The Must Have Gift of the Year

by

Tim Law

It was a marketer's dream. Somehow, it seemed overnight, the airwaves were bombarded with advertising for The Egg, claimed to be "The Must Have Gift of 2025". Radio stations were talking about it. Every television channel showed happy smiling faces unwrapping this mysterious present. Billboards everywhere showed nothing but Eggs, the same tagline translated into every language; "Get Yours Now, Before It's Too Late". Even the socials were flooded with scenes of kids, teens, and the elderly, all receiving The Egg just in time for that big day. There was no avoiding it, and yet, the world as a whole seemed to embrace it. From the very beginning, there was no negative press, nobody was willing or wanting to question this brand-new phenomenon. Everybody from everywhere wanted one, needed one, we all just had to have An Egg.

And yet nobody seemed to know where this Egg was coming from, what company was mass producing this product that everyone wanted, everyone needed, no matter the age, the gender, the interests. Shops had so many in stock that they managed to drop the price so low that everyone could afford an Egg or two, and although it seemed impossible, supply was easily keeping up with demand. A demand that was on a scale that had never been witnessed before. Billions of Eggs were turning up on doorsteps, everyone was caught up in the euphoria.

And then posts started to pop up online, across all the platforms, teens and young adults who had an Egg, attempting to open it early and reveal what was inside; to be the first to capture the big reveal and spoil the surprise. This only deepened the mystery, for nothing could break the outer shell; no brute force, not a diamond cutter, even high-powered lasers in medical laboratories failed to crack that strange impenetrable shell. The inner contents of The Egg remained a mystery.

Following this, of course, came the bombardment of fake news, stories that appeared in all of the most trusted papers that suggested the Egg was alien, or monstrous, or the plot of a terrorist organisation. That was all AI written nonsense, ridiculous accusations that were proven false just as quickly as they appeared, and the more they materialized, creating word of mouth, disagreement, and drama the more the Egg seemed to sell, drumming up interest from the constant hype. The church claimed, predictably, that they came from the Devil and that all God fearing parishioners should avoid such temptation. This did not stop their leaders from acquiring an Egg or two, for the purpose of examination and research, and, as the countdown to Christmas Day became mere weeks, many of the faithful discovered it was impossible to ignore a bargain.

Social platforms took a different path, feeds filled with the claims that people had managed to find the secret button or latch or whatever that accessed the inner chamber of this gift. Some fakes held chocolates, some golden necklaces adorned with jewels, one a nest of baby spiders. As quickly as these posts appeared they got shut down, disproven, or just vanished away as if they had never even existed in the first place. Some of them reappeared on the dark web. These were posts from conspiratory theorists who were certain The Egg spelled doom, many of these hoping that their mad ramblings and evidence-less claims would prove to be true. The company that was supplying this marvelous commodity seemed to have an impossibly powerful reach though. Even the dark web was not secret and secure enough for their ability to erase; be it posts, poor press, or people.

By the time Christmas Day rolled around the hype surrounding The Egg had ramped up to a fever pitch, and then, as if there had been a signal sounded, a gong or chime echoing across the entire world, The Egg hatched.

The young and old alike could do nothing but weep at the horror birthed in their presence. Teens screamed hysterically and found they could not stop, as parents wondered just what it was that they had brought to life, brought into their lives. The creature, finally hatched was hungry. It was nothing but a grey cloud, a living fog that seeped out through tiny cracks. The true horror was what it could do and the very fact that it was everywhere. Without prejudice or discrimination it ate, joy, love, anything and everything that made living bearable. And when it was done only death and despair remained.

By the following day we turned on each other, with tooth, nail, every sharp tool. Those who were left turned such weapons upon themselves, the fog from The Egg telling them that this was the only way. And then, when there were none of us left, the creators came, puppeteers who knew humanity, and knew we were wrong. They looked upon what it was that they had achieved, and smiled, seeing the world swept clean of human filth. With merely a wave from those masters the fog dispersed, allowing them to continue their lives upon an Earth without us.