SHOCKBOX - TIMELINE #102289371

(Timeline Tuesday #205)

Shockboxes are small, artificial lifeforms with an incredibly simple physical presentation. The creatures are perfectly cubed, with each side approximately two inches across. This cube is grey and mostly featureless, although a small glowing face appears on one panel and an opening rests on the panel to the face’s right. The timeline from which shockboxes arrive from is somehow locked, and any attempts to travel there will immediately fail.

Traveling outward from their home timeline is another story, however. Shockboxes are constantly arriving in our reality, sent here with a limited amount of energy and no ability to move or procreate. Most shockboxes will live for approximately one month before losing power and passing away.

When a shockbox encounters a human it will immediately speak up, hoping to grab their attention. These artificial lifeforms can communicate fluently in any known earthly language, and will use this ability to plead that someone place their finger in the small opening at their side. Inspecting the opening will yield few results, as this space appears to be hollow. Shockboxes tend to sound playful and mischievous, and their begging will not stop until someone is convinced to place their finger inside or the target continues on their way, leaving the area.

Anyone who places their finger inside a shockbox will receive a sharp, but harmless, shock. While it feels like an electrical current, and the shockbox will claim as much when explaining it was just a prank, careful scientific study has revealed the shockboxes are actually pricking the victim’s skin with a sharp needle. It is believed they do this to retrieve biological data, which is then sent back to their home timeline.