The Nether Mind: 33 Flash Fiction Stories

by E.A. Wicklund

  On Time

  Sarah glared at him on the platform. “Why Vince? Why stay?”

  “Because we’re good for each other. You’ve admitted as much.” He whined.

  Sarah pointed at the status board that read one minute until the next train arrived. “You have that long to convince me to stay with you. If I get on that train this is our last Sunday, our last day period!” She crossed her arms and waited.

  On his heels, Vince thought fast. “We like the same things. We’re always laughing together.”

  “All true, but not what I need to hear.”

  “The sex is great?”

  “Again, true. But I need more.”

  “I…I…”

  “This train is always on time,” she warned.

  Vince eyed the status board, wide-eyed. “I’d be lost, without you. I…love you.”

  Sarah smiled. “At last, you’re on time,”  and she kissed him deeply.

  Some day, she planned to tell him the train didn’t run on Sundays.

  Guru

  Second-richest man in the world, Hubert Hanson, climbed past the Himalayan cloud layer. The three thousand foot climb to the peak had broken lesser men before. Panting and gasping, he felt exhausted from the arduous climb. With shaking hands, he crawled the last fifty feet over sharp rocks to where the ancient guru meditated.

  Hubert's muscles were failing after so much effort. Sweat dripped past his eyes and pooled in the dirt beneath him. “Oh great guru,” wheezed Hubert, gasping for breath. “How can I make more money?”

  The wizened man gazed across the clouded mountains. His dark eyes seemed further away than the depths of space. Wisdom practically oozed from his sun-darkened, wrinkled skin. “You must start at the bottom,” he intoned.

  Hanson beamed. “Yes! Brilliant. I should start companies from the ground up. Make them in my own image!”

  “No, you idiot," grated the Guru. "Climb here from the foot of the mountain. Don’t ride your private helicopter up to the last fifty feet of the climb!”

  Kissing Day

  Joon and Jae found kisses at a park in May

  Both with braces entangled a difficult way

  Tooth by tooth, they conjoined

  For hours their lips were joined

  Now old and grey, they're still kissing hours a day!

  Jeff Appleseed

  “Rick? Have you seen this?” Chloe stared out the kitchen window.

  “Holy…That tree has balls!”

  Chloe glared at him. “Rick, there wasn’t even a tree out there yesterday.”

  “Big balls.”

  “Yeah. At least the tree does,” she commented dryly.

  “Let’s check it out,” said Rick, immune to her jabs as usual. He led the way out the back door. Incredulous, the two stared at the impossibly fast-growing tree. They walked around it, wondering at the odd fruit.

  Then Chloe froze in place. Barely moving her lips she said, “Rick. That branch is moving.”

  “Yeah. Trees do that in the breeze.”

  “There’s no breeze.”

  “I see it,” said Rick, and then he also froze in place. The moving branch reached out and grabbed another branch, then hung there a moment. It swung its…legs….a few times then catapulted off to land in front of Chloe and Rick. It opened its eyes, and smiled.

  “You’re…you’re…” stammered Chloe.

  “Jeff,” said the alien. Impossibly thin, Jeff was nearly seven feet tall with shoulders about one foot wide. With a long, narrow head and bark-like skin, Jeff looked like an anthropomorphic stick, with golden eyes.

  “Alien!”

  “I think I said my name was, Jeff.”

  “But you’re an alien,” said Rick.

  Jeff rolled his eyes. “Okay, fine. If you want to get technical. I’m an alien.”

  “Uh, is this your tree?” Asked Chloe.

  “Chloe!” Admonished Rick. “There’s an alien in front of us and you’re worried about a tree?”

  “It’s a weird tree.” Chloe defended.

  “How can anyone own a tree?” Mused Jeff. “Didn’t your Native-Americans teach you anything?”

  “We tried our best to kill them all,” noted Rick. “But we made up for it by naming football teams after them.”

  “How civilized,” said Jeff. He gestured at the tree. “To answer your question, this is a Gigimin Tree. It is a trans-universal propagating tree.”

  “And that means what, exactly?”

  “It tries to spread to as many universes as it can. If you dig deep enough, you’ll find that not all of its roots exist in this universe. It lives in several universes at once and tries to propagate into other universes.”

  “How many universes are there?” Asked Chloe.

  “Infinite as near as anyone knows,” answered Jeff.

  “So how does it propagate?”

  Jeff plucked one of the fruit and took a bite out of it. “It waits for someone to eat the fruit.”

  And then he disappeared.

  “Pretty cool, eh?” Jeff was standing behind them.

  “Woh!” Exclaimed Chloe and Jeff as they turned about.

  “The fruit grants the consumer the ability to travel to other universes. Most universes are copies of this one with gradually more and more significant differences. You could travel to another universe and hardly notice a difference depending on where you go. You can travel spatially too, so that you could easily visit Rome or Angkor Wat in this universe.”

  “Awesome,” said Rick. He plucked a fruit and examined it. “How do you direct it to where you want to go?”

  “Once you’ve eaten the fruit, you simply think of where you want to be.”

  Rick took a bite and chewed.

  “Rick, no!” Shouted Chloe.

  “Tastes pretty good. Like a mushy apple,” said Rick. And he winked out of existence.

  “Rick!” Screamed Chloe. She turned to the alien. “Please, Jeff! Bring him back. He’s not the smartest guy in the world, but he’s my guy.  I love him so much, I’d…”

  Rick blinked back into existence. He wore lederhosen and held a large stein of beer. “Hey Chloe!” He grinned. “Octoberfest is happening in Bonn. You’ve got to go there!”

  “Rick! You jerk!”

  “As you can see,” said Jeff. “Traveling with the fruit is perfectly safe, even for Rick.”

  *** Three Years Later ***

  Rick handed the keys to the Jaguar to the valet and slipped him a US $50  bill. A month’s wages for many in the Philippines. Rick walked out onto the sands of Boracay to join Chloe as she watched the sunset.

  “How’d it go?” Asked Chloe.

  “We are now the proud owners of Boracay’s newest resort,” said Jeff.

  “That’s nice,” she said absently.

  They held hands and watched the sunlight dance across the water. Chloe finished her Piña Colada with a sigh. “Jeff. Do you think we did the right thing?”

  “It’s a good resort.”

  “No. I mean the bank.”

  “Oh! That. It was great. Popped in, grabbed a bunch of cash and popped out. Best bank robbery in history!”

  “But it’s still theft, Rick.”

  “I know, but we haven’t done it again. We invested and tripled the money. That put it right back into the system. We started the orphanages, the charities, the African agricultural program, the computer education schools in Honduras. We’ve given back.”

  She sighed. “I guess we’ve done enough.”

  “Not nearly enough,” said Jeff, suddenly appearing beside Chloe.

  “Oh!” Chloe jumped, but recovered quickly. “If it isn’t the fabled Jeff Appleseed. Sun tan lotion?”

  Jeff looked significantly at his tree bark skin. “Pass.”

  “You’re barking up the wrong tree,” said Rick. “But maybe we can root some info out of him. We’ll have to pack our trunk first…”

  Chloe whacked Rick’s shoulder. “Stop it.” Rick responded
with tickles and the two fell into the sand in a tangle arms, legs, and hysterical squeals. Eventually they tired of the game and returned to their beach chairs.

  “You were saying, Jeff?” Asked Chloe.

  “The Gigimin Tree propagates across universes. Plural. You two only traveled spatially across this universe. ”

  “We don’t know how to do that,” said Chloe.

  “I can show you. How about it? Wouldn’t you like to see other planets in other universes?”

  “Come to think of it,” said Rick. “I haven’t spread any seeds around. How do you do that?”

  “They’re very small. They come out in your sweat after you eat the fruit.”

  “Does that mean we have to go to a hot planet, so we sweat?” Asked Chloe.

  Jeff looked at the excited and happy couple. “I’m sure you can work up a sweat somehow in a cooler place.”

  Rick took Chloe’s hand and said, “What do you think? Want to spread some seed with me?”

  Chloe’s grin was his answer.

  Job Interview

  The paddles of the ancient steam-powered river boat were silent as Captain Green stood upon her deck. Her refurbishment was complete, and the owners were excited about the monetary potential of the Dixie Queen as a floating museum in Britain's Weymouth harbor.

  Unfortunately, repeated calls to Scotland Yard about a very strange presence on the boat risked all that was invested. Because of the curious nature of the presence, it was Captain Green they sent to investigate.

  “Never seen anything like it, Cap’n,” said Fenton, staring at the dapper man in a white suit, neatly groomed goatee, and bolero tie. He could've played Kentucky Fried Chicken's Colonel Sanders in another venue.

  Green nodded. "There's definitely something different happening here." With Fenton trailing and carefully analyzing his instruments, Green stepped up to the man out of time and presented his ID. “Captain Green. London Department of Super-Normal Affairs and Job Placement.”

  The man shook his hand. “Pleased tuh make your aquaintance, suh. Ah am Jeffrey Whittaker. Of the Bourbon County Whittakers, that is.” He withdrew a large cigar from his suit and expertly clipped the end off.

  Green offered a lighter.

  Whittaker stepped back, startled. “What in tarnation is thayut?”

  “It’s a lighter.”

  Whittaker took it and lit his cigar. “A more peculiar gizmo, ah’ve never seen. Seems efficacious enough, though.” Reverently, he returned the lighter.

  Green turned to Fenton and murmured. “That lighter should have dropped straight through his hand.”

  “He’s a ghost,” whispered Fenton, consulting his meter. “The readings are spot on across the board, except for one thing...”

  "And that is?"

  "I know you hate that technical stuff, Cap'n."

  Green took a deep breath and reminded himself to be thankful for Fenton's technical wizardry. "Okay. What does that one thing mean?"

  "Well. Readings basically say he's a Poltergeist."

  "Poltergeist?" said Green, reflexively reaching for the weapon at his side.

  "Usually, Poltergeists are a surly lot and prone to destruction, but this one's different."

  "Different how?"

  Fenton pointed at the squiggly lines on his bulky, custom-made tablet. "His Ecto-theta-gamma-two readings are really low. It's the reading that makes no sense."

  Green rubbed his temple.

  "Told you you'd hate it. It means he's not an angry spirit at all. I reckon he wouldn't hurt a fly."

  Green felt a smile spread across his face. This was the part of his job he really liked. "Good candidate, then?"

  "Right as rain, Cap'n."

  "Gentlemen, ah am still standin' heah," groused Whittaker. "What ya'll are doin' is considered downright rude in the great state of Mississippi!"

  Green turned back to Whittaker. “I’m sorry to tell you this, but you aren’t in the Mississippi river any more. You aren’t even in America anymore. This is Weymouth Harbor in Britain.”

  Whittaker sagged and bowed his head, as if finally giving in to the inevitable. “Ah did have a notion that things were amiss. Lookee over yonder." He pointed. "That young lady is gallavantin’ around in her unmentionables. ”

  “They’re called, shorts.”

  "Indeed, they are. She has lovely ankles, though. Where ah grew up, that's all a young man ever saw 'til his wedding night. Ah can’t decide if ah’ve been hurled into one a’ Dante’s levels of Hell and a Den of Iniquity or carried on the wings of angels straight tuh Heaven.”

  “I think he's perfect,” murmured Green.

  “We couldn’t easily find a better historical source,” replied Fenton.

  “Sir. You're situation is unfortunate, but there may be a bright side to your situation."

  "A bright side to bein' a dead man?"

  Green said, "Would you be interested working on the Dixie Queen as Historian and Tour guide, Mr. Whittaker?”

  "Ya'll are offerin' me a job, sir? Ah have nevah worked a job in all mah life." He paused and puffed thoughtfully on his cigar. " On further consideration though, this isn't my life any more, isn't thayut right?"

  "I'm sorry to say, that's true," said Green.

  "Well, what sort of compensation can ya'll provide to a ghost?"

  Just then, a young woman in a mini-skirt walked past. She paused to give Whittaker an appraising look and appreciative smile before she sauntered away with swaying come-hither hips.

  Whittaker grinned hugely and stood up straight. "Never mind gentlemen, ah can already see the remunerations are more than adequate. He pushed past to follow the young woman. "Now if ya'll don't mind, I'll begin educatin' the youngfolk in the finer arts straightaway!"

  Baiting

  “It looks scary,” said Corrine, staring up at the imposing edifice of the old church.

  “It should,” replied Grant. “According to ghosttracking.com, there’s a Type IV ghost living here. We'll definitely get some award-winning pics.”

  “What’s that?” She pointed.

  The last thing either of them saw was a hideous stone face screaming towards them, marble wings outstretched.

  ***

  Jonsyt clapped a hand on his father’s carved stone shoulder. “See Papa? I told you it would work.”

  Grylsht, the gargoyle, lifted his head from feeding. “I always thought pigeons were tasty, but ghost hunters are even better.”

  “Easier than catching pigeons.”

  “Yeah, but only because you used ghosttracking.com as bait.”

  Survival of the Scaredest

  “I seen him right through there,” pointed Evan. “Like one a’ those dino-sores I seen on cable teevee.”

  Lou reeled in his lure and cast again from the boat. “Sure it weren’t no gator?”

  “Nope. Second time I seen it, it done came after me, runnin’ on two legs like a giant chicken. I rowed like hell for deeper water. But golldangit, the dang thing can swim! Lucky I can row faster scared than it can swim hungry.”

  Lou looked at Evan blankly. “You been smoking them funny cigarettes again, aintcha?”

  “No! I swear to God I saw it in the shallow water right thar.”

  Lou began rowing to the shallows, “It’s called ‘survival of the fittest,’ Evan. And dinosaurs weren’t fittest. They all done died.”

  “Don’t know about that. I do know ‘survival of the scaredest’ works best. And that dang thing scares me.”

  Lou stepped out of the boat into knee-deep water. He held his arms out questioningly. “Where’s your dinosaur now, Evan?”

  “Get back here, Lou. It ain’t safe!”

  “I ain’t scared.”

  That worked out perfectly for the 5’10” tall, eighteen-foot long Utah Raptor waiting in the bushes. It charged through the shallow water. With a single bite, it effortlessly snapped the neck of the obviously stupid prey animal. It was growing fast with all the easy prey shambling around
.

  Evan quickly rowed away to deep water accompanied by the sound of Lou’s breaking bones and tearing flesh.

  Told you ‘survival of the scaredest’ works best, Lou.

  Warped

  Bjorn tossed him higher and higher. Four-year old Stefan giggled with each toss. He obviously loved the sensation of flying. Eva watched with trepidation, always afraid something terrible might happen.

  “Not so high,” she called to Bjorn.

  “He's fine,” said Bjorn. “Look. He loves it!” He grinned to another peal of laughter from Stefan.

  “You’ll make him sick.”

  “It’s good for him. Maybe someday he’ll be a pilot.”

  “Heaven forbid! People aren’t meant to fly.”

  “He is. Just look…uh. Stefan!”

  Eva’s eyes bulged at the sight of Stefan, still giggling, hovering above Bjorn’s outstretched arms. “Stefan Gunvaldsson! You come down here right now.”

  “How is this possible?” wondered Bjorn.

  “You’ve tossed him too many times,” scolded Eva. “Now he’s stuck there!”

  And so began the little-known career of Warpman. With his ability to warp space and time, he was the first human to fly faster than light and, sadly, the first human lost in space.

  Here in America

  Ryan gestured at the building across the street from the cafe. “And that ugly behemoth is the headquarters for America’s newest spy agency, the SIO, or Special Intelligence Operations.”

  Jun, visiting from China, recoiled. “Perhaps we should stay away from it.”

  “Oh don’t worry. This isn’t China. You can say almost anything and get away with it.”

  “Please don’t…”

  “Like, ‘I’d like to blow up that ugly building.'” Ryan looked around dramatically. “See? Nothing happens.” He signaled the waitress for the check.