An old cooperatively generated short story chapter using GPT-3

bone-weary.txt

You rolled out of bed and stretched your lazy bones and looked over at the clock. You're late to work.

Ever since western civilization figured out that necromancy was an easy path to a cheap labor force that didn't need to be fed, life, or rather unlife, has been going downhill. Fortunately, summoning rituals are too expensive, so the world isn't literally going to hell, yet.

You stumbled over to the bathroom shower, and shut the door. You don't have eyes any more, so there's no real point to turning on the lights. No real point to anything really. It's not like I have any other choice.

"Hey Suzy…" you hear from the bathroom door. "Are you in there?"

You groggily look around the room and look over at the door. There is no one in the bathroom.

"What…?" you say as loud enough for him to hear. He opens the door and sees you standing there naked arms outstretched towards the door. His eyes widen when he sees you. You notice he is standing there with his knees bent inward, hopping up and down, doing a pee-pee dance.

"Come on in. It isn't like there is any flesh on me for you to peek at anyways," you finally say.

"But it's so awkward," your fleshy roommate says.

"Look. I don't have time for this shit." You hop in the shower, steadying yourself with one skeletal hand and relax to enjoy the warm spray of the water. You would close your eyes if you could. When you look around again, he is gone.

You finish your shower and begin getting ready for work. Your jeans are brand new. You bought them two days ago when you discovered you had ripped the old ones beyond repair. Clean jeans and a black hoodie, that's your work outfit. It's been two years since you started here. It isn't like you have any expenses -- you don't have a grocery bill any more, so money isn't really an issue. After paying the required union dues, you clear a couple hundred bucks every two weeks. That's enough to keep the lights on, so to speak, not that you need them any more. The high cost of living in this area is after all, just that.

Death isn't so bad. At least you left an intact corpse. The guy down the hall took his life with a shotgun to the face. Putting him back together was like assembling a jigsaw puzzle, and they didn't find all the pieces.

You finish getting ready and head out the door. You live a short walk away from work, so it doesn't make sense to drive. You get to the factory and punch in, heading straight for the assembly line. These new-fangled self-driving cars would assemble themselves. Yet. They haven't quite figured out the ritual for that, though knowing your luck, it'll happen some time soon.

Your job is simple: follow the ritual instructions on the computer screen, and put each part in when it is done. Sounds easy enough, and for the most part it is, but it can get monotonous at times. You are on the second shift, so it is relatively quiet.

Soon you find yourself just going through the motions, putting each part in their place. You begin thinking back to when you were alive. It was only a couple of years, but it feels like a whole different life now. You think about your friends, your family, your job. All gone. Soon, you're told, you'll forget what living was like. What it was like to have a family. What it felt like to be hungry. You think maybe that's a good thing. This line of thinking carries you until lunch.

The irony of getting a mandatory lunch break, yet not needing to, nor being able to eat is not lost on you.