Tag Archives: horror

Abandoning the Dead

norfolk

A gravestone in the cemetery of the brutal penal colony on Norfolk Island. Photograph: Lawrence Bartlett/AFP/Getty Images

Reverend Percy finally convinced the Church of England to relocate the Mission to the Solomons, ostensibly to be closer to the population of focus.

“Leaving our company now, Reverend?” A familiar voice chuckled from the darkness.

“I have no power here to dispel your kind, even in the name of Jesus Christ.”

“Your Savior won’t consort with us, Reverend. He’s already consigned us to the deepest pits of Hell. Best you pack and scurry off to that ship yonder.”

“Sir, I now abandon you to God’s mercy.”

“God abandoned us long ago with good reason. We all earned the gallows…would have perished except for Norfolk.”

Percy ran with his case to the open door. “I leave you and your sinful brethren, Mr. Robert Knowles.”

In 1920 the Melanesian Mission abandoned the former penal colony to the blacked souls of all the prisoners who lived and died there, and yet live on.

I composed this wee tale for the What Pegman Saw flash fiction writing challenge. The idea is to take a Google maps street image and location and use them as the inspiration in crafting a story no more than 150 words long. My word count (after a lot of editing as the original was over 100 words longer) is exactly 150. Today, the Pegman takes us to Norfolk Island.

I did a bit of Wikipedia research and discovered that it was yet another penal colony back in the day. What made it unique is that prisoners who had been sent to the Australian penal colony and who continued to commit crimes that should have earned them the gallows were then sent to Norfolk, a place of unspeakable brutality and sin according to this report.

I also learned that the island had been the headquarters of the Church of England’s Melanesian Mission between 1867 and 1920. In 1920, the mission was moved from Norfolk to the Solomon islands to be closer to their “population of focus,” but in my story, I suggest that it really moved because the hordes of blackened souls of all the damned prisoners of the colony horribly haunted and tortured the good Reverend in charge.

The mission finally abandoned the island of Norfolk, which had become a Hell on Earth. Being so close to Halloween, I thought I should turn the prompt into a ghost story. Of course, all this is fiction as are the names of the two people in my tiny saga.

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

It’s Safe Now

sunrise

© Roger Bultot

“It’s over Grandpa. Sun’s coming up. We’ll be okay.”

Timmy’s Grandfather lay asleep on the duck blind’s floor. Yesterday, they’d been hunting and got lost. Couldn’t find the truck. Sun was going down when they saw the first in a forgotten graveyard.

These zombies were real. Fought them off while their ammo lasted. Grandpa got scratched, but they hid back in the blind. It’s over now.

“Grandpa?” Timmy shook the old man. “Wake up.”

Bloodshot eyes oozing yellow mucus snapped open. It grabbed Timmy’s arms fast.

“Grandpa, no!”

Just because the sun comes up doesn’t mean the monsters go away.

I wrote this for the Rochelle Wisoff-Fields writing challenge of 27 October 2017. The idea is to use the image above to inspire crafting a piece of flash fiction no more than 100 words long. My word count is 100.

Decades ago, I saw the 1968 black and white film Night of the Living Dead on TV. I don’t like horror films beyond the old 1930s-1950s Universal horror films (Frankenstein, Werewolf, and such), but this was supposed to be a classic.

As expected, I was scared out of my wits and the movie has a tragic, ironic ending. Today, television is full of zombie-type shows, and I refuse to watch any of them. But it is “Halloween week” and horror stories are expected, so I thought I’d create one (though it’s not my first).

Poor Timmy.

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

The Hiroshima Legacy: From Tales of the Yūrei

Hiroshima

A mushroom cloud billows into the sky about one hour after an atomic bomb was detonated above Hiroshima, Japan – Atomic Heritage Foundation

“Five minutes out from target, Colonel. Altitude three two three three three feet. Local time zero eight one zero.”

“Acknowledged, Captain. Status of the package, Captain Parsons?”

“Parsons here, Colonel. Package armed in flight. Lt. Jeppson took the final safeties off 25 minutes ago. We’re set down here.”

“Acknowledged, Captain. We are a go for final approach and delivery. Descending to three one zero six zero feet.”

Colonel Paul W. Tibbets Jr. looked out the cockpit window, first to the left and then to his right. The Enola Gay was accompanied by two other B-29s, The Great Artiste was carrying instrumentation for measuring the heat and radiation of the blast, and no-name ship contained the latest photographic equipment to record what has about to happen.

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When Adam Awoke

hand

© artycaptures.wordpress.com

The light was too bright at first but then his eyes adjusted. He took a deep breath and exhaled feeling pleasure at the rise and fall of his chest. He looked at the clacking sound above him. Something turning around and around. A cool breeze came from it. It felt nice.

He sat up and realized this thing in front of him was his. He lifted it up. Moved the digits, Turned it back and forth. It did everything he thought about. He giggled. It was fun.

Another sound to his left. Something opened. Adam was scared. He tried to speak but it came out as a moan. Who’s that?

“There, there, dear boy. Don’t be afraid. I’m your doctor. I’m here to help. My staff and I will take care of you.”

He walked closer. He seemed friendly but Adam was nervous.

“You’re name is Adam. I told you that before when you woke up after the operation. My name is Dr. Frankenstein, Victor Von Frankenstein. I think we’re going to become good friends.

I wrote this for the FFfAW Challenge-Week of September 5, 2017 hosted by Priceless Joy. The idea is to use the image above as the inspiration for writing a piece of flash fiction between 100 and 175 words long. My word count is 175.

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

Hunger in the Darkness

Poisson Blanc Regional Park

© Google 2009

“Emily, how’s it wild camping if we have to book the damn island. Come on, help me with the raft.”

“But Patrick, what if we get caught?”

“No one expects us in this part of Poisson Blanc so late in the season. Already threatening to snow. The cowards who camp here with RVs, and surfboards, and smartphones don’t know what nature is. Better set up camp. It’s getting dark.”

“I’ll light a fire, Pat.”

As the sun descended into the west, something was rising.

“What’s that howling, Pat?” They were sitting by the fire roasting fresh trout.

“Don’t know, but it’s getting closer.”

“You said no dangerous animals here.”

“Shouldn’t be. No wolves so…”

From just beyond the circle of firelight, a huge shape slowly emerged from the forest, eyes glowing. It said one word. “Wendigo.” Then amid their shrieks, Patrick and Emily were messily devoured by the cannibal amphibian.

I wrote this for the What Pegman Saw writing challenge. The idea is to use the location provided from Google maps as the inspiration for crafting a piece of flash fiction no more than 150 words long. My word count is exactly 150.

Today, the Pegman takes us to Poisson-Blanc, Quebec. I looked the place up and this Regional Park offers just about every outdoor activity you can imagine, including being able to reserve small islands for wild camping.

I looked up “wild camping,” and while it has a variety of applications, in it’s purest form, it’s camping with a minimal equipment, no provided facilities (showers, bathrooms, picnic tables and the like), and you shouldn’t have to pay for it.

That was part of my hook, but then I needed to create drama. How many TV shows and movies have depicted young and daring campers encountering some sort of menace in an isolated location?

I remembered the legend of the Wendigo, ironically from an old “Incredible Hulk” comic book which featured the very first appearance of “The Wolverine” (you may know the character better from the “X-Men” and “Wolverine” movies). Anyway, like Big Foot, Wendigo is a legendary creature, but to make it worse, it eats people.

How did this creature go so long undetected? I gave it the feature of being amphibious, and no one is looking for it underwater.

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

Out of the Shadows

castle

© majesticgoldenrose

Victoria staggered out of the front doors of the manor. Thank God it was morning. The long dark night was finally over. She sank to her knees on the wet grass and wept. She was the only one who survived. All the others had died. She had killed the last one, Barnabas, the one who started it all.

How long had it been since he first arrived? Weeks? Months? He said he was a distant cousin from England, but in fact, he was centuries old, released from his crypt by a greedy little groundskeeper who thought he’d found hidden treasure.

All he found was a man with a curse and whose insane lust for blood cursed the rest of the family. Victoria was the only one left, bitten but she did not succumb. The sun was rising. She killed the rest and now there was only one left. The sun continued to rise and its light shone upon her. It burned. She was the last vampire. And now there were none.

Written for FFfAW Challenge-Week of June 13, 2017 #2 hosted by Priceless Joy.

The idea is to use the photo above as an inspiration to write a piece of flash fiction between 100 and 175 words. My word count is 171.

The image immediately made me think of the old TV show Dark Shadows, a daytime gothic soap opera which ran Monday through Friday in the late 1960s and early 70s. I blatantly ripped off themes from the series to craft my little tale, although taking it in a direction the show never did.

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

Saving Jenny

depress girl

© wiseGEEK

From the Life and Curse of Sean Becker

I haven’t had a meeting like this since I stood face-to-face with Moshe Cohen, the vampire who made me.

Oh, my name is Sean Becker and I’m a vampire. I also work for a private detective named Aidan Burke in L.A.

Tonight, I’m sitting across from the famous mystery novelist Brian Vail in one of my favorite restaurants, The Original Pantry Cafe on Figueroa. If memory serves, I think Vail even mentioned it in one of his books.

“Look, I just want to know that I’m not going crazy. First I see a ghost and now a vampire?”

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Blood in the Depths

evil mermaids

From the 2011 film “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides”

In later years, it was largely believed that Fair Isle, a tiny spit of an island between Sumburgh Head and Mainland, Shetland, which would eventually be claimed by Scotland, was originally settled by Bronze Age traders.

The real story was first withheld and then lost to history. Truth be told, Nordic raiders used Fair Isle as a hiding place for their plunder. By the ninth century, the Isle would become a legitimate Norse settlement, but hundreds of years earlier, it was the site of treasure, home of marauders, and a monument to a fearsome curse.

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The Curse of Slappy

slappy

The character “Slappy” from the Goosebumps books | found at Amazon.com

The Fifteenth Story in the Adventures of the Ambrosial Dragon: A Children’s Fantasy Series

It was a Friday and Landon was happy that the school week was over. He went into his bedroom to get rid of his backpack and saw something strange.

All of the living stuffed animals were at the foot of the bed looking suspiciously at an object resting on Landon’s pillows.

“Is that new thing your’s, Landon,” asked Baby?

“No. I mean, I’ve never seen it before.”

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What I See When I Look At You

blind

from the Tommy Edison Experience YouTube channel

The contents of his uncle’s safe deposit box were arranged across Brian Vail’s desktop. He moved the monitor, keyboard, and mouse of his PC to one side to make room. He wouldn’t be using the computer because he already had. The notes, letters, drawings, and other minutia organized in front of him contained far more relevant information about his condition than the internet did.

The origin of the sight was shrouded in mystery, though his Uncle Ellis, the most recent possessor of this ability before Brian, thought it went back to the 12th or 13th century, an ancestor who lived in either Southern France or Spain. He’s nameless, but was thought to be a mystic, one who dared to seek out the literal face of God.

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