Gareth Bedford / thethirdman.eth

"This opportunity won't last", said the devil. Dwayne 'the rock' gerbil stood at the crossroads, considering the offer. The devil, it turns out, was an old white dude from a property investment seminar. Perhaps even more surprisingly, he was also small enough to sit on Dwaynes shoulder. "I can make you the 100x Gerbil, but it won't come for free", he whispered. On the surface it was a good deal. His soul was, by and large, of little value - he spent most of his time swiping right, avoiding clickbait articles on social media, or wondering what TikTok was - and he was confident that the devil wouldn't lie to him about something like this. It was that leverage could cut both ways, but if you couldn't trust a property investor, who could you trust? "OK boomer", he replied, "let's do it".

1/2 “A whole new world A new fantastic point of view No one to tell us ‘No’, or where to go Or say we're only dreaming” Dressed like a sailor in the age of discovery, #BraveNewGerbil sang to herself as she gazed toward the horizon and considered the unknown future…. 2/2 … What if we are all just just one universe of many, an iteration generated by a great prompt in the sky? No use worrying, she realised, for the future belongs to the bold, and she was nothing if not bold. — (*with apologies to that song from Aladdin 😂)

1/3 Party Gerbil was horrified. He had been sure that dressing as as a punk musketeer riding a mechanical unicorn with a metal parrot on his shoulder would ensure he was unique, but it turns out that many other gerbils had also arrived wearing costumes of randomly generated traits. 2/3 He was in danger of becoming the worst thing a party gerbil could be: a follower! He needed an edge, an angle, a point of difference. The line moved forward and the man at the gate introduced himself - “Jones, Trevor Jones. Welcome to the castle.“ 3/3 Seizing the moment, Party Gerbil responded “Hello, my name is Castle Party Gerbil, and my party trick is…”

Counterfeit gerbil had a foolproof plan. Firing up her screenshot app she copied and glitched a few gerbils… Now she just needed to slap on some coin logos, think of a cool sounding pseudonym, and mint her fortune…. Hmmmm ‘non-fun-unicorns’? That will work. These noobs fall for it every time.

#genesisgerbil "Genesis (Adam) Gerbil was alone. And bored. And hungry, but that's another matter. The Gerbi-net was a confusing place and he had no one to discuss with him the great questions he had... ... What is the value of a gerbil? Is a fun one better than a non-fun one? Where is the peanut butter? Surely two Gerbils would be better than one - and many gerbils better than none. The button sat mutely daring him to press it. So Adam pressed the button."

@NonFunGerbils Moon gerbil is mining big cheese for hamStar industries on the lunar surface for 3 years. Moon gerbil cannot talk to earth. Moon gerbil crashed the lunar rover. A new Moon gerbil is arriving from earth in 2 weeks. Moon gerbil is dying. Moon gerbil is having doubts. #moongerbil (This probably makes more sense if you've seen the movie Moon. Or maybe not.)

@NonFunGerbils #preppergerbil #nonfungerbils Prepper gerbil didn't know if her grandmama had digital assets in mind when she said "Always buy extra in troubled times"... For sure, generative space travellers, crypto punks and listed edition edition art wasn't quite the same as stocking up on tinned peaches in the great nut famine of '03, but she felt it was a good maxim to live by and wasn't willing to risk letting grandmama down.... As her eye was drawn to the '1/1' label on screen, she whispered "This ones for you, grandmama"

@NonFunGerbils "My name? Well, you see, it was a birthday present." Mr unicorn gerbil leaned back in his chair with the air of a gerbil who has told a story many times. "One afternoon while exercising at the wheel, I was interrupted by my kids excitedly returning to the house... "On opening the door I found them standing there with an array of sound devices strapped to their heads, making the most prodigious noise. The sort of noises that bring your neighbours around." "A cacophony of migraine inducing sonically nauseating blaaah bleeee blaaah borrrp borrp weeeoooh brrrppt" "Looking entirely too pleased with themselves, they presented me with a remote control and shouted over the noise - 'Happy birthday dad! We got you a unique horn!"

@NonFunGerbils My #zkgerbil (full and complete) entry: "Wait,...what?!"

g-ra gerbil — She-Ra Gerbil checked herself in the mirror. ‘Damn’, she conceded - ‘Covering yourself in gold really does add something to a look’. When her advisors had suggested that just being mystical and godly wasn't enough, and that they wanted her to make more of an entrance it was fair to say she wasn't immediately convinced. But marketing was their business, and now that she had the ‘classic god’ outfit sorted, and her trusty mystic sword in her hand, she had to admit the effect was eye catching. ‘I wonder if they’ll think I’m cosplaying’, an idle thought crossed her mind. Keeping a giggle from escaping, she composed herself into what she hoped was proper mystic godly decorum, and stepped onto the platform: “Behold, for I am She-Ra!”