Performed by Val Cole

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Get to know the writer:

1. What is your short story about?

What if we could be programmed, our circuitry overwritten, erasing any trace of humanity, or attempts to, and if we stray into uncertainty, a threat to the system, we will be targeted and upgraded to fit nicely back into the societal mode. And if that doesn't work, lobotomy because the system must remain operational, but you don't.

2. What genres would you say this story is in?
Dystopian

3. How would you describe this story in two words?
Alternate Reality

4. What movie have you seen the most in your life?
I have seen a multitude of movies, and some I remember, some I don't. And some will stay with me forever like the movie, The Listener with Tessa Thompson (2022). Do we really remember that we are human, and why does it hurt so damn much? Nobody seems to care about our pain, our suffering, our fears, loss, but someone does. And they are listening, letting us talk, connect, and solitude melts away, even if it is for a few minutes or so. And we remember that yes, we are human, and no, we are not alone.

5. What is your favorite song? (Or, what song have you listened to the most times in your life?)
Again, I have found and listened to a multitude of songs, past and present. It takes a certain song to catch my ear, grip me tight, pull me into melody, vocals that drown out the noise, and one song in particular would be Mind over Matter (Acoustic) by PVRIS.

6. Do you have an all-time favorite novel?
Charlotte's Web by E.B. White

7. What motivated you to write this story?
It's routine. Get up. Go to work. Waste your time on mundane things. Go home. Eat dinner. Watch tv, or in my case, Apple TV. Sleep. Repeat. Again and again and again, almost as if I were a real cog in the machine. That doesn't work for me, but I can't seem to escape it. It's almost like I'm programmed to be this way, but what if I want to pull away, tear out the circuitry, and make myself bleed and feel and remember that I am Human.

8. If you could have dinner with one person (dead or alive), who would that be?
Seth MacFarlane

9. Apart from writing, what else are you passionate about?
Photography – People, Buildings, Dystopian/Abandoned Places

10. What influenced you to enter your story to get performed?
I saw that WILDsound was looking for dystopian stories, and this was one of my favorites that I had written. It needed a good home, so I submitted it to them.

11. Any advice or tips you'd like to pass on to other writers?
Don't let the world shut you down. I realized that I have been in a rut myself, barely writing, thinking, waiting for the world to burn down in civil war and World War III, but I'm wasting myself in doing that. I should be doing something, even if it is small, even if it is only known to me, so at least in the end, I can say, I created that.