#wss366 #Right

“Are you sure this is the RIGHT door?” Sorawo said. She nodded at the wooden door, then gestured at the wooden plank corridor.

“It says RIGHT here, FF100. That’s Beni’s shorthand for first-floor room 100. It’s just atmosphere for her steampunk-themed party.” Toriko replied. “But I brought my gun just in case,” tapping a pouch hanging from her steampunk outfit.

“I thought it stood for Fan Fiction 100.”

Toriko winced at Sorawo’s quip. “I love you, but your humor sucks,” Toriko said and patted her girlfriend’s head. A just payment, she thought, for the joke, and as she’d predicted, Sorawo grimaced at the show of affection.

“Perv,” came an answering mutter.

“You want to see perv?” Toriko asked, her hand slipping down.

Sorawo bolted, opening the door and ducked through.

Toriko dashed after her, a grin spread across her face.

In the next instant, they realized their mistake as they sailed into space and drifted toward the wooden sailing vessel below. The ship’s bow proudly proclaimed it was the “Fate Gear.”

The Fate Gear, home of bold, feared freebooters and escaped slaves, floated gently on a light breeze, a thousand feet above a tropical island.

Captain Mina looked up and smiled. “They’re back.”

[Note will be 100th post to #AO3]

#microfiction @extraspecialbitter #NMPrompts #NMV366 #OthersidePicnic #UraPi

Once upon a time, there was a village whose AI hallucinated up all and only those AIs that didn't hallucinate up themselves.

"Every year," said the alien, "we re-enact the last war, from over 500 years ago."

"What war was that?" the human asked.

"No one remembers," said the alien. "Our re-enactment is likely flawed and inaccurate. But the details are unimportant. It was the very last war. THAT is what's important."

"When I am grown up I want to be a big star"

"Well, that's easy, you just have to wait, Patrick"

The #MastoPrompt for Friday 2 May 2025 is:

#mournful

The poem or story can include the prompt word or be about the prompt word.

@ me, if you like, or just include the #MastoPrompt tag (to allow people to follow or filter their feeds), or keep your work to yourself - all the options are good as long as you're writing.

If you're including an image please do include alt-text if you’re able to.

Today's Wandering Shop Stories #prompt is #right. Feel like writing something short and sweet that has the word "right" in it? Check out the definitions of the word at: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/right Join in and tag it with #wss366! #writing #WritingLife #microfiction h/t @extraspecialbitter

Nobody wanted to talk to us Earthlings. It's hardly surprising, considering the rubbish that we inadvertently transmit into space.

That first signal from the stars wasn't meant for us. Or anybody really. The message didn't make much sense, we were just eavesdropping on somebody else's conversation.

After much deliberation and discussion from the world's foremost SETI experts, we replied to the source.

The response from them was terse:

"Sorry. Butt dialled you."

The Haiku Shack Magazine is looking for poetry and microfiction for its second issue. Theme: What does home mean to you?

Complete guidelines at https://creativeramblings.com/haiku-shack-magazine/

Digital cinema is so soulless. I shot my films on real eyeballs. Oh I still used RED image engines, I just swap out the CCD for a human lens and retina. We get them from homeless people, cheap. Don’t look at me like that, we only harvest one per donor. Preposterous, under arrest for what?

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall," said the villainess. "Who's the fairest of them all?"

A face appeared within the mirror. It barked a laugh. "I know someone it definitely isn't!"

The villainess scowled. The face in the mirror frowned. "Are we not doing a Snow White bit?" the mirror asked. "Sorry, I thought we were doing a joke on the live action film. My bad!"

Inspired by https://blog.sanctum.geek.nz/vim-koans/

One day, a left-handed vim expert and a right-handed emacs expert were pinky-wrestling, a passtime they enjoyed. The vim expert said "You usually beat me with your left pinky, yet I often beat you with my right. Still holding down that control key?" The emacs expert replied: "Indeed, and I assume your colon key is as busy as always?"

Their affectionate exchange was interrupted by a VSCode expert, who timidly asked "May I join in your competition?" The other two felt a bit awkward, since they were really just hanging out as friends, but assented, and proceeded to trounce the newcommer a few times each.

"Your pinky strength is impressive, said the VSCode expert, feeling a bit foolish, but eager to demonstrate his own talents, he continued "would you be interested in some arm wrestling too?" The other two were interested, but were promptly beaten themselves. The Vim expert spoke up: "We can match your left arm, but your right arm is so strong. Please tell us the secrets of your training!"

The VSCode user replied: "I'm surprised actually... I don't do anything special, although I suppose my right arm is built up from holding the mouse." The other two fell silent at this, exchanging a quizzical look, and then said in unison: "We will try to train with a mouse to see what it feels like." The VSCode expert pondered this statement in confusion as they took their leave, promising to return in a month.

One month later, the three experts met again, and the results of their pinky wrestling were largely the same. However, both the Emacs and Vim experts were able to beat the VSCode expert with their left arms, though they still lost with their right arms. Meaning to encourage the others and eager to befriend them (but also honestly) the VSCode expert said "I can tell that your training is paying off; this has been fun." The Vim expert agreed, "This training has been really fun!" She continued, "It's so much fun to code with a mouse, and petting her little furry back has done wonders for my stress levels." The Emacs expert had a nagging question. They asked: "I still don't understand why your right arm is stronger than your left? My mouse was running all over my desk, so even though I was petting him constantly, I used both arms about evenly. Do you keep your mouse only on the right side of your desk?"

---

Later on, the three experts became fast friends, but the VSCode expert always had the strongest arms. Once they resolved their confusion, he got himself a real mouse too.

The #MastoPrompt for Thursday 1 May 2025 is:

#network

The poem or story can include the prompt word or be about the prompt word.

@ me, if you like, or just include the #MastoPrompt tag (to allow people to follow or filter their feeds), or keep your work to yourself - all the options are good as long as you're writing.

If you're including an image please do include alt-text if you’re able to.

Some time last week, the stereo-pair speakers stopped talking directly to each other. They've been using the thermostat as a repeater -- a fun, unexpected use for a mesh network with fully interoperable protocols.

Today I tried to fix things, but wow that problem runs deep! I had no idea that a v7 packet header could convey such a clear sentiment of "You tell that stupid so-and-so that I said..."

#writever Trahir

"Eh bien, je *suis* un Grand Vizir. Il est dans ma nature de trahir. Je n'y peux rien. Mais je peux au moins choisir qui je trahis, et la tête du Grand Chambellan ne revenait pas; c'est donc tant mieux qu'il ait conçu de maléfiques desseins."

#writever Betray

"Well, I *am* a Grand Vizier. My nature is to betray. I can do nothing about it. But I can at least choose whom I betray, and I never could abide the Grand Chamberlain; so it's a good thing that he was harboring evil designs, isn't it?"

The Gravity Inverter drive my ship uses to escape your planet's gravity well produces acceleration inversely proportional to mass gradient. The ELI5 is that we start out at 5G but there's a long coast at near-freefall until we reach spacetime flat enough for the jump drive. You ground grippers keep asking me why I don't upgrade to a fusion-tube drive and boost at 2G all the way. Well, you know that read-it-later list that you keep adding stuff to but it never gets shorter? Mine gets read, every trip.

Ephraim the Fool decided upon gambling as the way to raise the money he owed Cinder the Loan Shark. But Ephraim's face was an open book: the other gamblers knew at a glance if his hand was weak or strong and bet accordingly.

Ephraim was on the verge of losing everything, but by fool's luck, he won! More than enough to pay his debt. He scooped up the amount he owed, but left the rest on the #table. The others called after him, but he shook his head. "This is all I need."

Rusu no Michizane looked up with fever-dulled eyes. His leg wound stank so badly that no one would go near him. How he was still alive was a mystery.

Then again, he was a stubborn man. To make it all the way to Shiroyama, you had to be stubborn, hold honor above all things, and master a keen blade. You needed to be a man who would only retreat if Saigō Takamori ordered it.

But Saigō-sama wouldn’t order a retreat today. Beppu-sama had done him the last honors and now held Saigō-sama’s head reverently, looking for a place to hide it.

Michizane-san’s eyes fastened on the head. If only he could rise and join their final charge, he could avenge Saigō-sama and send a few more peasant levies screaming after him. He could die with honor instead of cursing the peasant who put him out of his misery.

Forever Young, a Friday Fictioneers #microfiction story.

#WritingCommunity

https://ghlearner.wordpress.com/2025/04/30/forever-young-friday-fictioneers-flash-fiction/