Work Text:
“The fine folks at Bis ‘E’ Airlines regret to inform you that flight 21987 from Louisiana to D.C. dated the 20th of December 1997 has been delayed to an unknown time, sorry for the inconvenience, please take these free mints as an apology.” The airport intercoms spoke throughout the concrete catacomb, with a weirdly maternal tone in the speaker’s voice. “Please note taking of the mints and or consideration of taking of mints here by revokes your right to a refund.” The voice added, making sure to finish that sentence quickly. Sadly, for Linda, the lady in the green t shirt sitting by a clearly fake plant, she had considered the mint therefore revoking her potential refund.
Linda was annoyed both by the delay of her flight and by the inability to get a refund. It’s not like she would have refunded her flight anyway; she had to be at D.C. by tomorrow and this was the only flight to D.C. she could get on such short notice, but Linda would’ve like to have control over that decision.
The intercom sprang back on “An update on flight 21987 it’s departing in 5 minutes please get on.” Linda jumped out of her chair and started running to the escalator which was about 50 feet away. While running Linda noticed an odd trend where people were taking the stairs instead of the escalators, leaving them empty. Just then she noticed a sign on the escalator “Sorry Escalators Closed due to Eels” “Unfair” Linda thought “they didn’t even announce that.” Linda noticed an additional sign that wrote “This was announced 3 minutes ago which was a little bit before the start of the story.” “What story?” Linda thought.
Linda now had to run an additional 40 feet to the stairs which were to her… Linda held her left hand to her eyes and made a “L” shape, were to her left and she only had 3 minutes, which was just enough time. The intercom turned on “The fine folks at Bis “E” Airlines would like to remind you that there’s no airport security screening process as this story takes place in 1997 which is before 9/11.” Linda brushed off that weird comment she had to get to D.C.
You see a year ago Linda’s 9-year-old son Todd wrote a story about a Mother and her only Son. The story goes as follows “Once there was a Mother who was very orderly, she had a Son who was always getting into mischief. No matter what the Mother did she could never control the Son's chaos. Eventually the Mother enacted a last resort that would give her full control of the Son. While the boy slept the Mother picked him up and put him in the closet and locked the door. After 3 days of being alone in the closet the boy starved to death, granting the Mother full control of the boy. THE END” After reading Todd's disturbing story she took the only logical route. Banning all creative writing in schools. Over the last year her parent organization had been massively successful and now all Linda had to do to achieve her goal was to go over to Washington D.C. and sign the “No Creative Writing in Schools” bill.
“That’s not how bills work, why would you have to sign it? You’re not a congressmen. Man, this story is nonsense.” The intercom bleeped out. Linda froze shocked and confused as to how and why the intercom seemingly just responded to her thoughts. The exit door leading to the airplane was right in front of Linda, she had made it with 1 minute to spare, when suddenly the door shut and the intercom started shaking “Hello my son I regret to inform you that your attempt to ban creative writing from schools cannot be allowed to pass.” The words came out of the speaker not just vocally but physically as well taking the form of a mostly white putty like substance with thin blue lines wrapped around it and words printed all over it. The substance continued to drip from the speaker as it continued talking. “You see Son if I let you ban creative writing this creative work will cease to exist and we will all vanish.” At this point the putty had started to transform dawning a form similar to Linda’s albeit more goopy.
The putty creature opened its mouth “So as your Mother I will have to put an end to all your mischief ONCE AND FOR ALL!” The creature picked Linda up with its two hands, Linda could fill the texture of the creature it felt like a mix of paper and ink. Linda screamed trying to get someone’s attention but while people did see her none of them did anything they just stared not even blinking. The creature opened the door to the airplane only now it didn’t lead to an airplane, instead it led to a closet. Linda was shoved into the closet. The creature then shut and locked the closet door. Linda banged on the door repeatedly, “HELP” she screamed but no matter what she did no one opened the door. It was as if there was nothing else beyond the closet as if the closet encompassed the entire world. After 3 days of being alone in the closet Linda starved to death.
THE END