String Theory Adventures

Captain Zerxes watched as three Galactic Frigates closed in on their position. With the hyperdrive destroyed, escape at light speed was impossible.

"Incoming!" shouted Commander Bishop. Three Deuterium Torpedoes had locked onto their position.

“Prepare for impact,” the captain ordered.


“We’ll be destroyed for sure.”

Zerxes could at least take solace in his first officer’s death. He was always stating the obvious. It was very annoying.

“Don’t forget,” the captain lectured. “We may have failed in this timeline, but upon entering the worm hole we created multiple realities. We will succeed in at least one of them. It’s simple mathematics.”

Genre: Science Fiction

I'm Engaged To A Dentist

Meg looks across the room, and sees two beautiful blue eyes staring back at her. She falls in love.

Meg and Tom are perfect opposites. She loves cats. He loves dogs. He prefers TV night, and she likes dancing. But love conquers all.

Then Meg discovers that Tom is not really a dentist. He is a top-secret agent for a top-secret government spy organization. Meg doubts she can ever trust him again.

She calls off the wedding. But when terrorists kidnap her, and Tom risks his life to save not only Meg, but Fluffy too, they live happily ever after.

Genre: Romantic Comedy

Winning Isn't Everything

Eddie looked at the shot clock. Ten seconds remained, trailing by one.

He would take the last shot himself. No one else could be trusted. His teammates had already come close to ruining everything.

With five seconds left, he crossed over to his left hand, and drove into the lane. Three players collapsed on him. From the corner of his eye, he saw Ryan wide open.

Instead of passing, he forced the shot. It bounced violently off the rim. They lost the championship.

Eddie hid a smile. They may have lost the game, but he had just won 50,000 dollars.

Genre: Sports

Black Bart

Black Bart rode into town on his black horse, his black hat hanging low over his eyes. He had traveled two weeks to Ingalls, and the legends seemed true, with more saloons than shops, and not a lawman in sight.

Bart headed directly to the Tanglefoot, the most famous gambling establishment in all of Oklahoma. His brother spent most of his time there, and all of his money. The shootout, if necessary, would take place inside.

He was under strict orders from his mother. Bring home his brother, or die trying. Better to be shot here than disappoint his mother.

Genre: Western

The Ghostly Buccaneer

The wind whipped at my tattered jacket sleeve. The unholy mixture of salt, blood and sweat sickened me. My severed stump floated on the waves, sailing true north, until the menacing visage of the great white crested the surface and swallowed my dearly departed appendage.

Across the water, standing astern, laughing, the ghostly flicker of the Buccaneer gripped my eye. But with relief I heard his mast crashing into the sea. Our gamble had worked. The Hell Frigate drifted away helplessly.

The hunt was just getting started. I knew it would continue throughout the Seven Seas and into my nightmares.

Genre: Pirates

News: January Is Genre Month

Happy new year!

The month of January has officially been dubbed Genre Month. Each story this month will fall into a specific genre, whether it's a western, a mystery, a romantic comedy, or James Joyce.

If you have any suggestions for genres you would like to see me tackle, let me know. Or perhaps you have your own 100 word genre piece you'd like to submit. I encourage you all to join in the 100 word fun.

Mr. Flanagan’s Lawn Gnomes

Mr. Flanagan's yard was famous for its lawn gnomes. Every child on the block knew the tiny mischief-makers loved to drag unwary passersby into the yard and subjugate them to all manners of horror.

Bobby O'Shea supposedly disappeared while picking crabapples straight from the branch. Seamus Kennedy refused to say how he got his broken foot, but Mr. O’Leary had forced him to deliver groceries to Flanagan’s front door the day before. The gnomes bullied away lunch money and tricked children out of their shoes.

In hindsight, using Flanagan’s hedge as our homerun fence was almost certainly a bad idea.

A Matter Of Life And Death

I was moments away from death. The oxygen in my blood stream was starting to expire.

In reaction, my diaphragm flattened, almost instinctively. The simultaneous contraction of my external intercostal muscles forced my lungs to expand. My ribs elevated, extending the length of my thorax.

All this action, seemingly involuntary, but triggered by long forgotten impulses, had decreased my internal intrapulmonary pressure. My body had established a new pressure gradient from the outer atmosphere to my alveoli, causing air to be sucked inwards.

I had once again successfully executed the carefully calibrated intake of oxygen and nitrogen into my lungs.

Riding The Rails

Whenever I see a steam engine locomotive, I think of hoboes. Hopping on boxcars, riding the rails, free to travel the entire country, taking orders from no one.

As a child, I dreamed of life as a hobo. On Halloween, I would dress up in a tattered jacket, cut the fingers from my wool gloves, and go begging for candy. We once rode the Amtrak to Chicago, and I tried to board the freight car.

I have since learned that hobo life is not so romantic after all. Hoboes are just homeless alcoholics like the one who murdered my father.

Triassic Park

“I've got a great idea for a movie. It's about a scientist, who discovers a way to clone dinosaurs from their DNA. He gathers experts from all over the world, and together they build the world’s first dinosaur amusement park on a remote island.

“Everything is wonderful, but the scientist finds he can’t control nature. The dinosaurs break out of their enclosures, and begin rampaging. The most dangerous are the small dinosaurs, because they are faster and it’s easier for them to prey on humans."

“You mean like Jurassic Park?”

“I guess, kind of. But mine doesn’t star Jeff Goldblum.”