion

Where are my shoes,
glasses, and keys?
Who is that in the mirror?
Who rudely stares,

and examines with a critical eye?

I can't breathe.
I gotta lie down.
Can't lie down
gotta get up.

The clock is ticking.

What is the problem.
Can't solve the problem,

if I don't know what it is.

I am too old.
Stop staring at me.

I can't imagine the future.

Good? Bad?  Nothing.
How can I hope?
If I can't imagine?

My brain is partially broken.

If it is damaged this much,

why not go all the way?
Am I just a brain?

Is there an afterlife?
Is there something else
more than this?