Fiction Short Story
Plagiarist
You only end up cheating yourself!
The white page on his computer screen stared back at him.
Nothing!
No witty ideas. No clever storylines. Not a sausage. His mind had finally run dry of inspiration. As an author, he knew this day would come — as it does to every writer — but why now? He’d been on a hot streak. The ideas had been flowing like a river. His career was beginning to take off, and people were starting to notice him. And now he was about to disappoint all his followers, as they would expect something in their in-boxes from him in the next few hours.
Time for a coffee. It always did the trick.
Not this time! His imagination remained as empty as his coffee mug after the final swallow.
He looked up at the clock above his desk as his desperation gave way to panic. Time was ticking down. Suddenly, a small voice broke the silence, “Having a little trouble, are we, Buddy?”
The author looked around but couldn’t see the source of the sound. “Oh no, now I’m going insane too.” He thought to himself.
“Buddy, you’re not going crazy. It’s me, the little guy, sitting behind your computer screen.” The voice spoke again. The sound was coming from the back of the monitor. The author stood, leaned forward, and took the slightest of peeks. The shock set him back into his chair.
A tiny person, barely two inches tall, sauntered from behind his computer and sat on the edge of his keyboard. This figment of the author’s panicked mind was dressed in a red onesie with a pair of horns on the hood and a long tail extending from the butt. It was holding a red pitchfork with three prongs. It had a moustache, a pointy beard, bushy eyebrows, and a smug look.
The author stammered, “You’re the Devil!”
The Devil was very cool. “Oh no, I’m your biggest fan. I love your stuff — I read it all the time. Your pieces give your audience reason to doubt the existence of God — which makes my job that much easier — I consider you a close friend or at least an ally. And in ten years, you will be one of the most popular writers on the planet.” The Devil paused to see how his pitch was working. Authors were always easy; you just needed to flatter them about something they’d published, and they would be putty in your hands. He could see that this author was particularly intrigued about his future.
“Oh yes, your name will be right up there next to Stephen King, JK Rowling, Arthur C Clarke, all the biggies. It’s too bad you’ve hit a dry spot right now.” The Devil was mesmerising.
While tempted to learn more about his future, the author knew to whom he spoke. This is Satan, definitely someone not to be trusted. “So, how can I know what you’re telling me is true?” The writer eventually asked.
The Devil smiled, “Oh, so you don’t trust me? I’m hurt.” He feigned pain. “Take a look for yourself, Buddy! This is one of your posts from this platform — check out the date and look at the stats. Twenty thousand views is not bad, eh!”
The computer screen showed a Medium post with the author’s by-line attached. It was brilliant, witty and had a very profound message. It was his writing style and touched on some ideas that had only recently bubbled into his consciousness. But this piece was polished and refined — it showed a craftsmanship derived from many years of experience.
The Devil broke into his reverie, “Believe me now? See, it’s your piece — it’s got your fingerprints all over it.” The Devil was an expert at planting dangerous seeds. “It will be one of my all-time favourites from you when you write it ten years from now.”
The author looked up at the clock. His deadline was looming. The Devil, sensing the thought process ticking over in the author’s mind, began to smile his beguiling grin. The author started rereading the article. It was so good! It would only take a few tweaks to make the future references link to contemporary people and things. No one would suspect.
He ran the cursor through the entire future article, hit copy and then bam.
The blank page that had been taunting him for the whole day was now filled with elegant prose, copied from his article from ten years in the future. It would be his best work.
The Devil sealed the deal, “How can it be plagiarism? It’s your work. This is going to supercharge your career now, Buddy.” The author hit submit.
The Devil disappeared, leaving his laughter in the air.
The stats were encouraging but nothing like the twenty thousand views the Devil had shown him. But still, it was a fantastic piece, and the author hugged himself at the thought that this work had his name on it.
Time to prepare another story.
But again, inspiration eluded the author. He racked his brain, but it was like wringing a sponge left in the sun in the desert — it was dry. As his desperation rose, he again heard the familiar little voice, and the Devil, dressed in red, showed the author another story he would write some years from now. Once again, the temptation proved too much, and the author copied and pasted his work from the future. The acclaim and kudos always fell well short of what the article had initially garnered.
This pattern repeated for several months as the author became lazy and dulled from the ease of pulling work from his future self. Unfortunately, the more he did this, the more his future work began to suffer. Gone was the eloquent narrative. The ideas seemed stale. Worst of all, he started to lose followers, as the brilliant work that had attracted them a few months earlier was no longer evident.
The writer was depressed. How had he let the Devil tempt him so easily? In his funk, he hadn’t noticed that the little guy in the red onesie was again sitting on the keyboard. “Hey Buddy, I’m sorry you are sad.” The Devil lied. “Is there anything I can do to make it up to you? You are my friend, after all, and I did love reading your stuff — although what you are writing now sucks — sorry to say.”
The blood in the author’s face began to rise as he felt a mixture of anger, embarrassment, and rage. He stared at this little red Devil, wondering what he could do to turn the situation around and change his fortune. He wanted to wring its neck or much worse, but it was useless, as the little guy could vanish instantly. Then he opened the drawer under his writing desk, and there it was.
A loaded revolver.
The author initially thought he could kill the Devil, but his thoughts suddenly turned darker toward himself. The Devil taunted, “Oh, you could have been bigger than them all, but that future is long gone — you wasted it. Now you only have me — your biggest fan — come on, use the gun. Let’s be BFFs for eternity!” The Devil laughed as the author’s fingers touched the revolver’s stock. “DO IT!” the Devil egged him on. “You’re just a worthless writer; no one’s going to read your stuff any more. No one will miss YOU!”
The Light Ending
The author felt a warm touch on his shoulder. It was shaking him. He could hear his wife’s gentle voice, “Wake up, darling. You’re having a nightmare. It’s cold down here. Time to come back to bed.” He had fallen asleep while working at his desk.
There was no little guy in a red onesie. There was no revolver. But on the computer screen was a story. It wasn’t as good as the one from his dream, but it wasn’t too bad either. He was relieved that he still had a future and wasn’t going to Hell.
He realised there could be no shortcuts to becoming a great writer.
He hit submit and went to bed, hoping for better dreams and a viral story in the morning.
The Dark Ending
The author found himself in a dungeon-like place. It reeked of sulphur. Flames seemed to lick within a few inches of him, but he felt no heat. He was chained to a desk with a PC at the ready.
“Oh, it’s so good to see you! Glad you took my advice.” It was the Devil, but he was full size — as tall as a person. “Let me introduce you to the team. This is Barry — he’s in charge of preparing the clickbait story headlines.” The Devil pointed to a man who had lava dripping onto the back of his head, who was also chained to a desk with a PC. “Jeanne, over there,” he pointed to a lady chained to a desk directly behind Barry, “she is in charge of generating the ChatGPT listicles and snippets you will include in the stories you write.”
The Devil drew closer to the author until their noses almost touched. He could smell the Devil’s foul breath and looked deeply into his yellow bloodshot eyes. “Yes, you, my favourite author. You have the most important role in churning out these soulless stories. You will provide the human touch by top and tailing the ChatGPT drivel that Jeanne gives you with a cool introduction and a beautiful conclusion. Together, this team will flood Medium with so much rubbish that we will destroy the soul of every writer on the platform.”
The Devil turned and walked away, laughing maniacally. He looked over his shoulder and added, “You will publish a new story every ten minutes — for the rest of eternity! Fail, and you will suffer more agony than you can imagine.”
“And cheer up — you are writers, aren’t you — you’re doing what you love.” The Devil’s laughter echoed long after he’d disappeared.
The Grey Ending
The room was suddenly dark, and the Devil stood full-size as a man before the author. “Oh, Buddy, I never thought you’d do it. You realise I must taunt you like that — it’s part of my job.” There was an uncharacteristic sadness in the Devil’s eyes. “I’m happy to have your soul, but why does my victory make me so depressed?”. The Devil was, indeed, the author’s biggest fan. It dawned on him that there would no longer be those witty stories that had given him such evil joy each morning.
As THE DEVIL, he had to take matters into his own hands. Who was looking after his needs anyway — certainly not the big Guy upstairs! No one’s happiness was more important than his own. He thought, “What’s one soul in exchange for another sixty years of great morning reading?” And with that, the Devil’s mind was made up.
He clicked his fingers.
The author found himself still sitting in front of his PC with the white screen. But now, his mind was filled with a great story about the Devil. He looked up at the clock — he was sure he could make his deadline — and began banging away at the keys. The wind howled outside the window, sounding strangely like evil laughter, but the author was too engrossed to notice.
As long as you have a fantastic story to write, nothing else matters!
Thank you for getting this far, and I hope you enjoyed this story. Please consider buying me a coffee if you’d like to support my work.
I wish you a perfect morning, afternoon, or evening, wherever you are in the World.
