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    The mountain upon which he sat loomed over the village, its shadow like a tangible malice. Smoke rolled down its slopes and ascended into the sky, a miasmic odor accompanying it. A typical day. The town of Story was waiting for Writer’s next volley of wrath to come tumbling down the mountain.

    The Champion’s Guild had a board full of job listings. The protagonists, heroes, and motley crews were dispatched to clear the smoke and quell whatever evil had been roused by it. In their usual fashion, success came moments before failure. This drew the ire of Writer more than anything else, but despite his best attempts, his own creations always managed to stop his assault.

    The league of antagonists, villains, and monsters was more independently based, only loosely affiliated with one another. Their worry was not over what Writer wanted to do, because Writer always held a special place for them in his heart. Besides, only a member of the Champion’s Guild was equipped to dispose of them, and only then if there was a history. And it was in these times when Writer was in a mood that they flourished. While the pompous, vanilla saviors stemmed the tide of chaos, those who lurked in shadows were free to stir up strife.

    So it was on that day that Writer decided to, once again, annihilate his own creations. He gave strength to evil and disadvantaged good. He tipped the scales of balance and grinned favorably at the ensuing turmoil. Though, this would not be the first time he had done so, and he knew the end results would be the same. He was weary of the never-ending cycle.

    Writer decided to erase the village.

    The valley rumbled and rolled up as a scroll. Characters and plot points began trying to weasel their way into Writer’s mind, to preserve themselves in his neurons even after their ink had been forgotten. His precious children, the disenfranchised evil ones, moaned as their origins were stripped from them. Their motivation purged, they curled as dying spiders, resenting the father who would debase them. The protagonists and other heroes deadened their hopes and stalwart determination. Then all the world as they knew it and all within were as a white husk.

    Writer wailed atop his mountain. There was more to be had, though it would only be born of great anguish.

    He reached out to the page and gripped it tightly. The valley collapsed into itself, as he crumpled the paper. Then into everlasting darkness it plummeted, as he tossed it into the waste bin.

    Paper was archaic anyway.

    The keystrokes came, and the great mountain thundered with creation. A new Story was being built, etched into the ether of fibers and electricity. Its spires arched up, resolute, defiant. It was a nexus of fictitious elements. It was segmented into districts, interwoven yet foreign to one another. Streets of neon and smog tangled with steam and steel. Castles of obsidian and forts of pearl. Overgrown jungles, ripe with flora and sweet mist. Still there were cold places, mansions of ice with bitter winds howling through the eves. Void expanses between laser guided rails and plasma propelled crafts.

    Writer sat back and examined his new work. Certainly it was larger and shinier than his previous attempts, but he wondered if it would behave the same way. With a sigh he tapped the keys once more, and characters fitted into their natural roles. There were debonair steamboat entrepreneurs and gritted men, ashen with factory dust. Vampire lords skulked the shadows, hunted by sellswords and paladins alike, while peasant armies fought for their feudal masters. Animals and wild men mingled with one another, both hunted by the social elite of developed nations. Wolves howled in the snow, and people of frost eked out sustenance in the ice. Fleets of spaceships flitted in the black gaps, porting here and there in cities which teemed with life both familiar and unusual.

    Pleased with the new design, Writer leaned contentedly within the bridge of his colossal vessel. It was his new mountain from which he would scatter the pompous lives of those below with but a few flicks of his fingers.

    Then things were as they always had been. Story unfolded just as its predecessor had. The paint was new, sure, but the walls were the same. Writer watched, seething, as the fantastical lives below surged forth with hope. He shook his head and clasped together his hands. He had strived for as long as he could remember and wanted for only one thing. For them to fail as he had.

    Fingers trembling with rage hovered over a panel. The keys upon which mattered not, only his intent did. He depressed the inputs, cursing under his breath. He would throw everything he had at them, if it would only change Story into something new.

    There was a terrible barrage, as the canons of his ship unleashed unreasonable payloads upon the world below. The atmosphere peeled back, clouds scattering like ripples in a still pond. New clouds of dust and fire rose up, rapidly decaying mushrooms. Writer grinned at the devastation.

    On the surface was ruin. The gleaming utopias, the verdant gardens, all were buried in ashes and desolation. Static characters were lost, those without names or real purpose, and so too were even a few with names. Their deaths meant, for simple sake, weight. Yet, the truly meaningful ones remained, resolute, hopeful.

    He sat back and ground his teeth. If they were so determined to persevere, he would be sure to make it difficult.