JUST: Nightmares From An Unbleached Soul, AtoZ Blog Challenge

NIGHTMARES FROM AN UNBLEACHED SOUL

JUST

A hundred thousand mirrors broke
The Saturday afternoon as I arrived
You'd think that would be enough
Just to seal a fate, competely out of luck
But you'd be wrong
Oh man, you'd be wrong.

I've got one more in front of me
Just waiting to splinter and crack
I'm afraid to turn my eyes away
Looking for a claw to drag me through
You say look away, it'll be okay
Oh man, you'd be wrong. 

Just one more thing on a fiery heap
The mirror held in front, don't you see,
Sees the anguish I've held onto ceaselessly
Damn! Now it's started to crack
You've got platitudes that you think will help
But you'd be wrong, yeah, Oh so wrong.    

The weight alone of that one more thing
Just smashes the mirror into hundreds of me
We wear the same old far away stare
You look at me and your worry is deep
So the platitudes lay dead at my feet
That is wrong, oh man, that is wrong

Just to seal a fate, completely out of luck
Just waiting to splinter and crack
Just one more thing on a fiery heap
Just smashes the mirror into hundreds of me

Just smash the mirror into hundreds of me
Just smashes the mirror
Just smash
Smash.

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Sorry for the delay; needed to go tech free for the day. I needed the stress free environment of my place.

This is Saturday’s posting for April 11, 2020. I’ll work on K later and set the schedule to release K after Midnight (EST).

Stay healthy. Find happiness. Live.

A Dominie Dismissed (#FF Prompt)

Sitting atop of the drystone wall, one that followed the rise of the uplands, gave the Dominie a perfect view. The morning air had been clear but crisp, making the Mackintosh a necessity. The land beyond was wild and open, the sparseness of humanity and its dwellings is what drew him in, accepting the job without a second’s thought.

Until he had been dismissed.

Unfairly, in his mind.  The village was small, unto itself, but the one-room schoolhouse was full of children. All the neighboring small villages and farms, nestled in their own little valleys, didn’t have enough to justify separate schools with a separate teacher, each demanding their own pay. They pulled their resources and congregated their children in the small building. It had lasted many generations.

After he signed the contract and arrived, he placed his one bag in the back of the building that would serve as his bedroom. Meals would be provided on a rotating basis, provided by parents of the children who would be attending. He never got a satisfactory answer why the old schoolmaster left and the position opened up. They were, one and all, a closed mouth bunch, and only at the monthly council meetings was there any real discussion about the state of things.

He had some issues and resolved to bring them up at the next meeting. Walking the land near the school, one of the things that bothered him was the rushing stream that wended very close to the building itself. Clumps of trees created, as he saw it, hiding places; he knew children well enough.

So, on the second month of his stay, he brought up the problems with the stream. During their lunch breaks, the children scurried off to home for meals. Upon returning, though, many came back with their trousers or hems of their skirts, and shoes, sodden through and through. The whispers and laughter of the students spoke of how this one or that “slipped” into the stream. Some few returned with their entirety drenched.

He was afraid that, with the speed of the water, the slippery rocks, the tomfoolery of some of the students, that it was only a matter of time until someone got seriously hurt. He suggested fencing in the school, high enough so the students couldn’t climb over. This was outright laughed at and dismissed; the opinion being it would mar the landscape. He then added: “Well, what about fencing around the perimeter of the stream?  It could be made to blend in with the flora of the land.”

Explaining what flora was did nothing to dissuade the council. The most galling comment made sent his temper ablaze: “We’ve always had it this way, without any incident. There’s no reason to change what has always been and worked.” He held his tongue to this, but the fire that bloomed on his cheeks told them all what he thought.

Weeks passed, and word had gotten to the children what their headmaster had asked for. Things escalated from there, more and more students came in sopping wet. On top of that, clothing was starting to get damaged, torn and ragged. The parents were starting to complain, and, of course, the blame was being placed on their Dominie.

The gossiping got brutal. Meals were becoming hard to come by, if at all. He had stored away some food, but nothing that would keep him fully fed and healthy. The looks he got when he walked the village or entered the pub, got to be too much for him. He spent more and more time in his room at the schoolhouse.

This would have gone on for a long time if the death had not happened.

One of the students, William, did not return from lunch. All the others were very quiet when they returned, heads down, no joking around, no whispers. Many were wet, as usual by this point, but there was so much more mud spread around.

Worried, he started asking them about William. No answers were forthcoming. His anger built from their silence, he verbally lashed out at them, causing many of the girls to start crying, and a few of the boys as well. Ordering them to wait in the schoolhouse, he dashed off to the stream.

It didn’t take long to find William’s body. He was face down in the stream, the water rushing past him. His pants were caught on a tree root that had broken through the soil; otherwise, his body would have been washed away. Wading in, he picked up William and brought past the copse by the stream.  He placed him on the ground, surrounded by the many fallen branches that the students obviously broke off and played with. Looking up, he saw that he children had disobeyed him again and were standing outside, watching.

Turning the body over, he let out a gasp that was loud enough to frighten many of the children. William’s head was bloodied. He assumed his head fell on one of the rocks, but any evidence of that was washed away.

He sent one of the older boys to fetch William’s parents, and another to the pub to find members of the village council. Time seemed to stand still while they waited, but once the villages-all of them- showed up, everything was chaos.

The children finally started to talk. They blamed their headmaster that he had ranted about the stream, their coming in wet all the time, on and on. One boy said the headmaster pulled William out for giving him lip and brought him to the stream. Almost all the children began to agree with this story.

No matter what he said, the villagers turn on him. Rocks and fists were thrown, people screamed and, wailing, began to beat him bloody. They finally let him be.  The head of the council stopped them before they killed him. He bent down, looked into the headmasters swollen eyes, and spat in them. He was told he was dismissed, to leave the village immediately, otherwise…

Once he was able to stand, partially, he went and gathered up the few belongings he had. He left, not looking behind, but…

Not going all that far.

A few weeks passed as he nursed himself, deep in the woods, where it was unlikely anyone would venture. He ate what he could capture, drank from an offshoot of the stream, and got stronger. During this time, his body was healing, but his mind…not so much. His anger grew to a bonfire blaze.

When he was able to, he began damming up the stream. He moved medium sized rocks into position until he was strong enough to roll larger ones in place. The water stopped rushing down its run, pooling over onto the sides.

Creeping back, he made sure he wasn’t seen. He watched the children all march into the schoolhouse. Behind them: the head of the council. They had not had time to find another to take his place, and that made him smile.

In his pack, he had his kit. In that, were the tools he needed. He had been gathering thistle when he wasn’t building the dam. Once the schoolhouse doors were closed, he made his way, making sure he stayed out of view of the windows.

Placing the thistle in bunches around the perimeter of the building came first. He went back to drag over a thick branch near where he had laid William’s body.  This, he shoved through the door handles.

With that done, he scurried around, lighting the thistle as fast as he could. Once all were ablaze, he ran out of the area, up the rise, and settled down a top of the drystone wall. It gave him a perfect view. He watched the building burn, heard the screams, saw villagers swarm the area, heading to the stream for water that was not there, and watched many collapse on the ground, crying, wailing, beating their chests, suffering.

He spat on the ground before him, got up, and walked away.

No one dismisses a Dominie.

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Debs Carey was one of the people I interacted a lot with during this past AtoZ Blog Challenge in April. She and her writing partner, David, have been inspirational and friendly above and beyond the norm. They asked me to be on the lookout for the Sunday prompt on Fiction Can Be Fun, which is where their story of espionage and magic intertwined and I got captured in reading. Check it out.

The prompt was: pick a new release of an old (out of copyright) book at Project Gutenberg. Then head over to the Recent Books section. Pick one that you like the look of. The title of your chosen book forms the title and prompt for your story.

If you click on the link about at Fiction Can Be Fun, you’ll find others who have joined in on this prompt fest. Give them a try. I know I will.

Oh, and the other thing was, we were supposed to keep it at around 500 words(ish). Um…my ish is pretty big. Sorry Debs, but…no one dismisses a Dominie.

Gables Conceal (A to Z Blog Challenge)

**Please read Delicate Decisions and Easy Pickings and Frayed Knot before reading this chapter

**To start from the beginning, go to From the Case Files of Inspector Khazarian Rovas

“Gables Conceal”

The Case Files of Inspector Khazarian Rovas

Darkness does not have to wait for the sun to set. There are too many examples of atrocities we, humans, have done and continue to do unto others. Something beautiful can mask wickedness. It does not have to be outwardly frightening to house evil.

Judge Ackerman had owed Inspector Rovas a large favor. A case involving some questionable people, drugs, and his daughter seemed to leave his daughter unmentioned went put into the data base. Rovas knew he was bending the rules: breaking rules, more like it. But, the girl was on the outside looking in. She just got caught with her head through the window. She’s remained scandal  clean since then.

Feeling uncomfortable, the judge was reluctant to issue a warrant to search the house and property of John Peters. Speaking to Gil, but Rovas knew it was directed to him: “You know these photos will not be admissible if this goes to trial. We don’t know if those children were or were not the Palmont children. You have suspicions, most likely accurate, but there is no physical proof.”

Berrak had been fuming already, wishing they had charged in to get the children earlier. Rovas took a firm stance against that, and Gil halfheartedly agreed. Now, in front of a waffling judge, she was ready to scream. Rovas felt this and tried to cut it off, for their sake. He knew the judge would react like this.  They had no other legal choice, even if the true legality was on the razor’s edge. He did not want to go to any length that could potentially set free Peters, if he was as guilty as Rovas believed.

“The boy and girl appear to be the right age for the middle and youngest Palmont child. There are similarities in their hair coloring and contours of their faces, adding in these five years since they were last photographed. I believe that these are those children, and that…man, are the ones we’ve sought. There is no record of either child in any form. They are not registered in any of the local schools under the name Peters. None that fit their descriptors. This is not pure conjecture.” Rovas leaned forward in his chair towards the judge. “If we don’t find a reason to get into that house, I can’t see how we will find anything out-right or wrong.”

Berrak spoke up, having calmed down enough, for her. “Judge Ackerman, I am not one for breaking the law, but if this man is the one who took the Palmont children, and these are at least two of them, we owe it to them and their parents to rescue them and return them home.” Pausing, looking to see if the Judge was leaning towards their arguments-he wasn’t-she gave them all a way to end this quagmire. “I did forget to mention to you, and I see Khazarian and the good Sargent Detective Katsaros forgot as well,” chagrined looks from the two compelled her to continue, “…that while we were strolling along that day we heard some awful noise from the vicinity of that house. The Sargent Detective told us to stay on the sidewalk while he investigated. No one came to the door when he called out, so he went around to the back of the property where he again heard that noise. Again, no one answered his knocks. I’m surprised the neighbors have not complained about that noise, if it’s repeated frequently.”

“Mrs. Rovas…

“Berrak, please.”

“Hmph…Berrak, what, in your estimate, made this horrible ruckus?”

“Well, it sounded like children being very, very upset. More scared, really.”

Berrak had been fuming already, wishing they had charged in to get the children yesterday. Rovas took a firm stance against that, and Gil halfheartedly agreed. They knew.

“Hmph…extreme noise.” He shook his head. “Children not attending school.  Potential child endangerment.” The judge finished and signed the warrant. “Here. Sargent Detective?”

“Sir.”

“By the book, Gil. By. The. Book. If this is what you think it is, I want no mistakes.”

Rovas and Gil both said “Neither do we” at the same time. Berrak gave a half smile.

“Let’s get to it, then,” she said.

***********

John Peters was reluctant to let them in, even after Gil presented him with the search warrant. He introduced the Rovas’ as consultants to the police. It was Rovas belief that no one would question anything like that, after all the police procedural shows on television. He was right. Peters didn’t even seem to blink an eye at them. He was more fixated on the Sargent Detective. Gil and Rovas led the way into the house. Berrak fell in behind Peters, observing every detail of the man as she could.

“He is certainly tall and blond,” she thought.” Standing in the front room, while Gil and Rovas took in the details of the room,  she took in the details of his features. She noticed his large forehead, deep set eyes, hawk nose, and thin mouth. A chin that was barely noticeable. A few drops of sweat beaded his brow. As Gil questioned Peters about the house and it’s contents, she noticed that Peters put his hands behind his back. Moving slightly, she saw that Peters was clenching his hands. Very tightly.

They explored the front room, the hall closet, and then went down to the basement. With nothing out of the ordinary, they ignored Peters attempts to get them to leave, that there was nothing they would find, that he would call a lawyer. Gil pointed at the warrant each time. “Take it up with the judge,” he said, hoping he was throwing said judge under a bus.

From the basement, the next space they went to, with some overt reluctance from Peters, was the kitchen in the back of the house. The three of them stopped just past the doorway and stared. Rovas walked over to the back door, leading out to the back yard. Berrak, as with the rest of the search, stayed back by the kitchen entrance. All three looked up at the rope, hanging from what looked like a library rolling ladder rack that extended around the entire room.

“What do you make of this, Mr. Peters?” Rovas asked. “What could this possibly be for, in a kitchen, of all places. You are certainly tall enough to reach the top of the cabinets. And this,” he pointed towards the rope, “has very little to do with reaching any heights outside of a gymnasium.”

Gil had gone to knee and was examining the rope coiled around the floor. “Inspector,” he said, wincing at the mistake. “Mr. Rovas, there appears to be droplets along the tail end of this rope, knots and all. Dark, dry.” Gil rose. “This looks like old blood, Mr. Peters. Care to explain all this?”

Before Berrak could react, Peters spun and tried to get by her, getting tangled instead. His right arm wrapped around her neck, cutting off some of her air flow.

“You. Will. NOT. Hurt. My. Wife!” Rovas was livid.

“I’m leaving. Now. She will get hurt if you come after us.”

In the time the two spoke, Berrak shook off the shock of the attack. She brought her low right heel down on Peters’ foot as hard as she could. His arm loosened enough for her to squat down and elbow him in the groin, and then move away. Rovas pounced. By the time Gil was able to put him in cuffs, Peters face was more than a bit bloodied.

Gil called for a wagon to pick him up, dancing around anything non-legitimate. Rovas and Berrak continued their search to the second floor. They noticed the four doors. Three led to bedrooms. Inside the third they found the boy, tied tightly to the bed in the room. The knots were expertly done and it took Berrak quite a bit to undo them. Rovas, meanwhile, had called down to Gil to get an ambulance as well.

The boy would not answer any questions. He just kept staring out of the window.

Softly, Berrak said: “Gerald. I think your name is Gerald. You have two sisters, Janice and April. We think April is here. Where are your sisters?” His eyes quickly went to the door of the room, then back to the window. His face betrayed nothing.

“Zarian, I think…”

“Up to the attic,” he finished.

With the boy in hand, they went to the last door. It led, as he thought, to the attic. As they climbed up, the boy began to squirm and make small noises. They had turned on the light switch at the bottom of the steps,. Berrak had wished they hadn’t when she reached the landing.

The same tracks-two sets-ran along the attic room, supported by the beams. Instead of rope, here were metal chains. At the base of the chains, wound around them and padlocked, were two girls, naked. Both were filthy and undernourished. Both looked up at them, but there was little response. Neither tried to cover themselves.

“Are you Janice?” Rovas asked of the oldest looking girl. She stared at him, fear exuding from her.

“Janice. April.” cried Berrak.

The younger girl looked at her, nodded, and started to cry.

As Rovas went to find down to the bedroom to get something to cover the girls, he called the Sargent Detective as he headed back upstairs with some sheets.  “Gil. We found all three children. Alive, yes. We will need more ambulances…and a bolt cutter.”

He clicked the phone off. Berrak was holding Gerald’s hand-Rovas was positive this was Gerald Palmont, that the girls were Janice and April.  He placed  the sheets around the girls, as Berrak silently cried.

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“The Case Files of Inspector Khazarian Rovas” is my theme for this year. Cold case files for the good inspector to delve into, trying to make sense &/or solve. My plan is to use a variety of genres within this overarching theme to allow me to play and, of course, challenge myself. Some cases might bleed into another case. Most will be stand alone. We’ll see, won’t we?

As to the Blogging from A to Z challenge, I’ll let the words of Arlee Bird (founder of said challenge) tell you what this is all about:

The brainchild of Arlee Bird, at Tossing it Out, the A to Z Challenge is posting every day in April except Sundays (we get those off for good behavior.) And since there are 26 days, that matches the 26 letters of the alphabet. On April 1, blog about something that begins with the letter “A.” April 2 is “B,” April 4 is “C,” and so on. You can use a theme for the month or go random – just as long as it matches the letter of the alphabet for the day.

The A to Z Challenge is a great way to get into the blogging habit and make new friends.

So, join me (and the over 1800 other blogs involved) starting on Friday, April 1, 2016 and ending on Saturday, April 30th. Comments and such are always welcome. I hope you enjoy the stories.

The Brother Spectrum

Night, a dark room,  twin beds on opposite walls.

“William. William. William…when I die, will I still look out for you? William? I know I’ll be in heaven. How far is heaven, William? How far is heaven? William? William?  When I die, will I still look out for you?”

William lay awake on his back in his bed, a baseball cap clenched between his teeth. His open eyes stared into the darkness, his thoughts playing colors and sound, zig-zagging around.

Johnny beat his chest, bit his palm, said “William, when I die, will I still look out for you? William?”

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The above is a Drabble, a 100 word story. It was a prompt for the first day of the StoryADay challenge.

I have not been writing much at all, in fact it has been a chore at times, simply because of personal things I’ve been going through. I will attempt to do this: a story a day for the month of May. We’ll see how it all goes.

Any readers of mine know that I will write in any style that suits me. I hope to stretch a bit and get things moving again. Time will tell.

Bridge and Troll Authority

The toll collectors walked off the job one day, and the Trolls trod in, and stayed. There was a cry from the ex-toll workers and their union, as well as from the general public.

The Bridge Authority dealt with the union in a very simple way: “You tell them to get out.”

The Bridge Authority dealt with the public in another simplistic way: “Don’t get the Trolls angry. Pay your toll…and don’t forget to say ‘Thank You!”

The Bridge Authority had not been this happy in years.

If only the union and the public had listened.

“TWELVE DOLLARS NOW!” Dave Troll shouted. He was big, bilious green and naked, and he had the odor one would associate with living under a dank and must bridge for a very long time. If you knew what the odor was like, then most likely you were a Troll too.

Doris stared at Dave, this being her first time encountering a real life Troll in a Troll Booth. In Westport, this sort of thing would not have been tolerated. Glassy eyed a wee bit from lunch with the girls, she braved going into Queens on her way to Long Island to visit her hunk du month. Her Chevy Suburban was high off the ground and put her close to the Troll’s face. Almost, not quite, but quite close enough. She could smell something awful, and if she wasn’t so vapid and intellectually mediocre, she would have said his breath was fetid. Her hair was platinum, her nails and lips red, and she wore a brilliantly white summer dress that went very well with her brilliantly white Suburban.

Dave bellowed again (well, in actuality, to a human, it was bellowing. Dave was mildly perturbed): “TWELVE DOLLARS NOW!”

“Hold your horses, or whatever you Trolls hold,” she said, shooing him away with her finger tips while also ignoring Dave’s glare. Doris rifled through her large pebble grain leather  shoulder bag. Dave looked at it in Troll-like exasperation, as the seconds were ticking by, and a Troll is nothing but anal about time.

He started “TWELVE DOL…” when Doris gave him The Look! that she had had handed down from her Mother, and her Grandmother, and her  maternal lineage going  further back than Doris could count. Yes, I could make the comment about how much Doris could count, but why bother. She shoved the money into Dave’s outstretched hand, making sure not to touch it and doing a silent “ew” face when doing so.

Dave clenched his fist around the bills, making sure before he did so that it was indeed TWELVE DOLLARS. He was just about to wish her a safe journey across his bridge, when Doris did what she should not have done. She put the gas guzzler in gear and started to leave, not even thinking about saying…

“YOU FORGOT TO SAY THANK YOU” Yelled Dave a lot louder than before. He reached over (merely a flex of his arm), ripped the driver door off, threw it over the side of the bridge (which was quite a distance from the Troll Booth he was at, just so you know), picked up Doris and bit her head off. Literally. Off. Chomp. While swallowing (his mother told him to chew at least 29 times) he threw the Suburban over the side of the bridge. Safety First for other drivers had been drilled into him.

Dave got back into his haven. “NEXT! TWELVE DOLLARS NOW!”

There were very few incidents at the bridges after that. There were the initial problems with the Unions, but too many Union Lunches (the union leaders being the lunch) curbed that pretty quickly.  A few other problems, here and there, presented themselves,  especially later at night, where the hat wearing (backwards, more times than not, but not always), I-Own-The-Road SUV marauders tried to get away with things.

You don’t get away with things with Trolls.

The Bridge Authority was hoping for equal success with the Red Caps who took over the tunnels. Time would tell.

Renaissance: Prissy’s Story

Day broke over the town of Renaissance, but it wasn’t the only thing that was broken that day. Not by a long shot. Three hearts were broken, one heirloom dish shattered into 789 pieces, a few legs, arms and toes, some more things…and one life. Not a life that was soon forgotten. Broken way too early.

Josh Dunning was only 24 years old when Prissy Sykes killed him. People in Renaissance who came across young Josh liked him, admired him, lusted after him (a good many), trusted him, looked up to him, wanted to be like him, and just plain out loved him. Some, more than others. Prissy Sykes loved him so much, it hurt her. It eventually hurt him, too.

How people thought about Prissy was just about the opposite. Josh was good people, did for others before he thought of himself and had been like that since he was young. He was always there to help and be a friend. Not so Prissy. She was tied up in her own little Prissy world, thinking Prissy this and Prissy that, and thinking “Why aren’t you paying attention to ME?” thoughts. Except…except… the one thing outside of PrissyWorld that she thought about most of all, when at all, was Josh Dunning.

It started out as a young girls like, then a crush, then a need, then grew into a burning want as she went into puberty overdrive. Her want became her. “How dare he love Cara! How. Dare. He!” she wailed to herself, at night, under her covers, as her hands were Josh’s hands in the dark of night, the hands she wished were there. It was on August 3oth, her twenty-second birthday, alone in bed for her 8030 days of life, and Prissy determined it was going to be her last night alone.

Day 8031, and Prissy had invited Cara out for a picnic. Cara Fleming was surprised by the invitation and was reluctant to go (she  knew Prissy was jealous of her over Josh), but it was Josh who insisted she accept. Reluctantly, she went. Josh said he’d be along later to meet up with her and then go to the End of Summer party Renaissance threw every year since the reformation of the town after The Crisis so many generations ago.

Prissy was kind, for Prissy, in the walking to the picnic grounds with Cara. By the end of the next hour, Prissy had unloaded unto Cara all of her bile, her loathing, her desire to have Josh for herself. To hell with her parents, she said. To hell with everyone in Renaissance. Josh should be hers and hers alone. The only reason Cara stayed through all of this was simple: Prissy had brought out a gun and leveled it at Cara’s heart for over a half hour.

Prissy enjoyed the power she had in her hands. This was real life power, and she relished it.

She turned her head when she heard Josh call out to them, being true to his word to come for Cara. He yelled at her when he saw the gun. “Yelling at me?”, thought Prissy. “NO!”

She turned back to Cara, gritting her teeth, and began to lift the gun as Cara had gotten up to run to Josh. Taking aim, or so she thought, she fired.

Josh dropped to the ground, blood pouring out of the bullet hole in his neck.

Cara screamed and dropped to the ground by Josh, trying to staunch the wound. She babbled and cried and yelled for help. None came. Josh died in her arms.

Prissy, watching all this unfold, lifted the gun one more time, squeezed the trigger, and the noise turned Cara around.

Prissy was true to her thoughts. Last night had been her last night in bed alone.

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Welcome to the first story in the Shared World/Town of Renaissance and the Rule of Three Writers Blog Fest.  Created with fiction writers in mind, October 2011 will see a month long blog fest/hop. The rules are being finalized now and Damyanti Biswas at  Amloki and Lisa Vooght of Flash Fiction and I (with hopefully the addition of one or two more administrators) will be posting the rules soon. Right now, click on the link above for the Rule of Three  and you will get the shared world info for the town of Renaissance.

Where the writers who join us go with the stories is their own thing. They have to have THREE main characters; we have supplied the world and will supply some prompts. Once a week the writers who sign up will add their tale-ONE main character at a time-for three weeks. On the Fourth Week: the story culminates: the three characters  lives intersect, or not, into one last tale.

If this interests you, let me know. We’ll be posting more rule info soon. Real soon. This was a tease. Hope you were, and are, intrigued.

ANY genre style. ANY time period.

Sonnet: What Is My Next Journey?

Looking forward never got me anywhere

Looking backwards felt like just the same old

Been left alone for the last time, I swear

I don’t want to remain here, truth be told.

There are many things left for me to do

Being stuck in one place just makes me ill

Only some obligations to see through

Then follow the open journey I will.

But, have the years crept on me with disdain?

What if what I seek no longer seeks me?

What is left with an inquisitive brain

When time is rushing along, fast to see?

I cannot, will not, allow any defeat

To stand in my way; to hold still my feet.

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Once again, this picture prompt came from the folks at Bluebell Books for their Hump Day Challenge #8.  There is a lot to read on the site, and a huge array of writers and styles. Give it a shot; I think you’ll be glad you did.

The Cool Ones

The cool ones gathered in the staircase. The four blondes sneered at the Freshmen, two weeks into school and looking not as frightened as they did when they started. Janice, the leader of the pack, stuck her left leg out just so, causing a short brunette in braces and two year old jeans to trip and drop her books.

They all laughed, making clucking noises and looking innocent like demons.

“Yo, dork. You need to be more careful in these stairs. Don’t want you getting hurt, now, do we?” Janice sidled up to the girl, who was beneath her notice to even think of knowing her name. She whispered, “you tell anyone, anything, and You. Will. Be. Very. Very. Sorry. Got me?”

The girl nodded, a few tears letting loose, wiped away with a dribble of snot. As she shot up the remaining stairs, Janice and the others headed down. They were all smiling shit eating grins, bumping into other lowlife scum on the way down.

Janice turned to her clique. “See ya later girls!”

They all went their separate ways for the next period.

Janice entered her room. “Hello, Class.”

As one, the students straightened up. “Good Afternoon, Ms. Russell.”

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#5MinuteFiction is a fun weekly contest. At 1:30pm EST, Leah Peterson posts a prompt. You have five minutes to write it, check it over, then post it. By 1:45, time is up. She normally has a Guest Judge pick five finalists, and by 3:00pm EST, the voting opens until 9:00am EST the next morning. This happens every Tuesday, so if you can write at that time, join in. If not, read the finalists and vote for your favorite.

This week, the prompt was High School. Hope you like my take on it. I didn’t make the finalists, but please click on the link, read the five short pieces, and vote for your favorite. Thanks.

Z(ippidy-do-DOH!): A toZ Challenge

To read the whole story thus far…

Part 24: Zippidy-do-DOH!

They did not get far. The Lewd Ones were waiting around the slight bend that the tunnel took, to the left, then straight. Floating in mid air were three of the most stunningly beautiful women that any of them had ever seen. Nakedly floating, and moving around each other, touching each other, in ways that it would take quite the perverted mind to imagine.

“Wow..I had a dream like this once,” Daniel said. Elora glared at him for the comment, and was going to make quite a comment of her own, when Daniel was whisked into the air. Air whisking had nimble fingers, because before you could count to 1..2.. all of his clothes were laying on the floor under him. Under the lewd ones…and they liked it. Their smiles were the smiles of sirens leading sailors to their dooms, but just less moist.

Speaking in one voice, The Lewd Ones seductively and mellifluously said, as they wrapped themselves around and around and around Daniel: “Come,boy boy boy,come play with us us us, Barbeb, Pronia and Prunikos are so lonely lonely lonely. Fill us and stroke us and tenderly glide with us..Fill us and stroke us and tenderly glide with us..Fill us and stroke us and tenderly glide with us..” the r

“Daniel! Do something!” Elora screamed up. Elora and Jennifer Rose tried to grab a hold of him, but he was just out of reach. They also had to watch out for the three floating things with him: one had clawed at Jennifer rose, another tried to bite Elora, and the third one was slobbering all over Daniel, and great gobs of saliva like liquid fell around the two grounded ones.

“I’m..hey..try…Stop THAT!..ing..ohman…STOP THAT!…to!” Daniel was squirming every which way but loose, trying to get these..unbeliveably..stop that…hot…c’mon…women to stop…well, he wasn’t even sure what wasn’t being done to him at that point. He was feeling a bit off though. And he felt more off then on as the gyrating continued. He began to bleed from his nose, and not just a drip drop. It bled a bit more each time they started over in their chant chant chaa…..

Elora froze when she saw the blood, and she pulled Jennifer Rose to her. Daniel tried to sing again, hoping it would work with the Lewdish Ones (“funny, you DO look Lewdish” he laughed to himself), but at this point all he could think of was bawdy Ren Faire songs, and he didn’t think that would work. In one of the tossy-turvey moments,

“Hey…oh lewd ones. Bodacious as the three of you are, this isn’t doing it for me,” he half yelled over their chanting. “Elora…

Drinke to me, onely, with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kisse but in the cup,
And Ile not looke for wine.
The thirst, that from the soule doth rise,
Doth aske a drinke divine:
But might I of Jove’s Nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.
I sent thee, late, a rosie wreath,
Not so much honoring thee,
As giving it a hope, that there
It could not withered bee.
But thou thereon did’st onely breath,
And sent’st it back to mee:
Since when it growes, and smells, I sweare,
Not of it selfe, but thee.

Elora started to tear, not only for the Ben Jonson poem (one of her favorites), but also…Daniel sounded weaker with each circlet those bitches made around him, and the blood got bloodier.

Daniel weakly smiled at her, met her eyes again on one of the passes, and barely eked out “I’m enchanted with you, a smitten kitten, have been since I laid eyes on you. I, uh..stop it BarProPrune!!..Elora, I guess I love you.”

“Oh Daniel,” she wept completely. “Me too.”

Daniel fell to the ground on top of his clothes. The Lewd One hung in the air, the first time for them just stillness. Then, the three of them started to cry.

“That was beau..beauti..beautifil” they said, in three part harmony. They looked longingly at Daniel and Elora, she having rushed to him when he hit the ground, and silently touched ground. They walked away, in perfect unison, not looking back.

Elora helped Daniel into his clothing. ZsaZsa and Jennifer Rose were holding onto each other, sniffling and wiping a tear and one of them honked out a happy sounding laughed. Only Winston was unmoved by what occurred. They did not notice him starting off at the departing Lewd Ones. A few steps were all he took. Composing himself, he moved to two couples.

“WHAT HAVE WE HERE?” Boomed a big booming voice. “IT IS I, KAMADEVA! WHAT IS YOUR DESIRE!”

W(onderment): A to Z Challenge

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Part 21: Wonderment

The blathering in the front of the car crawled to a halt as Ms. Hemple sped on. Daniel, still holding the dead rodent in his blood caked lap and hands, just stared at him. “Good. He is finally focused.” Winston thought. “He needs to stay that way.”

Why had he bothered to explain anything to these cretins? The anticipation, the moments ticking away in such a dull way, surrounded by these..these.. Winston realized  he let them get the better of him. He just stared back, his constant smile again in place, and his hand throbbed a bit from the bites. It was not enough to cause him to lose his concentration again.

What would he say to them that they would understand, that they would not judge as drivel? That The Clock of the Long Ago Now is the epitome of cosmic precision? That his research did lead him to the truth: that aliens do exist, that the Celestial Zafeiropoulou have been here, have guided us and thwarted us, and that humans in secret conclaves know of this and support them? That the Zafeiropoulou are as close to time incarnate as one can get, that they are the personification of precision timing on a cosmic scale? That they really rule us all? They would laugh and ridicule him if he was not holding the gun.

He knew that this treasure is his way to ascend to a state of time bliss and to join them. If the Ratiocination Labyrinth is breached, the Clock will give him everything he’s wanted. His dream, forever along the time line of the universe, always perfect, always constant and precise. His dream, and he is putting all of it on a world class dreamer of a dolt.

Winston stared at Daniel through the corner of his left eye, while keeping the rest of his attention looking for that other rodent. He heard ZsaZsa making soothing and shushing sounds to the damned thing. “Just wait. All of you,” he threatened inside his head.

Looking at Daniel, he wondered, and in wondering, began to doubt,  if this head-in-the-clouds intelligent fool would really be the one to break through all the logic barriers the Zafeiropoulou put in to guard the Ratiocination Labyrinth and what it hides.

Forget the other incredible weapons and baubles that are supposedly to be found inside: Dropa Stones, Ica Crystals, The Cosovisto Artifact, the  Siribhoovalaya translation (numbers, in precise mathematical order, describing the universe), and so much more. Forget them. Daniel need to get me the clock. The clock is all that mattered.

He’d have to go through the sections, one by one: the Limbus Come; The Lewd Ones; the Tanuki; the desires of Kamadeva; the Emoticon Curtain; the Minim Five; the Numbing Nukekubi;  the Proposition of Mudd; and finally…he came across a blank wall on this one. There was one more section to pass, one last hurdle. There was no information on it. No clues. Nothing.

Winston settled into his thoughts, running through everything he knew about each sections passage to be gained. He needed an illogical thinker to make this work. He read all the secret supposedly destroyed and erased files on all the “intelligent” ones who tried to get through. All the ones who failed, and they all had. Only their companions survived, one at a time, and bit by bit Winston put all the information together. They had all approached this from the wrong angle, and all made the same mistake, time and time again. Linear thinkers, one and all.

Daniel was his key to success.

And…once he had the Clock….

Winston in real time smiled a little broader. Daniel clutched the body in his lap a little harder. Jennifer Rose stepped on the gas, making the care to a little bit faster, which caused Elora to flinch against the seat and made her back hurt and she gasped a little bit louder, and ZsaZsa soothed the squirrel a little bit needier…

The squirrel? He got a whole lot more angrier.