Author Archives: James Pyles

Missing

kayaks and sea

© TJ Paris

Their equipment sat quietly on the beach next to a placid sea. There was no sign of danger, no storm clouds, no menacing fog, nothing to say that Brad’s and Cheryl’s disappearance was the result of foul play or misadventure.

The two kayaks, life jackets, and oars were left abandoned when they should have been the fruition of a vacation they’d planned together for years.

Carolina Beach Detective Philip Lewis was baffled. How the hell did the Conklins just vanish?

“I don’t get it, Lewis. Broad daylight. Calm seas. No signs of struggle. What happened here?”

“Who knows, Davis. Alien abduction maybe?”

Junior Detective Estella Davis blurt out a short laugh. “I wouldn’t put that in a police report. What now?”

“Do our due diligence. Maybe someone saw something. Assign some uniforms to canvas the area and start asking questions.”

By nightfall, Brad and Cheryl Conklin were thousands of miles away traveling separately under different identities. The money Cheryl embezzled would let them live like royalty when they met again in Belize.

I wrote this for the FFfAW Challenge for the week of 8-01-2017 hosted by Priceless Joy. The idea is to write a piece of flash fiction based on the photo prompt above of between 100 and 175 words, with 150 being the ideal. My word count is 172.

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

The Palace of Heaven, Part One

ancient china
The Nineteenth Story in the Adventures of the Ambrosial Dragon: A Children’s Fantasy Series

The young sorceress Yao Jin, eight-year-old Landon, and the mighty Ambrosial Dragon stood on a ridge overlooking a valley in what they knew to be ancient China. By some mysterious magic, the trio had been taken backward in time rather than returning home after rescuing the souls of Yao Jin’s grandfather and his Nameless Master from demons on an unknown island in the River Styx.

“Buddy, do you think you can…”

The little boy had turned toward the now imposing and magnificent dragon only to find he was no longer there. In his place, there was a Chinese man. To the child, he seemed about the same age as Yao Jin. He was tall and dressed in what looked like old fashion Chinese clothes. At the same moment, Landon saw that Yao Jin’s clothes had changed, too.

“Hey, what happened to Buddy?”

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The Synthetic Men of Mars

alien head

© A Mixed Bag 2009
[Synthetic Alien Head from the National Space Centre, Leicester, UK]

“So why bring me here to see a bloody fake alien head, Ian?”

“It’s synthetic Dolores, not fake.”

“What’s the difference?”

“The difference, you silly twit, is that fake means it’s totally not alien. Synthetic means it’s an artificial head made by aliens.”

“Now that’s just stupid.”

“No it’s not. Listen. I was talking to the Professor and…”

“The Professor is just some homeless bloke who lives in the park and who’s been off his nut for years.”

“He’s smart, I tell you. He says he’s done his research on the head and it belongs to a race of synthetic men created by aliens to take over the Earth.””

“Oh is that so? Then why didn’t they take over?”

“Turns out that the old H.G. Wells novel wasn’t entirely fiction. The synthetics had no immunity to our diseases. They all died out because they caught the cold.”

“You are so gullible, Ian. Now take me to the cinema like you promised.”

The National Space Centre curator Patrick Moore had been listening to the conversation. “Damn kids came too close to the truth. I see sacking the Professor wasn’t enough. I’ll have to take stronger measures.”

Written for the Sunday Photo Fiction Challenge for July 30th 2017. The idea is to write a piece of flash fiction no more than 200 words long based on the image above. My word count is 195.

Since the caption read “synthetic” rather than “fake,” I thought I’d take my cue from that for my story. The title is from the old Edgar Rice Burroughs novel Synthetic Men of Mars which is the ninth book in his “John Carter of Mars” series. Of course, I’m also suggesting that the H.G. Wells novel “War of the Worlds” had some basis in fact. But it’s just all for fun.

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

Not All #MenAreTrash

cape town

Gagasi FM talk-show host Alex Mthiyane, businessmen Sandile Zungu, and Vivian Reddy, scientist Siya Xuza, Norma Gigaba and 5FM DJ Euphonik mentoring young men at the Gandhi-Luthuli Peace Hall yesterday. Picture: Nkululeko Nene

“Mommy, I don’t want to grow up to be trash.”

“Oh my sweet boy, you could never be trash.”

“But isn’t that what those women are saying about Daddy?”

“Daddy made terrible decisions, Denis.”

“They say he killed those women, other women say that makes all men trash. I don’t want to hurt anyone, Mommy.”

“You won’t, little one. You don’t have to be anyone except my wonderful little boy.”

“I love you, Mommy.”

“I love you too, Denis. I always will. I promise to teach you to be the best person you can be. Now get ready for school. Today you’re going to meet Norma Gigaba, the Finance Minister’s wife.”

Lefa Pillay, Denis’s father, had been arrested along with several other men for the string of rapes and murders of women in Durban prompting protests declaring #MenAreTrash. Dipalesa, the little boy’s Mom, would do anything to fight that stereotype.

I’m writing this for the What Pegman Saw photo writing challenge. The idea is to use Google maps street images as an inspiration to create a piece of flash fiction no more than 150 words long. My word count is 150.

Today, the pegman takes us to Cape Town, South Africa. I did my usual Wikipedia search but nothing came up for me. Then I looked at the local news stories.

I found a May 23rd story called #MenAreTrash: Yes, we are trash! which reported on protests in Durban, South Africa on the streets and in social media in response to multiple violent crimes against women over the previous two weeks.

I also found another story out of Cape Town, dated today (July 30th) called Not all #MenAreTrash, says Gigaba’s wife.

Part of the story reads:

IN THE spirit of teaching boys to become men, high-profile businessmen and radio personalities engaged with pupils from five schools at the Gandhi-Luthuli Peace Hall, Denis Hurley Centre, where they held an interactive motivational session with young men.

On Saturday, at the event hosted by Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba’s wife, Norma, and her foundation, boys were urged to be resilient in their quest to build healthy communities.

Gigaba said the focus was on boys because she felt that they were neglected. “We cannot fold our arms and watch them ruining opportunities of creating a better society. Men are called all sorts of names, more recently #MenAreTrash.”

My own wee fictional tale flowed from there.

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

Lunch at Antiques

Jeremy wanted to think of someplace creative for his first date with Clare. They met at an online dating site and she said she felt more comfortable having lunch with him.

“Antiques” was both a restaurant and an antique shop. They served “retro-cuisine” styled for the ’50s and ’60s. He hoped she’d like it, that it would tell her he was innovative and fun.

He was sitting on an old, blue wooden chair when he heard a voice behind him.

“Excuse me, are you Jeremy?”

He stood and turned. “Yes I am. Charmed to meet you, Clare.”

She extended her right hand and he took it, lightly brushing his lips against her skin. Then he held the seat opposite his out for her to sit in.

This was his first date in nearly forty years. Ellen died last fall and his children told him he didn’t have to be lonely for the rest of his life. Clare’s children told her the same thing.

Written for the Flash Fiction for the Purposeful Practitioner – 2017: Week #29 challenge. The idea is to use the photo above as inspiration for a piece of flash fiction no more than 200 words long. My word count is 163.

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

Europa

europa detail

NASA/JPL-CALTECH/SETI INSTITUTE
An enhanced color view from NASA’s Galileo spacecraft shows an intricate pattern of linear fractures on the icy surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa.

The four time travelers who had become reluctant astronauts aboard an alien spacecraft now sat at their stations in that ship awaiting takeoff.

Ross Murdock activated the manual control panel in front of him and opened the large hatch that had been covering the landing bay exposing the ship to space. The tube connecting their Forerunner ship to the interior of the Ceres Forerunner base had been retracted and, as a flight director at NASA might put it, “all systems were go” for their launch and mission to Europa.

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The Encounter

time tunnel

Photo used under Creative Commons from light_arted

The temporal field in the alien time gate sparked and cracked for several seconds before anything came through.  Then it appeared, a single Forerunner, an Orange.

“Watch out!” Murdock sounded almost panicked. “It’s a Forerunner weapon.”

It looked like the same race as the Blues. Skin color was a little darker, but everything else was identical. No hair on the exposed head and hands, human enough eyes, flattened nose, more or less a slit for a mouth, lumpy skin texture that looked like an orange peel. It was holding an object Ross recognized as the telepathic weapon the Blue used on him back at the Soviet base in the Ice Age.

Murdock, Ashe, and Zheutlin all reflexively reached for weapons they didn’t possess. Lynn Huỳnh never took agent training, so her response was to freeze.

The tip of the alien object glowed yellow which Murdock knew meant it was activated. He rushed forward to stop the Forerunner before it could paralyze them all.

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The Pay Phone Puzzle

pay phone

© J Hardy Carroll

“What kind of phone is it, Grandpa?”

“An old pay phone. You used to put a quarter in to make a call.”

“Why not use a cell?”

“Well, little one, because they hadn’t been invented when people used these. This one is so low so that people in wheelchairs could reach it.”

“Who uses it now?”

“I don’t know. We’re in the Refugee Center so…”

“Ahem.”

Denise and Grandpa turned to see a refugee from the planet Gorlick behind them. He was green and only about a meter tall.

“Spare some change? Got to make a call.”

I wrote this for the Rochelle Wisoff-Fields photo prompt writing challenge. The idea is to use the image above as an inspiration for a piece of flash fiction no more than 100 words long. My word count is 97.

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

Ceres

ceres

Found at: solarsystem.nasa.gov

The Forerunner sphere was off course and out of control. It was going to miss the portal into the dwarf planet Ceres and crash on the surface!

The lighting changed in the control cabin and a loud, intermittent buzzing sounded, probably an alarm.

The configuration of the panels as well as shapes and colors of the controls shifted as if made of melting plastic. One panel in front of Ross stabilized and the panel sections glowed with a bright white.

Murdock stared at the panel. It was so familiar but he wasn’t sure what to do or if he should do anything at all. Finally, he pressed the panel to the far left twice. It started glowing yellow and he could feel an electric shock that made him jerk his hand back.

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Julio the Explorer

boat

© The Storyteller’s Abode

Stranded on a sandbar, Julio pointed to the rocks ahead of him and loudly declared, “I claim this land in the name of Philip the First, King of Portugal.”

Some said he was drunk. Some said he was mad. The children pointed at him and laughed, making up silly and insulting rhymes about Crazy Julio.

“I don’t care what you think. I claim this land. It is mine. King Philip will honor me.”

“King Philip has been dead for over four-hundred years.”

“To you maybe little one, but he lives for me.”

Julio jumped from his boat with a small Portuguese flag in his hand. “I shall plant this here in honor of Philip and Portugal.”

The children laughed and ran away. They’d like to have come back later to steal the flag, but it really was his estate. His family had owned the land in California for generations. Julio was neither drunk nor mad. He just liked to have fun and to entertain the children.

I wrote this for the FFfAW Challenge for Week of July 25, 2017. The idea is to use the photo above to prompt the writing of a piece of flash fiction between 100 and 175 words long with 150 words being the ideal. My word count is 166.

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