Let’s begin with a large pile of 50-word stories.

**********

Something about his lips repulsed her. A slight taste of something familiar; so commonplace that when in a different setting it becomes unplacable. He was nice enough, but it seemed that he knew more than he should. That and he made her thoughts wander to horrible things. That taste. Sulfur?

**

The corpse pulsed with potential. It called to the young man.

“Take me,” it said.

“Use me,” it cried.

“I can aid you in your quest.”

The young man tried to resist. “This is wrong,” he thought. “Someone might see.”

“…what happens in Vegas… stays in Vegas.” said the corpse.

**

“Think we lost ’em?” Mike said to the old man. “Huh? Oh, I don’t know,” was his reply.

Mike continued, “I knocked over a garbage can to block their path…”

The old man turned to Mike and looked him in the eye. “Wait a moment…who the hell are you?”

**

His stomach sank into his shoes when he saw what she was holding. She found his stash.

He had told her that he stopped, but it was just so hard. Instead, he cut back to three a day and never around her. “Comics,” he thought, “are ink-and-paper crack.”

**

Her beautiful dark hair had been pulled back in a loose ponytail. “Well? What do you think?” she said, turning back to the house.

“I love it,” I said. “I’ll get started on a fence.”

“Wait.. we need to buy it first.” she chuckled as he walked away. “Honey? HONEY!”

**

He didn’t want to lose her this way; cast aside like an old pair of pants that, though once were favorites, no longer fit properly. If she was going to dump him, it would be on his terms. At least when he sold her dog she’d have a real reason.

**

He emptied the clip into the slowly advancing mob, unaware of the irony of the situation. He had been in torpor for a little over a decade, so there was no way for him to know that he was not, in fact, killing zombies. Emo-kids really should count, though.

**

Thomas rolled the unconscious man onto his back. “Hey,” he shouted, “this guy doesn’t look too shabby, think he’ll do?”

The amorphous entity to which he was speaking drifted over. “No,” it intoned. “His nose is too large… we must find another. Think more ‘Michael Jackson’ and less ‘Dustin Hoffman’.”

**

“Duck… duck… duck…” Shirley said, skipping. “Duck… GOOSE!” she laughed, patting Nick on the head. As she spun to run away, he was standing in front of her, scowling, the golden mist surrounding him already beginning to dissipate. “We run clockwise, here.” he said, his eyes narrowing slightly… “Now…. run.”

**

There was too much oxygen on this planet, but that wasn’t so bad if he didn’t breathe too often. Worse than that, though, was figuring out what was normal and what wasn’t. So he didn’t tell the police his car was stolen. Or his insurance company. He told his cats.

**

“Well, obviously you didn’t check the possible side effects!” the man in the lab coat shouted. Enraged, I grabbed him by the throat and slammed him into the wall. “Your pills,” I screamed, punching him in the side. “Turned my son,” another punch. “Into a lemur!” The scientist sighed. “Really?”

**

“Turn left at next stop.” said a pleasant, monotone, female’s voice. I turned, as instructed, slightly annoyed. “Continue for two-hundred-yards.” the voice continued. I started to grumble. “Turn right at ne…,” it started, just as I screamed “Knock it off or you’re walking!” The hitchhiker frowned, feeling dejected.

*****

-Hobbs

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