I noticed a neighbour had set up a little library box in their front yard. I checked the books and saw they were all jumbled up.
I had only moved a few when a net fell on me.
"Gotcha! Oh..."
"What's going on?" I asked.
"There's a feral librarian around."
"Ah. Catch, tag, feed, release?"
"Yup."
Improvisation
'Elena the Curious is unreliable,' said Krek the Swift. 'She depends too much on her improvisation ability.'
'This ability,' whispered Elena to his ear, 'is the result of years of rigorous training. Fancy an Itching spell?'
#MastoArt #FlashFiction #SmallStory #TootFic #MicroFiction #writever
The Fascist next door
There is a low fence between our properties. Every year he would pass a shopping bag of tomatoes to me in high summer, and I would give him apples later in the year. We talked about the weather mostly. It was polite but reserved. He would choose his words carefully, guardedly.
What did he think, I wondered? It was a thought I always had. What was behind the politeness? But I could never see.
When the government changed, things changed. That year, I still got the bag of tomatoes. He said the summer was looking good. Not too hot, I said.
The next week, someone threw red paint on my house. The blood of my people's crimes. He came home to me painting the wall, and walked quietly past me with his head down, saying nothing.
Our conversations grew shorter and more awkward, until eventually they stopped. Later in the year, as I gathered the apples from the tree, I knew I would not offer him some. The attempt at connection would only increase distance.
That year was also when the first flagpole went up in our street, and the national flag fluttered busily in the breeze.
Then it seemed a flag was going up every month. A house here, a house there. My neighbour wasn't the last to put up a flag, but it didn't matter. It wasn't long before every house except mine was flying one.
One flag was not enough. One person added the Party flag to their pole, and like students standing up for the teacher, all the houses fell in line.
I am looking out my window at the flags flapping silently on the other side of the double glazing. Each one of them is a tiny surrender. A sign that the house behind the flag will comply.
If things get worse, they will not help.
Maybe they think "it's just a flag". They don't need the trouble. Maybe they tell themselves if things get serious, then they will take action. Of course they will. They know they are good people.
Here he is, walking up the drive into his house. He looks relaxed and safe. It's like he doesn't see the red paint on my wall.
Yes I am angry with him. Did all those meaningless conversations about the rain or wind count for nothing?
Was he always a fascist?
Or is he still the same? Polite when that is expected, obedient when that is expected.
And if one day the Party is gone, he will offer me a bag of tomatoes again, because that is what neighbours do in the polite times.
My mother began to cry as we left Dr. Briar's office. Nothing dramatic, just small tears and shallow breaths that made it past the chaos in her head.
Irremediable.
Her hand was squeezing mine so hard that it hurt, but I understood. Through the crowds of the city and the subway, she held me and only let go when we stood before my room.
I took a big step to avoid the bleached spot on the floor, lay on the bed, and shut my eyes. The door closed, and I could hear her slump against it. Sobbing.
Sadness welled up in me as I reached out into the darkness behind my eyes with my hurting hand.
They coalesced from the shifting haze and flashes, reaching for the pain in my fingers and my soul, tearing it away, but it just whetted their appetite.
They turned towards the door, lusting for the sensation that lay behind, and it took all of me to hold them back.
All of me and the promise of another sacrifice.
"You will marry whoever you pick at the Royal Ball," the king told the princess.
"We'll hold another Ball," the king said. "Pick anyone of noble birth."
"We'll hold a third Ball," the king said. "Pick a man of noble birth."
"Wait," the queen said. "Maybe she doesn't even want to marry."
"What?"
"The gate is locked. You will need my seal to enter" said the statue to us. "Come and extend your hands to me"
I put my hand in the shape of a cup, waiting for it to give me the trinket.
The statue rose its fist, extended its thumb and the hand fell onto mine in a stern thudding sound.
"With that, you'll be able to pass the entrance. Good luck." The statue closed its eyes.
"Never fear!" exclaimed Bearnice. "Sherlock Holmes shall solve this mystery!"
"Why is Holmes investigating the death of an animal, anyway?" asked Ruff. "Surely he has better things to do."
"Animals are people too!" exclaimed Bearnice.
"to be honest," said Snowy, "I don't like killing animals. I'd rather we kill a human...."
Bearnice rolled her eyes. "Fine, Pachy is a dead human. Happy now?"
"I object!" exclaimed Caiman. "What menagerie contains a common human?"
The hooded customer slid a gold coin over. "Refill, please."
"My pleasure, sir." The bartender topped up his glass.
"That's a change. Nearly everywhere, I'm an unwanted #guest."
"Not here, not as long as you pay your tab." The bartender chuckled. "Though I hope you're not Death."
"Me? No. I'm... the other one."
"What? Get out!"
"How about I kidnap the dragon," the knight said, "and you come to rescue them?"
"It's still the same story," the princess said.
"No! We're all subverting-"
"I am tired of being in stories," the dragon said.
"What?"
"If you're not in a story, what even are you?"
"I'd like to find out."
Peers in the village told me I was a demon child. Mom confirmed. She wanted to give Satan a chance given God had done nothing to keep her husband faithful to her, and so far Satan was doing a great job protecting me. At what cost, I asked. She was stunned. “He didn’t ask for anything.” She said. “But then again he said he was very very bored down there.”
“So I am some kind of pet project to him?”
“Not even that. More like occasionally watering the plant.”
#microfiction
"At last, our world will know generational peace!"
"Have all nations finally settled their differences?"
"No. Some still hate each other."
"Then what happened?"
"Our God of War wishes to rest for as long as he pleases, and he has threatened dire consequences for the leaders of any nation that disturbs him with more war."
"They're all too afraid of him to fight each other..."
"Precisely."
Strange men appeared in the center of town. They stopped a passerby. "What country is this?" they asked.
"The United States?" the passerby replied, bewildered.
"What year is it?"
"Uh... it's 2026. How do you not know this?"
The strange men smiled. "We are part of a safari expedition from the future - a safari to punch Nazis."
"Oh! Then I think you want Germany in the 1930's or 40's."
"No," replied the strangers, "we are exactly where we are supposed to be!"
"I'm feeling hangry," said Adam.
"Hungry?" asked Beth.
"Hangry," said Adam. "Lack of food affects my mood."
Beth frowned. "I despise that word," she said. "It's dumb. It sounds like the invention of a child."
"It is a perfectly cromulent portmanteau," said Adam. "It's been around longer than you think, and it absolutely describes my mood."
"Nevertheless," said Beth, "Please use something else."
Adam smirked. "In that case, let me say that I am Lack Toast Intolerant...."
During the peak of the Diaspora, BnL starliners were departing daily on cruises intended to last five years. We calculate over eleven thousand vessels set out. One came back. Legend tells that the _Axiom_ was sent order A113 (remain on cruise, do not return to earth). Dark whispers say that other orders were sent; A112 (freeze passengers and await recall), B8086 (use passengers for parts), and in our worst nightmares come true we have learned of an order A66.
When the heatwave was at its worst, rolling electrical blackouts struck as air conditioners and refrigerators struggled to cope. In conditions where the heat index reaches the black zone, no amount of sweating or ventilation can prevent hyperthermia. I shudder to think what the death toll would have been like if not for the contingent of ice sprites from Cryptids Sans Frontieres who gated in to assist¹ the elderly and other vulnerable humans.
#Tootfic #MicroFiction #PowerOnStoryToot
¹ hug, basically
‷This must be the place, Captain; it’s the only planet within range of the chronometric polarizer drive in the kind of lifeboat that was missing from the wreck.‴
❝Any sign of the survivors?❞
‷The planet is borderline habitable, if they dug in under the ice caps they could possibly have evaded the worst of the heat.‴
❝Amplify spectral flux and check for distress signals.❞
‷Yes Ma’am—Got it! I’m picking up weak collimated neutrino transmissions. ‴
❝Where?❞
‷Everywhere! It’s the natives, they appear to have crude antennas erected in many of their dwellings.‴
❝Ridiculous, thats far beyond their technology. Unless…❞
‷Unless what? Uh, Unless what, Captain?‴
❝Scan for chronometric drive exhaust. I calculate that if you collected solar plasma at the pole you could power the lifeboat for about one suborbital flight every planetary year.❞
"I have heard that the thoughts you think most often, and strongest, are etched on the inside of your skull," the necromancer's assistant said. "Is that true?"
"It is," the necromancer said. "Though I rarely try to read them."
"Will you read mine, when I'm dead?"
"Do you want me to?"
"Yes."
"We wish to honor the first earthling into space," said the aliens, "by inviting them to join us on our journey across the cosmos."
The earth representative frowned. "You must mean Yuri Gagarin? Unfortunately, he is long dead."
"A minor detail, given our technology," the aliens replied, "and no, we do not refer to the human."
The air grew bright and hot. Colors swirled. A dog appeared.
Said the aliens, "Come with us, Laika. Join us on our journey."
The dog barked happily.
The witch’s robes flapped in the gale as she knelt on the beach. Waves crashed and she squinted as the sea spray lashed her face.
She withdrew a small syringe from the water as the magic started to work. As she stood, the wind calmed to a gentle breeze. The ocean settled until it was smooth as glass.
“This spell,” she said, knocking sand off her knees, “I call ‘sea quell injection’”
They gathered at dawn.
Dragons stood by knights, enchanted frogs by disgruntled witches.
Innocent stepsisters and good-hearted stepmothers held hands for courage.
And princesses, oh so many princesses. Kidnapped, locked away, cursed.
They all looked up at the walls of the childhood fortress.
"Tonight, the master of fairy tales falls!"
“That guy in the corner, is he always here?”
“Yep!”
“Doesn’t he have a home to go to? A Job? Should I bounce him?”
“Don’t you dare!”
“He hasn’t bought a drink all night, but”
“He tells stories; others buy drinks. Been like that for six hundred years.”
“Impossible.”
“Shows what you know, youngster”
“Why do you allow it?”
“Haven’t heard all the stories, yet”
When I was a kid I saw a one-person speedboat at a boat show, it was so tiny and sleek. I dreamed of someday living on a riverbank and being able to speedboat to work. Years later I recalled this and looked them up, wondering how much they cost; I was saddened to learn the maker had long since gone out of business, after fashion shifted to motorcycle-type jetskis. Having said all that, I totally get this mania for commuter quadcopters, I would have been drooling over them in my youth, too. Look there goes another one, you really should get one of these forcefield umbrellas. Oh dear, that’s not gonna buff out, here, get under this with me, I’ll walk you to work.
A short love story
A man and a woman who had never met before, but who were both married to other people, found themselves assigned to the same sleeping room on a trans-continental train.
Though initially embarrassed and uneasy over sharing a room, they were both very tired and fell asleep quickly, he in the upper berth and she in the lower.
At 1:00 AM, the man leaned down and gently woke the woman, "I'm sorry to bother you, but would you be willing to reach into the closet to get me a second blanket? I'm awfully cold."
"I have a better idea," she replied, "Just for tonight, ..... let's pretend that we're married."
"Wow!.. That's a great idea!", he exclaimed.
"Good," she replied. "Get your own fucking blanket."
After a moment of silence ... he farted.
The End
“Rise and shine, kiddo, we got a catch operation on runway 22. 1700pax onboard.”
“Second one this month. Heckin sloppy, boss.”
“You know, they used to just land airplanes on the belly if the landing gear got stuck”
“That’s wack. Surely it’d wreck the plane?”
“Pretty much yeah. They had the computing power to deploy a catch truck but apparently it just never occurred to them. They were catching these fuckoff huge primitive rockets, but if an airliner with 300 people on board had a gear issue it was ‘whelp let’s try a bellyflop, what could possibly go wrong?’ ”
“So what woke them up?”
“It was that AI bullshit in the twenties. When the bubble burst you could buy surplus vector processors by the skipload. All sorts of clever folk attacked previously intractable problems. That’s how we got tumourphages, catchtrucks, and dogvoices.”
“Wow but no cat translators, eh?”
“Oh they worked but nobody would pay to be told ‘fuck you feed me’ all day”
Yesterday's writing prompt at my writer's group was "passages". There are so many stories revolve around passages; wormholes, wardrobes, ships.... You name it. And I didn't want to write something that had been used a million times. So I spent a long time looking at the various definitions (did you know there's one related to dressage?), and this is what came out.
Safe Passage
It took me nearly a year to negotiate safe passage. I was lucky, some people wait decades, or just give up and risk taking the trip without a ticket. It's hard when you're getting older and older but still can't go. But fortunately Saint Peter owed me a favor. I'd gotten him out of jam one time; made some evidence disappear that would have shown he'd let in someone he shouldn't have. It wasn't really clear that anyone was paying attention anyway, but you never knew when God might come back from wherever he'd gone.
I showed up at my appointed time. There was a crowd of people making it hard to get through. Folks with canes, walkers, and in wheelchairs. Many who were obviously way past what would have been their appointed time. There was no way I was going to do that to myself. I had enough aches and pains after waiting a year. Some were hesitating. Some were resigned and limping ahead. But there weren't too many of us with tickets for safe passage.
I worked my way through the crowd, and over to the VIP door, and showed my ticket to the bored guard. He looked at it carefully, and then said, "Wait for an archangel, or this is worthless," and waved me through.
The other side was even worse than I expected. I stood in a small alcove with a door-sized iron grate between myself and the Rainbow Bridge. I'd known the bridge was in disrepair since God had walked off the job and disappeared, but I hadn't realized just how bad it was. There were holes in the pavement that dropped all the way to Purgatory. I heard some people were choosing that route over the alternative. The protective nets that kept out the beasts from Hell were torn and tattered. And high above I could see eagles, griffons, and other odder beasts circling, looking for fresh meat. The bridge was clogged with empty walkers and wheelchairs that had belonged to people who hadn't avoided their watchful eyes. If you were lucky they might drop you, and you'd end up in Purgatory forever. Otherwise, they'd take you down to the depths of Hell and feast on your liver along the way. Occasionally I could see someone dashing from one shadow to the next on the bridge, hoping they'd make it through. I knew some people tried to bring weapons, but it was pointless. Naked you came into this world, naked you would leave it.
But I had my ticket, so I waited for an archangel to show up and escort me to Heaven.
