The Haunting of Talk Elections: An Atlas Forum Adventure
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  The Haunting of Talk Elections: An Atlas Forum Adventure
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Author Topic: The Haunting of Talk Elections: An Atlas Forum Adventure  (Read 1257 times)
World politics is up Schmitt creek
Nathan
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« on: September 20, 2020, 07:15:50 PM »

(with apologies to Shirley Jackson)

Prologue

No political junkie can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even yellow avatars are supposed, by some, to dream. Talk Elections, (abnormal, insane), stood by itself on its new website, holding darkness within; it had stood on its previous website for twenty years and might stand on this one for twenty more. Within, polls continued to be taken, trolls posted cautiously, FF votes were firm, and socks were sensibly banned; silence lay steadily against the off-white background of Talk Elections, and whatever walked there, walked alone.

To be continued...
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afleitch
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« Reply #1 on: September 21, 2020, 07:26:26 AM »

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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #2 on: September 25, 2020, 06:42:42 PM »

IT'S HAPPENING Purple heart
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President Punxsutawney Phil
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« Reply #3 on: September 25, 2020, 06:44:09 PM »

good start. I hope I make an appearance.
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Ferguson97
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« Reply #4 on: September 25, 2020, 06:48:15 PM »

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GM Team Member and Senator WB
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« Reply #5 on: September 25, 2020, 06:53:56 PM »

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Continential
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« Reply #6 on: September 26, 2020, 05:27:05 PM »

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Battista Minola 1616
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« Reply #7 on: September 26, 2020, 05:37:56 PM »

Great start. I hope to make an appearance and I hate empty quoting.
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KaiserDave
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« Reply #8 on: September 26, 2020, 05:43:25 PM »

Include meeeeeeeee
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #9 on: September 26, 2020, 07:42:41 PM »

Great start. I hope to make an appearance and I hate empty quoting.
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Battista Minola 1616
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« Reply #10 on: September 26, 2020, 07:51:24 PM »


A lesson in irony.
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #11 on: September 26, 2020, 07:54:09 PM »


It is a universal law of Atlas Forum that a post complaining about empty quoting will be empty-quoted Grin
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World politics is up Schmitt creek
Nathan
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« Reply #12 on: September 27, 2020, 11:19:39 AM »

1.

Tender Branson was thirty-two years old when he came to Talk Elections. The only people in the world he genuinely hated were the left-leftists. He disliked rapefugees and people who had never heard of Zell-am-See, and he liked nailing Wink.

Tender was part of an elite team of paranormal investigators put together by TimTurner to figure out what the hell was going on on the forum. So too were KaiserDave, Battista Minola, and Ferguson97. All but Ferguson97 had experienced paranormal happenings of some kind on other websites; Ferguson was there as a representative of Talk Elections' founder, Dave Leip. (Nobody knew how Ferguson had angled this, since he didn't know Dave personally and Talk Elections was no longer Dave's responsibility anyway since they had changed the website.)

Tender Branson logged on to Talk Elections from a hip internet cafe in Salzburg where a little girl was having a fit over not having her special cup to drink from. He had a group chat open with the other investigators on the other website, and he had an unfunded mandate to get to the bottom of what was happening on the forum. This was going to be a tricky job.
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WD
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« Reply #13 on: September 27, 2020, 11:21:43 AM »

I demand that Olawakandi be included.
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The world will shine with light in our nightmare
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« Reply #14 on: September 27, 2020, 11:41:16 AM »


(also, I've actually had a great deal of paranormal experiences in my life, especially when I lived in Connecticut, which is sort of the nation's capital for hauntings and paranormal activity)

Looking forward to see how the story unfolds. I'll be following this for sure.
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Battista Minola 1616
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« Reply #15 on: September 27, 2020, 01:56:43 PM »

Lol I guess if you want to count my recent Christian metanoia as a paranormal happening... it was very much on *this* website though.
The Tender Branson part is a true gold nugget.
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Fubart Solman
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« Reply #16 on: September 27, 2020, 01:59:45 PM »

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World politics is up Schmitt creek
Nathan
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« Reply #17 on: October 05, 2020, 09:37:57 AM »

(warning: this chapter has jokes that won't make sense unless you've read the Shirley Jackson novel that "The Haunting of Talk Elections" is a parody of)

2.

As Tender Branson sat in the cafe in Salzburg browsing Talk Elections, the little girl kept having her fit.

"She wants her cup of nails Wink," her mother explained to another patron.

Indeed yes, Tender thought; indeed, so do I; a cup of nails Wink, of course.

"Her cup of nails Wink," the little girl's mother went on. "It has nails Wink in the bottom, and she always drinks her milk from it at home. She calls it her cup of nails Wink because she can see the nails Wink while she drinks her milk."

Tender took this as inspiration to make a forum post about nailing Wink. "Don't you think that's a little tasteless?" KaiserDave posted after a few minutes. "I mean, you can't have sex with a ghost...can you?"

"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 observed. "I wouldn't want to have sex with a ghost who was anti-choice, for instance."

"Why would it matter if a ghost was 'anti-choice'?" Battista Minola asked. "It's not like they can get pregnant."

"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 said again. "Besides, it's the principle of the thing."

Back in Salzburg, the little girl was still throwing a fit about her cup of nails Wink. Tender wondered if perhaps the Krampus could give her a new one this coming Christmas. Stranger things had happened.

Then, suddenly, the first manifestation of the ghost haunting Talk Elections happened! Tender felt a cold spot radiating from his computer; he was terrified, and wanted to leave the cafe, but he had to stay and get to the bottom of this, for all forumites' sake, and because TimTurner was paying him good money.

His breath catching in his throat, Tender leaned forward, and began typing a post...
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Ferguson97
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« Reply #18 on: October 05, 2020, 11:41:44 AM »


"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 observed. "I wouldn't want to have sex with a ghost who was anti-choice, for instance."

"Why would it matter if a ghost was 'anti-choice'?" Battista Minola asked. "It's not like they can get pregnant."

"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 said again. "Besides, it's the principle of the thing."


lmao
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World politics is up Schmitt creek
Nathan
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« Reply #19 on: October 05, 2020, 11:46:26 AM »


"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 observed. "I wouldn't want to have sex with a ghost who was anti-choice, for instance."

"Why would it matter if a ghost was 'anti-choice'?" Battista Minola asked. "It's not like they can get pregnant."

"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 said again. "Besides, it's the principle of the thing."


lmao

I'm debating whether to make this a Chekhov's gun and actually have ghost mpreg (mpreg rather than normal pregnancy because hey, it's Atlas) later in the story.
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afleitch
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« Reply #20 on: October 05, 2020, 12:22:09 PM »

Do it. Mpreg for the fangirls.(ghouls)
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
Ernest
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« Reply #21 on: October 05, 2020, 12:36:46 PM »

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Battista Minola 1616
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« Reply #22 on: October 05, 2020, 02:01:49 PM »

"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 observed. "I wouldn't want to have sex with a ghost who was anti-choice, for instance."

"Why would it matter if a ghost was 'anti-choice'?" Battista Minola asked. "It's not like they can get pregnant."

"Depends on the ghost," Ferguson97 said again. "Besides, it's the principle of the thing."


lmao

I was literally "laughing my ass off" at that.
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World politics is up Schmitt creek
Nathan
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« Reply #23 on: October 12, 2020, 04:44:03 PM »
« Edited: October 12, 2020, 06:21:45 PM by The scissors of false economy »

3.

"Have you ever seen a ghost?" Tender typed. He made it a poll.

The votes on the poll came pouring in. Within the hour, there were 7 yes votes, 15 no votes, John Dule had called two posters mentally ill for talking about their experiences, and a poster who was feuding with dead0man had posted "you just don't get it, dead0" even though dead0man hadn't created the poll.

Surely that would keep the ghost on its toes! It wasn't going to catch Talk Elections unawares. Now the forum was wise to it, or at least wise to the possibility of it.

But then, KaiserDave PM'd Tender saying "Hey, we're trying to prove the existence of the ghost, not scare it off. What gives?"

"I wanted to give the ghost an opportunity to manifest in a thread about ghosts," Tender said. "It seemed like the sort of thing a polite European who loves Western civilization would do."

"Fair enough," said KaiserDave. "But I'm warning you, as someone who's spent lots of time in Vermont: some of the ghosts you find in these old, drafty, out-of-the-way places, like a Web 1.0-style forum that's still active in 2020, for example, are even craftier than you would expect..."
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World politics is up Schmitt creek
Nathan
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« Reply #24 on: February 05, 2021, 08:00:02 PM »

4.

"No, of course I haven't seen a ghost," John Dule was still insisting. "That's almost as ridiculous as believing in QAnon or Presbyterianism."

"I take exception to that," said DC Al Fine.

"So do I," said Fuzzy Bear, "but not for the same reason."

This wasn't getting anywhere interesting. Tender was about to close the thread and go nail Wink some women in his basement, but then he got another PM from KaiserDave.

"Come to the 2024 board," KaiserDave said. "I think I've found something that could blow this whole case wide open."
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