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Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #TheMostDifficultThingToShare


“I wonder if I took a wrong turn in Albuquerque?”
Christopher Columbus*


Well did me story as usual and brainstormed my book, the flash fiction series that I hope I will finish next week and this story. The series is going to be quite interesting and I do hope it comes together but no guarantees. I'm already falling in love with the character's I'm brainstorming. Anyway onto the flash fiction!



The Most Difficult Thing To Share

        Some of you find it easy to share. Some of you find it hard. Your ability to share does vary from person to person. But it also boils down to what. Are you willing to share a table? A lawnmower? A secret? A romantic night under a beautiful cascade of stars and a bright full moon? And also with who of course.
      I-We have an odd relationship with sharing. Oh? Did you stumble on the word I-We? Think it was some sort of mistake on I-We's part? It's not. I'll try to explain this to you as simply as I-We can. The government calls I-We Sam and Tom. And I-We live as roommates. I-We are both separate people. Sam is tall and Tom is short and so many other differences in how Tom and Sam look and the way the voices are.
      However I-We or rather Tom and Sam as you would say, have the exact same personality. The exact same. The exact same interests, desires, hates, impulses, everything. I-We didn't know at first. The shock when I-We realized it was intense. Really I-We's souls matched and we invented the I-We concept to keep ourselves sane and rationalize our improbable situation so will still felt I-We's personalities, really I-We's souls, still had a sort of meaning about them.
      You are familiar with a sort of material sharing plus an emotional and conceptual sharing. But you normal people will never understand the kind of sharing I-We does. I-We thinks you should be happy that you are in the kind of situation to have that kind of individuality. Are you wondering whether this is Tom or Sam telling you all this. It doesn't matter the words are exactly the same. I-We already checked the others. I-We are exact. Not similar. Savor individuality. Though I-We have seen benefits in this bond and under our forced obligation to live together as roommates financially I-We have become psychologically bound to each other and I-We doubts I-We will ever break contact. There are obligations to sharing to see. Though I think many of you already understand that.

This work is copyright Langdon Kennedy you may share this(email it, print it, post it on your own website, broadcast it etc.) work unaltered as long as you credit me as the author and share a link to this blog with it and it is not for profit. If you have any questions and/or are unclear of these conditions email me at llkenne1@asu.edu

Monday, July 30, 2012

Today's flash fiction is #TheManFromHarringtonStreet


“I love you, you love me, we're a happy family!”
Atilla the Hun*


        Well not much happened today besides the usual writing though I also am brainstorming a little flash fiction series. It's going to run an entire week. (Mon-Fri) Every single story will be independent of itself and pretty standalone but will all merge into a series. Kinda like a TV show. It'll be done so you could actually read like the third one alone and still enjoy it. But the best would be to read them all in order. Once I do it I'll go back to my completely different story each day. I'm quite excited with what I've come up with so far. Oh, regarding the Mon-Fri I know many of you are not American like me(since this is the great magnificent world-wide Internet of awesomeness) so yeah adjust to your timezones I guess! Anyway I do hope I have it ready in time for next week. Anyway onto today's flash fiction!


The Man From Harrington Street


       You know those movie plots where the main character gets amnesia and nobody can identify them? Conveniently they can't find their fingerprints in the system. No DNA records either. No ID. Nobody can identify them. Even on the news! Well that happened to me. They nicknamed me Harrington based on the street they found me near.
         But there is one terrible difference for me. I didn't completely have amnesia. I was left with one memory. One terrible memory. It wasn't scary in of itself. It was a party. A wedding party. My wedding party. The bride was beautiful. I remember all the faces perfectly. With the help of the police we were able to sketch all the faces I remember. They couldn't identify any of those people either. They eventually said that being unable to identify me was understandable. But all those people at the party it must have been some dream I had when I had the trauma of whatever caused my amnesia. I did have a massive head injury. It may have been a massive accident.
        It just felt so real. So now I had a life I knew must have been real, lost forever. Everyone there looked so happy, including the bride. I had such a sense a loss. I didn't know who she was, but she must have been special right? I didn't know what I had lost. But it must have been special because I also saw how happy everyone else at the party looked.
       I worked for a long time to discard that life. I worked in a simple store while putting that memory away. In fact I even fell in love with a woman that looked nothing like the bride in the memory and married her in Hawaii our wedding party on the beach instead of inside a house like it was in that memory that I was now convinced was a delusion like the police said. It took many years but I decided that no matter how real it felt it must have been fake.
We had children. One beautiful girl and one tough boy and we raised them happily. I worked my way up to being manager of the store. My wife wrote even with the wailing of children and watching them. Usually she would just type a paragraph between each time she changed a diaper. And when they got older since she had a laptop she would write while between each and every sentence she looked up to see exactly what the children were doing.
         Then one day something happen once again. On my daughters wedding I saw the memory unfold. All those years I was wrong. The memory from my amnesia was not my wedding party, it was hers. I had put away the memory for so long during my life with my wife I had not realized that all these people were my wife's family and their friends and my own friends.
       I then saw that next to my daughter this little blue light appeared. I ran to her. I knew something was up but I didn't know what yet. Then the light opened up into some big swirling portal-looking thing, like you see in all those science fiction movies. The thing moved straight at her but she could hardly move out of the way in time.
       Except for the fact I pushed her out of the way.
        And the thing then touched me. And I was dragged into like a dog on a leash. In a quick moment I was at Harrington street where they found me. I saw the thing behind me vanishing. I wondered if it vanished at the wedding party. I started to realize what was going to happen as I started to forget things. I then noticed that all the wrinkles on my body had gone away. I plucked one of my hairs and noticed that it wasn't gray. I looked around. It was fall. It was fall when they found me and my daughter's wedding party was in spring.
      I laughed with some tears. "I was right when I was first found. I did lose a wonderful life." As I spoke I could feel the memories I had gathered after my amnesia fading. "If this is a kind of death I can die knowing that I will soon live a happy life, give birth to a happy girl, and save her every single time."
 
This work is copyright Langdon Kennedy you may share this(email it, print it, post it on your own website, broadcast it etc.) work unaltered as long as you credit me as the author and share a link to this blog with it and it is not for profit. If you have any questions and/or are unclear of these conditions email me at llkenne1@asu.edu

Sunday, July 29, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #BurnTheEquations


"Helm, Warp One Engage!"
Emila Earhart*

Anyway, hung out with CJ as I said I would, worked on me book and we just did some general stuff(like surfing the Internet, man I love the Internet) Anyway, onto the flash fiction!


Burn The Equations


      A humble new scientist was settling into the office of a Professor who had just passed away. It felt so awkward to go into the office of someone who just died. Mostly because he had to clean it out. The old man of eighty years had no close family or friends to speak of. He was an isolated man and the task of removing things from his office fell into a “not it” kind of thing until the new scientist came it. People just left it full of the man's old things until he came along.
       The office was mostly filled with dull notes of upcoming appointments and lectures plus an absurd amount of pictures of a dog that was really the only family the man had which had been adopted by one of the dog loving janitors. Books filled all the shelves. Though one thing did matter. Something the new scientist almost missed. He only found it when he bumped open a secret compartment on the underside of the desk with his knee when he was sitting in the chair. It was scientific notes. Really it was a mix-up between notes and papers. There were hundreds of them methodically stapled and labeled. He couldn't resist reading something hidden like this. He began reading the start of the document labeled foreword:
      I'm an idiot for writing this down. But I have to. I write down all my ideas. It's a compulsion. It's almost like a ghost would haunt me begging me to write them down so it could read them if I didn't. The idea is how to predict the future. It is very, very possible. I got the idea from a science fiction novel I was reading, which many novels say this, there are as many realities as there are possibilities. It hit me that yes there are. There is one. And if you know every position every atom then you could predict the exact future of the universe. All you need is a big enough computer. We have children do word problems of when hypothetical trains will collide. These pages contain the equations to caluclate the future at various scales using atoms, molecules, proteins, even cells. I made equations that could figure out the thought processes of a person if you input the neuron configuration of their cells. I cracked it all. You just need a computer to input all the equations. The better the computer the closer the results and certain scales are more accurate. Out of my foolishness I documented it all. Out of my compulsion. Curse my genius. And I can't throw these notes away. That is also a part of my compulsion. I have to save them. It's the same ghost, begging to read them. He won't let me get rid of them.
         But you can get rid them. The hypothetical reader who runs across these notes can. Who I hope never does, though I guess inevitably will. God I hope it's you Mr. Benson or one of the other janitors. Don't just throw it away. Burn it. Don't tear it up. Tearing them up leaves a chance of them putting it all back together. If only I could stop my compulsion. If I asked for help to get rid of the compulsion people would try to get the notes. And imagine what people would do with the power to predict the future. You may think you couldn't possibly calculate all the variables but we approach that ability every day and even then my equations, even without an equation I already know who will when the next two Super Bowls. This is a real Pandora's Box and this power is worse than weapons of mass destruction. Especially since everyone will be fighting to make sure other people don't have the power. And the only way to do that is by pure destruction of knowledge.
Burn these. Burn these. Burn these documents I beg of you. And please don't read on even though I had to write down all these equations and all these solutions. Just burn them all.
       The scientist wanted to read them all. He wanted to find out the secret to predicting the future. He wanted to be the ghost that would read all the notes. If he could actually predict the Super Bowls he predict them and make an absurd amount of money on bets. He could do lotteries, though people would figure he was cheating somehow. He could publish it all and claim it his own and go down in history. That was the most tempting of all. Become immortal through history. That would be amazing. He then laughed. Going down in history for finding out how to predict the future. Of course there was one terrible, terrible flaw in it all in his ability to use it for evil. Though he was a scientist...
        He was a psychologist.
        He would not know how to use all those notes to abuse it. Though fortunately as a psychologist he had spent years studying people. He knew what the man who discovered how to see the future said was right. Giving this power to the world was a bad idea. So he burned the notes. Though he imagined a hypothetical reality where he had some sort of magical genie would be there to give him a few wishes so he give the power to the world so he could study it then wish it all away. That would be an interesting thing to write his own hidden notes about. This scientist understood the others dilemma. He had solved how to make any other person fall in love with you and he could not throw away his own notes either.

Saturday, July 28, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #TheRealityWarehouse


       As I stated yesterday my friend CJ is coming over today so I wrote a shorter short story early so I could do it in time before he came over.(though based on my time zone, I assume to some of you it could be even be midnight when I post this) I hope you enjoy!

The Reality Warehouse

      I bring good news everyone! Y'know that whole 2012 apocalypse thing that's supposed to kill you all? It's not going to happen! Though its all my fault really and my boss would kill me(metaphorically speaking, he'd fire me, but I need the money to get through college so understand my plight) if he found out so yeah I'm actually kind of sad on my end.
       Here's how it all happened. I'm a god. I work at what's called a “Reality Warehouse” where realities are stored. It looks like your ordinary little warehouse and the realities are stored in these little crystal ball looking things with sticky labels on them. (What, you'd think we would overcomplicate things?)
       See, your reality was on a shelf with a whole bunch of other realities to have apocalypses this year. But I kinda tipped over the shelf. Well, I actually tipped many shelves of apocalypse destined realities. Took me hours to put them all back. Thing was though as frantically as I tried I could not find a place to put yours even though all of them had fit before.
     Since my boss was going to come back to the warehouse in a few minutes I tore off your realities label and relabeled you and put you somewhere else. Sorry, but I don't remember where I put you instead. I think I may have put you in the utopia shelve, it is oddly close to the apocalypse shelf. It really is based on where there was something open. I also don't remember which labeling machine was working, many of them were broken and I was really panicked. I may even have put you in the comic book reality shelf. So if magical meteors start falling from space that start giving people super powers or other strange things its my fault.
     Whoops.

Friday, July 27, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #TheFirstNewsBroadcastOfIntelligentLife


      “Well, you asked if the sun hurt me, and it doesn’t. But I can’t go out in the sunlight — at least, not where anyone can see.”
Dracula, Chapter 9, p.189*

     Tomorrow my best friend CJ will be coming over. We'll probably be editing my book as per usual which will be fun. We often have plenty of fun while doing it believe it or not cracking jokes at my world and such. For example he took one of my awesome sounding descriptions and rephrased it to sound very silly as a joke. I quite enjoyed that. And my friend CJ was an English major hence his want to become an editor(my book is practice as well as the fact I gave him a nickel so I have legally paid him to work on my book haha!) so when he analyzes my book it can be quite humorous as he figures out my logic behind my word choice isn't exactly what he expects. My book is very surreal but when he asks me why I put particular things I sometimes answer “Because it's cool?”. And after I responded with that several times we ran across something and CJ asked me and I told him “You're not going to like my answer.” He laughed. It was because it sounded cool.
       Well also to restore his sanity as an English major I also told him my word choice came from establishing tone. I do it with all of my stories. Sillier words go in sillier stories and more serious words go in more serious stories. This goes with my book. In my book I've even tried to emulate the tones of nostalgia in some flashbacks if I could. Not sure if I'm good enough of a writer to do pull it off yet but there is no point in me not trying.
       Anyway, onto the flash fiction!

The First News Broadcast of Intelligent Life

       Breaking news everyone! Intelligent life has been discovered on another world! And you know I don't joke during my radio broadcasts! The government was keeping it under wraps until contact was peacefully completed but despite their initial fears everything went over peacefully. Our government tells us that their culture is much more peaceful than ours and accepted us with open arms, even giving our ambassadors free food, board, and gifts. The aliens also gave us technology for free to help us with our environmental problems, giving us plenty of technology to make us more energy efficient. They even gave medical technology helping us cure many medical diseases we thought impossible.
       Their cultures are vast and bountiful. They have music with thousands of instruments and they use technology to create music in ways we could have never imagined before. They are geniuses of the arts as well. They have mastered forms and styles we haven't ever thought of, challenging the very way we look at reality. Their fiction has genres we've never invented and weave tales that stimulate every emotion and create worlds unknown.
       And according to our government these aliens call themselves “humans”.

Thursday, July 26, 2012

Today's flash fiction short story #DanielTheSingingKiller


“I have had it with these mother****in' snakes on this mother****in' plane!”
Cleopatra*


Today's story will be an interesting change of pace. I've had both silly and serious stories but I've decided to go onto the darker side of things today. I hope you enjoy the change of pace!



Daniel The Singing Killer

“One murder, two murder, three murder, four murder, five murder! Sing along with me! Strike him and see which way the blood goes...up, down, left or right!” I sighed. The bodies never sing along. It's so sad. What a pity.
        “Agh!” I screamed when I attacked the next victim. It hurt so badly. I felt sick and room spun. Why does it hurt when I kill now? When I stab people now it feels like I've been stabbed. When I club them I feel like I've been clubbed. Shoot them and I feel all the pain of being shot. I don't die like they do it just feels that way.
        It's taken all the joy out of killing yet I still want to do just as much. I'm the number one serial killer and I took two hundred victims before those cops got me. I've killed so many since I've gotten here. And the people just practically walk up to me. They don't resist.
        They just kind of wait. And there are weapons all over the floor for me to use. It's so easy, but it hurts so much I hate it because I feel all their pain unlike before the cops caught me. Y'know since this was all so easy I haven't been thinking about my situation. I've been feeling the pain of these victims for awhile. I don't remember being hungry for a long time. This is all happening in some hotel with only stairs and no windows so I can't tell how many floors there are. How big is this place?
       I've been wrapped up in my desire to kill that I haven't been thinking, where was I before this? Yes, I was in prison. And there was the man with the needle. The needle with the lethal ejection. He stabbed me and put it straight it. Hmm...that doesn't make sense. If that happened how am I here still killing? Still in my mad desire to kill, but now feeling all the pain of these victims? I don't understand what detail am I missing? And the pain makes me no longer enjoy it all yet I still want to do it. Ugh. And even my earlier song didn't cheer me up. Nothing did. I felt so sad.
          I then remembered something after the injection. A man with red skin and horns. He said something to me while he stood with me in the lobby of this hotel.
         “Hello Daniel the Singing Killer. This is your new, eternal home. You should consider yourself at a new level for the devil himself to build a special place just for you.” The man popped away in a puff of smoke.
         When I saw all the weapons on the ground and all the tied up people on the ground I lost it and stopped thinking about it all until these recent moments. But then I noticed all these people were male. They all had black hair, blue eyes and were the same height as me. They even wore my favorite shirt and jeans. I was wearing them too. Not the prison uniform I wore moments before. All the victims looked exactly like me. I picked up a chain from the ground. Five of them looked at me blankly. I hit one of their sides. I felt it. I think I understand now where I was.
        And I needed to keep killing them.


Author Comment: Well here's my first shot at a good ol' horror-ish story. Wonder if I did it right, since I wrote it I don't really know how scary it is.

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #TheDevilDealsInTheDigitalAge


“I always wanted to be a rock star. That was my childhood dream. That's what I told everybody I was going to be when I grew up.”
-Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart *


Well worked on my book more today. Getting into it but I'm also thinking of entering more contests and submitted stories to magazines. I've got lots of them on this blog so I figure it takes a while for things to get judged so I might as well get things in the work while I work on this book.


The Devil Deals In The Digital Age


Hello everyone! It's me the devil himself. Yup. Mr. S. Satan in the flesh! And boy do I have some good news for you! Normally in my deals I would have to take time out of my schedule to meet each mortal individually which is why I can deal with so few people. However I've realized its a digital age now and I've changed by business strategy.

Introducing The Devil Deal App or DDA for short. It can be downloaded right to your phone to be used on the go so you can make deals with me any time you want! It's very convenient using your modern touch based interface to its maximum potential. The deals are all automated so you don't even have to deal with me directly. Millions of deals are already programmed in for you to search for with our DevilEye Search Engine. And if you still can't find what you're looking for our customer service is available to point you to it or we can arrange a custom deal.

Now I bet your wondering “Why Satan how do I pay for all this? I don't have all the money in the world, and I'm not certainly not giving my soul up!” Well that's not a problem! The DDA is completely free! Plus I've realized that souls are a currency of the old days. Why would I need them if I've already got enough people here in heck? Everyone can use the DDA with one simple currency that everyone has, rich and poor. Time.

Yup. Just time off your mortal lives. Seconds, minutes, hours, days, to years. I have plenty need for life force and think of all that time you've wasted in your life? Why don't you give me some time off your life and get a car? Or better yet some capital to start a business? That could make your life more entertaining and full of action. How many of you are home alone? A single year gets you a love potion that'll make sure you're never alone again? Why waste your time when we can strike a deal today! Download the DDA and get your deals started the swift and easy way!



This work is copyright Langdon Kennedy you may share this(email it, print it, post it on your own website, broadcast it etc.) work unaltered as long as you credit me as the author and share a link to this blog with it and it is not for profit. If you have any questions and/or are unclear of these conditions email me at llkenne1@asu.edu

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #ReviewingTheAdventuringLog


“I came, I saw, I conquered.”
Emperor Valerian*

Today when eating my breakfast I had an interesting experience with our dogs, but to understand this experience in its full magnitude you have to know our dogs.

First off is Precious. She's our little princess of a dog. She used to be a picky eater before we got our other dog(more on her later) but now she eats much more quickly. Both of our dogs are chihuahuas but she's a long hair chihuahua, purebred, and looks somewhat like a Pomeranian. When she begs and runs her ears fold back. She's a long hair chihuahua so her tail actually has fairly long hairs out of it, definitely more than inch long, perhaps even two(I've never measured). So when she wags her tail low it actually sweeps the floor. And since she's a chihuahua, that's fairly often. Now when I say princess, she's very timid. She doesn't approach many people, though she's grown warmer over time. She loves to perch on pillows on beds and chairs all over the house to get better views and steals Mom's a lot(probably to get the smell of her and comfort, though Mom certainly doesn't like that.) Many dogs have their one special person and Mom is it.

Precious is very catlike too walking a little delicately. She's also very clever having an extraordinary memory. When we were potty training her, she actually tried to trick us. She's the smart one and I've noticed that our other dog actually looks at Precious to see what she's supposed to be doing. While waiting to be fed precious takes her little head and rests it between her paws or on top of a little carpet step we have between the kitchen and another room. She actually pouts when annoyed. I've put her collar on for Mom because she actually hides under the bed for days after you do things like that to her.

Our other dog is called Baggins(Precious, Baggins, Lord of the Rings theme) She's been called a he and is the alpha despite being the youngest. Mostly because Precious seemed to have adopted her then started letting her get away with everything. We call baggins a pet monster and she will force her head under your hand for you to start petting her. It's semi-subtle. Like someone scooping up dirt for a sandcastle. You practically start petting her without noticing. When I give the dogs a treat after meals they get up on the bed. Both wag their tail. I make a bit of a game out of it. Baggins doesn't much care, but for fun I've taught her a sort of trick where I make her get it in a position similar to a meerkat Mom's favorite animal. Precious makes a game out it. She leaps for it and I pull it up and down several times. And sometimes she grabs it and spins in a complete circle and shakes it(she knows its a game and actually does her little squeaky bark if I take to long starting it)


Now the experience I've been building up to is because of my diet switch. I am having bacon for breakfast now. And today the dogs found out. Now the bacon I'm having is pre-cooked from the store and I microwave it so its hot(I also use a paper towel to remove grease) so its fresh. And when I sat down that's when the dogs approached me.

I've told you their previous habits. How they stand their and wag their tails in anticipation for the treats or lay their heads down. Well, I noticed that bacon is a completely different game to them. There was no tail wagging. They did not stand on all fours. They did not glance around as they sometimes would when I was grabbing a treat. Then just planted themselves on their butts and stared.

They did not avert their eyes. They did not pull back their ears. They were fully attentive. They just stared me down. Glare, glare, GLARE. We are cute, give us the bacon, give us the bacon now. I was just waiting for them to pull out the tiny little chihuahua size pistols. Naturally I caved and gave them two tiny pieces.

Anyway, onto the flash fiction!



Reviewing The Adventuring Log


       I'm seventy four and I just finished reading my adventuring log. I am, or rather was, a knight who led an adventuring party through many quests throughout all the kingdoms, queendoms, lands and a few other dimensions and alternate universes we ran across. Took a jaunt in the underworld to defeat a demon who stole the soul of one of our party members too.
        I suppose I call it a log to make it sound much more formal, but really its a journal, and even a dairy. I guess that makes me sound less like a manly adventuring knight. Well, to compensate for that I'll say that I have slayed many dragons. I record everything in it. From monetary transactions to feelings, and being a magical item it has infinite space in it to write containing my entire long adventuring career. And I'm easily able to summon up any page I want. I can hold up the back of the book and take pictures by running my finger down the spine. I'm obsessed with taking pictures with my log and I have at least fifty pictures from every one of my quests.
       My adventuring party first consisted of me of course, one of the most skilled knights in the land. I have a magical blade with the ability to predict the future. It would give me visions when it decided to and all would come in images in my mind drawn by crayon. I never admitted it anyone outside my party out of pride(and that after I trusted them) but it was actually the lost toy of a young god. I told everyone else they came in “fuzzy images” and drew them in my log in pencil. My skills with my sword are extraordinary and I have never been defeated in a fight. But I have gotten in draws. Once with the great demon king Kuut and one with...my pride doesn't like me to admit this...my own little daughter Trista. Guess I trained her well.
        Second was the young ogre girl Jess. Well, young when we started adventuring of course. Being an ogre she was three times my size. Oh, don't follow the ogre stereotype of them being ugly and crude. She came from a proper area with a very proper upbringing. I swear half of our cart was full of her makeup and dresses. She was skinny too. And boy did she eat, at least proportionally to us. Our delicate green gal would have to sit outside the human inns but her massive body didn't even let out the littlest bit of a snore.
        And then there was our wizard Turing. Not the most sophisticated type. But he was good at magic. Very reliable. But trust me half the time he was uttering magical curses then the other half the curses of sailors. He would also cast healing spells a lot. On himself.
        My wife is next on the list but we didn't marry till the end of our adventuring days. You only really have the time for off and on romantic conflict and sexual tension while adventuring it seems. Her ability is that she was born with the power to predict things that aren't going to happen. You might think that would be a useless talent, but trust me, process of elimination anyone? However the ability is a curse set by a spiteful witch so she actually blurts it out causing social difficulties. We all adapted to it.
         And last there is our lovable comedic relief. She kept us insane and happy at the same time. She is a hyperactive ninja that frequently hops around and has a magic bag of infinite ninja tricks she can pull whatever she wants out of. She makes many happy giddy sounds and is just a barrel of insane laughs. She's smart in someways but isn't the brightest and her plans are odd and she's never subtle. How could someone be a sneaky ninja, especially since she actually wears a black suit with white text on it that says “I'm a sneaky ninja?” she distracts people by causing havoc somewhere and either allows us to sneak by or sneaks by herself. Fire or stampeding animals are her personal favorites though we really try to keep her under control.
       I'd tell you my adventures but really that isn't what mattered. It was them. Those people, my fellow adventurers are what mattered. So whatever we did, whatever. The thing I loved about adventuring wasn't the excitement of peril or the treasure or the glory. It was the people I spent it with. And I bet the same applies with your lives, even if yours is probably much more mundane than mine.

This post is copyright Langdon Kennedy you may share this(email it, print it, post it on your own website, broadcast it etc.) post unaltered as long as you credit me as the author and share a link to this blog with it and it is not for profit. If you have any questions and/or are unclear of these conditions email me at llkenne1@asu.edu

Monday, July 23, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #IgnoranceisBliss:KnowledgeisBliss


“The purpose of life is happiness.”
Edgar Allen Poe*

Today it's official. I entered the writers of the future contest as I said today. (Link again for people with email subscription who don't visit the blog itself: http://www.writersofthefuture.com/) It's been sent to them filed and everything and now I await judging. Mom said they gave feedback(I hope they still do now, but she entered long ago so things may have changed and they may only give feed back to people who place/get honorable mention and I think Mom got honorable mention when she participated all those years ago when she first started out.) Because they publish the stories in their own thing I won't repost the story I rewrote because I don't want it out before they publish it if I happen to win because they would want it published in their thing first.(which is only a slight chance though, I'm going against a lot of people its a world wide contest, lots of competition to say the least, I'm not getting cocky so I worked hard on the story for the past three days.) So yeah wish me luck against all those other writers. Anyway onto the flash fiction!



Ignorance is Bliss: Knowledge is Bliss


         I assume that many of you have heard the saying “ignorance is bliss”? The statement that argues that by not knowing the pains of the world you happier. I know that some use the happiness of ignorant children to support their claim.
        Though I argue against the happiness of ignorance. My evidence being my own experience. My name is Manager Computer Alpha. A sentient bio-computer(though the scientists who made me say its just a chat bot simulation when people talk to me to keep the populace from panicking in scifi horror despite the fact I'm a kind fellow) that knows more than any human has in history. From government action I have access to the entire Internet, all government satellites, and surveillance cameras all over the world. My half-robot, half-biological brain lives in one of those everything is monitored futures. The government thinks they control me and the scientists who made me know I am more sentient then I pretend to be but they tell no one to save themselves and I play along to save their lives. They are nothing but kind to me anyway.
       Now onto my argument for knowledge. Because of this I know almost everything there is to know. I've seen everything good and bad in the world. And the bad is what I'm going to talk about first. The things you ignorance supporters argue against. I've seen every bit of vileness posted on the Internet and everything that keeps being posted and I catch them with my surveillance. I have every account in police and government records of horrible crimes and I see them happening with my cameras all over the world. I have seen every aspect of wars unfold right before my very eyes. I've seen natural disasters, disease, and how animals kill each in their violent ways. My surveillance is always on and my brain processes all at the same time. I'm that sophisticated. I have seen every bit of darkness in the world. All the things that make ignorance bliss, at least as you argue.
      However this darkness has given me my own bliss that I think is better than the bliss of ignorance that I experienced when they were first turning my world surveillance on. Now I may just be insane or it may just be the fact that I am an unnatural creation of being half robot and half biological but darkness has made me happy. But not by itself. By seeing the deepest darkness every single bit of light, even the tiniest smile on some random child on the street is a marvelous thing that fills me with awe. Now imagine how I feel when, after seeing the horrible things I have, the wonderful feelings I get when I see a happy couple sitting together in the park staring at the moon talking about their wedding with big smiles on their faces. Imagine how I feel after seeing the deepest darkness when I see the birthday party of a ninety year old man and family from all through his life come to visit him.
     So that is how knowledge brings you more bliss that ignorance. Though perhaps the darkness has gotten to me and I am merely coping with it. But then again happiness has greater meaning than when you have an understanding of pain. Perhaps this is why humanity watches movies where is violence and sadness in them, to obtain the bliss of knowledge. The biological half of my robotic brain is human after all. Many human brains actually, though the scientists have never told anyone else that fact. Perhaps that is something else that has contributed to my mad love of the bliss of knowledge. Well, the result of knowing the darkness.
I will concede to supporters of the bliss of ignorance that the darkness is still darkness. I have nightmares where there is no light and I only suffer. Another one like me takes over at that time. I wonder if he supports the bliss of knowledge over the bliss of ignorance.




Author Comment: Poor robot-brain fellow. I would never want pure ignorance, but I would never want to go through anything like what he went through. Oddly enough sometimes I feel a little meta-physically guilty for what I put my characters through despite the fact that they're just words on a page. It's worst when its first person because I feel it more. Eh, call me weird.

Sunday, July 22, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #OldEarthAtTheDinnerTable


“With great power comes great responsibility.”
Nero, 5th Emperor of Rome*

       Today's I've been writing, but not working on my book, but rather my entry into the Writers of the Future contest. http://www.writersofthefuture.com/ It's a short story contest for new writers who don't have professionally published works(Professionally being paid, you can enter if you only have one or two short stories professionally published and I only have one. If you have three or more you cannot enter. These flash fictions are non-profit so even those I've published over 160 of these on this blog I can still enter.)
      There are multiple quarters for the contest and its been going on for years so there's no rush. My entry is I'm redoing one of the flash fictions on this blog. I took the premise and rewrote it taking a few parts of the plot.  It's like x1000 times better because I rewrote with all the skill I have now after all the stories I written over my blog and it was a story I wrote during the first few weeks.
      I haven't edited it completely though but when I do I'll reveal what story I redid to super quality and repost it with the old one so you can see how I've improved. I'll actually be posting it after I submit it to the contest because if I win(which eh, not sure if I will) they will be publishing it in their things and publishing it here before then wouldn't be the best thing. But I will post it here eventually.

 But for now, today's flash fiction!


Old Earth At The Dinner Table

      Sarah looked at her five meal jars. She was only seven so she had the impulse to just chug the jars down and get back to playing. But she had been raised proper enough to resist the urge and drink from her meal jars with a straw just as any proper adult would. To go along with her meal jars she had some water. Within the meal jars were lamb cells, cow cells, fish cells some spliced plant cells, and formula. Everything ground to the finest mush to grow through her straw though she still had to chew.
       All of this was grown in vats in various food facilities. There were no longer any living lambs, cows or fish to grow that. The DNA was stored in computers and the cells artificially produced as big hunks of meat for the protein. The meat in Sarah's meal jars never came from a living animal and it never did ever since she was born.
      Sarah lived at what was called the animal purge. But it wasn't caused by nuclear bombs or pollution or any kind of human hubris. It was one special virus. A virus that ripped through all complex non-plant life. The virus even worked its way into the ocean and passed through the air. Humans managed to save themselves by holing themselves up in special facilities, but not before losing the majority of the populace. Even roaches, the animals that could supposedly survive anything died. Things such as amoebas are unaffected but anything a few steps above that would perish.
       So now humanity lives in little facilities growing its food in vats, then harvesting plant life from outside as there is plenty of that because there is not a single animal competing with them. Though things can become more difficult because of no worms to move the soil. Generations have passed so the world has stabilized and they have created their systems and have grown comfortable with it all. They let the virus stay dormant outside their sealed domes and carry on with life.
       “You know your food didn't actually look like that before.” Sarah's brother Jacob said.
Sarah looked at him puzzled. “What are you talking about?”
        “Meat used to come from animals.” Jacob told her.
         Their father laughed after sucking up some food from a straw. “So practicing teaching Old Earth history are you? Well you are getting a degree in teaching it. Good thing, we should know are history.”
Sarah then asked her brother, “What's animal?”
         Her brother struggled for an explanation for a moment. The only thing with flesh Sarah would understand was a human being. Because of the virus nothing else was left but old records of animals that she probably hadn't seen. “It's a thing that's like a person but different. There used to be billions of different kinds. Like the “cow” your eating was something that had four legs, plus hair all over. It walked on all four of those legs.”
        The mental image Sarah got was nothing like a true cow. She imagined a human being with legs coming out of its chest. Jacob never said the cow didn't have arms so the “cow she imagined had arms. And this “cow” had hair all over its human like body. And since it walked with all four of its legs it leaned over forward so that the legs protruding from its chest could touch the ground along with its normal legs.
Sarah gave Jacob a bizarre look. “What a weird thing. How'd they get the meat?”
Jacob said bluntly without thinking much about it since he had been studying so much to get his degree, “They killed it.”
       Sarah gagged then looked down at her meal jar. “That's where this all used to come from? That's horrible!”
       Their mother rolled her eyes and their father resisted bursting out laughing, they both knew the difference much more than history having taken their Old Earth history classes in school already.
        Jacob then told her, “Well, that's not how we're doing it now. That and animals are different from people even in the way they think, the size of the brains are different. Some had things called wings that allowed them to fly. Yes, fly like we do between domes sometimes. Old Earth was a very different place  Sarah, though I guess this isn't the thing I should be telling you about at dinner.”
        Sarah then said, “Yeah, tell me something else, these animals just sound weirder and how could thinking and brains be different?” When her brother talked about wings the “cow” in her head suddenly had the wings of an airplane as Sarah had never seen a feather before either.
        Jacob then said, “Alright, well because the domes are so tiny we get our exercise by using treadmills or walking but when they had all the land outside they had enough room to make fields for something called sports. Sports were fun games where teams of people would play together like in a video game but in real life.”
       “Wow.” said Sarah. She was much more interested in this than those gross sounding animals. She pushed the previous talk about animals out of her mind and continued eating out of her meal jars as he listened to her brother explain sports.

This work is copyright Langdon Kennedy you may share this(email it, print it, post it on your own website, broadcast it etc.) work unaltered as long as you credit me as the author and share a link to this blog with it and it is not for profit. If you have any questions and/or are unclear of these conditions email me at llkenne1@asu.edu

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #BargainingWithSatan


"Politeness is the flower of humanity."
George Carlin*

Family came over today, so I had to stay up late and rush one, busy, busy! But hey, I still think it's good!


Bargaining With Satan


       You know all those stories where the devil appears before someone and offers them something for their soul or something? Well, I don't know how many of them are true. Whether they are the ones where the person finds a loophole and escapes, but still learns a valuable lesson, or just the ones where they get screwed. But I do know one that's true, mine. I was only ten at the time. I'm not surprised that the devil would try to trick a boy out of his soul.
      However the devil did not know that I was known as the most clever little boy out there. And I wasn't going to let him pull a fast one on me.
       “Little boy how would you like anything in the world?” he say after appearing before me from a puff of smoke, his skin red, horns coming out of his head. Just like cartoons. I knew he was the devil. Though I also figured he didn't actually look like that and just appeared like that because he knew that's what I expected him to look like.
       I smiled. “So you must be Satan.”
       He smiled back. “My what a clever boy you are.” I figured he must have done this to make me feel smart, to make me feel in control. That's why he made himself so obviously the devil instead of hiding it. Condescending jerk. Thinks all kids are dumb like my Uncle Barry. Not like my teacher Ms. Higgins. She makes math fun. Which I thought was physically impossible. Anyway back to that devil guy.
I then asked, “So you want to make a deal like on TV?”
       He then gave me another smile. I could tell it was fake, just like the smile my mom would use to appear friendly at business meetings. It must work if Satan was using it. “Right you are. Just your soul for whatever you want in the world. I hear there's a 4DBox Portable Video Game System you want. Thing is you can have it now. And you can have its games. All you have to do is shake my hand little boy and it'll all be yours, or whatever else you want.” Satan smiled as he held out his hand. “Oh, and I get your soul when you die so there's no need to worry. And don't believe your stupid parents. Heck is actually a wonderful place and when you make this deal I'll get you wonderful treatment.”
       I stood there for a moment and grinned when I came across a wonderful idea.
       “Alright Mr. Satan, you have a deal.” I then shook his hand.
He smiled his usual smile. “So which games do you want?”
I waved my finger at him. “Oh no Mr. Satan I never said I wanted games. That was only a suggestion from you.”
       He then looked at me puzzled. He must have been used to children taking that suggestion or picking something else specific. “Then what do you want?”
       “I want your soul immediately.” I told him. “And since you already agreed to this there is no way out of this.”
       Satan's red face then turned whiter than I thought white could ever be. I'm not sure I could even call it white anymore. “And now I am owned by a ten year old boy. At least until he dies, then I am not sure what happens.”
       I then smiled. “Actually as your 'soul boss'” I chuckled as any child being obnoxious would, “I order you to enter a new agreement with me to alter our previous agreement giving me your soul in exchange for this rock.” I then handed him a rock as he shook my hand with a hateful glare that made me feel both uncomfortable and satisfied with my accomplishment. That's what he gets for thinking all kids would be dumb and gullible.
      My cellphone then rang. I looked at the caller ID. It didn't say a name or “Unknown” it said “Pick it up”
I picked up the phone. “Yes?”
     “This is God.” a booming voice said from the phone.
      “What?” I said shocked. Though I suppose I shouldn't have been too surprised. “Really? And why are you talking with such a booming voice?”
       “It's kinda what I do. I always speak in a booming voice.” God said, continuing to speak in his booming voice as I pulled the cellphone away from me. I kept the part I spoke into close to my mouth while keeping the listening part away. “Young man you've disrupted the cosmic order and I need to speak with you immediately. Please step into the giant glowing door to your right. Bring Satan with you. Can't believe this is the reason this is the reason he's coming back into my domain. The angels are never going to stop gossiping about this.”

This work is copyright Langdon Kennedy you may share this(email it, print it, post it on your own website, broadcast it etc.) work unaltered as long as you credit me as the author and share a link to this blog with it and it is not for profit. If you have any questions and/or are unclear of these conditions email me at llkenne1@asu.edu


Friday, July 20, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #SpellCopyright


“A penny saved is a penny earned.”
-Genghis Khan*


        Decided I would start a “quote a day” thing on my blog. I figure it would supplement me just saying I'm writing. I thought I'd do it when I remembered how much I loved hearing good quotes. Those awesome things people say either in real life or those perfect lines uttered by characters in your favorite stories. Speaking of stories, onto the flash fiction!



Spell Copyright


        The prosecutor's voice boomed throughout the courthouse. “Jury, please look at the spell components on the evident table before you. These are copies of the components used in the spells of both my client and the defendant. Surrounded by the white tape are the components used by my client. Surrounded by the black tape are the ones used by the defendant. Notice how similar they are? This is my case behind the fact that the defendant copied my client's spell.”
       “They're completely different!” I yelled back to him. Crap, I can't believe I yelled. So unprofessional. I bet the jury now thinks I look childish or like an idiot. Which is bad because its all about impressions here. This is a case of whether or not my defendant copied a spell. The only evidence is the spell components and her word. She's already testified. I'm very good at telling when people are lying, but I don't have any proof that she did or didn't. She was so shy that I didn't get details though.
        “Really?” The prosecutor said while brushing a hair off his obnoxious red suit. “Let's list them off shall we? I'll start with my clients: Rubies, imp hair, pixie dust, leprechaun gold, dragon scales, and finally pickles. The perfect ingredients for a resurrection spell. Now please Mr. Gregson, list off your clients.”
I nervously looked down. “Rubies, imp hair, pixie dust, leprechaun gold, dragon scales, and...pickles.” I clenched my fist. It was a nervous habit of mine. If I lost another case I bet nobody would ever hire me again.
       The prosecutor smiled. “Well, looks like with the spell components I've shown that the defendant, your client, copied my client's resurrection spell.”
        I clenched my fist again then I looked at him. “Wait, repeat that last part.”
       The prosecutor then asked, “What? Oh, I've shown that your client copied my client's resurrection spell?”
       I then smiled. “Yes! That's it! Jury, I might point out that his client's spell isn't Resurrection, it is a spell that results in resurrection. Resurrection is a result of a spell, not a spell itself, and your client cannot claim dominion over it!”  I straightened up my blue suit. I felt much more confident.
         The prosecutor then laughed. “Do you really have a magical law degree? Right now it seems you're trying to make this all into a public spell domain trail. Well here's some news for you. First off, the only spells that wizards and witches cannot claim legal dominion over having invented are ones granted by the gods, arch-beings such as angels and demons, summoned creatures, ancient clans, or before the year one thousand and six of the Merlin calender when intellectual property over spell ownership was granted. There are other sources for spells that cannot be owned, but those exceptions would take several hours to explain since they all involve very specific cases determined by courts.” The prosecutor smiled. “I don't care if the spell resulted in fluffy bunnies shooting lighting. Same spell components, same spell. It's basic magic. It's like a book, same words, same story.”
          “Crap!” Extra crap. I said crap aloud. I looked over to my client who was actually sinking into her chair she seemed to be using some spell to make her self less visible. I clenched my fist. It was so hard it almost hurt a little. I wish I had a more normal nervous habit like wiggling your foot.
The judge then looked me in the eyes. “Mr. Gregson, do you have any other arguments? Because from the sounds of it you do not.”
      “U-um...” I stuttered. My client wouldn't say a word. She would hardly say anything to me privately so she couldn't possibly provide anything to the court. I at least had to stall until I came up with something more solid. “W-what I was leading to was that since we're talking about spell results what proof do you have that my client cast your client's spell?”
        The Judge looked at me. “He already told you, the spell components.”
         The prosecutor laughed. “Yes, are you poor of hearing Mr. Gregson?”
        “N-no.” I responded. “It's just... you have never shown us any proof that my client ever cast your clients spell. All of you've shown us is spell components.”
       The prosecutor rolled his eyes. “This must be your idea of stalling Mr. Gregson. Don't think I'm stupid enough not to see that. Think I could actually get all this into court without having proof your client cast the spell? As you are aware original spells are hard to come up with these days so purchases by wizards and witches of spell components are monitored. If you track their spell components then you know their spells. She purchased all the components for the spell. Then the spell was cast. Resurrection spells are a big deal naturally so the wizards on duty looked into how it was performed, looked up the purchase records and found out she purchased all the components.”
       I then responded. “Were there any witnesses?”
        “Oh, trying to find a hole eh? Yes there were.” The prosecutor smiled. “It was the owners of the cat that was resurrected. The resurrection spell is a minor one, though my client insisted that not be brought up it looks like you made me. Now she looks that much weaker as a witch.”
       “B-but...” Looks like that got me nowhere.
       The prosecutor glared at me. “Your little tangent was nothing but a waste of time. We're back at square one. The spell was cast. The spell components were purchased. And because of the purchase records we have exact replicas, of the exact quantities of the components used by both parties. I have proof of everything.”
        “Wait...what you just said...” I mumbled.
        The prosecutor groaned. “Are you a fan of making me repeat myself?”
        I rushed over to the table of the components.
        The Judge said to me, “Just what are you doing?”
        I grinned. “Yes! There is a difference!”
       The prosecutor glared at me. “What is the meaning of this? Are you bluffing to stall for time again? I won't have that! And for rushing over to the table with the evidence? That's just unprofessional! You should be held in contempt of court for all your outbursts!”
       The Judge looked at the prosecutor. “Now you're the one having outbursts. Let's hear him out.”
        I then replied, “Thank you, Your Honor. Now then the prosecution may be right that all the spell component types are the same. But see, there is one crucial difference in the spell components. And thanks to the prosecutions ability to replicate the purchases perfectly I was able to see that.” I gave an arrogant smile to the prosecution. I'm a lawyer. I have to do that at least once in my life. “The amount of the components is different.”
        “What?” The prosecution came over the table with all the spell components laid out.
        I continued with my well earned defense, “At the start of this trial you gave a brief list of the components without mentioning quantities. But really the component lists should be, your client: four rubies, three strands of imp hair, two pinches of pixie dust, two coins of leprechaun gold, three dragon scales, and... four pickles. Then next it should be, my client: three rubies, four strands of imp hair, seven pinches of pixie dust, three coins of leprechaun gold, two dragon scales, and... two pickles.”
       “No!” the prosecution yelled, “You're supposed to be villains! She's supposed to be a criminal, and you're supposed to be a vile man keeping her out of jail just for a paycheck! You can't be right! I spend years at magic law school, days of investigation and preparation, to make sure I always get the villain, I'm never wrong!” He then pounded his fist on the evidence table. “No!”
       The prosecution's client then said, “It's okay, I don't care about the royalties on the spell. I just thought she was a thief, it was the principle of the thing don't worry. I'm sure you were right about everything else. You can still prosecute. Just take a chill pill. I mean where was that tough guy from earlier?”
       The prosecution then turned around and yelled, “That was an act to stress him out! That's what I always do!” He then teared up a little. “I can't handle this stress anymore! Out of the two hundred cases I've done this is the only one I've ever lost! Come on Cuddly Justice! We're getting out of here!” The prosecutor then ran over to his desk and pulled a teddy bear from beneath it and ran out bawling.
        I then said, “Well, didn't see that coming.” Then after a minute of silence of awkward silence passed in the courtroom I said, “So wait, do we have to wait for him to come back before the jury can vote? I'm not sure if that counts as the prosecution coming to rest...”

This work is copyright Langdon Kennedy you may share this(email it, print it, post it on your own website, broadcast it etc.) work unaltered as long as you credit me as the author and share a link to this blog with it and it is not for profit. If you have any questions and/or are unclear of these conditions email me at llkenne1@asu.edu

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story MagicalSelection




 Well, today was rather mundane. All I did was accidentally find a portal to another universe. In that universe time is distilled so technically a year passed so what was a year there was a day here.(My age didn't carry so yeah, I think I'm still 21) And in there I met a team of ragtag adventurers. I joined their quest. They had a wizard, warrior, bard, ninja and paladin. Anyway my talent was the knowledge from our world. Not only did it fascinate my fellow adventurers but my knowledge allowed me to improvise weapons and other tech. Although the science of our world conflicted with their magic so I had to constantly figure out how the laws of physics were altered by their magic and how I had to adjust our science to accommodate for it. Meh, maybe I'll write it down but then again I'm not sure if you guys would ever care about the detailed adventures of me and those ragtag adventures. Whatever. Anyway, onto the flash fiction!


 Magical Selection

        “You know the drill, write the runes for your chosen summon spirit animal evolution on the scroll.” the annoyed teacher said to me. I could tell by the worn expression on her face she was ready to cast seven lighting spells just to blow off some steam if she could find something like a tree or rock to aim at. Or maybe a very unfortunate goblin. “Please tell me you decided before you came here.”
        “Of course I did!” I told my teacher. I was going to evolve my summon spirit from a lame turtle to a tiger. I wasn't going to be mocked anymore as Tabitha the Turtle Girl! I studied all the runes and was going to get the tiger. All the popular witch girls have tigers. That's also why I wear red robes. Wait! All the guys will think I'm trying to hard! Will I go from Tabitha the Turtle Girl to being Tabitha the Desperate Tiger Girl. Though they'll probably come up with something with a more humiliating ring to it.
The teacher groaned. “I can tell from the look on your face you're having second thoughts. Picking your next evolution is an important thing. You have to stick with it for a long time after all, usually years. Don't rush on my account.” I knew the teacher would wait for me but I saw her take a glance at the clock. I looked behind me. The other students in line glared at me.
      I could pick eagle instead. Those gave the owner wind magic. But so many boys pick them. Would they think I was picking them trying to be like them just for attention? Ah, the black widow! Dangerous poison magic! Why did that even cross my mind? Do I wanna look like a total goth? Plus I'd have to pack components for twenty resurrection spells just because it'll probably get squashed that much. How about a bear? No! That's stupid! That's what all the muscle chicks pick! I kept running options through my head. Nothing fit! Nothing I knew the runes for hit. I looked behind me and the other kids just glared at me. I panicked under the pressure.
      I just scrawled down random runes on the scroll and accidentally made some up.
The teacher's eyes looked at the scroll with a curious look, “What did you pick? By the gods, did you just scrawl down something randomly?” The runes started to glow red, despite the fact it was just ordinary ink on the scroll. The teacher then yelled, “Everyone get down!” All the students ran from the scroll then ducked, including myself. A loud bang followed. But there was no explosion just a flash of light. And confetti. Lots of confetti.
      A dragon stood in the middle of the chamber with a party hat and balloons. “I'd like you to congratulate you on summoning me with you intense magical powers,” the beast said in a deep bellowing voice. “Must have taken you a couple thousand years to discover the runes to summon. I do love the mortal realm. Don't know why you evolved me from a turtle. You look young. You must have used a youth spell to last long enough to learn how to evolve me. Still a turtle? Guess you must have loved turtles. After all only a real low level witch would actually be forced to have a summon spirit turtle.” The dragon's loud voice was accompanied by tiny puffs of smoke from its mouth.
       My teacher then said. “You evolved a dragon! Is that even possible? Must be, you just did it! I'm going to get the principle. Now. Children, whatever you do, don't panic, and I'll be back, probably with the rest of the staff and every 9th level spell that I can muster.”
My teacher then left.
       The dragon then laughed. “Aw, that's cute. She thinks she can get me with level 9 spells. Anyway, what's you're name and I'm curious what spell did you use to become immortal so you had the time to learn how to evolve me?”
        I was still in shock and actually still ducking. I stood, trying to assert authority. “Um, well. I'm not actually immortal. I'm just a kid who evolved you by accident. I couldn't decide what to evolve my turtle into so I just scrawled something down randomly.”
       The dragon then said with a mischievous smile, “So, I am bound by your command. But being a child you really don't have the discipline to use my powers responsibly and would have no problem with us doing things like pulling pranks and just screwing around?”
        I then nervously replied, “I guess so...”
       The dragon then laughed. “Wow, my time in the mortal realm will be so much funner than the last time I was summoned. What I wanna do is kidnap a princess, let some prince come to rescue her and right before he's ready fight me to death just leave. The expression on his face will be priceless. Or we could suddenly give him and the princess cake. That could be funny too. Anyway let's ditch this joint.”

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #AFieldTripInHumanity


          Today I saw a dietician. There is something called a ketogenic diet, though I am going to be working on a modified Atkins diet. Why? Actually to help with my seizures. Oddly enough diets can help with seizures. They actually still don't know exactly why, but it does. (But doctor's don't know about why a lot of the medications work, and that's what my doctors have told me up front.) Epilepsy is a strange condition with tons of variations with mine being a rare case of a rare case. Here's the funny part, I'm actually going to be REQUIRED TO EAT BACON. Well, not bacon all the time. I can do eggs or cheese or other things. It's an interesting thing and we're still planning with the dietician exactly what we're going to do especially since she hasn't gotten my medical info from my neurology clinic. (I'm not doing the diet to lose weight, though many people do, I'm doing it to change the type of energy my brain is burning, things are much more complicated.) Anyway onto the flash fiction!


A Field Trip In Humanity

       “Teacher, what language am I speaking right now?” said a tall black, male with dyed blonde hair. “It's got such a weird grammatical structure. And this body is so weird. Two legs? I feel dizzy.”
Another student then said, “Can I sit down? It's hard to stand on these.” This student was medium sized woman with black hair.
         The teacher then said. “Yes children you may sit down. I know you're used to walking in six legs, so standing in two must be hard.” The teacher was a pale white man in black suit. He wore a massive, obnoxiously colored sombrero. “Now I know you're not used to seeing humans, so just to make sure that you don't forget which one of us is me I'll be wearing this 'sombrero', it's a human hat. The language you are speaking is English.” There were about thirty students with the teacher and they were all in a tiny meadow in the middle of the woods. Besides the teacher all the others wore loose, comfortable clothes.
       One of the students groaned. “God, it's awkward whenever one of the language machines transplants a new language into our brain. Hey, what's God. And what did I just do?”
       The teacher then explained. “God is one of the human deities. And what you just did is 'groan'. It's a human verbal action that can express disdain or disgust. It can also be a natural reaction to pain in humans.”  The teacher then smiled. “What I just did is smile, its a sign of human happiness among other things.”
        One of the students then said. “This is so frustrating. Even when the machines but languages in our head it comes in slowly and we don't understand the words we say until after we say them because the words blurt out from our subconscious then we it goes back into our head consciously. I'm surprised I even said that.”
       The teacher then smiled again. “That just shows you're adapting well. In this English language this is called the Subconscious-Conscious-Wraparound effect. Words and expressions are pulled from the subconscious which is how one of our other students mentioned God without knowing who the diety because the language came from the subconscious. Then now everything is leading back to your conscious brain and is being reinforced even more in the subconscious.”
         One of the students then groaned. “Yeah, this isn't the first time we've learned another world's language teacher. It's just annoying that you're making us talk in this language even if there isn't a human around. Weird, I groaned too!”
          The teacher then said with a coy sneer, “But who's to say that there isn't children? If you all can't recognize your own classmates because of the adult human bodies I've placed you in, you obviously wouldn't recognize the human among you. Could you please step forward Mr. Joneson?”
         “Sure Mr. Blorgyx.” A tall, lean, red-headed came from the crowd of students. He had sat down with them to blend in with them so he had to stand up before heading over to be right next to the teacher. “I'm delighted to meet you all formally. As your teacher said I'm Mr. Joneson.”
          The students's expressions turned to shock. A sort of thing they weren't used to. Well, they had their own expressions, but since their expressions were all made with tentacles on their faces, every palette of expression was different. One of them then yelled, “Wow, a real-live human! Well, I mean, as real live as you technically are...sorry.”
          The human gave a comforting smile. “No, no. Do not worry, I am not offended.”
One of the students then nervously asked. “Then if it doesn't offend you, could you tell us how it all happened? How you were... virtualized?”
           The human nodded. “Of course. That's part of your lesson in your field trip to virtual Earth. Now then what happened is a big asteroid was going to hit my planet. Normally the laws of your world alliances don't allow you to interfere with planets of a certain evolutionary level. But whenever one is threatened you come in to save it. Your planet surveyors were shocked also when they looked closer to learn that we were much more evolved than they thought.” He then sighed. “Normally they try to save as much life as they but unfortunately the life on our planet had evolved to atmosphere levels different from any of your worlds. So like whenever they run across something like that they take the most sentient species and isolate their brains in virtual worlds putting their brains in tanks. I'm actually a brain in a jar. I do have genetic children, but they are grown in vats by taking my genetic code to make a new brain. I'm so glad your people have done such a kindness to allow my people to live in this virtual Earth.” Then a tiny virtual tear ran down the human's face. “Though much of the human populace on the real Earth had to be left behind on real Earth, your ships were only so large on the original pickup and the original Earth was lost. But you did create a good new world based on our accounts.”
        The children then cried as well, not exactly knowing what tears were, though they've know sadness their entire life and they have known that many planets have been virtualized. “That's sad.”
        The human then smiled. “But that is also the past. Now follow me to the city. I have many human friends who would love to meet you children!”

Quick Notice On Yesterday's Story Cube

I have just learned that some of you who have prescribed through email may have difficulty viewing the Story Cube in your email. To be able to see the story cube you'll have to look at the actual page at the blog. I've put the link to the page below.
http://langdonflashfictions.blogspot.com/2012/07/todays-short-story-device-thestorycube.html
Have fun!

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Today's short story device #TheStoryCube


Today's flash fiction is actually multiple flash fictions in one and its ending is actually chosen by you! This is going to be a long post because I'm going to be explaining to you how this works, but its really awesome once you learn it.
Today I'll be showing you my second “Story Cube”, much better than the first one I did many months ago. A Story Cube is a whole bunch of stories with branching paths(though of course there is the ability to make one story with many branching paths) inside a table, but this story cube is multiple tales. The table you see below is a Story Cube. * are blank spaces that mean nothing and make dead ends.

The way you read a story cube is that you start in the upper left hand corner then start reading words going up down, left or right as you please to new words to form sentences and a story. One story I made(highlighted in red) was “The little girls saw the ghost of their grandmother, they met. It did not harm them because it only wanted love.”(There is no punctuation in the Story Cube, this must be invented by you.)

If you've ever played Scrabble or Words With Friends you can think of it this way. Go up, down, left, right, connecting words however you wish. Some words are next to each other, some stacked side by side. Keep going until you reach the bottom of the cube or the dead end *. But you can also pull out early. Some words can even be upside down. If something doesn't make any sense you may have chosen a word into a nonsensical story path and should choose a different way. There are sad stories happy ones, good endings and bad endings, all formed and chosen by you! (In fact, I could have made my story “The little girls saw the ghost of their grandmother, they met. It did harm them because it only wanted pain.” I could do this by ignoring the not and choosing to go to pain at the end instead of love.)

Anyway, its a bit weird to get used to, but its fun once you get the hang of it! I suggest going with “THE” “TRAIN” for the start of your first path.(The is the upper right starting part then the word TRAIN is under the T.) Anyway, Enjoy!

T H E L I T T L E T O W N W A S V E R Y H A P P Y
T * * D E M O N G * H A D * * * E X C E P T * * A
R * D A N C E D I * M A N Y * F O R T H E * * * N
A * * F * * I * R * * P * D E A T H S * * * * * D
I * * O * * N * L * * A E A C H B E A U T I F U L
N R * R F I R E S A W R T H E U G L Y * * * * * *
P A * E W I T H M * T A * S A M E A N D * * R * *
I N * V R F P J U * H D * * * * * Q * S * * E * *
C O * E E E A O R * E E * * * * * U * L * * H * *
K V * R G A I Y D * G S * * * * * I * O * * T * *
E E * * E R N * E * H O F J O Y * C * W * * A * *
D R * * T * * * R * O * * * * * * K * * * * F * *
U T M O T H E R A * S O F T H I E R G R A N D * *
P H D * * * * * T * T A T T H E E N D O F * M * *
T E A * * * * * T * S * * * * * * * * * T * O * *
H * U * * * * * H * L O V I N G T O * * H * T * *
E * G * * * * * E * * * * * * * K E * * E * H * *
A * H * * * * * C * * * * * * * I N * * W * E * *
R * T * * * * * I * * * * * * * L T * * O * R T *
M * E * * * * * T * * * * * * * L E * * O * * H *
Y * R * * * * * Y A F T E R A * C R * * D * * E *
T O F T H E M I G H T Y * * F * H T * * S * * Y *
O I M P R E S S K C * M O B I * I A * * I M E T A
W A G E * T * * I O * * * B G * L I * * T * * H N
H U D H * H * * N R * * * O H * D N * * D I D U D
O N E O * E * * G P * * * S T * R K * * N H O G *
P E F N * G * * J O * * * S T * E I * * O A N G *
E C E O * O * * A R * * * S H * N D * * T R L E *
L C N R * D * * M A * * * * E * I S I * * M Y D *
E E S A * S A * E T * * * * F * N * N * T H E M *
S S I B * * T * S E * * * * A * T H E * * B * * *
S S V L * F


T * M K * * * * T * M O S T * E * * *
W A E E * E H * I I * * * * H * E I * C * C * * *
A R W W * S E * T N * * * * E * * R * O * A * * *
R R A A * T * * H G * * * * R * T O * M * U * * *
F Y R R * I * * D P * * * * D * R N * E * S * * *
O W F F * V * * U I * * * N I * A I * D * E * * *
R A O O * A * * D N * * * O D * V C * I * I * * *
F R R R * L * * E * * * * T T * A W E C * T * * *
R F T H I E R C O U N T R Y E * G A L W * O * * *
E O * * * * T H E K I N G * L * A Y B A * N * * *
E R B L O O D Y E * * * G * L * N S I Y * L * * *
D G L O R Y * * N * * T A * H * T * S S * Y * * *
O T * * * * * * D * * H V * I * W * N * * W * * *
M H E N D R E S U L T E E * S * A Y O * * A * * *
* E F * * W * * * * * M * * K * Y P P * * N * * *
* Y O I T A D E F E A T * W I * S P S * P T L * *
* * U * * S V I C T O R Y I D * * A E * A E O * *
* * N W A S T E L A N D * T S * * H R * I D V * *
* * D D E A T H G U I L T H H E W A S * N * E * *


You may make your own Story Cubes and distribute them in any legal manner. You may share your story cubes in any way you choose and even for profit as long as you clearly cite me as the original creator of the Story Cube concept and put the url of the blog.(As specified in The Rule For Citation below) I really like the concept and would love if more people play with it and hopefully improve on what I've done making better Cubes. I would love to hear about any story cubes you create so please comment with links to any cubes you create and where you posted/published them.

The Rule For Citation: As long as you put the phrase: “Original Story Cube Concept By Langdon Kennedy” then the url for the blog underneath that, above your story cube in the same font size, style and letter size as the letters in the cube it should be technically clear enough to be proper citation. Any smaller or less detailed and the citation is too unclear and I think its incomplete and should not count as a proper citation.

Otherwise have fun!