The Procrastinator's Code

“A curse that is accepted by all,
And passed down from one generation to the next
Shall come to those who procrastinate,
Those who don’t realize they have been hexed
I tell you now! Be warned my friends!
Before it is too late,
Listen now, and listen close,
Or doom will be thy fate!
If truth shall dawn, forsaken are they
The Pain of knowing the unknown
Then let another free the voice
And save the weary soul whom be told.”
-Luminescent Night
From the Anti-Procrastinationer’s Society 1

Now you may think that because there is an anti-procrastinator’s society that there is a procrastinator’s society. This is not so. The procrastinators have long thought it a grand idea to start one, for many might join, but they never got around to it. Maybe one day there will be one. Maybe one day some lazy bum will actually go through the slight effort to start it...nah. Probably won’t happen. Pity really, if there was, maybe there would be more people around to warn procrastinators of the curse...and stop stories like this to become a reality to us today...2

She couldn’t do this for much longer…it was eating her, consuming her soul. It was becoming her entire cause to go on. How is it controlling me? She thought wearily.
She couldn’t scream or shout out of despair, for she knew none will listen, or respond to her cry. They will only say, ‘too bad.’ And she would be forced to moan and listen to their dirty remarks while it took her. They wouldn’t do anything. She didn’t even think they realize the depth of control it already had over her.
There’s got to be a way out! There has to be! If there isn’t…A sound interrupted her thoughts. It had found her again…I can’t think about what will happen if there isn’t. There must be. I can’t accept the fact that
there may not be. No. There is a way out.3

But she couldn’t find it! Where was it? She fled blindly down a tunnel and fell through a hole in the ground. Luckily for her, it wasn’t that deep. She picked herself up slowly, then grinned. A picture had fallen out of her backpack. She grasped it in her hands and held it close. It was from her birthday party from a year or two back. She was in the middle surrounded by a countless numbers of friends. You! she thought, You can help me! She reached into her backpack to see what else was inside. History book, pencil, gum (she didn’t chew gum. How did that get in there?) , then she found what she was looking for: a laptop. She opened it up, and started typing. Thankfully, she had taken those typing classes at school. I guess school does teach you something you’ll use later in life, she thought smugly as the words spilled onto the page, who knew? 4

Danny woke up in the middle of the night after having a horrible nightmare... He dreamed that his friend was in trouble, but he knew it was a dream. He lay back down and tried to go back to sleep.

She was running again. It had followed her, like it knew where she was going to go. Where was this place? It seemed like she was running through a labyrinth decorated by underground dwarves who liked high ceilings. Pretty mush dirt along all the walls and no decoration what so ever. She could hear it behind her. Fiercely, it called her name. How did it know her name? She pushed the thought to the back of her head. Couldn’t think about that now. She knew she had to keep running, but the pain in her side was morphing into something she didn’t think she could handle for mush longer. 5

Then she fell through a dark hole and landed on her side. Again with the holes, she thought bitterly.
She heard the, the thing pass by over head. It’s bigger then the hole, she realized, it didn’t notice it. Suddenly she had ambivalent feelings toward the hole. Gratitude, because is saved her from that thing, and hatred, because it made her realize that it was big. Really, really big.
After a moments pause, she opened up the laptop again. The only light being the glow of the computer screen, she wrote:
‘It’s very dark here and I can’t exactly see where I am going. Okay, I think I have a second for the next code…here it is!’ 6

Francisco pulled his bike into the garage and took off his helmet. It had been a long day at school, mostly due to math and the boringness of wondering why one had to learn what would not pertain toward his future. Yawning, he opened the garage door, and went upstairs to check if he had an email. He looked down his line of email subjects.7


Subject From
Will you go out with me? The hot girl next door 8

(He checked his calendar, seeing if Friday was open for him.)9

Huge explosion right outside your front door! A Terrorist10

(His friend Brian…always doing and sending crazy things. He deleted it, then changed his mind and forwarded it to the CIA)11

See that pencil in front of you? Its me. A crazy man/woman12

(After looking at it, he printed it out and fed it to his paper shredder, because deleting a stupid e-mail such as this would be a pity. To him, this seemed a more just way to handle it) 13

…and the last one labeled HELP!!! Remember Me? 14

He decided to open the help one. He read (which was very uncommon) all the codes the email said they needed to find out a code to figure out what the spell was that was on her. Some sci-fi thing, he told himself, dismissing the thought. Not thinking anymore about it, he picked up the phone to call his neighbor and talk about Friday night. 15


Hitting the send button, she sighed with relief. Almost done. Two more to go. She went to pull up another e-mail box, but heard a sound from down the way. Alarmed, she pushed the laptop into her backpack again and started running. She could hear footsteps behind her, large, making a deep bellowing sound go ringing down the way. And then its touch pierced her skin. Fire flew with rapid spend up her arm and throbbed mercilessly. She let out a bloodcurdling scream that sent the monster hurdling in the other direction. Running, without looking back, she ran away and just kept running and running. When she finally stopped, she realized that she was holding her bleeding arm. Wait, bleeding? Eew…eew…eww! Pulling her hand away, she ignored the pain and laid against the wall. Her vision started focusing in and out, in and out. Realizing she didn’t have enough time, she pulled out the laptop and resumed typing:16

‘You have to help me! I don’t know how much longer I can hold out…I’m bleeding too much…lost a lot of blood already…vision going blurry…can’t stay awake much longer…don’t…don’t let it…don’t let it take me…’17

There was a thud of an unconscious head hitting send key, and the reality momentarily failed her. 18

Why d She reviewed her sheet, baring the codes of which were confusing her. None seemed to make sense except for the fourth. It was easy, which made her happy. She had been working one figuring them out for a long time, and finally she gave up.
? This can’t be good…19

“I’m sorry, if you would like to make a call, please hang up and try again. This is a recording…”20

“No!” Hope gone, she threw the phone to the ground. It never reached far enough for her to have the satisfaction of hearing it shatter into millions of pieces.
“What the heck!” she cried, staring frustrated at the phone. “After running around for who knows how long in who knows where, I finally find a phone and it doesn’t work?”
Standing in the middle of a clearing that looked like a huge cavern, she sighed. What is a pay phone doing all the way out here? Eyes dancing around warily, she sat down onto the rocky floor and opened up her laptop. It hummed happily at her touch. Funny, she thought to herself, this never worked at home without the cable...why is it working now? Tossing away the thought for later, she looked at the battery. Two bars left. She couldn’t be on for much longer. Quickly she checked her e-mail. Another thought popped into her head, how do I have e-mail in a cave? I guess someone installed a wireless connection before I got into this mess. Yay for them.
Impatiently she waited for the hunk of metal to update itself. Stupid Mac. She figured that if she had her pc that it would’ve not only had a full battery right now, but it would’ve been updated too. Finally, after what seemed like hours, a few e-mails popped up. Two, to be exact.
“Two?” she shouted to no one. Realizing what she had done, she hit herself on the head. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!”
Stupid, because a large rumbling sound followed by a roar seemed to be coming closer. Eerily closer. She had little time left before the running spree began again.
She opened up the two e-mails. Excited, she realized that they were almost there! She might make it! There was hope! Encouraged, she read the e-mails. As she scanned the page, her heart fell. “They’re so close…yet so far away…Darn it!” She looked at the e-mails she had sent. “Oops. I think I made a mistake.” The roaring grew louder and closer. Gulping, she sent out a reply…
And feeling something breathe down her back, she ran.21

It was a stormy night outside, and the winter wind was howling just outside the window. The girl slept uneasily in her wooden bed, annoyed at the creaking noises it made whenever she turned. Suddenly, the boom of thunder was heard outside, and then a quick blue flash of lightning was seen. The girl jerked completely awake, surprised by the unexpected sound. She was still slightly stunned and was a bit slow to react. The room was dark around her, but she could faintly see the darker border of the furniture within it. To her right was the large square window that took up about half of the wall on that side. The curtains were pulled and the window was closed, but she could still hear the tapping of the raindrops against the dirty glass panes. The clock read 12:00 midnight.22

“I’ll never be able to get any sleep at this rate,” the girl thought to herself, “but at least when the rain is gone, there will be plenty of sun!”23

Unexpectedly, her computer flickered on. The screen read, ‘One urgent message waiting Miss Luna Ilo’ and had a little envelope to the right of it with an exclamation point. That was certainly weird. She sat there in bed for a couple of minutes. Should she read it? Should she go back asleep? What was she to do?! Her conscience was biting at her, and it was like half of her knew she probably should stay in bed to sleep and ignore the strange message, but the other half was dying to know what the message was in the first place. In the end, curiosity got the best of her. She jolted out of bed, almost tripping over the shoes on the floor on the way to the computer chair. She turned on the desk light, sat down on the chair, and clicked on the little envelope.
“What’s this?” she asked herself silently. The message was about a girl. A girl who was put under a spell—a curse—but she could not speak its name, and needed Luna’s help to free her from it. There would be a series of codes given to her, each providing a clue to whatever the spell was. The first code read as follows, and from it were three letters to be pulled out that would lead to the solution.24

“Huh? This doesn’t make any sense! What the heck could she be talking about? And who is this girl anyways? How did she get my email? And what in her right mind thought it was okay to email me in the dead of the night? Okay, this is just too weird! “I’m turning off the computer and going back to sleep!” Luna whispered harshly.25


She ran for all she was worth. Which, apparently to the monster, wasn’t very much. Left, right, left, right, left, right, left, right. She picked up the pace. Dark walls swept by her; dirt crunched beneath her feet. She had to find a way out of this! Her side began to ache. Everyone knew she wasn’t the best runner in P.E., having done all but fail the mile run the week before. The pain in her side soon became a burn and her lungs grasped for air. Her throat was closing in. Not good, she thought, got to get out of her! It was closing in behind her. The heavy thumps of her follower were audible over the desperate screams of her frightened heart. Looking ahead, she noticed that there was a crevice in the wall before the next bend. There’s my chance! A burst of energy surged through her and she ran towards it with all her might. The thing followed with a roar. Suddenly, she dropped to the ground and rolled into the crack, immediately starting to crawl to where ever it led. If she had looked back, she would have seen the monster pass right by.
She kept crawling as fast as she could. The tunnel was dark, and she could feel multiple spider webs brush by her face as she pushed forth into the dark. A small part of her was grateful for the darkness, for if she had been able to see the spider web, she didn’t think she would’ve been able to make it through without screaming hysterically. After feeling a safe distance from the monster, she relaxed for the first moment in a few hours. She didn’t realize how tired she had been until her eyes slowly drooped lower and lower. At the end of a moments pause, she stopped resisting, and the fell with silent grace into sleep.

She looked at the code again with a sigh. Slowly she rubbed her temples, not realizing her that her twin brother had crept into the room. The only way she was going to figure them out was with the… (Her brother placed a conveniently located light bulb over her head and it lit up)…Secret Special Wonderfully Splenderific Code Decoder! (dun dun duuuun!) Taking no notice of her brother, she pulled it out of the depths of her closet and ran it over the sheet. Smiling, the brother walked out of her room, knowing that his job there was done as he heard the machine hum and come to life.
A bright red light blinked, showing three letters. She smiled. The answer to the first code. She repeated the scanning until she revealed the second code, and the third code. She unscrambled the letters spelling out the evil word. The worst word known to man. She screamed and fell to the floor in a faint. J

He had lay back down and tried to go back to sleep, but the uncanny feeling still haunted his rest. Annoyed, he got up and checked his email and watch TV. He saw that he had an email labeled “Help Me!” from his friend. He thought it was just a chain letter and almost didn’t open it, but he had nothing else to do. What the heck, he thought, why not? He opened it and found that was true, his friend was indeed in trouble. Irritated by a further lack of sleep, he hurried to help. One might say that it was because of the desire to sleep. But as the reader, you are entitled to know that as he progressed further, the concern for his friend grew and would not leave him until he finished, even when he attempted to take a break. The answer finally dawned on him, and, after hitting the send button, was haunted by nightmares for a week.26


After hanging up with his neighbor, he looked happily back to the computer. Friday…three days! Three days! Feeling good, Francisco opened the e-mail from his friend that needed help. As he went over it again, it dawned on him that she was telling the truth. Oops. He would end up owing her something for this…Looking over the codes again., he realized he needed help. So he talked to his friends online. One of them was a kid genius and instantly solved them, needing little interference from Francisco. (Not that that bothered him though; his neighbor had come online.) Once the genius had solved it, he quickly sent it to his friend without a glance at what the word was. Thinking highly of himself, he turned on his music really loud, helped himself to some bacon, and signed on to Age of Empires. 27


“Oh man, this is just too strange! Maybe it’s some sort of side effect of the curse? Maybe time won’t move by until I solve it? Maybe this is just a dream? Or maybe I’m just going crazy?! Aw, the heck with it! If I’m going to be stuck in time, my best bet is to solve the puzzle, dream or no dream.
“So, let’s see what they have in common. Hmm…well, I guess they’re all related in a way... Drat! I should’ve been paying more attention in school! Oh wait……it was….it was……… Of course! So maybe the letters were just as it read. Hmmm….” Luna pondered for a moment and then realized…”No duh! I get it!”28

Another loud boom of thunder was heard, and Luna looked at the clock again. 12:01! It had worked! Despite the fact that Luna still was a bit reluctant to solve the puzzle, you know, being stuck in time and all, and talking to a complete stranger, she was curious about what the stilled-future would hold, and secretly hoped that the forbidden word had nothing to do with it.29

Her eyes opened slowly. Where? Where was she? Trying to sit up, her head hit the small tunnel ceiling and the unfortunate truth came running back to her. Oh yeah, she was here. Tiredly, she rubbed her head, still in a daze. How long had she been asleep? There was no way of knowing, seeing as there wasn’t enough room to open up her laptop. Cursing in her own, made up language that no one in the world would be offended by if they heard, felt around the walls for tell-tale signs of which way she had come from. Randomly picking a direction, she crept silently throughout the corridor, knowing she had to make it out. After crawling for what seemed like forever, she found an exit.
She looked around and sighed. Drat, she had gone the wrong way. Laying herself against a wall, she took out her laptop and quickly checked her e-mail. When she was done, she put it away and began her journey to the other side of the crack. Where ever it led, she figured, it had to be better then where she was now. 30

She didn’t know how far off she was. 31

“It led here? Into its own lair?” She yelled, not caring if the monster heard or not. “Of all the rotten luck!” She stormed about furiously. She couldn’t believe this! Out of all the places to end up, the one path she had chosen had led her to the one spot she probably didn’t want to go to. How did she know she was in its lair?
The most obvious sign had to be the one posted upon the wall that read ‘Lair Sweet Lair.’ The next obvious one was the bed, closet, and the fishing equipment that was about ten times her size.
Her heart fell and a tear started to make its way across her cheek. She knew the fate of the tear might soon be that of her own. She closed her eyes and slowly felt it slide its way down her face. It crawled so slowly, unknowing of its doom, destiny inevitable. It dawned on her why tears tasted so bitter…when one can foretell their demise, bitterness is all that’s left. She pictured her life in that single tear. Everything inside the droplet barreling towards an uncertain path. As it rolled past her nose, she heard something in front of her and knew her time had come.
“Your time has come,” the monster said.
She opened her eyes and knew whatever happened, she had to save the tear. It represented her self, and if that fell, so would she. Her eyes fell upon the monster, and she shuddered. It is too scary to describe, so you will just have to imagine a big thing, that’s all dark, with fangs, and that, if you touch it, there’s a high probability that you will get a paper cut. (Insert scream here).
“You can talk?”
“Of course, I’m always talking. Every day. Every night. You don’t always hear me; your kind has learned how to block me out.”
“Oh…it’s for a good reason though.”
“How so?”
How weird was this? About to explain yourself to your assassinator. The tear reached her the top of her lip. “Um, well, we prevent…”
“I’m waiting.”
“…an…overlarge amount of…”
“Any day now.”
“…stress-causing…back problem relating…”
The monster grew furious and grabbed her with its giant hand and looked her in the eye, “You are just like every other of your line that has come through here. No one can give me an answer! And the punishment? Your death!” 32

The tear passed her bottom lip. 33

A sudden wind blew from nowhere and she felt herself being lifted out of the monsters hands to be set free into the chaos surrounding her. She screamed. She couldn’t do this! She had vertigo, and an unordinary fear of heights. Looking down, the world became a blur as lights and color swirled beneath her. Her stomach churned rapidly as the illumined spin became worse and worse. She felt sparks begin to puncture her skin to the slightest at every open point on her body. 34

“You can’t even say my name child, can you?” It spat, disgusted, then started to walk away, turning its back upon the pitiful sight.35

The tear made it to her chin and dangled dangerously.36

She struggled to make out her words. “I, I can give an answer…to…to both of…both of your questions!” 37

The monster stopped. She had captured its attention. Cautiously, it turned toward her trembling, afraid to hear what it hadn’t heard in more then five centuries. “What?” 38

The tear fell. 39

Her arm broke free as she screamed.40

A moment later, she sat up and screamed. It was on her face! “Get it off me! Get it off me!”
Two figures ran into the dark room. The light was turned on by one of them, and the other rushed to her side, “Honey, are you okay?” Light revealed the ‘monster’ to be a very soft E-wok. What?
Dina looked up tiredly to see her parent’s awaiting faces. “Where? Where am I?”
Her annoying brother walked into the room, “Um, at home…in your bed…in the middle of the night…screaming your head off. Where did you think you were?”
Confused with the world, she answered, “Never mind…I’m okay now. You guys should probably get back to bed about now…”
Uncertain, her parents and brothers walked back to their rooms.
She glanced at the clock and winced at the late hour she saw. I wonder how long I was gone…she glanced at her clothes. Dina was still wearing the same outfit she had been in the cave. Her backpack was sitting on the wall next to her door. She went to go get dressed. While doing so, she noticed that she had a bruise on her brow and a mark on her arm. She gulped. Not a dream…it really happened…Once she was in her pj’s, she glanced at her desk. An open math book lay neglected. An assignment sheet revealed the amount of problems she had brushed off a few days before. She was still debating whether or not to do them when her eyes closed and she fell asleep. But before she started dreaming happy dreams, she noticed that around her neck was a new necklace that had on it a single, crystal teardrop. 41


One day there was a confused girl named Jessica. She and her many great friends tried to figure out this weird code a girl sent her. It was a lost cause to begin with. The End 42