There was something oddly satisfying about the sound of Fred’s computer booting up in the morning. The soft whir of the fan and the rhythmic clunk of the hard drive starting up felt like a digital yawn, the kind that seemed to say, “Good morning, Fred. Ready to bend the laws of geometry today?”
Fred, our hero, nodded sagely to his screen, his bathrobe festooned with anime stickers and Go pieces fluttering as if animated by some unseen breeze. “Yes”, he whispered. “Today is the day I finally model the impossible — a jellyfish-shaped teapot-chair hybrid.”
As the machine finished its routine and settled into a quiet hum, Fred loaded up FreeCAD, watching the familiar interface blink to life. Now, Fred wasn’t just your average FreeCAD enthusiast. No, Fred had vision. He had ideas that would make lesser men weep into their spreadsheets. Fred was the sort of person who could look at a chair and think, “What if this had the flair of a jellyfish and the functionality of a teapot?” It was the kind of thinking that led to the invention of bagpipes and the unicycle — genius, but uncomfortable for everyone involved.
As the program loaded, Fred reached for a box of Pockys balanced precariously on the edge of the desk. A single stick snapped as he bit into it — much like his sanity did whenever he spent too long wrestling with 3D modeling software. But Fred had made his peace with that. After all, genius often walked hand in hand with a bit of absurdity. Or, in Fred’s case, wobbled hand in hand, much like a jellyfish.
Suddenly, with a triumphant ding, the screen flashed a banner: “FREECAD 1.0 — YOU’RE WELCOME. FINALLY.”
Fred's eyes lit up as though someone had just handed him the last biscuit at a long meeting. “At last!” he declared, his arms flailing in an elaborate pantomime of victory. “FreeCAD 1.0 is here! The world shall know my brilliance!”
It is worth noting that the world had, in fact, never really asked to know Fred’s brilliance. It mostly preferred to ignore him — much like it ignores people who wear socks with sandals or attempt to juggle in public.
Fred began furiously typing, shapes and lines spinning across the screen with the chaotic energy of a wizard who had just discovered caffeine. But just as his dream of a teapot-chair-jellyfish began to take form, a sense of creeping dread slithered up his spine like a particularly ambitious ferret.
Something was off.
Fred paused, staring at the screen, when a faint glow caught his attention. Across the room, nestled among half-forgotten VHS tapes, was his old copy of Hikaru no Go. The tape seemed to be glowing faintly — as things often do when reality starts to take a long lunch break and forgets to lock the door behind it.
Fred squinted. “Hikaru... Naruto... Brook...” he whispered, as though calling upon ancient spirits of procrastination. “Why must I be torn between the rigid precision of FreeCAD and the deep emotional lure of anime?”
As if in response, a puff of inexplicably pink smoke filled the room, and from it emerged none other than Brook, the skeletal pirate from One Piece. He stood there, violin in hand, laughing in that way skeletons do when they've learned all the punchlines but still find them funny.
“Yohohoho!” Brook cackled, giving Fred a bony wink. “Why so glum? Can’t handle the dual burden of FreeCAD and anime? Let me tell you, my friend — you can have both! And why not throw in a Go match for good measure?”
Fred blinked. He wasn’t entirely sure if the sugar from the Pocky stick had gone to his head, or if Brook was really standing there, all bone and bad jokes. But Fred had long ago stopped questioning things like this. The last time he questioned reality, he’d ended up with a half-modeled giraffe-shaped coffee table that still haunted his dreams.
“Brook,” Fred said, his voice filled with the kind of reverence one usually reserves for pizza delivery men. “You're right. But how do I balance it all? My jellyfish chairs, my anime marathons, my existential bread?”
Brook gave a hollow laugh, pulling out a Go board made entirely of bones from seemingly nowhere. “Yohohoho! A game, Fred! Play me! If you win, you'll find your balance. If you lose...” Brook leaned in close, his hollow eye sockets gleaming mischievously. “You'll have to model the world's first fully functional unicycle ship!”
Fred nodded gravely. There were many things in life that Fred feared: running out of Pockys, getting stuck in an elevator with someone who likes to whistle, but most of all, he feared losing at Go to a skeleton with questionable sense of humor.
They sat down to play. Fred was immediately thrown off by Brook's antics. Every time Fred made a move, Brook would burst into a mournful rendition of the flute solo in Naruto's Saddness and Sorrow, the notes curling around Fred’s resolve like a cold hand on a Monday morning.
“Not the sad flute!” Fred groaned, clutching his head. “You fight dirty, Brook!”
“Yohohoho!” Brook chuckled, tipping his hat. “That’s the way of the bone, Fred! No quarter given. No balance found without a little chaos! Aaannd Atari!”
Fred glanced at the Go board, still glowing faintly from Brook's last move. “Balance,” he mused, as though the very concept had just floated down from the ceiling on the wings of a confused pigeon. “That’s what’s missing from my life — and possibly my calcium intake.”
The thought drifted through his mind like a stray balloon at a festival, bumping gently into other half-formed ideas. A teapot-jellyfish chair, after all, couldn’t balance itself, could it? And maybe that’s what the world had been missing all along — a chair that doesn’t just balance but also offers a hint of mystery, like a riddle hidden inside a crossword puzzle only your grandmother knows the answer to.
Brook, meanwhile, was busy tuning his violin, which now had strings made entirely of spaghetti. Not the fresh kind, though. The dried, crunchy kind you’d normally throw into boiling water while questioning your life choices. “Yohohoho! Fred, my bony friend, balance is just another word for chaos pretending to be sensible! It’s like playing chess on a board made of soup.”
Fred blinked. He wasn’t sure if Brook was quoting Lao Tzu or just hungry. Either way, the idea of a soup board sounded like a health code violation waiting to happen. “Brook, what are you on about?” Fred asked, but his voice lacked conviction. A small part of him — the part that had once dreamed of painting his bathroom ceiling in glow-in-the-dark stars — kind of liked the idea.
Brook grinned, or at least did something approximating a grin with his skeletal face. “It’s simple, Fred! You don’t need to understand everything. Sometimes, you just have to let go — like that time I tried to model a bicycle made entirely out of bread. Didn’t work, but the birds loved it. Now, focus. Make your move. And for the love of all things calcium, pass me the milk.”
Fred, not one to argue with a skeleton about dairy products, poured Brook a fresh glass. “Bone-regenerating milk, eh? What’s next, invisible toast? Self-spreading butter?”
“Yohohoho! That’s exactly the spirit, Fred! We must embrace the absurd, like a well-dressed walrus conducting an orchestra of maracas. Now, your move.”
Fred picked up a Go piece, pausing to ponder the universe, or at least the part of the universe that involved anime-themed bathrobes and FreeCAD upgrades. He placed the stone carefully, hearing the soft click of plastic on bone as the room tilted slightly — not enough to cause alarm, just enough to make you think you might need a new prescription for your glasses.
Brook’s hollow eyes gleamed with approval. “Ah, I see! You’re catching on. You’re not just balancing work and play, Fred — you’re turning them into the same thing. That’s what all the greats did. They modeled their lives like they modeled their art: with reckless abandon and the occasional sandwich break.”
Fred thought about that. Maybe Brook was right. Maybe life was just a FreeCAD project with too many vertices and not enough coffee. Or maybe life was a Go match played against a skeleton, where victory was measured not by points but by how many times you laughed along the way.
“Brook”, Fred said thoughtfully, as though he was about to impart some profound wisdom. “Do you think fish ever regret not having chairs?”
The skeleton blinked, his bony fingers pausing mid-move. “Fred, my friend... that might just be the most brilliant thing I’ve ever heard.”
And with that, the game continued, spiraling into a whirlpool of absurdity and laughter, with every move accompanied by a new, strange thought. By the end of the night, Fred had not only mastered the art of Go but also managed to sketch the outline of his next project: a teapot-chair-jellyfish that could balance itself on a single drop of bone-re-generating milk.
The room was dark. Only the dim light of the monitor lit up the ceilings... A swaying form of a skeleton was wobbling in front of the screen, its bony fingers tapping the keyboard with the precision of a pianist who's only half-forgotten the tune.
Brook stared intently at the FreeCAD interface, his empty eye sockets reflecting the dim glow. “Yohohoho... where is it? Where’s the button for bone-friendly CAD exports?” he muttered, shaking his head as though the lack of skeletal customization options was a personal affront.
His bony hand paused over the mouse, and for a moment, the only sound in the room was the soft whirring of the computer fan. “Ah... perhaps it was never meant to be”, he sighed, the clickety-clack of his bones softening into an almost melancholic rhythm.
But just then, the screen flickered, and a new button appeared, glowing in a deep, eerie green: “Bone Mode: Engage”.
Brook straightened up, his entire skeletal frame rattling with excitement. “Yohohoho! It exists! I knew it!” He reached out, hand trembling, and clicked the button with the dramatic flair of a pirate claiming his treasure.
The screen exploded into a frenzy of bones — 3D models of femurs, skulls, and rib cages twirling in beautifully rendered chaos. Brook let out a hollow laugh that echoed through the darkened room.
“Finally!” he whispered to himself, a tear he couldn’t cry welling up in his imaginary eye. “It’s time... for the Bone Unicycle! Yohohoho!”
And with that, the skeleton pirate leaned back in his chair, arms outstretched to the heavens as though he were conducting a symphony made of nothing but bones and bad puns.
The screen zoomed in on the unicycle model, rotating slowly in the dim light... bone by bone... piece by piece.
“Yohohoho”, Brook chuckled softly. “Perfect balance... at last.”
