"When Good Salad Bars Go Bad" • by Gustavo Bondoni

 

The worst thing about being an apprentice had to be negotiating with the demons. That went double when you summoned them without the master’s permission.

“I get it. You’re angry I woke you. But could you at least stop pushing the ship down while we talk?” Gene said.

The algae monster he’d summoned roared something incomprehensible.

“You’re not supposed to kill everyone, just stop them from eating so much meat.”

Huh? A giant tendril of greenery did a good impersonation of an arm scratching a head.

“Again, I already laid the groundwork. I pretended to go into a trance right there in the steakhouse, and said that a spirit was coming to teach them a lesson. All you needed to do was to show up, grunt a bit, poke a diner with a tendril and disappear. Scare them vegan. No need to sink the ship.”

Grunt. This sound combined a sense of obscenity with a questioning of whether the person talking to it was in possession of all his faculties. A lot of meaning for just one grunt: magical telepathy.

“What will it take to make you stop?”

Grunt, snicker.

“Where the hell am I going to find a virgin? This is a single’s cruise.”

Grunt.

“It’s your problem, too. I won’t release you from the spell. You can’t hurt me while under my command.”

Grunt, grumble.

A large leaf-hand encircled him and placed him carefully on the monster’s shoulder.

From high above the water, Gene watched the ship go under. He’d only been half-serious about changing careers from waiting tables to dark magician. But after killing the crew and passengers of the Sea Spirit, he had little choice.

The monster began the long trudge to shore.

“Are you edible?” Gene asked.

Grunt.

He decided not to risk it.

¤      ¤      ¤

Gustavo Bondoni is novelist and short story writer with over three hundred stories published in fifteen countries, in seven languages.  He is a member of Codex and an Active Member of SFWA. His latest novel is Test Site Horror (2020). He has also published two other monster books: Ice Station: Death (2019) and Jungle Lab Terror (2020), three science fiction novels: Incursion (2017), Outside (2017) and Siege (2016) and an ebook novella entitled Branch. His short fiction is collected in Pale Reflection (2020), Off the Beaten Path (2019) Tenth Orbit and Other Faraway Places (2010) and Virtuoso and Other Stories (2011).
 
In 2019, Gustavo was awarded second place in the Jim Baen Memorial Contest and in 2018 he received a Judges Commendation (and second place) in The James White Award. He was also a 2019 finalist in the Writers of the Future Contest.
 
His website is at www.gustavobondoni.com

---

stupefy (ˈstü-pə-ˌfī) to stun, astonish, or astound

Available now on Kindle or in print. Coming in December to Nook, Kobo, Apple Books, and all the rest.

On Amazon now ► STUPEFYING STORIES 23

Interface with Stupefying Stories!

► on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StupefyingStories/

► on Twitter: https://twitter.com/StupefyingSF | @StupefyingSF

► kudos and complaints to: feedback@rampantloonmedia.com

Read More

"Bargaining Power" • by Mary Berman

 

The worst thing about being an apprentice had to be negotiating with the demons.  

Here Tony was, clinging to a hunk of flotsam, saltwater already erasing the bloody pentagram he’d hastily streaked into the wood, the waterlogged bodies of the ship’s crew swirling about, and the demon prince he’d summoned to his rescue said regretfully, “I just don’t think that’s a sufficiently low-level task.”

“I didn’t hire you for a low-level task. If I wanted my laundry done I’d have summoned an imp, not a Prince of Hell.”

“Well... grandiose feats of dark magic grow tedious after a while, you know? Everlasting riches this, three wishes that. So in the past few centuries I’ve switched to menial chores. There’s a bit of novelty in it. You’re sure you haven’t got any laundry?”

“I,” Tony said, “am drowning.”

“Ah, yes. Well, there’s nothing for it. I can’t go back to the big stuff now, or soon everyone will be insisting I construct cities for them and murder their ex-wives and whatnot and then I’ll never hear the end of it. Farewell!” The demon shimmered, abruptly transparent.

“Wait!” Tony shouted. “Listen—there’s no job more menial than that of a magician’s apprentice. You’re always running out at four in the morning to buy more powdered wyvern wing, and getting experimented on until you’re covered in boils, and being shouted at all the while. Plus, there’s all the laundry you could dream of. ”

The demon solidified, its fanged mouth pinched doubtfully. “So?”

“I have an idea.”

¤

A moment later Tony materialized in the center of a pool of lava, perched upon an enormous throne, the saltwater on his skin already evaporating. He grinned and wondered which the demon would find worse—drowning, or apprenticeship.

Tony’s money was on the latter.

¤      ¤      ¤

 

 

Mary Berman is a Philadelphia-based writer of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. She earned her MFA in fiction from the University of Mississippi, and her work has been published in Fireside, Daily Science Fiction, Weird Horror, and elsewhere. In her spare time, she takes fitness classes and antagonizes her cat. Find her online at www.mtgberman.com. 

 

 ____________________

 

 

 

Read More

"Out With the Old" • by Eric Fomley

 

 

The process server I’d been dodging for months spotted me. I was taking the old boat out when I saw the sniveling little ‘bot coming down the pier. 

I gunned it.

“Oh,” he said to me over my HUD. “Running from a legal entity on a boat. Brilliant plan, sir.” 

I ignored him. 

When I looked back, the server ‘bot flashed some documentation to another boat owner who let him climb on board and take off after me.

“Damn it.” If he caught up with me… I thrust the throttle forward and the front end of my boat rose out of the water.

“You should slow down, sir. At this speed it’s nearly impossible to make course corrections.”

As if on cue, I wrecked on something hard. There was a loud crunch and I was in the air, plunging into the harbor. I surfaced and gasped, treading water. 

My boat sank, the back half barely propped up by whatever rocks I’d hit. The process server’s boat drifted past the wreckage, coming to a relative stop in front of me.

I squinted when I looked up. The ‘bot’s dull, yellow eyes peered overboard at me. 

“I told you to slow down,'' it said, as it opened its chest and produced a 3D printed waterproof box. It shuffled some paperwork inside and handed the box to me. 

“You have been served.”

I reached for it but let it drop into the water beside me. I didn’t need to look inside to see the divorce decree. It was over. 

My boat pitched, dislodging from whatever rock it was on, and disappeared into the harbor. The boat was all I had left of her, of us.

I guess it was time for a new one.

¤     ¤     ¤

Eric Fomley’s work has appeared in Daily Science Fiction, Galaxy’s Edge, Flame Tree Press, and The Black Library. You can read more of his work on his website at https://ericfomley.com or buy him a coffee in exchange for a story at https://ko-fi.com/ericfomley.

---

Read More

"King of Chrome" • by Travis Burnham

 

The time traveler to 1977 didn’t even try to blend in. 

The robot strode across the midnight rest area parking lot, his chrome chassis gleaming in the sodium lights. He reached for the passenger door handle of a ‘74 Mercedes-Benz 450-SLC and slid in like he owned the gas guzzler.

Elvis Presley, incognito, sat in the driver’s seat, dressed in a black, red-trimmed, track suit. He’d just finished a show in Charlotte. The King froze, a banana-peanut butter-bacon sandwich on the way to his lips. 

“Not fat enough yet?” Robot EAP-5464 gestured to the dripping sandwich. “Don't stop eating on my account. Though you’ll be dead of a heart attack 178 days from now if you don’t listen to me.”

“What the hell,” the King drawled, “on God’s green Earth, are you?”

A panel on the robot’s forearm slid open and he withdrew a folded scrap of newspaper. The headline read Elvis, King of Rock, Dies at 42.

Elvis scanned the scrap of paper with his dark soft eyes. “Any moron with a small printing press could have made this up.”

The robot rattled off not one, not two, but a string of facts that only Elvis Aaron Presley himself could have known. It was then that Elvis noticed something familiar in the cadence and long-drawn vowels of the robot’s metallic voice.

“Just before you died at Baptist Hospital, a rock and roll think tank froze your brain. Our brain. And put it into this awful robot body. I’m here to save rock and roll. I’m here to save us.”

Elvis stared at the robot for what seemed forever. Then he sighed and said, “My mama always told me if you’ve got evidence of the impossible, then maybe it’s only wildly improbable. Tell me what I need to do to live.”

¤      ¤      ¤

 

Travis Burnham’s work has found homes in Far Fetched Fables, Hypnos Magazine, Bad Dreams Entertainment, South85 Journal, SQ Quarterly, and others. He is a member of the online writers’ group, Codex, and has an MFA in Creative Writing from Converse College. He also recently won the Wyrm’s Gauntlet online writing contest. Burnham has been a DJ on three continents, and teaches middle school science and college level composition. He lives in Lisbon, Portugal with his wife, but grew up in Massachusetts, is from Maine at heart, and has lived in Japan, Colombia, and the Northern Mariana Islands.

 

 

---

 

Now available in hardcover! Check it out! ►

Read More

The Cafeteria Plan Challenge

 

As you might expect from a lawyer, for this Pete Wood Challenge Pete came up with a real doozy. He calls it The Cafeteria Plan Challenge.

1. Characters

a. A sarcastic robot who is itching for an argument

b. A vegan waiter who hates working at the steakhouse

c. A door-to-door salesman who can’t accept that the days of the door-to-door salesman are gone

d. An heir to the throne who likes doing “grunt work” with low- or no-pay for the local color

2. Setting

a. A sinking boat

b. A rest area on the North Carolina interstate

c. The chocolate chip cookie capital of Mars

d. An archaeological dig run by incompetent political appointees

3. First lines

a. The time traveler from 1977 didn’t even try to fit in.

b. The process server I’d been dodging for months spotted me.

c. The worst thing about being an apprentice had to be negotiating with the demons.

d. There is one indispensable item you need for every quest, and trust me, it’s not what you think.

e. Everyone at the faculty meeting told Professor Gupta not to trust that intern to deliver the schematics to the patent office. 

The Challenge:

Write a flash piece, up to 300 words long, that takes one element from each of the above categories: that is, one character, one setting, and one first line. Any genre is acceptable. The story can use more than one character or setting, but the ones you pick from the menu must be integral to the story. You can’t zip over one of the settings in a flying car or have the chosen character make a cameo appearance in line at the coffee shop behind your protagonist.

Ready? Set? Start writing!

And the Winners are: 

Beginning tomorrow and running through Friday, with links going live at 0700 CST daily:

• “King of Chrome,” by Travis Burnham
• “Out with the Old,” by Eric Fomley
• “Bargaining Power,” by Mary Berman
• “When Good Salad Bars Go Bad,” by Gustavo Bondoni
  

___________________

Publisher’s Comments: 

As always, the participating writers responded with an impressive display of creativity. The astute reader will note that “An archaeological dig run by incompetent political appointees” proved so popular that Pete decided to spin it off into its own challenge, which resulted in last week’s batch of challenge stories, and if you haven’t read them, feel free to do so now.

The Incompetent Archaeology Challenge Winners

• “Sleeping Beauty,” by Roxana Arama
• “The Memory Excavator,” by Adriana Kantcheva
• “Clowning Around,” by Carol Scheina
• “Getting Performance Up to Par,” by Gustavo Bondoni
  
• “Still Life with Elderberries,”   by Anatoly Belilovsky
• “The Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb,” by Ray Daley

Note also that the opening line “The time traveler from 1977 didn’t even try to fit in,” proved too restrictive and Pete decided that 1977 could be acceptable as either a point of origin or a destination. I mean, “The time traveler from 1977 didn’t even try to fit in, but arrived in style in his tricked-out time-traveling AMC Gremlin, wearing four-inch tall platform shoes with a plaid double-knit polyester leisure suit and ready to par-tay!” Please, no.

___________________

Special Note to Ray Daley: 

Yes, a Gremlin. The DeLorean wasn’t introduced until 1981 and it was a terrible car, overweight and underpowered, with laughably bad performance, handling, and build quality. The only reason it’s remembered fondly now, and not considered an automotive joke right up there with the Edsel, the Pacer, or the Yugo, is because one was used in Back to the Future.

Actually, six DeLoreans were used in the Back to the Future series, and the only reason they were used was because the film was running over budget and over schedule. They didn’t have the time or money to do the time-travel effects originally scripted and could pick up DeLoreans cheap because hundreds were sitting unsold in Long Beach.

And thus another science fiction legend was born…  

Read More