Author: sjan

Trunk Stories

The Dreamer Wakes

prompt: Set your story in a nameless world.

available at Reedsy

The problem with nightmares is that they are processed the same way, by the same equipment, as the real world. To the brain, there is no difference between the sensory input from the waking world and the imagination of dreams.

“This has to be a dream, right?” Clint asked of no one. “This can’t be real…but if I know it’s a dream….” He tried to rise in flight, but nothing happened. He tried a running take-off, only to fall face-first to the very real feeling ground.

Clint stood, brushing himself off, the dark ash of the soil staining his jeans. His clothes were familiar, at least. After all, it’s what he was wearing when he lay down in the soft grass and warm sun. Let everyone else crowd the parks, he was happy with the cemetery near his house; better maintained and quiet.

“I’m asleep on the grass under the big oak,” he said to the entirety of the world around him. “None of this is real, and I’m going to wake up…as soon as I figure out how.”

He turned in a full circle, looking for any kind of landmark. No trees, no buildings, no signs of life marred the rolling hills of ash-covered ground. A faint peak, far off, caught his eye.

With the peak as his target, he began to walk. Faint puffs of fine ash rose from his every footfall. The only sound was his own breath and the soft sound of his steps. He checked behind himself often, ensuring that his footprints were still there.

The silence dragged on him, distorting his sense of time. He began to whistle a tune; whether to fight the silence or prop his falling mood he couldn’t say.

What started as a random tune began to coalesce into a song with structure. Verse, chorus, and bridge made themselves known. Too bad I won’t remember this when I wake up, he thought.

As he walked and whistled, his brain filled in the harmonies. The song went from a jaunty walking tune to a military march, to something slightly dark in a minor key, to a dirge, and then back again.

Clint wasn’t tired, but he was sure he should have been. He stopped to look behind himself again. His steps disappeared into the distance. Far beyond that, a cloud of ash was building on the horizon. He turned to face the peak again and went back to walking.

The song still rattled in his head, even though he’d stopped whistling. He was certain that he should be thirsty by now, but he felt no discomfort of any sort. As nightmares go, he thought, this one isn’t too awful.

Hours on, and still the peak seemed no closer; neither did the roiling cloud of ashen dust behind him. Clint slapped his face as hard as he could. “Wake up!”

All he had accomplished was the pain of the slap, a dance of spots before his eyes, and the dread that he would never wake from this. Now it’s a nightmare, he thought. He pinched his arm, digging his nails in. It was pain, but at least he was feeling something.

Clint wasn’t sure how long he spent like that but at some point, he’d broken the skin. A trickle of blood slowly trailed from his arm down his thumb and gathered at the knuckle. The pinching forgotten for the moment, he watched as the blood slowly formed a drop and then fell to the ground.

He watched it fall, as if in slow motion, making a splash of fine ash dust when it hit, then disappearing into the ash as though it was never there. Another followed and then a third before he moved to find something to put over the shallow cut.

“You have laid your claim and it has been accepted,” a soft voice said behind him.

He spun around and saw no one there. “Who said that?”

“Your domain.”

“What do you mean?” Clint moved to press the hem of his t-shirt to his arm, but it had already stopped bleeding. He turned in slow circles trying to find who might be speaking.

“Where we are,” the voice said. “I am the voice of your domain.”

“Where are we?”

“We are here. Is that not apparent?”

“I mean…what is this place called?” he asked.

“It has no name…yet. That is for you to decide.”

Clint took a deep breath and let it out. “I’m asleep on the lawn of the Oak Rest cemetery. None of this is real.”

“I am real, you are real. What is not real,” the voice said, “is the thought that there is somewhere else you are. You were dreaming but have finally awakened.”

“Why can’t I see you?”

“Look around you,” the voice said, “I am everything that you see. If you would prefer an avatar, perhaps I can oblige.”

The sound of soft footsteps behind him brought him about. He faced a nude woman, his own height, thin, collarbones and ribs visible, ash-grey skin and hair, pale eyes set wide above broad cheekbones.

“That’s better, I guess. What’s your name?”

“I’ve already told you; you haven’t named me yet. This form is just an avatar to make it easier for you to communicate to your domain.”

“Does everyone have a domain?” he asked.

“They do, but most don’t wake to it, despite thousands of dreams.”

“You’re saying my life…my entire life, has been a dream, and this is my reality?”

“I am saying all your lives have been dreams. This reality,” she gestured with a sweeping arm, “is waiting for you to shape it.”

“But I don’t have any control,” he said. “I couldn’t even fly.”

“Should you be able to fly? Nothing is fixed here, yet. Once you make your desires known, physics will be defined for your realm. But you can do no such thing until you’ve decided what I…your domain…should be…and give me a name.”

“But why is it covered in ash? Why does it look like a wasteland?”

“It’s not ash as you know it,” the avatar said, “it’s raw materials.” She picked up handful and let it flow through her fingers.

Clint sat cross-legged in the ashes…raw materials, he corrected himself, and thought. If this world is messed up, it’s my fault this time. What are all the things I wished I could’ve changed about Earth?

Time didn’t seem to move, but Clint felt that he’d been thinking for hours…days even…with the avatar of his domain silently watching. He didn’t know much about physics or biology or any of that, but he thought that overall, Earth was as good a place to start as he could imagine; parts of it, at least.

He thought of forests and mountains, wide plains and rich grasslands. Pictures of vibrant wetlands and oceans full of life flashed through his mind. All the things that made Earth beautiful and livable, minus the factories, mini-malls, urban sprawl, and suburban blight.

He had a clear picture in his mind; a rich, lively planet with seasons and diverse climates and habitats. But what to call it?

“I think I have a name,” he said, his eyes still closed. “Utopia. It will be my utopia, so I think it fits.”

The sound of crashing waves and the smell of moisture, slowly gaining a salt tang, brought him out of his reverie. He found himself on the shore of a vast ocean, the sun rising above it. The sky turned blue as a green sheen bloomed over the water. In places where the waves lapped high, leaving behind some of the green, it spread across the land.

He turned to Utopia’s avatar. Her flesh filled out, hips growing wide, breasts filling. Her skin began to change, turning a rich green beginning with her feet, moving up. By the time her eyes shone emerald, the hills beyond were full of trees.

Clint knew without looking that the seas teemed with life that changed and advanced faster than he could process. Soon, the land began to fill with animals. There were pressures that forced change on the plants and animals; volcanoes, floods, earthquakes, but they were minor, over in a flash, and necessary to make Utopia work.

“You’re beautiful,” he said, as much to the world as to her avatar that stood before him.

Utopia turned her gaze to him. “I can be nothing but,” she said, “as I am how you have made me.”

“What happens now?” he asked.

“If you wish to let the sleepers dream in your world, you can. You don’t need to, but it is allowed.”

“Will they be humans?”

“They will be as my environments shape them, but I, or even you, cannot force their form.”

“I worry about war and the destruction of the environment,” he said.

“Look around you,” Utopia said with a sweep of her arm. “I have already weathered ice ages, the splitting and rejoining of continents, and millennia of change. I am still here and still healthy.”

Clint thought for a moment, or was it a millennium? “Let the dreamers in.”

Trunk Stories

…And Child

prompt: Your character runs an inn for resting mountaineers. It’s a calm life, until they encounter a twist of fate.

available at Reedsy

Galen had always had a warm welcome for visitors to his inn, until this one. It was his nature to be warm and open with his guests. She didn’t feel like a guest, though, more an invader.

She had crashed through the door with a wordless cry like a soldier storming an objective, disturbing the quiet calm of the lobby. The fire still burned cheerily in large stone fireplace, the morning sun still shed its beams of warm light through the windows, yet the atmosphere was shattered by her arrival.

Under her large pack and bulky layers of outerwear, Galen could not make out any details. The only clue he had that she was, in fact, a she, was the slight stature combined with the pitch of her voice as she cried out with a, “Raaahhh,” as she barreled in.

“I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to keep it down, ma’am,” he said as politely as he could. “We have guests still asleep, after all.”

She let out a grunt as crouched down until the base of the pack was on the floor, then released the waist strap and wriggled out of the shoulder straps. The gloves came next, placed on the pack neatly. She removed the heavy parka to reveal a figure that seemed too small for the size of the pack.

After folding the parka and placing it atop the gloves, she unwound the scarf that covered her pale, freckled face and removed the thick stocking cap, releasing a cascade of frizzy flame-colored hair. Her eyes darted side to side, a wildness…possibly panic…driving them.

“I’m Galen,” the stocky innkeeper said, offering a large, work-hardened and sun-darkened hand to the woman. “Welcome to Mountain Springs Inn.” His usual friendly expression was absent; the smile line around his eyes in contrast to the concern his face wore.

She looked at him, starting with straight, black hair cut short, down his bulky frame to his pale, sandal-clad feet, then back to his deep brown eyes. “I—I’m sorry. It’s been a long trip. Are there any…official types staying here?”

Galen cocked an eyebrow. “What do you mean by ‘official’?” he asked.

“Government types?”

“Nope. Nobody like that around here unless there’s an avalanche or lost climber or something.”

She relaxed visibly, letting out a heavy sigh. “Okay. Can I get a room for a week? And I may need to extend it later or leave early. I’ll prepay for the whole week, though.”

“Sure,” Galen said, his normal smile returning as he walked behind the registration desk. “Your name?”

“Oh, sorry. Celeste Davies.” She pulled a wad of cash from an oversized pocket on her bulky snow pants. “Does the room come with meals?”

“It can. A room and three meals a day would be—”

She cut him off by dropping the wad of bills on the desk. “Will this cover it for a week? Room service for meals, don’t worry about cleaning the room until I’m gone. Privacy is a must. As such I won’t be leaving the room until it’s time to extend my stay or leave.”

Galen picked up the bills and began counting them. “This is enough for a month in the master suite, would you like—”

“A plain room…just the most basic you have. And keep the change. If I need to extend, I’ll be paying the same again.”

“Well, Ms. Davies, allow me to carry your bag up to your room.”

“You can call me Celeste, and I can carry my own bag. Could you, uh…”

“Yes?”

“Could you not put my real name in the register? I didn’t think about it until just now.”

“Are you in some sort of trouble? Running from the law? I won’t…”

“Nothing like that. Trouble, yes, but it’s not what you think.” She sighed. “I haven’t broken any laws, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Galen handed her a key and put a false name in the ledger. “Second floor, third door on the left. Room 2-H.”

Celeste took the key. “Thank you.”

Galen watched her as she threw her parka back on and sat to strap the pack on again. She rose with some effort, holding her gloves, hat, scarf, and key. “I assume lunch is at noon?” she asked.

“Yes. If you would like, breakfast is in an hour.”

“Not today. Tomorrow, for sure.”

Galen watched her make her way up the stairs. He wondered what was so precious in the pack. Packs were usually dropped to the floor, especially when they were so bulky and heavy as hers seemed.

He counted the bills again and put them in the strongbox beneath the desk. A glance at the tower clock in the corner of the lobby reminded him of what he should be doing. Breakfast would be starting soon, and the lobby would be filled with the quiet murmur of those eating, enjoying a hot drink by the fire before checking out to go up the mountain or return to civilization.

True to her word, Celeste remained in her room, never showing her face. Her meals were left outside her door, and the empty dishes were left in their place an hour later.

The morning of the third day, two men entered shortly after breakfast. They bore no packs and carried no bags. Their parkas were too light for the weather and their shoes were not the sort that the adventurous mountaineers wore.

“How can I help you gentlemen?” he asked.

“We’re looking for Celeste Davies,” one of them said. “She may be using an assumed name. Short, pale skin, red hair, green eyes. Possibly traveling with a tall man with a blonde beard.”

“She was alo—,” he began, realizing too late that he’d let it slip. “Who are you?”

“We’re just looking for Celeste. You were saying?”

“She was alone. Stopped in for breakfast the other day and left. Didn’t say whether she was going up or down, but since I didn’t see her before then I would guess up.” Galen hoped that was good enough for them.

“The other day,” one said. “Which day would that be?”

“Day before yesterday,” he said. As much as he hated lies, the behavior of the two men raised his hackles. If they were officials, they would have identified themselves and shown proof of their identity. Instead, they’d deflected the question.

“Can we see your ledger?” the other asked.

“Can I see your warrant?”

The first man shook his head and whispered to the other. They moved away from the desk and spoke in low tones for a moment.

“We’ll be on our way now, but we’ll be back. If you see her again tell her to stay put.”

Galen leaned on the desk. “I’m not a message service.” The first man began to reach into his parka before the other stopped him. “But,” he said, “I’ll make an exception for you gentlemen.”

They left and Galen watched the door for a long moment before letting out the breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. It only felt right that he should warn Celeste, but he worried that they may be watching him.

He went into the kitchen and put together a snack for her room with a note under the plate explaining what had happened. Galen carried it up to her room himself and set it down outside the door. He gave a quiet knock and began to walk away.

He heard the door open, then a quiet hiss. “Galen! Come quick!”

He rushed to the room and Celeste whisked him inside before grabbing the tray and pulling it in as well. She closed and locked the door behind her. Her hair was disheveled, her clothes rumpled. On the center of the bed the blankets were in a pile.

He told her about the men, and she nodded. “They’ll probably be back. Don’t change your story or add anything to it.”

She opened the pile on the bed and there, in a nest made of blankets, sat the largest egg he’d ever seen.

“What is that?” he asked.

“What I’m protecting,” she said.

Galen moved closer and heard a faint scratching noise from the egg. It rocked on its own. “Hatching?”

Celeste nodded and lay down next to the egg, warming it with her body.

Galen wasn’t sure how long he stood there, transfixed, before the egg began to open at the top. A small egg tooth appeared first, followed by a dark green snout. After the unmistakable head emerged, the hatchling struggled to drag its leathery wings, clawed feet, and serpentine body free before collapsing next to Celeste. It breathed in short, quick breaths. As it warmed and dried out, it opened its eyes and began to chirp at the woman that petted its head.

He watched as she chewed up a small piece of meat and dropped it into the waiting mouth of the hatchling. She made a cooing noise as she chewed the next piece and fed it. She kept this up until the hatchling slept again.

“That’s a…”

“Yes,” she said. She pulled out another wad of bills like the first one. “One more week before it’ll be strong enough to travel. Then we’ll get out of your hair.”

“No hurry,” he said.

“We’ve got to get out to the wild where he can hunt and be free,” she said, stroking its head. “Isn’t that right, little Galen?”

“Little…oh, you—you didn’t have to name him after me.”

“He needed a name, yours was close to hand.” She rose, careful not to disturb its sleep. “Now, if you don’t mind, I should return to my privacy.”

“Certainly.” Galen returned to the desk and checked the ledger. He looked at the false name he’d signed into the room, and scribbled in, “and child.”

Trunk Stories

Stranded

prompt: Start your story with someone making a cup of tea — either for themself or for someone else.

available at Reedsy

Cara watched the water reach a boil in the animal skin bag over the open fire. She kept a close eye to ensure the flame never reached higher than the water. She’d crisped one bag that way already and wasn’t looking for a repeat.

When the water reached boiling, she removed the bag from the fire and poured it carefully into the hand-carved wooden mug, soaking the crushed dried leaves waiting there. She let it steep for a few minutes before taking a tentative sip.

Nodding her approval, Cara sipped at her “tea” until she reached the dregs at the bottom. I should figure out a way to make a strainer, she thought.

The last leftovers of the creature she’d eaten the previous few days constituted her breakfast. That, combined with the stimulant properties of the leaves gave her the energy to hunt. She’d named the creatures “piradeer” because they looked like a cross between a pig, a rabbit, and a deer.

They were not frightened by her presence, but she worried that as time went on, they would begin to fear her. For now, “hunting” involved picking a couple of the bitter berries (that made her sicker than she ever wanted to be) and finding a piradeer. Once spotted, she need only show the fruit to the animal and lead it back to the cave.

About the size of a medium dog and gentle, she found that she could calm them by scratching behind the long ears, and then a tight hug around their thin neck put them out. The butchering was bloody and difficult, but she’d gotten efficient during the months she’d been stranded.

Cara looked out on the area outside her cave. The area to her right was flat and mostly clear. If she was still here in thirty more days, she’d build a paddock and see if she couldn’t domesticate the piradeer. They didn’t move far, but they moved in loose herds to fresh grass.

It would require work on her part not just to build the paddock, but to collect fresh grass for them every day. She’d been so lost in her thoughts that she’d neglected to knock out the piradeer that was now sleeping calmly under her scratching fingers, its pig-like snout twitching with each breath.

“I’m sorry,” she said, and rendered it unconscious with a squeeze of its neck. A tear ran down her cheek. No matter how many times she did it, it never got easier. 

Aside from the bitter leaves she used for tea, every other plant she’d come across made her violently ill, even in tiny tastes. The pseudo-tea leaves, however, were far stronger than coffee or actual tea. She learned that two of the fingernail-sized leaves were the right amount to give her energy without the shakes.

The meat smoked over the fire, her food for the next few days. The meat was gamey and a bit grainy, but she’d grown used to it. Cara picked up a stick and charred the end in the fire, before adding another mark to the wall. She wasn’t sure how long the days were here, but they felt longer than twenty-four hours. Still, this was the two-hundred-twenty-sixth mark she’d made.

There had been many days before that, sitting first at the wreck, then moving out when her supplies dwindled. The cave was a lucky find. It was two days travel from the wreck, and Cara hadn’t been sure where she was going. The lower oxygen levels caused her to tire easily at first, and her thinking was often clouded. It also made starting the fire more difficult, or at least she rationalized the entire day spent getting it going that way. Cara hadn’t allowed it to go out since.

She’d acclimated over time, and guessed that now she could return to the wreck in a single day or less. The hide of the creature that now cooked in the smoke of the fire lay before her. She scraped the back with the knife that constituted her entire collection of useful modern tools. Muscle memory took over, allowing her mind to wander while she scraped.

Her emergency radio sat quiet in the corner of the cave, the green light indicating that it was listening, the slow blinking of the orange light indicating every time her ship in orbit sent a distress call. Folded neatly beneath the radio was her flight suit, a massive rip in the right leg. How she didn’t die in the crash was still beyond her.

She stopped scraping and rubbed the scar on her right calf which itched when she thought about it. Cara was glad for the warmth of the weather, as she hadn’t anything other than her undergarments to wear. She wondered if she should make a needle and try to sew some hide clothes.

The scraping finished, she hung the skin over a rock near the fire. She wasn’t ready to sleep yet, so she grabbed a bone from the pile and began carving with her knife. Making a needle would probably take a good deal of practice and now was as good a time as any.

Cara woke the next morning and stoked the fire, adding another log. After tea, her next chore was to find more dried wood. While her tea steeped, she saw movement in the underbrush outside the cave. The piradeer were moving to the clearing near the cave.

“Hey, guys,” she said.

A few of them stopped and looked her quizzically, their ears perking up. She sipped her tea and watched them go about their calm business. While they ate, they seemed to take turns coming to the mouth of the cave, sniffing at the fire and deciding it was not good or sniffing at her and showing a great deal of curiosity.

She scratched behind their ears as they came around, and soon she had a dozen of them lying around her, in a state somewhere between waking and sleep.

Cara finished her tea and rose to set her mug on the rock outcropping she thought of as her “shelf” when the radio crackled to life. “Exploratory Vessel Andrews, this is Rescue Vessel Sunrise, do you copy?”

She picked up the radio and responded. “RV Sunrise, EV Andrews, Dr. Cara Meeks. I’m on the planet’s surface. From the downed shuttle, look for the smoke of my fire.”

“Roger, Dr. Meeks, we’ll be there to pick you up in less than an hour.”

The curious piradeer had risen and were surrounding her and she found herself scratching them as they got close enough. “Thanks, Sunrise. Take your time, I’m in no hurry today.”

Trunk Stories

Savages

prompt: Write about a character whose intuition is always right — until one day it isn’t.

available at Reedsy

His calm was not born of insouciance, but of clarity; he already knew what would happen and how it would play out. He waited outside the Lord High General’s office, letting the harried couriers and lesser generals bustle about. A subtle feeling led him to move to the other side of the entryway as the door swung violently open where he had just been.

“The Lord High General calls for the Royal Seer, Terkannan!” The guard that opened the door and barked it out hadn’t even noticed Terkannan until he was halfway through the door.

He approached the broad desk and bowed. “Lord High General, I am at your service.”

The general’s voice was hoarse from non-stop meetings since the first light of dawn. “The primitives in this system, here,” he said, pointing at a star chart. “You’ve seen the reports, what is your assessment?”

Terkannan closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. Not that he needed to, but it helped maintain the mystery of his line; long bred for intuition to the point of being nearly precognizant. “They are savage, brutish creatures, capable of only violence. This has led them to fight each other, making the strongest among them their leader. Strong they are, too…far superior to our raw abilities, but that’s what weapons are for.”

The general nodded in assent and motioned for the seer to continue.

“Due to their violent nature, they will advance only slowly if at all…assuming they do not do us the favor of wiping themselves out first. Worst case, they may advance rudimentary armor in a few hundred qot. We can use this to our advantage, as we have the technology and weapons to make us…that is…you, Lord High General, the leader of them all.”

“Strategy?” the general asked.

“Overwhelming show of force. As they gather in groups, find the largest gathering first and kill the leader and fighting capable males outright and capture the rest. This demonstration, using their own methods, will make you their undisputed leader.

“From there, it is a simple matter to assimilate bordering groups and grow an army of the creatures organically. They will be fanatically dedicated to you and do your will. They will also make good slaves for mineral extraction.”

“Thank you, Terkannan. The other generals are concerned by the strength of the beasts, while the scientists want to study them, and at least one princess wants to protect them. Bah! That entire system is wealth for the empire, and a million of those beasts on chains in front of our armies will secure our place in the galaxy forever.”

“Exactly as you say, Lord High General.” Terkannan bowed and left the general’s office to return to his own study.

As he walked through the city toward the library, activity around the fort increased. Shuttles were already transporting troops to the waiting ships in orbit. A quarter of a qot to board and prepare the fleet, then three quarters there. The system would be under the empire’s control in just over one qot. Which leaves another nine-hundred-ninety-nine to plan for. This would be the empire’s greatest turning.

Terkannan entered the library and climbed the steps to his study. It was quiet here, and he could shut out the world around him. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath; not for show, but to clear his mind, let his intuition wander. Suspicion niggled at the back of his mind. Something was missing, but he wasn’t sure what it was.

He was trying to let intuition guide him to the missing piece, when he felt he should stand and face his comms. He stood for only a moment when it chimed, and the Lord High General’s assistant showed up on the screen.

“How may I help?” Terkannan asked.

“The Lord High General requests your attendance on this campaign.” The assistant didn’t wait for a reply but disconnected immediately. As with all things the general did, this was an order, not a request.

Terkannan took the bag he had packed the previous day, knowing he would need it but not why. He made his way to the fort and turned left at the sign that pointed to the right for shuttles. A short way down the road he met the general’s staff, boarding a private shuttle, and let himself in.

He was shuttled to the command ship and settled into his cryopod. The general wouldn’t board until just before they left and wouldn’t have time to consult him anyway.

He woke to a cacophony of alarms and shouting. Something had gone wrong, in the worst possible way. Terkannan made his way to the bridge, and the sight that filled the screens was unbelievable.

This was the same planet, but it was ringed with artificial satellites, cities that lit up the night skies, vast amounts of pollutants in the atmosphere. It shouldn’t be possible. He knew they would never advance.

“Did someone get here before us?” the general barked out.

“Scans show the same creatures,” one of the deck officers responded.

“Hundreds of qots to get to crude armor!” The general’s face was distorted with rage as he rose and towered over the seer. “You said they would never advance!”

“Perhaps, Lord High General, I let logic try to explain the reason for my intuition, but I stand by it. An overwhelming show of force and they will follow you blindly.”

The general grunted and sat back down. He pulled up a holographic globe and picked the brightest spot on the night side. “We’re setting down there,” he said. “Set a course and lock it in. The fighters can flatten a landing area for us.”

“Lord High General,” the comms officer said, “we’re getting even more radio wave transmissions from the planet, all across the spectrum. Should we analyze before we—”

“No. Take us in.”

The fighters flew in ahead of the formation and began blasting the strange towers to flatten the land for the fleet. The response from the creatures was immediate.

Flying machines harried the fighters, tearing holes through them with projectile weapons, and finally destroying them with flying bombs. The fleet came over the horizon, flying machines at their backs, and we met head-on with missiles firing from the area of the destruction.

Terkannan felt the unsurety that had bothered him fall away. The general’s ship, and the fleet along with it, would die here. His fate was to sink with the ship in the deep water off the coast they were approaching.

#

“In this evening’s news: We are not alone, but we may not be safe. An alien invasion in Europe destroyed much of the Benelux before NATO troops were able to bring them down. Thousands dead and many more missing. An underwater salvage is underway in the North Sea to recover as many of the alien ships as possible. Here’s Dr. Silva from the European Space Administration to tell us what they hope to learn from the wreckage.”

Trunk Stories

I Meant What I Said

prompt: Write a story about two people who don’t know each other but bump into one other on New Year’s Eve (either once or every year). 

available at Reedsy

The first time I saw her, her eyes were haunted, her scars fresh. She came through the line in the soup kitchen, pointing at what she wanted but never uttering a sound. If I had to guess, I would say she was nineteen or twenty. That was New Year’s Eve, three years ago.

Two years ago, I volunteered on New Year’s Eve again, and saw her again. The haunted look in her eyes was pushed down, hiding under despair and dark circles. Her scars, the result of some horrendous fire, were still visible, but the color almost matched her medium-tan skin.

She was wearing a sticker on her jacket, probably from a twelve-step meeting somewhere. It said, “Hello, my name is Anita.” Once again, she uttered no sounds, but pointed out what she wanted. She seemed thinner, frailer. She seemed to have aged several years.

“Hi, Anita,” I said, “I’m Tim. Have you got a place to stay warm?” I made sure to include the card for the women’s shelter on her tray.

She looked up at me, for just a second, before walking away with her food. I watched her sit across from another woman, grey hair, missing most of her teeth, with the leathery skin of someone who has lived rough for years. They signed to each other between bites. The older woman cackled at something, but Anita didn’t seem amused.

By last New Year’s Eve, I had learned enough sign language to be almost conversational. I was able to talk to the older woman, who I found out was Maribeth, once a beauty pageant winner, fifty-four years old, and homeless for the last seventeen years. Maribeth had a crank habit, and claimed she’d been kicked out of shelters and rehab programs all up and down the west coast.

I asked about Anita, and she grew angry. She was signing too fast for me to keep up, but I caught the gist. They’d had a falling out. Maribeth’s signing slowed for emphasis as she told me, “That bitch thinks she’s too good for my meth. I tried to share but she said no. I bet she’s working for the government.”

Not wanting to aggravate her further, or get drawn into her delusions, I told Maribeth that she should eat before her food gets cold…and that she was holding up the line.

I didn’t see Anita until after Maribeth left. The despair in her eyes had turned to resignation but the haunt was still buried there. The cold outside made her scars stand out pink against her throat and hands.

She removed her heavy parka, four sizes too large. Where she had been thin the previous year, she was positively gaunt, and needle tracks marked her arm. She looked closer to forty than twenty-five.

As she approached, I signed, “Hello, Anita. Do you have somewhere warm to sleep tonight?”

She looked up at me and signed back, “Who cares? And I can hear.”

“Good to know,” I said. I grabbed one of the cards for the women’s shelter and was about to put it on her tray. Instead, I turned it over, wrote my name and number on the back, and handed it to her.

Anita looked at the card like it was poisoned. “I don’t want anything from you, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’m just worried about you. If you go to the shelter, talk to Julia Marquez, she taught me sign, she can help. If you need someone to talk to, you can text me at this number, any time.”

“Not my hero,” she signed with an angry huff, but I noticed that she put the card in her jacket pocket.

“Not even close to a hero,” I said. “I just care.”

As she ate, I noticed she was watching me like a hawk. Every interaction I had with the others as they came through the line. “Do you have someplace warm to sleep tonight? No? Here’s a card for a men’s shelter over on Second.”

There was a slight delay as a woman holding an infant and trailing a toddler came in. The left side of her face was swollen and purple, the eye almost swollen shut. Dried blood from her nose and lip mingled with the tracks of tears. When I made a move to help her, she cowered from me, so I backed off. “Sister Kathleen,” I called, “we could use your help.”

The sister came over at once and bundled the three of them into one of the side rooms that connected with the main body of the chapel. I stared at the door that had closed behind them far too long, trying to calm the reflexive part of me that wanted to find the monster that had done that to her and pay them back in kind.

I took a deep breath to calm myself, wiped the tears of anger that had started to form, and turned back around and went back to serving. My phone chimed, and I finished helping the man who was so intoxicated as to be reeling on his feet to a table before checking it.

It was an unknown number. The text message said, “Do u mean it?”

“Mean what?” I texted back.

“U care – any time – that shit.”

I looked at Anita, who was staring holes through me. I walked to her table and said, “Yes, I meant everything I said. I care, and I’m available any time.”

“What was her name?” she signed.

“Julia Marquez.” I texted it to her as I said it. “She’s the real deal.”

Anita rose to leave, and I thought I saw something different in her eyes…a faint glimmer of hope. Sometimes, that’s all one can ask for.

She didn’t text me at all after that. All I could do was hope for the best. As New Year’s Eve rolled around again, I volunteered for the fourth year running. Aside from some of the sisters, it seemed that the volunteers were new each year more than the people we were feeding.

I was about to introduce myself to the new volunteers when my phone chimed. I looked at it; a new text from Anita. “Behind you,” it said.

I turned around, and there she was. She’d gained some weight and shed the extra years, looking more her age. Her clothes, while casual, were neat and clean, in her size, her hair styled, and best of all, she wore a smile. The circles under her eyes were gone, and there was true happiness in them. She held her arms out, and I copied her.

Anita stepped close and gave me a big hug. As I hugged her back, she began to sob. I looked around for help, but Sister Kathleen just grinned at me.

“I—is something wrong?” I asked.

She shook her head no and clung on. After a minute or so she stepped back. “Nothing’s wrong,” she signed. “I’m just so glad you’re here.”

I noticed that she was wearing a volunteer pin. “I’m so glad that you’re here, on this side of the line.”

“I thought I was done,” she signed, “but you told me you cared, and I thought, if the dork at the soup kitchen can care enough to learn sign for me, I should be able to care enough to ask for help. So I did.”

I was about to ask her for more details, but she pulled something out of her pocket. It was a keychain from Narcotics Anonymous that said, “9 Months.” The pride in her smile was unmistakable.

“They say we can change lives doing things like this. Want to see if it’s true?” I asked.

She signed at me, “You dork, of course it’s true. I’m working next to you so you can translate.”

“Not if you’re calling people names,” I said.

“Never,” she signed, “at least not here. I work for the church as a janitor and I do this every month now, you should join me.”

“I think I will,” I said. As always, I meant exactly what I said.

Trunk Stories

Late for the Last Time

prompt: Start your story with a character who is always running late arriving somewhere just as it closes.

available at Reedsy

Liv hadn’t been on time for anything, ever, and this was no different. She knew it would still be there later, after all, and she’d had things she had to do.

The doors were massive, imposing. She took a deep breath and started toward them before stopping. Liv looked at the summons again. She was more than just a little late.

Liv shrugged. What are they going to do, sue me? she thought. As she began to climb the stairs toward the doors, they began to swing close.

The stairs were interminable. She wondered how they accommodated the handicapped. There were no ramps in sight, and no signage for accessible entry.

Liv continued to trudge up the stairs while the doors continued their slow, stately arches, moving inexorably closed. She was surprised that she hadn’t gotten short of breath on such a massive staircase, but she wasn’t going to run and risk tumbling back down them.

Even if the doors closed before she got there, she could truthfully claim she’d been here, but slowed down by the stairs. She noticed, now that she was closer to the massive doors, that there seemed to be person-sized doors set within the main doors.

She wondered why a place like this insisted on such grandiose, over-the-top displays of power and authority. We get it, already, she thought, we’re peons and you’re all the overlords of everything. Sheesh.

Liv climbed the last dozen steps as the massive doors closed with an almost imperceptible click. Not the massive thump she’d expected. That quiet click held the uncomfortable feeling of finality.

She stepped to one of the person-sized doors set in the bottom of the main doors that stood at least four stories tall. With a deep breath and final resignation, she knocked on the door.

No sooner had she knocked than the small door slid open. The man who stood before her in a grey suit made her uneasy. He was nondescript, bland-faced and forgettable.

“Olivia Marcos-Gonzales, you are late,” he said.

“I had things to do,” she said, “and it’s not like you’re going anywhere.”

“From the moment of your birth, two weeks late, you have never been on time for anything.” He looked at a tablet in his hand that she hadn’t seen before.

“Yeah, everyone knows that about me,” she said with a shrug. “My friends don’t mind, and my family’s used to it. My boss understands, and I get paid piece work rather than hourly. At least my work is always impeccable.”

“Your friends tolerated you, your family reached the end of their tolerance long ago, and your boss only assigned you work that had no deadline.” He swiped the tablet to a new page. “The closest you have been to appearing at an appointment on time was during your second year of school, when you were seven minutes late for your school photo.”

“Oh, come on,” Liv said. “You can’t blame me for being late in grade school! My mother never got me to anything on time.”

“It was always you that slowed her down,” he said. “Any time you were not a factor, your mother arrived on time or early. You acted as an anchor, slowing her down, and causing her no end of stress.”

Liv bit her lip. She felt the truth in his words. As much as she didn’t like to admit it herself, she was a burden to everyone around her. “I…I’m sorry.” Her voice was as small as she felt at that moment.

The man turned off the tablet and it disappeared from his hand. “It seems only fitting,” he said, “that you are subjected to this.” He pointed to the stairs behind her.

She turned to look, and the stairs seemed to descend forever into darkness. “What? What’s going on?”

“As unlikely as it sounds, you arrived at hell as we closed the gates for eternity.” He raised a hand. “Before you ask, heaven closed thousands of years ago.”

“Thousands of years? What are you talking about?”

“You are the last human soul. We’ve waited for you as long as we could, but we must move to a new universe now, so that all the other human souls can be reborn into new forms.” A small smile played at the corner of his mouth. “Olivia Marcos-Gonzales, you will remain in this universe until its eventual heat death, after which you will be forever in an eternal void…alone.”

“Come on,” she said, “you’re here, I’m here, the door’s open, let’s just move on.”

The smile dropped from the man’s face. “That’s where you are wrong. You are here, I am not. The door is not open, just a facsimile in order to pass your judgement. We have already gone.”

“Bu—but…I had things to take care of! It’s not like I was just wandering around doing nothing!” she cried.

“Olivia Marcos-Gonzales, that’s exactly what you’ve been doing. For three thousand years you wandered the Earth as a ghost, never moving on, never accomplishing anything. Then you spent a billion more making your way here. You have always been and will always be nothing but a faceless wanderer.”

“Th—three…thousand…years? Then a billion more?” she asked. “How?”

“Time moves differently for the dead, but then, time has always moved differently for you, hasn’t it?” A frown darkened his face. “Had you made this one appointment on time, you’d find yourself being birthed on a new world, in a new universe, right now.”

“But I’m stuck here forever?”

“Indeed.” He smirked with a perverse joy. “Perhaps now,” he said, “you’ll have enough time to do all your very important things. No one will ever bother you or ask you to hurry up, ever again.”

The man took a step backwards and the small door slid closed. The massive doors in front of her shimmered and disappeared. Liv looked around. With the building gone, she found herself floating in the void of space, watching the stars wink out, one by one.

Trunk Stories

The Other Me

prompt:  End your story with someone finding themselves.

available at Reedsy

Sometimes it’s easier to pretend that everything’s fine. This wasn’t one of those times. Still, I put on a smile and went through the motions until the end of the workday.

When I left at the end of the day I went straight home to try and straighten the whole mess out. I pulled out my phone and looked at the twelve messages I’d received over the course of the day.

Each message was, supposedly, sent from my own number. That’s easy enough to spoof, I guess, if one knows how. What concerned me were the intimate details contained in each message. Things that I’d not told anyone or written down anywhere…ever.

I read over the last message again, trying to make sense of it. It left more questions than answers.

Your bank password will be given to you tomorrow morning. Trust me, this is for your own good. You’ll find things a little tight until payday, but when the auto trade happens on Nov 22, three years from now, you’ll never have to work again. You’ll even have enough to buy J a house, even though she doesn’t even know you feel the way you do about her. When you do, don’t let her know it was you. Let it be anonymous for her and her kids.

I went to my laptop and logged on to my bank account…or tried to anyway. Not only had my password been changed, but I got an alert on my phone that someone unauthorized had attempted to access my account.

After spending twenty minutes on hold, I was connected with a service rep. They told me I had changed my password three times in the past few hours, and the account was now locked for further changes for a twenty-four cool-down.

The call ended with them trying to hint that maybe I was having a dissociative episode and might benefit from medical help. I’m sure they thought they were being gentle and subtle about it, but it hit like a hammer.

Was I going crazy? How would I have disturbed my own meeting this morning with a text to myself? Was someone trying to convince me I was going insane? Who would do that?

I was left with questions I couldn’t answer. Rather than continue the fruitless conversation with myself, I settled in for a Friday evening of binging streaming video. At least those passwords hadn’t been changed.

I finally got to sleep despite the nagging worry that my life had been hacked in some unrealistically deep way. My sleep was not restful. When I was woken by a text message notification, I didn’t feel like I’d slept at all.

The text message contained my new bank password, and login credentials to a stock trading site connected to a national broker with an office in town. It concluded with, “The good pruning shears are in the kitchen junk drawer—don’t know why. I’ll answer your questions Monday. I know it won’t do any good but be careful tomorrow.”

Not that I had any reason to, but I checked the kitchen junk drawer. I didn’t see any pruning shears in there. Of course, it was a mess. I dug into the drawer, and under the top layer of odds and ends…there they were. Missing for the entire summer, yet this person knew where they were.

I logged in to my back account and noticed it was short a thousand dollars. I checked the transaction history and found an in-person withdrawal that happened while I was in the meeting that had been interrupted by the text message. I looked at the record of the withdrawal and found that it was verified with ID, debit card, and thumbprint. On top of that, I knew all the tellers at the bank by name, and they knew me, as I was there on a weekly basis.

It was looking more impossible the further I went. I’d only added thumbprint verification for cash withdrawals a week prior, as soon as the bank offered it. Whoever this was, had a passable ID, my debit card with the chip, and my thumbprint.

I checked in my wallet, and found that my debit card was, indeed, still in my possession. Still in a haze of feeling violated, I checked the stock trading site. I had three transactions. The first was a deposit of one thousand dollars that included a free five-year membership. Next was an automatic purchase order for GryTek at nine dollars, which had triggered yesterday at noon, resulting in the purchase of one hundred shares after the trading site took their fees. The third was an automatic sell order of the GryTek at nine thousand dollars.

Here again, the transaction records showed that the transactions had been made in person with ID, and that certainly looked like my signature. I checked through the terms and conditions. The agreement was binding and there was no provision for refund. That money was gone.

Should I get the police involved? Someone with my debit card in hand, and my thumbprint, withdrew my money from the bank, and then bought a hundred shares in a nobody company. It would sound like buyer’s remorse…like I wanted to back out of a hasty decision.

I spent the day going in circles, trying to decide how to handle the situation. No idea I came up with was satisfactory. At some point I turned on the TV and let some documentary series play, until I fell asleep there.

The morning came and I woke feeling not refreshed, but like I had at least gotten some sleep. I showered and dressed, planning to spend the day trying to research identity theft, to see if it had ever been done so completely.

The phone rang around noon and I answered, hoping for the thief, but got a coworker instead.

“Could you swing by the office? You missed a signature on one page of your benefits packet. I need to get them out to FedEx this afternoon, but without your signature you’ll miss out on your revenue sharing.”

I drove to the office and handled the paperwork. I sat into the car and had no sooner started it than changed my mind about heading straight home. I got back out of the car and crossed the street to the park.

I walked to the bench by the water where I sometimes ate my lunch and sat facing the river. I wanted to clear my mind, let rationality take over.

The river made a pleasant burbling in front of me; the sunlight sparkled off the water in bright shards. I took a deep breath, letting the fresh air of the park calm me. I’m not sure how long I sat there, but I rose and headed back out of the park as the sun hung low in the sky.

I hadn’t even made it out of the park when my mind began to race again, going in circles as I stepped into the crosswalk. A screech of tires and loud honk made me jump. The last thing I felt before everything went black was my knee shattering against the bumper.

When I woke in the hospital, my entire body felt like a giant bruise. I could only see out of one eye. I reached up with a hand in a cast, only my pointer finger free, and felt at the bandage covering my eye.

The TV at the other end of the room was tuned to a news channel. They were talking about a hundred-fold increase in the stock price of a little-known scientific instrument company that had just signed deals with every major smart phone maker.

I found the remote by my other hand. That hand wasn’t in a cast, although that elbow was immobilized. I turned up the volume.

“The announcement of the deals signed by GryTek early this morning signaled a meteoric stock rise. The CEO has said that they plan a series of stock splits, to normalize their stock prices over the next few years. The first came as a surprise this morning when they made a one to five split.”

I muted the TV. It seemed I now owned five hundred shares of GryTek. I muted the TV, turned my head to the left…and there I stood, smiling.

“Hey, there I am. I couldn’t remember what room I was in,” the other me said. “I know this is weird but hear me out.”

We looked like identical twins, although I noticed a small wrinkle near the corner of other me’s eyes I knew I didn’t have. “What…what is this?”

“GryTek just had the first of several stock splits. Over the next three years, that one hundred…well, five hundred now…shares will turn into twenty thousand. They reach their peak at nine thousand and four dollars a share before they collapse completely.

“For the next three years, their name will be in the news constantly. They make a sensor that ends up in every smart phone and smart watch, until they get pounded by a patent suit.”

“How…who…?”

“I’m you, four years from now. I had this same conversation with myself, on your side, four years ago. Last year…three years from now for you…I retired. A few safe real-estate investments and I’m set for life.”

“If you’re from the future, how does this all work? Causality, I mean?” I asked.

“Hell if I know. I didn’t invent this, just stumbled on it by accident…you’ll see. Was there a version of me that didn’t have a future me come back and make that investment? Maybe. That might have been the me that started all this.”

“But you have my debit card…?”

“Of course. It doesn’t expire for another four years for you, next month for me.” Other me stood. “It’s time for me to go.”

I noticed a slight limp as other me walked a few steps away then faded away into thin air.

Trunk Stories

Method Acting

prompt: Write a story about a character practising a speech in front of the mirror. What are they preparing for?

available at Reedsy

“Okay, again.” He looked in the mirror, took a deep breath and relaxed his posture.

He looked at the script again. It couldn’t really be called a script, though. It was broad strokes, with details sprinkled throughout. A believable performance required that he be totally at ease with the story and the character, while recalling the details as if he had lived it.

“I met him in the coffee shop in the lobby; seen him around a few times. Said his name was Greg? Gary? Pretty sure it was a ‘G’…I suck with names. Saw him on Thursdays, since that’s when I usually have enough time to grab an iced coffee after lunch. Either way, it was around one o’clock in the afternoon last Thursday that I last saw him.”

He glanced at the script to check details. He’d need to get it down without needing notes.

As he continued with the story, he caught himself bunching his shoulders, or shaking his head slightly when affirming something. Another deep breath, he shook himself out and he started again.

After several restarts, and hours spent watching himself in the mirror he took a break. While he prepared his lunch, he carried on an imaginary conversation with a small mirror propped up on the counter. “Oh, yeah, I thought he was weird as shit, but that’s his business, right?”

He took a bite of his sandwich and talked around it. “Yeah, I heard about that, right? I mean you hear about this kind of shit every day almost.”

He nodded as he continued to chew. “Yeah, it’s a little freaky that it happened so close to work, but it was bound to at some point, right? The city’s only so big, and the dealers and pimps have been moving closer for months now. It’s weirder that it was ‘The Weird Coffeeshop Guy’ I kinda know.”

He finished his lunch and brushed his teeth, checking that there was nothing stuck between them. Satisfied, he began recounting the story in the mirror again. Each time he told it, the order he told it in changed, but the details remained the same.

With each retelling, he built the picture in his mind, creating a memory where none was. As long as he believed it, his performance would be perfect. 

He’d been called on so rarely to perform, but he borrowed heavily from method acting for those times he was called. Prior to now, his performances were small potatoes: almost all sales pitches with the occasional pick up on a lonely Saturday night.

A good night’s sleep, filled with dreams of the pictures he’d been building in his mind, and he woke refreshed. He was a little surprised that he hadn’t been called on to perform yet but took full advantage of the time to engage in more mock conversations about it.

He had just finished breakfast and was brushing his teeth when the doorbell rang followed by a heavy knock on the door. Opening the door, he saw two police officers.

It was his time to perform. He didn’t resist, but he demanded to know why they were arresting him in the first place. When the word “murder” came up he was suitably shocked and appalled that he would even be implicated.

The ride to the police station gave him all he needed to completely lose himself in the character he’d built up. Every passing minute increased his confusion at being accused of something he’d never even consider doing.

When they left him alone in the interrogation room, he let his confusion overwhelm him. “What’s going on?” he asked the camera.

The interrogating officer entered the room, introduced himself, and asked the man where he had been the previous Friday at six pm.

“I was still in the office,” he said, “working on a deal for a needy customer. If you want details, you’ll need to contact my boss and sign an NDA.”

“Okay, so you were at work. Anyone see you there?” the officer asked.

“After five on a Friday!? You must be kidding. Most of my coworkers would rather lose a client than miss out on happy hour.”

“Is there any way you can corroborate that you were in the office?”

“I think the last email exchange I had with the client was around seven or so. I went home right after that and it was almost eight when I got in.”

“We’ll check that out,” the officer said, “since we already have your personal and work computers.”

“What the hell? You just dig into my personal stuff, for what?”

“Why don’t you just walk me through your entire day last Friday, from the time you woke up, until you went to bed.”

“Do you need to know what I had for breakfast? I don’t remember if I had cereal or a breakfast bar.” When the officer signaled that those sorts of details were unimportant, he described his typical day, finishing with the details about working until seven pm, getting home at eight, and having a beer for dinner.

The interrogating officer leaned forward. “We have an eyewitness that puts you in the alley where Gary was killed, at six pm on Friday. And Gary was wearing your raincoat.”

He let the anger build up inside him at the accusation. “I wasn’t there! I just told you!”

“Why was he wearing your raincoat?”

“I don’t know. I hung it on the hook in the office last week when it was raining, what was that, Tuesday? Anyway, I walked out without it, and realized after I got home that I’d left it in the office.

“When I came in the next day, it was gone. I asked around about it, but no one saw anything. I saw him on Thursdays, usually. I didn’t know he was around the building any time.”

The officer just kept nodding and making notes as the man talked. When he finished, the officer asked, “How well did you know Gary? You said you saw him on Tuesdays?”

“Thursdays. That’s when I have some extra time after lunch, so I go to the lobby and get an iced coffee. Gary is…was…weird. He’d say shit like, ‘The butterfly flaps its wings…beware the storm.’ That’s kind of what he said to me last time I saw him.”

“He said, ‘Beware the storm?’ What do you think he meant by that?”

“I think he was off his meds. Sorry, that’s mean. I don’t know if he was crazy or constantly on drugs or just…creative. He was a nice enough guy, he just didn’t seem to have his head in the same reality as the rest of us, you know.”

The officer conferred with another officer outside the open door of the interrogation room. He returned and removed the cuffs from the man’s hands.

“We’ll check on your alibi and get back to you. In the meantime, don’t leave town. We’ll probably have more questions for you.”

“I’ll stay available. I hope you catch your guy.” The man rubbed his wrists as he walked out of the police station. 

He took a ride share to his home and walked in to the small mirror still sitting on the countertop. He leaned in until his face filled the mirror and smiled. “Who should we choose next?” he asked.

Trunk Stories

After the Storm

prompt:  Write about a character who’s stuck in a shopping mall.

available at Reedsy

There were, no doubt, better places to hide out, but this one was available. The storm was coming. Already, the heavy rains pounded against the large glass wall of the main mall entry.

Deciding that the glass was likely to turn into shrapnel when the storm fully hit, Angel moved deeper into the pitch-black mall, the crowbar she’d used to break in hanging from one hand. Her phone provided a little light, at least for now. She didn’t dare check how much battery it had left.

The drumming of the rain echoed in the empty promenade, louder now. A bright flash illuminated the empty store fronts, followed by the boom of thunder that hurt her ears.

She looked up to realize that the entire promenade had massive skylights for a roof. That, combined with the sheer amount of glass in the empty store fronts made her more nervous.

Angel tried to remember the last time she’d been here. What brought her back to the city she’d fled she couldn’t say. Years ago, when the stores were still open and the mall was packed daily, this was a happy place for her. She wasn’t sure what had killed the mall, but it was a dead, dusty thing now long faded like her memories.

Aside from some graffiti, though, the inside looked untouched. Another bright flash followed immediately by the boom of thunder pulled her head back into the present and presented a possibility.

She shined her phone’s light at the sign she’d glimpsed in the lightning flash. The restrooms and mall office were down a hallway just ahead. No exterior windows, no skylights, it would do.

The end of the hallway presented her with the restrooms and a heavy door to the office. She tried the door, but it was locked. Angel tried to break the lock with the crowbar, but the door was sturdier than the outside door she’d jimmied.

The sound of glass shattering and the sudden increase in pressure motivated her to run on to the restrooms. There was no door on the men’s, but the women’s restroom was still whole.

Angel sat down against the inside wall, feeling the air pressure pulsate as the door opened and closed, pumping like a bellows in response to the gusts. She turned off her phone’s flashlight to save her battery and darkness made her eyes strain to get the light that didn’t exist.

She closed her eyes, listening to the storm raging outside. The door was spending more time opened than closed, the wind raging past in the hallway outside. The steady drumming of the rain was punctuated with the percussive sound of branches or other detritus striking the skylights like mallets on a giant drum.

The faint echo of a whimper caught her attention. It was a dog, she was certain, and it sounded as scared as she was. She turned on her phone’s flashlight and called out, “In here, puppy! In here!”

The whimpering drew closer. A small mutt, curly brown coat soaked, showing the emaciated frame beneath, slunk in, ears down, tail between its legs. It bumped its nose against her hand and rolled on its back, shivering.

Angel turned off the flashlight and lifted the feather-light puppy into her lap. “You look how I feel,” she said. She stroked the wet fur slowly, giving the scared pup time to trust her.

“I think,” she said, “you’ve been living on the streets as long as I have. If we make it out of here I’ll make sure you get some food, okay?”

The dog licked at her hands, tentative at first, then gaining confidence. It tried to burrow under her sweatshirt, and she helped it. “Yeah, I don’t have much, but I can share some warmth at least.”

Every crash of thunder, sound of breaking glass, and large strike of rubble against the skylights made the dog tense and shiver. Angel cradled the scared animal under her sweatshirt and rocked it slowly, as she had rocked her baby once.

“I never got the chance to be a mommy,” she said, “but I’ll be one for you.” She remembered the day, what should have been the best turned into the worst day of her life. Her small son, cradled in her arms, umbilicus freshly cut, as he lay still and lifeless. The doctors tried, for what seemed like hours, but there was nothing they could do but let her say goodbye. Tears ran down her face, mirroring the rain outside, as she remembered the day that made her run away from her own life.

By small measures, the puppy she cradled calmed, until it finally slept, sucking on her sweatshirt. A sad smile crossed Angel’s face, as she continued to rock the sleeping puppy.

The storm tailed off so slowly Angel didn’t notice until it was silent. Her hips and back hurt from sitting on the tile floor. She realized that she could make out the sinks and stalls. Light was coming in from somewhere.

Angel rose, careful not to drop the puppy, that stirred and tried to lick her face as she took it out from under her sweatshirt. She put her phone in a pocket and picked up the crowbar with her free hand.

The door to the restroom stood open a crack, a small branch wedged under it. She forced it open the rest of way with her shoulder and stepped out into the hallway. Leaves and small pieces of branches littered the hallway. She turned the corner to the main promenade, where the morning sun poured in the shattered skylights.

What appeared to be an entire tree lay in the main walk, surrounded by shards of glass. Not a single skylight had survived the storm.

The puppy squirmed. “No, I can’t set you down in here, you’ll cut your feet. Let’s get out of here.”

She walked out of the shattered main doors to the path of the storm’s destruction. The river had flooded and taken over the lower parking lots. Pieces of building material and trees were piled against one wall of the mall. The construction site to the south had been scrubbed clean.

A heavy sigh escaped Angel’s lips as she realized that her squat was gone. She’d known it wouldn’t last forever, but at least until the construction was done would’ve been nice. She walked to a grassy island in the parking lot and set the puppy down.

Her phone still had a little charge, and she still had the one important number in it. She looked at the number and locked her phone. Was that why she’d come back? She would have to get something to eat soon, and she wasn’t likely to get any water at the fast-food places, since they’d all be closed.

She wondered if the water in the downtown park bathrooms, four miles away, was working. At least she wouldn’t die of thirst, then. The park was a good place to panhandle, too. She could get at least enough to buy something off the five-dollar menu at the taco place…assuming it was even open.

A whimper at her feet brought her back to the present. The puppy was begging to be picked up. She picked it up, holding it on its back Ike a baby.

“You’re a cute little girl, aren’t you?” She scratched the puppy’s belly. “Well, I promised to feed you, and I can’t do that without help, can I?”

The puppy nibbled at her fingers, play biting turning into an attempt at suckling. Angel took a deep breath, unlocked her phone and hit the “call” button before she could change her mind. The line on the other end rang once, twice, then was answered.

“Mo—mom?” Angel’s voice broke. “I—is it okay for me to…I mean, can I come home?”

Trunk Stories

Hidden Links

prompt: Write about someone in a thankless job.

available at Reedsy

In all the inhabited worlds there were fewer than five people who had more than a passing acquaintance with Kia Tyler. Her direct supervisor, Adama, was perhaps the one who knew her best, and they never saw each other outside of work.

The most important thing that Adama knew about his employee was that her skin was very sensitive, and she was, according to her, “allergic to damn near everything in the universe.”

With mandatory genetic counseling, this sort of trait was all but unheard of, making her uniquely suited to her job. It wasn’t difficult, or physically demanding, but she often ended the day with contact dermatitis around her nose and mouth.

As the only manufacturer of masks for low-oxygen environments that didn’t require full vac suits, the lives of nearly everyone on Mars depended on his product. Adama felt his company should do everything in their power to ensure their product was not just safe and effective but comfortable as well. That’s where Kia’s sensitive skin came in.

Kia wore an oxygen mask in her testing office. Since she didn’t require extra oxygen in the environment of the dome, the mask delivered slightly cooled room air. Thermal cameras recorded any leaks of the mask. A certain amount was allowed, but she would automatically fail any material that was less than 98% effective in the proper size or 90% if too small or large.

The new compound of the mask seal she was testing passed the leak test with flying colors. Despite trying it on in every size available, even the masks too small and too large maintained a seal above 98%. Her face, however, was not happy.

It began as a faint itch, progressing to a burning sensation. Less than an hour after donning the mask, Kia was forced to remove it. She looked in the mirror at her desk. The edges of the mask were clearly marked by what appeared to be an angry red burn; bumps beginning to form.

“Compound Z-443-alpha-2, wear test negative. Allergic reaction positive. Wear time: forty-eight minutes.” She saved the results and pulled the seal off the testing mask and tossed it in the recycler. Kia made a point of cleaning her hands, then her face, and finally, the mask.

There was no more testing that she would be able to do for the day. Before treating with an antihistamine, her face was sensitive to any contact, including the rush of air caused by her breathing. After treatment, her face would be completely insensitive to any sort of allergic assault for at least twelve hours.

#

Miria loved her job, traveling across the Martian landscape far from any domes, checking the progress of the bacteria and fungus that had been engineered to release oxygen from the iron oxide in the soil. Her rover had food, water, and oxygen for twenty days. She would spend fourteen in the wild.

She was required to post regular reports to the terraforming commission, but never had to deal with them face-to-face. Her reports were signed by her employee number. Miria didn’t mind being a small cog in a large machine.

The thing she loved most about her job, though, was that she was completely alone. Not one given to idle companionship, she preferred the company of her “little world changers,” as she called them.

Two dozen mask seals, labeled Z-799, were stored in a cubby above her three masks, near the airlock. One primary, and two backups. Ten oxygen canisters provided enough for twenty hours outside the rover and could be refilled in the rover itself.

She stopped at the grid coordinates for her inspection and pulled on her mask. Cycling the airlock, she stepped out into the cold, thin atmosphere. She found the marker flag, bent over by a windstorm at some point, and straightened it back up.

Yellow lichens clung to every rock larger than a couple centimeters. Miria took samples of the lichen, the surrounding soil, and one deep soil sample. She paused to lift her mask and take a drink from her water canister. The air was sharp, acidic. She lowered her mask and took another breath.

“Someday, you will make the air sweet here,” she said to the lichen sample. “I’ll be out of a job then, but I’ll probably be over a hundred, so it doesn’t matter.”

Back in the rover, she made use of the mobile lab and compared the genome of the current bacteria and lichen versus those originally seeded. The faster reproducing of the current bacteria had a lower oxygen toxicity threshold than was desirable. Miria would have to find a way to give the more oxygen resistant bacteria a leg up, so to speak.

The lichen, however, was doing its job superbly. “Strain 613-gamma, code name whirlwind, maintaining stable genome and positive nitrogen production,” she added to her audio log.

#

Zane planted pale yellow lichens around the base of the new hybrid rhododendron in the Capital City Park. He took a deep breath of the air, sweetened with the scent of roses and the moisture from this morning’s watering.

“You need some of this to help you get enough nitrogen,” he said to the plant. He liked tending the plants in the park. The Martian atmosphere was thin, but high enough in oxygen for daily life. He had seen holos of the early settlers more than a century prior. First with their fully contained suits, then, after millions of tonnes of Venusian atmosphere had been mined and dumped on Mars as CO2, with their masks.

He stepped back and admired his handiwork. It made him proud that thousands of people admired his work every day, even if they never knew it. Zane prided himself on planting and pruning in such a way that the garden looked like it just happened to grow that way.

With a check of the time, Zane gathered his tools into his carrier and made his way to the hidden gardener’s shack. The carrier hovered a few inches above the ground, not leaving any tell-tale wheel marks. He’d had the idea when he first started of planting a hardy, low-growing moss on the path to the shed. Any footprints would be gone within minutes, leaving no trace that a human had been anywhere other than the paved path.

In the shack, Zane put away the tools and checked his supplies. He’d need to order more whirlwind lichen starts soon. The respirator he used when spreading fine particulate like mold spores still had good filters, and he had plenty of spares. He checked the seals and ordered another dozen 799 grade face mask seals.

His day done, Zane logged his time out in the shack, and left by the door that led to the employee gate. He looked up at the sky, where the morning sun reflected off the few, high clouds. It was going to be another beautiful day on Mars.