Tag: story

FP288 – Mulligan Smith in Legacy, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and eighty-eight.

Flash PulpTonight we present Mulligan Smith in Legacy, Part 1 of 1

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp288.mp3]Download MP3
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This week’s episodes are brought to you by The Ice and Fire Convention.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, private investigator Mulligan Smith finds himself asking hard questions in a dingy roadside store.

 

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan Smith stood before a shelf of Pringles cans. Though his eyes were directed towards the parade of gassing trucks beyond the store’s broad window, his ear was cocked to the shop-keeper’s current discussion.

As he talked with his back turned, Andy Marland pushed at the nub of a tall commercial coffee dispenser and filled a cardboard cup with the Top Stop logo printed on it.

“- yeah, he built it fifty years ago, and I’ve worked here the better part of the time. The first twenty years I was just a change jiggler, but once Pops finally left his post I started having to pump the gas as well – hah, joking of course, we haven’t been full service for over a decade.”

Smith had heard the same gag told through three times in as many days, and he felt repetition had done little for its comedic merit.

The customer at the receiving end of the conversation accepted his steaming caffeine and gave the old man behind the counter a nod, then shrugged his battered denim jacket against the chill and pushed open the glass door.

Though the fuel flowed constantly outside, most payments were handled at the pump, allowing Mulligan a moment alone with the pot-bellied proprietor.

The private investigator watched himself slide from fish-eyed mirror to fish-eyed mirror as he approached the front of the store. No angle was left uncovered, but dotted between the round reflectors were the endlessly winking red lights of security cameras.

Mulligan SmithMulligan happened to be familiar with the models – hi definition units wirelessly connecting back to a central recorder. It appeared the station’s owner had sprung for a package generally reserved for warehouses and large offices; there was nowhere to sneeze in the building without being watched by at least four lenses.

Before the counterman could begin his spiel, Smith stepped in with his own.

“You keep the place alone? It must suck always being chained to the spot.”

Marland raised a brow. “This is my legacy. My father picked this place like a prospector pans for gold. He drove up and down three states to find this spot, and I’ve been working this counter for the thirty years since he died. Those doors have been open every day but one – the day of Joanie’s funeral – and that’s the only time I’ve ever wanted off.”

Smith shrugged. “I hear what you’re saying, but I see you saying it from behind a thirty-year-old counter – a counter that mainly sees the sale of cigarettes and energy drinks to long haul truckers. I mean, wasn’t a trailer involved in your wife’s death? A cowboy making a lane change without looking?”

“It was late. She was minding the till while I had some supper. Who are you to be asking?”

“I’m the snoop Misha Taylor hired.”

A smile came to Marland’s face fully formed, an alarm response as automatic as the thick recessed security shutters slamming down. He said, “who?”

“The wife of a guy who drifted into oncoming traffic, and a single mom with her three kids in the back seat. It was a couple weeks ago, you might have seen it in the newspapers you never manage to sell?”

“What does any of that have to do with me?”

“That’s what I’m asking. Maybe you had a grudge against the big rig guys, but I think it was more than that. I think you were angry about watching so many people a day hop on that highway and slip away. All you see is taillights, you never see the journey. I don’t think the resentment is over your wife alone, I think it was because you were anchored here.

A twitch formed at the edge of Andy’s grin. “Did you stop here to do meth in the bathroom? I’ve had to run your kind out before.”

“You should have just sold the damn place. You could have been telling stories about how your father’s legacy was an ocean-side condo down in Florida, but, speaking of high powered chemicals, you have a tough time sleeping, Andy? Those pills only come by prescription.”

Marland’s hands seemed to grow flatter with each statement, and Smith worried they would soon break through the transparent plastic that housed the scratch tickets beneath.

“Things change,” said Smith,” and not always for the better. You either flow with that change, or you risk losing yourself to it. Look at those mirrors, the shutters, the cameras. Look where the money’s going – not in presentation, not in building on what your father handed you – it’s all invested in distrust.

“My theory is that you hate this place, and the people who visit it, but it’s all you have because you’re too afraid to change anything. You bury it deep, but it’s there.

“Problem is, change, well, you need to roll with change, or change’ll trample you. These cameras, for instance – your system works fine, but you’ve still got the default password on everything. I’ve spent the last three days sitting in your parking lot with a laptop.

“I figure maybe you didn’t mean to hurt anyone when you started dropping those Ativans in with their joe. When you began, maybe you figured you’d teach those rig wranglers a lesson by forcing them off the road for a nap – but I did the math. Pretty simple, really. Those boys move quick, which saved you for a while – they’d be a state or two away before they finally passed out and coasted into a ditch. Oh, I’m sure plenty of them bunked down first, but I pulled together a bunch of news reports on an online map. It basically gave me a big circle, and from there it was just a matter of making it smaller and smaller.

“It took a while, but you’d be amazed how much a trucker makes in a year, and Misha loved her husband dearly. Time was all it took to make the circle as tight as these walls.”

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

FP281 – Mulligan Smith and The Reformed Man, Part 1 of 3

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and eighty-one.

Flash PulpTonight we present Mulligan Smith and The Reformed Man, Part 1 of 3
(Part 1Part 2Part 3)
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp281.mp3]Download MP3
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This week’s episodes are brought to you by The Dark Wife.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, private investigator Mulligan Smith dines at the edge of a crime scene.

 

Mulligan Smith and The Reformed Man, Part 1 of 3

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan SmithThe client had been vague in his instructions: “Check out the crime scene and get a feel for the area before your meeting, the following day, with Cassie Withers.”

Smith was no stranger to any of Capital City’s neighbourhoods, but he had done his best to earn his pay. The downtown alley in question was a narrow run between a college bar, whose ownership was in constant rotation, and a shuttered shop with a sun-worn sign that read “Taj Mahal Grocery.”

Mulligan continued to stare at the lane, though the afternoon had worn away to evening, and the growing shadows were unlikely to provide any new information on the death of Donnie Benton. As he eyed the gloom, the P.I. tapped a cooling mozzarella stick against his not-quite-clean plate.

His friend, Billy Winnipeg, had selected the nearest eatery to the location of the murder; a pub-style hangout with a sidewalk patio, which was otherwise devoid of patrons due to summering students. The seating area consisted of five plastic tables trapped in a box of wrought iron barricades, and the view was making it difficult for Smith to enjoy his client-billed dinner.

Billy, who was retelling a particularly embarrassingly vomit-filled incident from his mother’s time as a motel cleaning woman, was having no difficulty disposing of either of his hamburgers. Between the tale and the food, the thick-fingered Canadian had no attention left for his friend’s lack of appetite.

Mulligan’s gaze wandered down the street, to a gray-bearded man in the process of turning in his sleep. Even as his fingerless gloves worked at maintaining the newspapers that made up his bench-bed’s blanket, the slumberer’s snores continued.

The free meal bothered Smith. Why had he been hired? Two of the client’s university friends had been murdered, three years apart, but he had nothing else to add. Had the victims been into anything nefarious? He didn’t know. Were the dead pair close? He couldn’t say, they hadn’t been in touch.

Yet Mulligan’s employer was willing to pay for a professional snoop to walk in the C.C.P.D.’s footsteps.

The detective dipped his fried cheese in the complementary marinara sauce, but the red glaze failed to make it any more appealing.

Somewhere beyond the restless hobo, a chant drifted in on the still August air, and, within moments, the pavement filled with a throng of angry slogans and wildly swinging flashlights.

The Church of the Burning Christ had taken publicized stands against recent military actions overseas, going so far as to protest the funerals of local soldiers, but, to most of the city’s dwellers, they were best known for their signage and roadside homilies.

From the opposite direction came a lone woman, wearing a long leather coat and a studded choker. A pair of white earbuds – matching her facial makeup – thrust some unknown beat into her ears, splashing that which would not fit back into the boulevard.

Despite the approaching gauntlet, the girl did not swerve in her course, and Mulligan, though he did not know her, gave a respectful half-wave as she passed.

She had just enough time to give him a resigned shrug in reply, then the shouting began.

It started with the leader of the group, a red-headed man with full day’s stubble on his cheeks.

“And when Jehu was come to Jezreel, Jezebel heard of it; and she painted her face, and tired her head, and looked out at a window,” he announced to the crowd at his back.

His congregation snickered, raising higher their hand-scrawled declarations.

From his position, Mulligan could easily read two “God Hates Fags” and a “You’re Going To Hell.”

“Harlots stain their faces many colours,” continued the preacher’s impromptu sermon, “but all are equally whorish.”

There came the scrape of plastic on stone, and Winnipeg rose from the ruins of his meal.

“Hey,” he said. The word rose like thunder from the depths of his throat. “My mom spent a few years as a hard hustling whore. It ain’t easy. They don’t call them working girls for nothing.”

Smith knew it to be a lie, but the few seconds of distraction were enough to let the leathered woman slip through their net of beratement.

Over the collar of his crisp white shirt, the evangelist’s neck took on a shade not unlike that of his hair.

He turned to his followers.

“Leviticus tells a tale we must now recall: “Now an Israelite woman’s son, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the people of Israel. And the Israelite woman’s son and a man of Israel fought in the camp, and the Israelite woman’s son blasphemed the Name, and cursed. Then they brought him to Moses. His mother’s name was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan. And they put him in custody, till the will of the Lord should be clear to them. Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Bring out of the camp the one who cursed, and let all who heard him lay their hands on his head, and let all the congregation stone him.’

“Did you hear this heathen’s accent? Just as the half-breed egyptian came into the camp of the Israelites, so too has this foreigner – a Canadian, and the admitted son of a prostitute – come to speak to us of corruption.”

A cacophony of slurs rolled from the crowd, but, having accomplished his task, Billy simply sat back down.

Mulligan raised an eyebrow and asked, “you going to let them talk to you like that that?”

The weight of Winnipeg’s arms strained the workmanship of the table as his glass of beer disappeared within his fingers’ grasp. He lifted the mug as if it were the first drink after a day’s heavy labour: With a smile, and entirely oblivious to the troubles beyond its rim.

“Talking shit is all we’ve got,” he said. “Mom says its a universal right – one of the few. Talking shit and dying are really the only two things you can never stop people from doing. You can make laws about it, but then people just think they’re badasses because they’re talking shit in private.

”You gotta treat these sorts of folks like those little dogs, the yapping buggers. Kicking them just makes ‘em worse. You live with one for a while, and leave ‘em alone, it gets to a point where you don’t even notice the constant barking anymore.”

Realizing they’d get no further reaction out of the chatting pair, the crusaders marched on.

Smith grinned. “I’ve never known you to back away from the opportunity to lob a fist.”

“I’m a reformed man,” responded Billy. “No more punch ups.”

“Why the change of heart?”

“Well, as Gandhi once said, “I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.””

As the members of the Church of the Burning Christ turned the block’s corner, Mulligan’s smile turned to a smirk. Over Winnipeg’s shoulder, however, he could see the formerly sleeping man creeping in his direction, an ear cocked to the wind, so that he might guess the distance of the warbling assembly.

It was clear he had no interest in remaining long enough for the hostile flock to return.

“Besides,” said Winnipeg, after draining his ale, “Ma says she’ll be pissed if I lay anyone else out.”

Donnie Benton’s final moments came to Mulligan then – the pain that must have blossomed from the crown of his skull as the two-by-four landed, the impact of his cheek on the cool cement, the utter indifference the world outside the alley had shown his last breath.

It didn’t seem like much of a neighbourhood for pacifism.

Lifting his hand to summon the bill, Smith nudged his abandoned dinner towards the passing homeless man, who, in turn, gratefully filled his pockets.

 

(Part 1Part 2Part 3)

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

FPGE11 – Mulligan Smith in The Cinema Show, by Rich "the Time Traveller" Jefferson

Welcome to Flash Pulp Guest-isode 011.

Flash PulpTonight we present Mulligan Smith in The Cinema Show, by Rich Jefferson

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This episode is brought to you by The Mob.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight we present a tale of everyone’s favourite private investigator, as provided by our very own time traveller.

 

Mulligan Smith in The Cinema Show

Written by Rich “the Time Traveller” Jefferson
with Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio Production by Jessica May

 

Mulligan Smith

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

FP280 – Ruby Departed: Circles, Part 3 of 3

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and eighty.

Flash PulpTonight we present Ruby Departed: Circles, Part 3 of 3
(Part 1Part 2Part 3)
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp280.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Radio Project X.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Ruby attempts to save a life not from the shambling dead, but, instead, from post-apocalyptic justice.

 

Ruby Departed: Circles, Part 3 of 3

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Ruby Departed

Story text to be posted.

(Part 1Part 2Part 3)

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

FP279 – Ruby Departed: Circles, Part 2 of 3

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and seventy-nine.

Flash PulpTonight we present Ruby Departed: Circles, Part 2 of 3
(Part 1Part 2Part 3)
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp279.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Radio Project X.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Ruby hears more than just the moans of the voracious dead.

 

Ruby Departed: Circles, Part 2 of 3

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Ruby Departed

Story text to be posted.

(Part 1Part 2Part 3)

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

FP277 – Identification, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and seventy-seven.

Flash PulpTonight we present Identification, Part 1 of 1

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp277.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Strangely Literal.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, we tell a chilling tale regarding a risky child in a neighbourhood of constant hazard.

 

Identification

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

ChillerNathaniel Minor had been born with a curious inability to identify danger.

On a September Monday, at the age of ten, Nathaniel had selected his blue and white striped shirt – his favourite, and thus the first be worn after a weekend’s laundry – folded it neatly on his dresser, then tested the temperature by walking out onto the back deck in nothing more than the underpants he’d slept in.

An early-autumn chill drove him back inside, and into a warm pair of jogging pants.

After devouring a bowl of lucky charms, and planting a kiss on his Mother’s distracted cheek,
he was ready to march the three blocks to school.

As he closed the door behind him, Mrs. Minor provided her usual instructions. “Head straight there, no talking to strangers, no goofing around. Be good, love you, Nate. Bye.”

His initial stop came at the midpoint of the chain-link fence that marked the border between the sidewalk and the row of townhouses that marched alongside it.

He began digging through his bright yellow knapsack, and, as he did so, a burly Labrador Retriever he called Mumphrey came bolting through the sliding patio door of the nearest rental unit. Though the animal’s speed made it tough to identify why he thought so, Nathaniel was left with the impression that his visitor was in even more ragged a condition than usual.

Minor had decided to befriend the mutt earlier that summer, when he’d watched the red-brown canine step onto the small porch that lead to the backyard. There was something to the way the dog stood testing the air that reminded Nathaniel of himself, and he’d spent fifteen minutes in idle conversation with his new chum before settling on the name.

The child had also concluded that Mumphrey’s owners must sleep late, as the Lab seemed in constant need of food when he strolled by – why else would the four-legged beast leap against the fence while barking and generally causing a ruckus?

As he’d done every morning since, the boy retrieved the single slice of bologna from his sandwich, and, careful not to dirty his hand with mayo, he tossed it over the metal links.

Mumphrey ceased his intemperate barking to gobble down the processed meat, then he immediately returned to his assault on the barrier. Nathaniel, however, had already moved on.

At the corner the youth encountered Tobias Swanson, his constant companion since an incident the summer previous, in which the slightly older boy had pulled a sputtering Nate from too-deep water at the local beach.

Their conversation began as it had ended the afternoon previous, when they’d parted on the same spot.

“Maybe you’re right about absorbing his atomic breath,” said Tobias, “but King Kong would still be defeated by Godzilla’s physical attacks. He’s got, like, blades on his back and a huge biting mouth. What can King Kong do? Throw his own poo?”

Nathaniel shrugged. He did not have his friend’s love of giant monster films, but he always did his best to carry his part of the conversation.

“Kong is a great climber. He’d get up on top of a building and start chucking people and antennas and stuff.”

“Being hit in the nose by a guy in a business suit isn’t exactly going to stop Godzilla,” replied Tobias.

The debate continued for the rest of the long block, until they encountered a schoolmate known largely as Bull.

“You ladies headed to school?” he asked.

“Aren’t you?” asked Nathaniel.

“Nuh-uh, I’m sick. Mom called and told ‘em – but you ain’t going today either.”

The day before the start of classes, while loitering at the McKinley Playground, Bull had convinced the fearless boy to climb a massive elm. Tobias had been late in returning from his piano lessons, and, by the time he’d arrived, it had been necessary to scale the tree to its midpoint just to have his shouts of “come down!” be heard.

As Nathaniel finally dropped the last few feet to the ground, he’d found his friend weeping anxious tears. It was the sight of his worry that had turned Bull into an enemy of both.

When news of the incident had reached Mrs. Minor over a soothing pair of chocolate milks, she’d been quick to inform her son he was out of the tree climbing business, as well as that of talking to Bull.

To her son her word was law – and it was only this notion that had kept him safe against his peculiar defect.

“Great,” said Nathaniel, as he attempted to edge around his antagonist, “you enjoy hanging out with your mom. We’ve gotta go.”

The problem, of course, was that the apparent act of courage had simply goaded the ruffian further.

“No, I don’t think you heard me, you’re -”

Tobias put his arm out in an attempt to motion the obstruction aside, and Bull responded with his fist.

For a moment Nathaniel stood still, not quite sure how to react – then he caught the split in his comrade’s lip.

Although the violence had baffled him, blood was something his mother had ruled on: Blood meant finding an adult, or at least a phone, as quickly as possible.

He bolted for home.

“Hell no, you ain’t tellin’,” said Bull, as he began to follow.

The accidental daredevil’s speed was also his downfall. A full tilt run had left him with a cramp, and, as he neared Mumphrey’s home, he was forced to slow.

It was the sight of the half-open door, and the memory of his friend’s red chin, that compelled Nathaniel to clamber onto the chain link.

Close up the maroon vertical blinds he’d seen so often from the road were filthy, and the smell wafting from the interior reminded the schoolboy of his mother’s cooking on liver and onion night.

“I need to use your phone, my friend is bleeding,” Nathaniel told the shadows beyond the slats.

When he received no reply, he pushed inside, unaware of Bull jumping the fence behind him.

The attempted-rescuer entered the galley kitchen as the young thug slipped into the living room. The unit’s cooking space was nothing more than an L-shaped counter and a single-seated white-topped table, but there was a second exit, at the far end, which opened onto the front hallway. Much to Nathaniel’s disappointment, there was no phone on the wall to match the one hung in his own home, so he turned a quick eye over the greasy wallpaper and heavily scratched cupboard doors, then moved on to the opposite hall.

As he stepped through, Bull’s Nikes touched down on the dirt-covered linoleum.

Oblivious to the trail of mud which stained the stairs, Nathaniel decided to expand his search to the upper floor.

“Mumphrey?” he asked, as he climbed, but still he received no response.

He found a phone, finally, in the master bedroom. It stood on a small black nightstand beside the decaying carcass of its owner.

The room had been decorated in a variety of unicorn posters, a theme broken only by the black slab of television that had been hung alongside them. What lingered of their owner – a once rotund woman of forty – lay spread across the shimmering moonlight scene of her bedspread.

In many places her remains were little more than bones, as the Labrador, having emptied his dish a month previous, could not afford to be sentimental regarding his meals.

“That’s pretty gross,” Nathaniel said aloud.

It was then that Bull rushed the doorway – but, before he might tackle his target, his feet seemed to meet a terrible resistance at what his mind was observing.

He screamed.

The noise was enough to raise Mumphrey, who’d been dreaming of light and colour and meat in the coolest corner of its den, the bath tub.

The dog awoke hungry.

It paused briefly at its feeding room, to snort Nate’s mix of running sweat and deodorant, then it moved on.

Bull was nearly to the ground floor by the time the canine had picked up his urine-tainted scent, but, nonetheless, it was a tight race to the fence.

Still inside, Nathaniel closed the bedroom door against the noise, and, with a steady hand, dialed home.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

FPSE13 – Another Rescue

Welcome to Flash Pulp, Special Episode 13.

Flash PulpTonight we present Another Rescue, Part 1 of 1

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulpSE13.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Strangely Literal.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight we return to The Hundred Kingdoms, and the perils that lie within its fantastic borders.

 

Another Rescue

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

In the depths of the Ogre King’s inkiest cave, Duchess Lilian Mildred was weighing the stench that filled her nostrils against the idea of enraging her guards to the point of shortening her life – and thus her current captivity.

It was not a serious thought, but her imprisonment amongst the brute lords had been nothing if not dull, and her mind had begun to wander.

She’d stood in the cell some twenty hours, with arms pulled high by hanging chains affixed to the rock wall.

Skinner Co.Despite the ache in her limbs, she considered the accommodations melodrama implemented only to heighten the price of ransom once a remote seer was engaged to determine the veracity of her captors’ demands.

This was a frustration, as her uncle, Archduke Mildred, was something of a miser, and would no doubt hold the debt against her till she repaid it or died.

She had not intended to have her caravan hijacked – there was no other route home from the capital but the Queen’s highway, and there was no choice but to take it when the court season had ended. Her party had been no different in size or composure than the Archduke’s own daughter’s, though she’d made her way north to tour instead of heading directly to her father’s keep.

Lilian sighed at her fate, but it simply forced her to draw in another lungful of her watchers’ reek.

The tedium ceased, however, when another of the twisted-faced ruffians approached. This one was little more than a youth, and, though she could not translate his grunts, her two ripe guardians departed briskly at his words.

Within moments, the sounds of bragging and clashing steel could be heard from the corridor beyond.

A man appeared, leading a band of stout-armed warriors. The newcomer wore a patch over one eye, and his hair swept back in a tight top knot. The chain-mail across his belly had been breached, but his mouth carried a wolfish grin.

His blade dripped with the tale of his handiwork.

“Duchess?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied. “The Archduke sent you?”

She rattled her chains gently as she spoke, with the notion that her saviour might free her as he explained – his reply was, “not quite.”

She could see he had the key in his hand, and yet he stalled.

It’s meaning was clear to the bound woman: Whoever had financed her rescue – whoever would garner the praise for her heroic recovery – would only enter once the area was proven safe.

As she waited, she set herself to hoping that the impending Prince, or Duke, or – Gods forbid – Merchant Lord was seeking reputation and renown, and was not of an appropriate age for marriage. The Duchess had come by her title by inheritance, and, regardless of her recent waylaying, she looked forward to wearing away some of its shine before she was forced to carry its full weight behind the tall stone walls of Baldenkirk, her home.

Finally, a thin-faced boy in velvet garments entered the room. It was obvious he made some attempt to mute his trumpet’s note, but, in the tight space, its sounding still left a ringing in Lilian’s ears.

It was to this accompaniment that Prince Cornelius Galen filled her view. He now held the cuffs’ key in his palm.

“Milady,” he said, “even under the duress of this terrible calamity, you are striking.”

Cornelius was but one of the thousand younglings that stood within the shadow of the crown, and Lillian’s few interactions with his house had left her cold – and yet she knew that, even now, he likely had minstrels, out of sight, composing odes regarding the perils he’d faced to win her.

It would be her own people who would pay highest coin for the swollen tales of his gallantry, and she knew the songs would likely arrive at her borders before she did. She would have to weight the purses of many crooners if she hoped to counteract his nuptial narrative.

“It seems your uncle has claimed his coffers are bare,” continued the prince, “but, do not fear, your peasants have gathered quite a bounty in their temple bowls.

“That said, I’m not here for the silver – I hope to collect a greater reward.”

Lilian could not deny her gratitude at the rescue, and it was this, and the fact that she remained chained, that kept her tongue steady.

“Truly this is too rough a place to speak of love, milord, “ she replied.

He hadn’t spoken of any such thing, of course, but she was released from the wall nonetheless.

The Prince and Duchess’ ascent was a stroll behind a threshing screen of steel, as the hired arms made short work of any rotund brute who was sleepy-eyed enough to stumble from the burrows that branched from the shaft’s main column.

A second force of mercenaries and balladeers greeted them at the tunnel’s mouth while scanning the surrounding hills and fingering the tools of their occupation.

All were soon mounted, but the ride was a harried one.

The Ogre King had hastily mustered his troops, and their legs held fury enough to them keep apace with the fleeing stallions.

It became plain that combat was imminent by the time they made Cannibal’s Hollow, a mountainous protrusion at the bottom of a wide rimmed valley that was known largely for its desolation.

As Lilian climbed the path to the bottleneck that marked their only chance of organizing a defense, she took some solace in the knowledge that a premature death would at least save her from a premature marriage.

Dying a martyr would also make for much better songs.

The patch-wearing captain strode the line, slapping shoulders and lifting spirits, as Lilian and her unwanted Prince watched from a nook above. Their perch also gave them a clear view of the approaching horde, although she found their battle chants more than sufficient warning.

She guessed them at ten leagues – then five. Then two.

Her husband-to-be’s voice became like sugar, and the duchess soon realized he sought a kiss to lessen his sense of peril. She’d bussed worse, and yet she withheld her lips with indignation – her greatest danger in her cell had been her escort’s stench.

“I am pleased, at least, that my last sight shall be of you,” he said.

Wincing, she replied, “ease your words, it’s more likely we’ll both be soon held against ransom.”

He coughed. “Well, I might, but your uncle has already turned down the offer, as I’ve mentioned. Still, I will stand and fight for you – should it be necessary.”

“Oh, certainly not – the cost would be too high.” Lilian’s gaze held on the writhing mass of clubs and poorly concealed flesh. They were no further than a half-league.

Cornelius smiled. “Perhaps you might make some down payment then? With an embrace?”

His brazen phrases were cut short, however, by the shadows of a hundred kites breaking over the vista’s edge: They were frames of the Royal Contrivers, the Queen’s engineers.

Under their gliding shade came on a host so immense it stretched the horizon, and at its lead cantered the warhorse Gwelmere, who had once pulled straight the crooked tower of the sorcerer Al’Min.

On the beast’s back rode the woman who’d broken him: Sofia Esperon, Queen of the Hundred Kingdoms.

Though not but the fury in her eyes was visible behind her plate and mail, it was obvious she was displeased.

With a raise of her onrushing hand, the wicker and canvas structures let loose from the marching strings that made up their only earthly bonds, and, catching the wind, their creaking and pondering passage carried them into the ranks of the surging ogres.

Each impact delivered an explosive wrath.

Holding high her ebony spear, the queen summoned ten thousand arrows, then ten thousand more.

Behind her, the roar of the Royal Guard’s war-bears was enough to drown the wild drums and chorus, which had now shifted to a rhythm of retreat.

As the savage multitude moved up, and beyond, the distant crest, Sofia Esperon did not follow.

Instead, she turned her attention to the prince, and his supposed prize.

Removing her helm, the monarch strode through the untested line of hired swordsman.

For the first time that day, Lilian felt true relief.

Cornelius only smiled and waved at his regent.

Sofia Esperon’s voice easily cut the distance to their airy post, and the hired singers and sword-arms averted their smirks to avoid risking their pay.

“Oh,” said the queen, “quite pleased that you’re out of danger, are you?”

The prince ceased his greeting.

“Has he made overtures?” Sofia asked the former prisoner.

Lilian nodded.

“I did not come,” continued Esperon, “to deal with those foul-mouthed gluttons. I unfurled my banners because I knew such blue-blooded scoundrels would be skulking about, looking to capitalize on a hostage’s distress.”

“What sort of man seeks to bind the hand of a woman while her wrists are still aching from the manacles of her kidnappers?”

It was the duchess’ turn to grin – and well she might, as the queen’s poets would be profoundly inspired by her tenacity for months to come.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

  • Car Door Slam by sdfalk
  • Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

    – and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

    FP276 – Mulligan Smith and The Jailhouse Lover, Part 1 of 1

    Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and seventy-six.

    Flash PulpTonight we present Mulligan Smith and The Jailhouse Lover, Part 1 of 1

    [audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp276.mp3]Download MP3
    (RSS / iTunes)

     

    This week’s episodes are brought to you by Dead Kitchen Radio.

     

    Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

    Tonight, private investigator Mulligan Smith finds himself listening to a tale of prison romance.

     

    Mulligan Smith and The Jailhouse Lover

    Written by J.R.D. Skinner
    Art and Narration by Opopanax
    and Audio produced by Jessica May

     

    “Power windows? Fuck power windows,” Walmart Mike was saying.

    The Mercedes-Benz alongside the Tercel pulled away from the stoplight.

    Mulligan had offered the old man a ride home after discovering him waiting out the downtown bus in a plexiglas shelter, but he hadn’t expected much in the way of a conversation.

    Mulligan SmithThe greeter asked, “you know those flicks where some a-hole with a moustache finds himself facing off against twenty guys and he just stands behind his jalopy and blasts them all? Yeah, I knew this idiot, Dustin Cameron, who actually tried it. He was on parole, but he couldn’t resist living big. Drove around in a boat of a Cadillac. First car I ever rode in with power windows.

    “Only because he bought me lunch, you understand – I was done with the life by then.”

    Mike paused, drumming his fingers on the passenger-side door’s armrest.

    “Few weeks later he rolls on a couple hard-cases who were bothering his employers. Stops his road yacht in the middle of the street, stands up from the driver seat, and levels a Colt .45 – blam, blam, blam.

    “I’m guessing that he was coked out of his mind, but they didn’t mention it in the papers.

    “Anyhow, one of the pair drops, but the other’s quick, and he gets his own peashooter in play.

    “The two of ‘em keep doing the squint and squeeze for a few more seconds, until they’re both clicking at each other, then, full of adrenaline, the idiot gets back in the caddy and starts to drive away.

    “Apparently his windshield had several holes in it, and his goddamn engine must’ve looked like a sieve. A block on he realized that his brakes were pooched, and that he couldn’t stop at the light. A FedEx truck moving through the cross traffic hit ‘im in the trunk, though. Spun the car around and made it stall – but the impact was also enough to spark a fire.

    “Some pedestrians who hadn’t seen what he’d been running from came pounding the pavement toward him, looking to pull him clear before it was too late, but he jerked out of his shock suddenly, and his first instinct was to bring his big pistol up.

    “Well, of course everyone stepped the fuck back.

    “He panicked, threw the piece in the rear seat, and started yelling for help. At that point, though, no ones really excited about giving it a second go.

    “People could see him slamming at the power windows, but they were as dead as the rest of the car. He tried kicking at the glass, but his sneakers kept bouncing. By the time he thought to look for the Colt, the Cadillac was so full of smoke he probably couldn’t see where he’d dropped it – he cooked before he found it.”

    Mulligan whistled. There was a note of emotion in his passenger’s telling that seemed heavier than the story – one more tale of violence in the hundred he’d heard previously – so, rather than trample a carefully prepared runway, the private investigator otherwise maintained his silence.

    After a moment, Mike cleared his throat.

    “It’s funny, in prison people hustle hard for just a bit of sugar,” he said. “That’s where I met Dustin. There was this guy, real prison house Cyrano, you know, used to write letters for him. Well, really, the guy did it for a lot of folks. Some illiterate liquor store holdup man would wander off to him in the yard and say “Hey, it’s me and my lady’s third anniversary, can I get a poem?” The writer’d ask a few questions – you know, get a feel for what their relationship was like – and then he’d wander off and scrawl a little something.

    “In exchange, Cyrano would score a couple of packages of Twinkies from the canteen. Kept him fat through the cold months.

    “Hell, he was no Shakespeare, but a lot of those guys barely knew how to read.

    “Dustin and him got in pretty good. Came to the point where Cameron would just bring his words from home over to Cyrano’s bunk to have ‘em read, then the ghostwriter would spit something out and collect his sweets.

    “Thing is, after a few months, the scribbler falls for the girl. Can’t blame him, really – he had no one writing him, and she was always hella enthusiastic about his messages.

    “I was always under the impression that maybe it was as close to a romance as Dustin ever gave her, even if it was a sham.

    “There’s a limit to what you can say, you know – what they’ll let pass through the mail – but things got as hot as they could under the warden’s watchful letter opener.

    “Maybe that’s why Cameron stopped wanting to write as often, and waited before swinging by Cyrano’s bunk. The correspondence, and Twinkies, slowed to a trickle.

    “Now, Dustin was to be in for twenty. Didn’t happen that way – he did just over six before he was released to go down in his blaze of glory – but, as far as we knew, he was in for a full shift.

    “Cyrano, however, was short, and he couldn’t shut the woman from his mind, even if he’d only seen her in a grainy picture taped to Dustin’s wall.

    “Two months before he’s to be pushed out the gate, Cameron started a major ruckus in the yard and got himself shoved in the hole for a little thinking time.

    “He was still there when lover-boy went through the door.

    “My understanding is that, while Cyrano wasn’t proud of it, he looked in on Mrs. Cameron not long after. Guess he’d written her address enough times to have it memorized.

    “It was a small apartment on the west side of the city – he caught her exiting her door, dolled to the hilt and glowing like a classy pinup. She was pulling a gent along behind her, and the both of them were grinning as if they were kids sneaking out from under the bleachers.

    “Dustin had a temper, so I suppose she can’t be blamed for not being in a hurry to piss him off by delivering the news that they were done. She did theoretically have a couple decades.”

    “Right, well, Cyrano just apologized and said he’d meant stop on the floor above – said he must have hit the wrong button in the elevator, can you believe that, ha, ha, ha. Then he ran like a kicked dog.

    “Haven’t seen him in quite a while, actually.”

    Years of practice had guided the pacing of Mike’s telling, and, as he finished, Mulligan was nosing his ancient Tercel into the parking lot of the ex-con’s residence.

    “What do I owe ya?” asked the elder man, still wearing his blue work-smock.

    Smith smiled. “Nothing, as always – though, honestly, I now have a terrible hankering for a Twinkie.”

    Mike scowled, but found he couldn’t hold it, and was forced to shift to a red-cheeked grin.

    “C’mon inside,” he said, “I happen to have a few in the fridge.”

     

    Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

    Freesound.org credits:

  • Car Door Slam by sdfalk
  • Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

    – and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

    FP275 – Dwelling, Part 1 of 1

    Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and seventy-five.

    Flash PulpTonight we present Dwelling, Part 1 of 1

    [audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp275.mp3]Download MP3
    (RSS / iTunes)

     

    This week’s episodes are brought to you by Dead Kitchen Radio.

     

    Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

    Tonight, a young boy finds himself unable to fully escape a haunted house.

     

    Dwelling, Part 1 of 1

    Written by J.R.D. Skinner
    Art and Narration by Opopanax
    and Audio produced by Jessica May

     

    The trouble began late one Halloween evening.

    Under the uncaring gaze of a flock of plastic ghosts hung on an elm across the street, a trio of fourteen-year-old boys were sizing up the rotting shutters and peeling yellow paint of 186 Bunten Road – and, unknown to them, the house was taking their measure in return.

    ChillerTwo of the youths were dressed similarly, having adopted the personas of Jake and Elwood Blues, while the third, Samuel Curry, was dressed as Clark Kent. The costumes had been hasty choices made only once they’d realized their growing desire for maturity had yet to outweigh their need for candy. Church suits, cheap sunglasses, and Jake’s father’s fedora collection had simplified matters, and Sam had but to mousse up, and expose the Superman t-shirt he was already wearing, to perfect his attire.

    It was perhaps his too-handsome looks which brought the Blues Brothers to challenge Curry with a dare of entry into the reputedly haunted property.

    “Sure, if it isn’t locked tight,” was his final reply, and the hat-wearers smiled.

    The false Kryptonian was somewhat disheartened to discover the door ajar, but he moved on nonetheless.

    Digging his key chain from his pocket, the boy engaged the small flashlight which he’d long ago hung on the ring, and pushed through the tight antechamber which preceded the front hall.

    The second entrance provided no more resistance than the first, despite its heft.

    The building was a remnant of another age. Its armour was red brick, and its gilding, from frames to wainscoting, were of heavy oak. Even its innermost entryways held a bulk unheard of in modern construction. The occult symbols which crowded its woodwork were rarer still.

    Inside, Sam was provided with a pair of choices – a passage to the left, which seemed to lead to a darkened living room, or, on the right, a set of stairs rising to the second floor. The agreed objective was the solitary unshuttered window facing the street, a pane on the story above, and the boy lay his sneaker on the gray carpet which ran down the center of the flight.

    As he did so, the exterior most door slammed shut.

    Sam decided it was only the wind – and held to it when the nearer slab also closed.

    It was this tenacity that goaded the house.

    In the kitchen below, a vodka bottle – abandoned atop the counter some years earlier by a startled drunk – shattered on the dusty linoleum.

    The lad, at the head of the steps, ignored it.

    He could see the opening that would lead to the end of his quest, and his focus was completely on his goal.

    With a steady stride, he passed into the former bedroom. He had no time for the black and white leaves that filled the wallpaper, nor the constellation of unidentifiable stains which littered its floor – his eyes clung firmly to the square of illumination from the streetlamps beyond.

    When he peered out, however, he discovered that his companions didn’t have his stomach for unexpected slamming.

    They were gone.

    Turning, Sam readied himself to retrace his route. Ten strides carried him to the cusp of the hall, and an eleventh would have put him safely outside the bedchamber, if it had not been for the sudden closing of the exit.

    The hinged weight landed solidly on his leg, snapping bone below his knee, and the adolescent screamed.

    Pinned in place, he had no option but to watch the corridor’s thick carpet writhe with mirth.

    It was all too much for Samuel, and the teen lapsed into shock-induced unconsciousness.

    He awoke to fresh agony, when the oak frame impacted twice more. His position shifted slightly with each hit, so that, though no blow landed in the same place, the shards of his tibia were churned into fragments, then splinters.

    The boy realized, with horror, that the door was chewing on him.

    The maw again swung wide, but, before a third bite might be taken, Sam dug his nails into the roiling carpet, and pulled himself forward.

    Emitting a mix of grunts and tears, he crawled to the stairs, then down them.

    The structure briefly considered heaving the rug to toss the child the distance, thus assuring an abrupt snapping of his neck at the bottom, but there was too much risk of becoming a known danger to the public.

    No, it decided, permitting an escape would ensure its reputation – ensure the fear it needed.

    Sam had made it to the lower-most step when flashing red lights began to pour through the no-longer-shuttered windows of the first floor.

    Within moments, dual flashlights were probing the boy’s ashen face.

    “I fell,” was the extent of the explanation he provided as the officers transported him to Capital City General.

    No one doubted him.

    * * *

    For a time the house was content.

    On another Halloween, four years later, it had scared away a similar group of explorers through simply swinging wide its front-facing slats while their backs were turned. Six months following that, it had allowed a stray Boston Terrier to enter its basement, only to hold it prisoner until it collapsed from starvation. The residence felt its carcass would make a nice surprise for some future adventurer – but none came till the second summer following, when a bored man in a fine suit made his way inside.

    Having grown bored and hungry, the trap set itself to its best behaviour, as if laying out its tongue to await a meal.

    A parade of workers followed, all instructed to maintain as many of the original fixtures possible. The cacophony scraped paint, varnished surfaces, and peeled the gummy fur from its cellar floor, and, in the end, the presence took some pride in the remarkable nature of its restoration. As they departed, it found itself hard pressed to want to murder this latest batch of subservient intruders.

    On a later June morning, a smartly dressed woman carrying a clipboard lead a recently married couple over the threshold. The bride’s belly was growing heavy, and the twosome cooed at the flood of natural light that filled the room at the top of the stairs.

    They lasted but three weeks – on a quiet Sunday evening the dwelling’s intelligence had exposed, to the expecting woman, every drawer and cupboard in the small kitchen. It had then silently shut each while she breathlessly retrieved her husband.

    The house had not anticipated how seriously the young family would take the incident, and after their premature departure it still yearned for a more satisfying result.

    As such, it again allowed the woman with the clipboard to tour the floors and prattle on about its historic beauty.

    Eventually, a group of five attempted to nest within; a middle aged couple, their teen twin daughters, and the matron’s drooling mother.

    This time the predator took a subtle approach. Tensions flared over missing money and mysterious injuries appearing on the senile gran. The old woman was an invalid, and the corruption took no end of pleasure in terrifying her awake upon a rocking bed – it enjoyed how she screamed endlessly behind her unmoving mouth.

    After a half-decades careful effort, the situation was a primed powder keg. The wife was sure the husband was beating her increasingly frail mother, and the husband was progressively obsessing over the notion that nocturnal shutter creaks, and the sounds of shifting furniture, were signs that his beloved daughters were running rampant with their ne’er-do-well boyfriends – and yet he could never seem to catch them in the act, finding, instead, that when he entered their rooms they would claim they had just awoken, even if their clothing seemed freshly strewn across their floors.

    His freshly purchased shotgun did little to reassure him, though the home viewed it with a sense of impending glee.

    Then, one Tuesday morning, the sleepless nights, and air of constant suspicion, were unexpectedly interrupted by a phone call.

    The malignancy could not penetrate the depths of the conversation, but the family had left together, chattering excitedly.

    Much to the entity’s disappointment, they did not return.

    * * *

    Early Wednesday, a dozen broad-shouldered men arrived in boxy trucks.

    Being familiar with the migration of movers, the house was content to lay silent as the paintings were stripped from its walls, and the furniture emptied from its living spaces. By noon only that which couldn’t be carried away remained.

    As the rumble of engines drained from the lane, a black sedan pulled to a halt at the curb.

    It was then that the lurking hunter realized the sudden departure was a greater threat than it had fathomed.

    The sole of a well-built black shoe set down upon the sidewalk, followed by the stout nose of a masterly crafted oak cane.

    A grown Samuel Curry stepped from the car, then removed his dark suit jacket.

    He left it on the rear-seat as he retrieved his tools.

    Despite his years of planning – his years of panicked awakenings and secret confessions to his psychiatrist – Sam made no speech.

    He peeled the shutters first, plucking off the lowermost with crowbars, and using a ladder to reach those higher.

    The doors came next, without subtlety: Guessing where the hinges might hide within, the avenging form simply laid his sledge against the barriers until they no longer stood. The rush of adrenaline made his stints away from his supporting cane all the more bearable.

    Long planning had lead to caution, so Curry retrieved a pair of sharp bladed scissors, and dropped to his knees, before entering.

    He immediately took to slicing wide shards from the carpeted surfaces, which he then carried to the lawn with meticulous care. As each passed through the house’s maw, it ceased its wiggling protestations. As the path of destruction advanced, the material increasingly bucked and jerked beneath his blades, but a lack of leverage left the complaints useless.

    Every cupboard cover was stripped, and every shelf removed.

    Sweating, the entrance which had left him with a permanent limp was the last tooth that Sam plucked.

    Wandering from room to room , he then pummeled the plasterwork with his walking stick. The walls groaned with rage, but the lack of reprimand was proof enough to the bright-eyed man that the danger had passed.

    As a last insult, Sam unfurled a sleeping bag and slept the night, soundly, upon the kitchen floor.

    He was awoken by the sound of an arriving backhoe, with whose clasping bucket he would chew the house to rubble.

     

    Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

    Freesound.org credits:

    Text and audio commentaries can be sent to comments@flashpulp.com – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

    – and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

    FP274 – Sgt. Smith in Model Behaviour, Part 1 of 1

    Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and seventy-four.

    Flash PulpTonight we present Sgt. Smith in Model Behaviour, Part 1 of 1

    [audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp274.mp3]Download MP3
    (RSS / iTunes)

     

    This week’s episodes are brought to you by Dead Kitchen Radio.

     

    Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

    Tonight, private investigator Mulligan Smith hears a tale from his father’s checkered history with the Capital City Police Department.

     

    Sgt. Smith in Model Behaviour, Part 1 of 1

    Written by J.R.D. Skinner
    Art and Narration by Opopanax
    and Audio produced by Jessica May

     

    Mulligan SmithIt was a Sunday, and Mulligan was dabbing at his plate’s last smudge of Hollandaise sauce with his final sliver of English muffin.

    He leaned back from the square oak table – the same he’d grown up leaving chocolate milk rings on – and burped.

    His mute father grimaced, and pointed to a yellow blob that had escaped his son’s fork and landed on the unzipped hoodie he insisted on always wearing.

    “Yeah, yeah,” replied Mulligan, as he rubbed at the stain. “Listen, Dad, not that I’m complaining, but you cook for me when you have a favour to ask – so ask.”

    The gray-haired former police sergeant let out a lungful of air, and nodded.

    Rising, with a creak, from the thrice reupholstered kitchen chair, the old man moved down the short wood-paneled hallway that lead to his bedroom. After a moment of shelf shuffling and drawer slamming, he returned with a cassette tape and a rectangular player consisting of a transparent flip-out door bookended by a pair of black speakers.

    With a fast moving BIC pen, the elder Smith scrawled a short preface on his always-near pad of paper.

    The note read: “Capital City wasn’t in great shape in ‘89.”

    It was the only warning he provided, but it was clue enough to the younger Smith. He knew his father had regularly carried a pocket recorder during the era to capture witness statements. The method saved on hand cramping when tongueless-ly attempting to convey information to his fellow officers.

    Except for a very few, however, those cassettes had been destroyed at his father’s retirement.

    Mulligan’s belly felt suddenly heavy as the play button was pressed.

    The voice was a woman’s; high pitched, but comfortable speaking with a cop.

    “It’s Doreen – but, listen: I was washing my panties at the Washeteria on Danforth, maybe an hour ago, so 10PM-ish, and this blond came in wearing a Capital University jacket and a Walkman so loud it could frighten an Amish village off their land.

    “She struts past me with a pink plastic laundry basket piled high with her frillies and a stack of textbooks – and I notice she’s wearing jewelery. At the goddamn Washeteria.

    “Really, it was nothing too over the top. Classy stuff, but, you know, girlish. There was a gold music note on her neck that would get you at least a hundred bucks in any of the downtown pawn shops, and a bracelet chunky enough to club a seal.

    “Anyhow, she picks the machine at the end to dump her clothes into, then she sits up on the counter and starts digging through one of her books. I mean, not in a bored kind of way, she was seriously tucking in.

    “Thing is, there was this guy in a white sweater, with a blue zigzag pattern – sort of Charlie Brown style, but thinner, and around his collar instead of his stomach. His teeth were perfect and I’d be willing to bet he had his hair done earlier today – and not cheaply, either.

    “Their conversation started about math – he was maybe twenty-five to her eighteen or nineteen, and I guess he’d been through the same accounting course. I tuned it all out until he said:

    ““I’m done my laundry too – and that looks like a lot of stuff. Could I drive you home?”

    “Well, there was one car in the parking lot, a cherry red Corvette with windows as black as a blind guy’s sunglasses.

    “She looked impressed – and I couldn’t believe it.

    “Before she went through the door with him, I put myself in her path.

    ““I don’t think that’s the best idea, hon,” I said.

    “She looked my little black dress over and I know she was thinking, “Jesus, this woman dresses like a whore.”

    “Hell, I almost blurted “that’s because I AM a whore, bitch,” but one of us had to maintain some manners.

    “She didn’t actually say anything to me, she just kept talking to the guy. Told him she was down the road at The Gardens, and how she really appreciated it.

    “Now, I know you’re thinking, “who is this street walker to judge who this girl wants to climb in the sack with?”

    “But that ain’t it.”

    The woman cleared her throat, and the tape reported a lighter being struck twice, then igniting.

    She continued.

    “I don’t know how long he’d been haunting the place, but I’m sure he noticed the same thing I did: A good looking, but slightly overwhelmed, girl folding clothes with no wedding band on.

    “Now, what’s a guy with that much expensive cologne on doing hanging around a laundromat after dusk? Waiting to play knight?

    “Hell no. I can’t prove it, but that guy was either a rapist or an axe murderer.

    “Worse, though, is that I know cars. You get in that pretty moving box, and you really don’t have any room to maneuver. A lot can happen in that tiny space before you can do anything about it.

    “Hey, maybe I’m just being an idiot, but the news is always yammering about those missing blondes…”

    Though the tape kept winding, there was a pause in the dialogue as a pencil scratched across paper.

    “Yeah, actually,” said the woman, after reading an unseen request. “You’re lucky I’ve made it a professional habit to memorize license numbers.”

    There was a juttering shift in the audio then, and, following a series of clicks, a man’s voice filled the speakers.

    Mulligan recognized it to be that of Gus Kramer, his father’s former partner.

    “You’re sure about the lawyer? Okay, in that case, why don’t you tell us what you’d intended to do with the Ms. Harrison once you knocked her out?”

    The tape head ground on, but there was a deep silence before the response came.

    “Yeah, sure guys, why not?” was the eventual reply. Despite the delay, the man’s tone was cool and clear. “She was the fifth. You’ll find the rest back at my house. The basement will be cold when you enter – I like how, er, pert it makes them, but I really keep it that way to slow the reaction.

    “I built a tank in Dad’s old workshop; well, I had it built for me. I said I needed an incredibly strong giant aquarium.

    “There’s two tubes on either side – are you familiar with casting resin at all? You mix two chemicals together and the goo hardens to something almost like glass. Sometimes, at booths in the mall, you can buy a tarantula in what looks like clear plastic. Basically the same thing.

    “My first stab at a diorama was a failure. I started by dumping too much in, and I didn’t realize how hot the process would get – at her hips, she was screaming in agony. The whole place smelled like flaming chicken.

    “I panicked a bit and finished filling the tank twice as quick. Her thrashing did a surprisingly good job of mixing things, and she was firmly stuck when the liquid stopped her bawling.

    “The end product was terrible, because the resin cracked and went yellow from the heat, but she was good training.

    “I ordered away for industrial stuff, which is way cooler, and number two taught me to do it in stages. She fought forever, though, and I ended up with something that looked like a woman curled in the fetal position at the top of a box, which isn’t exactly sexy.

    “With number three I kept her unconscious till the bottom layer had already set, so that she had the use of the rest of her body, but her feet were pinned in place. From there it climbed a few inches of resin at a time, with a mix that allowed it to set as slowly as possible. Of course, she wanted to remain alive, so she stretched every muscle, with her back arched and face upturned to try and get that last breath.

    “That definitely turned out sexy.

    “Four is beautiful as well, actually – she showed me about the value of props, and now she’ll always be my naughty french maid.

    “I had a school scene in mind for number five. I have a desk and plaid skirt at home waiting for her. Nothing more though – I prefer them topless. I thought I could strap her to her chair beneath the tartan, so that she could still move her arms a bit, and provide the randomness that’s really necessary for a life-like scene.

    “Wouldn’t it be great if I could convince her to keep just one hand raised?

    “I was so excited to see my beautiful liquid glass slide past her cherry lip gloss -”

    The elder Smith stopped the tape, and his son sighed. He knew the case well enough, and that the man the press had dubbed The Cube Killer was long dead from a sharpened prison house toothbrush.

    “I was wrong,” said the younger man, “you also cook before a funeral. The victim?”

    Reaching into his pocket, the retiree retrieved a newspaper obituary for one Doreen Mitchell, mother of three. It indicated that viewings would begin Monday evening, and both Smiths wondered if the accompanying photo had struck many of those who habitually trawled the back-page column as inappropriate. Still, whatever the cut of her dress, the ferocity of the woman’s smile was inescapable.

    Mulligan nodded, considering his words. Finally, he said, “I’ll get my suit pressed in the morning.”

     

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