In Every World, Alarm Clocks Are Evil

A high-pitched sound that seemed to be the combination of a buzz and a beep rang out consecutively, looping in on itself after four consecutive repetitions.

The dark room felt like no air flowed through it, the dust settling on stacks of papers and trashed folders with their guts spilling out. There was not much for illumination, yet one could see the shadow of a person, dead asleep on a rundown couch, with the help of a small light coming from the center of the room. It was let off, specifically, by a large tube-like contraption, the sound of bubbling liquid discreet, yet loud enough to make itself known.

The sound kept going for an entire minute before the figure decided it was a good idea to make it stop. A soft male voice interrupted the pattern of the beeping with a groan, followed by the thudding sound of someone falling to the floor. Surprisingly, there was a little bit of space remaining at the foot of the couch that was not lathered with paper and non-electrical tools.

The fallen person felt around for a certain object with a hand, his fingers moving through everything on the ground without decorum. He was frantic, desperate to kill the noise that made his headache even worse.

"There you are..." he muttered unconsciously as his skin finally made contact with a cold, rectangular object. He was practiced in finding the button that made it shut up without opening his eyes. He slid his index finger down the convex, a small space akin to a smooth dent on the otherwise flat surface of the alarm clock, and pushed down with more force than usual.

His arm fell limp, and he couldn't even muster up the energy to turn over to his back. The cold, hard floor hurt against his ribcage, but he knew he needed a few more moments to collect himself. He stayed unmoving until he felt the awful headache begin to make way for other thoughts.

He pushed his weight up with his arms, and although they weren't a strong pair, they could adequately carry a body that was skinny rather than muscly.

He didn't care in particular about the way he looked, nor did he see any purpose in paying attention to it. He was in a lab coat 24/7, and the only thing that existed to gaze upon him was the eternal dimness that was too attached to this room.

On his knees then to his feet, he pinched the bridge of his nose momentarily. The headache was still there, but it was no longer as bad as it had been when the alarm decided it was a good idea to wake him up.

He sighed.

Whoever gave him this present in last year's secret Santa event was an absolute nutcase.

He could very easily destroy it, but he didn't have the heart to smash such an interesting machine to pieces. A letter in the box claimed it was a relic from the world above in its heyday, and people used to use it to wake them up in time for work or school.

He didn't have much of an interest or an attachment to things past and things he'd never seen, but he was still a decent enough person to have some sort of curiosity hanging off the vestiges of reality before the era of the gods. The era of humans, who, in their prime, had built convenience for everyone in the world.

He wasn't much of a sentimental 60-year-old, but in knowing they were getting closer to reaching a state of true peace, the gap between the rich and the poor getting narrower by the day, put a smile on his face when he'd first heard of it. In knowing this ideal was crushed to fine powder under the feet of the creatures who fell from the sky, just like that, disappointment bubbled up in his heart and evaporated all feelings of enthusiasm in this regard.

It was such a stupid thing. The instant something thrived, they'd come down all over again to zap it out of existence. He wasn't much of a talker, nor did he dabble in the mystic arts, but from all the books he'd read, he drew one conclusion; these "gods" were scared of humans who advanced further, past the brainwashing.

He yawned, erasing all prior negativity from his brain. It wasn't as if he was an optimist, but it still surprised him how he decided today that thinking about the ugly situation upstairs was a great way to rev up.

Shrugging the kinks off his shoulders and massaging the unusually sharp pain at his side-- must have been from a protruding spring on the couch-- was his next move, shaking his legs as he made way for the tube situated in the middle of the dark room. He got there without much difficulty, having memorized the layout of the things scattered on the floor.

He moved over them in a practiced manner.

He wasn't much of a genius like his dead brother had been, but his great memory was remarkably useful for this undertaking.

Arriving at his destination, he stopped for a few seconds. The faint glow that came from the capsule was not uncommon in a place where everything grew in tubes and under synthetic light, yet there was something mystifying about it, as if one look compelled you to keep staring. Perhaps it was the contents of the capsule; perhaps it was the sheer size of it, seeming to occupy most of the room with its brilliance that was not even much, yet stuck out like a sore thumb.

He rubbed his hands together, as if he were in the middle of winter, the soft sunlight peeking through the leafless branches represented by the glow of the huge capsule.

Now that he thought of it, it was indeed quite cold.

He moved his foot by several inches, and he knew exactly where the fallen barometer lay. He stopped there. He bent down, and a blue button glowing slightly, came into view. Just as he was about to push the button that stripped the shutters from the surface of the capsule, the sheer tranquility of the scene was interrupted by the loud buzz-beeping noises.

Although he was used to the layout of the garba-- important tools and documents scattered on the floor, he successfully managed to disrupt the formation by tripping over a few of the obstacles on his way to shut the alarm clock up for the second time today. The clattering and crumpling noises did not do well for his ears alongside the alarm clock's cries, and he felt that splitting headache come over once again.

He made sure to press the correct button this time. He forgave himself, claiming he was too disoriented to differentiate between the snooze and the kill button earlier, his eyes closed as he inhaled the dust in the room.

This made him cough.

Perhaps this damned alarm clock was reminding him to tidy up as well.