Posts from four of Prediction’s most loyal regulars this week make it a full house in my book, and the customary inventiveness and high quality writing certainly merits a shout of ‘House!’ along with my thanks for your participation. Fingers crossed the words for next week – groin owl whistle – will similarly whet your writing appetites.
Entries by midnight Thursday August 8th, new words Friday 9th
Usual rules: 100
words maximum (excluding title) of flash fiction or poetry using all three
words in the genres of horror, fantasy, science fiction or noir. Serialised
fiction is, as always, welcome. All variants and uses of the words and stems
are fine.
The Banquette in the Loam
ReplyDeleteBefore Fox could reach the human corpse festering in the loam Owl lit down on it and began to peck at the groin. When a twig cracked under Fox's paw Owl became alert, eyes gleaming under the moonlight, blood rippling on her beak.
She raised a claw. 'Step closer and I'll have your ears.'
'I only want my fair share,' said Fox.
'Bide your time,' warned Owl. 'The carrion crows have already been here and I need the entrails for my young.'
The night wind whistled through the leaves.
'Owlets,' thought Fox, salivating. 'Now there’s a dainty dish.'
Clever use of the prompt words, David, and some brilliant imagery to boot. 'festering in the loam' and 'eyes gleaming in the moonlight , blood rippling from her claws.'
DeleteLeave it to the fox to devise a backup plan. Well done, David!
ReplyDeleteNature in the raw - nice one David, thank you.
DeleteIn my entry above I used whisper instead of whistle. This entry corrects that error.
ReplyDeleteME OR… ?
Anna and Randy stood facing each other like gunfighters prepared to draw. Anna spoke, her voice gruff and cold. “Working late again were you, Randy? Someone blew the whistle on you! You’ve been spending these night-owl outings with your whore of a secretary!” Anna mockingly grabbed her groin.
“What?” came Randy’s startled reply. “Anna, may God strike me dead if what you say is true!”
Randy suddenly grabbed his chest and dropped to the floor as Anna drew and shot.
Stunned, Anna stared dumbly ahead then at the smoking gun in her hand.
“Me, God… or You?” she haltingly whispered.
Smoothly- inserted prompts (I deleted original) and love the final line.
DeleteThresholds new [31]
ReplyDeleteThe yellow-flecked grey of Gulch’s eyes, along with the sharp delineation, suggestive of a beak, above his upper lip imparted owl-like wisdom, His lips momentarily puckered, as if about to offer a disputatious whistle to counter Acker’s ‘feisty’ accusation, he then stated, ‘All Egesa’s offspring bear a tattoo –‘
I knew of none such. ‘Where? And what?’
‘The double circle of infinity. In the region of the groin Some mistake it for a figure 8, but it’s intended to be horizontal rather than vertical.’ Females have it on the left.’
His stare a laughing challenge to reveal mine.
Yet again, Sandra, you have created a wonderfully creative path of words and phrases to lead us through an interesting tale.
ReplyDeleteThank you Jim :-)
DeleteThresholds new [32]
ReplyDeleteDemonstrating entirely spurious modesty I slid my riding skirt to where the overlap could be lifted with one hand to reveal my groin while the other shielded my pudenda. Ignoring Gulch’s whistle - a demonstration, I assumed, of similarly kneejerk admiration - I peered and saw, faintly henna’d, the startled eyes of an infant owl.
How come neither I nor Raven – who’d stepped closer to peer and whose eyes now met mine with puzzlement - had never noticed it before?
Have you one?’ I asked, sure of a negative.
‘I have not.’
We can, therefore, be entirely absolved of incest.’
[Apologies - 'groin' far too useful a word not to use a second time.]
ReplyDeleteThe Secret Armadillo Soldier (SAS) Diaries - entry 281
ReplyDeleteA flash of light flickered from the hillslopes where Nigel's troops were hiding.
Armi scratched his sumac irritated groin and glanced over his shoulder in the direction of the weasel encampment, ‘better get moving before they actually organise ‘emselves, mate. I don’t fancy meeting them weasels wivout back up.’
Atlas nodded and, heading toward that distant glint-light, they set off running.
Despite the pace, it was dusk before they reached the foot of the hillslopes and scrambled into covering undergrowth.
An owl swooped from the shrubbery above with a startled whistling hoot.
Armi collided with Atlas, ‘Feckin’ ‘ell.’
Atlas chuckled.
You have an enviable talent for convincingly portraying the progressive actions of your cast of 'dillos, Terrie,
DeleteYour outstanding use of language makes this so easy to follow, Terrie.
ReplyDelete