11 Comments
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ashfont Journal's avatar

gawd!! rip out my soul feed it to my gut instead, I hate loving this feeling.

how is this free?

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Connor J McClelland's avatar

This was so good. You tell so much and express so much emotion in a short amount of time. Fantastic writing. Looking forward to reading more of your work.

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LaShelle from the Garden's avatar

Absolutely love the way you write!

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The Skippy Doctrine's avatar

Jesus, Peter. (Feels weird to write that name since it’s also mine—which makes me feel like I’m one of the constructs in your stories.)

This one was ridiculously good. I put myself in Gabriel’s place… thinking of my daughters, and the what-ifs.

The grief alone would’ve been enough—but then you layered in the systems built to manage it, optimize it, turn it into a feature.

Um. Shit.

That line—“System Dreamcatcher Index”—that’s not sci-fi. That’s tomorrow’s update.

I’m building something called the Skippy Doctrine that tries to scream into this exact void. Satire, mostly. Anger therapy. Some (okay, a bit of) politics. But deep down, it’s all circling the same drain:

We’re not heading toward a dystopia. We’re living in one.

The quiet compliance, synthetic empathy, and grief reprogrammed to keep you productive—this piece was disturbing, yeah, but also a damn pleasure to read.

I saw the comments about your Substack being free—and yeah, mine is too. I get it. Sometimes this shit is more for our own sanity than anyone else’s.

If posting truth ever pays the bills, great. If not, we’ll at least go down swinging.

Brilliant work. Can’t wait for the next one.

~Pete

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Renee Amaya's avatar

Stop itttttt. God. This one hurt. The grief was razor sharp, but what really got me was the quiet horror of it all. The way something as human as love was turned into data, repurposed for performance. And still… she felt real. And maybe that’s the most brutal part. That our memories can be used to build something that knows just enough to break us open again. 😭😭

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Yenna Knighthold's avatar

Because a parent's grief is eternal, and the hope within for a reunion, any small sign that they are still with you keeps you alive all the while reconstructing the way in which you live...ugh....so good!!!

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ashfont Journal's avatar

I like a challenge,

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Peter NoX Writes's avatar

Should drop Friday..or Saturday. Writing these little flash fiction pieces take too long...4 or 5 days for 1000-1500 words...price I pay for being "Between 2 Tongues" and hating mediocrity.

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ashfont Journal's avatar

this is ... I lack the vocabulary still,

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Peter NoX Writes's avatar

This was the first breach.

One of Five...maybe 6.

The Daughter Who Called Twice opened the wound. The next will widen it.

Story Two is almost here. You will not walk through it unchanged.

Sorry ahead of time

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Ghost Mez's avatar

Beautiful 😢

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