The Darius the Great is Not Okay Flash Fiction contest results!

We had a low turnout this weekend, probably due to summer and the world cup but the entries were terrific.

In a category all to himself, the Steve Forti!

>>Hey pendejo. U must b loco, vato. Who u think u are?
New phone. Who dis?
>>U got huevos, holmes. But u some weak whitebread, I bet.
I don't know what you want, but eat a duck.
*dick
>>U wanna fight? Luchemos. I'll show u pain.
F U
>>Si o no?
Go to hell.
>>I'll send u there, vato. U'll regreat messing wit my Miranda.
>>regret
Wait, who?
>>Don't play dumb. Miranda. Mi amor.
I don't know any Miranda, dude.
>>Lo siento. Wrong number.

Ok, so I thought I was amping it up by giving Steve an extra word. As he dunked in my face, he used TWO prompt words back to back: Miranda, dude.  Not to mention three words for one prompt. Whitebread, I bet.


And infusion across three lines.

Honestly, next time Steve is just going to have to get different words than everyone else.

Starting with paroxysm, neologism, and probably Nefertiti, just to start with.

And just to really slam it home, notice he's the first post…again.



I love Timothy Lowe's entry with Steve Forti as the villain of the piece! Now THERE is a new idea!!

And Kitty's entry about Steve being the new copy editor made me laugh out loud!

And Steve Stubbs' great pun had me groaning out loud!

Kregger's deft wielding of "Adib" as a prompt word really stood out:

Where am I anyway? Abu a dibi?

Will McPhail's first paragraph just cracked me up

No one knows exactly how The Great Iranian Dog and Pony Show earned its moniker, mostly because the event itself has nothing to do with what the title would lead you to believe. An annual tea bazaar put on by the Catholic Women’s League.

Sherin Nicole's entry was devastating

And John Davis (manuscript) Frain sails in and just lays infusion out there in the last sentence. I actually heard the mic drop when I read it.


Here are the entries that stood out to me.

Claire Bobrow

Ira noodled over the problem.
Kugel without cinnamon?
His mother’s kugel always had cinnamon.
Should he mention it, or…
maybe not.
She’d squawk like a cockatoo -
“Mama’s boy!”
A dibble plunged in the eardrum – that’s what her protest would be, allowing yet another seed of discord to sprout.
As if their life weren’t already a great jungle of misery.
No – best keep his trap shut so “The Mistake,” as his mother called her,
wouldn’t clutch her tea and moan loud enough to wake the Dead.
Or Dad, as I used to call him.
Until he complained about mother’s kugel.

I love how this story loops back in on itself to create a perfect circle. Very deft!


Barbara

Adib sat by his father's bedside. "I'm sorry, Dad."

Darius coughed, spitting up blood. "No matter. It's the way of kings. Sons murder their fathers. Unless we are truly great men, it is how we become kings. It was the tea, wasn't it? Poison."

Adib nodded. "Yes. But I swear by our Iranian gods, never will fratricide happen in our family line again."

Darius smiled. "Good. Now bring my grandson so that I may see him before I die."

Adib looked away, ashamed to meet his father's eyes.

"I cannot. I made a vow. I gave him the tea, too."

Dark dark dark!


Marty Weiss

“I was had! I believed there was a person called the Great Oz,” said Dorothy.

“Oh, there was! I had tea with a hare who told me Oz existed,” Alice responded.

“I know that hare,” said the tortoise. “I ran a race with him and he lost, quite badly I might add.”

“It’s getting late. I think it best if we all skedaddle now and go back to our library shelves,” Mrs. Goose suggested.

“Yes. These days, the children are more interested in their Facebook, Twitter and Iphone activities. Even the young ones have forsaken us,” Aesop lamented.

This just cracked me up.


Michael Seese

The guys with the great big guns seemed surly. I suspect it had something to do with the warhead I borrowed.

"Where bomb be?” the unibrow barked in English so broken it was beyond repair.

Apparently, I'd advertised the sale on TerrorismForDummies.com. These Iranians put the “HA!” in jihad. Still, armed only with a shovel, I was underdressed for the party.

“Let’s not get our sirwals in a bunch. I'll let you have it. Gladly. One question. Coffee or tea?"

“What?"

"That's what stewardesses ask folks when they fly," I said, fingering the button and counting back from ten.

Here's another guy we're going to have to up the ante on. That second line is utterly perfect.  oh hell, the whole thing is perfect.


KD James

A glance at my watch lent an infusion of panic to adrenaline.

I ran harder.

"Don't be dead, don't be dead," I begged.

Too late, my charge's tea-stained teeth bared in a rictus, skin already cooling, sluggish blood trailing down limp flesh.

Dammit, I'd only looked away for a minute. Or twenty. I'd just wanted a doughnut. Fortification.

Fresh Hot Now!

But it seemed someone had signed me up for the failure-a-day club. This made, what, an even dozen now?

"Great," I muttered, licking glaze off ghostly fingers. "I'm never going to gain guardian angel status at this rate."

Notice the use of infusin and forti-fication? Very clever.
Also a terrific story.


Melanie Sue Bowles

No one at The Reef saw it coming. Although everyone was shocked when Forti ran away with Frain’s manuscript. Perhaps a Dib Membrane moment of obsession with John’s ghostly pale complexion? Who knows. But a great brouhaha ensued.

Smith took a shot at easing the tension by telling “dad” jokes. The Reider collective eye-roll caused a shift in the tides around Carkoon.

It finally required an infusion of murmurings and incantations from Luna, Bobrow, and Faris to restore the peace.

Normally I don't go for the meta entries (the ones that are about the blog, etc.) but this one just cracked me up completely!


RosannaM

They added two extra Mondays per week, and scheduled daylight savings four times a year, which goes faster because they cut out July.

We’re taxed on the number of letters in our names. Dad saw it coming and named me half of a lowercase t. Calls me Plus.

I randomly open a box of food, no clue what’s inside. All packaging’s white; no labels.
Great! Pickles. I dip one into my tea, formerly known as coffee, and munch.

Why the infusion of Government Mandates?

To drive us mad, I believe.

But I know up is not down. Dad kept books.

This  is a whole lot harder to write this than it looks. Well, it's hard to write WELL-brilliantly imaginative and stylish, plus it makes total sense. That's a hat trick.



Amy Johnson

Great Scot!” exclaimed Sir Abbott Costello, International G.O.A.T. Awards Emcee.

“Steve, actually.”

“Not the bagpiper?”

“Nope. Steve: Flash—”

“Fastest superhero?”

“Fiction.”

“The truth, please.” Someone approached. “Who’s coming?”

“No, he’s by the TARDIS.”

Steve was surprised when the bearded man introduced himself. “Father Abraham: Dad.”

Then Julia Child. “The French Chef!”

“These days I’m specializing in fusion.”

“Confusion, indeed!” cried Sir Abbott Costello.

Steve tried to explain. “It’s not that bad…I…Before, she cooked French…”

“Don’t bother,” a woman whispered into Steve’s ear. “I ran into him earlier. Like talking to a nurikabe.” She sipped her sweet tea. “Julie: Vocabulary.”

And infusion and Forti appear again! You guyz are having way too much fun with this!



And the winner of the ARC of Darius the Great is Not Okay is  RosannaM.

RosannaM, if you'll email me with your mailing address, I'll get this in the  mail to you!

Thanks to all of you who wrote and posted entries. I loved reading them.
The display of talent here never fails to amaze me.