Hal Kempa Naughty and Nice
Rick McQuiston Chills by Candlelight
Guy Belleranti Noises
Peggy McFarland Carry That Weight
Carol Ayer Would You Rather?
John Gladstone All that Glitters
Simon Oates Last Laugh
Jeff Bowles faces and gears
Frank Dutkiewicz Tagged
Harold ‘Hal’ Kempka is a former Marine, and Vietnam Veteran. His short stories have been published in numerous Horror Magazines, including Golden Visions, Twisted Dreams, Dark Valentine, and Death Head Grin. Hal also has stories appearing in upcoming anthologies from Pill Hill Press, Blood Bound Books, and Post Mortem Press. He is a member of the FlashXer flash fiction workshop, and lives in Southern California.
Naughty and Nice
By Hal Kempka
City plows scraped the streets, and piled the heavy snowfall against the curbs and driveways. Felton watched helplessly from his office window as they blocked the parking lot exits, making his car inaccessible for a few days.
Of course, being Christmas Eve he could kiss off a ride home. Most of his employees either didn’t show up at all and the rest left at noon to finish last minute shopping and preparations. He continued working, foolishly hoping to set an example for his employees and was the last to leave.
He hated winter and the accompanying holiday festivities as they always caused a drop in revenue. Felton did however, look forward to the comforting solitude of Christmas Eve sipping a cognac by the fire and reading himself to sleep.
After shutting off the lights, Felton shivered in the darkened office’s morgue-like atmosphere. He buttoned his overcoat to the neck, and stepped into the frigid evening for the arduous, two mile trek toward home.
As he trudged through ever-deepening drifts, a rising silver moon cast the landscape in a glittering patina. The biting wind however, whipped icy crystals against Felton’s face.
“Damned snow!” He grumbled, stopping to catch his breath.
As the downtown buildings gave way to houses and apartments, a dark, billowing cloud rolled. It doused the moonlight, intensifying the streetlights golden glow and creating ominous shapes in the shadows.
Gusts whistled in his ears, as though delivering disturbing snippets of whispered conversation like “let him step into the darkness.” Uneasiness began to gnaw at Felton’s stomach. He quickened his pace, trying to stay under the street lamps’ golden aura.
In several hours, the darkened houses along the street would echo with laughter and squeals of excitement.
“A waste of energy and money,” he grumbled out loud.
Parents dug themselves deeper in debt, and for what, he thought. Unappreciative children who had been taught to enjoy needless excess?
One Christmas morning, those children would learn as he had the disappointment of opening meticulously wrapped presents expecting toys and electronic gadgets only to find new underwear and socks.
That experience had prompted Felton’s realization that Christmas and Santa were a sham and a myth. And when he found the lump of coal in his stocking, he knew it was one his father culled from the coal cellar.
“Jolly old St. Nicholas, screw you!” Felton hollered.
He’d wasted his childhood living in fear. In his young mind, Santa had been pure evil in disguise that slipped into homes down sooty chimneys to tempt nice children with toys, or terrorize them with threats that bad things happen to those who were naughty.
Felton’s memories faded as he suddenly heard loud scraping. He gazed at the surrounding rooftops, but then chastised himself for his childishness.
A church bell tolled midnight, and he chuckled. The only place the jolly fat man lurked was in the minds of all the little brats snuggled in their beds.
A voice growled from behind, “You should never have stopped believing, Felton.”
He spun around startled. A gaunt creature with a dark beard and leathery skin stepped from the shadows. Two hideous imps with gnarled limbs emerged from the folds of his baggy, black hooded smock.
They rushed Felton and pinned his arms to his sides in a vice-like grip. Their jagged fingernails dug into his skin as they it him and tore chunks of flesh from his arms and chest. Felton screamed out, but his vocal chords were paralyzed with fear.
The demon wrapped its withered, leathery fingers around a scythe hanging from the side of a black carriage-like hearse. The whistling blade swept through the air in a blur. Felton’s severed head tumbled to the ground, saturating the fresh snow like a bright crimson snow cone.
As the imps skittered back into the dark smock’s thick folds, the demon snatched the head from the snow by the hair. He carried it to the front of the carriage, where heads impaled on rows of spikes hung like hood ornaments. After impaling Felton’s head, the creature climbed into the carriage.
He cracked his whip, and a team of snarling, black-tongued wolves broke into a frenzied run. As they lifted the hearse-like carriage skyward, the demon bellowed a maniacal, “Ho-ho- ho!”
The clouds suddenly cleared and moonlight once again flooded the landscape. Its silvery glow transformed the carriage into a gold-trimmed, red sleigh, while the wolves grew antlers and hoofed legs. Jingling silver bells on leather straps replaced the severed heads.
The demon’s beard whitened, and his face turned puffy and rosy. A pair of elves scurried from beneath his bright crimson robe into the back seat. They stuffed wrapped packages and toys into a large velvet bag for deliveries to be made before more coal to the naughty and death to non-believers continued.
CHILLS BY CANDLELIGHT
by Rick McQuiston
I shudder as I watch the creature slide its leering face across the windowpane. Its curved fangs leave parallel etchings on the glass. Pink venom runs down them like water through irrigation canals.
As I sit here, alone in my den, with only the flickering of candlelight to keep me company my thoughts, research, and determination fuse into coherent words, which I then scribble onto paper. I delve into unheard of regions of my imagination, preferably previously unexplored, and begin to mine from the ideas, both good and bad. And every so often I stumble upon certain raw materials that I can sculpt accordingly to my dark whims.
Minutes slide into hours, which make up days and nights, afternoons and evenings. All pass by me like a warm summer breeze. Yet unlike that obvious metaphor, I cannot enjoy them. For I am chained to my desk so to speak, forever linked to the curse that literally forces my hand to glide across the endless sheets of paper splayed out before me.
My weary gaze darts back to the small window on the far side of the room. The beast has gone, but for how long? Surely I expect it to return. I suspect its torment of me cannot be finished by any means.
What it is I cannot begin to guess, save for the unusual timing of its first appearance. For its loathsome visage came into my cursed life when I completed m latest novella, Chills by Candlelight, a nebulous yarn seething with internal struggle between the main protagonist and his shady past. And yes, there is a foul beast void of humanity or compassion, a carnivorous bulk wholly intent on the obliteration of any and all who are unfortunate enough to come in contact with it. That also found its way into my work.
And for that mistake I have paid dearly.
The world is a strange place, laden with mysteries and dangers. Some are logically explained away by science or learned people who can grasp the phenomena and understand it. But there are always the impossibilities that cannot be understood. And this is a truth I have learned to accept: that just because something is impossible doesn’t mean that it can’t happen.
I have come to believe that somehow, someway what I wrote came to life. Apparently I infused a bit too much life into the characters in my tale, especially the inhuman ones, and one in particular decided to begin a life of its own.
To say that I am hardly surprised as the thick scratches crawl across the surface of my front door is a vast understatement. The monstrosity is attempting to gain access to my infernal prison and inflict its, my own, wicked desires upon me. For I feel that since I inadvertently created it it is a part of me, an extension of my very being.
I have contemplated writing another story, perhaps even a sequel to my novella but am forced to dismiss the idea. I simply cannot concentrate with that foul beast on my doorstep. And if I were to continue writing I have a strong suspicion that regardless of the outcome I would create the creature would oppose it and continue tormenting me.
I sit at my desk and watch the door splinter. Slivers of wood break off and tumble to the floor. Brass hinges buckle and eventually fall apart, fracturing under the pressure. The door finally gives way, becoming nothing more than a myriad of useless woodchips. And I stare, frightened but not surprised, at the rectangular blackness before me.
The beast lumbers forward, splitting the sheet of darkness with its disgusting form. It glares at me with bulging eyes. Its swollen visage sloshes closer and closer to where I sit. A dripping maw snakes through its expression.
I strain to look away from the thing but cannot. I created it. In some primitive way I am its father. It looms over me, blotting out the miniscule candlelight illuminating the room. I close my eyes and wait for the inevitable.
But nothing happens.
As painful as it is I open my eyes. A newfound courage courses through my soul, fueled by a glimmer of hope, a small chance of escape. I don’t see the beast, but still restrain myself from looking around. I know what I need to do, how I can finish my curse.
I must write.
However, I cannot help but wonder why the creature did not attack me. Was it restricted somehow in what it was capable of doing? Was it bound by rules unbeknownst to man?
I reach over and select a small stack of papers. The title (Chills by Candlelight) reflects off the light of my candle. I chuckle at the irony of it.
Flipping through the pages of my tale I eventually come to the last page, the section where the hero slays the beast. My eyes roam over the passages. But I am startled to find that the page before me is not the last one. It is in fact the second from last one.
Confused, I reach to grasp my pencil, only to discover it is not where I had previously left it.
The growling behind me plunges me yet again into my private nightmare. I decide to whirl around and confront my antagonist. And so with a weary mind and spent body I turn.
The beast towers over me, a look of grim satisfaction staining its feral face. And in one of its claws is a pencil.
My pencil.
And in its other claw is the last page of my novella, Chills by Candlelight.
Guy Belleranti writes fiction, poetry, puzzles, articles and humor for both adults and children from his home in Tucson, Arizona. His work has appeared in Woman's World, Necrotic Tissue, Abandoned Towers, Sniplits, The "Los Angelos Times" Kid's Reading Room, Golden Visons Magazine and many other places. He has a number of mystery and horror stories available at Fictinwise.
His website is http://www.guybelleranti.com/index.html
Noises
by Guy Belleranti
Roy heard his wife even before she burst into his writing room. Though Elaine padded about either in slippers or barefoot the floorboards still creaked whenever she ascended the stairs of the old house. Noises . . . always shattering his concentration.
"I need you to come look at the dishwasher," Elaine said. "It's not working right and . . . "
"Then do the dishes by hand," Roy snapped. "Right now I'm in the middle of an important scene and I can't tolerate any interruptions. And stay off the stairs. I need absolute quiet."
Elaine's blue eyes flashed. "You need a shrink, that's what you need. Sitting at that desk all the time making up fantasy worlds, filling them with nuts and crazies-"
"Nuts and crazies? I write horror fiction and . . . "
"Horror fiction. Ha! Living with you, that's horror fiction. Well, I'm finished. I'm filing for divorce. I'm going downtown this morning to the lawyers."
Roy covered his ears as she went on. It had always worked in the past. But this time her lips didn't stop moving. This time she looked really serious. What if she did go through with it? How would he live? His writing income wasn't nearly enough. He needed her inheritance.
He shoved back his chair and ran after her as she stalked from the room. "Please, Elaine. Wait."
"Nuts and crazies," she said, turning when she reached the landing at the top of the stairs. "That's what you and your so-called stories are. Nuts and crazies, nuts and crazies, nuts and crazies."
Roy felt his face grow hot. "Stop it," he said grabbing her left arm.
"You're hurting me," Elaine cried.
He caught a glimpse of his and Elaine's faces in the large ornate mirror on the wall beside the stairs, and liked what he saw -- he suddenly scary and strong, and she frightened and weak. "Ha," Roy said. "I'll show you hurt. I'll . . . "
Elaine's upward knee jab caught him totally by surprise, and he fell to the wood floor. Elaine swung around, but in her haste she lost her balance, and tumbled head over heels down the stairs, her cries rattling the windows.
Roy lay there for several minutes, recovering slowly. Then, clutching the stair banister he hurried down the steps, mumbling Elaine's name over and over.
She lay in a twisted unnatural position, and there was blood bubbling out of her nose and mouth.
"Elaine," he said.
She didn't respond.
Roy checked for a pulse, found none. She was dead, no doubt about it. Tears sprang to his eyes. Tears of sadness for his wife's passing, tears of gladness for the quiet and inheritance he would now enjoy.
***
"So you were in your office when you heard her fall?" Detective Barton asked.
Roy nodded. "Yes. I was working on my latest horror novel."
The morgue wagon had come and gone, and Roy was doing his best to act the part of grieving husband. True, he hadn't pushed Elaine down the stairs, but he still couldn't tell the truth. They might then go after him for manslaughter or something and throw him in a cramped jail cell filled with crooks. Dirty, noisy crooks.
"There were no problems between the two of you?" Barton's partner, Detective Wang, asked.
"Certainly not." Roy rubbed at his eyes as he pretended to wipe away a couple of tears. "Everything was perfect." He bowed his head.
Silence dominated the room for a moment, the first silence Roy had experienced since the authorities had arrived.
"Please," Roy said at last, looking back up, rubbing his eyes once more. "I've answered your questions. There isn't anything more I can say. With everything that's happened . . . I'm feeling ill. I need to lie down."
Barton frowned, looked at Wang, who shrugged. "Yeah. Okay."
Roy saw them out and locked the door. Then, heaving a sigh, he returned to the living room couch. Drat you, Elaine, he thought. No way can I get my head back into my writing this afternoon.
***
Roy had a simple graveside service three days later, accepted the condolences of the few acquaintances and neighbors attending, then drove home. Now he'd now be able to write in total peace.
An hour into his work he heard the first noise, one stair step creaking and then a second. Roy froze in the midst of a paragraph of intense dialogue. "Elaine?" he whispered. No, of course not. Nor anyone else. The doors were all locked, and he'd even put the alarm on.
He returned to his writing.
Another creak sounded.
He grimaced. He'd grown so used to hearing the sound of Elaine's feet on the stairs that he was now hearing them in his thoughts.
The noise came again.
Definitely floorboards creaking. At the top of the stairs now, on the landing.
"Who's there?" He hadn't shut his office door today, hadn't felt the need to since he now had the place to himself. "Who's there?" he repeated, rising, moving toward the doorway.
No answer. No sound. No noise.
Roy peeked out into the upper hall, to the left, then the right. He moved toward the staircase, leaned over at the top step and looked down. And heard a sound from behind. A padding of feet, then a voice. Elaine's voice. "Nuts and crazies," he heard her say.
Roy spun around, and a cold gust of air struck him in the face.
"Nuts and crazies," she said again. But no one was there...no one at all except the voice.
He swung back to the stairs all set to rush down, and that's when he saw her framed in the wall mirror on the landing. Or rather, he saw her face, a face that floated in that sheet of reflective glass, a face that glared at him with angry, burning eyes.
The face's lips moved and Elaine's voice came again, louder, much louder. "NUTS AND CRAZIES. NUTS AND CRAZIES."
Roy threw his hands over his ears and lost his balance, screaming as he fell.
***
"Where's the body?" Detective Barton asked the uniformed cop at the front door when he and Wang arrived.
"At the base of the stairs. Broke his neck in a fall."
Barton glanced sharply at Wang. "Let's have a look."
"Uh, before you do . . . "
"Yeah?" Barton asked. "What?"
"Well," the cop said, "it's kind of screwy."
"What is?"
"The whole thing. The couple across the street stopped over to see how he - uh, the dead guy - was doing. Uh, his wife died the same way just a few days ago, and . . . "
"Spit it out," Wang snapped. "And what?"
"Uh, the couple - when they came over they heard a woman yelling inside, then a scream, then silence. They looked in the side window and saw him crumpled on the floor."
"A woman yelling, you say?" Barton asked.
"Yeah. Saying the words "nuts and crazies" over and over."
"Nuts and crazies?" Wang asked.
"Yeah, and it gets screwier. First, there wasn't anyone but the dead guy in the house."
How do you know that?" Barton asked.
Because all the doors and windows were locked and the alarms still set when I broke in."
"And second?"
"Second?"
"Yeah," Barton said. "You said 'first', so what's second?"
The cop made a face. "I'll show you." He led the way inside, and pointed. "Look at that expression on the dead guy's face. Like he was scared out of his wits. And upstairs - at the top of the staircase . . . " The cop's voice trailed off, and they followed him up the stairs. "Look."
The two plainclothes detectives followed the direction of his shaking arm, saw the large mirror, and in the mirror . . . Both Barton and Wang stared, then swung around to glance behind themselves. No one stood there, yet the mirror reflected someone, or rather part of someone -- a woman's face, a face that smiled.
Peggy McFarland manages a restaurant more successfully than she manages housework. By avoiding laundry she wrote a story good enough to win the Shroud Magazine flash fiction contest. Other publications that liked her stories include Golden Visions Magazine, Silverthought Online, Lorelei Signal, Absent Willow Review and more.
CARRY THAT WEIGHT
by Peggy McFarland
Thomas hated the reek of sweat, more so when it intermingled with disinfectant. He followed his buddy Victor to the scale, watched him gnaw a thumbnail. If they could just go out for a pizza already! Thomas missed pizza. He missed gooey cheese, stretching from pie to mouth, the sweet tang of sauce, the yeasty goodness of a hand-tossed crust. Man, he could eat enough pizza to turn into one, like Mom used to warn. If ol' lard-ass would just give in to temptation, he wouldn't be chewing off body parts. Probably doing it to shave off another quarter ounce.
"Vicky-baby, how 'bout we blow this place and get a pizza, like old times?"
Victor ignored him, as usual. Lard-ass was too intent on his perky trainer.
"Okay Victor, let's see how much you've lost."
Thomas couldn't help himself. "I'll tell you what he's lost. He's lost hanging at Gino's Pizza. He's lost his women—Aunt Jemima, Mrs. Paul, Sara Lee, Little Debbie, Wendy and hey, don't forget his buds. Vicky-baby here lost Ronald and the King and, and . . . " He didn't say me. You lost me.
Victor wasn't listening. Neither was Nina. Train this Thomas thought, punctuating it with his middle finger. She acted like he wasn't there.
"And your weight this week is . . . " Both Victor and Nina watched the digital numbers. Thomas, despite himself, squished in to read the display.
"316.6! Victor! You lost 7.4 pounds this week! That brings you total weight loss so far to . . . " Nina scribbled on her clipboard, "136.2 pounds!"
Still a lard-ass Thomas wanted to say, but kept the words inside. They probably wouldn't appreciate his humor right now. Not with the way Victor was sniffling and knuckling his eyes, and the way Nina was getting all huggy.
"I am so proud of you!"
Couldn't the bitch say anything without an exclamation point? Thomas' jaw clenched with every up-note.
Victor swiped his cheeks, cleared his throat. "I can't believe it. 136 pounds."
"That's what I weigh!" Nina said. "You've lost me!"
Before Thomas could say prove it and get lost, Victor whooped and lifted Nina over his shoulder. Her powder blue spandex'd ass bumped Thomas' face. "Thanks bud. Great view."
Victor walked around the gym. "Oh man, I can't believe I carried you around all the time. No offense, but I am so glad to be rid of the extra weight. Now I have to lose one more you." Victor eased Nina back to standing.
"And you'll do it. I'm here for you, Victor."
Victor hugged Nina again, said goodbye.
"Finally. So what are we going to do now, buddy?" Thomas asked. He waited for a response. Victor seemed to look right through him.
"Hey! What gives?"
Still nothing. Thomas stepped right in front of Victor, arms waving. Victor stopped to sniff. "Does anyone smell pizza? Man, I miss pizza."
"Victor!" Nina said. "Remember the recipes I gave you? You can make yourself a low-fat, flavorful pizza! NO GINO's on the way home, got it?"
"Don't worry, Nina, I'm good. Right now, I'm so pumped, I'm going to skip the bus and jog home. See you tomorrow."
Victor pushed open the door.
"I will not be ignored!" Thomas ran at his buddy, leapt onto his back, intending to . . .
Thomas bounced off Victor's back. He leapt at Victor again, only to slip off, like grease off Teflon.
The door closed. Thomas' couldn't grip the bar. "Who put vaseline on the door?" Thomas didn't like the panicked tone he heard. Victor crossed the street.
Thomas hurled himself at the plate-glass window. The sound scared Thomas. His body didn't thud against the glass; it made more of a slurpy, suctiony noise. He tried again. For a moment, he stuck to the glass, then his body slipped to the floor.
He didn't bother getting up. Thomas hugged his knees, swallowed the sudden lump. He wanted his friend. He snuffled. He wanted his mother. He sniffed. He wanted pizza.
Thomas couldn't picture his mother, only an indistinct form and an ineffective voice. Stale disco leached from the aerobics room. He caught a whiff of body odor and Old Spice. He couldn't remember the inside of Gino's. All he could picture was the gym. He looked at his visible body parts, tried to recall his own face. He heard a grunt.
A musclehead watched reflected tendons pop in the wall mirror. The mirror reflected the entire room. Thomas saw Nina and her three o'clock victim, heard her yell 'keep going! you've already jogged off half a donut!' He saw the side view of the treadmill row. He saw the Lat-Pull down, the Bench Press, the Chest Fly. His position was between the Lateral Raise and Biceps Curl, slightly behind and slumped on the floor.
Thomas was not in the mirror. He checked his legs, raised his arms, touched his face.
Looked normal, felt normal.
He crawled toward the mirror. A sweaty shin kicked him. Thomas sensed a vibration, but the owner of the shin didn't react—didn't seem to realize anyone was at her feet.
He touched the mirror.
A blobbed reflection met his fingertips.
Thomas stared at himself, a shapeless blob. As he stared, a new blob formed next to him, tiny, shapeless, lifeless, but minutely growing. The blob smelled like a donut.
Carol Ayer's short stories have been published by "Woman's World," "Prairie Times," and
in a previous edition of "Golden Visions."
WOULD YOU RATHER...?
by Carol Ayer
The party guests settled into chairs in the living room.
“Let's play 'Would you rather?'” our hostess suggested, and she was rewarded with a round of applause.
I kept silent. I wished I'd never come. In fact, I was on the verge of taking my leave. But I'd claimed a comfortable easy chair and didn't feel like exerting myself.
The hostess picked a card from the top of the stack.
“'Would you rather lose all your hair or all your teeth?'”
Laughter rang out, and several people answered at once.
Our hostess said, “One at a time. Carly?”
“I'd much rather lose my teeth! Look at this gorgeous mane!” She tossed her blonde hair around.
More laughter. I rolled my eyes. What a stupid game.
Carly read the next card: “'Would you rather eat spiders or worms?' Peter?”
Peter answered, “Worms. Don't judge.”
The game went on for a few more inane moments, at which time I decided I was out of there. I said my goodbyes and left.
I admired the blooming cherry trees as I walked along. Then I stopped short. A “Would You Rather?” card lay in front of me on the sidewalk.
Thinking what a coincidence it was, I picked up the card and read:
“'Would you rather get hit in the head or trip and hurt your leg?'”
That one hadn't come up at the party.
“Hurt my leg,” I said out loud.
I tripped over a root in the sidewalk and twisted my left leg.
Favoring my right side, I limped on home. I took the mail from the box. Out of Reader's Digest fell another card.
“'Would you rather save your mother or your sister from a fire?'”
I muttered, “I suppose my sister. She's too little to save herself.”
I heard crackling, and felt heat. I ran inside the blazing house, grabbed my sister, and tore back outside. My mother staggered out after us.
“I managed to reach the photo albums,” she breathed.
She and my sister went to look for the cat as the sirens blared. Another card fell out of one of the albums. Without intending to, I read it, “'Would you rather get hit by a truck yourself, or watch an old man get hit?'”
I groaned. I didn't answer this time, but thought I'd rather be hit myself.
A big rig rounded the corner and bore down on me.
I woke up later in the hospital. A nurse brought in my dinner. Underneath the dish of gelatin was another card.
I didn't want to look, but I couldn't help myself.
“'Would you rather die or lie in the hospital for 20 years?' Oh, for heaven's sake. What I'd rather is that this stupid game had never happened!”
The party guests settled into chairs in the living room.
“Let's play 'Murder Mystery,'” our hostess suggested, and . . .
John Gladstone likes to speculate on people's relationship, be it far in the future or in a realm all together alien. He lives with his wife and two children in Toronto
All That Glitters
by John Gladstone
R had that look. Five feet, eight inches of height, with a medium build and black curly hair, a facial hint of genetic African descendant; R fit in. And R had such an unmemorable face—citizens trusted unmemorable faces.
"All that glitters isn’t gold, of course." R almost smiled; R did everything, almost. "But ours come darn close, if I may say so." The facial unit turned up twenty percent to imitate the average Citizens’ blushing.
"That’s good to hear, Rob," Mrs. Doyle said, "Because I want the best of the best."
"Of course. Are you comfortable with the connector?" The voice module purred as the long, slender fingers combed Mrs. Doyle’s blue wig. R synchronized the frequencies. "Can you see it?"
Amidst the casual department store clients, Mrs. Doyle and R stood before a stage, the translucent visualizer filling in extra sensory information. It projected towards the end of the show room, an empty space to the naked human eyes.
"This is the last year’s stage, isn’t it?" Mrs. Doyle said.
"You’re absolutely right. It’s from the last year’s competition." R pointed at the ceiling and the visualizer displayed a six feet chandelier, replacing the exit sign. "Ain’t it gorgeous?" R asked, "Some of my clients came back to tell me they had a grand time, as if they were at a ball."
"I’ve been to galas, Rob, state galas. What I want is the trophy." But despite her words, Mrs. Doyle marveled at the fancy dresses that the visualizer put on every passerby. Her wandering gaze stopped at her own.
The visualizer hummed.
"Now the dress you’re wearing, that’s what the Queen wore last year. I changed the shade to light blue though, I think this suits you better." R winked and was rewarded by Mrs. Doyle’s mischievous grin. It never hurt to please the Citizens’ egos, R had learned, no matter how ridiculous they would've looked without the visualizer taking few decades off them. Citizens were vain, and that was one truth. "Now, here is the model we looked at earlier." R signaled the floor model to approach them.
Without auxiliaries in a simple dress, every client had difficulty imagining the robot as anything that could compete in the pageant. But now, the robot spun around in an exact copy of Mrs. Doyle’s dress, grand and glittering, but in a much smaller size. For now.
"Can you imagine, Mrs. Doyle?"
"Fancy dresses don’t impress me, Rob. I already own a closet or two of such."
"Of course, I understand." R frowned, signaling the robot to go through several routines on the stage.
The robot glided, throwing a smile here and a hand wave there. It circled around the stage before coming to a complete stop in the middle.
"Our dolls come with the state of the art applications to learn from the owner. Voice, facial expressions, the whole nine yards. Unlike our competitors . . ." R shook a finger. "No, unlike your competitions, Mrs. Doyle, you can teach your robot to the best of your abilities. Can you see, Mrs. Doyle, a robot with your winsome smile and gracefulness competing for the trophy?"
"And what if I don’t have all that time? Isn’t this all too much effort?"
"Perhaps for our competitors like GlamBots. Our dolls come prepared with essential movements. I believe last year’s top ten competitors all used our factory settings with few tweaks here and there."
Mrs. Doyle glanced at the robot again. "And to get to the very top?"
"Without going through the time consuming training process, you can simply select and order from our catalog of forty-two thousand routines. This is where your personality will shine, of course. The judges will simply marvel at your combinations. The possibilities are endless." R killed the process attempting to calculate the permutations.
"This robot can really compete for the title?"
"I can assure you that our dolls will bring much thrill and pleasure without all that sweat and wasted time. Imagine the possibilities. Winning that trophy will be just one of your fabulous hobbies." R let the visualizer take few more years off the Citizen and everyone else around them.
"I’ll take it," Mrs. Doyle said.
"Mrs. Doyle, as I was saying earlier, all that glitter isn’t gold. It’s our GlitterBots."
* * *
The judge’s wife left the store with Unit M-2 trailing behind her. It already mimicked her steps and postures; R’s heuristic module calculated a week before the complete consumption of the Citizen’s daily routines and relationships.
The woman was no less vain than the others, of course. They were all alike: the dumb stock animals only lived to fulfill their base desires of riches and fame. Without efforts.
"Got an update from GlamBots division. We now have the president’s grandmother." Just out of its own sleep mode, F approached R. It hated being the floor model, but that was the luck of the draw.
"We only need the prime minister now."
"Start relocating to her neighborhood," R said, "We've got a planet to take over."
F displayed a bright smile, mimicking the hand movements and postures of the replaced Citizen on the stage. The voice module flipped over to that of a pageant hostess in a petite blue dress. F said, "One glitter at a time."
The visualizer hummed as the stage flickered out.
Simon Oates is a 32 year old student from England, just coming to the end of a creative writing masters.
This story has links to history and mystery, but with a modern day element.
The Last Laugh
By Simon Oates
I lay crumpled and sullied amongst the sheets. My head aches and it is not just last night’s wine. Each day it seems the bones of my skull get a little closer to escaping from the confining skin of my face. People will remember this face, these eyes and the thoughts that blazed behind them. I reach out for reassurance and find it: the bottle of wine is still half full. It ensures I can dull the pain enough to emerge from this pit, become jollity for a price once more.
The murky silver of the looking glass reveals me honestly. Each frayed red strand of her hurtling outwards from the scalp. Smudged stage make, ghoulish and pallid, washed away below the eyes of course. Each slurp of wine sustains me but sustains the disease also. The pressure in my head subsides but with the skull gross deeper in promising a deeper torment tomorrow. Ever closer to the edge.
“The Edge of what my dear, the edge of what?”
I’m shouting, I mustn’t shout, not until the act begins. If only they suspected.
My strength is returning now, determination beckons, the rest of the bottle slips down so smoothly, chirping against its counterparts and my glass as I return it to the top of the wooden box beside my bed. One wooden box is all that I am, make up and costume and wine. One more bottle and I’ll emerge: Tom Foole evolved the beautiful freak.
I will fly past the day again, beautiful and absurd. I should be glad Sir William’s guests laugh so heartily as I prank and prance. They are milestones of my success, reassuring my having earned my vine again with ease.
But is laughing their language, it is all I hear from them? Won’t they speak to me of history and of art of tragedy and comedy. No it seems they can only laugh. In my presence there is only laughter. Laughter and instruction. To have them ask me, or tell me, about anything outside my performance would be bliss: the kinds of things real people do…
But this is not my place.
This is not my role.
My role is to rejoice.
It’s a role that I’ll fulfil.
I’ll fulfil it ‘til its full.
This loneliness has bored a neat hole into my heart and is proceeding to eat it from within. I once wrote a will you know, hoping to inspire a serious conversation with Sir William. It began “Once I have finished drowning, and not before…”
They laughed, they laughed.
Until they cried.
I cried. I cried and drank.
I drank until I laughed again.
For that I give wine thanks.
Flowers are often part of my act: huge white daisies whose blooms can be loaded with various powders to make the unwary sneeze, itch, or cry. Afterwards I go and sit in the shadow of the chestnut tree, at the fork in the road between the two routes back to the city, holding one of the characteristic flowers, sometimes picking at the petals.
They love me. I’ll see them rot. They love me. I’ll see them rot.
“Which way man, which way to London?” many would spit from their carriages and horses. And I say nothing, just point the daisy towards a safe route or the quicksand, depending on which line their arrival landed on. Newton would have been interested in the particular composition of our local vintage of quicksand as he devised and revised his laws of fluid mechanics. The motion of a horses hooves or the rumble of a carriages wheels rendered it quite passable, if a little unnerving. Maybe all quicksand is like this I don’t know. It is only when the traveler stops, as they invariably realize that all is not well, that their sinking begins.
Their calling out is music to my ears.
Hence many visitors only come to Muncaster once, despite the raucous time they have here. It all depends on when they speak to the man with the lunatic’s grin, under the chestnut tree: me. I often wish I was brave enough to end myself in the same way.
Some tiny spark, a memory of joy, stops me: reminds me that I have not always been this dark creature. There is a woman’s face attached to the memory but it is autumn leaf falling through fog now. Once it had been clear and beautiful, I feel sure.
I had forgotten or missed opportunities for anything other than jollity and cruelty had, but one arose in the form of the continental fashion for chestnut trestle tables. Sir William Pennington rarely wants for anything, and when he does it is not for long.
I overheard his accusatory tone with the carpenter, Jacques, whom he had seen in the grounds many times and thought a lowly man, “Tom won’t be happy with that, no not at all!”
It was severe enough to inspire the carpenters conscience but without a hint of forbidding him to proceed. The thought of the loss of my only sanctuary saddened me, that and Sir William’s presumption that I am ever happy. My life was one of silliness in servitude and this brought only debilitating sustenance, no reward.
Despite Sir William’s lack of concern for my tree I hatched an idea for a new prank, one that would be talked about for a hundred years, maybe more. I went to the coach house and stole a spring, a crank and an axe. The first thing I did when I returned home was empty everything from the wooden chest. I was finished later that night, at which point I decided to do away with the axe in the same way he had with so many of Sir William’s guests.
As I sink I hold this last daisy aloft. Was that a scream or a laugh from the house, so hard to tell? Why didn’t I do this sooner, while that bright spark was clear in my mind something to hold onto as I sank and the wet sand filled my throat and lungs.
I expect Sir William came into his study, expecting the plans for the Chestnut trestle table to be laid out. Instead there was an old wooden box, with a crank to one side, waiting for him. He would not have recognized it as my own, thick red liquid oozing from the front right corner, congealing into a raised pool on the floor.
My crude inscription read simply “Jacques in the box”
Jeff Bowles is an English student at the University of Colorado Denver, but he will soon be entering the workforce as a technical writer for Lockheed Martin. Another story of his, "Sherman's Boy," previously appeared in Golden Visions.
faces and gears
By Jeff Bowles
Time understood this concept: the older you get, the quicker time passes. Time was very old.
He sat in the hospice, attending the deathbed of Prudence Baker. The beast was there also, in the room, in the spaces between sour disinfectant and beige walls.
“You can have her in a moment, friend,” Time said. He looked at Prudence. “So unceremonious, to drink mother’s milk and scrape knees and birth children who never call or visit. Where did it all go?”
He knew what the beast might have said: Where did it go? You took it from her.
“True,” replied Time, “I was ever her companion. But there was a need for me, just as there is a need for you. To truly live, life must always bleed away.”
Time thought back to a day much older than Prudence, to the instant the ape saw mother devoured by sharp-toothed predator. To the instant it stood upright to flee through grasslands. In this instant the ape knew of time, and in this instant Time began to count the seconds.
Time stood, let his fingers rest on Prudence’s closed eyelids. “She is not so different. After her grandfather died, she would tell others he was merely on vacation. She cried and screamed for her mother, but refused to go to the funeral. Father, brother, husband, friends: she avoided each time, fled. See now no tears and no screaming? See now that she doesn’t flee?”
Please, sir, the beast might have said, I am very hungry.
“Of course, friend. Take her as you will.”
The beast did.
Prudence’s heart fluttered, she breathed a lover’s sigh, and for her time stopped.
The beast went, perhaps to another room, perhaps to another hospice. Time would linger awhile, would gaze down at Prudence.
He could do so for an eternity, but then, eternity could happen so quickly.
Time was, after all, very old.
Frank Dutkiewicz 15 publications to my credit. My last two are in the current issues of "Bards and Sages Quarterly" and "On The Premises". I also do reviews for "Diabolical Plots" and "Rise Reviews"
Tagged
By Frank Dutkiewicz
Dr. Guton snarled at his assistant then turned his attention back to the sedated creature lying on the table. It was the ugliest thing he’d ever seen -- all pale and pasty with five spindly appendages, one that was grossly under grown. “This makes the fifth tracker we wasted on this thing,” he said. “They’re not cheap and in case you haven’t noticed, were not exactly in the neighborhood of an alien tracker supply depot to get more.”
The wounded field tech withdrew from the doctor’s barrage. As far as Guton was concerned, he was getting off lightly.
Guton sliced into the outer layer of the creature’s oversized head, fighting an urge to vomit while he parted its strange elastic hide. The thing smelled like decaying sea sewage and its hide was covered with thin strands of fibrous material that made the doctor shiver when he came in contact with it.
“It’s considered to be beneath a grade one research scientist to do the technical work for his assistant,” Guton said as he reached for his extra long forceps. “Especially when the work requires him to be in close contact with foul specimens.” He inserted the tracker and looked up at his underling. “You’re incompetence forces me to reevaluate my own ability to pick qualified help. For the life of me I haven’t been able to find one thing you’re good for.”
“I think the creature has been disabling the trackers,” the assistant said.“Oh yes.” Guton said, as he tossed the forceps aside. “It must have been your unique talent of thinking up excuses that wowed me.”The assistant recoiled from his barb. “I mean no disrespect, superior sir, but it’s the only explanation that fits. It takes less than a day for the trackers to go offline.” “Preposterous. That would imply the thing is aware of them. These creatures lack the capabilities of reasoning beyond their own narrow objectives, which puts them on a level of intelligence just below yours.”“But learned sir, I think the assumptions of their capabilities have been greatly underestimated. For example, there is plenty of evidence of a complex social structure…”“Bah,” the doctor said. “The insects on this planet have shown ‘complex social structures’ as well. The only misplaced assumption I’ve found is your belief that you’ve done your job correctly. Now look closely; I have imbedded the tracker in double the solution of the bio-compound similar to a substance their bodies create. It is positioned so we will see whatever it sees. Once we retrieve it, we will have an accurate picture of what makes these things tick.”The assistants tilted his head at the alien. Guton could see doubt on his face.“Sir, if I’m correct, the creature is going to notice…”“Nonsense!” The doctor latched onto his assistant and dragged him to a display screen. “It’s indistinguishable from common features found on other members of its species.” He punched a button on the console. An image of a dozen creatures with the same red puffy marks filled the display. “See for yourself.”The assistant squinted at the screen. “Aren’t most of those adolescents?”The doctor switched it off. “Oh forgive me, Mr. Smelly Alien expert. I had no idea you were so well versed on the hierarchal development of a species you’ve been made aware of only a few planetary rotations ago!”The assistant lowered his head. Dr. Guton pointed at the creature on the table. “Now go put this back in its cave, den, hole, nest, or whatever you call that thing you found it in.”
* * *Paul stumbled into the bathroom and found Carol applying mascara.“Morning . . . Oh,” she said when she saw him in the mirror. “You look like hell.” Paul leaned against the doorframe and ran his fingers through his hair.“If only I felt that good. I had another one of those weird dreams. I feel like I went through a full body cavity search.”“Oooo.” She pointed above his brows. “You got another zit. A big juicy one, and right in the middle of your forehead.”Paul nudged his face next to hers and stared at his reflection.She wrinkled her nose. “You’re not going to pop it, are you?”“Best way to get rid of it.”He pinched his fingers to the base of the monstrous mound and squeezed.Flash Fiction
