Author: R.

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at oneadayuntilthedayidie.com.

This is the Weekly Challenge, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

We’ve got stories by:

• Tom
• Jon
• Jeffrey
• Richard
• Charlie
• Lizzie
• Serendipity
• Norval Joe
• Tura
• Laieanna
• Planet Z

TOM

Offer Void is Some States

Well the heart final gave it up. It had pretty much been winding down since 2030. Perhaps less cheesecake would have been in order. Naaa. Why eat to live, when you can live to eat. The last flashes of current are firing in the brain. A mini-mental sunset fades to concentric circles of deepening black and in the center of all thing is the void. And then …

A patch of red growing in size as it approaches. Protoplasmic fingers reach out for it. A scrap of paper tears away. I reads upon it “You’re number 40,001.” Oh Fuck.

JON

The Void

By

Jon DeCles

I’m a science fiction writer. As the anesthesia kicked in I heard someone say something about the void, and there I went:

Stars wheeling across the cosmos, galaxies spinning, black holes engulfing mega galaxies, comets sliding in and out around primaries, planets with a thousand different ecosystems, creatures populating planets and ships that sailed the endless dust laden emptiness between the tiny amounts of matter that make up what we experience directly as the Universe, dark matter balancing…

When I awoke, you can imagine how disappointed I was that the nurse had been talking about the contents of my bladder.

JEFFREY

A Void in His Heart
by Jeffrey Fischer

When Jeremy’s wife of 30 years died, it left a huge void in his heart. He tried everything he could think of to find happiness again. He joined a book club, but the books all seemed to focus on long, happy marriages. He went to a line-dancing group. Surely country music songs emphasized existential despair, but everyone else came and socialized as a couple. He even pretended to be an alcoholic to attend AA meetings, but no one wanted to grab a drink afterward.

He could take no more. He would end it all so he could be reunited with his wife. As he perched at the edge of a cliff, ready to dash himself on the rocks below, he had a vision: his mother-in-law beckoned him to cross to the other side. Jeremy quickly backed away from the precipice. He had no desire to be reunited with the old battleaxe any time soon.

RICHARD

Checking out

There are some things that technology should play no part in.

Take shopping, for example – who on earth thought it would be a great idea to replace people at the checkout with a machine?

Self-checkout – worst thing ever!

‘Unknown item in the bagging area’; ‘How many bags have you used?’; ‘Please wait for staff assistance’.

I end up arguing with that smug voice! It’s crazy, incredibly stressful, and takes me at least twice as long as I would dealing with a person.

Finally, I’m, done. I swipe my card.

And the machine says: ‘Sorry, your card is void!’

CHARLIE

When I finished law school, I interned at Null and Void for two years while studying for the bar and getting some clerking experience. My mentor was a sharp paralegal, and she taught me so much and so quickly. I passed the bar, and in a year, I was an associate.

My first case was a comedian charged with drugging and raping sixty women. He was rich and pretty well known in the community. The judge declared a mistrial, but one of the women accusing him of rape shot him in the head and groin as he left the courthouse.

LIZZIE

A young rabbit looks at an old tree. The tree whispers.
The rabbit hops back and forth near the tree. The tree whispers.
The rabbit perks up two long ears. The tree whispers.
And the rabbit rests.
The tree sways in the wind, its leaves rustling softly.
The tree is wise and the rabbit ponders.
“Big ears don’t make you hear better, do they?” The tree whispers on.
The rabbit ponders, intrigued.
Maybe, just maybe, the rabbit will hop away with a tiny bit of the tree’s wisdom.
Maybe, just maybe, the tree will smile, watching the rabbit hop away.

SERENDIPITY

I inhabit the void between thought and spoken word; I wait in the spaces between questions and answers; I lurk in the netherworld between your dreams and wakefulness, and although you acknowledge my presence, you pretend I’m not there.

More than that, if pressed, you’d deny I exist – you’d laugh off the suggestion as absurdity and nonsense.

But, I am, most definitely part of you.

I am your hidden thoughts… The murderous ones, the lustful ones, the sick and twisted ones that you keep close to your heart and would never pursue.

Or would you?

If given the opportunity?

TURA

The Void
———
“We check and recheck everything all the time, because any misstep in these tin eggs and the vacuum claims you. You’re not an astronaut until you feel the void closer than your own heartbeat.”

The spacer paused for another swig at his beer. “But what would you know, metal man?”

A great deal, in fact, much more than these evolved monkeys knew about us. The void is our natural habitat, away from their sweaty, corrosive atmospheres. The day may not come soon, but in the end it is we who will explore the cosmos, for ourselves, leaving our ancestors behind.

NORVAL JOE

In the late 1980’s Domino Pizza advertised with an animated little character called ‘The Noid’. He destroyed pizzas, except for Domino’s of course. So, the only way to avoid the noid was to order from Domino’s.
If all it took to avoid annoyance in ordering pizzas was to have it arrive on time, and you didn’t care if the fast food was barely edible, then, the advertisement had merit.
However, if you wanted flavor and the reasonable expectation of not ending up in the emergency room, then you would avoid Dominos and order your pizza from almost any other restaurant.

LAIEANNA

“The Calling”

Tom once hid from the world, but people still sought him out, and he
learned to live with it. Sometimes several, sometimes just one,
people constantly begged of Tom until he exposed the void at his core.
The depth of nothingness was a startling sight, but its calling never
failed to force people past their fear and reach into the darkness.
Tom stepped over bodies with vacant eyes mirroring the black inside
him. He mourned as they fell but for what they had, not what they
lost, for he could not follow and the void was always calling to him.

PLANET Z

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
After he read some of Nietzsche’s books, he searched for The Abyss so that he could stare into it.
It took him a week to get there. And once he was there, the line was five hours long.
“What’s it like?” he asked the pale and haggard people walking back to the parking lot.
They didn’t respond. They just shuffled past.
When George finally got to the head of the line, he took a deep breath and stared into The Abyss.
It stared back, and then roared with laughter.

Welcome to the 100 Word Stories podcast at oneadayuntilthedayidie.com.

This is the Weekly Challenge, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.

We’ve got stories by:

• Jeffrey
• Charlie
• Richard
• Tom
• Jon
• Lizzie
• Serendipity
• Norval Joe
• Laieanna
• Tura
• Planet Z

JEFFREY

News at Six
by Jeffrey Fischer

The demographics for TV news must skew so old that one wonders if anyone stays awake for the second half-hour. Ads for geriatrics predominate: drugs for cancer, drugs to keep one’s bowels moving, upcoming golf tournaments – and Depends diapers, too. The only youngsters seen in ads are either visiting Grandpa in the hospital or waxing enthusiastic about the wonders of Chevrolets.

One can only imagine where young people go to find news. Twitter? Worse, Facebook? Sketchy web sites? Under a volcano? All I know is that Americans seem increasingly uninformed about the world around them yet increasingly confident in those uninformed opinions.

CHARLIE

It was too warm. The temperature was two degrees above normal for the month. The other dentists and I went to Hawaii for the Annual Tooth Tour. We stayed at The Toucan lodge, shared with the band that played nightly at the Toon Saloon, just under the outfall of Kīlauea on the Southern Shore.

The second night, a lava stream burned through the back wall of the bar and bottles of expensive rye whiskey and scotch exploded, sending a chunk of glass into the forehead of our lawyer, Don.

Don shook it off and ordered another round before we evacuated.

RICHARD

#1 – Pick Two

The instruction was simple – pick two – but there were just far too many to choose from.

It’s always been this way: I go to pieces when I’m given a choice…

Pizza toppings terrify me; I go through hell picking lottery numbers; and I can never decide which particular parking space to pick. Never offer me the box of chocolates, just pick one and give it to me!

I just wish I hadn’t asked my careers adviser to choose my profession for me: Bomb disposal is a bad choice when you can never decide which wire you should cut.

#2 – Italy

I recently toured Italy and did all the usual things – threw coins in the Trevi Fountain, got ripped off by a gondolier and had gelato in the piazza, Florence.

I visited Pompeii and marvelled at the casts of those poor people, caught and preserved forever in their death poses.

I stayed in Naples, but I was never comfortable – that volcano brooding over me terrified me.

It wasn’t so much being buried in ash and dying horribly that worried me. It was the thought of tourists in two thousand years laughing at my petrified genitals that creeped me out!

#3 – Toothache

My tooth hurts.

It’s a volcano of pain exploding through my jaw and I can’t get an appointment for two weeks.

I’ve tried everything – painkillers, oil of cloves and whisky, in every possible combination, with no effect.

I’ve tried yanking it out with string and attacking it with pliers. I asked a friend to punch me in the face, hard, twice – didn’t work.

I’ve tried fooling my brain – inflicting pain elsewhere to take my mind off the tooth. I’ve stabbed, cut, burned and bludgeoned myself, and still my tooth hurts.

Trouble is, everything else hurts now, too!

TOM

Haven’t Written This Same Story Before?

Jimmy Too Small was a second story man. Technically a member of the Delmonty Family, but that was just a courtesy. His specialty was Pre-Divorcee acquisitions. Often arranged by the Mother-In-Law to secure and retain family heirlooms. You know how nature compensates when a soul is lacking. Well Jimmy’s small stature was compensated by a hyper-sensitivity in his fingers and ears. Wasn’t a safe he couldn’t crack. Also had a wicked sense of humor. He leave a Polaroid of the loot in said safe. “Kid cracks me up,” said Don Delmonty. His X thought different, and pull Jimmy on Ice.

JON

Two for the Volcano, by the Toucan

By

Jon DeCles

Oh that this too, too solid flesh would melt away.

Well, at least half of it. There’s two of us. It’s the date from Hell.

I took her to the Volcano Room at ‘Vegas’ new sensation, the Pompeii. I got the best seats in the house. We had already taken the hotel tour, and as I had noticed she had a sweet tooth I ordered the Zupa Anglais.

The singing toucan looked more like a toon than animatronics, but he still had more personality than she had[. Women think we look at their boobs: we really look at their eyes.

LIZZIE

A Couple’s Life

When the young couple decided to take a tour of Toon Tooth Park to see the new volcano exhibit, they had no idea that this would change their lives significantly.
They walked side by side, sure of themselves, feeling positive that they’d have an entertaining day.
But a crazy man dressed in a foamy toucan outfit decided to act like an annoying clown and leaped about around them. He was so irritating that the young couple pulled out two shotguns each and put an end to the nonsense.
They are now living near a real volcano in Iceland, the Eyjafjallajökull.

SERENDIPITY

A stuffed toucan, half a stale loaf, a mouldy old mattress and a six pack of Czechoslovakian lager. What do these have in common?

They’re some of the increasingly dubious offerings offered to placate Nargron, the volcano god, in recent weeks.

Nargron – that’s me, by the way – is fed up with it, the place looks like a tip and these are hardly offerings of a people awed by my presence.

So it’s about time you showed some respect and started back with the human sacrifices… And, if you don’t, I might have to stop being quite so magma-nanimous!

NORVAL JOE

Growing up as a twin in the 60’s and 70’s wasn’t easy. People made fun of us because of the Double Mint gum commercials. It always featured twins doing active things. People would ask why we weren’t in a commercial. Were we too ugly to be on TV?
Besides. We weren’t very active. A commercial of us watching Gilligan’s Island would be pretty boring.
It didn’t matter after seventh grade, though.
Someone said to Roger, “You two look so much the same, you must be fags.”
Ignoring each other was easier than being bullied.
We didn’t talk again until college.

LAIEANNA

Future topic: Ferris wheel

Too Finicky Sam, the Toon Toucan, took a tour of the volcano to
determine which of two locations would make a better villain base.
First up, a canopy covered cave by the beach was an oasis, but there
was no hidden dock for his transportation. The second sight of
intricate interlacing pathways to the interior volcano had vast
appeal, but a base so close to the center was a danger in the case of
a lava explosion. Sam had to decide quick! His rival, Toothy Tony,
the Terrible Tiger, was arriving on a second helicopter and Sam wanted
first dibs.

TURA

Volcano; Two
———
“FIRE above FIRE, the dragon over the volcano,” I read from the yarrow stalks, pandering to Rebel Chang’s populism. The volcano was clearly the rebellious people, the dragon, Chang himself.

Among these rebels who had abducted me, only I was educated enough to read the yarrow stalks, so I simply picked a suitable hexagram.

I continued, “The two fires united, create; divided, destroy.” That was ambivalent enough to be a prophesy of however things developed. I did not expect to live through the coming troubles, and like any court astrologer, I mainly wanted to be seen to have predicted everything.

PLANET Z

George was a pirate, but he wasn’t a very good pirate.
Unlike other pirates, who had monkeys and parrots on their shoulder, George had a toucan than he’d picked up from some trader.
Unlike a parrot, the toucan didn’t talk.
And unlike a monkey, it didn’t screech or dance around.
The toucan pretty much spent all of its time flapping madly or trying to gouge out George’s eyes with its beak, or bite off his fingers.
One night, the toucan got loose from its cage and flew off.
George replaced it with a ham sandwich, which was significantly less dangerous.