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Available at http://www.lulu.com/ danmarvin
The World Under the Utility Sink
A call to arms by Dan Marvin
Magical sprites filled the air in the Kingdom of Nagale, singing beautiful songs and twinkling like a million fireflies seen through the trees. Of course, when Edgar tried to catch a few for dinner, they dissipated as if they were nothing but the wind.
Edgar had been here three days and man, was he hungry. The Leprechauns tasted like shoe leather and were about as tough and the wood nymphs squealed when you pulled their arms out until a magical princess came and yelled at you. When you went after her with a fork, she zapped you into the next county for Pete’s sake! How was a guy to get three squares a day in such a rotten place?
A peal of laughter caught his attention and he saw a fairy flitting through the trees spreading pixie dust and generally being a nuisance. Surely one fairy wouldn’t be missed! Edgar began to formulate a plan.
As he watched, the fairy flew closer and closer to the bush where he was hiding. His mouth began to water as it made its way to the waiting net. Would it never get here? Finally, the fairy was in range. Edgar threw the net over its head and reeled it in like a trophy bass! The fairy bit and kicked until he could get it filleted and ready to be roasted.
His fire that night held the fixings of a glorious feast. A spearmint sauce bubbled daintily on a flat rock and the fairy filled the air with the aroma of seared meat as it rotated lazily on a spit. Edgar, hungry as he was, took the time to savor every bite, stopping only long enough to die when he realized the magic mushrooms he had painstakingly sautéed were deadly poison.
The End
Fabricated Factoid:
73 - The percentage of people who feel ripped off if they come to a mostly blank page in a book.
27 - The percentage of people who are happy to find a blank page so they can take notes on what they’ve read
100 - The percentage of the 27% above who characterized themselves as “socially awkward” and “unpopular” in High School.
Fighting Chance
Contemporary fiction by Dan Marvin
Without the suit, he was just a man. His limbs weren’t particularly strong, his eyes couldn’t see around corners, he couldn’t jump high or run fast or throw things a long ways. About all he could do was sit in his recliner and think back to how it had been.
Back in the day, “Do Good Man” was a household name. Whenever a seemingly unstoppable force of evil would come to town, he got the call. He had a direct line to the Commissioners Office and it used to ring off the hook. Not these days. There were no calls for “Ordinary Man.” There were lots of ordinary men on the payroll that were just fine jumping in and grabbing the headlines when the menace was tame.
For awhile, the headlines had screamed for him. “Super Huge Eel Swallows Aquarium, Who Will Save Us?” Then a strange thing happened. With no one to fight them, the super villains simply moved on. It seemed that the adrenaline rush was half the fun and no one actually wanted to run this moribund little backwoods Metropolis. They moved on to bigger fish, so to speak, and he was no longer “Do Good Man”, he was just “Man.” All because of the suit.
With a sigh, he drained his beer and looked for a rerun of Seinfeld. It wasn’t as funny to him anymore. Once he knew he could easily defeat the Soup Nazi and win a cup of his delicious soup. Now, he didn’t even know if he could match wits with Newman. He seriously wondered if he needed some Abilify. That stuff seemed awesome in the commercials. Even the dogs perked up.
Lost in his own thoughts, he barely heard the doorbell, it didn’t even register. When it rang again, it intruded into his brain enough that he realized that… someone wanted him. He was wanted! He sprang from his chair and ran to the door.
“Sign here for your suit,” said the man from the drycleaners. “Sorry it took so long, it had some acid stains and we had to send it to Cleveland to get them out.” Eagerly he signed for his suit, tipped the disinterested delivery man, and streaked for his bedroom.
With shaking hands, he opened the plastic garment bag and realized he had been given Gopher Woman’s suit by mistake. Collapsing onto the bed, Do Good Man wept.
The End
Dubious Definition – Arsenal (n) – a bad place to store your nal
A Victim of Circumstance
Nail biting suspense from Dan Marvin who has been compared to Alfred Hitchcock, albeit unfavorably.
It was almost noon. I could tell by the clock on the wall, it pointed to different numbers that told my brain that it was almost noon. Plus my stomach was growling. You know how it is. I had just decided to go down to the Grimy Deli for a $5 plate of heartburn when Lila stuck her head in my door with a message. That’s where she’s talked to someone and they’ve asked her to tell me something. I get them all the time, everyone does, they’re messages, like I said.
This one was different. It didn’t contain any words in the same order that I recognized from previous messages, that’s what made it unique. It was the kind of message that tells me something completely new, something I wouldn’t have known if I didn’t see it. It was that kind of message. My Private Eye instincts kicked into overdrive because I’m a private dick, a finder of things that people want found. I locate people and information that would have gone unlocated if it weren’t for me and therefore have good instincts. Like I said, a Private Eye.
“Watch out. A large object is about to fall on you.” That’s what the message said. It might have been code, that’s where somebody tells you something that isn’t what it appears. If you’re smart enough, you can figure out what it’s actually supposed to say. Pretty clever, if you ask me. It seemed like it might have been code.
I studied the message Lila had given me. It was printed on a “Here’s your Message” Post It note, the kind that one comes off the top and it sticks to stuff but not too tight because you will want to throw it out eventually. You know the type. It looked familiar, much like the paper Lila usually uses to give me messages. That was it! It was a message from Lila, the kind I usually got! Now we were getting somewhere. That’s where you are arriving at a place different from where you were earlier.
Now that I was on the right track, I happened to glance up. Actually, it was more of a reflex action that anyone would have to a large object hurtling through the air under the acceleration of gravity and crashing through the roof above you. You put 100 people in a room with a large object crashing down on top of them and all 100 would look up, I guarantee it! The note started to make sense now. I could tell it was...
The End
A Posse of One
A story of love and redemption by Dan Marvin
Over the next ridge lay water. Ladstone knew it, he just had to convince his tired horse and his sun swollen eyes to find it. They had been riding two days, hard and long. The meager provisions he had been able to steal from the stable hand barely lasted a day and the water had been used mainly for the mangy dapple he was riding with little for himself.
Only 72 hours separated him from the life of a wayward but very successful gambler. A bad night, some bad hombres, and suddenly he was running for his life, all that he had built gone. In a way, it was fitting. All that he had built was on the backs of businessmen and cattlemen and farmers, all of whom needed the money more than he. Still, it was a suitable life for a man of refined tastes and he missed it acutely at this very moment.
Ladstone crested the ridge and saw more of the same, unremarkable scrub and sun-beaten earth. With a grimace, he gritted his teeth and slapped the reins. The dapple started off resolute but exhausted. If he didn’t find water soon, both he and the horse would be dead.
The ridge allowed him to scan the country behind him. At least there were no tell-tale columns of dust to be seen. Either his pursuers had lost interest or were very good at what they did. A small copse of trees lay ahead.
Although the patch of trees didn’t look very inviting, they were all he had. He crawled on his belly under the scrub brush and prickers until he happened on earth that looked like it might have been wet sometime in the last several months. With his hands and a broken branch, he carved out a hole in the center. Ever so slowly, it began to fill with brackish, brown water. The first hatful went to the horse. Then, Ladstone allowed himself to drink. He gulped the water and bathed his head.
This would have to do for the night. He set up a meager camp, set up a snare for any wayward wildlife, and rested. The horse nibbled on some forlorn looking grass a few feet away. He wouldn’t be going anywhere. The sun began to set and Ladstone began to relax. A few feet away, a small explosion set the earth falling over him. Ducking for cover in the briars, Ladstone waited.
Nothing moved. The earth was as quiet as if all life had long ago died out and it was now waiting for him to do the same. After what seemed like an eternity, Ladstone went to investigate. A large rock, blackened and melted sat in the center of the small crater. A meteorite had almost vaporized him!
Years later, as a successful businessman in Austin, it defied odds that Ladstone was actually killed by another meteor. The heavens really had it in for him.
The End
Beware the Ides of 2179
Contemporary fiction by Dan Marvin
In the swirling mists of mid day, the mining colony looked like a handful of jacks on a dusty playground. Sitting in the driver’s seat of the cruiser, Mac McWain perused the desolate landscape he called home. Twelve years ago, he had accepted a short assignment as project specialist for a mining colony. That had been before they even knew about the Veegon.
The Veegon had struck mercilessly at the fledgling outposts of new space-power earth. Alpha Zed 3 (AZ3) was the last mining colony and one of only seven outposts to survive at all. Through a hurried alliance with the Grinls, they had survived the onslaught. Now, they had to pay them back in precious ores and minerals (PO&M).
Mac’s short assignment had turned into a lifelong pursuit. Earth Central (EC) wouldn’t waste space on a freight ship for a person even if they were inclined to let him leave. Mac was resigned to his fate, and his bones were slowly wasting away, leaving him unfit to return anyway.
There was a bright spot to all this. He had complete autonomy from earth. Any messages for him were days getting here on pulsed light relay (PLR) and by that time, whatever was important then most likely wasn’t now. There was food, water, shelter, and even a girl he kinda liked. The thought of Mafan sent blood rushing to his face.
Mac broke out of his reverie and continued on his mission, to transport core samples to the testing lab for a full analysis spread (FAS). The ore veins they had been working in the area had begun to play out and he desperately needed to find a new source to keep the shipments flowing. The color of these looked promising.
At Airlock 7, the vehicle was de ionized and he pulled it into a refueling bin. He hailed an Automatic Conveyance Device (ACD) to cart the samples to the lab and headed to his quarters for a quick shower. The lab results would be slow coming; he should have time for a bite to eat and a pint of Alpha Orbital Ale (AOA).
A rumbling in the personnel transport tube (PTT) warned him that something was amiss. A Huge Alation Stone Worm (HASW) burst from the surface awakened from his centuries long slumber (CLS) by the drilling equipment and quickly ate everything in sight (AEIS).
The End
20,000 Leagues of Their Own
A romantic tale of warfare at sea by Dan Marvin
A gentle vibration indicated that the engines had engaged and the surreal undersea view started to move. Captain Durain looked around the cabin and read the nervous tension on the faces of his crew. As quietly as possible, the Spirit of Hoboken moved out, hoping to avoid detection by the enemy topside.
She leaked a bit of oil into the turgid water but seemed to have weathered the depth charges well. The backup generators kicked off and primary power returned, indicating the Chief Engineer had somewhat overstated the lead time required to redirect the output into the secondary wiring harness. In all, they could have been much worse off.
Under the blanket of static the jammers provided, they might have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting clear of the destroyer above and radioing for help. Might. Still, it was impossible to disband the knots in his stomach waiting for the next depth charge to detonate. Ahead, the outlines of a large cavern began to unfold. Captain Durain formulated a quick change of strategy.
In the war room of the USS Dole, Durain’s counterpart was getting red in the face. “What do you mean we LOST them?!” he demanded, incredulous. “They were dead in the water, powerless and adrift! How did we just LOSE them?” A string of technobabble from the sonar operator indicated that he didn’t know. “Find them!” Captain Desmont yelled as he stormed out. The Dole began to look in earnest.
The forlorn ‘ping’ of active sonar went over their head 8 times in the next 6 hours. The destroyer must have been circling in an ever widening sweep to track them down. Durain’s crew could not afford a cough, a whisper, or a thump to give them away. The strain was overwhelming.
Suddenly, the sonar was joined with another sound, the muffled explosion of depth charges. They were far away but ominous, searching for a target but finding only fish. Still, the Spirit of Hoboken waited silently.
A gentle rocking indicated that all was not well for the submarine. Was this cavern seismically active? Durain could not afford to find out. He ordered full astern and the engines engaged once more. As the sub began to move, the cavern began to close. The centuries old slumbers of the colossal sea eel had ended with the depth charges and it engulfed the submarine on the way to the surface. Once there, it added the destroyer to its lunch.
Captain Durain hoped fervently that the colossal sea eel had a quick metabolism.
Unfortunately for Captain Durain not…
The End
Functionally Literate - The Idaha Deming Story
Biographical nonsense by Dan Marvin
By the time he was just 17, Jacob Brawn had been a prospector, a gambler, a cowpuncher, and was rapidly getting the reputation of being a hard man in a hard land. His fists were legendary, his temper was volatile, and he drank straight whiskey from sun up to sun down.
Marian Bronson was a demure young woman, good Western stock and the apple of her father’s eye, the rancher Rocky Bronson. Her mother had died in an Indian fight years ago and he had raised her, spoiling her with everything she wanted. Despite the temptation, she had been relatively good and saved her best tears for very big ticket items.
When the cocky young man rode into the ranch yard, Marian stood behind the curtains of the sitting room and watched him. He was quite a sight, rippling muscles could barely be contained by his shirt, his eyes held fire and laughter. Her father sauntered out to meet him.
“Howdy, sir...” Jacob began. “Race Johnson at the stable said you might be looking for some help. I may be young but I’ve roped and ridden plenty of miles.” Rocky had heard of Jacob’s reputation and was wary. With some quick negotiation, they decided to give each other a try. Jacob Brawn’s eye was caught by a flutter of cloth at the window as he turned.
Marion turned from the pane of glass that had separated her from the fine young man. She knew in her heart that they would meet. She also knew that she must have him. Jacob was blissfully unaware of his fate.
Many years later, as he brought in groceries, listening to his wife nag him about his lack of earning potential on a Saturday night while his friends were at the Lurchin’ Lizard saloon, Jacob secretly prayed for death.
Not, unfortunately for Jacob, The End
Questionable Quotation – “Ask not what your country can do for you because quite frankly, we’re about out of ideas.” - FDR
If you love something...
A play in three acts by Dan Marvin
Halfway through his dinner, Dinardo sat upright and stared at his companion. “What did you say?” He snarled with disbelief. Mabel Anne shrunk back into her seat and sat motionless, afraid lest she reawaken his anger. He had been so much better lately, the last thing she wanted to do was piss him off.
For now, he let the transgression slide and returned to his beef. The minutes ticked away in silence. Dinardo’s brow softened, Mabel could almost see the working of his mind. “I’m sorry I snapped. Please, finish what you were saying.”
Heartened, she returned to her narrative. “I want to go back to school. I’ve always wanted to finish my degree.” She looked at him from under her eyebrows to watch his reaction.
“I see.” The veins on Dinardo’s neck were sticking out. To his credit, he paused before he continued. “If that is your dream, let’s see what we need to do to get you enrolled.” As far as he was concerned, the topic was closed. Mabel Anne gave him a happy kiss. “Thank you! I’m so happy. I want to be productive again. Raising the children was rewarding, but now that they’re gone...”
“I said you could, now let me finish my meal, woman” he grumbled. Deep down, she knew he loved her. There had been a time in his life when the anger owned him. With lots of help and support, he owned it most of the time now.
Fifteen months later, Mabel Anne walked across the stage to accept her diploma. She tipped her cap for the audience to see. Some laughed; others wondered what the message meant. It said “so long, sucker.” She jumped in the Buick and headed to Vegas. Dinardo would never see her again.
The End
Pharcical Philosophy – Humans have, like 500 bones or something in their hands, but only one covering their head so it’s no wonder we tend to be pretty inflexible in our thinking.
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