Author Archives: James Pyles

Dire Beginning

beginnings

© Sue Vincent

The afternoon sunlight, which had been shining dimly through the mist and overhanging trees, flickered and threatened to extinguish, as if a giant was blowing out a candle.

“They came! They heard me and they came!” In spite of their dire circumstances, trapped between an army of demons on one side and a strangely alien Shay accompanied by the resurrected Sakhr on the other, little Zooey was jumping up and down with excitement. Coming in from high above and crossing the sun was an unprecedented legion of vultures. It was impossible to tell the birds apart as the vast flock began its dive toward the demonic forces, but the girl knew that Gyffus was at the lead. She took the single feather he had left behind, held it up and waved.

The rest of them looked up and then back again at the wounded golden dragon and her companion, Dani’s shadowy reflection, who seemed no worse for wear after having been impaled on the dragonrider’s sword.

“Sakhr! I killed you!” Dani’s right hand ached as she tightly gripped Witherbrand’s hilt. The blade felt heavy, threatening to pull her arm downward, lowering her guard.

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Injured and Dangerous

Alek Minassian

Alek Minassian, the man accused of killing ten people with a van in Toronto April 2018.

I must be living in a cave because I’ve never heard of Incels before.

According to Wikipedia:

Incels (a portmanteau of “involuntary celibates”) are self-identifying members of an online subculture who define themselves as unable to find a romantic or sexual partner despite desiring one, a state they describe as inceldom. Self-identified incels are mostly white, male and heterosexual,.Discussions in incel forums are often characterized by resentment, misanthropy, self-pity, self-loathing, misogyny, racism, a sense of entitlement to sex, and the endorsement of violence against sexually active people. The Southern Poverty Law Center described the subculture as “part of the online male supremacist ecosystem” that is a member of their list of hate groups,and self-described incels have committed at least four mass murders in North America.

Holy crap. That’s terrifying.

I follow the blog of author Steven Barnes which is how I came to read his article #NOTALLHUMANS (No, I’m not shouting, he has the title in all caps). I think I’ve heard the term “incels” before, but this was the first time I found out what it meant.

So naturally I went to his source material at We Hunted the Mammoth, which describes itself as:

Specifically, this blog focuses on what I call the “New Misogyny,” an angry antifeminist backlash that has emerged like a boil on the ass of the internet over the last decade or so. These aren’t your traditional misogynists – the social conservatives and religious fundamentalists who make up much of the far right.

These are guys, mostly, who range in age from their teens to their fifties, who have embraced misogyny as an ideology, as a sort of symbolic solution to the frustrations in their lives – whether financial, social, or sexual.

Okey dokey.

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Should We Burn Ray Bradbury’s Books?

f451

Book cover for Ray Bradbury’s novel “Fahrenheit 451.”

I just read an essay by Katie Naum at the Electric Lit website called The New ‘Fahrenheit 451’ Movie Fails to Reckon with Bradbury’s Racism.

First of all, I had no idea HBO had remade the film adaptation of Bradbury’s classic novel (I have seen the 1966 film version, and of course I’ve read the novel a number of times). Secondly, Ms. Naum and I seem to have read very different novels titled Fahrenheit 451 and authored by Ray Bradbury.

Here’s what I mean, quoting from Naum’s essay:

I still have that same copy of Fahrenheit 451 — a trade paperback edition printed circa 1993, whose creased cover and flammable pages are already yellowed and crumbling. I reread it prior to watching the new film version, starring Michael B. Jordan as protagonist Guy Montag, and Michael Shannon as his boss — and ultimately, the bad guy — Captain Beatty. The novel was largely as I remembered it, until I got to the end. At the back of the book, there are a few pages Bradbury wrote decades later, in 1979, where he gets into what he thinks the real threat to literature is. I’d forgotten that reading this coda as a child always left me feeling uncomfortable, in a way I couldn’t fully interpret yet.

He is angry at a “solemn young Vassar lady” who asked whether he might write more female characters. He is angry at other readers who disapprove of how he wrote “the blacks” in one of his stories. He is angry at “the Irish,” “the Chicano intellectuals,” at “every minority” that has some perspective on his stories at variance with his. In his own words, every last one of them “feels it has the will, the right, the duty to douse the kerosene, light the fuse…. Fire-Captain Beatty, in my novel Fahrenheit 451, described how the books were burned first by minorities, each ripping a page or a paragraph from this book, then that, until the day came when the books were empty and the minds shut and the libraries closed forever.”

Sorry for the lengthy quote, but I wanted to provide enough specific information to convey the issue at hand.

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Head Tax

escalator

Photo credit: Kaique Rocha pexels-photo-125532 escalator

Manny almost jumped back from top of the escalator when he saw Leah walking across the baggage claim area right below him. She hadn’t looked in his direction and was out of sight by the time he reached the bottom.

He hadn’t expected her to still be at Seatac. Her flight should have arrived hours ago. “Plane must have been delayed,” he muttered, approaching the line of waiting taxis. Entering the closest one, he uttered the address he was given. Manny was grateful the driver wasn’t chatty.

He arrived at the designated part of South Park, paid the driver including a generous tip, and got out. He’d be staying here for a few days, and the first thing he had to do was buy a gun, which wasn’t hard if you had the right connections.

Tomorrow, he’d greet and then kill Leah Thompson just as she left her upscale condo in Belltown. Then he’d exterminate everyone else on the city council who voted to repeal the “head tax.” His uncle Darrel had been murdered by another homeless person six months ago. If the city had been able to provide affordable housing to the needy, he’d still be alive.

I wrote this for the Week #24 writing challenge at Flash Fiction for the Purposeful Practitioner. The idea is to use the image above as the inspiration for creating a piece of flash fiction no more than 200 words long. My word count is 196.

The photo looks like it could be an airport and I picked the city of Seattle at random. Looking up news for that city, I found Seattle quickly repeals ‘head tax’ that Amazon opposed. Apparently, Seattle had passed a law taxing big businesses like Amazon and Starbucks $500 per full-time employee so the city could fund affordable housing and services for the homeless. However Amazon pushed back in a big way, so the city council voted 7 to 2 to repeal it. Well, they actually dropped the tax to $250 per employee, but a lot of people were unhappy that the council caved in to big business.

I had planned to write an ominous tale when I first saw the photo, and my research just served to fill in the details.

My having written this missive doesn’t imply that I support or oppose Seattle’s “head tax.” I just needed to give Manny a motive for murder. Oh, the names used in my story are totally fictitious, and as far as I know, no one named “Leah Thompson” is on Seattle’s city council. I’m also not condoning killing anyone associated with this issue or for any other reason.

To read other stories based on the prompt, visit InLinkz.com.

As I’ve mentioned before, this link up needs a lot of love, so please consider contributing your own flash fiction piece.

Connie’s Flight

bird

© Jean L. Hays

The courier taking Connie and the other birds from the lab to the observation center dropped her cage in the parking lot and she was the only one he didn’t catch. Now she was free.

“Hello little birdie,” said the young girl. “Are you hungry?”

The coturnix quail hadn’t eaten in a long time.

“I’ll get you some bird seed.” The seven year old ran off, and Connie stayed because of food and decided to live with Eloise.

The longevity researchers gave up on the serum experiments because Connie went missing. Both she and Eloise lived another seventy years.

I wrote this for the Rochelle Wisoff-Fields photo writing challenge. The idea is to use the image above as the prompt for crafting a piece of flash fiction no more than 100 words long. My word count is 99.

I know the photo Rochelle posted isn’t a coturnix quail (commonly known as a Japanese Quail), but ten seconds of Googling didn’t reveal the species in question so I faked it.

I did discover that Japanese Quail have been a popular laboratory research animal since about 1957 and is used in the studies of aging and disease. The lifespan of this bird is about two to two-and-a-half years. Of course my experimental bird Connie lived a good deal longer and was a kind and loyal companion to Eloise all the days of her life.

To read other stories based on the prompt, visit InLinkz.com.

Is There a God in the Moon?

dark moon

Photo credit: Duks Visuals

Tristan Schaefer wasn’t sure if this was magic or just the drugs kicking in. Vixia’s single moon Tatis always seemed unusually large in the sky when it was full, especially compared to Earth’s, but now it was impossibly reflective, as if the forest were perfectly mirrored and inverted on its surface.

“Izola!” Where was she? His wife had been with him just a second ago, but she had vanished and so had their campsite.

The Ambia Country spiritual excursion was supposed to be the highlight of their tour of the colony planet. Only one person out of two who entered the park were allowed to inhale the Mist to seek out the Way, the conduit to the spirit realm. Izola was supposed to keep him rooted in the physical plane so he wouldn’t lose himself in the vision. She promised she would be with him every second, but it couldn’t have been more than fifteen minutes since he first inhaled the psychedelic they’d purchased with their tickets at the park entrance . Where could she have gone?

“Merhaba, Traveler.”

He’d been staring at a flight of birds crossing the gray and black moon and hadn’t noticed the man approach. He was an Indigenous. No one knew what they called themselves, and the colonists had to call them something.

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A Suburban Horror Story

two children

Photo credit: wildverbs

“How did it happen? I mean, who was looking after her?”

Gerald and Marni were standing with the crowd of neighbors on the other side of the street watching. Police cars, fire, and paramedic units were seemingly cast in random arrangements in front of the stylish home in the upscale neighborhood.

“I think her brother was supposed to be watching her.”

“Are you nuts, Marni? He’s only five.”

“Hey, it’s what I heard.”

The onlookers made a collective gasp as the tiny body was carried out, drawfed by the adult-sized gurney.

“Oh my God.” Marni buried her face into her husband’s chest and sobbed. “She was only a baby.”

Marni’s husband stared across the street, trembling as he saw the haunted expressions on the faces of the little girl’s parents. Their young son was clinging to his mother’s leg and wailing.

He thought of their own backyard pool. The faces of their three children who were visiting their grandparents in Utah came into view unbidden. How horrible to be a parent and lose a child.

I wrote this for the 169th FFfAW Challenge hosted by Priceless Joy. The idea is to use the image above to inspire the creation of a piece of flash fiction between 100 and 175 words long. My word count is 175.

I just read a news story stating that the nineteen month old daughter of Olympic skier Bode Miller drowned. It’s a tragedy every parent dreads.

There’s no news about the cause or manner of death, but since the family lives in Orange County, California (my family used to live there over twenty years ago), the first thing that came to mind was a swimming pool. They are extremely common down there.

I remember our home had a pool, and when our children were very young, we had a motorized cover installed. It was impossible to slip under, and to open it, you had to insert, turn, and hold a key in a spring-loaded lock.

Of course, a child that age could easily drown in a bathtub as well.

Here in Southwestern Idaho, we have an extensive canal system that provides water for farmers and some neighborhood sprinkler systems, and every year, a few children (and the occasional adult) drowns in one.

My wee story is both a study in tragedy and a cautionary tale. When kids are that little, leaving them alone in or around any body of water for any amount of time is dangerous.

My condolences to the Miller family on their loss. As a parent and grandparent, I can feel the icy touch of death every time I hear about a child needlessly perishing.

To read other stories based on the prompt, go to InLinkz.com.

The Eshana

desert planet

Wallpaper found at wallpapersafari.com.

The eastern horizon bled the color of garnet, quickening a new morning and the possibility of survival. Once the air temperature rose to somewhere near four degrees C, Tatiana could shed her alien enhancements and revert to humanoid form. She had survived the night crossing of the Gael badlands and once she made it to the northern shore of the Lilthe Sea, Daron would pick her up.

She was beginning to nurture the small bud of hope that was sprouting within her breast when her comm channel crackled to life. There was no doubt that it was Balin and he had been tracking her.

“You really did think you were going to get away with it, didn’t you?”

Tatiana toyed with the idea of remaining silent and pretending he wasn’t sure of her location, but it was pointless. If he was close enough to reach her on her private channel, she had as much chance of escape as a duck in a fox den. “Up until this moment, yes.”

“Wait for me. If we can conclude this quickly, I may yet be able to stop the Dissolution.”

She kept walking across the last vestige of the frozen tundra. “Dissolution was inevitable the moment I took the Eshana.”

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The Quest to Save Landon

anime girl wand

Anime version of Hermione Granger holding a wand

Nine-year-old Landon and his classmate and friend Ana were in school, which was strange, because school was out for the summer. What was even stranger was that Landon was at the head of the class and Ana was the only student.

“Now today class, I want to introduce you to magic wands.” He was wearing a white shirt and tie, dark slacks, and was wearing something that looked like a cross between a jacket and a robe while Ana was dressed similarly.

“Stop being silly. I’m the only one here.”

“Just trying to get into the mood, Ana.”

“Fine, you teach me how to use a wand, and I’ll teach you moose healing magic.”

“Are you sure we should be keeping this from Buddy?”

“You said you knew enough to begin my training yourself. Besides, we’re ready to start the fourth grade. I think we’re old enough to handle the basic stuff ourselves.”

“Okay. Anyway, this is a magic wand.”

“It looks like a long, thin stick. What makes it magic?”

“We do. Wands help us focus our spells, especially ones that normally would affect a wide area.”

“Like my light spell.”

“Exactly. The elemental light spell explodes like a bomb or a flash bulb on an old-fashioned camera. If you focus it through a wand, you can create anything from a flashlight beam to a laser.”

“Cool. Can I try?” She stood up at her desk and held out her hand.

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Sea Angel

sea angel

Image of Sea angel (clade Gymnosomata) – found at Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie – no photo credit given

“You weren’t kidding, Somata. An actual sea water pool.” Gary had been dating the beautiful model for weeks, but this was the first time she’d invited him over to her place by the beach.

“It helps to live so near the ocean. You can’t see the machinery, but the pool’s water is constantly being recycled from just off shore.”

“This thing must have cost a fortune. In fact, your whole house is amazing.”

“Don’t bother asking how I can afford it all. I invited you over for a swim, not to discuss my bank balance.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend. I’m just overwhelmed. I mean, I’m only a junior accountant and this is like a dream come true.”

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