A Death Of Imagination

20260519

Written for Bradley Ramsey’s “Halls Of Pandemonium”, Day 19.

For context, see the previous stories here and here. Note that this one isn't a Kira prompt.

At some point I might get used to having what is effectively an imaginary friend tangibly present, and in fact lolling at the foot of my bed. But not yet.
I feel I ought to have all sorts of things to talk to nem about, yet none seem important. Perhaps because I’m tired, perhaps because, being kinda part of me, talking about nem is almost superfluous. Instead I ask “So… have you met Kira?”
“Duh.” Pois scoffs, rolling nir eyes. One of many benefits of the crazy eyeball design I gave nem is emoting freely without having to pause your gaming. “She’s currently my supervisor.”
“What’s she like? Like, around the water cooler, or whatever the equivalent is for muses.”
“Amazing.” Pois intones, utterly deadpan. “Eternally charming. A pure delight to be around.”
“What, is she spying on us??”
“I am assured she has her sources.”
“Ooookay.”
Can I get a more complete answer? Do I want a more complete answer?
While I decide, I ask “Was she the one you annoyed or whatever, that landed you as my muse?”
“Nah, that was this stuffy whiny beancounter with more mouths than it knew what to do with. And I didn’t annoy them. We just had… a philosophical disagreement.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Uh-huh?”
“They felt - unreasonably strongly, might I add - that you aren’t supposed to air out filing systems.”
“Wait, what? You were emptying their filing cabinets?”
Ne gives me a look of guileless earnestness. Entirely fake, natch. “Such stuffy records need to breathe!”
That… doesn’t make any sense. Knocking over a filing cabinet, sure. Getting caught idly reading through a filing cabinet, sure. Failing to file something because ne only deals with paperwork if necessary to prevent a major catastrophe, sure. So many explanations perfectly in line with the various “I need an excuse for why you’re suddenly embroiled in this alien world and situation” I’ve come up with over the years.
So why tell me one I won’t believe? Pois is good at lying, it’s a core guile hero skill after all, and knows me far too well. Which means ne’s presenting me with clearly false information as some weird puzzle.
Tsk. I guess that’s only fair, given how many characters I’ve inflicted this on via nem.
But my head is fuzzy and I’m in no mood for puzzles, so I lean forward and sternly go “Seriously, what-”
At that exact moment, implausibly perfect timing you can only pull off when you have a BS superpower of knowing the right place and right time and what to do with it, a shimmering dark globule whistles through the open window and splatters against the wall where my head was.
Before I blink, Pois is up and yanking the window closed.
“What the…?” I shove my Steam Deck aside so I can duck low across the bed. Absently noting that Pois managed to pause nir game as part of that split-second response.
With the serenity of someone who handles warzones and genuine disasters on a regular basis, Pois says “Imagine, if you will, that every story you’ve ever conceived of but didn’t write, for whatever reason, has clumped together into a gestalt of resentful narrative mass which can’t climb out of that ‘creative primordial soup’ you talk about, but is unwilling to dissolve back into raw potential. And it’s here. And it wants revenge.”
“Ahhh…”
The concept makes perfect sense. It is also vividly impossible for this to be happening and I’m suddenly aware that this has to be fiction, and that I’m pretty sure I’m not the real ‘me’, and also that I definitely don’t want to test that theory.
“Good.” Pois says, as if my inarticulate horror was comprehensible.
“Can you… deal with them?” I slide off the bed to huddle under my desk, in what space’s left between the drawers and mini elliptical machine.
“Kinda.”
“Kinda??”
I was already not in the mood for riddles and this has magnified that considerably!!
“How do you kill something fictional?”
Answers tangle on my tongue. ‘It depends’, ‘however you like’, ‘you tell me, you’re the one with experience being a fictional character’…
Pois crouches to face me (people are right, knees bending backwards is jarring, but also far more practical because your knees don’t jut in your way) and a familiar weight is pressed into my hands.
My laptop. Twelve years old, practically ancient by tech standards. It saw me through a uni degree, has been a lifeline throughout my struggles with poor health, and also my writing tool of choice. A stolid workhorse for imagination. These grubby keys have tapped out not only coursework and typist work and other “proper” writing, but also reams of fanfiction, terribly self-indulgent catharsis stories, countless written doodles, and my first novel.
A blank document is open. The cursor blinks in a familiar, expectant fashion.
“Start by writing me some equipment, will ya?” Pois’s calm tone grounds me.
I shift so my back’s against my bed, the desk (and Pois) still between me and the window. I take a deep breath. I cast aside any concerns about prose quality, story cohesion, or power balance.
If this is a story… character or not, I am a storyteller. This world will yield.
So I declare, as certainly as I can, “I don’t need to. We have your magic box.”
The one linked to Pois’s impossibly huge closet, which lets nem pull out anything ne wants. It got retired very quickly, as soon as smole Lee figured out tension in fact, but needs must.
A thunk. Pois has pulled the box open. I have no idea what that crazy sci-fi contraption ne’s fiddling with is meant to do, or how it’s going to be used, I just have to trust.
Ok. How do you kill something fictional?
…
Of course I’m getting blank page syndrome.
Knowing this might end terribly, I just start typing and see where my fingers take me. “The Amalgam stumbled down the deserted road”

Prompt was “A character from one of your stories has come to life and is determined to kill you for reasons unknown.”