I started young, and so yes, I started small. Understandable. As a child, it was easy - I just used to say I loved animals - flies, mice, anything. Everything dead. It was enough to say I found their bodies in the woods. Dad helped me buy the chemicals. He even built me a display cabinet.
But after the cat, the badger, the neighbour's cockapoo? Well, for a few years, I had to stop ... collecting.
Now? Now my whole house is a cabinet for my curiosity. Now my collection is nearly complete, just one last specimen, and I will be done.
CANNIBALS..... so wrong and bad. I once asked an old boss of mine, a gourmand of the highest order, if he would ever eat human flesh, and he had quite a long think about it before he said no.
When I was a kid, playing on the playscape was the best part of going to McDonald’s. My sister was too old for the playscape, so I always went by myself. I crawled into the tube. The tunnel smelled like sweat and urine. Cries and giggles reverberated through the scape. I trudged through a dark blue corridor that I didn’t notice before. It smelled like a bunch of dirty diapers. I turned a corner and found it. A gray boy in overalls with feckless and red hair lay sprawled out on the floor. The boy looked like he was sleeping, but his chest didn’t move. Dark veins bulged in his cheeks. I shook him, but he didn’t budge. That’s - the last time I used the playscape.
All Hallows Eve, and I become one with the shadows. I stalk the little ones, creeping through the dark as they wander, oblivious and laughing. I lure them away—far from their pack. It’s not hard, I’m cute. It squeals when I bite its leg, dragging itself, trying to get away. Another bite, and I let it go again. Then another, and it stops moving, blood pooling beneath it. I take its limp body back to my home.
I proudly drop my prize—a mouse, now just a corpse—on my hoomans’ bed. They scream. Dammit, I brought you a gift! Silly pawrents.
She was out looking for lunch. The street was already busy with office workers.
Her phone rang, it was her grandma.
‘Nainai… what are you up to?’
“Lisa… these people are so noisy. I couldn’t nap. The man next to me is snoring all the time. The woman over there can’t stop talking. That man over there kept grinding his teeth. The woman next to me, she already cried for hours….”
‘Nainai….where are you?’
“I don’t know. Is this Friday? I must go to the mahjong club…”
Lisa pinched her forehead. Not again. She switched on her tracker app.
Her heart rate rose when she arrived at the hospital. The tracker app led her somewhere next to the main building.
There was just a staircase to the basement. She followed the stairs and opened a door to a huge room. On the wall were metallic square doors shaped like grids.
She knew where her grandma was. She was in the middle slot. Right in the middle.
Wait… she had been here before.
She turned around, walked out of the morgue, and walked up the stairs towards the sunlight.
The air hung heavy with decay in the dim light of the abandoned cabin.
A corpse lay sprawled on the floor, its lifeless eyes staring blankly into the void. Flies buzzed around the festering wound at its throat drunk with the gore; some getting stuck in the congealed blood on the floor.
Whispers echoed in the shadows. Were they taunting the stillness, or was the spirit of the dead warning intruders not to enter?
With each creak of the floorboards, the air thickened, suffocating the living.
Evil filled the room, beckoning the brave to enter and listen to its tales.
The corpse lay in the woodland cemetery on man unmarked grave. A rifle and a Bible lay on her chest. Her ruby red hair, spilled over dry blood stained grass from the shotgun hole in the back of the head.
Fifty years ago to the day, the fifteen year old corpse was found. No one knew why. There was plenty of speculation.
She came from a good religious family; every Sunday her two years younger sister and parents went to church. Now they say different prayers.
There was no autopsy report. Pregnant? Abortion was out of the question. That was not taught in sex education class.
I was told the news by my friend who was her neighbor at the lake retreat cabin next to hers. I was changing classes. He stopped me in in the hall. I dropped my jaw.
Our dreams were never to be fulfilled. Last I saw her was on Labor Day. She waved to me from her boat dock as she sun bathed wearing her bright green bikini. Her character was never questioned. No one went to the secret memorial service. The years have passed. She continues to appear in our present as an unopened gift from the past.
It was a ferocious battle, the anguished screams echoing through the valley. The beck running alongside the main village street was tainted red for hours.
She moved from corpse to corpse, pocketing anything of value. A ring here, a pendant there. If she could sell it, she stole it. The screams had turned to moans and the victors had moved on already.
She reached down to yank a gold signet off another dead finger. The hand shot into life, gripping her wrist, its owner’s eyes wide and desperate. She finished the job with a dagger. He was never leaving here anyway.
“Master,” Skew, his homuncular assistant, said as he palpated the head of the corpse, “when do I get to embalm it!” He sheepishly clapped with open palms.
“I’ve thought of a better idea. Watch!”
Skelton adjusted a knob. Music roared. The corpse jerked. Skew flinched, reeling back with a “YIPE!” The body flew up from its cooling board and wildly danced across the mortuary.
“Master! Master! What deviltry is—wait.” Skew leaned in with one open eye. “I can see the strings!”
“I know. I know. But a mortician’s gotta have fun at least once in a while!”
This was a great one, Miguel. I heard the author, Michael Marshall Smith, say on a podcast the other day, that the story needs to be told, sometimes we just need to get out its way, which I thought was a nice turn of phrase
And, in my opinion, a story isn’t too short or too long, it’s exactly the length it needs to be to tell the tale 👍🏼
Nobody tells you that when your grandfather dies peacefully in his sleep, the cops arrive and investigate as though a murder had taken place. There was yellow crime scene tape across the door to his bedroom. Detective Rodriguez interrogated the family – gently and tactfully, in my case – to ascertain whether one of us had in fact killed him.
A white-faced rookie was ordered to remain with us. He was supposed to stay in Granddaddy’s room, but paced in the hallway instead. “I just can’t sit there with a corpse, man,” I heard him tell his partner. “It freaks me out.”
Earl was as big as a brick shithouse. Part metabolism sure but part abuse. Not just what he endured but also some he gladly dealt himself. Thought he deserved. Then the wonder drugs melted off the blubber. He stood in front of the mirror hoping to admire his new leaner self. Sleek to be sure. Almost skeletal. Cadaverous. Staring at the reflection of his new living corpse he realized to his dismay the pounds had been a symptom not the disease. He really didn’t look any better. And worse, his hate for himself was still there. And wasn’t going anywhere.
She stared up at Abigail’s house. It hadn’t changed. Then again, why would it? She took a deep breath. All she had to do was get to her window, declare an emergency, and have Abigail leave with them. No matter what happened, the coven stuck together.
“Are you ready, Dimitri?” He didn’t say anything and she waited patiently, hands on her hips. She turned on her heel. “Look, I know you may not approve, but you need-” She stopped. Her brother’s corpse was lifeless on the ground.
Oh god, oh god, oh god.
She needed Abigail. This was an emergency.
____
This was definitely the quickest one i've written so far. I saw the notification pop up and knew EXACTLY what I wanted to happen. The last prompt, however, was the complete opposite. I sat and rewrote it so many times!! I'm loving the progress of the story, and as always thank you SO much for providing these prompts!
It would take days to move the corpse.
“Do we really have to do this?” she asked, wiping the sweat off her brow.
Her best friend smiled. “If we get away with this, we could be a modern day Bonnie and Clyde.”
“Bonnie and Clyde were lovers though. We’re just friends.”
He shrugged. “Murder brings people together.”
“I don’t need a replacement boyfriend,” she said. “I’m done with dating.”
She swatted the flies buzzing around her boyfriend’s decaying flesh.
“Did he cheat?”
She shook her head. “No. But I feel like he was going to. Now that he can’t cheat, I can remember him as a good boyfriend.”
I started young, and so yes, I started small. Understandable. As a child, it was easy - I just used to say I loved animals - flies, mice, anything. Everything dead. It was enough to say I found their bodies in the woods. Dad helped me buy the chemicals. He even built me a display cabinet.
But after the cat, the badger, the neighbour's cockapoo? Well, for a few years, I had to stop ... collecting.
Now? Now my whole house is a cabinet for my curiosity. Now my collection is nearly complete, just one last specimen, and I will be done.
That’s amazingly awful story Nick. I hate to love it haha. Great job!
PROMPT: CORPSE
THE BODY
It was resting in the corner of the cave.
We didn’t want to look at it, or even acknowledge it was there.
For now, we pretended it was a rock. Just another feature in the stony cocoon we’d found ourselves trapped in.
The blizzard was still raging in the mountains outside, and help was not coming soon.
It’d be a few days, at least, before they could attempt a rescue.
There’d been four of us. Now only three were left.
No one wanted to talk about it.
But there was no avoiding the inevitable.
Soon, we would have to eat… 🏔️😎🏔️
CANNIBALS..... so wrong and bad. I once asked an old boss of mine, a gourmand of the highest order, if he would ever eat human flesh, and he had quite a long think about it before he said no.
Haha! That's definitely not a question you want to be pausing on before you answer... 😎
I half expected him to say “depends how its cooked”
Haha! It gives a whole new meaning to the term 'finger food'... 😎
“Playscape”
When I was a kid, playing on the playscape was the best part of going to McDonald’s. My sister was too old for the playscape, so I always went by myself. I crawled into the tube. The tunnel smelled like sweat and urine. Cries and giggles reverberated through the scape. I trudged through a dark blue corridor that I didn’t notice before. It smelled like a bunch of dirty diapers. I turned a corner and found it. A gray boy in overalls with feckless and red hair lay sprawled out on the floor. The boy looked like he was sleeping, but his chest didn’t move. Dark veins bulged in his cheeks. I shook him, but he didn’t budge. That’s - the last time I used the playscape.
All Hallows Eve, and I become one with the shadows. I stalk the little ones, creeping through the dark as they wander, oblivious and laughing. I lure them away—far from their pack. It’s not hard, I’m cute. It squeals when I bite its leg, dragging itself, trying to get away. Another bite, and I let it go again. Then another, and it stops moving, blood pooling beneath it. I take its limp body back to my home.
I proudly drop my prize—a mouse, now just a corpse—on my hoomans’ bed. They scream. Dammit, I brought you a gift! Silly pawrents.
Haha! Another fun one... 😺😎😺
Hahaha glad you liked it! Been a bit more challenging keeping to the cat theme haha
It's definitely a Theme that works really well for Halloween. It's a 'Cat-alogue of Horror'! Haha... 😺😎😺
Hahahah I love that!!
Microdosing > 100mg of a Corpse
She was out looking for lunch. The street was already busy with office workers.
Her phone rang, it was her grandma.
‘Nainai… what are you up to?’
“Lisa… these people are so noisy. I couldn’t nap. The man next to me is snoring all the time. The woman over there can’t stop talking. That man over there kept grinding his teeth. The woman next to me, she already cried for hours….”
‘Nainai….where are you?’
“I don’t know. Is this Friday? I must go to the mahjong club…”
Lisa pinched her forehead. Not again. She switched on her tracker app.
Her heart rate rose when she arrived at the hospital. The tracker app led her somewhere next to the main building.
There was just a staircase to the basement. She followed the stairs and opened a door to a huge room. On the wall were metallic square doors shaped like grids.
She knew where her grandma was. She was in the middle slot. Right in the middle.
Wait… she had been here before.
She turned around, walked out of the morgue, and walked up the stairs towards the sunlight.
And she woke up, longing for her Nainai.
Deep. Dark. lovely
The air hung heavy with decay in the dim light of the abandoned cabin.
A corpse lay sprawled on the floor, its lifeless eyes staring blankly into the void. Flies buzzed around the festering wound at its throat drunk with the gore; some getting stuck in the congealed blood on the floor.
Whispers echoed in the shadows. Were they taunting the stillness, or was the spirit of the dead warning intruders not to enter?
With each creak of the floorboards, the air thickened, suffocating the living.
Evil filled the room, beckoning the brave to enter and listen to its tales.
The corpse lay in the woodland cemetery on man unmarked grave. A rifle and a Bible lay on her chest. Her ruby red hair, spilled over dry blood stained grass from the shotgun hole in the back of the head.
Fifty years ago to the day, the fifteen year old corpse was found. No one knew why. There was plenty of speculation.
She came from a good religious family; every Sunday her two years younger sister and parents went to church. Now they say different prayers.
There was no autopsy report. Pregnant? Abortion was out of the question. That was not taught in sex education class.
I was told the news by my friend who was her neighbor at the lake retreat cabin next to hers. I was changing classes. He stopped me in in the hall. I dropped my jaw.
Our dreams were never to be fulfilled. Last I saw her was on Labor Day. She waved to me from her boat dock as she sun bathed wearing her bright green bikini. Her character was never questioned. No one went to the secret memorial service. The years have passed. She continues to appear in our present as an unopened gift from the past.
Corpse
It was a ferocious battle, the anguished screams echoing through the valley. The beck running alongside the main village street was tainted red for hours.
She moved from corpse to corpse, pocketing anything of value. A ring here, a pendant there. If she could sell it, she stole it. The screams had turned to moans and the victors had moved on already.
She reached down to yank a gold signet off another dead finger. The hand shot into life, gripping her wrist, its owner’s eyes wide and desperate. She finished the job with a dagger. He was never leaving here anyway.
Ouch, that's brutal
brutal.
Thanks. Was reading about people who actually did this at a local site recently. Easy connection to the prompt then!
🤢
"THE CORPSE" - 100 words
Dr. Skelton smiled from ear to ear.
“Master,” Skew, his homuncular assistant, said as he palpated the head of the corpse, “when do I get to embalm it!” He sheepishly clapped with open palms.
“I’ve thought of a better idea. Watch!”
Skelton adjusted a knob. Music roared. The corpse jerked. Skew flinched, reeling back with a “YIPE!” The body flew up from its cooling board and wildly danced across the mortuary.
“Master! Master! What deviltry is—wait.” Skew leaned in with one open eye. “I can see the strings!”
“I know. I know. But a mortician’s gotta have fun at least once in a while!”
This was a great one, Miguel. I heard the author, Michael Marshall Smith, say on a podcast the other day, that the story needs to be told, sometimes we just need to get out its way, which I thought was a nice turn of phrase
And, in my opinion, a story isn’t too short or too long, it’s exactly the length it needs to be to tell the tale 👍🏼
Yeah I fully agree with that! And I encourage everyone to forget the word "limits" if the story takes them somewhere else.
Miguel, I thought that was a story about an angel trying to save suicidal humans -- until the end. Really good unexpected finish!
Thank you Lia :)
Nobody tells you that when your grandfather dies peacefully in his sleep, the cops arrive and investigate as though a murder had taken place. There was yellow crime scene tape across the door to his bedroom. Detective Rodriguez interrogated the family – gently and tactfully, in my case – to ascertain whether one of us had in fact killed him.
A white-faced rookie was ordered to remain with us. He was supposed to stay in Granddaddy’s room, but paced in the hallway instead. “I just can’t sit there with a corpse, man,” I heard him tell his partner. “It freaks me out.”
Earl was as big as a brick shithouse. Part metabolism sure but part abuse. Not just what he endured but also some he gladly dealt himself. Thought he deserved. Then the wonder drugs melted off the blubber. He stood in front of the mirror hoping to admire his new leaner self. Sleek to be sure. Almost skeletal. Cadaverous. Staring at the reflection of his new living corpse he realized to his dismay the pounds had been a symptom not the disease. He really didn’t look any better. And worse, his hate for himself was still there. And wasn’t going anywhere.
oooph. kidney punching hard.
She stared up at Abigail’s house. It hadn’t changed. Then again, why would it? She took a deep breath. All she had to do was get to her window, declare an emergency, and have Abigail leave with them. No matter what happened, the coven stuck together.
“Are you ready, Dimitri?” He didn’t say anything and she waited patiently, hands on her hips. She turned on her heel. “Look, I know you may not approve, but you need-” She stopped. Her brother’s corpse was lifeless on the ground.
Oh god, oh god, oh god.
She needed Abigail. This was an emergency.
____
This was definitely the quickest one i've written so far. I saw the notification pop up and knew EXACTLY what I wanted to happen. The last prompt, however, was the complete opposite. I sat and rewrote it so many times!! I'm loving the progress of the story, and as always thank you SO much for providing these prompts!
It's progressing nicely, yes. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens next... 😎👍
I'm glad you enjoy it so much!