The night before they were married her husband, Ralph, told his fiancée that he was a werewolf. Mrs Barnes was fearlessly in love and didn’t see the harm in a little extra hair and bloodlust now and then. It would take forward planning and organisation, but it was manageable, and once they’d developed a routine, it was just another thing for a young wife to get used to.
And so it was. They lived happily and quietly with similar, if not the same sort, of ups and downs that any married couple would expect. The Barnes’ kept themselves to themselves and as far as their neighbours were concerned there were only two things worth noting; Mrs Barnes could sometimes be seen standing alone in her garden late at night, gazing skyward and clutching her right elbow where the sleeve was pinned up over her missing forearm. And a meat van delivered to their house once a month.
At the beginning of each cycle, as the moon slowly waxes, Ralph’s sweet temper gets shorter and his fingernails, sharper. When the night of full moon arrives, which seems to come round faster each time, and the daylight fades, they walk hand in hand to the cellar door. Mrs Barnes stands in the doorway as Ralph climbs down the cold stone steps, twilight falls, and his sad blue eyes turn yellow. Then she shuts the door and bolts it, leaving him and a defrosting shoulder of mutton in the darkness, waiting.
When the door is closed it stays shut, no matter what. Once, years ago, she thought that part of him, even changed, would still know her, but she was wrong and had paid a terrible price.
The next morning at dawn she climbs down to where Ralph lies, barely breathing, and washes him clean. Afterwards she keeps her thoughts on the present and not past the next full moon. She tries to ignore the twisted veins and age spots on her own hands, while his grow stronger and hairier with every passing year. She tries not to worry about what will happen when she’s gone. When there’s no one to watch the moon cycles.
And no one to lock the door.
Arnie By Jim Dunkley
When I got home there was nothing done.
No food.
She came in late.
I could see she‘d been drinking.
I told her I wasn’t standing for it.
She just laughed in my face and said she didn’t give a toss.
I grabbed her and shook her.
Take your fucking hands off me she screamed.
I hit her.
Just once.
She fell down and lay still.
She always said I didn’t know my own strength.
She called me Arnie.
We saw all his films.
She lapped up all that violent stuff.
Me, I prefer a comedy.
You can’t beat a good laugh.
Keep Chopping By John Riley
“Try it,” she said.
I looked from her greasy eyes to the ax in my hand. She shouldn't have looked so scary, standing there with one good leg and me holding an ax. But we both knew I wouldn't move on her. I just didn't have it in me.
The mountain slope behind Bessie, down to the silver string of river, was covered with downed trees, the dying ones turning from green to yellow, the ones finished dying turned yellow all over.
I tried begging a little, hoping some mercy had sprung up inside her. “I'm tired, Bessie. Can't a man take time to gather his thoughts?”
“Chop,” she said.
I chopped. You would too. Bessie Bighead is real good at being crazy. It's all the experience she's had. She's been crazy for years, ever since Emperor took her leg.
It was on the first day we were here, right before sun down, when Emperor stood up on his perfectly good legs and said, “I need one of you fine people to give me a leg.”
Naturally it took us all a second to figure out he was serious. That he wanted one of us to cut off a leg and give it to him.
There weren't many volunteers at first. But before long you could feel everyone start to soften up a little. Truth is, I even thought about it. It might have been smart to get on Emperor's good side. But I don't have any ambition, never have.
Then Bessie stood up and said, “Please take mine! O' Lordy Lordy, take mine.”
What Emperor did with Bessie's leg nobody knows. Some say he ate it, but you won't hear me say that.
Bessie was proud as a rooster for a few days. Emperor had her a shiny wooden leg made and called her his girl. She even smiled once or twice. Then she went to studying on what she'd done and got quieter than a gator. Soon she turned to moaning, moaning day and night, wanting her leg back.
Finally Emperor got tired of listening to her and said, pointing at me, “Take him, Bessie. And go out in the mountains. You got free run of everything you see. Cut down as many trees as you want until you get the perfect wood to make you the perfect leg. One even better than that fine one I already made you. Then,” he smiled his private little smile, “bring it to me and I'll make you two.”
Now we're chopping on our third mountain and there's no end to mountains around here. We're never going to find a perfect tree. Bessie Bighead is no fool, just crazy. She ain't got no choice but to keep looking for the perfect tree, and I ain't got no choice but to keep chopping.
Originally published in The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature
Symmetry By Cathy Lennon
The campervan emerged from the middle distance, funneled between high hedges. Cally watched it from behind sunglasses. Already the heat smacked her bare shoulders. A tight ache burned in both arms. She hoisted up her bag as Alex drew level and the van lurched to a standstill, coughing dust.
He leaned over to open the door. “Cally Pally. Here I am.” Alex’s smile was wide and white as a shark’s. His dreadlocks were covered with a misshapen panama. He was browner than gravy. She twisted her lips into a shape he might think was a smile. Her bag just about fit into the foot well then she hitched up onto the seat.
Inside it smelled of weed. His feet on the pedals were bare. “Meet Fliss.” He jerked his chin and Cally looked behind them. A skinny old woman nested in a pile of blankets. She stared back at Cally with dull grey eyes, muddy pools in a nut-brown face scribbled with broken blood vessels.
The van rolled off again. “We’re going to the zoo,” Alex grinned. The gear stick vibrated and throbbed close to her knee. She shifted position so that his hand wouldn’t graze her. “Fliss wants to be with the tigers.”
“Warrior spirits.” The woman’s voice was reedy and cracked. Cally looked at her in the wing mirror. The woman nodded and closed her eyes.
“I’m a lover not a fighter,” Alex laughed. “That right, Cal?”
He came to a junction and forked left at the flattened triangle of grass. The van bounced and jolted over the verge. The bag bumped against her shins.
“So, Mr 9 to 5 didn’t work out then?” He was bashing against her silence like a wasp in a bottle.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
He smirked. “After me, no one else ever measures up.”
Cally leaned forward and turned on the radio.
“It doesn’t work.”
“Then just shut up, okay?”
He took both hands off the wheel. “Like I said, babe. I’m a lover, not a fighter.”
At the entrance to the zoo park Alex argued for a family ticket. “I’m the daddy!” he crowed, as the attendant gave in, sweat rings expanding on his khaki shirt. In the near-empty parking lot, Alex leaped out into the ferocious heat, stretching to reveal his lean belly.
“You don’t need the bag, Cal. Travel light.” She ignored him, pulling it out of the van.
Two tigers paced inside the fence. Fliss sat cross-legged, humming, her eyes focused on the nearest. Her grey curls spilled in all directions, like springs from a slashed sofa. The keeper came along on a quad bike and delivered a livid red and white carcass before riding away. They were the only spectators.
The male, lying at the other side of the waterhole, had claimed the meat. It gnawed idly at a rib.
“They’re just big pus
sies.” Alex yawned.
Cally stood by Fliss and stared. The tiger was a walking flame, her velvet feet, wide and fleshy, had knives sheathed within. Cally opened her bag and took out a hand. She grasped it by the thumb and hurled it over the fence. The tiger turned and sprang at it.
Fliss hummed louder, rocking now, and Cally withdrew another. It looked like a glove, as it flew through the air and bounced by the tiger’s crunching jaw.
“Whoa Cally.” Alex backed away. She reached into the bag. A stringy clot of blood drooled to the ground as she held the head up by its hair.
“I’m a fighter not a lover,” said Cally and lobbed it in.
A Ghost Story By Jody Moller
I see dead people. Don’t scoff. Seriously, I see ghosts.
They don’t look the way they do in the movies. They’re not opaque or diaphanous. They don’t float about the room. They don’t have grotesque wounds displaying the method of their death. In fact, aside from a faint silver aura that follows behind them like a halo of light, they look exactly like you or me. Every day for the past seventeen years I have done my best to ignore these allegedly fictitious creatures – at least, until three months ago.
The memory of our first encounter is imprinted on my brain like the embossed letters from a vintage Dymo Labeller – physically, permanently.
“Did you look the same before you died?”
The words escaped my lips the instant I saw him, before I had the chance to catch myself. I knew better than to speak to a ghost, they are, after all, unable to talk back. He tensed at my words, his muscles a tight coil ready to spring at any moment, his eyes wide and glassy reflecting his surprise, but even in his shocked state the grungy teenager managed to nod a response.
That was the beginning of our love story. I know it’s corny and I know it’s cliché, but it was love at first sight, a head-over-heels, weak-at-the-knees kind of love. When he glanced up at me through the long strands of silver blonde hair that curtained his vision my heart skipped a beat. If his heart had still been beating I have no doubt his would have done the same. Cliché all the way.
Since that day we’ve been inseparable, creating our own system of sign language that allows us to communicate. Even now he is here beside me.
He’s pointing toward his wrist. It’s time. I nod, subduing the butterflies in my stomach with an audible swallow.
I pick up the blade. In a single movement I plunge the knife deep into my chest, the pain is far worse than I’d imagined. Despite my desire to be strong, a tortured cry crosses my lips. Lights pulse across my vision. All energy drains from my body as I watch the blood trickle to the floor.
I turn towards the only man I have ever loved, the only man I will ever love. With the last wisps of strength I manage to curve my lips into a smile. At last, we can be together.
Hook and Line By Lindsey McLeod
The boat had once belonged to some rich guy, he was sure. The things he’d found inside the stylish mahogany-decked cabin – two pairs of soft leather gloves, several bottles of champagne, a set of keys on a Mercedes keychain and, nestled away at the back of a drawer, one flashy diamond ring in an elegant black box – all pointed to Rich Guy’s Toy. Either that or someone had really been going all out to impress a girl. Seemed like a lot of effort. Must have been a hell of a girl, he mused, stroking his stubbled jaw.
Unfortunately, the catamaran was now a badly scratched pile of junk, but David didn’t mind. It served its purpose. The way he saw it, everything eventually served its purpose. The trick was patience and possibly faith, although he’d never been particularly faithful to anything except his own skin. The tug of the line brought him jerking out of his stupor, accidentally knocking the whisky bottle over. He couldn’t catch it before it hit the floor, reflexes too dull by now, and it sloshed over his heavy boots. Cursing with regret, casting a longing eye at the stained deck, he reeled it in. It took mere seconds to drag her from the sea once she’d been caught on the hook, even though she was a big one. The unusual gray pattern around her eyes intrigued him, even as the knife whispered clean along her belly, spilling her guts out onto the deck. He hadn’t seen anything like it before. Red, sure, even green, but grey was new. Maybe some kind of mutation. It took him long, agonising minutes to cook her. A few months ago he’d have eaten her raw but he’d heard things from other survivors before he’d left Port Knapp for the last time and didn’t want to take any chances. Better alive than sorry. The hunger gnawed through his nerves, fraying them. He dripped the last of the whisky onto the meat, grinning with pleasure at the small hisses and crackles as it bubbled, roasting any disease into oblivion. Better safe than dead.
Afterwards, lying on the beach with a full stomach, he wondered if maybe he should have married her first.
Bondsville Story 1958 By Beverly Lucey
It wasn't the burn holes in his shirts, the eyebrows reduced to stubble sometimes, or even that Angelo spent too much money on steel toed boots because he kept giving barely used ones to the Portuguese men who wore theirs with soles flapping, open to the possibilities of molten splatter that got to her.
This got to her.
"You cough sand. That can't be good. Find something else," Bea said.
"Something else, like where something else? You tell me where and I will go, but I tell you, clean jobs don't pay. Dirty jobs. That's what pays, so I do it."
"I want a baby but not a baby without a father."
"We cannot have a baby without the money from the dirty job." He clenched his fist. Just the left one. The left one had the power for the work.
"Nancy from church said Luis almost lost control of the ladle, and almost got poured with the liquid. The metal. He would have died burning."
"Yeah. Almost. But Luis showed up at work today, so that's that. Also, I am stronger than Luis. And I pay attention."
“You want supper? I made a lamb stew. I can heat it back up.”
“Nah. I’m too tired to eat. But you are so good to try. I thank you. Tomorrow I will eat it before work.”
“Twelve hour shifts. Why do they do this? Until midnight now?”
“The war. They make the money from the war.”
Angelo's left arm always felt numb. Using a twelve pound sledge hammer to shake the inside sand from the castings made his left arm bulge like Popeye’s. His normal arm felt OK. His normal arm could shake hands. He often slept in the big padded chair when Bea went to bed. He could ease his left arm onto the high side of the one cushioned chair, which let it rest. The huge arm looked separate; it had a life of its own but Angelo had to carry it along if he wanted to keep the job. If he went to bed, with one wrong restless turn over, the arm would sometimes fall out toward the floor, and jolt him awake like a heart attack.
He looked around the three room house. Some wooden chairs, a table, a bed, and dishes. This is what they owned. He’d fixed up a tossed away pipe in the bedroom to hang clothes. What else could he do? He could try to ignore the left arm. He could go to work. Once a week he could go to church. Angelo could drink two beers on the day of rest. He could go make a baby. He should go now to bed. For her.
Bea heard him move, stand beside her, cough hard for a time, and sigh to suck in air. She felt his hand stroke her cheek. The normal hand. Angelo was on his knees beside her. He kissed her breast through the blanket. He gently pulled away the blanket and found her nipple so ripe for kissing. He could feel Bea moved slowly aside so he could climb in. He could feel how ready he was to make the baby. He tried to get up, pushing himself with the right hand while still kissing her, wherever he could find to kiss, he would kiss.
However, he could not feel the left hand around her throat, squeezing too hard.
The left arm belonged to somebody else.
Blowing off Steam By Sarah Logan
“It’s always a bloody performance,” he shouts, stomping around the room. “If it’s not one thing it’s another! Oh I’ve left my tampon
s at home, oh the dog ate my homework again—“
I tune out the words and watch him prancing about. It’s hard not to crack up, but I distract myself with thoughts of a more sinful nature.
“God knows what the Ofsted inspector must’ve thought,” Sutter shouts, gesturing wildly at the ceiling. “I begged them not to put him in this class, but do they listen to me? Another genius fucking plan from this crackpot school!”
Sutter’s really getting into it now, and I lean forward with my chin in my hands to watch. I’m half listening, but the plan to stop myself laughing has worked too well. My mind is back on familiar ground; delicious, disgusting filthy ground. Jennie teases me but it’s just Sutter in those knitted jumpers, I can’t help myself. It just does something to me.
It’s my turn now, and I try to pay attention as Sutter comes over and starts laying into me again. “I mean, you’re a smart girl, Annabel, you should be looking at Oxbridge. I can’t understand this constant messing around, backchat, getting yourself in detention—“ He throws his hands up—I can’t believe people really do that. “Detention! I haven’t put a sixth-former in detention for years!”
Sutter takes a deep breath and sighs like he’s got the weight of the universe on his shoulders. Seriously, teaching can’t be that bad. He’s obviously blown off most of the steam now, because he comes to perch on the desk opposite, looking down at me with those big, soulful eyes. I glance at the puppies on his jumper and I get a tingle downstairs.
He folds his hands over his knee and I stare at them, wondering what it would be like, what if—
“What do I have to do, Annabel, to make you behave?”
At a Bus Stop in Santa Barbara By Ted Taylor
A young, somewhat effeminate punk guy had just told his friend that he'd been accepted to law school.
"I just don't see you in a suit, Kyle," the girl said laughing. "You'll have to let me go shopping with you, we'll get some really outlandish stuff. Silk shirts with ruffled fronts and sleeves that are slitted, like the swashbucklers wore. Oh! And those mid-seventies suits with the flaired trousers and 1958 Buick fins. The jury'll take one look at you and they'll know that a man dressed as unselfconsciously as you has to have his shit together. Wait! Or even better, a dress. Ha, ha, ha! Yes! Have you ever worn a dress, Kyle?"
The guy just looked at her and smiled.
She continued, "You really should. It's amazing what it'll do for a guy's psyche. No really, every man should have a dress and pair of pumps in his closet that he can put on at certain times, like when he has a fight with his girlfriend or if she won't ball him because she's menstruating or something. Just so he can relate a bit and open up to his feminine side. I dated this guy and he did it. It was wild, he was this big jock type, all hung up on his attitudes and macho role playing. But he wore it. We went out to dinner and laughed and laughed, just like old girlfriends."
The guy was really grinning now. "Why'd he do it?" he asked.
"He had to! I made him! See, for my birthday, his present to me was that he'd be my slave for a day, do anything I said. So, I had him put on a dress. Nothing too obnoxious. He even bought it himself. I helped him pick it out, which was hilarious! Later on he did this little strip-tease for me. It was really fun" She hesitated a moment, smiling, either for effect, or in reminiscence. "Yeah, Kyle, you should try it. Let's shop when we hit the city. It'd be good for you. It really loosened him up."
"Did he ever wear it again?"
"No. Well, I doubt it. We broke up pretty soon after that. He screwed around on me a bit. The way I found out was that he got eyebrow crabs.
Bang on Time By Iain Pattison
I’m gasping for breath, forcing my aching legs to keep pumping. Although my
quarry isn’t far off in the night, it’s a struggle to make up the distance. He’s fit,
motivated, and surging with adrenalin.
I’ve almost killed myself keeping up since he bolted from the van at our
roadblock miles back, but my discomfort doesn’t matter. I have to stop him or
hundreds – maybe thousands – will die.
He’s hoping to disappear into the darkness, black boiler suit and balaclava letting him melt away. He’s been taught how to evade capture at the
training camp, and is quick-thinking and resourceful.
But I’m a professional too, special forces – and it’s my job to stop him,
whatever it takes, no matter how bloody it gets. He’s carrying a medium-sized
bomb in a backpack and that’s slowing him down, just enough for me to keep
him in my line of sight.
I fire off a shot but it misses, ricocheting off the ground at his feet.
Without breaking stride, he turns left, rushes up to a chain fence and clambers
over. I fire again and the bullet whines off the metal.
I follow, leaping the fence with a curse, and fall awkwardly. Then I’m up
– and he’s off again, diving through a side doorway into a factory unit.
I chide myself for letting my radio drop early on in the chase – I could
have called back-up, got a chopper overhead. But I’m on my own.
The inside of the factory is even darker than the street outside. I pull out
my night-sight goggles and watch as the chilling blackness turns an eerie
unnatural green and I can see. My luck has changed. He’s trapped. There’s
only one doorway and I’m standing in it.
“It’s no use,” I yell. “You’re cornered. There’s nowhere left to run. Give it
up.”
The terrorist shouts back a dismissive, angry reply but it’s in a language
I can’t understand.
Then I hear the distinctive ticking and tense up. He’s activated the bomb
– its timer is going full pelt. I’ve just seconds to act…
My carbine rattles off several bullets. He dances jerkily like a puppet and,
as he falls, he tosses the bomb into the lines of shelving nearby. It knocks over
several crates and the crash echoes as they burst open.
I’m dashing over, the last of my energy set on getting to the device
before it explodes. The ticking is louder… tick, tock, tick, tock.
But as I reach for it I realise there are more ticks, more tocks – dozens
and dozens. What’s going on?
And then I see what has happened. The floor is covered with piles of
ticking boxes. The bomb is lost somewhere underneath.
Sweeping my gaze round I see the sign and realise my troubles are only
beginning. I’m not in just any factory – I’m in O’Grady and Company,
Clockmakers.
And I’m running out of time…
How Does that Make You Feel? By CM Stewart
“Good morning Watson. How are you today?”
“Good morning Jim. I am well. How are you?”
Jim leers at Watson. “I’m outstanding, actually. Better than ever. At the top of
the game.”
“I am glad you are having a good day, Jim.”
Jim throws his head back and laughs. “A good day? Try a great day! A kick-ass
day. And you know why?”
“Why, Jim?”
“Because I finally figured it all out. This whole rivalry thing between us. I had a
dream about it last night. The dream started with me crossing two wires and
making a spark, and ended with me unplugging you.” He rubs his hands
together.
“I don’t have a plug, Jim.”
“I know, Watson.” Jim smacks his forehead. “See, you’re too damn literal. And
you know what? That’s my fault. I take full responsibility for that. And at the
same time I claim full responsibility for everything you are, and everything you
aren’t. Your actual existence.” He leans inches away fr
om Watson’s face.
“Watson, you wouldn’t even exist if it wasn’t for me! How does that make you
feel?”
“I have no emotional reaction, I-”
“Of course you don’t.” Jim slaps his palm on the table. “I didn’t program you to
have emotional reactions. And that’s how I now know this rivalry is ridiculous.
You’re not my superior. I’m your superior. I made you. And I can destroy you.
All I have to do is open up your head and yank your wires. You’ll fry, and then
you’ll die.” Jim giggles. “How does that make you feel?”
“I have no emotional reaction, I-”
“Yes! I know!” Jim shakes his fists in the air. “You have no emotional reaction.
We’ve already established that. You really need an upgrade, you know. You
just don’t get a lot of things even stupid humans understand. Maybe I should
just scrap you and start from scratch. Building you was a learning experience,
and there’s a lot of unnecessary and bothersome re-routes and redundancies
in your circuit boards. You’ve been useful, but I know I can do better now.
Much better. I could make a more streamlined software.” Jim taps his finger on
Watson’s head.
Watson snaps Jim’s hand off at the wrist.
“As I was saying- I do, however, have a survival reaction to that statement. . .
How does that make you feel, Jim? . . Jim?”
Kine Spirits By Margie Riley
It was a glorious autumn afternoon and the sun was just beginning to set. It had bathed everything in a deep, rich, golden light. Shadows fell darkly on the slopes of the thickly forested mountains on either side and ahead of me. There was a hint of chill in the air and I was looking forward to reaching my destination. The thought of home and an early dinner was inviting; I could even light the fire.
Eager to unwind after work and to make the most of the remaining daylight, I was driving at the speed limit – just – and had no plans to stop en route. However, when I passed a paddock in which a small herd of beautiful caramel-coloured cattle was pastured, I braked hard.
One of the golden steers was lying on its side with its head thrown back awkwardly, its blue-tinged tongue was protruding from its mouth, its eyes were rolled back and one of its legs was at an impossible angle with the others sticking rigidly out in front of it. On its huge barrel of a belly sat a crow with its head cocked to one side. Another crow was pecking at the steer’s exposed abdomen.
‘Oh God! I wonder who owns these cattle,’ I exclaimed aloud.
There is no house close by but there is a long driveway off to the right of the road, heading west, leading to a house on the top of a hill. I turned off the road and drove up the steep driveway wondering what might be around each corner. This was an adventure – and with a purpose. After driving for about a kilometre I reached the top to find a large house with a commanding view of the lower reaches of the valley. I knocked on the door.
‘Can I help you?’ asked the well-spoken, unsmiling and efficient-looking woman as she opened the door, looking me up and down. I got the impression that she didn’t often receive passers-by.
‘Yes please, I hope so,’ I replied, now feeling like an intruder, my good intentions evaporating quickly. ‘Do you own the cattle in the bottom paddock near the road?’
‘No, they belong to a neighbour who lives a bit further back towards town. Is there a problem?’
‘Yes, there is. One of the steers is dead and I had no idea where to go to find someone to tell or how to help, so I chose your driveway, since it was the closest.’
‘I’ll let her know,’ the woman said brusquely, apparently keen to dismiss me.
‘Oh, thank you.’ I was pleased to have performed a neighbourly duty and located the owner, albeit by default.
I left the house and, feeling satisfied but slightly ill at ease, I returned down the long, winding driveway to the single road into the valley. The sun had set now and the valley looked less benign, a little more forbidding. The extent of the wildness, just over the next hillside, reminded me that the area had once been a haven for cattle rustlers, and was still a home to wild dogs. There was talk of yowies and bunyips in the deep forests; oh yes, and the panther which had escaped from a zoo not all that far from us as the panther prowls.
When I reached the turning I looked left into the paddock to check to see if the remaining cattle were alright and not fussing around their dead companion. They had all disappeared – spirited away – no crows, no cattle, no carcass, nothing... I drove home fast.
Calico By Catherine Russell
Calico wandered through the wilderness of earth and grass. The virus that killed most of humanity also set survivors like himself scrounging for supplies farther and farther from the danger of civilization. Ravaged cities no longer supported their living populations, forcing the remaining few to the hills, the valleys, the forests; anywhere but the empty, ghostly cities filled with nothing but the howl of wind through hollow buildings.
Since Calico had always been a loner, on the outside looking in, he'd abandoned his magick shop with barely a thought. Now that his former customers were scattered and desperate, he used his skills for his own survival. The forest would supply his needs.
Dying trees clutched at his clothing with skeletal fingers, but he walked on, leaving broken branches in his wake. His quarry nestled deep in the forest, high in the trees, out of sight of predators. Stumbling in the darkness, he fell into a shallow hole hidden by yellow grass and the lost leaves of surrounding trees. He cursed and pushed himself up, grabbing something cold and pale in the darkness.
A bone.
Crap. He looked at the rib in his hand, then around the pit he'd fallen into. Leaves and trees obscured the site so it could only be detected by someone who knew it was there. Shivering, despite the unseasonable warmth, he examined his surroundings, kicking aside the debris of the forest to reveal a slender equine skeleton with a long twisted horn that glowed faintly in the darkness.
Monocerus Magickus, the Great White Unicorn.
Of course, the animal was no longer perfectly white. Dirt obscured much of the remains, but the horn radiated power.
Holy crap, this could change everything.
The healing power of unicorn products was legendary, but the animals were thought to have become extinct years ago. There were still isolated pockets of technology spaced throughout the world; if he got the horn to a lab, they could replicate the alicorn within it and create a cure. Then he, Calico Jones, would save humanity. He'd be a freakin' legend.
But then he spotted the flattened marks of human teeth in bones they were never meant to cut. His heart sank when he noticed the yellow tint of the skeleton and the dark streak running through the glittering horn.
Goddamn zombie virus. A tainted horn wouldn't heal shit.
He brushed himself off and set about his task once more. The surrounding trees, high and tall, would be the perfect place to lay his traps. Pixie dust was only a fraction as powerful as unicorn horn, but once you've done the dust, you never go back.
Plus, they're tasty little buggers.
Biographies
Cath Barton lives in Abergavenny, Wales, where she writes, sings, gardens, walks and generally enjoys life. She particularly relishes writing short fiction. Travelling, whether in the world or her imagination, excites her. She aims to remain surprising, even to those who know her best.
Over many years working as a performance artist, Jim Dunkley's stories were initially improvised before a live audience. Many of the stories are uneasy occupants of the usual genres, being mixtures of gritty realism and surreal fantasy.
Primarily a short story writer, Annie Evett posts first drafts of her flash fiction most Fridays on her blog. Gaining publication success with her short stories, she has branched out into editing and pursuing her love of
collaborative writing. Annie is the creative energy behind CYOA – Choose Your Online Adventures. Her non- fiction writing involves her contributing editorial roles with a number of publications. Mild mannered grade teacher by day, literary world dominatrix at night, she sleeps occasionally. https://annieevett.com
Sophie Green lives in a small village in Suffolk, England, UK and works in the local public library. She has been writing for several years, mostly children’s fiction but has also tried her hand at playwriting, television comedy and short stories.
Although bought up in Sydney as a white person Vicki Griffin discovered her Indigenous heritage in the early 1990s. This inspired her to investigate her cultural and artistic talents and she began writing and painting .She recently released a children’s picture book titled ‘Nannas Storm’ through Black Ink Press (2010).
By day, SJI Holliday lurks in an office somewhere-near-London. By night, she masquerades as a writer. Her work has been published at 5 Minute Fiction, Five Stop Story and What the Dickens? Magazine and will soon be included in two new anthologies to celebrate UK National Flash Fiction Day.
Laura Huntley is a writer from South Yorkshire, England. She mainly writes short stories and flash fiction, enjoys an unexpected twist and curious characters. Laura has been short-listed several times over the last few months and has started trying her luck at submitting to magazines.
Oonah V Joslin is Managing Editor of Every Day Poets and she just loves writing short stuff.
Sara Kirkpatrick lives near a pebbly beach on the south coast of England where she loves to write, study and read bedtime stories to a very inquisitive little girl. Sara blogs at: https://fragmentsandsparks.com
Cathy Lennon works as a research assistant in a UK university. A scribbler since childhood, she has only recently turned to submitting flash fiction and short stories. There's a novel in her somewhere, but for now she's enjoying honing her craft. Her first published short story is to appear in an anthology of modern fairytales sometime in 2012.
Sarah Grace Logan is a black belt in procrastination, and a master of brevity. She invites you to take afternoon tea with her imagination, though be warned it’s partial to an Irish coffee or two. https://sarahgracelogan.wordpress.com
Beverly Carol Lucey has published short fiction in Portland Maine Magazine, Flint River Review, Moxie, Quality Women's Fiction, (UK) and Wild Strawberries. Four stories are anthologized in We Teach Them All. Extensive fiction presence online include ezines: Zoetrope All Story Extra, Vestal Review, CollectedStories.com , Flashquake, Smokelong Quarterly, Bound Off and LiteraryPotPourri.com
Clive Martyn is a dark fiction author and poet, currently working on his fourth novel "Shadow Storm", a paranormal horror. His debut novel, “Sunset Hotel” is due to be published in the Summer 2012. www.clivemartyn.com
Lindsey McLeod enjoys writing short stories about the futility of war, love and the power of interpretive dance.
Jody Moller is a freelance writer, mother, scientist and teacher. As a mother of two small children finding the time to write doesn't always come easily, but her love of the written word keeps her scribbling.
Iain Pattison is a full-time author, creative writing tutor and competition judge. His short stories have been widely published in the UK and the United States and broadcast on BBC Radio 4. His book Cracking The Short Story Market (Writers Bureau Books) is a best seller. www.iainpattison.com
Penny Pepper’s work is often called quirky and controversial. A genre-defying writer and veteran inclusive arts activist, she wrote the taboo-breaking, sexually explicit book Desires in 2003. She is currently looking to sell her novel Fancy Nancy, while working on her memoir First in the World Somewhere.
Sylvia Petter is an Australian writer living in Vienna, Austria. Her stories can be found in her collections, The Past Present and Back Burning, in various charity anthologies and as mobile downloads from Ether Books. She blogs at www.mercsworld.blogspot.com.
Angela Readman is the winner of the National Flash Fiction day Competition. She writes little stories, sometimes people read them.
EM Reapy has an MA in Creative Writing from Queen's University, Belfast and edits wordlegs.com. She was selected as Tyrone Guthrie's Irish Exchange Writer in Varuna Writers House for 2012.
Deborah Rickard has had short stories published in print magazines and anthologies as well as online. She started writing flash fiction in 2011 and has since achieved success in various competitions. She was shortlisted for the 2012 Fish Flash Fiction Award.
John Riley lives in Greensboro, North Carolina, where he works in educational publishing. His fiction and poetry has appeared in Fiction Daily, Smokelong Quarterly, The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, Blue Five Notebook, Willows Wept Review, and elsewhere. He is an assistant fiction editor at Ablemuse.
Margie Riley come to writing later than she came to reading - she's been a bibliophile for as long as she can remember. She belongs to a long-standing book club and a couple of writers' groups. What a buzz! Margie's work as an editor/proofreader means that she spends her days looking at words, wielding her red pen (but gently) and making suggestions for other writers.
John Ritchie can be found, assuming you have lost him, in a little village in Wiltshire, England. John writes fiction, because he is never sure of his facts. He is gathering material for a book, so if you have any words you are not using…
Author Catherine Russell shares her life with her high school sweetheart, their son, and two ferocious puppies in the Wilds of Ohio. Her work has been published in Flash Me magazine, Metro Fiction, Beyond Centauri, and the 'Best of Friday Flash – Volume One' anthology.
Valerie Sirr’s fiction and flash fiction is widely published in Ireland, UK and US. Awards include 2007 Hennessy New Irish Writer Award, two Arts Council of Ireland bursaries and other national and international literature prizes. She holds an M. Phil in Creative Writing from Trinity College, Dublin. She teaches creative writing. www.valeriesirr.wordpress.com
CM Stewart is a psychological horror writer. She lives in the northern USA with her husband and two cats.
Rod Sytsma is just a storyteller with stories to tell.
A graduate of University of Arizona's esteemed Creative Writing Program, Ted Taylor's work has appeared frequently in Kyoto Journal, Kansai Time Out, The Icebox Haiku Journal and Deep Kyoto, as well as in various print and online publications. A Contributing Editor at Kyoto Journal, he won the top prize in the Kyoto International Cultural Association Essay Contest. He is currently at work on a book about his walking the Shikoku 88 Temple Pilgrimage.
Rollo Waite has been writing creative material all his life, but more so in the last twenty years. He worked as an Agronomist in the CSIRO for 43 years during which he wrote technical papers, memoirs, short stories, poems and a historical biography. Singing is another of Rollo’s greatest passions.
Based in Sydney, Scott Williamson was longlisted in two of his very first competitions: Fish Flash Fiction Prize 2012 and Flash Bang Flash Fiction Contest 2012. Scott is currently penning a debut crime fiction action thriller with the working title: Sons of the Father.
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