Adventure Prone

“Careful!” warned the attendant. “Not as cute as popular opinion has you believe.”

The visitor wheeled out of the gas-station. Blue skies and folksy music accompanied him into the countryside.

New country, new job, new adventure… With a friend’s help he restored his confidence following a wrenching divorce.

The visitor stopped abruptly. A mob of kangaroos blocked his lane.

“Be patient,” he told himself, waiting for the animals to move away on their own. When they did he stroked the dog on the passenger seat beside him.

Splashes of color painted the sky as they rode into the setting sun.

From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs

Trait

This is a strange scenario where she turned around to see if the guy that she dated was still around or not. He was there, but she lost interest. Not fully, but with the arrival of a past partner things changed. She was into him but yeah now someone else was there to share the attention too. She was not sure if she should move forward with the one she dated. A date with the same mate? Is too fate? Or, too late? Next, is a date with either of the soulmate? Or, let fate be the cupid's old trait.

From Guest Contributor Preeti Singh

Preeti is a Freelance French Interpreter, author, newbie script writer, and likes to humm and strum her guitar.

In A Waymo

The doors automatically lock as we settle into the Waymo self-driving car riding to the restaurant from the hotel. It’s strange riding without a driver. The Waymo jolts to a stop in the middle of the street; its computers seem confused by the police cruisers. Heavily armed cops bang on the windows yelling, open for a drug search. Not knowing how to unlock the doors and looking around, there’s a black bag on the floorboard from the last passenger. There was no driver to remove it before we got in. Gasping awake, I throw the bedside lamp at the window.

From Guest Contributor Michael C. Roberts

Getting Off The Island

“What's the matter, Mel?”

“I'm trying to get help for us, Charlie.”

“But I already put a letter in a bottle and threw it in the ocean.”

“What'd it say?”

“I wrote – ‘HELP, WE'RE ON A DESERT ISLAND. ALL WE HAVE TO EAT ARE COCONUTS AND WASHED-UP FISH.’ Then I gave them our last coordinates before the boat sank.”

“But it didn't work.” Mel had a point. They were still eating coconuts and fish heads. “That's why I've written this manuscript. People should respond to a manuscript.”

“But will it fit in a bottle, Mel?”

“Well, Charlie…That's my problem.”

From Guest Contributor David Sydney

For the prompts Manuscript and Letters

Adrenaline

Bullets passed by my head in a blur, and I had only one chance to make a run for it.

I hid behind the bushes with soldiers’ lifeless bodies nearby, a sitting duck waiting to be devoured. I took deep breaths, counted to ten, then ran and shot in the air at anything that moved.

I had to make it back to my family. My wife’s sky-blue eyes, flowing brown hair and son’s quick wit pictured in my mind, gave me the adrenaline I needed.

Chaos ensued and men started shooting, but I kept going.

I made it. Then collapsed.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Drone

Have you felt like someone was following you and when you turned around nobody was there, but you were worried they were still behind you? Wherever you turned, your unseen stalker always managed to keep just out of sight?

I bring this up because for several months I've been followed by a constant humming, a droning I can't shake. Almost like tinnitus but it's coming from behind me, even though there's nothing there.

Except it turns out I really am being followed by a surveillance drone. We all are these days.

So the good news is I'm not going crazy.

Said The Spider To The Fly

“Give me $50,” said the spider to the fly.

“That’s not how this scene usually starts,” said the fly.

“I know; I’m trying something new here.”

“Okay, sorry. Start again?”

“Give me $50,” said the spider to the fly.

The fly patted itself. “I don’t have any cash on me.”

“Venmo works.”

The fly searched itself again. “Oh, right, I don’t have a phone.”

The spider tore open its silk pouch, looked inside, then hid the pouch behind its back. “Neither do I.”

“What’s in the pouch?” asked the fly.

“Never mind. Let’s just do the usual. I’ll start over...”

From Guest Contributor Tara Campbell

Tara (www.taracampbell.com) is a writer, teacher, Kimbilio Fellow, and fiction co-editor at Barrelhouse. She teaches flash and speculative fiction, and is the author of two novels, two hybrid collections, two short story collections, and a chapbook of sestinas. Additional publication credits include Masters Review, Wigleaf, Electric Literature, CRAFT Literary, Uncharted Magazine, Daily Science Fiction, Strange Horizons, and Escape Pod/Artemis Rising.

Instructions For Life After Life

Cast my ashes into an Atlantic gust alongside pelagic birds soaring, sleeping.

Watch them disappear over rogue waves.

Mourn me with salt-stung eyes and encyclopedias of words left unspoken.

Celebrate me with a frenzied fiddle and jittery jig.

Find me in the memory of a parting embrace.

Hear me in sweet words whispered in dark spaces.

Take solace knowing you, too, will one day suffer the pyre.

Picture your ashes strewn to the wind’s caprices.

Believe in an eternal afterlife of repurposed atoms.

Let us rest, not in peace, but spiraling together in an infinite universe pulsating with ancient energies.

From Guest Contributor Elizabeth Murphy

In The Museum

“It's tough being a museum worker, Ed.”

“Yeah, but somebody has to take care of these letters and manuscripts.”

Mel and Ed were two workers in the Antiquities Section.

“No, I mean the flies. These ancient letters are really worthless at swatting the flies in here.”

The museum had a lot of flies.

“You shouldn't be using ancient letters for killing flies, Ed.”

“No?”

“No way…See that one on the table there.”

The creature had a bulbous head.

“You should drop a heavy manuscript on it…Like this.”

He found the older the manuscript, the more squashed the fly.

From Guest Contributor David Sydney

For the prompts Manuscript and Letters

A Blow To The Head

Justin never saw what hit him. Last he remembered, he was walking down the street and felt a sudden blow to the head, then everything went black.

He awoke inside what he could only assume was a dream. It was a magical land filled with all manner of exotic animals. Many of them had wings and were flying about, while others were swimming in tanks of water or prowling inside cages. There were balloons and children and even a colorful train.

Several sets of eyes were staring down at him with concern.

"Where am I?"

"You're at the city zoo."