Day 43

Day 43:

Shredders are Terrifying. 

I was worried about this shredder as soon as I found it in the corner of the dining room, by the back door. In it were bits of old fluff, tiny bits of shredded paper, and nails. Not fingernails, real metal nails inside the shredder. Not shredded. Whole nails.

"I have to get these out before I use it," I thought. I slowly removed the heart of the beast, the shredding lid, and then took the nails out, one at a time. As I shook the base of the shredder, it made horrible clanging noises, even though the base was made of plastic. The nails felt worn and old, and bits of white dust came off on my fingers. Once it was all out, I tried to plug it into the wall. The wire was tiny, I had to have the shredder right up against the kitchen unit and unplug the toaster to get a socket for it. All of the wall sockets were covered by washing, and documents that I needed to shred.

All of the papers I needed to shred were stacked in these huge cardboard boxes, and some of the documents dated as far back as the 1980's (that's quite a long time before I was born). When I asked my mother why all of this shredding hadn't been done years ago, she replied "We don't like using the shredder, it interferes with the television."

"It interferes with the television? How could it do that?!" I exclaimed. 

"It makes the television go all static," she replied.

Unsettled, I returned to the kitchen to start shredding. I tentatively took a slither of paper with an address on it and lowered it into the jaws of the beast and...

I pushed it against it a little more. Nothing happened. I then realised that the on/off switch had three settings instead of two; off, shred and reverse. I couldn't believe it; this shredder has a reverse setting. That must mean it can UNSHRED THINGS. There were already suspicious things surrounding this shredder, and now it might be able to UNSHRED documents? I immediately had to test my theory. I took a sheet of paper covered in personal information and set the shredder to the 'shred' mode. I slowly lowered it towards the shredder's open mouth and..

RRERRRERRERRRERERRREEEE.

It was shredded. The piece of paper had been split into dozens of thin lines of ex-tree. Infinitely curious, I grasped the setting switch between my thumb and forefinger, then activated UNSHRED mode. 

...

Nothing happened. Maybe I'd done something wrong, maybe something needs to still be within the jaws of the shredder to become UNSHRED. I grabbed another piece of paper covered in personal information, re-activated shred mode, lowered it into the jaws of the beast and...

RRERERERERRRRRERE   DUYNK.

Before it got to the end, I stopped the shredding. Nervous and slightly shaking, I pushed the switch closer and closer to the UNSHRED mode, and then..

RRAAEUUEAUUURAUUAUWU

IT STARTED VOMITING THE REMNANTS OF THE PAPER BACK UP!

I was quite frightened; I gave a little yelp and then ran away. I stood in the opposite corner of the room until the unnatural process had been completed. Just then, I heard a voice. It had been drowned out by the horrific sounds of the UNSHREDDING, but it was clearer now, and it was familiar. It said to me,

"Turn that shredder off! I'm trying to watch The Masked Singer!"