Welcome back to the home of Weird, Wild, & Wicked Tales. Today is Thursday and that means it’s time to start flashing. We’re at the beginning of our ninth year of weekly prompts. It’s amazing we’ve gone this long! This is Week 436 of #ThursThreads, the challenge that ties tales together. Want to keep up each week? Check out the #ThursThreads #flashfiction group on Facebook and the Group on MeWe.
Need the rules? Read on.
Here’s how it works:
- The prompt is a line from the previous week’s winning tale.
- The prompt can appear ANYWHERE in your story and is included in your word count.
- The prompt must be used as is. It can be split, but no intervening words can be inserted or tenses changed.
Rules to the Game:
- This is a Flash Fiction challenge, which means your story must be a minimum of 100 words, maximum of 250.
- The story must be new writing, not a snippet from something published elsewhere with the prompt added.
- Incorporate the prompt anywhere into your story (included in your word count).
- Post your story in the comments section of this post
- Include your word count in the post (or be excluded from judging)
- Include your Twitter handle or email in the post (so we don’t have to look for you)
- The challenge is open 7 AM to 8 PM Mountain Time
- The winner will be announced on Friday, depending on how early the judge gets up.
How it benefits you:
- You get a nifty cool badge to display on your blog or site (because we’re all about promotion – you know you are!)
- You get instant recognition of your writing prowess on this blog!
- Your writing colleagues shall announce and proclaim your greatness on Facebook, Twitter, MeWe, and Google Plus, etc.
Our Judge for Week 436:
Medical assistant fueled by caffeine who loves getting lost in world of a book, Rose Sogioka.
And now your #ThursThreads Challenge, tying tales together.
The Prompt:
“You need to do something soon.”
All stories written herein are the property (both intellectual and physical) of the authors. Comments do not represent the views of the host and the host reserves the right to remove any content. Now, away with you, Flash Fiction Fanatics, and show us your #ThursThreads. Good luck!
“You need to do something soon, Sam.” Talon had been more emphatic about it than usual as she had prepared poultices for the infirmary. I had no idea what all of them were for, but given most bikers weren’t the most careful of people, she never seemed to have enough. “Something’s coming and you’ll want your relationship solid before it hits.”
“What’s the big hurry, Talon?” I’d rubbed the back of my neck and glanced out at the torrential April rains. “Jeff and I have been taking it slow. You know I don’t rush into anything.”
“There’s slow and then there’s glacial. You, my dear friend, are in that category trending toward geological. You know us humans don’t live that long.”
I’d snorted and shook my head at her. “Don’t hand me that. You’re what, three centuries old?”
She’d given me a flat look. “Nevertheless, Jeff isn’t going to wait three centuries for you to make your official move. Get to it, little tiriganiarjuk.” Tiriganiarjuk meant fox in her first language, and the endearment struck my heart every time.
So I’d taken myself out into the wilds of the hills above the Concrete Angels compound to plan my moves. Foxes don’t take a dump, son, without a plan.
I snorted. The old movie line managed to bring a smile to my canine face as I skirted Flint and Rochelle’s home. While the gargoyle and his witch mate didn’t mind my traipsing across their space, I tried to give them privacy.
250 ineligible #ConcreteAngelsMC words
@SiobhanMuir
The two men sat at a corner table. One stared into his beer, his expression morose.
“You need to do something soon.”
Jack Riggs gave his oldest friend in the world the fish eye. “Because I’m older’n dirt? Don’t be remindin’ me, Pops.”
“Hell, son, we’re both older’n dirt but look at me.” Newly married, David “Pops” West was puffed up like a male peacock about it. “Havin’ Elena in my life has taken years off.”
“Justice ain’t Elena. And she’s not interested.” The lie burned. Pops was his best friend but Jack had secrets—like the fact he was a Wolf and Wolves mated for life, just like their wild cousins. Wolves carried a mutated gene that gifted them with the ability to shift into their animal half. His wolf had taken one sniff of Justice McAlester and demanded right there in the middle of a tornado that Jack claim her for their own.
Pops snorted, the sound both derisive and filled with humor. “Not interested? Jack, you aren’t paying attention. That woman has the prettiest blush in Bandera County and she pinkens whenever you’re around.”
Oh, he paid attention, all right. With every preternatural sense at his command. Justice wasn’t only interested, she was…nope, He pushed the thought away as his wolf swiped at his insides. He was too old and set in his ways to be claiming a pretty young thing like her.
“Nobody like an old fool,” Pops declared.
There was truth in those words.
****
250 current WIP with a deadline words so yay!
@SilverJames_
Death Rattle-trapeze
I left Phyllis a large tip. Two bucks and an admonishment to never trust men, especially Dicks. That almost got a smile out of her world-weary thrice married mug.
Her personal remembrance of Irv Finecastle’s sexual expeditions told me more than I would ever want to know about the randy Realtor. Irv was a player, the type to keep rotating on his selfish turntable until somebody, a woman, an electrician or, maybe, a female electrician, finally unplugged his cord.
Irv’s vibrating predilections were of no particular interest to me. Unless it involved murder. Irv struck me as more a love ‘em and keep them hanging around type of lothario. Murder would just get in the way of petite amour triangles.
Still, there was that demanding little dick voice in my head saying, ‘you need to do something soon, son. One murder frequently leads to two.’
Meanwhile, Irv’s combination secretary/offspring Gladys, might have an interesting take on her daddy.
I strolled across the street, knocked, peeked in, asked if she had a minute.
“Whatever,” she said. “Just wear a mask.”
I donned my cloth hanky and entered.
“Irv’s not here. He just left. Did you upset him?”
“My lot in life,” I confessed. “So, what’s it like working for your daddy?”
She batted her green eyes, smiled, said, “Do I look like I need a daddy?”
“Not the question I asked,” I said.
“It’s the only one I’m gonna answer. Anything else?”
Her freeze-glare was chilling.
I was SOL.
250 WIP
@billmelaterplea
Felix sank to the bottom of the tank. The water grew still. His brother put his face up against the glass, enjoying the show.
“It’s two minutes now,” he said. “Very nearly two fifteen. What was the best time he’s done so far?”
“Just under three and a half. But that was with an air tank. You can go longer when you know you’ve a fall-back.” Alice picked up the heavy hammer, looking bored.
The man in the tank began to struggle, his chains weighing him down. The padlock he was pulling at was being stubborn, refusing to come free.
“Three minutes…and counting.” Frank yawned, the second hand on his watch lurching round. “If you’re going to make it out without our assistance, Bro, you need to do something soon.”
“Did he tell you about his mistress? His bit on the side? She’s half my age, would you believe?” Alice studied the face of her brother-in-law, rolling her eyes. “He obviously didn’t think I’d find out, that’s for sure.”
“No. Felix is a closed book. He always has been. That’s why he loves being a magician; he’s never happier than when he knows something that other people don’t.”
Alice nodded, looking grave. She put the hammer down. It was too late to use it now anyway. She pirouetted on the spot in her stage costume and gave a deep bow.
“He didn’t know about the superglue I put in the lock mechanism, did he now? Now, isn’t that a shame?”
250 words ~ twothirdsrasta.blogspot.com
Tom Alvarez‘s presidential campaign was gaining momentum and it was my job to stop him.
“You’re the best political operative we have, Dani,” Jake said over the phone, after the DNC hired him, and he turned to me to dig up any dirt on the candidate.
Jake was my ex. If you call a one-night stand a relationship—even when a pregnancy and baby daughter are the result of said one-night stand.
“Jake, I got his file from my contact at the State Department and it’s not looking good for Congressman Alvarez. They suspect his wife of being a foreign operative.” I hung up the telephone and emailed the key elements of the file to him, and waited for a reply.
It didn’t take long.
You need to do something soon. Jake texted me after he’d read the email.
What the hell does that mean? I texted back.
It wasn’t my job to plant stories in the press or on the internet. Did he expect me to confront the candidate and blackmail him into quitting the race?
Jake’s terse reply came from a secure server.
The convention is in two days. Move fast.
I was used to this work. Digging up the dirt on a candidate. But was I doing it for the sake of the country, as I believed? Or was I merely a pawn of the leaders of the political party that hired me?
I thought about it. And I thought about my daughter.
And I made my decision.
Catherine Ducourau
@cathducourau
250 Words
You Need to do Something Soon, by Joseph P. Garland, @JPGarlandAuthor, 249 words.
“You need to do something soon.”
Their eyes met in the mirror.
“Didn’t you hear me? You need to do something soon.”
He lifted his glass, ice peaking through the Scotch’s surface.
“I know, okay? You’re my sister, not my mother. You don’t need to remind me.”
He took a sip.
“Apparently I do.”
He put the glass down, harder than he thought, and the bang startled her.
“Okay,” he said as he slid from his stool. “Let’s go.”
“You okay to drive?”
“You’d better.”
He was half-glad, half-not when his sister pulled into the driveway.
“Look like she’s still here.”
“I can see that.”
She turned the ignition off.
“Look. This is not my battle. Not my life. You fucked it up and you know it. She said she was leaving because she wanted you to stop her. To convince her to stay. To give you another chance.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“Peter. You’re my brother. An idiot. But still my brother. You’re her husband. You. Are. Still. Her. Husband.”
They saw a silhouette in the bedroom window, drawn by the car lights, knowing whose car it was. It disappeared.
A cab pulled up in front of the house.
“Tell her you’re sorry. Tell her you love her. That’s what you have to say. And you need to say it soon.”
Peter undid his seatbelt. His key was out when he reached the door. His wife opened it for him, suitcase beside her. And she waited.
I’d passed all the test. A week of tests and now they’d let me go home and see my boy. I missed my wife and my children. You need to do something soon I told myself; jobs I’d done for the government in my lifetime had taken me away from them. No more time away life was too short for the family time I’d missed I only hoped that my family would appreciate the sacrifice I was making for them.
I scanned the crowd awaiting me. Then I saw him My boy he’d grown up looking a lot like me.
“Dad?”
“Nicky. So glad to see you.”
“It’s been along time dad . I go by Nick now.”
“Sorry, “ I craned my head and looked around.
“Penny?” I asked the air.
“Mom’s long gone.”
“It wasn’t my fault but some kind of temporal distortion. One minute I was flying to Alaska the next minute I landed here … forty years later.”
“Mom’s long gone.”
“I’m sorry, Jonas. How?”
“Breast cancer. It took her last year.”
“Where is Emily?”
“Who?”
“Your sister.”
“I’ve never had a sister.”
I headed for my plane I conned someone into fuelling it and then got in the cockpit flying back into the coordinates I’d come through I flew back. Crossing my fingers, I landed in the airfield I’d taken off from. I saw my family waited there for me; I was back in my own time and space and I was never leaving again.
@SweetSheil
250 words
“As a fellow life sucking creature of the night, allow me to welcome you aboard The Pajamas.”
The raven haired shirtless shantyman dipped his torso in a rough approximation of a courtly bow. As the sailor straightened, Bartal Boros admired the enticing moonlit relief of his sculpted abdomen.
“Thank you.”
The well-dressed gentleman inclined his head to his underdressed acquaintance. Just when Bartal had become accustomed to his new circumstances, they changed again. He turned to evaluate the three masted ship sailing them through the night. So far, waking up at sea was less distressing than waking up under six feet of earth. Bartal’s companion wove his fingers back through his gorgeous locks to clasp his hands sensually behind his head.
“You seem distracted. Is there anything you need to do?”
“Something. Soon.” Bartal nodded, judging the distance to the island on the horizon. “I must feed.”
“Huh,” the shantyman turned to the horizon next to Bartal. “I thought that’s what the half elf was for.”
“It is better if I do not feed on him too frequently. He needs his blood too.”
“I’d offer you some of mine, but I have no idea what it’d do to you. You could always ask the wind caller to heal your man.”
Bartal shook his head.
“Miracles ruin the flavor. I shall go ashore.”
“Happy hunting.”
Bartal’s incubus shipmate winked, as the vampire drew on the darkness of the night to twist his form into that of red furred bat.
248 Cat’s The Pajamas words
@DavidALudwig
#ThursThreads Week 436 is now CLOSED. Thanks to everyone who wrote this week and I hope to catch you next week. 🙂