Wicked Prompts

INTRODUCTION

This is a collection of flash-fiction and short stories, from the science-fiction and fantasy genre. Below I've provided a short description of each piece in the collection, which can be read in any order, so feel free to read and comment on whatever interests you. I will update this page as more stories are added to the book.

FLY LIES. A mysterious man spends time in a remote village to get away from something horrific. Is it paranoia or are the flies there really watching him? What's he running from and what did he do? And why would a fly "lie"? Could the flies represent something else entirely? Something else that is always watching, like a fly on the wall with its big eyes, and telling everyone else?

COMMUNITY BLASPHEMY. All groups, all communities, have their own rules, often unwritten, traditions, and mores that must be followed. These rules are often enforced by one another. That's how it starts. Then the black vans and helicopters arrive in the middle of the night. Do we really have free will? Or are we unwittingly controlled by our neighbors? Dare say, our friends?

BLIND CORNERS. A ride through a foreign city on the back of a motorbike can be disorienting and even scary. When the traffic is all motorbikes, and they're weaving recklessly amidst one another, and there's something peculiar about your driver, it can take on a whole new dimension of uncanny. With human limbs, flesh and blood, wrapped around these twisted pipes of engines and machine components, they almost resemble a new kind of cyborg-horse, buzzing past, or maybe that's just the fumes and dizzy speed. Still, what's wrong with the driver's eyes? Can horns be a kind of sonar?

MUTUALLY ASSURED (HOME) DEFENSE. Is it madness to want to protect your family? A man walks into a gun-shop wanting to do just that. The world has become a crazy place, with mind-reading technology and personalized nukes. Only home-invasion robbery remains.

PROFILE. A man loses his phone while traveling abroad and then he loses his mind. Or maybe it's his soul he loses. It's hard to tell. When he buys the used phone of a friend the phone isn't sure either. Traveling is freedom to choose many things, including your own identity. Online profiles for dating apps can do this too. What are we if not a collection of memories and personal relationships? Can we become someone different if we change our appearance and play a new role?

MARTIAN SCHOOL OF ART. An accomplished art teacher has traveled to another planet so a new civilization could be born. She's suffered for her art and wants to make sure others do to. What will the art say about this new world?

HOMESTEAD. A young married couple decide to make a new life together on a new world. Like the pioneer days of the American West they embark on a dangerous journey where some very intrusive changes are cast upon them, if they're going to survive. Survival is one thing but love, as they will discover, is something entirely different.

CONVICTION. In the near future, justice may be as simple as engaging with ChatGPT. Then as now, it's a kind of negotiation. Freedom in exchange for civilization and convenience.

BAIRD WHISPERER. When a new Artificial Intelligence consultant arrives at the corporate office dressed as a priest, the Chief Technology Officer is understandably skeptical. When the consultant switches and plays psychologist things get emotional. Both men may be projecting their own flaws onto one another and a machine. Or the machine might be reflecting the flaws of its creators. In the mix of arguments, rambling poetry, and identity crises taking place in the office that day, it's really hard to know which.

WORKING STIFF. A new kind of employee promises to solve the talent shortage plaguing corporate America. He's everything an employer would dream of but he might be every employees' worst nightmare.