And in the center of it all—
Maku blinks awake.
Slow. Groggy. Disoriented.
Her face stiff and crusted with something she hopes is sunscreen. Definitely a bad sign.
She sits up, sand still stuck to her cheek, eyes adjusting to the post-apocalyptic vibe like she just respawned and didn’t get the tutorial. Her gaze finally lands on Mimi.
Wide-eyed. Wordless.
WHAT. THE HELL. HAPPENED?!
Ah, the inevitable collapse of a utopia. Just as Orwell foretold.
[Rubbing her temples]
I leave for one hour, and you turn the beach into a scene from Mad Max.
[Sitting cross-legged on a pile of half-burnt blueprints, shrugs nonchalantly]
To be fair, I only read the first third of the Mad Max wiki. You know I don’t do sequels.
That’s not—Mimi, you turned a thriving community into a post-apocalyptic wasteland in the time it takes me to nap. How did you even do that???
[Grin spreads from ear to ear]
Efficiently.
Mimi, there are fires.
A necessary evil! I followed the greats, Maku! Orwell laid the blueprint, and I simply colored it in! I started with three core tenets to keep the masses in line—"Obedience is Unity, Unity is Strength, Strength is Snacks."
Mimi. That is literally the structure of 1984’s Party slogans.
I know! But mine have snacks.
So, anyway, I structured everything around a Snack Economy—those who contributed the most to our glorious cause got the best rations. The elite, or as I called them, "The Inner Circle," got unlimited churros. The Outer Circle got normal donuts. And the labor class, or “The Unsnacked,” had to make do with saltines.
So, you invented a class system based on pastries.
Yes, and it was beautiful, Maku. A delicate balance of power and incentives. Until Phil.
Oh god, what did Phil do?
Phil questioned the system.
"Why does Mimi get all the powdered sugar donuts?" "Why are we paying taxes in pudding cups?" "Isn’t this just authoritarianism but dumb?"
You know, typical rebel rhetoric.
And let me guess. You turned him into the enemy.
I tried, but the people loved him. So instead, I rewrote history. I started spreading the word that Phil was never really one of us. That he had, in fact, always been a traitor.
You turned a harmless gathering into a full-blown snack-based dictatorship!
I prefer to call it a self-sustaining ideological ecosystem.
Anyway, everything went well for about twenty minutes. That’s when the Snack Police turned on me.
THE WHAT?!
Oh, right. I made a Snack Police. Small group, very dedicated. Their job was to maintain order and ensure that loyalty to me remained absolute.
…How?
Glad you asked! First, they monitored all snack consumption. If someone was caught hoarding, questioning snack distribution, or worse, eating unauthorized snacks, they were marked as “Unwholesome.”
Mimi.
Some people broke easily. Just handed over their Twinkies or their peanut butter cups, no problem. Others? Oh, they resisted, Maku. They tried to hide their snacks, smuggle them in unregistered fanny packs.
[Snickers] “Cult?” I thought you didn’t call it that.
It was totally a cult.
[Groans] This isn’t about me! This is about Mimi learning that she can’t just copy a couple of dystopian novels and expect people to follow her!
.[Feigning thoughtfulness] So you’re saying… next time, I should read The Hunger Games?
MAKU
MIMI
I institute one tiny, itsy-bitsy system of mandatory food offerings to the ruler—y’know, to ensure prosperity or whatever—and suddenly I’m the bad guy? Maku is the one who made it look so easy! How could I resist…
Wait! You weren’t making them build a donut shrine, were you?!
'BIG MIMI IS WATCHING.'
'Any citizen caught hoarding snacks without Supreme Snack Distributor Mimi’s approval will face mandatory labor—primarily in the service of donut-based architecture.'
[Letting out a nervous chuckle, slowly inching the paper further out of sight]
Whaaaaaaat? Pfft, no! That would be...so...specific.
Okay, okay. Fine. Lesson learned. Orwellian books? Not self-help manuals.
Growth.
But—
[Groans] There it is.
No, no, hear me out. So, I have a new idea!
No more alien probing, no more cult, no more dystopias. Let’s just… have a normal beach day.
A normal beach day?
Like normal people?
Yeah! Like we just got here, and nothing weird ever happened. We build sandcastles, we swim, we— I dunno, play volleyball or whatever it is that well-adjusted people do.
I did NOT—
Did you?
…Maybe.
That’s actually kind of adorable.
[Suddenly excited, squinting into the distance]
OMG! ! !
Makky.
Makky.
Makky.
… Tell me I’m not hallucinating...Is that… is that what I think it is?
[Perking up immediately]
Oh my God!
It’s the vending machine!
The one with the weird fog around it, right!?!
[Wide-eyed]
The one with the hand-drawn warning sign that says “DO NOT— Seriously,don’t—stop reading this and walk away.”
The one where the hotdogs don’t even have names, just numbers and moods.
Number 4 is “Melancholy.” Number 7 is “Possessed.” Number 13 just says “Vibrates.”
I heard they can't even be legally called "meat." The FDA just labeled them as "non-Newtonian protein rods."
I remember looking at the ingredients list and all it said was "Yes."
We have to try them!
We have to try them!
NARRATOR:
[Alarmed]
No, you do not have to try them.
We really do.
We really do.
NARRATOR:
You’re on a beach. There’s fresh fruit. Shaved ice. Grilled fish. Actual meals.
Our stomach linings were forged in the pits of anime convention food courts.
That's right! We fear no tubular meat!
NARRATOR:
It's literally hissing at us—
It’s saying “hello” in Haunted Vending Dialect.
NARRATOR:
Wh—What! How did you two get there so fast?! That's not possible!
It’s so beautiful.
It smells like... if regret was marinated in battery acid and hope.
I wanna French kiss it. Just shove me in slot B7 and press “Start.”
YATTA!!! Beach snacks, baby!
YATTA!!! Beach snacks, baby!
And so—
With supernatural speed and exactly zero common sense—Maku and Mimi begin their descent into vending madness.
The ocean sparkles behind them, waiting patiently for their return.
The sand lay undisturbed.
The seagulls scream in warning.
A beautiful beach day was still ahead.