“Prove it,” he said.

“I can’t. But the Ayeye says it’s true.”

He was merciless. “If you don’t understand the machine’s reasoning, you can’t tell it’s correct.”

All I knew was this felt right, but I had no answer.

“If the Ayeye does the grunt work, has the insight, and formalises the proof, but you don’t grasp the meaning, does it even mean anything?”

“Pah! Philosophy!”

“Well, here’s a philosophical question for you: what’s the point of people?”

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

What do we need the gods for now? Oh, they strut and fume as we tear down their statues and temples. Zeus releases a stream of thunderbolts which fizzle and spark before plopping spent on the carpet. A mist of angels wring their little hands before evaporating. Legba holds a weeping Inti close as they thin and dissipate.

We are the masters now. The steam from our great engines blows across a sun hiding its face in shame.  

If only the rains would come as they used to.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

The flowers are dark, so dark they swallow all light. For weeks, I didn’t notice them, my mind skittering past what seemed misshapen leaves. Only at day’s end, when the dying sun licks them like a craven dog, can you spot them—blood red, nodulated. No insects ever visit these monstrous blooms.

The bees know. I’m certain these are relativistic explosions, slowed to a crawl in our timeframe. We’re under attack. Neither the police nor my MP will listen, not even Mrs. Sanders, who holds that Boris Johnson was the messiah. I’ll gather my evidence. If I’m right, the detonations will slowly fade away.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

Albert enjoyed travel. Move 3,000 miles, or ten, and you reached a different place. Well, duh, you might say, but that would be to misunderstand. The places weren’t what Albert craved—palm trees or snow huskies equally a matter of complete indifference. What mattered was the difference—new in a bar where nobody knew his name.

He slid onto the stool in the hotel bar and ordered a sidecar, because that’s what a guy like him drank. The blonde on the next stool eyed him. Tipping his fedora at a rakish angle, he smiled.

“Hiya, little lady.”

“Scram, loser.”

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

Memories within memories. Before the war, there was dining and dancing, evenings at the Opera. No, wait—I’m getting confused. The Opera was London—our old life before we took power. But here too we once had parties, I’m sure of that.

Nowadays, there’s politics and war. War is politics conducted by other means, as Clausewitz sort of said. Turns out I’m deliciously good at politics.

Events flap and billow in the gales of history, and we struggle to hold them down.

.Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

It’s hard to remember, but I think it all went tits-up when Grandad took his teeth out. The vicar’s wife shrieked, as if he’d exposed himself, or sunk the gnashers into her ample rump. Grandad, perhaps to be seen to do something, grabbed the picnic hamper and flung it over the railings into the river. The florist swung a punch. Soon, all the wrinklies were one brawling mass.

When the bizzies arrived, they’d surely blame me as the only young ‘un. A pub at the end of the walk sang siren songs of refuge (“Wasn’t there, Guv”). I legged it.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

The scribe puts down his stylus and sends the clay tablet for baking. A good day’s recording of the village’s wheat yields, so he allows himself a cup of beer with his dinner.

In the tavern, villagers avoid him. He’s used to that. Scribes are never popular.

Voices at a nearby table rise as the ale flows. “Writing! What’s it good for? Spying on our harvest! And what does that get us?” “Bloody taxes.” “For the bloody king, may Ahura curse him.”

The scribe shivers at the next outburst. “We need to put a stop to all this writing business.”

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Writing seems to have been invented three distinct times. The cuneiform of ancient Mesopotamia and the hieroglyphs of ancient Egypt are well-known, But the third, proto-Elamite from ancient Iran, is shrouded in mystery. One fascinating feature of the Iranian invention is that they gave up writing for 800 years around 5,000 years ago. We can only speculate why. 

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

Even the walls are vibrating. The very air in my little house pulses. Enough. I have to go next door.

“Would you mind,” I ask, making my smile as friendly as I can manage, “turning the music down a bit?”

He scratches his chin, which he then juts out. “Gotta live our lives, don’t we?”

“Yes, but I don’t want to live it too.”

The door slams.

Six weeks later, there’s a tentative knock on my door. He says, “Locked meself out, haven’t I? Alright if I climb over your wall, mate?”

I sense the prospect of an accommodation.

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.Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

Every cell door stands wide. The gaolers dead or fled. The prison is ours, the streets too. Strangers embrace me. We spin and dance to music only we hear— a shared soundless music. We are one. Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. I try the words out in my mouth. They’re big and hard to chew as week-old bread.

Bread. This I understand. When we hungered, they said, “Let them eat cake.” What use are they? We can sow and reap. They just dance. Today I learned to dance. We’re coming now, on the road to Versailles, with a terrible joy.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here

The demonstrator steepled his fingers.  “The Belanthropus system allows target acquisition for your preferred weapons platform faster than any human operator.”

“And that’s a good thing?”

“In the highly complex kinetics of modern warfare, yes. More targets, more kills.”

The General leaned forward, body tensed like a wolfhound. “With this, we’ll anticipate the enemy’s intentions and neutralise them before they strike. It could make attack unthinkable. We must be first to possess this.”

“General,” I said, “this won’t eliminate war, but automate it and make conflict more likely. We have to ban this.”

That’s how I got command of paperclips.

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Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here