34: A Bad Decision

The prompt is to begin a story with...

The clock winked. "Do you know what time it is?" it asked.

"¿Sabes que hora es?" the little girl with the backpack asked.

"I don't know," said this guy in a green striped shirt. "What time is it?"

A giant blue paw print fills my view.

"Oh!" the man in the green shirt says, "We should play Blue's Clues to find out what time it is!"

"I don't know, Bert," the toothy kid in the striped shirt asks says. What is it with stripes?

The clock winked again. "Maybe you should get up now, Tim," it said.

That is the LAST time I eat pizza and watch kid's shows just before bed.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

33: The Monster

Prompt #33 is to write about a fear of mine.

The monster walked out of the closet, its cavernous, toothy mouth drooling radioactive slime onto the floor. It lumbered over to the bed, where the grown man lay, staring up in unbelief.

"Really?" he said. "Aren't you a little late? I haven't been afraid of monsters in the closet since I was six!"

The monster growled and howled. Its blood-stained claws snapped at the darkness.

The man laughed.

"You're even green!" the man said. "Seriously, what are you doing here?"

The monster reached a long, slimy tentacle out, touching the man on the forehead with a sucker.

A word entered the man's head.

"MESSAGE"

"What message?" the man asked.

The monster dissolved into a vision in the man's mind. A vast emptiness. An utter meaningless void. Nothing ever mattered. Nothing ever will.

The man pulled the covers up and shivered. Hours later, he still was unable to sleep.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

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32: Formal Review: A 740 Story

Prompt #32 is about a blind person in a room full of seeing people. Sounds like a 740 story to me. I've written two of these before ("Ninety-Five Percent" and "Hunger and Greed"). They feature Matches, the blind captain of the 740 armed humanitarian support cargo vessel, and Cutter, the 740's computer.

"You are relieved of command of the Common Transport  Response Vessel 740," the man said.

Matches couldn't see him, of course, but she knew a lot about him. His name was Mark Landsford and he was a program supervisor at Central.

Matches was truly blind here. Cutter could not help her in this room, so far from the 740. She had to rely on her wits, her training, and the other senses she'd been working on improving.

"Actually, Mr. Landsford," Matches said. "You don't have the authority to relieve me of command."

"You are wrong," Landsford said. "I am acting on behalf of Central Core."

"Is this true, Mr. Markowitz?" Matches asked, turning to face the other man in the room. It must have been somewhat unnerving for section lead Phillip Markowitz. Both he and Landsford knew she was blind, and Markowitz had not announced himself. Matches could hear him shift in his seat and knew he must be there if Landsford was assuming Central Core authority.

Markowitz stuttered a bit, but Landsford spoke instead.

"You lost a humanitarian support cargo on Gwill Novis," he said.

"It was destroyed by enemy activity," Matches responded.

"You did not adequately defend the cargo against the activity," Landsford said.

"The video recording of the encounter argues otherwise," Matches said, "as the review committee concluded."

"There's a video recording?" Markowitz asked.

"You could not have adequately defended the cargo," Landsford said, "regardless of whatever trickery you might have managed with the video."

"Trickery?" Matches asked. "Would you describe to me how I would accomplish such..."

"You could not have adequately defended the cargo," Landsford said, shouting now, "because you are blind."

"The video evidence and review committee argue otherwise," Matches said.

"You didn't tell me of any video evidence," Markowitz said.

"I will not argue this with you," Landsford said. "You are blind. The idea that you can adequately command a common transport response vessel, or any other vessel, is ludicrous."

"I would like to see this video evidence," Markowitz said.

Matches heard Landsford's chair swivel. He must be facing Markowitz.

"I can't believe you're buying this!" Landsford said. "I didn't think you would be as easily duped as the review committee!"

"You said the review committee voted for removal," Markowitz said.  "Have you been lying to me?"

"I can't believe this!" Landsford shouted. "OK! Here! How many fingers am I holding up? Tell me and you can keep your command!"

"Mr. Landsford!" Markowitz said.

Matches could feel a slight breeze on her face. He was waving his hand in front of her, the jerk.

"If you want me to count them, Mr. Landsford," Matches said. "You should stop waving them in front of my face."

That shocked him. He held the hand still.

It is one hand, Matches thought, so it's zero through five. If it's zero, she wouldn't have been able to feel the breeze so clearly. Furthermore, a "trick" answer like zero would look bad in front of Markowitz and the cameras. (There had to be cameras recording this.)

Five fingers and one fingers were unlikely because they would look bad waving in front of her face, either like he was trying to squash something in my face or wagging a finger at me.

That left two, three, or four. Landsford was upset, so this was a snap decision. This was a chance. Matches liked taking chances.

"Three," she said.

A half hour later, Cutter asked her, "How did it go?"

"Not bad," she said. "Are we ready for take-off?"

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

31: The Skies Above

Prompt #31 is to write about something colored blue.

Jeremy looked into the sky and dreamed. There were no clouds to watch, to imagine into dogs or daisies or spaceships. Nothing but and endless, deep blue, holding only the sun, the bright sun he knew he should not focus on, the energy source that could blind you, or so he had heard.

At night, the skies were too crowded, even when the electric lights crowded out the stars, leaving only a select few, and the moon, and the clouds, lit from below, and the airplanes.

But in the blue of the daytime sky, there was nothing but space, nothing but emptiness that he could grow into. Through that blue, through that color made by unimaginable numbers of tiny molecules reflecting the light from the blinding sun, through that depth that even the sea mirrored, there was 

possibility.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

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30 Why I'm not at Work Today

Prompt #30 is to write an excuse for not going to work.

Hello, this is Tim. I'm calling because I won't be able to come to work today.

Yes, I know, there's that big meeting today and the project due and all, but I just don't see how I can make it in.

No, I'm not sick or anything. I feel fine, it's just that...

well...

I just gave a mouse a cookie.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

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29: Change I Believe In

The prompt is to write 500 words starting with...

If I had the power to change something, I would change the way we treat each other. I would get us all to understand, really understand, that God loves the world, and that God actually loves us.

So many times, we are more concerned with being right than with being loving. We would rather be heartless than naive. We can watch people starve rather than try something that might not work. I wish we could all change that.

We are so afraid of what's going to happen to us, so certain that all we hold dear, even our country, even our God, is on the verge of implosion like a condemned football stadium, that we pull the blankets up around our necks, convincing ourselves that anyone who's even a little different is a monster under our bed, ready to drag us down by our toes. And we never question whether a blanket is really a good defense against a horrible beast from the underworld.

I don't wish that we'd all share a hug and sing a song about teaching the world to do the hula or something. That's not what I would change. To be honest, if I were trapped in that kind of world, I'd be writing a blog post a lot like this one. That's as much "let's pretend" as the world we are in now.
What I wish is that we can all get past the stupid idea that people who disagree with us are aligned with the forces of Satan. I wish we could learn to finish nearly every argument with "I could be wrong."

I wish we could accept politicians and leaders who continue to learn, and therefore, to change their positions as new facts emerge.

I wish we could avoid treating people as enemies unless they prove otherwise.

I wish we could learn that we can prevent someone from hurting us without killing them, and that it's worth the effort, not for their sake, but for ours.

I wish we could seek first the kingdom of God, and the righteousness that comes from caring for the poor, the sick, the orphan, and the widow, and worry about impressing people afterward.

And when I say "we", I mean us. Me too.

I know that Christ has released us from the powers that imprison us, but I wish we could all quit acting like we're still behind bars.

I'm not sure if any of this is even possible. But I do know that the Bible says that with God all things are possible, and I do know that Arthur Charles Clarke once said that we can't know the limits of the possible without pushing into the impossible.

So I keep praying, for myself, that I might escape, but also for everyone else, because whatever lies outside, it won't be complete without all of us being there. And I keep fighting losing battles, because it's not about winning or losing. It's about freedom.

I could be wrong.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

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28: Another Boring Lecture

I'm supposed to write about a boring experience, but make it sound interesting. This is kind of intriguing and more than a little challenging.

The man at the lectern had some title, but I don't think anybody but he really cared what it was. He's done this speech a million times (it seems like a hundred thousand of them to me), but I still don't know his name, and it was just on the screen a minute ago. He's flipping through powerpoint slides, trying to make interesting what nearly everyone in the room thought was tedious. We didn't want to be there, and he didn't want to be there. It was the annual Equal Employment training. Everybody gets it. Nobody wants it.

"It is forbidden," the man intones, "to make racist or ethnic jokes in the workplace. You will be fired if you use race as a criterion for hiring, firing, or promotion."

The thing is, that somewhere under the speaker's monotone, there is the sound of a black man no one heard crying out at the injustice at a world where he is treated like an animal, even if he is an animal who can vote. It is the sound of the family mourning the loss of their son to a lynch mob, a sound kept quiet because it is not wise to be heard. Somehow, through the work of brave men of all races, the sound has been heard, and layered under the monotone or a group of men and women for whom such treatment is so obviously wrong that to talk of it is boring.

"Sexual harassment can take many forms," the man says. "It need not be an exchange of sexual favors for a promotion or such. It might be lewd comments, uninvited touching, demeaning photos posted in the workspace."

And under these words are the futile, desperate cries of the woman who felt she had to play along to get ahead, of the woman who was constantly asked to trade her dignity for her career, of the woman who started to feel that she could not be as valuable as the men. Words few heard, some laughed at, and no one paid attention to, until they wove their way into the colorless voice of the man warning people about things any moron would know, things that not too long ago, nobody knew.

It's a great thing that for most people, equal opportunity lectures are boring.

There are still racists and louts who think that it's OK to treat Hispanic people the way their grandfather did, who think random women enjoy being pinched by them, who cling for dear life to the idea that they are better than anyone who doesn't look like them.

Thank the Holy Spirit, there seem to be fewer of them now.

Maybe if there were none of them, we'd all be able to avoid another boring lecture.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

27: He Looked at the Glass

Prompt #27 is to write a story featuring an empty glass.

He looked at the glass,

the empty glass,

on the table where she used to

rest her arms.

He had thirsted for her.

He had let her beauty wash into him like

water from a glass like

the empty glass

on the table where she used to

show him fashion magazines.

She liked fashion magazines, so

he liked fashion magazines.

He listened and heard her

confessions and hopes.

He washed her confessions in forgiveness.

He let her hopes fill him

like water in a glass

on a table.

In his heart, he knew 

that his confessions were not to be forgiven,

that his hopes were not to be welcomed.

He tried to speak them anyway.

And now he was left

looking at a glass

the empty glass

on the table where she used to

rest her arms.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

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26: Why's Guy

Prompt #26 is to talk about one of my easiest decisions. That's simple. It's to ditch this prompt and reply to a "Slag" entry on my daughter's blog: "The Why"

Little kids love questions. Kids love the trails of questions: Why are we going to the store? (Because we need bread.) Why do we need bread? (Because we're out of bread.) Why are we out of bread? (Because we ate it all.) Why did we eat it all?....

Most grown-ups try to kill those trails. There are good reasons. Trails of questions like that can lead to all kinds of places, many of which are very uncomfortable, or even disturbing. Like trails through the woods, they can take you to dark places where you might start to doubt yourself or where you might find that the things you rely on aren't as firm as you thought.

The thing is, those paths lead to all kinds of phenomenal places as well. If you have the courage to ask the question, to keep asking the questions, you often find yourself looking up at the universe, or down into the deepest seas and you begin to understand that the world is so much more beautiful than anything you could possibly imagine or even appreciate.

Christians used to talk about "mystery" a lot. It doesn't get as much attention now, I think, because most of us want the Bible to answer our questions, we want our ministers and priests to answer our questions. We also want our scientists to answer our questions.

Well, most of us. To me the greatest thing about answers is that when you can make more questions out of them. Good answers have lots of questions pouring out of them.

"Mystery" isn't just not knowing the answer. It's enjoying the wonder that goes beyond our imagination.

I'm not a physicist in order to understand the world. I'm a physicist because I find it the best way for me to see how incredible the world is.

Seeing clearly isn't knowing all the answers, it's seeing how beautiful the mystery is.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

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25: Talking To Be Prefered Over Coin Flipping

Prompt #25 was to write about a difficult decision. More autobiography. Bleh. Tomorrow's is to talk about an easy decsion. Bleh.

After I got my doctorate degree, I interviewed for a teaching position at a small college. The job was teaching freshmen and sophomores in support of other departments. They had no physics department at the time. Shortly after the interview, I was offered the job.

At the time, I was also pursuing a job with a research laboratory. That job paid better, at least in principle. While I thought my chances at the lab job were good, I had not yet been offered the job.

I liked teaching, but I didn't want to give up research yet. The lab job paid better, but it wasn't a sure thing.

Here's what I did: I talked and I carefully listened.

I talked with my new wife Christie, and I put my intention to listen to her. We were (are) married, and that meant my decisions were as much hers as mine, and her decisions were as much mine as hers. It was important that we make a decision like this together. I've also found that I make better decsions when I talk with Christie about them. (I noticed that long before we were married.)

I also talked with God. That is, I prayed. I've discovered that our relationship is better when I put for the effort to share my thoughts with God, and to listen carefully to God's response. Often God is silent. While that isn't my wish, I recognize that I cannot compel God. Maybe I'll get the chance to write about prayer later, but for this post, I think that's enough.

What I wish I'd done is gotten a little perspective. The fact is, that while my life would have been quite different had I chose differently, neither option was really bad, and I would probably have been really happy if I'd taken the other path. That's what made the choice difficult, but it should also have taken some of the pressure off. 

I took the job at the research laboratory. It worked out well.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

24: Humility Is His Greatest Gift

Another autobiographic prompt. I'm to write the 100-word blurb for the book of my life. How about if I imagine the book will be written in the future....

Perhaps you know Tim Ruppel from his three Nobel Prizes: Physics, Peace, and the one invented just for him: Sheer Awesomeness. Perhaps you know Dr. Ruppel and his wife as the four-time Sexiest People Alive  after they turned 50.  Perhaps you know of his church work with loners and outsiders, or how he bought the Saints and gave it to the people of the New Orleans, or his phenomenally successful children, his amazing magic act, or his cure for congenital stupidity. But do you know the REAL Tim Ruppel? Now you can, and your world will forever be positively changed!

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

23 The Seven Alcchemists and Snow White

Prompt #23 is to re-write the Snow White story from Bashful's point of view. I figured I could have a bit of fun with the Disney version, but use some of the plot elements from the Grimm story. Wikipedia has a nice summary. I took an extra day with this one, since it was so much fun.

"Snow White' lay on the floor she scrubbed clean, the comb lodged in her long black hair. The face that laughed at me was now lying serenely, the eyes that saw me only as a child closed, at least for now.

I am known as Beshmorgan, which means "savior." I just couldn't stand to watch her treat us this way.

We twelve form an alchemist circle. We mine worthless rocks from the mountains and transform them into gold, silver, and precious gems. When we told this woman of our miraculous work, she smiled and said,  "Little boys love to play in the mud!"

We are not little boys! From the moment this woman crept uninvited into our home, she has treated us as if we were witless children, making us clean our fingernails before dinner, reading us sappy bedtime stories, and kissing us all goodnight with chaste little pecks on the tops of our heads.

She wouldn't even learn to say our names! My name is Beshmorgan -- she calls me "Bashful". Bashful!

After weeks of dealing with her condescension and idiocy, Dokkor ("Doc" she calls him, though his name means "clever") approached me while we worked in the mines.

"I think it is clear that she will not leave us, no matter what we do," he said. "What keeps her here?"

"She is afraid of her mother, the Queen," I said. "I do not know what she did to raise the ire of the old clothes horse, but Snow White is frightened even to leave the cabin."

"The Queen would not dare to seek her in our domain," said Dokkor.

"How do we rid ourselves of her without harming her?" I said. My magic is tied to my ethos as savior. I dare not harm the trollop or allow any others to harm her.

"I have an idea," said Snizzky , who had been working nearby. (His name means "servant", but Snow White calls him "Sneezy." His magic requires him to obey orders when given.) He smiled a bit, then proceeded to sift through the muck, forming the symbols which would facilitate our alchemical transformations.

***

A few days later, Snizzky emerged from his room carrying a wide purple ribbon. "Excuse me, miss," he said.
"Call me 'mother'," said Snow White.

"I'd prefer 'miss' all the same," he said. "While I was in town, last market day, I saw this lovely ribbon, and I thought you should have it."

"Oh, my!" said Snow White, holding the ribbon aloft. "How lovely!"

"Yes," I said, "that purple ribbon really does go well with your fair skin and blue eyes!" I was trying to be helpful.

"Why," she said, looking at Snizzky and me, "not every little boy would have such fashion sense!"

I held my tongue with great effort.

"Allow me to tie it about your waste, miss," said Snizzky.

"Of course," she chirped, and raised her arms.

When Snizzky had the ribbon tied, Snow White walked over to the mirror to admire herself. She turned this way and that, cooing over herself and her new accessory.

Then, after a moment, her face changed. Something was wrong. She raised her hands to her neck. She let out a little gasp, and then fell forward onto the floor. She writhed for a moment, and then lay still.

"Very nice," I said. "How does it work?"

"Oh," he said, "It pulls the air from her."

"What?" I cried.

"It pulls the air from her," he said again. "You know, so she passes out."

"She'll die that way, you friggeinsky!" I cried.

I had no choice. I pulled my knife from its scabbard, rolled Snow White onto her back, and cut the ribbon from her. She sucked in a big breath, and then coughed it out. She sucked in another gulp of air.

When she could, she sat up and looked at me. "Oh, Bashful!" she cried. "You saved me!"

"It must have been the Queen," said Snizzky a little too quickly.

"But you gave me the ribbon," said Snow White.

Dokkor decided to help. "Did you buy that ribbon from an old hag in the market, Snizzky?" he asked. "A woman you'd never seen before?"

"Er... yes!" said Snizzky hastily. "She seemed to have just the one left, but she said it was the most beautiful of all, so I thought you should have it, miss."

"Mother," Snow White corrected him.

Dokkor cried, "It must have been the Queen in disguise again!"

"Oh, dear!" cried Snow White. "And all because I'm the fairest in the land!"

"Right," I said, trying to disguise my relief. "Well, I think it's time we all settled in."

"How about a bedtime story," chirped the princess.

Dokkor yawned. "Oh, let's skip it tonight. I think I can get to sleep without it. And you need to rest and recover."

"Oh, how thoughtful," cooed Snow White, and then she kissed the tops of our heads goodnight.

 ***

On our day of rest, I persuaded the others to leave in the morning as usual. Snow White knew no better, and I could use her ignorance against her.

After breakfast, we all left the house as we did everyday, chanting our preparatory meditation ("Haiy hoh haiy hoh"). She waved as we went.

When we were out of sight, I doubled back, and the others took to the trees to see what their savior would accomplish.

The comb looked as lovely as it was magical, inlaid with pearls and diamonds. Snow White would not be able to resist it

I began calling, in the cracking voice of an old hag, "Combs! Combs! Buy a comb from an old woman! Combs! Combs!"

Snow White ran into the house, loudly barring the door and drawing the drapes. She feared the Queen so much she would not even peep through the windows. Just outside the door, I dropped my comb, and then walked off, chanting all the while. I stopped  behind a tree, and let my voice trail off as if I were walking miles away.

Snow White opened the door a tiny bit, then a tiny bit more. When she saw the comb lying there, her countenance assumed an odd expression of delight mixed with concern and fear. After a moment, she picked up the comb and called out,  "Old woman! Old woman! You dropped your comb!"

She seemed mesmerized by the comb in her hand. Her conceit aroused, she placed the decoration in her lovely black hair. Her vanity activated the comb's magic.

Snow White gave a little sigh, rolled her eyes back, and fell limply back through the front door.

Motioning the others to stay back a moment, I left my hiding place and approached her still form on tiptoe.

I touched her face. Her skin was cool. She did not move. I raised her arm and let it drop; it fell with a thud. She still did not awaken.

I gave the "all clear" to my fellow dwarves.

They ran out of the woods and gathered around.

"Is she dead?" asked Snizzky at last.

"You know better than that!" I said. "However, she will sense nothing until the comb is removed from her hair. I'm in no hurry to do that."

Dokkor and I dragged her inside. She was limp, dead weight. We were very careful not to dislodge the comb. We laid her out in a corner, and avoided her for weeks.

It would have been a satisfactory situation if it weren't for Snizzky's clumsiness. Carrying a bucket of water from the well, he tripped over her leg and spilled the water onto her chest and head.

The rush of water swept the comb from her hair, and Snow White awoke with a start.

I thought she would be angry with us, but her expression softened instantly. "Children! You saved me! How clever to think of pouring water on me, Sneezy!"

"It must have been the Queen," said Dokkor helpfully. He took the comb and pretended to examine it. He asked, "Did you buy that from the Queen? It must be some kind of magic."

Snow White shook her head. "No," she said slowly (but perkily), "I don't remember..."

It takes her a while sometimes.

"Oh, wait!" she suddenly cried. "The old woman! She must have been the Queen in disguise!"

"She must have dropped the comb just so you would pick it up!" said Snizzky, and I had to fight the urge to beat him on his bald head.

A bright woman would ask how he knew the "old woman" had dropped the comb, but this was Snow White.

"Oh, dear!" she said, suddenly realizing that she was literally all wet. "You boys must excuse me now! I'm not decent!"

As we filed back in to the kitchen, Dokkor muttered, in Dwarvish, "Not very bright either."

***

As the weeks rolled on, we became so obsessed with finding a solution to the Snow White problem that our work suffered. We would go to town with sacks full of emeralds or rubies instead of gold or silver. It was downright embarrassing!

Snow White was perky as always, and still frightened that her mother would somehow try to kill her. We came to believe that the Queen had counted herself lucky to be rid of her.

Then, one day, while walking back from the mine with bags full of germanium (worthless stuff), Dokkor cried out, "Of course! It's so obvious!"

He wouldn't go into details until we got home, no matter how hard we pressed him.

When we arrived, Snow White was sitting at the table, crunching on a red apple. "Just a minute, boys," she said, starting to get up. "I'll get your dinner. Did you have fun playing in the mud?"

I rolled my eyes, but Dokkor walked over to her. "Snow White," he said in a very low tone, one might think too low for a dwarf to make.

Snow White froze, staring into Dokkor's eyes. Now why hadn't I thought of using Vox Victoris, the conqueror's voice?

Snow White didn't move.

"Sleep," said Dokkor, "sleep deeply."

Snow White's eyes rolled back again, then her lids closed and she fell back into her chair, her head tilted back.

Dokkor started to turn to us, but I grabbed his arm. "You must add an aberratio. I cannot allow it otherwise." An aberratio is a loop hole of sorts. As savior, I could not allow the princess to be eternally bound to slavery.

Dokkor shrugged a bit, and then added, "Sleep until kissed by a man taller than yourself. When you wake, if you wake, you will remember that the Queen, in the form of a hag, sold you a poisoned apple."

He looked at me and I nodded. She would probably never find someone taller than she who would care to kiss the little bubble-head, but the possibility existed, and my honor was upheld.

***

The years rolled on pleasantly enough. Our work resumed it's former brilliance.

Dokkor made a box for Snow White out of purest quartz, protecting her from any accidents. It looked to me like a glass coffin, but Dokkor was proud of it, so I held my tongue. We kept her out in the woods, where she was out of the way and also unlikely to be found by the occasional passers-by or supplicants who come to our cabin.

We scrubbed our own floors and made our own meals, as we had done for many decades before she arrived.

The Queen was a troublesome woman, however. She found that she had need of a daughter after all, someone to marry a prince from a neighboring kingdom whose riches would add to her own wealth.

Coward that she was, she got the prince's father to send him to us to "rescue" her daughter. Fool that he was, the prince agreed.

He announced his presence by pounding on our door with the butt of his sword and reciting to us his life story, the history of his land, and a few philosophical and theological musings in what I'm sure he thought was a demanding and intimidating voice. It was fun to listen to him for a while, but after a few hours, it grew old.

"Stop!" said Dokkor, again using the Vox Victoris, and the prince froze in place. Then, with a glance at me, he added, "for five minutes."

I nodded agreement.

"The Queen has deceived you," Dokkor said, still using the Vox. "She has killed her daughter, Snow White, jealous as she was of her beauty. She has sent you here to meet the same fate."

After a moment, and a glance at each of our faces to see if there was anything else he should add, Dokkor led us back inside to await the end of the enchantment.

In a while, the formerly frozen prince assumed an attitude of sheer terror. "Do not hurt me," he cried. "I was tricked into coming here."

Brave guy, isn't he?

Dokkor called through the door, "Go your way, then." Not with the Vox, just his regular charming self.

The prince turned and ran into the woods, forsaking the road on which he came.

As it turns out, our stalwart prince, having abandoned the road, could not seem to find his way to the edge of the woods. We would send someone to surreptitiously check on him every now and then, and we'd all get a good laugh out of the rather ludicrous situations he'd get himself into.

After a few weeks, though, he apparently stumbled onto the box. Snizzky found him just as he lifted the lid and, perhaps from being incredibly lonely wandering around in the woods, kissed the corpse-like Snow White. Snizzky barely kept himself from crying out in frustration as Snow White awakened.

Snow White and her prince prattled on for a while, recounting the story we had given them about their predicament. Snizzky let them talk a while, then showed himself, feigning surprise and glee. "Order me to meet out revenge on this evil Queen," he said.

The prince replied, "No, brave dwarf! The vengeance is mine!"

Snizzky said, in a low and ominous tone, "Would you contradict me, my prince? My frustration may drive me to anger..."

Panic is an unseemly emotion in a prince, but this particular future king seemed to regard it as precious. He managed to stutter out, "No, perhaps you have been wronged more than I. Seek your vengeance."

Snizzky asked, "Am I so ordered?"

"Er, yes," the prince replied. "I so order."

Snizzky's magic requires him to obey direct orders.

Since I knew nothing of this, I could not try to stop him. At the wedding of Snow White and this prince, Snizzky found the Queen and gave her a set of iron dancing shoes, pretending them to be a gift. When the Queen put them on, she found that they were, in fact, magic shoes which would not allow her to stop dancing, even after the shoes became white hot, and even after she fell to the floor, sweaty, and convulsing. Her feet still twitched violently until she was finally dead.

After that, they all left us alone, and we lived happily ever after.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

22: Flight of the Red Plastic Teapot

The prompt is to write about my first toy in 200 words. A lot of these prompts lean pretty heavily toward autobiography it seems. Maybe I can turn this around a bit.

The dog paced through the house, looking in all the same places she looked before. I know it is bothering her and the boy that I'm missing, but sometimes, a toy has just got to get away sometimes.

It really is hard for a teapot like me to get around, even when no one is looking. I am nothing but smooth plastic, except for that little seam the boy liked to run his fingers and tongue along. I do not have legs, and I cannot even roll very far with my spout getting in the way.

Bouncing and sliding sometimes works pretty well, especially if I fall off his high chair. This time, I got lucky and managed to bounce up into the soft chair. One of the throw pillows landed on me and hid me a bit. That's why the dog couldn't find me.

I loved being played with, of course, but the boy was teething and there's slobber all inside me. I just need a minute to dry out and gather my thoughts. I'll roll off the chair soon. I just hope the woman finds me and not the dog. The dog gets even more slobber on me.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

21: Letter to a 10-Year-Old

Prompt #21 is to write a letter to the 10-year-old me. I've decided to try to minimize the autobiography on this blog, but I really can't avoid it here.

Dear Timmy,

People are going to stop calling you that in a few years. You'll get a job at Wendy's, they're going to be in a hurry to make your name badge, it'll say "TIM", and you'll start going by that. (As an aside, one of these days you're going to look at the badge in a mirror and see that it says "MIT". You'll think it's an omen of your future college. It's not.)

So, here's the thing. Things are going to get worse. You really don't know how bad it's going to get. I think it might be good for you to be ready for that.

Things are also going to get better. And they'll get worse, and they'll get better.  And sometimes, they'll be worse at some things, and better at others. (Actually, that last thing is most of the time.)

You know, most of the time, I think people who want to go back in time want to go back to when they were ten. Politicians who look to the "good old days" are usually talking about the time they were ten.

But that's not how God made the world. There's no perfect time in the past when everything was great. Each year brings sunshine and rain, but God is at work in the world. You're going to be part of that, not because you're all that special, but because God is.

Keep your eyes open. There's a story about a famous violinist who played a concert in a subway station to see if people would notice. Very few did. Be one of those few.

There are at least a million ways to laugh. Learn as many of them as you can.

Talk only after you listen. Supply and demand works here. The world has a lot more talkers than listeners.

Forgive before you forget.

And most importantly: you're stronger than you think.

Peace.

Tim

PS: Give Mom and Dad and Pardner and Nana a hug. You'll want to do that as often as you can.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

20: Hunger and Greed, a 740 Story

Prompt #20 is to write about the color of hunger. I like the characters from yesterday, so let's see what else happens to them.

Matches awoke, sensing the 740's deceleration. She moaned a bit, but got herself up. She was still tired and sore from the training Cutter put her through. She didn't complain, though, because she kind of knew what he was doing. It was a cruel and random world, and it made sense to be prepared.

She stretched and yawned, then said, "OK, Cutter, what's going on?"

"You can sleep longer," Cutter said. "We've only just entered Gwill Nolls gravity. We're hours away from contact."

"It feels closer than that," Matches said. "Are you sure you did the calcs right?"

"Of course I did," Cutter said. "I'll double check, but I think you've just gotten more sensitive."

"Could be," Matches said and walked over to the shower. Even though all the world was blackness to her eyes, she was able to walk and interact with the ship as well as any seeing person. She knew the 740 very well, and Cutter made sure that stuff stayed where she knew it was. "Can we spare some energy for hot water?"

"No problem," Cutter replied. "We'll recharge from Gwill Nolls's radiation. Take five minutes."

Five minutes, Matches thought. I'll need five hours to work out all the kinks.

But after the shower, she felt much better. She dressed in her contact clothes, then took a moment to say her usual prayer.

"Would you like to do the navigation drills, Matches?" Cutter asked.

"Yes," Matches said, "that will be good." She walked to the cockpit and began practicing the maneuvers, responding to Cutter's terse commands with flawless precision. 

Cutter told her that he could not override the thruster controls due to a safety feature of the 740's design, so that she must actually push the throttles and handle the orientation controls. She suspected that he was lying, that he really just wanted her to feel useful and capable despite the fact that she couldn't see. If he was lying, it worked pretty well.

"Contact," Cutter said, after a few hours of practice. "in three.. two..."

Matches waited past the silent "one" and began, "This is 740 approaching Gwill Noll 5 on standard approach 4. We carry food in stasis."

"Thank God," a voice replied through the speakers. "This is Golf November 5. Roger seven four zero on standard 4."

Thank God? thought Matches. That's odd.

"Cutter," Matches said, "what's with the 'thank God'?"

"It's mission related," Cutter said.

Matches usually didn't want to hear about the mission, just what was going on in the next few minutes. This seemed exceptional, however. "Tell me," Matches said.

Cutter said, "Gwill Noll 5 has been in draught conditions for about 5 local years. They're desperate for food. We're the first of a flotilla launched by..."

Matches said, "That's enough." Too many details and she'd start to lose her stomach for this kind of thing.

After they landed, Matches walked out onto the gangplank. She wore dark glasses to obscure her blindness. She walked confidently, responding to Cutter, who was prompting her with brief commands through the glasses's earpiece. The training was good. Matches relied on Cutter as she would have relied on her own eyes.

"Hail," Matches said. "With whom do I have the pleasure?"

"It's a girl!" said the man in front of her. "They sent a stupid girl!"

"What?" Matches said. Cutter told her that there were three large men, the closest a meter away, the other two slightly behind him.

"Kill her," said the man.

Cutter's commands were lightning. Matches's responses were thunder. She ducked under the blast from one of the men, then swept the feet out from under the leader. He fell into the man with the blaster, who sent another shot into the shoulder of the third man. He howled and fell, taking the leader with him. While the shooter reacted in shock at having just shot someone on his side, Matches jumped back into the ship, planning to retrieve her own weapon.

The man recovered enough to fire once into the open hatchway, into the belly of the 740. It hit something which made a screech.

Matches new that sound. The fool had hit the stasis regulator. She couldn't see, of course, but she knew what was happening. The field went from green to red to gray. There was nothing to do. The bacteria, kiloliters of it was held alive in the stasis until they could be placed in the environment of the world to which it was designed. When the stasis field failed, the bacteria would die in moments.

The man with the gun ran away, along with the other two idiots. Cutter sealed the door and jettisoned the gray, useless cargo. Matches pushed the emergency thruster and the 740 lifted off. 

It might be another week until another ship came by. How many people would die of hunger before then?

Matches returned to her quarters and cried.

Cutter wished he could cry too.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

19: Ninety-Five Percent

Prompt 19 was to begin a story with.. well....

"There once was a chance I didn't take," Cutter said. "A 95% sure shot. Only once, and I regret it. Burn 2 red 5 sec."

Matches pushed hard on the right thruster for five seconds, barely avoiding the laser bolt from the pirate ship on their tail. "I know," she said. "I still wonder how we've stayed alive so long."

Cutter fired two quick shots with the rear turret. "In a way," he said, "so do I."

Matches had no time to reply as she worked to pilot the 740 away from the pirates, who'd had a few friends join them, appearing out of the darkness of etherspace. This was no small task because she needed to rely on Cutter for the locations of the pirate ships. Cutter, in addition, fired the guns, and worked on the escape vectors. The escape vectors were more important. The guns cost energy, and the one thing they needed was energy.

The pirates fired a few times, but as often at each other as at the 740. That's the thing about pirates.

Cutter finished the calculations. There were two possible escapes. Success probabilities 75% and 14%.

Cutter told Matches a course, "250-80." It was the 14% vector.

Cutter understood the risk to the 740, to himself, and, most importantly to Matches. He was a computer, of course. But long ago, on his first mission on the 740, he had played the odds, chosen an approach to a station with a 95% SP.  A wrench, probably discarded by some careless mechanic on the station, struck the 740's surge relay, causing no major damage to the 740, just a bright flash of light, a flash that blinded Matches. She would never see again.

Cutter will never make the mistake of playing it safe again. Matches means too much.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

18: Intruder

Prompt #18 is to write what I'd say to an uninvited guest.

You come into my house, wander around like you own the place. Just because you didn't have to break down a door doesn't mean I want you here. It's time for you to leave, and never come back. I don't want you, your family, or any of your kind hanging out here.

You woke me out of a deep sleep, you know that? I was having a great dream, but you had to go around, making all that noise. Well, this ends now.

Mine isn't the only blood that will be drawn today. You can try to hide in the laundry hamper or in some corner, but I will find you and I will knock you DOWN.

No mosquito's going to make a fool out of me!

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

17: Hopes for Heaven

The prompt is to create my ideal place in 400 words. Go ahead, count them.

When I was young, people who loved me told me of Heaven. They told me every detail: streets of gold, gates of pearl, harps, angels. I'd be able to meet the apostles. I would know all the answers. I would never feel pain or loss. I would never feel sickness or death. I'd be "the perfect age," whatever that may be.

I was never really asked what I thought of all that. I was afraid to consider whether the Heaven they described seemed like a good place. The only other alternative was the fire of Hell. Even if Heaven were boring and clinical and, well, lonely, there is no doubt that it is better than the alternative.

I'm much older now, and I've long tired of people bullying me with Hell in a way God never does. I also have come to believe that God loves me: not some cartoon version of me that only kind of looks like I do.

So I don't really care what color the streets are or what the gates are made out of.  I'm not really a fan of harp music. (I mean, it's OK, but the last time I really enjoyed hearing the harp Harpo Marx was playing in an old movie.)

(I would love to meet the apostles, though.)

Mainly, I just hope Heaven is different from this world. I hope it is a place where I won't ever feel ugly, or lost, or stupid, or awkward. I hope that I won't ever feel left alone, rejected, abandoned. I don't want to feel sick, unless I could be sure that people like Christie will care for me. I like feeling cared for.

However, I also hope that Heaven is a place a lot like this world. I hope that there will be paths to explore, questions that lead to more questions. I hope that there will be lots of beautiful mathematics, just like in this world. I hope that, regardless of what it says in the Bible, that I'll still be Christie's husband, because I can't imagine being whole with her as part of me.

I hope that God and the saints will talk with me, even argue with me, push me to grow, because when I'm growing, when I'm learning and discovering and creating, I'm happiest.

So, I guess, I hope Heaven is not so much a place, as a life.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

16: Defying Gravity

Prompt #16 is to write about the place I go when I want to get away from it all.

When I was a kid, I used to try to find someplace really dark to get away. My closet, for example. Or the bathroom. I'd turn off the lights and close the door, and suddenly there were no limits. I could no longer see any walls, any boundaries. As a kid, lots of people kept telling me I could do anything... someday. These people spent the rest of their time telling me what I couldn't do. Or so it seemed to me then.

Today, I don't know that I have a place to get away. Sometimes I walk. Not going anywhere in particular. Just walking. Left right left right. I guess like Forrest Gump running. Or like Elphaba in Wicked taking to the air. The world moves under my feet and I can go anywhere.

Sometimes, I use my imagination. I imagine getting in my car and driving as far as I can without getting the engine wet. Florida, maybe. California. Argentina. Just away.

Maybe it's the same as when I was a kid. I'm still trying to find someplace without limits.

Oddly enough, I'm really not sure if that's a good thing.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

15: Scotophobia

Prompt #15 is quite specific, giving the occupation of the title character (a teacher), the setting (a lab), the key object (a fuse box), and the theme (irony).

Louis told himself to breathe.

He was still in the lab. The astronomy lab he went to almost every night. It's just dark is all. Really really dark.

He took a deep breath in, then out. In. Out. There. That's better.

Weren't the exit signs supposed to stay on when the power went out? What happened to the exit sign?

Breathe in, Louis told himself. Breathe.

Better again.

Then, he heard the door open. He nearly jumped to the ceiling.

"Mr. Pitt?" It was Claudia. Louis was expecting her. It was time for astronomy class.

Louis fought to keep the fear out of his voice. "Yes, Claudia, come in."

"Why is it so dark in here?" she asked. Louis heard the door close. "The whole building's dark."

"I don't know, Claudia," Louis said, trying really hard to sound natural. "All the lights just suddenly went out."

"Must have blown a fuse," Claudia said. "Should we call someone? Or just call off class for tonight?"

Claudia pulled out her cell phone, the glow illuminating her face.

Louis felt better already. "No," he said, "don't call anyone. Let's see if we can fix it ourselves."

Louis reminded himself for the hundredth time that he should get himself a cell phone sometime.

"I guess," Claudia said. "Do you know where the fuse box is?"

She snapped her phone shut, and it was pitch dark again. Louis's felt his blood rise again, which also reminded him how hungry he was.

"It's by the stairs," Louis said, and this time a little panic escaped and put a little squeak in his voice.

"Are you afraid, Mr. Pitt?" Claudia asked. "You're an astronomy teacher afraid of the dark?"

Louis answered as calmly as he could. "Would you please turn your phone back on so we can find the fuse box?"

"OK, scaredy pants," Claudia said, and pulled out her phone again.

In a moment, Louis was by Claudia's side, crowding her close as they crossed the lab, past the star charts and the orrery and the lens grinding stations and over to the stairs which led to the observatory upstairs.

There was a spare fuse mounted on the wall next to the box. By the light of Claudia's phone, Louis pulled open the box and replaced the single fuse inside.

The room lights came on instantly.

"There," Claudia said, putting her phone away again. "That's better."

Louis, able to breathe again, was getting very hungry.

"Wait a minute," Claudia asked. "Where is everybody? I'm not early, am..."

Claudia fell silent, her face blank, her arms limply at her side.

There would be no more students in class tonight. Louis had called them all, all except Claudia, saying the class was canceled because it was too cloudy to observe anything. Claudia was on her own. No one would miss her for an hour or more.

Louis felt his fangs sharpen in his mouth. He approached the entranced girl, turned her head, and drank her life from her neck.

It was a good thing he fell into death-like sleep moments after closing the lid on his coffin.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

14: Leaving the Bat Cave

Prompt #14 is to write about a move.

I used to live in the Bat Cave.

At least, that's what my friends called it. It was in what used to be the basement of a house in Oxford, Mississippi. The way you got to it was to walk around the side of the house, down the hill on some uneven stone steps, and through the screened-in porch. The only windows were in the kitchen (where they looked out on the steps), and the front door, which looked out on the porch. There were no other windows, even in the bedroom. The Bat Cave. It was impossible to convince people to deliver pizza to me. 

I was a grad student, so the no pizza delivery thing was actually kind of a downer.

I got married right after I finished my comprehensive exams, very near to Christmas.  Neither the Bat Cave nor Christie's apartment (which made mine look like Buckingham Palace) were big enough for the two of us, so we moved into a nice apartment on Anderson Road. It was up on the second floor, and looked out on a little bit of woods where we saw a deer on a few occasions. There was a pool and a laundry room.

We took a cruise in the Bahamas for our honeymoon. It was warm and sunny and the water was so blue, and we had an amazing time. When we got back, it was time to move.

It was also time for an ice storm in Mississippi.

As it turns out, it was really not very pleasant for my best man Keith and I to try to push a plastic-covered couch (and a bunch of other stuff) up two short flights of outside stairs in a freezing rain.

I bought Keith a pizza. It was delivered.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

13: Someone Should Capture This Into Some Action Items

Prompt Lucky #13 is to write about a weird day at my workplace.

Somebody somewhere must enjoy meetings. There must be someone who wakes up in the morning and jumps out of bed, thinking how great it is that he will be able to follow an agenda or review minutes. I've met a certified professional parliamentarian, so I know these people exist.

I'm not one of those people.

The boss said, "Can we please put a pin in the 800-pound gorilla so that we can deal with the elephant in the room?"

As it turns out, large gorillas do not like being stuck with pins, and enraged gorillas don't make elephants more docile.

This was not a boring meeting.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

12: The Old Man

Prompt #12 is to write an encounter with an old professor that is both short and scary. This story is fictional, but I didn't make it up. I'm using some of the characteristics of a real professor of mine, but the encounter here is fictional, and I do not believe that the real professor suffered as Dr. Tyler is.

It felt good to walk on campus again, after all these years. There were new buildings, and the students look younger, but I still could find the landmarks, the quad and the towers and the dorms where I lived.

I walked out to one of my favorite outdoor study places, a bench on the outskirts of campus that was pretty, but shady, and not a lot of foot traffic so you could read or write or think.

Sitting on the bench was an old man. As I got closer, I realized it was The Old Man, a physics professor who taught me mechanics and optics and an off-beat course he devised called "What's the Matter." He was hard on me, and there were times, many times, when I hated him. I was trying to get good grades, and he was trying to teach me how much I still had to learn.

I sat down next to him. "Good afternoon, Dr. Tyler," I said.

I didn't expect him to be so obviously afraid of me. "Who are you?" he asked.

"I'm Tim Ruppel," I say. "You probably don't remember me, but I was your student in the 80's. I'm a scientist now, you know."

"What do you want?" he asked. He was still afraid of me.

"Nothing, sir," I said. "I just wanted to tell you thank you and to find out how you are. It's been a long time."

A little bit of recognition showed on his face, but he was still frightened, and something else that scared me:

He looked confused.

Here was a man who could explain why glass is clear and sand is not, who had built dozens of classroom demonstrations out of little more than Army surplus stuff and some bits from the garbage, who had terrorized me and my classmates with exams that were so hard that we'd all wonder whether we were really cut out for physics, or science, or anything at all.

I remembered him angry and haughty and thrilled and excited, and even proud when he personally shook the hands of each student he ever taught at graduation.

"I remember you, Herr Ruppel," he said. He wasn't German, but it was a little quirk he had to use slip German words into conversation. "You are doing well?"

"Yes, sir," I said. "How is Der Alte Mann doing?"

Dr. Tyler used to call himself The Old Man, or it's German equivalent.

"I live in Memphis," he said. "I don't know how I got here."

"You are in Memphis," I said. "We're on campus, sir."

"Really?" he said. "It looks so different."

I talked with him of the old days, reminded him of some of the projects we accomplished while I was there, asked him about the times before I got there. Sometimes, he made sense, but sometimes he didn't.

Even when I hated him, I would not have wished this on him.

When I dream of this conversation, I wake in sweat.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

11: The Minor, The Major, and the Mind-Controlling Time Travellers

Prompt #11 is for me to write three short short stories (300 words or less) using three sets of words. I'll underline the words as I use them.

1. It Works in the Movies

She was so pretty. I never knew her name. She was in Miss Cooper's 3rd grade class, and I was in Miss France's class. She was only the girl with a pink ribbon, because she always wore one in her long brown hair, tied with a bow at her neck. I made her a necklace out of paper clips and slipped it and a note into her lunch box while she played on the swing, her hair streaming behind her each time she went forward.

I was sent to see the principal.

2. Career Choice

Mom, Dad, listen! I was not cut out to be a biology major! I never want to see the inside of another frog. I never want to classify another leaf. I never want to draw another blood sample from anyone, least of all an all-to-trusting foreign student named Phillipe, who will, I am certain, someday regain the use of his left thumb.

That's why I used the emergency credit card to buy a 10 class card package at the studio of a former ballet star. And yes, I know what happened when I took dance in high school! Stop harping on that! I'll watch where I kick this time, I promise!

3. The Real Thing

The operatives have been dispatched, posing as a janitor and an office clerk at an advertising department whose details are described in the packet you have been given. An office typewriter has been replaced with a time-continuum communicator, a filing cabinet with the MTS 5000 mind-control unit, and a hole puncher with a class III photon cannon in case they are discovered. An ancient copying device called "carbon paper" will be used to disseminate our message throughout 1950s America. Or rather, it has been used. Time travel can be confusing.

No matter. As you can now see, the procedure is 100% effective. I'll be you've never heard of the thing they used to call Coca-Cola.

Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.

This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.