The Scapegoat

God watched Abraham carry his son Isaac up the mountain.
“Seriously?” mumbled Jesus. “You going to let him to this?”
God tried to stifle a laugh. “Nah, I’m just testing him.”
“Dad,” said Jesus. “You’re a dick.”
God scowled. “Oh, shut up. I’ll stop him before he stabs the kid.”
“Would you do this kind of thing to me?” asked Jesus.
“Of course not,” growled God.
Abraham put down his son and felt around for his knife.
Shit. Left it at home.
So, he picked up the kid and dashed his brains out on the rocks.
“Oh fuck,” said God.

Spare keyboard

Once, I spilled coffee in my computer keyboard, and I couldn’t wash it out. The keyboard was ruined.
I didn’t have access to an office to borrow a replacement keyboard.
It was over Thanksgiving weekend, back before the Black Friday phenomenon, so stores were closed for two whole days.
Ever since, I’ve kept a spare keyboard and mouse on my closet shelf.
And spare ammunition.
And meals ready to eat.
And…
I’d better not say more. Someone might hear and want to steal my emergency supplies.
I’d better shut down the generator. Fuel’s scarce these days.
Do you hear zombies?

Imaginary

Do imaginary children worry their imaginary parents when they have real friends?
I tried to ask my imaginary friend Steve, but he kept insisting that he was real.
“Oh, come on, you’re not real,” I said. “My parents don’t let me have real friends because I bite them.”
Steve insisted that he was real. “They tell you I’m not because my parents don’t want you biting me.”
“Aha! I’m right! They do worry!”
Steve shook his head, and went back to playing with his Tinkertoys.
I reached for the Tinkertoys… but my tentacles passed through them.
I hate being imaginary.

Provide

When people say God will provide, I ask them what God will provide.
They never have a specific answer.
So, I ask “Will God provide Pop Tarts?”
They usually say “No.” or “Probably not.” However, this one time they said “No.” and God interrupted us, and He said “”Hey, guys, oddly enough, I have some Pop Tarts.” And He put the box of Pop Tarts on the table.
They were cherry-flavored.
“My favorite,” I said. “Thanks, God.”
“You’re welcome,” said God. And He vanished.
I put them in the toaster, but it was broken.
That’s okay. They’re good untoasted, too.

Loyalties

People often accuse me of divided loyalties, but that’s mathematically incorrect.
Loyalties add, not divide. Instead of being loyal to one, you’re now loyal to two.
How loyal you are, well, that’s another axis of measurement. Not our concern here.
You might think they multiply, multiplication being the opposite of dividing, but it’s easy to mistake multiplication for addition.
Especially with two and two. The results may be the same, but the methods are different.
No, loyalties do not divide or multiply. Instead, they add.
Or, in your case, what with all this annoying stupid questioning and harassment, they subtract.

Weekly Challenge #475 – THE TENTH ANNIVERSARY

Despite everything Fate threw at me this weekend, here it is and here you are.

Let’s make it happen, cap’n.

NOTE: The first 22 minutes are me rambling, ranting, and gushing. If that’s not your thing, skip ahead.

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

This is 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:

What’s the next Weekly Challenge? Come to the website and subscribe to the feed to find out!

Electrics

MUNSI

Happy Anniversary

By Christopher Munroe

Ten years ago today a man had a dream that he would write a 100-word story a day, every day, forever.

They may have called him mad, but here he is a decade later, keeping up the pace he’s set for himself, providing us our daily story sustinence.

And we, his Sunday writers, have joined him, pledging ourselves to his quest, writing our prompts and sending them in, rain or shine, without end as the years go by.

Because he won’t be done until the day he dies.

And if we ever want to stop, we have to kill him…

JEFFREY

Beginnings and Endings
by Jeffrey Fischer

Beginnings of stories are often the hardest to write. For his Game of Thrones series, George R.R. Martin had to write but one beginning that served him for thousands of pages. Marcel Proust, same thing. A 100 word story? A new beginning every week. Clearly the tougher job.

We have the better of the other side of the process, though. Will Martin ever finish his epic? Robert Jordan never did, and had to have Brandon Sanderson finish the Wheel of Time saga. But a drabble… well, the odds are pretty good that the same author can begin and finish his masterpiece. Unless dinner intervenes, of course.

Language
by Jeffrey Fischer

Language is infinitely malleable. Said one way, a word can have one meaning. Said with a different inflection, the same word can have the opposite meaning. Metaphors can embed themselves so deeply in the culture that a phrase can have meaning only as metaphor – we know what handling with kid gloves means, but few connect the phrase to goats.

I work with lawyers, who are masters at making words mean what they want the words to mean. Bill Clinton infamously said, “It depends what the meaning of ‘is’ is.” My lawyers aim for Clintonian heights when part of their boilerplate language reads “The words ‘and’ and ‘or’ are to be taken in their disjunctive and conjunctive meanings.” Yes, I work with people who believe “and” means “or” and vice-versa. No wonder I’m often confused.

RICHARD

Urban Legend

Ever wondered where urban legends come from?

Those stories of knife-wielding maniacs hiding in the back seat; alligators in the sewers, and waking in the bath to find you’re missing a kidney… Stories you know can’t possibly be true, but they might just be?

They must come from somewhere, and I know just where that somewhere is!

Every one of those myths is based on a story idea that I’ve had, scribbled down on a post-it note, which has later mysteriously disappeared after my agent has called to see me.

It’s not exactly how I planned being published!

TOM

Rocky the Barking Squirrel

Rocky moved in last week. Fuckn brave squirrel considering the 12 cats who live at different points of the deck. We haven’t seen a squirrel about in over 20 years. It seems to be perpetually pissed off, barks at on you like: “what the fuck you look at monkey boy?” Must say he quite good at leaping from limb to limb in the smallest forest in North America. Since most of the cats are well over 18 years old Rocky might well make it. If Rocky start getting those pinecone at the 60 foot level I’ll be one happy camper.

The Pistachios are on the Front Seat

Of late I have been drifting away from my local church. But from time to time I will run into a person I’ve shared a pew with, in the store, at the movies, or the farmer’s market. It’s unusually awkward and full of gaps in the conversation. In an effort to find common ground I remember the person I’m talking to is fond of pistachios. “We going to Santa Rosa I’ll bring back some pistachios.” “Oh don’t do that, I’m short of cash.” I smile and tell them I’m not listening. They frown. Sometime doing good it like pulling teeth.

Lincoln Lincoln I’ve been thinkin

The war was going rather slow this week and Lincoln found he had some free time on his hands, so from under his desk he pulled the old Double XX and took a double pull. Sitting on his desk was a piece of Tennessee Hickory, a toy for Tad; Abe had been carving on for weeks. Ironically it was a bust of Booth.

“Should I whittle or sand?” pondered Abe.

The more he debated the drunker he got. In the end the angels of his better nature directed him to whittle.

A Souse divided against itself can not Sand

Epistemology

“Build a boat,” said the voice.

“You said you would never flood the earth,” said the man.

“I lied,” said God.

“You can’t lie,” yelled the man.

“Oh, like I can’t create a stone

so heavy I can’t lift it” whined God.

Suddenly a granite form the size

of the moon appeared over the man.

“Take it,” said God.

“What” cried the man.

“Hold out your hand.”

commanded God.

The man did and the stone

felt lighter than a feather.

“You couldn’t lift this?”

“Idiot, God does have hands.

Now go build that boat.”

The man walked away completely stoned.

JERRY

Sorry Laurence, but this entire week, for some reason, the well has gone dry and my mind is a blank. No ideas about what to say or how to say it. This week has been a real drag and the old wheels are just not turning. You gave us free will to write anything at all for your tenth anniversary pod cast and I, to my shame, can think of not one subject on which to write. I know I am a disappointment to you as I am to myself and so, no, wait I can write 100 words about….

SERENDIPITY

10 Year Anniversary

Can’t believe we stayed together so long, especially with all your complaining.

I could never do anything right, or come up to your exacting standards – no matter how hard I tried, you always found fault and put me down.

I stuck with it though, year after year, after year. Can you believe we’ve been together for ten years now?

It was hard at first, but I stuck with it and I found ways to cope. Although – to be fair – you’ve been much quieter these last few years… ever since I cut out your tongue and chained you in the basement.

—

The Weekly Challenge

I hate Facebook, and I loathe the people who can’t live without it.

That’s why I created the Weekly Challenge – call it an experiment in social engineering…

Every week, I post a challenge and those idiots stupid enough to rise to the task are rewarded with my Facebook friendship.

The challenges were simple at first – steal a bicycle; punch an old lady; poison a puppy… but soon I was inciting torture and murder… and people were doing it.

I’m still not sure what my crime actually was, but when they caught up with me, I was sent down…

For ten years.

—

Whatever the hell I want

He was the uncooperative type – the sort for whom normal punishment for a life misspent was pointless.

“So what should I do with you?” I asked, as he stood arrogantly before me

“Whatever the hell you want” came the reply.

I smiled. This was going to be fun.

“So be it… the hell that I have chosen is this:

I’m returning you to the mortal world, where you will write for my amusement. You will write a hundred-word story every day of your life: every day, until the day you die.

And you’ll write them, in your own blood!”

ZACKMANN

“You want to get out of that cell?” asked a small man in a suit.

“That’s my fairy godfather.” said the troll.

“”Yes, I am and I will get you all out of that cell by turning the bars into cheese singles.” he said.

Matt looked at the bars and said “I can’t believe this is real.”

“It’s definitely not real.” responded fairy godfather “It’s processed American.”

Matt replied “I’m not sure I should go through with this man. I’ve always had trouble with singles bars.”

“Oh, come on. As as fairy godfather troll, I’m to protect the rightfully accused.”

ANIMA

The Triathlete

Exhausted, I fall on the sofa and gulp down my recovery drink. 11 long and slow miles are now done, and I am tired but happy. One more weekly goal accomplished.

I am what I consider a triathlete. Mostly I try to run (slowly), I try to swim (slightly better than a rock), and I try to bike (downhill is better than uphill). I have little natural ability, other than refusing to accept defeat or pay attention to the nay-sayers who think I should act my age and mind the grandchildren.

But now I have 3 marathon finisher medals, so there! :P

LIZZIE

Cake?

When she dropped her cake, a murmur of excitement spread through the room. Miss Perfect had messed up. When she picked up the smashed pieces of cake and tried to put them back together on the plate, everyone chuckled; everyone except him, the stranger with the pierced nose. He walked up to her slowly, sat on the floor and got a few pieces that were still scattered about. “Cake?” he asked the crowd. “No? Your loss.” Since then, once a year, the two of them smash a cake to pieces and ask “Cake? No?” to reply in unison “Your loss!”

TURA

1. On Obedience

General Wei journeyed with his army to inspect the state of the people. At the town of Xiin he demanded passage. The governor of that town said, “See! The gates lie open to you, and none shall obstruct your path.”

General Wei then demanded supplies for his army. The governor replied, “We will provide whatever you need, at the army price decreed by the emperor.”

Then General Wei ordered the governor executed and the town burned, saying, “An excess of obedience is rebellion. Willing servitude weakens the state. Only when the people are compelled against their will is order maintained.”

———

2. Concerning Heavenly and Earthly Virtue

The Emperor decided to move the capital from Sheng-tzu to Sheng-nieh. Secretaries created plans to dismantle every building, from the imperial palaces down to the labourers’ huts, and transport them fifty miles east, where the terrain at Sheng-nieh would be excavated and built up to replicate the topography of Sheng-tzu.

General Wei said, “The conception of Heaven exceeds the capacity of Earth.” Then he executed the secretaries and destroyed the plans, substituting a ritual observance of withdrawing a single nail from each building and hammering it back in, and redrawing maps to show the capital at its new official location.

NORVAL JOE

When Dergle received the invitation to his ten year high school reunion, he threw it away. “No one I want to see there.”
“Aw, come on,” Bambi said. “It should be fun to see your old friends. I’ll go with you, if you want.”
Dergle spent the entire night watching Bambi laugh and joke with all of her friends and eventually explain that she graduated in 2008. It was Dergle who was a member of their graduating class.
When he smiled and said hello his classmates typically scratched their heads and asked if he’d been in their wood shop class.

PLANET Z

Writers

So you’re wondering why I’m holding out a blank sheet of paper as we walk along this alley.
That’s because there’s nothing more formidable to a writer than a blank sheet of paper. Or a deadline, but it’s hard to wave a deadline around at a rampaging pack of angry writers.
They think a blank sheet of paper is the most awful and daunting thing in the world, more dangerous than garlic or a cross to vampires.
What? Did you hear that?
I think I hear writers! Dangerous writers!
Hold out this paper, and make haste for the stationery shop!

Bars and cords

Some people have just one cord for their phone and they bring it with them everywhere they need it.
I’m not one of those kind of people.
I have a cord on my nightstand, a cord at the coffee table where I use my laptop at home, a cord in my backpack, and a cord at my desk at work.
I don’t know whether this means that I’m paranoid, lazy, or wasteful with money, but I know that anywhere I go, I’ve got a spare cord available when I need it.
Too bad I never have any bars.
Fucking Verizon.

Birds

You know that song, “Why do birds suddenly appear?”
Well, I know why birds suddenly appear every time you are near. It’s obvious.
It’s all that birdseed you covered yourself with.
How did you get it to stick to your body?
Peanut butter?
Honey?
Baby oil?
I hope you’re not allergic.
Not only does that crap attract birds, but there’s a large population of squirrels and chipmunks and other varmints following you around.
Okay, so some of them eat the seeds you’re leaving behind you, but the ones that crawl up your legs… aren’t you worried about rabies or scratches?

Casting Call

Sally was a great singer, but a lousy actress, and she was ugly as hell.
Denise was a great actress, but her singing was awful, and she wasn’t much to look at.
Tracy looked amazing, but she couldn’t sing or act her way out of a paper bag.
All three showed up to the casting call.
The producer hired Sally to perform on the soundtrack. Then, he hired Denise to work with the stop-motion capture group.
What he did with Tracy, well, let’s just say that she ought to have a pimp instead of an agent.
The movie bombed spectacularly.