We’re Moving On To The Finals!

We’ve managed to make to the third, and final, round of the NYC Midnight Scary Story Contest! Our story, “The Tree of Life”, managed to resonate with the judges and earn 3rd place for this round.

I’ll be honest and say that I was surprised! I worried we had gone too high-concept to properly spook anyone. Thankfully, the judges disagreed!

Words From The Judges

If you weren’t here for our last review post, the contest stipulates that three judges, labeled by numbers, decide the placement of stories in each group. And this time they were generous in giving a heap of critique!

What The Judges Liked

2480

The doctor's motivation in this story is so clear. We know both why he's gone off the rails and why he's asked his daughter to come back to the mansion.

2531

Overall, this is an excellent short story. The opening line functions as an excellent hook and the pay-off for this mystery (why would a building howl?) is genuinely horrifying. There's a great sense of Cronenbergian body-horror and the writer lingers on its description of this "tree of life." The writer has faith in the image's ability to horrify through description alone and so the prose doesn't tell the reader what to feel. The story is all the more terrifying for it.

2535

The imagery created for your scare element was genuinely harrowing, and landed with impact. You managed to combine both physical body horror and a layer of emotional distress, creating an effect that lingers on readers and adds depth to your characters. Finally, even as your magnate character is clearly obsessed with his new pursuit, there's a basis to this development, both in his technical capabilities to create this horror (being a successful doctor) and in the internal logic of his motivation. This creates a really compelling focal point for readers, since we're drawn to his perception of reality and can believe his arc, no matter how strange it may be.

What The Judges Feel Needs Work

2480

I'm curious how you might use Abigail's character and knowledge of the house to build in more specific details to make this story come alive and feel real. For example, since this seems to be her childhood home, I'm curious if she can tell us which room the tree is in instead of " a room." Similarly, when she arrives at the house and it's creaking and howling, I was a little confused if this was the house making this noise or something she was hearing from inside. I wondered, if this was her house growing up, could she make some comparison. "The house never made these kinds of noises before" or maybe the opposite, "The house always made strange sounds, but then again it was old." Something to clue us into her relationship and experience with the house then vs now. Word count is tight, and while I think the backstory and motivation is strong, I do think you can trim some of the exposition in the beginning. In a longer story, I love all the detail added here, but in a story as short as this, you might be able to trim things a bit. For example, the opening line might be shortened to something like "The house howled." Similarly, in the next paragraph you might trim and combine a bit. "Then Mother died and he became obsessed, eschewed practical research..." These are just suggestions and examples, but I think there are multiple ways you might both trim exposition and allow us some more personalized details from Abigail that lend credibility to the world.

2531

Overall, this is an excellent short story. One small note may simply be that, after the opening hook, there isn't a lot of attempt to disguise the direct exposition (an acclaimed neurosurgeon, since mother died etc). There's an argument to be made that the story would be just as effective without it (we can infer that the mother has died when we see her in the tree, easily infer that he's mad, and infer that he's obviously a brilliant scientist). In this iteration it would go from "I'd never heard a building howl" to "My hands hesitate." But if this is a bridge too far then simply cutting down on some of this direct exposition could make the opening a little smoother.

2535

While the initial paragraphs provide necessary context to the final scenes, a significant portion of the piece is given to exposition, which may take readers out of the story. For a more immersive effect, it might be worth tying that exposition with a physical experience in the story (for example, the daughter is reminiscing while walking through the house and interacting with it) or in dialogue, so that the reader stays within the character's perspectives, rather than being an observer looking in. Also, the impact you've already achieved with the scare might be heightened by creating a build up of tension, particularly between seeing the tree and realizing the late mother is part of it; this could be achieved by adding subtle clues to it, or letting the doctor expound on his theories to show how deranged he's truly become.

A Vicious Hacking

The judges were eminently fair this round. Some good points were made about the way we handled exposition, and I think Judge 2535 is right that the ending is a tad rushed.

I am also pleased to see that they found the imagery satisfying, and generally the fact that something as abstract as a brain tree managed to do well means there’s a lot of breathing room in the horror genre. But some of their feedback, especially around emotional cohesiveness of the doctor’s turn to madness, I can’t take much credit for.

The first version of this story was more invested in physical threat. The characters were a bit flatter, partially because I can’t help but write parodies of classic stories when presented with the chance. Frankenstein in particular was a favorite book in my childhood, and the many parodies over the years give a clear image of the “madman” that I enjoy writing over and over again.

So all credit goes to George for really reeling this one in! At least half the story was rewritten by his hand, and he incorporated feedback from various family and friends to bring this piece together. In his own words, the talent here was bringing in an emotional element while identifying the essential aspects of horror present in the original story.

So now we present the original, deeply campy, Tree of Life for your amusement.

Yggdrasil

I’d never heard a building howl before.

My hands hover over the knocker, hesitating, when suddenly the old oak doors burst into a fit of shaking, the long beams supporting that old mansion bending and creaking as the whole structure moans. I leap back instinctively, almost twisting my ankle on cracked stairs.

An earthquake? The untamed birch trees slowly invading the grounds lie utterly undisturbed. Perhaps it is just my heart that’s shaking.

Something is very wrong. What would an infamous medical magnate be doing here? My father should be touring the highest quality hospitals and research facilities, not some backwoods relic of a mansion on the verge of falling apart.

He said he changed, but I’m so sure it’s for the better. Three years we hadn’t spoken, since I’d found out where he was getting his test subjects. When he showed up again at my door, I was sure it would be to scold me for failing to find a husband, or remind me of his influence on my own career in medicine.

But the old man had gotten lonely. How convenient that only after making his fortune he realized that what he really wanted was connection. I almost shut the door on him, but the look in his eyes was unfamiliar. Manic. And for all my rage and disappointment, he was still my father.

And he said he’d changed. He said he had something to show me.

Cautiously, I knock. An impatient moment passes, and the door creaks open to reveal a woman.

At first I assume she’s father’s newest strumpet, but then I see her lab coat. Fresh crimson blotches over the brown of older stains. In places, the layers caked enough to turn black. I can’t suppress a shudder, but it’s not the coat.

It’s the eyes. Her manic pupils jittering, trying to escape the confines of her eyelids, just like father’s.

She exclaims, “Ms. Applebaum! We’ve been expecting you!” The mansion howls again, fresh cracks yawning as it shivers for a few seconds. “Your father is especially excited to see you.”

I extend a hand, hoping she doesn’t notice the tremor. “A pleasure, Ms?”

“Dr. Lind!” She ushers me forth. “Apologies for the secrecy. Our project simply demands it, as most revolutions do.”

There is a rhythmic breeze in the hallway. A breathing.

She continues, “Your father and I share a fascination with connection. In the newest biological theories, all life is revealed to share a single origin, and therefore a single purpose. In electric matter the universe knows itself! But that knowledge is split among so many different perspectives.”

The last door. And another howl. A howl is different inside the maw. The walls are rattling, and beyond the threshold of the door I hear a cacophony, like all the voices in the woods screaming.

She is unperturbed. She opens the door. “Behold!”

My brain scrambles to understand what I am seeing. Hundreds of animal faces droop from flesh branches, the backs of their skulls sawed open to expose the pinkish-grey brain-flesh. Greymatter stretches from each, tangling and stitching together to form a spongy, drooping willow tree, all in twirling place, as if to showcase every gaping face.

I retch. “What is this?”

“Knowledge.” She extends her arms, exalting. “Every perspective, every connection. Little insect, swimming fish, clever monkey, all one thinking machine.”

My eyes are caught between a hundred spinning faces. “How is it moving?! And why?”

“Ah, the majority of its body is actually below us. As for why, well exercise is always important for living things.”

The twirling stops. I see a familiar face.

I rush forward. “Father!”

It’s jaw trembles, chewing its words, “Ab-i-gaiiil”

The building is shaking. Lind pushes me aside. “It awakens!” She grasp’s father’s cheeks as she falls to her knees.

The floorboards creak and rise as dust hails from the ceilings. I am paralyzed even as my legs beg me to run.

She weeps. “Glorious Yiggdrasil!”

The floor opens beneath me, and a horrific, beating root is revealed as I scramble to avoid being falling in with the angling planks.

Lind is unphased. “Tell me, what is life’s meaning?”

The tree responded.

“PAIN.”

The mansion crumbles as the Tree of Life arises.

Last Thoughts

See, now isn’t that much goofier?

I had to be fought a little on this, but in retrospect, my friends were right: the physical threat of the tree is not as scary as the existential threat of being put in the tree.

The campy mad scientist was another character I was loathe to part with. My first love, after all, was comedy. But it is in cases like this that word limits actually promote better story telling, as this character was simply too difficult to salvage with 306 words to cut.

It’s truly a completely different story, and one of really three stories we ultimately scrapped in the process of developing “The Tree of Life”. And as the final round looms upon us, I shudder to think how many more works must be sacrificed upon the altar of edits.

The Horror!

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First things first: Happy Birthday. I am terribly sorry.

As you know, I have once again killed myself. It is reassuring that there is no need to explain why. In a moment, you yourself should remember. After all, you are me.

I read the lightly glowing scroll with bleary eyes. It was all that was in the room besides an intricate mirror, composed of great silvery shards fused like a web. I remembered the liquid feeling of swimming through its mercury, emerging.

I didn’t remember anything else.

You must think yourself somewhat sentimental, to see your predecessors write the same note thirty-three or so times. But it wouldn’t be right to send you off without at least this common courtesy, for I am asking so much of you.

Rastagon the Great has too many responsibilities to disappear. So it is with a humble heart that I ask you to carry the torch. But if you find the task too daunting… I understand. In that case, please reactivate the device before joining me.”

The 34th Rastagon the Great

That was it. Whoever Rastagon was, he was confident his replacement would need little convincing, and even less advice.

I felt around the dark brick until I felt an opening to a winding stair to a small door, just wide enough to crawl through. In front of it was something incredibly heavy, concealing and barring it. I jolted against the door, immediately feeling my entire skeletal structure protest. A little light streamed in, and I saw that my hands were not young. Was Rastagon trapped here? Or did he have other means to move such weight?

I did not. A few painful pushes and the heavy thing fell over with a deafening crash. I spilled out into a magnificent room, filled to the brim with silk and silvery metals. I saw now that the heavy thing was a cabinet with sparkling liquids spilling from it, soaking into a floor composed of fine white sand. Unfamiliar animals in spun glass cages panicked at the calamity, and I instinctively moved to calm them.

As I did so, the sand shifted around my feet, and a shadow went over me. I turned around, tripping over myself as a mound of sand formed into the lazy shape of a man.

“Help!”

The door burst open, and a young woman perhaps nineteen or twenty, in sparkling robes marched through.

“Master! What’s happened?!”

It was at that point I realized I was naked.

The woman closed her eyes, looking annoyed as she flicked her hand. “Ramil, fetch my father his robe before my eyes burn out their sockets.”

The sand creature shivered before stretching up over silken banisters, past shelves of books to racks of ornate outfits. A clump of them fell, smothering me.

“Thank you… Ramil.” The creature vibrated before reforming its lump. If that amounted to satisfaction from praise, I couldn’t tell.

She looked around. “What is this mess? Some experimental failure?”

“Ah yeah. I was tinkering with…” I looked around as I hastily clothed myself, clocking a stack of levitating disks. “That thing.”

She opened her eyes, raising an eyebrow after she saw what I was pointing out. “Isn’t this an older experiment? The disks are suspended by their future falling selves, I think.”

What? “Right well… their future exploding selves knocked over my cabinet.

She rolled her eyes. “A secret then. Fine. Good day, master.”

“Good day… daughter.”

She stopped. She turned for a moment, her face cold, eyes squinting with suspicion. My breath stopped as I anticipated my discovery.

But she just left without a word.

***

Months passed, but Rastagon’s memories never returned to me. I did manage to scrape together some information about my situation though.

The young woman’s name was Luneniene, daughter of Rastagon the Great, a wizard renowned for great and puzzling magic that offered wondrous solutions for impossible problems. She was also “my” apprentice.

Rastagon himself was a painfully cryptic and secluded individual. As I wandered through the halls of his tower, servants scattered from me unless directly addressed. Outside the many windows, I saw an oppressive wall, high enough to deter even birds from entering. The entire tower and its grounds were suspended in the sky, with only a precarious spiral staircase of floating steps connecting it to the earth below.

Despite the treacherous climb, supplicants poured in. Week after week, I listened to their stories. Everyone came for Rastagon the Great, expecting miracles I was incapable of.

Thankfully, miracles were rarely needed.

One came seeking treasure, so I pulled a cryptic looking map out of Rastagon’s drawer. Another came seeking knowledge of all things, so I hired them as staff for the library. One wanted to know how they would die; they were a sailor, so I gave an educated guess.

A few people did need specifically magical solutions, legendary weapons or ever-burning torches, but Ramil, Rastagon’s mute lump of sand, seemed to have a perfect memory of Rastagon’s stock of metaphysical knicknacks.

It all seemed to work out.

Yet, outside of Rastagon’s supplicants, hardly anyone interacted with me at all. Luneniene seemed to avoid me, and even the staff made themselves scarce when I wandered the halls.

At least there was Ramil. It followed me around as a knee-high clump, not really sliding so much as folding-over after me. I wasn’t sure what Rastagon used it for, but my favorite thing about Ramil was that it couldn’t repeat complaints. Or secrets.

“I would lose my mind without you, Ramil.”

“...”

“Truly, you are my rock.”

Before Ramil could answer, I heard steps coming from behind me.

The servant woman bowed, “Sir, you have a guest.”

I nodded, heading to the wizard’s hall, waiting until an unexpected supplicant entered.

“Luneniene?”

She ignored me, striding forward before kneeling. “Great Rastagon, will you hear my wish?”

Slightly disturbed, I nodded.

“I am Luneniene, daughter of the Sorceress Isolt. Seven years ago, she… passed, and I was left alone.”

A strange emotion came over me. It was like the seed of sadness dying on dry ground as I realized I had never lost or gained anyone. With no water to nourish it, the feeling failed, leaving an awkward emptiness. “I’m sorry.”

“In my childhood, my mother would make a pastry, filled with poppy. When I realized I would never taste it again, I was filled with regret. Great Wizard, I want nothing more than to taste my mother’s cooking one last time.”

Luneniene stared into my eyes, searching for my reaction. Her own eyes were filled with a deep sadness tinged with rage. What was she hoping for?

“Do you remember how they tasted?”

She shook her head. “Only faintly.”

It was an impossible request. Rastagon the Great could have probably snapped his fingers and conjured these poppy dumplings out of thin air. But I wasn’t Rastagon. I couldn’t read forgotten memories to create a recipe lost to time. Who could?

I smiled. I was not Rastagon, but I had the next best thing. “Luneniene, how would you grant this wish?”

Her eyes went wide. “You want… my opinion?”

Oh no. I had clearly done something un-Rastagon-like. “You are my apprentice aren’t you? Or have you learned nothing?” Slightly more Rastagon.

Her eyes narrowed, but she was thinking. “There is a poultice for memory… but I never learned the recipe; it would only bring back the taste.”

Close enough. “How many cooking staff do we have?”

Luneniene shrugged, and I looked around the hall until a servant spoke up. “There are one-hundred and twenty-three staffed in the kitchen, sir.”

“Great. Luneniene, you’ll be making this poultice. Restore your memories. Then we’ll just make a few hundred variants and have you taste them.”

“A few hundred?! I’d be living on poppy for months!”

“We’re trying to match an exact taste. Besides, it sounds entertaining.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Really? It’s your solution.”

“Not that. You have never asked for my assistance before.”

“Indeed.”

“What’s changed, master?”

“Can you handle it?”

She answered indignantly, “Of course.”

“Then that is what’s changed. You will be handling many requests from now on. I will assist you, but I will give no instruction.”

She looked slightly panicked. “Master, what if the request is above my ability? Like the dancing plague, or the root serpents?”

I stopped. “Address me as master no more. You are no longer my student.” Not that I could teach her a thing to begin with. “I’ve chosen to believe in you, Luneniene.”

She looked conflicted, swallowing several words. “I will not disappoint you. I will begin concocting the poultice this evening… will you at least assist me?” There was some doubt in her voice. But I had no choice but to bet on her.

“I will come. But only as a father.”

Luneniene was the wizard of the tower now. Hopefully Rastagon was a better teacher than he was a parent.

***

Luneniene worked in Rastagon’s study day and night. I accompanied her, giving nebulous advice and vaguely encouraging sentiments when she seemed discouraged or asked for advice.

“You’ve reached a dead-end, retrace your steps.”

“You are not restarting, you are learning.”

“Well how would you test it if I wasn’t here?”

Thankfully, Ramil was far more helpful than I. It seemed to know the library by heart, and fetched tools as soon as they were named. I was deeply relieved, though the fact that Ramil was probably sentient made me a bit nervous. It knew too much.

Luneniene smiled as her potion changed color to a star filled purple. Wiping her brow she held it up proudly. “Master, we’ve done it!”

“Well done, Luneniene. But it’s you who completed this task. And I told you, I’m not your master anymore. I’m only your-”

Her embrace took me by surprise. I awkwardly patted her back, looking down to see her tearful face.

“Father, thank you for trusting me. I… I’ve missed you.”

I shouldn’t have felt anything from this stranger’s embrace. But still, something real resonated within my chest. “I enjoyed our time together, Luneniene. I’ve also been too lonely.”

After a moment, she became embarrassed and pushed me away. “You should check on the poppies.”

“Right.”

***

Inspecting the poppies was actually a secret delight of mine. I went out to the grounds, where Rastagon kept a vast garden. The soil made plants grow with unnatural speed, and we had dedicated a patch to the absurd amount of poppy we would require. I was hardly needed, but the task of supervising the patch was my favorite part of the day.

I made it to the gated entrance, striding past through rows of fragrant flowers. In the distance I saw wheat, shimmering like gold. I took my time sauntering to the poppy plants, where the hooded groundskeeper was sitting.

He raised a hand to greet me, “How goes poultice making, master?”

“Excellently. How are the poppies?”

He grinned as he stroked a tall stalk. “They reach half this height in the land below. Hard to keep up when everything grows like weeds.”

I laughed. “Sorry to overwork you.”

He shook his head. “It’s a welcome change. Rastagon the Great never needed help before this, but now the cooking staff is bustling, looking for unique poppy recipes. The gardeners also appreciate the challenge. I’ve also noticed you’ve accepted more guests than usual; the servants are pleased.”

“I see.” I smiled bitterly. “I must have thought the world would collapse without me, when in reality, all these people were here to support Rastagon.”

“Indeed, he was a fool.”

I tensed up. No servant addressed Rastagon this way. “How long have you been here, Master Groundskeeper?”

“Not much longer than you. I replaced the aging groundskeeper in his retirement, taking his appearance and role. Would you believe that hardly anyone noticed the change?”

“I would.” A thousand questions bubbled up inside me, until one broke through. “Why?”

“I had the same question for you. Why have you changed?”

I scowled at him. “I didn’t. The mirror failed!”

He seemed perplexed, then surprised. “Ah. How unexpected. My failure to die partially interfered with the memory transfer. You are not Rastagon.”

“No. I’m not.”

My hands were shaking, and I felt my nails dig into my palm.

“I’m sorry. I’ve troubled you excessively, though you’ve managed to perform admirably, all considered.”

“You idiot.” I was surprised to feel tears on my face. “All these people love you, but I’m just an imposter. Can you imagine how lonely I’ve been?”

“Of course I can, I’m the 34th after all.”

Right. We were both clones. Fakes. I calmed myself. “Why? Why any of this?”

He gave a pained expression. “Seven years ago, the Sorceress Isolt, wife of Rastagon the Great, died.”

“Rastagon can’t bring back the dead?”

“It wouldn’t matter if he could. Isolt took her own life.”

That strange emotion returned. The seed of sadness. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s an old story. But I… no, Rastagon was broken by it. He isolated himself, and raised his tower high in the sky. He shut everyone out, when they needed him most. Even Luneniene. She is right to hate him.”

“But she doesn’t. Nobody does.”

The 34th Rastagon gave me a doubtful look. After a moment, he continued, “You’re more than an imposter you know. It is you who have brought life to this place.”

“But I’m not Rastagon.”

“You can be.” He touched my forehead. “If you want my memories, I will give them to you.”

I looked out over the fields. Beneath the stalks were many gardeners, whispering and laughing. Somewhere in the tower was Luneniene, excited to regain the memory of her mother. We would be trying a hundred poppy recipes in the day to come, mostly delicious but some surely awful. Would Rastagon laugh together with them?

“No.” I pushed the hand away. “Your memories are poison, Rastagon. Why did you stay here, when you can go anywhere in the world? Why didn’t you, with your great magic, erase your pain?”

The 34th Rastagon was silent.

And I, the 35th, spoke. “You’re bound to your grief. But I’m not. Because I’m not Rastagon the Great, I can be a Rastagon who lives. The one these people need.”

I smiled, and put a hand on the groundskeeper’s shoulder. “Great Rastagon, will you hear my wish? After we harvest this poppy, I think it’s time we free your tower from the clouds.”

***

I returned to my study, knocking on the door.

“Luneniene? Have you tried the poultice?”

The door opened, and Luneniene had tears streaming down their cheeks.

Alarmed, I looked closely at her face. “Did it fail?”

She shook her head.

“Then why are you crying?”

She laughed. “They were delicious.”

I smiled at the joyful expression of Rastagon’s daughter. And it felt real.

Words From the Author

My birthday is just around the corner, and as I think back on the year, I remember one of my favorite stories. I often fail to evoke the emotions I’m hoping for with my stories. High concepts, funny twists, horror, these things I understand well. But in Rastagon’s story, I had the rare luck of imbuing drama into fantasy.

Fantasy and drama are not so easily blended. Fantasy is abstract, and the more fantastical your setting, the farther away you are from the grounded experience of human emotion. Bridging the gap of empathy needs far more skill while you are also trying to convince your reader of a strange world’s reality. I am not so skilled a writer, so Rastagon must connect to the reader through emotional universals: family and grief.

But for me Rastagon is more than your standard treatment of these subjects. The magical element is not flavoring, but an attempt at engaging with the philosophical core of grief. In his repeated suicide, Rastagon tries to answer why loss so perturbs us.

Many of the things we lose in life, the things that cut the deepest, are things that we were once without. Lost items, broken relationships, a loved one who is no longer around. You can remember a time before you had these things, when you were satisfied, so why does their absence leave such a hole? Did they dig a space in you, one too deep and specific to fill?

The 35th Rastagon is, in a sense, an enlightened individual. His botched memory transfer has not left him totally clueless, but it has left him utterly detached. What distinguishes him from the 34th is not merely his identity, but his profound forgetting. In accepting people into our heart, we change to accommodate them, we dig their space.

The 35th Rastagon, with his clean plot, can plant relationships that the 34th cannot. The 34th certainly knows this, but he will never remove his own his grief. It is too precious to him. He cannot part from the Rastagon who loved Isolt.

But despite the heaviness of its subject, Rastagon’s story remains whimsical, slightly comedic. The world teases little mysteries and wonders. What is Ramil? Who are the people living in the tower? What is the nature of the world’s magic?

And who is Rastagon the Great?

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Above is an illustration taken from “The Library of Babel”, a book written by Jorge Luis Borges in 1941. The book describes an apparently infinite library, filled with all the information that ever has, ever will, or indeed ever can be produced. Every grandmother’s re-telling of “Little Red Riding Hood”, the full equations of quantum gravity, and every sequel for “Game of Thrones” exists in the library, with one caveat.

You have to find them first.

The reason the library contains all knowledge is simple: It contains every possible combination of English letters and punctuation. Every true sentence exists in the library, as does every lie. But the vast majority of library is neither true nor false, because it is in fact nonsense.

With a library like this, the task of finding what you’re looking for is quite daunting. The infinite books are not categorized neatly by subject, as they were written quite thoughtlessly, and organized with similar thoughtlessness. Because of this thoughtlessness, you would spend more time finding even a nugget of intelligence in the library than you would if you had endeavored to simply write something yourself!

How bad is the situation? We’ll have to do some math to find out.

But first, a little philosophy.

Between Noise and Music is A Cipher

In today’s world, most information is compressed.

What is compression? It’s essentially a cipher that lets you write a shorter message with the same content. For a simple example, let’s look at a simple “a-cipher”.

Message: aaaaabaaacaaaaaaaaaaaaad

Can you think of a way to shorten the above message? Fundamentally, any compression algorithm is about finding helpful patterns in a message, and then converting that pattern into a shorthand. You’ve probably noticed that this message includes clusters of “a”, so our a-cipher encodes the message like this:

Compressed Message: 5b3c13d

The first message was 24 characters, but we’ve gotten it down to 7! The rule used in a-cipher converts any series of “a” into numbers representing the length of the series. You might be wondering “what if I want to write a number?”

You can’t! Our compression algorithm isn’t very good, but if English resembled our random message, then the cipher would boast a compression efficiency of 3.4.

But why are we talking about compression? What’s interesting about it (besides being the backbone of modern society’s data storage)?

The message is only meaningful in the context of the compression algorithm.

Look at this next compression.

Compressed Message: 2 b 0r n0t 2 b

What do you see? The a-cipher would give “aa b r nt aa b”, but I bet you see something else. Internally, your “hamlet-cipher” uses rules about phonetics and shape resemblance to convert “2” to “to” and “0” to “o”. That gets you the original message.

Message: to be or not to be

For any two messages, there is a cipher of some complexity that translates the first to the second. The difference in complexity between first message and the second is necessarily made up for by the cipher.

Without the cipher, the compressed message is meaningless. Conversely, with the right cipher, even white noise can be converted into meaningful text.

With the right cipher, we could even have every book in the world.

The Babel Cipher

You are potentially wondering what compression algorithms have to do with the Library of Babel. The answer is everything. And also a workaround for copyright laws.

The original Library of Babel is essentially a noisy signal. Without any pattern in its indexing, the library is utterly impenetrable, and without the correct knowledge, you might not even know it should you happen across some profound truth. Imagine stumbling onto a formula for deriving all prime numbers, and dismissing it as nonsense because the math is a millennium ahead of your own time!

Borges himself insisted the library was meaningful, so long as the correct language was used to describe it. The stories of a hundred unborn mythologies, unknown ethics, the most grotesque forms of smut, ignored by eyes blind to their meaning.

In reality, most readers entering the library are armed only with their single language and experience. To them, the library is as dark and intimidating as the illustration above, a black hole of meaning where totality converges with nothingness.

But what if the library had an index?

Enter the real Library of Babel. Created by Jonathan Basile, the Library is part compression algorithm, part database. Unlike the original conception, with its randomly placed books, the digital Babel is generated by formula. It is searchable. With a caveat.

So long as you know what you’re looking for already, you can find its index in the library. For instance, the full Hamlet speech, as written on Wikipedia, exists in the library on page 88 of the book “nayhirgmjbqld” in the 11th Volume on Wall 4 of Hexagon… well the address is quite large actually. Indeed, the address is almost as large as the speech!

The library contains every possible page of an English letter book, though not necessarily in the right order. By extension, every English letter book has, in a sense, been written in the library. By recording 1100 such indices, you could store the entirety of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy!

This is the “Babel Cipher”. Any book can theoretically be recreated with Library of Babel indices. And feel free to share! Claiming copyright on the indices would be as ridiculous!

After all, you’re only borrowing books from the library.

Originality in Babel

The issue of copyright in the library, though not especially practical, is wider than it initially seems. As we said earlier, any message can be converted to any other message with the appropriate cipher.

By extension, not only books exist in the library. Each page in the Library of Babel contains 1,312,000 characters, aka a little over one megabyte of information. With the right converter, every possible image likely exists somewhere in the library, and by extension entire movies exist somewhere inside. Somewhere in the library even you yourself exist, catalogued at every point of your life along some set of indices.

This all begs the ancient question: is knowledge creation or discovery? Are we all searching the Library? Yes and no.

The English language pre-contains every possible English thought. But before the words “electricity”, “Jabberwock”, and “swagger” were minted, the thoughts formed from them did not exist in 26 characters. The cipher was insufficient, and lightning did not exist in Babel. In that sense, the truest form of creativity is found in William Gilbert, Lewis Carroll, and William Shakespeare: the making of words.

The real lesson here then is not about compression or copyright or libraries. It is about nonsense.

Embrace nonsense! Make up words! Name things as you like! In the making of the world, this was Adam’s first right! Only by giving meaning to noise do we fill Babel with books to find.

The Math of Babel

Enough philosophy. It’s math time.

There are, according to WolframAlpha, about 5.1 letters in the average English word. Merriam-Webster claims that there are approximately a million words in English (more on that claim later). The alphabet contains a humble 26 letters. How should we quantify the chances of getting a meaningful word by randomly printing 5 characters?

Shorter words somewhat complicate the issue. If we count syntax markers like “a” as meaningful, then we’ll be encountering meaning all the time! Longer words present an issue as well, as the they are exponentially less likely to be observed with each passing letter.

For complicated problem, there is always a dirty solution, and a correct solution. Here, we’ll show both, though before reading on, take a moment mull it over. How would you approach this?

Quick and Dirty

We can approximate the solution quickly by establishing some rules.

1. We make combinations of 5 characters, repetitions allowed

2. The characters can be any of the 26 English letters, or a blank space

3. We count a combination as an English word match if the combination matches the first 5 letters of a word

4. For words shorter than 5 characters, the combination must match the full word from the beginning of the line, and the extra should be blank spaces

Those four rules obtain a definition of a match that accounts for words over and under 5 characters. Sort of.

English has a lot of words like “ground” and “groundhog”. This means the space of unique “5 letter beginnings” is actually smaller than the million words we’re trying to guess the incidence of, and we should be reducing the chances accordingly.

But that’s more or less impossible, so we’ll add a fifth rule to complete our approximation:

5. All duplicate 5-letter starts have a letter replaced until they are unique

Now we can say there are a million possible matches in a mathematically rigorous way!

You are maybe complaining at this point. “This isn’t quick.” Fair. But even for dirty methods we must be precise in how we’re being dirty. We have defined a match, and we are showing all our shortcuts. This is an approximate, and therefore wrong, answer, but we have outlined how we’re wrong.

But I digress. There are a million possible matches. How many possible combinations are there?

Quite easy. For each of the 5 characters in our combination, there are 27 (letters or a blank space) branching paths. The number of possibilities multiplies by 27 with every step.

So there are 27^5, or 11,881,376, possible combinations of the 27 characters. There are about 11.88 times more combinations than words in 5 characters. an 8.4% chance of seeing a recognizable beginning of a word.

Oxford University says the average sentence length is 15 words on the lower side, so the chances of reading an average “English” sentence is equal to the chances of playing this game 15 times and only ever getting real words. “And” means repeated multiplications again, so chances are about 0.084^15, or 7.3e-15% (0.0000000000000000073).

To be clear, that’s any combination of English words. “cat umbrella ice their a mat pat an vape stick stick sick dig dog check” would count. The chances of getting a sensical sentence are actually much lower.

This is all to say, the difference in density between meaning and nonsense is astronomical in Babel.

But perhaps you feel that I’ve cheated. Taken too many shortcuts. “You said this is a Math Corner!” I hear you shouting.

Well, let’s do it the painful way.

The Painful Way

To do this right, we need incidences of word lengths.

So we turn to the “Journal of Statistical Planning and Inference”, Volume 14, Issues 2-3, “The distribution of English dictionary word lengths” by Lord Rothschild. Published in 1986, word length was slightly longer at a mean of 6.94 letters, but this was before the introduction of literary novelties such as “gat” and “fleek” (though “skibidy” helps push length up again).

It will have to do. They sampled 2477 words to produce their estimates, and we’re going to go with their distribution, while sticking to our supposed one million words.

Total is 2477, and we’ll use the “Top” words column (top of a dictionary page sampled) since it shows counts for lower length words. The “proportion” of the English language each word category takes up is equal to the ”Top” count divided by the total. When we multiply the proportion by one million, we can obtain the approximate count of words per length.

Immediately, we see a problem. There are apparently over three thousand single letter words. There are only 26 single letters. It is apparent that the author’s single counting strategy is, to put it lightly, flawed. There are also 2 many 2 letter words, seeing as there’s only 676 two letter combinations. Even the three letter combinations are clearly over-counted.

What gives? Well, for one, many of these words are duplicates (“bat” and “bat”). There’s probably some sampling bias that is over-representing low length words.

It would seem the million words claim is greatly over-exaggerated. Regardless, we’re going to need to fill in the numbers ourselves. With Scrabble.

Scrabble is a great resource here, because unlike the dictionary they are counting unique words. According Scrabble says there are 12,915 five letter words, 5,663 four letter words, 1,351 three letter words, and 107 two letter words. According to this list of one letter words in many languages, which is fun in its own right, there are only 2 one letter words, “a” and “I”. I think I must concur.

We’ll use those numbers to calculate proportional probabilities. A valid concern here is that we are only using up to 5 letters, but soon you’ll see that this is more than enough for our purposes.

For each word, the chances of randomly obtaining it is equal to:

P=1/(C+S)^L=1/(26+3)^L=1/29^L

Where P is the probability of obtaining a word by randomly drawing from the character pool, C is the number of English characters, S is the number of special punctuation characters (spaces, commas, and periods per the digital Babel), and L is the word length.

When we have single word probability, we can multiply by the total number of words for a given length category to obtain the probability for drawing any word of that length, the adjusted probability.

But what is the cumulative probability for words of any length? Let’s outline some assumptions:

1. We draw characters one at a time from the set of 29.

2. If we obtain a word, we stop.

So we cannot simply add the adjusted probabilities of all lengths. For each length, we must add the adjusted probability times the probability of not obtaining a prior, shorter word. The series formula looks like this:

C{L} = C{L-1} + A{L}*(1-C{L-1}); C{1} = A{1}

Where C is the cumulative probability, L is the length, and A is the adjusted probability. Note, we are still making simplifying assumptions here; for one, we are assuming (falsely) that our shorter words do not prefix longer words, which would decrease their effective count.

While we’re at it, we should really also calculate a “Real Word” probability that doesn’t count one and two letter words. After all, you aren’t going get much meaning from a series of “at’s” outside of social media.

So we get two new estimates! One says you have nearly a one in four chance of encountering a word! Though, it will probably be something like “it”. Your chance for encountering a word that means something is closer to 6.4%, which isn’t too far off our dirty estimate of 8.4%.

Notice that the cumulative probability barely changes between 4 and 5. There could be many, many six, seven, and eight letter words, but the nonsense increases exponentially by a factor of 29 with every letter. We don’t need the count of six letter words for this reason; it’s simply too small to really matter.

But let’s end on a happy note. “To be or not to be”. That’s mostly two letter words, and it’s considered quite profound! Six words in length, though really, we need spaces between the words so we’ll treat them like 3 letter words. What are our chances of grabbing the next Hamlet out of Babel?

6.4% chance of a word, 6 times in a row.

0.00000687%

I guess I like those odds.

I’d never heard a building howl before.

I’d turn back, but my father’s been secluded for months. An acclaimed neurosurgeon and hospital magnate, he was renowned for his ability to make impossible dreams a reality. Paralysis undone, phantom limbs excised, dementia cured... his hospitals bordered on the miraculous.

Yet, since Mother died… his focus changed. He became obsessed, controlling. He eschewed practical research, diverting millions into paranormal subjects: Collective unconscious. Eschatology. Eternal life.

For three years, his only communications have been raving letters. He’s refused my company, estranging us both as I’ve been forced to run his hospitals.

But now he has something to show me. And as much as it hurts, he’s still my father, and I’m still his daughter.

My hands hesitate over the knocker of our family mansion, when suddenly the whole edifice moans. I leap back instinctively, almost twisting my ankle on cracked stairs.

Recovering, I knock cautiously. An impatient moment passes, and the door creaks open.

The mansion is dark, silent except for a rhythmic breeze whistling in the hallway. A breathing. And another howl.

The walls rattle, and beyond the basement door I hear a cacophony, like all the voices in the woods screaming.

I descend the steps, heart pounding.

There, in a room all alone sits a large, open tank, glowing faintly. And in it, a tree of faces and brains, roots of ganglia spilling over the glass.

A massive collection of animal and human faces droop from flesh branches, the backs of their skulls sawed open to expose pinkish-grey brain-flesh. Greymatter stretches from each, tangling and stitching together to form a spongy, drooping willow tree, showcasing every gaping face.

And there, admiring the tree, is my father.

I retch. “What is this?”

“Connection, Dear.” My father smiles, too serene. “Every perspective, every experience, all joined in one Tree of Life. Little insect, swimming fish, clever monkey…loving wife.”

In its trunk I see a familiar face.

I rush forward. “Mother!”

Her jaw trembles, chewing her words, “Ab-i-gaiiil.” Her voice is layered by dozens of others, some voices human, others animalistic.

The tree howls, reverberating the building. My instincts beg me to run, but my legs betray me.

“Don’t worry Abigail.” My father cups my cheek reassuringly.

Thick tendrils of nervous tissue twirl around me, embracing me, holding me down as my father cleans his surgical tools.

“We’ll all be together again soon.”

Words From the Author

Another round of the Scary Story Contest by NYCM! While this one’s under my name, it’s definitely another group effort, with considerable re-writing from George (and even a contribution from his brother!) and suggestions from Miguel.

Different writers definitely have different strengths. For this particular contest, I actually wrote three different 500-800 word stories, just to feel out what we felt would work best. One I might end up posting at a later date, since I ended up liking it, but the group voted to go with this one as the most creative and creepy of the scary stories I presented (even though it was originally 300 words over). This is all to say, ideation and quick drafting are particular strengths of mine.

But the original draft was significantly more “Frankenstein” (always had a soft-spot for gothic horror). The emotional angle was not especially developed, and the mother wasn’t included in the story at all. I had the brain tree connected to a sort of under-floor behemoth, so the threat was more physical than existential. George, who truly is a master of character emotion, bumped up the quality of the final product significantly.

Ideas from my fellow authors got it to this point, and now we can only hope our idea of scary resonates with the judges. But overall, I think we have a neat piece of body-horror here.

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We Got 1st Place!

… for Round 1. Still, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t pleased.

A few months ago our trio entered the NYCM Scary Story Contest, which was a pretty fun way to spend All Hallow’s Eve. At the time, we struggled with the word count constraints (400 words is so short), and we left the contest less-than-confident.

But sometimes you get the right judges for your story!

You can read our submission here.

Words From The Judges

NYC Midnight generally has three judges per round, who are paid some amount for their feedback. They are labeled by number, presumably so we can’t come to their house with our complaints.

What the Judges Liked

Judge 2549

Outstanding grasp of flash fiction principles, voice, and language to convey depth, despair, realization, and horror. This is masterful work. Specifically, the opening not only sets the season but also establishes the expectation of hot weather. Ironically, the story flips the script: a child burns up with fever while the outside temperature drops. Very clever. An economy of words, compressed, brief, and urgent, moves the story forward at the perfect pace, revealing a world that feels so much bigger than the one confined to the farm. Here, details matter: pink icicles, slushy antifreeze, and little bombs like "Antifreeze doesn't do that (freeze) until 35 below." This is excellent because the story resists telling the reader what to think, and we instantly understand something is horribly wrong and experience an emotional response because the story lets the reader take part in its discovery. And the discovery is worth the journey. Well done!

Judge 2306

I love the aura of magic and mystery that accompanies your frosty supernatural narrative. The descriptions of frostbite are frightening and morbid. Your narrative voice is emotive but slow-moving and chilling, and the story gives the reader new information at a good pace.

Judge 2531

This is a great short story. It has an excellent opening line that immediately engenders a sense of mystery in the reader and from there there's a sense of dread being built up until the inevitable and poignant climax. One moment that really stands out is when the girl asks "you too?" It really complicates the morality of the tale as it's clear the girl has little control over what she is doing and can only see the abuse she is suffering and has suffered in the past. It's excellent, complex storytelling.

What the Judges Feel Needs Work

Judge 2549

This story is basically publication-ready, but I'll offer a couple of minor suggestions to help provide a final polish. 1. Consider another piece of diction in this line besides "froze": But when she looked at me, I froze. The word appears multiple times in different forms, but, importantly, here it is too "on the nose" and doesn't work for the story to shed further light on the situation. 2. The very last line reveals that the story is what we call a "dead narrator" story, and that often makes it hard to publish. A tiny revision can change that. Instead of "the cold took us," try "waited for the cold to take us." The words seem hardly consequential in their difference, but it's enough for a reader to imagine the ending happens "off page" and not now. Therefore, the narrator is still alive to tell the story.

Judge 2306

I wanted a clearer idea of what compelled the protagonist not to kill the girl. Was it his own mercy, or does the girl have supernaturally compelling powers? I don't need this spelled out explicitly, but I'd like a bit more of a hint so I know what to make of the story's conclusion. I don't think you need the line 'the cold took us' at the end, as it pulls us a bit far away from our narrator and their perception of events (as in, they wouldn't be able to see the cold taking them because they were the ones being taken by the cold). I think it would be enough to have the narrator snuggling up next to Martha, with the ending being made clear through implication.

Judge 2531

One small note may be that the framing feels a little bit strange. It's not entirely clear from what point in time the narrator is narrating from as the story seems to end with him dying. If he is narrating from beyond the grave, which is perfectly acceptable, it would be good to make this clear at some point.

A True Group Effort

I happened to write the first draft of this particular story. At the time, I had a fourth character I was rather attached to, and they were a large source of pathos in the story. Miguel, always with the smart cut, decided to combine the character with Martha (the wife), dramatically reducing our word count and generally making the thing more efficient. On some level, I miss some of the build up I gave that character, and we went back and forth on what exactly we could cut without losing anything.

George did a truly massive amount of cutting and condensing this round, and his wife (she would never agree to put her name on the internet) helped to revise the original ending, which went with more of a “mystery monster” type of feel, was not particularly scary. We reworked it, which ended up being kind of a huge deal in terms of the overall vibe of the story.

A part of me wonders if this story should be extended, potentially adding back the original 4th character now that word cuts aren’t a thing, and adding a bit more of a slow burn. On the other hand, maybe the efficiency of this story is its selling point. Maybe next Halloween I’ll have a work-shopped version of it to share, and we can judge it ourselves then!

For now, I’ll share the first draft of “Child of Winter”, with all its imperfections, for the sake of showing the sheer extent of the group contribution.

The First Child of Winter

It was Summer in July, and it was snowing. First it was a small flurry, tiny crystals falling only to immediately melt in the wheat fields surrounding my farmhouse. I remember my wife, Martha, telling a lame joke about global warming.

Overnight the temperature dropped to 10°F, and the flurry started to stick. Martha was worried about the crop. I told her the wheat could take a little cold spell or two. In truth, I wasn’t sure.

Giles from the next farm over visited in the morning, bringing some church gossip. Martha wasn’t in the mood, but I understood his intention. He mostly ranches, so he offered to buy up some early grains as feed. He mentioned picking up a stranger, some kid, out in the cold. He’s a bit nosy, but Giles is a good guy.

The snow picked up. Me and Martha got our warmest clothes to brave the unfamiliar frost, using the wrong kind of shovels to clear out the snow piling over the doors. As we looked out over the shimmering whiteness, it was hard not to think it was beautiful.

That night the power went out. Snow must have taken out some power lines. We cranked the radiator up. Martha made a joke about farmers being super ready for the apocalypse, and it made me feel a little better.

We hadn’t seen Giles for a few days now. I decided to check up on him, but the truck wouldn’t start in the garage. When I looked under, pink icicles of coolant dripped with slushy antifreeze. Antifreeze doesn’t do that until 35 below.

Shivering under four layers and my thickest boots, I had to push Martha away as I walked out into steady snowfall. We were a small community, Giles was only about 3 miles out. “I’ll be back,” I said.

My heart sank when I saw the ranch. Snow piled high over the doors, through the barn windows I saw necrotic black cattle, frozen standing in their pens. I was smart to bring my shovel, and I broke in through the windows.

I was too late. Giles was frozen solid, fingers cracked off his hands. But he wasn’t alone.

I saw her shivering next to him, a girl I’ve never met. Clinging to his blue body, her face was feverish red.

I took her with me, taking extra layers from Giles. I had to carry her most of the way, and I worried the sweat would speed up our inevitable hypothermia.

She said she felt hot.

***

A week passed, and neither the snow nor the girl’s fever let up.

Martha started acting strangely. “How is she warm?” I’d never seen Martha so scared.

I was scared too. Why was she warm? The propane would run out soon, and me and Martha would freeze.

Would the girl?

She was sweating in the guest bed. I had my hatchet. She was skinny, emaciated. Thin. One swing would do it.

But when she looked at me, I froze. She scrambled out the bed, running past me as she discarded layers. After a moment, I ran after her, but the door was already open, the freeze was coming.

And she was running through the snow.

Last Thoughts

This was a bit of a wordy post! But I’d like to reflect a little on the advancements made by friends.

First things first, this thing was a whopping 136 words over word count. In a normal contest that’s practically nothing, but in a tight 400 words? That’s over a quarter of the final story.

And, no matter how you look at it, that’s a flat ending. Compared to the pathos (never my strong point) of the final product, with its sympathetic moments for both the story’s main characters and its monster, this version mostly leaves you with questions.

Now to pat myself on the back, a lot of the stories strong points (gross imagery and spooky overall theme) are present in this first draft. But ultimately, I was going to scrap this entirely before George ripped it apart into a shorter story and Miguel’s suggestions let us add some flavor back in.

If we ever revisit this, I’d like to try to add some of the original’s slower burn, and might even extend the ending to have slightly more information on our monster, as suggested by a forum reader.

Thanks as always for reading, and I hope the feedback we shared proves useful in your own writing ventures!

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Burlap Sack? Check. Black clothing? Check. Concealed weapons? Technically black-painted water guns, but also Check.

Robbing a bank wasn’t supposed to be complicated, but for some reason things never went their way.

“Ok Gus, you’re sure you got the address right this time?” On the brothers’ last three attempts, Gus had taken them to an empty field, a barber, and a pet shop.

“Don’t worry Frankie! See it says right here, ‘Bankery of America.’” Gus squinted at the cracked screen of his iPhone 4. “But Frankie, do we have to keep trying to rob places? Couldn’t we, I dunno, learn a skill like Ma’ wanted us to-”

“Dangit Gussy, don’t pull the “Ma’ wanted” card on me! I take care of you, don’t I? Besides, once we pull off this bank robbery we’ll be living easy!” This time, Frankie was confident; he even had Gus pull up a wiki-how online.

“Alrighty boys, here we are!” Their elderly taxi driver smiled behind goggle-eyed glasses. Frankie wanted to drive his own getaway car, but he and Gus weren’t old enough to get a license.

Frankie and Gus grabbed their equipment and rushed into the building. The next step on Gus’ phone was to ‘show ‘em who’s boss’ and ‘case the joint.’

“Alright everybody stick ‘em up! This is a hold-....up?” Something felt off. The lobby smelled far too nice. The patrons all wore black suits and dresses with aprons. Instead of queues, there were rows of... bread.

It was at this time Frankie noticed the photograph and large loaf of bread on the counter, with a large banner strewn across the room. “In loving memory, Johnny Rye.”

“Gus, let me see that phone…” Frankie snatched the device from Gus’ hands. “...This says ‘Bakery’ not 'Bankery!’”

Frankie smacked Gus upside the head as an elderly lady in a black dress approached. “Ohh Johnny always did love his puns, almost as much as he loved his bread! I’m Dolores, are you boys here for the memorial?”

“Here for the - what? No!” Frankie took a closer look at the black-clad patrons. Gus had brought them to a baker’s funeral. The wiki-how did not prepare him for this. He glanced down at the phone. Show ‘em who’s boss. Right.

“Everybody stop! This is a hold up!” Frankie shouted and waved his plastic gun in the air threateningly. He got a couple gasps from the small crowd - good sign. Most of the mourners were frozen in place, some even mid-bite. Gus helped Dolores into a chair. He was a good kid. Ma’ would’ve been proud.

“OK! Now I want everybody to…” All eyes were on him. Suddenly, all his instructions scattered from his brain like flies from a soap factory. “Hang on a second!”

He pulled out the iPhone to review his wiki-how, but the screen wouldn’t turn on. He desperately spammed the power button, but all he got was an image behind the cracked screen of an empty battery. “Gus? Why is the battery DEAD!?”

“I’m sorry Frankie! I was playing Bejeweled on the car ride here…” Gus sheepishly peaked out from taking cover behind Dolores.

Frankie rubbed his temples. They had never gotten this far before. What was the next step again?

None of this was going correctly. He couldn’t disappoint Ma’ now, not after she-

He waved his squirt-gun again at the bereaved bakery-goers. “Look, we’re robbing you! We just uhh… need you to… does anyone have a phone charger?”

The hostages exchanged awkward glances and patted their pockets. A mousy girl in the back piped up, “I’ve got a USB-C, does that work?”

“No! We’ve got an iPhone 4! You know, with the long sort of… forget it.” Frankie was on his own. He turned to Gus for assistance, but Gus was already sharing a scone with Old Lady Dolores.

Frankie held the sack out for everyone’s wallets - but apparently no one brings cash to a funeral. Well he wasn’t going to walk out empty handed. Frankie was feeling hungry anyhow.

“Just give us some of those bagels, a few muffins, and… gimme that loaf.” Frankie gestured towards the perfectly dusted bread sitting on the pedestal.

A few choked gasps rippled through the small congregation. Jackpot, there must be something special about that loaf.

With things finally going his way Frankie thought he deserved a snack, so he pulled out the dusty loaf, and ripped off a hefty chunk. A few women screamed and one fainted as he took a large bite.

The mourners cried out as he chewed, but it tasted terrible. Why would they care about some crummy terrible tasting bread?

Only Dolores seemed unperturbed, and in fact seemed amused as she led Gus by the hand up to Frankie. “Don’t worry dear, I think this is how Johnny would have wanted it.” She winked and smiled towards the framed photograph on the counter. “He always did love his puns as much as his bread.”

Frankie looked down at the dusty loaf, up to the counter, over to the banner with the words “In loving memory, Johnny Rye” and back down to the loaf.

Oh god he had eaten old-man-ash-bread. Frankie curled over and immediately dry-heaved.

This was NOT how this was supposed to go. He closed his watering eyes, and not because of the bread. “I’m sorry Gus, I never do this right. I know I promised Ma’ I would take care of you while she was in jail, but…”

Frankie felt a hand on his . He opened his eyes to see Dolores’s hand on him.

“How about, instead of taking, you help me make the bread instead. After all,” She said chuckling, “My Johnny lives on inside you now.”

Frankie shot a look at Gus, who smiled widely and nodded.

Frankie took his brother’s hand, and then Dolores’. “You’re kind of crazy, lady. But you remind me of our Ma’. You got yourself

a deal.”

Robbing banks didn’t seem to be their specialty anyways.

Words from the Author

This was our entry from the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction competition, with the required prompts of “Comedy, A Bakery, and a Phone Charger.” It ended up making 6th place, not bringing any trophies home, but also enough to keep us in for the next round of the competition.

What sticks out in my memory the most about this story is that in our original draft, Frankie and Gus were grown men. The story was actually almost identical, with the joke being that the brothers were goofballs a la The Three Stooges. We ended up aging them down to preteens last second out of a fear the judges wouldn't find Frankie and Gus as endearing if they were men in their 30s.

What do you think? Did we make the right choice, or were we cowards opting for the safe option?

It was July when I found her.

I was just making my rounds, gathering church gossip, being nosey. There was a rumor floating about something strange skulking the local wheat fields. It was just some poor kid, a stranger, wandering alone.

A surprise cold front struck the night before. The girl, maybe ten, must’ve been outside all night. She was burning up. I carried her to my truck.

Not long after, snow came. It started slowly, tiny crystals immediately melting. But then the temperature dropped, and the flurries stuck. Martha fretted over the crop. I told her wheat could take a little cold spell or two. In truth, I wasn’t sure.

The girl didn’t speak much, but she told us she felt hot.

The snow picked up, and that night the power died. Martha and I got our warmest clothes, fired up the propane furnace, and huddled for warmth. As we looked out over the shimmering whiteness, it was strangely beautiful.

The girl pushed us away, refusing any blankets. Her fever wouldn’t let up.

Martha began to ask fearful questions. “How is she warm?”

I was scared too. Propane was running out, and Martha and I would freeze.

Would the girl?

We needed supplies, but the truck wouldn’t start. When I looked underneath, pink icicles dripped with slushy antifreeze. Antifreeze doesn’t do that until 35 below.

Shivering under four layers and my thickest boots, I had to push Martha away to trudge into the snowstorm. We were a small community, the store only about 3 miles out. “I’ll be back,” I promised.

But with every mile, the snowstorm faded. As if it were centered around my farm.

I ran back into the storm.

When I reached home, my heart sank. Snow buried the doors. Through the barn windows I saw our cattle: black, necrotic, frozen standing in their pens. I used my hatchet to break into our house.

I was too late. My Martha was frozen solid, fingers cracked off her hands. But she wasn’t alone.

“So hot.” The girl whimpered.

She was sweating. I had my hatchet. She was skinny, emaciated. Thin. One swing would do it.

But when she looked at me, I froze.

“You too?” She sounded betrayed.

The wind howled, and wood beams cracked under icy weight. Snow broke through, burying me as she scrambled away.

I crawled next to Martha, and the cold took us.

Words From the Author

Were you spooked? I hope so, as that was the goal for this Halloween Writing Contest by NYC Midnight. The spookiest part about this story was the 400 word limit, which meant that we had to be rather sparse on details, characters, and flowery language.

I have mixed feelings on this piece. Frankly, the version before word cuts was much better, enough so that I might workshop it later just to prove a point. We were forced to cut a character I felt was central to the feeling of the story, and rather than the slow build-up I prefer, we felt that we needed suspense from the story’s onset.

400 words is pushing it story-wise, but this contest does parallel some real life realities. Even established authors, who have earned the trust of their readers already, are forced to contend with reader interest. A slower progression gives more time to steep your characters, weave complex narratives, add meat to your story, but you often have to earn your reader’s attention first by punching them in the face.

As sure as the sun sinking into the hills, the trappers of Baldridge Outpost gathered at dusk round the fire, drawn from their shelters by the scents of smoke and roasting bison meat. Beneath the black shadows of the trees above, Jack Sunday, a sharp-eyed mountain man clad in buckskin, noticed a newcomer in their midst.

“I don’t care how many days you’ve been in the wilderness; no one takes a bite before we all say grace!” jeered Jack Sunday.

“To hell with ya Jack, and eat your piece!” the small group of men cackled in jest. Most of the men in Jack’s frontier brigade were glad to be as far from a chapel as possible. Chatter and laughter gave way to quiet as the famished men devoured their meals.

A soft voice spoke from the crowd of grim faces, “I can lead us in prayer.” It was the newcomer, a young man who couldn’t be older than twenty-five. His skin was too soft, his long hair too clean, and his voice too well-mannered to be that of a weathered fur-trapper. “My name’s Isaiah Pierce. I’m a preacher,” he said.

Jack Sunday nodded and hesitantly gestured to the young man to begin, knowing the trappers would chase him up a tree before he could get halfway through an Our Father Who Art in Heaven.

The preacher hopped on a nearby stump and spoke, and to Jack’s surprise, he went on and on talking about mercy and grace. The men were silent and even thoughtful the whole while until the young man paused and solemnly said, “Amen.” They murmured and then scattered until only Jack and the preacher lingered by the dying fire.

“Who are you? And why in hell are you in this wild and godless country?” he said, clutching the horn hung round his shoulder where he kept his gunpowder.

“I’m a minister at Fort Lewis,” the young man said. “Rather, I used to be. The truth is I’ve fallen on some hard times and I am on my way to Flintsville to start a new parish.”

“Flintsville? That’s all the way down the river. I’m afraid you’ve come up the mountain the wrong way.”

“I heard there’s a shortcut through the mountains by way of a place called Malady Bluff,” the preacher said. “I pray there might be some faithful soul among your brigade that might serve as my guide. I’ve fallen on some hardships, so I have no money, but I assure you, Heaven will look favorably on the deed.”

Jack looked on bewildered as the crestfallen young man buried his face in his hands. “What you heard about that shortcut is true,” he said. “You can make the trek in just a couple days if you travel light, but it’s dead steep the whole way. The trail cuts through Blackfoot country and warbands patrol it the whole way.”

The preacher nodded, but Jack recognized the air of despair in the young man’s eyes. Only a man running for his life took such chances. He recalled with sympathy the day long ago when he himself came to the mountains searching for mercy in a cruel wilderness. The next day, Jack and Isaiah departed on foot towards Malady Bluff.

Traveling light, Jack brought only his long-rifle, his powder-horn and a handful of musket-balls. In his belt, he kept a broad knife, an iron tomahawk, and only his most prized possessions in his buckskin pouch. It was everything he needed to thrive by himself on the mountainside.

The trail was as Jack remembered. He recognized each barren ridge and wind-beaten stone, and despite his hunter’s eyes, Jack saw no game for miles on end save for the buzzards that spiraled overhead.

Isaiah hardly uttered a word as they scurried across the exposed rocky ridges back into the cover of hushed ponderosa groves, but every hundred paces or so the sound of dead pines knocking in the wind would startle him.

It wasn’t long before Jack noticed Isaiah lagging behind. “We ought to go farther before nightfall. We’re hardly ten miles from where we started!”

“I need to rest,” the preacher begged. He might as well have had lilies for feet.

Jack fumed. There was a clearing just around the bend that would make a fine campsite with fresh running water nearby. There was no purpose in wasting any more strength. After all, Malady Bluff was nearby.

“Don’t start a fire,” Jack snapped. “No one must know we’re here.”

The preacher set down a bundle of firewood, starting to strike a tinder. “I haven’t heard so much as a mourning dove coo all day. We’d’ve heard horses if there was anyone up here.”

“The Blackfoot don’t need horses to catch a tenderfoot from Fort Lewis. Besides, I don’t believe you’ve told me everything. No doubt, you give a fine sermon, but why would a minister be so desperate to reach Flintsville that he would entrust his life in the wilderness to an armed stranger?”

Jack began sharpening his tomahawk on a stone as the light of the little fire grew.

“I pray you are not calling me untrue, Mr. Sunday. I started this journey with nothing but godly intentions. I could well ask the same of you. If this trail is indeed so treacherous, why risk it for a tenderfoot, as you put it?”

Jack grumbled. The preacher was reserved, but Jack had forgotten shame after so many years with only the mountain to talk to. “I’ll tell you why,” Jack reached to cradle his long-rifle. “I could hit the head of a beaver from a thousand paces with the ol’ long-rifle here,” he said, inspecting the flintlock and barrel. “But when his time comes, no man, not even the toughest brick-headed trapper escapes death, and that’s a fact. There have been nights in these hills where the voice of my heart wouldn’t let me rest. I agreed to this damned excursion because, truth be told, I fear for my soul, and I need the help of a true man of god.”

The preacher’s expression softened. “It cheers me to see such earnest repentance. I’ll pray for you, Jack.”

“I don’t believe you are getting my meaning.” Jack reached into his buckskin pouch and produced a plain wooden mask. It was rough and featureless except for two little holes for eyes.

The trapper held the mask over his face. “I never learned reading, so my bible was never much use, but one day I met an old peddler who traded me five beaver skins for this mask. He told me ‘wear it and look at your reflection in freshwater, and whatever you see is the face of your soul itself.’” Jack became very quiet as he spoke now. “I only tried it once. I saw a face the color of blood with eyes so full of rage they looked like hot coals. Ever since then, I knew for certain that I was a damned man.”

“Only the Lord knows the fate of a man’s soul,” Isaiah said, side-eyeing the mask. “You mustn’t lose sleep over some frontier ghost story.”

“Ghosts of another kind,” Jack Sunday whispered with a hand over his heart, searching the young man’s eyes for understanding. “You see, I was once a guide for soldiers when Fort Lewis was just a scant camp. I was raised in the mountains, and I hoped to make a name for myself. But one day, the commanding officer heard a rumor that my mother was a Blackfoot and accused me of planning to lead his soldiers into an ambush. That didn’t sit right with me.”

“What did you do?” Isaiah asked. “Did you tell them the truth?”

“I was simply overtaken by hatred of this man. I waited weeks for a thunderstorm, and when my storm came, I ran into the barracks and burst into his cabin. I hesitated and he barely got a scream out before I planted my hatchet in his chest. I watched him die and then I ran for the mountains hoping the rain would wash away my tracks.” Jack’s gaze strayed into the fire as he put the mask back in his pouch. “Can there be grace for a man like me?”

“When we arrive in Flintsville, I’ll baptize you myself. That’s a promise, Mr. Sunday,” the preacher said in a hushed voice.

Jack threw dirt on the fire and stamped it out. “God bless ya, Mr. Pierce.”

~~~~

The young preacher couldn’t believe the mountain man’s tales. Only the Lord could know one’s soul. And yet, the thought of his own guilt tortured his dreams. The night was warm, and the trapper who went by the unlikely name of Jack Sunday was sleeping like a dog.

Isaiah sat up on his bedroll. His back hurt and his feet were covered in sores. He felt disgust at every part of his body, which was now stinging and itching all over. The roar wind wouldn’t let him think, let alone pray. His little sermon on the stump was pure spectacle. The truth was it had been a long time since Isaiah Pierce had spoken to the Lord, or felt His hand guide the way. He had entrusted his fate to an illiterate trapper who was no less than a fugitive murderer.

By the cold coals of the little fire from earlier, the trapper’s buckskin pouch seemed to beckon him. Isaiah couldn’t resist it. He crawled to it and searched inside for the crude wooden mask. A chill danced over his skin as he clutched it.

In moonlight, he stumbled through a grove of aspen toward the sound of running water nearby. The air became still, and each rustling of a leaf or snapping of a twig sent terror to his bones.

He finally crouched by the murmuring stream and took a few gulps of fresh water before putting on the mask. A shriek of mountain wind rocked the surrounding slopes, but Isaiah felt perfect calm all around him. The stream before him had ceased to flow and the water now resembled a quivering pool of mercury reflecting the cool hues of the night.

To his astonishment, Isaiah looked in the pool and saw his own face - the brown curls falling over his blue eyes, the red fullness of his lips. He was mesmerized by the shimmering image of himself but then the eyes began to redden, and the skin of the face began to char and peel away like burning parchment. Soon, all he could see was crimson smoke but before he could pry the mask off, he felt a blunt strike on his head and everything went black.

When he came to, Isaiah’s hands and feet were bound with rough rope. He was crumpled near the edge of a stone bluff. A disheveled cavalryman loomed over him, brandishing a saber on his shoulder while running his fingers along the two pistols tucked in his belt. “You think you’re so clever, don’t ya, Isaiah? I’m gonna make you stand trial. I’ll make sure you hang for what you done.”

The corporal held up the wooden mask, shuddering at its eerie expression, before putting it in his pocket. Isaiah wondered for a moment if he was still somehow lost in a dream. The chill of a saber on his neck was very real, “I’d leave the mask, if I were you,” he said. “It belongs to a trapper that goes by the name Jack Sunday, and as sure as the devil in Hell, he’s on his way to claim it.”

The remark earned him a sharp knuckle blow to the mouth. “Shut your trap,” the soldier said. “Just remember. I know everything that comes out of your mouth is a lie.”

A kick to the gut made Isaiah spit blood. The corporal’s eyes seemed to glow with fury, as he reached into a pocket for a rag. “Before I gag your lying mouth, I wanna know just one thing. Did you love her? Was your night of passion with my Joanna worth your life?”

“All men die,” Isaiah spat. “Men like you die for less.”

His heart was cheered by the glint of Jack Sunday’s knife signaling in the morning sunlight.

~~~~

Jack was silent as a snake in his moccasins, and swifter than the Blackfoot hunter that taught him to read soldier’s tracks as easily as a game trail. He sauntered into a meager campsite. For Jack, the faintest wisp of campfire was as good as a beacon. The prints on the ground told him this: one warhorse, one man in military riding boots, likely armed for a brawl. This was a manhunt.

Jack followed the sign down a game trail that led to the stream where he recognized Isaiah’s stumbling tracks beside hoof-prints. He followed them across the ridge and soon Jack could make out the shape of two figures standing on Malady Bluff. Though he could hardly make out their faces, he knew the unmistakable pomp of a cavalry officer’s uniform. He knelt behind a tumbled spruce, and loaded his rifle. He trained the rifle sights on the officer’s chest. He took a deep breath, closed one eye, and pulled the hammer back.

But his finger on the trigger wouldn’t budge. The searing image of his damned soul was turning in his brain. One man’s lifeblood was more than enough of a burden to have on his conscience. Jack lowered his rifle, and paying no mind to what might happen next, he walked to the bluff and announced himself. He flashed the polished blade of his hunting knife in the sun, and fired his rifle into the air.

Jack emerged from under the trees to find a cavalryman’s pistol pointed at his chest.

“You must be Jack Sunday,” the cavalryman said.

Jack dropped the knife and gently placed the rifle on the ground. He held up empty hands. “I don’t mean trouble. I don’t know what designs you got with that man you’ve gagged there, but I hope you weren’t planning on doing him no harm. See, there’s something that he owes me.”

“He mentioned that,” the soldier said, pulling the mask from his coat pocket and tossing it to Jack. “But I reckon what he took from me is greater.”

“The mask is just a trinket. He owes me a big favor, and I can’t let you take him.”

The cavalry man tugged the rope around Isaiah’s wrists, pulling him to the ground. “This man is a lying bastard,” he explained. “I got stranded on a scouting mission a hundred miles north of Fort Lewis. My men never found me, so I trekked by foot across the wilderness until finding an outpost where I could recover. I got to Fort Lewis only to find my bride-to-be expecting a preacher’s bastard child. But the spineless bastard couldn’t even face me, and skipped town before I could see his face!”

Jack could see in Isaiah’s eyes all of this was true. The soldier raised his pistol, “I don’t care what favor he owes you, Jack Sunday. I would sooner die than let this man go, and you don’t look like a killer.”

Jack’s eyes hardened. “I killed once before. I was the mountain guide at Fort Lewis in 1829. I was the half-breed who slew Captain Johnny Braxton.”

A puff of white smoke erupted between Jack and the cavalryman. Jack ducked and reached for his rifle, then bolted for the shelter of the trees. Isaiah threw himself on the ground, and began crawling away.

“There’s one thing you oughta know, Jack!” the soldier cried out, drawing another pistol, and calmly mounting his horse. “He damn sure had a nasty gash, but Captain Braxton lived!”

Those words took the wind from Jack’s lungs. He remembered the mask’s vision. If he never was a killer, why did he see his damnation through the mask’s demonic eyes? It wasn’t until then he felt the wet heat of blood gushing from a pistol wound in his side. He began loading his long-rifle, but his fingers were slick with blood.

Another pistol shot rang in the hillside. Jack dropped his rifle and ran, only to see the cavalryman charging him on horseback with his saber swinging.

In one mindless motion, Jack reached for the tomahawk in his belt which flew from his fingers and twirled forward as if weightless before taking root in the rider’s skull. The horse trotted to a halt, and the limp cavalryman collapsed. Jack stared in horror at the face at his feet – a face the color of blood with eyes so full of rage they looked like hot coals.

Jack felt a twist in his gut and fell to his knees to vomit. He could barely stand, but he crawled across the aspen grove to the cool stream, fumbling for the mask in his pouch.

The preacher found Jack flat on the ground. Isaiah’s wrists were raw from the soldier’s rope which he managed to cut with the knife Jack had left at the bluff.

“They’ll be sending men after you. You best hurry,” Jack croaked, his mouth sputtering blood.

“I won’t make it far in Blackfoot country without you, Jack,” Isaiah said, his voice pleading.

“Only the Lord knows,” Jack put his gunpowder horn in the preacher’s shaking hands. A soft breeze cooled his face and for a moment, Jack felt a familiar peace in that ancient shady grove.

The two men clasped hands, knowing they would soon part ways. “I must keep my promise to you somehow,” Isaiah said, his voice shaking.

He knelt by Jack at the edge of the stream, and with cupped hands poured clear, cold water on the trapper’s bloodied head. “Jack – you are baptized now,” he whispered. “In God’s name.”

Isaiah’s face was blank and somber as the cursed wooden mask floating away in the stream. Now in earnest, he prayed.

Words from the Author

This became my second story ever published when it was part of the Honorable Mentions in The Writer’s Playground 1-Year Anniversary Challenge. The first two of my stories to make it past my Documents folder had a key element in common. Both are Westerns with a gothic twist.

The original contest prompt of this story required one of the characters be a religious leader. It also required the use of “a wooden mask”. With such a particular character and such a mysterious item, I knew that I wanted to tell a story with the spiritual concerns of gothic fiction, but I couldn’t resist setting the story in the Old West.

I have always been drawn to the Western genre because in many frontier tales, the wilderness looms large over characters. The historical context of frontier stories also allows for such interesting explorations of identity and the tensions between civilization and nature. For this story, this distinct blend of elements was a winning combination.

“Juni, you’ve been fighting again.”

Junichiro Nakashima hoped to hide his hands until he could ice them, but as usual his mother was too perceptive. Junichiro sat on the floor next to the family kotatsu as his mother retrieved her medicine box. Her antiseptic stung the open sores of his knuckles, but her usual monologue stung worse.

“How many times must I tell you not to fight with the other boys? This is the second time this month! Don’t you know what we’ve sacrificed to make this life for you!?”

Her chastisements continued for 15 minutes, and served to maintain his proficiency in Japanese. Junichiro knew there was no stopping her, so he just stared out the window to watch the bustle of the Little Tokyo nightlife.

“Don’t you know what it means to be Nisei? Juni? Are you even listening?” She poured more alcohol.

“Youch! Of course I do Kaa-san!”

“Then you tell me this time Juni. What does it mean to be Nisei?”

Begrudgingly, he repeated back the speech his parents had given him so many times before. “My sister and I are Nisei. We are the first generation of U.S born Japanese. You and Tou-san are Issei. Your generation immigrated to Los Angeles and founded Little Tokyo to give us a better life. For that we should be grateful, and proud.” Junichiro added extra emphasis to that last word, not because he believed it, but rather the opposite.

“But Kaa-san, you don’t understand. You don’t have to go to school with them! You don’t have to fake a smile while they stretch their eyes out, or keep eating while they plug their noses at the smell of pickled plum in your lunchbox, or pretend not to hear when even the teachers whisper you’re a spy, as if what happened at Pearl Harbor was somehow OUR fault!

“I just don’t get it. Why does Aiko get to attend school with the other Japanese children, when I have to go to the American school? And why do I have to study for this stupid spelling competition? You and Tou-san barely speak English and you get along fine!”

At this, his mother’s tone softened. She gently took Junichiro’s hands in hers. “Because Juni, you’re special. We sent you to private school because you have a rare gift for learning. You study because when you win the championship, you’ll prove we’re more American than any of them.”

Although Junichiro wished to object, he simply couldn’t when his mother spoke like that. He kissed her goodnight, promised he wouldn’t fight again, set new coals under the family kotatsu, and pulled his notebooks out to begin his nightly exercises. Word, definition, etymology. Word, definition, etymology.

Once into his rhythm, his malaise faded away. He would never admit it, but his mother was right. Junichiro did have a gift for language. Each new word spoke to him in new ways. Paradox – a self-contradiction, like Japanese-American. Termination – when his father was fired again for reasons he wouldn’t explain. Liaison – a word of French origin that somehow found its way to America, and describes someone bridging two worlds. At home, his parents only saw him as their American future. At school, his teachers only saw a Japanese student. A foreigner bridging two worlds. Junichiro understood the word liaison.

                                                             * * * * *

“Hey! Hey Johnny!”

Out of the house “Juni” became “Johnny,” as that was the name the school decided to register Junichiro as. They said it would “help him fit in better.” “Johnny” didn’t think it worked very well.

The voice was Freddie Miskowitz – Junichiro’s classmate and resident bully. Junichiro knew Freddie never had anything good to say, but also knew ignoring him only egged him on.

“Heyyy don’t be such a cold fish Johnny! Oh sorry, I guess that was just your lunch that I smelled.”

Today’s jokes weren’t even clever, but they hurt all the same. Junichiro’s fists clenched, but he couldn’t bear to disappoint his mother again. Instead, he lowered his eyes and fled Freddie’s sneering gaggle of seventh-graders.

Teachers never discouraged the bullying; most ignored Junichiro entirely. The worse ones even contributed to the teasing. But worst of all was Mr. Carlson.

Mr. Carlson never liked Junichiro, and the Japanese attack on Hawaii only made things worse. He didn’t call Junichiro “Johnny.” Instead, he called him “Little Tojo,” apparently for some Japanese general. When Freddie called him names, Junichiro at least figured it was some dumb joke – but Mr. Carlson never seemed to be joking.

Every day after history class, Mr. Carlson inspected Junichiro’s notebooks. “Alright Little Tojo, you know the drill.” Ostensibly, he was making sure Junichiro “wasn’t engaged in espionage.” But all he ever found were vocabulary words, carefully written in repetition. His interrogations usually lasted longer, but when Ms. Atkins showed up at the classroom door, he was forced to let Junichiro go.

“Juni, come with me to the Dean’s office please.”

Junichiro immediately perked up. Ms. Atkins was the only teacher that didn’t treat Junichiro as though he were different, as though something was inherently wrong with him. As his literature teacher, it was her idea for him to compete in the spelling championship, and often introduced interesting new words to Junichiro for fun. Junichiro didn’t even mind when she called him ‘Juni’ – a name previously only used by his mother.

Regardless, her arrival was unexpected, as Junichiro already had literature class that morning. Her demeanor seemed uncharacteristically somber, and after walking in silence for a solid minute, she finally spoke.

“Juni, I have a new word for you.” This was normally a fun exercise, but something didn’t seem fun today.

“Have you heard of the term Xenophobia?”

Junichiro hadn’t, but he had studied enough Latin to guess. “Phobia… so fear. And Xeno… outside? The fear of being outside?”

“Close, but not quite.” She grimaced. “It’s the unjustified fear of outsiders. I want you to keep that in mind. Remember that it’s not your fault. Nothing is your fault.”

Junichiro wasn’t sure what she meant, but he soon found out. In a long speech, the Dean hailed some new law called “Executive Order 9066.” Apparently, President Roosevelt was worried about spies like Mr. Carlson was, and wanted to move “high risk” populations out of Los Angeles and into detention centers. According to the Dean, if “one drop” of Japanese blood made you eligible, then “full-blooded Nips” like Junichiro were “as good as guilty.” Disenrollment meant no more American school, no more spelling championship, no more being American.

Only Ms. Atkin’s reassuring hand stymied Junichiro’s tears. When the Dean finished, she gently led Junichiro out of the office and asked him to wait on the wooden bench for a little longer. From outside the office Junichiro could hear everything – Ms. Atkins was furious! The Dean made proclamations such as expulsion being “for the good of the school” or that if “the boy hadn’t started all those fights” that he might have a case. In retort, Ms. Atkins called the Dean’s excuses “unconstitutional” and introduced her second new term to Junichiro that day: “horse-shit.”

                                                             * * * * *

Within a month, the Dean’s predictions came true. Military men showed up at Junichiro’s home in the Mikado Hotel, informing them that they were “selected” for relocation to the Santa Anita “Assembly Center.” Junichiro did his best at translating, but decided it best not to translate everything his father had to say. And so it was that with their one allotted bag each, mother and sister both crying, and father simply stoic, the Nakashima family boarded the bus to their internment camp, and Little Tokyo was left a ghost town.

Over the next few weeks, Junichiro settled into his new schedule. Thanks to Ms. Atkins’ fervent appeal to the Dean, Junichiro was allowed to remain a student, but “he was her problem.” When questioned, Ms. Atkins only said that anyone with “a lick of human decency” would do the same.

Each morning Junichiro woke up early and left the stall his family had been assigned to live in – which just six months ago housed a racehorse. In darkness he would brush his teeth in the community bathroom, pack his bookbag, and wait by the barbed-wire fence. Ms. Atkins would pick him up and make the forty-five minute commute to school, practicing new words as they drove.

After 8 hours of living as “Johnny” at school, Junichiro returned to Santa Anita. He was young enough that he wasn’t assigned official duties, and for the first time in his youth, Junichiro was surrounded by children that looked like him. For a moment, Junichiro considered that perhaps this was what he always wanted, but he quickly remembered his mother’s words. Junichiro didn’t have time to play with the others like innocent little Aiko did.

Instead, Junichiro studied. When running chores for his mother, he focused on Latin. When standing in line for his daily rations, he drilled common prefixes and suffixes. Even when the facility lights were shut out, he studied by the light of candles Kaa-san collected for him. Incarceration. Despotism. Determination. Junichiro needed to win the spelling championship to prove that his family was American, and then certainly they’d be allowed to return home.

                                                             * * * * *

The day of the “All-American Spelling Championship” arrived. Junichiro’s family couldn’t leave the camp, so his mother made him a small charm with the kanji for “Victory!” from a scrap of wood she found in their stall. Charm safely in pocket, Junichiro entered the gymnasium. Ms. Atkins walked with him to the registration table, pinned his paper bib to his shirt, and gave him a quick hug before joining the other teachers. “Remember Juni, no matter what happens, I’m proud of you.”

Junichiro took in his surroundings. The other competitors were dressed in fine suits, but since Junichiro didn’t have a chance to grab nice clothes before being interned, he just wore his school uniform. He suddenly felt more out of place than ever.

“Eww do you guys smell that? Did someone let a horse compete?” Junichiro turned to see Freddie Miskowitz, wearing an ornate cap on the back of his head. “Oh wait, it’s just Johnny.”

Oddly enough, Freddie’s teasing snapped Junichiro back into focus. He didn’t have energy to spare on Freddie’s antics, so he just brushed past him and sat down to wait for the opening ceremony.

The Dean got up to give the starting speech. He included words like “patriotism” and “the American way,” but they sounded hollow coming from his voice. Finally, his diatribe ended, and the competition started.

The first couple rounds were easy. Other students stumbled on basic vocabulary, but not Junichiro. Each time he was called to the stage, his assigned word evoked familiar memories. Dichotomy – a Japanese student born in America. Fallacious – the misguided teasings of his classmates. Tenacious – one who refuses to give in, no matter what.

Finally only two contestants remained: Miskowitz and Nakashima. Back and forth the two went, neither missing a beat. Vivisepulture. Prodigal. Prescience. Entrepreneur. Fortuitous. Despite all his teasing, Freddie was actually a diligent student. But Freddie hadn’t experienced language as Junichiro had – and Junichiro needed to win.

“Next up, Johnny Nakashima.”

As Junichiro stepped up and waited for his next word, he heard Mr. Carlson – serving as a judge – chuckle softly. Mr. Carlson announced over the microphone, “Your word… is Jaundice.”

Jaundice. Despite knowing the spelling, something boiled within Junichiro. He suddenly felt compelled to ask the question. “Could you use it in a sentence please?”

Mr. Carlson couldn’t wait to oblige, smiling wryly. “Jaundice. A term to describe a sickly shade of yellow-ish skin, like that of the oriental vs. the American. Jaundice.”

Suddenly, painfully, as laughter rippled through the crowd, it dawned on Junichiro. Winning this competition wouldn’t change anything. These people didn’t care whether he won a spelling bee. Their minds were made up the moment he entered the school. The only two people who didn’t appear amused were Ms. Atkins, who was biting her lip, and strangely – Freddie.

Clutching Kaa-san’s “Victory!” charm, Junichiro finally found the strength to speak.

“Jaundice. J-...” He paused.

“Junichiro. J-U-N-I-C-H-I-R-O. Junichiro.”

Mr. Carlson chuckled again, but more awkwardly this time. “Uhh, Johnny, you were supposed to spell Jaundice.”

Junichiro spoke again, with more confidence. “No. I spelled exactly what I needed to. My name is Junichiro. J-U-N-I-C-H-I-R-O. It isn’t Johnny, it isn’t boy, it isn’t Nip, it isn’t Jap, and it isn’t LITTLE TOJO. My name is Junichiro Nakashima. My parents immigrated to America and founded Little Tokyo before I was born. I am Japanese. I am Nisei. And I am AMERICAN.” Junichiro practically shouted the last part as he ended, leaving the room in an awkward silence as he rushed off the stage.

Once in the safety of the literature classroom, the dam of tears finally broke. He had failed his family. If he wasn’t expelled before, he certainly would be now.

A few minutes later, the classroom door creaked.

“Uhh, hey Johnn-err-Junichiro?” On top of everything, it seemed Freddie couldn’t miss the opportunity to gloat.

“What is it Freddie? I’m not in the mood.” Junichiro wiped his eyes.

“I…” Freddie swallowed. “I’m sorry. For everything.”

This was the last thing Junichiro expected to hear, so he didn’t know what to say. Freddie sat down next to him, avoiding eye contact.

“Before you came along, I was the one everyone picked on. Polack, Jew-boy, Kike… but then you enrolled, and I wasn’t the odd-one out anymore! I got to be the one making the jokes instead of… well. But when all the adults were laughing, suddenly it didn’t seem so funny anymore.”

The two boys sat together in silent understanding. After a time, Freddie offered his arm to help Junichiro up, and the two boys parted ways.

Ms. Atkins found Junichiro soon after. They didn’t discuss much on the drive back, but she did keep repeating “she had never seen anyone so brave.” Junichiro didn’t feel that way, and felt even less brave when he had to face his family. He expected them to be furious. Instead, his mother just held him and cried. His father, normally so stern, smiled and said it was the best investment he ever made. Little Aiko was too young to really understand, but she gave Junichiro the biggest hug she could anyways.

                                                             * * * * *

Junichiro was indeed expelled from school, but Ms. Atkins came every weekend to tutor him. He and his family would move between internment camps for the next four years, and it would be another forty years before the US government finally apologized for the unjustified incarceration of its Japanese citizens.

Despite losing the championship, Junichiro continued studying language. He eventually returned to Little Tokyo to become a journalist for Rafu Shimpo, connecting worlds through words. Galvanized – one who has been inspired to action through experience. Stalwart – someone who never backs down from what is right. Resilience – one has the capacity to bend without breaking. Yes, Junichiro understood the word resilience.

*This story received honorable mention in the English Adult category of the Little Tokyo Historical Society’s 9th Imagine Little Tokyo Short Story Contest, found here.

Words from the Author

Originally written in 2021, this story has a special place in my heart. It was one of our earliest forays into writing, and at the time we were really into prompt-based competitions. In this story’s case, the original prompts for the NYC Midnight Short Story contest were “Historical Fiction, an immigrant, and a championship,” and from those prompts, we eventually landed on the premise of J is for Junichiro.

One of my favorite themes to explore in writing is the strength of children in the face of extraordinary circumstances, especially through historical fictions interlacing history with narrative. One plot point that did give me concern though was the potential “white savior-ism” presented by Ms. Atkins (which was indeed where one judge docked me points in the original submission). But what I really wanted to include, beyond the necessity of an ally for historical realism, was the importance of the role of the teacher who is willing to go above and beyond for their students. I had one such teacher in middle school, which is why Ms. Atkins is named in her honor.

I’ve written a couple short stories now in this vein, and through the research process I’ve really appreciated the chance to read about real peoples’ experiences that I might have not learned otherwise. Juni may be a fictional character, but the discrimination against Japanese-American families during WWII was absolutely true. I hope this read was enjoyable for you, and perhaps a little educational as well.

Thanks for reading,

- George

Imagine an infinite universe with infinite planets.

Are you doing it? It’s not too far-fetched; we have no way of knowing what is outside the observable universe, so there could be an arbitrarily large number of worlds besides our own. Even our own universe has about two-trillion galaxies by current estimates, so if you’d like you can replace “infinity” with that insane number.

But now imagine there are also infinite travelers visiting those infinite planets. Their exact origin doesn’t matter, just imagine a big pool of them in space, visiting the planets one by one.

Are you done imagining? Great, now we can pose our riddle:

With Infinite Travelers Visiting Infinite Worlds at Random, What Portion of Worlds are Expected to be Empty?

The key assumptions are that each traveler visits one world, and the two infinities (travelers and worlds) are of similar sizes.

In terms of hints, this is a simple issue of probability; the infinities are distractions.

Thinking about this simple problem reveals some fun details about how probabilities behave with large numbers, and we’ll use it to reveal an interesting insight about aliens.

Scroll down when you’re ready for my answer!

Starting with Buckets

Infinities are not so well-behaved, so let’s start with something a bit simpler to get our bearings.

100 balls in 100 buckets. I toss the balls at random into the buckets, one at a time. When I throw the first ball, the chances it goes into any given bucket is 1/100, or a 1% chance. By extension, the chances of any bucket not getting the ball is 99/100, or a 99% chance.

This chance is the same for the second ball. But, what are the chances of both the first AND the second ball both missing a given bucket? Well it’s an and statement, so we multiply the probabilities to 0.99^2, or 98.1%. Can you imagine how to extend this to 100 balls?

We can generalize this formula for X balls in X buckets. The chance of a given bucket being empty, which is equal to our expected portion of empty buckets, is this:

P = ((X-1)/X)^X

If we plot this in WolframAlpha we get this:

Notice the trend? We can take this and extrapolate to our original problem by taking the limit to infinity:

P = lim(X-> ± ∞){((-1 + X)/X)^X} = 1/e ≈ 0.367879

Skipping some steps here, we see that in the infinite case, we expect 36% of worlds to be empty, even with infinite travelers.

But what does this tell us about the worlds that are visited?

Bonus Question: What is the Average Number of Visitors in the Subset of Visited Worlds?

This is a much simpler question, but with less intuitive result.

The average number of visitors per world is simply the number of travelers over the number of worlds, X/X, which is 1. In a vacuum, knowing nothing else about a planet in this scenario, you would expect one visitor.

But in the subset of worlds with at least one traveler, the average is equal to total number of travelers X divided by the subset of visited worlds, X*(1-0.367879).

(Subset Mean) = (Travelers)/(Visited Worlds) = X/(X*(1-0.367879))

In other words, the average number of visitors per world, for the non-empty worlds, is not 1. It’s 1.58.

That means, in an infinite universe with infinite travelers, the moment you land on a planet, your best bet is that someone else is there with you.

Wrapping Up, What Does This Mean?

I personally am something of a skeptic about meeting other intelligent life in our universe, but if for argument’s sake we concede that life is very common, what would be the best way to find it?

We don’t need real infinities for this math to be relevant. The formula for empty worlds converges around 10 worlds, and we are well past that point. As for infinite travelers, there are 8.2 billion people on Earth alone, so if life is common in our universe, the numbers might very well add up to “close to even”.

But the surprising thing here is that venturing out into our hypothetical universe gives you similar odds of finding aliens as just looking at the planet you’re already on. So if aliens are a common thing in the universe, we might as well turn our telescopes inwards.

Because the math says they might already be here.

The rad-winds picked up, and Pepsiko the Teeth Collector lowered his hood to protect his already fugly face from their burning touch. It had been a long journey through the rusted steel ruins of the Screened Ones’ fallen empire, but he was almost home, weary, but hopeful.

For he brought with him a great treasure.

He approached the gate of his enclave, where two chained Muskbots twitched frantically. Their heads displayed an ominous “X”, the mind-eating demon worshiped by the Screened Ones. The machines tore apart anybody who approached the entrance, unless you knew the secret phrase that disabled them.

“It’s Twitter not X.”

The Muskbots screeched and sparked before their automatic reset kicked in. Pepsiko strode by to the Hall of Banquets, where music and boisterous laughter overflowed through phone-brick walls.

Pepsiko entered, and the celebration ceased. Chief Gator-Ate, largest of the Fizz-Head Clan, spat bits of beef-pork as he bellowed, “Announce yourself! Who dares disturb our Supersummer Banquet?”

Pepsiko unhooded himself, and Gator-Ate sighed with relief. “Welcome home, Pepsiko! Tell me, have you found teeth?” Gator-Ate banged on his teeth-vault.

“I have brought something far more valuable, my liege.”

The audience eyed Pepsiko skeptically. What could be more valuable than teeth?

Pepsiko grinned, “I have found a relic of the Screened Ones.”

The hall collectively gasped, the children glanced about excitedly, and one man choked on his fizzy-drink. But the Elders were nervous. One of them, Fox-Noose the Neighsayer, shouted, “Take it back! We have no need for accursed things from left-swiping devils, world destroyers all!”

But Gator-Ate lifted a heavy palm, silencing him. His eyes lit up with greed, for it was own father who used the Screened One’s Fizzy Drink Device to purify the water and build their enclave so long ago. Standing up, he raised his leg of beef-pork. “Bring the Pelo-Ton! Let us witness Pepsiko’s deeds.”

Four women strained under the Pelo-ton’s weight: an iron contraption entrapping two large pedaled wheels to a system of gears and a shock-box, a bicycle perfectly designed to go nowhere.

Pepsiko then unveiled his treasure to the enraptured crowd. A large black box containing a window to a small, empty chamber. It bore the pronged tail matching the Pelo-Ton’s, and Pepsiko ceremoniously plugged it into the shock-box.

On its crown were metal-branded words, and Fox-Noose hobbled forward to read them. “It is the Screen-tongue. 3… D…. Printar.”

“3 Ds? What does it mean?” Gator-Ate asked.

Pepsiko answered, “Perhaps 3 Destinies.”

To which Fox-Noose muttered, “Or 3 Dooms.”

Koogle the Pervert spoke up helpfully, “I think it’s 3 Dicks.”

“Silence!” Gator-Ate banged his beef-pork like a gavel. “There is no use anticipating the Screened Ones. Activate it, Pepsiko.”

Pepsiko nodded. He climbed the Pelo-Ton and began to pedal. In response the machine sputtered to life. Lights appeared on the black surface, revealing it to be a dreaded Screen. The hall fell silent.

Suddenly, the Printar screeched. A needle appeared in the empty chamber, and an awful grinding noise filled the air. The less brave backed against the walls of the banquet hall, but the young and foolish came closer. And Pepsiko pedaled.

And pedaled.

And kept pedaling for another hour.

Much of the excitement was lost at this point, and most of the food had been eaten up. Many were asking, “What is it even doing?” and “How long is this going to take exactly?”

Disgruntled, Gator-Ate barked an order. “Pepsiko pedal faster!”

“I’m trying my liege!” Pepsiko was panting. He was a traveler, acquainted to long distances and hard journeys, but the fearsome Pelo-Ton could drain the life force from even great warriors.

Some left the banquet hall or fell asleep, though the children still gathered around to watch the Printar at work. Others came to cheer on poor Pepsiko. Another two hours passed.

And finally, the grinding stopped. The Printar emitted a high-pitched, cheerful chirp, and Pepsiko tumbled to the floor, gasping. “It is done.”

The window opened, and children gasped and chattered about what they were seeing.

Gator-Ate stormed forward, tossing them aside. “Let me see it!”

He reached into the chamber, and pulled out the Printar’s creation. But when he held it up to the newly excited crowd, his face contained neither fear nor joy, but confusion.

“What is this?”

In Gator-Ate’s hand was a small, plastic statue depicting a woman in frilly, multicolored garb. Her eyes and her breasts were proportionally impossible, and her hair was pink. In her hand was a heart-shaped scepter, and she was frozen in a dancing pose.

Those still attending the Supersummer Banquet gathered around, speculating. “Perhaps the Screened Ones worshiped this woman?” “Is it a weapon?” “Maybe it comes to life!”

Gator-Ate shook his head. “I don’t understand. It is simply a statue of a strange-looking woman. Why would the Screened Ones make such a thing? It is useless!”

Shakily Pepsiko rose to his feet. “Perhaps… perhaps the uselessness was the point.” Gator-Ate looked at him quizzically, but Pepsiko continued. “I have ventured far throughout the lands, seen many of their ruins, seen their skeletons hunched over on the Screens that killed them. And I’ve come to understand them a little. The Screened Ones were not satisfied by ordinary life. They wanted more than the mundane life we have, that of high-speed diesel races through hell-storms, of chainsaw battles in the blood arena, of beef-pork feasts in the great hall.”

Fox-Noose interrupted, “They were insatiable and inscrutable, corrupted by their Screens! To understand them is to invite madness.”

“Perhaps,” Pepsiko answered, “but they were noble in their own way. They sought a sense of purpose and beauty beyond their mortal condition, desiring the very stars for themselves. They wanted to be more… but in doing so they left-swiped the world.”

There was a somber silence in the hall, as all regarded the strange figurine.

Then, Koogle the Pervert shrugged his shoulders. “I think it’s a sex thing.”

And Pepsiko shrugged back, smiling wistfully. “It could be both.”

Words from the Author

Hello all! I’m excited to share one of my favorite stories with all of you. “What’s Greater Than Teeth” was a real group effort, with extra credit to Miguel for some of the punny names. My first drafts had slightly less personable characters, with very Mad-Maxy sounding names like “Gortash” and such, since I have a tendency to really lean into a theme, but the final product had much broader appeal, and ended up winning a round of the NYC Midnight contest.

The original contest prompt was satire with the required item being a 3D printer. I really struggled to come up with a thought, but when I first pictured a character powering a 3D printer by hand, I was cackling, and knew I had a fun concept.

Generally, you can expect a bit of absurdity and comedy from my work, and a lot of high-concept. I’d say I’m probably the least artsy of our trio, so you can expect to relax after reading some of George’s heavier stuff!

It takes a true friend to tell you…

…delete your entire draft and start over.

Most (all) writers are narcissists, but what if they could actually take suggestions? If two heads are better than one, then why aren’t there any animals with two heads? Can three amateurs combine forces to make one competent author?

These are the questions we hope to answer here. Join us for whacky stories from across genres, some of which are actually good enough to win awards! We’ll be sharing some of our best (and worst) work.

And if for some reason you hate English there’ll also be some math.

But actually though, why are we here?

A friend can tell you your writing sucks, but he won’t let you give up. None of us are writers by profession, but writing, laughing, and telling each other stories has been a mainstay of our friendship for the decade and a half that we’ve known each another. It was about time we started finding a place to save these stories outside of Google Drive.

And to any potential readers out there,

What do we ask of you? Honestly, absolutely nothing. Suggestion Mode is our little way of sharing our stories with each other, and the world by proxy. But if one of our writings brings a tear to your cheek or a smile to your lips, we’d love it if you’d consider sharing our blog with someone else. And if you need to tell us we suck… well, make sure you’re in Suggestion Mode.

By the way…

… did you notice three people wrote this? Sami thought it was too sappy, but George and Miguel want you to know, we love you.

Sami, George, & Miguel