Prompt: The Dead On Arrival

Writing Exercise #14

Today I share with you another Sprint! This was supposed to be a Sprint but became a prompt. 5 minutes wasn’t enough time, so I ran with it.

It’s been a while, so let me refresh your memory. In the Writing Gym, a Sprint is an exercise where I take a prompt and have 60 seconds to think about my idea and 5 minutes to write as much as I can—if the alarm goes off mid-thought I have to stop!

If you have ideas for Prompts, Crunches, Relays, Sprints, or other writing exercises in the future, please leave them in the comments! If you would like to write your own take for this Sprint, please comment with a link so that I can see what you wrote and support your work, maybe even share your version with my subscribers. Please let me know if you have any thoughts, comments, or constructive criticisms as well!

Enjoy!

Sprint: A self-driving car pulls into your driveway and a dead man is in the drivers seat. Taped to the steering wheel is a folded note, with the words “DONT CALL THE POLICE!” Scribbled on the front. What do you do?
(Source)

I was sitting on my front porch drinking my morning coffee when the car pulled up the driveway.

It’s polite when one has guests to rise out of one’s seat, so I did—I stood, and took a step or two off the porch to see who had arrived. I couldn’t see anything through the tinted windows. And no one stepped out of the car. It was an awkward few moments.

I shouted “Hello?” and walked towards the car—I was really puzzled, no one had ever done this to me before. Was this a prank? “Jim, is that you, man? This is weird,” I said.

I tried opening the drivers-side door and it opened with a satisfying click. In the drivers seat was none other than the billionaire Anders Gerin—he was clearly dead, and had been for some time.

I kept my cool—I put my finger on his neck to check for a pulse, but his skin was already cold. Taped to the steering wheel was a note, scrawled on the front was written by hand, “DO NOT CALL THE POLICE”.

Something was definitely up. I thought about calling the police anyway—but for some reason I didn’t. I could at least read the note, and THEN call the police.

I took the note off the steering wheel and carefully unfolded it. It was a simple, typed note.

There is a shovel and two-million dollars cash in the trunk of this car. Bury me—don’t let them find me. Take the license plates off the car and remove the VIN numbers—there’s tools you can use for that in the trunk too. Send the car to this address in Alaska. It won’t make it, but at least it will be far from here.

I am sorry to do this to you. Please take the two-million dollars as compensation. And don’t tell a soul.

I took the note around the back and opened it up. There were four silver cases, a shovel, and various other tools.

I didn’t know whether to be afraid or happy. Two million dollars and a dead body—plus the car to dispose of. This was weird. Why did he not want to be found? Why was he dead? Was this suicide?

I looked through the car. There was nothing else as far as a note, all the bins and drawers and everything were empty. I checked the poor dead man’s pockets—he didn’t even have his wallet on him.

Where the heck am I supposed to bury this guy? Surely not on my property? I can buy another house in cash with this two million, another house far away from here.

This was not how I imagined my day would go.

What can I do except bury this man?

I went to my back yard—it was a large property, surrounded by woods. The seclusion was exactly what I needed, in order to avoid exactly this situation. I found a spot near the tree line, I marked out a body sized area and started digging—I would dig six feet down I guess, maybe more if I wanted him to stay hidden.

I got a radio and turned on a baseball game. At least I could listen to something.

I was about waist deep and six innings in when they cut to an emergency news break.

“Anders Gerin, the billionaire founder of Gerin Labs which specializes in the development of artificial intelligence, has gone missing—two days after a bizarre string of social media posts where he warned against AI and promised to shut down his company and all his research. Investigators say—”

I zoned out. This was weird. I looked over at the self-driving car he used to get here. I had this weird sense that it was looking back at me.

I was about to resume digging, when it’s lights turned on…

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Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoy! Come back next week for another writing exercise!

God bless!