Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 171

 This week's prompt photo is from Alice Zummerfish. I'm a little confused as this is credited as by her on multiple art sites but on her Deviant Art site there is no sign of these creations. I'm wondering if she just creates them for specific sites. 

I tried to keep a Steam Punk feel, but it's not my genre really, and I dipped into sci-fi of sorts. 

The General Guidelines can be found here.

How to create a clickable link in Blogger comments can be found on lasts week's post here.

There is also a Facebook group for Mid-Week Flash, if you fancy getting the prompt there.

Visions

‘What do you see?’

‘A sphere spinning in my hand.’

‘Is there anything inside it?’

‘Yes, I think it’s our galaxy.’

Peter’s face lit up in delight. ‘Marvellous.’

‘But ...’  Annabelle felt the skin of her forehead crease against the helmet covering the upper part of her face as she frowned. ‘There’s something else ... a cloud, or shadow, it’s moving closer.’

Peter spun dials on the display board, the steam driven generator letting out a high pitched squeal. Annabelle gasped.

‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just thought maybe with some magnification ...’

‘You didn’t. It’s the view, it altered. I can see what it is now.’

Peter waited. Annabelle didn’t speak, just moved her hand closer to her face, her perfect red lips opening slightly in awe. He’d developed the helmet to help her see her visions more clearly. She’d been plagued with them for months now and he knew there had to be some kind of meaning in them, although people in this era were close minded to such things – in fact all things. The industrial age had heralded too much change for them, they didn’t like it. But the new age beckoned to people like Peter and Annabelle.

‘A cloud of stars, or ... hold on, they’re something else. They’re moving. I can see some kind of fire ejecting out of the back of them.’

‘Like the power pack I made the other week?’

‘Yes, a bit. But these are huge. Like ships, but driven by these fires at the back of them.’

‘Where are they going?’

‘They are coming here, to us.’

‘To us?’

‘Yes. I think so. There’s a lot of them, at least fifty.’

‘Are you sure? To our planet? Our galaxy is full of other planets; maybe they live on one of them.’

‘No, no, it’s quite clear to me, they are coming to us.’

‘And how soon will they get here?’

‘A long time yet, Peter, a long time yet. I’m not sure we’ll see their arrival in our lifetime. But when they do ... oh Peter when they do ... it will be the end of life as we know it.’

Peter looked startled. ‘What do you mean, Annabelle, would they do us harm?’

‘They want our planet and they want our resources.’ Annabelle’s voice went strange, deeper than usual. ‘We are one of a chain of planets spanning many galaxies. This is their next stop. They will retrieve minerals and deposits it holds, items we have yet to discover and understand, but which give great power. To do so will mean splitting the core. We will not survive this undertaking.’ Annabelle jolted sharply in her seat. ‘Oh Peter! That’s awful!’

‘It is, Annabelle. We need to find out exactly when they will arrive.’

‘But how?’

Mathematically of course. But first I need you to tell me, have they breached the edge of our galaxy yet?

‘They have it in their sights; it will be another week before they do.’

‘Okay, sweetheart, off with the helmet.’

It took much undoing and a bit of pulling but eventually Annabelle was free of the iron contraption. Then the two of them sat in Peter’s study and began the calculation.

They burned through two nights of lamp oil before they had a result.

‘Shouldn’t you run those by Francis to be sure? He can be discreet.

‘No, not this time. I want to take them up to Greenwich and ask them up there. Pose it as a theoretical. No one will believe this, Annabelle, but we can record it for those in the future. Now, it’s time for sleep, my dear, to rest our weary heads.’

They climbed the stairs to bed, snuffing out lights as they went, but forgetting to turn off the steam generator in the basement, which if left unattended would overheat. That night the sound of the blast as it exploded could be heard for more than a mile. Little was left of the Edwardian house, only a pile of rubble.

People came to help recover the bodies and any remains worth keeping. There were books and some journals left untouched, even papers dated from the night before, but they were scorched and illegible, only some numbers. One of them was circled many times at the bottom. It read 2022. A few pondered it, but no one knew its meaning.   

Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 170

This week's photo is from Leszek Paradowski, a polish photographer I have actually had an image from before on Week 162.  He calls it The Beech with Human Face. 

Gone a bit dark this week, apocalyptical. Although a whole other sort of apocalypse. 

The General Guidelines can be found here.

How to create a clickable link in Blogger comments can be found on lasts week's post here.

There is also a Facebook group for Mid-Week Flash, if you fancy getting the prompt there.

Atonement

I crawled across the bed of decaying leaves, the stench of their transformation in my nostrils. As life turned to feed, I didn’t want to risk upsetting them in case I should become their feed too. They grew from what rotted in the ground; some believed those around the graveyards were the strongest.

I wanted to ingratiate myself to the leader. It had to be the leader; it was the tallest in this ancient beech forest, one of the few we hadn’t killed off. Although now they had taken over there would be a comeback.

I reach my hand out and felt something soft and gentle. I dared to glance up at the moss covered root. Was it a foot? Or a hand? I didn’t know, but as soon as I came in contact with it, I was laid rigid by the energy that poured from it and consumed my body, leaving me paralysed.

‘You come to beg for your life?’

The deep rasping voice seemed to emanate from deep within my brain. Each word felt like a migraine as though they were being pulled from me, but weren’t mine.

‘Please,’ I whispered, unsure whether I had said it out loud or only thought it. It was all I could do from my prone position.

‘Why? You took our lives in their millions. Why should I spare yours?’

The energy rose to an excruciating pitch. Every inch of my body twanged with nerve rendering sensitivity like I was on the tip of a dentist’s drill. Then rage swept through me; a blinding fog of red spreading through my mind, and I could feel tears running down my face. I was feeling what they felt.

It might have taken them millennia to find a way to take over, but they had, en masse. We’d thought we’d known so much, but we’d known nothing about how they lived; their symbiosis with other plant life and other species; their ability to poison the air and the earth; the refined methods of using transferral between all these things to bring a stop to human life and their way of living.

Then they had started to “communicate” with those remaining. It was painful but at least it gave us a chance to understand and maybe atone.

That was why I was here. It was my turn to offer myself to them, to appease them, to be of service. I had no idea what that might mean. No one who had offered themselves so far had returned. I could only hope I’d be the first. 

Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 169

This week's photo prompt is in the public domain for use and not attributed to anyone, so untraceable, which I always find a shame.

Another Tricky tale - the last one was Week 167. As I get closer to National November Writing Month and having a bash at putting down the first in what I believe will be a series of Tricky books, she seems to be appearing more and more MidWeekFlash prompts. At least it gives me something to work with. 

The General Guidelines can be found here.

How to create a clickable link in Blogger comments can be found on lasts week's post here.

There is also a Facebook group for Mid-Week Flash, if you fancy getting the prompt there. 

Feathered Fatality

She saw the bird fall out of the tree and ran to it, but by the time she reached it, its life was gone. Tricky picked it up gently in her hands and examined it. There were no visible wounds, or signs of sickness or old age. She fanned out its wings looking for any breakages. Nothing. But she took a moment to admire the stunning blue feathers that glinted with luminescence in the morning light. It also reminded her of her mother.

Her mother had used feathers liberally: in her clothing, in her rooms for decoration, and in her magic. Well, people called it magic but Tricky knew better. The energy feathers contained was high, and watching her mother easily manipulate people while covered in them, she knew it was powerful.

People thought finding one feather was lucky, but one feather alone could do little unless added to a potion of some kind. Her mother never needed to use them in potions though; she had mastered their use without having to combine it with other elements, and blue had been her favourite. She’d said it carried the most power being a unique colour in nature, so rare and unusual.

Tricky remembered a particular frock her mother used at special occasions, at a public gatherings where she could show it off. It had layers of coloured feathers adorning it, and the blue especially had stood out, highlighting her mother’s eyes that reflected the same piercing shade of blue.

Tricky’s smile faltered as she recalled the end of the frock; wrapped around her mother the day of her execution. They’d gone with the tradition of burning at the stake. Tricky had been proud her mother hadn’t screamed.

This thought brought her back to the bird in her hands, which hadn’t cried out when it died; it had fallen silently from the tree. There was something unnatural about it. And even though she knew such deaths of wildlife were common, particularly since much of the world had died off, a feeling in her gut told her otherwise.

This wasn’t just any bird, it was a Jay, one of the Corvid family and in her circles they had a deeper meaning. For one to fall dead in front of her portended something dark had being wished against her.

Carter. It had to be him and his cronies. Had they tapped into feather energy or had they just used an old witch ritual? Did they know what they were playing with? Tricky couldn’t be sure. Carter was wily and slippery, you could never be sure what he knew or what he could find out. He had his fingers in many rotten pies.

Tricky shuddered. She wrapped the bird in her scarf. She would take it home and perform a parting ritual. She would then remove the feathers. They might contain information about what had passed. Maybe she could glean something from them about what he was up to. 

 

Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 168

This week's photo prompt was taken by Kris Williams, a British photographer based on the Island of Anglesey, in North Wales. He has some amazing shots - definitely worth a browse. He calls this: ' Spring Snowfall' - Castell-Y-Gwynt, Snowdonia, and says about it: 

"Early dawn hues breaking across the skies above the wild and wintry slopes of an icy Glyderau, with the first sunlight of the day hitting the very peaks of Snowdon to the left and Glyder Fawr to the right. It had already been a cold start to the day after camping out for th enight just below this point amongst the rocks and snow - but this dawn colour soon warmed the heart."  

I went somewhere different with this story. It could even be a beginning to a story or novel. 

The General Guidelines can be found here.

How to create a clickable link in Blogger comments can be found on lasts week's post here.

There is also a Facebook group for Mid-Week Flash, if you fancy getting the prompt there.

Contaminated

Annabelle woke up in time to watch the sunrise. The sky reflected a glorious warm pink that lit up the mountain tops and made them glow. She snuggled down into her sub-50 sleeping bag to watch it. It had been a hard climb up the day before, especially with her backpack full with a month’s worth of supplies, but at least now she was safe.

Hopefully they wouldn’t find her up here. This was as remote as you could get. There’d been talk of them finding others in the wilderness; having some kind of special drone scanners that could see through trees and foliage, but she hadn’t heard about them looking along mountain tops. Saying that, they could easily access them with their flying capabilities; if you could fly to Earth from space, a mountain range was a piece of cake. Yet, they’d halted all flying machines – in fact everything on Earth had stopped since their arrival.

They were obsessed with how people were treating the planet, which yes, wasn’t good. But now they were rounding them up, claiming they were contaminated too. Annabelle wasn’t sure if they were killing people or taking them to use elsewhere. She hadn’t been able to find that out. They’d arrived so fast all media had ground to a halt, even the internet had gone down. There’d been a few last broadcasts, but then silence.

It wasn’t too hard for Annabelle though, she was already living a remote life out on the edge of a tiny village with Snowdonia at her backdoor. She hiked daily, so coming up here wasn’t new for her, although she’d never stayed overnight. But at least she was equipped for it. She’d planned to go to the Himalayas the following year, climb the Annapurnas, maybe reach a base camp. She didn’t think she’d ever try Everest, but she’d wanted to experience being in its shadow.

But such plans were gone now, along with normal life. She didn’t know if being up here for a month would be enough, but they’d been working their way through the region and were days away from her village. She hoped that maybe they’d be finished by the time she needed to come back down.

She spotted movement on the skyline. Had other climbers had the same idea as her? Maybe it was someone she knew. She sat up, edging closer to one the jutting rocks to shield herself from view. She couldn’t make out details from this distance, but they didn’t seem to be loaded up like her. She couldn’t see any backpacks and they were moving towards her.

A bad feeling spread across her stomach. She could see the colours of their coats now, but it was their faces she needed to see to find out if it was them or not.

The difficulty with these aliens was that they weren’t really alien; they were human. The only thing that separated them from the people on earth was their eye colour; they had translucent, reflective eyes, but from this distance she couldn’t see them.

They’d come to ‘reclaim’ the Earth. Humans had been left here millennia ago to take care of it, but  hadn’t done a good job. They weren’t happy.

Annabelle shuffled out of the sleeping bag and rolled it up while watching their progress. There was still nothing to define whether they were friend or foe. She attached it to the bottom of her pack and slipped her arms through the straps. Should she stay or go? Was she about to be caught or were they also people trying to escape?

The sun peeped over the top of the range and as they glanced over their shoulders there was a flash of light. It was them!

She slid backwards along the snow on her bottom, not wanting to stand up. She could maybe slide down over the edge a bit, and get to her feet out of view. She reached the edge and swung her legs round. She might make it. Then the rocks gave way under her feet, and she descended faster than expected, the stones taking her straight down. Then she was thrown forward into a hollowed out cavern on the side of the mountain.

She lifted herself up, checking her body as she went. No serious injuries, only a few scrapes. She looked out of the hole in the side of the mountain amazed and relieved at her escape. Then she heard a shuffling behind her and turned. Ten figures appeared out of the gloom.

‘Did they see you?’ one of them asked.

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Good,’ said another.

It seems there had been other that had had the same idea as her.  

Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 167

This week's photo prompt is from Mikhail Ray, a Ukrainian photographer. I have used his work before because he does some incredible art. Worth checking out his website. 

Another Tricky tale. They are building, and with each one I move a little bit closer to finding the stories she wants telling. It's going to be an interesting ride. Want to read more of her tales? There is last week's - Week 166 - and within that a link to the others. 

The General Guidelines can be found here.

How to create a clickable link in Blogger comments can be found on lasts week's post here.

There is also a Facebook group for Mid-Week Flash, if you fancy getting the prompt there.

Custodian

She breathed on the glass and rubbed it with her scarf. Such pretty bottles. Such beautiful contents. She wished she could go to the places they beheld. But no, Tricky had other things to concentrate on; there was no time for disappearing off – not when she was at risk of being followed.

Her stomach turned at the thought of the storm that was brewing – not a physical one, oh no, one of wit and guile. She could play that game, oh yes she could, but Carter was a slippery one, one she had to be careful of; he’d almost caught her before. He knew about all her pretty things and he wanted them. He’d given that much away at their last meeting.

It’d been a gathering at the old mansion on the hill, an attempt at a party, a way for him to show off his gains. He’d gathered much at the expense of the people of Clancy. No one liked him, but no one turned down a free feed either, not even Tricky. It wasn’t as though the people could do much about him, they were simple folk. They spent their time gathering enough to feed themselves, scraping a living in the tumbled down wreck that was the world since Mother Nature had taken back control.

Tricky had been lucky. She’d inherited the special sight and had it nurtured by her surrogate mother. A powerful woman before Carter had shown up. She’d been respected if not loved. Her reputation had attracted him to the area, but her wrath had been her undoing. He’d managed to bring an end to her, but he’d missed Tricky. He hadn’t reckoned her being a match for his scheming mind, but she knew his game. She could read him like a book, it was one of her gifts – but it wasn’t a pleasant read; it was a horror. Fortunately, Tricky could do dark. She sniggered to herself, oh yes, she could do dark very well indeed.

At the gathering he’d sidled up and pretended polite conversation. She’d gone along with it, curious as to what information he was trying to pry. And he’d mentioned some ornaments, some glass jars he was seeking that he claimed to be an heirloom. He’d eyed her keenly, but Tricky had given him one of her open smiles and said, ‘Glass is a rarity to behold, you don’t see it much these days.’ He’d tried to dig further but to no avail. Tricky knew how to talk round things. But his description was true, and coming to talk to her about it meant he knew more than she liked.

Once home she’d checked and double checked they were still there and still contained their magic. Being able to travel into other times and other dimensions where the worlds were still intact and there was much to plunder was what attracted Carter, but he didn’t have the intelligence to understand the legacy of his actions.

It was fine going but the coming back was the trouble. You disturb one thing, you disturb another, there were ripples, and they took their toll. She knew how to navigate those ripples and mitigate their effect. It had taken her years of careful study and travel. She didn’t think Carter would be so gentle. Some would say let him take the risk, let him find out the price of such liberty, but Tricky knew that it wouldn’t just be him that would pay; it would be all of them.

No, these weren’t for the likes of him. They weren’t even for the likes of her. But she was the custodian of them and she had to keep them safe, and if he knew she had them, they weren’t. She needed to move them and Tricky knew a place, the challenge was how to do it without raising suspicion, it would be tricky. She chuckled to herself, yes tricky, but that was her name, wasn’t it? She’d turned tricky into an art form. She rubbed the glass again. The answer lay within. 

Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 166

This week's prompt photo was taken by Alan Chaput, a Cozy Mystery author, in Savannah, Georgia where he lives, and where his books are set. He is an author worth checking out, not just for his books but he has great posts on both twitter and facebook. 

Another Tricky tale. They write so easily and each time she reveals a little bit more of her larger story. Soon I will be writing her whole store. I can hear her clap her hands in glee. We last saw her on Week 159, where I list all of her stories. 

The General Guidelines can be found here.

How to create a clickable link in Blogger comments can be found on lasts week's post here.

There is also a Facebook group for Mid-Week Flash, if you fancy getting the prompt there.

A Paltry Ploy

As soon as she saw it on the road, Tricky knew. She went over and looked at it and laughed to herself. They thought Tricky was stupid, they thought she would fall for that. She went to the side of the road and found a stick, and brought it over to the cobbled patch, supposedly revealed after decades of wear.

She poked it and it wobbled. Ha! You didn’t fool Tricky that easily. They liked to employ these traps to try and catch her out, but she knew their game. She’d seen these ones before. Sadly last time it had meant the end of one her lovers who’d not been as clever. She’d tried to warn him, but he hadn’t believed her. He’d thought people couldn’t be that devious, but she knew otherwise. Life had taught her.

There were powerful people out there with access to things only the likes of her knew about. She had an idea how they had gleaned the information, but needed evidence. Could this be evidence?

She poked it again, harder this time and the image on the top broke turning into grey fuzzy lines. She put the stick further in and felt something grip it. People might take this for a monster, but it wasn’t, it was just adapted electronics; remnants from the last century that only few knew how to work.

It was those few she was interested in. She’d acquainted herself with two of them, but there was a third being kept in the shadows by Carter. She would find them, and turn them as she had the other two. Carter always thought he had the upper hand and would catch her out. Tricky chuckled. Not with these cheap tricks; Tricky hadn’t earned her name for nothing.

She stuck her hand in the hole after the stick and grabbed at the metal trap, pulling it up. It came away from its cables easily and the grey image blinked out. She tucked it into her bag for later inspection. It had a projector that might prove useful, and she could always use cabling.

People thought this was trickery and magic, but they had no idea. These were toys compared to the true magic in the universe, something humans had been oblivious to – and even fought against – their entire existence. It’s why she was shunned. But that was just fine with Tricky, it suited her aims and enabled her to live beyond prying eyes – and made it more difficult for the eyes that wanted to pry. They had to resort to these kinds of gimmicks. She laughed at Carter’s attempts, although cautiously. He was getting more blatant; there might come a point where he wouldn’t bother with the illusion anymore.

Tricky was never foolish enough to underestimate her enemy. These were high stakes; if he got his hands on her knowledge ...

Tricky straightened herself up and pulled her coat round her, suddenly cold. That was not a thought worth entertaining. But if he continued on his with such arrogance an opportunity would appear and she would be ready.

Mid-Week Flash Challenge - Week 165

This week's picture prompt is sadly untraceable. It's all over pinterest, but I can't find anyone crediting it. Lots of people calling it street art, but where and by who? I tried loads of foreign sites. Even the Turkey Tribune used this for a poet to write to, but didn't credit the source of the art. Such a shame cuz I love it but I don't know where it is or who did it. 

It took a while to get my writing mind working again, especially with so many distractions going on in my real world, but when I did I went dark - my normal mode - and I rather like how it turned out. 

The General Guidelines can be found here.

How to create a clickable link in Blogger comments can be found on lasts week's post here.

There is also a Facebook group for Mid-Week Flash, if you fancy getting the prompt there.

Speechless

She wanted to speak but couldn’t. Her mouth was open, but she couldn’t get her throat to make a sound – not that it would make a difference if she did, they wouldn’t hear her.

Yet she could hear them, and even feel them touching her nose and lips, marvelling at them, at their perfection encased as they were in concrete. They discussed the artist and how brilliant the lines were; how he had achieved such a believable representation of the real thing, not knowing that it was the real thing, only covered in a layer of quick drying cement.

As for the artist, he believed her dead. He thought he had given her a lethal dose of anaesthesia; he believed the muscle relaxant had not only paralysed her but left her unable to breathe. He’d been wrong. She’d been conscious the whole time, but because he’d glued her eyes shut she’d been unable to let him know – or maybe he had known and that was why he’d glued her eyes shut.

After he’d done what he had wanted to her body he had put her into a mould, one that enabled the outline of her lower facial features to penetrate.

She’d felt the weight of the liquid as it was poured over her, but with her mouth open she’d enabled a small gap to remain, and despite blacking out a few times, when he’d removed the mould and placed her upright, she’d remained alive breathing through a tiny slit.

The only muscles she was able to move were those allowing her to draw in a breath. Not a deep breath, a slither of air that kept her conscious – part of her wished it didn’t.

She didn’t know how much longer she would remain alive – the pain of starvation and the weight of the stone covering her were all consuming – but while people were close by she would keep trying to make a sound – any sound, in the hope the truth of the artist would be revealed.

She tried not to think about the other statues he’d shown her that night as they’d wandered around the exhibition he’d held at his mansion. She’d been so star struck by this famous artist taking an interest in her, ignoring his other guests and lavishing his attention on her. He’d talked about her wonderful features, comparing them to his other sculptures, pointing them out. All of them displayed various women’s body parts: a bent knee and a top of the thigh on one piece of wall, a shoulder and ear on another. She’d admired the detail, right down to texture and curve. She’d had no idea.

Now she knew she wasn’t the only one, but how many more were there? His pieces were sent all over the world. If she could shudder at the thought she would, but it faded as she blacked out once more – maybe for the final time. She could only hope.