Category Archives: Fiction

Five Sentence Fiction: Words

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Photograph by Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use without permission)
The sudden explosion lit up the dusk and its thunder robbed him of his hearing as he was hurled across the dusty, gritty road; shock and shrapnel embedded its shards beneath his bloodied skin, but nothing stopped him crawling back across the detritus to circle the remains of the best friend he ever had. Confusion tore at his heart, but despite the ringing noise and acrid smoke he refused to leave, and settled mournfully in the middle of the rutted road to wait.
Black night loomed with shouts and gunshots, then chaos and blasts, and he flattened his ears and his body, and trembled by his master’s corpse. 
Dawn sneaked across the hills and he shivered in the morning cold, until soldiers, bloodied and weary, marched back along the road, and he growled, his hackles raised and ears sharp. He flinched as they approached and their brusque commands failed to touch him; it took a burly trooper’s bristly embrace and soft, whispered words to allow the dog to leave, but never forget.
go and read all the other stories…

Visual Dare: Normalcy

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Photo Source
Doris tightened her lips and clenched her buttocks as she strode purposefully forward, under her best town hat. 
The city was not the place for her. 
The bus ride was best forgotten, particularly the appalled gasps of revulsion when her goose evacuated his behind and shook his tail feathers. The marabou plumes on the chic lady’s hat shook with the same shivering rhythm, but for very different reasons, and they’d been politely ushered off to continue on foot. 
The goose followed with a surprisingly majestic gait, but his constant honking strengthened both her resolve and humiliation. She avoided bemused giggles and glanced up at the street sign before turning resolutely onto Main Street.   
Heavy, ornate signage, chandeliers and swirly scripted menus intimidated, but before she pushed through the doors with countryside naivety and offered up her fattened prize, she checked: roast goose and fois gras were still on the menu. 
(150 Words)

How can you not write about this picture? 
Go and take a look at the other great entries!

Blues Buster: A Rainy Night in Soho

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Another Blues Buster from The Tsuruoka Files, the prompt song is A Rainy Night in Soho by The Pogues and several lines from this song inspired me: ‘I’ve been loving you a long time, down all the years, down all the days, and I’ve cried for all your troubles, smiled at your funny little ways…’ and ‘Now the song is nearly over, we may never find out what it means, still there’s a light I hold before me, you’re the measure of my dreams…’

Photograph by Lisa Shambrook (please do not use without permission)

A Rainy Night in Soho

He glanced at her, his pale blue eyes tearing up as he gazed at her long hair, glowing silver in the moonlight upon the pillow. She stirred and a smile played on his lips. He wanted to reach across and move a stray lock away from her face, but didn’t want to risk waking her at such an early hour. A sigh swelled in his throat and he released it gently, shivering as his breath departed in a long wisp of smoke.
The cold penetrated his bones, even under the thick duvet, and he pulled the cover up tucking it round his shoulders. He carefully manoeuvred his body, again cautious not to disturb his lady, and settled on his side, his head gently relaxing into his flat and stained pillow. He drifted off to sleep with the beating rain drumming in his head.

She danced in his slumber, invaded his dreams with her youthful grace and honest beauty. He whirled her in his arms, up and down the rainy, glittering streets beneath the brutal neon lights and dirty windows.
Her crimson lips and tight dress won hearts and minds, and caused desire to rise through the steamy rain. He whirled her in his arms, letting her dance, and he fought her battles and defeated the dragons disguised as paramours.  He allowed her essence to soak him and he fell in love.

He awoke again, still in the depths of night. He tried to dilute the urge, but failed, and he pushed back the duvet and stepped out onto cold, hard linoleum. He hurried across the floor and down the corridor, the cold air prickling like a million tiny daggers of ice and he clicked the bathroom door closed.
Sweet relief and he moved as swiftly as he could back to bed. Sliding down beneath the covers he wriggled his toes to recirculate his chilled blood. He shivered violently as the temperature slowly rose and he gripped the duvet tight around his chin. He stared at the window, still partially lit by the roaming moon and smiled as familiar neon blue flickered in the bottom corner, from the sign on the building opposite. He sank into the mattress, feeling his body reacquaint to its accustomed hollow. His eyes gradually closed and his dream resumed.

She still danced, but this time she waltzed just out of reach, her long, black hair glinting against the stormy night, her lips smiling and teasing. He relaxed to watch and adore his queen as she stole the hearts and yearning of every man she saw. He had nothing to worry, for she returned to his embrace every night, creeping back into his arms and soul in the early hours to slake their desire.

The moon was vanquished when he woke, and salmon pink streaked through the early clouds peering in through the icy window. Frost had etched and encrusted the pane while they’d slept, and dawn’s colours danced, filtering through the oblique design.
A tired sigh escaped his mouth and he chuckled at the smoke eddying through the crisp morning air, as he turned to regard his love.
She remained asleep, her raven hair, now silver and white in dawn’s gaze, and he carefully propped his old body up on his elbow. Ravaging cold bit through his greying vest and goose-bumps exploded across his wrinkled skin, and his rheumy eyes blinked with unshed tears.
He caressed her shrunken cheek, and moved the stray lock of hair. He leaned forward and tenderly kissed her dry, cracked lips.
Grief tore through his ancient body, and he shuddered, and swirling breath danced across her peace, as his tears dropped onto her tranquil face.
Her song was done, not a note escaped her silent lips, but he gently moved from his depression in the mattress and cupped his body to hers. There he lingered, holding his love, his tears wetting the pillow and her silver hair, and in his dreams she danced…

(662 Words)
@LastKrystallos

Monday Mixer: Silver

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This is for The Latinum Vault’s Monday Mixer, write a piece in exactly 150 words using at least three of the nine prompts: a place, a thing and an adjective. This one qualifies for Overachiever as I’ve used five of the prompt words.

Photo Source: Joe Mabel on Wikimedia (cropped by Lisa Shambrook and Instagram)
Gwenllian smoothed her fingers across the filigree threads, newly set, against the burnished silver cuff and absently wiped the dusty, glinting swarf from her work table. Tears fell as she stroked the soft, pink scar running down her face, recalling the scandalous lies and trite excuses she’d offered in his protection. 
Now she hid herself away in the croft on the banks of Afon Caer and waited.
A mewling cry came from the small bedroom, and Gwenllian pulled her mind back from its dreams and stared up at the full, yellow moon.  She snuffed out her candles, grabbed the annealed bangle and hurried towards the cry, wiping her tears of hiraeth as she moved. 
She gently cwtched her daughter, placing the silver bracelet around the babe’s tiny wrist. “Ah, cariad, not long now…” She grabbed the rifle, propped by the cot, and loaded the silver bullet. “Now let him come…”
(150 Words)

Find Monday Mixer here…and take a look at the other entries…

55 Words: Recollection

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Photo Source: 55 Word Challenge
Beads of perspiration formed on her skin. It was these lonely, hot summer nights that she couldn’t bear, these balmy evenings that lengthened into humid and unbearable nights, where inky blackness served only to torment. 
She turned on her back and stared at the ceiling, reminiscing, remembering, recalling the night she handed over his name…
(55 Words)
Written for Lisa McCourt Hollar’s 55 Word Challenge

Five Sentence Fiction: Paradise

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Photograph by Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use without permission)
The moon slowly rose, lifting high over the purple mountains, casting its pink glow across the bleached land. Stars faded into an inky backdrop as the moon took its place on night’s stage. Light mists crept across the peninsula, like curtains, rising from the rocks and crevices around the base of the ridge. 
The two sated dragons met each other’s eyes and rumbled, contentment flooding their bodies. They dropped to the ground and nestled close, and allowed their dreams to guide them through the night. 
Written for Lillie McFerrin’s Five Sentence Fiction.
Read more great stories using the prompt here.

Blues-Buster: Red Right Hand

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Another of Jeff’s Blues-Buster’s, and the prompt song is the brilliant Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Red Right Hand. I was particularly caught by the lyrics: ‘…where the viaduct looms, like a bird of doom, as it shifts and cracks, where secrets lie in the border fires, in the humming wires, Hey man, you know, you’re never coming back…’
Scan by Bekah Shambrook manipulated by Lisa Shambrook (Please do not use without permission)
Red Right Hand

Jenson ran, his rasping breath burning his throat, but he ran without looking back. He’d learned long ago that looking back got you killed and that wasn’t part of his plan.
The streets were deserted, but he knew they were coming as sure as his blood raced through his burning veins.
The old town spread its fingers in narrow, contorted lanes and he knew most of them, his pursuers did not, they relied solely on the tracking device in Jenson’s stomach. He smirked wryly, barely thinking cognitively as pain seared his lungs, but aware of the irony of his enemies using the same tech he’d developed himself so long ago.
His fingers closed around a foil containing a bead of liquid purge, but he was unable to use it for fear of damaging the other prize churning within his stomach’s bile.

A helicraft whirred, not far out of range and he knew time was running out. He ducked into an alley and stared at the screen strapped to his wrist; old tech, twenty-first century tech, this time. He gazed at the flashing dots, until sure of their definite positions. Seconds later he was running again.

The arm that grabbed him came out of nowhere and he reeled, spinning, his hand ready to strike as he stumbled into a doorway.
“Shhhh!” she hissed, “it’s me!”  She twisted his wrist pulling him down into her lap.
“I thought they had you!” he whispered, his hand moving from strike to stroke as he touched her bloodied and scarred cheek.
“They did…” Her voice caressed his ear.
“How did you escape? That place is strapped down like a lunatic in a strait jacket!”
“I have my ways,” she purred and slid her hand across his inner thigh.
“No time for that!” he said regretfully, but unable to stop his lips from claiming hers.
She pulled away. “Transport, Jenson, transport!”
He chuckled. “Always a tease…we’ve got three and a half minutes…stop delaying!” He yanked her to her feet and the pair of them left the doorway, sprinting across the road towards the most abandoned part of town.
“How’re they extracting you?” she panted, “Helicraft…or something else?”
He pulled her across the road towards the old viaduct and the crumbling bridge.
The whir of the approaching helicraft erupted, destroying the silence, and Jenson pulled her across the kerb. Rotary blades thumped and the craft loomed up over the bridge like a merciless vulture eyeing its prey. Jenson’s hand wrapped around hers and they raced for sanctuary. Above them came the crackling sound of gunfire and collapsing masonry.
Beneath the arch of the bridge Jenson turned her hand palm up and placed his over hers. “What’re you doing?” She was out of breath.
“Checking!” Jenson grinned. A red glow emanated between their clasped hands. “I had to know, you could have been playing me, been one of theirs, one of his…but you’re not.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I’m the only one who knows how to mess with the chip in your hand, yours is red…as it should be. Now are you ready for change?”
“Change?” She stared at him. “I’m ready for anything, I’m a wanted woman!”
“That you are!” He whirled her round against the wall and pulled her body close, kissing her hard. “I’m leaving with everything he owns,” He patted his stomach, “and you, if you’re coming with me?”
“Like hell I am!”
“A new century… this time I’m going back to the twenty-first!” Jenson slammed his hand to the wall above her head, directly onto an ancient, peeling, red graffiti hand print. Dust choked the air, bricks distorted beneath his palm and he grinned at his companion’s shocked cry as they plunged backwards. “Geronimo!”

(622 Words)

Zombie Flash: Time is Up…

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Governor Stirland was irritated. “Put him on hold,” he said curtly and lifted his finger off the comm button. He growled and leaned back in his shiny chrome, padded leather chair. From the sixty first floor he had a commanding view, he linked his hands behind his head, and surveyed his domed and air-conditioned, stainless steel city.

The city centre was clear of the undead…completely clear.

Professor Turnbull’s concoction had changed the world and made the young Governor a rich man, a very rich man, and he was grateful, really he was, but the professor’s whiny voice was now causing him a great deal of stress.
The airborne ZV39sT had worked and the undead had vacated the cities of their own accord, and now lived peaceably in the countryside, just as it was so across the planet. As a result the rest of mankind, now of no interest to the zombified, lived beneath domed cities, and were free to come and go as they pleased with no fear of the undead.

The Governor ran his fingers through his greying hair, sighed and picked up the phone. “So what’s the problem?”

Professor Turnbull cleared his throat at the other end. “Co2 levels are critically high and we’ve already lost huge land mass due to rising sea levels.” He paused for effect, “We may have turned the zombies vegetarian, but zombie deforestation has hit ninety-five percent and we’re about to run out of oxygen!”

(242 Words)

This was written for a fun Zombie Flash Fiction Competition hosted by Holly at Confessions of a Stuffed Olive. Must be written in under 250 words and contain humerous references to zombies! Go take a look at the rest on Holly’s page…they’re great!

Five Sentence Fiction: Whisper

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Photograph by Bekah Shambrook (Please do not use without permission)
“Tell me, tell me what you see” she murmured, and I pulled the heavy fleece tighter around our shoulders as she relaxed into my arms, her grey hair tickling my stubbly chin.
“I see a huge ball of white flame, a golden orb, dancing on the horizon. The sky is on fire, and the few cotton clouds are bathed in molten bronze…” my words struggled to do the sunset justice, but she gripped my hand with such fervour, I continued to describe what I saw. “The sky’s turning indigo, from orange to violet to indigo, I can even see a few early stars, right up high…and the waves are lapping gently on the shore…”
“Ah, I can hear the ocean…” she spoke softly, her voice a reverent breeze, “What else can you see?” 
I stared at her, my hand brushing her cheek, I gazed right into her sightless eyes and whispered words formed in the soul of my heart, “I see beauty, perfect beauty…I’ve never, in my life, seen anything so beautiful…”
Lillie McFerrin’s Five Sentence Fiction – Whisper

Blues-Buster: Is This Love

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Written for Mid-Week Blues-Buster Flash Fiction Challenge Week 3 over at The Tsuruoka Files. This week’s prompt song is: Bob Marley’s ‘Este Amor (Is This Love) by Gerado Ortiz. A 500 word challenge, but anything between 300 and 700 words works! I was inspired by this section of the translated song: 
‘I want to love you and treat you right, I want to love you every day and every night, We’ll be together with a roof right over our heads, We’ll share the shelter of my single bed.’

Elena stood by the door arch, and the flames from the lantern flickered in her eyes as she stared down the dusty road into the night. Her bare feet shifted leaving scuff marks in the dirt and she cocked her head to listen to the sounds in the shack behind her. Small voices whispered and a complaint echoed. She leaned back inside and uttered instructions to share. The voices softened and faded, and she returned to her vigil.
The ground beneath her feet was pitted and worn, and her rough soles matched the patches of eroded earth. She shivered and pulled her holey shawl tighter around her shoulders, and leaned down to flick away an irritating mosquito.  Elena coughed, a sound that echoed through the night as much as it rattled through her chest, and she struggled to clear her throat.
She tapped her foot impatiently and tried to gaze further than her old eyes would see, tried to penetrate the dark indigo desert and see beyond the tall saguaro, the sentinel at the edge of the track into town. She pulled in a deep breath, shaky with worry, and leaned back against the stone doorframe. The wick in the lantern was low and the oil almost spent, but she refused to turn it out, refused to sink the track into the gloom of dusk…not yet.
A bark carried across the chill night air and resonated through her bones, and sent fear curling into the pit of her stomach.
Still she waited, aware that there was now quiet in the hovel, aware of the fatigue that chilled her fragile body, and aware of the last crust of bread and spoonful of soup sitting by the dying embers in the grate. Her belly growled.
The moon scrolled across the sky, and stars began to glimmer, and Elena wondered if time had moved too far.
She stepped out from beneath the arch and moved across the stony track, limping awkwardly, her heart sank each time the wild dog howled, and she tried to bat away the tears that hung on her lashes.
She waited, still standing firm, her resolve never wavering, despite the darkness of the night.  She stood until her feet ached and hope began to fade like morning stars.
Then she heard it, as quiet and soft as a mouse; footsteps, tiny footsteps beating against the dirt trail and her heart swelled. She shuffled towards the sound, dragging her lame foot, until a small child burst past the saguaro and ran, haloed in the moonlight, into her welcoming arms.
He wept, rubbing tired and dirty fists across his tear-stained face, and Elena hugged him close. “Hermoso niño!” she murmured, “Al fin en casa.”
After the spoonful of soup and the last crust of bread the exhausted child slipped beneath a ragged blanket on a narrow bed, with six other lost children, and slept beneath his guardian’s constant gaze.  

(488 Words)  

(For those of you needing a translation: “Hermoso niño!” – “Beautiful child!” and “Al fin en casa.” – “Home at last.”)