Tag: writing challenge (Page 2 of 4)

Orb X57

October 11, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Char perched in the window of the stone ruin, ready to leap to the battered floor at the first crumble of unstable mortar. It felt reasonable under her rubber-soled boots, and she settled into her current guard position, hidden behind an ivy curtain that covered half the open window.

Well, behind something that looked like ivy to her eyes, at least. Orb X57 reminded her of Society, her home planet. Training let her automatically categorize the most evident differences – ground covering a silvered grey rather than green, the dominant harvest plant color maroon rather than the vivid orange she remembered.

She shifted in her perch and adjusted her grip on her weapon, scanning the dull grey horizon and treeline. It wouldn’t do to get careless, thinking she was home. Not with most of her squad downstairs sleeping.

And not that home brought fond memories. Char rolled her shoulders to ease the tension creeping into her neck. Society was long behind her, and this wasn’t her planet. Orb X57 was the planet they were checking for colony viability. So far, it seemed promising.

At the sound of a bootfall, she relaxed further. Two solid months of training let her identify the sound as her squadmate John without turning. He was slowly patrolling the tower’s south side, marking a crescent between east and west with his tread. Sam was at the bottom of the surprisingly well-kept ruin’s stairs, guarding the only entrance and their only exit, carefully camouflaged with local foliage. Char was overwatch for Sam until they traded positions. Without the shuttle, they’d be stuck on this planet until Command could afford to send someone to get them. It was worth the tradeoff to protect their only escape route.

“Nothing to report, boss,” John said in a low baritone. It would carry less than a whisper. “No signs of current habitation.”

She nodded. “Mist starting at the edge of the forest, there. Keep sharp.” Orb X57 so far had been damp, chill ground mixing with warm northern breeze. Perfect fog conditions.

Char studied the forest. The dark green trees with pointed tops looked like they’d keep their coloring throughout the coming winter. Her briefing packet identified this as a planet with a long, warm growing season and a light winter. Command thought this could be one of the original lost colonies, sent millenia before to increase humanity’s presence throughout the galaxy.

The histories called Old Earth’s plan to seed likely planets self-sufficiency. Char called limited scientific surveys and no supply chain both stupid and doomed to failure.

“Contact.” Her fingers had moved automatically to depress the comm button before she’d consciously realized what her eyes had seen. “Contact, moving fast. Northern forest.”

“I see it.” Sam’s voice was smooth and calm in her ear. “Estimate about five minutes away at current speed.”

Two clicks on the comm meant the group below was up and readying for action.

She trained her binoculars on the blurred, moving figure, careful not to flash the lenses in the dim morning light. A horse and rider emerged into her view. The pair stumbled out of the northern forest, staggering away from the mist’s grasping fingers.

Char blinked. What flight of fancy was this nonsense? And yet – she could have sworn the horse reacted to the fog, jumping away.

She increased the magnification and focused on the chestnut. It had magnificent lines, but yes, blood streaked both croup and hock where the mist had reached for the creature. The rider was slumped over the saddle, face hidden. “Probable confirmation of lost colony and continued habitation. Horse and rider. Both injured or exhausted, no visible weapons.”

Char kept the binoculars up and trained on the mist. She heard John’s footsteps behind her on the stone floor. “Nothing from the other directions.”

“Take the risk. Prepare for action to the north.” Char felt her jaw harden against her indecision and wondered if being in charge always meant making it up as she went along. “Something weird here.”

His laugh rumbled low behind her. “New planet always has something weird. Gris reports everyone downstairs is up and prepped for action. We’ll be fine.” He took a position next to hers, on the other side of the window, weapon at the ready.

John’s reassurance helped her first command jitters, if not her decisionmaking. Binocs moved smoothly in her hand to the slowing horse and rider.

Just in time to see the mist lunge for the horse, to watch the chestnut mare scream, her head up and eyes wild. The rider came to life, sliding off the horse to collapse into a pile of leather rags on the ground, silver-grey grasses covered in the first dropped vermillion leaves of autumn. The figure crawled for a few frantic moments, dodging frenzied hooves before lurching to two feet and beginning a faltering run.

The mist withdrew a few feet, air pink with aerated blood, momentarily satiated. The horse collapsed to the ground, squeals evident even from a distance, unable to rise.

Char dropped the binoculars around her neck. “Evac! Evac now. Everyone to the shuttle.”

She made frantic hand motions at her second in command. “Now!”

John stared at her unblinking for a brief moment before he bolted down the stairs. His baritone bellowed down the tower staircase. “Evac now, evac now, grab your gear and go!”

She looked one frantic time at the deepening pink mist, now enveloping the horse up to her withers. Char turned and ran down the stairs, grabbing her pack as she slid across the tower’s polished second floor. The others were already ahead of her, running in a diamond formation.

Sam waited for her at the entrance. “Took you long enough,” she grunted. The two women bolted after the others, all traces of stealth abandoned.

The shuttle’s engines started with a roar. Char risked a glance over her shoulder at the figure now chasing after them. The androgynous figure put on another spurt of speed, mist looming large and sanguine behind it.

“Sha’eka,” Char spat, and ran faster. She could barely breathe by the time she reached the shuttle. John reached out a hand and yanked her on board by her pack.

“You’re the last.” The airlock doors were open, its single crew cycle unused until returning to the ship. He bodily shoved her past the second door and leaned back to close the main door.

Char coughed, wheezing. “No, I’m not.”

“Boss, you’ve got to be kidding.” John gave her another split-second stare of disbelief. “Right. Closing inner airlock door only.”

“There’s room enough in there.”

“On your head be it.” He shook his head. “Pilot, takeoff in twenty seconds, regardless of how crazy the boss is.”

Twenty seconds later, the outer door was secured, but she was out of time to strap in. She slid to the floor and braced against the thrust. Her weapon would be secure enough in her lap for now, with her arms looped through the emergency straps on the inner airlock door. She gripped the stock and with her free hand, Char double-tapped the comms button to reach her superior officers.

“Command, Squad Leader Charlotte Merikh, emergency squad evacuation of Orb X57, all crew on board. Shuttle is inbound for Aquilon. We have likely confirmation as a lost colony.”

“Squad Leader, Command, explain.”

“Command, the planet has horses.” No one had found their like originating anywhere across the universe outside of Old Earth, but most early colonies had carried embryos and the short-term means to birth a diverse herd.

“Copy. Continue debrief.”

She closed her eyes in relief and pressed the back of her head against the cool metal of the shuttle. The voice didn’t sound unhappy about the early evac. “Command, planet appears to have hostile carnivorous intent. We are unable to proceed without additional protection. A mist…ate the horse.”

“Copy. Anticipate hard decon upon arrival.”

Char winced. No one sane liked hard decontamination. She ignored the thumps and unintelligible but increasingly high-pitched gibberish coming through the window just above her head. “Command, complicating factor in the airlock…”

***

Catching up after a few extremely hectic weeks! Week 39‘s Odd Prompt came from Cedar Sanderson: “The fog was an unnatural cotton-candy pink as the sun rose. As the light hit it, it glowed, but there was a moving shadow in the heart of it. What emerged…” My prompt went back to Cedar; “Don’t wake up the computer. It’ll bite.”

Manuscript

September 15, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Lindsey flicked her eyes upward every time someone walked past, hating herself for the hope she knew was shining on her face. She’d seen the look in the mirror enough times, working on her poker face and failing. Each time, she tried to avoid the stranger’s eyes. Being ignored could be played off as a mistake. Oh, not who I was waiting for. The groups of mean girls with their giggles and shrieks of laughter didn’t have time to notice her, and that was just fine with Lindsey Boucle.

Pity, though. Pity was the worst. Those were the strangers’ eyes that saw right through her, saw how awkward and hopeful she was, seized straight upon her neediness.

Was it so bad to want a friend? Maybe more than a friend?

Where better to find a more-than-friend than at the Writers Of Romantic Manuscripts conference?

Her cheeks burned, but she took the time to scribble some notes for her next book on the free notepad WORM had put at each seat. Long rows of writers were seated in an enormous room, burbling conversation and colored lights filling the air, and yet the entire length of table next to her was empty. How humiliating. Was her eagerness to get a seat a turnoff?

Perhaps she was too eager in general. It’s just – well, it wouldn’t be so bad to get some real experience, outside of her imagination. She had plenty of imagination. She’d written a dozen books based on her imagination. Wasn’t a dozen enough to be alone?

Lindsey let out a sigh and stopped looking up. She slumped over and smushed a hand against her face, ignoring the music and coffee-scented air. If all she got was a free notebook and pen, plus some writing tips, well, that was all she had paid for.

It would have to be enough. Life wasn’t a bowl of –

“Excuse me,” said the sexiest baritone she’d ever heard. “Is this seat taken?”

***

I didn’t know what to do with this week’s odd prompt from Cedar Sanderson: Life is a bowl of cherries – if you’re a worm. My husband suggested the acronym idea, and we had a lot of fun tossing around ideas for it. See story one here.

My prompt went to Leigh Kimmel, to describe a scene in the Carta Marina.

Mahogony and Loyalty

September 15, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Frank Delacroix leaned back and kicked his legs up on the desk. Mahogany, of course, an exquisite import from Old Earth, or so he was told. The handmade Persiannah rug was soft enough on his feet; he’d made sure of that. Cheryl needed a soft rug for when she gave him his special personal treatments. He wasn’t a monster, even had a fond spot for her. But some days, a man just wanted to kick back, classic-style, and view his empire.

He’d fought long and hard to get here, after all. The rumor campaign that followed his predecessor just kept coming up somehow, every time the man made a move. It had taken longer and been more expensive than he’d anticipated, too. Frank snorted. Who’d have thought personal loyalty would have been a factor?

It was worth it, though, even if that guy had ultimately transferred a better position, in a larger city. One where you could go outside wearing white and not have it turn black-streaked from a dry, filthy snow. He was content here for now, solidifying his position to keep moving up the tower, to bigger and better towers. His turn would come, and then he’d get rid of that guy. Maybe start introducing himself as Francis.

In the meantime, no longer did he have to tolerate hearing his workers complain about their rights and needs. Smug bastards, thinking they knew better than someone put in place to put them in their place. He’d simply raised the quota until the workers were too exhausted to complain. Not that they’d dare after that woman bled all over the floor. And if they disappeared? So much the better. He could pay their replacements less, justifying their lack of experience.

He leaned back again, a satisfied smile on his pudgy face at the memory of today’s broken promise. He loved teasing the ambitious with promotions, only to yank it away at the last moment of hope. Even better, he could act apologetic, simpering about how this time, things hadn’t worked out, but next time, it was sureto be a sure thing. If only the circumstances were slightly different, if cuts hadn’t happened, if the quotas hadn’t gone up from central, if that work had been smidgen higher quality.

Frank licked his lips and contemplated the view, six stories above the level of heavy smog the grounders had to put up with every day as they trudged from their hovels to the factories. From here, he could see lights shining as his city worked to provide him with all the comforts and indulgences this crappy planet could offer. No goggles and stuffy breather for him, no sir.

Perhaps he’d call Cheryl in for some special treatment time soon. He deserved it, after all, now that he’d reached this status. Nothing was too good for a World Obtainer and Requisitions Manager. Each city on Formulant had one, each in a towering pillar to look upon the peons and control their miserable lives until they’d squeezed out everything they had to give.

Frank laughed, alone in his tower room with the unbreakable diamond windows. He’d discovered that most of the peons would do anything just to hope for a better chance at life. Cheryl, for instance. All he had to do was make her cry, toss out some promises, throw her a bone once in a while, and she’d do anything. He just couldn’t let it get too far, had to keep the puppet strings from being too obvious. Get her sister a job, but make it dependent on her keeping him happy. Had to keep her upset enough to keep hoping, but not get so expectant she started thinking she could make demands.

His boss told him he was a master at handling that delicate balance, but it was really a prerequisite for the job. World Obtainer and Requisitions Masters only wanted the powerful, the skilled, the talented. And he’d made it, off the factory floor at last. He was one of the elite.

Yes, life was just a bowl – a fancy, hideously expensive Ming dynasty bowl, whatever the Ming dynasty was – of cherrylinas for a WORM. Frank reached over and plucked one of the shiny fruits out of the blue and white dish, its deep red flesh bursting luscious and sweet in his mouth.

At the nearby spaceport, Charlotte Merikh stepped off The Wyvern and breathed in Formulant’s air for the first time. It smelled just as foul as the background dossier she’d read on the flight to this corrupt, polluted hellhole. It was a far cry from the early settlers’ terraformed greenery and soft sandy beaches, lost after the factories edged the settlers into poverty and bondage. Beggar children were held back from bothering the tourists – those that remained – by a rusted fence and a bored security guard. Their sticklike arms reached through holes in the fence toward her, but no hope shone in the foundlings’ dull eyes.

Char couldn’t wait to take down WORM.

***

My prompt went to Leigh Kimmel, to describe a scene in the Carta Marina.

Nightmares

September 8, 2020 / fionagreywrites

If I had known how it all would escalate, I’d have done things differently. But so say we all, and now with each labored breath, I fear I’ll take them all down with me when at last I cease to be.

I will not regret what I will become.

Once I spent my time careless and carefree, the only worry a good meal and a quick burst of playful energy. To stare out the window, and be a good companion. It was easy. It was enough.

Then came the day when I began dreaming, though not the casual dreams of youth. Instead, each time I woke, I sank into the miasma of despair. I remained in a waking dream, the monsters surrounding me, taunting me, too quick to catch or kill. A last burst of vivid memory, fading with waking, only to jolt anew at the realization the dream was the same I’d had the night before.

My innocence was lost the day I realized the monsters were real.

They are not intelligent on their own, per se, but they are many. And with this final burst of delirious dreaming, I have at last purpose. I will protect my companion from their destruction as best I can.

When I go, I’ll take them with me, tail lashing and whiskers twitching one final time.

Writing Cat fortunately has never needed to plot a mouse massacre.

This one was hard! Thank to Leigh Kimmel for this week’s challenge, solved only by last minute panic and a disrupted, napping cat.

“The dreams of one man actually create a strange half-mad world of quasimaterial substance in another dimension. Another man, also a dreamer, blunders into this world in a dream. What he finds. Intelligence of denizens. Their dependence on the first dreamer. What happens at his death.”

My photo prompt on ruined fortresses went to nother Mike, and I do hope he continues the story about ghouls eventually.

Float

September 1, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Some long days at work are longer than others. I’d been late, then slipped on a puddle of coffee someone else was too rude to clean up and bruised my tailbone. The boss had been on a tear, and I’d been unlucky enough to not get the group text to hide before he came storming in ready to scream at the first victim he found.

Which meant I’d also gotten stuck with fixing someone else’s mess, of course. I got to be the one to stay late while the guilty party skipped merrily out the door, gleeful she’d “forgotten” to include me on the air raid – I mean boss – warning message. And finding out my car had been keyed in the parking lot was the perfect end to a perfect day.

Yeah, my sarcasm meter overfloweth.

All I wanted to do was faceplant into the couch, maybe with a glass of wine injected by IV so I didn’t have to pick up my head from the pillow. Maybe rent a movie. Pizza and actually watching the movie would be optional.

I really wished I’d never given my mother a key. But I’m fairly certain if I hadn’t, she’d have shown up anyway, hanging out on the front porch until the neighbors called the cops.

The whine started as soon as I opened the front door. Ears like a bat, that one. Thought I’m not sure she usually bothered to see if I was around when she started. Or stopped. She could have been going for hours for all I knew.

It’s all blah, blah, job’s terrible, they don’t treat you right, you work too hard. I know, Ma, believe me. You don’t eat enough to keep a bird alive, but don’t go near those evil cookies. Ma, I’m ordering pizza just to spite you now. Did you meet a nice boy yet? When will the family meet him? Let me set you up with a complete stranger. Maaaa. Stop. Please, I’m begging you.

Sooner I dealt with it, sooner it’d be over. I dropped my keys and trudged through the living room and into the kitchen. The nasal snarl came from outside, though the screen door. I bet the neighbors loved the background screech whenever she showed up.

I know she had something to do with the neighbors planting a screen of fast-growing trees in addition to the existing fence. They told me. Both of them. After carefully checking that she wasn’t hiding around the corner.

The kitchen held temptation, even if it was bland and boring, with fake wood veneer everywhere you tried not to look. I eyed both the unopened bottle of cabernet sauvignon as well as the freezer, where frozen pizza lurked. But through the sunlight shining, though that open screen door, lay my doom. I braced myself and pushed onward.

“I’m home, Ma. Yes, I’m sorry I was late, but I didn’t know you were coming over. And you clearly – helped – uh – um – huh.” I swallowed hard, and blinked a few times to clear the spots out of my eyes.

The yard wasn’t much, just some scrub grass that hadn’t recovered from the last renter’s dog, and barely grew thanks to the neighbors’ trees shadowing it most of the day. Bigger than the proverbial postage stamp, but certainly not a full-size envelope. Flowers died as soon as I touched them, their unwatered skeletons brittle and whitened by the sun.

And amidst it all, the crown jewel that made me rent the place sight unseen from an unscrupulous landlord, and worth cleaning out a ridiculous amount of bugs, dropped leaves, and algae. Blue water, in a perfect circle, the best way to relax that mankind had ever invented.

Some days you just need to float. Although Mom didn’t just rest atop my giant taco pool float when she stopped by. Ever. She reclined, regally, with her oversized Hepburn-style sunglasses, keeping her curls out of the water. Always managing to stay in just the amount of sunlight, even with all the shade in the backyard. Each movement perfectly cut through the water without effort or splashing, a vision graceful and slim even in her early fifties.

The sunglasses were what gave it away. Well, that and the voice.

The scales, on the other hand. Those were new, and several shades of rippling green that blended with both the neighbors’ trees and the water. The claws would have threatened the inflatable, but somehow Ma managed to be perfect there, too. Her tail steered her around the pool, and the teeth were more numerous and pointier than I recalled.

The sunglasses weren’t oversized, either. The part of me that would always be small around my mother didn’t want to see what lurked behind them.

I ducked back into my suddenly attractive kitchen and hoped she wouldn’t notice I wasn’t paying attention to her tirade. Yanking out my phone, I called my little sister. My breath came in fast pants while I listened impatiently to each ring, before finally the brat picked up.

“Hey, Chris? Yeah, good. Hey, um…did you know Mom’s a dragon?”

This week on More Odds Than Ends, Becky Jones challenged me to address the dragon floating in my pool. My prompt about vultures perching on unusually solid clouds went to Anne and Jim.

Losin’ My Irish Marbles

August 25, 2020 / fionagreywrites

My husband decided, prompt unseen, that this week I should write as a western. I seem to remember protesting, not agreeing to this. Yet here we are.

“Connemara marble,” the biggest cowboy hat Aoife had ever seen said in a quiet murmur.

She halted in the hallway and blinked at the hat’s battered leather edges through the open door. “That’s nice?”

“These figurines,” the hat said, in an accent so warm it rolled over her skin slowly, like warmed honey. The hat moved upward, and she met the eyes beneath the brim. “Oh. You’re new, aren’t you?”

“Aoife.” She shifted the box she was carrying to one hip and extended a hand.

His grip was warm and callused under her fingertips. “Jethro.”

“So what’s with the marble?” She propped the box against the wall, oddly reluctant to walk away from those melted-chocolate eyes. Normally strangers made her want to run, an itch between her shoulder blades that wasn’t soothed until she locked her bedroom door.

“Irish marble. As I assume you know, given your accent.” He winked, and she took a step back in surprise. He held up a small, flat figure and gestured to the tray on the table in front of him. “We just got these carvings cleaned up from today’s find. Fantastic condition. Probably some gods and fertility figures.”

“And a horse,” Aoife said, her fingers careful not to brush over the stone. “One foot up. He’s ready to head out and scout.”

Jethro nodded. “Never come between a man and his horse.” He picked up the stone and cradled it to his chest. “Isn’t that right, lil’ guy?”

Aoife stared in horror. The last few words had come out in an odd baby-talk. She backed away, that spot high up on her spine beginning to twitch.

“Aren’t you just the cutest horsie, all ready to grow up big and strong?” Jethro cooed. The green horse disappeared under the hat. Aoife couldn’t tell if he was about to eat or kiss the stone carving.

“Do you love daddy like I love you, little horsie?”

She ran so fast, she didn’t even hear the echoes of her footsteps in the empty hall.

***

This week’s prompt came from Leigh Kimmel: “Little green Celtic figures dug up in an ancient Irish bog.” (My husband claimed this was “just part of the challenge.”) I prompted nother Mike with “Follow your dreams. Taken literally.” Join the Odd Prompts crew! It’s easy and delicious – I mean, fun.

Love, with a Side of Sugar

July 22, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Laura stared out the window from where she sprawled in the rocking chair, not caring that curtains blocked the view. One leg was carelessly thrown over the hard wooden edge, exposing a run in her pantyhose. Her shoeless foot was numb.

Dylan had made the chair for her before he deployed. A promise, he’d said, his grin shining white teeth bright against the dark stubble he always grew while on leave.

The house was cold, belying the bright sunlight that seeped around the edges of the window, bright halo against neutral paint. So cold, too empty, a house where silence now reigned.

There had been voices in the background at first, voices she ignored. Voices that insisted she do things, bringing food she ignored.

Silence broken only when Laura was forced to move, wooden rockers creaking against the floor. A wooden laminate floor Dylan had installed. Another promise, this one tied to kissable lips and laughter as they’d pushed aside the tools and –

A tear escaped down her face, a soundless sob wracking her stiff body, jolting at the pain. Laura hadn’t let go of the soft triangle, heavy folded cloth since they’d handed it to her. She could feel the seams of the flag pressing against her stomach through her thin black dress. She hugged it closer.

A grateful nation, the anonymous face above the gloves had said. She’d heard broken promises, flinched away from offers of assistance.

The door opened behind her. She wrapped her body around the flag and hoped whoever was here to bother her would go away. Like her husband had, gone a month before returning in the most dreaded manner possible, the door to this house opening on practiced, uniformed condolences.

“Enough of this.” Sharp words to meet sharp noises, her mother-in-law’s heels clicking firmly against the wooden floor. A pointed nose and a grey bun greeted Laura’s uncaring gaze.

“Artemesia.” Her voice was hoarse, strained from internal screaming. She watched with dull eyes as the woman sat primly on the couch.

“You aren’t the only one, you know.”

“I know.” Laura turned her head back to the window. She couldn’t find the energy to tell Dylan’s mother to go away.

“I brought you something.”

She didn’t move. “I’ll look at it later.”

“No,” Artemesia said. There was steel behind that single word. “Tomorrow I leave. Today you look at this.”

Her foot dropped down to the floor with a thump. “What is it?”

Thin, speckled hands pushed a worn, stained book into her lap. “I never shared his favorite cookie recipe. The one I always sent when he deployed.”

Shuddering, Laura tried to push the book back into her mother-in-law’s hands, the cover hard against her fingers. “No. You wouldn’t share when it mattered.”

“A mother’s right.” The words dropped harshly in the dim room.

“Why didn’t you just tell me which cookbook?”

A sad smile. “I made edits.”

The book sat there, taunting her with memories of Thanksgiving. She hadn’t known it was possible to resent a cookbook before, but Laura knew now. The rage caught in her swollen throat.

“I’ve marked the page,” Artemesia said.

Laura stared at the cover’s white and red letters without reading them, tracing the edge of the cover with a single cold finger. She gulped a breath as she opened the book. Vanilla sugar wafted up as she flipped through the pages.

Between the pages of the old recipe book rested a patch that made her fingers reluctant to move. The stripes she and Artemesia had been supposed to pin on Dylan’s uniform when he returned. The ingredients list and instructions were heavily marked with half-legible handwriting, notes on adjusting temperature and various additions.

The words blurred as her eyes watered, tears streaking wetly down her face.

“Stains and sugar make the love real,” Artemesia said. “You think I can’t tell you have more than yourself to care for now? I want my grandchild to know their daddy. Even if it’s only through his favorite treat.”

***

I’m exploring social media again. Find me on Facebook here, if you’re so inclined.

This week on Odd Prompts, Cedar Sanderson asked me to identify what was between the pages of the recipe book. I challenged Leigh Kimmel to explain the cancellation of dragon season.

Turtle Talk

July 15, 2020 / fionagreywrites

“Your hand’s all sweaty,” Brian said. He disentangled his hand and wiped it across his t-shirt.

“It’s ninety degrees and eighty-five percent humidity. You try holding hands and not sweating.” Jenna surreptitiously took the opportunity to wipe her own hand against her shorts.

“I saw that.”

She stuck out her tongue at him. “I’m going up the hill.”

“Grass looks pretty slick. I’ll stick with the path.”

She headed up the hill. It wasn’t much of a shortcut, but the path wound around the long way. Enough others had thought the same that the grass was worn to dust. Toward the top, she paused as a dark, shining oval caught her attention.

“What’s up?” Brian was already waiting for her.

“Found a turtle. Hang on, I want to Insta this. Such a cute little guy.”

“Weirdo.”

The turtle on the trail cautiously extended its neck, peering at Jenna, and then opened its mouth. “No!”

Jenna froze, half-bent over the reptile, her phone two feet away. “Brian. The turtle.”

“What about it?” Brian stuffed his hands in his pockets.

“Talked.”

“You’re darn tootin’, I talked.” The turtle glared at Jenna. “I’m trying to lay some eggs here.”

“Oh. Ohhh. Um, okay. I’ll back off. I’m sorry.” Jenna stuffed her phone back in her pocket. “See, I won’t –“

“And I don’t need help getting back to the water. Don’t you dare pick me up!” The turtle turned her back on Jenna and yanked her head into her shell.

“Wasn’t planning on it!” She backed away, hands in the air.

“Three times already today! Three! And four yesterday! Helpful humans! I wish you all to the mud!”

Jenna turned and slid down the dry grass back onto the path to where Brian waited. “Whew.”

Brian looked at her with indulgence in his eyes. “Talked, huh?”

“Back off, humans!” A tiny, indignant voice carried down after her.

Brian looked at her with his mouth agape.

Jenna shrugged. “Told you. Cranky, pregnant, talking turtle.”

This week, Cedar Sanderson prompted me with “The turtle on the trail cautiously extended its neck, peering at you (character), and then opened its mouth to say_________________.” I knew what I wanted to write, but another wildlife-inspired story came pouring out before I could capture the cranky turtle. I’m also glad I didn’t try to mix those two tales. That was a truly terrible idea.

My prompt went to Leigh Kimmel: “A prairie storm, with rolling thunder, ominous clouds, and flickering lightning. And in that flash of light, you see…”

Join the Odd Prompters! It’s both easy and fun.

Consequences

June 28, 2020 / fionagreywrites

The thin blond woman in a suit entered the room. Simon knew she had to be more deadly than she looked. Yeah, there it was. He spotted her weapon underneath the suit blazer when she turned to close the door. FBI agents went through a lot of different training. Maybe she’d been brought in to put him at ease, get him talking.

Or break him. This was an interrogation, after all.

The woman crossed to where he sat, chained at the table. He waited for her to say something while she set up her recorder. Not that she needed it. There must be at least three more agents observing behind that two-way glass, not to mention the cameras.

Sitting, the woman adjusted her skirt before she finally spoke. “Agent Jamie Simmons, interrogating Simon Pursleh Adams. Mr Adams, would you please confirm for the recorder that you have waived your right to counsel?”

“I know my rights,” Simon said. “I don’t need a lawyer.”

“Right then. Mr Adams –“

“Simon.”

“Fine. Simon, tell me where Johnny Salvaro is.” Agent Simmons leaned back in her chair like she had all the time in the world, her limbs loose as she studied him. Just like she’d studied him from behind the mirror, probably. He ran his eyes over her neck, following the trail of a delicate necklace that ended in a long, rectangular bar.

“I don’t know,” he said. Simon mirrored her posture, as best he could with his hands chained to the table.

“Based upon your actions, it looks like you do, Simon.” She let out a smile and crossed her legs. “The base is locked down until we find him. Why don’t you save us the trouble? I’m sure we can come to a mutually beneficial agreement.”

“Is anyone ever going to ask me anything else?”

“What would you suggest we ask, Simon?” Her voice was smooth honey, poured hot into perfectly brewed tea. Yeah, she was an interrogator, all right.

“Maybe how all this started.” He realized with a jolt that he wanted to tell his side of the story. Someone ought to know.

Agent Simmons leaned forward, her head tilted to one side, hands clasped in front of her. “Then tell me how this started, Simon.” Her voice purred, and he felt a flush.

“It was all back in 2020,” he began.

Early in 2020, when everybody was in quarantine. It’d been a week or two, and everyone was still scared, but starting to get bored, too. And Johnny had been coding the whole time. He saw opportunities, that kid did. Seventeen years old and a bioengineering prodigy.

A mastermind with one friend in the world, named Simon, who was better at handling money and people. I protected him from the bullies, so Johnny reached out to see if I’d be willing to break quarantine for a good reason. And that reason was genius, too, just like Johnny.

But he was not quite as great at coding. Brilliant, yeah, but you have to understand, the portal discovery, that was all an accident. He didn’t mean to do it. Most people don’t get that. He’s not real coherent in the interviews.

Johnny was trying to merge bioengineering techniques with code, y’see. Make it so that everyone stuck in their homes would be able to experience the places they couldn’t visit in real life.

Johnny laughed at the idea of watching a video. Laughed every time another museum put up a recording of someone walking around. All those VR headsets used to really crack him up. He wanted the experience to be real. Indistinguishable from reality. Not looking like a dork with a headset on. Johnny knew what being a target was like, and that was a prime example.

Just think of the possibilities, he used to say. The blind to see again, the experience of travel without the hassle of TSA and visas. How many people wait until retirement to travel, then realize they can’t for one reason or another? Don’t wait, he’d say. Make it so you don’t have to wait.

After everything those kids did to him, growing up, it’s amazing he didn’t want to burn down the world. But instead he saw potential.

Don’t ask me to explain the portals. The math is way beyond me. Suffice to say, when Johnny tested it and found himself actually at the Louvre, he knew he had an invention on his hands that would change the world. Change everything.

He was so excited, he forgot to tell me. That’s right, Johnny forgot to tell his damn business partner. Because I’d gone home for the night. Ironic, isn’t it?

Nor did he make a business decision. He just uploaded the code. Made it open source. Anyone could edit it, if they understood what it did, and there weren’t many of those. But anyone could also use it, and that didn’t require much of anything at all. Just a little metal wire, injected into your hand, and he released the specs for that, too.

Funny thing was, once the code was released, it was like the whole world paused. You can travel anywhere in the blink of an eye, and it was like everyone was suddenly okay with staying home after all. Maybe it was that people didn’t believe at first, but it was like the opportunity meant people figured they’d get around to it later instead.

The world changed overnight, and everyone got lazy. Who’d have thought?

Oh, but there was interest from the shadows, governments twitching at the implications. Governments wanting Johnny to come work for them, whether he wanted to or not.

The code got pulled down, then reposted. It was back to the early days of the internet, where censorship routed around blockages and information wanted to be free. Hell, they had kiosks at the malls to inject you with the biomech wire, like they used to do pierced ears, only the apparatus went in your finger and hurt more.

Even as it proliferated, it still stayed pretty quiet for a while. Maybe a year or so. Fourteen months. Long enough for Johnny to start hiding from the attention.

And then came the chaos.

Whole economic sectors exploded. Truckers were put out of business, not by the slow-moving automation they feared but was never quite ready, but by code and a shining silver hole in the universe controlled by your phone. Delivery industries were revolutionized. Doctors came to you again, concierge style, while travel agents tried to help you plan your trip rather than book it for you.

Highways grew over with grass and weeds, even as the car companies tried to produce their own personal versions of the portals. Instant transit, from a trusted brand. Some of the hotels just gave up. Why bother, when you can zap yourself home in a few seconds? Others tried to create portal stations, a safe place to step into for a small fee. Most of those went under, too, but at least they tried.

But that wasn’t the worst of it.

Crime skyrocketed. Murder, theft, everything. The terrorist attacks just kept coming, because we lost all ways to predict targets. But the ability to transit whole armies, each soldier with his own portal? Everything broke down. There’s no way to enforce the law. What was left of the governments had to figure out how to protect nuclear weapons. And don’t get me started on the drug trafficking, sheesh. Or worse. The cartels – I try not to think of all the people who disappeared.

The guilt that comes with having been a part of it doesn’t go away. I’m well aware of the terrible things that happened.

And that generated new economic sectors. Portal safe rooms. Personal bubbles. How to digitize your entire life when anything could be stolen. The size limit made it hard to protect anything bigger than a human.

Johnny said something about the biomechanical limits. He’s always been the only one who really understood the tech.

Personal bubble shields became ubiquitous, and you kept everything you owned in them with you. Rich people hired poor people to form a collective shield with their personal bubbles, trying get around the biomech limits, but it didn’t work. Too many gaps, and a portal could still get through.

As you can see, Johnny wasn’t so great at thinking about consequences.

Everything went digital. Johnny had invented what he had originally tried to achieve, too. Holographic, interactive representations of everything. Nobody knows who has the original Monets after all the crazed art thefts of the first early years, but does it matter anymore when anyone can download a high-fidelity scan and have it for their own?

That one, I at least got him to monetize.

But then we started seeing people mess with the code. Malicious hacking. Malware, ransomware. The portals were too useful to stop using, even after people started showing up bloody, or in bloody pieces.

People paid out the nose to make sure they could keep what they had left. You lose digital, you lose even the illusion that you can own things without them getting stolen by who knows who. It’s such a cat and mouse game of trying to protect your family memories, of being able to travel safely.

The government got involved. Tried to restrict the tech. It was way too late, and they were hanging by a shred of legitimacy anyway. Security was a promise they couldn’t keep.

I lost my taste for it pretty quickly, sold my shares. Tried to think of a place where portals wouldn’t work.

Damn good thing it doesn’t work off planet, right? Or so they hope, since the rich folks are trying to get off planet. Take up farming on Mars, or some such. They made huge investments in the space program. First ship launches tomorrow.

Johnny used to tell me the portal tech was matched to our geomagnetic field, somehow. Our biology, our home planet, combined with code. So none of those folks who disappeared wound up on Venus, at least. Probably at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, I figure.

You ask me, I think he figured out how to get off planet using the portal. Those rich folks, they’re gonna get to Mars, and Johnny will be waiting to greet them with a great big smile, still talking about potential.

So yeah, I was trying to smuggle a gun onto the base. Not because Johnny’s there like you think, but because I’m one of those rich folks now. I’m set for life. I want to get to Mars.

But he’s still my best friend. He trusts me. And if he’s there like I think, well. He won’t be for long.

I don’t think he means any harm, Agent Simmons. Not intentionally. But I really don’t want to see what he comes up with next.

***

This week, Cedar Sanderson challenged me to fill in the blank: “When portals are invented and you can go anywhere you want in the blink of an eye, ____________ will happen.“

My prompt submission went to debut author Becky Jones. “A visceral memory (yours or fictional as you prefer), brought to mind by a scent, taste, song, etc.“

Join the Odd Prompts crew! Submit a writing prompt to oddprompts@gmail.com. There’s no commitment, no genre restrictions, and no word limit. It doesn’t even have to be the written word, just an expression of creativity.

Sometimes, It’s Just Not Your Day

June 23, 2020 / fionagreywrites

Celia walked through the woods, grumbling about everything. The humidity made her shorts cling oddly to her legs, and the sun flickering through the leaves only gave her a headache. The path was muddier than the lack of recent rain had indicated, and her new sneakers were ruined. She’d stepped on a rock funny half a mile back, and every step with her left foot twinged up her ankle, which served her right for wearing sneakers rather than boots in the woods. And she wasn’t sure she’d gotten that last turn right, either. Everything in this direction looked generic and familiar, in a vague way that wasn’t specific enough to be sure.

She didn’t care. Her boss had cut her hours again, that pesky cat clawed her leg and ran to hide in the basement when Celia yowled a protest, she’d burned dinner four nights in a row, and her boyfriend had drifted off in the past few weeks without even bothering to properly dump her.

A clearing appeared, and Celia knew she was lost after all. A tree had fallen, huge majesty now dark with internal rot. It blocked the path, but opened up an entrance to a hidden grove, shining with gentle sunlight.

A grove that held a miniature field of tiny wild strawberries, untouched by hungry wildlife and so ripe her mouth watered at the sight. The berries dangled from the vines, lush and ready to burst, while tiny white and yellow flowers promised more prizes if she returned. The sweet scent washed over her in a wave as a breeze cooled her sticky body, and Celia knew there was no more resistance.

Five minutes later, she’d stained her only white t-shirt with berry juice, because her hands just weren’t big enough. Well, this was why she didn’t wear white often.

It was worth it. The taste exploded on her tongue, sweet and tart simultaneously. Celia let out a whoop.

“About time this week started getting better,” she told a distant honeybee. It ignored her, but as her eyes followed, her pleasure received a jolt of adrenaline.

She froze. Was that a wasp nest? It was swollen and grotesque, a giant grey lump caught between the branches of an enormous tree even larger than the one blocking the path. Why, it must be larger than her neighbor’s Saint Bernard.

Celia slowly started to stand up, still clutching a shirt full of miniscule strawberries. The pollinators certainly liked the berry patch, but now she knew why the wildlife had left this grove of temptation alone.

Her eyes didn’t leave the nest as it began to quiver. Celia felt her ankle twinge as she stood up, and wondered how far wasps would chase her.

A tiny, elfin face popped out of an entrance cleverly hidden by the natural bumps of the wasp nest. “There you are! I was wondering when you were coming to tea. I’ll be right – down – “

The miniature woman let out a disproportionately loud gasp and clutched her cheeks with delicate hands. “My winery! What have you done! Thief! Stop, thief!”

For this week’s Odd Prompt challenge, I asked Leigh Kimmel to explore alien condescension. Cedar Sanderson challenged me to explain the tiny, elfin face in the wasp nest.