Working on a short story in my off time, it seemed like a good idea, but now I've got a bit of writers block. So, if anyone wants to take a look, here are the first five chapters of the manuscript.

-=WARNING - TEXT IS UNABRIDGED - MATURE CONTENT WARNING=-

Its two AM and yet again, I stand in my basement, arc-welder in hand, glasses off and a hand to my forehead in exasperation. Why won’t it work? Again and again and again and again I've run it by the computer and by SCIENCE it should work. There’s nothing more thrilling then secretly building a laser in the pit of your mothers basement under the secrecy of night. I hit the device again, and it gives a groan of complaint. Why should it be groaning? By all rights, it should be spewing forth a torrent of superheated plasma into my arch nemesis in the heart of downtown Manhattan by now...
But I remiss. My name is Chuck. Chuck Collison. Remember that name, it'll be important one day, I can assure you. So why am I sitting (standing, now) in my mother’s basement attempting to build yet another world-ending device? Well, to put it quite simply, I am a criminal mastermind. An evil genus? There’s really no good word for us. I can’t be a super villain, as I don’t (yet) have any good superpowers, and I'm really not into destroying the world because of some crazy childhood thing, I just want to rule the world. Although I suppose that I should be doing my work in, say, a giant underground lair, not ALL of us can afford these niceties, believe it or not. But seriously, who hasn’t thought of being a super villain at least once in their lives? Come on, I mean, what’s wrong with you? Haven't we all wanted to take over the world, or control the moon with nuclear blasters, or throw the world off orbit using thermal power, or hold New York ransom from the moon while aiming your Doom Laser at it?

Honestly.

I take off the welding goggles and head back to my bedroom, the artificial light from my computer stinging me a bit. What can I say, I'm a creature of the darkness. I sit down on my bed and hit the switch for the lights, the spot lights shining down and making more than a few buggers run for their short, meaningless lives. Kind of reminds me of the one time I took in my first AI to the science fair... Look, to be honest, I didn't MEAN for it to go crazy and start swearing, but it did. AI can be insane, man. In any case, I hop on the interwebs and boot up my remote server from my bed. Comfy, I know. Eve welcomes me in her traditional manner, a "Good day master," and things of that nature. Voice-activated AI for a super-nerd. More impressive things have been accomplished. I pull up the blueprints for the Death Laser (Look, it’s a stupid name, but **** it. I'm a super genus, not an author) and review the schematics intently. God, it SHOULD work perfectly... The wires are all correct, the mirrors are aligned, and the power is good at a couple of megajoules, I don’t see the...
And then suddenly, like a squirrel caught in a lawnmower, it hits me.

The crystal. I'd been a cheap bastard and used glass for the focusing crystal, but all this time... Rubies. I need rubies. Well, one ruby, but it made me feel like a real super-villain to scream "RUBIES!!!" at the top of my lungs. A sudden banging on the roof of my room reminds me that my shrill cries have indeed woken up my parents. Curses. They yell down at me to keep it down, they have work in the morning. Grumbles ensue. I'm a supervillan, damn it. I don’t have to put up with this. Rubies, though. That’s the answer! If I can just get one raw one, I can use the vibroscapel to cut the it into anything I'd like... For those of you not in the know, a vibroscalpel is a little diamond-tipped blade (the scalpel part of it) that vibrates at an ultrasonic frequency (the vibro part of it) to give it far, FAR more cutting power. Thank you Star Wars for giving me the idea, and thank you rainy day fund for giving me the money to buy a microvibrator. It’s not as dirty as it sounds, I swear.

After a short stint on the schematic plans (Scribbling "RUBIES" on the plan with a tablet) I hopped on the interweb to see what EBay could provide for this little maniac today... Click click, Ebay.com... Click click, RUBIES... click click... Oh, wow. This may take a little more funding then I supposed. Let’s see here... "Grade-A RUBY," "Cut RUBY for cheap!," or "Grandmas RUBY for sale for CHEAP?"

Oh for petes sake.

Buy now price? Twelve hundred dollars. Nine hundred dollars. Thirteen hundred dollars. What is this? How do people afford this crap? They're not even good rubies! RUBIES. I mean, if I sell the Doom Laser, I could afford mayb- Wait a second. I have to have the laser first. Frack. Okay, what if I sell Eve?... No, no, she'd never make it on another OS, the poor girl. Fine, fine. "Eve, formulate plan. How do I afford said rubies... RUBIES. Rubies. -Aherm- How do I afford said rubies in time for my 21st birthday?"

"Theorizing... Three solutions found, master."

"Well, shoot, love."

"Designation: Eve."

"It’s a joke, Eve. Relax."

"Affirmative. Solution one: Work honestly for set period."

"No, no. I'm an evil mastermind, remember? We don’t really work, per-se."

"Affirmative. Solution two: Sell previous invention 'Heli-Chopper.'"

"Argh, no... That sounds like a good idea, but he needs some fixing up, the rotor broke off the last time we took him out..."

"Affirmative. Solution three: Steal said rubies."

"RUBI- Errr... Wow. Actually, that’s not a bad idea. How did you think of that one, Eve?"

"You /are/ a mad scientist, master."

"Point taken. Formulate plans, then Eve."

"Yes, master. Etc is four hours. Should I order pizza for the master?"

"Erm... No, no. I'll grab a hot pocket or something. Silence unit Eve until plan completion."

The computer fell silent, and the progress bar came up on the screen. Four hours? I need a CPU upgrade. Granted, though, none of my other friends can say that they're running a speech-driven AI on their computers... A small accomplishment, but an accomplishment nonetheless. Blasted computer... I suppose that stealing a ruby RUB- ermmm, right. Stealing a ruby is kind of what we do, really. You know, along with taking over the world, and building super computers and enslaving the masses and such. The hot pocket cooked in the microwave and as the cheese melted, I knew that life would never be the same again. Well, it would at least start to get good, right? I mean, sure, I'll be putting over a jewelry store or something, but if I get away with it, it'll be great, and I'll have a functional laser and EVERYTHING. Then I can move on to the robots! Robot army! Wooh! The bell sounded on the hot pocket, and as I picked it up (quickly dropping it on the floor, I didn’t realize it was at about 320 degrees) I smiled to myself and started to practice my evil laugh.

"Mwahahaha! MwahahHAHAAH! MWahaha-"

"GO TO BED!"

Damn. At least I can do it in my mind... Mwaha. Mwhaha. MWAHAHA. Ah... yes. A good day indeed. I went to my bed and placed the computer on its side, making room for myself to lie down. A good night’s rest and everything would come together... Everything would come together quite nicely...

End Chapt 1