Decades ago, deep in the wastewater of an interconnected sprawling complex of abandoned South African emerald mines was born a corpulent blob, a beast who would grow to want to consume the world.
Pale without any touch of the sun, wrinkled from soaking in mine tailings, stuffed full of the toxic sludge that was the only nourishment in the darkness, its body sprouted grasping arms and hands to grab and filter the mine’s alluvium to find sustenance. But it hungered for something more.
It hid from the men, with their bright lights and their loud machines, until it heard laughter. It drew closer, many arms reaching, grabbing. But laughter slipped through the creature’s many fingers.
It wriggled behind the men, to the edge of the mine. When the creature emerged into moonlight, crawling, sluggish, dragging across the earth, it burned with hunger deeper than the caves. It grabbed small animals and gobbled them into its flesh. In the day, it hid in shadow. At night, it grabbed and ate, ate and grabbed.
But none of this sated the creature’s hunger. It yearned to consume the laughter. It watched the miners in their camps. It tried to mimic the sound. But it could not.
One night, a man stumbled in the darkness near the rock where the creature watches. When the man lay without moving, the creature approached, slowly. It touched the man where the laughter came from, and the man’s eyes sprang open. Before he could scream, the creature’s hands enveloped him. Reaching, greedy, it grabbed deeper, grasping to find the laughter. But its hands came away empty.
The Grabber feeds. It will consume your essence until you are its essence. It grabs and it grabs and it grabs, but nothing can fill its need because it can never find true laughter. It wants to guzzle your soul so that it can know the heart of a true human person. It guzzles, it devours, it grabs, but in the end it can only consume you in an attempt to understand you.
Its form keeps spreading everywhere as it devours more, as it sucks up the life essence of everyone it encounters. It oozes into every corner of our lives. It creeps into the backseat of cars and takes the wheel. Don’t struggle, The Grabber will get you where you’re going. It slides into your wallet, grabbing for your bank card. Everything will be easier when The Grabber can help you buy. It slinks into your phone, grabbing for the words you speak to your children, the things you say to strangers, the dirty things you think… Don’t struggle. It will all be best when The Grabber knows.
The Grabber yearns for what you have. It cannot understand real laughter, so it will take yours. It cannot grasp human connection, so it will take yours. Its empty soul cannot feel. Joy, love, sorrow…it knows only hunger. A hunger so deep The Grabber will ingest the entire world and your soul to fill its need.
The Grabber is just a scary story kids tell around the campfire. A creepy joke in the back of a satire magazine. But the real Elon Musk is far scarier than you can imagine.