Sep 25, 2014 Original Short Stories
PHOTO PROMPT Copyright – Marie Gail Stratford
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count (not including the title, name, date): 100 words
Only Darkness at the End of the Day
©September 25th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
The wine-light spilled in gem-tones, red, gold and green, filled with promise, promising respite. He yearned for it.
He thought about what had happened that day — the morning quarrel, the slammed door, the long commute to work, work that sucked away his joy, unmade all he had become.
And when he’d come home, the note he’d found on the dresser, and the absence of his center, the lingering ghost of her perfume sealed it.
I’m sorry. I tried. It won’t work. You didn’t try hard enough.
Gazing deep into all that light, he reached for it.
Bitter oblivion tasted of grapes.
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Thanks, as always, to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for being such a warm and inspiring host of Friday Fictioneers. Thanks, also, to Marie Gail Stratford, for her beautiful photograph.
Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Heartbreak, #Original Short Story, 100-word short story based on photo prompt, breakup, Flash Fiction, in vino veritas, Oblivion, wine and marriage
Sep 11, 2014 Original Short Stories
Photograph copyright: Rochelle Wisoff-Fields
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words
Inferno
©September 11th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
She had come through the worst. She had been forged in fire, and had emerged tempered steel.
Nothing could reach her anymore:
Not the death of a loved one – she had lost all of her family in an fiery accident.
Not the loss of happiness– for she had none.
Not the worries of everyday life – hers had died with her family.
Still, afterwards, she awoke every morning, put on her firefighter’s uniform, went to work. Fire was her enemy. Yet, she knew that though it could destroy life, it could also renew it.
Unafraid, she walked into the four-alarm fire.
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Thanks, as always, to our Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting, and for the photo-prompt! I was too late to submit it for last week’s Friday Fictioneers, but thought I’d still write it. I hope some of you read this!
Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Original Short Story, 100-word short story based on photo prompt, Flash Fiction, Micro-Fiction
Aug 28, 2014 Original Short Stories
PHOTO PROMPT – Copyright – Madison Woods
Genre: Science Fiction/Horribleness
Word Count: Exactly 100 words
Dinner
©August 28th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
Wounded, far from home, crash-landed on this planet, I felt a chasm open up.
Flaring my optics into flame, I shut them down hurriedly. The light was too intense. My heart throbbed, flopping on the dirt, hanging by a thread.
Would I never see Ztruthnutzhehaasszz!%$^ again? “Nooo!” screamed my belly, wherein lay the shining gem my mother had implanted when I was born in her back-sack. I wept copiously, my springs watering the strange pointed blades that emitted oxygen, almost too rich to bear.
A four-pawed creature, horrible breath emanating from a long-snouted, fanged opening, noted me.
The fangs descended.
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Thank, as always, to Fairy Blog-Mother, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting Friday Fictioneers! Thanks, also, to Madison Woods for this truly terrible picture!
P.S. I was away for the past two weeks prior to this one, so I missed the last two story prompts alas! I’m quite addicted to Friday Fictioneers.
Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Original Short Story, alien story, canine antagonist, Flash Fiction, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields
Aug 6, 2014 Original Short Stories
PHOTO PROMPT – Copyright-Björn Rudberg
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Word Count: 100 words
Fold-Unfold
©August 6th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
Call me superstitious, but I shouldn’t have bought that house after my marriage folded.
Perched on a precipice, surrounded by a tight mass of trees, it looked picturesque. A constantly folding-unfolding, susurrating ocean looked inviting at a hazy distance.
I had some money that I’d set aside, refusing his help. I had my job, my fiction-writing on the side, my goldfish, sunlight, good looks. Of course, my heart hurt, but I’d learned to ignore it.
I loved my new place. What could possibly go wrong?
At least I wasn’t home when it caved in.
I’d just met my new love.
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Thanks, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting “Friday Fictioneers,” and thanks to Bjorn Rudberg for the great photo-prompt.
Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Original Short Story, Flash Fiction, Marriage break-up and house cave-in, Micro-Fiction
Aug 5, 2014 Current Affairs / General Interest, Original Short Stories
Overthrow–A Sombre Vision
©August 5th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
Gaea was angry, and her rage had built up to incandescent levels, lighting up the skies, pouring out through fissures, terrifying her children.
Too long, too much wrong had been done unto her.
Deep down, deeper than the human mind can follow, in the sombre shades of Tartaros, lived the monsters, the forgotten children of Gaea, who waited patiently, calmly.
They knew their turn would come. It was only a matter of Time. It is the way of the Cosmos. One gets overthrown by another, then, another, and another until the end of creation. After this, it would begin again, but in what form, nobody could know.
A crater blew up far, far away, where the Titans and Cyclopes lived in the deep, deep cold of a frost beyond human ken. Then, another, and another.
Things melted. Plumes of invisible spirits arose into the air, vengeful spirits all, locking arms, high above the world.
The Titans and their children were now the Gods of the Air, triumphant and savage after having been chained within for so many billennia.
And the Children of the Earth, puny humans, proud and heedless for so long, looked up and trembled.
Their time had come.
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Note: What made me write this piece? I’ve been reading too many accounts of the horrible methane craters being discovered in Siberia. I’ve also been reading Greek Mythology to (and with) my daughter, who has been devouring them voraciously. (I remember being the same way at that age!)
Tags: #Original Short Story, Climate Change, Cyclopes, Gaea, Gigantes, Greek Mythology references, Methane Craters in Siberia, Tartaros, Titans
Jul 23, 2014 Original Short Stories
Genre: Weird Semi-Real Fiction (I just made that up)
Word Count: 100 Words
Sauce
©July 23rd, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
What? I scare you? Why? Am I not handsome? Isn’t this great food? What’s your problem?
“You are the problem,” you say? Have I harmed you? Okay, I’m from a time far from yours, but that’s no reason to hate me. You don’t believe me? Explain this then: How come I’m answering all your thoughts? Guesses? Sigh. How did I ever emerge from a race like your backward little one?
At least shake hands, then. Hey! You’ve strange hands — FIVE fingers? Check out my two — long, pointed, perfectly carved bone things. Nice, huh?
Fork! Don’t go! Try my hot sauce!
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And, as always, thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields for hosting Friday Fictioneers, and for providing the prompts each week, and to Marie Gail Stratford for her photograph above.
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Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Original Short Story, 100-word short story, Chopsticks, Flash Fiction, Micro-Fiction, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields
Jul 16, 2014 Original Short Stories
Thanks, as always, to our wonderful Fairy Blog-Mother (I hope you don’t mind my calling you that, Rochelle), Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for hosting Friday Fictioneers, and to Adam Ickes for the strange, unsettling photo-prompt.
Genre: (Sort of) Realistic Fiction/(Sort of) Humor
Word Count: 100 Words
Horny
©July 16th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
“What do you think?” asked Ben. He’d invited Alicia, his co-worker, home for a drink.
Alicia looked flustered.
“It’s … um … nice,” she finished lamely, staring at the corner of the wall.
“I haven’t unpacked yet,” he replied, bringing her a glass of red wine, gesturing to her to sit beside him.
“I have to go,” she said, moving towards the door.
“Did I offend you?” he asked.
“No, it’s … did you know there’s a ram in that corner?” she blurted.
She opened the door, and fled.
“What is she talking about, Father?” said Ben.
The ram ate cardboard in silence.
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Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Original Short Story, 100-word story, Flash Fiction, Micro-Fiction, Photo-prompt-based story
Jul 9, 2014 Original Short Stories
Below is my short-story response to Rochelle-Wisoff Field‘s Friday Fictioneers prompt (photograph kindly provided by Kelly Sands). Thanks Rochelle and Kelly! If you are interested in reading more stories, click on this cute frog icon here:
Your curiosity will be well-rewarded with some of the most creative and diverse responses/stories you will read on the web.
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Genre: Mythological Fiction/ Science Fiction
Word Count: 100 words
Titanic Emergence
©July 9th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
No one noticed the clouds that day, because people had been forewarned.
The alarm had sounded all over the globe — even the indigenous peoples in forests and hills and distant islands had been informed. Nobody ventured out.
When the clouds parted, a beam of light shot through and sucked up the entire planet.
Where the Earth was taken, no one knew. People’s eyes were shut tight, and they felt … translated.
Later, in a newly formed Universe, a new race emerged. Twelve people straightened up. Their heads brushed the edges of space.
“Let it begin again,” said Time.
And it did.
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Tags: #Original Short Story, 100-word short story, Flash Fiction, Kronos, Micro-Fiction, Mythological Fiction, Science Fiction, The Twelve Titans in Greek Mythology
Jul 2, 2014 Original Short Stories
PHOTO PROMPT, Copyright – Claire Fuller
This is my second 100-word story-attempt based on the above photo-prompt on Rochelle Wisoff-Fields’ Friday Fictioneers blog-site. Hope you like it.
Genre: Mythological Fiction
Word Count: 100 words
Circe
©July 2nd, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
You will not believe me, but I have to tell someone.
Come close and listen. Listen well. No, don’t look around you at the animals. Regard this statue. Doesn’t he look handsome? Doesn’t he look real?
What was that? Yes, the story.
His name was … perhaps you’ve heard of him? He was a sailor whom I lured to my island.
I was hungry for love.
Unfortunately, everything I touched turned into an animal, all, except for him. He turned to stone.
What? Release him? Why should I? I’ve crowned him king, and he won’t ever sail away.
I’m lonely here.
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Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Original Short Story, Circe, Flash Fiction, Micro-Fiction, Odysseus
Jul 2, 2014 Original Short Stories
PHOTO PROMPT, Copyright – Claire Fuller
This is in response to the above photo-prompt for this week’s “Friday Fictioneers,” which appears on Rochelle Wisoff-Fields’ blog. Every week, writers from around the world write a story based on the given photo-prompt on her site –and we have to do it in 100 words or fewer. Here’s mine.
Genre: Semi-realistic, semi-historical fiction
Word Count: 100
Reigning Supreme
©July 2nd, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
“Ozzie, this won’t make a difference,” said the brave Queen to the King.
Honesty was her greatest gift. It was also her downfall.
No one questioned him and lived.
The statue he commissioned was completed. Alas, the sculptor was also repaid with death, because the King wanted no replicas. He was that sort of king.
Eventually, everything in his kingdom fell apart. He died. Only the statue remained. Then, even that crumbled.
A traveller to his land found this on the pedestal: “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”*
Only dust reigned.
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*With apologies to Percy Bysshe Shelley.
Tags: #Friday Fictioneers, #Original Short Story, Flash Fiction, Micro-Fiction, Ozymandias, Percy Bysshe Shelley, photo prompt, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields