Category: My stories

The Great Claw

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The Great Claw wobbles over our ravaged city.
Every now and then, it descends and grabs at a car or a building and yanks it up into the sky.
Invading the world wasn’t enough for the aliens, so they put it up there to torment us.
“The rest of the world is dead,” said the message. “But you’ll keep us amused while we extract the necessary isotopes for our next journey.”
Scientists at the university tried to come up with defenses, but The Great Claw ended those plans.
It rained bricks as the research center was hauled up… and up…

The Last Photograph

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The Conquest Museum on the Zagitz homeworld has many exhibits, but the most popular is the last remaining human DNA sample.
Drones guide their podlings to the guarded platform for a peek at the vial in magnetic suspension.
The thing is, that’s not the real sample. It’s just for display purposes.
Some claim that the real sample is in a research asteroid where the government is cooking up new batches of humans to stage fake invasions.
But the truth is, there’s no human DNA left. The humans were annihilated decades ago.
The conspiracy theory makes a good bedtime story, though.

Bystander

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Who names a child Innocent Bystander?
I look over the victim’s medical records and shake my head.
A car jumped the curb and mowed down a bunch of kids on the sidewalk.
They all suffered broken arms and legs except for one: little Innocent here, laying on the gurney.
His parents have asked for no autopsy. It’s obvious that the driver is to blame for the kid’s death, right?
Except that he’s not.
The kid was standing in the middle of the street, and the driver swerved to avoid him.
Afterwards, Innocent was beaten to death by an angry mob.

Do you trust these pancakes?

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The courts upheld the ban against pancakes last year.
Now, the only place you can get pancakes is an underground grill.
Or, if you risk it, at home.
“We’re making waffles,” I tell the grocery checkout girl as she holds up my maple syrup bottle suspiciously.
The government says that waffles are a gateway breakfast food leading to pancakes, but I disagree.
I like waffles.
I like bacon.
I like orange juice.
But pancakes? No. They don’t hold butter or syrup like waffles do.
She bags the eggs, flour, and maple syrup.
I’ll make waffles.
But after that? Who knows?

Food chain

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Several months after the oil spill, the government kept the real environmental impact assessments suppressed.
President Blaine grinned as he stood before a table piled high with steaming shrimp and crabs.
He rubbed his stomach, full of salad that he’d eaten on the Air Force One flight down to the photo op, and said “Delicious!”
The studies, on the other hand, screamed “Dangerous!”
Plankton contaminated.
Small filter-feeders contaminated.
Bigger fish contaminated.
Predator species contaminated.
All to lethal levels. Total breakdown.
Back in his New Orleans mansion, The Vampire Lord drummed his fingers, grumbling “Damn these humans and their suicidal stupidity.”

The Arch

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I watched as the Gateway Arch came to life.
It pulled at the anchor pads, legs straining and buckling from the effort.
People were streaming out of the emergency exits as one foot broke free and stamped at them.
A few people got crushed before the Arch pulled up its other leg from the ground.
Free at last, it roamed the city, crushing cars and buildings while news helicopters circled it.
The Arch couldn’t do much to them, being an arch without hands or laser-beam eyes.
So it rampaged on as the generals watched and said “It’s only St. Louis.”

Mister Invisible

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Mister Invisible is a member of our superhero team, but I’m not sure why.
He will only attend meetings when we use a sign-in sheet and lock the conference room doors.
It’s an insult, he says. We don’t make Mystic Seer demonstrate that he’s not astrally projecting away, right?
Right.
I checked the call logs and saw that he hasn’t been calling The League Of Evil as much as he used to.
So, I inspect his suite, and find the cell phone.
And the nuclear bomb.
“It’s armed,” he says, and hits me in the back of the head.
Blackness.

Muppets

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It’s been a while since you heard anything out of the Muppets, right?
Oh, sure. Jim Henson’s Workshop carries on, but when you ask about the Muppets, they hush up quick.
It turns out they tried to make a movie about the Sicilian Mafia: The Godfrogger.
After watching a preview copy, a boss named Don Music wasn’t amused at his portrayal as a failed songwriter bashing his head against a piano.
Fozzie ended up as a bearskin rug on his floor.
Kermit got skinned and stretched over a pool table.
Poor Gonzo. Tasted like the chickens he loved so much.

Pascal’s Wager

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You need a little history lesson, Sonny.
Blaise Pascal said that even though one could not prove God’s existence through reason, one should bet on God’s existence because you have Eternity to gain if you’re right and nothing to lose if you’re wrong.
To bet on Him not existing means you can earn Damnation or Nothingness.
Which would you choose?
Anyway, lifelong afflictions suggested he hadn’t long to live, but making bizarre wagers based on God’s existence actually caused his early demise.
The Organization wasn’t as tolerant then as it is now.
We just break your legs.
Now pay up!

The Man

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After countless adventures with Curious George, The Man in the Yellow Hat got tired of chasing him down and having to pay for damage.
For a while, he kept the rambunctious monkey locked in a cage. The little creature couldn’t escape, and he would shriek all day long.
The neighbors complained. They said The Man that he was being cruel, keeping George in a cage, so he let George out and fed him tranquilizers.
These days, you’ll see them walking hand-in-hand, The Man smiling wide with his glassy-eyed, simian zombie.
“Wipe the drool from your lip, George,” he says.
Pathetic.