Instant Story

Flash fiction fresh from my fingers to your mind!

Challenge #01982-E158: Sufficient Motivation

“You can still save the world.”

“I could,” grinned the human, “if I wanted to.” Behind them, the Capital burned.

“But you won’t.” My voice was more hoarse than I’d ever heard it, and I could taste the bitterness of my own blood running down my cheek.

The human’s “shrug” was silhouetted by the flames.

“Convince me.” -- Anon Guest

What motivated a human? Greed? No. This human was already profiting from the current course of events. Events that were literally destroying everything I had known for my entire life. This world could still make it... if the human wanted to make that happen.

Sex? Gross. No. Never. Besides, the plumbing wouldn't allow their bodies to mesh. Excitement? What could possibly excite a human more than the rampant destruction currently underway?

What mattered to a human more than any of that? I wracked my brains. Going through everything I could remember about their species. And then... a moment of pure genius and inspired desperation.

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Challenge #01981-E157: One Educational Day on a Strange New World

Due to the dangerous and rather... peculiar circumstances of the mission, all crew members were assigned a personal “guardian human”.

Your human seems to hate you. At least if their glare and “sarcasm” is anything to go off of. You’ve already tried all the suggested bonding methods but you’re certain that she wouldn’t hesitate to leave you (to die! On that gods-forsaken planet!) if given the chance.

But then the storm came. -- Anon Guest

Edge Territory Planetary Survey,

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Challenge #01980-E156: Friends From the Fringe

Having grown up together in the intergalactic community equivalent of an extremely isolated orphanage, you are very confused as to why everyone seems to be terrified of your best-friend-turned-basically-sibling-because-years-of-social-isolation-will-do-that-to-you. I mean, sure. She certainly has some weird habits and ways of showing affection, and can be rather unaware of her strength at times, but she’s also the nicest, quietest, most loving and peaceful sentient you’ve ever met. So why do all the scary, known-to-be-killers species hiding from her in fear?

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Challenge #01979-E155: The Horror

We've all done it. Yelled at the screen when the 'new guys' did something to an old favourite. -- Knitnan

"They made a movie out of Sigh of the Wind!"

Kam looked at his nerd sister. "And you want me to go see it with you."

"Well... camouflage. I don't want some neckbeard mansplaining my favourite novel series to me for the entire film." Jen shrugged. Women were always challenged on their knowledge of Sigh of the Wind despite being the target

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Challenge #01978-E154: Ozimandias' Stepchild

Treasure comes in many forms. -- Knitnan

When the wealthy can afford room-sized vaults to protect themselves and their treasures, those who can't do so are bound to revolt. This is a fundamental truth. Civilisations end when the gap between the wealthiest and the rest are too large to be withstood.

When the wealthy live in secret, secure bunkers, separated from the real world by armies of their own guards and throngs of their own servants, you know the world is about

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Challenge #01977-E153: Toughen Up

humans have a passionate love affair between guns and explosions.

so much so that they decided to combine the two in fun and interesting ways -- Anon Guest

Offensensitivity Warning: Loud noises, sudden flashes of light, and human mirth at same.

Parent File: Mythbusters.

Contents: Humans test human myths by taking their mythos to the extreme. Frequent use of loud, fast projectile weapons, rockets, and bombs. The humans on record and viewing these files find the content highly amusing.

Support me on

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Challenge #01976-E152: Low Rent Catchment

booooom "What the hell was that?" "Thunder?" "Are you nuts? It's a clear sky, there's not a storm for a thousand K's." -- Anon Guest

"Different kind of thunder," said Fouthet.

Somik glared at hir as if ze had grown another head. "There is only one kind of thunder."

"There's two," insisted Fouthet. "You're of age now, so you can sense the Hidden School." And just as Somik was about to argue, ze added, "It's where the mageborn go to learn their

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Challenge #01975-E151: Toxic Culture Kills

We're all familiar with phrases like "toxic masculinity", "testosterone poisoning", and similar terms used for men whose mindset and behavior could charitably be described as "aggressively unpleasant"...

But what if all that were not just wordplay? What if "toxic masculinity" somehow actually was toxic? What if "testosterone poisoning" really was poisonous? To whom, whether it be the person themselves or those around them, I leave as a decision for the author. -- Anon Guest

The last victim of the Friendzone Killer was

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Challenge #01974-E150: Dangers Untold

Team Blue again. In this case Team Blue read fan fic. -- Anon Guest

Evo-era Nightcrawler stopped when he saw his face on a thing. It wasn't a comic book, not a book. It was thick and filled with lurid art and closely-set type. "Was ist das?"

"This is my zine," said the vendor, "Blue is My Colour. It's a collection from a bunch of fans. There's Kurtty in there as well as Kurmanda. I try to keep out the hate-fics on

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Challenge #01973-E149: Rhapsodical in Blue

More of shenanigans when "Team Blue" turn up at a convention. Nightcrawlers, Taako and the Tick. AKA "Team Blue". -- Anon Guest

[AN: This hails back to this thing that happened a little while ago.]

Good news: They were relatively harmless. Bad news: They had decided to split up and search for clues. Some Nightcrawlers were Bamfing all over the place. Some were perched on tall objects. The youngest Nightcrawler of the group was politely asking gargantuan-suited cosplayers if their outfits were

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Challenge #01972-E148: Secret Curse

Earworms, those inane or catchy little tunes that play endlessly inside your head. Good defence against telepaths though. -- Anon Guest

If there was a worse curse you could give to a human, Rache couldn't imagine one much worse than telepathy. Sure, people could look past ugly. They could ignore venomously mean and frequently did. They could, eventually, believe that disabled didn't necessarily mean worthless. But telepathy? That was a living hell.

Human minds are chaos. There's conscious thought, subconscious thought, and

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Challenge #01971-E147: Help Them Grow

[Title: the Trousers of Time] Sir Terry Prachett quote there. Some one did something, often trying to be nasty that changed your Life for the better. -- Anon Guest

[AN: I keep telling y'all please DO NOT relate the content of your prompts (which I always use) with the title (which I hardly pay attention to). It's a pain in the butt for me to derail my usual routine to make certain the prompt makes sense to my readers]

This is how

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Challenge #01970-E146: Crash Site Review

"How does it feel?" "Can you describe...?" "What do you think?" And other inane questions often asked of the accused, the shell shocked survivors of a tragedy or just some poor sod who happened to be there when something happened. -- Anon Guest

In retrospect, it is a mistake to make an emergency landing on Nolliwud. It was almost a resort planet, with a majority of the planet's industry dedicated to creating dreams. Live action, animation of varying kinds, even audio. If

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Challenge #01969-E145: Fit to Print?

News, or Scandal. Newspapers either publish accounts of what is actually happening or gossip. World situation, local concerns or who has dumped who. Which current 'star' was caught cheating on their partner. With drugs, or just legless drunk. -- Anon Guest

"What's that?" asked the newest Ambassador, G'jok.

"That is the news station. People subscribe there for the news they are interested in."

"News," Ambassador G'jok repeated the new word. "Is...?"

"Information disseminated as a public service. Updates on alliances, wars, commerce,

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Challenge #01968-E144: Bullish Behaviour

Can you please write more on Challenge #01911-E087: Uptick in Downsizing? It was probably one of the best pieces of fiction I have read in forever. I don't really know your policy regarding this kind of stuff (I may have just stumbled on this site a few hours ago and have been bingeing your writing) so I really hope I'm putting this in the right place... Either way, cheers and keep up the amazing work! -- ASingleSpeck

[AN: I welcome

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