January 2026 - Week 1

NeuroNews - Week of January 4, 2026

This Week's Artism: The Radio (Horror)

    What once was can never be achieved again. That is what I thought, at least. The sky, one bright with joy, was now pitch black. 

    Despite it being 2:00 AM in the middle of a rural 500 mile road, driving half asleep, I somehow could not see any stars. Until now.

    I cautiously turned on the radio, with a slight voice in my head telling me otherwise. I ignored whatever voice there was, screaming at me, “DON’T DO IT! DON’T TURN THAT STUFF ON!”. 

    Static noise blurred my thoughts as I flipped through channel to channel. Nothing came up. 

    Hope, the only thing keeping me awake driving a thirty ton truck over three thousand miles from Portland, Oregon to Portland, Maine (I know it sounds funny) seemed to flood my head when turned on the radio, something to cure my ever increasing boredom.

    But the plug was pulled, with that idea of fun sinking deeper and deeper into the drain, I lost interest and stared at the road. 

    I remembered my roots, a southern boy now driving through the deepest darkest parts of the north. 

    My mother always told me if I got in a situation like this to take deep breaths and say to myself, “I am        Ozzy, a smart kind person who can get out of anything.”

    But that version of Ozzy died when my family burned to death in a house fire.

    That Ozzy was murdered when I sank below the poverty line. 

    That Ozzy was burned as well, when-. I stopped daydreaming as I slammed something heavy, something strong, something, bloody?

   A deer had ran out of nowhere and crushed my hood, like a tin can under 5000 kilograms of force. 

I was stranded. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I looked up at the stars, as they blurred, and seemed to mix with one another. It was kind of like a dizzy response where you saw stars, but these were real.

I tried to call 911, but that was no use in this deserted area.

I slammed my fist on the touchscreen, shattering it to smithereens. 

I walked to the mattress that was folded up on the wall. I pulled it down and jumped on top of it. 

Before I was about to fall asleep I heard that sizzle and pop of the static through the night. 

But then, the rice crispy sound effects stopped and I perked up. A noise - no - a female, raspy voice came out of the radio station that the broken screen flipped to.

“Hello everyone, tip your waitresses and kiss your babies, welcome back to the richest game show on earth, ‘Who Wants to Be a Billionaire!’ They say it is unethical but there is no way to do so otherwise these days. We will now cut to our host, Jake Hopper!”

“Hi, all, good to see you.” I smiled. Finally, a signal!

I took a mental break from my current situation, and listened to this opportunity of something to do.

“Without further ado, here are the contestants for tonight’s show, Janette, Tom, and Ozzy!”

I felt an odd sense of intuition that something was not right with this show, but It seemed to be a coincidence that my name was the same as the contestant. 

Before I could  ponder any further, the host continued on, “Okay, question one (, what food creates the most house fires per year: 

A) turkey,

 B) flour, 

C) alcohol,

Or D) none of the above Ozzy, you first.“

Ten seconds came off of my clock, no the clock, then twenty, then a full thirty seconds went by.

The timer was about to go off at the forty-five second lapse, when I muttered, “D, no food does but not keeping an eye on it will put any house in flames.”

The filter of the radio gave a muffled noise of a “ding ding ding!”

“You know that one, don’t you Ozzy!” 

“I guess, but how can you hear me? I laughed it off, and though it was my imagination playing tricks on me.”

“I am, because, Ozzy, I’m right behind you,” Jake chuckled. But there was no odd filter this time, in which I heard his voice through a long connection of antennas. No. This was in person, behind a wall.

I slowly turned around to glare into a closed door that I had not closed. My hand slowly reached to the handle, my curiosity getting the best of me. I debated my life choices, my ignorance when my entire family perished, my economical decisions when I needed it most, and worst of all, this horrific job.

 The door opened with a creak, giving way to two gleaming eyes and crooked teeth. This ‘host’ raised a hammer, then I felt a hard knock on my forehead, and everything went dark.

Headline This Week:

Trump Administration Receiving Pushback From Federal Employees On Anti-Trans Policies.

In the US government, the administration banned many services and much support for transgender individuals. However, federal employees are starting to speak out, pushing back against Trump's anti-trans policies.

Read more here

Thank you for reading all of the way down! See you next week -Sam I.