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:
NORVAL JOE
After three flights around the backyard Billbert went into the house.
Sitting in the dining room, he ate butterscotch pudding with vanilla wafers, when his mother walked in and dropped bags of groceries on the table.
“How was your first day of school?” she asked.
“Okay,” he said and slid his chair closer to the table. He hadn’t thought to take off his bag before sitting down.
“Good. Help me bring in the rest of the stuff,” she said, waiting for a response.
How could he explain flying in grocery bags? he thought before he levitated off of his seat.
JON
What’s in a Name?
By
Jon DeCles
The old textbook said you were supposed to consecrate a wafer and it would turn into the blood and body of Christ. As ‘Christ’ was a word that meant ‘light,’ Tolund thought it would be an amazing and beautiful thing to achieve: but although he could readily picture a body of light, he had a hard time imaging what the blood of light might be like.
Nevertheless, he was determined to cast the old spell, and he set about gathering all the ingredients. There was water in the time vault, and some Thunderbird wine. For the wafer, a peppermint patty.
JEFFREY
A Little Bit of Treason
by Jeffrey Fischer
Hillier looked at the wafer-thin USB drive before scooping it up and placing it in a pocket. His contact within DoD had come through, copying the design of plans for the next-generation of nuclear missile technology from an insufficiently-secured laptop and leaving the USB memory stick at the designated drop point. Hillier just needed to verify the contents of the stick before passing it to his buyer. He didn’t think of it as betraying his country. It was just a way of making a living.
Once in his apartment, Hillier placed the USB drive into his own laptop. He double-clicked on the icon. But instead of seeing a schematic of a new missile, the drive launched a video of Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up.” Rickrolled by some Defense Department geek.
TOM
Straight to hell
Raise Catholic it is reasonable to say I’ve eaten my fair share of wafered waffles. It’s on art to get each wafer fully filled with equal amounts of butter and maple syrup. Since we’re talking decades of Friday meatlessness, damn near everything you can imagine had gone into the batter. Nut, bananas, rock candy. There were various vegetables, but those general sucked. The acme of wafer delight had to be ice-cream and waffles. Messy, but so sweet. Once my kid sister dropped in a bunch of cut-up hot dogs. So for 12 hour all of us were going straight to hell.
SERENDIPITY
The boundary between life and death is rarely as distant as we’d like to believe. Death loiters beside us, sometimes far too close for comfort. Indeed, that boundary can be barely perceptible… it can be practically wafer thin.
A split second’s indecision when crossing the road; the ill-advised swim just a little too far from shore; a moment of distraction when driving; or perhaps choosing to take that short cut home along the lane tonight.
The lane where I am waiting, cold steel in my hand and blood lust in my eyes.
And with every step, death grows ever closer.
RICHARD
Pink wafer biscuits
One of the constants in my life – ever since my earliest days. My grandmother used to serve them as a treat if I’d been good. You’d always see them wheeled out at church socials, reposing on china plates along with the chocolate digestives.
Yet, there was nothing to them – a couple of layers of pink cream filling, sandwiched between those unassuming delicate pink wafer fingers. And the taste… Well, even to this day, I can only describe them as the flavours of pink, and wafery!
Even so, a single bite can transport me effortlessly back to my childhood.
LIZZIE
Mr. Probitas stared at the store window.
The new notice was titled Antisocial Behavior Order, an anti-sugar diatribe.
Ever since the intake of sugar became controlled by decree, Mr. Honey’s store was in a financial crisis.
Mr. Probitas walked in.
“What’s that all about?”
“I have to close. Or I’ll be arrested…”
“Arrested?!”
Mr. Honey shrugged.
“Why?”
“For being antisocial. Here, have a wafer. Be antisocial while you can.”
It was then that Mr. Probitas and Mr. Honey started an underground movement to import wafers.
But it was not really about the wafers, was it?
CHARLIE
That’s all it took. A wafer, containing all the circuitry, was placed under the skin of the top of the hand. It was close enough to the surface so any luminescence would provide enough power.
It was still in beta, but the first mechanical brain stimulator on the market. The device would excite the cortex immediately, when activated.
My device was a transplant from a deceased donor. His device shorted and blew out a piece of skull from just above his ear. For a few seconds, the donor had an I.Q., estimated at 400, and his eyes shown like lasers.
PLANET Z
The wine represents the blood of Christ.
The wafers represent his body.
Dr. Odd pondered how to obtain both.
He ran some experiments and ended up with what he called Quantum Duplication.
With a simple set of nine-dimensional coordinates, he could flash a copy from the past into the present.
The short, hairy messiah babbled endlessly in Aramaic.
Dr. Odd smiled, and made a few more copies.
Then, he tasked the Jesuses to stomp grapes from his vineyard.
“Wine made from grapes stomped by the feet of Jesus himself.”
The ones who became exhausted or uppity went into the dough.