The Death of Walter

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Walter ran with a tough crowd.
They were the Boston Mafia, jogging through their Framingham neighborhood in the morning, bodyguards forming a protective cloud.
Once, Walter was out jogging on his own, and he crossed paths with that Mafia group.
The bodyguards checked him for weapons, recognized him from the travel agency, and invited him along.
Now, in an era of online airline reservations, Walter still got steady business from this group. Cruises and extended vacations, a little something extra for a private villa for a week.
And Walter never testified against them.
They killed him anyway.
It’s only business.

Weekly Challenge #188 – Impact

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Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number One Hundred And Eighty-Eight, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.
The topic this week was… was…. um…
It’s Impact!
The excellent theme music is by Guy David.
VOTING

Which stories were the best this week?
Steven
Norval Joe
TJ
Justin
Zachmann
Anima
JRadimus
Katharina
Planet Z
  
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Go ahead and listen to them and then vote for your favorites (multiple selections are allowed):


Steven

In 2012, the whales told us they were intelligent.
Then they told us they were causing global warming.
My roommate giggled as the whale songs were translated into the
details of the libertarian Federation of Ceteceans. He laughed harder
as the whales revealed their ongoing plan.
Carbon dioxide was the first step. Next, they would free methane
trapped at the ocean floor, spiking the temperature and turning the
Earth into… well, the Water.
“That’s horrible,” I said.
“Don’t you see the irony?” he asked. “They’re libertarians. They
don’t believe in environmental impact statements!”
I thought I could smell salt water.

Norval Joe

“Mr. Caldwell, you need to take responsibility for you actions,” the social worker had told him, just before they released him from the city jail. “You have a wife and children who want you to come home. You had a well paying responsible job. You can’t just walk away from those things.”
The words had no more impact on his mind than the cold, wet, mist that beaded on the old, filth encrusted, army field jacket.
“Responsablity is a curse. I have all of it I want,” he muttered to himself as he shuffled away down teh dismal empty street.

TJ

In the airlessness of space there’s no real sense of immediacy. People dismiss the concept of a clockwork universe absent a caretaker, but in all reality, the supernovae responsible for forging our uranium, gold and lead spun out a disc of heat and dust some 4.5 billion years ago. There was the smash that gave us our moon, then we were nudged gently into place by one or two genocidal meteors until one day, something that’s just been silently zipping along out there all this time presents our more curious primates with a dazzling lightshow and an “Earth-shattering kaboom.” Oooooooo.

Justin

“Knock-knock, it’s Johnny Copperwire!”
“Hello there Johnny, and Dex, good to see you! I’m working on this Numbing Ray. It will revolutionize the use of anesthetics in medicine and dentistry!”
“Sounds capital Professor Winston, can I try it?”
“Sure, I’ve stand there…”
“Dex’s mother isn’t going to yell at me for this, will she?”
“Now, touch your face, feel anything?”
“Nope, nothing. I can even slap myself over and over and I don’t feel anything at all!”
“It works!”
“You mean you’ve never tried it before?”
“Oh, good point. I’ll power it down… feel anything now?”
“Owwwwwww, my face hurts!”

Zachmann

I started to wonder what the impact on my life would be if I read a print book since it has been a long time since I read a book.
1) Would I pick the right book
2) Would it affect my writing
3) Would I be able to read some of it at work
So I picked a book thinking if I was not going to write a book I could read one.
1) Started reading
2) Brought to work and it had impact as it fell on wet pavement
3) Should have expected problems since book was CURSED

Anima

It’s a simple question: Paper or Plastic? Little did I know what impact my actions could have.
Choose paper, and I destroy the rainforest that holds the answer to the cancer that I now carry, unbeknownst to me. I also cause 7 people to lose their jobs; Chose plastic, and I am a heathen that honors the wishes of big oil, sucking on the teat of megaindustry. If I tote everything home in the bag that I wove out of the hemp fibers I harvested, I risk living a life of criminal farming, and of being too politically correct. ARRRGH!

JRadimus

Wind whips past his ears, thundering out everything but the snapping of his nylon suit. Pure exhilaration: that’s why he dives. Kyle never tires of the initial thrill of leaping into open air. But that thrill was immediately crushed by an icy horror tearing through him. He had pulled the rip cord, but nothing had happened.
The mental impact of his new reality would be nothing to the physical impact of the ground’s reality, now rushing unnecessary, unwanted detail at his eyes. He whispers a prayer, hoping being closer to Heaven will help. He grips the emergency cord, and pulls.

Katharina

I remembered this feeling… It was like a wonderful memory, so amazing that it almost felt unreal. This overwhelming feeling of excitement and tension was creeping up behind me. Oh, I knew exactly what it was.
My hand reached carefully behind me, unsure what it would grasp. Even though I expected naked skin, it still shot an electric shock through my body.
“Turn around”
I felt my feet being swept away.
The force that I hit the bed with took my breath away.
Still, it was nothing compared to the sheer force of the impact he had entering me.

Planet Z

The team chartered a luxury jet from an Dubai businessman, who was once a high-flier but now looking to make a quick buck to repay some shady loans.
The players sprawled on the sofas and lounge chairs, throwing footballs around and laughing.
“This is way better than that shithole that’s sponsoring the Super Bowl,” said the coach, holding a glass of brandy and a cigar.
Except that hotels don’t crash.
Everyone died on impact.
The league declared a forfeit, Vegas paid off big for the underdog.
And the businessman bought a smaller jet with his winnings and insurance settlement.

Wishbone

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Tommy is my older brother.
He’s a bully. And a jerk.
Every year when it’s time to break the wishbone, he puts his thumb on it so it breaks in his favor.
This year, I made a wish:
I want him to be gone.
Totally gone.
When it came time to snap the wishbone, I started on it with my thumb high on the bone.
We struggled, and then I heard the snap.
I opened my eyes.
I had the bigger piece of the wishbone.
And… and…
My dad held the other piece.
“Congratulations,” he said, smiling. “Make a wish?”

Cashews

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Yes, this is a magical nut dish that I am posting on eBay.
I put peanuts in the nut dish, close the lid, and they turn into cashews when I lift the lid.
I don’t like cashews. I like peanuts.
Turning peanuts into cashews has no appeal to me.
Sure, it’s cool that it changes one thing into another in a manner that defies explanation, but as many times as I show my friends and scientists, I still end up with mounds and mounds of cashews.
And I don’t like cashews.
Want a nut dish? And want some cashews, too?

Funeral barge

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I watch a milk carton boat float down the bayou, a dead hamster laying inside.
I walk upstream until I come to a house.
A boy on the front steps, crying.
“What’s wrong?”
“The hamster died,” he whines. “Mom beat me.”
I knock on the door, and a woman answers “What do you want?”
A younger boy is behind her, also crying.
“Why did you beat a kid for his hamster dying?” I asked.
She says “It was his little brother’s. Now butt out.” And slams the door.
I walk down the steps, and punch the kid in the face.

Static Wave

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Instead of saying her first word, my daughter opened her mouth and a wave of static filled the room.
The lights flickered for a few seconds before they caught and stayed lit.
I was expecting a Mommy or Daddy, like most kids, but the doctors warned us that the high percentage of nanoparticles in her system may alter her development slightly.
My wife and I said “Good, Marcie!” and tried to be supportive, but her grimace matched mine.
Still, despite the setback, not bad for 5 days old.
We’ll finish uploading Calculus tonight and start work on her Quantum Physics.

High-Five

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Grampa only had one last bit of advice for me before he died: “Never high-five a pirate.”
Then, he died.
Grampa was always good for stupid, useless advice.
According to him, you should never cook sea urchins on a Thursday. As if I’d cook them on any day of the week? They’re disgusting!
He also said that Van Gogh was smart. Cutting off your ear to impress a chick is a lot smarter than cutting off his balls like Picasso did.
“But Picasso never castrated himself,” I said.
Grampa just lit his pipe, blew a cloud of smoke, and winked.

The Diploma

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Okay, so I hit it off with this chick at a bar, we’re both drunk as hell, and she says come back to my place.
So, we do.
I don’t know how we got there, but we got there.
We both took our clothes off, and… we…
Agree we’ll do it in the morning. Just too damn drunk.
I wake up eight hours later, and…
What the hell is her name?
I look around, and her medical degree is over the bed.
Aha!
She wakes up, I say her name, and…
She goes by her middle name.
Oops.
I lose.

Weekly Challenge #187 – Hospitality

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Welcome to the Weekly Challenge Number One Hundred And Eighty-Seven, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.
The topic this week was… was…. um…
It’s Hospitality!
The excellent theme music is by Guy David.
VOTING

Which were the best stories?
Anima
Steven
TJ
Katharina
Norval Joe
JRadimus
Justin
Planet Z
  
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Go ahead and listen to them and then vote for your favorites (multiple selections are allowed):


Anima

Zlinka dreamed of working in the hospitality industry; She learned the finest cooking in France and Austria, diplomacy from various parliamentarians, and how to hold a proper tea from the Queen herself.
But it was not enough – Once Zlinka had her own inn, she discovered that travelers are whiners – the lamb at dinner was too raw, the straw beds too moldy, the lounge too dank and smelly…
What did they really expect from an Ogre? After 4 miserable years, Chez Grendl closed its doors.
Zlinka is much happier as a middle manager overseeing loans at the local bank.

Steven

“There, grandpa,” Mike said, his young hand releasing the wood tile.
“I spelled PIT. How many points is that?”
Grandfather looked at the board. “I think it’s ten.”
“Did you play this game a lot with grandma before she died?”
“Yes. We played most nights.” Grandfather put his tiles down on the
board. “Hospital.”
The boy frowned and hummed, then his face lit up as he put down his
letters. “Hospitality,” he said.
“Congratulations,” Grandfather said. “You win!”
As they left the room, they left behind the game board. There, for a
little while, hospitality was spelled with two e’s.

TJ

I wasn’t born in a barn. My mother raised me just fine, and indeed a coworker’s 50th birthday is a milestone affair, a thing to be celebrated. I agree with all of these things. And it’s true that Phil did push just the tiniest bit too hard on the RSVP, but I honestly couldn’t think of anything else I’d be doing on a Saturday afternoon so I blurted out “Of course!” and yes, prayed that something, anything would come up. It didn’t. So here I am. The only one. At the home of Phil who oh, I didn’t mention? Nudist.

Katharina

“Welcome to my humble abode.” She motioned the young man into her house.
The weather was horrible, a thunderstorm unseen in years. He was soaking wet and dripped on the floor, leaving behind huge puddles of water. Shaking and obviously cold, he was thankful for the pot of soup he soon had between his hands. It was a rich soup, with potatoes, noodles and a lot of vegetables. The clothes she had given him were a bit too big for him – he figured the man in the house must be rather tall.
“What is your name anyway, young lad?”
“Hänsel”
“Oh, how fitting! I needed fresh meat anyway…”

Norval Joe

Making a living as a traveling minister during the great depression was difficult. He went to the south, hoping to find a humble, accepting feild of labor.
He turned his attention to the people he had grown up calling the “Mulato’s”.
“You’ve come in time for dinner,” he was told at the first house he visited.
“I’d heard of southern hospitality, but I didn’t expect this,” he said as a girl washed his hands, trimmed his nails and brushed his hair.
In the kitchen the mother made a gumbo, the grandmother used his hair and nails t0 make a doll.
If I win, how about, donkeys

JRadimus

In some cultures, it is a terrible insult to your host if you eat all the food on your plate at dinner. It says, “You are a stingy and unwelcoming host.” In other cultures, it is great praise. It says, “You are a generous and gracious host.”
As the honored guest at a ceremony of the Korowai of Papua New Guinea, I do not know which custom they follow. Frankly, I could not care less how much of me they leave on their plates. It is hardly the debate to have with oneself in the broth, amongst the root vegetables.

Justin

Johnny made sure his jaw still worked and stood. Doctor Sinusoid stood on the deck, small and red faced.
“Welcome to my airship, Mr. Copperwire. I trust my assistant Palms greeted you nicely?”
“If you call giving me several high-fives to my face nice, then I don’t want to suffer your hospitality.”
“Well, I had to bring you here on my terms, of course.”
“But I’ll be leaving on mine.”
Johnny tossed a sachet at Sinusoid. Palms swatted it into powder.
Sinusoid and Palms sneezed and fell over gasping.
“Now to disassemble the sine wave death ray without any opposition.”

Planet Z

I work in a hospital. I run network systems for the IT Department.
Medical records? Scheduling?
All computers.
Sadly, Hospitality and Hospital IT are mutually exclusive.
We’re well aware that the time it takes a system to reboot may kill someone. Or, if it’s the networked pharmacy database corrupting, an entire floor can get wiped out.
Everything is a crisis. Everything is important. It’s written over all of our monitors.
You do not need to keep reminding us.
It’s rude. It’s repetitive. It’s patronizing. And it wastes valuable time that should be spent fixing the problem.
It’s just downright… inhospitable.

Time Kennel

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I think putting my dogs in the kennel while I travel is cruel.
So, I put the dogs in the Time Kennel.
It’s not like the Pet Freeze service. Those folks are butchers, freezing and thawing pets. They end up shattering or roasting them half the time.
No, these folks use a quantum bridge tunnel to send your pet into the future, right to the time of your return from a vacation or business trip.
To them, you’ve never left.
They lose fewer pets. Although, when they do, at least your dog has a fighting chance in the year 5000.