I Can't Possibly Be Wrong All the Time

It’s the first of September 2023, so I went through my social media feeds and grabbed all of the MicroStories I’d tweeted during the month of August.

As a reminder, these represent story-essences composed using no more than 269 characters (so I could tweet them with the hashtag #MicroStory.)

Usually, I only tweet Science Fiction and Fantasy #MicroStories. August was no exception. I guess?

For really great #MicroStory action, please follow @MicroSFF, the Twitter account that inspired me to participate in this minimalist writing exercise. That feed puts out great science fiction and fantasy MicroStories all the time.

(I want to make it clear that @MicroSFF is *not* a Twitter account of mine. Their flash-fiction tweets are excellent. Mine are okay.)

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My companion noticed me clutching my symbol of the Almighty in my free hand.
“Your god won’t help us here,” he said.
“You doubt the reach of the Almighty? He’s the Almighty”
“Then his attention is spread out all over. Best pray to someone not deluged with prayers.”
#MicroStory

We managed to limp the ship to the alien habitat. The Flattops had told us about these abandoned places; you could dock, safely make use of any stored H2O or carbs. But repair and get out quickly.
Unexpectedly, the implicit hospitality could flip to lethal resistance.
#MicroStory

It was an unremarkable rock, very low chance of its orbit colliding with Earth, and made a good training target for the explorer craft. The lander settled into surface dust. PHA 23212 was not a monolithic rock, but millions of individual rocks. Wait, those were eggs.
#MicroStory

One day, you’re the President of the most powerful nation on Earth, and the next day aliens have given North Korea starships.
Just GAVE them starships.
#MicroStory

The desperate demon agreed to our terms.
We’d allow it to venture North, where there were only rebels and spies from Utmarch.
We were relieved that we’d not have to destroy it – killing demons carried the risk of attracting infernal attention.
Or worse, an angel’s.
#MicroStory

The planet was not as uninhabited as we’d thought: the ecologically-minded starfaring alien race was hard to detect.
Our landing crew was instructed that they should leave, and leave no traces.
That presented a problem: half of the lander was designed to stay behind.
#MicroStory

My scanners had two derelict survey ships orbiting each other, one once clearly manned, one an autonomous craft.
Interesting.
Robots are good in dangerous situations, humans when the situation was weird.
I hadn’t found anything more weird or dangerous than me.
As yet.
#MicroStory

Every wizard college library had a locked section of forbidden books of magic.
Necromancy? Demon summoning? Any sophomore could check one of those out.
Controlled tomes were healing spells, spells for curing disease, or creating feasts.
Mages required a dark rep.
#MicroStory

The alien envoy shrugged.
“We won’t be eating them or probing them, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“You’ll just — take our inmates with you into space?”
“We will, for the duration of their sentences.”
“Why?”
“It might be transformative for them.”
#MicroStory

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Thank you to everyone who reads and enjoys my small stories. I tweet flash-fiction at irregular (VERY IRREGULAR) intervals on my Twitter account, @patman23. At more regular intervals on Twitter, I’ll be talking about my weekend or television (one time it was mostly about Game of Thrones), or complaining about raking leaves off of my lawn. I say that, as if Twitter hasn’t become a dumpster fire of late. If you don’t want to go to Twitter or X, you can follow me on Mastodon or BlueSky. I need to look up the addresses.

Header image is a picture I took during a recent visit to the Kennedy Space Center. That photo belongs to me.

Want to read my earlier MicroStory collections? I have my first three years’ worth of stories HERE and the second three years’ worth of stories HERE – I might need to put together another 3 year’s worth of microstories soon.

In general, I’m fine with anyone using the text of my MicroStories for non-commercial use. (Look how cute I am, thinking someone wants to make a t-shirt from one of my flash fiction bits. I say cute, but you can substitute in some other, more appropriate, adjective. I’m not the boss of you.)

© Patrick Sponaugle 2023 Some Rights Reserved