I won the flash fiction competition for my Goodreads group. To do it, I had to follow a number of guidelines in constructing this story. Here are a few:
- Had to be a scene involving battle
- couldn’t use the words: night, dark, die, fight, angry.
- someone had to die
- I’d get extra points for using the words “sandwich” and “brother”
If you’re interested in a Goodreads group with a wide range of interests and who do a lot of cool things like quizes, reading/writing contests, giveaways, etc, I can’t recommend Pro-Active Destruction enough.
The Emperor’s New War
The Imperial Legionnaires had been bombarding the planet for three days, reducing most of the buildings in the planet’s six population centers to rubble, with one exception: the rebel headquarters. General Foxworthy had whole star systems of ordinance available at his fingertips, but he’d spared the troublesome base.
“General Foxworthy?” his assistant said. “The rebel leader Carter is waiting to see you.”
“Thank you Eliot, please send him in. Oh, and would you ask Rose to make me a sandwich?”
“Certainly sir.”
Moments later, Elliot escorted in a young man dressed in a Mark-3 Zherun war suit. Capable of withstanding impossible compression ratios, the suit could survive almost any sort of conventional attack. Standard-issue suits also came with a complement of sophisticated weaponry molded into the frame. Foxworthy knew about the suit, and the weapons, but had said nothing to Elliot about disarming the man.
Carter surveyed the lavish cabin, his eyes finally drifting to the enormous viziframe covering the wall. It showed the rebel planet C3JU625-Andrew-Prescott. Five hundred standard years previous, the legendary Captain Prescott had discovered the remote little world during his famous exploratory voyage. He’d named it according to the imperial planetary classification system. Two weeks before the General’s bombardment, the planet had been renamed “The Emperor’s A Big Fat Donkey” by Carter, who transmitted news of the change by a looping broadcast throughout Occupied Space.
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John L. Monk 