No Paradise

We left our gear on the shore and braved the jungle. Verdant, mossy plants, swollen fruits, normal snakes and spiders. All expected. But that smell. Like sulfur. Why? As earth and rocks piled up it permeated everything. It coated our hair and settled into the weave of our clothes. Warnings went unheeded. When we summited, it was too late. The crag gave way to a cavernous cleft. It glared a stony glare. Then the ground shuttered. Then it trembled. In those final fleeing moments, choked in smoke, death raining down, we understood the island's ancient name: The Great Giant's Buttocks.

From Guest Contributor Nicholas De Marino

Stressful Day

There were more than twenty people in the crowd a little distance away from where I was standing. I shouted, but none could hear. A huge rolling tide swept me, I was choking. I could not feel anything.

I was holding on to the branch of a tree. Feeling so lucky to be alive, I walked a little distance.

There were snakes of all kinds along the path that led to a house. I was terrified.

Next morning, I went to an analyst and asked him the meaning of this dream. He said, “You indeed had a very stressful day.”

From Guest Contributor Thriveni C. Mysore.

The Face That Launched A Thousand Ships

On July 24, 1914, a disenchanted Will Schutz, filled with animosity towards Napoleon III, defenestrated him from the top of Prague’s Town Hall. This led Joan of Arc to rally the Huguenot forces and lay siege to the proud city of Ilium.

Joan, due to a congenital defect, was born with snakes instead of hair, and a visage so awful to behold that men were forced to do her awful bidding, thus saddling her with the moniker of the Face That Launched a Thousand Ships.

Needless to say, these ships were targeted by German U-boats and sunk almost immediately.

The End.

From Guest Contributor, Boris Gump