Flash

A Moment In Time

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There is a moment in every intense fight where time seems to slow down. Motion becomes fluid, action becomes exact, and the fight changes from ultimate chaos to pure order.

It only happens when the combatants are evenly matched and battling with everything they have. They need not be skilled; they need to be committed to their cause. Anything less and their contest will not warp time like this.

People who survive these moments feel it as it happens, but almost no one outside the conflict notices anything beyond growing intensity. The explosions seem bigger, the movements faster, the blood splashier. The crowd responds, roaring and cheering as their favored fighter battles for their life, feeding into this intensity.

I have been accused of many things. Slavery. Murder. Cruelty. Warmongering. And so on. Not a day passes that I do not walk through my city followed by a crowd calling for my blood from beyond the perimeter of my guards. They know I’ve spilled my share already. After all, what kind of emperor would I be if I did not conquer everything put before me?

I have conquered the world and they refute my power with mere words and the occasional stone or bullet if they feel so daring. Still, none can topple my throne. I’m sure someone will, someday, but not until they learn my secret.

After all, what is the point of having people kill each other? There is no need in society being met by bloodshed. No one wants for food, their health, or their safety. Everyone is taken care of. These warriors seek glory, reknown, and a shot at my throne. In exchange, harvested one sliver from every warp these fighters create, I get the one thing no one else can ever get more of. Time.

Making The Most of a New Day

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Wren checked the clock and saw they’d overslept. Grumbling under the music playing from their phone, they heaved themselves upright and sat on the edge of their bed for a few luxurious mintues, mind blank as sleep slipped slowly away.

After their routine of exercise, stretching, coffee, showering, and breakfast, they slumped into a lounge on their deck and spent an hour planning their week. Meetings were maneuvered, appointments shifted, and plans confirmed as their second cup of coffee dwindled. Wren clambered off the chair after finishing, left the pool of lamplight on their deck, and went for a brisk walk through the woods.

It still felt wrong to hike in the dark, but they’d adjusted to wearing a headlamp and marked all their favorite paths with reflective trailmarkers. Their parents had gotten used to winters without snow eventually, so they figured it was just a matter of time.

After their hike, Wren settled down for lunch in their kitchen, absorbing the warmth and light of a sun lamp while eating. They could have taken vitamin suppliments, but they found comfort in the routine of basking.

After cleaning up, they settled into their office and put in a few hours of work, doing a few pages of roughs and working on some flats for their currnet graphic novel. The idea was about five years old, but it felt nice to draw sunlight. Nostalgic, even thought it had only been a few months since the Shutter project failed, cutting Earth off from sunlight permanently.

Since the shutters were all solar panels, humanity had plenty of power to turn the moon into a replacement. Days were 28 hours long now, after adjusting the moon’s orbit, but Wren always felt like they were built for days like this. Shame about the tides, though.

The Sword And The Alchemist

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Tej slipped silently through square, disappearing into moonshadows as she neared the park. Even the guards at the entrance didn’t see her, despite their torches.

Once inside, she moved swiftly, heading for the column of moonlight over the plinth. As she neared, she saw the familiar glow of the blade magnifying all the light that struck it.

She took a moment to observe the churned mud surrounding the plinth. So many tried to free the sword and earn the Xendran crown. Who wouldn’t be tempted by that much power?

Certain she was alone, Tej slipped into the moonlight and laid a hand on the pommel. The blade began to brighten and she leapt away. “Shit.”

Tej threw her cloak over the blade, leaving the hilt uncovered. After a deep breath, she pulled it free and set it on the ground. She could see the blue and gold glow pressing against her cloak, so she worked quickly. It had taken weeks to convince people it had been struck by divine lightning after the first time.

She poured both her flasks into the plinth and stirred the liquid with a stick until it began to stiffen. Careful not to toss aside the stick, she grabbed the sword from the ground and plunged it back into the plinth. The light beneath sputtered and disappeared as she tore free her cloak’s hem to wipe the adhesive from the plinth and wrap up the stick.

As she snuck away, she checked the sky. By the time the sun rose, the sword would be sealed in the stone again. This recipe should buy her enough time to finish negotiating with the Aluskan Empire. Better to sell the crown and disappear with the money than be assassinated like the last four fools to pull the sword free.

The Power of Plastic

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Jordan swiped their card and stared at the terminal until they remembered swiping didn’t work anymore. “Sorry.”

“I forget all the time.” The teller shrugged. “Just tap it on the screen.”

Jordan did and the payment terminal beeped, finally taking their payment.

As their receipt printed, Jordan jerked their head toward the rest of the store. “Amazing this place still runs.”

“Sure.” The teller shrugged again. “Stock’s different, but we still sell stuff. Helps people focus, you know?”

Jordan nodded, taking their receipt.

“Still.” The teller sighed, staring at the doors out of the store, “beats slaving away out there.”

“Yeah.”

“You good with all that?”

“I think so.”

“I could call someone…”

“No, I’ve got it.” Jordan gave a half-hearted smile, shifted the bags around, and started walking toward the exit. “Have a nice day.”

“You too.”

Jordan slowed, carefully peering out the door. The blasted ruins of cars, melted asphalt, and red haze in the air were still present. Nothing moved but plants swaying in the breeze.

Confident they were safe, Jordan hitched their mask over their face and exited the airlock. They glanced around as they walked, watching for danger and a ride away from the burned-out husk of the city. When they spotted a buggy pulled by a balding donkey, they waved it down. The elderly driver stowed Jordna’s bags and patiently waited while they fumbled with the payment terminal.

As the machine beeped to denote a payment received, the old driver chuckled. “I always figured capitalism would fail when civilization did. Thought we’d be bartering by now.”

Jordan chuckled as they climbed into their seat, brushing their iron grey hair away from their mask. “Guess it just goes to show. Peace, health, and safety are things money can’t buy. For the everything left, there’s MasterCard.”

A Little Knowledge Can Open Doors

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Theo jiggled his key in the lock for a moment before swinging the door open, gesturing for Izzy to walk through before him. She stepped inside, glancing around before turn back to Theo to raise an eyebrow at him.

As Theo closed the door, he jingled his keys in his free hand. “Did you know that most keys work by pushing little metal pillars around so you can rotate the lock? Gotta line up these little gaps so it can turn freely. To move the deadbolt back and forth.”

“No, but that sounds familiar. Maybe I saw a video somewhere.” Izzy sat down on the couch, setting her bag down beside her, and scrutinized the room as Theo continued.

“That’s why you need to replace keys eventually. They get too worn-down to get the little metal pin thingies in the right place. And if you wait too long, your new key won’t work either. All the peaks and valleys will be too low.”

“I see.” Izzy nodded, half-listening while looking around the room at the tasteful decorations and new electronics.

“Which means there’s only so many keys that can exist. The number is huge, but most lock smiths aren’t making random keys each time, especially for apartments. They all gotta be sorta similar to work in all the doors from outside to inside. Lots of commonalities.”

Izzy turned to see Theo closely examining one of his keys in particular. “So?”

“So.” Theo brushed the key with a thumb and them looked up to Izzy, smiling. “You can just file down a key a whole bunch and, if you’re lucky, open the apartment of a neighbor who’s on vacation.”

“Devious.” Izzy smiled and opened the huge bag she’d brought. “Let’s start with the video games. Those are easy to move.”

I Struggle With Writing Short Fiction

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I have a vacation coming up in a week and a half. I’ll have access to the internet and my laptop with me (I plan to work on some editing projects since I can’t just NOT do anything), but I still plan to double my usual blog buffer so I can just ignore my blog every day that I’m away. My current intention is to do five Flash Fiction posts in the place of my usual content, as a nice compromise between writing five normal posts and letting my blog sit empty for a full week, but I’m running into the same problem that I always do when I’m trying to produce new flash fiction. I just don’t know what stories to tell in so short a format!

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Illusions of the Past and Flash Fiction

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I kind of miss the old way I used to run this blog, with a different type of content for every day of the week. It was a very creatively enriching time in my life and I really feel like I grew as a writer during that period. I was also at my healthiest, mentally speaking, during that period. My inclination is to chalk all of this up to a wide variety of writing, heavy structure, active participation in numerous creative projects that included working with people for feedback, and the rewarding feeling of sharing it all someplace other people could see it and respond to it. Unfortunately, things aren’t actually so simple as that. Like most things, the truth of the matter is more complicated.

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Revelation

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Roger wasn’t much for animals. They didn’t like him and he didn’t like them. Every dog he’d ever tried to pet had either run or bit him. Cats clawed him and even birds pecked him.

Which is how he knew something was wrong when he woke up with a mouse sitting on his nightstand.

“Go away” he said. It didn’t move.

“Scram.” Roger sat up and waved at it. It washed its whiskers.

Roger eyed the clock and then looked out the window. It was past eight but still dark out. Odd. Roger watched the mouse carefully as he stayed outside arm’s reach of the mouse while getting up.

He grabbed his things and headed to the shower without taking his eyes off the creature until he left his bedroom. Stayed facing him the entire time.

When he came back, it was still there. He combed his hair in silence, still watching the mouse that moved only to rub its whiskers.

When he couldn’t take it any longer, Roger stepped forward, grabbing a book off his shelf. “Get out of here now or I’m going to smash you!”

The mouse paused for a moment, and then resumed rubbing its little face.

Roger moved to the bed, put the book down, and picked up a pen. When he poked the mouse, it squeaked and then continued washing its whiskers.

Roger bent over to look at it and whispered half to himself. “What the hell are you doing, little guy?”

“Distracting you” said a small voice behind him. By the time he started to spin around, the horde of mice was crashing over him.

The last thing he heard as darkness swallowed him was a small voice saying “At last, the prophesied hero has fallen. Soon, so will all the other Humans.”

Breaking Protocol

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“Thank you all for gathering on short notice.” Harry sat in his chair with the light of his monitor reflecting off his glasses. “I know these are hard times, but I’m glad we can still gather quickly as the need arises.”

Harry focused his eyes on his webcam, doing what that guide to video conferencing had told him to give the illusion of eye contact to the people on the call. It was tricky to maintain, but he’d had a lot of practice.

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