Friday 13 August 2010

The Sucker

Apologies for the second post of the day, but I've just finished the second draft of a little bit of flash fiction (a rare piece of flash fiction, if you're me), and I thought I'd share it. Not like it's publishable or anything, as it's just a bit of fun that occurred to me when I was on holiday. Let me know what you think.

The Sucker
Peter Wilson

The Sucker was coming.

He could hear it even though he couldn’t see it, as it sent its strangely high-pitched whine through the air. It sent a chill through his body, knowing that before too long that whine would turn into a roar and that roar would translate into the hideous sucking power of a great mouth that was guaranteed to bring death.

Looking round, he realised that he had been careless in venturing out. The sound of the Sucker meant is was moments away at best, leaving him with no time to make the rush back to cover, back to the darkness of the caves at the foot of the cliff. He was adrift, exposed on the savannah-like flatlands. The Sucker couldn’t fail to notice him – it had never failed to notice any who had been careless enough to be out like this before, and he was no different from them – unless he somehow managed to get back to the caves.

It wasn’t as if there were any obstacles. His path was clear. Nothing could stop him from making the caves except the Sucker itself. He would have to try; if he didn’t, he would just be giving up without a fight. At least if he was caught on his way, he would go to his death with the consolation that he had tried his utmost. He broke into a run, seeing the cave in the cliff as the greatest treasure in the world, should he attain it; it was salvation from his mistake. Slowly, it grew larger, very black against the pale cliffside, and hope grew within him. He could just make it…

A glance over his shoulder, and hope was lost. The Sucker was there, standing as a grey tower for a moment, as though weighing him up. He stopped, knowing running now was futile, knowing he would never make the cave now. His world was the Sucker now, and he wanted to watch it as it advanced on him, the whine intensifying. He trembled momentarily as it leaned back, and a wind of hurricane force pulled at him.

He kept his feet, still staring up. He had never thought he would see the Sucker like this. He had always watched from afar as another made the mistake that sealed their fate, watching as their small forms disappeared into the maw of the Sucker. He had always assumed he was too intelligent for that to happen to him. Numbness took him as the Sucker advanced, the whine intensifying to a white noise.

Amidst the hurricane winds and the screaming din, he curled up and waited to be sucked into the vortex of the Sucker’s mouth.

* * *

Ellie White shuddered as it went up the vacuum. Old as she was, she still hated spiders.

3 comments:

  1. I love this. :) You could swap my name for Ellie White...we have a bit of a bug problem, and I always vacuum them up after I spray them with Raid, but even knowing they're dead, it skeeves me out. Usually I freak out and do a little girly "ew gross" dance when I'm done.

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  2. Very good! A nice idea, well executed. I didn't see the end coming until the last line, and I must admit that it really made the story.

    Personally, I don't vacuum spiders, because I don't like to kill them (some arachnophobe I am...). A glass, a sheet of paper, and chucking them outside works fine for me- along with a glass of something to calm my nerves afterwards. I hope they appreciate my mercy, freaky little bastards. I probably wouldn't be so generous if they were human intruders.

    Anyway, it was a very good little piece, short and punchy, exactly as flash should be. And aside from a few places where phrasing could be tightened up, it was well written.

    Now go write more.

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  3. Thanks both of you. More flash fiction might be in the offing, if I ever manage to get control over some of my ideas. This one started out as a bit of silliness involving an anarcho-democratic commune of flies in a perpetual state of war with the religious zealots of the spiders, and I actually managed to bring it under control. The aforementioned idea is probably evidence of me watching too much Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

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