[#Occ] Down with the Ship

In a small cabin high in the Bernese Alps, the air was tense and smelled of expensive cigars.

A tall thin man knelt next to the fireplace. The reflection of flames danced evilly across his eyes.

"The Directors are not pleased" he said as he stood upright and turned to the man standing near the door. He slowly walked over to the other man and towered above him. "This project was to be the crowning achievment of our race since we took over this filthy planet!"

"I understand that sir, but if we...."

"If we what?" he shouted. "What could you possibly do to save the program now?"

"The parameters were flawed, but I think I may have a way to reconstruct it."

The tall man laughed loudly and walked back towards the mantle. "There is nothing to reconstruct! The product is tainted. After your program failed, the humans filled the streets and protested as if they actually had a choice in the matter. Protests turned into riots, riots turned into anarchy and the complete breakdown of any sort of control that we had! New York, Los Angelos, London, Rome, Bejing and Bangkok......." He let out a loud sigh. "....some of our biggest concentrations of product was lost after they began killing each other all because your damn program failed!"

"If we continue with the harvest we can salvage whats left."

"That's where you are wrong my friend!" The tall man picked up a bottle from the mantle that contained a model boat and slowly walked back towards the other man. "We have spent over 200,000 years on this planet preparing for the DNA harvest of planet Earth. The largest collection of biologically-diverse material in the galaxy, valued more than anything within our concievable imagination and its lost with only 12 months left until harvest! But you think we can 'salvage' the project?"

A bead of sweat rand down the cheek of the other man, his fingers clutched at his pants nervouslly.

The tall man held up the bottle. "Do you know what this is?'

"Yes, the humans call it a schooner".

He placed the bottle in the other man's hands and said, "and did you know that it's honorable amongst humans for the captain to go down with his vessel?"

The room fell completely silent except for the cracking of wood in the fire place.

The tall man walked towards the door leading out into the frozen landscape, turned around and as he opened the door said, "Well, the directors have decided to eliminate any more liability and cut their losses. It's time to scuttle the ship, Captain."

The door closed......

reply to post by sheepslayer247



hello, it brought a smile to my face. It was like reading a novel but I wondered which one were you in that?

Were you the tall man or the director or the one answering the questions?

It was intriguing because I was not sure where you were going with it. Well written ...

I did not put myself into the story. I guess I could have.

The gist of the story is that the programming that kept the people of Earth under control was breaking. The riots were a reference to OWS. The people broke away from the programming and rebelled against the system. Unbeknownst to the people, the program (IE the people) was a DNA "bank" for a off-world "corporate" entity.

In the end the tall man told the other man that the Earth had to be destroyed because of his failure in the program. Hence, the captain went down with his ship.

reply to post by sheepslayer247


Personally, It would have been more interesting to see you in there... yanno.. which one would you be?


It flowed really well and it was easy to read!

lol na I am probably intrigued now to see what character you would have chosen to be.

reply to post by Thurisaz


Which person would I be? That's a hard question!

Ideally, I would be one of the protesters that fought against the system, but in reality I probably would have been the programmer that was willing to fix the system until completion. Sounds bad but it fits.

reply to post by sheepslayer247


Wonderful! Such a slant on the Occupy movement I would never have imagined! I really like your story. The opening line is a winner -- it grabs you and takes you into the story.

reply to post by argentus


Thank you very much. This was my second attempt at writing a short story and both have turned out fairly well. I hope that I am up to the challenge to attempt another contest, or possibly post other stories I have written just for the fun of it.

Thanks again!