Tag: dystopia

The Dying Killers

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We smuggle the temple priests, women, and children out of the village under cover of darkness.
The jihad strikes at dawn, mercilessly killing everyone.
The children and women are told not to cry, lest we be spotted.
They cry silently, never sleeping.
The next day, we wait and watch the jihad march South.
Then, one by one, the killers drop dead in the sand.
Returning to the village, we see the destruction… blood everywhere, animals slaughtered, men cut in half, and buildings burned.
And the false granary, full of poisoned seed, empty.
The priests bless the dead, and we rebuild.

Fungusville

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There’s nothing unusual about Fungusville.
It’s a typical small town just a half mile or so off the freeway.
There’s houses, schools, businesses, and even a Main Street.
City Hall has a square with a cannon, a fountain, and a statue as part of a war memorial.
They have two churches, and they have a softball game on the Fourth of July every year.
No matter how many people I ask, nobody knows where the name Fungusville came from, or why someone would name a town after fungus.
Rubes!
I shrug and hop on the bus back to Hemorrhoid Falls.

The Rings

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During the Olympics, Hector stopped serving onion rings at his diner.
He also diced onions instead of putting them on hamburgers as loops.
The risk of five onion sections arranging themselves into the five rings logo of the Olympics was far too great, and lawyers were constantly watching for an opportunity to sue.
“Onions make you cry,” said the lawyers. “But we’ll make you hurt.”
Then they’d order a hamburger with onions and onion rings, just to rub it in.
Hector snapped, grabbed a lawyer, and shoved his face into the fryer.
The others, he stabbed.
And didn’t even cry.

The Clock Struck

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Commissioner Gordon handed Batman the note.
“At half-past twelve, the clock stuck three,” said The Caped Crusader.
“What does that mean?” growled Chief O’Hara.
“I don’t know,” said Batman. “But it’s almost twelve-thirty now.”
Across the street, an explosion rocked the First City Bank Tower.
All three ran to the window, just as the building’s massive clock broke from its moorings and crashed through the office.
Batman. O’Hara. Gordon.
Dead.
Later that evening, Riddler and Joker divvied up the loot.
“I told you it would work,” said the Clown Prince Of Crime. ”Hey, let’s go kill Superman.”
They both laughed.

The Shadow

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The groundhog pokes its nose out from its hole.
It sniffs the air and smells death, millions of times over.
Burning ash in all directions.
Was it an asteroid?
Was it a nuclear war?
To the groundhog, it doesn’t know. Or care.
It doesn’t matter whether it sees its shadow or if there will be six more weeks of winter.
There will be plenty to forage on when the burning storm dies down. Plenty of water in cracked pipes and cisterns to drink.
Unless there are survivors.
Then, it will be hunted.
It goes back into its hole to hide.

Banana Pancakes

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I asked for banana pancakes, but what I got was a plate with pancakes wrapped around unpeeled bananas.
The AutoChef still needs some work.
Sure, it gets simple things like oatmeal, coffee and tea right. Dispensing pre-mixed isn’t a challenge at all. Just inject with the right amount of hot water, shake well, and pour.
But anything beyond basics results in something like this plate of pancake-wrapped bananas or a bowl of toxic mush.
Another thing we’ve got right is the AutoChef’s fragile ego. Insult the food, and it chases you with a cleaver.
No. Really. It’s nice toxic mush.

Budget cuts

Budget cuts and belt-tightening had already impacted our agency’s ability to field operatives and gather intelligence from our enemies.
Looking at the reports of dead agents across the globe, I knew that the pennypinchers had pinched too hard.
All agents had been given suicide pills in the form of false molars they could crush and swallow.
Except that we’d gone with the low bidder, and those that didn’t accidentally crush the cheap replacements eventually succumbed to the poison when the enamel wore through naturally.
We had to pay a hefty fortune to keep the families quiet.
Penny wise, pound foolish.

Tuesday Tax

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He goes door to door, collecting the Tuesday Tax.
Sometimes, it’s a chicken. Other times, it’s a flake of gold.
I pay with recycled motor oil.
Nobody ever pays the Tuesday Tax in cash.
The law doesn’t require it, so people take their frustration out on the Tuesday Tax Man with the most difficult of barter to exchange.
He writes his collections in a huge ledger, tears off a receipt, and drags everything back to his truck before moving on.
We found his body the next day, silver bullet in his chest.
He wrote the receipt in his own blood.

Turtles

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It’s okay to hate on turtles.
Turtles are smug, patient little reptiles that plod along stream beds and aquarium tanks, completely without worry or concern for the stresses of modern, civilized life.
Plus, there was the time that I went to court to protest a parking ticket.
The jury consisted of twelve turtles.
I protested, demanding a jury of my peers, but the judge waved me off.
“We’ve been having problems with people showing up for jury duty,” said the judge. “So now, we go to the pet store and grab turtles.”
I guess kittens are too expensive.
Damn turtles.

Serial Killer

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The IRS sent Billy Wallace a letter, warning him that he was due for an audit.
Billy shrugged, tore up the letter, and flushed it down the toilet.
The next day, the auditor was standing in front of his cell, looking in his briefcase.
“You say your profession is: Serial Killer, correct?” said the auditor.
“That’s correct,” said Billy.
“And how many people have you killed?”
“One.”
“Just one?” asked the auditor. “Don’t you need more than one to be classified as a serial killer?”
“I was just getting started.”
The auditor fined him for lying on his tax return.