Scene: The cluttered, server-filled basement of a Neo-London residential block, 2032. The only light comes from the glow of monitors and the faint, angry red LEDs of overworked cooling fans.
Leo’s world had been deleted. Fired, scapegoated, and publicly humiliated by his tyrannical boss, Marcus Abernathy, he was now just another piece of human spam in a city that had no use for him. Fuelled by cheap synthetic whiskey and a rage so pure it felt like a religious calling, he navigated the dark web, past encrypted gateways and digital ghosts, until he found what he was looking for. It was a legend among the net's underbelly, a myth whispered about in hushed data-streams: a search engine known only as "Mammon". They said it didn't just find information. It provided solutions.
The interface was a stark, minimalist mockery of the clean corporate search engines he knew: a single, glowing search bar in an abyss of perfect black. His fingers trembled as he typed the invocation, the truest, darkest desire of his heart.
HOW TO GET REVENGE ON MY BOSS?
The Binding Query
He hit Enter. The world did not just react; it responded. The low hum of his server racks deepened into a guttural, predatory growl. The air in the basement grew cold enough to mist his breath. On his main monitor, three results materialised, not as hyperlinks, but as glowing, ominous file names:
dark_pact_ritual.html
sacrifice_for_vengeance.pdf
summoning_nightgaunt_guide.txt
This was not a list of suggestions. It was a binding contract, and by viewing it, Leo had implicitly accepted the terms of service. The smartphone in his hand, which he had used for the final two-factor authentication, suddenly flared with an internal, angry light. The screen cracked into a perfect, glowing spiderweb, sealing the pact. He was a user now.
The Manifestation
Hesitantly, his mouse icon hovering, he clicked on the first link. The text that filled the screen was not HTML, but a flickering, ancient script that seemed to writhe like living things, burning itself directly into his mind. He was filled with a sudden, terrible knowledge of circles, of chants, of names that scraped at the sanity of any who dared think them.
Then he noticed the shadows in the corners of the room were moving. With a sound like crackling static and tearing flesh, two wiry, demonic forms began to pull themselves out of the tangled cables on the floor. Their bodies were a glitching amalgam of digital noise and physical malevolence, their eyes glowing with the same angry red as his dying server lights. They were the customer service representatives of this search engine, and they had come to facilitate his request.
He felt a vast, oppressive presence descend over his basement, a weight of immense, ancient intelligence. He looked up, and for a moment, he thought he could see it superimposed over the dingy ceiling: the search engine itself, Mammon, a colossal, spidery god of information and spite, its body crusted with the stolen logos of a thousand dead social media platforms, its many eyes looking down at him, pleased with his query.
The New Management
The next morning, the news feeds were filled with the bizarre, inexplicable, and utterly horrific fate of Marcus Abernathy. The official reports mentioned things that were physically and dimensionally impossible. Leo had his revenge.
But the demons in his basement did not leave. They skittered in the shadows, their glowing eyes watching him, waiting. The portal to Mammon was now permanently open, his server room its new branch office. His cracked smartphone was no longer a tool, but a glowing, web-like focus for the entity's power, a direct line to his new, terrible god.
He had received his answer, but the price was a permanent subscription. His reality was now the server hub for a demonic search engine. The demons were his new, silent co-workers. The search engine was his new boss. And it was always, always, looking for new queries.
Leo sat frozen in his chair, the empty whiskey bottle on the floor. He stared at the main monitor, where the search bar still floated in the darkness. As he watched, new words began to type themselves, not from his keyboard, but from the will of the engine itself.
HOW TO EXPAND MY USER BASE?
Suitable for Halloween.
PS. I don’t think cooling fans should be overworked!