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Weekly Contest #240
[Note: This story is a follow-up on Quivira] A cool wind gust brought a sprinkling of cold heavy raindrops on James’ face, followed by a small warmer drier wind in the opposite direction. This was the perfect time for the night’s activities, but that did not mean it would be fun. The tornado watch was out, and the storm was going to be a big one as they always were this time of year. James checked his phone’s GPS to ensure he parked in the right spot and pulled a large toolbox out of the front seat. He w...
Weekly Contest #235
A horse was essential out here simply because how d***ed far everything was from everything else. Lieutenant Nathaniel James Beaty kicked up his horse to a brief trot to catch up with his companions. Despite the official rank given to him by the State of ________, he was actually a junior member of the group as this war party had no army to command. 22 officers and NCOs moving incognito across the scorching hot prairies into the far west i...
Weekly Contest #223
Often the information is out there, finding it simply means asking the right questions and taking the time to look. ` The question James was asking was about pre-Indian settlement of his hometown of Quivira. Indeed, what he had previously found was this region appears to have been completely blank before 1850 when the Indians came from the west. Popular records available on the internet put American settlement at 1857 but they were wrong as James saw graves dating as early as 1840. All children, a James assumed these were the kids of early s...
Weekly Contest #210
The region appeared empty. Not empty in the form of the immense voids between the stars and the rocks and the planets, but empty meant the ship’s pilot Aata saw nothing of note. They had a terraforming machine, but these settlers had neither the equipment nor expertise to assemble a habitable planet from nothing. 57 human souls jumping into the void so far that it was impossible to map their path ahead of time nor guarantee they would warp into the galaxy intended. But now, Aata set a course putting the ship in orbit on a tiny planet where...
Weekly Contest #206
The streets were suspiciously empty. Al-Khalil was an incredibly old city with incredibly proud residents, but they were not acting so tough now that there was fighting rather than just strong words. Musa walked along in broad daylight carrying his black market M-16 in his arms and his shemagh hid his face. There was a warrant out for his arrest in another city but it simply didn’t matter. The wide road he was trudging on was usually loud with slow-moving traffic honking at each other and pedestrians going every which way. Musa cou...
Weekly Contest #204
[Author’s note: While the historical context of this story is real, all named characters are fictional] This was not anyone’s idea of fighting a war. They were once a proud part of the Los Angeles Mounted Rifles. The militia from a city full of rogue former Mexicans, Southern immigrant farmers, and outlaws. No wonder they tried to leave the Union, and the state of California almost had its own civil war because of it. But turns out wars on the frontier weren’t like what you see in stories. For two months, this city was on its own with ev...
Weekly Contest #202
Anton was hungry, but everyone was hungry. They were winning the war ever since the big fight at Poltava, but that did not make the roads any less mud and the rations few and far between. Sometimes Anton wondered how he ever became so desperate that he joined the army. The secret was that army life was mostly marching and waiting for aristocrats to make up their minds about what to do. Anton had only fired his musket in practice a handful of days and had carried the same powder charges and lead shot for many months, and Anton had burned thro...
Weekly Contest #200
"How does this make me a suspect?" Old Sheriff Williams said nothing for a moment as he looked at the young man. "It doesn't, it might be relevant to the investigation. And I don't want to hear what you know through the grapevine, I want to hear it as you heard it and I want to know who said it." The young farm was visibly nervous and adjusted his bowler hat. "Well, I'm not the one for gossip, but when I was at the general store I asked Mr. Stamford if we knew anything new about the murder. He said people thought they knew the motive, th...
Weekly Contest #199
George was walking down the street through this small city, although it was generous to call it either a street or a city. The largely illiterate Bantu population lived in self-built shacks with no utilities all spaced almost touching in winding narrow streets of dirt that went in no particular order. Allegedly, the whole city was squatters with migrants to the city arriving over the decades and putting their homes in open fields previously owned by now-displaced farmers. George did not know about any of that, but this location was relativ...
Weekly Contest #195
[Warning: Contains foul language] Break time, and they all had the dust coat on their clothes to prove it. Mahmoud shut off the backhoe and left the keys in the ignition. He undid his kafiya to let the front part fall off his face, took off his safety glasses and one of his earplugs, and used the inside of the kafiya to get the dust off of them before putting them back on and dismounting. Dust mixed with sweat to form caking layers of mud on their heads as their machines cut through bedrock and construction loader trucks hauled it away. ...
Weekly Contest #194
[Author's note: The story below contains themes of violence, substance abuse, and curse words] Juaquin entered the room and meandered to the table, sitting his heavy frame on an old metal folding chair. He was an aging man and a bit overweight whose bushy mustache was the only indication of his officious post. Across from him sat a gangly man handcuffed to the table who watched him blankly, unsure what to say. Juaquin took out his phone, set it on the table, and pushed a button on an app to record the conversation. Juaquin said: "Surpris...
Weekly Contest #192
They were not supposed to be anywhere near there. The war was many years ago, but the men who fought it were still around and just as paranoid as ever. They told the Masri customs officer they were archeologists looking for ancient copper trade just west of the canal zone. This was true, but they were only making a short stop there and proceeding far beyond there into what was once a warzone and was still a region where no journalists or foreigners were allowed. Likewise, no one was allowed to even ask why the area was taboo. Juan and his ...
Weekly Contest #187
Aryeh was not a giant hunter like other cats that once roamed this place. Or at least that's what he thought as he passed the sun bleached skeleton of an ancient hunter. It's skull was large enough to fit Aryeh's whole body within it, and it had only recently been exposed by the winds sweeping waves of sand across the desert. Aryeh trudged on, the soft fur on his oversized paws being all that separated him from the scorching sand. Aryeh was a skilled hunter, bringing a kill home to his family on two out of three nights, this night had not ...
Weekly Contest #186
Author's note: This story is composed entirely in Haiku. We stand tall and grim We do not believe the scene Her soul has gone out She speaks and is heard We press questions that she hates No secrets can be She confesses his sins She cannot excuse anymore We all knew long ago The marks told us too Some were hidden some were not We knew what to ask We now know for sure We ponder our final move The Hunt consumes us We divide ourselves Our Prey will hide and evade We cover more ground There's no justice here No judge or jury presid...
Weekly Contest #184
Mazen was used to Rami asking strange tasks. Mazen was paid to get things done quietly and not ask questions, and a man who paid well and on time was something a day laborer like Mazen very desperately needed when he met Rami, who even taught him how to shoot with a rifle. They actually met through Mazen's sister, Adara, whose profession over the past few years was never spoken aloud. Rami never had any interest in Adara's services, but instead paid her to attend parties as a favor for clan leaders and government officials where she would bo...
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